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chriskoz at 12:44 PM on 13 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 8
william@2,
Your "prophecy" does not make any sense in light of e.g. (Samson 2011):
(click to see larger version)
Same aplies on the smaller scale: "rich and famous" are going to sit in their A/C towers, or move to their other properties, while poors and vulnerables are going to suffer. Example: recent cases of suicide in flooded Thailand. Rich people do not react like that.
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Tom Curtis at 11:47 AM on 13 January 2017Russian email hackers keep playing us for fools
As I have said previously, I am not going to endlessly reprosecute this point. I will note, however, that while adamski will not accept significant evidence of Russian involvement in the DNC hack, he reverses the onus of proof when it comes to condemning Assistant Secretary of State Nuland, who is charged with fomenting a coup simply because the US has given aid to the Ukraine. Next he will be telling us that the US pulls Putin's puppet strings because of the >10 Billion in aid given to Russia over the same period.
I will also point out that my accurate description of Putin as a hardline, nationalist, dictator is not in any way weakened by the extensive support of such dictators by the US in the past, given that I am not a US citizen, and have never condoned that support. Indeed, I have condemned it.
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bjchip at 08:20 AM on 13 January 2017Press complaints process is ‘exercise in futility’ for scientists
The great misfortune for our children is that democracy fails us when people are ignorant, and that they prefer not to pay for "news" that is "inconvenient" to their beliefs or that simply fails to entertain them. Which means that media outlets have a stron interest in entertainment and controversy, and very little in the boring part about accuracy.
Since we enlightened our social structures so that news is now a commercially sold product (infotainment), the result is a spreading and undeniable increase in ignorance. The ignoranti outnumber us, and democracy IS failing, and the result is that we are failing our children, in not providing them with an environment that supports the civilization and privileges we ourselves enjoy today. This is simply a symptom. It is actually remarkable that there is still some theoretical mechanism to correct it. I do not think that in the USA the ability to challenge a media pusher on its products even exists (outside of libel court).
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william5331 at 05:47 AM on 13 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 8
Just a wee niggle. Climate change is likely to have a pretty devestating effect on the rich and famous. Think about all that high priced realestate that will be trashed by sea level rise. Think about cities which typically have three days of food within their boarders when there is a massive Northern Hemisphere crop failure. Think about the wall street types that were jumping out of their multi story buildings during the 30's crash. They joy may just possibly be spread around a little more equally than we think.
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Sean OConnor at 01:27 AM on 13 January 2017Conservative media can't stop denying there was no global warming 'pause'
You state that we've had warming of between 0.16C and 0.18C per decade. How does that compare to model predictions?
Moderator Response:[Rob P] Here's an update to a figure which appeared in the IPCC AR5.
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John Hartz at 01:18 AM on 13 January 2017Russian email hackers keep playing us for fools
In my opinion, Kurt Eichenwald is one of the best investigative journalists in the US. I therefore place great weight on the accuracy of his reports about the Russian/Putin interference in the 2016 Presidential election. Here is an introduction and link to his most recent Newsweek piece on this topic.
Prior to the November presidential vote, Newsweek published an article revealing the scope, intent, mechanisms and global impact of Russia’s interference with the American election, based largely on information from European intelligence services. Given the recent release of declassified government documents confirming large portions of the original article, we are combining new reporting with extensive information from the first Newsweek piece that has yet to be declassified and has been described by individuals from and connected to several foreign intelligence services who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Trump, Putin and the Hidden History of How Russia Interfered in the U.S. Presidential Election by Kurt Eichenwald, Newsweek, Jan 11, 2016
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Tristan at 15:56 PM on 12 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
@RedBaron
Very interesting, thanks for your detailed response. -
Ignorant Guy at 15:24 PM on 12 January 2017Conservative media can't stop denying there was no global warming 'pause'
Like chriskoz, I didn't like the headline. But you can't always not get what you don't want.
But let's get serious. I really agree with chriskoz that this web-site needs to be easy to read. I come here frequently to keep myself informed and find the site higly valuable.
I am not a native English speaker and I am so-so fluent, but I have a way with words and I have I way with logic. Still I needed to read the 3-negtion headline several times to get the meaning right. -
adamski5807 at 14:02 PM on 12 January 2017Russian email hackers keep playing us for fools
Tom@32 How is it that other actors are eliminated without giving us factual substance of thier claims? You are prepared to question assange's claims yet give no qualifications to what is being claimed by the agencies ( remember Iraq?) You provide a link that half way down states there Assange asked the US to review and redact names but refused and that there is no evidence that anyones life has been threatened as a result. You also omit that it was a 'real journalist' - David Leigh of the Guardian, who made it necessary for the cables to be dumped en masse after he published the decryption codes in a book.
www.newscientist.com/article/dn20869-assange-why-wikileaks-was-right-to-release-raw-cables/
Is it possible for you to provide examples of countries where the US has suppported democracy as I can give plenty where the opposite is true (read Chomsky)
Leak or hack, what does it really matter as we know all govts are involved in such affairs, but in this case what is seen as the "crime" is its release to the american public.
Demonising Putin with descriptors such as hardliner, nationalist, dictator are meaningless when there are plenty of leaders around the globe who enjoy full US suuport and protection. Putin is an oligacarch thanks to US capitalism after the collapse of USSR and the privatisation of state assets.
And finally, where are you getting you information of Ukraine and Syria? Are you saying Nuland had nothing to do with the illegal overthrow of Yanukovitch despite her admission of spending $5bn to secure "a democratic Ukraine"
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sailingfree at 08:16 AM on 12 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 8
The Bible says even more.
God made the Garden of Eden for Adam and Eve, but got mad at them and kicked them out to a less hospitibale place: “… cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shall thy eat out of it … in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread,…” (Genesis 3.17,19)
And after a few generations He was so mad at mankind that He flooded the Earth. “And God saw the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” (Genesis 6.5) “… and so the Lord said I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; …” (Genesis 6.7)
He later changed his mind for Noah and his family, and promised no more global floods. He made no such promise about heat though.
Could He be mad again, seeing how "well" we have taken care of the Earth and have treated other humans?
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chriskoz at 18:15 PM on 11 January 2017Conservative media can't stop denying there was no global warming 'pause'
Thanks Dana for another good article, but its title, with 3 negations "can't stop", "denying" and "no global warming 'pause'" is virtually impossible to grasp even for me, a fluent English reader. I grasped it only by inference, because I know Dana and what he thinks on the subject, and of course from the text.
However, those less fluent (e.g. what google translate would do with it if some need to read in another language?) or who don't read the text carefully, will just remain confused.
Simplicity and clarity of arguments & language is what separate this website from denialist crowd and let's not forget about titles...
"Conservative media keep denying that the global warming 'pause' was debunked" would be far better. Or a different take: "Science denying conservative media keep believing in a myth of the global warming 'pause'"
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BBHY at 18:06 PM on 11 January 2017Conservative media can't stop denying there was no global warming 'pause'
Not only are El Nino years hotter than previous El Nino years and La Nina years hotter than previous La Nina years, but we also have La Nina years that are hotter than earlier El Nino years. If that isn't evidence of warming what is?
I like to remind people that 2008, which was the coolest year since 2000, was still warmer than all but one year of the 1900's. So a year that is actually in 99th percentile of warmest years is now what counts as a 'cool" year in the 21st Century.
My conservative friends still claim that the Earth is in a cooling period, but we know that has now become part of their political identity and has nothing at all to do with the scientific facts.
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RedBaron at 07:21 AM on 11 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Tristan,
Easier said than done. The best published science so far regarding management changes on existing grassland is here:
But one study in Texas, no matter how well done, doesn't help much to determine what will happen in Kansas, Iowa, Illinois, South America, Asia, Australia etc etc... Its being done in all those places. Soil carbon is rapidly rising. Vegetative cover is increasing, etc etc etc. But as far as I know, there isn't yet enough published literature to quantify it.
