Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[CapelDodger]

Conspiracy theorists focus on anomalies. Fact is that if you look at enough email from anybody you can find something they said that you can present out of context and use for a CT.

Indeed. Any amount of data can be ignored by the dedicated CT'er while they demand precise answers to "what about this then, eh?", where "this" is one more pathetic thing after another, and any number of questions posed by rational people can be held off until their demands are met.

It is a hallmark of people of low intelligence that they cannot tolerate incomplete knowledge, and they confabulate to finish painting the picture.

It's not so much a matter of low intelligence as the way intelligence is applied. People of low intelligence are happy with a cartoon. People of high intelligence can be wedded to a belief system and fill in their own picture from prejudice and what they're fed by middle-rank intellects who know what buttons to press.

Some deniers are obviously stupid - Anthony Watts is the prime example. Others have psychological problems - the swivel-eyed Viscount, for instance. Many will deny for pay - Singer, Morano, whoever stole the emails. Some deny for attention - Curry. Believers in any of them are dupes.

 

[Giordano]

What source do you now dismiss out of hand? James Taylor?:

"I am senior fellow for environment policy at the Heartland Institute and managing editor of Environment & Climate News. I write about energy and environment issues, frequently focusing on global warming. I have presented environmental analysis on CNN, CNN Headline News, CBS Evening News, MSNBC, Fox News Channel, and several national radio programs. My environmental analysis has been published in virtually every major newspaper in the United States. I studied atmospheric science and majored in government at Dartmouth College. I obtained my Juris Doctorate from Syracuse University."

From what I can tell in researching this, James Taylor's experience is entirely in law and political lobbying. Not clear what "studied atmospheric science" means, but his major was government. If he even took one class on meteorology is not clear from what I found. Certainly he is not a climate scientist, not even a climate science undergraduate. Appears to have focused on law and policy from a strongly conservative perspective since obtaining his law degree. Heartland Institute has received $676,500 dollars from ExxonMobil for their work.Heartland's Governemnt Relations Advisor, Buchholtz, is an ExxonMobil executive. http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=41

Darn straight I dismiss his views!

The AGW deniers believe that all the scientists are lying, creating this enormous pro-AGW conspiracy because they want the grant money, but believe ExxonMobil and similar organizations, because they, not the scientists, are committed to the truth. Sure...

By the way- most grant money pays for the research, not the scientist's salaries. Many of the AGW deniers make it sound like the scientist's take the cash home to build hot tubs.

 

[Trakar]

He has behaved rationally in the past, and it seems fairly obvious that he's got into climate woo just to get the GOP nomination (and, perhaps, reclaim the party). In his character, he appears to be a manager and climate will be throwing up more things which need managing in the next few years. This is no lazy, proudly-ignorant frat-boy like Bush.

So Mitt Romney might not be so bad. (Sure, he'd be called a Socialist Anti-Christ on health and climate, but it'll be hard to make that stick.) At the very least it's not certain that he would be awful, anyway .

I recall the same arguments about the "frat-boy" prior to his election. Anyone that would compromise rationality and factual understanding to get elected in the name of the irrational and extremist,...can't be trusted to rediscover his inner adult and do the right thing in the bubble that is the white house.

 

[lomiller]

Oh really? So you would say it's more dramatic now than tropical vegetation under the ice near the poles?

The current rate of warming is ~ 2 Deg C per century.

Warming at the end of the last glaciation was ~6 deg C over 5000 years.

IOW the earth is warming at a rate nearly 20X faster than it does at the end of an ice age. I’d say that qualifies as dramatic warming.

 

[lomiller]

The tobacco industry denied the link between smoking and lung cancer for decades. They even payed people to wilfully obfuscate and misrepresent the overwhelming scientific evidence for that link, and plenty of smokers who really wanted it not to be true were only too happy to believe them.

Sound familiar?

Some of those same people are now paid by the same political groups to deny global warming. Eg Fred Singer .

 

[Venom]

I may be beating a dead horse, or perhaps beating the skeleton of a horse under 6 feet of dirt, but please bear with me.

There was an exchange I remember a while back when a user named Diamond insisted that CO2 levels were following periods of warming in congruence with "every ice core sample" yet tested.

And the "hockey stick" results were apparently invalid, including Mann's, because they were all using the same program which made the hockey stick "mistake".

Need an explanation or link back to the page? thanks.

 

[Trakar]

I may be beating a dead horse, or perhaps beating the skeleton of a horse under 6 feet of dirt, but please bear with me.

There was an exchange I remember a while back when a user named Diamond insisted that CO2 levels were following periods of warming in congruence with "every ice core sample" yet tested.

