Climate Science Glossary

Term Lookup

Enter a term in the search box to find its definition.

Settings

Use the controls in the far right panel to increase or decrease the number of terms automatically displayed (or to completely turn that feature off).

Term Lookup

Settings

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.

Home Arguments Software Resources Comments The Consensus Project Translations About Support

Bluesky Facebook LinkedIn Mastodon MeWe

Twitter YouTube RSS Posts RSS Comments Email Subscribe


Climate's changed before
It's the sun
It's not bad
There is no consensus
It's cooling
Models are unreliable
Temp record is unreliable
Animals and plants can adapt
It hasn't warmed since 1998
Antarctica is gaining ice
View All Arguments...



Username
Password
New? Register here
Forgot your password?

Latest Posts

Archives

Recent Comments

Prev  2255  2256  2257  2258  2259  2260  2261  2262  2263  2264  2265  2266  2267  2268  2269  2270  Next

Comments 113101 to 113150:

  1. What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
    What do you get when you put 99 climate scientists who support The (significant human-made global climate change) Hypothesis in a room with a sceptical climate scientist like Dr. Roy Spencer – red faces? I think that Claude Sandroff (Note 1 - American Thinker) would agree with this. In his article “Global Warming, R.I.P” he reviews Spencer’s latest book on the subject (Note 1). [quotes removed]
    Moderator Response: Unfortunately the policy of "American Thinker" with regard to language explicitly attributing bad intentions to scientists etc. does not comply with that of Skeptical Science.
  2. Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
    Batsvensson passes a hail mary coming up short. To claim there was a non-observed photon emitted from the radiator and that this non-observed photon in some way "existed" in the empty microwave as some non-observed electromagnetic field with some amount of non-observed energy and then was absorbed back by the emitter is therefore a statement that is utterly gibberish and that is not, and can not be, supported by any experimental evidence. Burnt-out magnetron tubes disagree with you.
  3. Confidence in climate forecasts
    Argus, watch out with those slips, you’ll have Doug suggesting that “ .. your imagination is getting ahead of you. .. “. Doug, looking further into those Asian weather extremes it’s interesting to note that concurrently there are floods in China, Pakistan, etc. Russia had serious droughts/famine in 1891/92, 1921/22, , 1936, 1938, 1946 and 1972. Is it a coincidence that China had serious flooding in the years between 1917-22, 1936-38, 1945/46 and 1974. The 2006 paper “The variation of floods in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and its teleconnection with El Ni˜no events” (Note 1) suggests otherwise. There is a relevant summary of “The Most Deadly 100 Natural Disasters of the 20th Century” (Note 2) which includes droughts and floods in that region. Such events as we are experiencing now are nothing new and there is no convincing evidence that they had anything to do with our use of fossil fuels. There is a 2007 Russian paper “Dynamics of severe atmospheric droughts in European Russia” (Note 3) -unfortunately payment is required) which says “Dynamics of extreme droughts in the 20th century is derived from the meteorological station data. The tendency of drought occurrence in 1991–2000, 2041–2050, and 2091–2100 is obtained from the MGO (Main Geophysical Observatory) regional climate model (RCM). A catalog of severe atmospheric droughts of different intensity is made based on the observations for 1936–2000 and modeling results for 1991–2000. The comparison of the observational and model data has shown that the MGO RCM simulates well the frequency of severe atmospheric droughts”. I couldn’t find any reference to human-made climate change in the small extract made available so wonder if anyone here has more information about that model. I was out with my grand children today in beautiful sun-shine, under a shady tree looking out over a park and suddenly remembered that I had been doing that very thing in the summer of 1980. On reflection I realised that in my experience the local climate hasn’t changed in any significant manner over the past 30 years. I recall a harsh winter in 78/79, followed by a hot spring/summer in 1979. In 2009/10 we had a harsh winter and now, in 2010 we are enjoying a hot summer and I’m looking at the same vegetation as 30 years ago. This is in spite of Hansen’s 1988 model projections and the warnings by Wally Broecker in his 1975 paper “Climatic Change: Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?” in which he is claimed to have said "[...] .. the present cooling trend will, within a decade or so, give way to a pronounced warming induced by carbon dioxide". My suspicion is that there are plenty other septuagenarians around the globe who have similar experiences. While checking out information on past weather events I came across another interesting site run by Marine Biologist Dr. Gary Sharp (Note 4) which includes a list including such events going back much further than the Disaster Centre list. It’s a fun read - enjoy. Perhaps the real culprit causing those global weather events that are being misinterpreted as human-made global climate change is El Ni˜no and not our use of fossil fuels. NOTES: 1) see http://www.adv-geosci.net/6/201/2006/adgeo-6-201-2006.pdf 2) see http://www.disastercenter.com/disaster/TOP100K.html 3) see http://www.springerlink.com/content/q272845556530204/ 4) see http://sharpgary.org/2005_Onward.html Best regards, Pete Ridley
