Arguments
Recent Comments
Prev 2284 2285 2286 2287 2288 2289 2290 2291 2292 2293 2294 2295 2296 2297 2298 2299 Next
Comments 114551 to 114600:
-
John Cook at 08:12 AM on 24 July 2010Assessing global surface temperature reconstructions
Another temperature reconstruction I've been wanting to get my hands on is by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF). They're the ones who published a paper analysing the HadCRUT data and concluding their recent warming trend was slightly low due to not including the Arctic region where warming was pronounced (blogged about here). I'm told their temperature data is somewhere on their website but haven't tracked it down yet (admittedly I hadn't looked that hard). Anyone else found it, plotted it? -
KR at 08:10 AM on 24 July 2010Assessing global surface temperature reconstructions
Ned - fantastic compilation. Thank you. -
Dr Bob at 08:03 AM on 24 July 2010Assessing global surface temperature reconstructions
Ned This is very impressive work. I have been reading this site for some months now and am most impressed with the quality and the quantity of dedicated and talented work that is submitted. Congratulations and keep it coming. Bob -
KR at 07:54 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
My apologies, the previous post should have referred to the Heritage Foundation, not Institute. As well as the Science & Environmental Policy Project, the European Academy for Environmental Affairs (where G. Gerlich was a member), George C. Marshall Institute, etc. -
Doug Bostrom at 07:51 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Theodwulf we're currently spending something like 4% of global GDP on what for most of us are imaginary harms, possibilities we all agree and fervently hope are only remotely probable. The fact that we spend $6 trillion dollars per year on insurance premiums which only function effectively if most of us never make claims has not threatened democracy and has not brought our industrial society to its knees. Meanwhile, something like 2% of global GDP spent on a shift from fossil fuel dependency will not only purchase insurance against a substantial risk from climate change but will also ensure that our industrial society will continue to function after our fossil fuel endowment is depleted, an inevitable outcome that will only become more difficult to address the longer we procrastinate. If you're curious to see the gains of the past few thousands years erased for most of us in a dramatic and ugly way, simply avoid spending money to foster substitutes now, instead wait for fossil fuels to be exhausted. Short of concerted effort, that inflection point is fast approaching; China, India and other countries are not going to put their development plans on hold, after all, so we'll be treated first to a bitter struggle for fossil fuel resources and then a collapse of the world order as it now stands. Seems like a no-brainer to me. -
KR at 07:45 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Theodwulf - When in the History of Science has a Theory demanded that the political and economic foundations of the world be overturned and rebuilt into unknown, untested models? - Disease control: plague in London requiring reworking entire water system. - Microbe theory of disease: All of medicine changed there, all of sanitation practices. - Fish depletion leading to major limitations on catch and seasons, major industries. - Air pollution: In the US this meant the Clean Air Act, EPA, major major industrial effects. - Ozone layer: Banning of CFC's. - DDT and other pesticides: Reworking of pest control, complete re-do on malarial prevention. Note that people and groups (in the US) opposing climate change science (Heritage Institute, lots of others) have also opposed the dangers of acid rain, smoking, second-hand smoke, dangers of DDT, any and all EPA regulations/Clean Air Act, etc. That includes Robert Jastrow, Frederick Seitz, and S. Fred Singer, among others. If they were active when the microbe theory of disease was being discovered I suspect they would have taken contributions from hospitals and opposed that. They have a lousy track record for scientific accuracy and honesty. -
Philippe Chantreau at 07:44 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
"the political and economic foundations of the world be overturned and rebuilt into unknown , untested models?" If I had a penny for every time I saw that strawman... The problem with credibility to the masses is that it is a matter of manipulation by the people who specialze in mass mind manipulation. As for this: "I personaly would rather see the world burn (or drown) than see a mass backslide to Tyrany and/or Oligarchy (even benign ones)." I don't see how you could convince me that these are the only alternatives. Considering how bleak the choices are, perhaps you could also examine a little closer why you believe that and where it comes from. -
shawnhet at 07:38 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Oops, the above was a response to post#55 not #50. -
shawnhet at 07:37 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Ned #50, I mistyped there. I meant to say that expertise in science is related to how many predictions you can get right. As you say, a guy on the street could guess right once or twice,but he could not without some understanding of the system consistently guess right. Cheers, :) -
Philippe Chantreau at 07:32 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
