Recent Comments

Prev  1763  1764  1765  1766  1767  1768  1769  1770  1771  1772  1773  1774  1775  1776  1777  1778  Next

Comments 88501 to 88550:

88501. Alec Cowan at 00:24 AM on 16 April 2011
       The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
       @Ken #116 (This is a partial reply. I'll follow it later)
       Do I detect the curled lip of the academic who is laughing on the other side of his face Alec?? ... When I have worked out how to tap into the rivers of gold flowing into paid research on climate science - I will do my own Argo analyses.
       Your detector is broken: I meant and still mean it. Many people, including I, have downloaded it and used it -in my case, in a third-wordly five years old computer- and nobody is getting paid for it. In fact, it takes much less time to scout the databases and learn a lot than commenting repetedly and fruitlessly in blogs. I have to practise my English and the heat of the debate promotes me thinking in English, what's your excuse?
       My simple calculation of the S-B relation with an OLR of about 240 W/sq.m and final emitting temperature of 255degK is like this: (255/254.25)^4 x 240 = 242.84. Increase in OLR = 2.84W/sq.m. for an increase in overall emitting temp of 0.75 degC. This is remarkably close to Dr Trenberth's 2.8W/sq.m increase in longwave radiation which suggests that the surface temp increase since pre-industrial times of 0.75 degC (at around 288 degK) is very close the the increased emitting temperature of the planet at around 255 degK.
       We're still talking about Earth, aren't we? Please, confirm that and your 255°K. Imagine the surprise of 15 degrees Celsius plus 240 watts per sq. meter becoming 255 degrees Kelvin and then being "remarkably close" to something slightly pertinent to the subject.
88502. Alec Cowan at 00:06 AM on 16 April 2011
       The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
       @Gilles #115
       I thought the thread was about the interpretation of Dr Trenberth's quote, I think I have already answered : In my opinion, he just meant what he said: there is a lack of warming and it's a travesty we can't explain it.
       You do know he didn't (by the way, I call your technique "back to square one"): 1st)Your interpretation coincides with that of the "climategate mysticism", that is, phase 1: some words out of context are taken away and presented as a conspiratorial theory; phase 2: the person behind the words make clear he/she didn't mean it that way; phase 3: the people behind phase 1 try to cast shadows on 2, insist on 1, and suggest that 1+2 is like O.J. saying "I didn't do it", trying to promote the public associating the target with something reported at 6PM News. There are many techniques that are useful with ignorant folks in a laundrymat context ("If the dude didn't mean it, why didn't he sue the people pointing a finger to him? Eh!?) --- Iterate. In case the debate goes badly for your position, return to the last place you feel in control and on solid ground, that is, phase 1 (...back to square one...). 2nd) Why did you put almost a third of this thread's comments? Can you summarize the main points of what you have said so far?
       The blackbody at which temperature ?
       Really!? That is pretty obvious, there is a range of pertinent ones and the implications will not change. But I proposed that to Ken Lambert who appears to be knowledgeable. But I can make it easier for you: If some year's imbalance is, say, 0.9W/m²and the planet warms, will be next year the imbalance the same ceteris paribus.
88503. Adam at 00:01 AM on 16 April 2011
       It warmed just as fast in 1860-1880 and 1910-1940
       Dikran the paper I gave you was published 17 months ago. That is plenty of time for a comment to have been submitted to the Journal and published. Yet there have been none. Dikran there has been no published critsicm of Klotzbach et al, and the points raised in the real climate article you gave me were, as shown by the authors, either erroneous or irrelevant. Dikran once again, in his graph Tamino used more surface data than satellite data. The use of those datasets would have obscured the trends in the satellite data. Anyway, it is pretty well established that the satellite data is different from the surface data, since it shows virtually no warming from 1979-1997. And compare it with the graph presented in this article There is a very clear warm bias in the surface temperature record. Once again I suggest you actually read Klotzbach's paper.
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] I am writing a reply to a paper at the moment, the original paper was published in 2009, mine isn't even submitted yet. The paper refuting Morners assertions about the satellite sea level data wasn't published until a couple of years later. So your initial comment is at variance with my personal experience. Your second comment is merely restating the comment I had addressed. That is a very weak rebuttal indeed. BTW, I only pointed you at the RealClimate page FYI, I didn't claim Klotzbach was wrong, and if you read the blog articles, they seem to view the paper as a bit of a curates egg and most of the problem is in the reporting of the paper in skeptical blogs. The silly ad-hominem (the source of an argument is irrelevant, correct science ocurs on blogs, incorrect science sometimes makes it through peer-review, rejecting information from a blog because it is from a blog is denialism) and demonstration of ignorance of scientific publishing hasn't done you any favours.