That's the first problem. The second problem is so far, counter to what everyone is claiming, no land managed this way has ever been found yet to saturate so far. Other types of grassland management has, but not HPG, not yet. Gabe Brown has one paddock up to 11%, and it is actually accelerating carbon sequestration rather than slowing down. There is a guy in Missouri named Greg Judy who has been doing this long enough he theorectically should have reached saturation, but instead, his land the A horizon carbon sequestration simply tapered off at the upper levels, but accelerated deeper in the soil profile. He is now building high carbon soil meters deep. No saturation in sight...yet. But he hasn't had his land volunteered as part of a carbon sequestration scientific study with controlls either. Only relying on his own reporting of soil tests sent to labs. So these lines of evidence are not robust at all, nor quantified properly.
In some cases where some of these properties have been robustly measured, they often are simply thrown out as outliers. That doesn't help us much either.
But the biggest obstical of all is getting any good data at all on land currently in corn and soy production. What would be the effect of changing that land back to properly managed pasture? People have done it, but I have seen no data that could be used to quantify the effects besides the case studies done on several farms including Gabe Brown and his neighbors. A webinar describing those results can be found here and even this focused on cover crops used as forage rather than the pasture land:
Innovative No-Till: Using Multi-Species Cover Crops to Improve Soil Health
And here is Gabe describing it himself:
Gabe Brown: Keys To Building a Healthy Soil
This would necessarily be part of any plan though. Because while we currently over produce corn and soy, we wouldn't want to stop completely either. So this needs to happen too. Wouldn't want to grow it for biofuels though. Switchgrass not only produces about 5 times the biomass above ground for biofuel production, it also rapidly sequesters carbon in the soil at the same time. (10.6tCO2/ha/yr in the 0-120 cm soil profile)
Soil Carbon Storage by Switchgrass Grown for Bioenergy
Basically what we are left with then is calculating potential theoretically rather than actually robustly estimating it from observable published results. We have a few studies here and there, and they are suprisingly consistant, but not enough to be sure worldwide. Agriculture can double soil carbon levels in the topsoil within three to five years, particularly when the starting point is below 2%. Soil carbon increases of 0.5-1% could therefore be achieved relatively easily with these simple changes to land management anywhere those soil carbon levels have dropped below 2%. So the next question is how much carbon is that? To calculate that we use this formula:
Total weight of the soil (100 t/ha/cm) x % SOC = 1tC/ha/cm for every 1% increase of SOC. The standard soil measurement depth is 30cm. So 30tC/ha for every 1% increase in SOC. (SOC actually increases meters deep and in the case above with switchgrass even more at depth than shallow, but data for depths over 30cm is quite rare because most the data was collected in conjunction with arable cropping)
The only thing to do next is simply project how many acres of land we do this on.
Desertification is experienced on 33% of the global land surface and affects more than one billion people, half of whom live in Africa. [1]
Applying the numbers above to 33% of the land surface gives one ridiculously high potential. Even I can't be that optimistic. Agricultural land producing food totals 49,116,227 square kilometers (just under 5 gigahectares) So if we could do this on just 33% of current agricultural land that would give us a usable sink of around 1.5 gigahectares. That gives 45 Gt C for every 1% increase in SOC just in the top 30cm of the 1/3rd the world's agricultural soils. You won't reach saturation for at minimum 225 Gt C. Every 27 tC sequestered biologically in soil represents 100 tCO2e removed from the atmosphere. That gives us 833 Gt CO2e sink size for only 1/3rd the agricultural land increasing in SOC 5% only in the top 30cm. More than all the excess CO2 currently in the atmosphere and approaching significant numbers for total emissions ever. The last figure I found for global industrial emissions since 1751 was ~ 1,450 Gt CO2e (maybe some of you climate scientists could confirm that)
Yet as big as that number is, 1/3rd the agricultural land being capable of sequestering well over 1/2 of the total industrial emissions ever just by increasing SOC 5%. It is still finite. So we still must rely on the other scientists and engineers to get a handle on emissions.
I still contend if we do both, it will solve AGW and may be the ONLY way we can. Certainly the only way I know of that can be afforded and instead of risks, benefits.
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Tom Curtis at 07:06 AM on 11 January 2017Russian email hackers keep playing us for fools
adamski @31, there are now six independent organizations with relevant expertise that claim the malware shows the computers to have been probably hacked by Russian government associated hackers. Those organizations state that fingerprints are emulatable by others so that it is not definitive proof, but all are confident that it is relevant evidence. Given that you are not an expert in cybersecurity, your opinion that it is not evidence at all is irrelevant.
The recent claim by a purported "whistleblower" to have leaked the data (your original postion) is shown to not be credible by the prior claim by Guccifer 2.0, who is shown to have been running a false flag operation by his deficient knowledge of Romanian (his purported nationality). He also (unconvingly) claims that Russian metadata left on the files was his "watermark"; but that metadata shows a Russian connection prior even to the wikileaks dump.
Public statements by Putin show him to have a strong preference for Trump as president, showing the Russian government to have a clear motive compatible with their having leaked the DNC documents. He may have had a reasonable motive for that, but that has no bearing on the matter. (I will note that everybody, always, would "like a cooperative relationship". The question is, on what terms. Russia's activities in the Ukraine and Syria show the terms on which they will accept a "cooperative relationship" is explicitly inimical to US foreign policy, and to the supporting of democracy in general. Putin is a hardline, nationalist, dictator. Any US President who gains a "cooperative relationship" with Russia while any of those three descriptors applies is probably sacrificing US interests to do so.)
Finally, Assange is not a journalist of any description. At best he merely dumps data to the web with no effort to assess its import. However, he does far worse thant that. While initially favourable to the idea of wikileaks, Assange lost my support when he dumped a large body of unredacted data revealing the names of Afghanistanis cooperating with NATO forces, thereby setting them up to be murdered by the Taliban. Since then, the further, completely targeted dumps show him (at best) to be a stooge for people inimical to the West. His public statements suggest he is a willing stooge.
I am not going to endlessly reprosecute these points. Nothing in your response actually presents counter evidence to the evidence I already detailed @13. You have just thrown mud (together with an unwarranted testimonial for Putin) in the hopes that the evidence will be ignored.
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John Hartz at 07:03 AM on 11 January 2017CO2 lags temperature
Adri Norse Fire @510:
Here's another science-based response to the issue you have raised:
“Over eight glacial cycles in 650,000 years, global temperature and the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere have gone hand in hand. When temperatures are high, so are CO2 amounts and vice versa. This obvious connection is part of a coupled system in which changes in climate affect CO2 levels, and CO2 levels also change climate. The pacing of these cycles is set by variations in the Earth’s orbit, but their magnitude is strongly affected by greenhouse gas changes and the waxing and waning of the ice sheets.”
Source: Climate Change: Picturing the Science, Gavin Schmidt and Joshua Wolfe, W.W. Norton Company Ltd, 2009
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Tom Curtis at 06:03 AM on 11 January 2017CO2 lags temperature
Adri Norse Fire @510:
1)
"If we have verified that CO2 follows the increase of the global temperature in the ice cores with a determined time delay, it is evident that it is not the CO2 that causes the temperature increase, but the opposite."
As it happens, however, what has been determined over the most recent deglaciation is that 90% of the temperature increase lags the CO2 increase (see final figure in OP, and Shakun et al (2012)). That is entirely consistent with the standard theory which is that while the deglaciation was triggered by changes in NH insolation due to the Milankovitch cycles, it was then driven by a feedback cycle of greenhouse gases (CO2 and methane) and albedo changes.