Galoopingcamel, your counting head remark goes to the heart of the Oregon petition. Thanks to Doug for clarifying the UK's court decision on the movie. -
Theodwulf at 07:27 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Can someone without a doctorate in climate science make a valid point, make a valid observation? Can someone with a doctorate in climate science make a mistake? Someone with such a specialized edjucation is obviously very knowledgable on the subject BUT it doesn't make them correct, especially when the subject is as complex as this topic. In an acedemic setting, Yes ,one would accept that the "expert" was correct BUT when the Modern Era itself is about to be sacrificed to appease Gaia,then THEY must prove their theory beyond all doubt to us "normal folks" who will pay for it and have to live with it. THEY may be correct in defining the problem, BUT are they right with the solution for the problem? Considering the solution would require political and economical changes to the world that cannot be fully known and may require require us to get rid of the finest acheivement of Mankind...Democracy. I personaly would rather see the world burn (or drown) than see a mass backslide to Tyrany and/or Oligarchy (even benign ones). When in the History of Science has a Theory demanded that the political and economic foundations of the world be overturned and rebuilt into unknown , untested models? Don't expect us normal folk to suspend disbelief because you brushed against the walls of an institution of higher learning. If you are right , the future is going to be very bleak, even if we do heed your advice. I realy do hope the AGW crowd regroups and reestablishes their credibility to the masses. As Much as I want you proven wrong, I want it only if you are wrong. -
Doug Bostrom at 07:18 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
Readers should take Galloping Camel's implication that Mr. Justice Burton of the England and Wales High Court is endowed with or claims mind-reading powers with a grain of salt. Justice Burton made no remarks about Al Gore's honesty and did not attempt any assessment of such. While generally expressing admiration of many of the film's qualities and concurring with expert witness assessment that in "An Inconvenient Truth" "Al Gore's presentation of the causes and likely effects of climate change in the film was broadly accurate" Justice Burton did take issue with 9 points made in the film. He refers to them as "errors", most (or some will argue all) of which were not in fact erroneous. The complete court opinion may be read here. RealClimate elaborates on the "errors" here, where it becomes a little more clear what the case was actually deciding, a question not primarily about "An Inconvenient Truth" but rather interpretation of guidelines for material to be presented to students in the UK. New Scientist also looked more closely at the "errors" and that writeup may be found here.
-
gallopingcamel at 07:06 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
JMurphy (#109) Q1. "Catastrophic Global Warming" is what the IPCC predicts in AR4, without presenting convincing evidence. Q2. Owing to the willful misconduct by most of the "Main Stream Media" in the USA, you may not have heard that Al Gore's book is considered a work of fiction in the UK. See: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2007/10/09/court-identifies-eleven-inaccuracies-al-gore-s-inconvenient-truth http://abcnews.go.com/US/TenWays/story?id=3719791&page=1 Q3. As I have said several times before on this blog, science is not about counting heads. However, it is sometimes amusing to pretend that counting heads matters. -
scaddenp at 07:02 AM on 24 July 2010Models are unreliable
Peter, your faith in Vince is touching. Perhaps you should google for some other opinions? (Or look at his review comments at IPCC and editor's response). I've known Vince all my working life and I would trust him to do a coal analysis for me. You still seem to think Hansen's model is somehow flawed because it's deals with "fictious scenarios". Would you complain about say an automobile model not predicting speed because it cant tell how hard you press the accelerator? With the Hansen model however, you can rerun it with ACTUAL forcings instead of the scenario. What else can demand of a model? You are also ignoring all the other model/observation matches in the above article. Where have the models failed? -
muoncounter at 06:52 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
Wow: at #80 we learned that there could be 3 Galileos in the same room and at #110 we learned that my high school students needn't bother working any longer, as they are all potential Einsteins, whether they graduate or not. Things are looking up? Unfortunately, in the US, they are not. Despite what the majority of scientists believe, the people who repeat those two nonsensical arguments are winning: "48% of Americans now believe that the seriousness of global warming is generally exaggerated, up from 41% in 2009 and 31% in 1997". See this article for the full dose of bad news. -
KR at 06:31 AM on 24 July 2010Rebutting skeptic arguments in a single line
RSVP - yep, asymptotic convergence. The relationship should become linear once you are unsaturated all through the band-pass of the GHG, but that's at very low concentrations. Proper calculation of these requires numeric integration over all GHG's and the full spectra, which I am sadly incapable of doing in my head (sigh) - but a sum of asymptotic convergences of the various GHG components agrees quite well, and is pretty darn close for mental shorthand. -
