Merged Global Warming Discussion II: Heated Conversation

[CapelDodger]

I remember when predicting that the Arctic Ocean would become ice-free counted as alarmism. Now it's, like, meh. Happens all the time. Ask the Chinese.

One very solid piece of evidence against an ice-free Arctic Ocean in the Medieval period is that the Japanese never got a visit from the Vikings. If they had we'd definitely have heard about it.

Some other things seem to have become less alarming in the last twenty-five years : more frequent extreme weather, for instance. Heavier rainfall when it comes. Bigger storm surges. So what? Climate is always changing. On the other hand, any change in the economic status quo has, if anything, become an even more terrifying prospect, not to mention the looming Ice Age signalled by Antarctic sea-ice.

Back in the 80's I didn't expect to see so much happen in my lifetime, and there's more to come (fingers crossed ).

 

[CapelDodger]

yup
prima facie agitprop

Monckton is indeed the prime face of the AGW denial project. Which is the most remarkable (not to say hilarious) aspect of the whole sorry story.

The UK floods have faded from the news now; it'll be interesting to see if they, and by extension climate change, remain a political issue now the immediate threat has receded.

 

[macdoc]

a real if temporary climate driver in play....

Volcanic eruptions in the early part of the 21st century have cooled the planet, according to a study led by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. This cooling partly offset the warming produced by greenhouse gases.

Despite continuing increases in atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases, and in the total heat content of the ocean, global-mean temperatures at the surface of the planet and in the troposphere (the lowest portion of Earth's atmosphere) have shown relatively little warming since 1998. This so-called 'slow-down' or 'hiatus' has received considerable scientific, political and popular attention. The volcanic contribution to the 'slow-down' is the subject of a new paper appearing in the Feb. 23 edition of the journal Nature Geoscience.

more

This is not like ENSO, this is outside the box influence.

 

[Trakar]

...One very solid piece of evidence against an ice-free Arctic Ocean in the Medieval period is that the Japanese never got a visit from the Vikings. If they had we'd definitely have heard about it...

In Japan, buffets are called "Vikings." Interesting story, but has nothing to do with ancient longships cruising into Tokyo harbor for a little berserker-ing

 

[a_unique_person]

I'm still waiting for one single source of any kind, that shows that climate models predicted the colder winters.

They don't predict anything about a particular winter, now that there won't even be more record cold events. The overall temperature will rise, the number of record highs will outnumber the record lows. Weather will always be here, the dice are now loaded so that we have a tendency towards higher records, more frequent extreme events.

 

[r-j]

Colder winters are a prediction of climate models!

if you don't have any evidence for your claim, it would be best to retract it.
Show us one climate model that predicted colder winters.

Changing your claim is acceptable. If you now want to say "colder winters in 'some' places was predicted by climate models", that is fine.

Just link to the evidence for that.

But certainly, as your original claim stands, it is untrue.

 

[Mikemcc]

Seems like that it's only you that fails to see that it is a regional observation, not a global one.

 

[r-j]

Seems like that it's only you that fails to see that it is a regional observation, not a global one.

What is? His claim was a response on my hilarious example of what the current climate consensus sounds like to regular people. this is a topic about global warming. Saying "the models predicted colder winters" and then insisting it means "in some places" is fine, just show us the evidence. You can change the claim, but you still have to back it up.

a reminder, this started the whole thing

Here's a way to understand what it sounds like.

"The models predict it will rain in three days, heavy long lasting rain"

A week later, no rain at all. Instead, dry and dusty conditions.

"The models were correct, we just didn't plan on a shift in the wind."

Then how can you say the model was right?

"If the wind hadn't shifted, they would have been right"

But the wind did shift, and they were wrong

"You don't understand how science works. We can't predict exactly when the rain will happen, but we can predict that it will"

Yeah, so what?

"It's like with global warming. There might be natural factors stopping it for now, but it will happen"

Just like it will eventually rain?

"Exactly. Science deals in probabilities, not accuracy"

So, you are just guessing. You don't really know what is going to happen, or when.

