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1077 at 10:45 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#34. oracle2world Sounds rather logical and solid to me... But after all I wrote today on this website no one will be surprised. Kudos to John Cook that he did not censor all this as he did with one of my previous postings. He might be off on Sundays? Neh! That was under the belt and I apologise right here and now! -
Riccardo at 10:42 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
Bob Armstrong, actually there are good reasons why Boltzmann and Kirchhoff are not mentioned. Tyndall studied the absorption of "radiant heat" in the 50s of 19th century and first proved the effect in his famous paper in 1961. It was a purely experimental paper and Tyndall did not apply his findings to the earth system. Afterall Kirchhoff had just published it's law (1859) and Boltzman was a young student. Arrhenius, often cited with Tyndall, first applied it to the earth in 1989 (pag. 255, you'll find the Stefan-Boltzman law). As for the 9 °C, where does this number come from? Kirchhoff and Boltzman teach us that it is 33 °C, you should be more specific. It apperas that you are comparing a so called grey atmosphere to an optically thick one. It's not this situation that the 33 °C refers to; the comparison is with a transparent atmosphere (optically equivalent to no atmosphere at all). The changes in the absorption spectrum of the atmosphere due to increasing CO2 are surely minor, something like a few W/m^2. Unfortunately it turns out that the climate system is quite sensitive to minor changes, like the ones that caused the glacial cycles. Bad luck indeed. Plant growth can increase if supported by the right temperature, the right amount of nutrients and the right amount a distribution of water. In some cases it worked, in others not. But the concentration in the atmosphere in clearly increasing, maybe they are not good enough. Bad luck, again. Morner is well known, not least for using a few selected tide gauges instead of performing the full analysis required to infer global sea level rise. We can just infer how much sea level will increase in the next century, but not much doubt that it's increasing now. In the end, i see many reasons to be worried about warming, none to ignore it. -
1077 at 10:35 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
32. milestone55 You got it wrong on two accounts: 1. My outlook and experience affects my political bias, not the other way around. 2. I do not think that I am smarter than the experts in climatology. But I am one of the many "experts" in my field, meaning that I know more in my field than the average person does. But I am far from knowing everything even less in a deffinitive and incontrovertible manner. Therefore I am keenly aware of how little I and all the so called experts really know. So my real position is the anthitesis of hubris. Gauss used to compare the knowledge of an individual to a sphere floating in the infinity of knowledge available. If the knowledge grows with the radius of the sphere, the contact with what that individual does not know grows with the square of the radius. -
oracle2world at 10:27 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
ProfMandia at 04:46 AM on 1 March, 2010 I also promise you that if there is a landmark anti-AGW paper that shows record levels of GHGs are not driving the climate but instead it is caused by X, and then X is shown again and again in the literature to be the primary driver of climate, I and most others will jump ship and be pro-X. ---------------------------------------------- You think so? The psychological theory of "dissonance" says people will dig in even harder. Since there is no "definitive" paper SHOWING that GHGs drive anything, there won't be any "definitive" paper showing they don't. But once again this shows the chip on the shoulder of AGW. Like the burden of skeptics is to show where AGW fails. Sorry. Skeptic is the default. It is up to the AGW community to show why their theory explains more than normal variance. And telling folks to wade through peer-reviewed wallpaper is just a cop-out. Present your data. One sentence or graphic per paper linked. No nebulous abstract that someone wrote to make a living. Include all the anomalous data. Start with, CO2 is rising (this should be easy). And end with "if China isn't on board none of this matters anyway".Response: "Since there is no "definitive" paper SHOWING that GHGs drive anything"
There are a number of papers showing that greenhouse gases trap heat which causes radiative forcing which drives climate.
Harries 2001, Griggs 2004, Chen 2007 all find less radiation escaping out to space at the wavelengths that greenhouse gases absorb energy. Eg - greenhouse gases trapping heat.
Wang 2009, Philipona 2004, Evans 2006 provide additional independent confirmation of this result, using surface measurements to find more longwave energy returning back to the Earth's surface. Evans 2006 is particularly interesting because it looks at the longwave spectrum to quantify the individual contribution of each greenhouse gas.
"...telling folks to wade through peer-reviewed wallpaper is just a cop-out. Present your data. One sentence or graphic per paper linked"
This is good advice. In fact, so good that I have already attempted to do this on multiple occasions to the point where I'm waiting for people to start complaining I'm being repetitive. I first attempted to document the independent lines of evidence that humans are causing global warming last October with Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming. I wrote a similar article last December, this time with bullet point lists and one sentence per paper linked, in What happened to the evidence for man-made global warming? Then last week, and I thought maybe I was pushing the repetitiveness at this point, I summarised all the science in Senator Inhofe's attempt to distract us from the scientific realities of global warming.