       If you want to compare the satelite and surface data, then try using plots for the same period on the same axes, woodfortrees is an excellent resource for that. Here is a comparison of UAH and HADCRUT datasets:

       

       Click the image for the source. Looks pretty similar to me. The slight displacement of one relative to the other is small, and due to (i) they use different baseline periods and (ii) they don't actually measure quite the same thing, so some difference is to be expected. The trends for this period are very similar 0.14 per decade for UAH and 0.15 per decade for HADCRUT. Play with the other dataset on woodfortrees for yourself - it is an excellent resource for checking up on claims about trends etc.

       I've just noticed that Woodfortrees already has a pre-prepared plot where they have adjusted for the difference in baseline periods used to define the anomalies for each products, there is no clear difference between the satellite products and the surface station data. The satellite products do have slightly lower trends, but that isn't unduly surprising, they are not measuring surface temperature, but a weighted average temperature of a thick slab of the lower troposphere.

       

       p.s. please use width=400 when posting images so they don't mess up the formatting on the site. I have inserted them for you on this occasion.

88504. Ken Lambert at 23:58 PM on 15 April 2011
       The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
       Alec Cowan #114 "I suppose, as your appear to be commenting this in a knowledgeable manner, that you have downloaded and installed the interface to Argos data to do your own checks." Do I detect the curled lip of the academic who is laughing on the other side of his face Alec?? The Knox and Douglas paper is here: http://www.pas.rochester.edu/~douglass/papers/Knox_Douglass_KD_IJG_InPress.pdf When I have worked out how to tap into the rivers of gold flowing into paid research on climate science - I will do my own Argo analyses. And by the way, Dr Trenberth calculated the increase in radiative feedback in Fig 4 of his famous paper here: http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/Trenberth/trenberth.papers/EnergyDiagnostics09final2.pdf His number is -2.8W/sq.m. He explains this on page 23 thus: Dr Trenberth: "However, the observed surface warming [2] of 0.75 degC if added to the radiative equilibrium temperature of the planet would result in a compensating increase in longwave radiation of 2.8 W m2 (Figure 4) (although this does not translate into OLR)" My simple calculation of the S-B relation with an OLR of about 240 W/sq.m and final emitting temperature of 255degK is like this: (255/254.25)^4 x 240 = 242.84. Increase in OLR = 2.84W/sq.m. for an increase in overall emitting temp of 0.75 degC. This is remarkably close to Dr Trenberth's 2.8W/sq.m increase in longwave radiation which suggests that the surface temp increase since pre-industrial times of 0.75 degC (at around 288 degK) is very close the the increased emitting temperature of the planet at around 255 degK. The doubling of CO2 theory requires an approx 3 degC rise at the surface for a 1 degC rise in emitting temperature which equates to a 3.7W/sq.m increase in OLR. One wonders why the current emitting temp increase is not significantly less than 0.75 deg surface increase if the enhanced CO2GHG effect is already causing an extra insulating effect in the atmosphere. This is a good question for Dr Trenberth, unless you have an answer to share with us.
88505. José M. Sousa at 23:36 PM on 15 April 2011
       Last day to vote for Climate Change Communicator of the Year
       Done!
88506. KR at 23:03 PM on 15 April 2011
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       RSVP - "Stephan Boltzmann's Law ... contains the letter A. A is for area. What is the surface area when you are talking about energy delivered in a reciprocating internal combustion engine, or ocean water cooling a nuclear power plant? " (emphasis added) Are you arguing, then, that our energy use fails to radiate because it's more concentrated? Well, at least that's a fairly new one... But that's a complete 'fail' as an argument - Trenberth pointed out that his initial energy budget underestimated surface radiation (390 W/m^2 vs 396 W/m^2 in the 2009 update), due to the T^4 relationship and temperature variances. Variances from an even temperature increase outgoing IR (cooling the planet more) because an upwards variance puts out much more energy than a downward variance inhibits. So to the extent that our energy use is concentrated it's warming effects will be minimized - you argue against yourself. Secondly, you've argued that waste heat is causing the warming we attribute to GHG's - but warming increases radiation to space, so again there's no "accumulation". In fact, if waste heat was the cause of warming, we would see an increase in outward IR due to the planet being over equilibrium temperature, rather than the observed decrease as the climate catches up to the GHG forcing. ----- New readers: All of this is covered in the previous months of discussion on this thread. "Waste heat" as a cause of global warming is two orders of magnitude too small to be the issue despite RSVP's fixation on it, and I would encourage anyone interested in the issue to just read the post at the top and follow the thread if you have more questions. DNFTT.
88507. Gilles at 22:54 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       7 : Sphaerica : translated into temperature, and barring any romantic hyperbole, I'm curious to know what is your prediction on the expected temperature trend for the next 50 years, as a function of the carbon emissions we could reach ?
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] Trollometer reading: |========--|

