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JohnFornaro at 00:52 AM on 2 January 2017Skeptical Science Study Finds 97% Consensus on Human-Caused Global Warming in the Peer-Reviewed Literature
Composer99: "If you want to get down to brass tacks, you can sum up the basic fact of global warming with a single number:
0.6 W/m²
Everything else is commentary."
I'm not getting your 0.6 W/m² figure. The anthropogenic RF is between 1.13 W/m² and 3.33 W/m², by my understanding, if the following figures are correct.
From:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_constant
"The solar constant includes all types of solar radiation, not just the visible light. It is measured by satellite as being 1.361 kilowatts per square meter (kW/m²) at solar minimum and approximately 0.1% greater (roughly 1.362 kW/m²) at solar maximum. The solar "constant" is not a physical constant in the modern CODATA scientific sense; it varies in value, and has been called a "misconception". It has been shown to vary historically in the past 400 years over a range of less than 0.2 percent."
From: WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL.pdf, page 11:
"The total anthropogenic RF for 2011 relative to 1750 is 2.29 [1.13 to 3.33] W/m² (see Figure SPM.5), and it has increased more rapidly since 1970 than during prior decades."
For conversational purposes:
1.13/1,362 is: .083%
2.29/1,362 is: .168%
3.33/1,362 is: .246%While mankind's percentage contribution is pretty small compared to Mr. Sun, if these percentages are true, we do seem to be warming the planet, and shekels to bagels it doesn't stop anytime soon.
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chriskoz at 19:32 PM on 1 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
Daniel Mocsny@9,
Since uncritical faith in the words of men is the basis for America's $1 trillion religion industry, eradicating the fossil fuel industry might require eradicating (or at least greatly diminishing) the religion industry, by persuading people to put their trust in facts and evidence.
You confuse FF industry with "religion industry". They are different industries and their interests are often different. Maybe interests of mormonism or evengelical christianism in US that you give as examples do overlap with FF interests but first, these are not the only religions, second the reasons people are coming and "trusting" those two industries are fundamentally different. People trust religion, because they want rationalise the existential questions they don't know the answer or fear the answer (like fear of death), while the same people trust FF, because they want to have energy to fuel their lifestyle. One has nothing to do with each other and eradication of the later (to combat AGW) does not imply eradication of the former (if you want to reform religion or replace religion by other rationalisative mechanism).
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Glenn Tamblyn at 17:44 PM on 1 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
william #7
Rosy? I suspect that is intentional. Trying to use a non-rosy view of religion isn't likely to help you with communicating to people who are religious. And lets be quite clear. Katharine has set herself a specific task - communicating to that demographic. -
Daniel Mocsny at 14:29 PM on 1 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
william @7: the "rosy" view of religion's relationship to science has a name: NOMA, or "non-overlapping magisteria of authority." Stephen Jay Gould coined the term and described it in his (lamentable, in my view) book Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life.
NOMA is essentially the official position of the National Academy of Sciences.
NOMA has been heavily criticized by a number of prominent scientists, philosphers, etc., including Richard Dawkins, whose book The God Delusion gives it a working over.
The claim that "religion has nothing to say about climate change" is a category error. (It's similar to claiming that nothing about climate change could feature in a J.K. Rowling novel - which is nonsense, because Rowling can write whatever she wants in her novels.) To understand the error, we have to understand what religion is. To understand what religion is, we need only look at where religious knowledge comes from, by posing the question to a religious believer: "What do you know about God (or spirituality, etc.) that you did not learn from men?"
Very few people claim to have received a religious revelation directly from God or from some supernatural source. There is, to my knowledge, no documented case of any two people independently receiving the same religious revelation, identical in all respects. For example, if you make first contact with some tribe in the Amazon rainforest, there is zero chance that they will have independently received even an approximate copy of the Bible (or a copy of any religious group's doctrine or theology) directly from the alleged source (God). If you find a tribesperson with a Bible, you know it had to come from missionaries or someone else who in turn got it from a long chain of middlemen tracing back to the original writers, redactors, editors, and compilers of the Bible. It wouldn't have come from "God" revealing the same thing twice to different people who had no prior knowledge, because that never happens.
Religious people, therefore, do not put their trust in "God," but rather in some particular man or group of men who tell them some particular set of claims about God. Believers put their faith in whatever their religious leaders tell them to believe. As religious claims are unconstrained by any requirement for evidence, the claims of various religious groups are as diverse as human imagination itself. If some religious leader wants to make a religious claim about climate change - just as many religious leaders make claims about the age of the Earth and whether humans share a common ancestor with turnips - he is perfectly free to do so. Just as Joseph Smith, founder of Mormonism, was free to claim that the second coming of Jesus would occur at Jackson County, Missouri.
For comparison, suppose I claim Elvis Presley is still alive and he told me to tell everyone to give me all their money. If someone accepts my claim and gives me all their money, who does that person believe?
- Elvis, or
- Me
Even if I somehow persuade a million people to repeat my claim, anyone who accepts the claim is still placing their faith in me, not in Elvis. There is no option to believe Elvis, because Elvis has not verifiably shown up to make any claim. You can only choose to believe, or not believe, a real person who verifiably shows up and claims something. However, for me to qualify as a religious leader, rather than just a swindler, I must convince my followers that they have placed their faith in Elvis, rather than in me. Every religious person you talk to on this point will be deeply confused about where they have actually placed their faith, thus demonstrating the triumph of religion over reason. Religion benefits from the common human tendency to be better at remembering claims than at tracking their sources. It's easier for people to say "God wants me to do X" than the more accurate "My pastor tells me that God wants me to do X."
Given that America's white Evangelical Christians just voted for Trump in a higher proportion than they've voted for any Presidential candidate before, and given that Trump appears to be waging war on climate science, Occam's Razor suggests a productive strategy for fighting climate change is to talk people out of putting their uncritical faith in the mere words of men. Since uncritical faith in the words of men is the basis for America's $1 trillion religion industry, eradicating the fossil fuel industry might require eradicating (or at least greatly diminishing) the religion industry, by persuading people to put their trust in facts and evidence.
A religion like Mormonism relies on getting millions of people to take seriously claims as unlikely as the one about Jesus returning to Jackson County, Missouri. But all religions make equally far-fetched claims - some just do a better job of disguising them. It's hard to imagine humans are going to tackle tough problems like climate change, and whatever as-yet-undiscovered environmental catastrophes are coming next, as long as we have a trillion-dollar industry actively working to destroy peoples' reasoning capacities (and starting on them at very young ages).
Sure, a few religious people subscribe to creation care philosophies. But in the USA - a nation critical to Earth's climate future - religion appears to be mostly an obstacle to long-term human survival.
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nigelj at 05:59 AM on 1 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
Altruism has benefits including helping people and promoting stability and peace, and it brings a sense of satisfaction as well. Many people seem drawn to altruism, maybe most at some level. Many societies have experimented with altruism. The Soviet Union tried, but their society was based on a flawed model. Scandinavia has got the balance better with good results.
However like Chriskoz says evolution of altruism by competition between nations slows down in a globalising world. The lessons and advantages of spacific nation states become diluted.
