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Comments 96501 to 96550:
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actually thoughtful at 04:33 AM on 10 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
apiratelooksat50: "I'm a big fan of Popper" - Based on past posts, I am going to guess that you are a fan of Popper in that you were exposed to his work in a philosophy of science college class and realized, in the absence of any particular issue, that Popper's methods would indeed move you towards the truth. Now you are struck by something (climate science (aka AGW)) that directly smacks your internal ideology or internal belief system in the face. Popper is still your man. So rather than keep posting the same erroneous claims here over and over - why don't you study Popper with AGW in mind? Hopefully your emotion-free acceptance of Popper when there wasn't something you are so vested in on the table will trump your current stubborn insistence on wrong ideas now. In short the challenge is to correctly use Popper to support any of your skeptic arguments. I realize you are trying to get past your blocks on climate science, and I appreciate that. But you are also very frustrating because 1) you don't appear to internalize any of the science that many, many posters have pointed out to you and 2) you teach science! Which makes it even more annoying that you don't understand it, and a crying shame that you are influencing the next generation with flawed logic. There is no problem questioning the science, there is a big problem with questioning the science, then rejecting the science with no valid reason. Go to Popper, and if philosophy is your strength and you ares still bogged down, check out W.V. Quine's Web of Belief. At least you will have some insight into why it is so important to you to reject well understood, mainstream science. -
Dikran Marsupial at 04:24 AM on 10 February 2011Global Warming and Cold Winters
DSL@161 According to Karl Popper, a hypothesis can't be proven, but can only be corroborated (supported) by experiment and observation; however a hypothesis can be disproven, which is at the heart of falsificationism. If I have a hypothesis that a coin has two heads, and I flip it an observe a tail, then my hypothesis has been unambiguously disproven. -
Mike G at 04:13 AM on 10 February 2011Climate Change Impacts on Ocean Ecosystems
@ Arkadiusz In addition to the issues others have pointed out, your links on NPP do not show what you claim they do. The first one, which you claim shows an increase in NPP doesn't make any claims about global NPP trends. The only trend shown is for a single grid cell in the Irminger Sea. However, if you follow the link back to the original data source at Oregon State, you do find the presentation Climate Driven Trends in Contemporary Ocean Productivity which shows a decrease in global NPP. Although the data only covers a short period, the result is consistent with in situ measurements of phytoplankton. Note that the authors of that paper warn that global NPP is cyclical, so short the short periods covered by satellite data aren't necessarily useful for determining the long-term trend. Your other link on NPP is just about a new model to convert satellite data into NPP measurements since the latter cannot be measured directly from space. Luckily though, there are other, much older methods of measuring NPP including respirometery, directly measuring chlorophyll concentrations, using Secchi disks, etc. which provide us with data independent of the satellites. It does not follow from your link, that because the satellite algorithms are still being optimized, we know very little about NPP via all other methods. -
arch stanton at 03:56 AM on 10 February 2011Monckton Myth #9: Monckton vs Monckton on heat waves
Steve L, good example. BTW, when was the last time you heard someone say: “A record high low was set for this date last night…”? -
Albatross at 03:56 AM on 10 February 2011Monckton Myth #9: Monckton vs Monckton on heat waves
SteveL @19, "I do not know, for example, in Albatross @17 if the abstract refers to 24 hour periods or daily maximum values." The title for the paper specifically refers to daytime temperatures, as does the abstract. So that bolded sentence refers to daytime. -
DSL at 03:53 AM on 10 February 2011Global Warming and Cold Winters