       Why not construct some emissions scenarios that cover what you think might happen over the next 50 (or 100) years, and then run those scenarios through a range of leading climate models, performing multiple runs for each model to capture both the uncertainty in the model physics and internal variability. Then put the results into a publically available archive so that the results can be analysed by anyone who chose to do so. Oh yeah, I forgot, the IPCC have already done that haven't they? The predictions of just that from the leading experts in the field are available in the WG1 report, why troll for predictions on blogs?

       

       Click image for details. I suggest not indulging Gilles' trolling (unless of course Sphaerica disagrees with the IPCC projections).

88508. Bob Lacatena at 22:31 PM on 15 April 2011
       It warmed just as fast in 1860-1880 and 1910-1940
       60, Adam,

       ...could you please state what forcing caused the previous Greenland warming of 60 years ago, and why you don't believe it is causing the current one?

       Um, actually, this isn't how science works. We have an established, explicable mechanism (GHG theory), supported by empirical evidence, which explains the recent warming in Greenland. We do not have the same for the warming 60 years ago (partly because there is no way to go back in time and get measurements that weren't taken), but we know that it could not have been greenhouse gases. That's all fine. Nothing in proving GHG theory requires us to explain all climate events prior to the current period. If you wish to argue that whatever caused the warming in Greenland 60 years ago is also the current cause, then it falls to you to first develop a hypothesis, then test it and find evidence to support it, and then to put forth that hypothesis for current warming, and then further test that, and find evidence to support that. The argument that it must be proven that the cause of prior recent warming events is not the cause of current warming is like arguing that before anyone can be accused of a recent murder, the DA must first prove that all previous convicted murderers were not guilty of the latest crime.
88509. Eric (skeptic) at 22:27 PM on 15 April 2011
       Solar Hockey Stick
       Ian, "sensitivity" is sometimes given a very narrow definition, especially here. That definition is the temperature increase due to a doubling of CO2 from 280 to 560 ppm. Some people extend that definition further to say any doubling. I have never seen that backed up with models (e.g. showing a 3C rise or even 2-5C range when going from 50 to 100 ppm of CO2 or any other doubling). Sometimes, sensitivity is given a broader definition as it was in this thread #46, in Dana1981's response to me. That definition is "the observed GAT response to known CO2 forving over a substantial interval of time (e.g. since the industrial revolution)". The problem with using that definition is that part of the rise in GAT since the industrial revolution is natural and that the amplification of CO2 warming by increases in water vapor is highly variable due to weather even on decadal timescales. In one specific case, the dominance of El Nino (a weather phenomenon) in the 1990's created a situation in which CO2 warming was more amplified by water vapor since El Nino creates more water vapor even without CO2 warming. In the looser definition of sensitivity, the response to CO2 forcing is variable and based on weather.
88510. Bob Lacatena at 22:19 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       5, Lassesson,

       I'm just qurious about Evan's argument...