"Exactly, But it will be bad."

And you don't hear how that sounds?

"Clearly you hate science"

No, but you on the other hand, I think you are insane

His response was

And another conversation between ignorant people, r-j .
Colder winters are a prediction of climate models!

I asked him to show us. So far, lots of twisting and spinning, but no evidence.

 

[macdoc]

Britons need to accept their new climate

* 19 February 2014
* Magazine issue 2957. Subscribe and save
* For similar stories, visit the Leaders and Climate Change Topic Guides

The increasing likelihood of extreme weather events poses big challenges for the UK. Fortunately, there are some unexpected precedents

IN THE crypt of Winchester Cathedral stands a sculpture of a featureless man contemplating water pooled in his cupped hands. When it rains, the crypt floods, so the man is partially submerged. That's fitting for a building whose bishop until AD 862, Saint Swithin, is associated in folklore with incessant rainfall.

Last week, however, the water reached levels unmatched in recent memory, preventing anyone from visiting Antony Gormley's sculpture. Weeks of stormy weather have swollen the river Itchen to bursting point, threatening to deluge the ancient city, capital of the southern Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex during Swithin's time, and later that of England as a whole.

Elsewhere in the cathedral stands another remarkable statue, this one of a man wearing an antique diving suit. It commemorates William Walker, who spent six years working in the crypt's pitch-dark waters, single-handedly shoring up the cathedral's foundations in the early 20th century. His Herculean labours required nearly 26,000 bags of concrete, 115,000 concrete blocks and 900,000 bricks.

The engineers struggling to hold back the water in Winchester with sandbags and gravel are the heirs to Walker's approach. The same could be said of those who will have the job of rebuilding the defences of British towns afflicted by this winter's weather. That will be a slow, painstaking and expensive process. But given the increasing likelihood of extreme weather events, is that a sufficient response?

Much of the British Isles is clement, its population mostly unused to dramatic weather, and generally unprepared for the abrupt failure of transport, power and utility networks. But in the past month, the western regions' Victorian railway lines have become impassable, while the capital's Victorian sewage system has repeatedly overflowed into the Thames. Defending such vulnerable systems from future disasters will take ambitious feats of engineering rather than mere patching up – more like the construction of the Thames Barrier, without which London would have been far worse off.

But spending from the public purse is both financially and politically constrained: hence the hasty retraction last week of UK prime minister David Cameron's claim that "money is no object". Loosening the purse strings will require high-profile figures to break what psychologist Adam Corner calls the "climate silence" (see "Will record floods finally shift UK climate debate?"). Even then, the money needed to defend every acre of the UK's green and flooded lands is probably beyond reach.

more

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22129571.900-britons-need-to-accept-their-new-climate.html

 

[r-j]

They don't predict anything about a particular winter, now that there won't even be more record cold events.

There must be a typo in there, but I'm not sure what it is.

now that there won't even be more record cold events

Not? Nor? What is it supposed to say?

 

[Trakar]

And another conversation between ignorant people, r-j .
Colder winters are a prediction of climate models!
I would give you a link to Skeptical Science containing the appropriate links to the scientific literature but you do not read blogs (and presumably forums as well )

While, as you explain, climate science does predict more extreme weather events during the early phases (the next couple of centuries) of our planet's current climate change episode, literalist extremists will undoubtedly distort such statements. Of course, a warming planet will not produce generally colder winters, though it will create episodes of sporadically colder winter weather events as previously "normal" wind patterns and flows are disrupted. Though it only takes one or two such extreme events during the winter months of a given region to make that winter, in that specific region, seem like a very cold winter, that does not translate to an unqualified "colder winter" for the hemisphere or even necessarily as averaged over the entire timespan of "winter" in a given region. I thought that is what you intended here and was indeed how you clarified your statement when "questioned" about it. Mainstream climate science fully supports and agrees with this understanding.

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/srex/SREX_Full_Report.pdf
report discusses such events in detail throughout, below is one example.