But societies at either the national or global level can still consciously choose altruism just as they can consciously choose climate policies. In democracies the will of the majority ultimately tends to prevail, and in a global average sense seems to currently favour an emerging if somewhat limited altruism.
We do seem to be slowly heading towards a global common humanity and morality with a recognition altruism is important. Of course more self interested motivations have their place as well, and it may be about finding a workable balance.
However some people oppose altruism. We have people like Rush Limbaugh and Donald Trump, Steve Bannon and others, using either misleading rhetoric or fake news. This poor quality information makes it hard for voters to make informed choices. Last year the battle lines were drawn most firmly in America.
But other countries do not have to follow America.
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william5331 at 04:36 AM on 1 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
I love her videos on climate change but that is a very rosy view of religion.
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PluviAL at 03:35 AM on 1 January 2017Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
Chrikoz@3,
Love your take, without the pejoratives and jusdgements on others. Your bottom line is what I like: We must develop a global perspective.
I think we are in the process of doing that, and really, one could say this is the point of the video. Our perspective is tribalistic and religious: That's how our conception of political reality and divinity has been honed; from Gilgamesh to current Abrahamics, and Eastern Strains it's what we could put together without the scientific method and subsequent tool.
Now with a scientific perspective, it is time to create a new awareness of a common humanity, and a common morality. We are on the way, this website, and this video attest to this quest.
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WRyan at 02:11 AM on 1 January 20172016 in Review: a recap of what happened at Skeptical Science
The research component of John's Honours degree was in solar physics.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 21:30 PM on 31 December 2016Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
newairly
As far as I know, no. Internet only. -
chriskoz at 18:47 PM on 31 December 20162016 in Review: a recap of what happened at Skeptical Science
John Cook has another degree in solar physics, and I recall it's also PhD although I don't know the subject of his dissertation there. So, to fully acknowledge John's credentials we should call him "Double Dr" now. Congratulations, John.
Moderator Response:[BW] From what is currently stated on the About Us page (which we'll obviously have to update!):
"Skeptical Science was created and maintained by John Cook, the Climate Communication Fellow for the Global Change Institute at the University of Queensland. He originally obtained a Bachelor of Science at the University of Queensland, achieving First Class Honours with a major in physics."
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nigelj at 13:35 PM on 31 December 2016Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
Chriskoz @3, I agree with all that. A lot to ponder over. An interesting related book is "The Moral Arc" by Michael Shermer. -
Digby Scorgie at 11:15 AM on 31 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
For pity's sake, nigelj, stop omitting necessary apostrophes. It is really, really irritating. I'm referring particularly to "cant" and "wont" and "dont", but you also have a cavalier attitude to "its" and "it's".
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chriskoz at 11:00 AM on 31 December 2016Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
nigelj@1,
That's a very interesting topic.
Altruism in a group has indeed developped as an evolutionary adaptation: group's survival odds turned out to be, in some cases, more important than the individual's selfish & competitive desire to pass their rown genes. After few trials and errors (no doubt involving eradication of "selfish" groups, as well as overwhelmingly "altruistic" groups), those groups that developed a perfect balance of altruism vs. classic darwinian survival of the fittest strategy, survived.
Now, how can we apply that knowledge to find out the solution to AGW problem, which is not an environmental but a social problem? Surely, we must find social solutions to it. Here, in XXI century, we have a global civilisation consisting of 7bln sofisticated, predatory individuals whose immediate survival strategy is a typical darwinian survival of the fittest. Their altruism is often limitted towards their immediate and extended familly, to pass on their genes. Then, for many of them, the next altruistic level is the well being of their friends, neighbouring community (like a church community in case of Katharine), then entrire town/county. Vast majority of people never goes, not even understands the altruism past this level. Those who do (local politicians) often fail, e.g. encumbered by corruption. Then, we have the countries (almost 200 of them) as the largest groups. Here, the moral standards are even more shaky, vulnerable to all sort of conflict of interest and encumbered by individualistic predatory thought process. The failures can be even more spectacular. This past year, we had two big failures in politcs at this level: the election of a serial criminal in Philipines and the election of an inept but self-boasting liar and sexual predator with a brain of 12y o child in US. I hope, after president Obama, that it's just a circuitous path this nation decided to take, and it will learn from, and it will eventually emerge from, stronger. But the signs are pointing to even bigger problem: one major polical party denies most environmental sciences like Flat Earth Society, and president-elect shares that denial.
From above examples, you can see the "natural evolution" did not develop adequate group morality at the national level. Now, what about hte morality needed to fix AGW problem? We have only one global civilisation "supergroup", and evolutionary trial and error approach does not apply at this level. You would need to have an "alternative" civilisation that would develop different standard allowing it to survive while the primary civilisation fails. Unfortunately, it's impossible now. It was possible when we had smaller mini-civilisations in the past. Now, global civilisation (dominated by white man) has ransacked all planetary resources and pushed alternative civilisations into oblivion.
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newairly at 10:16 AM on 31 December 2016Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
Does anyone know if this series is on free to air TV in Australia?
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nigelj at 09:33 AM on 31 December 2016Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 7
Katharine argues that the science can only describe the nature of the climate problem and suggest technical solutions, and religion can offer moral guidance on what we do.
Well the new testament does talk some real sense on morality, however science also provides some guidance on morality. (decaration of personal interest, Im an athiest) Altruistic behaviour and looking after people is a trait in early human societies, and even the animal world sometimes, which suggests basic morality has an evolutionary adaptation, with biological origins. I would suggest its one we should not ignore. However its clear that not all people have this altrustic tendency.
However if anything this shows that the new testament and science are speaking the same language at least on some aspects of morality.
It certainly doesnt seem moral to lock in many centuries of sea level rise when renewable energy is dropping fast in price and is eminently affordable now.
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nigelj at 07:41 AM on 31 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
KeenOn350, I totally understand your frustration. The way scientists talk in probabilities and conditionality may be fustrating, but its also the truth about various issues. We should not distort the truth. Hopefully most people can understand thats the way science does work on the basis of probabilities.
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nigelj at 06:48 AM on 31 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
One Planet Only @15,
"If there is an Engineering Solution it should have to be developed, implemented and proven to be effective before the action to obtain benefit started"
Yes that makes sense. I think we would want proof of viability and to ensure profit is not made out of some fantasy scheme, purely for the benefit off the shareholders.
However personally I dont think engineering solutions like carbon capture or more ambitious geoengineering solutions have much practical viability, and some have high risks as well. I know technology has produced great feats, but we cant assume this ability is infinite. Even if we find a workable engineering solution, it would be too late to stop dangerous climate change, so our first priority should be reducing emissions, with engineering solutions as a second order of priority.
"It is common sense that the people who will benefit from an activity should be required to create and pay for any mitigation/adaptation to the changes that the actions. Another way of saying it is that no portion of humanity should benefit in a way that negatively affects other members of humanity, including future generations'.
It is indeed commonsense, and its also recognised by economists that environmental impacts should be either prohibited, or user pays principles should apply. In fact society mostly (but certainly not all) recognise this. Currently we are mostly all using oil, and this impacts negatively on the environment. The obvious solution is a carbon tax that would reduce oil use and also pay for some degree of the problems.