Actually, mozart, an hypothesis is either supported or not supported by the results of experimentation and observation. There is no "prove" or "disprove" in science. Instances of experiment or observation either raise or lower the probability/certainty for a particular hypothesis and any associated theories. Jackboots, indeed! The heart of this site is the presentation of alternative theories and hypotheses to AGW. I don't recall the brownshirts offering the same type of forum to non-Aryans.Moderator Response: [Daniel Bailey] mozart just invoked Godwin's Law. -
Albatross at 03:51 AM on 10 February 2011Global Warming and Cold Winters
Mozart @160, With respect, you are talking though your hat mate. You have clearly not read the literature, nor or you paying attention to what is been claimed by the scientists-- both observational and modelling data have demonstrated that changes in the Arctic ice cover have marked impacts on the the atmospheric circulation, both regionally and afar though teleconnections. The "warm Arctic, cold continents" is one of them, but do not interpret it to mean that all the northern continents will experience colder conditions for the entire winter. Anyways, a couple of those references are provided in the NSIDC reports that I linked to earlier, there are many more examples out there. And you are making the mistake of using data for one point in space to try and refute a hypothesis and conceptual model. Has it occurred to you that where the long-wave trough plunges southwards will vary from event-to-event? That is, each and every single negative phase of the AO is not the same, sometimes the trough will be displaced to the east, sometimes to the west. The maps that I showed above were the loading patterns derived for many events. The same holds true for ENSO, which is very well studied, each event is different-- so looking at data from one point and claiming it refutes ENSO (and its known teleconnections ) because it does not show the expected response because you cannot find a pattern in a particular metric (that you decided on) is pointless. By doing so you are missing the big picture. If you have an issue with the work of the scientists, then by all means do some research, write it up and submit it to a scientific journal for publication. to date all we have seen here are musings and some "fiddling" around with data for one location-- so I find it odd that you are lecturing others here about the scientific method and hypothesis testing. If i were you I would be asking more questions of the knowledgeable people here at SkS-- sincere questions please. Please read my post at 156-- going by your recent post, you seem to have ignored it (as well as posts made by others). -
Steve L at 03:34 AM on 10 February 2011Monckton Myth #9: Monckton vs Monckton on heat waves
Yes, unfortunately English lends itself very well to those who would exploit its ambiguity. One example is "a day", which I interpret to mean essentially "one 24 hour period". But I interpret "day" differently if it is mentioned in the same breath as "night" -- under this latter condition the period of time is cut essentially in half. Since nights warming much faster than days is a hallmark of AGW, then it behooves us to be very precise when we're talking about record temperatures. I do not know, for example, in Albatross @17 if the abstract refers to 24 hour periods or daily maximum values. If we can't communicate meaning precisely with one another, then you can imagine how easy it is to obfuscate the meaning of scientific results to the lay public. -
Albatross at 03:27 AM on 10 February 2011Voicing values and climate change
Mark et al., A great dialogue. I encourage you to please send this to the cabinet ministers and leaders of all the political parties in Australia. be sure to retain the SkS URL and send along a copy (or link) of the "The Scientific Guide to Global Warming Skepticism". This piece is also just the right length for an op ed in a major daily newspaper, perhaps with a graphic showing the rise of CO2 superimposed on the global SAT record, or some similar attention-grabbing graphic. So please do consider pursuing that avenue as well. -
michael sweet at 03:19 AM on 10 February 2011Global Warming and Cold Winters
Muoncounter: I admire your finding out that Chicago has warmed at 0.22C for the past 4 decades. Where did you get that data from? Is it hard to pull out of the database? -
XPLAlN at 03:14 AM on 10 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