...Also, feedbacks between trends in snow cover and changes in temperature extremes have been highlighted as being relevant for projections (e.g., Kharin et al., 2007; Orlowsky and Seneviratne, 2011). Feedbacks with soil moisture and snow affect extremes in specific regions (hot extremes in transitional climate regions, and cold extremes in snow-covered regions), where they may induce significant deviations in changes in extremes versus changes in the average climate, as also discussed in Section 3.1.6. Other relevant feedbacks involving extreme events are those that can lead to impacts on the global climate, such as modification of land carbon uptake due to enhanced drought occurrence (e.g., Ciais et al., 2005; Friedlingstein et al., 2006; Reichstein et al., 2007) or carbon release due to permafrost degradation (see Section 3.5.7)...

 

[Trakar]

a reminder, this started the whole thing


"The models predict it will rain in three days, heavy long lasting rain"

A week later, no rain at all. Instead, dry and dusty conditions.

"The models were correct, we just didn't plan on a shift in the wind."

Then how can you say the model was right?

"If the wind hadn't shifted, they would have been right"

But the wind did shift, and they were wrong

"You don't understand how science works. We can't predict exactly when the rain will happen, but we can predict that it will"

Yeah, so what?

"It's like with global warming. There might be natural factors stopping it for now, but it will happen"

Just like it will eventually rain?

"Exactly. Science deals in probabilities, not accuracy"

So, you are just guessing. You don't really know what is going to happen, or when.

"Exactly, But it will be bad."

And you don't hear how that sounds?

"Clearly you hate science"

No, but you on the other hand, I think you are insane

Straw-man hyperbole is neither science, nor evidences, why should anyone respond to such juvenile antics with reasoned discussion?

 

[CapelDodger]

This is rather cute

January 2014's extreme weather worldwide - interactive map
http://www.theguardian.com/environm...ve-map-january-2014-extreme-weather-worldwide

Just one month on one planet so hardly definitive, but I can't help thinking that's not normal for an ENSO-neutral month.

One small criticism : where it says, for instance,

Extremely light precipitation
San Francisco
Total precipitation : 0mm
Precipitation to the normal (%) : 0
Days : 0

there are no error ranges given. (Somebody's going to say it; it might as well be me )

 

[Trakar]

This is rather cute

January 2014's extreme weather worldwide - interactive map
http://www.theguardian.com/environm...ve-map-january-2014-extreme-weather-worldwide

Just one month on one planet so hardly definitive, but I can't help thinking that's not normal for an ENSO-neutral month.

One small criticism : where it says, for instance,

Extremely light precipitation
San Francisco
Total precipitation : 0mm
Precipitation to the normal (%) : 0
Days : 0

there are no error ranges given. (Somebody's going to say it; it might as well be me )

February is making up some of it, but N. California and S. Oregon are experiencing an extremely dry fall and winter (which is normally the wettest part of the year -very little rain from late spring through summer most of the time).

 

[CapelDodger]

February is making up some of it, but N. California and S. Oregon are experiencing an extremely dry fall and winter (which is normally the wettest part of the year -very little rain from late spring through summer most of the time).

There'll be water problems this summer whatever happens now, but an El Nino this autumn would probably bring relief - and with it some different problems.

Regarding cold weather in the Eastern US, I think it's worth pointing out that, while extreme, it's not out of the ordinary. This sort of thing has happened before. What's actually remarkable is how remarkable so many people think it is, which rather suggests we've developed a new sense of what's ordinary. Which, in turn, suggests that the climate has changed.

There are those who'll say that climate is always changing, but I'm old enough to remember when it didn't.

 

[Reality Check]

if you don't have any evidence for your claim, it would be best to retract it....

If you do not read posts containing the evidence then it would be obvious that you will have the idea that there is no evidence, r-j !
FYI, r-j:

The evidence starts with climate science:
Short form: Colder winters are a prediction of climate models.
Longer form:
Climate models predict higher global surface temperatures. And (to put it simply ) higher global surface temperatures provide more energy to drive things such as wind. That means cold air gets further south in winter. That means that places further south get more cold air than they used to and cool down in winter.
Thus: Colder winters are a prediction of climate models.
...
A couple of results from the first page at Climate Change Science Search Engine
with 'climate model cooling winters':
* How reliable are climate models? just has "For example, a climate model can tell you it will be cold in winter, but it can’t tell you what the temperature will be on a specific day – that’s weather forecasting.".