Things get more difficult with climate change because we are considering such a long term issue that get harder to quantify so easier to ignore.
Several factors are at work: Business interests can become very orientated on short term goals, very avaricious and neglect costs that are far in the future.
People get scared that they might face high costs now to protect something far in the future.
Some people are very fixated on the present and their personal rights. Some people are narcissistic and self centred, while others have more of a big picture natural concern about the future. These are psychological issues that divide society, and its really important to grasp this.
What we have to do is bring narcissistic people into line and make them see we need to consider the bigger picture. We need to demonstrate that it's ultimately in their interests to leave a decent planet for their children. We need to show that the costs of dealing with climate change are just not as large as the scaremongers claim.
"And an international body like the UN would monitor/audit all of the nations and identify which nations have leadership that is failing to be objectively effective."
Yes in an ideal world. The UN is the ideal organisation to regulate some global form of environmental standards. They also do see the big picture. But you know what certain people will say, "world government, nanny state, anti capitalist etc" and this is so frustrating.
However we need global agreements and standards, and a way needs to be found to do this that ensures the UN has power, but is also accountable and properly democratically constrained. Its got to be a balance between the central power of the UN, and countries sovereignty. Somehow this riddle has to be solved and agreement reached on the proper role of the UN.
I think its inevitable and useful that global agreeements will become more significant, provided they are well constructed and fair in nature, but Trump is a backwards step in this regard.
Anyway those are a few random thoughts that may be of some help. -
Gbcllc@att.net at 05:03 AM on 31 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
Last year, before La Nina we heard about the N. Pacific blob of warm water (2-4C warmer than it should be) ...
Recent forecasts, where the ocean surface temperatures indicate a weak La Nina (about 0.5C cooler) ... showed on NOAA produced maps that the "blob" had moved to be just south of the Bering strait (in November 2016) ... it seems that this warm Pacific Ocean water left over from the last El Nino (?) is heading into the Arctic, reducing the amount of seawater ice and ice thickness.
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One Planet Only Forever at 03:09 AM on 31 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
KeenOn350@7,
I am an engineer with an MBA. I have been thinking about issues like climate change and global economic inequity for a long time. I was a fan of things like Fair Trade far before I became aware of the climate change issue. I became aware of the climate change issue before Kyoto made the headlines because of the changes to climate design requirements of structures and surface water managment systems. And the climate changes also increase the inequities that actions like Fair Trade try to develop truly sustainable solutions to.
As an engineer I constantly seek increased awareness and improved understanding of what is going on and strive to apply that understanding to create something that will achive a desired objective without creating unacceptable future consequences others will have to deal with.
Recent global events and this holiday break has allowed me to advance or clarify my understanding.
I am becoming more certain that it would be better for everyone to be constantly hearing:
It is unacceptable for any portion of humanity to benefit from an activity that ultimately is a limited opportunity, like the burning up of buried ancient hydrocabons, or an activity that creates challenges and problems others will have to deal with, like the actions associated with the exctraction, transport, processing, and burning up of buried ancient hydrocabons.
The preface for that constant reminder message to everyone would be:
The aspiration/objective of human life is to help advance global humanity to be a part of a lasting better future for all life on this or any other amazing planet.
And the concluding reminder would be the understanding that:
'The freedom of everyone to believe what they wish and do as they please is the best way for things to be', only applies if everyone is honestly dedicated to helping to advance humanity to that lasting better future.
That set of constant reminders would annoy and disappoint some people, but they would have to admit they deserve to be annoyed and disappointed until they change their minds and become more helpful, less harmful.
And all the leaders/winnersaround the globe, and anyone aspiring to be a leader/winner, would be expected to be the ones delivering those constant reminders that annoy, disappoint and discourage those who deserve it. And any leader (wealthy, influential, in business or politics), who can be shown to fail to honestly dedicate themselves to that task of promoting awareness and better understanding of the changes required to honestly advance humanity deserves to be removed from their position of leadership, wealth or influence (until they prove that they have changed their minds and decided to become helpful rather than harmful regarding the advancement of humanity to a lasting better future for all).
There clearly are many issues deserving increased awarness and the changing of minds about developed social and economic activity and attitudes, far more than just climate change. Perhaps a 'punchier' way of referring to every instance could be to say they are one of the many fronts of the 'War for the Future of Humanity'.
Perhaps that would help everyone fighting on one of those fronts see more of a connection between their actions and all of the other fronts, like the connection between Fair Trade and Climate Change, or the connection between the design of safe structures and Climate Change.
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KeenOn350 at 18:04 PM on 30 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
I am becoming more and more exasperated with the way scientists word their dispatches to the public.
"Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change" just doesn't do it ... every Tom, Dick, and Harriet will be saying - ahh - but it COULD have happened without climate change.
What John Q. Public ( Q. for Idiot) should hear is simply - this insane warmth in the Arctic could not happen without human-caused climate change! - PERIOD.
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One Planet Only Forever at 16:46 PM on 30 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
In my comment @15 I also copy-pasted the text and forgot to insert a couple of links:
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One Planet Only Forever at 16:41 PM on 30 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
Late editing of the second paragraph in my comment at 15, too late at night, has produced the expected result. Here is a revised 2nd paragraph.
"The follow points related to the above quote from the OP need to addressed. If there is an Engineering Solution shouldn't it have to be developed, implemented and proven to be effective before the action to obtain benefit is allowed to be started (to ensure that the ones benefiting have not done something that others would suffer the consequences of - the fundamental role of a Professional Engineer in Canada)? Who pays the cost?"
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One Planet Only Forever at 16:37 PM on 30 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
"Tillerson has argued that climate change is “an engineering problem and it has engineering solutions.” In other words, that we can keep burning fossil fuels, and solve the problem through adaptation efforts. However, research is quite clear that while we’ll need a combination of mitigation and adaptation, relying primarily on adaptation would be exceptionally costly.”
The follow points related to the above quote from the OP need to addressed. If there is an Engineering Solution it should have to be developed, implemented and proven to be effective before the action to obtain benefit started (to ensure that the ones benefiting have not done something that others would suffer the consequences of - the fundamental role of a Professional Engineer in Canada)? Who pays the cost?
The second question is easy to answer. It is common sense that the people who will benefit from an activity should be required to create and pay for any mitigation/adaptation to the changes that the actions they hope to benefit from will create. They should also be the only ones to suffer any potential negative consequences. Another way of saying it is that no portion of humanity should benefit in a way that negatively affects other members of humanity, including future generations.
Until global humanity develops the ability to effectively defend its future we will likely continue to continue to see popularity and profitability that is successfully detrimental to the future of humanity.
The UN is currently the main international body trying to achieve the advancement of humanity to a lasting better future for all. The UN is undeniably prone to influence from parties interested in actions contrary to the advancement of global humanity. However, it has a history of trying to advance humanity (and that history has also made it a target for people who have interests that are contrary to the advancement of humanity).