       Yes, I saw that, too. I was very impressed with what a clever bit of trickery that was. "Why should we bother to change? It will barely reverse things." It's sort of like telling a cancer patient "why bother with chemotherapy, it will only shrink your tumors by 5%" when without chemotherapy the tumors will grow so fast that the patient will be dead within a week.
88511. Gilles at 22:18 PM on 15 April 2011
       The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
       "Most of published works go that way, but I'm waiting for Gilles to completely explain/expose himself on this subject prior to provide the links and comment the conclusions." I thought the thread was about the interpretation of Dr Trenberth's quote, I think I have already answered : In my opinion, he just meant what he said: there is a lack of warming and it's a travesty we can't explain it. "Also, when you checked Hansen's 0.9W/m2 against the black body, what ΔT did you get?" The blackbody at which temperature ?
88512. Bob Lacatena at 22:15 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       What is every bit as frightening is the list of comments on Evan's post. Admittedly, modern publications tend very much to write for their readers, so one should expect that the readership there will be primarily, rabidly, anti-science. But it's still alarming. Sadly, at this point in time, I see two ways to get policy and understanding on track. Both are inevitable, but both will take time... at least another five years, maybe ten or fifteen. The first way is that as temperatures continue to rise, the denial engine will have a tougher and tougher time. As soon as a single year passes 1998 (and at least one in the next five will do so, if not more), the "it's cooling" argument will go away, and it's going to shock a lot of people into rethinking things. The Arctic, glaciers, extreme weather (much of which actually won't be properly attributable to climate change), and other sign posts will contribute. The second is that, quite simply, the old, tired, arrogant crowd of retired-with-too-much-time-on-their-hands deniers needs to fade away. This is going to insult a lot of people, but I'm sorry, it's true, and it needs to be said. The young need to wake up and take responsibility for and control of the future of this planet. It's far too easy for a bunch of grumpy old retired engineers who think they know it all to spend all day posting comments on blogs, dismissing the science and spewing reams of information supporting their crackpot theories. I will bet that if you conducted a poll, you'd find that 90% of the people posting the hateful, ignorant and obnoxious comments on climate change are 50+ years old, and at least 75% are 60+. The people with the least to lose by letting the planet burn to a cinder, and the most to gain by making sure things continue with business as usual, are, I am sure, that loud, vocal, aging minority whose vociferousness give the illusion that denialism is a populist movement. So as time goes on, those people will fade. Eventually, the truth will be quite undeniable, and the people who need to worry about the future (the young) will finally get motivated to wake up, learn, speak up, and take action. The "speak up" part is big. Very big. The young people of the world need to do what the youth of the 60s did in America with the Vietnam war. It needs to be important, and they need to be vocal, and they need to remind everyone that it is their lives and misfortunes that are being put on the line for other people's gain and fortunes. The young bear all of the risk, while the older one gets, the more one directly benefits from ignoring the problem. Really, this is a call to arms. A grass roots campaign of both education and, more importantly, voice needs to start in the universities of the West.
88513. Alec Cowan at 21:23 PM on 15 April 2011
       It warmed just as fast in 1860-1880 and 1910-1940
       @Adam Why did you change from "Poptech" to "Adam"?
88514. Adam at 21:17 PM on 15 April 2011
       It warmed just as fast in 1860-1880 and 1910-1940
       Dikran Tamino used several datasets in his graph, using more more surface station data than satellite data. The fact that his graph used mainly surface data (which showed higher warming trends), would cover up the smaller trends shown in the satellite data. Once again, I suggest you read the paper I gave you.
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] If the satellite trends lie within the spread of the surface station data, that means the satellite and surface station trends are statistically similar (within their respective uncertainties). If there was a meaningful difference between the surface station trends and the satellite trends, the satellite trends would not be covered up by the surface station trends.
88515. Adam at 21:14 PM on 15 April 2011
       It warmed just as fast in 1860-1880 and 1910-1940
       Dikran once again, blog posts (real climate) are not published and do not warrant a reply. Only published criticism counts. Anyway, the real climate article in question has indeed been refuted. See here and here.
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] Very few papers that are incorrect are ever the subject published comments, generally the just get ignored and end up with few citations. It is also too early to be sure that any comments papers have appeared yet, they take time to write and to get through peer review. If you are only going to accept published refutations then it is obviously disingenuous to raise a paper for discussion before there has been a proper chance for those refutations to have appeared. Besides that, if blog posts don't count, that means you will not accept any refutation given here anyway, so what is the point in anyone discussing it with you?
88516. Alec Cowan at 21:11 PM on 15 April 2011
       The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
       @Ken Lambert #113 Be so gracious of providing the links. About Purkey & Johnson, do they (and you) mean this? [Which is one of many works showing warming in abyssal waters and in southernmost basins]. Most of published works go that way, but I'm waiting for Gilles to completely explain/expose himself on this subject prior to provide the links and comment the conclusions. I suppose, as your appear to be commenting this in a knowledgeable manner, that you have downloaded and installed the interface to Argos data to do your own checks. How did it go? Also, when you checked Hansen's 0.9W/m² against the black body, what ΔT did you get? What conclusions did you reach? And the supposedly cooling oceans and sea level variation, what conclusion did you get from your reality check? It speaks volumes about a person whether he or she did that or didn't. This kind of forums or comment sections are plenty of polemicists amateurs, would-be dialecticians and assorted dilettanti. One would better think it twice before asserting that salmons disprove that rivers flow from mountains to seas.
88517. Adam at 20:51 PM on 15 April 2011
       It warmed just as fast in 1860-1880 and 1910-1940
       Daniel Bailey Tamino's graph was indeed a mixture of all the datasets, but the satellite trends were mostly covered up by the surface temp trends. I am not 'goal shifting'. I was focusing on Greenland temps, but Albatross was the one who made the claim that the sun could not have caused post 1970 climate change. I was simply answering, and providing a paper counter to his opinion, which simply involved tropospheric data. KR if CO2 was having at least some effect, then you would expect there to be a correlation. You're argument that there is no correlation because co2 is not the only driver of climate, pretty much shows that natural forces will always overwhelm the effect caused by CO2. The Greenland warming of 60 years ago was just the same as the current warming. They were exactly parallel to each other. I don't believe that it just a simple coincidence. Once again could you please state what forcing caused the previous Greenland warming of 60 years ago, and why you don't believe it is causing the current one?
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] If the satelite trends were mostly covered up by the surface trends, does that not imply that the satelite tends are essentially the same as the surface trends? You might want to clarify that.
88518. Adam at 20:40 PM on 15 April 2011
       It warmed just as fast in 1860-1880 and 1910-1940
       Daniel Bailey and Albatross, if there is no warm bias in the surface temperature record could you please explain why there is such a huge difference between satellite data and thermometer readings? Read the following paper: 'An alternative explanation for differential trends at the surface and in the lower troposphere' by Klotzbach et published in the 'Journal of Geophysical Research (2009)
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] This has been discussed elsewhere, see e.g. this RealClimate article and links therein.
88519. Lassesson at 20:06 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       I'm just qurious about Evan's argument saying "Even if we stopped emitting all carbon dioxide [...] it would be cooler in 2050 by about 0.015 degrees." Compared to what? Compared to today? But how much warmer will it be if we do nothing?
88520. David Horton at 19:54 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       It is every piece of nonsense from every thread on every blog, all combined into one. I don't know what kind of mental process allows someone to keep copying and repeating these mistakes, without also reading the answers to them. And just on one old familiar line "evidence showing that the earth responds to the warming due to extra carbon dioxide by dampening the warming" - perhaps he should be asked to explain, in that case, how the climate has changed so radically in the past? Or does the "dampening" only happen when humans insist on burning all the stored carbon?
88521. Gilles at 19:53 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       "As these figures show, estimates from both models and observational data consistently find that the most likely climate sensitivity value is approximately 3°C for a doubling of CO2. " Sorry again, but the concept of "likelihood" is totally irrelevant when aggregating a number of heterogeneous measurements and computations, none of which being really strictly speaking validated. Basing a theory of the motion of planets on the number of proposals and texts and giving a "likelihood" to the geocentric hypothesis on this criterion would have been utterly wrong - they all have been ruined by some minutes of observations of the phases of Venus by Galileo. What is worth is irrefutable scientific facts - not the number of erroneous proposals that have been made here and there. Because if the climate sensitivity has really a meaningful physical value (which is not granted) , the vast majority of all values is wrong, and if it hasn't, they're all wrong.
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] Trollometer reading; |=========_|