    Moderator Response: See the argument It’s El Niño. For good measure, check out It’s Pacific Decadal Oscillation.
  4. Confidence in climate forecasts
    Argus, research indicates that at the end of the day you will probably continue to believe whatever makes you feel best. Your conclusion regarding the data you viewed could be viewed as confirmation of what the authors discovered, in an indirect way. I can point out the repetition of that research over a span of time covering various events that may sway public opinion and what seems to be the relative durability of the composition of various groups despite that, but that's unlikely to change whatever interpretation of the survey you may produce that comforts you. What appears to work best for you is the perception that "skepticism" is on the rise despite being shown data that does not demonstrate a trend. Not to say that everybody is not susceptible to the same phenomenon, most of us are. But other scientific evidence-- the plethora of research results on climate change-- strongly suggests some people have cemented opinions in congruence with facts, others do not. This is a key problem in making progress on this issue. Enough people have beliefs and values producing counterfactual perceptions of the world that we're having a problem dealing with this pollutant C02.
  5. actually thoughtful at 04:03 AM on 9 August 2010
    Confidence in climate forecasts
    Pete Ridley @82 "The underlying data are the direct product of the various operational forecast models run by the National Centers for Environmental Prediction, National Weather Service, NOAA and are supplied without interpretation or correction” – and that’s just about forecasting weather, never mind climate change forecasts (don’t forget that the UK Met Office uses the same model for both)" Pete - there are those who understand that predicting climate change is very different (and actually easier) than predicting the weather, and there are those who don't accept that fact, as it is inconvenient. Shall we mark you down in the latter camp?
  6. More evidence than you can shake a hockey stick at
    Dear Prof. Mandia, Thanks for your comments. The deniers ask us to believe a third claim in addition to the two you cite: carbon emissions and atmospheric CO2 concentrations can continue to rise, but global temperatures will not continue to rise. This claim goes against all scientific knowledge; to support it they have not a shred of evidence.
  7. What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
    Poptech, instead of wasting everyone's time on here, why don't you ask the authors themselves. Perhaps they can help you out with your problems. Or, going by your past behaviour, you can tell them where they are wrong and what they really meant. I would suggest, though, that you are more civil and less self-regarding when/if you do contact them. Otherwise, they may ignore you or try to humour you - just as happens on every website you spam.
  8. Remember, we’re only human
    We live in a world were one prevalent idea seems to be that the very existence of human beings is a problem.
    How deep is your ecology?
  9. Confidence in climate forecasts
    'and are' should read 'are'. Sorry.
  10. Confidence in climate forecasts
    doug_bostrom at 03:56 AM on 8 August, 2010 Doug, I fail to see how my belief that alarmist reports and are counter-productive, can identify me as belonging to ''a small minority of persons that […] appears to show little if any trend''. I did not know that opinion surveys were undertaken that examine common folk's views on what types of propaganda are best suited for informing the public about climate matters. If this is what you meant? If you were instead referring to my view that the 'public is becoming more skeptic', and your claim is that this view places me in a group of some kind, I am equally surprised that such surveys are conducted. The report about the Six Americas, does little too enlighten me here. If I read it correctly, the diagram on page 9 says that the two groups with the 'highest belief in global warming' have both diminished by 5 percent units in 1 ½ years. They seem to have migrated to 'cautious' or even to 'dismissive'. Maybe this was because they were fed up with scare stories?
  11. Talkin bout the Skeptical Science phone apps
    Is anyone aware of any independant analysis of the accuracy (or more likely otherwise) of the Watts App? At the moment the massed hoards (duo) of watts staffers seem intent on guiding the debate on the Guardian piece towards a sales drive marketing opportunity for their app. It would be nice to see a quality debunking on a 10 point basis to their Top 10 points. It just gets to be very tedious watching them lead some of the more sober Guardian posters on a not so merry dance?
  12. Confidence in climate forecasts