I would be a bizarre form of science that threw out a theory because the data conformed with the expectations from the theory.
2)
"But how do you know that CO2 is responsible for current climate changes?"
A regression of Global Mean Surface Temperature (GMST) against CO2 forcing shows a correlation of 0.9, an R^2 of 0.811, and a temperature change of 0.58 C/(W/m^2), ie, a Transient Climate Responsce (TCR) of 2.14 C per doubling of CO2. In contrast a similar regression of GMST against Total Solar Irradiance (TSI) shows a correlation of 0.416, an R^2 of 0.173, and a temperature change of 1.77 C/(W/m^2). Adjusting to the solar forcing, that represents a temperature response of 10.1 C/(W/m^2), or a TCR or 37.3 C per doubling of CO2.
The high correlation between CO2 forcing and temperature is not due to the CO2 increase being a consequence of temperature increase, both because multiple lines of evidence show the CO2 increase to be due to anthropogenic emissions (as per Daniel Bailey's post @512) and because the correlation between GMST and CO2 forcing (0.9) is higher than the 0.679 correlation between GMST and CO2 concentration. To reject the dominant role of CO2 forcing in the increase in GMST in this circumstance is to reject that which has strong supporting evidence (CO2 forcing as the cause) in favour of that with only very weak evidence (TSI forcing as the cause); but also to indulge in magical thinking that supposes that like effects (ie, similar values in forcing) are up to 17 times stronger when the cause is solar forcing than when it is CO2 forcing.
There is much more evidence of the dominant role of CO2 forcing in recent temperature increases than this, and stronger individual items of evidence - but this evidence is very straight forward and easy to understand. In the end you either accept evidence or you do not. If you do, you do not have any serious doubt as to the role of the anthropogenic increase in greenhouse gases in the current rapid increase in GMST.
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One Planet Only Forever at 04:12 AM on 11 January 2017Conservative media can't stop denying there was no global warming 'pause'
If the denier/delayers lose traction with their 'pause' propaganda they will surely move to another delaying tactic like saying they need to see another 10 years of data to be convinced. That can be repeated in 10 years, as many times as it works for them.
Promoting denial is just one of the actions they will try to benefit from. Ultimately the biggest trouble-makers are the ones with the most to lose because they chose to deny that they should dramatically reduce their reliance on getting away with benefiting from the global burining up of the non-renewable buried ancient hydrocarbons. They gambled big on getting away with behaving less acceptably.
Clearly it is irresponsible for anyone to try to delay actions that will develop truly lasting improvements for all of humanity far into the future, developing almost perpetual ways for all of humanity to live decently on this amazing planet.
It is equally clear that 'the conservative media' are not the real problem. The problem is any individual or organization that pursues the increase of its perceptions of success "Winning" popularity and profitability without responsibly limiting their actions to "Helping" to advance humanity to a lasting better future for all.
Winners who are not Honestly Helpful are actually Threats regardless of temporarily created perceptions in the minds of a portion of current day humanity.
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Daniel Bailey at 00:55 AM on 11 January 2017CO2 lags temperature
Off-topic, but I'll answer anyway and risk the ire of the moderators.
Scientists have a pretty good understanding of what the Earth's climate has been throughout it's history, why it has changed over time and what the specific factors are that have made the climate change.
And the only factor that fully explains all the changes we can see and measure in temperatures, ocean salinity, atmospheric composition, loss of Arctic sea ice volume, changing species habitats & ranges is due to the warming from human-derived fossil-fuel CO2 we have put back into the carbon cycle.
We have accurate, reliable data for the growth of atmospheric CO2 and for anthropogenic emissions (for details, see Cawley, 2011). The fact that the net natural flux is negative clearly shows that natural uptake has exceeded natural emissions every year for the last fifty years at least, and hence has been opposing, rather than causing the observed rise in atmospheric CO2.
It is true that the fluxes between the oceans and atmosphere depend on temperature, so all things being equal, one would expect atmospheric CO2 to rise in a warming world.
However, the thing the fake-skeptics and compulsive liars normally ignore is that CO2 solubility increases with increasing difference in the partial pressures of CO2 between atmosphere and surface waters.
In the real world, all things are not equal, our emissions have caused a difference in partial pressures, which is increasing the oceanic uptake, which more than compensates for the temperature driven change in fluxes.
The human-caused origin (anthropogenic) of the measured increase in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 is a cornerstone of predictions of future temperature rises.
As such, it has come under frequent attack by people who challenge the science of global warming. One thing noteworthy about those attacks is that the full range of evidence supporting the anthropogenic nature of the CO2 increase seems to slip from sight. So what is the full range of supporting evidence?
There are ten main lines of evidence to be considered:
1. The start of the growth in CO2 concentration coincides with the start of the industrial revolution, hence anthropogenic;
2. Increase in CO2 concentration over the long term almost exactly correlates with cumulative anthropogenic emissions, hence anthropogenic;
3. Annual CO2 concentration growth is less than Annual CO2 emissions, hence anthropogenic; (Link, Link)
4. Declining C14 ratio indicates the source is very old, hence fossil fuel or volcanic (ie, not oceanic outgassing or a recent biological source);
5. Declining C13 ratio indicates a biological source, hence not volcanic;
6. Declining O2 concentration indicate combustion, hence not volcanic;
7. Partial pressure of CO2 in the ocean is increasing, hence not oceanic outgassing;
8. Measured CO2 emissions from all (surface and beneath the sea) volcanoes are one-hundredth of anthropogenic CO2 emissions; hence not volcanic;
9. Known changes in biomass too small by a factor of 10, hence not deforestation; (Link, Link)
10. Known changes of CO2 concentration with temperature are too small by a factor of 10, hence not ocean outgassing.
The current, and ongoing, increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is due to human industrial activities. In scientific circles this is the climatological equivalent of the Earth being round - a fact so plainly obvious and supported by such a vast body of scientific evidence that to question its reality is absurd.
It quickly becomes clear that it is the humans who have caused the rise in CO2 levels, by burning fossil fuels in the twentieth century. Every other hypothesis makes a host of predictions that do not pass the test of the evidence.
H/T to Tom Curtis, from which much of the above is sourced.Please stay on-topic from now on. Thousands of threads exist here on virtually every topic related to climate change imaginable. Use the Search function to find the most appropriate thread and place your questions there.
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Daniel Bailey at 00:47 AM on 11 January 2017CO2 lags temperature
And yet the BEST team found that, WRT 'Is CO2 leading or lagging temperature rise':
"we know that the CO2 is not coming from the oceans but from human burning of fossil fuels"
And
"it is clear that it is the CO2 that comes first, not the warming"
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Adri Norse Fire at 21:31 PM on 10 January 2017CO2 lags temperature
If we have verified that CO2 follows the increase of the global temperature in the ice cores with a determined time delay, it is evident that it is not the CO2 that causes the temperature increase, but the opposite. It is a proof that the temperature causes the increase of CO2. So far we are all agreed. But how do you know that CO2 is responsible for current climate changes? Because it is a greenhouse gas? Of course, all greenhouse gases produce a warming (if the theory of greenhouse effect is true) in the global temperature. But, how do you know that the current increase in temperature (+ -0.5 ° C since the end of the Little Ice Age) is due to the action of the tiny fraction of the atmosphere composed of greenhouse gases and among them the tiny part composed of CO2 and within the CO2 of the tiny percentage produced by human industrial societies and not due to the action of other more widespread greenhouse gases or to the huge natural emissions of CO2 or the undisputed influence of the sun on global temperature wich in turn raises the atmospheric CO2 level?