The 1987 UN Report “Our Common Future” strives to encourage the understanding of what needs to change to advance humanity to a lasting better future (a particularly contrite point is made in paragraphs 25 and 26 on page 16 of the pdf file). The more recent UN Millennium Development Goals are additional evidence that the UN collectively strives to advance humanity to a lasting better future.
Some people will not like that objective based understanding of what is required. But objectively they will not be able to justify their objection. The wealthiest and most powerful particularly have little excuse to not understand it. That is why the least deserving among the wealthy and powerful can be seen to be trying to get away with promoting the popularity of things like 'people free to believe whatever they prefer to believe, and do whatever they want to do, as the best way for things to be' or 'everyone else is against us'. That ideology is popular because it is ignorant of any requirement for responsibility. Responsibility gets to be considered completely independently by declaring things like 'anyone less fortunate or suffering some consequence is responsible for the situation they are in and the challenges they face'. That paired-up impaired way of thinking is a perfect delusion/excuse for the fossil fuel crowd. They get to do as they wish. And others are responsible for dealing with any negative consequences (Trump's Art of the Deal in a nutshell - set up the deal to ensure you maximize your benefit and that others suffer any negative consequences).
For the first question, as an Engineer with an MBA I suggest the following Business-Minded/Engineering solution.
Engineering is the pursuit of the greatest possible awareness and understanding of what is going on and applying that understanding to achieve an acceptable objective result.
My understanding of the objective result is “Advancement of Humanity to a lasting better future for all”. And my Business-Minded awareness and understanding is that business is driven by the pursuit of maximum benefit, and by minimum risk of loss by the one hoping to get the benefit.
Maximum benefit is often achieved by getting something done quicker/cheaper (both of which usually increase the risk of producing a damaging consequence or increasing the disadvantage of a worker by giving less reward for work done or making the work riskier to do). Maximum benefit can also be enhanced by successfully creating perceptions among the population (deceptive marketing).
Minimizing risk of loss means doing things in a way that reaps benefits for as long as can be gotten away with in the least acceptable way, and rigging things so that others will face any consequences (like future generations having to 'Engineer' a solution for a bigger challenge).
Often the only effective restrictions on Business activity are leadership actions that curtail understandably/objectively unacceptable pursuits.
So the engineering challenge is to increase the awareness and understanding in the global population, especially among leadership hopefuls, that there is no significant chance that people will succeed if they try to get away with benefiting from actions that can be understood to be contrary to the advancement of humanity to a lasting better future for all.
Popularity and profitability have been conclusively proven to fail to restrict understandably unacceptable behaviour. What has been proven is that the more popular or profitable an activity is able to become the more challenging it is to curtail it. The climate change challenge is probably the most significant case proving that point.
Before the climate change challenge developed there were many other cases where external actions were required to curtail understandably unacceptable developed popular and profitable pursuits. Many of the understood to be unacceptable activities, like expanding nuclear weapon capabilities, still continue to be potentially profitable and popular.
Business and Political leadership can be significantly influenced by popularity and profit. That makes every business enterprise and sovereign nation a potential threat requiring external actions to limit behaviour that is damaging to the advancement of humanity. And the target of effective action needs to be the the trouble-making leaders, the people with the most power and influence would gain the most from the understood to be unacceptable actions.
The popularity and profitability of burning fossil fuels is so significant that the understood Engineering Solution (action to achieve a desired objective result based on the best understanding of things) would be a global agreement that all nations be required to monitor and effectively restrict the actions of their citizens based on the objective of advancing global humanity. And an international body like the UN would monitor/audit all of the nations and identify which nations have leadership that is failing to be objectively effective. International external action would then be taken to try to 'correct' the failings of the leadership of that nation. And large multi-national corporations would probably need to be audited as if they were a nation-state since their leadership could come from many different nations making it difficult for a single nation to be effectively responsible for the leadership of such an entity.
That type of action is understandably an 'ideal' that is unlikely to ever be achieved, but as with all things - aspiring to do the best is the best way to achieve a good result.
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One Planet Only Forever at 10:33 AM on 30 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
Also blew it when trying to embellish the folowing part of my comment@4. The following is a better presentation.
"I am not skilled at creating and presenting graphs. So I offer the following presentation of the sea ice extents relative to the ONI events and their relative intensity (L, M, H). I have included the approximate annual minimum the NSIDC Charctic Graph as well as the September Average from NASA. Extents are are in million square km presented following each year (Min from NSIDC Charctic - September average from the NASA graphic; The closer these values are the flatter/broader the minimum extent was through September):"
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One Planet Only Forever at 10:26 AM on 30 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
Missed a link in my comment@4
"A good presentation of the relevant data would be to superimpose the Arctic Sea Ice Extent graph (the one from NASA) on an inverted presentation of Jan Null's ONI graph (inverted so that El Nino is down)."
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One Planet Only Forever at 10:17 AM on 30 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
chrickoz@2,
I made comments about minimum Arctic Sea Ice extents occuring in the years following an El Nino event. Looking at El Nino events based on the ONI presentation by NOAA there appears to be a related pattern in the minimum summer Arctic Sea Ice extents presented by NSIDC in the Charctic Interactive Sea Ice Graph. The minimum sea ice extent appears to be significantly below the trend line of Arctic Minimum one or two years after an El Nino event.Based on my crude evaluation of the magnitude and duration of the ONI values for the different events the most significant (H) ONI value events since near the 1979 beginning of the NSIDC presentation were: 1982/83, 1997/98 and 2014/15/16. The next group of moderately significant (M) ONI value events were: 1986/87/88, 1991/92, 2002/3, 2009/10. And the last group of least significant (L) ONI value events were: 1976/77, 1977/78, 1979/80, 1994/95, 2004/5, and 2006/7.
I have since confrimed my crude evaluation is consistent with the more detailed evaluation El Niño and La Niña Years and Intensities based on the ONI values prepared maintained and presented by Jan Null.
A good presentation of the relevant data would be to superimpose the Arctic Sea Ice Extent graph (the one from NASA) on an inverted presentation of Jan Null's ONI graph (inverted so that El Nino is down).