    What would be useful on discussion of the climate models, would be an analysis of the many "predictions" the models actually got right. As well as never ending rhetoric about uncertainty (yes, we know!), the skeptics tend to focus mainly on global temperature, however the models are more sophisticated than that. They have correctly predicted features such as stratospheric cooling, polar amplification, global sea ice asymmetry, intensification of the hydrological cycle, that the Arctic would warm faster in winter than summer and that (counter intuitively) the Arctic sea ice extent would exhibit greater reductions in summer than winter. I do wonder what "predictions" will manifest themselves in the future?. Maybe this one?
  13. More evidence than you can shake a hockey stick at
    Dr. Powell, My favorite part is where you summarize observed warming by stating if increases in CO2 are not causing modern day global warming then two things must be true: 1) Something unknown is suppressing the well-understood greenhouse effect (and doing so during massive increases in GHGs). 2) Something unknown is causing the warming that mirrors the GHE. So we can accept what we know to be true (AGW) or we accept two unknowns. A pretty simple and straightforward defense of the science. Thank you.
  14. Visually depicting the disconnect between climate scientists, media and the public
    Poptech wrote : "JMurphy, Pielke Jr. explicitly stated that if the list was only about papers that reject AGW than his do not belong, this is not the case as I explained on his blog. His papers support skepticism of the negative environmental or economic effects of AGW and thus warrant inclusion, the same with Brooks." Yes, of course. Despite what those two had to say about the inclusion of their work on your little list ("There is nothing in my writing that fits in this category" & "I have no idea how it could be construed as saying anything at all about man-made global warming"), you have "explained" to Pielke on his blog, and "the same with Brooks", and therefore you think you know best. Hmm, let me do a search to find where the two of them state "Ah yes, Professor Poptech, you are right and we were wrong. Forgive us. Our papers are against AGW (alarmist or not) after all and we thank you for enlightening us. May we pass on all our pre-publication papers to you, so you can determine how anti-AGW (alarmist or not) they are ? Thank you in advance, if you can spare the time." No, nothing's coming back. Can you provide those links to them accepting your interpretation ? Thanks in advance - if you can spare the time.
  15. What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
    Poptech wrote : "The PNAS paper has been completely discredited...", ...by Poptech ! Boy, you do rate yourself, don't you ? Anyway, since you have now produced an Energy & Environment type paper (i.e. not peer-reviewed in a real journal - perhaps you could send your work to them, to be published ? I reckon you stand a good chance), it will no doubt now be included in your little list of 'Papers that Poptech reckons are sceptical of AGW (alarmist or not), despite what the original authors may think', and at least this time you will be able to state correctly that you know exactly what the writer is trying to say !
  16. Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
    While I been reading in this tread I don’t like the attitude some people here has toward RSVP understanding of physics. Some people here think they know what they are talking about when they make statement about things they – or anyone else for that matter - knows nothing about, namely about the unobservable universe. Loosely put, according to the quantum mechanical description of the world there exists no photons unless there is an "observer" to observe the photons (photons are interpretation of events in certain experiments), nor does it exists any electromagnetic waves (which is interpretations of event in certain other experiments). What exists according to the theory of quantum mechanic is observable events and non-observable events. The observable events has for every event (i.e. an observation in an experiment) connected a abstract space filled with a flux of probability for the observable event to occur. Every single point in this abstract space, at any instance of time, has a well defined probability value for this event. However this is not the same thing as there actually would exist an equal thing such as a photon (or a wave or whatever else event that may be generated) somewhere in the real space. What exist is observed events and the non-observable. What the non-observable is we don’t known, can not know. However we know what it is not – it is not a photon nor a electromagnetic wave! Photons does not exist, photons is only interpretations of experimental result (events) setup in certain ways to generate these events labled "photons", or as RSVP put so colorfull put it, there exist no orphan photons, which he poetically described as there would be no starlight in the universe if the universe only contained one single star – that is if there is no observer then there exists nothing to observe (this is basically the orthodox Copenhagen interpretation of the quantum mechanical model). The quantum mechanical description of the universe does not make any claims about where a "photon" has been, what is has done, where it is going, or even how it came to be in the place where it emerge (read: heat transfer!!!) Any question of such nature are namely forbidden to ask in the quantum mechanical universe because these are question about the non-observable things in the universe. To make