However, your comment has demonstrated that people are still failing to recognise the many independent lines of empirical evidence for man-made global warming so I will probably need to resummarize all the scientific evidence every month or so. -
1077 at 10:19 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#29. doug_bostrom You write: "The economic powers like the ones who contribute so much to Senator Imhofe would be quite content for climate scientists to play with their models and theories, as long as they did not try to upset the economic apple-cart." My answer: Quite likely. But how about the economic powers driving Al Gore? Your attempt to reversse my analogy with Galileo falls rather flat. Sorry not to be unable to follow your logic. -
milestone55 at 10:19 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077: To quote your initial post: "And how revealing that the "left" seems to be overwhelmingly pro-global warming. It seems to be indeed "a Bolshevik plot" And another: " these motivations, which I see everywhere, are the alpha and omega of the entire controversy." At least that the second is accurate. Let me see, you discussed the alpha, but left out the motivations of the omega? And why would you concern yourself to look at the disinformation that is being intentionally spread by Big Oil, Coal or conservatives? I think you would save yourself some typing if you just came out and said that your political bias affects your outlook and your hubris leads you to think that you are smarter than the experts. -
1077 at 10:14 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#27. doug_bostrom Appreciate your honesty. The wilderness produced by the human psyche is as real as the physical environment that you attempt to describe with numbers. And is as important. This comes form an engineer who left engineering and is now waist-deep in economics. Beware: ivory towers are used by the real humans in the wilderness for purposes that the ivory tower inhabitants may find quite disgusting. Humanity will overcome this too. Malthus predicted extinction 200 years ago or so. The premises were different, but philosophically the thinking process waas the same. He was wrong and the solution was and will continue to be technology. But the road was not and will not be smooth. The size and gravity of the roughness is not predetermined (as Marx thought) but did and will depend on our decisions (as Karl Popper demonstrated). Enjoyed the exchange with you very much. -
oracle2world at 10:06 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
Anyone here do a scientific experiment for hire (aka professional scientist)? I thought not. I'm not talking some canned lab exercise in college. It is really hard, under the best of circumstances with controls, with nothing riding on the outcome. Time and time again folks that have had their hands in the dirt have made very persuasive cases that it is extremely unlikely anyone could possibly have a handle around climate change. A very complex non-linear system with inputs and outputs not well characterized? Unpredictable in theory and practice. When astronomers say a solar eclipse will happen at a given place at a given time, and tour operators take money from people expecting to see the eclipse, and the eclipse occurs. That is a powerful demonstration of the theory. When climate change folks continue to make WAG after WAG that doesn't pan out, base their entire argument on very noisy incomplete data, and end every argument with the world-is-coming-to-an-end ... it is easy to dismiss them. Very very easy. They have cried wolf like waaaaaaaaaaaay too often by now. In fact, why do climate change folks have to whine and moan about nobody appreciating their latest end of the world pronouncement at all? When a nuclear physicist says you can split the atom, and Hiroshima gets incinerated by a big honking bomb ... there is little doubt the physicist is on to something. So here is MY challenge. Show data, unequivocable, that increased temperatures on earth (say 2F) over 100 years will definitely lead to the end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it. I'm not talking WAGs ... show me exactly precisely how my summer day 2F hotter (on average) is suddenly going to destroy the planet. Show that mankind is completely incapable of adapting to this change. As well as all other species, cockroaches included. Watson and Crick won a Nobel Prize for a one page paper on DNA. A true breakthrough. That is how science works. -
tobyjoyce at 09:46 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077 (#12) said "Galilei was opposed by the establishment. It is not beyond belief that pope Urban VIII, the consummate self-serving politician, knew that Galileo was right; may be that’s why a harsher punishment was not applied to the aging scientist. The AGW is establishment policy today." That is stating it exactly backwards. Galileo was a scientist. The Catholic Church was quite happy for him to play with his telescopes, as long as he did not challenge their teaching authority. They were content for him to use the Copernican Theory as a "calculating device" as long as he did not insist it was "true" i.e. corresponding to the facts. The economic powers like the ones who contribute so much to Senator Imhofe would be quite content for climate scientists to play with their models and theories, as long as they did not try to upset the economic apple-cart. It happened before with Big Tobacco, it is happening now with Big Oil and Coal. Big Tobacco used every argument about scientific truth - there are many theories, scientists differ, there's a "controversy", not all the evidence is in, its a global conspriacy, a few anti-free-market scientists are lying.. ultimately they failed. The message to climate scientists now from the sconomic powers is "Stay in your labs, stay off public platforms, we'll tell you when you're needed. If not, we'll break you" Only someone who is very blind can fail to see who the real "establishment" is in this fight. -
Doug Bostrom at 09:34 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077 at 09:10 AM on 1 March 2010 I'm sorry but I can only walk with you to the edge of the wilderness, I can't follow you in. Other than funding inspirational public spaces and the like, in my book commitment of public will needs to be based on things that can be described with numbers. -
dhogaza at 09:16 AM on 1 March 2010Misinterpreting a retraction of rising sea level predictions
Martin Vermeer (who along with Stefan Rahmstorf uncovered the errors which led to the retraction of the Siddall paper) gives a correct explanation of the problem with the paper. Apparently my explanation isn't wrong but "a separate and interesting issue but not significant" (compared to the BIG erro)r. -