RSVP at 06:13 AM on 24 July 2010Rebutting skeptic arguments in a single line
KR I follow what you are saying. All this seems to point to asymptotic convergence. -
actually thoughtful at 05:59 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Pete Ridley, your poinst would make sense if they were true. But they are not. How do you refute Hansen's 1988 work - still accurate after 22 years (and of course models now are much more sophisticated and while they have not stood the test of time, given that they stand on the shoulders of Hansen's early work, only a crank would claim they will do less well. -
tobyjoyce at 05:41 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
chriscanaris, @39 Like yourself, I am an admirer of Gould's writing, and his efforts to gain recognition for figures who were once admired but now derided as "losers in the game". An example was Georges Cuvier, the great pre-Darwinian biologist who explained the variety of species by periodic catastrophes destroying somes species. Gould defended Cuvier's theory as "good science" in his day, pointing out how the extinction of dinosaurs by the famous KT-boundary comet collision means that Cuvier was not entirely wrong. But where does that get us? A dollop of sympathy for Richard Lindzen or Roy Spencer because they may be partially right? Darwin spent his life after the publication of Origin of Species watering down his theory in subsequent editions to satisfy or placate various critics. But we know now that he was most correct in the first edition. My own feeling is that Hulme and people like Judy Curry are not really helping. There are some issues over which no compromise is possible. The question is "Who speaks for science?", or "Who has scientific authority?". I think we know which group is not the answer to either question. -
KR at 05:14 AM on 24 July 2010Models are unreliable
Pete Ridley - A question for you. The Hansen 1988 model appears to satisfy all the criteria I know of for a reasonable scientific model. You seem to disagree. Can you tell us where the Hansen model fails these criteria? Or perhaps tell us what your definition of a scientific model might be? -
KR at 05:07 AM on 24 July 2010Rebutting skeptic arguments in a single line
RSVP - you forgot the other greenhouse gasses. You got 9-10 oC just by removing CO2. CO2 is 25-30% of the total GHG retention - add water for ~50%, methane, NO2, etc. (each with logarithmic effects), and look, you're right around 33 oC. -
KR at 05:01 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
TruthSeeker - Soon and Baliunas 2003 were criticized analytically, looking at their numbers and methods, misattributions of information, their selective sub-sets of data, and finding considerable fault with them. That's how you criticize a paper! If Watts feels that his data was misinterpreted, he should post a comment describing that, to the same journal that Menne published in. If he feels Menne analyzed it incorrectly, he should point out the math errors. If he feels that the full set of data would lead to a different conclusion than Menne reached, he should analyze it in the same fashion and show it. He has done none of the above. If you haven't read the Menne paper, well, that's end of discussion for me. I read Menne's paper and Watt's blog prior to even commenting on the issue. I would respectfully suggest you do the same before continuing. -
dhogaza at 04:58 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
"Come on, Einstein didn't either." TruthSeeker needs to spend more time trying to live up to his high-falutin' handle. Einstein got his undergraduate degrees in mathematics and physics in 1900, and finished his doctoral thesis in 1905, and as a result was rewarded his PhD by the University of Zürich. Later that year he published the four papers that established his fame for eternity. You can read this in WIkipedia yourself. Or elsewhere, if you think wikipedia's lying about Einstein's academic background. Comparing Watts and Einstein falls flat for many reasons, claiming Einstein only had a high school diploma is only the most obvious fail. Perhaps this will teach you to more closely research claims made by denialists? The einstein one's repeated about once a month on blogs I read regularly. Isn't it about the time that this lie was put to bed once and for all? -
KR at 04:52 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
johnd - I agree that historic cloud data is limited. That's why I was delighted to find the Warren et al 1988 paper covering 1952-1981 (my typo about coverage dates in the previous post - sorry). No trend was found. Note that this was ocean data - I haven't located the previous land cloud cover data yet. But the ocean data should have much lower variability and more clearly indicate a trend if one existed. If clouds were a function of temperature, or temperature a function of clouds, I would expect some correlation. The data doesn't seem to support either hypothesis. -
Peter Hogarth at 04:37 AM on 24 July 2010Models are unreliable
Pete Ridley at 00:59 AM on 24 July, 2010 You state "contrary to reality which is a turning point or even downturn in globa tmperature trend". I assume you mean surface or lower tropospheric temperature trends as measured by land/vessel based stations, satellites or radiosondes? Could you please explain how you arrive at your conclusion? I have quite a few data sets available, and it is difficult to see any turning points or downturns in trend unless you are extremely selective or narrow on start and end times. -
