I thought weather was not the same thing as climate? And obviously everyone starved before weather forecasting.US farmers must be totally ignoring all those weather forecasts that are not 100% correct and definitely not real time.That would explain the millions of starving people in the US!
Climate Science: Is it currently designed to answer questions?
- Thread starter Poptech
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lomiller
Penultimate Amazing
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Poptech since you seem to have a very different view of what computer modeling is then,well anyone, perhaps you should provide a detailed description of what you *think* computer modeling is. Without that, your posts come across as gibberish, since no one knows what you are trying to say.
Reality Check
Penultimate Amazing
Weather and climate forecasting both use computer models that are not 100% accurate.
Weather and climate forecasting both use computer models that are not calculated in real time.
If climate forecasting is wrong because it uses computer models that are not 100% accurate and in real time then weather forecasting is also wrong. If that is your reason for ignoring climate forecasts then you must also want to ignore weather forecasts.
Why do you want to ignore climate forecasts again?
The use of computer models for any purpose is complex since there are several source of possible errors, e.g.
- Hardware errors, a floating point chip that implements the wrong algorithm for an operation.
- Software errors, e.g. a programmer thinking that an array starts at 1 when it starts at 0.
- Implementation errors, e.g. the scientific model states that for these range of parameters, this law should be used but the computer model is implemented with a different set of criteria because the scientific model was not understood.
Weather forecasting is frequently wrong, especially after more then a day.
Weather forecasting actually uses real time data which is why there is very limited accuracy short term. They are still wrong in detail and especially long term. Tracking real time data and making short term predictions of this data is useful. But the length of the usefulness is the problem. This is also different than Climate Modeling.
Computers are excellent tools to compile and analyze data on. But long term predictions are worthless.
Here is Katrina 3 Days before it hit. It should say "we have no freaking idea".
Weather forecasting actually uses real time data which is why there is very limited accuracy short term. They are still wrong in detail and especially long term. Tracking real time data and making short term predictions of this data is useful. But the length of the usefulness is the problem. This is also different than Climate Modeling.
Computers are excellent tools to compile and analyze data on. But long term predictions are worthless.
Here is Katrina 3 Days before it hit. It should say "we have no freaking idea".
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Reality Check
Penultimate Amazing
Everyone knows this. So what?
Everyone doesn't know that. We most certainly had more than "no freaking idea" as Poptech claimed. I was extremely confident that it wasn't going to affect me here in Phoenix, Arizona. Poptech said that models "cannot predict anything." That is simply untrue unless by "predict" he means "forecast with 100% accuracy." If that's the case, I don't disagree. I also find it irrelevant since 100% accuracy isn't required.
100% accuracy is required for relevant results. But weather models are tracking real time data and essentially just extrapolating basic weather movement, cloud cover, rain ect... Long term weather modeling is where it becomes laughable. Climate models are attempting to simulate the climate and give temperature projections 100 years from now. Total nonsense.
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Reality Check
Penultimate Amazing
That is right:
Short term (days) weather modeling is acurrate enough to use.
But long term (weeks) weather modeling is really inaccurate because it tries to predict on a local scale.
But this is where a difference beween weather and climate modeling comes in: Climate modeling is making predictions on a global scale.
Short term (years) climate modeling is acurrate enough to use.
But long term (centuries) climate modeling is really inaccurate, especially since the best test of a climate model is fitting existing data from previous years.
Temperature projections 100 years from now are not nonsense but are doubtful.
Temperature projections 100years from now are expected to be accurate (given that the same models match the temperature data of 10 years ago).
IMHO
Any prediction from a climate model for dates > 100 years in the future is extremely doubtful.
Any prediction from a climate model for dates > 50 years in the future needs to be taken with a grain of salt.
All other predictions are as reliable as the climate model. But you of course never rely on a single climate model.
If the majority of climate models have the same predictions then we can be confident that they are correct. We do not expect 100% accuracy because of the complex nature of climate and climate modeling.
What is useful is real time data extrapolated VERY short term (1 day). The modeling of it short or long term is useless. Just because eveybody uses weather forecasts does not make them accurate. Weather forecasts are constantly inaccurate. I just look at real time data to see what is going on now and make educated guesses very short term.