1077 at 09:10 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#24. doug_bostrom You wrote: "Let me add, I'm disappointed that your post seems to slide into the realm of attributing motivations into which neither you nor I have productive insight." Would appreciate if you elaborated a bit. From a strictly scientific point of view, you are undoubtedly correct that the realm of motivations has no business being invoked. But for me, as a non-climatologist, these motivations, which I see everywhere, are the alpha and omega of the entire controversy. Otherwise I would have no reason whatever to get involved; anymore than I did not get involved into a controversy about an apparent falsification of results in a research about ostracodes which a very good friend specializing in that field shared with me. There it was a pure matter of ambition. And trust me, I am not dreaming when I drill down to motivations, where every breathing, thinking human being can and should have productive insights. The choice is living in a totalitarian system. It may make no difference in some people's mind but it does in mine. -
1077 at 08:57 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#18 doug_bostrom Apologies for the typo in my Post Nr. 22: It should have been #18 doug_bostrom rather than #17 doug_bostrom. -
Doug Bostrom at 08:51 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077 at 08:27 AM on 1 March, 2010 Some concepts do not fit into the space occupied by differences of opinion, unless one is prepared to delve so far into philosophy as to be a lost man when trying to live in the world we inhabit and at the same time scrupulously account for philosophical uncertainties. However, where opinion does count, differences in opinion like so many things exist along a continuum; different opinions can roughly be ascribed some measure of utility. The trick here is to discern where on the continuum differences lie relative to one another. Let me add, I'm disappointed that your post seems to slide into the realm of attributing motivations into which neither you nor I have productive insight. -
1077 at 08:49 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#17. ProfMandia You wrote: "Economic models and theory are vastly different than physical models and theories. Physics is "rational and logical" - people are not. Therefore, ecomonic models will never be as stable as those in physics." Perfectly correct! Benoit Mandelbrot was employed by IBM and a few others to distiguish with his fractal geometry approach between noise in electrical circuits and the tru physical phenomena going on. Stimulated by his success, and probably by the potential pay-off, Prof. Mandelbrot launched into the financial world working for a number of well known institutions. He demolishes brilliantly the Modern Potfolio Theory (MPT) but admits honestly and meekly that his theory needs a lot more work before it can produce a practicable approach to the world of economics and finance. To me, the world of climatology lies, as far as mathematical complexity, somewhere between electrical circuits and economics. And I doubt that climatologists have found a solution reliable enough to put my life in their hands. -
1077 at 08:37 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#17 doug_bostrom Yes, "ambition" is a powerful motivator. In the academic world it is the equivalent of "power" in politics. And according to Hegel, power is the ultimate motivator of human action. At leas he got this right. I suspect we could have a very intesting conversation if we ever met... which is highly improbable. -
Riccardo at 08:27 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077, it's astonishing tha you can write "is rather revealing for an unjustified complex of superiority" on one side and on the other side re-writing history "it is not beyond belief that pope Urban VIII, the consummate self-serving politician, knew that Galileo was right". Maybe you do not remember history and Galileo's story and should check back otherwise you'd not compare the Inquisition to today's "establishment". Also, after half a century of United Nations is it still so hard to accept that almost all the countries in the world gather here and then? Does it look like the time of Pope Urban VII? From what you write it seems that for you common people and scientists are at the same level even in the highly specialized arena of climatology. I guess this applies to any other scientific, technological, political, cultural, etc., sectors of humkan knowledge. Oh sure, I have a complex of superiority ... You missed the point of that paper, it's not about who's better, who is smart enough. But you know, it comes as no surprise given that we all know that there's a foundamental cultural bias in accepting "unconvenient" science. So please, leave all those things aside and talk about science. -
1077 at 08:27 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#14. doug_bostrom I read the exchange between you and gallopingcamel. The specifics are above my head. But the very existence of a difference in opinion, as you admit exists, is an indication to me, poor slob caught in my own profession’s controversies, that the conclusion of AGW’ists is not enough of a basis for sweeping life changing economic action. So let the controversy continue! And let us not drift into a totalitarian society by using sometimes honest sometimes paid scientists as excuse. Because that’s what appears to be going on here. And that concerns everybody, climatologist or not. Incidentally, the mater is a global one. A friend in France reccommended that I read L'imposture climatique : Ou La fausse écologie by Claude Allègre (not translated so far). Before buying the book I was perusing the comments on Amazon.fr. The book seems to have run into a massive AGW’ist resistance. You would most likely join the “one star crowd” there. Interestingly however, the arguments concentrate on what IMHO is a malevolent and ubiquitous conflation of ecology and climatology (I must say a brilliant dirty trick used extensively by Al Gore and his acolytes), on political arguments concerning the French President and GIEC (Groupe intergouvernemental d'experts sur l'évolution du climat), hair splitting on references to a publication by the American Meteorological Society on Oct. 19, 2009, etc... The AGW lobby is certainly active and unforgiving. A rebuttal by a certain Sylvestre Huet on his blog called Sciences to Mr. Allègre is quoted. I would like to see what Mr. Allègre has to say to that rebuttal before I spend the money. Have you heard of this Mr. Allègre? -
johnd at 08:15 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
