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EddieEvans at 23:50 PM on 26 June 2023Greenhouse effect has been falsified
"Has the greenhouse effect been falsified?" with current NASA evidence for anthropogenic greenhouse gas warmoing.
EVIDENCE
How Do We Know Climate Change Is Real?
There is unequivocal evidence that Earth is warming at an unprecedented rate. Human activity is the principal cause.
While Earth’s climate has changed throughout its history, the current warming is happening at a rate not seen in the past 10,000 years.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), "Since systematic scientific assessments began in the 1970s, the influence of human activity on the warming of the climate system has evolved from theory to established fact."1
Scientific information taken from natural sources (such as ice cores, rocks, and tree rings) and from modern equipment (like satellites and instruments) all show the signs of a changing climate.
From global temperature rise to melting ice sheets, the evidence of a warming planet abounds.
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Doug Bostrom at 00:04 AM on 26 June 2023Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023
Thank you for your kind remarks, OPOF. We're just closing in on 4 years of 208 contiguous editions. Stokers really help to keep the engine turning. :-)
I've passed on your compliment to Marc, who trawls for the gov/NGO section (and whose experience and hence informed discernment we're very fortunate to have on hand).
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BaerbelW at 17:39 PM on 25 June 2023Ocean acidification isn't serious
Please note: the basic version of this rebuttal has been updated on June 25, 2023 and now includes an "at a glance“ section at the top. To learn more about these updates and how you can help with evaluating their effectiveness, please check out the accompanying blog post @ https://sks.to/at-a-glance
Thanks - the Skeptical Science Team.
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Eclectic at 12:15 PM on 25 June 2023Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023
BaerbelW @3 , thank you ~ a brilliant idea to have commenters demonstrate that they have read the article before they make a comment. I see problems with eliminating the troll factories, though. But there might be ways of overcoming that.
Thanks also for the Finland link. I knew that Finland's education system was well ahead of the bunch (of the rest of us), but you show that the Finns are Gold Medal indeed, in producing a civilized society.
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One Planet Only Forever at 06:24 AM on 25 June 2023Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023
BaerbelW,
The education-related action by Finland is a helpful action in parallel with, but not part of the scope of, the UN actions regarding Information Integrity on Digital Platforms.
A major 'non-censorship' action discussed in the UN document is developing ways to effectively keep disinformation, misinformation and hate messages from being profitable, especially by controlling advertising placement. A related action would be for responsible advertisers to stop advertising on platforms that do not effectively do that.
During my MBA education in the early 1980's my course on Marketing began with the professor telling us that we will be learning about the ability to be temporarily successful by being misleading and warning us about the unsustainability of that Marketing approach.
Attempts to benefit from Disinformation are nothing new. Digital Platforms are just the latest, and potentially most damaging, development that can be abused that way, especially with the rapid unregulated development of AI.
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One Planet Only Forever at 05:47 AM on 25 June 2023Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023
Nigelj,
I am responding hoping to encourage you to read the UN document about Information Integrity on Digital Platforms.
I agree that Harari’s “21 Lessons for the 21st Century” (and “Sapiens”) are helpful presentations. I read both books a while ago. Your comment prompted me to revisit “21 Lessons ...”
“The Ecological Challenge” sub-section of the “Nationalism (Global Problems Need Global Answers)”, a chapter about the problems caused by nationalism, is aligned with the new UN initiative regarding the harm of successful disinformation production and promotion. Another tragically relevant chapter today is the “Post-Truth (Some Fake News Lasts Forever)” chapter.
The item from Harari’s book that seems most relevant to the new UN initiative is from the “Education (Change Is the Only Constant)” chapter. Though not explicitly stated, the implication is that people who resist increasing their awareness and resist improving their understanding of what is harmful and helpful to the development of sustainable improvements for the future of global humanity ‘will potentially need legal or other government actions to limit the harm done by their preference for preserving a misunderstanding or lack of awareness’.
In the chapter on Education, Harari makes the following important point:
So what should we be teaching? Many pedagogical experts argue that schools should switch to teaching “the four Cs” – critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity. More broadly, they believe, schools should downplay technical skill and emphasize general-purpose life skills. Most important of all will be the ability to deal with change, learn new things, and preserve your mental balance in unfamiliar situations.
The new UN initiative regarding the harm of disinformation, misinformation and hate on digital platforms, including its further development and implementation, is a “four Cs” type of action.
I would encourage you to read the complete UN document. Though I can quickly scan a document, when reading I am usually slower than others because I tend to read every word. It took me 40 minutes to read the entire text (not reading footnotes). For comparison, the Harari sub-section on The Ecological Challenge was a 10 minute read. And it is only 1/4 of the important “Nationalism” chapter. And that entire chapter is only 6% of the book’s ‘well worth reading’ content.
Regarding your stated concern:
However I'm not too keen on governments or the news media or other organizations becoming censors of information. I read George Orwells book 1984 recently and it certainly does a good job of raising awareness of the dire consequences of governmnet and media censorship even if it's well meant.
Of course we do have some established and reasonable limits on free speech, like laws against inciting violence but they are minimal and related to law breaking. I'm talking about going beyond this.
Your concern is addressed in the UN document. Also, the interventions you are accepting are ‘interventions to limit harm done’. That is, or should be, the fundamental principle of laws and their restrictions of freedom. Tragically, I agree that sovereign national or regional governments and pursuers of profit cannot be trusted to constantly govern their law-making, regulation-creation, enforcement or other actions to limit harm done. Pursuits of popularity and profit can create interests for individuals and sub-groups of global humanity that are in conflict with correcting harmful developments and conflict with developing sustainable improvements for global humanity. Those damaging ‘developed and developing conflicts if interest’ include the potential for the sub-group of ‘all of current-day humanity’ having interests that conflict with the development of a sustainable improving future for global humanity.
