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All IPCC definitions taken from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Working Group I Contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Annex I, Glossary, pp. 941-954. Cambridge University Press.

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Comments 109751 to 109800:

  1. A South American hockey stick
    Re: Jeff Freymueller (3) Try here. the Yooper
  2. Jeff Freymueller at 12:41 PM on 18 September 2010
    A South American hockey stick
    This is really interesting! Thanks for posting it. Unfortunately, it is in a section of Journal of Geophysical Research that I can't get (but maybe at work!).
  3. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    #41: "the warming is masking the cooling" Maybe it was this junk from the junkman, circa 2005. "One of the more interesting "Sky Is Falling" postulations made in recent years has been the claim that the apparently cooling stratosphere is masking observation of anticipated warming in the troposphere."
  4. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Oops, I was waaay late on that one (hadn't refreshed the page in a while before writing #39). I see others have responded better than I, and am again grateful for the general quality of comments on this site.
  5. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    @baz: "So, the warming is masking the cooling? Where have I heard that before?" I glossed over this passage before, but it kind of nags me. Where *did* you hear that before? This sounds like a reference to something else, but I can't figure it out. Anyway, I had a look a the graph you tried to embed, and I don't understand why you think this shows a cooling. Did you not see the "2004" arrow, indicating the current range of temperatures? In fact, this graph clearly shows the warming is currently masking any long-term cooling effects. Note, however, that the subject of this article is about shorter time frames (to the order of 30 years).
  6. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    @barry: you are completely right, my choice of words was ambiguous. In my mind I was saying it in the context of climate science, where "we are cooling" means the climate is cooling in a statistically significant way. To claim otherwise would have been scientifically incorrect, in other words. Indeed, one has to carefully phrase what they say, especially when confronting others about their own rhetorical inconcistencies. In my defense, I'll say English is not my first language, but I'll try to be more careful.
  7. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    It's about frame of reference. There's nothing wrong per se with saying, "the globe has been cooling", when this applies to a time frame in which the globe has actually been cooling. If the statement is void of the word climate then it can be 'true' for short-term periods, but the point of confusion is that 'skeptics' reading such statements, and probably also writing them, implicitly assume that it is climate that is being discussed, instead of short-term weather phenomena. archiesteel in the post above this one is thus dragged into the murky waters by such omissions. By 'scientifically correct', they mean 'climatically significant'. 'The globe has cooled since X' may be 'scientifically correct', but it is tosh with respect to recent global climate. So much care has to be taken with contrarians. They are not interested in a reasonable conversation or with seeking the *truth* They only want ammunition, and careless phrasing provides them with it.
  8. A South American hockey stick
    @Sealcove: well, there's an easy answer to that, and it's contained in your own examples: "many of which seem to take thousands of years." The current observed change, as can easily bee seen on the above graphs, is quite rapid. Cycles that take thousands of years to complete by definition tend to move much slower than what we're seeing. Thus, it is very unlikely that the current, rapid change is due to such natural cycles.
  9. Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    When Lal countered that he never said what David Rose in The Daily Mail attributed to him, Rose's journalism was investigated, and it was found he was a serial abuser. Even Roger Pielke Jr, a 'skeptic', wrote to Rose asking him to correct the record. The headline for Rose's article on Murari Lal is, "Glacier scientist: I knew data hadn’t been verified." So the spin starts with the headline. Murari Lal is not a glaciologist.
  10. A South American hockey stick
    Question, is 1600 years enough of a sample in terms of climate cycles to be significant? I am just thinking of some of the wild swings we see in much larger samples, many of which seem to take thousands of years, and I don't quite know how to explain to myself or others why such a small snap shot is significant.
  11. Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    Re: thingadonta (8, 13, 14) An example of making a positive contribution to this thread might have looked like this:
    "There was indeed an error in Section 10.6.2 of the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) in that the attribution of the Himalayan Glaciers disappearing by the year 2035 was incorrect. However, a closer look into the tale reveals that the date cited, 2035, most likely crept into various reports from an original 1996 International Hydrological Programme (IHP) report by Kotlyakov, published by UNESCO, which gave a rough estimate of shrinkage of the world's total area of glaciers and ice caps by 2350. J. Graham Cogley, of Trent University (Ontario), suggested that the 2035 figure in the second sentence of the WGII paragraph was apparently a typographic error, and should have instead read 2350. Summational source here."