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adamski5807 at 16:12 PM on 10 January 2017Russian email hackers keep playing us for fools
Tom @30. U.S. Intel Chiefs have a history of deceiving the public ( Glenn Greenwald). Who can forget James Clapper performance before Congree regarding the NSA in 2013?? So then - where is the evidence?? The latest report again says nothing on this, a report which was claimed to be why the 35 diplomats were deported. The phrase “we assess” was used 19 times without a single fact to demonstrate Russian involvement. In other words we, the intelligence community, have made a judgment, and you, the American people, must take it on faith. NSA even gave it a moderate vote of confidence.
So lets look at your reasons.
Malware - It cannot be claimed that tools such as X-Agent have been exclusively sourced by Russia when it can be shown others have access and these tools and the infrastructure the DNC hackers allegedly used are not evidence that points to any specific actor. Indeed any cyber-crime actor, like the NSA, seeks to disguise as a different actor when committing attacks. Something that "proves" that A did it is likely to have been created by B, C or D to disguise as A. All such hacking tools use freely available infrastructure like TOR or rented networks from cyber-crime wholesalers like the recently exposed Israeli denial-of-service franchiser.
Crowdstiker - FBI claims that democracts refuse full access to DNC servers. Did C/striker get this? How do you do a thorough investigation without full access?
Putin - stated that he would like a cooperative relationship with US. With Clinton comparing him to Hitler, naturally look to the othr side. How many time have we heard the US state thier preferred candidate.
Assange - WikiLeaks conducted themselves as actual journalists, not stenographers for the CIA and Pentagon, and made the secret documents public, damaging the candidate who was the overwhelming favorite of the military-intelligence leadership. If you think the publication by WikiLeaks of US military and diplomatic communications that document war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan and conspiracies against governments around the world is treasonous, then you and I have a major difference.
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Tristan at 14:40 PM on 10 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
@RedBaron
Maybe this is simplisitic, but it seems that to advance your position you need to have references for the following things, and a discussion on the significant caveats:
A) Carbon capacity of existing temperate pastoral grassland (seems like Jobbagy and Jackson (2000) has you covered)
B) Carbon capacity of the proposed C4 pastoral grassland.
C) Cost/time associated with converting the grasslands of A) to the grasslands of in B). -
michael sweet at 10:27 AM on 10 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Red Baron,
It appears to me that you feel that your opinion is the only thing that can be accepted science and everyone else is incorrect. Since I am not expert in this area, I have to go with the consensus opinion. If your soil claims have merit keep on presenting them to others. Scientists accept new proposals once they see convincing data. "Potential climate wedges" from supporters is not very convincing.
I think you should stop your very loud criticism of others based on your assumption that you know it all. Perhaps there is some merit in others experience. Voicing the mainstream scientific opinion cannot be called "false myths". Perhaps I have misread your posts.
From our previous discussion it is clear that you greatly underestimate the amount of carbon that has to be removed from the biosphere and overestimate how much soil can remove. In the end we will have to implement everything that removes carbon so perhaps your ideas will be seen as beneficial. In any case it will probably improve the soil for those who can implement it.
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william5331 at 05:13 AM on 10 January 2017As Seas Rise, Miami Development Continues Unabated
I suppose they could fill the bottom floors of tall buildings with concrete and enter at the second floor. Wharves could be built to moor boats and singing boatmen imported from Florence. Going with the flow so to speak. There should be a great business opportunity for raising houses a few meters and putting piling underneath. Could be quite exciting too. There should be an influx of crocodiles and water moccasins and even the giant hybrid pythons. Mangroves will become the favored (or only) garden plant that will grow. Spoon bills and other birds will use them to nest and the area will become a naturalist paradise. "always look on the bright side of life"
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RedBaron at 04:56 AM on 10 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Tom,
I have no fundamental problem with Jobbagy and Jackson. It is of course discussing the highly degraded current state rather than prior to industrialized agriculture, overgrazing, undergrazing and various other human impacts. So you sould be careful in the conclusions you draw from the paper. But I can certainly accept in the most general terms the data while still disputing certain conclusions some might draw from it.
As far as your claim of typically about 1% SOC found in mollic epihedons. That of course is the problem. When soils that historically contained 6-10% SOC prior to human impact are currently holding 1% SOC we have a serious problem. Basically farming on subsoil.
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Tom Curtis at 03:54 AM on 10 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
RedBaron @14:
"Now the last thing for you to connect all the dots is understand what biome builds soils, forests? or grasslands? This is again 100 year old science. Mollic Epipedon"
While Mollic epipedons are formed in grasslands and have a high (>0.6% , typically about 1% SOC according to one source I saw) SOC, Folistic epipedons are mostly composed of organic material and consequently, have SOC in the 10's of percents. They, or course, are formed in forestland.
That goes to show that just citing the high SOC values of Mollic epipedons, or that they are generated in grasslands has no evidentiary value. What is required is an actual stocktake of total carbon reservoirs for typical environments, as is provided by Jobbagy and Jackson (2000).
They show that temperate grasslands store 19.1 kg/m^2 of carbon in the first 3 meters (Table 3), with a further 5 kg/m^2 above ground (Table 4). In contrast temperate deciduous forests store 22.8 kg/m^2 of carbon in the first 3 meters, with a further 129.2 kg/m^2 above ground. Temperate evergreen forests also store more carbon in the soil than do temperate grasslands, and considerably more in the total ecosystem (although not as much in either as do temperate deciduous forrests). Similarly tropical forests (deciduous and evergreen) store more carbon in the first three meters of soil than do tropical grassland/savanna, and massively more when the whole ecosystem is taken into account.
You are welcome to say that that data is out of date, and link a more up to date source, but unless that source details total ecosystem storage for all relevant ecosystems, it does not supplant Jobbagy and Jackson.
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RedBaron at 23:43 PM on 9 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Michael,
When I supply a link like: Liquid carbon pathway unrecognised, what do you suppose "unrecognised" means if not missed by the accepted mainstream line? We have the situation where ~5,000 farmers and rapidly growing numbers in Austrailia, and a few case studies run by Dr. Jones for scientific verification are in fact doing right now as we speak what the accepted mainstream line completely ignores and even worse says is basically impossible. Well in my book, we can attach a high level of uncertainty to new breakthroughs like this, but it is improper to say it can't be done. That's denialism exactly parallel to AGW denialism.
Much the same, I gave you a source that claims
"The relative size of each of these pools can vary in
different soils. But in general, the size of the stable pool remains relatively constant, while the sizes
of the labile and slow pools are sensitive to management."That is the accepted mainstream line and it is what I was taught. That knowledge is 100 years old! For all that time no one really understood exactly why, but no one ever accomplish the formation of a mollic epipedon where one didn't exist. It basically was impossible. We could degrade it, but we didn't know how to bring it back. However, it is an impossible thing that several people are doing right now for the first time in human history! And you want me to hold back my enthusiasm?
It's even worse for SRI, which has over 5 million practitioners and over 700 articles in the scientific literature, yet the accepted mainstream line as reviewed by that link completely ignores it.
Did you ever wonder why I am so sympathetic to your SkepticalScience claims that "big oil" is actively obfuscating the science behind AGW? I have kept that open mind and reviewed the evidence because I know for a fact "Big Ag" is doing the same thing to soil science where ever it crosses the line in the soil they have claimed for themselves.
There is a reason I gave you that link anyway even though Daniel Kane clearly dances around that "Big Ag" minefield on tiptoe.
