Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[Caper]

'Fraid so. As long as the USA displays an utter lack of leadership on this issue, no real, effective action will happen. If Romney is elected, goodbye. If Obama is elected and continues his present leadership, goodbye. As long as Republicans hold a majority in either house of congress, goodbye.

It ain't a pretty picture.

So nothing less then the end of the world if Romney gets elected? Or if congress stays republican..... either of those events and the fate of the world is sealed?

Well if nothing else, we can stop the debate if Romney gets elected and move on to having one last 50 year party.

 

[Megalodon]

I think SezMe is referring more to "goodbye to the world as we know it". And I think we passed that particular adieu some years ago.

We will not disappear as a species, as we're far to adaptable for that. I can't imagine a realistic climate-related situation that would be an extinction level event for our species.

But it will be anything but a party, and every year that we delay action to minimize the damage will cost us dearly.

 

[Mikemcc]

Increasingly I'm looking at sites and the views are getting increasingly pessimistic. The elephant in the room that I can see is bio-diversity, particularly in the oceans. I can easily see a massive collapse in fisheries in the next 50 years. Bottom up there will be a loss of coral reefs and birthing grounds. Top-down the over-fishing and acidification will kill off many lines.

As pointed out, it isn't necessarily extinction level events for some of the population. But for those in the worst conditions the conditions are horrific. The trouble is that they are already recieving the very same horrific conditions (doughts, floods, etc). That they get worse is difficult to quantify.

 

[seycyrus]

Greetings,

The article in British newspaper seemed to contain data from 2012 whereas the ERL paper used to refute it is less recent.

Can someone please show the most recent data?

 

[jimbob]

Greetings,

The article in British newspaper seemed to contain data from 2012 whereas the ERL paper used to refute it is less recent.

Can someone please show the most recent data?

Not the most recent data but a response to the Mail from the Met Office, so pretty mainstream.

It is the second article Mr Rose has written which contains some misleading information, after he wrote an article earlier this year on the same theme – you see our response to that one here.

the rest of that article is good as well...
ETA: and from that earlier link

Today the Mail on Sunday published a story written by David Rose entitled “Forget global warming – it’s Cycle 25 we need to worry about”.

This article includes numerous errors in the reporting of published peer reviewed science undertaken by the Met Office Hadley Centre and for Mr. Rose to suggest that the latest global temperatures available show no warming in the last 15 years is entirely misleading.

Despite the Met Office having spoken to David Rose ahead of the publication of the story, he has chosen to not fully include the answers we gave him to questions around decadal projections produced by the Met Office or his belief that we have seen no warming since 1997.

I suspect mendacity and not by the Met Office

 

[Olowkow]

Most recent data abounds and a simple google of "global warming most recent data" will provide many hours of entertainment. Those who just cannot understand why there is such a "controversy" among scientists should read what these scientists write, then investigate just who they are.

I suggest taking an anti AGW article such as this one, in the Wall Street Journal, signed by 16 scientists, beginning with Claude Allegre, by the way, at the bottom of the article. Investigate the reasoning behind the claims of each of these signers, find out who they are, then decide whether you would stake the lives of your grand children on the opinions of these men. When finished, wade into the IPCC web site.

As for the politics, I cannot see any significant difference between 4 years of Obama or Romney in terms of improvements to the global weather condition. China is going to be a huge player into the future no matter what the US does.

 

[seycyrus]

So, the actual data points in the plot are not being disputed?

 

[Dancing David]

So nothing less then the end of the world if Romney gets elected? Or if congress stays republican..... either of those events and the fate of the world is sealed?

Well if nothing else, we can stop the debate if Romney gets elected and move on to having one last 50 year party.

It is not the end of the world, just some big changes, and it may be that once the furor dies down, steps will be taken.

Some could be fairly low tech if implemented on a lrge scale, the biggest issue is teh volume of fossil feuls.

And Romney matters little, it is more the policy of the larger nations all together.

 

[Pixel42]

So, the actual data points in the plot are not being disputed?

No, it's what's being inferred from them that's wrong. In the same way that my noticing that today is warmer than the coldest day last week and inferring that winter isn't on its way after all would be wrong.

 

[CapelDodger]

This should all play out right? I mean for all the talk we have about doing something to combat it, little is ever done and it seems to me, what we would have to do....no one in the end would do it.

Talk and some tinkering around the edges is all we'll see until stuff hits the fan, and even then the response will be piecemeal. I don't think it's in our nature to deal with problems like this, and it's certainly not what our political and diplomatic systems have been developed to manage. Wishful thinking, short-termism and procrastination will continue to be the order of the day until things have to be done, at which point we'll cope as best we can (which, for many, will mean not well at all).

Then we'll get down to something we are good at - which is apportioning blame.

 

[CapelDodger]

No, it's what's being inferred from them that's wrong. In the same way that my noticing that today is warmer than the coldest day last week and inferring that winter isn't on its way after all would be wrong.

What the denier line would be now without the '98 El Nino will be one of those great "what-if's" of history. The next clearly record year will probably coincide with a whole-year El Nino, and I've little doubt deniers will blame it on that when it comes.

Of course, surface temperatures aren't really the issue, but they're simple enough for deniers and their target audience to grasp. What really counts is the impact climate change has on people's lives, mostly via flooding and food prices (and even availability).

