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All IPCC definitions taken from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Working Group I Contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Annex I, Glossary, pp. 941-954. Cambridge University Press.

Recent Comments

Comments 23301 to 23350:

victorag@verizon.net at 14:09 PM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

#117 When we examine the data, as presented in any number of graphs representing global temperature since ca. 1880, we see only one period in which both tempertures and CO2 emissions are rising at roughly the same rate at the same time: the last 20 years or so of the 20th century. Aside from that, no correlation is evident. That doesn't mean that an underlying correlation might be present that is hidden by other factors. But given the complete lack of long-term correlation in the raw data, it is incumbent on followers of the mainstream view to support the underlying correlation they seek to demonstrate with clear and convincing evidence. Otherwise, skeptics are justified in denying that any such correlation exists.

Once again, I won't waste my time elaborating until I feel sure my comments won't be deleted or censored.

Moderator Response:

[JH] All commenters on this site are required to abide by the SkS Comments Policy.

KR at 13:38 PM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

victorag - WRT your links to "The reversed responsibility response", i.e. the reversal of the burden of proof - you have it backwards:

The correlation of CO2 to warming (as one of many forcings, both natural and anthropogenic) has been well established over the last 150 years, starting with Tyndall, Fourier, and Arrhenius and basic spectroscopy, and continuing through theory, observations, and simple empirical evidence to today. That evidence has been accumulated and collated, the case regarding AGW has been made. The burden of proof now rests upon those who disagree, such as you, to present evidence sufficient to overturn that 150 years of data and theory. Armwaving and nitpicking, let alone semantic gaming and your presentations of short term trends without statistical significance (such as since 1998) do not suffice.

The strength of that correlation with CO2 was your initial objection to this thread - and quite frankly your objection has not survived examination. Since then you've done little but dance around trying to change the subject. You've been verbose, and your Gish Gallups extensive, but hardly convincing.

victorag@verizon.net at 12:12 PM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

MARodger: "Victor states @108 that Fyfe el al, by "specifically refer to the terms "hiatus" and "slowdown" as equivalent" but this is untrue."

See the abstract:

"It has been claimed that the early-2000s global warming slowdown or hiatus, characterized by a reduced rate of global surface warming, . . " etc.

As for the rest, I won't be responding further until I am assured that my comments will not be deleted or censored.

Moderator Response:

[JH] All commenters on this site are required to abide by the SkS Comments Policy.

victorag@verizon.net at 11:49 AM on 23 August 2016

IPCC admits global warming has paused

With regard to Fyfe et al., see the very interesting blog post and discussion at Ed Hawkins' blog. See also the Guest Post by Fyfe et al. on the same blog, followed by many very interesting comments as well.

I won't comment further until I receive a reassurance that my comments will not be deleted or censored, as I see no point in wasting my time.

Moderator Response:

[JH] All commenters on this site are required to abide by the SkS Comments Policy.

Tom Curtis at 10:50 AM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

I have responded to victorag @108 on a more appropriate thread.

Tom Curtis at 10:50 AM on 23 August 2016

IPCC admits global warming has paused

Elsewhere, victorag is arguing that a "pause" exists, basing the argument on Fyfe et al (2016). He ignores Werner et al (2015) (discussed here). Werner et al first determine the locations of the break points in the piecewise trends in GMST for a forced number of breakpoints up to eight. Breakpoints only appear around 1998 or later if you force seven or more breakpoints:

They further apply statistical tests to determine the statistical support for each number of breakpoints, finding the best statistical support for three breakpoints, with potential support for two, four, or five breakpoints. There is little statistical support for seven or eight breakpoints, and hence little statistical support for a 21st century slowdown:

Fyfe et al (2016) do not include Werner et al in their references, and therefore ignored this evidence. Further, their rejection of statistical tests showing no change in underlying trend because of their supposedly extended baseline, which is true of the IPCC AR5, but not true of all such statistical tests. Using their preferred intervals for the "big hiatus" and the "slowdown" and updated NOAA (Karl 2015) data, we can see that the Jan 1972- Dec 2000 interval has a trend of 0.171 +/- 0.061 C/decade. The Jan 2001- Dec 2014 interval has a trend of 0.078 +/- 0.140 C/decade. That is, the trend for the second interval includes the trend for the first interval in its uncertainty, and therefore the null hypothesis that the trend has not changed cannot be rejected. (Note that it can be rejected using HadCRUT4, but that is because HadCRUT4 has limited coverage, particularly in the Arctic and North Africa, as can be checked by looking at the HadCRUT4 Krig data.) (See also Cahill et al (2015), also ignored by Fyfe et al.)

In short, Fyfe et al insist on a slowdown because (as they say) their "exploration of an alternative baseline period is motivated by ΔF, the estimate of anthropogenic radiative forcing" rather than because of any statistical evidence of a slowdown. They have either mistated or ignored the statistical evidence that, based on the temperature series, no slowdown exists (Werner et al), or at least that no slowdown has been demonstrated (statistical uncertainty on the trends of their chosen intervals).

Worse for victorag is that even if we accept a slowdown in the trends, it was actually predicted by the CMIP5 computer models. Fyfe et al show the following graph:

The black line is the running fifteen year trend, while the grey shaded area is one standard deviation from the mean of the CMIP5 running fifteen year trend. The clear dip in the predicted running fifteen year trend is easilly seen. More importantly, the GISTEMP running fifteen year trend skirts the botton of the 1 SD shaded area, showing that it is easilly within the 2 SD prediction zone. And if the data is within the prediction range of the model ensemble, the model ensemble is not falsified by the data. (Further discussion here.)

Bob Loblaw at 10:41 AM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

In post #106, Victor doubles down on his original list that he claims to support his statement that a "great many skeptics are in fact climate scientists" . In #106, he provides an additional list, this time of simply "climate scientists", and argues that many of those are also not "specifically identified as "climate scientists" per se". He seems to feel that this new list represents the same sort of qualifications as his original list.

What do the two Wikipedia pages say when you read them? Victor's original list starts with:

"This is a list of scientists who have made statements that conflict with the scientific consensus on global warming as summarized by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and endorsed by other scientific bodies.

whereas the new list starts with:

"This list of climate scientists contains famous or otherwise notable persons who have contributed to the study of climate science.

So, Victor's first list doesn't even claim itself that it lists "climate scientists", and his second list only covers "famous or otherwise notable persons who have contributed to climate science". [Note that some of the "skeptic" list names do appear on the second list.]

No wonder that Victor does not want to argue about who can "truly be regarded as a climate scientist". Again, the two links Victor provides do not say what he is implying they say.

The new link also has, near its bottom, a link to a List of Authors of Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. That Wikipedia entry begins with:

"This is a list of the 620 authors contributing to Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis, which was the 996 page contribution of Working Group I to the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report.

So, just the IPCC report has 620 authors, compared to Victor's original list of 61 (living) skeptics. I think we can safely say that the IPCC report authors can be considered "climate scientists". I think we could also consider the list of authors contained in the references to that IPCC report to be "climate scientists", too, and the number will be far higher than Victor's list of "a great many skeptics".

In fact, we could decide to look at the peer-reviewed scientific literature to find out what "climate scientists" are saying about anthropogenic global warming - but we need not, as this has been done (and published). Skeptical Science has several posts describing such studies:

Consensus on consensus
Consensus confirmed: over 90% of climate scientists believe we're causing global warming
The 97% consensus on global warming

If Victor wishes to argue against the existence of the overwhelming scientific consensus, as described in any of the above posts, then he should continue this discussion on one of those pages. (After reading the posts, of course.) This is increasingly off-topic on this page.

Tom Curtis at 10:32 AM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

victorag @106&111:

1) I excluded the majority of the list of "skeptical" climate scientists as climate scientists not based on their initial discipline, but their singular failure to have written even one peer reviewed paper on climate science, or in a few cases (Rob Carter comes to mind) the fact that their primary discipline and professional activity has been unrelated to climate science and the very few directly related peer reviewed articles they have written have suffered from rooky mistakes. Regardless even if we accept everybody on the list, you have completely ignored the primary thrust of my comment @104, unless your suggestion that "this post strikes me as extremely literal minded and even a bit pedantic" is a tacit acknowledgement that my explanation of the basics of English is correct, and that my orriginal charge that your claim that "a great many skeptics are climate scientists" is therefore literally false on any interpretation, but that you don't want to admit it.

2) Pay attention to the quotation marks. I quoted what you said. The second sentence in your quotation is my comment, and you have not responded to it.