statements about truth as to what happens with non-observable things are meaningless! To claim there was a non-observed photon emitted from the radiator and that this non-observed photon in some way "existed" in the empty microwave as some non-observed electromagnetic field with some amount of non-observed energy and then was absorbed back by the emitter is therefore a statement that is utterly gibberish and that is not, and can not be, supported by any experimental evidence. In the same way the claim that the emitter never emitted an electromagnetic field and just was heated up by the current is also not supported by any experimental evidence. Both description are just that – descriptions. Which one is true we don’t know. The only thing we can know (observe) for certain is the heated up emitter – but how it was heated up we don’t know. Not both suggestion can be true, but both need not to be false, however it is not possible to determined which, if any, is actual true because they are both statement about the non-observed. The only way to know if a photons exist inside the microwave is to prepare it with an observer, something like - right! - water. Then and only then any heat transfer can be detected from the emitter – but to claim that heat actually is transferred around inside the macro wave when no observer is present (i.e. no experiment to detect that heat transfer was set up) has no support in experimental physics whatsoever. Since we can not determine which description is true, then both are equal good to use. However Occam’s razor tells us to use the most simple explanation. The description RSVP suggest is the most simplified, and therefore preferred one as it does not involve radiation and re-absorption of energy. I therefore give my fully support to RSVP standpoint that no energy is being radiated in an empty microwave. Finally, judging by the comments about RSVP’s grasp of physics, the Dunning-Kreuger effect seams to have a muhc more wider spread than many people her is willing to acknowledge.
  17. Confidence in climate forecasts
    Pete Ridley wrote : "Some people stick to their beliefs no matter what the evidence." Having read your last few comments here, and your lack of detail (e.g. "scientific hypotheses that are based upon dubious statistical manipulations, unsound assumptions and estimates used as a poor substitutes for a proper understanding about global climate processes and drivers" - are you able to provide more detail and examples), I can only agree with you. And you are also typical of the so-called skeptics in that you prefer one expert above all the others. Why is that ? Does von Storch give you exactly what you want, whereas everyone else doesn't ? And you are typical in that you put words into others' mouths, e.g. "you don’t wish to recognise that significant uncertainty exists about global climate processes and drivers" (to Chris). Can you point out where ?
  18. Three new studies illustrate significant risks and complications with geoengineering climate
    batsvensson - you deny that this is a science of public interest, and describe the Swedish acidification impacts and exemplary remediation efforts, but have not explained how ending GHG emissions would be remotely sufficient for controlling the now accelerating interactive positive feedbacks. With society having missed the chance in the '70s to end global warming by ending GHG outputs, are you now advocating a similar 30-yr delay to waste the final opportunity to avoid catastrophic climate destabilisation by the additional means of carbon recovery and temporary albido enhancement ? Regards, Lewis
  19. Talkin bout the Skeptical Science phone apps
    PS: I must confess when I saw the WUWT post that I didn't read it in detail and so I missed the suggestion that you'd turned to the Guardian for help. So in this case, the mountain in fact came to Mohammed (or would Matthew 21: 21 be the more appropriate quote?) Either way, an outbreak of decency is always a good result.
  20. Talkin bout the Skeptical Science phone apps
    I guess you'd have to ask HumanityRules but the thought did cross my mind ;-)
  21. Talkin bout the Skeptical Science phone apps
    Well, John, you've made it into the rough and tumble of WUWT via your Guardian Post (if you haven't featured there already). Congrats for the Guardian - you might have mixed feelings about the former but to be fair, Anthony calls you 'a generally reasonable Aussie.' He feels his apps are doing better than your apps (now, he would say that, wouldn't he) and thanks you for the boost you're giving him. He does defend you against one of his more feral posters saying: REPLY: I don’t think he’s a ‘dimwit’ by any means, and it’s really not a label you should be using. He’s just not very good at understanding mass media and communications, like most scientists. – Anthony It's a bit of backhanded compliment - your (non-carbon) footprint's getting bigger and your site's become a serious contender in the blogosphere. As it very deservedly should be (and has been for some time).
    Response: Interesting comments thread on WUWT (for the record, the Guardian asked me to write the article, I didn't approach them) and decent of Anthony Watts to defend me. I also think one of the comments there by an enigmatic "HR" might be our own HumanityRules. If I ever do a testimonials page on Skeptical Science, I'll be sure to include:

    "I don't think he's a dimwit"
    Anthony Watts
  22. Visually depicting the disconnect between climate scientists, media and the public
    Poptech, it is quite inappropriate to ask non-experts in art how quality is defined in art. Is there any art experts here? I dont know, but if one decided to answer I am pretty sure that expert would be able to give you a list of requirements. I would most likely not understand those requirements or how to evaluate them - would you? Every specialist is train in their own field of expertise and know how to evaluate quality objectively in their own field. I know how to evaluate quality in my own filed of expertise, and I can assure you measuring quality is not a matter of subjective opinions but a quantitative process everyone can agree on. We may think experts in other fields are making subjective measurement of quality but that is only because we do not understand on what technical ground they made their evaluation.
  23. Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
    doug_bostrom 204 In order to teach an old dog new tricks, they need to be worth learning. Back in this thread, the significance of waste heat was played down by stating numerous times that non-GHGs transfer energy to GHG in the mixture, and that GHG in turn radiate this energy (up and down). In this way, even though non-GHG have very low emissivity, they cool via radiation through GHGs. AGW, on the other hand, attributes global warming to this same process, but in reverse. It is very hard for me (old dog) to see how this waste heat is therefore released if the net flow is supposedly in the opposite direction. How can GHG have a net warming and cooling effect simultaneously? This makes no sense. As a compromise and way to answer this question, I proposed the idea of vector cancellation in favor of overall heating due to AGW, assuming the GHG vector was much larger than the waste heat vector. This leads to the weird idea that the more waste heat, the less effect GHG have in heating. But for saying this, a lot of chaff was raised.
  24. Models are unreliable
    Mats (Frick), thanks for advising about "A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming". I responded on 31st July and 1st August but my comment was removed so I’ve modified it a little and hope it is now acceptable to the moderator. I note that Professor Edwards is not a scientists involved in any of the numerous disciplines contributing to improving our poor understanding of global climate processes and drivers, so I wonder what has convinced him that “I think climate change is real, and I think it is the biggest threat the world faces now and will face for generations to come. ... Climate change is not a matter of opinion, belief, or ideology. This book is about how we came to know what we know about climate — how we make climate knowledge” (Intro xiv). It’s that “climate change is .. the biggest threat the world faces .. “ bit that I disagree with. He makes no mention of “uncertainty” anywhere in that introduction, which makes me suspicious about the extent of his understanding of those processes and drivers and of his environmental activism. I will be getting a copy but as you’ve read most of the book can you tell me if he touches on any of that or the subject of validation. The manner in which Edwards presents what Professor Freeman Dyson said about the reliance on models gives a somewhat different impression to how I interpret them. I’m think that Dyson was referring specifically to computer models rather than models in general. Chapter 13 is the one that I’m most interested in reading – any comments on that, taking into consideration my previous comment here? I’ll have a more careful read after my holiday and get back to you. Best regards, Pete Ridley.
  25. Talkin bout the Skeptical Science phone apps
    Just read the Guardian article. Very nice. You highlight the most obvious contrarian tactic - focus on one thing, and draw conclusions that don't follow.
  26. Three new studies illustrate significant risks and complications with geoengineering climate
    doug_bostrom, It goes beyond my understanding why computer time is wasted on ideas like this. This is no science of public interest, at its best mockery with the subject at worst disconnected from reality.
  27. Why I care about climate change
    Jmurphy, ref. comment #115 (and Chris, comment 116), regarding vonStorch, I won’t repeat here what I’ve already said on the “Confidence in climate forecasts” thread so if you wish to pursue that one I look forward to further discussion on that thread. On the mater of AGW v The (significant human-made global climate change) Hypothesis, I thought that I’d already adequately explained that but just for you I’ll repeat what I think I said. Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) is in my opinion misleading. I believe that most sceptics accept that humans cause some warming of the globe but do not see convincing evidence that the effect is significant as far as changing global climates are concerned. I didn’t realise that I needed your approval of particular terminology before using it, mistakenly thinking that the blog administrator was the person who had to be satisfied about comment contents. Best regards, Pete Ridley
