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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.

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Comments 46801 to 46850:

  1. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    Are the effects of different air pressures changing absorptive properties included in the equations above describing the greenhouse effect? My physics is beyond weak: I guess I'm asking if this is accounted for, and if not, what difference it might make for calculating a change in temperature from a significant increase of CO2 (ignoring feedbacks)?

  2. The Scientific Method

    @chrsikoz #9

    You write,"Please do your little homework and make sure you understand the basics before you blame the climate scientists..."

    You obviously wrote that before my second comment, otherwise I doubt you would had not made such an ill conceived notion as to my understanding.

    I don't make this stuff up. 

    How can tis broader audience be educated to which rockytom emphasizes, when there are contradictory responses among the (-snip-)?

    NOAA scientists suggest that,"higher global temperatures might be increasing evaporation from land and adding moisture to the air, thus intensifying the storms and floods associated with El Niño," while other scientists that RC post that ENSO may enter an average state. This is two completely different hypothesis from well-respected climatologists.

    (-snip-), that Climate Change is not the same as weather, you may want to ask the climatologists that are blaming recent weather patterns on AGW. Skeptics aren't blaming ENSO on Climate Change, the Climatoligists are. The Skeptics aren't blaming record snowfall on AGW. Climatologists are. So says the news.

    Please don't detract from the discussion on the Scientific Method please. Lets stick to the discussion of how to improve communication on the practice. (-snip-). 

    If I bring up any doubt, its only because if we can improve the method, we must first point out the flaws. Not the theory. The results of a correct prediction formulated on models will be all the facts I need.

    Moderator Response: [DB] If you cannot take this model-centric discussion to one of the pages devoted to models here, then you will force the moderation staff to intervene more stringently. Inflammatory tone snipped.
  3. The Scientific Method

    Climate4All@3, you said:

    In order to strengthen the predictions of their hypothesis, the anomalies [ jet stream currents, ENSO, UHI, and Illuminosity] previously omitted from GCMs, should be concluded(sic).

    Assuming sic is just typos (you mean "included", otherwise your sentence does not make sense), your very basic misunderstanding of climate science concepts is that you confuse climate with weather. You look at any single weather event and don't try to understand the big picture, as if you looked at a single tree and did not try to understand the tree is part of the forest.

    A better analogy would be the description of termodynamic properties of gas in a cylinder. You don't look at what each particle is doing (it's velocity, exact paths, how often it comes in contact with other particles, etc) when you want to describe the overall properties of gas: temperature, pressure, saturation. You can only say, that say the average velocity of particles increase with temperature.

    The exactly same distinction aplies between climate science and weather events. Climate scienists never say that that "these weather anomalies is a result of a [climate change] theory". They actually say that "probability of weather anomalies changes as the result of climate change".

    Please do your little homework and make sure you understand the basics before you blame the climate scientists and their models for misrepresenting the reality. They actually understand the reality far better than you because they can see the world through both larger/longer (average conditions) and shorter (weather events) perspectives. For example, climate models already know the influence of ENSO and can predict the effects. But you cannot, because all you do with your current attitude is look for one tree and deny the existence of a forrest.

  4. The Scientific Method

    @John Russell #6

    Once again, please don't put words in my mouth that I do not utter. As the post suggest, Scientific research includes GCMs, but there is no mention of reformulation of them. But that is the Scientific Method. If not a large part as rockytom said,"mainly."

    From IPCC DCC, this disclaimer is stated:

    "Moreover, many physical processes, such as those related to clouds, also occur at smaller scales and cannot be properly modelled. Instead, their known properties must be averaged over the larger scale in a technique known as parameterization. This is one source of uncertainty in GCM-based simulations of future climate."

    RC posted on the subject of GCMs and the problematic behavior of ENSO:

    "...the question about how ENSO will respond to a global warming is still not settled. However, it seems that one common trait among some climate models is the indication that a global warming may result in a more a general El Niño-type average state."