So, Harari’s book is informative and exposes many important issues. However, the UN document is doing the harder work of applying the ‘four Cs’, to develop global change regarding the integrity of digital information to limit harm done. The section titled “What is the relevant international legal framework?” (page 9) addresses the matter of free speech (as do other parts of the document). It is less than a 3 minute read and opens and ends with:
The promotion of information integrity must be fully grounded in the pertinent international norms and standards, including human rights law and the principles of sovereignty and non-intervention in domestic affairs. In August 2022, I transmitted to the General Assembly a report entitled “Countering disinformation for the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms”.15 In the report, I laid out the international human rights law that applies to dis-information, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Under these international legal instruments, everyone has the right to freedom of expression.16
...
In its resolution 76/227, adopted in 2021, the General Assembly emphasized that all forms of disinformation can negatively impact the enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms, as well as the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals. Similarly, in its resolution 49/21, adopted in 2022, the Human Rights Council affirmed that disinformation can negatively affect the enjoyment and realization of all human rights.And the following is a quote from the beginning of the section titled “Towards a United Nations Code of Conduct UN” (page 21):
The United Nations Code of Conduct for Information Integrity on Digital Platforms, which I will put forward, would build upon the following principles:
• Commitment to information integrity
• Respect for human rights
• Support for independent media
• Increased transparency
• User empowerment
• Strengthened research and data access
• Scaled up responses
• Stronger disincentives
• Enhanced trust and safetyI encourage people who are concerned about the harm of disinformation to take the time to read the full UN document.
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BaerbelW at 04:42 AM on 25 June 2023Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023
nigelj @2
"However I'm not too keen on governments or the news media or other organisations becoming censors of information."
There are other means organizations can prevent - or at least minimize - the spread of misinformation. Warning messages that content has been contested for example, or a setup that would-be commenters or sharers first have to answer a question related to the article before they can do either.
And then, there's that whole idea of inoculation, that goes along with improving media literacy of large swaths of the population. Imagine how effective it would be, if nobody falls for all the FLICC-techniques any longer and mis- and disinformation than no longer gets shared? Finland seems to be well ahead of many other countries in that regard, based on this article published recently:
Finland’s ‘visionary’ fight against disinformation teaches citizens to question what they see online
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nigelj at 08:37 AM on 24 June 2023Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023
OPOF, thanks for the very useful copy and paste quote.
The misinformation is very troubling. The climate denialists are still very active although its swiched to some extent from denialism about the science, to denialism about the impacts of climate change and the solutions.
However I'm not too keen on governments or the news media or other organisations becoming censors of information. I read George Orwells book 1984 recently and it certainly does a good job of raising awareness of the dire consequences of governmnet and media censorship even if it's well meant.
Of course we do have some established and reasonable limits on free speech, like laws against inciting violence but they are minimal and related to law breaking. I'm talking about going beyond this.
But at he same time the way Musk has allowed twitter to revert to an open slather for hate and misinformation is equally as troubling. It all leaves me unsure what the best solution is.
However there is no justification for algorithms that send people a deluge of climate denial. This is just manipulation to increase profits.
I recommend this book to people: 21 lessons for the 21st century by Yuval Harari. Very good chapter on climate change and other environmental issues. IMO this man has a great grasp of reality.
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One Planet Only Forever at 03:16 AM on 24 June 2023Inside the unexpectedly wild landmark Montana youth climate trial
prove we are smart,
I fully agree with your understanding.
I would add that these young plaintiffs, and many others like them (including older concerned people), need help bringing about the increased awareness and improved understanding of the need for significant corrections and improvements of the developed socioeconomic-political systems.
I recommend reading "Our Common Agenda Policy Brief 8 Information Integrity on Digital Platforms, United Nations" (same link as the second item listed in the ‘Articles/Reports from Agencies and Non-Governmental Organizations Addressing Aspects of Climate Change’ of the "Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023").
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One Planet Only Forever at 03:03 AM on 24 June 2023Skeptical Science New Research for Week #25 2023
As an engineer with an MBA I am interested in new information and feedback that helps me understand how to limit harm done.
The weekly Skeptical Science New Research listing continues to be a helpful resource for increased awareness and improved understanding, especially the category of ‘Articles/Reports from Agencies and Non-Governmental Organizations Addressing Aspects of Climate Change’.
Politics can be understood to be the system for influencing/governing/controlling/delaying the development of social and economic systems and understanding. There is a parallel to engineering which develops new things and changes (improves and corrects) existing things.
Imagine if the engineering of things was significantly influenced, was allowed to be compromised, by disinformation developed by pursuers of status/success in competition for popularity or profit. Now imagine the more massively damaging results if political leadership was influenced/compromised that way (no need to imagine it – just become more aware of today’s developed reality).
Anyone concerned about the harm done by pursuers of personal benefit from disinformation, and the related harmful spin-offs of unjustified sharing of misinformation and the potential related unjustified fear, anger and hatred (which includes the development of hatred for people who try to increase awareness and improve understanding of climate science and the required corrections of popular and profitable developments), would benefit from reading "Our Common Agenda Policy Brief 8 Information Integrity on Digital Platforms, United Nations" (same link as the second item listed in the ‘Articles/Reports from Agencies and Non-Governmental Organizations Addressing Aspects of Climate Change’).
The document is fairly easy to read. And there are only about 16 pages of text in the 29 page document.