  28. Confidence in climate forecasts
    Pete, what did I say? I think your imagination is getting ahead of you. :-)
  29. Visually depicting the disconnect between climate scientists, media and the public
    RealClimate have censored my comments... I have no interest in improving their worthless paper because you can't, it is flawed by design. If I squint at that really hard, I get some clue as to what the problem may be with you having your remarks appear at RealClimate. They're pretty slack but everybody has limits.
  30. Confidence in climate forecasts
    My previous comment lost a little at the end so I repost the last bit. I respectfully suggest that you re-read what I quoted but try doing so a little more slowly and you may see my point about uncertainty more clearly. Of course there is a possibility that you don’t wish to recognise that significant uncertainty exists about global climate processes and drivers. Some people stick to their beliefs no matter what the evidence.
  31. What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
    poptech #156 This really is tiresome. As the methodology is systematic it is quite reproducible, although I agree that (as with much social research) they may not have explained every part of the data collection process -a problem relating to space constraints in journals . Anyway, another fixed that for you: "I think I have irrefutably demonstrated ..." Again, it seems that the level of discussion, and your 'legend in his own mind' approach suggests that its really not worth engaging you in discussion.
  32. Confidence in climate forecasts
    Chris, if you don’t find my comment interesting then you don’t have to read them, do you? I wholeheartedly agree with you that “evidence is always preferable to opinion”. If there was convincing evidence I don’t see why von Storch would have considered it necessary to say “I have to admit that I may be wrong with that assessment”. I respectfully suggest that you re-read what I quoted but try doing so a little more slowly and you may see my point about uncertainty more cl
  33. Confidence in climate forecasts
    In my comment #74 I inadvertently said in the penultimate paragraph “Gelman then goes on to say .. ”. This should have been “Roberts then ….”. Sorry if I misled anyone. Doug, ref. comment #76, thanks for that link to a very interesting poll of Americans. The most important point about that poll, as for any, is the original questions. I did consider responding to those questions in the way that I think I would have if I’d been included and leave it to you to place me in the appropriate category but this is not the forum. My guess is that I’d be placed in the “concerned” category. If you want to follow this up then let me know via this one and I’ll start a thread on my Global Political Shenanigans blog. I’m puzzled as to why you, despite your acknowledged lack of expertise in the subject (comment #68), “ .. should be equally amenable to the notion that today's weather in Russia is confirmation of climate change .. .”. I would expect you to be aware that abnormal weather events occurring in parts of the world, such as hot spells in central Russia give no indication of global climate change (the topic of this blog I believe). After all, the Russians were experiencing similar conditions “ .. in 1919, 1920, 1936, 1938 and 1972 .. ” (Note 1) so they’ve seen it all before – that’s weather for you. If you have a particular interest in global weather conditions then you may be interested in looking at the Cola Weather and Climate Data site (Note 2). “As you can see, the temperature outlook for the next two weeks for the areas just north and east of the Black Sea is bad to say the least” (Note 3) . but I do like the official disclaimer. “COLA and IGES make no guarantees about and bear no responsibility or liability concerning the accuracy or timeliness of the images being published on these web pages. .. The underlying data are the direct product of the various operational forecast models run by the National Centers for Environmental Prediction, National Weather Service, NOAA and are supplied without interpretation or correction” – and that’s just about forecasting weather, never mind climate change forecasts (don’t forget that the UK Met Office uses the same model for both). We can all expect the cost of a loaf of bread to rocket as a consequence of this weather event. Of course, Yahoo Green has a different take on this (Note 4). Peter (Hogarth) “envisaging possible future climate” is significantly different to predicting them. NOTES: 1) see http://www.kyivpost.com/news/russia/detail/73341/ 2) see http://wxmaps.org/ 3) see http://www.thepoultrysite.com/poultrynews/20637/cme-russian-heatwave-may-spark-wheat-crisis 4) see http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20100802/wl_time/08599200808100 Best regards, Pete Ridley
  34. Three new studies illustrate significant risks and complications with geoengineering climate