Currently the atmosphere and
ocean have too much carbon while soils have lost carbon at an alarming rate due to development,
conversion of native grasslands and forests to cropland, and agricultural practices that decrease soil
organic matterand
Oceans and aquatic systems are by far the largest at an estimated 38,000 gigatons (Gt)
and vegetation is the smallest of the pools at an estimated 650 Gt. Soil is about four times the size of
the vegetation pool at an estimated 2500 Gt, making it the largest terrestrial pool of carbon (Batjes,
1996).and
Historic land use conversion of native ecosystems to agriculture is responsible for soil carbon reductions as high as 60-75% (Lal, 2011).
(btw That's on land still in production. More cropland has been lost completely and abandoned to desertification than is currently in production)
So you can easily see the soil pool potential is far larger than the living biomass potential. I don't dispute that forests have greater biomass potential. I simply am saying the soil carbon potential is much greater.
Now the last thing for you to connect all the dots is understand what biome builds soils, forests? or grasslands? This is again 100 year old science. Mollic Epipedon
So when we talk about AGW mitigation strategies, do we talk about labile biomass carbon? Or the 4 times larger and orders of magnitude more stable soil carbon pool? It shouldn't even be in dispute. But by far the most common approach advocated is afforestation rather than soil sequestration. It's a zombie myth that keeps rearing its ugly head just like the zombie myth addressed in the OP!
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michael sweet at 21:14 PM on 9 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Red Baron,
Your link is not a peer reviewed source. While it is interesting it does not support your claim. You claim:
- "In my opinion, no scientist can complain about a politician like Trump getting the science completely wrong, if they also remain stuck on equally false myths like Dyson's just plant a bunch of trees to solve AGW myth."
From the introduction of your source:
- "Recent reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) suggest that even if substantial reductions in anthropogenic carbon emissions are achieved in the near future, efforts to sequester previously emitted carbon will be necessary to ensure safe levels of atmospheric carbon and to mitigate climate change (Smith et al. 2014). Research on sequestration has focused primarily on Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) and reforestation with less attention to the role of soils as carbon sinks. Recent news reports of melting glaciers and ice sheets coupled with a decade of record-breaking heat underscores the importance of aggressive exploration of all possible sequestration strategies.
- Soils have the potential to sequester carbon from the atmosphere with proper management. Based on global estimates of historic carbon stocks and projections of rising emissions, soil’s usefulness as a carbon sink and drawdown solution appear essential (Lal, 2004, 2008). Since over one third ofarable land is in agriculture globally (World Bank, 2015a), finding ways to increase soil carbon in agricultural systems will be a major component of using soils as a sink. A number of agricultural management strategies appear to sequester soil carbon by increasing carbon inputs to the soil and enhancing various soil processes that protect carbon from microbial turnover. Uncertainties about the extent and permanence of carbon sequestration in these systems do still remain, but existing evidence is sufficient to warrant a greater global focus on agricultural soils as a potential climate stability wedge and drawdown solution."
My emphasis. A wedge is a small portion of the needed carbon drawdown. Your solution is described as a "possible wedge". Your chacterization of other posters as "getting the science completely wrong" is falsified by your reference. You need to stop making this claim.
The IPCC is described as discusing other methods of sequestration but not considering this method. Your method cannnot be considered as a major fix of carbon pollution as you have described when the IPCC is not even considering it. You are slandering other posters on this site who are following the accepted, mainstream line. You need to control your enthusiasm for your preferred method of farming. It is not a silver bullet.
I have been a lifelong gardener and currently have a small flower nursery (about 10,000 3 gallon pots) on 1/2 an acre. I have about 3,000 sq ft of greenhouse space. I am sympathetic to your style of farming. Good luck.
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RedBaron at 17:38 PM on 9 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Michael,
The best new review available is this:
However, it doesn't include SRI, pasture cropping, HPG, management impacts on methanotrophs and movement from the slow cycle to the stable pool or even the multispecies integrated forage cover crop/cash crop system being developed by Gabe Brown and others in conjunction with USDA-NRCS & SARE. In spite of these limitations, it is still a very good "101 primer" to get you started on understanding the vigorously debated issue.
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One Planet Only Forever at 10:48 AM on 9 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Daniel Mocsny,
Though I share some of your perspective I particularly disagree with your statement that “People are greedy and selfish.”.Since there have been studies done that confirm that altruism is an innate human trait (seen in young children), it is likely that the 'socio-economic-political' environment that a person is, or chooses to be, immersed in can significantly affect which aspects of their character are encouraged to develop and which ones are discouraged or beaten down.
From my perspective, the real problem is the popular misconception that the aspects of life that matter most are the “Competitions to Win - with the evidence of success allowed to be undeserved created impressions, particularly wealth obtained in ways that do not advance humanity to a lasting better future for all (more correctly the appearance of wealth, since money games and their rules are just made up by humans, and many cheaters prosper to the detriment of others and the future of humanity) ”.
Obviously humanity struggles to advance because the ones trying to win any way they can get away with have competitive advantages over everyone who honestly strives to help advance humanity to a lasting better future for all (the likely winners are not constrained by any sense of responsibility for the future of humanity). The profiteers of fossil fuel burning are clear examples of that.
Carbon taxes are not even legitimate equalizers. They sort of help the helpful, but they fail to disqualify the unhelpful.
Clearly the biggest failure of developed economic systems (and their associated political systems where politics has been perverted into being an extension of economics rather than being the monitor of economic activity and 'corrector' of failings of the economic activity to advance humanity to a lasting better future for all), is the lack of penalty for the ones who through the past couple of decades had gambled on continuing to get away with an understood to be unacceptable pursuit, a pursuit that was not advancing humanity to a lasting better future, a pursuit that was understandably detrimental to the future of humanity. Had it been clear that they would lose their bets they would have been angry, but pursued other ways of winning.
So implementing a carbon tax lets the trouble-makers keep their wealth and likely shift their focus to some other damaging unsustainable pursuit of personal benefit, because that is the type of people they have made-up their minds to be, people focused on winning any way they can get away with.
Climate science and the many other cases of the unacceptability of what is going on politically and economically are more than enough evidence that major fundamental changes need to occur. The younger and unborn generations need to “Win the defence of their future and get current day efforts focused on actually developing a better future for them (or at least not making things more difficult for them).”
As stated in my para-phrasing of the title of Naomi Klein's book “This (hopefully) Changes Everything”. The future of humanity requires changes of the socio-economic-political games to happen, the sooner the better, as long as the change is objectively focused on advancing humanity to a lasting better future for all. Any other objective is worth-less and is likely to be damaging.
The economy does not need to shrink, the economic game needs to change, and many of the current day perceived winners need to be clearly seen to be losers.
And increased learning in real world matters like the many fields of climate science are essential to ensure that humanity actually advances regardless of how popular and profitable it is to try to dismiss or discredit the elites (the actual best of a group - not the ones who think they are winners or better than others) and experts who can explain the unacceptability of popular and profitable aspects of developed human activity in the made-up human economic games.
However, I do agree that there is a potential need to 'shrink the developed economy', particularly the 'technological mass-consumption mass-marketing aspects'. Economic activity that keeps humans fitting in as part of life on this planet is essential for the future of humanity. Being apart from life, a damaging potential side-effect of technology, is detrimental to humanity.
It is simply unacceptable to attempt to justify or prolong 'current day activity that is understood to be creating challenges for others including future generations' by claiming that 'some current day perceived prosperity or wealth would have to be given up to avoid creating those challenges or costs'. The economic game only works well if the ones benefiting from an activity will be the only ones suffering any potential consequence.
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One Planet Only Forever at 08:54 AM on 9 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
The following statement in the OP incorrectly refers to 'terms' as 'phrases'.
"Moreover, the scientific community adapted the use of inaccurate phrases like “hiatus” and “pause” to describe what was..." -
michael sweet at 06:54 AM on 9 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Baron,
While you have a lot of interesting links in your post, none of them appear to me to support your claim that grasslands are the primary carbon storage method in nature. You have no link to the IPCC report that discusses this type of subject. You make very strong claims on very old, unrelated links that discuss grasslands generally, but do not make the claims you are trying to support.
