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Comments 82801 to 82850:

82801. Norman at 10:37 AM on 12 June 2011
       There's no room for a climate of denial
       62 Albatross I will send a series of links to floods and droughts if you are interested. A historical perspective. Last 100 years of some major floods in the USA. Major flooding episodes in Australia. Worst floods in History. Droughts reconstructed over 500 year period. 100 years of flood estimated damage figures in USA (note sporadic jumps). More if needed, let me know the thread you are posting your links on, thanks.
82802. Eric (skeptic) at 09:44 AM on 12 June 2011
       CO2 limits will harm the economy
       DSL, I think we will always differ on what Heritage wants for Haitians, but you are correct that the country has been exploited. A lot of the deforestation came from plantations, see http://www.fao.org/docrep/v3960e/v3960e09.htm and continues with poor farming practices. The authors of this study on protection of the commons seem surprised that: Indicators of wealth were not significantly correlated with landholder cooperation or defection in three out of four measures. Thus, wealth does not apparently reduce the incentive to cooperate. Rather, relative wealth corresponds to a greater ability to contribute, and such contributions might be an act of "leadership" I am not surprised since that is how I act. KR, my point from the other thread was that wealth leads to environmental protection. The title of this thread is somewhat backwards. It is not that "CO2 limits will harm the economy" but that strengthening the economic security of all people on the planet will inevitably result in the luxury of conservation. I with you agree a reasonable amount of regulation is always needed and best performed by government (e.g. contract law enforcement). My statement about authoritarianism was too general. I was referring to the fact that I know how to manage my land better than any government agency be they Haitian or not and that Haiti had an index of respect for property rights equal to Cuba. I connected those two, probably incorrectly as the study I linked above suggests.
82803. Norman at 09:28 AM on 12 June 2011
       Extreme weather isn't caused by global warming
       #25 Tom Curtis Here is an explanation of the increase in tornadoes in April. Check out what is needed to form a supercell thunderstorm. A strong jet stream is required. Here is the April anomaly for the Globe. You can see warmer than normal air in the Gulf of Mexico while the air in Canada was well below normal. Conditions are right for supercell thunderstorms. As Eric the Red pointed out in post #26, tornado season diminishes as the Canadian air warms rapidly in the summer months. There is not the strong differential and the jet stream weakens.
82804. Norman at 09:15 AM on 12 June 2011
       There's no room for a climate of denial
       #61 skywatcher, Your comment "So you think cherry-picking individual heatwaves from history disproves the radiative forcing effects of CO2? Interesting logical process you have there..." No I would not think this. The available empirical evidence does demonstrate that Carbon Dioxide, present in the atmosphere, does radiate Downwelling Longwave radiation back to the surface. Being energy, it will cause warming to some extent. Without any positve feedbacks, a doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere will raise the global temp a degree Celsius or so. The question I am raising is not about the science of CO2. My "denier" position is not over this point. My position of denial is that such a temp increase will lead to much more devastating climate conditions than have already taken place. The global anomaly is 0.8 C in 100 years. Most record temperatures are far above this level from normal. This would mean that to get an extreme heat event (like in Russia last year) you must have a location with much colder temps (area in siberia east of Moscow). I am greatly questioning the hypothesis that a few degrees of warming will lead to much more extreme weather. When I watch the World News heat waves are blamed on global warming or climate change yet the mechanisms of why a small increase in global average temp would lead to extreme weather events is lacking. Just saying more tornadoes is the result of the small global temp increase does not make it so. What are the mechanics that would show global warming is responsible for more violent weather?
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] this thread might be a good place to discuss such issues (and indeed find some answers to your question).
82805. hamletpri at 08:36 AM on 12 June 2011
       Call for beta testers of the latest SkS Firefox Add-on
       Hey guys, just discovered this new service connecting app developers to beta testers, so if you're wanting to be selected for testing, or wanting to find testers quickly, go ahead and check it out: www.betafind.squarespace.com
82806. dhogaza at 08:34 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       "Spencer and Christy's analysis was wrong they insisted very loudly that they were right and everyone else was wrong." I have a very clear memory of the WSJ running an op ed claiming that Spencer and Christy's initial published results were "the wooden stake through the heart of global warming". Christy was named to the five person NAS committee formed early in the W administration to report on global warming. This was after errors in the S&C analysis had already been exposed. You might remember that W had promised, while running, "further research" to figure out what was happening with climate change. This "need for further research" really hinged on the satellite vs. ground station record, and early on there was a kind of summit conference with UAH, RSS and others duking it out. Anyway, long story short, for those of you here who are from Oz or weren't following things a decade ago ... the NAS committee, among other things, stated that the ground station record was as accurate as the satellite reconstructions. Christy signed it. NAS (actually the NRC which functions as part of NAS) put him on the committee, making certain that denialists couldn't scream that the NRC finding was cooked by excluding him. It didn't take long for Christy to hem and haw his way out of that statement, but he's on record of having signed it. On the finding that GW is real he said immediately afterwards: "the report simply confirms that the Earth has become warmer over the past 100 years." (this, at least, was an improvement over his earlier claims that the satellite record showed cooling, not warming, in recent decades.)
82807. RickG at 08:30 AM on 12 June 2011
       There is no consensus
       Earlier today I had a discussion with a person who described himself a "skeptic", not a denier concerning scientific consensus on ACC. His stance was that there is no consensus among climate scientists that the current climate change was due to human causes. Of course, I directed them to Anderegg 2010, Doran 2009 and Oreskes 2004; but he kept coming back with the statement, "there are climate scientists who do not believe there is a consensus among climate scientists". I kept trying to explain that yes, there are climate scientists that disagree with the consensus, but not that there is no consensus. Are there actually any practicing climate scientists that disagree that there is a consensus?
82808. DSL at 08:11 AM on 12 June 2011
       CO2 limits will harm the economy
       KR, I agree with regards to Haiti. I disagree with regards to other economic modes. Most alternative modes--various forms of socialism, modern feudalism, and totalitarianisms--have occurred within the context of the dominant mode--capitalism. Capitalism is extremely aggressive, and the reasons for some of the failures of these alternatives has been the corrupting force of capital. A pure experiment is where all other variables are controlled. That would not be the case for Cuba, USSR, Nazi regime, Venezuela, various African experiments, China, etc. etc. All were (and are) heavily influenced by the forces of capital. I imagine that were we living in a socialist world, you would call capitalism an "extreme social experiment." As far as Haiti is concerned, one also has to take into account U.S. interference (and here. And, of course, Baby Doc and his compadres. Eric, Haiti is a study in disaster capitalism. The country was pillaged by non-Haitians, then pillaged by Haitians (with the help of non-Haitians), then repeatedly kicked in the gut by nature, and then descended on by thousands of NGOs, the IMF, and a whole slew of companies looking to make a buck in the labor market and the pool of NGO dough. What the Heritage folks want is an unfettered (and desperate) Haitian labor market. What the Heritage Foundation calls "freedom" is usually the opposite of social and environmental justice.
82809. skywatcher at 08:10 AM on 12 June 2011
       There's no room for a climate of denial
       Do you have sources for that assertion Eric? I understand you accept the general premise, but the global record, as constructed and validated by many independent sources now, does not show the same pattern as the US, with regard to an especially hot 1930s. Based on the records constructed from the GHCN and other datasets, I would doubt what you say about the 1930s, and 'we simply do not know' does not stand up to perusal of the GHCN.
82810. Denier at 08:09 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       Thank you Moderator [Dikran Marsupial] that is the INDOEX link in question. In respect of your request for more info. concerning Prof. V. Ramanathan, the following is a must watch - 2009Lecture_Ramanathan.wmv The location and magnitude of the ABC and the resulting loss of evaporation would most likely affect Australia. The importance of the weather role of the Indian Ocean and linking it with the extensive drought of southern Australia was revealed by UNSW early 2009. It should be noted the eastern part of Australia was rescued from drought by a freakishly intensive La Nina, whereas WA is still suffering drought.
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] no problem, link to video activated. I've only watched the first five minutes so far, but Ramanathan seems to be rather concerned about greenhouse gasses, and in particular carbon dioxide. At 17:42 Ramanathan shows a plot of major shifts in rainfall over the last 50 years. Australia is not highlighted, that rather suggests to me that Ramanathan provides no support for your speculation. But I'll keep an open mind for the rest of the talk. O.K., having watched the rest of the video, AFAICS it provides no support whatsoever for your assertion. Firstly it suggests the major change in rainfall is concentrated on equitorial Asia, India and Africa (with relatively little change in Australia). Secondly Ramanathan clearly identifies CO2 as the major problem. Thirdly Ramanathan is clear that dealing with ABCs is only a temporary fix that will buy some time to deal with CO2, but nothing more. Fourthly Ramanathan's findings are mainstream science, he identifies where it is discussed in the IPCC WG1 report (I should think we have all seen that diagram)