And the "hockey stick" results were apparently invalid, including Mann's, because they were all using the same program which made the hockey stick "mistake".

Need an explanation or link back to the page? thanks.

Context and links are always appreciated,...but, roughly, it looks like the "lagging" argument. Yes, in many naturally forced episodes of climate change atmospheric CO2 ratios do respond to the warmings due to other sources in which case the CO2 is acting as a feedback mechanism rather than a forcing mechanism. This isn't however, always the case (PETM for example).

 

[Trakar]

The current rate of warming is ~ 2 Deg C per century.

I believe we are actually a little over that - on average - currently, somewhere around .3°C/decade IIRC, it would just be a nit if it weren't steadily increasing.

Warming at the end of the last glaciation was ~6 deg C over 5000 years.

IOW the earth is warming at a rate nearly 20X faster than it does at the end of an ice age. I’d say that qualifies as dramatic warming.

I'll pop up a reference when I run across it.

 

[Mikemcc]

I may be beating a dead horse, or perhaps beating the skeleton of a horse under 6 feet of dirt, but please bear with me.

There was an exchange I remember a while back when a user named Diamond insisted that CO2 levels were following periods of warming in congruence with "every ice core sample" yet tested.

And the "hockey stick" results were apparently invalid, including Mann's, because they were all using the same program which made the hockey stick "mistake".

Need an explanation or link back to the page? thanks.

In previous episodes of climate change the retreat of the ice caused release of GHG from the permafrost and the ocean. This caused GHG concentrations to lag the temperture rise, it was a feedback. In this instance we're about and throwing huge quantities of GHGs into the atmosphere, the CO2 increase is driving the temperature rise (though there is also a degree of positive feedback since the temperature rise also triggers a release of GHGs from permafrost, calthrate deposits, etc).

WRT to hockey stick myth the best bet is to point you here:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/broken-hockey-stick.htm

 

[bit_pattern]

.

WRT to hockey stick myth the best bet is to point you here:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/broken-hockey-stick.htm

It's amazing that people who deny climate science are so bereft of arguments that they are STILL obsessing over a single data set in one study from thirteen years ago which, despite it arguably having a few statistical failings, has been confirmed in the preceding 13 years by something like a dozen or so other temperature reconstructions, based on multiple different proxy indicators, that all show the same overall trend.

 

[BenBurch]

I may be beating a dead horse, or perhaps beating the skeleton of a horse under 6 feet of dirt, but please bear with me.

There was an exchange I remember a while back when a user named Diamond insisted that CO2 levels were following periods of warming in congruence with "every ice core sample" yet tested.

And the "hockey stick" results were apparently invalid, including Mann's, because they were all using the same program which made the hockey stick "mistake".

Need an explanation or link back to the page? thanks.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-lags-temperature.htm

 

[a_unique_person]

Souther Ocean absorbing a lot more heat than expected.

New research shows the Southern Ocean is storing more heat than any other ocean in the world.
The study, carried out by Tasmania's Antarctic Climate and Ecosystem centre, has found that carbon dioxide levels in the Southern Ocean will be corrosive to some shellfish by 2030 if current trends continue.
Scientists say deep moving currents around Antarctica are the reason why the Southern Ocean is warming faster than other oceans.
"The Southern Ocean occupies about 22 per cent of the area of the total ocean, and yet it absorbs about 40 per cent of the carbon dioxide that's stored by the ocean and about half the heat that's stored by the ocean," climate scientist Steve Rintoul says.
Dr Rintoul says the warming extends for four kilometres, from the ocean surface to the sea floor.
He says satellite measurements show the Southern Ocean has been warming by about 0.2 degrees Celsius per decade.
"One of the impacts of a warming ocean may be that the ice that flows off Antarctica into the ocean may melt more rapidly," he said.
"Once that ice reaches the ocean and is floating, if we melt it, it doesn't change the sea level because that ice is already floating, just like an ice cube in your drink, when it melts it doesn't cause the cup to overflow.

Audio: Southern Ocean warming faster than other oceans (AM)

"But what does happen is that as the ice floating around the edge of Antarctica thins and breaks up and disappears, the ice that's on the continent slides off the continent into the sea more rapidly, and that does increase sea level rise.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-11-29/southern-ocean-waters-warming/3700532

 

[Pixel42]

There was an exchange I remember a while back when a user named Diamond insisted that CO2 levels were following periods of warming in congruence with "every ice core sample" yet tested.

The explanation for this has been given, but here's a good link that goes into more detail:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-lags-temperature-intermediate.htm

 

[lomiller]

I may be beating a dead horse, or perhaps beating the skeleton of a horse under 6 feet of dirt, but please bear with me.