The following excerpt, from the section titled “What harm is being caused by online mis- and disinformation and hate speech?”, captures the nature of the challenge/threat and the importance of effective collective limits on the success of people who pursue benefit from disinformation and the related lack of increased awareness and lack of improved understanding of the harm being done:
Similarly, mis- and disinformation about the climate emergency are delaying urgently needed action to ensure a liveable future for the planet. Climate mis- and disinformation can be understood as false or misleading content that undercuts the scientifically agreed basis for the existence of human-induced climate change, its causes and impacts. Coordinated campaigns are seeking to deny, minimize or distract from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change scientific consensus and derail urgent action to meet the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement. A small but vocal minority of climate science denialists30 continue to reject the consensus position and command an outsized presence on some digital platforms. For example, in 2022, random simulations by civil society organizations revealed that Facebook’s algorithm was recommending climate denialist content at the expense of climate science.31 On Twitter, uses of the hashtag #climatescam shot up from fewer than 2,700 a month in the first half of 2022 to 80,000 in July and 199,000 in January 2023. The phrase was also featured by the platform among the top results in the search for “climate”.32 In February 2022, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change called out climate disinformation for the first time, stating that a “deliberate undermining of science” was contributing to “misperceptions of the scientific consensus, uncertainty, disregarded risk and urgency, and dissent”.33
Some fossil fuel companies commonly deploy a strategy of “greenwashing”, misleading the public into believing that a company or entity is doing more to protect the environment, and less to harm it, than it is. The companies are not acting alone. Efforts to confuse the public and divert attention away from the responsibility of the fossil fuel industry are enabled and supported by advertising and public relations providers, advertising tech companies, news outlets and digital platforms.34 Advertising and public relations firms that create greenwashing content and third parties that distribute it are collectively earning billions from these efforts to shield the fossil fuel industry from scrutiny and accountability. Public relations firms have run hundreds of campaigns for coal, oil and gas companies.35
Mis- and disinformation are having a profound impact on democracy, weakening trust in democratic institutions and independent media, and dampening participation in political and public affairs. Throughout the electoral cycle, exposure to false and misleading information can rob voters of the chance to make informed choices. The spread of mis- and disinformation can undermine public trust in electoral institutions and the electoral process itself – such as voter registration, polling and results – and potentially result in voter apathy or rejection of credible election results. States and political leaders have proved to be potent sources of disinformation, deliberately and strategically spreading falsehoods to maintain or secure power, or undermine democratic processes in other countries.36
Hopefully this UN effort will help reduce the damaging success of disinformation. And hopefully it will be more effective more rapidly than the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)”.
The powerful ability to benefit from disinformation and its spin-offs of popularity of misinformation and hate requires a significant correction of the developed political systems and the resulting social and economic developments and corrections.
Climate scientists, likely unwittingly, were a significant factor in exposing the problem and forcing the increased awareness and understanding of the need to correct a lot of what has developed, especially the abuse of disinformation by political game players.
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prove we are smart at 13:35 PM on 23 June 2023Inside the unexpectedly wild landmark Montana youth climate trial
Consumer capitalism has distracted us all from our connection to nature, we are literally destroying our own ecosphere. From the country of capitalism on steroids another example of why it seems "We can solve our problems, but it's not clear that we can solve our problems and get rich at the same time, and that is the current requirement for all solutions."
Good luck to our 16 young plaintiffs- afterall, it is their future and those that follow who will experience the tipping points set in motion.
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One Planet Only Forever at 09:45 AM on 22 June 2023At a glance - Is Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth correct?
I am reading Greta Thunberg's compilation of contributions by many experts - "The Climate Book" . Hopefully it will effectively increase awareness, and more effectively than 'An Inconvenient Truth'.
Unlike 'An Inconvenient Truth' being attacked by claims that Al Gore made it up, 'The Climate Book' cannot be claimed to be 'Just Greta's opinion'. It is a comprehensive presentation of the history and current understanding of the diversity of implications of human induced climate change. Each chapter is independently written and compelling. But I am particularly impressed by how holistically the issue is covered in the following chapters:
- 1.5 'The science is as solid as it gets' by Greta Thunberg
- 1.6 'The Discovery of Climate Change' by Michael Oppenheimer
- 1.7 'Why Didn't They Act?' by Naomi Oreskes
Go Greta 'the High School Climate Protest Graduate'.
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One Planet Only Forever at 07:28 AM on 21 June 2023At a glance - Is Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth correct?
BaerbelW,
Thank you for exposing a minor improvement to my comment.
I should have stated "Without that significant increased awareness, especially in the Nation with the greatest ability to be helpful or harmful, the situation today ..."
As a Civil/Structural engineer with an MBA (in Canada) my personal interest has always been constantly learning to develop sustainable improvements with actions including:
- limiting the harm done by new developments
- correcting dangerous existing developments (reducing the risk of damaging results)
- stopping the use of dangerous and damaging systems until they are corrected (that action can be applied to structures, but not to the developed systems of human activity impacting a planet - changes of the human developed systems and norms is what is required).
The impacts of pollution from fossil fuel activity (extraction through end-use) had been effective arguments against continued fossil fuel use. And they continue to be arguments against continued fossil fuel use even though some reduction of harm has happened due to government intervention in the Marketplace of thoughts and actions.
An Inconvenient Truth expanded my ability to 'try to correct misunderstandings being presented by people who did not want to reduce their ability to benefit from harmful fossil fuel use'. And Skeptical Science, improved by your engagement, has been even more helpful.
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BaerbelW at 05:45 AM on 21 June 2023At a glance - Is Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth correct?
One Planet @1
Indeed! I'm not sure, I'd be here hadn't I watched AIT when it came out in Germany in 2007 as described in this blog post:
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One Planet Only Forever at 05:28 AM on 21 June 2023At a glance - Is Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth correct?
A more important question regarding "An Inconvenient Truth" is: Did it increase awareness and understanding regarding the damage to the future of humanity being caused by human climate change impacts (primarily the use of fossil fuels)?
The undeniable answer is YES.
Without that significant increased awareness in the Nation with the greatest ability to be helpful or harmful the situation today would likely be far worse because of less being done to reduce the harm being done.