       I do recommend people should watch the video.
82811. Albatross at 07:47 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       Chris @5, "Imagine the furore if that level of faulty analysis had been perpetrated by pukka climate scientists." Indeed Chris, good point (and good posts above). Just look at the controversy and faux debate that people like McIntyre have fabricated over the famous Hockey stick paper by MBH98-- they are still talking about that, even though MBH's Hockey Stick has been corroborated by multiple independent analyses and data sets over the years. And I think we are still waiting for the UAH code are we not? I think the last I heard they Spencer and Christy promised their code would be available this summer.
82812. Albatross at 07:43 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       Michael @4, "Spencer and Christy's analysis was wrong they insisted very loudly that they were right and everyone else was wrong." And Spencer is still make such proclamations on his blog and in his book.
82813. KR at 07:32 AM on 12 June 2011
       CO2 limits will harm the economy
       My statement holds, Eric - a reasonable amount of regulation makes for a much improved situation. From your reference, "Inadequate regulatory and legal frameworks hamper private-sector development." Yet you claim that the "authoritarian government" of Haiti would prevent you from using your property as you wish? This is a very contradictory statement. Again, as I stated, a mix of approaches seems to work best. I would personally prefer a straight carbon tax to direct external costs to those causing them, and let the market decide from there, with reasonable regulation and administration to ensure that this actually occurs.
82814. Eric (skeptic) at 06:16 AM on 12 June 2011
       CO2 limits will harm the economy
       KR, part of the answer is that the Dominican Republic has a "moderately free" society http://www.heritage.org/index/country/dominicanrepublic while Haiti is mostly unfree http://www.heritage.org/index/Country/Haiti Haiti is pretty much bottom of the barrel for property rights, and if there are no property rights, then forests won't be protected. The other part of the answer is that the Dominican Republic enacted some market-value-oriented policies (scroll down this page: http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5647e/y5647e05.htm) Their policy is comparable to the efforts by developed countries and has an emphasis on private ownership.
82815. Eric the Red at 05:04 AM on 12 June 2011
       There's no room for a climate of denial
       With regards to the countries that set records, many of these countries have temperature records going back less than half a century. That is not saying that it was not a hot year, but most of the state temperature records in the U.S. were set in the 1930s. We simply do not know how many of those countries may have experienced warmer temperatures in the first half of the 20th century. On the flip side, very few record cold temperatures have been recorded anywhere in recent times.
82816. chris at 04:34 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       Thanks michael. Imagine the furore if that level of faulty analysis had been perpetrated by pukka climate scientists. And yet Drs. Christy and Spencer are considered something akin to heroes in some quarters. Christy, in particular, seems to have no qualms about making particulalry unpleasant attacks on the science that informs our undertanding. Can't find a link to Gary and Keihm (1991), but the abstracts of the other papers on corrections to faulty satellite tropospheric temerature measures cited just above are worth a perusal... Hurrell and Trenberth (1997)) Wentz and Schabel (1998) Fu et al. (2004) Mears and Wentz (2005)
82817. KR at 04:32 AM on 12 June 2011
       Are you a genuine skeptic or a climate denier?
       Eric (skeptic) - I don't often comment on politics here (I prefer to stick to the science), but I cannot let that last howler go by without a reply. Please see my post on the far more appropriate The economic impacts of carbon pricing thread. Now, can we kindly get back to the "skepticism versus denial" topic? Or move on to other discussions? Side tracks into extreme political arrangements such as pure libertarianism are really off topic...
82818. KR at 04:32 AM on 12 June 2011
       CO2 limits will harm the economy
       From this thread: Eric (skeptic) - I don't often comment on politics here (I prefer to stick to the science), but I cannot let that last howler go by without a reply. "If I lived in Haiti I would be stripped of my land by the authoritarian government who would then pretend to mitigate climate change using proceeds from a carbon tax that would actually just be squirreled away in Swiss bank accounts." Haiti has less than 1% of it's forest cover remaining, because there has been no regulation of forestry use whatsoever. Individuals (who do not directly get assessed the full costs of their actions) cut down the trees for charcoal and land clearing. That's the "libertarian free market" in action. By contrast, consider the neighboring Dominican Republic, which shares a border with Haiti. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has rated the DR forestry programs as exemplary, with the government run conservation resulting in some of the best woodlands in the region. Libertarianism is an interesting extreme societal model, like a pure dictatorship, direct democracy, anarchy, true communism, etc. All of these have some benefits, and overcome some social issues - and all of them as pure systems have been failures. I believe a realistic view requires a mix of approaches, not extreme social experiments.
82819. michael sweet at 04:23 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       It is worth adding to Chris's excellent summary that for 15 years while Spencer and Christy's analysis was wrong they insisted very loudly that they were right and everyone else was wrong. They allowed deniers to use their data set to claim the globe was not warming. they did not find any of their errors, others had to do the hard work. Spencer is making more of the same noise today.
82820. chris at 03:52 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       There is an elephant in the room in considering the demonstrably incorrect arguments of Drs. Spencer and Christy. Although we should of course focus on the specific scientific elements of their “arguments”, it's important to recognise that these two have spent a large part of their careers getting the tropospheric temperature measurements hopelessly wrong, and therefore coming to an incorrect conclusion about the troposphere warming response to enhanced greenhouse gas concentrations (see below [+++]). This is bound to have influenced their outlook on this subject - it must be very difficult to throw away a favoured interpretation from 15 or more years of study, and not hope that one’s conclusions might yet be vindicated. While it’s important to address deficient arguments with logic and evidence, it’s also useful (and may become increasingly so) to try to fathom the psychology that underlies specific examples of scientific misrepresentation. Each of Spencer and Christy and Lindzen is objectively wrong in their essential representations of the science. I think we can at least partly understand some of the reasons for this in the case of the first two. [+++] Christy and Spencer's erroneous interpretation of tropospheric cooling was only revised after a long series of corrections identified by other scientists. It was pointed out as early as 1991 that (a) their analysis was not sufficiently constrained to distinguish cooling from a warming that would be consistent with physical expectations [*], (b) the method of averaging different satellite records introduce a spurious cooling trend [**], and (c) their failure to properly account for orbital decay introduced another spurious cooling trend [***]. A little later it was shown (d) that MSU-2 showed a spurious cooling trend due to spillover of stratospheric cooling into the tropospheric temperature signal [****], and later still it was pointed out that (e) the diurnal correction applied by Christy and Spencer (a sad litany of error) was of the wrong sign and gave yet another spurious cooling trend [*****]. [*] B.J. Gary and S. J. Keihm (1991) Microwave Sounding Units and Global Warming Science 251, 316 (1991) [**] J. W. Hurrell & .K E. Trenberth (1997) Spurious trends in satellite MSU temperatures from merging different satellite record. Nature 386, 164 – 167. [***] F. J. Wentz and M. Schabel (1998) Effects of orbital decay on satellite-derived lower-tropospheric temperature trends. Nature 394, 661-664 [****] Q. Fu et al. (2004) Contribution of stratospheric cooling to satellite-inferred tropospheric temperature trends Nature 429, 55-58. [*****] C. A. Mears and F. J. Wentz (2005) The Effect of Diurnal Correction on Satellite-Derived Lower Tropospheric Temperature Science 1548-1551.
82821. JMurphy at 03:38 AM on 12 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       Indeed, Sphaerica, and to drag out the avian analogy further, the Goddards and Watts' of this world will then be just like the pet-shop owner in the classic Monty Python 'Dead Parrot' sketch.
82822. Bob Lacatena at 03:21 AM on 12 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       46, skywatcher,