    Peterson et.al. 2003 also stated, a leading climatologist for the IPCC also wrote:

    “Contrary to generally accepted wisdom, no statistically significant impact of urbanization could be found in annual temperatures.” This was done by using satellite-based night-light detection of urban areas, and more thorough homogenisation of the time series (with corrections, for example, for the tendency of surrounding rural stations to be slightly higher, and thus cooler, than urban areas)."

    So pardon me for engaging in a thought analysis that is part of the scientific method.

    There is no agenda here other than drawing out some conclusions regarding the scientific method. As the previous quotes I highlighted above, which by the way is sources derived from either, The IPCC or the authors that participated in the Assesment Report. They as much claim, as indicated, to the enherit difficulty predicting the exact anomalies I posted in a previous message.

    Why is it considered poor taste if i remotely cast doubt on climatology, when the authors of climatology express the same doubt, but you and others feel it necessary i do so for some agenda. Why dont you ask the authors of climate science why they are not complete sure of their predictions, rather than attack me?

    I only suggest this to open communication on the scientific method and just made reference to the posters on admission of GCMs as the main predictive factor in the method in how it applies. 

  5. The Scientific Method

    One important step omitted from the "preliminary look" is the checking of auxilliary hypotheses.  As noted by Pierre Duhem and Willard Van Orman Quine, scientific hypotheses cannot be used in isolation to make emperical predictions.  Rather, you need a conjunction of emperical hypothesesis to make such predictions.  That is, you need the primary hypothesis, and the first auxilliary hypothesis, and the second auxilliary hypothesis etc.  When the prediction fails, you know that one of clauses of the complex conjunction (set of sentences connected by the logical operator "and") is false, but you do not know which one is false.

    Checking auxilliary hypothesis has led to some of the greate scientific discoveries.  For instance, Ole Romer made carefull observations of the moons of Io in the seventeenth century to test Newton's hypothesis of universal gravitation.  When he noticed a discrepancy, he did not consider himself to have falsified Newton's law of gravitation, but rather the auxilliary hypothesis that Light travelled at infinite speed (which till then was also accepted by Newton).

    In an (oddly) more famous intance, Urbain Jean-Joseph Le Verrier predicted the location and mass of Neptune based on disturbances in the orbit of Uranus.  The search for, and discovery of Neptune at the correct location by Johann Gottfried Galle confirmed Le Verrier's auxilliary hypothesis (the existance of another planet) which saved Newton's hypothesis (universal gravitation) from falsification.

    Auxilliary hypotheses extend to such things as the correct calibration of instruments.  The history of the UAH temperature record is one of the repeated checking and adjustment of auxilliary hypotheses so that a record originally touted as falsifying AGW turns out merely to have had many false auxilliary hypothesis.  Once these were corrected the record confirmed global warming.

    As Imre Lakatos has explained, the fact that hypotheses never face refutation alone means that scientists are rightly resistant to concluding that core hypotheses are falsified.  Theories are tested not by single crucial experiments but by continued failure. In particular, a "scientific research program" (see line above) is not abandoned until it is clear that the adjustments to auxilliary hypotheses involved in retaining it are increasingly ad hoc, ie, that the predict no novel emperical content.  Newton's law of universal gravitation survived many apparent falsifying instances because the revised auxilliary hypotheses required to save it resulted in novel, and successful predictions.  Eventually, however, it was supplanted by Einstein's theory of General Relativity because Newtonian auxilliary hypotheses to explain discrepancies in the orbit of Mercury were were either falsified, or unfalsifiable; whereas General Relativity not only explained the discrepancy but predicted novel empirical content (the bending of light near the sun).

    The existance of auxilliary hypotheses needs to be urgently learnt by so-called "skeptics" of the IPCC concensus.  They repeatedly, and absurdly assert the falsification of AGW because they ignore auxilliary hypotheses about the temperature record.  Most recently, the ignore the effect of ENSO on that record in the short term.  Of course, they can easilly falsify AGW (if it is indeed false) by showing the auxilliary hypothesis (that El Ninos warm the Earth in the short term, and La Ninas cool it) is false.