The people fighting to benefit more from understandably damaging unsustainable activity are still very influential (being more harmful is more profitable and popular if it can be gotten away with, especially if there is a lack of awareness). But they have been steadily 'winning less' of their endless attempts to get away with being freer to believe and do whatever they please.
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Rob Honeycutt at 15:22 PM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
That comment is very definitely going to get deleted by the mods, Peppers, because you couldn't follow a very simple instruction to post it in the appropriate thread.
Moderator Response:[BL] The comment you are referring to, plus another that followed, have indeed been deleted as off-topic.
Continued behaviour such as this by Peppers will likely result in his posting privileges being rescinded.
On second thought, no point in waiting. Peppers will no longer be participating here.
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Rob Honeycutt at 09:26 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers, here is a link to the appropriate thread for the breathing CO2 topic. But before you respond, please take the time to read the article and consider the science presented.
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peppers at 05:01 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Philippe, your ad hominem aside, I went to your thread shown and it is far from decided. The cycle discussed is not calibrated for a 5 times increase of people breathing. There is a rush to return to fossil fuel as the cause on that thread.
I wouldnt be surprised if fossil fuel were paramount. More people also mean more fossil fuel use. But submission participants who were really interested wanted to know and caculate how much Co2 is emited per person, etc. No one answers that there.
Ill see what I can dig up. Whether it is from breathing or from more fossil fuel use and if it is because we now have more people, this starts a lot of prioritizing junctures over again. I think. Thx D
Moderator Response:[BL] Take this to the correct thread. Any further off-topic posts will be deleted entirely.
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Rob Honeycutt at 04:49 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
I actually take Peppers at his word thinking he actually believes these are pertinent questions to ask. I think he's likely operating at a very low level of understanding on climate science issues, thus everything seems pertinent. The problem is he's not understanding that he's asking very low level questions for which there are simple answers.
It's rather like when climate deniers say the warming is caused by the sun on the ridiculous assumption that climate scientists have never bothered to check.
All very "Cranky Uncle" stuff.
I guess it's far easier to believe there's a conspiracy rather than reading the published research to learn there's not.
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Bob Loblaw at 04:05 AM on 19 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
OK, Charlie Brown. I agree that I overstated it when I said that "a lot of IR loss to space comes from the stratosphere". But the important point is that what is seen at any height, looking up or down, is not from a single level above or below the observation height. I think we agree on that.
The IR emitted in the stratosphere will easily be lost to space, due to the small number of molecules at that height, as you mention. We've discussed on other threads how the view of upward-directed IR at high altitude has its origins at different levels, in a kind of inverse view of Beer's Law. Beer's Law tells us the probability that a photon will be transmitted through X path lengths, and the flip side is that it tells us the probability that a photon seen at altitude Z came from a source X path lengths away. A high probability that it came from somewhere close; a low probability that it came from somewhere far away. Exact values of "close" and "far" are dependent on the absorption coefficient for that particular wavelength.
When we "see" an individual photon, we have no idea how far it has travelled, as all photons of that wavelength look the same and carry no memory of the temperature they were emitted at. With a large number of photons, we can start to talk of the probability distribution that it came from altitude Z. It could have been emitted by a layer just below, or well below, or just emitted locally.
In a model, you will have access to internal calculations that tell you how much of the upward flux was transmitted from lower layers, versus how much was emitted within the layer. Field measurements will just give you the sum of the two, though. (In part, it's because field measurements don't have "layers" in the way a model does.)
The MODTRAN page you link to has a button "Show raw model output". That has a lot of detail. I don't know if there is a way to parse that to get the split between "transmitted" "emitted" in the flux. It is a very useful site, none-the-less.
All of which is to say that the words Vidar2032 posted in #383 have serious shortcomings. I don't know if we will see Vidar return with any clarification on his/her thoughts.
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Philippe Chantreau at 03:50 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers' comment @ 22 above should be on this thread:
This old dead horse has been flogged ad nauseam already and has no value. It casts serious doubt on the sincerity of anyone willing to stoop so low as to use it. It is even worse when it is accompanied by thinly veiled accusations of "suppressing" dissenting voices, accusations for which there is not a shred of credible evidence, especially in the post making the accusation. Anybody who can think quantitatively will quickly see the vacuity of the "human breathing causes CO2 rise" argument. The "just asking questions" trolling method has been seen around here innumerable times, it is no more amusing now than it was years ago.
Moderator Response:[BL] Note that although the displayed text for the "breathing" page is garbled, the actual link behind the text points to the correct page.
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Rob Honeycutt at 03:45 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers, the problem is when you say something like, "I find some questions intriguing. We must ask more questions."
Asking questions is perfectly reasonable. It's great to ask questions. But you also must put that in context of your level of understanding of the subject. The way you're stating this implies that you're asking something that isn't fully understood by researchers.
You seem to be posing questions for which there are simple answers you're currently unaware of. But you're not taking the time to research if there is a simple answer and rather prefer the idea that you're somehow presenting some new concept researchers haven't considered.
Again, I will state here, in order to ask pertinent questions worthy of substantive discussion you must first spend some considerable time researching the topic before hand.
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Rob Honeycutt at 03:19 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
CO2 is up and still increasing primarily because we continue to rely on fossil fuel sources of energy.
Human respiration is part of the active carbon cycle regardless of the numbers of humans on the planet.
The increase in atomospheric concentration of CO2 is a function of humanity reintroducing sequestered carbon back into the active carbon cycle through buring of FF's.
Human respiration is not an "equalizing factor" because human respiration does nothing to sequester carbon.
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peppers at 03:09 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Hi Rob, OK thanks for trying to understand. The world has completely changed and Co2 is just a one part of these changes. But this is proving hard to relate, especially in this settled and denier climate.
But Co2 is up, and increasing. Still, there are a lot of questions that have answers that are being suppressed.