apiratelooksat50: "Dr. Spencer is asking for a paper ruling out natural, internal climate cycles as the cause of "most" of the recent warming" That would be some paper - the one that knows everything. But is he really asking for that? Or is he merely exploiting rhetorically the unsurprising fact that no single paper exists which 'rules out the possibility of natural causes'? I'd suggest that it's the latter - and a clever sleight of hand by Spencer who finds himself with nothing of substance to offer as an alternative to AGW. It really boils down to this: until such time as Spencer actually publishes a proper alternative with sufficient detail that it can be falsified, he doesn't even have a hypothesis to challenge the mainstream theory of AGW. Just rhetoric. -
arch stanton at 03:11 AM on 10 February 2011Monckton Myth #9: Monckton vs Monckton on heat waves
Steve L, Billyjoe, Clonmac, villabolo, others, If I may- Ambiguosityologist (am-big-U-osity-olo-gist); someone who makes a practice of intentionally manipulating vague or unclear terminology, or someone who misuses highly technical terminology, with the intent of misleading for propaganda purposes. E.g. the Viscount Monckton.Moderator Response: [DB] Fixed text per request. -
michael sweet at 02:57 AM on 10 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
These are terrific slides. I think your point about disguising information as fun especially good. I would change the volcanoes question to: How much more CO2 is due to human activity than volcanoes? I find your wording hard to read. I would change the sea level rise question to emphasize the cost more. $25,000 billion doesn't mean much to me. Perhaps 25-28 Trillion dollars would work. The cost is so phenominal that it is difficult to convey properly. -
Dikran Marsupial at 02:49 AM on 10 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
apiratelooksat50@78 That is precisely the point I was making! It was not correct to assert that Spencer's challenge was valid simply becuase the definition of "natural internal cycles" was left unspecified, so the hypothesis was impossible to falsify. Essentially it is fine as rhetoric, but it isn't valid science. If you try and specify what "natural internal cycles" actually means and specify mechanisms to the point you can actually define what is and what isn't consistent with the hypothesis, you will end up with somthing rather like a coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation model (AOGCM). At which point the experiment has already been done and it has been shown that the observered warming is not consistent with natural cycles, see the post by Daniel Bailey. Dr Spencer ought to be well aware of this, as it is "Frequently Asked Question 9.2" on page 702-3 in the most recent IPCC WG1 Scientific Basis Report. The spread of the model runs tells us what is consistent with our current knowledge of "natural variability" and the current warming lies outside the spread of the model runs if anthropogenic forcings are excluded, which means that the observed warming can't be explained by our best understanding of natural variability. P.S. If you think Spencer's challenge doesn't require a well-defined hypothesis, you do not understand Popper at all. Falsificationism requires as well define hypothesis, that much ought to be obvious to anyone who has even dipped into his writing, never mind a big fan! -
MichaelM at 02:46 AM on 10 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
Oxygen 209,460ppm and CO2 398ppm. Could RSVP give some 'scientific' soutces for oxygen running out? To give someone their due respect, sometimes = pointing and laughing. -
apiratelooksat50 at 02:08 AM on 10 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
Dikran, First, we would need to define and agree what constitute "natural internal cycles". Otherwise we would be arguing semantics. I see your point about using the scientific method and agree with it. I'm a big fan of Popper. Perhaps Spencer should define a hypothesis, though I am not sure his challenge requires a hypothesis to be formed. -
Daniel Bailey at 01:54 AM on 10 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
Re: SteveS (18) As Albatross has stated previously, RSVP has set up a straw man argument (the implicit unspoken statement is twofold: that plant uptake will offset rising CO2 emissions and that if we burn it all then the oxygen will be consumed). The statement clearly demonstrates a lack of understanding of the physical world and the carbon cycle. As to the trace gas depleting a non-trace gas statement: we can actually measure this and it is happening (this graph sums it up nicely):
Further discussion on that here.