gallopingcamel, I tend to agree with you. Increasing atmospheric water vapour is what actually results in increased warming with water vapour supposedly being very responsive to CO2 forcing. The amount of water vapour in the atmosphere is related to the temperature of the atmosphere. It suggests that whilst the warming that has occurred since the last ice age due to, or leading to, a corresponding ongoing increase in atmospheric water vapour, CO2 data indicates that the increase in CO2 was not matching the increase in water vapour, and it was only in recent years when CO2 levels accelerated that the ratio of water vapour to CO2 stopped increasing with CO2 levels apparently increasing at a faster rate than water vapour. If water vapour is as responsive to such CO2 forcing as is claimed, then it must have been just as, if not more responsive, to various natural changes that have occurred in the past. -
Doug Bostrom at 08:14 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077 at 07:24 AM on 1 March 2010 From my perspective I'm concerned we're failing to act in a way that is rash, heh! As to common sense, intervening in a process where one does not have command of the facts necessary to make useful decisions does not seem like common sense. I'm afraid that for most of us we're going to need to take a statistical snapshot of what researchers are telling us-- look at where the bulk of their results point-- and base our input for decision making on that signal. It's the best we can do. I don't think there's much doubt that powerful actors are working to influence our perspective on this issue. If there's any benefit to be derived from that, it lies in the bright spotlight of attention we see focused on any apparent serious discrepancies in our understanding of our climate system and the subsequent arguments that come of such potentially disruptive findings. So far nothing has emerged that has survived the unusually public scrutiny being applied to this field of research. As this process has unfolded we also seem to have eliminated most if not all robust counters to the fundamental physical argument underlying AGW even as we have seen a mounting body of evidence indirectly supporting the basic premise. If there's an elephant in the room that's going to squash the fairly basic physics predicting a warming ocean-atmosphere system it must be very well camouflaged indeed. I think it's also helpful to remember that if there's any human emotion seriously afflicting scientists, it's our old friend "ambition", working in effective concert with plain old curiosity. Such discrepancies as do emerge in our predictions with regard to climate are a tantalizing goal for explanation because of these two basic human drives. Inexplicable behavior in the face of an established theory is the subject of compulsive fascination not only because of its very "wrongness", but also due to the scientific prestige that would accompany such a finding. -
ProfMandia at 07:45 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077: Economic models and theory are vastly different than physical models and theories. Physics is "rational and logical" - people are not. Therefore, ecomonic models will never be as stable as those in physics. -
Bob Armstrong at 07:41 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
This video is a mixture of fact and and silliness . I recommend as a counter-point MIT's Richard Lindzen's talk at CIE : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmGiiNQ0yHQ . While there are many ways to show how small the perhaps 0.3% change in mean temperature has been over the last century , I so like his comparison with Boston's spring climate , I extracted it to http://cosy.com/Science/Lindzenlineplot800.gif . In general , the ecological arguments are patent BS -- and many have been thoroughly shown to be just that . Listen to this interview with Dr. Nils-Axel Mörner , http://itsrainmakingtime.com/2010/nilsaxelmorner/ , who spent his life studying sea level , was involved with the IPCC and effectively indicts its report on sea level change . Show me global maps of the change in the 0c contour over the seasons over the last half century and then we can start discussing the reality of animals and plants drastically reacting to a change in mean temperature which is just a "just noticeable difference" for humans in psychophysical experiments . What personally , raises my hackles is the , as stated in the video - wrong - assertion that without the green house effect we would be 33c colder . Far more realistic , and mathematically tractable , is that we are about 9c warmer than a gray ( flat spectrum ) body in our orbit . And that's the last discussion of quantitative physics in the video . Tyndall is mentioned , but Stefan , Boltzmann and Kirchhoff which are the names actually associated with the equations which produce those numbers are not . The effect of the minor changes in our mean temperature from the minor changes in our planet's spectrum from CO2 can be calculated , but you won't find that from the alarmists because it's too small to be anything from beneficial . Finally , you will never see recognition that CO2 is the anabolic half of the respiratory cycle of life and therefore even the bit of carbon we are restoring to the biosphere from previous lush epochs is provably increasing green plant growth around the planet . If anything you will see absurd attempts to dismiss this grade school fact that all life , including each of us , is over 90% CO2 + H2O combined by sunlight . I must say John Cook presents more actual evidence than other alarmist sites , but still not the quantitative physics without which you do not have science , you have children at play . -
1077 at 07:24 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
#9 doug_bostrom Wonderful post. I answered it partially before I had a chance to see it. Just one remark: It would surely be an equal folly for us to abandon our emotions and feelings (or common sense) and act in a rash way based on theories just because they look intellectually satisfying at a certain point in time. As for mathematical rebukes in the field of climatology, I am not able to provide any: not my field but I care about it because it impacts economic and political decisions that influence my life and that of my children and beyond. Such mathematical rebukes of entrenched orthodoxy exist however in the field of finance with which I made a parallel in my previous post. And yes, people are not only entitled but obligated to intervene in the economic and political decisions in the world of finance, even if they are not in possession of the tools required to refute prevailing theories. Common sense does count. -
Doug Bostrom at 07:23 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077 at 07:12 AM on 1 March 2010 May I offer, that to be a skeptic you must offer specific arguments in support of your skepticism? The fact that AGW is used as the basis for forming public policy is not an argument against scientific results. A numerical offering showing specific problems with a specific scientific finding would be an argument. "I don't believe it" is not skepticism. Similarly, saying you are a skeptical because statistics are employed in the research case for AGW is not actually skepticism. A skeptical case would be to identify specific problems with specific research findings supporting AGW. Again, "I don't believe it" is not an argument. The Lindzen and Choi paper cited by gallopingcamel is an instance of a skeptical approach to AGW. It fails, but it's an argument. -