     See? That wasn't so hard. Unless all you seek is to generate controversy and to waste others' time. Then carry on, my wayward son. The Yooper
  12. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    @Baz: Point what to me? That you admitted not being rational about this subject? That you picked a five-year (or is it ten years now) time frame in a completely arbitrary way, and this change a belief you claim to have had before? Oh, yeah, and let's not forget that you've "worked with acids." Well, so have I, so I guess it makes me as much of an expert as you. It's not surprise you've decided to make this personal instead of answering my counter-arguments, however I have to remind you this is against site policy. As for me, this will be my last intervention on this thread. Next time we meet, try to have actual scientific, rational arguments, m'kay?
  13. Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    thingadonta #13 A good way to have yourself not taken seriously in any discussion of climate change is to use the British Daily Mail as a primary source to justify your point of view. Example here.
  14. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    @Baz: "Anyway, we ARE cooling." ...only if you cherry-pick a very specific time frame. By any other (scientifically-correct) measures, we are not.
  15. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    Baz... I would trust what the experts in the field have to say. If they told me that increasing ice mass in Antarctica was a signal of a coming ice age, I would listen. What I think you're failing to recognize or read is the accelerating nature. If you look at 0.001% (a figure that I still need to confirm) as a linear figure, you're right, that's not going to amount to much very fast. It's the fact that this is accelerating that is pause for concern. And it's not even a concern over, "Oh crap the southern ice cap is going to melt soon" it's just yet another indicator of the impact anthropogenic CO2 is having on the climate. And relative to the Arctic ice, maybe you haven't been watching the PIOMAS ice volume chart. 2010 is going to be a dramatic low for ice volume.
  16. Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    "To any normal thinking person, this mean exagerating for political purposes, a clear and admitted breach of IPCC prinicples." 1) Learn to type ("prinicples," "should be releaved of duties", etc). Reading your posts hurts my brain. 2) Snark comments about the science and scientists are not what this site is about. Try WUWT instead. 3) This is tempest in a tea pot, quit adding your own farts to the winds. 4) Your attempt at satire failed miserably. I suggest you leave it to those with a talen for it. Your comment adds *nothing* to the scientific discussion, and neither does this one. So I'll ask you to please cease your hit-and-run, poorly-worded, scientifically-deficient posts, as this isn't an advocacy or debate site. Thanks, and have a nice day!
  17. Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    ....that is sent back to 1st year science class.
  18. Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    re #12 The statement was made to show how stupid the glacier statement was. There is an interesting quote by Dr Lal, co ordinating author of the chapter, who desipuite knowing it was dubious, states "It related to several countries in this region and their water sources. We thought that if we can highlight it, it will impact policy-makers and politicians and encourage them to take some concrete action" Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1245636/Glacier-scientists-says-knew-data-verified.html#ixzz0zpcSb8EC. To any normal thinking person, this mean exagerating for political purposes, a clear and admitted breach of IPCC prinicples. "IPCC reports should be neutral with respect to policy". Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1245636/Glacier-scientists-says-knew-data-verified.html#ixzz0zpcmLu7g I would like to use my dubious statement above, for political purposes. I am concerned about Asias energy supplies in the next few decades, and the rising threat to these from climate science, so I am going to leave it in my report to "impact policy-makers and politicians and encourage them to take some concrete action". Dr Lal should be releaved of duties and sent back to 1
  19. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Ken #14 "Just the fact that we are all niggling about whether the Earth is slightly heating or cooling over the last 8-15 years, or whether it is statistically significant is pretty good proof that the theory of CO2GHG forcing as the main driver of global warming is in serious trouble." How do you make these illogical leaps? It simply means you're asking the wrong questions. Have you considered the possibility thatyour ideological preconceptions contaminate your ability to evaluate the science in a level headed way? I might write up a post for SS on statistical power and trends in the next week or two to dispel this rubbish once and for all.