Hey, allow me a tickler for you. This is not any main point of mine at all, but I would love to hear a rebuttal.
I understand the premise that human respiration on earth is an equalized basis; that an equal amount of Co2 is expired based on the photosynthesis that happened to create the Co2, as a cycle. What about if one quotient were increased by a factor of 5 times, such as human population inceasing from 1.6B in 1900 to 8B today? Foliage has increased according to Nasa, by not 5 times worth. With 5 times the 'engines' of people respirating Co2 being in play, but without the photosynthesis being up to speed at the same rate, wouldnt the atmosphere be 'banking' Co2 until the other parts of this cycle, used to explain the human equalizing factor, be a possible explaination to increased Co2 in our world? I find some questions intriguing. We must ask more questions.
Moderator Response:[BL] Accusations of dishonesty on the part of scientists snipped.
This is getting increasingly off topic, and increasingly tiresome.
Philippe (below) has pointed you to a proper thread for the breathing/CO2 discussion. Here it is again:
https://skepticalscience.com/breathing-co2-carbon-dioxide.htm
Before you go and pollute that thread, ask yourself:
- How much carbon is stored in 1B people?
- How much carbon is stored in 8B people?
- If people breathing out have been adding net carbon to the atmosphere, how does that jive with your estimates of the change in storage between 1) and 2)?
...and when you sit down to have your next meal (or ten), look at what you are eating, and ask yourself where the carbon in that meal came from, and how long it was in that form between the time it came out of the atmosphere and went into you.
You need to spend some time looking at the cycle of [anything], and thinking over the difference between quantities in storage and quantities moving between different forms of storage. You seem to be extremely confused between high storage and high rate of transfer. You should also look at this post on residence time, and this post on residence time.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:31 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
a) Has modern medicine reduced infant mortality rates in the past 150 years? Of course.
b) Is that a clear proxy for "human suffering." No. You can have low infant mortality and great human suffering.
c) Is CO2 a necessary byproduct of human advancements? No. Access to energy likely is and thusfar that access to energy has been supplied by fossil fuel sources. But today renewable energy is cheaper and cleaner and will replace those FF sources over the coming decades.
d) Will the human population return to 1B? It likely could and probably should, as that is probably what this planet can reasonably sustain over the future millennia.
There are estimations I've seen suggesting the natural decline in the human population into the 22nd century could be rapid as more of world's people attain first world status. We already see this effect occurring in many first world nations. It's most obvious in Japan due to it's strict immigration laws. The US would have a falling population if not for immigration. China's population is now starting to fall as well.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:18 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers... All that and it's still not very clear to me what exactly you're trying to assert and it's confounded, once again, by a myriad of technical errors in what you're stating.
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peppers at 01:31 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Eclectic,
You are more than welcome to call me out on misuse of premises or data. But I think you slipped in to some all or nothing thinking to cancel out my logic. I dont think Einstein updating Newton's laws of gravity, from all objects exterting an attracting force to thier interplay with space and time and warping the fabric of space itself, invalidates Newton's advance on the subject to him point in time. Bur more is always coming in science. One can never say something is settled. Einstein is now (and he knew it) unable to explain the deepest space questions within black holes, where his formulas now fail. My only point is to ask you to question anytime someone says an area of science is settled, and the derogations of any still continuing to ask questions, to be deniers. Thx D
Moderator Response:[BL] If you think that nothing in science is ever deserving of the title "settled", do you spend a lot of time questioning the existence of gravity when someone warns you "be careful up there, you might fall"?
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peppers at 00:56 AM on 19 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Hi gentlemen. Rob, I start my logic from our worlds increase from 1 to 8 billion people. I dont know of anywhere this is made up or in dispute. I then premise that this describes mankinds addtional use of resources, including increased use that has elevated Co2. I will pause there until we are agreeing these premises are in agreement, but I will hint that this is a remarkable change in approaching this topic. If we do not agree that our population has rocketed up from 1 to 8 billion ( 8 billion reached November 22, 2022 ) in 200 years, after never going over 1 billion in the prior 180,000 years of human history, then we cannot really go to the next step of my ideas (thx).Eclectic, hi. I understand infant mortality to be the measurement of human suffering over the large picture. That is how it is posed. I know it sounds off base and we should discuss cancer or heart disease, etc. But infant mortality has been the real beast to our existence. 50% in roman times, peaking to 62% I think in south american in 800AD. It has been at 50% in many place on earth into the mid 1800's. Today it is under 1% in the US, and about 4.35% globally with the third world locations providing the offsets of up to 8.5%. I posted a chart earlier on this thread.
Surprisingly, or not surprisingly, the eradication of infant mortality, the leap of our lifespans and the shear amount of people who now live to be an adult produces a chart that is an exact mirror to the hockey stick chart used to show our rise in Co2.
I hesitate to go further, but I will hazard it. If you see what I am referring to, much like the rise of people on earth to 8 billion; there is no going back. The world is different. The world is already different and there is no going back and the United Nations estimates we will continue to increase to just about 9.5-10B around the end of this century and then it will taper off on increasing.
I have not explored expectations of any decline but if it is expected I would imagine it would involve several hundreds of years. And only find a moderating level of some kind and not return to 1B.
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BaerbelW at 19:20 PM on 18 June 2023Glaciers are growing
Please note: the basic version of this rebuttal has been updated on June 18, 2023 and now includes an "at a glance“ section at the top. To learn more about these updates and how you can help with evaluating their effectiveness, please check out the accompanying blog post @ https://sks.to/at-a-glance
Thanks - the Skeptical Science Team.