Your link to biosequestration, which seems to be most on topic, discusses reafforestation as a primary method of fixing carbon first. It later mentions grasslands and herding animals but your claim that grasslands are the best pathway is not supported.
Please link to citations that specificly claim that grasslands are the best method to fix carbon in soil. The links should not be more than 5 years old without more recent support.
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bjornstjerneb at 06:24 AM on 9 January 2017Rose and Curry Double Down on Global Warming Denial
Last link in article is broken, I believe this is the correct one: https://www.carbonbrief.org/this-weeks-top-six-rebuttals-to-david-roses-warming-has-stopped-claim
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RedBaron at 05:10 AM on 9 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
@nigelj As I have pointed out many times on other portions of this website. You got the wrong biome. It is not the forests that can be a significant mitigation tool, but rather a different biome. We already have discussed this in detail. It’s called C4 perennial grasses in symbiosis with AMF. [1]
C4 carbon fixation - Wikipedia
C4 metabolism originated when grasses migrated from the shady forest undercanopy to more open environments,[2] where the high sunlight gave it an advantage over the C3 pathway.[3]
… Today, C4 plants represent about 5% of Earth's plant biomass and 3% of its known plant species.[4][5] Despite this scarcity, they account for about 23% of terrestrial carbon fixation.[6][7] Increasing the proportion of C4 plants on earth could assist biosequestration of CO2 and represent an important climate change avoidance strategy.
Glomalin is Key to Locking up Soil Carbon
Of course that “mitigation tool” while capable of cooling the planet: Cenozoic Expansion of Grasslands and Climatic Cooling it is currently plowed, herbicided, burned, overgrazed, undergrazed, eroded, paved over and otherwise molested to the point that it basically no longer works very well.
If you seriously want to claim that we don't need to entirely eliminate fossil fuel use due to fixing the other side of the biological carbon cycle, please at least get the correct biome and correct biochemical pathway. Otherwise your arguments are quickly and easily shot down once the details and quantified impacts are put pencil to paper. Using the bucket analogy, reforestation give you a slightly bigger temporary sink. But they do very little in the way of removing carbon from the short term cycles and into the long term cycles. Gives you a bigger bucket but doesn't impact fluxes much once that bucket saturates.
In my opinion, no scientist can complain about a politician like Trump getting the science completely wrong, if they also remain stuck on equally false myths like Dyson's just plant a bunch of trees to solve AGW myth.
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nigelj at 14:42 PM on 8 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Donald Trump will no doubt be "tweeting" climate zombie myths on a weekly basis. America is a lost cause on climate change for at least 4 years. The guy has a terrible range of policies on absolutely everything from climate change to economics, because he doesn't correctly diagnose any problems.
I actually think this aircraft travel issue is another climate myth where people claim it can't be solved. Firstly you dont have to eliminate all air travel to stop dangerous climate change, just reduce it moderately. This has been documented in numerous reports.
Secondly we don't have to stop using air travel. There are numerous mitigation strategies including carbon sinks like planting forests, and use of alternative low carbon or zero carbon fuels like ammonia based fuels (which are viable for short to medium distances). I'm not saying any of this is easy, just that the problem is not insolvable, even just with existing technology.
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Tom Curtis at 14:34 PM on 8 January 2017Russian email hackers keep playing us for fools
adamski @29, I refer you to my comment @ 13. With regard to the idea that the emails was leaked, leakers do not leave the footprints of malware on the targeted computer. They certainly will not leave malware used by hackers associated with the Russian government. So, if we assume that Craig Murry is being truthful, and that his source was being truthful, we are then left to believe that Russian hackers penetrated the DNC files at the behest of the Russian government, but that their nefarious aims were preempted by an internal leaker. We are also to assume that the leaker coincidentally took an action that would damage Hilary Clinton, and help Donald Trump when public statements by Putin show that is an outcome he would have been very happy to achieve. Further, we must assume the internal leaker had complete access to the DNC computers, so would be easilly identified if it was revealed that there was a leaker, which he himself reveals.
At the same time, if we believe that the alleged internal leaker exists, we also have to beleive that the purported Romanian hacker Guccifer 2.0, who also claims credit is lying (even though he made the claim, and released some documents four weeks prior to the wikileaks leak). (With regard to the relationship between Guccifer 2.0 and the Russians, see here.)
I do not consider that credible.
What I do notice is that Julian Assange's leaks are exclusively damageing to the US and its allies. No leaks of Chinese or Russian material are, apparently, to be found. He is an intelligent man, and must realize he is being used as a pawn for some power inimical to the US, and conincidentally to Australia. That he continues to release the material on those terms makes him not a champion of free information, but a selective releaser of confidential material of the US and its allies, and therefore a traitor to his own nation (Australia). Any close associate such as Craig Murry is tarred with the same brush. Given that assessment, it is no surprise that they would attempt to disassociate their source from the Russian government; even if the data was dumped in their files anonomously.
In short, I do not believe the alleged leaker to have been dishonest because I believe the allegations of the existence of the leaker to be fictions.
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chriskoz at 13:39 PM on 8 January 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #1
rkrolph@1,
It would be good (for AGW mitigation efforts) if Judy retired completely (i.e. do not utter any word about climate science anymore and spend the rest of life e.g. fishing) but that's not the case according to this article:
She's instead going to focus on growing her private business, Climate Forecast Applications Network, which provides insights into climate and weather risks for agriculture and energy companies.
So, now she's going to be a consultant for energy companies, likely downplaying the impact of their business, like Bjorn is doing. Cross "agriculture" from the above because it may not work due to conflict of interests.
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chriskoz at 13:10 PM on 8 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Daniel Mocsny @3,
We might see a "global warming stopped in 2016" denier argument, but maybe only if we get another 10-year or longer pause in surface warming... We might not get another 10-year pause in the near future. The odds went down with Trump getting elected. If positive feedbacks start kicking in, the base rate of warming might increase, shortening the time before the trend overrides short-term noise.
To better understand the impact of new US presidential term on global CO2 emmisions and consequently future warming, read this:
Trump carbon and the Paris agreement
which postulates that said impsact will be minimal, at least in the short term.On the other hand the impact on the level of scientific understanding of AGW in this administration cannot be any starker: from a decent, appropriate level (Obama), to the utter moronic ignorance of everything that a selfish 12y old childish brain cannot grasp. Such mind is able to deny not just AGW and the social origin of this problem but also all elements of human morality and decency. In such environment, as opposed to in previous environment, I'd argue that all AGW myths, including "global warming stopped in XXXX" myth, has better chances to come back, even regardeless of what will happen with surface temperatures. That's because the new perpetrator is a crackpot, denying everything that's inconvenient to his 12y old childish brain. He's shown time and time that he does not care about reality when it comes to his opinions, so all climate myths have much higher chance of resurfacing under his administration, regardeless of the reality. Therefore, I think your statement I quoted above (that the caption myth will die due to realities of AGW) is incorrect, or at least very improbable. It would be probable if DEM (who do not deny the reality) had won the election.
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adamski5807 at 12:09 PM on 8 January 2017Russian email hackers keep playing us for fools
Nigelj @ 27 - i dont think Clinton spoke about policy during the campaign. Dont recall her raising the issues about wealth inequity, corporation not paying tax, wages, globalisation and the rise of part time/casual employment. I do recall her stance on foreign policy in terms of being more aggressive which concerns me.
Tom @ 25. Sanders did really well considering he openly declared himself as a socialist, (which in america equates to being the devil), the backing of wall street for the clintion campaign and with 95% of U.S. media backing Clinton during the campaign.