       But we can't blithely blame interannual variations for a downward trend in extent and thickness that is over 30 years old and accelerating.

       Sure we can. But not forever, and not even for long. I really think the denial crew stuck their heads on the chopping block with this one... like Goddard last year. The Arctic truly is the canary in the coal mine, in that no one is going to be able to hold the pretty little bird up, in the end, and say, "No, it's alive, see? See that? Its chest moved. It's still breathing! Trust me! He's fine..." The inter-annual variability just isn't as great as with the temperature records, the arguments about observation correctness don't really exist, and the trend is undeniable. Really, there's little the deniers can do except say "Look, it went back up (this year)" or "Well, but it's because of wind, it's not really melting". They will even some day say "Look, the trend is totally flat" (because it's all gone, and there's no more ice left to melt). But I love the Arctic, because the Arctic is and will be undeniable. It is, I think, the barometer that will ultimately turn public opinion before anything else. Then they'll look at the glaciers, and the droughts, and the extreme weather events, and the ecosystem changes... and people will finally start to seriously listen, or rather, they'll finally start to look askance at the "don't worry, it's nothing" crowd. So they can make bizarre predictions and dismiss it as much as they like. In fact, I encourage them to, because it will make it look that much more comical, and also demonstrate that they are that much less trustworthy, when the canary is clearly lying at the bottom of its cage, with its feet sticking straight up in the air, and they are still trying to claim that they can see it breathing.
82823. Eric (skeptic) at 02:50 AM on 12 June 2011
       Are you a genuine skeptic or a climate denier?
       Scaddenp, you asked "I need to know the answer to question about why you would consider it acceptable that say fishing/tourist to pay cost of reef protection rather than creators of the problem?" After I thought about my answer to okatiniko /news.php?n=785#54211 I acknowledge that the libertarian free market is part of the problem of your hypothetical harms (but "let's not talk about the airport"). That market satisfies the whimsical desires of consumerism but also the needs of billions of people. In comparison a relatively small number of people will be harmed by climate change, and when I ask for specifics I get "estimates" of meters of rapid sea level rise (rate since 2003: 1 inch per decade). When I propose specific solutions I get blown off as too complicated or not workable or your answer which is we should simply do nothing and ask the culprits to pay. I am simply frustrated by your apparent lack of willingness to adapt. OTOH, I agree the free market is far from perfect. The essential problem is that short term profits don't account for long term costs. A good example is a company that buys up a forest to clear cut and uses the proceeds to buy a bigger forest to repeat the process. The answer is that a wealthy society does not require the products of clear cutting but can instead demand the products of mixed use resources. Case in point, Haiti has no forests, all were cut down for cooking fuel. Where I live in Virginia we have lots of new forests that were once completely clear cut for charcoal for smelting and lime kilns and then for farming and ranching. The demand for nature from tourists is somewhat offset by the horses which require pasture and hay production. But the result is a large amount of robustness to climate change such as it is here (perhaps a few more floods) without an oversized contribution to CO2. My own transitional forest of red cedar is being replaced (by nature and my help) by hardwoods and native understory. My steep slopes to a major river now have water retention and Prairie Moon seedlings. I am not wealthy but have enough spare resources to take really good care of 5 acres (although I ought to have and do more). I can easily handle any climate contingencies having unlimited water supplies and the ability and resources to easily deal with floods. If I lived in Haiti I would be stripped of my land by the authoritarian government who would then pretend to mitigate climate change using proceeds from a carbon tax that would actually just be squirreled away in Swiss bank accounts. My example is hardly far fetched. You may consider it a red herring or false dichotomy but it is not. The way people gain the wealth and independence to mitigate the effects of any environmental disasters is by the free market. So I have to ask you, since your wealth came from the market, why won't you use your wealth to adapt? Second, why won't you promote the economic freedom needed to create that wealth in countries like Bangladesh. If you don't think that is feasible, why won't you give a small portion of your wealth to private relief organizations?
82824. Dikran Marsupial at 02:48 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       trunkmonkey The answer to that question ought to be obvious. To get the degree of variability seens since the proterozoic you need major changes in the configuration of the continents. The configuration of the continents has changed very little during the pleistocene, so one ought to expect much less variability than witnessed since the proterozoic. AGW has occurred only during the pleistocene, so it is the variability of the pleistocene that is relevant to the discussion of AGW.
82825. trunkmonkey at 02:37 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       The continents are more widely dispersed today than they have ever been in the last 600 million years. There have been a couple phases if amalgamation and disintegration, but over the vast perponderence of this time there has been some sort of panthalassic ocean and a cluster of continets. The Pacific is in some sense a relict panthalassic. There has almost always been a continent at the south pole. There has never been one at the north pole. Glacial periods have occurred in many different configurations. To a geologist focussing on the pleistocene or even the tertiary is cherry picking. Why is the range of internal variability constrained by anything less that the range of variablity since the proterozoic?
82826. Dawei at 01:55 AM on 12 June 2011
       Climate Consensus on a T-shirt
       I'd imagine people who wear this shirt will get themselves involved in some interesting confrontations. The fact that it's a statistic, rather than just a picture of a swimming polar bear or something, should make it more inviting for debate. In a few months, it would be cool to post another blog article asking for those who purchased this shirt to comment on their experiences. I'm sure there will be some good stories to come from wearing this.