       The use of "likelihood" and "likely" in either the subjectivist or objectivist Bayesian sense is perfectly reasonable. The theory of AGW is based on well understood physics: Gilles, please go and read this book to get an idea of the historical development of the theory (it is a collection of the foundational papers with commentary) and then this book to get an overview of the basic concepts. Climate sensitivity is a well-defined physical concept, whether you grant that or not, see the IPCC WG1 report. I suggest otherwise DNFTT is the correct approach here.

88522. David K at 19:45 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       Credibility or accuracy seems to not be of importance to climate deniers - they know that people will continue to cite their posts long after they get debunked. Exposing Climate Denialism
88523. José M. Sousa at 19:21 PM on 15 April 2011
       David Evans' Understanding of the Climate Goes Cold
       Maybe it is worth saying that he is not a climate modeler nor has he published a single peer-reviewed article on climate change according to desmogblog: http://www.desmogblog.com/who-is-rocket-scientist-david-evans
88524. Gilles at 18:13 PM on 15 April 2011
       Video on why record-breaking snow doesn't mean global warming has stopped
       so as DM reminded us several times, a scientific theory cannot be proved, but it can be disproved-actually it *is* scientific only if it *can* be disproved. So in your opinion, what could disprove AGW theory ?
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] Trollometer reading: |========--|

       The IPCC WG1 report is full of falsifiable predictions, pick one. Additional hint, a theory about climate is unlikely to be falsified by an observation of weather; they are not the same thing. I'm glad to see you have got the idea of falsificationism at last though, and are talking about disproving rather proving theories. That at least is some progress.