  20. Why positive feedback doesn't necessarily lead to runaway warming
    70, TTTM: I'm not sure what you mean by "literally trapped". What is pretty clear from the radiative transfer theory is that the intensity of IR power reflects the temperature at the photosphere; so the higher the altitude, the lower the radiated power, the smaller the amount of cooling. I don't see any conflict with cirrus clouds: Just because you use a blanket doesn't mean you can't wear pajamas.
  21. Why positive feedback doesn't necessarily lead to runaway warming
    TTTM: After some thought, I come back to the same point of view: - Increasing convection, in itself, wouldn't change the radiative forcing budget, so it wouldn't affect the global average temperature. Additional mixing would probably stir things up a bit more, spreading the heat around: So you would get "more weather". Not surprising: weather is pretty much driven by convection anyway. - The ground-level heating should increase the absolute humidity, which should result in a smaller lapse rate (rate of temperature drop with altitude): Dry air has a lapse rate of about 10-deg-C/km, whereas saturated moist air drops at about 5-deg-C/km. What this implies is that the ground-level temperature will not need to rise as much to make the radiative forcing imbalance go away. This effect can never be big enough to result in a net cooling, but it will moderate (to some extent) the warming due to the enhanced greenhouse effect. So, never let it be said that I denied ALL negative feedback loops in global warming!
  22. Why positive feedback doesn't necessarily lead to runaway warming
    High level Cirrus clouds make a large difference to keeping the long wave energy within the atmosphere. Your ideas that the (15um) long wave energy is literally trapped within the atmosphere isn't supported by evidence (or the science)
  23. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    Rob, what I'm saying is that the 'loss' is so small (in context with the amount that the Antarctic has) as to be insignificant, and within Grace's error, surely? As of now, it's losing 0.001% of its mass. Do you really react to that with alarm, seriously? Within five years that could be reversed, and as I said, it could be in error anyway (haven't yet clicked on Daniel's link yet). Rob, reverse this. If the Antarctic were gaining 0.001% of its mass annually would you be afraid that we're heading for a new Ice Age? [Please ignore the other metrics as we're talking about the poles.] I'm willing to bet you wouldn't. I see no alarm about the poles as of now. The Antarctic looks healthy, and only time will tell on the Arctic. Certainly all the scare stories we got from what should be level-headed people after 2007 look somewhat shaky. 2008 ice was supposed to be so thin that 2009 would be disaster. Not so. Despite the thickness it recovered fairly well. 2010 is inconclusive as of now (let's see what happens in the coming weeks). But like I said, let's see what happens over the next few years.
  24. What's happening to glaciers globally?
    mspelto, although it may sound ovious, I wish to thank you for you invaluable contributions. There's a sentence in the conclusions of you paper that I, not being a glaciologist, could not fully understand: "The correlation coefficient in annual balance between each glacier exceeds 0.80, regardless of the extent of accumulation zone thinning, indicating annual balance alone cannot be use." My trivial picture would say that accumulation zone thinnig alone could be enough to point not just to disequilibrium but to the non-survival of a glacier. What I think I'm missing is some physical mechanism of glacier dynamics that justify the use of more sophisticated parameters. I would be gratefull if you could elaborate a bit on this.
  25. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    Baz... So, how is it that you, with no particular expertise in ice, would come to a very different conclusion than the experts who are actually working with the data? There is very a big difference between "Antarctic ice is stable" and "Antarctic ice loss is accelerating."
  26. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Daniel... Not so important to waste time on it. I just wanted to bookmark it so I would be able to locate it in a pinch. Thx!
  27. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Re: Rob Honeycutt (33) Michael Tobis ran across it somewhere & posted on it, so a bunch of us ran around trying to find the original source image (buried in a ppt somewhere). This is the source for the image that caused the controversy. I forget the thread post at OIIFTG. If it's important, I can look it up for you. The Yooper
  28. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Daniel... Do you have a source for that diagram? I had never put that together that the emergence of agriculture is timed exactly with coming out of the Younger Dryas. Let's hope we don't later have to add to the other side of the chart a captions that says "agriculture ends."