TruthSeeker at 04:26 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
KR #104 "What Watt could do would be to (a) demonstrate that Menne's analysis was flawed (bad statistics, method, etc.), or (b) show that the more complete data, when analyzed a la Menne, results in different conclusions than the initial data set." I agree with that. Again, I still go back to SB03 and the fact that it was rebuked and criticized by those that argued that the authors had misrepresented or misinterpreted their data. How is this different? dhogaza #106 "I think it's become obvious that TruthSeeker hasn't actually read Menne's paper and analysis, but rather is basing his comments on Watts claims" That's true. "I hate to break this to you, but Watts highest degree is a high-school diploma," Come on, Einstein didn't either. "because I actually have some faith that you might be smart enough to figure out that he doesn't know squat on your own." You give me to much credit, remember I think Watts is being attacked because he is a hominid. . :-) Thanks for your thoughtful responses. You have given me more to think about. -
johnd at 04:21 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
KR at 03:36 AM, clouds have been determined as having an overall nett cooling effect. The problem with working them into modeling is that there is no historic data or ways to reconstruct proxy data. Early observations are obviously limited, and reliable satellite data only available for the last couple of decades, barely enough to establish trends, however enough to show a reasonably large degree of variation. But there is still that indecision as to whether temperature is a function of clouds or clouds a function of temperature.
-
JMurphy at 04:06 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
gallopingcamel wrote : The above claim may well be correct. My point is that the outcome would be reversed if the question was changed to include the phrase "Catastrophic Global Warming" and the participation were broadened to include all scientists. What is "Catastrophic Global Warming" and why do you believe that all scientists should have a say as to whether Global Warming is happening, 'Catastrophic' or not ? Do you also believe that all scientists should have a say as to whether, say, Dark Energy exists ? gallopingcamel wrote : ...the MND piece opens up with an account of Al Gore's dishonesty in "An Inconvenient Truth" that was proven in a British court of law. What 'dishonesty' and which British court of law proved that 'dishonesty' ? gallopingcamel wrote : Getting back to John Cook's straw poll, 30,000 scientists signed a petition opposing the Kyoto protocol. So ? Does that mean that the tens of millions of other scientists out there supported the Kyoto protocol ? -
Ned at 04:04 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
shawnhet writes: Basically, we have one easy way to tell whether someone is an expert in science and when someone isn't: whether they can make a risky prediction that turns out to be true. Actually, that's not a particularly reliable test either. Experts can and do make mistakes, and an incompetent amateur can make a prediction that happens to turn out correctly despite being based on entirely wrong reasoning. I doubt there's any single test for expertise, though there are a bunch of different possible indicators. -
Ned at 03:58 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
30,000 scientists signed a petition opposing the Kyoto protocol Possibly, if you use an extraordinarily loose definition of the word "scientist". -
RSVP at 03:53 AM on 24 July 2010Rebutting skeptic arguments in a single line
KR "RSVP - The physics of CO2 and the greenhouse gas effect is logarithmic; for each doubling of CO2 levels an additional forcing of ~1 oC is expected." If this is true, then successive halving should reveal where temperatures would be without CO2. Lets do that... 350 / 2 = 175 (minus one degree) 175 / 2 = 87.5 (minus one more degree) 87.5 / 2 = 43.75 (minus one) 43.75 / 2 = 21.86 (minus one more) 21.86 / 2 = 10.94 (another degree less) 10.94 / 2 = 5.46 (one more) 5.46 / 2 = 2.73 (one more) 2.73 / 2 = 1.37 (one more) 1.37 / 2 = 0.68 (one more...) I have halved the CO2 ppm only nine times and am basically at zero ppm. According to your statement, my calculation is "incorrect", and yet taking what you are saying on face value also does not add up. One of us doesnt know what he is talking about. -
KR at 03:36 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
johnd - cloud feedback, both as albedo changes and as additional IR entrapment (negative and positive feedback, respectively), is certainly an interesting issue. However, the discussions I've seen indicate that this cloud variability is fairly small - I believe the Lindzen and Choi paper has been shown to have serious analytic issues, and the cosmic ray/clouds hypothesis is junk, as it doesn't match temperature trends. I will point out, however, that if clouds greatly affected outgoing long wave radiation (LWR), that would show up directly in the top of atmosphere (TOA) readings as variability of readings for ground referenced points over time, as cloud cover changed. That would be a fairly straightforward analysis, and quite definitive - I haven't seen any papers on it yet, though. Anyone else? Have there been papers on this topic, of cloud induced variability in TOA outgoing energy? I greatly suspect, however, that given the majority of LWR is emitted from the top of the