3) Mathematics is a branch of logic (see Russell and Whitehead, Principia Mathematica, and also the Church-Turing thesis). It follows from this that all theories stated in mathematical form are theories by the logical definition. In fact, to not be a theory by the logical definition, a "scientific theory" would have to hold to be false at least some of the logical implications of its axioms/thesis.

I am beginning to note that indeed the "logic" you use in formal discourse is very different from formal logic. Formal logic remains, however, the fundamental principle underlying any rigorous proof; and by underlying probability theory, also any statistical "proof".

4) I don't see any point in going further on this. You are insisting that those "disproving at theory" need not provide any evidence for the positive claims they make in that disproof; and nor need they show that the theory they purport to falsify actually predicts the opposite of their purported falsifying index. Such a claim is nonsense, pure and simple.

victorag@verizon.net at 06:46 AM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Here's the link to the web page cited above, which got lost when I repasted my comment: The reversed responsibility response

victorag@verizon.net at 06:42 AM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Please once again excuse me. The formatting got lost when I posted this last time, so I need to fix that and post again. Note to moderator: please remove my post #111.

#104 Tom Curtis:

1) See my previous post.

"While many skeptics have very obvious biases, if their arguments are sound, their bias can safely be ignored."
The presumption that their arguments are sound is hardly warranted.

Where did I say that? I presumed no such thing. IF their arguments are sound, then bias doesn't matter.

"". . . logically, the claim that "GMST did not follow the predicted path given AGW" is also a theory." Again: no, not at all."
Actually, yes. In fact, true by definition of "theory":

You've provided a definition of theory from the realm of formal logic, which is very different from the logic used in ordinary discourse — or scientific discourse either. Look, I'll make it easy for you. Have you ever submitted a paper for peer review? I have. Many times. Have you ever written a peer review? I have. And would you expect someone reviewing a paper that presents a theory to produce a theory of his own if he sees some problem? A theory by any definition of that word?

You claim that, according to your research, fireflies generate a significant amount of heat, threatening the future of the civilized world. I examine your argument and find a flaw. Fireflies do not generate a significant amount of heat — or any heat at all. Is it necessary then for me to produce an alternative theory explaining why the earth seems to be heating up nonetheless? You tell me.

"The passages I quoted are statements regarding basic principles of science that are universally applicable."

I doubt you would get any philosopher of science to agree with that, and you would certainly not get a consensus agreeing with it. For a start we are talking about burden of proof, and "proof" is a very slippery word.

Yes, if we take this phrase literally you have a point. "Proof" is not expected in science. In math, yes, but not science, because any valid scientific theory can always be disproved or modified over time. So strictly speaking "burden of proof" is a misnomer. But once again as I see it you are being overly literal. What's implied by this phrase is that the one offering a theory has a responsibility to back it up with convincing evidence, while the person critiqueing that theory has no such responsibility and need only find flaws. If for example you offer a math formula to support your theory and I discover an error in that formula, I need not back my observation up with evidence, or a theory of my own, but simply point out the flaw.

Here's another discussion of essentially the same issue that should help you understand what's at stake: The reversed responsibility response
Some excerpts:

When anyone makes a claim that a certain entity or relationship exists, they have the responsibility of supplying supporting evidence. Without such evidence, the claim is worthless. The fact that you know of no falsifying evidence is irrelevant. Those who claim that an entity or relationship does not exist do not need to supply evidence.
In science, the default position about any relationship is that it does not exist. This position is called the “null hypothesis“. For a claim to be accepted, the proposer must present sufficient real-world evidence for the null hypothesis to be rejected. . .
Reversing the burden of proof is a form of the argument from ignorance fallacy, in which it is argued that a claim must be taken as true if it hasn’t been shown to be false.

RedBaron at 02:01 AM on 23 August 2016

Climate-related disasters raise conflict risk, study says

@bozzza,

One can find many multiple instances of environmental degradation that was an instigator of conficts or war, particularly agricultural degradation and including deforestation, etc.. In fact one could say it is the norm, not the exception. Why would AGW, whose major component is environmental degradation, be any different?

MA Rodger at 00:07 AM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Bob Loblaw @99.

The 'victorag@verison.net' here and the 'victor' @Realclimate are indeed the same Victor Grauer. On top of the unmistakable argumentation, he first appeared as a commenter on both sites in October 2014 with word-for-word identical comments. To quote Victor "There is only one Victor Grauer."

Moderator Response:

[JH] Please note that Victor is no on the cusp of relinquishing his privilege of posting comments on this site. He has been cited multiple times for multiple violations (modertion complaint, sloganeering and excessive repetition) of the SkS Comments Policy. Our patience is not infinite.

MA Rodger at 00:05 AM on 23 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

I think to get to the nub of this laborious interchange with Victor Gauer there are some fundamentals Victor has failed to provide.

We have an SkS thread on the topic of why GMST wobbes don't match CO2 wobbles. The OP explains why such a mismatch would be expected under AGW, It provides "the burden of proof" but Victor's position is that this proof is not provided because of apparent "contradictory evidence." As Victor insists @100:-

"The burden of proof is on the person insisting that the correlation (ΔGSMT v ΔCO2) is real in the face of what looks like contradictory evidence."

Victor hold great store by such "contradictory evidence", to the point that he suggests there is no difference evidentially in the existance of AGW than there is in existence of leprechauns!!

There are perhaps two fundamental aspects of Victor's position that remain poorly described. Firstly, while he objects strongly to the OP (& thus the science presented by the IPCC), the size of the gulf between Victor's position & the IPCC's is not truly know. While it appears to be that Victor sees no or very little role for CO2 (along with other AGHGs) as a force in AGW, Victor has failed to set out how much of the science that supports AGW he refutes.

The second fundamental omission is that Victor has failed to set out the extent of his "contradictory evidence." This I will do here. Victor's initial enquiry up-thread was to find a comprehensive attribution of GMST since 1900. Victor refused to accept any of the studies offered as fitting the bill (studies which included IPCC AR5) and it is the absence of such a comprehensive attribution that was the first piece of Victor's "contradictory evidence" presented here. We have also been treated to a description of the alleged 'dodgy' nature of many of these attribution studies, this presented also as evidence, and to the bold assertion that many climatologists support Victor's "skeptical" stance. Further evidence from Victor comprises two of the wobbles in the GMST record that are not immediately matched by wobbles in CO2 levels. These are firstly the warming prior to 1940 bring too big to be forced by the CO2 of the time, and secondly the post-1998 GMST which is too small.

If this is the sum of the "contradictory evidence" Victor has to offer, assertions pretty-much debunked already up-thread, there is (with just the one exception) nothing further to discuss.

That exception is the full paper Fyfe et al (2016) 'Making sense of the early- 2000s warming slowdown' whose abstract Victor has been waving so vigorously recently.

Victor states @108 that Fyfe el al, by "specifically refer to the terms "hiatus" and "slowdown" as equivalent" but this is untrue. Fyfe et al say that some others refer to the 'slowdown' as a hiatus. Perhaps more tellingly, the paper says "A point of agreement we have with Lewandowsky et al. concerns the unfortunate way in which the recent changes have been framed in terms of GMST having "‘stalled’, ‘stopped’, ‘paused’, or entered a ‘hiatus’"."

In Victor-speak, the main message presented by Fyfe et al (2015) is that "A warming slowdown is thus clear in observations" but that they make sure to add "it is also clear that it has been a ‘slowdown’, not a ‘stop’."

victorag@verizon.net at 23:02 PM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

#105 Hi Eclectic. The Fyfe paper can be accessed from here. And yes, I've read it. And yes, they specifically refer to the terms "hiatus" and "slowdown" as equivalent. This is an important and also highly contentious paper that deserves more attention than it seems to be getting in both the media and online forums such as this.