    Good luck with that.

  6. John Russell at 08:35 AM on 1 April 2013
    The Scientific Method

    @Climate4All

    You're making unreferenced assertions that lack any basis in reality.

    Global climate models are not, as you so accusingly describe them, "to prove the hypothesis of AGW ". They were firstly created to enable meteorologists to provide more accurate weather forecasts. Their use in making long term climate projections has been a secondary development. All factors considered, they are remarkably accurate and getting better all the time, though, of course, increased resolution, enhanced computing power and further research will always improve their accuracy.

    To suggest that climate scientists wilfully choose to ignore 'anomalies' such as you describe, indicates a lack of understanding—and your agenda. There's nothing any climate scientist wants more than to improve the accuracy of their models.

    Here's more reading.  And more; and more.

  7. The Scientific Method

    Here are some entertaining and often enlightening quotes on scientific method.

  8. The Scientific Method

    A good riff on "science is what scientists do" is by Dan Berger.

  9. The two epochs of Marcott and the Wheelchair

    This discussion has been cited by Andrew Revkin in his Dot Earth post, Fresh Thoughts from Authors of a Paper on 11,300 Years of Global Temperature Changes

  10. The Scientific Method

    You write, "..what good is it if no one knows of the results?" The reality is the result.

    The chief characteristic which distinguishes the scientific method from other methods of acquiring knowledge is that scientists seek to let reality speak for itself.

    This specific attribute regarding the scientific method sets it apart from all the other sciences.

    GCMs are the creations of necessity to prove the hypothesis of AGW. The results of those models fall short of actual reality, concluding in a less than certain hypothesis. If the GCMs can't accurately predict the resulting evidence of actuality, maybe the models need to take into consideration other phenomena previously omitted from them.

    Climatologists, in defense of their models, either blame weather patterns for less than perfect predictions, or others simply confess that these weather anomalies is a result of a theory, despite their hypothesis.

    In order to strengthen the predictions of their hypothesis, these anomalies previously omitted from GCMs, should be concluded.

    Those anomalies are jet stream currents, ENSO, UHI, and possibly Illuminosity.

    Climatologists need to change their hypothesis to allow predictions prove true, in order to mirror reality, rather than make excuses as to why their models failed in comparison to empirical data.

    Moderator Response: [DB] As an addendum to John Russell's comment below, please take further discussion of Climate models (it is noted you conflate weather models and climate models) to a more appropriate thread. Weather models are off-topic.
  11. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    MA Rodger:

    If you consider the simplest case, in which there is just one spectral band of interest for greenhouse functionality, the ΔT corresponds to the change in temperature due to the change in altitude of the OP=1 point; and the ΔF corresponds to the same temperature change, but restricted to the GH spectral band.

    Thus, if the altitudinal change is Δz and the adiabatic lapse rate is A:

    ΔT = A*Δz

    ΔF = [B(f,To) - B(f, To-ΔT)]*Δf

    where

    To = temperature at original OD=1 point

    f = center frequency of band

    Δf = width of band

    B(f, T) = Blackbody spectral density at frequency f and temperature T

    Now if Δf = infinity, the ΔF becomes the integral of [B(f, To) - B(f, To-ΔT)] and this would give the result you're proposing. But since Δf is just one IR subband, ΔF is much smaller than that.

    If you add more subbands, the situation becomes a bit more complicated, because the Δz for each subband will be in general different. So that will not bring the situation closer to what you're proposing.

  12. David Rose Hides the Rise in Global Warming

    David Rose is at it again. Same arguments, except maybe this time he attacked hindcasting more than he did the previous times; I don't remember.  He says hindcasting tailors the models to the temperatures. I submitted a corrective comment, but don't know if it will survive moderation over there.

  13. The two epochs of Marcott and the Wheelchair

    Marcott et al. have responded to their critics with an FAQ.