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Charlie_Brown at 03:13 AM on 18 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Bob @388
We agree more than you think. I did not intend to imply that only two atmospheric layers need to be considered for emittance. I was intending to illustrate the many strong and weak absorption lines in the layers that were most important for emittance from CO2 and H2O. A useful concept is to look down from the top of the atmosphere. Integrate absorptance/emittance for energy loss to space from the top and descend until a value of 1.0 is reached. MODTRAN Infrared Light in the Atmosphere (MILIA) model, which is a multilayer model, does the calculations.Maybe we disagree on descriptions for the magnitude of contribution to the upward heat flux from the tropopause and the stratosphere, because I conclude that the major emitting layer for CO2 is the tropopause (11-20 km in the 1976 U.S. Std atmosphere) and the stratosphere contributes only a small amount. This can be demonstrated by changing the altitude in MILIA from 20 km (217 K) to 50 km (271 K). At 20 km, the bottom of the spectrum in the CO2 band of 14-16 microns reaches 217 K, which matches the Planck distribution. Raising the altitude to 50 km brings the bottom of the band up a little bit to 222 K, but not to the higher temperature of the stratosphere. Also, and very interesting, is the appearance of a sharp peak at 14.9 microns that matches a Planck temperature of 240 K. This is caused by the contribution from a few very strong CO2 absorption lines.
We agree that Manabe’s work is awesome, but I don’t think that it necessarily supports a description “A lot of IR loss to space comes from the stratosphere.” It demonstrates a significant effect of CO2 on the temperature of the stratosphere. However, the stratosphere has so few molecules that small differences in the total IR energy flux can have large differences in temperature.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:11 AM on 18 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers... (sigh) Having a substantive discussion requires that you put forth something meaningful to discuss. What I'm trying to point out is, your assemblage of statements (@9 & 13) are functionally worthless because you're not putting forth rational concepts. Worse yet, you're just making up stuff on the fly with an erroneous assumption it's based in science when, in fact, you've completely mucked up.
Do some research before posting. Take some time to formulate something worthwhile to discuss and everyone here will be eager to engage.
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Eclectic at 22:22 PM on 17 June 2023CO2 increase is natural, not human-caused
MARodger @36 ~ thanks for that. Sadly, my initial look into the Suess Effect merely turned up a lot of children's books.
Then, once I got onto the right path ~ it seemed that the 14C-radiocarbon story would be the only aspect of interest (for, as you say, there would not appear to be anything much concerning the 13C ratio which might raise any skeptical doubts in the mind of poster Log @34. )
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MA Rodger at 21:21 PM on 17 June 2023CO2 increase is natural, not human-caused
Eclectic @35,
The Suess Effect is entirely to do with the carbon cycle and the 13C/12C ratio in the atmosphere.
Log @34,
Proper isotopic carbon analysis is in accord with what you'd expect (eg see Andres et al (2000) or Keeling et al 2005) to the point that it is being used to analyse the response in the biosphereto rising CO2 (eg Keeling et al (2017) 'Atmospheric evidence for a global secular increase in carbon isotopic discrimination of land photosynthesis').
Of course, that doesn't stop denialists using crazy ways of combining the various numbers for airborne fraction and the drop in 13C to find results more to their own liking. I've seen a few of them through the years but can't find any recent ones.
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Eclectic at 11:37 AM on 17 June 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #23
John Hartz, thanks for linking to George Monbiot's excellent article. To quote some more :-
< Culture war entrepreneurs, often funded by billionaires and commercial enterprises, cast even the most innocent attempts to reduce our impacts [on AGW] as a conspiracy to curtail our freedoms. Everything becomes contested: low-traffic neighbourhoods, 15-minute cities, heat pumps, even induction hobs. You cannot propose even the mildest change without a hundred professionally outraged influencers leaping up to announce: "They're coming for your ..." It's becoming ever harder, by design, to discuss crucial issues such as SUVs, meat-eating and aviation calmly and rationally.
Climate science denial, which had almost vanished a few years ago, has now returned with a vengeance. Environmental scientists and campaigners ar bombarded with claims that they are stooges, shills, communists, murderers and paedophiles. >
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Eclectic at 10:10 AM on 17 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
@13 , thank you, Peppers, you raise some very general points ~ which might be allowably on-topic in this Cranky Uncle thread. (And please forgive my overly formal usage of a capital P in your moniker ~ since even our impersonal friend ChatGPT gets awarded an initial capital C . )
Rob H. is being too tactful to hint at the conjunction of Veritas with an excess of vinum.
Peppers, you are using false logic when you suggest that all newer scientific understandings (e.g. Einstein's relativity) are entirely replacing (and invalidating) the previous consensus position (e.g. Newton's views). Quite false, to assert that such "progress" does imply that Einstein is also wrong & will in turn be thrust into the dustbin.
Peppers, I also take issue with you on the infant mortality argument that you use. There are still parts of the world where infant & maternal mortality/morbidity are appallingly high. And even in parts of the USA, too. The solution to these problems is essentially non-scientific ~ it is political [includes attitudinal ]. The problem is: too many Cranky Uncles in this world, with their bad attitude/ their illogic/ their uncompassion & uncharitableness. [ is "uncompassion" a ChatGPT neologism? ]
# John Hartz's comment (today, in the News Roundup #23) quotes George Monbiot on climate science denial and the current rising level of antisocial fascist behaviour. That is a thread, Peppers, where you might well continue your Chatty musings !
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peppers at 09:59 AM on 17 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Well Rob, thats an unexpected snarky response, culminating in your cancellation. Perhaps this is really only to be an echo chamber for you. Maybe a yes or no answer can pass your criteria to be a discussion for you.
Have humans during their 180k years remained below and slowly approached 1B inhabitants through this entire time span, only to have skyrocketed 8 time this amount over the last 200 years?
After 4 such questions you will have my point, which is only going to use existing empirical evidence and no guessing or leaps of faith. There is no reason to struggle, the answer to the above is yes.
And Rob your answer may also be no if you just do not want to follow to my point. I am more than happy to use my time for this, but that does not mean you are more important somehow, in regards to cancelling me.