That is a fallacy. I have no idea why people believe this. You cannot manipulate how a computer works by calling code "climate" and redefine "short term" to fit what you want it to be.
The big joke is that running multiple wrong computer simulations will give more accurate results. Total nonsense.
If the climate is 100% understood then every climate model should be identical and every run 100% identical. And if it is not understood (it isn't) the models will be wrong. Besides the fact that they are not a 100% perfect real time simulator of the earth. There is nothing real time about any of them.
It is amazing how clueless people are with computer systems. It must be because a bunch of clueless scientists waste a lot of time on them and they get millions in grant money they must be right!
Pleading ignorance does not make the climate model code any more right when they are all 100% wrong. All the modelers do is constantly make excuses and change the code. The whole thing is a joke. AGW is based on computer illiteracy.
ROFLMAO! If 5 idiots all agree they must be right!
I had no idea how bad this was. No wonder everyone thinks the world is coming to an end.
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MattusMaximus
Intellectual Gladiator
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Poptech, did we not go over this in a similar thread before you got suspended? This is the Science subforum, so if you want to criticize something in regards to the AGW consensus within the scientific community, then please make a scientific argument. Then we can scrutinize your scientific arguments and have an appropriate discussion.
To go on and on about this other stuff is completely counter-productive. What you're doing is nothing more than spewing politics, and, ironically, you are just as guilty of the kind of behavior of which you are accusing others on the other side of the climate change issue. If you want to keep going on this line of argumentation, take it to the Politics subforum.
Otherwise, start talking about some science. If you refuse to discuss things appropriately, don't be surprised if very few here take you seriously.
Matt did I ask for your opinion? No I don't think I ever had. Politics and AGW are one and the same, in case you missed the discussion for the last 20 years.
Don't take me seriously - I don't care. Just become educated about the "alleged" scientific objectivity of RealClimate.org. There are plenty of people who have no idea.
Don't take me seriously - I don't care. Just become educated about the "alleged" scientific objectivity of RealClimate.org. There are plenty of people who have no idea.
MattusMaximus
Intellectual Gladiator
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Wrong. Ever heard of a little thing called probability? Nothing in any kind of experimental or empirical science is 100% - that is the very nature of uncertainty.
And you can get a lot of relevant data out of a model even without 100% accuracy - we do this all the time in all realms of science. In fact, we use models of all kinds to provide a meaningful replica and/or explanation of reality - in most, if not all, cases our models are never 100% accurate reflections of what they're trying to describe, because if they were 100% accurate then we wouldn't be using a model, we'd be using reality. The entire reason we use a model in the first place is to attempt to describe & explain a reality which is, for lack of a better phrase, too big and/or complex for us to otherwise grasp.
You seem to be setting the bar for computer-generated climate modeling unrealistically high in an effort to discredit all of climate change science. That, and you are displaying an appalling ignorance of modeling in science.
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MattusMaximus
Intellectual Gladiator
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Too bad, like it or not, you have my opinion.
Well, I will agree with Athon's earlier point that one cannot totally separate science from politics (or vice versa), but you seem to want to unnecessarily muddle the two to the point that you are clearly proceeding from a preconceived political bias and allowing that to color everything regarding the science of climate change.
It's funny that you act as if that website is the only source of information regarding climate change science
Reality Check
Penultimate Amazing
Weather forecasts are generally considered to be useful up to about 5 days. Next day forecasts can be quite accuate, e.g. the UK Met Office target was ~82% for temperature in 2008.
No one calls code "climate". That seems to be your delusion.
Please give your evidence that every or even a majority) of computer models are wrong.
Otherwise you are just spouting total nonsence.
Have you ever read anything about climate and climate models?
Even if we know everything about climate the physics means that we will never be 100% accurate. The fact that we do not know everything about a system does not mean that the models that we use to understand it are wrong. All it means is that the results are not accurate and need testing. Climate models are tested by checking that they reproduce past climates.
What do you mean by "real time"? One day of processing time to produce a forecast for a day?
Why is a non-real time computer simulation not correct?
Who is pleading ignorance?
Now it sounds like your previous conspiracy theory stuff: all computer modelers are AGW stooges and have been changing the code to falsify their results
!Please cite your evidence that all climate model code is 100% wrong.
I am sure that you can give us links to the many published papers listing them.