 

[Reality Check]

So, the actual data points in the plot are not being disputed?

The data is correct.
The fact is that you can take the entire set of temperature data (not just the last 15 years) and cherry pick starting points so that you get level or cooling periods. This is a common tactic of climate change deniers.

The "official" length of time that you have to look at weather (like temperature data) before it becomes climate is 30 years.

 

[aleCcowaN]

And the most interesting aspect of that data series exploitation is how few cases of "global warming has ended" you can extract. It's as simple as this: in a world with even average temperatures you could point to a humongous lot of sub-series "pointing" cooling or warming. I suggest to whom are able to do it to try it in a classroom by making two groups to compete selecting sub-series that point to warming or cooling. Giving the "warming" side to women and the "cooling" side to men is a success in high school level.

 

[macdoc]

data points are correct tho very incomplete as the Arctic data is not well represented in HadCUT4

lets take a maximum El Nino event in 1998 and start the data point from there.
Fail..
Hadcrut4 is notoriously lacking in High latitude data at all - odd sort of disconnect between the article and a record low Arctic ice cover.

HadCRUT is underpinned by observations and we've previously been clear it may not be fully capturing changes in the Arctic because we have had so little data from the area.
​

Global Highlights
The average combined global land and ocean surface temperature for June 2012 was 0.63°C (1.13°F) above the 20th century average of 15.5°C (59.9°F). This is the fourth warmest June since records began in 1880.

The Northern Hemisphere land surface temperature for June 2012 was the all-time warmest June on record, at 1.30°C (2.34°F) above average.

The globally-averaged land surface temperature for June 2012 was also the all-time warmest June on record, at 1.07°C (1.93°F) above average.

ENSO-neutral conditions continued in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean during June 2012 as sea surface temperature anomalies continued to rise. The June worldwide ocean surface temperatures ranked as the 10th warmest June on record.

The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for January–June 2012 was the 11th warmest on record, at 0.52°C (0.94°F) above the 20th century average.​

The starting point of the graph is the highest El Nino driven temps recorded - yet

The Northern Hemisphere land surface temperature for June 2012 was the all-time warmest June on record, at 1.30°C (2.34°F) above average.

rest is worth reading
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2012/6

as is this which is indicative of the lack of data in the HADCRUT4 series the article is based on.

an El Nino is in potential stage but no guarantee.
Indeed there is some thought that LaNina's might be more frequent which might slow the impact of increasing heat retention by burying it in ocean overturn.

Does not change the physics...just the timing.

If you look at the graph here

- 1998 is a real outlier for the decade and anyone foolish enough to think warming has stopped cuz some reporter cherry picks needs to visit a psychiatrist about their delusions.

and I'll stress again the Met is hampered by poor high latitude data in the Northern Hemisphere.

 

[CapelDodger]

And the most interesting aspect of that data series exploitation is how few cases of "global warming has ended" you can extract.

I think this is a case for The Escalator

http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=47

 

[RandFan]

I think this is a case for The Escalator

http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=47

In a nutshell. Bookmarked. And I recommend others do the same. Awesome graph.

 

[CapelDodger]

data points are correct tho very incomplete as the Arctic data is not well represented in HadCUT4

http://www.skepticalscience.com/hadcrut4_analysis_and_critique.html

From the above :

"The first surprise concerned coverage bias. Studies from the ECMWF and GISS have both identified significant coverage problems in the HadCRUT3 dataset, leading to a significant underestimation of recent temperature trends. I expected the HadCRUT4 update to focus primarily on addressing this. However the improvement in global coverage is actually rather small. Instead the Hadley/CRU collaboration found some different biases and addressed those.

The second surprise concerns the year 1998. Multiple factors have been conspiring to inflate temperatures around 1998 and/or suppress trends starting in the mid 90's or later. In addition to the 1998 El-Nino, these factors include poor coverage of the Arctic, poor coverage of the Antarctic and a discontinuity in the old HadSST2 data. HadCRUT4 does resolve the SST discontinuity and part of the Arctic coverage bias, but not the Antarctic coverage bias."

 

[bit_pattern]

I think this is a case for The Escalator

http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=47

Beat me to it :thumbup:

 

[aleCcowaN]

I think this is a case for The Escalator

http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=47

Great! That's a living instance of the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words".

It also reminds me this infamous graphic I saw with the title "One year of cooling wipes out 100 years of global warming"

 

[CapelDodger]

This is timely:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2012/9

The average combined global land and ocean surface temperature for September 2012 tied with 2005 as the warmest September on record, at 0.67°C (1.21°F) above the 20th century average of 15.6°C (60.1°F). Records began in 1880.

Preliminary but unlikely to be far out.

Deniers are beating their "no warming since ..." drum as hard as they can while they can. I think they sense that their golden days are behind them.

Given the signal-to-noise ratio in surface temperatures, fifteen years with little or no increase is quite possible, and the occasional decade is quite likely, but more than fifteen years is improbable. Deniers were lucky enough to get a "long decade" from '97 to 2011 (an El Nino to a La Nina) but it's all downhill for them now. Even 2011 saw the warmest full-year La Nina on record.