Some excerpts:

The last notable decadal slowdown during the modern era occurred during the big hiatus. [referring to the cooldown from 1940 on] The recent decadal slowdown, on the other hand, is unique in having occurred during a time of strongly increasing anthropogenic radiative forcing of the climate system. This raises interesting science questions: are we living in a world less sensitive to GHG forcing than previously thought, or are negative forcings playing a larger role than expected? . . .
Newly identified observational errors [ref. to Karl et al.] do not, however, negate the existence of a real reduction in the surface warming rate in the early twenty-first century relative to the 1970s–1990s. . .
In summary, climate models did not (on average) reproduce the observed temperature trend over the early twenty-first century6, in spite of the continued increase in anthropogenic forcing. This mismatch focused attention on a compelling science problem — a problem deserving of scientific scrutiny. Based on our analysis, which relies on physical understanding of the key processes and forcings involved, we find that the rate of warming over the early twenty-first century is slower than that of the previous few decades. This slowdown is evident in time series of GMST and in the global mean temperature of the lower troposphere. The magnitude and statistical significance of observed trends (and the magnitude and significance of their differences relative to model expectations) depends on the start and end dates of the intervals considered23.Research into the nature and causes of the slowdown has triggered improved understanding of observational biases, radiative forcing and internal variability. This has led to widespread recognition that modulation by internal variability is large enough to produce a significantly reduced rate of surface temperature increase for a decade or even more — particularly if internal variability is augmented by the externally driven cooling caused by a succession of volcanic eruptions. The legacy of this new understanding will certainly outlive the recent warming slowdown. This is particularly true in the embryonic field of decadal climate prediction, where the challenge is to simulate how the combined effects of external forcing and internal variability produce the time-evolving regional climate we will experience over the next ten years.

Tollefson's contention that the paper "does not in any way undermine global warming theory" is accurate in the sense that the authors do not claim that their findings undermine the mainstream global warming view. In fact, like so many others before them, they offer reasons for the slowdown based on the usual invocation of natural forcings, internal variability, etc.:

This reduction arises through the combined effects of internal decadal variability11–18, volcanic19,23 and solar activity, and decadal changes in anthropogenic aerosol forcing32. The warming slowdown has motivated substantial research into decadal climate variability and uncertainties in key external forcings. As a result, the scientific community is now better able to explain temperature variations such as those experienced during the early twenty-first century33, and perhaps even to make skilful predictions of such fluctuations in the future.

Regardless of the reasons they suggest for the slowdown, which resemble so many other reasons offered in the past, they provide ample evidence that it is real and that climate scientists need to deal with it rather than simply dismiss it. An unusually candid and honest study, I must say.

Moderator Response:

[JH] Your spin on reality as expressed in your final paragraph is absurd. Climate scientists have been rigorously investigating and deliberating about the "slowdown" for over a decade now. If you pesist in your false and blatant sloganeering, you will forfeit your privilege of posting comments on this site.

Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can and will be rescinded if the posting individual continues to treat adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.

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chriskoz at 22:57 PM on 22 August 2016

2016 SkS Weekly Digest #34

Nice plot by Gavin. Very informative. I also like the breakdown of last cycle to land/ocean and hemispheres by Chris Colose:

https://twitter.com/CColose/status/766321330241306629

Gavin has also tweeted his R plot of UAH seasonal cycle data:

https://twitter.com/ClimateOfGavin/status/765911359485779969

Obviously UAH data starts in 1979 only. But you can clearly see the warming signal on that plot. And, like in GISTEMP set, July 2016 was the absolute warm record in v5.6 UAH set.

Tom Curtis at 22:17 PM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

victorag @100, I have reserved discussion of this quote to a seperate post because it is directly germain to the topic of the OP (ie, what we are supposed to be discussing in this thread), and because it directly demonstrates the strength of your own bias. In the discussion, I will refer to certain results regarding the correlation between CO2 concentration and temperature. I have used the BEST LOTI monthly data for temperature, and the Mauna Loa monthly index converted to an anomaly value for CO2 concentration. By converting to an anomaly value, I eliminate the seasonal cycle from the CO2 data, just as it is eliminated from the temperature data (also an anomaly). As a result, I was also able interpolate missing months as the average anomaly of the all months with observed data within three months of the missing value. This is an effective method with the anomaly data because the seasonal cycle has been eliminated.

Turning to your position:

"All that's required is to demonstrate the lack of continuity between the strong upward trend so evident from the late seventies to ca. 1998 and what followed during the following 15 years or so. If the first period appeared to demonstrate a correlation between CO2 and warming, the second period demonstrated the falsity of that assumption. CO2 levels continued to soar while the increase in temperatures slowed considerably. If the relationship is exponential, as has been asserted, then why wouldn't that relationship continue even more convincingly into the 21st century?"

I take this to be a clear claim that the correlation between temperature and CO2 between Jan 1975 and Dec 1997 is substantially larger than it is between Jan 1998 and July 2016 ("the first period appeared to demonstrate a correlation between CO2 and warming, the second period demonstrated the falsity of that assumption"). I also take it to claim that the correlation between Jan 1975 and July 2016 is less than the correlation between Jan 1975 and Dec 1997 ("why wouldn't that relationship continue even more convincingly into the 21st century?", a quetion that presuposes the relationship has not continued more convincingly).

As it happens, the correlation between Jan 1975 and Dec 1997 is 0.592, while that between Jan 1998 and July 2016 is 0.507. It is less, but not substantially less. More importantly, the correlation between Jan 1975 and July 2016 is 0.832. That is, the correlation over the full period since Jan 1975 is substantially larger than either of its two subparts, and increased greatly relative to the correlation of the first period even though the correlation of the second subperiod was less.

In short, your confident assumptions about what the evidence showed with regard to the correlation of CO2 and temperature are simply false.

There is a reason for that, which should be transparent to anybody truly familiar with AGW theory. Specifically, the short term temperature response (TCR) to a change in CO2 concentration approximates to 2.17 x ln(CO2/CO2_o) where CO2 is the CO2 concentration, and CO2_o is the original CO2 concentration. Thus, the expected change in temperature from the average annual increase in CO2 concentration over the period Jan 1981-Dec 2010 was 0.01 C, which is negligible compared to the temperature fluctuations induced by ENSO and volcanic activity. Therefore, over subdecadal time spans we expect the influence of CO2 to be indistinguishable from the temperature sequence in the absence of any change in the CO2 forcing. Over a decade, the influence rises to 0.11 C, which is still small relative to ENSO and volcanic fluctuations, but large enough to influence the trend. Over multiple decades, of course, the ENSO and volcanic fluctuations do not accumulate while the influence of CO2 changes does; so that in the long term the influence of CO2 forcing dominates. Therefore, as a direct prediction of AGW, we expect correlations between CO2 and temperature to be small over short intervals, but to increase with longer intervals:

Graphed above are the correlations of a running series of intervals approximately 15, 20, 25, and 30 years long. As can be seen, in general, the longer the interval the higher the correlation, as also the higher the mean correlation and lower the standard deviation of the correlations. That is exactly what we expect from the theory of AGW, given our knowledge of the small difference in year to year change in CO2 forcing.

It also gives some idea how the fake "skeptics" have persuaded people that the data from 1998 on "demonstrated the falsity of that assumption". They show graphs of CO2 vs temperature over just that interval (where due to the short duration, we do not expect a strong correlation) but do not calculate or show the actual correlation values. They exempt themselves from the burden of proof so that they can employ simple rhetorical tricks rather than cogently discussing the issue. When you instead look at the change in correlation from the additional years of data, you plainly see the evidence in favour of CO2s substantial influence on temperature has improved. Or alternatively, when you compare the correlation of the 1998 forwards period with the correlations of past intervals of similar lenght, you see that the correlation is not unusually low for intervals of that length, and therefore not evidence against the theory.

For what it is worth, the correlation over the full available data is 0.855.

Further, and obviously, AGW does not consider CO2 to be the only forcing, and not always the dominant forcing so that restricting the discussion to CO2 itself represents a distortion, or at best an oversimplification of the theory.

Jaimesald at 22:13 PM on 22 August 2016

2016 SkS Weekly Digest #34

The "business as usual" hypothesis is not realistic because business change a lot with time.

victorag@verizon.net at 22:12 PM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

#104 Tom, I'm sorry, but this post strikes me as extremely literal minded and even a bit pedantic. With respect to the designation "climate scientist," if you look at this list of "climate scientists" you'll see a great many names not specifically identified as "climate scientists." And if you look again at the list I linked to, you'll see that none of these people are specifically identified as "climate scientists" per se. If you take a look at the Wikipedia article for James Hansen, you'll see that he has degrees in physics, mathematics and astronomy — no degree in "climate science." Nowhere in the article is he identified specifically as a "climate scientist" or "climatologist." Obviously he is, but the writer of this article saw no reason to explicitly identify him as such.

The credentials of most of those in the list I provided include people with backgrounds in fields such as meteorology, physics, astrophysics, earth science, geography, geology, atmospheric science, environmental science, chemistry, etc. We can argue forever as to whether each can "truly" be regarded as a climate scientist or not. I think the point I was making was clear enough, but if you want to insist that this is not a true listing of actual climate scientists I won't argue with you. The larger point is that "climate scientist" vs. "climate skeptic" is not a meaningful opposition. It reflects bias, but clearly you are not willing to recognize your own bias, which is unfortunate.