  14. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    nealjking @76.

    I have a feeling another look at what was said @65 and particularly its reference to comment@57 could be useful to this interchange we are having.

  15. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    MA Rodgers:

    The Stefan-Boltzmann formula is the integral of the Planck spectral energy distribution over frequency (with no weighting). But the issues that give rise to the greenhouse effect (different absorption coefficients in different frequency bands) are frequency-specific. So the treatment in terms of S-B does not have nearly the specificity to explain the GHE.

    Here's another way to see the point: The constants in the S-B equation, and therefore in your ΔF/ΔT equation, do NOT depend in any way on the composition of the atmosphere. So if the equation were valid, it would be valid for any value of the concentrations; including 0 for the GHGs. But then there would be forcing with no GHGs, which is a contradiction.

    What determines the loss of radiated flux are the temperature differences at specific frequency absorption bands (due to the change in altitude of the critical point where optical depth = 1); using the Planck distribution, this gives the change in spectral density, which is integrated over the region of the spectrum that is absorbed by the GHGs. But the temperature difference for a particular band will depend on the GHG's absorption frequencies and concentration, and will differ from band to band. The total change in flux determines the radiative forcing.

  16. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    nealjking@69:  I would still like Sks readers to be open to the possibility that the Economist article is a subtle kind of 'hit piece' designed to leverage the magazines well-known reputation for balance on behalf of climate deniers.  As I detailed, the author makes the point he wants to leave readers with in his first sentence.  His LAST sentence is just there for 'plausible deniability': so he can claim 'balance' when confronted.  Maybe I'm innacurate in this, but I've seen it done before. The overall tone of the piece is to project doubt about climate science.  But as I've said elsewhere the REAL remaining doubt about global warming is in the costs of mitigation, damage, and adaptation.  This is not trivial: if the cost of mitigation is as low as I've seen it estimated, then it frankly DOESN'T MATTER whether the climate sensitivity is 2C or 4C: we should mitigate.  Can 'The Economist' tackle that ECONOMIC issue?  As it is, it seems to have a serious case of pointing out the grain in someone elses eye while missing the log in its own eye.

  17. helenavargas at 03:09 AM on 1 April 2013
    The Scientific Method

    When I introduced undergrads to the scientific method, I used to emphasize the iterative nature of the process:  tests of hypotheses may lead to theories, but the testing continues.  That in turn may require reformulated hypotheses, but even those aren't worth much if they can't be tested and survive testing.  I wanted to emphasize that science isn't an ideology (accepted for faith once and for all time) but a process of approaching the best representations of facts in nature.  Pseudo-skeptics accuse scientists of the same kind of faith that religionists praise, and I tried to do my bit to defuse that idea.

  18. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    nealjking @70
    You say "...the Stefan-Boltzmann formula for total blackbody radiation power is not applicable in the context of the enhanced greenhouse effect."

    Yet:-

    (1) Temperature increases in a zero-feedback-world are said to be easier to quantify.

    (2) That zero-feedback quantification appears to me to utilise the S-B formula, but for some reason that use is not very apparent. (I'm sure it used to be more apparent but now a search of the web turns up pages of denialists saying S-B is no good with zero reference to who it is they are having a go at for thinking otherwise.)

    (1) Non-feedback sensitivity is easier. According to AR4 - "While the direct temperature change that results from greenhouse gas forcing can be calculated in a relatively straightforward manner, uncertain atmospheric feedbacks (Section 8.6) lead to uncertainties in estimates of future climate change."

    And TAR - "In other words, the radiative forcing corresponding to a doubling of the CO2 concentration would be 4 Wm-2. To counteract this imbalance, the temperature of the surface-troposphere system would have to increase by 1.2°C (with an accuracy of ±10%), in the absence of other changes."

    A value of ECS-with-feedback ±10% is something we can today only dream of and this being so, I would suggest that, whatever the method which yields this non-feedback sensitivity, it should be more widely known, if for no other reason than to bash denialists with.