troposphere and stratosphere that the cloud variability mostly affects distributions in the lower troposphere, with the results averaging out and not affecting TOA radiation levels and hence the radiative balance. In order for clouds to have a trend effect, there would have to be a change in total cloud cover. There are papers on that, albeit many from Lindzen. There's an interesting paper by Warren et al, 1988, describing sea cloud coverage in the period 1952-1995, indicating observed small changes (+0.7% 1952-1981) in total coverage, although probably tied to low observation counts and poor geographic coverage in the earlier years (esp. WWII). They seem to conclude that any yearly trends are issues with the data, not real phenomena. There's a previous atlas showing land data - I haven't been able to find a link to that yet. So - no real evidence for cloud change trends there. -
NickD at 03:35 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
@ RSVP at 03:30 AM on 24 July, 2010 I'll take that as a "no" to my asking for "extraordinary evidence" for your hyperbolic claim. You simply have personal anecdotes. Thank you for your response. -
RSVP at 03:30 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
To NickD "Do you have extraordinary evidence which backs up your assertion that global skepticism amongst laypersons became an "avalanche" after the molehills you cited?" When I do get the chance to bore the uninitiated (i.e., "normal people") about AGW theory, they may not understand or remember any of the details, but what they do seem to know all about is an exaggerated version of Climategate, a molehill which seems to have stuck like mud. -
Phila at 03:29 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
#9 Humanity Rules One could argue Steve McIntyre or even Monckton has been researching and banging on about their respective climate science interests that they have developed some level of expertise. Yes, one could argue that. The problem is, a lot of "skeptics" are quick to grant McIntyre and Monckton this expertise, while ignoring or insulting the expertise of thousands of scientists who've studied longer and worked harder, and -- most important -- are able to provide proof that McIntyre or Monckton have made basic errors. Because they haven't gone down a formal academic process does not necessarily invalidate that experience. Is No, it doesn't. But you know what does invalidate that experience? Being consistently wrong. There's a real world out there, and we can check certain kinds of theories and claims against it, and get a pretty good idea of which ones are closer to the truth. That's where McIntyre and Monckton fail, and the debate about their relative "expertise" is simply a faux-populist distraction from that basic fact. Ultimately, the proof that Monckton and McIntyre don't have the proper credentials is the fact that they consistently use the wrong methods and get the wrong results. You don't get to have it both ways. You don't get to claim that climate "expertise" is worthy of respect when Monckton sucks it up osmotically in his spare time, and then call it "groupthink" when it's earned in the traditional way. Maybe this point will be clearer to you if we get away from AGW for a moment. I don't think the AIDS/common cold/MS cure that Monckton's been working on is going to work. He's not a doctor or a virologist or anythig along those lines, and the chance that he's going to hit on a miracle cure for multiple diseases strikes me as vanishingly slim. I'm sure he'd claim to have developed some homegrown "expertise" on this subject, too, but what snake-oil salesman doesn't? It's possible that he's going to revolutionize modern medicine, just as it's possible that I'm going to be crowned Pope next year. But sensible people will bet the farm against it. -
gallopingcamel at 03:02 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
scaddenp (#93), I have many reasons for believing that mankind's influence on the climate is small, but that is not the point. This thread claims that "Over 97% of actively publishing climate scientists think humans are changing global temperature". The above claim may well be correct. My point is that the outcome would be reversed if the question was changed to include the phrase "Catastrophic Global Warming" and the participation were broadened to include all scientists. kdkd (#94), Like scaddenp you failed to address my point but since you have raised the subject of dishonesty, the MND piece opens up with an account of Al Gore's dishonesty in "An Inconvenient Truth" that was proven in a British court of law. Getting back to John Cook's straw poll, 30,000 scientists signed a petition opposing the Kyoto protocol. Most of the scientists I work with are highly sceptical about CAGW and several of them signed this petition, while I did not. Clearly it is not difficult to get many thousands of scientists to support statements that on the one hand reject the idea of catastrophic global warming and on the other hand point to the beneficial effects of carbon dioxide. http://www.petitionproject.org/index.php -
johnd at 02:58 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