The Yooper
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Daniel Bailey at 01:40 AM on 10 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
@ XPLAIN (8) Sounds better than most of the drivel coming out of Hollywood these days. Is there a part in it where they find a thriving colony of denialasauri lomborgasi on a remote island (and do they nuke them from orbit)? I'd pay money to see that. Well, only if the popcorn was good. The Yooper -
Dikran Marsupial at 01:32 AM on 10 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
apiratelooksat50@76 Sure. For Spencers challenge to be valid, rather than merely rhetorical, the "null hypothesis" that the majority observed warming is due to the natural variability of the climate, must be a valid scientific hypothesis. A requirement of a scientific (rather than a non-scientific) hypothesis is that there exists at least the potential to disprove the hypothesis should it be false. This is a well established part of scientific method, stemming from the work of Karl Popper. It is my contention that the hypothesis of "natural variability" is unfalsifiable, simply becuase the mechanism of "natural variability" is left unspecified, which means there is no means of establishing which phenomena are consistent with the hypothesis and which are not. Thus *anything* we actually observe can be blithely attributed to "natural variability". It would be easy to prove my contention wrong, by giving an example of an amount of warming that is not consistent with the theory of "natural variation" and that was my challenge - specify a condition that is definitively excluded by Spencer's hypothesis. I am happy to clarify further any of these points, if required, but please try to specify exactly what it is that you don't understand. -
apiratelooksat50 at 01:14 AM on 10 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
Dikran Can you please rephrase your question? -
SteveS at 00:49 AM on 10 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
#16 RSVP: "As far as your comment on the oxygen supply, plants and algae. If CO2 ppm is going up, you must assume that oil combustion is outpacing plants and algae." One of the comments I continually get from someone where I live is that CO2 is a trace gas. I fail to see how increasing a trace gas will deplete a non-trace gas in any appreciable way (unless you believe we're going to be raising the quantity of CO2 to non-trace levels). Do you have any numbers for this? -
Alden Griffith at 00:41 AM on 10 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
@RSVPOn the otherhand, there are also things that do not require science to be known. For instance, even if the petrolium should never run out, the oxygen will. So at some point, regardless of global warming, alternative forms of energy will take over.
I'm confused as to why we don't need science to know this. Using "science" to examine this question shows that we could burn through all known fossil fuel reserves without making much of a dent in atmospheric oxygen. We have far greater problems than the non-problem of oxygen supply. -
Bern at 00:28 AM on 10 February 2011Voicing values and climate change
Phil, the obvious answer to the "natural cycles" bit is to compare with tides. Tide comes in, tide comes out, all's good. But what if, each time the tide came in, it was a little higher up the beach? And each time it went out, it didn't go out quite as far as last time? Surely that would be an issue worth worrying about? I hope this new blog comes up with good discussions of possible approaches to fixing the problem of CO2 emissions. Many 'solutions' are net-cash-positive in the long term - such as energy efficiency - I've heard of industrial cases where a $150,000 cost is recovered within two years, and after that it's all gravy (and how many businesses would say no to an extra $50k-$75k profit every year?) -
HumanityRules at 23:41 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
Moderator #6 One point. From the graph 2010 seems to start at -700 and end at -1150, that's more like 450 Gigatons. I think what you mean is that 600 Gigatons was lost during the melt season, some weight was put on either side of this period.Moderator Response: [Daniel Bailey] Fair point. Net losses vs peak losses in a noisy time series (thank you for pointing that out). But the system is displaying signs of increasing de-linearity and needs further monitoring. -
RSVP at 23:38 PM on 9 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
#15 MichaelIM "If you are going to make stuff up " Sorry if science is second nature to me, as I cant distinguish from what I know and what you call science. As far as your comment on the oxygen supply, plants and algae. If CO2 ppm is going up, you must assume that oil combustion is outpacing plants and algae. Maybe you can "make up some stuff" to explain how this is not so. -
Phil at 23:04 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
I printed the PDF to put in the Kitchen at my workplace but printing double sided means that the answers are on the front and the questions on the back of the previous page ! I printed out pages 2-25 and then 1 and 26 separately. It would be nice to include the Skeptical Science URL in it too -
Phil263 at 22:22 PM on 9 February 2011Voicing values and climate change