Eclectic at 21:55 PM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Victor @ #97 . . thank you for your reply - but you are wrong once more.

You referred me to the paper Fyfe, Meehl et al., 2016, in Nature Climate Change ( published online 24th February 2016 ).

The snippet of abstract you quoted, does not support your contentions.

The paper is paywalled (and so it was impractical for me to check it in detail) , but I do notice that one of the editors of the journal [Jeff Tollefson] has stated that:

'Fyfe uses the term "slowdown" rather than "hiatus" and stresses that it does not in any way undermine global warming theory.' [unquote]

Presumably the editor has read the paper - but Victor, it appears that you have either not read the paper, or have failed to understand it.

Victor, your argumentation (sic) seems to be a leg-pull, rather than anything scientifically serious.

Tom Curtis at 15:07 PM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

victorag @100:

1) "many" means "a large number of", and "large", like "big" and "small", is always specified relative to the population under consideration. Thus even while "a large x" is always larger than "a small x", for any given value of x, we cannot infer that a large mouse is larger than a small elephant, and large mountains (such as Everest) fit very comfortably on the surface of small planets (such as Earth). "Great" is a superlative, that amplifies the meaning of the term qualifed. Thus "a great many" is a larger quantity than "many". It follows from this that "a great many leprosy sufferers" will be a much smaller number than "a great many South Americans" and "a great many AGW skeptics" is almost certainly a larger grouping than "all climate scientists"

If we do not want to take this standard view on the use of the English language, we would have to say that a great many people live in Fordwich, even though its population is just 0.004% of that of Greater London, and it is "the smallest community by population in Britain with a town council".

This is just basic English, understood by any native speaker; and understandable by anybody competent in English. Yet you want to maintain your rhetorical point against these basic facts of grammar, even though to do so you point to a list of scientists (the majority of whom are not climate scientists) whose population is about a sixth that of Fordwich, and which represents and about a 12th of the number of "skeptical" climate scientists I indicated to exist based on statistical data.

As I said, this is really basic English. Let us put that aside, however. Based on statistical evidence, there are about 720 "skeptical" climate scientists from among a population of about 30,000. That in itself is strong evidence that those 720 odd "skeptical" climate scientists maintain their position because of non-scientific biases (something of which we have independent evidence), and that the consensus position therefore can reasonably be characterized as the position of climate science.

2) "While many skeptics have very obvious biases, if their arguments are sound, their bias can safely be ignored."

The presumption that their arguments are sound is hardly warranted. Nils Axel-Morner for example (who is on your list) has doctored the photograph of a tree to use as evidence against sea level rise. This, of course, does not mean that all of their arguments are unsound. Each must be judged on its own merits, but you are not entitled to assume the soundness of any of their arguments just from their existence as you have done.

3) "". . . logically, the claim that "GMST did not follow the predicted path given AGW" is also a theory." Again: no, not at all."

Actually, yes. In fact, true by definition of "theory":

"theory
A theory T is a set of all sentences in some language K that are implied by T itself [Boolos+Jeffrey1989-cl p.106].
A theory always contains all valid sentences of K, as these are implied by any set of sentences of K. Thus, for example, every theory contains ∀x (x=x) as this is valid in every language. These sentences can be thought of as the basis of the theory, and that the theory, which by definition is closed under the operation of implication, can be constructed by applying implication successively using the sentences already in the theory.
Note that in general there are true sentences in K that are not in a particular theory T. In particular, for every theory of any language that includes the language of arithmetic, there are true statements that are not in the theory"

You may want to insist that there is a distinction between "theories" in logic, and those in science, but given that science accepts logical implication and requires that their theories not be inconsistent, scientific theories are just a subset of logical theories - specifically, that subset of scientific theories whose proof is established by a certain rigorous empirical process. If, then, that "GMST did not follow the predicted path given AGW" is not also a scientific theory, you need to insist that its truth is not established by scientific empirical methods (in which case it is irrelevant to science). Alternatively you need to assert a very strong observation sentence/theory distinction, which strong claim has been multiply refuted (see the Duhem Quine Thesis)

4) "The passages I quoted are statements regarding basic principles of science that are universally applicable."

I doubt you would get any philosopher of science to agree with that, and you would certainly not get a consensus agreeing with it. For a start we are talking about burden of proof, and "proof" is a very slippery word. Presumably you (and Minhinnick) do not mean logical proof, for if you did not empirical claim can satisfy the burden of proof, and therefore all ontology must be rejected, including the claim that there exists an external world, or indeed any claim that your self exists (unless "self" is taken to mean "a locus of thought"). If we allow it as proof on balance of probabilities, we face similar intractable difficulties because in the end all probabilities are relative, as Popper is at great pains to point out in Logic of Scientific Discovery. Further, if you mean "provide cogent evidence that" then the assymetry between proof of existence and disproof of existence disappears; and with it any justification for the different burdens of proof.

bozzza at 14:49 PM on 22 August 2016

State of the Climate 2015: global warming and El Niño sent records tumbling

Australia seems to have had a particularly cold winter that looks to have coincided with not the bottom of the current solar cycle but we are getting toward the bottom of it! It would be interesting to see if next years winter is even colder.

Saying that there are several factors making the Northern Hemisphere warmer than the Southern Hemisphere. This means the Arctic gets the lions share of Global Warming and if the Arctic sea ice melts the ocean currents will change meaning in ways that are unpredictable and so the earths distribution of heat will change in ways that are unpredictable.

You would have to guess a lot of people will freeze as there is no longer impetus for the heat from the equator to move toward the pole that has no ice...

bozzza at 14:39 PM on 22 August 2016

Climate-related disasters raise conflict risk, study says

(..or was that scientific expediency?)

bozzza at 14:38 PM on 22 August 2016

Climate-related disasters raise conflict risk, study says

I believe the black soil of the Ukraine was wanted by Germany at some point in time for some reason: possibly political expediency?

Tom Dayton at 14:08 PM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

New model by Poppick et al. using human and natural forcings. Amazing fit to observations. In press, but Variable Variability has a preview.

Trevor_S at 11:34 AM on 22 August 2016

2016 SkS Weekly Digest #34

>Maybe illegible script at its bottom corner would give a clue?

It's perhaps time for a perscription check ;) It's signed 'Bennett' then says 'christian science monitor' presumably a link to the resource with the same name ? My take was the same as Bob's above.

There is also some irony with the juxtaposition of Dr Schmidt's quote 'on business as usual' and the Rio quote... using what precious little emissions budget we have left to have a bunch of people run a round a stadium in Rio, as 'per usual'. Fiddling while Rome burns comes to mind.

Bob Loblaw at 11:04 AM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Also not ad hominem. That Victor's references rarely support what he claims they say is simply an observation, and pointing it out legitimately "relates to the credibility of statements of fact" that Victor purports to demonstrate. (Follow the WIkipedia link to see the full quote in context.) It serves as a warning to all readers: follow Victor's links and read them carefully before accepting anything he says about them.

In fact, the bulk of my comment does not say "Victor's links are usually wrong, so this one is also wrong" (which would be ad hominem), I specifically stated why that particular link does not show what Victor claims it shows. He has not (yet?) made any attempt to argue that the link does support his original claim, so it seems that he is using the "ad hominem" claim as a means to distract from the substantive issue.

[For some reason, comment #100 seems to be a duplicate of comment #98.]

Bob Loblaw at 10:50 AM on 22 August 2016

2016 SkS Weekly Digest #34

Chriskoz:

Well, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but to me it looks like the woman is looking out of the window of a microwave oven (set to "Global Warming")...

chriskoz at 08:57 AM on 22 August 2016

2016 SkS Weekly Digest #34

What's the message of this week's toon? Maybe illegible script at its bottom corner would give a clue?

Some people, esp. lab scientists, are so focused on their field & their work that they miss/don't understand social jokes. I honestly subscribe to this bunch herein.

nigelj at 07:51 AM on 22 August 2016

State of the Climate 2015: global warming and El Niño sent records tumbling

Jonbo @69

" I hear 'skeptics' claiming that we are going to soon be entering a cooling phase that is likely to be of long duration due to lower sun activity and changes in ocean cycles."

I'm no expert, just an interested observer of the climate change debate, however I have repeatedly read articles in responsible publications like this saying the effect of solar cycles on temperatures is simply not that large, and not enough to hugely alter the increasing greenhouse affect and IPCC projections of warming going forward.