82827. Geologist at 01:52 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       I have to agree with Mike Palin (#61) that this is a quite tiring meme which I thought would be beneath SkS. Yes, there are some geologists that deny AGW but as was pointed out in the original article most of us don't. Also, lumping together hard rock geologists who work and study things that have very little to do with climate with Quaternary geologists and palaeoclimatologists who provide vital data for our understanding of AGW (most of our knowledge about the normal variability of the climate, data to validate the computer models and the possibility to use previous climatic events for comparison with the present depend on the work of geologists) is highly problematic. Many geologists do have a good understanding of math and those who don't mostly work in field where it is less important. It is true that advanced math skills are needed for many types of climate science, but palaeoreconstructions often only requires fairly simple statistical approaches. On the other hand many modellers can't identify a climatic or environmental change in a sediment succession or distinguish between an arctic or boreal fauna in a sample. That's the whole reason why we need collaborations and multi-disciplinary research. I believe that these kinds of discussions are detrimental for such work. #33, MajorKoko, besides the link from DSL showing that a positive feedback is not necessarily a runaway feedback it is worth noting that there is at least one major negative feedback effect which is important for earths climate, the weathering of bedrock. On very long timescales (millions of years) a warmer climate will lead to more weathering and thereby a decrease in CO2 in the atmosphere (since CO2 is used in the process). Unfortunately this effect is extremely slow so it won't have any significant effect on the timescales we are worried about (hundreds to thousands of years).
82828. skywatcher at 01:45 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       #82: You'll find a lot of useful information at skeptic argument #51, CO2 was higher in the past. If you were a good geologist you would understand about timescales. Milankovitch operates effectively at timescales of less than about a million years or so, and require a global configuration of continents that is sensitive in such a way that the small Milankovitch variation can trigger ice ages. On longer timescales, the movements of continents (e.g. closure of Panama, uplift of Himalaya, isolation of Antarctica), drive the likelihood of the globe being sensitive to a flickering switch of glaciation. The cooler Sun in distant geological past also allowed for deeper glaciations than at present, but the individual flickers of glacial periods analogous to the Devensian, Anglian or other phases are generally not clearly resolved in the existing geological record, and of course we can't define the orbital variations hundreds of millions of years ago that might have been in operation to pace the glaciations. Milankovitch, of course, was just a mere twinkle in the eye of a small furry creature in the Mesozoic... The small furry creature was enjoying a geological and CO2 configuration that favoured high global temperatures and little ice cover.
82829. Lloyd Flack at 01:42 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       trunkmonkey #82 The Milankovitch Cycles drive the alternation of glacial and interglacial periods within an ice age. Whether we have an ice age or not is determined by other things. The most important of these is continental configuration.
82830. Dikran Marsupial at 01:35 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       trunkmonkey I don't think the proterozoic/ordovician/permian glaciations have been attributed to Milankovic cycles. Milankovich cycles are not the only thing that peturbs the carbon cycle. For example, the position of land masses affects the weathering thermostat. If the landmasses are concentrated at the equator, weathering increases because the equator is warmer than the extra-tropics and CO2 tends to fall. If you are genuinely interested, see the excellent book by David Archer, reviewed here.
82831. RickG at 01:31 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       @ trunkmonkey #82 Your comparison is not even as close as apples and oranges; more like bananas and elephants. Take all data and facts into consideration, especially continental drift. What was the continental configuration during those times? How did that affect ocean currents? How about shallow seas and mountain systems that existed then that do not exist now.
82832. skywatcher at 01:29 AM on 12 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       While soome of this discussion is indeed interesting, there has been a subtle shift in this thread away from the focus on ice loss. In particular, garethman's successful avoidance of accepting that there is a very clear downward trend, which has not in the least bit slowed in recent years. Dikran's point in #37 about the variability around the trend is worth noting again. It's also disingenuous for garethman to get a helpful answer on another thread pointing to additional factors affecting ice loss, and then post here pretending that wind and ocean temperatures are the only story. They are not, and if he has read the two threads in question, he would know this. Wind in particular causes much of the variability about the accelerating downward trend, with poor wind conditions in 2007, and favourable winds for ice retention in 2010 (still the 3rd lowest on record). But we can't blithely blame interannual variations for a downward trend in extent and thickness that is over 30 years old and accelerating.
82833. trunkmonkey at 01:18 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       scaddenp@119 Can We Trust... Sorry about the wild leap in good fun. Moved over here to be more on topic. The point is that once we reach the limit of certainty bestowed by the wonderful equasions we are blessed to have in fluid dynamics and are forced to describe apparently chaotic features with perameters, we become far more like the poor geologist out in the hot sun of uncertainty, picking at rocks that seem to indicate a wildly chaotic history for our planet. To the reasons geologists tend to be skeptical already well descried in this thread I would like to add Milankovitch. Before Shackleton and the fan club of foraminifera Milakovitch had been carefully studied by gologists for many years and found wanting because his orbital variations had little explanatory power in earth history. How do you get a proterozoic glaciation, an ordivician glaciaton, a permian glaciation, and our current glaciation, all separated by roughly 200 million year interludes of much higher temperatures and CO2 levels from Milankovitch? If Milakovitch explains why CO2 is the slave to temperature in the ice cores, where was he during the mesozoic?