tobyjoyce at 07:18 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
Its quite amusing to find at about 4 mins into the video a reference to the same Harries et al (2006) paper that @garythompson "disproved" at American Thinker. http://www.skepticalscience.com/American-Thinker-claims-to-have-disproven-global-warming.html -
1077 at 07:12 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
Before anything, it was and is not my intent or endeavor to insult or even put down anyone. Just to express my modest opinion. And, as strange as it may seem, I am keenly aware that I have been and still can be wrong. #6. Ricardo: The only way climate scientists can be puzzled by “polls [which] show that fewer Americans say they believe humans are making the planet dangerously warmer, despite a raft of scientific reports that say otherwise” (paragraph preceding in the text the one I quoted in my previous post) is that they believe in the absolute ability of individuals in their profession to transgress normal human behavior. Your question “Why should it apply to scientists as well?” is rather revealing for an unjustified complex of superiority. Note that I am purposefully avoiding other terms which are more derogatory and which could easily apply. Being a scientist is just a profession like many others, requiring some more education than others. And it can be a dangerous one for the common sense, since a lot of education can make one blind at realities that fall outside that education. Examples are numerous in the history. Assuming that more education automatically confers common sense is a fallacy that lead more than one otherwise intelligent person to horribly wrong results. Galilei was opposed by the establishment. It is not beyond belief that pope Urban VIII, the consummate self-serving politician, knew that Galileo was right; may be that’s why a harsher punishment was not applied to the aging scientist. The AGW is establishment policy today. Otherwise much fewer countries would have sent representatives to Copenhagen and Nobel Prizes would hardly be given to politicians are super-governmental organizations supporting AGW. NOAA, IPCC etc. are governmental organizations, i.e. they do represent the establishment and scientists working for them must be mindful about keeping their jobs. One cannot expect all to be heroes. Thus, being a “denier” today is equivalent to bucking the establishment, just as Galileo did and a (very) few others before him. AGW does not have the seasoning of the established theories you mention. It may reach that status, that’s why I am rather a skeptic than a denier, but it is not there yet. #8. ProfMandia: May I respectfully disagree with your contention that your “science colleagues are typically more logical and less emotional than the average person”. That’s what the intuitive reality should be. But my experience with academics is that frequently (if not typically) they tend to be more argumentative than the average person and sometimes they tend to create a contorted and often distorted logic. Not always a bad thing as counterintuitive observations help progress. But this is not unlike nitro-glycerin that needs to be handled with utmost care. I have experienced some academics becoming extremely emotional in order to support a point of view. This is understandable, as they invest a considerable amount of time and effort in developing a position. Appreciate your open mindedness in accepting X. Such a paper may or may not come. Until then however, I remain a true skeptic as most of the evidence for AGW I have seen is statistical in nature. And as an engineer turned financial analyst, I am way too aware how incomplete, erroneous and harmful such statistical analysis can be. Let me mention as an example the ubiquitous MPT (Modern Portfolio Theory) elaborated by Dr. Markowitz in the 50’s and improved by a few others. It makes assumptions like normal distribution of returns, lack of discontinuity in the data etc. which are absolutely necessary for a mathematical treatment of the subject. But they are also inconsistent with reality and thus make the theory only a first approximation of the real world. Result is a faulty risk control which gave us the current financial mess (as a proximate cause since other more fundamental causes also exist). I could go on with this parallel but I have already occupied more space than I deserve. -
Doug Bostrom at 07:12 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
gallopingcamel at 06:55 AM on 1 March, 2010 You should hang on to your ticket, book dinner and leave your luggage in your stateroom. Skeptical Science summary on Svensmark, Friis-Christensen 1997 While there was good correlation between cosmic radiation and temperature prior to 1970, the correlation breaks down sharply after 1970. The analysis concludes that "between 1970 and 1985 the cosmic ray flux, although still behaving similarly to the temperature, in fact lags it and cannot be the cause of its rise. Thus changes in the cosmic ray flux cannot be responsible for more than 15% of the temperature increase" ... There are other problems proving the causality link between cosmic rays and cloud formation. One of the key proofs of Svensmark's cosmic ray theory is the high correlation between low cloud cover and cosmic rays. However, the correlation broke down in 1991 (Laut 2003). At that point, cloud cover began to lags cosmic ray trends by over 6 months while cloud formation should occur within several days (Yu 2000). The correlation completely breaks down in 1994. Could cosmic rays be causing global warming? Real Climagte summary on Lindzen & Choi 2009 --LC09 misinterpret air-sea interactions in the tropics The main changes in tropical SST and radiative fluxes at TOA are associated with El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and are not necessarily indicative of forced variability in a closed system. ENSO events cause strong and robust exchanges of energy between the ocean and atmosphere, and tropics and subtropics. Yet LC09 treat the tropical atmosphere as a closed and deterministic system in which variations in clouds are driven solely by SST. In fact, the system is known to be considerably more complex and changes in the flow of energy arise from ocean heat exchange through evaporation, latent heat release in precipitation, and redistribution of that heat through atmospheric winds. These changes can be an order of magnitude larger than variability in TOA fluxes, and their effects are teleconnected globally. It is therefore not possible