Have you read Craig Murry blog where he states that he has spoken wih the democrate who leaked the emails? Wouldnt this seem a more plausible explanation of what happen with a member upset with the rigged DNC election process rather persuing cold war mcarthyism.
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Tom Curtis at 10:13 AM on 8 January 2017NOAA was right: we have been underestimating warming
Further to Echo_Alpha_Zulu @7:
1) Echo_Alpha_Zulu, in a confused passage, says that he won't dispute my data because it is correct, but then disputes that current NH temperatures are greater than those shown for circa 900 AD (he continues to insist the graph shows temperature 2000 years ago); and that furthermore my "correct" data is misleading because:
"Even the past 400 years temperatures have been at a steady incline. I do not argue that. The point I am making is that this warming period has little to do with us. It would have happened even if humanity didnt exist."
Here is the graph in question:
First, it is evident from that graph that the Greenland borehole data shows an increase in temperature, followed by a sharp decline until about 150 years ago. The "hockey stick" (Mann Bradley and Hughes 1999) shows declining temperatures until about 130 years ago. The "multi-proxy" (Moberg 2005) shows essentially flat temperatures, with a sharp rise starting about 1850. Finally, the instrumental record (HadCRUT3) shows declining temperatures from 1860-1900, a sharp rise to the 1940s, followed by a plateau for about thirty years followed by another sharp rise. The only "steady incline" over 400 years is from the "worldwide boreholes" (Pollack and Smerdon 2004), but that is because conduction within the rocks smooths out the signal so that no detailed signal can be expected. In short, Echo_Alpha_Zulu's claim to find a "steady incline" over 400 years comes in complete disregard of the information he himself presented.
It also disregards more recent multi-proxy temperature reconstructions such as the Mann (2008) global EIV reconstruction:
That, again, shows effectively flat temperatures from 1600 to 1900. Echo_Alpha_Zulu's "steady incline" in temperature over 400 years is a fiction.
Second, as already noted that HadCRUT4 temperature for the Northern Hemisphere "... shows an anomaly of 1.041 C for 2016, with all annual anomalies from 2001 forward being 0.554 C or higher". That is much more than the 0.3 C increase of the scaled ice bore temperatures (Left hand side of the graph). It is not more than the unscaled values (Right hand side), but the unscaled values differ between the two bore holes. That emphasizes the point that these are purely regional records, not agreeing in absolute value of change even between two fairly close locations in Greenland. So, if Echo_Alpha_Zulu insists that is the relevant scale, he needs to point out why we should expect Northern Hemisphere temperatures to match particular, different regional values. Failing that, his refusal to accept the actual data showing NH temperatures to be 0.2 - 0.7 C greater than the scaled borehole temperatures as showing they are in fact greater shows him to be in simple denial of the actual data which he vaunts himself on consulting.
2) Echo_Alpha_Zulu says:
"The sun is now just exiting one of the most violent maximums ever recorded in history. Fewer sun spots but the amount of energy released from CME's and solar flares was something we have never seen."
In fact the (possibly) most recent Solar Maximum had the lowest energy output of any since instrumental records of Total Solar Insolation began. That, however, is not what Echo_Alpha_Zulu is discussing. He limits the discussion to solar flares and Coronal Mass Ejections only. Unfortunately it is difficult to get direct information on that. Wikipedia states:
"In modern times, the largest solar flare measured with instruments occurred on November 4, 2003. This event saturated the GOES detectors, and because of this its classification is only approximate. Initially, extrapolating the GOES curve, it was estimated to be X28. Later analysis of the ionospheric effects suggested increasing this estimate to X45. This event produced the first clear evidence of a new spectral component above 100 GHz.
Other large solar flares also occurred on April 2, 2001 (X20), October 28, 2003 (X17.2 and 10), September 7, 2005 (X17), February 17, 2011 (X2), August 9, 2011 (X6.9), March 7, 2012 (X5.4), July 6, 2012 (X1.1). On July 6, 2012, a solar storm hit just after midnight UK time, when an X1.1 solar flare fired out of the AR1515 sunspot. Another X1.4 solar flare from AR 1520 region of the Sun, second in the week, reached the Earth on July 15, 2012 with a geomagnetic storm of G1–G2 level. A X1.8-class flare was recorded on October 24, 2012. There has been major solar flare activity in early 2013, notably within a 48-hour period starting on May 12, 2013, a total of four X-class solar flares were emitted ranging from an X1.2 and upwards of an X3.2, the latter of which was one of the largest year 2013 flares. Departing sunspot complex AR2035-AR2046 erupted on April 25, 2014 at 0032 UT, producing a strong X1.3-class solar flare and an HF communications blackout on the dayside of Earth. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded a flash of extreme ultraviolet radiation from the explosion."
Note, however, that the solar flares from preceding solar maximum were far more energetic than those currently. Further, wikipedia is also clear that the largest flare observed was the September 1, 1859 Carrington event, a flare so large it was visible to the naked eye.
Given this, Echo_Alpha_Zulu's claims are at best, unsupported, and likely false. Absent his citing and linking to a credible source for this claim, I think we should regard it, as so many others of his claims, as so much spindrift.
(Note: I say "possibly" because it is not yet certain we have reached the maximum.)
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nigelj at 10:13 AM on 8 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
Daniel Mocsny @3
I was also thinking that the global warming has stopped argument may be getting weak. I won't speculate on temperatures in the coming decade, but basically the staircase pattern has become more clear over time, and can't disguise an obvious longer term increasing trend.
However there are many other zombie arguments with no sign of them stopping. There are powerful vested interests at work related to this climate issue.
"The only way to shrink emissions fast enough to avoid cooking civilization - since we've left it for so long now - is to shrink the economy."
You offer no evidence of this. The Stern Report found it is possible to stop dangerous climate change at the cost of 1.5% of global gdp per year. This equates very approximately to 1.5% of our incomes, so is not onerous, and theres no evidence this would shrink the output of the economy. Even a higher figure than 1.5% is something most people could live with, and poor people could be compensated.
Remember the cost of renewable electricity has fallen a lot since the Stern Report.
It is also possible to stop dangerous climate change without drastic changes to air travel, provided other measures are comprehensive. Read the various research on the issue such as the Stern Report.
Greed and selfishness is a part of the issue, but like most of your comments you stop with this considerable simplification and also offer no solutions. Nobody wants to sacrifice a plane trip for a very small change to emissions, thinking they may be the only person who does this, and that it won't make much difference. It would possibly be ethically right to stop flying but it's not entirely logical. This is why it's important to have things like carbon taxes that put the pressure on people bt using a price signal.
It has been pointed out to you by several people now that this is not all about personal choices or morality. Of course we all want people to take climate change seriously and alter their lifestyles or "do the right thing" without coercion, but in the real world carbon taxes make plenty of sense. And only governments can promote renewable electricity and this then makes electric cars a more viable option.
I don't think you are listening to what people say.
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rkrolph at 09:57 AM on 8 January 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #1
Apparently, Judith Curry has retired. The interview in the article was interesting. On one hand, she thinks scientists are overstating the human effect on global warming, and then admits they may be right, in which case the Paris Agreement falls way short of what would be necessary to effectively change anything. She doesn't then say what should be done. Seems a bit strange to me.
Sorry if the link is not working.
http://www.eenews.net/stories/1060047798
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Daniel Mocsny at 09:53 AM on 8 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
The jobs issue promises to get worse going forward. I'm reading the book Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future. It is basically 350 pages elaborating on the themes that also appear briefly in the YouTube video, Humans Need Not Apply.