82834. KR at 01:11 AM on 12 June 2011
       Lindzen and Choi find low climate sensitivity
       For completeness on the Lindzen and Choi papers: LC11 PNAS rejected submission here. LC11 APJAS (in print) here. Some small differences, an additional 3 pages in the APJAS version (it apparently hit the PNAS size limitations). IMO - Lacking in sensitivity analysis for start/end dates of their temperature changes (cf. Trenberth 2010), extratropical heat exchange armwaved and asserted to be unity, etc. It's essentially LC09 with some added (and IMO fairly weak) explanatory text, no accounting for how the critiques pointed out contradictions with actual observations.
82835. dana1981 at 01:03 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       Badger - yes, we'll add the Christy Crocks button to the other Christy Crocks posts. In fact I'll do that now.
82836. John Hartz at 01:00 AM on 12 June 2011
       Examining Dr. John Christy's Global Warming Skepticism
       @Dana or John Cook: Will the "Christy Crock" button be inserted into all of the other articles in this series? How about adding a Note similar to the above to all of the other articles in the series?
82837. Bob Lacatena at 00:37 AM on 12 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       44, Dikran, Yes, I probably should have added that I believe that my observation almost always applies to skeptics (not meaning all skeptics, but rather, it rarely applies to people who do already understand the science, and far more often applies to skeptics, especially vocal skeptics who are so confident in their position that they feel they can openly and confidently recant a scientific position). Skeptics are the ones who tend to try to mold climate science to fit into their own boxes, and this is often what leads them astray. Because they are only seeing things from a very limited (and inaccurate) perspective, but it is also a perspective that they have spent years fine tuning, and through which have achieved a lifetime of personal success and achievement, it is very easy for a skeptic to Dunning-Kruger himself, and to believe that of all people, he has the tools to unravel the great climate mystery, and if not to find the solutions that have eluded the professionals, to at least understand it as well as he needs to make a final, authoritative (Dunning-Kruger) judgment. So, while my observation and advice was and is directed at everyone, it's particularly applicable to those who have already made up their minds that climate change is not an issue, and that look at every single aspect of climate change -- be it melting ice, drought, temperature records, climate sensitivity, the physics whatever -- but in every aspect, they feel they have achieved understanding but always through their own best avenues, tools, and limited perspective -- with their own, best hammer-- and so have convinced themselves that their position is valid. I think for many of these people, the simple recognition that they are one of the blind men describing an elephant is the starting point to getting out of the box which they have constructed that defines their skepticism, and prevents them from learning the science and finding the truth.
82838. Eric (skeptic) at 00:27 AM on 12 June 2011
       The Critical Decade - Part 3: Implications for Emissions Reductions
       okatiniko #3, that is a worthwhile thought exercise. The simple answer comes from the history of the oil industry (wikipedia). Oil and gas were exploited relatively extensively in the far east 1000 or more years ago. That spread to Asia, particularly Russia. The U.S. took over in the 20th century but various countries that we once dominated have now nationalized their industries. We still have varying degrees of geopolitical influence in oil and energy although that is increasing challenged by China and other countries. The question you raise is not technological. You imply that we should not invent new techniques, but it is impossible to not invent or uninvent when the market demands the product. You also point out the great expense involved, but even with the government "subsidies" (which are mostly just a temporary alleviation of high taxes), the market has no problem providing the financing. I would point out that China has oodles of money, strong science and technology, and a large manufacturing sector to feed the energy to. The answer is therefore, geopolitical, but also very much dependent on the economic policies of various countries independent of the environmental considerations. My suggestion is to start here http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/envir_e/climate_challenge_e.htm because it is in the context of trade agreements where your suggestions have the best chance of being implemented.
82839. Dikran Marsupial at 00:20 AM on 12 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       Sphaerica There is a difference between garethmans brand of behavioural science and the way an electrical engineer or a chemist or a statistican would approach climate change, which is that the latter are constrained by the truth. Rhetoric isn't. There is plenty of scope for discussion of behavioural science in climate change (although perhaps not on this thread). There is no place for rhetoric in the scientific discussion of climate change. As a statistician/electronic engineer, I find the physics far more convincing, but my comments tend to be about statistics as that is my primary expertise. I generally read the discussions about physics and chemistry rather than participate. I suspect I am not alone in this, so on-line appearances can be deceptive. I have also pitched manure and written a sonnet ;o)
82840. J. Bob at 00:10 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       Dirkran Marsupial @ 78, it's been a couple years since I last looked at the ABC, and have not looked at it from a drought perspective. My interest then, was looking at the thermal radiation & convective effects of the particulates. However, some time ago I noted the use of solar ovens instead of wood fires, for cooking, and their effect on saving trees, and reduced erosion. This report (Machine Design, if I recall) was about the high elevations of Northern India, Nepal, etc. It's simplicity and resultant effects was an engineer's delight.
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] No problem, I was just wondering if there was a genuine contradiction there, it seems perhaps not.
82841. Phil at 00:08 AM on 12 June 2011
       Phil Jones says no global warming since 1995
       An update from Phil Jones
82842. Tom Curtis at 00:02 AM on 12 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       Denier @77: Brief bio of professor V Ramathan:

       " V. Ramanathan Title: Professor/ Director Department: Scripps Institution of Oceanography Organization: California Space Institute La Jolla, CA United States Website: http://www-ramanathan.ucsd.edu/. Bio Dr. V. Ramanathan is the Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric and Climate Sciences at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California at San Diego. In the mid 1970s he discovered the greenhouse effect of CFCs and numerous other man-made trace gases. He correctly forecasted in 1980, along with R. Madden, that the global warming due to carbon dioxide would be detectable by the year 2000. He and his students also used satellite radiometers to detect the atmospheric greenhouse effect directly from observations and demonstrated using satellite and ground based observations that the coupling between atmospheric warming and water vapor greenhouse effect exerted a strong positive feedback effect, thus confirming earlier model predictions. Teaming up with NASA colleagues, he showed that clouds had a large natural cooling effect on the planet using direct measurements of the atmospheric greenhouse effect. He, along with Dr. Paul Crutzen, led the Indian Ocean Experiment (INDOEX) that first discovered the widespread South Asian Atmospheric Brown Clouds (ABCs). Using INDOEX, Dr. Ramanathan showed that the South Asian brown clouds led to large scale dimming of the ocean slowed down the monsoon circulation and decreased monsoon rainfall. He followed this with a path-breaking study with agricultural economists to show that ABCs and greenhouse gases were responsible for a 14% decrease in rice harvest in India. In 2006, he used miniaturized instruments on light weight unmanned aerial vehicles, UAVs, to show that black carbon in ABCs are causing a large heating of the atmosphere over Asia, linking ABCs to the melting of Himalayan and Tibetan glaciers. During the summer of 2008, he used these UAVs to track pollution from Beijing during the Olympics. His most recent publication suggests that human activities have likely committed the planet to exceed the threshold for several climate tipping points during the twenty first century. Dr. Ramanathan currently chairs the UNEP-sponsored ABC Project with science team members from the USA, Europe, India, China, Japan, Korea and other Asian countries. He is the recipient of many national and international awards such as: the American Meteorological Society's Rossby medal, the Buys Ballot medal by the Dutch Academy of Sciences, the Volvo environment prize in 1997 and the Zayed International prize for environment in 2008. He has been elected to the American Philosophical Society, the US National Academy of Sciences, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences by Pope John Paul II, the Academia Europea, the Third World Academy of Sciences and most recently to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. He chairs the National Academy of Sciences panel that provides strategic advice to the US Climate Change Science Program (CCSP), a $2 billion/year inter-agency research program. He is part of the Nobel Peace prize (2007) winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change since its inception, and for the 2007 report served as one of the lead editors in IPCC-AR4 (2007), WG-I. A more complete resume and bibliography can be seen at: http://www-ramanathan.ucsd.edu/."