andrew adams at 21:33 PM, I think it is obvious by which authority, from the scientists themselves. There are some issues that are most central to understanding how the climate works but are poorly understood, the most obvious being clouds. Scientists themselves declare it an area that is poorly understood, yet clouds are a major influence where a small change can make a large difference over any time frame. Clouds are not the only area of contention, but the most obvious, and likely the most important. That poor scientific understanding is reflected here on this site with virtually no one able to debate the issue, most contributors steer well clear of the subject, possibly because there is little credible data that can be used to support a pro AGW point of view. -
dhogaza at 02:58 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
I think it's become obvious that TruthSeeker hasn't actually read Menne's paper and analysis, but rather is basing his comments on Watts claims. TruthSeeker, I hate to break this to you, but Watts highest degree is a high-school diploma, and while that doesn't mean that he might not be able to learn some basic algebraic and statistical techniques for data analysis, there is plenty of evidence that he hasn't. I read Menne and Watts' "rebuttal" and Watts is full of it. I'm not going to bother going back to re-evaluate Watts' "rebuttal", because I actually have some faith that you might be smart enough to figure out that he doesn't know squat on your own. Another thing for you to consider is that several people, including some in the skeptic camp, have spent the last six months or so coming up with their own surface station temperature reconstructions, using a variety of statistical techniques. And they all come up with numbers very close to GISSTemp. This was a surprise to some among the skeptic camp who apparently believed that their various "more valid" analyses would undermine GISSTemp. Watts has been promising us a paper for a couple of years now. Where is it? And BTW he admits his own incompetence in regard to analysis because he's stated that others will be doing his analysis for him. -
KR at 02:53 AM on 24 July 2010Models are unreliable
Pete Ridley - a 'scientific model' is a simplified system for making reasonable projections and exploring system interactions, especially useful when it's not practical to subject the real system to repeated tests and inputs. Evaluating a model takes into consideration several things: - Ability to match previous observations (historic data) - Ability to predict future observations - Ability to estimate different future states based on different inputs (Given 'A', predict 'B') - Match of model internal relationships to known physical phenomena - Simplicity (no nested 'crystal spheres' for epicycles) The 1988 Hansen model was, by current standards, fairly simple. Ocean heat content/circulation, ice melt rates, some additional aerosol information, etc., weren't in it. But it still shows close predictive agreement with inputs matched to what has happened since 1988! That's a pretty decent model. And no, it's not 1-to-1 agreement. Short term variation (a couple of years) is really weather, not climate. You need to make running averages of >10 years to average out the short term fluctuations and identify the climate trend. On a side note, you complain about reliability of surface temperature measures. That's a fairly common skeptic argument, and has been discussed here and here, as well as in a very recent topic on cherry picking data. The surface temperature measures are reliable - that argument really doesn't hold water. -
JMurphy at 02:48 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
It's unbelievable the way the so-called skeptics can't accept reality and continue to repetitively repeat and regurgitate what they were led to believe would be the final 'final nail in the coffin of AGW'. It used to be just the 'hockey-stick' graph and now it's 'Climategate' - both were promised (by the so-called skeptical gurus - their particular brand of acceptable authority, to whom the so-called skeptics give total obedience) as the final proof against AGW, and their followers are still hanging onto those faith-based promises because they can't face up to accepting that they were lied to/misinformed/used/shown up/gullible. But here we have them repeated again - twice from one poster, as if there was a need to make it appear more 'real' : "Climategate and the subsequent IPCC-gates have started an avalanche of scepticism among lay people around the globe." Pete Ridley (Part I) "Climategate wasn’t spin, it was a scandal exposed by the leaked files and the enquiries held so far were simply whitewashes but they don’t lessen the scandal of the general public’s recognition of it." Pete Ridley (Part II) "The difficulty with this line is that public confidence has been damaged by Climategate, and the exaggerated claims by advocates like Al Gore are not being believed by the great unwashed who will have to pay for the radical changes to their energy sources." Ken Lambert The difference now, I suppose, is that these so-called skeptics want to try to make it appear that the general public are on their side in their disbelief. The truth, I believe, is quite the opposite, but that will be hard to accept for some - especially those who think it was a 'scandal', followed by a 'whitewash'. For goodness sake, get over it (especially the Al Gore obsession) and move on to something else that might have more substance - if you can find anything... -
andrew adams at 02:28 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Pete Ridley, The point I was making is that you made a specific claim about the state of our collective knowlege about what drives our climate, ie that our understanding in this area is very poor. But there is a large body of published science which shows that actually we do understand many of factors which influence our climate rather well. So if I'm to believe you and dismiss the scientific literature then I have to believe that you have some kind of authority on the subject. -