That is just stupid name calling.
If hundreds of competent, intelligent scientists in various groups agree then they are probably right.
DarthFishy
Graduate Poster
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As a computer scientist (it seems credentials are important when it comes to AGW), I find the idea that we need 100% accurate input into a computer model to get anything useful out of it ludicrous.
As an example consider a poker playing AI (i.e. a computer program modeling a poker game and using the model's results to make predictions). Now the input into the model is obviously not 100% accurate (unsure what cards the other players have or what cards will still be drawn). Even so the AI, using probabilities based on previous observations (e.g. probability of drawing an Ace), can model possible scenarios and predict possible results.
Sure the model won't be 100% accurate, but it would have some degree of accuracy.
Let's say then after playing 1000 games (assume with the same deck) it is observed that there is a slightly higher probability that Aces will be drawn instead of any other card. Then we adjust the AI's model and test the results. If after another 1000 games we find that the AI is playing better we can assume that our assumption of a higher likelihood of Aces being drawn is correct (or at least highly likely).
The AI will never be 100% correct, but with enough accurate information fed into it, it will win more than it will lose.
It should be obvious that the same holds for the climate models:
(1) We observe climate changes.
(2) We model them (whether in a computer system or not)
(3) We generate predictions.
(4) We test the predictions against observations of the real world.
(5) We adapt our model. (back to step 2).
Explain to me where the flaw is in this?
As an example consider a poker playing AI (i.e. a computer program modeling a poker game and using the model's results to make predictions). Now the input into the model is obviously not 100% accurate (unsure what cards the other players have or what cards will still be drawn). Even so the AI, using probabilities based on previous observations (e.g. probability of drawing an Ace), can model possible scenarios and predict possible results.
Sure the model won't be 100% accurate, but it would have some degree of accuracy.
Let's say then after playing 1000 games (assume with the same deck) it is observed that there is a slightly higher probability that Aces will be drawn instead of any other card. Then we adjust the AI's model and test the results. If after another 1000 games we find that the AI is playing better we can assume that our assumption of a higher likelihood of Aces being drawn is correct (or at least highly likely).
The AI will never be 100% correct, but with enough accurate information fed into it, it will win more than it will lose.
It should be obvious that the same holds for the climate models:
(1) We observe climate changes.
(2) We model them (whether in a computer system or not)
(3) We generate predictions.
(4) We test the predictions against observations of the real world.
(5) We adapt our model. (back to step 2).
Explain to me where the flaw is in this?
a_unique_person
Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning
I have worked as a computer programmer, and at first I wondered how they thought they could get anything useful from trying to predict the climate up to 100 years in the future. Then I read up on what they are actually doing, and what they aren't trying to do.
They aren't trying to predict the weather in 100 years time, that is impossible. They are just taking the 'ingredients' of the climate, using the known physics of the systems in the climate, and coming up with a resulting state. Run this for 100 simulated years. The day to day weather, the PDO, won't happen as predicted, but the overall mix will approximate the 'average' state during the run. This can be verified by running the models for known temperature records.
I have no doubt at all that the precision is problematic, but it gives us an idea of what happens when you start adding CO2 to the mix.
The models are also useful for understanding the past climate, so we can attribute how much change is due to CO2, and how much to other forcings.
Belz...
Fiend God
I don't recall reading that.
You certainly should think for yourself on those issues, but you shouldn't think that the conclusions you come to personally trump those of people who work in this field on a daily basis.
For instance, I can come to a conclusion about a pain in my stomach area, but it might be better to see and trust a doctor about it.
Belz...
Fiend God
Then I submit there is no relevant result in any field, by this criterion.
macdoc
Philosopher
An exemplar for the interchange between observation and modelling....
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702140835.htm
snip
"all models are wrong some models are useful"
this one could be useful
•••
regarding the OP statement......
Yes climate science addresses intelligent questions.....
some assembly of knowledge required...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702140835.htm
snip
"all models are wrong some models are useful"
this one could be useful
•••
regarding the OP statement......
Yes climate science addresses intelligent questions.....
some assembly of knowledge required...
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a_unique_person
Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning
We are still puzzling over gravity. We don't know exactly how it works, and space probes leaving the solar system are moving at the wrong speed, by a small amount.