Look forward to the UWA blog too. Just one comment about Mark Edwards' post. While a majority of Australians may think privately that CC is a serious issue, I am not certain that everyone is actually convinced that 1)the impact is going to be significant 2) that we need to do something about it now. Even the recent natural disasters that we had in Queensland did not seem to raise that awareness. I had actually many people telling me " Oh, you are going to say that it's all related to climate change, but it isn't really, it's all about natural cycles..." I think that there is a bit of the "head in the sand " attitude here. People sense that may be our activities are harming the environment, but if we took the science seriouisly we would have to change the way we live and we don't really want to change. This is like someone who is addicted to junk food, who is getting overweight because of it, knows that this habit is likely to cause problems in the future, but still doesn't want to modify their diet because they love junk food so much! This attitude to the CC issue is certainly compounded by the fact that some powerful corporate interests and conservative ideologues work hard to spread doubts about the science. But their attempt at disinformation wouldn't go very far if it did not resonate somehow with private attitudes. -
MichaelM at 21:05 PM on 9 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
RSVP: It's telling that your ideas seem to be based on a thorough misunderstanding of scientific principles. Oxygen: it's generated all the time by plants and algae. "My idea here does not represent science, nor pretends to, nor needs to." It does need to. If you are going to make stuff up as a means of arguing it does become rather pointless and tedious for all concerned. -
Dikran Marsupial at 20:58 PM on 9 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
RSVP@13 Ah I see, word games. You are indeed free to buy an idea or not; however that freedom doesn't make your choice rational. As this is skepticalscience it is probably best to stick to ideas that are intended to represent science and leave the word games to one side. -
jyyh at 20:47 PM on 9 February 2011Climate Change Impacts on Ocean Ecosystems
#12 dorlomin, that's a good question. I can only guess reasons for that, one might be the exchange of water between atlantic and other oceans is less in amount than that between indian and pacific. That would be because of the antarctic circumpolar drift, but I'm only guessing here. -
RSVP at 20:27 PM on 9 February 2011Crichton's 'Aliens Cause Global Warming'
#11 " "even if the petrolium should never run out, the oxygen will" interesting suggestion, care to expand? " Combustion depends on oxygen. For all practical purposes oxygen is free "fuel" that is slowly getting consumed, and without oxygen, petrolium becomes quite useless. (I suppose the airlines will be the first to notice this problem.) The point of all this was to illustrate that an idea can have its basis in an understanding of scientific principles (or some notion thereof), as opposed to claiming to represent science. My idea here does not represent science, nor pretends to, nor needs to. If the information is useful, its no different than knowing what the price of bread is in local grocery store. You can buy it or not, embodying a concept called freedom, etc. -
BillyJoe at 20:19 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
I have been interested in climate change for nearly a year now. It seems it's paying off with all correct answers in the quiz :D Thanks to Real Climate and Sceptic Science. :) -
Glenn Tamblyn at 19:05 PM on 9 February 2011A Case Study of a Climate Scientist Skeptic
HR 'changing the flow rate between the two vessels while I alter the flow rate into the whole system.' That isn't the case. The flow through the system is reduced when we first constrict the valve. This is the initial change in the flow into/out of the entire system. This then starts to produce an accumulation of water in the 2 tank system. This imbalance can only be restored when the level of the smaller tank rises enough to force an increased outflow. However, the smaller tank cannot reach this new balance level until the larger tank also reaches this level. So most of the accumulation is actually going into filling the larger tank - around 90% in the case of the climate. Until then, the flow into the largert tank artificially limits the rise in the smaller tank. Only at equilibrium does it all come back to level -
Dikran Marsupial at 19:02 PM on 9 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
apiratelooksat50@67 Good, we both agree that CO2 can be a temporary driver of climate. The next question is how long is temporary. The reason volcanos have a short lived effect is that the aerosols they eject into the atmosphere are short lived, and are gone in a couple of years. CO2 however is much longer lived, the adjustment time of CO2 is several hundred years, and full equilibriation takes tens to hundreds of thousands of years (because full equilibriation requires geological weathering to permanently remove the excess CO2 out of the active carbon cycle and into the lithosphere). There is a good book by David Archer called "The global carbon cycle", which explains the mechanisms involved in detail. The equilibriation from the PETM took on the order of 100,000 years - which is not very temporary from a human perspective (although it is a blink of the eye in geological terms). See Archers book, page 45 for details. Essentially, in your ice in a pan analogy, you need to take into account how long it takes to melt the ice. Sure the effect of CO2 is temporary, but that doesn't mean it is not relevant as "temporary" on a geological timescale is a very long time for us. However, you are continually refusing to answer the question I posed earlier. This sort of evasion is generally an indication that someone is not taking the discussion seriously and making a rhetorical argument rather than a scientific one. If you are not interested in the truth and only want to win a rhetorical debate, then perhaps this is not the site for you. -