  29. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    Re: Baz (261)
    "As I understand it Grace reports an annual loss of 190 GT (+-77). As the Antarctic has 20,000,000 GT of ice then that 0.001% of ice is well within Grace's normal error, surely? If the Antarctic were gaining 190 GT of ice (according to Grace) then I'd say it wasn't gaining it! For me, it appears that the Antarctic is extraordinarily stable."
     Actually, I covered the net (bottom of the error range) loss of Antarctica here. The majority of losses have come since 2006, so the loss is just ramping up. And many sources point to catastrophic instability in the WAIS, particularly in the PIG. Just pointing it out to, um, you. The Yooper
  30. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Re: Baz (25)
    "Anyway, we ARE cooling."
     By ignoring the 20th & 21st Century temperature rise, you're still wrong. Anyway, this would have been a better version of that graph to use: As the other commentators point out, you're not using the correct resolution of time-frame for this thread. The Yooper
  31. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Baz... Are you missing the point of that chart? Yes, the overall natural trend should be a very slow (geologic scale) cooling. But that chart makes a hard break to the positive trend around the industrial revolution. You are doing exactly what Barry @ 19 pointed out. You skip from way too short of a trend to prove a point (5 or 10 years) to way to long of a trend (8000 years). The entire issue is about current warming and statistically significant trends. I think I understand where the focus on short term trends comes from though. What if, for some reason not yet understood, climate is taking a turn toward cooling? Do we need to wait for 30 years to find out? I'm sure someone here can answer this better than I can but I believe statistically you can see that turn in temps without waiting 30 years. You'd be looking to see if the temps start falling outside the 2 standard deviation boundaries of the trend. Alden Griffith does a really good job of addressing this whole idea of current cooling here.
  32. What's happening to glaciers globally?
    Everyone on this thread should know that mspelto is a researcher on glaciers. I appreciate his comments as they are more informed than what the rest of us can come up with. Thanks mspelto for your help. I was amazed at your web site on ice worms, I had thought they were fictional.
  33. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Baz, I noticed in your graph that 2004 is hotter than any other year on the graph. 2010 would be higher again. The warming has overtaken the cooling and it is now hotter than the previous 8,000 years: your data shows that!! You give a prefect example of what the post states. It is too bad when sceptics point us to data that proves themselves wrong. Unfortunately they can't read their own graphs.
  34. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Baz, "Anyway, we ARE cooling." Over which window of time and for how long has this "global cooling" period been occurring Baz? Are you referring to the Fig. you linked to? If so, look at the insert in the Fig. in the link that you just posted...see that arrow in the top RHS, or the arrow at 2004? The long-term trend (20-30 yrs)in global temperatures is most definitely positive, only those in complete denial about what is happening think that the planet is not warming. Regardless, you are taking us off topic (ably assisted by me)-- this post/thread is on the last 30 years, not the last 10 000 years.
  35. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Re: Baz (26) Try this, replacing the asterisks with < and > on the outsides of the text: *img width="450" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png"* Should work. The Yooper
  36. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    John, sorry for breaking your web design - stay happy.
  37. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    Soory, that didn't work http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png
  38. Should The Earth Be Cooling?
    So, the warming is masking the cooling? Where have I heard that before? Anyway, we ARE cooling.
  39. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    Who's going to point it out to archiesteel?
  40. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    Rob 246. As I understand it Grace reports an annual loss of 190 GT (+-77). As the Antarctic has 20,000,000 GT of ice then that 0.001% of ice is well within Grace's normal error, surely? If the Antarctic were gaining 190 GT of ice (according to Grace) then I'd say it wasn't gaining it! For me, it appears that the Antarctic is extraordinarily stable. As for the other end, as I said, we've been here before (just 70 years ago) but we never had television news crews to show how thin the ice was then. I'm not alarmed about the Arctic. Let's see what happens over the next few years. Thanks.