to quantify the cloud feedback with a purely local analysis. --More robust methods show no discrepancies between models and observations In TFOW, we compute correlations and regressions between tropical SSTs and top-of-atmosphere (TOA) longwave, shortwave and net radiation using a variety of methods. LC09 found the observed behavior to be opposite from that of 11 atmospheric models forced by the same SSTs and conclude that the models display much higher climate sensitivity than is inferred from ERBE. However, in our analysis comparing these relationships with models, we are unable to find any systematic model bias. More importantly, the nature of these relationships in models bears no relationship to simulated sensitivity. That is, the metric developed by LC09 is entirely ineffective as a proxy for simulated sensitivity. --LC09 have compared observations to models prescribed with incomplete forcings The AMIP configuration in the model simulations used by LC09 have incomplete forcings. The AMIP protocol started off a test only of how an atmospheric model reacts to changes in ocean temperatures, and so models often only use the ocean temperature change when doing these kinds of experiments. However, over the period of this comparison, many elements – greenhouse gases, aerosols, the sun and specifically, volcanoes changed the radiative fluxes, and this needs to be taken into account. Some models did this in these experiments, but not all of them. For instance, the dominant source of variability in the reflected solar flux arises from aerosols associated with the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in June of 1991 yet all but 2 model simulations examined by LC09 omit such forcings entirely. Other radiative species are absent from the models altogether. It is thus obviously inappropriate to expect such model simulations to replicate observed variability in TOA fluxes. --LC09 incorrectly compute the climate sensitivity By not allowing for the black body radiation (the Planck function) in their feedback parameter, LC09 underestimate climate sensitivity. Using the correct equations, LC09 should obtain a feedback parameter and climate sensitivity of -0.125 and 0.82 K, respectively, rather than their values of -1.1 and 0.5 K. In contrast, TFOW results yield a positive feedback parameter and greater sensitivity estimate, though we also caution that this approach is not a valid technique for estimating sensitivity, as a closed and therefore global domain is essential (though not by itself sufficient). Lastly, LC09 fail to account for variability in forcings in estimating sensitivity. Lindzen and Choi Unraveled -
gallopingcamel at 06:55 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
The Warmists say that the world has been warming since 1860. I can't disagree with that. It seems that the world has been warming for ~10,000 years. The Warmists also say that the noughties was the hottest decade on record. Can't disagree with that either. When the Warmists say that the primary driver of Global warming is radiative forcing caused by rising atmospheric CO2 concentrations their arguments are unconvincing. The idea that CO2 concentration drives temperature does not fit the facts on any timescale. Yet Warmists reject contrary scientific papers "ex cathedra" even when those papers show a better agreement with observations than theirs do. This approach no longer works because the fallibility of the Hockey Team has been exposed. ProfMandia (@8) please get ready to jump ship. The Svensmark, Friis-Christensen 1997 paper sounds pretty weird but so did "Plate Tectonics" when it was first put forward. Likewise, Lindzen & Choi 2009 (ERBE experiment) puts forward an explanation for the failure of the GCMs that predicted a sharp rise in global temperature. -
Konfacela at 06:45 AM on 1 March 2010Skeptical Science housekeeping: Woody Guthrie award, bug-fixes, Facebook and donations
Time to put my money where my mouth is :-) My favourite climate blog, happy to chip in my bit. -
Doug Bostrom at 06:10 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077 at 03:39 AM on 1 March 2010 Discounting numerical research results without showing the flaws that permit such dismissal will not take us any closer to the realm of facts. Identifying flawed research conclusions in a way that can be assessed via mathematics does move us closer to facts. Failure to understand this important distinction is a fundamental difference in worldview between scientists and many members of the public. Scientists are not super-human but they practice a particular discipline allowing them to perform intellectual feats that are sometimes quite astounding, superficially transcendent in appearance. Same as a well trained gymnast, or virtuoso concert pianist. We're wonderfully adaptable creatures and are capable of suppressing or rising above many of our grosser features when we concentrate. Logical positivism is a useful thing at the phenomenological scale we usually operate on and has taken us a long way from a grubby existence dominated by superstition. It would surely be folly for us to abandon ourselves to emotions and feelings. -
Doug Bostrom at 05:53 AM on 1 March 2010Senator Inhofe's attempt to distract us from the scientific realities of global warming
Charlie A at 12:25 PM on 28 February, 2010 Charlie, I read that (thanks) and it was not really comforting. There's no doubt we'll see refined results over the next few years, I'm sure we can agree on that. For my part I'll be happy if I see a fair number of analysis conclusions including a trend sloping down toward the right. Unfortunately they're all going the other way now. As to Dr. Spencer's conclusion "we're back to square one", I don't think he makes a case for that. -
Doug Bostrom at 05:37 AM on 1 March 2010Misinterpreting a retraction of rising sea level predictions
Berényi Péter at 23:45 PM on 28 February 2010 That was a nice illustration, thanks. The big unknown here and one that has proven tough to model is of course what's going to happen to major ice sheets in coming years. Prognostications of sea level rise based on what's happened so far are missing this important component. Progress is being made in modeling ice sheet behavior but from my reading so far it's a tricky task because each ice sheet is arranged differently as to details. We'll see! Some of us, anyway... -
ProfMandia at 04:46 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077 wrote: The implied assumption here is that climate scientists are above it all, i.e. they are super-human. An alternative conclusion offered by me (a scientist) is that scientists are skeptical by nature but can become nearly convinced when there is overwhelming data to support a position. My science colleagues are typically more logical and less emotional than the average person. These are the characterists that motivate one to become a scientist in the first place. I also promise you that if there is a landmark anti-AGW paper that shows record levels of GHGs are not driving the climate but instead it is caused by X, and then X is shown again and again in the literature to be the primary driver of climate, I and most others will jump ship and be pro-X. -