I also read an article saying that the oceans are basically entering a warming phase according to scientists, that could last several decades at least as below.

www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/04/10/the-pacific-ocean-may-have-entered-a-new-warm-phase-and-the-consequences-could-be-dramatic/?utm_term=.824880ad33a2

This is the PDO (the pacific decadal oscillation) and its been in a cool phase for some years and may have been a factor in the pause since 1998 (slight slow down). The signs are its now entering a warm phase that could be decades long, and will simply add to warming from greenhouse gases, and could counteract any change in solar irradiance . It's certainly a cyclical event so has to change sooner or later. So the sceptics seem to have it 100% wrong and around the wrong way.

Jonbo69 at 07:14 AM on 22 August 2016

State of the Climate 2015: global warming and El Niño sent records tumbling

'Unfortunately, in many ways, the climate of 2015 is not likely to stand out as especially unusual in a few years’ time. More record hot years are likely, with associated extreme weather events, as greenhouse gas concentrations continue to climb.'

I hear 'skeptics' claiming that we are going to soon be entering a cooling phase that is likely to be of long duration due to lower sun activity and changes in ocean cycles. My expectation (based on my limited knowledge, I'm not a scientist and I appologise for any scientific illiteracy in my writing ), was that if this is the case we would not see a downward trend in surface temperatures, due to the warming effect of CO2, but we would go back to the slower rise in temperatures we had for a number of years prior to the beginning of the current El Nino. But you seem to have a clear expectation of further record temperatures in the coming years. Is this because you are not expecting the negative natural cycles or you think that the effects of CO2 are so potent they will significantly counter the natural cycles?

I'm also wondering in general what natural cycles are expected between now and 2050, and what the resulting patterns might be. I'd also be interested to know if any skeptic has stuck his or her neck out and made some firm predictions for the next 5, 10, 20 years, such as a clear downward trend in surface temperature, recovering arctic sea ice, a downward trend in sea level etc. Thanks.

victorag@verizon.net at 05:59 AM on 22 August 2016

Aerosol emissions key to the surface warming ‘slowdown’, study says

Maybe if we could persuade the Chinese to extend the length of their smokestacks into the troposphere, where the resulting pollution would be relatively safe, we could have the best of both worlds? :-)

Moderator Response:

[JH] Your attempt at humor does not cut the mustard. Have you carefully read the OP and the comments that have been posted on this thread to date?

victorag@verizon.net at 05:43 AM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

#99 "..but Victor seems to have suggested that he also posts at RealClimate. If he is indeed the same Victor, then over at RealClimate he has a long history of adding links to his posts that do not support what he says. From his short appearance here, I would say that the behaviour here matches. Whether his Morton's Demon prevents him from realizing they do not support his case, or he doesn't care and hopes that nobody will follow the links and therefore providing links will bamboozle people, I can't tell. Either way, if Victor claims that a reference says one thing, it wil almost certainly say something else."

Ad hominem. And by your definition also sloganeering. Please remove. Thank you.

Moderator Response:

[JH] Since you have reposted the text of the final paragraph of Bob Loblaw's comment, deleting his original text would accomplish little.

victorag@verizon.net at 05:34 AM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Before dealing with #95 I'd like to say that Tom Curtis's response is a good example of the sort of thing I am always hoping to find when discussing this issue, yet so rarely do. Tom sticks to his argument and his evidence with no need for sarcasm, condescension or ad hominems. That's much appreciated, so thank you.

"Saying that a "great many skeptics are in fact climate scientists", ie, that a large proportion of the class "AGW skeptic" are also members of the class "climate scientist" is absurd."

Sorry but that looks like a strawman. I never said anything about a "large proportion" — I said "a great many." Which is true. I'm sure you've seen this list before, but just in case. . .

"And even among the small number of climate scientists who are "skeptics", in most cases there exist clear evidence that suggests they are biased, ie, that they hold their "scientific" opinions for reasons that are primarilly political or religious."

My point regarding bias was that we are all biased to some extent. But as far as science is concerned, there is a powerful bias that must be acknowledged which can easily cause a researcher to overlook serious weaknesses in his own methods or arguments. While many skeptics have very obvious biases, if their arguments are sound, their bias can safely be ignored. So it's really better to focus on the arguments and go easy on the accusations of bias, as this really amounts to an ad hominem.

Do you really intend to assert that critics of a theory may assert any phenomenon to be contrary to the predictions of the theory they criticize with no burden of intellectual rigour placed on them to establish that fact? Seriously? If so, your use of a "burden of proof" argument amounts to intellectual legerdemain - a piece of rhetorical prestidigitation that allows you to declare circles are squares and darkness to be light.

No, not at all. Again you are setting up a straw man. Of course there is a burden of intellectual rigor. But that's not the same as burden of proof. In other words intellectual rigor is required, but it is not necessary for the skeptic to establish any fact. All that's needed is to demonstrate that there is a serious problem (a hidden assumption, an inconsistency, a misreading of data, etc.) with the theory being offered.

". . . logically, the claim that "GMST did not follow the predicted path given AGW" is also a theory." Again: no, not at all. A critique is not a theory. The critic may have a theory of his own, but that's beside the point. Peer review would be impossible if the reviewer needed to establish his own theory before critiqueing someone's paper.

Stephin Minhinnick's argume (which I do not accept in any event) specifically relates to the proposition of entities, and the ontologies of climate scientists and (at least well informed) "skeptics" is the same, at least as regards the climate. Neither proposes a distinct set of entities, be it form of radiation, or unusual subatomic particles, or whatever. The only way that you can take Minhinnick's argument to be relevant is if we count abstractions such as trends as being entities.

The passages I quoted are statements regarding basic principles of science that are universally applicable. The examples provided pertain to entities, but can obviously be extended to theories of any sort. In any case, the usual AGW argument can be understood as existential and I've read many times assertions that it "really exists," that "climate change is real" and so on. How is that different, in principle, from the assertion that leprechauns are real?

Specifically, AGW proponents propose an underlying linear trend over the period 1975-1997 which continues thereafter, while the "skeptics" propose the existence of a new trend from 1998 onwards. And on that basis, they have singularly failed the burden of proof of showing a new underlyng trend.

Skeptics need not show a new underlying trend. All that's required is to demonstrate the lack of continuity between the strong upward trend so evident from the late seventies to ca. 1998 and what followed during the following 15 years or so. If the first period appeared to demonstrate a correlation between CO2 and warming, the second period demonstrated the falsity of that assumption. CO2 levels continued to soar while the increase in temperatures slowed considerably. If the relationship is exponential, as has been asserted, then why wouldn't that relationship continue even more convincingly into the 21st century? There is a difference between questioning an assertion and developing a whole new theory that contradicts it. A new theory isn't necessary. The burden of proof is on the person insisting that the correlation is real in the face of what looks like contradictory evidence.

You appear to imply that because the "skeptic" rhetoric regarding the purported "pause" has been refuted multiple times, and in several different ways, that of itself refutes the multiple refutations.

The many papers attempting to explain away the pause were prompted largely by questions raised in the field of climate science itself, not as a response to skeptics. If the later papers managed to replicate the findings of the earlier ones then that would have constituted significant evidence that the mainstream view is sound. But that's not what happened. The later papers either discovered weaknesses in the earlier ones that they attempted to correct, or else simply ignored the earlier attempts in favor of some new wrinkle. Finally, after the adjustments made by Karl et al., many of the numbers used by the earlier researchers were no longer valid, apparently, thus undermining the earlier research. Now if that research were sound it could not have so easily been undermined, no?

Bob Loblaw at 04:26 AM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

I will let Tom Curtis continue to dismantle Victor's Gish Gallops of unsupported assertions, but I will comment on one of his links:

The Wikipedia link provided by Victor to support his claim that a "great many skeptics are in fact climate scientists" has a total of 61 living and 7 dead "climate scientists" on it. Of that 68, there is a mixture of botanists, meteorologists, geologists, ecologists, businessmen, chemists, astrophysicists, physicists, etc. Very few are really "climate scientists", except by virtue of their dissemination of tired, denier memes such as those debunked here at SkS. You can look for their names either using the SkS "Cimate MIsinformers" button (in the group below the "Most Used Climate Myths" section along the top left side of each SkS web page), or over at DesmogBlog's Denier Database.

So, really Victor has pointed us to a page of names of fake "skeptics", of which only a very few deserve to be called "climate scientists". To call this "a great many" is indeed strectching things. It reminds me of Project Steve. Tom CUrtis is correct in claiming that the set of "skeptical climate scientists" represents a very small proportion of the set of "climate scientists".