But I am not skilled at creating and presenting graphs. So I offer the following presentation of the sea ice extents relative to the ONI events and their relative intensity (L, M, H) with the approximate yearly minimum Arctic Sea Ice from the NSIDC and the September Average from NASA extent in million square km as the value near inside the (Min from NSIDC - Sept form NASA; The closer the values are the flatter/broader the minimum extent was through September):
- 1976/77 (L)
- 1977/78 (L) - No NSIDC ice extents prior to 1979
- 1979/80 (L) - 1979 (7.0 - 7.19), 1980 (7.6-7.83)
- 1981 (7.0- 7.24)
- 1982/83 (H) - 1982 (7.2-7.44), 1983 (7.3-7.61)
- 1984 (6.5-7.10)
- 1985 (6.6-6.91)
- 1986/87/88 (M) - 1986 (7.2-7.53), 1987 (7.0-7.47), 1988 (7.2-7.48)
- 1989 (7.0-7.03)
- 1990 (6.1-6.23)
- 1991/92 (M) - 1991 (6.40-6.54), 1992 (7.3-7.54)
- 1993 (6.3-6.50)
- 1994/95 (L) - 1994 (7.0-7.18), 1995 (6.1-6.12)
- 1996 (7.3-7.87)
- 1997/98 (H) - 1997 (6.7-6.73), 1998 (6.4-6.55)
- 1999 (5.9-6.23)
- 2000 (6.1-6.31)
- 2001 (6.7-6.74)
- 2002/3 (M) - 2002 (5.7-5.95), 2003 (6.1-6.13)
- 2004/5 (L) - 2004 (5.9-6.04), 2005 (5.4-5.56)
- 2006/7 (L) - 2006 (5.9-5.91), 2007 (4.3-4.29)
- 2008 (4.7-4.72)
- 2009/10 (M) - 2009 (5.2-5.38), 2010 (4.7-4.92)
- 2011 (4.4-4.61)
- 2012 (3.4-3.62)
- 2013 (5.1-5.35)
- 2014/15/16 (H) - 2014 (5.1-5.28), 2015 (4.5-4.63), 2016 (4.2-4.72)
- 2017 - Yet to be seen
Low events that occur one or two years after an El Nino are:
- 1984 and 1985 following the 1982/83 (H) event
- 1990 following the 1986/87/88 (M) event
- 1993 following 1991/92 (M) event
- 1999 and 2000 following the 1997/98 (H) event
- 2007 and 2008 following the series of 2002/3, 2004/5, 2006/7 (L) events
- 2011 and 2012 following the 2009/10 (M) event
1996 is a year that clearly does not fit the pattern of low extents one or two years after an El Nino. This could be because the 1994/95 event was a very weak El Nino followed by a La Nina in 1995/96.
If a pattern similar to the years following the 2009/2010 occurs then the Arctic Sea Ice minimum in 2017 will be lower than 2016 and the minimum in 2018 could be even lower, potentially setting a new record minimum, especially if La Nina does not develop.
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nigelj at 09:52 AM on 30 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
Michael Sweet @13, I agree totally. Rush Lindburgh makes my blood boil. I just didn't want to annoy people by singling out a particular ideological group, and getting into a rant as such. However even this website has acknowledged the Conservative movement has certain characteristics seen in various polls.
In fact I do think lack of trust in institutions a combination of things that we have both mentioned. The CIA and politicans let us down over Iraq, and even some Republicans probably quietly felt that, but their reaction could be to only distrust the CIA when it suits them, if you understand me.
"Will they wish they had voted for Clinton's retraining instead of Trump's promises that they would get their jobs back?"
One hopes so. Coal is on the way out and I feel globalisation is essentially a good thing, with some rough edges. Clinton had sensible policies to mitigate the negative side of globalisation and general job losses, like retraining. My country has relocation grants for poor people and family assistance. This can be designed in a dignified way that avoids a sense of dependence.
Trump wants to go down the alternative protectionist route which seems flawed for too many reasons to state here.
Will they wish they had gone with Clinton? I hope they realise this, but you know what? It will all become a confused mess where cause and effect become blurred and scapegoats get blamed.
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There's no empirical evidence
HB #324:
"...we can assume that a gas that is not a heat source, is the cause of high temperature?
I would choose almost any other explanation than that. All of them would include heat generation of some sort. Since that is what it takes to heat something up."Really?
The temperature of a system (a planet, a house or whatever you like) can be raised just as much by decreasing the heat loss as increasing the heat gain. That’s exactly what thick clothes, fur, feathers and house insulation do. None of these are able to generate heat by themselves, but they can still raise the temperature by preventing heat loss from the system, provided that the system has a heat source to begin with, like the sun.Let’s suppose that the high temperature on Venus really was caused by some kind of heat generation, and not atmospheric insulation as the standard greenhouse theory claims. What would we observe if this was true?
A surface temperature of 735 K corresponds to an IR flux of ~16,500 W/m2. All this radiation should escape to space and be very easy to detect, especially by space probes like the Venera series, Magellan, Venus Express and so on.
Here’s a spectrum of Venus obtained by Venera 15 (bottom). You find the same figure on page 4 here.
I did a rough estimate of the "area under the curve" for Venus, and came up with about 55 W/m2. Note that the flux is given as W/m2 per steradian (sr), so we have to multiply this by pi, which gives us ~173 W/m2.
This is in good agreement with the amount of solar energy absorbed by Venus when distance, spherical shape and albedo are accounted for (assuming an albedo of 75%).So, where is the rest of those 16,500 Watts that you claim is generated on Venus?
Have they just disappeared in thin air, violating the first law of thermodynamics in that process?
Or is your "theory" about Venus completely wrong, and the high temperature actually caused by an insulating atmosphere that allows only about 1% of the surface radiation to escape to space?
Your "theory" has a huge hole in it! -
michael sweet at 09:19 AM on 30 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
Nigelj,
I agree that trust in institutions is low and is a big problem. I see the source somewhat differently. Most of the "fake news' in the last election was directed at conservatives. Progressives were not as susceptable (they were not completely free of taint). I think the issue is talk radio and Fox news. Fact checker for Rush Limbaugh has been described as the easiest job in the world. People who listen to these sources have many false beliefs. Many still believe weapons of mass distruction were found in Iraq, have questions about Obama's birth certificate, think unemployment went up under Obama, the stock market went down and that the debt was larger under Obama than Bush.
The ability of business to buy whatever "news" they want in America, a first amendment right, leads to monied interests paying for fake stories. During the Bush administration I recall a top aide saying that reality was whatever they wated it to be. Eventually reality exloded in their faces. It took them only 4 years to rebuild their fake reality to hold back Obama.
It will be interesting to see what coal miners say after four years. Their jobs are gone forever. Coal is too expensive. Will they wish they had voted for Clinton's retraining instead of Trump's promises that they would get their jobs back?
We will eventually fid out. Trump will try to blame Obama.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 07:50 AM on 30 December 2016Models are unreliable
ramprasad
Here are some climate scientists discussing climate models: -
nigelj at 07:27 AM on 30 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
I would contend that until recently, society has mostly had faith in the honesty and fact based reporting of scientific bodies, government agencies, and the private sector. Even politicians and the media have been at least held in some degree of respect.
Of course we "all" know people lie sometimes or get things wrong, and we should all be sceptics to a point, but I would contend we have largely had basic faith in institutions being generally reliable. And institutions have mostly been reliable, with genuine problems exposed by the media.
But things have changed in recent years. I dont know if studies have quantified, this but the anecdotal evidence is so obvious and so strong it demands attention. Extreme levels of distrust have emerged regarding virtually all our institutions.This is very concerning because the functioning of society relies on trust and accurate information that can be relied on.
I think this discontent and cynicism has several origins. The precipitating factor could be the GW Bush invasion of Iraq and non existant weapons of mass destruction. I contend this more than anything has caused the distrust. It started with distrust of the CIA and politicians, and opportunists have used this to deflect distrust onto the climate science community and all agencies and institutions and also the globalisation agenda.