There was an exchange I remember a while back when a user named Diamond insisted that CO2 levels were following periods of warming in congruence with "every ice core sample" yet tested.

That’s the type of sound byte advocates of pseudoscience like to pull out no matter what topic. It’s designed to sound like it makes sense to the uninformed but doesn’t hold up to the actual science.

The short version is that CO2 and temperature are linked in a feedback loop so they will always move together but one or the other will always change first. Which one changes first is hint as to the source of the temperature change. The fingerprint of the natural climate change that causes a glaciations to begin/end is CO2 lagging the initial temperature change, while the fingerprint of human induced climate change is CO2 leading the temperature change. For the current change CO2 is leading, which indicates a man made cause.

The slightly longer version is that the orbital changes that cause glaciations are far too small to account for the energy involved in these events. They require amplification in the form of positive feedback loops in the system. The two main ones are ice albedo feedback and greenhouse gas feedback.
Initially changes in the Earth’s orbit cause more sunlight to fall in the northern hemisphere causing the large north American ice sheet to melt a little. This causes the planet to reflect less of the sunlight it receives, which warms it and causes even more melting and also releases trapped CO2. Releasing this trapped CO2 then causes the planet to warm even more, so it releases even more CO2 and reflects even less sunlight. This cycle continues until the planet reaches a new (quasi) equilibrium.

When all is said and done ~20% of the energy for ending the glaciations comes from reflecting less sunlight, and about 80% cones from greenhouse gasses like CO2 preventing infrared energy from leaving the atmosphere.

And the "hockey stick" results were apparently invalid, including Mann's, because they were all using the same program which made the hockey stick "mistake".

Need an explanation or link back to the page? thanks.

There was an error in the way one of the statistical procedures were applied in Mann’s 1998 paper but it fixing and even using different statistical procedures altogether didn’t change the result. There have been a dozen or so reconstructions since then all of which confirm Mann’s basic result.

This is how science works. Papers employing completely new methodologies are seldom perfect, but these methodologies get refined over time giving increasing confidence in the results, and that’s exactly what’s happened here. Paper after paper has confirmed Mann’s results with greater and greater confidence.

If you wanted to draw an analogy, it would be a little like creationists insisting errors in methodology used by early palaeontologists prove that the whole fossil record is false. It just doesn’t make sense.

 

[CapelDodger]

It's amazing that people who deny climate science are so bereft of arguments that they are STILL obsessing over a single data set in one study from thirteen years ago which, despite it arguably having a few statistical failings, has been confirmed in the preceding 13 years by something like a dozen or so other temperature reconstructions, based on multiple different proxy indicators, that all show the same overall trend.

Not so amazing when you consider how other cultists behave - focusing on one tiny issue (like a Truther with a video-clip) and making the issue only about that for their own comfort and what remains of their sanity. I remember varwoche pointing this out years ago, and of course they're still at it. If they can just bring down this one brick, and Michael Mann with it, it'll all go away and they will be vindicated!

There's a long tail to cults like AGW denial. We're the only people who pay much attention any more .

 

[Trakar]

I believe we are actually a little over that - on average - currently, somewhere around .3°C/decade IIRC, it would just be a nit if it weren't steadily increasing.

I'll pop up a reference when I run across it.

Well I've given it a more thorough look-see and I now don't see what I was remembering, ...perhaps I was confusing a land surface temperature rate increase with a global rate. I'll withdraw my quibble and keep an eye out. ((Not that .2°C/decade isn't bad enough!))

 

[lomiller]

Well I've given it a more thorough look-see and I now don't see what I was remembering, ...perhaps I was confusing a land surface temperature rate increase with a global rate. I'll withdraw my quibble and keep an eye out. ((Not that .2°C/decade isn't bad enough!))

My guess is that you were thinking of some of the more realistic scenarios for reducing CO2 emissions. I.E. it's warming at ~0.2 deg per decade now, but in all likelihood that will accelerate so there is a good chance of 3 Deg over the next 100 years.

 

[Westwall]

Here is Appels take on the recent release of emails from the CRU whistleblower. Makes for some interesting reading. The emails that have been released are quite disturbing to say the least.

I'm sorry I don't have enough posts to give the link but it's quite easy to find.


Saturday, November 26, 2011 Is This Climate Science’s Thermidorian Reaction?
In historical analysis, a Thermidorian Reaction is the point in a revolt or revolution where the mob says: Hey, wait a minute, what exactly are we doing here? We have to live here after we smash this place up, so maybe we’d better take a deep breath and think this over again.

To me, at least, this past week feels like a Thermidorian Reaction in the climate change scene.