...but Victor seems to have suggested that he also posts at RealClimate. If he is indeed the same Victor, then over at RealClimate he has a long history of adding links to his posts that do not support what he says. From his short appearance here, I would say that the behaviour here matches. Whether his Morton's Demon prevents him from realizing they do not support his case, or he doesn't care and hopes that nobody will follow the links and therefore providing links will bamboozle people, I can't tell. Either way, if Victor claims that a reference says one thing, it wil almost certainly say something else.

saileshrao at 03:31 AM on 22 August 2016

Climate urgency: we've locked in more global warming than people realize

RedBaron,

The definitive book on the subject, commissioned by the StockFree Organic Growers Network, is by Jenny Hall and Iain Tolhurst, "Growing Green: Animal Free Organic Techniques," Chelsea Green Publishing, 2007.

Sure, there are unanswered socioeconomic and political questions in the veganic approach as I already pointed out, just as there are unanswered questions on species extinctions, toxic pollution, etc., in the Rotational Grazing approach. The latter continues the Western scientific tradition of extracting more from Nature in the face of an ecological crunch, along the same vein as the Haber-Bosch process of the 1900s and the Green Revolution of the 1960s, both of which has had unintended catastrophic consequences.

But perhaps, we are veering off topic? My best wishes to your proposed plan of action.

I consider this discussion closed.

SteveAplin at 03:26 AM on 22 August 2016

Richard Milne separates skepticism from denial

Tom Curtis

Fair enough, and I appreciate your reply to a five year old thread!

It's perhaps beside the point that the 2008 GOP nominee was an avid sponsorer of climate change legislation which was (in my view) much more strenuous than what eventually emgerged from the House in 2010.

Romney "walked back" from a previously moderate position to a more denier friendly one during the 2011 primaries? Candidates say all sorts of things in the primaries. If that's an indication of what they'll do as president, then Bush Junior would have dedicated his eight years to overturning Roe V Wade and cutting taxes, instead of ignoring RvW and hiking them, and Obama wouldn’t be firing drone missiles at suspected terrorists in Yemen.

Picking Rick Perry's absurd Galileo claim as an example of the Galileo fallacy is just as much a shot at party positions as an illustration of the actual fallacy. Which in my view is cherrypicking.

The Chernobyle reference was at 41:30 of the video. My paraphrase was inaccurate — the fallacy was actually presented as "I wasn't there when Chernobyl exploded, therefore I'm immune to radiation" — but my assessment of the underlying implication was not. I think Dr. Milne meant for the rebuttal to be "no, you are not immune to radiation."

A better example would have been "I wasn't there when Chernobyl exploded, therefore I'm immune to explosions and fires." Or even better: "I was not there when [pick any natural gas explosion from your local newspaper] went off, therefore I am immune from explosions/fires."

You may think this is a quibble. But my antenna go up with this kind of statement. You want junk science and fallacies, look at what the anti-nuclear crowd says. In spite of my complaints, I very much liked Dr. Milne's talk because from his descriptions climate denier arguments sound just like anti-nuclear arguments.

It would be like somebody citing as an example of a logical fallacy: "A single molecule of CO2 absorbs and re-emits infrared photons, therefore CO2 in any amount is dangerous."

You would no doubt agree that the logic of that statement is incorrect. But you would be forgiven for wondering where the person giving that example stood on the climate change debate.

On Blair (1:02:50): again, I can't see how anybody's logical side could, in early 2003, have kicked in, allowing them to see that what Blair said wasn't correct. Blair wasn't presenting scientific evidence, or even claiming he was. He was presenting a strict risk management argument — "Saddam has a proven history of (1) military aggression, (2) using WMD, and (3) secret uranium enrichment for military purposes. The consequences of him acquiring what we suspect he is trying to acquire warrant military action on our part."

(That's a paraphrase; the full speech to which I believe Milne refers, i.e. Blair's to the House of Commons on March 18 2003, is here: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2003/mar/18/foreignpolicy.iraq1)

It's perfectly legitimate to disagree with Blair, as many (millions) do. But to say "it wasn't correct" ... is not correct.

This may appear to be another quibble, and off-topic to boot. But it underlines my point about playing the politics of moving beyond climate change talk to action. There's a whole partisan cadre, on both sides of the Atlantic, that makes a lot of political hay over how they "knew" Blair/Bush et al were "not correct." Throwing in with that crowd on the expectation that they'll do something meaningful on climate change is, I'll repeat, a mistake.

victorag@verizon.net at 02:35 AM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

"Saying that a "great many skeptics are in fact climate scientists", ie, that a large proportion of the class "AGW skeptic" are also members of the class "climate scientist" is absurd."

Sorry but that looks like a strawman. I never said anything about a "large proportion" — I said "a great many." Which is true. I'm sure you've seen this list before, but just in case. . .

Do you really intend to assert that critics of a theory may assert any phenomenon to be contrary to the predictions of the theory they criticize with no burden of intellectual rigour placed on them to establish that fact? Seriously? If so, your use of a "burden of proof" argument amounts to intellectual legerdemain - a piece of rhetorical prestidigitation that allows you to declare circles are squares and darkness to be light.

Stephin Minhinnick's argume (which I do not accept in any event) specifically relates to the proposition of entities, and the ontologies of climate scientists and (at least well informed) "skeptics" is the same, at least as regards the climate. Neither proposes a distinct set of entities, be it form of radiation, or unusual subatomic particles, or whatever. The only way that you can take Minhinnick's argument to be relevant is if we count abstractions such as trends as being entities.

Specifically, AGW proponents propose an underlying linear trend over the period 1975-1997 which continues thereafter, while the "skeptics" propose the existence of a new trend from 1998 onwards. And on that basis, they have singularly failed the burden of proof of showing a new underlyng trend.

You appear to imply that because the "skeptic" rhetoric regarding the purported "pause" has been refuted multiple times, and in several different ways, that of itself refutes the multiple refutations.

Moderator Response:

[JH] Please take the discussion of the "Pause" to a more appropriate comment thread, i.e., Aerosol emissions key to the surface warming ‘slowdown’, study says by Robert Sweeney of Carbon Brief. Sweeney's article is the most recent on this topic to be posted on SkS.

victorag@verizon.net at 01:27 AM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

#94 Eclectic: "The argumentation you present, is becoming increasingly silly. Your mentioning of the disproving of the existence of leprechauns - is ridiculous."

Obviously, the "leprechauns" argument was an exreme example. However, as the article makes clear, in principle there is no difference between a claim for the existence of such beings and a claim that CO2 emissions are heating the atmosphere to an intolerable degree that endangers the future of humankind. (In fact, the second assertions looks, on its face, far more ridiculous than the former.) In both cases, the burden of proof is the same — and the challenge for the skeptic is the same. One cannot definitively prove the nonexistence of something, whether it's a leprechaun or an impending disaster. Consequently there is no burden of proof on the skeptic, only the requirement that his argument be sound.

"Your search for recent "Pause" in global surface temperature rise, has (so far) been unsuccessful. If you have evidence of a claimed Pause, then it seems you have not yet presented it. Please do not withhold such evidence - if it exists, then please present it now."

The evidence I presented concerned the lack of a long-term correlation between global warming and CO2 emissions. Since I've been told not to repeat myself, I won't get into that again. However, I can't help but repeat one essential reference, the paper by Fyfe et al, titled Making sense of the early-2000s warming slowdown. Here's what it says in the abstract: "It has been claimed that the early-2000s global warming slowdown or hiatus, characterized by a reduced rate of global surface warming, has been overstated, lacks sound scientific basis, or is unsupported by observations. The evidence presented here contradicts these claims."

If you are unwilling to accept the evidence I've already offered, then at least take seriously the evidence offered in this paper, by a consortium of widely recognized climate scientists.

victorag@verizon.net at 01:03 AM on 22 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

With reference to my #93 post:

I won't mind if you remove #93 completely, as it was intended primarily for the moderator(s) — as is this post. What it amounts to essentially is a plea for more agressive moderation, not less. In other words: please do your job accross the board and weed out personal attacks, condescending remarks and ad hominem arguments from whatever source. I have the impression that you are doing a far better job in this regard than the moderators at RealClimate — but you could do better. Thank you.