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John Hartz at 05:25 AM on 17 June 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #23
ubrew12:
George Monbiot's opinion piece, The hard right and climate catastrophe are intimately linked. This is how, published in yesterday's (June 16) edition of The Guardian lays out in stark terms how and why the human race's response to climate change has regressed since the release of Al Gore's film, An Inconvenient Truth, in 2006.
In the essay, Monbiot states:
Climate science denial, which had almost vanished a few years ago, has now returned with a vengeance. Environmental scientists and campaigners are bombarded with claims that they are stooges, shills, communists, murderers and paedophiles.
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Rob Honeycutt at 01:54 AM on 17 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
FYI... It's spelled "quorum." This is a fascinating error because the mispelling is essentially a demonstration of Pepper's underlying thought processes with his other... points(?). It's a kind of lazy ignorance. No effort to check the spelling or meaning. Just thrown out there in an attempt to stir the pot.
Like Eclectic, I had to read the mix of chaos theory/6 degrees of separation thing a couple of times to see if there was some intended reference. My only conclusion is, no. He just doesn't know what he's talking about and doesn't want to be bothered to genuinely understand.
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peppers at 01:01 AM on 17 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Hi gentlemen,
I see a quarum gathering!
I see science as not a conclusive process. History has proven it can only be a progressive form. Einstein overtook Newton, the solar system replaced the center theme, the flat earth, etc. We do not seem to end up too foolish until we stop and say, we know. Then it begins to prove we do not.
I am really working right off the label on the package. The searching of science never has an arrival.
For instance. in 1900 the world population was 1.6B. Now it is above 8B. This is the result of science. Global warming is the result of science discovering germs and influencing hygiene, housing and food supply within the industrial revolution. Infant mortality dropped from 50% to 30% by 1950. Today it is below 1% USA after antibiotics were discovered. An historic era for mankind! But do we celebrate this alleviant of human suffering and pain, or do we chastize it for bringing on global warming.
To me this is so important a question I am hesitant to continue without knowing quite a bit more. I would endure a lot of weather and sea rising in exchange for the boon science has brought.
https://ourworldindata.org/child-mortality-in-the-past
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Philippe Chantreau at 00:48 AM on 17 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers' production @ 9 has numerous characteristics of what I would indentify as older AI generated language. Rich vocabulary without comprehension or meaning. Correct sentence structure conveying incoherent thoughts. Related concepts mashed together in nonsensical ways.
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Eclectic at 23:41 PM on 16 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers @9 ~ I raise my hand to "second" Philippe's point. Please help!
I must be a Cranky Uncle of low I.Q. , for I am failing to grasp the points which you are (or may be) making.
Why are you mentioning "concluding" and "science" as (possibly) excluding each other? And why undertake a scientific process, if not to reach a conclusion? Is confirmatory scientific investigation somehow invalid? (And please do not bring Sartre into your explanation!)
Chaos and the Butterfly Effect ~ how connected with Milgram's 6 degrees? If this is a Mixed Metaphor of some sort, then it is too subtle for me . . . so please explain !
[ Unlike the changes of weather, the changes of climate are not chaotic. Cloud cover & albedo changes are not chaotic, even though difficult to compute precisely. ]
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Philippe Chantreau at 23:10 PM on 16 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Peppers at 9:
What in the world are you trying to say?
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peppers at 21:19 PM on 16 June 2023Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
I have an ex wife who a year or so later, was 'fond' of me. I have an adversion to the word now!
How do we reconcile these 2 premises:
1. Characterizing another who does not conclude at this juncture, as; someone who is fond of misunderstanding climate science matters.
2. Oxford Dictionary; The systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories against the evidence obtained (the definition of Science bearing no mention of conclusion, and also applies the inference that a conclusion would be an impediment to the process of science).
I dont think you mean to have a conflict with others still observing and testing theories.Milgram's Six Degrees of Separation famously said that a butterfly can flap its wings in Peking, and in Central Park, you get rain instead of sunshine. As opposed to being settled, you cannot operate a scientific understanding without first not knowing. If you are steering to a conclusion, thats not science nor even close.
To add a bit more meat to the above poetic insertion, I'd like to add 2 observations. On November 22nd 2022 the world hit 8 billion, having increased exactly at the pace and curve of the famous hockey stick graph from 1 billion in the same time span. For a discussion about the planets ability to handle such a change, the clouds and atmosphere contain all the energy and ability to moderate that. However it is impossible to model any of it.
I say we need to observe, experiment and add theories to our incomplete knowledge of our world and of the solar system. More warmth, more moisture, more clouds, more albedo, etc.
Theories do not require immediate citations or proofing, however that would be the next thing sought. For the sake of theory ( not a belief nor desiring antagonizing), if we stay to any natural progression of things, the increase of our species having caused changes, if the natural offset were more warmth, moisture, cloud cover and albedo to offset this, are we interferring with natures response just because we would not want a warmer world, more weather, higher coastlines, etc.?
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Eclectic at 14:06 PM on 16 June 2023CO2 increase is natural, not human-caused
Log @34 , my apology for not replying more promptly. I was hoping that someone more knowledgeable than me would respond to you.
My understanding is that the Suess Effect's major relevance is with radiocarbon dating, rather than with climate matters.
It would be helpful if you could clarify your question, by discussing it in more detail how you believe there are difficulties of comprehension of the planetary total carbon cycle. Perhaps you are seeking more precision than is required for verification of the mainstream scientific understanding of modern climate change.
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Rob Honeycutt at 11:35 AM on 16 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Manabe's Nobel Prize was very well deserved, that's for sure.