Obviously the first was the release of a new batch of emails. It doesn't show anything nefarious, but I think it does raise questions about how much purported unanimity has been artificially created by IPCC reports, and whether the full state of uncertainty is being communicated. And why are people talking about deleting emails? Why is Ms Kathryn Humphrey from UK's Defra saying the government wants a strong message? She wrote (email 2445):

"I cannot overstate the HUGE amount of political interest in the project as a message that the government can give on climate change to help them tell their story.

"They want their story to be a very strong one and don’t want to be made to look foolish."

 

[CapelDodger]

Here is Appels take on the recent release of
emails from the CRU whistleblower.

It's your belief that the emails weren't stolen, I take it? All the evidence is that they were, but your beliefs are yours to choose, obviously.

Makes for some interesting reading. The emails that have been released are quite disturbing to say the least.

The effort being made to construct something out of them is really amusing. I'd find the mendacity applied very surprising if I didn't already know the kind of people I was dealing with.

I'm sorry I don't have enough posts to give the link but it's quite easy to find.

Perhaps
http://davidappell.blogspot.com/2011/11/sorting-through-stolen-uae-emails.html ?

Same old same old. The cute thing is he quotes Richelieu and links to Wiki where the quote is listed as "disputed". A little erudition is a dangerous thing (but not to others).

Saturday, November 26, 2011 Is This Climate Science’s Thermidorian Reaction?

Nope.

In historical analysis, a Thermidorian Reaction is the point in a revolt or revolution where the mob says: Hey, wait a minute, what exactly are we doing here? We have to live here after we smash this place up, so maybe we’d better take a deep breath and think this over again.

Now that might well apply to the climate denial project. More and more people are realising how much they've been lied to by professionals, and one day the tumbrils may roll.

To me, at least, this past week feels like a Thermidorian Reaction in the climate change scene.

What a strange person he is. The real take-home message from this latest denier effort is how little impact it has had (outside the Murdoch press, of course).

Obviously the first was the release of a new batch of emails. It doesn't show anything nefarious, but I think it does raise questions about how much purported unanimity has been artificially created by IPCC reports, and whether the full state of uncertainty is being communicated.

It doesn't, of course. IPCC reports are quite clear on uncertainty, and unanimity is a necessary requirement under its mandate - all member governments have to sign off on them. Hence all the stress on uncertainty (that's a lot of people to sign-off on anything, and some of them were US Americans of the Republican persuasion). This, of course, has nothing to do with actual climate science, which the IPCC merely collates in a completely transparent manner. It has even les to do with what's happened since 2005, which many people find disturbing.

And why are people talking about deleting emails?

Because they might get stolen. Would you be happy to have everything you've ever emailed revealed to public scrutiny after careful editing by people who do not have your best interests at heart? Nor have any concern for the truth?

Why is Ms Kathryn Humphrey from UK's Defra saying the government wants a strong message? She wrote (email 2445):

"I cannot overstate the HUGE amount of political interest in the project as a message that the government can give on climate change to help them tell their story.

"They want their story to be a very strong one and don’t want to be made to look foolish."

What government doesn't want to send strong messages, or does want to appear foolish? Which government was this, by the way? None of these emails are at all recent, so presumably the Blair government? No reasonable person ever thought he was about anything else than messaging. If Appell attached dates to the emails he's mined it would be easier to tell.

Take comfort in the fact that all of this effort has been soundly debunked by people who have actually read the emails, some of whom actually wrote or received them. Nothing disturbing there at all. Sorry if you were hoping there was, but there it is. (Unlike so much Arctic sea-ice these days, which is more "there it isn't".)

 

[Trakar]

Here is Appels take on the recent release of emails from the CRU whistleblower. Makes for some interesting reading. The emails that have been released are quite disturbing to say the least.

I'm sorry I don't have enough posts to give the link but it's quite easy to find.


Saturday, November 26, 2011 Is This Climate Science’s Thermidorian Reaction?
In historical analysis, a Thermidorian Reaction is the point in a revolt or revolution where the mob says: Hey, wait a minute, what exactly are we doing here? We have to live here after we smash this place up, so maybe we’d better take a deep breath and think this over again.

To me, at least, this past week feels like a Thermidorian Reaction in the climate change scene.

Obviously the first was the release of a new batch of emails. It doesn't show anything nefarious, but I think it does raise questions about how much purported unanimity has been artificially created by IPCC reports, and whether the full state of uncertainty is being communicated. And why are people talking about deleting emails? Why is Ms Kathryn Humphrey from UK's Defra saying the government wants a strong message? She wrote (email 2445):

"I cannot overstate the HUGE amount of political interest in the project as a message that the government can give on climate change to help them tell their story.

"They want their story to be a very strong one and don’t want to be made to look foolish."

Don't we already have a conspiracy thread up for this discussion?