     

    (2) Does that method use the S-B formula? The S-B formula does give a ~1°C which is encouraging. And dodging all the denialists, I did find Roe & Baker 2007 who have a Suppliment where they use S-B to enumerate λo for use in a model which includes feedbacks.

    And the RF emissions from Earth are of the form of blackbody radiation, although highly motheaten. If a GHG increases to take another bite, I see no fundamental problem why the RF reaction wouldn't be as a blackbody all the way down to surface temperature.

    Of course this is nowhere definitive but I feel there is enough weight to counter your assertion of 'S-B non-applicability'  by saying  - The planet may not be a blackbody but it apparently behaves enough like one for ΔTs with zero-feedback to be derived from S-B and so it is likely that is how it is derived.

  19. David Kirtley at 01:44 AM on 1 April 2013
    Back from the Dead: Lost Open Mind Posts

    Also, the link at Oct 19, 2007: IPC projection falsified is actually for Oct 19, 2008.

    Moderator Response: [DB] Fixed; thanks!
  20. The Scientific Method

    The link to the textbook fails and there's a font problem with "The four steps above form the basis of a scientific inquiry; they constitute a simple model for the scientific method. One possible sequence is 1, 2, 3, and 4. If 2 is true, what are the consequences? Testing (4) should include considering the opposite of each consequence in order to disprove 2. If 2 can be disproved, then start again with step 1."

    Moderator Response: [DB] Fixed; thanks!
  21. 2013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #13

    chriskoz:

    Also check out the Climate Institute's report, Global Climate Leadership Review 2013, for addtional details about the LCCI.

    Note: The article, Asia cuts its carbon faster than Europe summarizes the findings of this report.    

  22. 2013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #13

    chirskoz:

    The article, Asia cuts its carbon faster than Europe, contains the following paragraph:

    The report, the Climate Institute/GE Low-Carbon Competitiveness Index, published by the Climate Institute, was first released in 2009. This year’s edition relies on data from 2010.

    I have quickly perused the website of the Carbon Institute for a definition of the Low-Carbon Competitiveness Index (LCCI). The definition I found is embedded in the news release, Australia alone in low-carbon competitiveness slide posted on Mach 19, 2012.

    The (LCCI) index measures carbon competitiveness through the examination of nearly 20 indicators in three areas: sectoral composition (historical snapshot of current economy – e.g. transport, trade emissions intensity); early preparedness (e.g. investment in clean energy, growth in emissions); and future prosperity (e.g. investment in education and infrastructure).

    The compilation of the LCCI is a joint effort between the Carbon Institute and GE Australia and New Zealand.  

  23. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    Using a generous and simple 30-year linear for thickness (PIOMAS/CTSIA), I have winter max eventually moving to mid-February with ice finally disappearing on February 11th, 2076.  The 10-year linear has it in 2047 on March the 12th.  No, I'm not putting money on either.  I just can't see an ice-free Arctic year-round, unless we hit 600ppm and stay there for a while.  Yet I speak from within the momentum of my own culture.  It's hard to imagine what general circulation changes will occur when ice is just beginning to form in December, and harder to imagine what those changes will mean for the further (lack of) development of the ice. 

  24. 2013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #13

    The first article just mentions that China overtook Germany & UK in "Low-Carbon Competitiveness Index" and is placed third while Germany and UK fell to places 6 & 5. And that US rates bad: no score, apparently out of competition.

    I cannot find what that LCCI means, so I have no perspective on this rather surprising news, because the popular believe is to blame China on increased emissions, that grow still faster than the renewables, period. I would like to see some analysis of that LCCI, particularly the most interesting numbers: what dent it makes in each contry's emissions now and/or how does it influence the prognosis of future emissions.