Philippe Chantreau at 02:25 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
"ad hominid (sic) attacks on his credibility." Well, I would certainly stop short of calling Watts an hominid. However, an attack on credibility is not an ad hom. I have zero knowledge of quilting. Zilch. If I was trying to make a technical comment and criticize others on how they do it, an attack on my credibility would be perfectly justified. It would not call into question my worth as a person (hence disqualifying it as ad-hom) but certainly would do so as a commenter on quilting. That would be fine. Watts history of posts demonstrate that he is not competent to analyze data. If he his, why is he not doing so? He's been at this for over 3 years, that's enough to partially store the bigger part of a degree in applied maths. Saying that he is not competent to analyze data is not an ad-hom. -
KR at 02:07 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
TruthSeeker - Watts put out some data, Menne analyzed it, and it's not normal peer review process to give the originator of the data refusal rights over your analysis. What Watt could do would be to (a) demonstrate that Menne's analysis was flawed (bad statistics, method, etc.), or (b) show that the more complete data, when analyzed a la Menne, results in different conclusions than the initial data set. He has yet to do either. Watt's current blog posting has not one bit of analysis of how his issues with the data collection affect the global temperature track as derived from the GISS data. That isn't to say that he might or might not have some points in his complaints about Menne's methods or personal interactions. But he has not yet analytically criticized Menne's results. -
Philippe Chantreau at 02:03 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
About this: "we need better measurement and more years to find out what is really happening". It applies only because skeptics insist on levels of certainty and a reductionist approach that are both incompatible with complexity. If the same standards were applied to medicine, all progress would stall. Open a pharmacology book and note all the substances for which it is reported "mechanism of action unknown." -
NickD at 01:49 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Pete Ridley at 00:17 AM on 24 July, 2010 said, "Climategate wasn’t spin, it was a scandal exposed by the leaked files and the enquiries held so far were simply whitewashes but they don’t lessen the scandal of the general public’s recognition of it." Besides the ironic spin in your comment, I wanted to point out that, as a member of the general public having no ties to the scientific community (every bit the layperson), what I recognize as scandalous is that private emails were obtained without permission (generally recognized as "stealing"), and released to the general public. I find criminal activity to be generally scandalous. I tend to find, based on personal experience, the view expressed by Doug Bostrom to be much more accurate. Those who were already in-the-know with climate science generally fall into two camps. Those who are self-described "skeptics" tend to look at the the "Climategate" non-controversy as evidence confirming beliefs they already held. Those on the other side of the fence vary a bit from seeing some perhaps inappropriate comments that have little bearing on the larger picture, to being irate at the crime committed and the ensuing death threats, etc leveled at those involved. Those with no knowledge (people who have never heard of this site, WUWT, RC, etc) of climate science have probably never heard of CRU. At least that's my experience. Perhaps there are some facts and figures to back up your "avalanche" comment and subsequent similar assertions. I will continue to wait for them. -
shawnhet at 01:45 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Basically, we have one easy way to tell whether someone is an expert in science and when someone isn't: whether they can make a risky prediction that turns out to be true. If someone did "the work" and ended up no better at predicting what's going to happen than a guy on the street, should we still be listening to him? Cheers, :) -
shawnhet at 01:21 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
Skywatcher:"skywatcher at 19:06 PM on 23 July, 2010 #74 - shawnhet, your last sentence does not make any sense. There's a huge difference between distribution of heat and addition of heat. One can cause a long-term change in a system, the other can't." I don't understand you here. You'd originally started by saying that "I agree that Milankovitch cycles redistribute heat - but they do this globally - such as shifting insolation preferences from the NH to the SH, namely to a place where it cannot easily redistribute back". Now, presumably, Milankovitch cycles cause long-term changes in a system, so your latest position seems to disagree with your original position. As to my point vis a vis PDO and the temp trend, it is pretty easy to understand IMO. If we assume that X affects temperatures, and there is no trend in X, then it follows that X will not affect the temperature *trend*, but it doesn't mean that X doesn't affect temperature. Cheers, :) -
TruthSeeker at 00:51 AM on 24 July 2010What do you get when you put 100 climate scientists in a room?