Norman Wells at 04:37 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
pdt3 feb 28 2010 Re the article referred to Interesting indeed How is someone classified who supports Technology and Free Enterprise,but is suspicious of authority and does not trust Industry or Commerce What percentage of deniers accept the self evident fact that human activities are increasing atmospheric pollution and support efforts to reduce it regardless of whether or not Global Warming is a consequence . -
Riccardo at 04:22 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
1077, i really can't see from what you deduced "The implied assumption here is that climate scientists are above it all, i.e. they are super-human." The experiment is conducted with people with no high level knowledge of the various issues (not just climate change). Why should it apply to scientists as well? The very possibility of warming due to anthropogenic CO2 has been denied for decades by distinguished scientist. The same happened to Galilei and to all the new theories, it takes time to be accepted untill evidence grows enough. I can not see any parallel with the 2% of anti-AGW scientists, there's no alternative theory to be accepted or refuted, they are just the "remains" of the crowd of scientists that once refuted AGW. Given that there are still scientists refuting evolution, plate tectonics, relativity, big bang, quantum mechanics, etc., i can anticipate that a small number of scientists skeptics of AGW are here to stay for ever. Neverthless science will keep going. -
Philippe Chantreau at 03:44 AM on 1 March 2010Senator Inhofe's attempt to distract us from the scientific realities of global warming
"isn't Oklahoma a large oil and gas producing state?" No and yes. CA produces a more oil than OK, OK more gas. "isn't Oklahoma a large oil and gas producing state?" http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petrosystem/petrosysog.html The real difference reside in the fact that it is dirt cheap to get a candidate elected in OK, compared to CA (about 4.8 times cheaper): http://www.pewcenteronthestates.org/ttw/trends_map_data_table.aspx?trendID=19&assessmentID=10 -
1077 at 03:39 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
pdt #3 Feb 28, 2010 Interesting and relevant article. Here is a short paragraph that caught my attention: "This puzzles many climate scientists — but not some social scientists, whose research suggests that facts may not be as important as one's beliefs." The implied assumption here is that climate scientists are above it all, i.e. they are super-human. Well, they are not. Scientists are all too human. Interesting evidence in this direction in the article is contained in the contention that "People tend to conform their factual beliefs to ones that are consistent with their cultural outlook, their world view,". How true. And how revealing that the "left" seems to be overwhelmingly pro-global warming. It seems to be indeed "a Bolshevik plot"… Although I do not contest that many scientists and non-scientists on the AGW side are honest believers. I knew many honest believers in Communism: most of them ended up in Gulags when the philosophy they promoted prevailed. Incidentally, experimental findings "consistent with" a hypothesis are evidence not proof for the hypothesis. Conveniently disregarding this minor nuance is a well established propaganda tool. So is the conflation of environment protection, a necessity, with anthropogenic climate change, a theory which has not been proven. As for only 2% deniers, just think of the percentage of those who denied the heliocentric system in the times of Giordano Bruno and Galileo... -
ProfMandia at 02:42 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
pdt: Here is the study that Brahan is referring to in that article. -
Berényi Péter at 01:48 AM on 1 March 2010Temp record is unreliable
Thanks, Jeff. It's GHCN-DAILY Version 2.1, I'll look into it. $ wget -r ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/daily/ -
pdt at 00:44 AM on 1 March 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
I thought this was an interesting story related to the "debate" on climate change, Belief In Climate Change Hinges On Worldview. -
Riccardo at 00:36 AM on 1 March 2010Hockey stick is broken
"Good for you, next step will be understanding that unfortunately it does tell us much about the ongoing warming trend." should read "[...] does NOT tell us much [...]" :p -
Riccardo at 00:33 AM on 1 March 2010Hockey stick is broken
protestant, i guess you've just discoved that climate has changed in the past. It has been warmer and colder, what a surprise! Good for you, next step will be understanding that unfortunately it does tell us much about the ongoing warming trend. PDO and solar minimum has nothing to do with the divergence problem and we cannot attribute it to UHI effct. In this post many proxies (other than tree rings) are shown that confirm the recent sharp temperature increase. Please read the comment policy and resrtain from talking about quackeries and the like. -
Berényi Péter at 23:45 PM on 28 February 2010Misinterpreting a retraction of rising sea level predictions
kwinters79, with your equations, the projected 2100 sea level rise for these three periods are Period1 => 73 cm Period2 => 84 cm Period3 => 148 cm The equations give your values by the year 2106 (with minor rounding errors) relative to the 6710.8 mm tide gauge level, which is indeed the average for the years between 1856-1876. Not 21 years though, only 20, for the year 1661 is missing (Civil war? The New York Draft Riots occurred in 1863. Some gadget from tide gauge needed for war? Personnel drafted?). However, we get a better view of the quality of data, if we calculated projected 2106 sea level rise based on some more subperiods. I also supply a second column, sea level rise relative to the 1990-2008 average. It is 37.4 cm higher than your reference level, but it has already happened in New York and the city is still alive. 1900-1920: +15722 mm +15348 mm 1900-1930: -1711 mm -2085 mm 1900-1940: +2566 mm +2192 mm 1900-1950: +2313 mm +1939 mm 1900-1960: +1792 mm +1418 mm 1900-1970: +1204 mm +831 mm 1900-1980: +817 mm +443 mm 1900-1990: +557 mm +184 mm 1900-2000: +696 mm +322 mm 1900-2008: +675 mm +302 mm 1910-2008: +596 mm +223 mm 1920-2008: +534 mm +160 mm 1930-2008: +511 mm +138 mm 1940-2008: +754 mm +380 mm 1950-2008: +879 mm +505 mm 1960-2008: +1155 mm +782 mm 1970-2008: +1588 mm +1214 mm 1980-2008: -184 mm -557 mm 1990-2008: -2862 mm -3236 mm Had we faith in this method, the 1980-2008 trend would project an almost two feet sea level drop by the year 2106 and more than 3 m (10 feet) if the judgment is bases on the last two decades. Quite scary, ships stranding at low tide, New York harbor gets unusable. On the other hand, if we only saw data for 1900-1920, would fancy a 15 m rise by 2106. Manhattan submerged. Whenever trends are so sensitive to endpoint selection it does not make much sense to use them. To illustrate it, I give 2106 sea level projections with a finer resolution, relative to present (1990-2008 average). 