  25. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    CraigD@21

    Iteresting question, I haven't heard any prognosis about zero WIM. Looking at PIOMAS death spiral, with full rotation of 36y, it will have taken ~40y for the summer ice to reach zero (I agree with you and Maslowski on that). By that time, it looks like WIM will be at the point where summer min has started. So my wild guess is: it'll take another ~40y if the process continues at the same speed.

    So my  wild, uneducated guess for zero WIM is: 50y. Interesting indeed, as it may be within the lifetime of some of us. Anyone wants to make another/better guess?

    How does it influence the IS melting? Does it make sense in context of SLR rate? Yes IS melt should increase (some 10 times on average from their current contribution of 1mm/y), to fullfil the predistion of ~1m SLR by 2100 the semi-empirical models. Such increase makes sense to me.

  26. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    shoyemore:

    The most explicit derivation of the EGHE that I have seen personally is at the end of John Houghton's The Physics of Atmospheres; however, the derivation is effectively scattered through the book, partially in exercises.

    The explanation I gave above is from Pierrehumbert's book, but since I have only an early draft of the book, I don't know if he derives the entire formula explicitly; but he probably does.

    It's unfortunate that Weart's website, The Discovery of Global Warming, side-steps the derivation: I think he decided it was too hard to present.

  27. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    MA Rodger,

    The equation cited (in some form or other) goes all the way back to Svante Arrhenius (1896), who wrote (see his bio on Wikipedia): If the quantity of carbonic acid ... increases in geometric progression, the augmentation of the temperature will increase nearly in arithmetic progression.

    I underlined "nearly" so I presume Arrhenius derived the relationship from his observations, and knew it was only approximately true.

    The place I encountered the equation was on page 36 of David Archer's Global Warming: Understanding the Forecast , where he stated it applied to long-term equilibrium changes only. Nielson-Gammon used it in a short-term context with a "transient" value for K.

    Most websites dealing with this topic, like Science of Doom, go straight to the radiation physics.

    Is there a way to derive this approximate relationship from the radiative transfer laws?

  28. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    I posted a comment about two hours ago and although it was visible initially it has now been disappeared.  Is this due to snippage or should I post again?

    Moderator Response: [DB] The moderator on duty at that time deemed it too far off-topic.
  29. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    MA Rodger:

    I mean the Stefan-Boltzmann formula for total blackbody radiation power is not applicable in the context of the enhanced greenhouse effect.

  30. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    ubrew12:

    #61: You start off complaining that the author left his point to the end: "But there's a reason for that placement: how many readers make it to the END of such an article?"

    #68: Later, you point out that he made his point in his first sentence: "The author made his point in his first sentence."

    Which is it?

    All I'm pointing out, as I subscriber who reads The Economist every week, is that their articles are frequently written in such a fashion that you need to read to the very end to get the picture.

    Does that make it a bit harder to digest their articles? Yes, it does. But they've been in publcation since 1843, so I guess they think they know what they're doing.

  31. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    nealjking@66 - I think Economist readers are like any other.  The author made his point in his first sentence.

  32. 2013 SkS News Bulletin #5: Alberta Tar Sands and Keystone XL Pipeline

    Thanks, Chris & John. The reason I didn't publish it here is that it was a little bit too political and opinionated for Skeptical Science norms.

    Michael Tobis and Dan Moutal have a great blog going at Planet 3.0, with a slightly different focus than SkS, with more discussion on sutainable technologies and cultures, but with the same overall goal: promoting understanding and solutions on climate change. I urge all SkS regulars to check it out.

  33. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    Interesting. I had no idea that La Nina and El Nino had such impact on sea levels. However, I expect that after the Arctic goes ice free in summers after about 2017-2020, the Greenland Ice Sheet melting will accelerate significantly. With the Arctic ice gone the summer sun will warm the Arctic Ocean. The warming of the Arctic Ocean will also accelerate at more ice is lost, and the time of no ice lengthens. With this, the Arctic will warm considerably over its current state. As the Arctic warms, the Arctic Winter Ice Maximum will decrease. Now the big question is how long will it be before the Winter Ice Maximum reaches zero? As the WIM decreases each year, Greenland will melt more and more ice. It is going to get interesting. 