#88 "The problem, however, is that the guy who collected the data (Watts) wasn't invited to "peer review" the paper. Which is the normal Peer Review process. " Splurf ... TruthSeeker, if I were drinking coffee when reading your post, you'd owe me a keyboard. There's no polite way to say this: you don't know what you're talking about." Maybe so, I didn't fully research that before I posted it. That, however, doesn't undermine the argument that Watt's makes regarding the quality of data that Menne used. In fact it is the same argument that undermine the Soon paper. I find it self serving to claim its bad for Soon but not for Menne. Like you all have said, I too am curious to see if Watt's gets a paper published. That being said, non of you point to where Watt's criticism of Menne's paper isn't valid. All you do is ad hominid attacks on his credibility, but you don't address the argument that Menne's paper is flawed based on a skewed and uncontrolled dataset. -
Ned at 00:34 AM on 24 July 2010CO2 effect is saturated
Hi, Daved. You're right, people do post links to that paper a lot. Fortunately, this site is here to help people quickly assess those kinds of claims. The short answer is that the "falsification" paper by G&T is just nonsense. You can find a rebuttal to it on this site at The greenhouse effect and the 2nd law of thermodynamics Or, if you want more depth, there's a lot of discussion of this at the website "Science of Doom": On Having a Laugh – by Gerlich and Tscheuschner (2009) On the Miseducation of the Uninformed by Gerlich and Tscheuschner (2009) and subsequent posts at Science of Doom. -
Doug Bostrom at 00:33 AM on 24 July 2010The nature of authority
Ken Lambert, if you read the home page of this site you'll notice that Skeptical Science is here in large part due to the odd phenomena of so-called climate change skepticism itself; the properties of "climate skeptics" are a topic of investigation and discussion. Posts focusing on such specimens as Monckton are entirely in keeping with the mission of the site. Regarding threads reaching stalemates, I'd offer that we'd like better precision for many measurements while at the same time noting that such precision and harmony as we do have among various data is quite sufficient to inform us that we are looking at a significant risk of and from climate change. Your final points about public opinion and money are spot-on for this site. "Climategate" was a synthetic and hollow matter, as confirmed by multiple investigations, but is turning out to be an interesting topic for social science researchers and thus an appealing topic for those who perceive "climate skeptics" as an intriguing subject of perusal. Preliminary results seem to show that the dominant and more durable effect of "climategate" has been to harden existing beliefs among so-called climate skeptics. The same research indicates that surprisingly few persons were actually aware of the matter at all, with awareness being concentrated among those already following the subject of climate change. Acceptance of "climategate" as a valid matter of concern is strongly correlated with ideology. Research also indicates that fortuitous timing between "climategate" and heavy snowfall in parts of the U.S. and Europe last winter exaggerated the impact of the matter but this effect is not expected to be durable. Your connection between money, mitigation, uncertainty and fear of loss is whether by coincidence or not exactly as though it had been taken from the playbook of the political consultant Luntz in his memorandum of a few years ago to the GOP.
Prev 2284 2285 2286 2287 2288 2289 2290 2291 2292 2293 2294 2295 2296 2297 2298 2299 Next