       OK, he discovered the global warming effect of several trace gasses, predicted the GH warming of the atmosphere in the 1980's, has been a participant in the IPCC since 1990, and a lead author in AR4. But he is obviously not an "AGW scientist" because he is leading the effort to find out about the Indian Ocean Brown Clouds, which you tell us the AGW scientists are ignoring. A brief quote from Professor Paul Crutzen (and others):

       "Far more profound are the chemical and biological effects of global human activity. It may seem remarkable that changes to mere trace components of the Earth’s atmosphere—CO2, methane (CH4), and so on—can so fundamentally impact the Earth. Nevertheless, the concept of control of surface temperature by levels of greenhouse gases (GHGs), as originally worked out by Arrhenius (10) and Chamberlain (11), has been vindicated by subsequent work. Today, the rise in CO2 to over a third above preindustrial levels has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt: by systematic measurement since the 1950s (12); and by the record of atmospheric composition, now nearly a million years long, preserved in Antarctic ice (13). The rise in temperatures, that, at high latitudes, already exceed modeled predictions, has important consequences. The fringes of the great polar ice-sheets, once thought to react sluggishly to temperature rises, are now seen to respond quickly and dynamically (14). The ensuing sea level rise, scarcely begun, may ultimately be of the order of several meters (15) if temperatures rise by some 2−5 °C, as predicted (16). Global temperature rises will have far-reaching consequences for the biosphere. Species will migrate (if they are able to) to track their optimum climate belt, a phenomenon more pronounced in the oceans than on land (17): changes in, say, larval hatching times can cause cascade-like changes in entire ecosystems, when these larvae act as food for other animals."

       But again, he can't be one of those "AGW scientists" because he, like Ramathan is a Co-chief scientist of the INDOEX program, and as you inform us, this is an issue being ignored by AGW scientists.
82843. Bob Lacatena at 23:58 PM on 11 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       garethman, and everyone, You said this, and things like it a number of times in the past:

       ...in my behavioural science you...

       I see this sort of thing a lot. Electrical engineers analyze climate using electrical engineering concepts and terms. Statisticians make everything revolve around statistics. Chemists look at the chemistry. I certainly flavor my own thoughts with systems thinking (being a software developer and systems analyst), but I think I have a slight advantage because the real key to success in my job is breaking that mold, and getting in tune with the real world and the real problem, from many angles, not just my own, narrow, computer-specialist perspective. In fact, a lot of computer systems fail because of this habit of people to look only from their own perspective, and so computer systems too often reflect the computer considerations, and not the realities of the problems they are trying to solve. Hammer/nail syndrome ("if all you have is a hammer, every problem is a nail") is human nature. But I think climate is a particularly broad, varied, and complex problem. It includes systems, and feedback loops, and behavioral components, and statistics, and chemistry, physics, biology, politics, economics, everything. Everyone needs to make every effort they can to break the hammer-nail syndrome and expand their thinking in uncomfortable but necessary ways. If you ever find yourself falling into your comfort zone, realize that you are falling away from the answers and solutions, not closer to them. You feel more comfortable with your understanding, because it is familiar and fits into a complex box that you have spent a lifetime and a career constructing, but in fact that box is a prison, not a prism. It keeps you from seeing the whole picture and the truth, rather than helping you to do so (which is how it feels, but not how it is). This isn't a criticism of garethman, or anyone. It's just an observation. Avoid hammer-nail syndrome. The climate problem is far too complex to be handled by a single specialist, or even a team of specialists. To repeat a favorite quote of mine from Robert Heinlein:

       "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."