  34. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    MA Rodger:

    I don't believe the equation

    ΔF/ΔT = 4σT^3

    has much relevance in this context. The blackbody spectral radiation formula is not applicable in the context of the greenhouse effect.

  35. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    Philp Cohen - Duly noted. I think a tweak is all that's required.

    Nichol - depending on the time frame under consideration, there can actually be a net gain, or net loss, of moisture from the continents. There doesn't seem to be any long-term trend over multiple decades - See Ngo-Duc (2005) linked to in the blog post - but for any given decade the trend can vary. From 2002-2009 , for instance, there has been  a net gain in continental water mass equivalent to a fall in global sea level of around 0.2 mm per year (Jensen [2013]). Not that surprising given the ENSO trend.

  36. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    ubrew12:

    Articles in The Economist are frequently not designed along the well-known journalistic "upside-down pyramid" approach: It is often the case that you have to read to the end to get the point.

  37. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    Count me as another who misread the title and considers a vivid, memorable metaphor a bad thing if it inclines you to remember a falsehood. The recent rise is a speed bump-up, not a speed bump. Metaphor aside, good piece.

  38. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    Still open to a better metaphor.


    Snakes and Ladders.

  39. To frack or not to frack?

    gws:

    With all due repect, the title of your OP is all-encompassing with repsect to the upsides and downsides of fracking. Futhermore, there is no other article posted on SkS that addresses fracking and water impacts.

  40. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    Looks like if there will be more rain, there is an argument for more effort in keeping that water on land, or replenish ground-water reserves. More dams, even more so where water can 'leak away' into underground aquifers. In stead of returning to the oceans.  I imagine that in the past such locations for dams have been avoided?

  41. To frack or not to frack?

    "Do any of you know what chemicals go into fracking?"

    thanks for asking: here's the ones the industry *admits* to.

     

    http://fracfocus.org/chemical-use/what-chemicals-are-used

    Methanol? Formic acid? Potassium hydroxide? Trust your well water to thousands of oil and gas wells going through your aquifer? Not me, not yet.

  42. David Kirtley at 08:40 AM on 31 March 2013
    Back from the Dead: Lost Open Mind Posts

    I was able to get to a "still missing" tamino post:  Oct 5, 2007 Wait for it...

    Moderator Response: [DB] Added, thanks!
  43. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    Shoyemore @63

    Your equation is of course mathematically identical to the equation @43.

    The question asked (or was it a demand) by elsa about an equation linking ΔCO2 with ΔT first appeared @38 - “Perhaps, since you say that the link between CO2 and temperature is derived from physics, you can tell us what the equation is that links the two and how it is derived?” - itself prompted by the statement @24 - “Both the models and how CO2 affects temperatures are entirely derived from physics.” So the question was a bit presumptious.

    The insistence on a single 'equation' kind of rules out addressing the model aspect but the CO2-temperature relationship when shorn of feedbacks can be reduced to that anticipated single equasion. Half of it I rather cheekily presented @57, the half which yields ΔF. From it with the derivative of the Stephan-Boltzman eqn (pretty much a constant for small changes in T) ΔT can be derived.

                                                          ΔF/ΔT = 4σT3

    This is all such straightforward stuff that usually just the result from it is quoted. A link to point folk at might be good but I cannot say that I know of one.

  44. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    ubrew12:

    Articles in The Economist are frequently not designed along the well-known journalistic "upside-down pyramid" approach: It is often the case that you have to read to the end to get the point.

  45. To frack or not to frack?

    @10: Who is your comment addressed to?

    The post does not address the fracking&water issue and was not intended to. Please take discussions of the water issue to other venues. I know the issues cannot be completely seperated, that this discussion should be not morphing into one not related to the post topic.