Tom Curtis at 00:58 AM on 22 August 2016

Richard Milne separates skepticism from denial

SteveAplin @66, Guliani ran in the 2008 presidential race, not the 2012 presidential race. Of the 2012 presidential race he said "it's tough to be a moderate and succeed in GOP primaries". Therefore his views cannot be taken as representative of the Republican party in 2011/12. As it happens, of the still viable candidates at the time of the first primary, four were explicit deniers, 2 had walked back from previously moderate positions to more denier friendly positions (including eventual Republican nominee, Mitt Romney), and only one had a climate policy avowedly accepting of climate science. That one polled only 0.44% of the vote, recieving just one delegate. That, however, is beside the point. The citation of Perry (12:43) is not made to present him as representative of the Republican party, but as a citable instance of the "galileo gambit" being played, which gambit is then rebutted.

If you want to discuss the other examples, you should provide time stamps for their time of occurence rather than expecting interlocuters to watch the entirety of an 80 minute video to find the obscure reference to find out whether or not you have fairly represented them.

SteveAplin at 23:30 PM on 21 August 2016

Richard Milne separates skepticism from denial

I'm late late late to this, but what can you do. Better late (I watched this last night, August 20 2016) than never.

I really enjoyed the video, and echo Dr Milne's recommendation of this website (skepticalscience.com).

But am I the only one who noticed the pot calling the kettle black? Rick Perry was one Republican candidate in the 2012 presidential race. Rudy Giuliani was another. Milne chose Perry as representative of — I guess — "right wing" views. Giuliani is a "right wing" guy and his take on climate change is the opposite of Perry's. Giuliani ran for the nomination of the very same party. Milne wanted to portray that party, which happened to be contending the upcomping presidential election, as retrograde. He picked the best caricature of that view. Giuliani would have made a poor choice for that purpose.

That, in Milne's own definition, is, um, uh... cherrypicking.

Another example of PCKB (pot calling the kettle black), and hugely important in the context of exactly how mankind can flourish without continuing to dump obscene amounts of carbon into our air: Milne's example of a logical fallacy "I wasn't at Chernobyl, so radiation isn't dangerous."

Yes, that's a logical fallacy. And so is Milne's implication that radiation IS dangerous.

It was a throwaway line, I know. But it was a pretty breathtaking thing for a scientist, lecturing about skepticism, to imply.

I, you, and Dr Milne are under constant radiation bombardment, from natural terrestrial and cosmic sources.

Are we dead?

And Dr. Milne's example of how he momentarily fell for Tony Blair's case for invading Iraq, before coming to his senses and realizing how wrong it was.

How wrong "what" was? Blair did not make, and did not pretend to make, a scientific case for the invasion. He made a polticial case, and framed his case in EXACTLY the way Milne says political cases should be made.

So how could Dr. Milne have figured out it was wrong? Unless he had some inside knowledge of the state of Saddam's uranium isotope separation program, which I am certain he did not, he could only have evaluated Blair's case on the political merits that Blair himself laid out.

I don't mind a scientist venturing into poltics — he's a citizen just like everybody else. I do believe however that public scientists do their own cause a disservice when they buy into a particular partisan frame and insert that frame into their speeches.

The climate change "community" (i.e. those who believe man-made CO2 is a problem worthy of huge effort and action) are making a major mistake if they think that politicians who have glommed onto this issue and say the right buzz words are worthy of support.

German politicians utter the right buzz words, in spades. Germany's electric power generation sector dumped more than 330 million tons of CO2 into the air last year. France, right next door, made a comparable amount of electricity and dumped only 43 million tons.

I do not see, on this web site or any of the other excellent ones that deal with the issue of climate change, any inquiry into the reasons for the remarkable fact I laid out in the previous paragraph.

I do see a lot of rhetorical support for the route Germany has chosen to cut carbon. This amazes and disappoints me. A glance at the publicly available data instantly tells you the German approach is a failure.

Scientists are supposed to work from evidence, not politically motivated fairy tales.

RedBaron at 23:23 PM on 21 August 2016

Climate urgency: we've locked in more global warming than people realize

@saileshrao,

The thread title is, "Climate urgency: we've locked in more global warming than people realize".

I have contended there is a mitigation option that allows us to avoid being locked into this greater AGW. I have provided case studies for all the major staples; rice, small grains and large grains, meat and dairy being produced at commercial scale in a way that significantly reduces atmospheric CO2 by sequestering C into the soil, restoring soil health to agricultural land, if they were adopted world wide. (My own work is in various vegetable crop regenerative models of production but I haven't posted that here because it is original research) I have shown evidence for both correlation and causation. I have even proposed a way to potentially break the current political deadlock and avoid economic disruption both to the many producers and larger commodity markets, international trade markets etc... by proposing how we might do this at a profit at all economic trophic levels. (pardon the pun)

Now you said, "Even if we need a few domestic animals to sustain it (many veganic farmers disagree), a Vegan food system, which reduces the human biomass demand on Nature by a factor of 6, would be easier to manage into the future."

Where are your numbers? Where are the case studies? How do you scale it? Where is the socio-economic political plan? How will this prevent us from being locked into more global warming than people realize? How will we pay for it? Who are the economic winners and losers and why?

I ask all this because I don't want a sloganeering reply based solely on your attempt to convert acolytes to your religious dogma, rather I am actually interested in this so called "veganic" agriculture and how it might fill some of the more minor gaps in my plan. There are various local ordinances and zoning issues surrounding animal husbandry in and near large population areas. It is not the major agricultural land, but it is one small gap in my proposed plan I need to work through.

So if you could please leave the conversion of the world's population to Veganism aside for a moment, and instead answer some of these questions, maybe I could integrate some of your ideas into my proposed plan of action?

Thanks in advance.

Tom Curtis at 21:58 PM on 21 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

victorag @87:

"A great many skeptics are in fact climate scientists..."

Passing over the assumption that "skeptics" are in fact skeptical, rather dogmatically oppositional, surely you have mistated your position. First, and this should be very clear from any excursion to WUWT, the vast majority of "skeptics" have neither qualifications in, nor understanding of climate science. Saying that a "great many skeptics are in fact climate scientists", ie, that a large proportion of the class "AGW skeptic" are also members of the class "climate scientist" is absurd.

I assume you merely mispoke, and intended to say that "a great many climate scientists are 'skeptics'". Even there you are on very shaky ground. Based on surveys of climate scientists, at most 15% and more likely << 10% of climate scientists hold a "skeptical" position on AGW. Among publishing climate scientists, by self assessment only 2.4% of climate scientists thought there published work rejected AGW (see Table 4). So, at best, a very small minority of climates scientists are "skeptics" - sufficiently small that their views cannot be taken as representative of climate science.

And even among the small number of climate scientists who are "skeptics", in most cases there exist clear evidence that suggests they are biased, ie, that they hold their "scientific" opinions for reasons that are primarilly political or religious. A significant proportion of them, for instance, are employed by right wing political think tanks, or have published for or spoken at conferences for such think tanks. Indeed, one of the most noteworthy "skeptical" climate scientists has declared that, "I view my job a little like a legislator, supported by the taxpayer, to protect the interests of the taxpayer and to minimize the role of government", a declaration tantamount to saying that as a matter of principle he will distort the science for political ends.

"However, we must recognize that, as far as science is concerned, there is an asymmetric relation between someone who offers an hypothesis and someone who critiques it. The burden of proof is on the person offering the theory, not the critic."

My criticism of the "skeptic's" discussion of the "pause" was that they incorrectly stated the predictions of AGW, and that the responses that you considered to be akin to cherry picking merely established what AGW actually predicted over the relevant interval, and thereby showed that the actual temperature records followed what was expected from the theory. Given that I am flabberghasted by your response. Do you really intend to assert that critics of a theory may assert any phenomenon to be contrary to the predictions of the theory they criticize with no burden of intellectual rigour placed on them to establish that fact? Seriously? If so, your use of a "burden of proof" argument amounts to intellectual legerdemain - a piece of rhetorical prestidigitation that allows you to declare circles are squares and darkness to be light. Even if the " ...burden of proof is on the person offering the theory", that would be completely irrelevant to the case under discussion.

As it happens, even in more general contexts, your principle is useless. That is because, logically, the claim that "GMST did not follow the predicted path given AGW" is also a theory. If a burden of proof applies to those proposing theories, than a proponent of this view has a burden of proof to demonstrate to things, ie, the predicted GMST temperature trend given AGW; and that GMST did not follow that path.