88525. Gilles at 18:07 PM on 15 April 2011
       How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
       so 1t C producing 3t CO2, what Jaccard proposes is about 600 $/t C China currently burns about 3 Gt C/yr. What you propose is to tax them up to 1800 G$/yr The average income of chinese people is about 3000 $/yr/cap, giving about 4000 G$/yr what you propose means taxing half of the income of people much poorer than western ones. I'm sure this will impact their consumption - I'm not sure they will accept it.
88526. Dikran Marsupial at 18:07 PM on 15 April 2011
       Monckton Myth #16: Bizarro World Sea Level
       Denial Maris is still just trolling, however it is good to see he has looked at a scientific paper, if not actually read it, at least he has scanned it for comments he can use out of context. This does show one of the difficulties scientists will face communicating with the general public, namely the issue of statistical significance. Very few in the general public really understand it, Daniel certainly doesn't. The increase in the rate of sea level rise that you might get from a model based calculation is going to be very small, compared with the uncertainty in the observations (see the figure). At this point, even if you were exactly correct, you would not expect the increase in rate to be statistically significant. The scientists will almost always test for statistical significance anyway and honesty report the outcome. This makes it very easy for denialists to make a hyperbolic claim as Daniel just did, that ignores that point. For another example, see the dishonest reporting of Prof. Jones' comment about statistical significance, he was honest and straightforward, and completely misrepresented by the skeptic blogs and media. I suggest we just ignore him, at least until he can demonstrate that he is not simply a denialist troll, but going back and acknowledging (including a clear statement of his position) the answers given you the previous questions he has posed.
88527. Arkadiusz Semczyszak at 17:56 PM on 15 April 2011
       Christy Crock #3: Internal Variability
       Let me add a quote from this website: “Ultimately, breakthroughs in our understanding of Earth's climate evolution will come from close interactions between paleoproxy experts, paleoclimate modelers, and climate dynamicists. It is time to train a new generation of scientists familiar with all these fields.”
88528. Dikran Marsupial at 17:49 PM on 15 April 2011
       Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected
       Rovinpiper I expect you are referring to the old "no warming since 1998" canard and its variants. Yes, the models do predict there will be occasional periods of a decade or two with little or no warming (or even slight cooling), even in the presence of a long term warming due to e.g. CO2 radiative forcing (i.e. AGW). See the paper by Easterling and Wehner. The models can't predict when this will happen (as it is "weather" rather than "climate") but they clearly do predict that it will happen. Yes, this does get pointed out on a regular basis, but skeptic blogs have a tendency to keep trotting out the same tired canards again and again, even though they have been debunked on a regular basis.
88529. RSVP at 17:37 PM on 15 April 2011
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       MichaelM 382 "Why do you stop at 200 years? " I said "generally approaches zero" just for the reason, otherwise I would have said "reaches" zero. As long as it has been growing, you are right. And the issue (I believe) is not overall climate change, but that part which is due to humans.
88530. RSVP at 17:29 PM on 15 April 2011
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       KR 379 "You're still claiming that energy use is somehow qualitatively different from greenhouse gas entrapment, that the heat from energy use doesn't radiate IR like the heat from the sun " Remember the form of the Stephan Boltzmann's Law that relates to what you are talking about contains the letter A. A is for area. What is the surface area when you are talking about energy delivered in a reciprocating internal combustion engine, or ocean water cooling a nuclear power plant?
88531. Arkadiusz Semczyszak at 17:15 PM on 15 April 2011
       Christy Crock #3: Internal Variability
       @Albatross “So I am afraid that your papers are irrelevant to this discussion.” Nothing could be further from the truth. The changes described in the cited papers that I was rapidly and quickly - today are identical. External factors described for the past - are discussed, eg a direct effect of the TSI and volcanoes - not to prove. If past IMP was able to cause rapidly and quickly changes, perhaps eg as stochastic remainder D.-O. ... Abrupt glacial climate changes due to stochastic resonance, Ganopolski and Rahmstorf 2002., Centennial-to-millennial-scale Holocene climate variability in the North Atlantic region induced by noise, Prange, Jongma and Schulz, 2010., Holocene temperature records show millennial-scale periodicity, Loehle &Singer, 2010. Sure you can say that so much the worse for current warming - a small impulse - RF CO2 - a powerful change ... Therefore, you can also say, however, and that a further increase p.CO2 in the atmosphere is insignificant when all process of feedback has been running ... “The NIPCC is not a credible source of scientific information. It is propaganda and nothing more than a elaborate misinformation document.” 1. Please prove it on the example cited by me - instead of using "ad hominem” and invective. 2. NIPCC says the same about the IPCC. Christy is an eminent scientist - to discredit him, have done better. @Stephen Baines “... paleo climate changes and are consistent with GHE and AGW ...” - with very, very large range of possible error - yes. I think we detailed "to discuss” the Holocene Optimum and its abrupt end - in a separate post.
88532. MichaelM at 17:11 PM on 15 April 2011
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       RSVP 381 Why do you stop at 200 years? Prior to that the energy released must have been smaller but had been accumulating for 1000's of years surely? Why is visible light not accumulating also?
88533. RSVP at 16:48 PM on 15 April 2011
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       pbjamm 377 "How much energy are we talking about here? " If the value 0.028 W/m2 is correct, simply multiply this by the surface area of the Earth and then multiply by the years for which this value is the case. The total time is around 200 years, while the value 0.028 generally approaches zero as you go backwards.
88534. RSVP at 16:41 PM on 15 April 2011