  46. Skeptical Science Firefox Add-on: Send and receive climate info while you browse

    I'm having trouble signing in with the Firefox add-on. I type my username and password, click "log in" but nothing happens... Same thing happens with version 12 and 19 of the Firefox. Any suggestions?

  47. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    Elsa, @55

    ∆T = K Ln(CO2final/CO2initial)"/Ln(2), where Ln(.) is the natural log function.

    If you can use Excel, it should be easy for you to download one of the temperature records, and the CO2 Mauna Loa series since 1958.

    Plot ∆T since 1959 against the right hand function and come up with a rough estimate for K, or at least the transient K for a non-equilibrium situation.

    John Niesen-Gammon has a good post here about this equation.

    http://blog.chron.com/climateabyss/2012/10/carbon-dioxide-and-temperature/

  48. Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level

    Speedbumps works well for me - a temporary slowing often followed by an aggressive acceleration. In reality there's often a futility to the few speedbumps that get built, they provide a false sense of security and stop people looking at the bundle of measures needed to actually cut traffic speed to a safe level.

  49. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    Sphaerica - Not only are most of Elsa's posts offtopic, but Elsa is persistantly repeating false statements from who knows where, without any supporting evidence. We are replying with papers and links that as far as I can see are being simply ignored. Ignorance is excusable - we are all ignorant of many parts of sciene - but wilful ignorance isn't/ This appears to be sloganeering and I would hope moderators would take a stronger line in demanding substantiation of claim (in the appropriate thread).

    Moderator Response: [DB] Indeed, much latitude has been given in the now-vain hope that elsa would have something substantive to offer to support her assertions. Until that new materiel is forthcoming, no further diversions to the OP of this thread will be permitted.
  50. Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective

    'Location, location, location'  Many commenters on this thread have mentioned that the author of the Economist hit-piece somewhat redeems himself by mentioning in the article's last paragraph the potential of a 4 C rise, which is 'hardly reassuring'.  But there's a reason for that placement: how many readers make it to the END of such an article?  

     

    To recount: "OVER the past 15 years air temperatures at the Earth’s surface have been flat"  This is the very first sentence, the one most likely to be read and retained by readers.  No provisional, like "of course, in the past 20 years, the surface temperature anomaly has almost doubled".  This could literally be the second sentence of his article: why isn't it?

    The second section is titled 'The insensitive planet'.  If you were just skimming this piece, what message would you take away from that title?

    The third section is title 'New Model Army'.  This section makes it very clear that there is a 'war going on' between the [possibly communist] IPCC and a 'New Army' of rambunctious young Scientists who are all converging on a sensitivity of 1-2 C.  Who will win?  Unsure, but we know who is losing: "the chances of climate sensitivity above 4.5°C become vanishingly small"

    There's 'obviously' a war going on in the climate science community, so why take action before 'they' resolve it?  As the fourth section is titled, there are 'Clouds of Uncertainty' on this whole subject.  Could the lack of recent atmospheric heating be due to better ocean heating?  The author: "Perhaps it lies in the oceans. But here, too, facts get in the way"  and there is a graph of the surface ocean ALSO not heating.  Again, if you're skimming this material, THAT'S the graph you're going to see, with its ready-made conclusion: Nope, its not the oceans.  Now the author produces the caveat that maybe warming is going into the deep ocean.  Or maybe not, since according to the author, that is "obscure". 

    In the section titled 'Double A-minus', the author directs the reader to sources of natural atmospheric heating, like the recent paper by Tung and Zhou.  It should be obvious that the ONLY reason this flawed paper deserves to be singled out is its use of the word 'natural'.  That's a very important word to the 'doubt is our product' crowd.

    All of this fresh doubt piled on IPCC's 3 C sensitivity leads to this statement, which Rupert Murdoch's 'The Australian' newsmagazine chose to lead off with: "If climate scientists were credit-rating agencies, climate sensitivity would be on negative watch".  Because, as we all know from the housing bubble, credit-rating agencies are the gold standard when it comes to understanding value...

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