You attempt to support your dictum with a quote @90 from comuter scientist, Stephen Minhinnick. Event there, however, you go awry. Stephin Minhinnick's argume (which I do not accept in any event) specifically relates to the proposition of entities, and the ontologies of climate scientists and (at least well informed) "skeptics" is the same, at least as regards the climate. Neither proposes a distinct set of entities, be it form of radiation, or unusual subatomic particles, or whatever. The only way that you can take Minhinnick's argument to be relevant is if we count abstractions such as trends as being entities. But if we do that, it is the AGW "skeptics" who are proposing an additional entitity. Specifically, AGW proponents propose an underlying linear trend over the period 1975-1997 which continues thereafter, while the "skeptics" propose the existence of a new trend from 1998 onwards. And on that basis, they have singularly failed the burden of proof of showing a new underlyng trend.

"To be perfectly clear: the theory in question is the theory that CO2 emissions due to the burning of fossil fuels have been warming the earth steadily over a long time period and as a result placing the world in grave danger. The so-called "hiatus" is an attempt to refute this theory by calling attention to a certain body of data that seems inconsistent with it. Promoters of the hiatus need not offer a counter-theory. All they need to do is demonstrate a serious inconsistency in the "climate change" theory."
(My emphasis)

And now, apparently, we are in aggreement, except you exempt the "skeptics" from actually having to make the demonstration of inconsistency, which requires not only demonstrating the post 1998 temperature record, but also demonstrating the actual prediction of AGW (not just the projections). And once again, demonstrating that the "skeptics" have not undertaken their task with any intellectual rigour is not akin to cherry picking.

"The most recent "pause buster," by Karl et al., adjusted the data in such a way as to render literally all these studies superfluous, which should have been a huge embarrassment to the mainstream climate science world, but has on the contraty been accepted with enthusiasm simply because it appears to do the job more convincingly."

First, and most obviously, Karl et al discusses just one temperature data set, and therefore cannot render analyses of other datasets superfluos. Second, you are not entitled to assume that a reworking of (for example), Foster and Rahmstorf using the latest temperature products would not show an accelerating temperature trend. All you can say from the update of the temperature series is that the former studies are not dated, not that they are superfluos (ie, that repeating the studies would not impact our understanding, or demonstrate any underlying trend greater than the revised temperature trends from Karl et al). Again your argument suggest to me rhetorical legerdemain. You appear to imply that because the "skeptic" rhetoric regarding the purported "pause" has been refuted multiple times, and in several different ways, that of itself refutes the multiple refutations. It is only conspiracy theorests and pseudoscientists who think there theory is confirmed by the mounting of evidence against it.

Eclectic at 21:53 PM on 21 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Victor @ 93 and prior :

The argumentation you present, is becoming increasingly silly. Your mentioning of the disproving of the existence of leprechauns - is ridiculous.

Your search for recent "Pause" in global surface temperature rise, has (so far) been unsuccessful. If you have evidence of a claimed Pause, then it seems you have not yet presented it. Please do not withhold such evidence - if it exists, then please present it now.

Earlier, the analogy was made that global surface temperature was the tail on the dog body [ body = ocean ]. Victor, you have made a major Logical Fail, by ignoring the dog and instead concentrating on whether the dog has a tail [ a tail, a cropped tail, or never any tail in the first place ! ].

Your "criticism" needs to: not only point to the absence of a tail - but also point to the absence of a dog.

Since, for well-known physical reasons, the ocean has been warming without Pause - then it becomes not only plausible but highly probable that the "tail" would have no Pause. And the evidence indeed shows no Pause - yes, it shows minor fluctuations as the tail wags a little : but no real Pause.

Your desired "Pause" has become the leprechaun that you must demonstrate.

Jonbo69 at 20:41 PM on 21 August 2016

Temp record is unreliable

I have a question I would like to ask; I'm not sure if this is the best thread to ask it, for which I appologise, but it's somethimg I've always wondered and would really appreciate an answer to. I know that the Had Cru surface temp data is biased low because they do not have coverage in the arctic. My question is, why is this the case? Why have Had Cru never used data from the arctic stations when the greater coverage will clearly lead to more accurate estimates?

victorag@verizon.net at 13:35 PM on 21 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

It's getting very tiresome to present perfectly logical objections to climate change dogma, only to be greeted by ad hominems, nit picks (thank you, Mr. Rodger), intimidation, misreadings and condescension. Admittedly, this site is run in a far more even handed and decent manner than RealClimate, which is, for the most part, populated by rude imbeciles, encouraged to rave on with little to no supervision.

For the information of all concerned, I am not easily intimidated and I do not suffer fools (you know who you are) gladly. But I am also happy to engage in even handed dialogue with anyone challenging my views, provided they do so with intelligence and respect. And if my attitude is a problem for the moderators then my advice to you is very simple: ban me from the site.

If, on the other hand, you are interested in meaningful, no-holds-barred dialogue on one of the most important topics of the day, then freely open the gate to those like me who have ideas of their own and are not afraid to express them.

Moderator Response:

[JH] Your comment is a blend of agumentative and off-topic statements, moderation complaint, and sloganeering — all of which are prohibited by the SkS Comments Policy.

If you cannot abide by the SkS Comments Policy, you will relinquish your privilege of posting on this site.

Tom Dayton at 13:29 PM on 21 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Congratulations, Victor. Your understanding of science has advanced from grade school to high school. Look up "naive falsificationism."

victorag@verizon.net at 13:08 PM on 21 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

#89 Michael Sweet:

"Your characterization of Karl's paper is false, the paper adjusted the sea surface temperatures as required by science to remove measured biases. The old ship data is obviously biased compared to the new bouy data. You often make false assertions about scientists motives and data. Once several of your assertions are shown to be false, your arguments become not very convincing."

My characterization of Karl's paper had nothing to do with his claims regarding the validity of his adjustments. So you are the one making the false assertion. What I claimed is that his adjustments made the earlier studies irrelevant, another thing entirely.

victorag@verizon.net at 13:00 PM on 21 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

First, in response to the accusation that I'm repeating myself: whatever I said that might be construed as repetition was presented in a different context (a discussion of bias, in response to Tom's assertions that the notion of a hiatus is due to bias — not sure how I could respond to that without repeating some things I'd said earlier.)

Tom Dayton: "victorag claimed "there is no burden of proof associated with evaluating someone else's work, nor any need to establish one's lack of bias." The falsehood of that claim goes beyond even the other grade school caricatures of science that victor has put forward."

An excellent discussion of this issue appears here: http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~edmin/Pamphlets/Pamphlet%2003%20-%20Scientific%20Method%20and%20the%20Burden%20of%20Proof.pdf

Some excerpts:

Filtering out delusions and wishful thinking
It is easy to deliberately, or through mental illness,
imagine things that do not exist. Examples that
immediately come to mind are time-machines,
leprechauns, hairy blue frogs, elephants that fly.
Anyone could make up such things all day with no
real effort. And there are an infinite number of these
non-existent things that could potentially be
imagined.
But it is nearly impossible to prove that these
things do not actually exist, or have never existed. (my emphasis-V)
You would have to show you had looked
everywhere the object could be and still not found
one. Even then it could be said that the thing was
hidden, or moved while you were looking for it, or
you looked at the wrong time. . .
The same principle applies in general science. For
this reason the onus is always on the believer to
provide convincing evidence that the object
believed in is not merely a laughable fantasy but
actually exists. This is called the ‘Burden of Proof’. . .
As we have seen, the proof on an object's nonexistence
is actually impossible in practice. . .
Default Axioms
There is an important consequence to this - if an
object cannot be shown to exist, the default position
is that it does not exist. It is axiomic that something
does not exist unless shown otherwise.

With respect to bias: if I can demonstrate that a claim is unsubstantiated, then it doesn't matter whether I'm biased or not. On the other hand, if I'm attempting to establish the truth or relevance of a theory, a hidden bias might be at work in my methodology or my selection of data that makes my theory seem more convincing than it actually is.

Moderator Response:

[JH] My cautionary note about escessive repetition was prospective.

I also activated the link you provided. Please learn how to use the editing function to activate links.

michael sweet at 09:41 AM on 21 August 2016

There's no correlation between CO2 and temperature

Victor,

Please link your references so they can be checked. Tom Curtis and MA Rodger have shown that your previous papers do not support your claims.

You are getting very repetitive. Consider following the moderators suggestion and stop repeating the same failed assertions. Simply repeating an assertion that has been previously shown to be incorrect will not convince anyone at this site that your arguments have merit. Most of the regular readers have seen your posts at RealClimate and do not need to see them again, especially three or four times.

Your characterization of Karl's paper is false, the paper adjusted the sea surface temperatures as required by science to remove measured biases. The old ship data is obviously biased compared to the new bouy data. You often make false assertions about scientists motives and data. Once several of your assertions are shown to be false, your arguments become not very convincing.

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