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       muoncounter 378 "Can't argue with you there. Summers are hotter than winters; late-afternoon is the hottest part of the day. Is this news? Was this in need of an explanation?" Depends. Someone might want to believe that a day temperature high was higher (in late Spring for instance) due solely to the extra minutes that the Sun had radiated that day, when in fact it is in the main due to heat that was progressively accumulating throughout the season. As long as the pulse is ON, the energy is building, and idea that is perfectly consistent with the 1st Law of Thermodynamics.
88535. Dan Moutal at 16:39 PM on 15 April 2011
       How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
       per tonne of CO2 equivalent emissions, I think... hmmm, might have to do some digging, but for now lets assume my memory isn't completely bonkers.
88536. scaddenp at 15:30 PM on 15 April 2011
       Monckton Myth #16: Bizarro World Sea Level
       Umm, the amount of carbon is greater and sealevel is higher. The RATE of change is another story. The closest thing you can get to prediction of rate from climate response that I know of is Vermeer and Rahmstorf. Nothing unexpected here. Your use of 'catastrophic' has no meaning without definition. Perhaps a better way to approach the problem is to ask what predictions from WG2 do think is not going happen with respect to sea level rise?
88537. Gilles at 15:11 PM on 15 April 2011
       Christy Crock #3: Internal Variability
       77 - but weren't 2010 conditions "implausible" in 1880, since conditions of 2010 were never met 100 years ago ? "Who cares about the "characteristic relaxation timescale for an "implausible" initialization to reach quasi-steady state?"?" I care, and I think you should. This is not trolling : its give an indication of the maximum period of variability that the model is able to simulate. 76 - Albatross : if the relevant citation is ""When you look at the possibility of natural unforced variability, you see that can cause excursions that we've seen recently", I think it's perfectly true in computer simulations since some runs show sometimes variations of 0.6 °C in three decades - but anyway as I said it not really a proof of anything.
       Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] Sorry I am not going to respond to your trolling anymore. If you think there is a problem with the initialisation of the models, download some code and see if you can demonstrate it. Report back here when you are done. I suggest others do likewise and DNFTT.
88538. Gilles at 15:00 PM on 15 April 2011
       How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
       sorry is your $200 per t CO2 or per t C ?
88539. villabolo at 14:53 PM on 15 April 2011
       CO2 is plant food
       Did the title change on the twin post,"Too much of a good thing is a bad thing. Increasing Carbon Dioxide, as 'plant food', is not good for plants."
88540. villabolo at 14:45 PM on 15 April 2011
       CO2 is plant food
       Correction on the above post. Should read: 1. CO2 is plant food. 2. CO2 is good for agriculture. They're the same idea but the layman might search for one phrase versus the other. Hence the possible title change to incorporate both phrases.
88541. villabolo at 14:36 PM on 15 April 2011
       CO2 is plant food
       John (JC); I really don't see the need for redundant posts. It's somewhat like the multiple "planets warming" posts that can and have been incorporated into one rebuttal. The general public may have heard of both statements (titles): 1. CO2 is plant food 2. Too much of a good thing is a bad thing. Increasing Carbon Dioxide is not good for plants. Nonetheless, for the sake of streamlining, there should be one rebuttal. Perhaps the title could be changed, in order to capture the attention of the layman whose mind might be more focused on one phrase rather than the other. If you think that re-titling, for the sake of removing redundant posts, is recommended please let me know and I will think of something.
88542. Daniel Bailey at 14:20 PM on 15 April 2011
       Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected
       Found it. The last month with below-average temperature was February 1985. That makes 313 consecutive months with temperatures above the 20th Century average. Not that anyone expected that... Betcha that streak continues for some time. The Yooper
88543. Daniel Bailey at 13:54 PM on 15 April 2011
       Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected
       Thanks for that. That Chevelle pic brought back memories (we had a '71, retrofitted as an emergency response vehicle: 375 engine, glass packs, skid plate, everything...hit the gas & watch the oil companies profits spike on the tach).
88544. muoncounter at 13:42 PM on 15 April 2011
       Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected
       Looks like some time in the late '70s: [source] But everything was cooler in the '70s.
88545. Daniel Bailey at 13:31 PM on 15 April 2011
       Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected
       Hey, muoncounter, do you remember offhand the last month that was cooler than normal? IIRC, it was sometime in 1985, but I can't remember exactly (and am too tired to look it up). Been toying with writing a post on that subject. Like the odds on throwing "heads" with a coin 300+ consecutive times... Thanks, The Yooper
88546. muoncounter at 13:28 PM on 15 April 2011
       Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected
       Rovinpiper#3: "failing to explain the relatively low amount of warming that we've seen?" Apparently you missed the point of this post? Its in the large blue letters at the top of the last paragraph: Warming is Consistent with What We Expect As if that wasn't enough, there are half a dozen other threads on climate sensitivity, which all say the same thing. And a few on predictions made as far back as 1988 which pretty much called it. If you've been paying attention, this isn't news.
88547. Rovinpiper at 13:14 PM on 15 April 2011
       Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected
       Thanks for the reply, Dikran. So are these AOGCMs that incorporate aerosols also failing to explain the relatively low amount of warming that we've seen? If not, why don't mainstream climate scientists simply respond to the claim that, "Earth hasn't warmed nearly as much as the models predicted..." with "That's not true, the model of lead author et al. (year) accurately portrays the warming of the past 35 years." ?
       Moderator Response: [DB] Given that we've just exited the warmest decade on record, which was warmer than the 90s, which was warmer than the 80s, etc, what "relatively low amount of warming" do you refer to?
88548. daniel maris at 12:57 PM on 15 April 2011
       Monckton Myth #16: Bizarro World Sea Level
       Marcus - Sorry - that was a quote from the Church and White Paper (2011) cited by Scaddenp. It doesn't seem to accord with the impression given by various posters here of an inexorable increase in the rate of sea level rise ending in catastrophic inundations. However, I think you've been instructed by DB not to engage with me on this, so be careful.
       Response:

       [DB] Church and White 2011 make no attempt to project future SLR trends; you'd know this if you'd have read it.  A look at their trends:

       

       And the overall trends in global MSL:

       

       The overall trend is greater than linear; in order to hit the expected rise of 0.8 to 1.2 (or more) meters rise by 2100, the trend will also have to continue to increase in greater-than-linear fashion.  This will have great implications for various countries around the world, something the "various posters" here have tried to convey.  Why? A non-linear increase in trend won't stop on a dime...

88549. Tom Curtis at 12:02 PM on 15 April 2011
       Muller Misinformation #2: 'leaked' tree-ring data
       Steve McIntyre's "documentation" leaves a lot to be desired. After arguing strenuously that the data was not available until after September 08, he admits in an update that evidence clearly shows it was available on Sept 12th, 08. From that he concludes that it was updated on Sept 9th, on no other evidence than that that date post dates his FOI inquiry; and despite information from the website administrator (Osborne) that it was updated in August 08. Curiously, the NCDC cache of data for Briffa 98 was last updated on "Wednesday, 20-Aug-2008 11:23:45 EDT", which is consistent with a decision to publicly release the data in August of 08. Thus McIntyre is shown to follow his consistent pattern of promulgating the most negative possible view of the "hockey crews" actions which are not actually contradicted by the facts. Muller, in the meantime, misinterprets the facts presented by McIntyre to create an even more negative fantasy.
88550. Daniel Bailey at 11:48 AM on 15 April 2011
       Solar Hockey Stick
       Re-reading Trenberth's rede, I think he actually used the word "tapestry"... Anyway, I'm sure Spencer & Christy can figure it out, given a decade or two to parse it.

Prev  1763  1764  1765  1766  1767  1768  1769  1770  1771  1772  1773  1774  1775  1776  1777  1778  Next