Glenn Tamblyn at 18:54 PM on 9 February 2011Voicing values and climate change
A fantastic idea. But oh my God - how do you moderate it to keep everything OT. Discussions of solutions Only, not the Climate Science itself. One insight, if it hasn't been considered already, is separating the different streams of 'solutions'; Technical like energy technologies, Economic, Political, Social, Psycholocal, Advocacy and Outreach. Keep us posted. -
BaerbelW at 17:43 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
@Eric L Thanks for your feedback (and finding yet another typo!). I'll collect suggestions and will then re-upload the modified files. The quiz originated in connection with a 350.org activity which is why I included a question about 350 ppm. The individual questions are not numbered so any print-outs can obviously select suitable questions and/or re-arrange them as needed. @Daniel Bailey Thanks for the pointer about Greenland ice in 2010! A general "problem" with questions like the one about the Greenland ice is that they are moving targets. Ideally, these types of questions should be updated whenever new data (plus the corresponding graphics!) become available.Moderator Response: [Daniel Bailey] You're very welcome. A graphic expressing the Greenland mass-loss growing quadratically (which it is) would be nice, if achievable. A 3D version of this graph, but showing the loss growing instead of the mass declining, if you will. -
SME at 17:16 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
To further help inform people you could try a question of this form: What percentage of its ice was lost by Greenland last year? A) 5% B) 1% C) 0.1% D) 0.01% Answer: 286 Gigatonne or 0.01% of ice was lost by Greenland last year. _____________________ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenland_ice_sheet Total Greenland ice (ice sheet plus glaciers) ~= 2.85 megagigatonnes (2.85 E15 tonnes) 2.86 E9 / 2.85 E15 ~= 0.01% If all ice melt was considered to be land based ice, consequent sealevel rise would have been about 0.7 mm. Not a trivial amount in absolute terms. IF melting from this source continued at this rate for 100 years it would cause about 70mm (almost 3 inches) sea level rise. SMEModerator Response: [Daniel Bailey] A couple of points: 286 Gigatons was the 2009 amount. The corresponding 2010 value was 600 Gigatons. The latest research suggests future Greenland and Antarctic ice losses will be anything but linear, with multiple-meter rises in sea level possible in decadal timescales. -
mozart at 16:28 PM on 9 February 2011Global Warming and Cold Winters
[ -Snip- ]Moderator Response: [Daniel Bailey] If you insist to continually be off-topic, the moderators will have no choice but to intervene. You persist in your focus on record highs and lows in spite of everyone here trying to help you. Discussion of highs and lows should take place on the dedicated thread for it. No one wants to stifle dialogue. But it needs to be channeled into the appropriate venue for it. Thanks for your understanding! -
Eric L at 16:12 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
This is great. I would note: you mispelled "decade" on page 17. Also, I would have another question introducing the issue of CO2 acidification, as it is not a problem many are aware of and I suspect many would be confused by the question or find it ridiculous. Also, and this is just my feeling, but I think the 350 question is kind of subjective for a quiz to teach people the facts (that isn't to say it's not correct), and also given the following question may give people the impression that the damage is already done and there's not much point in trying to fix it now. -
watchingthedeniers at 15:38 PM on 9 February 2011Voicing values and climate change
This is a terrific initiative, and I look forward to the forth coming blog. It is a much needed voice. -
Phila at 15:16 PM on 9 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
You continue to neglect physics. To be precise, he continues to neglect physics that people here have repeatedly taken the time and trouble to explain to him, in this thread and others. Which is beginning to seem somewhat rude, as well as irrational. -
ahaynes at 15:01 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
Also, Michael Tobis has had some good puzzlers, on In It; though I'm not sure how to find them again though. And Yulsman's What are you looking at? "mystery image" -
muoncounter at 14:51 PM on 9 February 2011Global Warming and Cold Winters
#154: "providing no support for the view that a shift has occured." Your daily records analysis makes no sense whatsoever. Climate change is about trends established over many years and large areas. The GHCN temperature trend in the 5x5 degree lat/long grid in the Chicago area (40-45N lat, 85-90W long)? Up 0.22 degrees C per decade since 1970. The shift has occurred, whether you can see it out your window or not. -
ahaynes at 14:39 PM on 9 February 2011So, you think that learning about climate change needs to be tedious?