1970-2008: +1214 mm 1972-2008: +1142 mm 1974-2008: +388 mm 1976-2008: -136 mm 1978-2008: +397 mm 1980-2008: -557 mm Depending on endpoint selection, sea level would either rise by four feet or drop by two. If we consider the 1927-1991 period, for which tide gauge data seem to be most reliable, we get a 64.7 cm drop by 2106 relative to present. It is reasonable to use as much data as one has got. Based on the period 1856-2008, projected sea level rise is 38.2 cm (relative to present). It is basically a linear rate of 2.3 mm/year (acceleration is negligible, 6.7 micron/yr^2). It is not much, considering the difference between low and high tides at the Battery can easily exceed 6 feet. We can see "recent rate of sea level rise acceleration" is meaningless if it is based on a single site. However, for the US alone one can readily find 2523 more gauges. http://www.saltwatertides.com/pickpred.html The PSMSL has 1166 gauges, 75 US sites. Looks like if one is not interested in the deep past, at least ten times more gauges could be used (e.g. for the last two or three decades). It is just a data collection problem, which should be easy and cheap in the Internet age. -
Dan at 23:23 PM on 28 February 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
Minor correction: I think the correct wording of the Richard Feynman quotation at the end of the Youtube video is "Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself." -
Norman Wells at 21:32 PM on 28 February 2010YouTube video on the empirical evidence for man-made global warming
Generally sceptics are in denial in respect of man made global warming, and consequent Climate Change because they do not wish to make the costly changes to Industrial activity and our way of life,that are necessary to counter them .At least not during their lifetime! Consequently the debate rages over the issue as to whether Global Warming is taking place or not,thereby neatly sidestepping the basic and undeniable fact that human activity is responsible for a greatly increased level of atmospheric pollution. Regardless of whether this results in Global warming there are many other important reasons why it should be reduced without further debate as to whether the cost of doing so is affordable.At this moment it is clear that an unwillingness to take action for cost reasons is not the only problem .More serious is the likelihood that we may not even know how to!! Norman Wells -
tonyabalone at 20:06 PM on 28 February 2010Skeptical Science housekeeping: Woody Guthrie award, bug-fixes, Facebook and donations
Keep up the great work. More than ever your site is needed. I've chipped in $50.00. Its only fair as I constantly use your site as my source for countering the sceptics/cynics. This weekend I've fired off several letters to the editors of "The Australian" and "The West Australian" Here in Western Australia we have just had our hottest summer on record and Perth has had the hottest and driest summer on record. Hopefully the letters will be published. -
protestant at 20:03 PM on 28 February 2010Hockey stick is broken
Why do you comply same cherry-picking as the IPCC? Many of the graphs presented still have Korrajärvi upside down. And the glacier-graph is ridicilous why do you cut it from 1600 the whole data from Greenland example can be seen here: http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/?p=3553 You are presenting a graph which ends just before the MWP and other warm periods. Why? Secondly, what statistical method allows you to do "the trick". Many other proxies than just tree-rings show the same divergence - which happens to be in the cooling phase of the PDO and between solar maximums. Much more likely explanation for the "divergence" is the UHI-effect and the effect of CO2 being weak (cloud feedback). if you use non-tree ring samples and UAH temperature data you get this: http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/lanser_holocene_figure11.png The IPCC "hockey stick" reconstructions are just pure quackery to hide the flaws in their biased theory. Even the Institute of Physics is aware of this possible scientific malpractise and cherry picking: LINKModerator Response: [RH] Embedded link. -
BlankCanvas at 17:00 PM on 28 February 2010Working out future sea level rise from the past
This is probably a silly question. In Fig 1 of this post, when current sea levels match the interglacial sea levels (the zero line), would the current CO2 levels match with those particular interglacial CO2 levels? -
kwinters79 at 15:52 PM on 28 February 2010Misinterpreting a retraction of rising sea level predictions
Oops. kwinters (67) wrote: "Though my analysis here is much too simplistic, it certainly helps convince me that Siddall's results appear quite reasonable. " I meant to say (Vermeer & Rahmstorf 2009) appears quite reasonable. I think Siddall was too low in his retracted paper (which is why he retracted it). -
kwinters79 at 15:49 PM on 28 February 2010Misinterpreting a retraction of rising sea level predictions
Berényi Péter, The data quality issue is indeed a problem. But since I'm not working to publish any results and since these are only hobby calculations, I'll just stick with the simplistic approach of using the annual data, as is, except for the 2 years flagged with XX. I subtracted out of all my level measurements the 21-year average tide level from 1856 to 1876. The levels were left in mm. And my Time-0 is 1856. I computed a h0 + v*t + a*t^2 least squares equation for the 3 periods: 1856 - 2008, 1950 - 2008, and 1970 - 2008. The equations I got are: Period 1 => -20.524 + 2.269t + 0.0033t^2 Period 2 => 190.2 - 0.787t + 0.0142t^2 Period 3 => 1133.5 - 14.99t + 0.0672t^2 Projecting these out to 2100 I get the following sea-level rise (relative to the average from 1856 - 1876): Period 1 => 75 cm Period 2 => 88 cm Period 3 => 1.58 m So what can I conclude from this little exercise? Not much, as it's far too simple and only dealing with a single tide gauge. But along with all the recently published papers, the ice sheet dynamics, and the fact that Siddall withdrew his low estimate paper, I'd have to conclude that the IPCC estimate was indeed too low. A 1M rise may actually turn out to be a conservative estimate. It will be interesting to see what additional papers are published over the next year or two.
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