In fact globalisation (which seems basically good to me) has definitely had some problems along the way, and this has also eroded trust in the "authorities" or intellectual elite, unfortunately. Everyone has been smeared by this. Another problem has been the rampant paedophilia and sexual abuse exposed in a variety of institutions, further eroding tust in these institutions but also all institutions and the "elite" in general.
As a result the word of the authorities and objective truth has come into disrepute and something has to fill the gap. People now believe whatever they want to believe, or they believe "alternative" websites or writers.
Given the demise of facts and truth people have gone with nothing more than gut instincts, emotion, ideology, and beliefs. If something doesn't pass through their ideological filter it gets discarded. People talk about "truthiness" a concept so vague and emotive it surely doesn't make sense.
The more politicians or agencies of the state repeat mistakes like Iraq, make things up, or base decisions on emotion and assertion rather than hard evidence, the more the trend away from objective facts and truth will be reinforced, until society starts to seriously break down.
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ramprasad at 06:51 AM on 30 December 2016Models are unreliable
There seems to be alot of confusion on setting up a model.... "fudging" "tweaking" "adjusting"....
Any good model is "Calibrated" and then "Verified". One dat aset--say climate data from 1900-1950--is used to calibrate the model. That is adjust coeficients and varibles, tweak if you will, to match existing data.
The model is then verified against a second data set--say 1951-2000— to "verify" if the "calibrated" model can predict actual data without any tweaking or fudging. Only then is a model ready to "predict" future conditions.
Though the question of whether the "calbration" dataset is similar enough to future conditions to ensure that predicted results are meaniful still remains.
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william5331 at 04:56 AM on 30 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
To a large extent, statistical analysis and prediction of the likely frequency of various events depends on past records and that inputs are the same now, on average, as they have ever been. In this completely new scenario of Carbon dioxide above 400ppm and climbing, all bets are off. The now famous tipping points are likely to be sending the climate into new territory that past experience can not predict.
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MA Rodger at 20:05 PM on 29 December 2016There's no empirical evidence
HB @324.
Addressing your comments in order:
☻ - 1- There is no problem with the numbers you present in themselves although using such rough figures are unnecesary. Your use of atm for bar is no great impediment although it is wrong. The problem with both your inexact numbers and inexact descriptions is purely one of clarity and becomes a problem only when combined with your incredibly bizarre assertions.
☻ - 2 - See Glenn Tamblyn @325. Note that the 1 bar altitude is set at some 50km on Venus and is roughly the altitude of the top of its troposphere. Above that altitude (65km) are SO2 cloud banks which are more important than any CO2 effect at this altitude. As for the rotation of Venus being slow, the planet's 'day' is some 2,800 hours but with the rotation of the optically thick atmosphere some 50 hours, this length of 'day' is not relevant. It is only relevant way up high in the upper atmosphere, for instance in the mesosphere above the cloud banks (1 μbar) where the day/night temperature range is 130K.
☻ - 3 - You say that you "would choose almost any other explanation than (GHGs being the reason for the high Venusian temeratures). All of them would include heat generation of some sort. Since that is what it takes to heat something up." This is you again arguing that the laws of thermodynamics are wrong. Trust me. Such argument has to be far far stronger than a pantomime.
I should add a correction to #324. The Venusian temperature at 1 bar (350K) is colder, not hotter, than a pro-rata 1 bar Earth temperature corrected for the elevated Venusian insolation (400K). However, the albedo of the Venusian atmosphere above 1 bar far exceeds that of the total Earthly albedo which makes the pro rata calculation a little unrepresentative.
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chriskoz at 18:15 PM on 29 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
Some commenter here (sorry I forgot who & cannot find) suggested the years following extreme ElNino recorded very large summer ice extent minima (e.g. 2007, 2012) whereas the next years featured the"recovery" to the long-term trend. The commenter speculated if there is any mechanism responsible for such delayed influence of ElNino in the arctic so that the season of the relatively largest melt is likely tobe the following season, but no one came up with anything.
The topic is interesting and the speculation appears to be confirmed by this year's poor freezing season (past record 2015-16 ElNino) but it remains to be seen what the melting season of Northern autumn 2017 will bring.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 15:23 PM on 29 December 2016There's no empirical evidence
HB
You are missing one important point. Albedo. Venus is highly reflective with a Bond Albedo of between 0.75 to 0.9. So it only absorbs 10%-25% of the sunlight that strikes it. Incontrast the Earth absorbs around 70% of the sunligt that strikes it So, although it is much close to the sun, Venus actually absorbs less energy from the Sun than the Earth does.
Next, for the temperature at the surface to be high doesn't require heatgeneration. It only requires heat tranport from the upper atmosphere to the surface.
See my comment at 318. The atmospheric Lapse Rate determines th surface temperature, based on the upper atmosphere temperature which is set by radiative balance and GH gases - for Venus mainly CO2.
I suggest you do some reading to understand how vertical air movements, which can transport heat up or down, create the Lapse Rate. -
anticorncob6 at 15:12 PM on 29 December 2016It hasn't warmed since 1998
Here it says that 2015, 2014, 2010, and 2005 were hotter than 1998. But weren't 2013, 2009, and 2007 all hotter than 1998 as well?
That's what I determined after averaging these two data sets:
NASA land-ocean temperature data
NOAA land-ocean temperature data
(even though they use different bases for the abnormalities, we can still determine the relative ranks of years).
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Andrew1776 at 14:42 PM on 29 December 2016So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Why did you snip Q96? The quesiton of whether falling CO2 concentrations could cause mass extinction is a very legitimate scientific quesiton. The scientific literature shows CO2 dropping from 2000ppm to 180ppm betwee K and Pg (see phanerozoic carbon dioxide graph on wikipedia ). My question relates to how this drop in CO2 affected plant life on earth?
The most fundamental enzymatic reaction on earth for sustaining life is the fixation of carbon dioxide by the enzyme RuBisCO. (see wikipedia entry for RuBisCO). RuBisCO's activity is very slow and depends on the concentration of CO2. Indeed, RuBisCO is rate limiting for photosynethesis on earth. It has single digit turnover per second as compared to most enzymes which are in the 1000s/second (see wikipedia). It also makes up 50% of the soluble proteins in leaves (Id.). And despite it's slow activity, billions of years of evolution have failed to produce anthing better. Instead, plants have evolved mechanisms to deal with the low activity rate (e.g., C4 pathway). Since RuBisCO is rate limiting to life on earth and CO2 concentration determines the rate of RuBisCO, competition amongst plants for CO2 must be a driver of evolution, especially in a low CO2 environment.
My hypothesis is that flowering plants were more fit for low CO2 and outcompeted plants that relied on high CO2. The plants that thrived in high CO2 fixed carbon faster and could support large animals like the dinosaurs. The dinosaurs could not survive on the flowering plants and died off. A similar event occured in the ocean. Plankton that was more fit for lower CO2 (i.e., higher ocean pH and less availability of CO2) out competed existing plankton species.
Also note that the total caloric output of the earth's plants should be lower with lower CO2 since CO2 fixation is the rate limiting step. Lower CO2 concentrations therefore create a scarcity of food, which would increase competition amongst populations and should drive evolution (less food means more competition for the food and the fittest survive).