Trump got elected partly by hammering on voter fears of job insecurity, although Trump, being either misinformed or a liar, blamed the problem solely on global trade, regulation, and outsourcing. Technological progress and right-wing policies have also played critical roles in hollowing out the middle class and wiping out well-paying manufacturing jobs. People who are gainfully employed are often anxious, because a surprising number of people even in wealthy countries are in financial distress. See the book: Financially Stupid People Are Everywhere: Don't Be One Of Them and the Neal Gabler article: The Secret Shame of Middle-Class Americans. Gabler writes: "Nearly half of Americans would have trouble finding $400 to pay for an emergency. I’m one of them."
Rise of the Robots paints a grim picture of increasingly capable robots and narrow-AI software systems wiping out category after category of jobs that were previously beyond the reach of automation. Switching to a green economy doesn't really address this beyond perhaps delaying job losses for a few years. Robots are just as happy to take a clean job as a dirty job, and perform it at a fraction of the cost of a human worker.
What's the political landscape going to look like in a future when unemployment hits 50%? Even before the problem becomes a crisis, a demagogue like Trump can get elected by playing on just a small version of the fear. To get people to care about the climate, we have to move that concern up their list of priorities. If they are in fear of losing their jobs, incomes, homes, etc., it's hard to see people focusing on much else.
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Daniel Mocsny at 09:21 AM on 8 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
We might see a "global warming stopped in 2016" denier argument, but maybe only if we get another 10-year or longer pause in surface warming. The argument worked better the first time around, since before 1998 the global warming argument was fairly new. Public awareness of climate change was still new enough in the 2000s that people didn't have a memory of an earlier version of the denier argument that had been destroyed in 1998. (Such as "warming stopped in 1988" or whatever the previous hot outlying year was.)
We might not get another 10-year pause in the near future. The odds went down with Trump getting elected. If positive feedbacks start kicking in, the base rate of warming might increase, shortening the time before the trend overrides short-term noise.
Plus we have many other indicators of warming that aren't subject to similar pauses, such as sea level rise. Every year the king tides along America's east coast get higher. Flooding under a clear sky is pretty definitive, since there's nothing abstract or relying on complex models about it. Anybody can see that the familiar road, pier, seawall, etc. that people built to stay above water is now routinely getting submerged in fine weather.
Eventually the deniers will quit trying to deny on the basis of any scientifically testable claim - because they can't, and they don't need to. They'll retreat to their last and insurmountable line of defense: jobs.
Despite the hypothetical promise of green jobs, we still have an 85% fossil fueled economy. The only way to shrink emissions fast enough to avoid cooking civilization - since we've left it for so long now - is to shrink the economy. This is easy to see living on your carbon fair share (the globally equitable individual greenhouse gas emission allowance), or less than two tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year. You just can't buy most of the stuff you see advertised. You'll save gobs of money - fixing the climate is not "expensive", but if everybody does this then most of the economy goes poof. For starters, there can't be any flying. A single jet flight can blow your entire carbon allowance for the year, leaving nothing for, say, eating food. Since the overwhelming bulk of flying is unnecessary, the first tiny measure of our willingness to take climate change seriously is to shut down all the airports. If we won't even take that first baby step, then we're just marking days off the calendar on our way to cooking civilization into nonexistence.
People are greedy and selfish. That's why the climate gets destroyed. If selfish people could get more of what they want by not destroying the climate, then they wouldn't destroy it. It's easy to focus on explicit deniers, but the climate gets just as destroyed by the person who pays lip service to scientific reality and then jets off to the holiday spot or scientific conference anyway.
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Doug Bostrom at 09:20 AM on 8 January 2017As Seas Rise, Miami Development Continues Unabated
A lot of "maybe" there, KGB. Maybe we're all living in a simulation and somebody will tweak our code, fix everything.
"Maybe" doesn't apply when you're standing on the smooth spot where your home was, or skimming sediment out of the living room. Try "maybe I'll sleep on my wet, fungus-ridden mattress." Does it sound appealing? Maybe not.
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nigelj at 06:26 AM on 8 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
The global warming zombie myths persist. This is partly because plenty of people spend most of their time on facebook, or reading about Kim Kardashian, as opposed to reading something informative.
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william5331 at 03:33 AM on 8 January 2017Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’
With the crazy ice behaviour this year, there is more than a reasonable chance that the coming northern hemisphere summer will see unprecidented ice melt and hence unprecidented world heat gain as the Arctic ocean turns into a giant heat collector. If so, the step function may turn into an exponential function. While this will be great for shooting down the deniers, it is a hollow victory if we have now exceeded one of the coming cascade of tipping points. We can all stand together in the ever warming pot like frogs, croaking, We told you so. The one necessary condition to sort out this CF we find ourselves in is to get vested interest money out of polics. Without that we are pushing a huge pile of the brown stuff up hill with a spoon.
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gws at 02:13 AM on 8 January 2017It's cosmic rays
It may be useful to add that the CERN group has long since dropped the argument that cosmic rays affect climate. Their latest paper (with Kirkby a co-author) in Science summarizes (abstract):
"... A considerable fraction of nucleation involves ions, but the relatively weak dependence on ion concentrations indicates that for the processes studied, variations in cosmic ray intensity do not appreciably affect climate through nucleation in the present-day atmosphere."
... and that position has been in place for some time.
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michael sweet at 22:48 PM on 7 January 2017NOAA was right: we have been underestimating warming
KGB,
All data has bias. Scientists work hard to collect the best data possible and then they review the data carefully to find any new biases that appear. There was never a "mistake" in this data. New data aways has to be compared with old to ensure it is exactly the same. In this case there was a very small difference. Since the difference was small it took some time to measure and correct it.
In this case, new bouys were put in place to monitor sea surface temperatures. iIt was known that parts of the ocean were not being monitored as well as could be done by the old method. The new data stream was added to the existing data stream. The old data was primarily from ships. The data was carefully compared when it was obtained and was very similar, so they were just added. After the passage of 15-20 years, much more data was collected. This data was carefully checked and a very small adjustment was made to the record. The old record was not bad but it turned out that the bouy data was very slightly colder than the ship data. It was determined that the ship data was slightly warmer than the ocean really was. Data sets are updated like this all the time. Usually no-one notices these changes because the data for surface temperature is so good that the adjustments are very small.
The reason that there has been so much talk about this particular update is because it contributes to the argument that there was never a "haitus" in global temperature rise. Tamino (who is a very good statistician) and many others have shown that there was never a "Haitus" in the original data set. The update makes Tamino's argument stronger, but the old data set never really showed a haitus in AGW anyway. Deniers complain because their incorrect argument has been affected by this change. They hope people will disregard all the data because of this minor update.
Scientists know that there remain minor issues with their data sets. They continue to review them and correct them. The corrections to the surface data set (the data set we are discussing) have been very small since around 1990. If you use the raw data (which is available on the internet) the increase in temperature is greater than using the corrected data. You reach the same conclusion. There was never a "haitus" in either data set.
We always have to use the data we have. Would you prefer to not correct for known issues in the collection of the data? Go with the raw data which shows much more warming. Scientists try to use the best corrections possible and keep in mind that there might still be some issues.
For comparison, major changes in the satallite data sets are made all the time. Deniers claim these data sets are better to use because they are noisier and it is harder to clearly show the warming.
Keep reading here and you will learn more about how to interpret data sets in the real world. Data is never perfect, but the surface temperature data set is very solid and has not had major changes for decades.
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Tom Curtis at 21:27 PM on 7 January 2017NOAA was right: we have been underestimating warming
Echo_Alpha_Zulu, I have discussed your views on cosmic rays on a more appropriate thread. I also recommend you read the advanced version of the main article on that thread, in addition to the first link by Tom Dalton @11.
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