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Bob Loblaw at 11:01 AM on 16 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
I also disagree with part of what Charlie Brown has said in comment 386. Although it is reasonable to say that the IR radiation emitted to space looks like it is being emitted from a single layer at temperature X, the losses to space are an integration of IR radiation emitted at many layers of differing temperatures.
A lot of IR loss to space comes from the stratosphere. In the Beer's Law thread I linked to, in comment #15, I give the modelling results from Manabe and Wetherald, 1967, which shows a cooling of the stratosphere with increased CO2. That is because adding CO2 also increases the ability to emit radiation, as well as to absorb it. In the stratosphere, that means that the temperature change is dominated by the fact that the same IR radiation can be emitted a a lower temperature. That would not make any sense if IR loss to space only came from a single height. Here is the figure I included in that oher comment:
IR radiation transfer in the atmosphere cannot really be dealt with as a single-layer item , except as a useful approximation to illustrate certain characteristics. It is a continuous system of many layers, with absorption/emission sequences that depend on all of the following: temperatures, atmospheric composition, and the wavelength of radiation (since greenhouse gasses absorb and emit at specific wavelengths).
It is correct that water vapour is concentrated in lower layers of the troposphere, where the temperatures are warmer - whereas CO2 is relatively uniformly mixed through the troposphere and stratosphere. But both exist in a continuum. The symbols in the figure I give above represent the different layers that were used in the Manabe and Wetherald model. Still a set of discrete altitudes (heck it was 1967, so the computer they used was far less complex that your current cell phone) - but a lot more layers than just "this one for water vapour, that one for CO2".
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Eclectic at 08:54 AM on 16 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Charlie_Brown @386 ,
No. Please remember the old adage about "not seeing the forest for the trees". ;-)
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Charlie_Brown at 07:47 AM on 16 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Actually, I think that Vidar2032 @383 is correct. When he/she says GHGs emit at a fixed temperature, I believe he/she means at the temperature of the atmosphere as fixed by the atmospheric temperature profile. The 1976 U.S. Std Atmosphere for the tropopause, where CO2 emits to space, is close to 220K, while the emitting layer of H2O vapor in the troposphere is about 240-270 K. When he/she says that the effect of increased concentration is to broaden the band, that also is correct when considering that increasing concentration strengthens weak absorption lines. Look at the Figure in Bob Loblaw @7 in his linked thread to Beer’s Law above, which Bob kindly produced for me at that time. The weak absorption lines on the wings get stronger as concentration increases. There is sufficient path length in the tropopause to bring most of the absorption lines for the CO2 band between 14-16 microns close to 1.0, which means that the emittance is close to 1.0. Stacking the strong absorption lines in the middle of the band, which means increasing the path length and bringing an emittance of close to 1.0 even closer to 1.0, is not how increasing CO2 increases the emittance. Note that increasing emittance means more energy is emitted from a colder temperature which has less intensity than the energy emitted from a lower altitude at a warmer temperature. This is in accordance with the Planck black body distribution curves that Bob presents. The difference between a black body and a gas is that a black body absorbs/emits at all wavelengths while gases absorb/emit only at wavelengths specific to their molecular structure. What would be interesting, if only I could post my own Figure, would be the HITRAN absorption lines for CO2 at conditions of the tropopause and H2O for the troposphere.
Meanwhile, Vidar’s question is an excellent opportunity to use the Univ of Chicago link to MODTRAN Infrared Light in the Atmosphere. Choose the 1976 U.S. Std Atmosphere. All one has to do is increase the water vapor scalar to 1.07 to show a 7% increase, then adjust the temperature offset until the original value is matched. It turns out to be about 0.25 C. Better, to see if 7 % is about right, set CO2 to 280, CH4 to 0.7, and Freon to 0 to get pre-industrial conditions. Save the run to background. Then change CO2 to 415, CH4 to 1.8, and Freon to 1.0 to get current conditions, adjust the temperature offset to match the starting value, and choose holding fixed relative humidity. The raw model output shows that it changes the water vapor by about 6%, and the temperature offset is about 1.0 C. It's a very good approximation, but be careful not to place too high of an expectation on the accuracy and precision of this model. Realize that it is designed to be an educational tool with high computational speed and limited flexibility that provides good results, but better models exist for professional use.
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Eclectic at 04:39 AM on 16 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Vidar2032 @ post#383 ,
No. What you propose about infrared emissions is bizarrely wrong.
To educate yourself, please go back to Physics 101. From what you have said, you have a great deal of reading to do, to get up to understanding the very basics about radiation and molecules. You have a lot of work ahead of you !
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Bob Loblaw at 04:38 AM on 16 June 2023Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Vidar2032:
I think you have some fundamental misunderstandings of the emission and absorption of radiation.
First, gases do not emit radiation "at a fixed temperature". Temperature is not a characteristic of radiation. Temperature is a measure of thermal energy, and that thermal energy is available to be converted to radiation (i.e., emitted). Gases will emit radiation at selected individual wavelengths, related to the structure of the gas. But they will emit radiation at those wavelengths at any temperature.
The way that temperature links to emission is by the quantity of energy available. Higher temperature? More frequent emissions of photons, which carry more energy. (But each individual photon at a specific wavelength will contain the same amount of energy.) For a blackbody (not a gas) the higher temperature also tends to increase the amount of radiation more at shorter wavelengths, so you see a shift in the wavelength with the peak emissions:
Increased concentration of gases means more molecules to absorb radiation, which means that individual photons will travel shorter distances before being absorbed. This is simply due to the number of extra CO2 molecules, not their concentration in ppm relative to the remaining gases. You can read about the proper way to use measurements of gas concentrations for radiation absorption calculations in this blog post:
https://skepticalscience.com/from-email-bag-beer-lambert.html
The comments in that blog post are also useful in explaining some of the related effects.
Once the proper calculations of the effects of adding CO2 and water vapour are done - yes, the seemingly small increase in water vapour will have that 1C warming effect.