My hypothesis is not "gish-gallpingly time-wasting". Rather it is a hypothesis based on the scientific principle of evolution (e.g., flowering plants out competed their contemporaneous plants by being more fit to survive lower CO2 concentrations). What isn't science is the use of correlation to prove causation. The correlation of an impact event or massive volcanic activity is not proof that either of these things did or could cause mass extinction. These are just theories and the science supporting them are for the most part theories. In contrast, evolution by competition has been proven through scientific observation. The activity rates of RuBisCO are measured using repeatable biochemical assays. The rate limiting effects of low CO2 on RuBisCO are testable and repeatable. The ubiquety and utilization of RuBisCO by plants has been measured. In short, my hypothesis that low CO2 killed the dinosaurs, is a legit hypothesis because it is based on scientific data, not correlations.
If I were to speculate, I'd say low CO2 was probably the cause of the majority of mass extinctions on earth. CO2 is a gas and therefore equilabrates throughout the whole earth, including the oceans and the air on land. It sustains all life on earth. Its fixation is for the most part limited by a single enzyme, RuBisCO. And CO2's concentration has fluxuated by over an order of magnitude (4000-180ppm) during the earth's history (or at least we think it has).
A drop in CO2 from 4000 ppm to 180 ppm would be more catestrophic than a 6 degree change in temperature. Almost all ecosystems on earth experience temperature variations greater than 6 degrees every year (due to rotation of the earth about itself and the sun). Consequently, organisms adapted to relatively large temperature swings long ago. CO2 in contrast, does not vary much from year to year. Cycles of 1000's of ppm allegedly happen with a frequency on the order of millions of years. If so, it would take billions of years to evolve the mechanisms to deal with low CO2. Consequently, we would expect the drop in CO2 to be catestrophic because the plants would not be adapted to it. Note that rising CO2 levels would not be catastrophic because most plants would not need to adapt to it (because they evolved from plants that were adapted to it). Put another way, we expect a catastrophe when we starve a plant of CO2 when the plant has never experienced starving conditions, but giving a plant excess CO2 when it evolved from plants that lived in a high CO2 environment should not produce a catastrophic event, or at least not to the same degree.
I am not suggesting that today's rise in CO2 is a good thing. That's a different debate for a different day. Certainly some plants would do better and others wouldn't in a high CO2 environment. The purpose of this post is to propose the basis for mass extinction of the dinosaurs. The data suggests low CO2 may have been the culprit.
(snip)
I'm looking for a scientific based response. No need for ad-hominems.
Moderator Response:[RH] Andrew... Your erratic banter has more than run its course.
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ubrew12 at 12:54 PM on 29 December 20162016 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #52
An excellent summary of the weeks highlights. Thank you. I would also alert your readers to another highlight, in HuffPo. The more information, the more ammunition, if you know what I mean.
Moderator Response:[JH] Thank you for the positive feedback and for the recommendation.
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MA Rodger at 10:19 AM on 29 December 2016There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature
HB @171.
Your difficulty seems to stem from an overly simplistic principle you apparently are wedded to - the idea that a cold object cannot warm a hot object. Given such a profound level of misunderstanding, it is best to to simplify the situation by ignoring the external source of heating for the system.
Imagine a hot body (heated magically) and radiating out into space. As space is close to absolute zero, the warm body will receive no energy flux from space, no downward radiation.
Now an atmosphere becomes formed around the hot body which is warmed by the hot body (this atmospheric warming you apparently have no problem with), the atmosphere reaching a chilly -18ºC = 255K at equilibrium. Being warmer than absolute zero, the atmosphere will radiate upward into space and downward back to the hot body. So will the extra energy flux back to the hot body not have a heating effect? Note - if it doesn't we will have to rewrite the laws of thermodynamics and we are not very keen on doing that.
HB @ 172.
If a hot body is flat in form, like an atmosphere surrounding a planet (if you ignore the curvature), it will have a top and a bottom, it will thus have to radiate up and down. Its surface, top and bottom, will be double the surface area of the planet it surrounds. Temperature and surface area dictate the total energy flux. Double the surface and you double the flux. The 400W/sq m was being presented in terms of sq m of the planet beneath, not in sq m of the atmospheric surface which has a top & bottom and thus double the radiation. As you imply in your rather confused final statements, air does not choose a particular direction to radiate to - it radiates in all directions but the sideways stuff has no net flux as that is just the atmosphere heating itself, leaving top and bottom radiation. (By the way, a cube has six sides - (1) top,(2) bottom, (3) left, (4) right, (5) front, (6) back. And the ratio 4:1 to convert discal area (πR2) to spherical area (4πR2) only applies to spheres.)
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nigelj at 09:40 AM on 29 December 2016Record-breaking Arctic warmth ‘extremely unlikely’ without climate change
The arctic warmth in recent decades is being driven partly by a positive feedback from declining ice cover exposing more ocean, so this warmth would tend to stay near the surface for some time. Could this partly explain why the surface as measured by Giss is heating a little more rapidly than the middle of the atmosphere in the UAH data?
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nigelj at 09:25 AM on 29 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
Nanuk @9
"There is no direct evidence of humans causing global warming."
Can you precisely specify what direct evidence you want, and what you mean by direct? Remember we cannot put the entire planet inside a laboratory.
We certainly have strong evidence fossil fuels are causing climate change due to basic greenhouse gas theory, basic correlations between CO2 and warming, CO2 signatures, sources of CO2, etc, as discussed in articles on this website and the IPCC reports.
"Well, the tub does have an insignificant effect on the overall temps but it is certainly NOT the main cause. "
What main cause do you propose? Why so shy about saying? Remember scientists have investigated and ruled out all alternative causes. Solar activity has been on a declining trend for decades, for example.
You are going over boring old ground, that has been dealt with by climate scientists 100 times over, so its hard not to conclude you are simply trolling and trying to cause doubts. Maybe you are the person paid to spread lies?
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RedBaron at 08:26 AM on 29 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
Nanuk,
For evidence look here.
But since you mentioned "common folks" that might not even know the basics of science. Maybe this experiment by mythbusters will help you understand easier.
Mythbusters tests global warming theory - does CO2 warm air?
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nanuk at 06:41 AM on 29 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
The fACTS are: there are NO facts! There is no direct evidence of humans causing global warming.
that the LIE is repeated is not going to make it suddenly come true! When are you folks going to realize you have been duped? You are being made fools of, but since you are getting paid for lying it is OK with you?!
Here is how your logic works:
you are baking bread. You get hot and sweaty so you decide to have a bath. As you fill your tub, you notice the kithen is still getting warmer! So you theorize the water in the bath is causin the warming trend.
Well, the tub does have an insignificant effect on the overall temps but it is certainly NOT the main cause. But your ideology/ religion is cemented and you refuse to accept it could be anything BUT the bath water! ;
THAT is what common sense folks see you saying!
Moderator Response:[JH] Inflamatory sloganeering snipped.
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nigelj at 05:47 AM on 29 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
HB @6, good point. Very amusing.