  41. What's happening to glaciers globally?
    HR Fig. 1 is the best representation of global glacier records we have and it correctly shows that mass losses are much greater recently than during the 1945-1955 period you mentioned. Before 1945 we have no mass balance records. The first mass balance programs began in 1946, and these records are much more negative now for the specific glaciers examined then before. Cogley has done a better job than the IPCC graph. Further as a glacier retreats which many have, it is getting rid of it worst performing sections, which is supposed to increase its balance and return it to equilibrium. This has not happened even with retreat, mass balances are getting more not less negative. In some cases this is a sign of disequilibrium where the glacier will melt away. And two that I have measured mass balance on have.
  42. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    Paul Daniel Ash 249. Actually, as I clearly said, there was only one question in 177, and I answered it. As for 'response', no, not really, unless you actually want to debate the whole issue of AGW, satellite data, and OHC! Surely to 'respond' would just open up a massive debate which is surely best served item by item on threads as they come up. All the best.
  43. The contradictory nature of global warming skepticism
    @johnd: "a solution cannot become more acidic from being alkaline without becoming neutral first" True, but we're not talking about a solution here, but the ocean. The fact is there is more carbonic acid in the oceans due to dissolved CO2. Therefore, there is more acid in the ocean, i.e. it is becoming more acidic.
  44. Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    I think it's clear thingadonta is a "hit and run" troll. He barges it to post his half-baked anti-science drivel, then runs off, never responding to counter-arguments. Isn't this ground enough for bannination?
  45. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    Skepticalenergyguy-- Yes, CO2 has been higher in the past; yes, global temps have been higher in the past; yes, there are natural cycles that modify the Earth's climate. Modern humans, however, have never had to deal with a relatively very rapid global temperature increase. Our tripled population rests on an infrastructure and political/economic framework that has enjoyed a relatively stable climate. Worse yet, as this incredibly energetic economic mode has developed over the past 150-200 years, absolutely no responsibility was built into the system. Externalizing waste costs has been a matter of course for most of industrialized history, to the extent that when such externalization is pointed out, industrialists like, I assume, yourself are shocked by the gall of someone questioning the integrity of the system ("it's just CO2 -- we've been pumping it out for decades. So what?"). You can't seriously expect a rapid doubling of a gas that re-radiates long-wave radiation to have no effect, can you? You do understand how the process works, yes? Maybe that's the first question skeptics should be asked: how does global warming work, according to climatologists? Well, ESG?
  46. actually thoughtful at 03:40 AM on 18 September 2010
    Himalayan Glaciers: Wrong Date, Right Message
    So what is the correct (estimated date)? What is the correct (estimated) number of people affected by the loss of the glaciers? Are we fresh out of new science, to be going back over this very well-worked ground?
  47. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    People who have convincing evidence and intellectually sound reasoning on their side don't generally have to accuse their rhetorical opponents of advocating genocide. Care to try again?
  48. What's happening to glaciers globally?
    HumanityRules I doubt anyone will find difficult "to aknowledge that mass balance loss was as fast in 1945-1955 as it was in the past decade". Indeed, is a good confirmation that the planet is warming, as it has in the first part of the last century and as anyone should aknowledge. Your skeptic mates, at least the followers of the mantra "it's not warming" or "surface temperature datasets are bogus", would be in trouble instead.
  49. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    I'd invite not to point to birth control (let alone genocide) just to frighten people with unacceptable theories never backed (and not allowed on SkS) by anyone here.
  50. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    #64: "The earth has naturaly cycled through significant temperature changes " Ah, the natural cycles game ... its all happened before. Dealt with extensively here and here and here. Its necessary to substantiate your claims. Please find a reputable source that documents a prior natural cycle with all of the following: increasing global temperatures, accelerating Arctic ice melt, etc (full list here); in the face of decreasing solar output, lower concentrations of atmospheric aerosols, etc (full list here); AND increased CO2, all over a very short period of time. And stop throwing around things like 'global birth control'. Once you come to understand that we have indeed made significant impacts on the environment, look for some practical ideas for creating change.

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