I should clarify that the quiz over at the Warming101 post (link) has a lot of Qs different from Baerbel's quiz (though they do overlap). Baerbel's is much more beautiful, with the images... -
dana1981 at 14:32 PM on 9 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
Marvin - fossil fuels are artificially cheap because we don't pay for the climate change or associated damages their co2 emissions cause. That's what economists call an "externality". Pirate - the whole reason the planet is warming is because it isn't in equilibrium, because of the ever-increasing co2 forcing. You continue to neglect physics. -
muoncounter at 14:25 PM on 9 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
#67: "equilibration comes into play (i.e., after a major volcanic eruption) and temps go back to their normal phase" It might be wise to check your facts, especially if you intend teaching this idea. Robock 2003 provides a thorough and definitive analysis. The June 15, 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption was a large but relatively shortlived shock to the Earth’s atmosphere. Temperature and CO2 records conclusively show that a brief cooling and temporary reduction in the rate of increase of atmospheric CO2 were done with within 2-3 years of the eruption. So no, there's no 'equilibration,' whatever that is supposed to mean. But your right, temps went back to their normal phase -- increasing due to the forcing of anthropogenic CO2. -
scaddenp at 13:50 PM on 9 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
Pirate, just an addendum. Volcanoes make short-lived contribution (your ice-cube) because the aerosols are quickly gone. CO2 is not quickly gone. -
scaddenp at 13:48 PM on 9 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
I've considered that CO2 can "drive" climate and rejected it. So what psuedo-skeptic nonsense did you fall for? Got some peer-reviewed science to back your conclusion. What do you mean by your reference of "artificially cheap fossil fuels"? Fossil fuels are subsidized. That makes them artificially cheap. IEA estimated subsidies worldwide to be US$557B in 2008. See IEA report for the details. Ending subsidies is a good way to get an different energy structure started, but bad for fossil fuel company shareholders. -
scaddenp at 13:41 PM on 9 February 2011How We Know Recent Global Warming Is Not Natural
Pirate - and if you continue to add ice cubes? CO2 is eventually removed by geological processes but at geological rates. Meanwhile, we keep adding CO2. What concerns me is that you can postulate all kinds of nonsense if you don't do the maths. Doing the maths means comparing the relative strengths of forcings and the effects on temperature. (That we you don't get the "recovering from LIA" nonsense). -
GFW at 13:36 PM on 9 February 2011Articgate: perpetuating the myth that Arctic sea ice has recovered
Rhjames is the very definition of a "concern troll" (google that if you're not familiar with the term). Note his hilarious use of "We" to open three paragraphs. Hence, I don't expect him to return, or to read the reasonable responses people have written if he does. Nonetheless, in case someone else was taken in ... I'll expand on Phillippe's response a bit. The global sea ice plot at Cryosphere Today shows a clear downward trend. All studies of land ice on Greenland show significant mass loss (see elsewhere on this site) and recent studies of Antarctica are showing the same sort of decline (also referenced on this site). That's all the "polar ice" so, yes, total polar ice is decreasing. As for the NW passage, there was exactly one single-year passage before recent years (when there have been many, some in very light craft that couldn't take any serious impact with ice). That historic passage was of course commanded by Henry Larsen in the St. Roch, which was a heavily reinforced schooner. The St. Roch was able to squeeze down leads in ice that would look solid had there been satellite images back then. So really, the passage wasn't "open" in the sense that we use the term - meaning clear blue water on the satellite images. Larsen was a brave man who got lucky. Considering his one other passage took 3 years, we can say he averaged 2y per passage. In 2010, some Norwegians did the EW passage and the NW passage in a couple of months, using an ultralight fiberglass trimaran. There's just no comparison.
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