    LewisC, I come from a country that is known to have the cleanest fresh lakes, soil and air in Europe. Despite this forests was dieing and lakes life was wiped out due to acid rains. Since the 70ties chalk has been dumped in lakes and forest has been spray from the air with chalk powder to combat acid rains and prevent forest and lakes from dying. All this in the cleanest country of Europe – imagine the rest... This and this is what happen. Historical architecture was literally falling apart in front of our very eyes due to acid air pollutions. However, the air in Europe has now been cleaned up to such extent that cupper plated roofs now turn black instead of green, I think I can live with out the greenish cupper plated roofs. We do not need to know more about acid rains than the already known effects to dismiss such an idea as futile.
  35. Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
    Well, that certainly confirms my impressions RSVP. Thanks for the additional insight.
  36. Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
    doug_bostrom 202 If you think I am beating a dead horse, thirteen days (July 27 to Aug 8) is nothing. In 1976, I did a paper in High School about whether the Earth was warming or going into an ice age. (I remember including things about CO2 monitoring in Hawaii, and questions about the Earth's albedo changing, and if I am not mistaken the question of cooling or warming was still open. I had never heard the name Al Gore.)
  37. Visually depicting the disconnect between climate scientists, media and the public
    Poptech, did you notice that Anderegg et al are actually paying attention to the RealClimate thread? Forgetting for a moment that you're apparently the only person carrying the "can't use google scholar torch," why are you over here endlessly repeating yourself when your chance to have your concerns addressed is over at RealClimate? If you're actually concerned about improving things, jump on over to RealClimate and have at it. You've got your golden opportunity, use it. Failing that, readers here are going to be left with only the conclusion that you're trying to create and preserve an impression without bothering to exploit a rare opportunity for dialog, for whatever reason.
  38. It's cooling
    Doug: Thank you for the von Schuckmann paper.
  39. What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
    FTFY: I have produced a subjective and fairly poorly thought out attempted rebuttal of the PNAS paper by Andresson. It looks to me that because their methodology was systematic, and designed to generate a sample of data, it's fine. You're demanding a census which is really not possible without a good deal of resources. Anyway, if they were to use ISI web of science, which has less inclusive indexing criteria, this would be unacceptable to you as well, due to poorly thought out reasons that you have inflicted on us previously ;).
  40. 10 Indicators of a Human Fingerprint on Climate Change
    "We," AlanR? Superficially speaking "we" have some hints that you are sufficiently motivated as to register here and ask questions in a way that suggests you are familiar with this topic but at the same time insufficiently curious to make an effort to find answers on your own, a seeming paradox. Or perhaps you are not curious, it's hard to say exactly without more data. Now you appear to be departing from the world of facts, presumably imagining "cooling" or the like in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary as well as sliding into the fuzzy world of semantics and rhetoric, which helps to confirm that further discussion of science with you is probably pointless. I could be wrong, of course.
  41. michael sweet at 10:22 AM on 8 August 2010
    Confidence in climate forecasts
    Joohnd at 67: The specific prediction of an El Nino (or La Nina) is weather and not related to long term climate forcasting. The climate modelers do not claim the ability to forcast these reliably. You need to produce an example of a long range climate model in action, not a weather model.
  42. 10 Indicators of a Human Fingerprint on Climate Change
    Why Doug, the warming effects we noted at #47. ACO2 is CO2. I think so too. The IPCC models treat them differently. Easy yes. Mystery no.
  43. Visually depicting the disconnect between climate scientists, media and the public
    For what it's worth, any possibly substantial quibbles with the Anderegg paper are much narrower than what poptech mentions. There's an interesting and informative thread at RealClimate on Anderegg's limitations: Expert Credibility in Climate Change – Responses to Comments on the topic. A fellow going by the handle of "RomanM" appears to bring up the sole possibly serious issue. There's no agreement on whether his point is truly valid, though it would be interesting to see the analysis redone using his suggestions. It's also fairly clear that a redo using RomanM's take won't change the results much. I personally find it really interesting see how vigorously the notion of lack of consensus is defended by contrarians. They've highlighted and even could be said to have synthesized this matter and now when the concept comes under serious attack they're amazingly keen to defend their construction. The time could be better spent doing science on the core issue as opposed to meta-science, but contrarians did insist, after all. Expect more on the topic, creating an entire subdomain of contrarianism as we appear to see emerging even now.