82844. DSL at 23:54 PM on 11 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       By the way, Denier, I'd like to see the logic and evidence that differentiates your proposed hypothesis of "an identified physical cause of change totally destroys the greenhouse gas hypothesis" from "this means a significant change in the number of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in Argentina." In other words, why do you propose your final hypothesis? What does this alleged cloud of pollution have to do with the physics of radiative transfer? And AGW is not an hypothesis. It's a theory based on a broad range of already well-tested hypotheses.
82845. J. Bob at 23:39 PM on 11 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       Here are a couple of references to the Asian Brown Cloud (ABC)& Ramanathan. A Google search on the "Asian Brown Cloud" will get a lot more. ABC-1 ABC-2
       Moderator Response:

       [Dikran Marsupial] I was wondering if there was a verifiable reference to ABC causing drought in Australia, rather than Asia (which would provide some support for Denier's speculation).

82846. garethman at 22:35 PM on 11 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       Hi Skywatcher. Sadly I cannot give you any cause for hope, like you, I would like to see some good news. You will also note all my posts state I fully agree with the fact the ice is declining rapidly. My apparent sin was to ask why the ice declined at varying rates, and to show charts which demonstrated a temporary slowdown in melting rates. Obviously a very sensitive area which I was unaware of and which has upset many people. I’m still unsure why, but in my behavioural science you don’t ask why people behave in some ways, you just have to accept. So there we are, I will try and carefully avoid posting any material which is likely to offend or cause upset in the future.
       Response:

       [DB] This is a forum wherein like-minded people discuss the science of climate change from the perspective of what the science actually says, not what the media represents it as.  Participants took exception to some unscientific statements you made and attempted to make you aware of a more appropriate context and methodology to examine those situations.

82847. Denier at 22:33 PM on 11 June 2011
       Geologists and climate change denial
       The following was posted on ABC Environment. To ensure it is not lost and unanswered it is posted here, being mindful of your words - " Scientists should always challenge themselves to expand their knowledge and improve their understanding." The information provided below suggests AGW scientists have seriously failed your test. There is evidence of a dimming event, capable of affecting global hydrology from INDOEX; a very comprehensive field study conducted in equatorial Indian Ocean during 1999. Briefly, the 250 scientists of INDOEX discovered a massive atmospheric cloud of mostly man-made pollution from fossil burning, covering an area the size of Australia extending upwards 3 to 4 kms, was reducing the sun’s ability to create evaporation. Subsequent monitoring by Prof. V. Ramanathan of USC, determined this cloud remains stationary for 3 to 4 months yearly due to an inversion, with one of its adverse effects being regional drought. Those supporting the global warming case have long argued these clouds of pollution have aided in arresting temperature increases. INDOEX distinguishes the effect over this body of water has catastrophic consequences. The question is – why have Australian climate scientists pushing the CO2 warming barrow failed to acknowledge such a momentous climatic happening? Could the answer be - an identified physical cause of change totally destroys the greenhouse gas hypothesis?
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] Fixed URL (hopefully that is the one you intended). Can you supply a verifiable reference to the findings of Prof. Ramanathan?
82848. Dikran Marsupial at 22:33 PM on 11 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       garethman I am not interested in a rhetorical debate with you. I have clearly stated why. If you want your posts to be better received, just drop the rhetoric as I advised, you will find you get your questions answered in a measured tone. I suspect the last few posts will be deleted as off-topic (I would do so myself were I not a participant), but hopefully you will get the message that your rhetorical tone is doing you no favours here. Note that my first response to one of your questions was perfectly reasonable. Note I said a denier would want to look only at a 3000 year trend, not a skeptic (there is a difference). A denier would want to use data that could not possibly reveal any anthropogenic influence on climate, whether it was there or not. That was not implying that you were a denier, just pointing out how useless a 3000 year trend would be for the discussion at hand (albeit obliquely).
82849. Dikran Marsupial at 21:56 PM on 11 June 2011
       Impacts of a melting cryosphere – ice loss around the world
       garethman It is rather arrogant of you to assume that I am in some way lacking in my understanding of human nature (a rhetorical trick I have seen before, a subtle ad-hominem). One of the purposes of scientific method and practice is to overcome some of the less helpful aspects of human nature, in doing so, it is helpful to have a good knowledge of those human failings actually are. Rhetoric on the other hand tends to appeal to them (especially our natural confirmation bias). I would avoid rhetoric if I were you, if you want to engage in scientific discussion; science looks for the truth, rhetoric looks for a victory in a debate, and truth or logical consistency are generally only secondary considerations (if that). I doesn't work as well in written communication as there is time to check for cherry picking and logical consistency etc. There was a good essay by Schopenhauer lampooning rhetoric ("the art of always being right" or something like that), well worth reading so you know the tricks to look out for in others and avoid using yourself. Rhetoric is a hallmark of denialism, it really isn't something to be proud of. If you think it is a good way of arriving at information, you are profoundly mistaken.
82850. skywatcher at 21:32 PM on 11 June 2011
       The Critical Decade - Part 3: Implications for Emissions Reductions
       #3: Being a scientist and not a politician, I can't answer your last question, but I like the proposal otherwise! I suspect that there are savoury and unsavoury political reasons why this happens, as well as insufficient political pressure to move away from fossil fuels (see Obama's flip-flopping on it). As we move into the first significant decade of climate consequences, maybe those pressures will change. We're already seeing some renewables prices lower towards some FF prices, so maybe part of the solution is undeway.

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