Its fair to say the "warmists" sometimes make themselves easy targets, and this becomes an excuse for climate denialism by people like Trump. But I think people also blow minor mistakes by warmists out of all proportion like that glacier issue in one of the IPCC reports. Its like warmists are held to almost an impossible standard, yet sceptics are given a free pass to talk the most incredible nonsense without the slightest evidential foundation. Society is in effect crippling science, and will ultimately pay a price for this cynical approach.
Just changing the subject slightly, the climate issue has become very divisive indeed and it intrigues me to identify what is really driving this level of climate change denialism, division, and general tension. I have seen dozens of theories that are all quite convincing, and its tempting to say perhaps they just all add together, however there is usually a simple underlying principal explanation for most things in life. I dont think we have found this for climate denialism, although One Planet may be close.
I was briefly a climate change sceptic, ages ago, having watched a certain movie (I dont want to name it and give it any promotion). But I had lingering doubts about the sceptical claims, and when I looked more deeply I found the movie was full of factual errors and misleading claims, etc. I dont like being tricked like this, esspecially given I have a high level of education, and it has made me an advocate for the IPCC position and reducing emissions. If I can change my position, maybe Trump can.
However I do think Trump is likely to be more amenable to business arguments about advantages of renewable energy, etc.
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william5331 at 04:49 AM on 29 December 2016Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
No sense in pushing Trump into admitting that climate change is happening and likely to bring disaster. He will just get huffy puffy and sulk. Instead get the message to him how he could become the hero of the American people by stemming the flow of all that lovely wealth to other countries for oil and to use it for job creation in repairing American infrastructure. No need for subsidies. In fact since he is a true capitalist (cough cough), stop all subsidies including to fossil fuel and let renewables and fossil fuel battle it out on the economic playing field. More money saved from not having to pay subsidies. He is about to lower corporate taxes. Fine, but emphasize that he must then ensure that all companies actually pay their taxes. He wants to penalize American companies who manufacture overseas so he may be sympathetic to this message. We have to play the instrument we have been given. And emphasize that setting the economic playing field to favor electric cars and Wind and Solar will save even more money in foreign oil costa and better still, the people pay for the infrastructure.
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Facts matter, and on climate change, Trump's picks get them wrong
nigelj at 08:17 AM on 28 December, 2016
"However Trump is a proud person. If he could be shown that the denialist arguments are really just cheap tricks, he might take notice. He wouldnt like being taken for a sucker"
Which is the reason for him not listening to the people saying that we need a world government based on a hypothesis that has shown to be worthless for doing what it claims.I also think the stupidity of U.S. climatepoliticians when they decided to prosecute people that don´t think like them, might be a large cause for Trump ignoring the undemocratic forces behind the climate scam.
(In a whispering voice: I am starting to wonder if the nazis are behind the climate scam, they where the last ones that tried to take over the world;)
I am almost joking in the above sentence
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There's no empirical evidence
323. MA Rodger at 01:25 AM on 29 December, 2016
HB @322.You presumably mean 1 bar when you say "1 atm pressure." On Venus 1 atm of pressure is about 90 bar and the surface temperature 462ºC. What your energy flux figures are meant to represent is not immediately clear to me. A simple S-B calculation suggests the Venusian surface emits some 17,000W/sq m as opposed to the Earth's 400W/sq m. I'm assuming the "~2500W/m^2" figure you quote is a stab at the Venusian insolation. But I could be wrong."
2500W/m^2 is insolation, that is correct. But I think it is a bit more. Why do I need to be exact? Do you have an argument based on the difference of 2000W between 15-17000W?
Did you really not understand that I used 1atm as it is on earth?
"I am no expert on the Venusian atmosphere but likely Robinson & Catling (2013) know a thing or two. Their figure 1 (below) uses data from Moroz and Zasova (1997) for its Venus Temperature-Pressure trace and shows Venus at 1 bar to be significantly warmer than Earth at 1 bar."
With more than 90% co2 in the atmosphere you would expect a bit more, wouldn´t you?
2500/4=625W/m^2
But for a slowroller like venus you should use the hemisphere:
2500/2=1250W/m^2
350K=850W/m^2
"This elevated temperature (350 K) exceeds a pro rata temperature wrt Earth due to the elevated Venusian insolation. Thus the GHG effect on Venus at 1 bar exceeds the full Earth atmosphere GHG effect. What contribution CO2 makes to this high-altitude Venusian GHG effect is a further issue. I assume your comment concerning this, that "there seems to be no effect of co2" has no evidential basis. But I could be wrong. So please surprise me if you can!"
So because people believing in greenhouseffect can´t understand the planetary temperature of Venus surface where co2 is so hot and dense that it is in a critical state, we can assume that a gas that is not a heat source, is the cause of high temperature?
I would choose almost any other explanation than that. All of them would include heat generation of some sort. Since that is what it takes to heat something up.
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There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature
158. MA Rodger at 23:31 PM on 15 December, 2016
"Firstly, the atmosphere is insensitive to up or down. So in addition to radiating 200W/sq m upwards, it also radiates 200W/sq m downwards. It thus requires 400W/sq m to maintain a temperature of theoretically -40ºC (as Stefan-Boltzmann"
Do I understand you correctly?
Are you saying that air at a mean temperature of -18C contains enough energy to radiate 400W/m^2?
To radiate that amount of energy, ignoring the nonsense "photons in all directions", any radiating body has to have a temperature of 289.8K.
It doesn´t matter if it is an atmosphere, it has to have that temperature. Radiating bodys radiate according to their temperature, nothing else.
Where do you find these fairytales?
If your claim is "200W up and 200W down", the atmosphere would have to have a temperature of 243K. You cant add them to get 400W, since you only have one m^2. If your claim is that a cubic meter holds enough energy to radiate 200W in four directions, then you have to explain it much more carefully.
Why do you not divide by four like you do with solar radiation? the same rule applies for cold air as a planet when you treat it as a separate radiating body.
Do you really mean that air chooses to only radiate up and down? How does that work?
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There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature
MA Rodger at 19:57 PM on 28 December, 2016
HB @165.
"You dispute the very idea that CO2 in the atmosphere results in an increase in surface temperatures. Yet your use a bowl-of-ice in a-warm-room as an analogy for atmospheric-CO2 above a-warm-surface suggests you are not really thinking through your position. And perhaps you are not entirely clear about what it is you are arguing against. You talk of an absence of “experimental data” to support what you call “the claim that co2 can increase the temperature of the heat source heating it,” this specific to the warming of a surface by the warmed CO2. "I dispute the claim that a cold gas sitting on top of a warm surface heated by a hot star can cause the temperature to rise beyond what the hot star can cause. I dispute the claim that co2 can increase the temperature of its own heat source, especially when it has a mean temperature of -18C in the atmosphere.
I dispute the claim that you can increase the temperature of anything by adding a cold gas, or fraction of a gas, without adding more energy.
I dispute the claim that in the atmosphere, the gasses and water vapor have the opposite effect to what we experience in our daily lives.
Have you ever increased the temperature of anything by adding water vapor that was not pre-heated, or by adding air flowing over it?
I dispute the claim that you have any science to back your claims, aside from hindcasting temperature graphs and showing a doubtful correlation with temperature.
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