  44. Has Global Warming Stopped?
    #61: "are the temp observations during that period representing a rise in temperature or are they random?" Temperatures can't be random. If its hot now, its more likely to be hot a short while from now. Physical properties of water and air limit instantaneous rates of temperature change. Unless we know the underlying physics, how can we presume to say that any specific power function is any more than a mechanical fit through data points? How do we know quadratic is bad and quartic is good? Without an underlying model, all we can do is be descriptive of what's going on in the data. As an example from a prior post, The linear fit is virtually meaningless, but its the number everybody quotes as 'trend'. I'd be tempted to try an even power (concave up), but even that is meaningless -- as it would keep going up faster and faster forever. Even the most ardent warmist wouldn't make that claim! I've learned to prefer LOESS, an adaptive smoothing process, which produces results that are very similar in appearance to moving averages. If a rate of change is needed, a symmetric difference quotient of the smoothed values works wonders. From this graph, is it not reasonable to conclude that temperatures are rising faster during the last 50 years? And that's a conclusion that might just shed some light on where to look for an explanation.
  45. It's cooling
    Full text of von Schuckman here (pdf).
  46. 10 Indicators of a Human Fingerprint on Climate Change
    Damped the effect, AlanR? What effect are you speaking of? C02 is C02, excepting isotope markers which don't affect P-chem. If you have a system that has been cycling C02 in a rough state of equilibrium and you dump a large additional amount into that system, you'll see a bulge of unprocessed C02, failing the emergence of increased processing power. The IPCC refers to the lack of excess capacity in the existing system. In this case, once enough time has passed we'll see the bulge eventually diminish, ironically in part because of increased temperature in the system. If the system had previously had -excess- capacity we'd have seen a trend of decreasing C02 prior to the C02 glut we've imposed on the system, if the trend were short enough to have allowed us to develop the capacity to make such measurements. Easy enough. The remaining mystery is, was that actually a mystery?
  47. 10 Indicators of a Human Fingerprint on Climate Change
    Yes. Hard to say what has damped the CO2 and vapour effect for the last fifteen years. I'm not sure if ACO2 behaves itself either. Unlike natural CO2, of course. The oceans cheerfully exchange 90 gigatons natural CO2 each year though they appear to miss half the ACO2. IPCC: In current models, the uptake of anthropogenic CO2 is controlled mainly by physical transport and surface carbon chemistry, whereas the natural carbon cycle is controlled by physical,chemical and biological processes.
  48. It's cooling
    Susan Wijffels presentation for OceanObs 2009 had a slide that she credited to Palmer 2007 that compared eight different analyses down to 700 m. They all disagreed but had visibly the same shape, and averaged 0.3 W/m**2 over about 50 years. The von Schuckman 2009 paper obviously took advantage of the Argo network, went down to 2000 m, but estimated power at 0.77W/m**2. Furthermore, the 700m analyses had about four times as much accumulated heat. Either von Schuckman has discovered something new and exciting, or the Argo system still has a few bugs. In either case, the world is going to be full of papers which are going to examine the Argo data in detail, and compare it to predecessor data. It might be a real good idea to let the dust settle before using the data.
  49. Confidence in climate forecasts
    Pete Ridley at 06:59 AM on 8 August, 2010 "Doug (Bostrom) hit the nail right on the head with his "that's my inexpert advice". Most of us here are offering our inexpert opinions and advice for free and there is a saying “Free advice is worth what you pay for it”." Doug is showing a certain amount of humility. In truth Doug is both rather well informed and more importantly (we've learned from our experience here) honest and informative. There are many posters here with strong backgrounds in the physical sciences that can address the scientific evidence with insight and understanding and are able to communicate this. So this site is a very good forum for gaining understanding of the science (if one chooses to be informed of course). Careful not to make the mistake of thinking that any old stuff one posts is of equal value (the pretence that everything might be dragged down to a low "common denominator" can be a conceit for those with deficient arguments!). I expect pretty much everyone that reads these threads is able to recognise honest attempts to present relevant evidence, summarise the science, perhaps to question this, and engage in an informed exchange of ideas....
  50. Waste heat vs greenhouse warming

Prev  2255  2256  2257  2258  2259  2260  2261  2262  2263  2264  2265  2266  2267  2268  2269  2270  Next


The Consensus Project Website

THE ESCALATOR

(free to republish)


© Copyright 2024 John Cook
Home | Translations | About Us | Privacy | Contact Us