* Cold winter in a world of warming? (2010)

And to emphasis what Trakar emphasizes: This is not that every winter will be colder. It is that there will be a trend for winters over a period of time (e.g. decades) to be colder (there will be more extreme winter events).

 

[r-j]

And to emphasis what Trakar emphasizes: This is not that every winter will be colder.

I don't care what your claim is, I want to see why you are saying it. Where is your evidence? What are you going on to say these things? Because there isn't any model that predicted colder winters, as in a trend of colder winters. Certainly they predicted the exact opposite.

It is that there will be a trend for winters over a period of time (e.g. decades) to be colder (there will be more extreme winter events).

That is complete baloney. Which is why I asked you for evidence the first time you tried to claim it. You still haven't produced any evidence at all. Which is why your post contains none. Still.

You are in essence claiming the exact opposite of what global warming theory, and all the computer models predicted.

You have zero evidence that global warming models predicted colder winters. If you want to now say you actually meant "colder winters, some places, some times", then provide evidence for that.

You can change what you claimed as much as you want. Eventually you will change it so it matches reality. Which is actually the goal of science.

 

[Reality Check]

Where is your evidence? ...snipped a bit of an irrelevant rant....

The evidence that climate models + science! predict a trend of colder winters (posted 24th February 2014).

 

[r-j]

The evidence that climate models + science! predict a trend of colder winters (posted 24th February 2014).

Nope, nothing in there about climate models predicting the colder winters. Or "climate models predict colder winters". If you think there is, then simply quote where it says such a thing. I mean, why not quote where it actually says that? Or even anything close to it?

The evidence starts with climate science:
Short form: Colder winters are a prediction of climate models.
Longer form:
Climate models predict higher global surface temperatures. And (to put it simply ) higher global surface temperatures provide more energy to drive things such as wind. That means cold air gets further south in winter. That means that places further south get more cold air than they used to and cool down in winter.
Thus: Colder winters are a prediction of climate models.

As far as I know, earlier climate models did not have the ability to model climate on small enough scales get to stuff such as winter temperatures. I think that modern models are able to model seasonal conditions (as mentioned in your link, r-j). At least the modeling that I can find about cooling winters seems recent.

A couple of results from the first page at Climate Change Science Search Engine

This search engine will scan a large number of sites known to have good climate change related information on them.

with 'climate model cooling winters':
* How reliable are climate models? just has "For example, a climate model can tell you it will be cold in winter, but it can’t tell you what the temperature will be on a specific day – that’s weather forecasting.".

* Cold winter in a world of warming? (2010)

In a more recent press-release, Vladimir Petoukhov and Vladimir Semenov, argue that Global Warming could cool down winter temperatures over Europe, and a reduced sea-ice extent could increase the chance of getting cold winters.

I know why you can't find a single source that says what you claimed. It's simply not true.

 

[macdoc]

This is what it took to get SO2 abatement moving....the courts...

European Commission sues UK over polluted air

* 19:00 25 February 2014 by Andy Coghlan

Time to choke on writs. Last week, the European Commission began legal action against the UK, which has failed to cut nitrogen dioxide smog to meet limits set by the European Union. Several other countries could also be taken to court.

Nitrogen dioxide (NO2) mostly comes from diesel engines. It causes asthma and other breathing and lung problems. "Air pollution contributes to an estimated 4200 premature deaths in London [each year]," says Jenny Jones, a Green Party member of the London Assembly. Main roads in affluent the Chelsea area and the City of London exceed the legal limit.

Many other countries have broken the pollution limits, according to the European Environment Agency (EEA) in Copenhagen, Denmark. The European Commission (EC) will target them next. "We have opened pilot investigations in France, Denmark, Sweden, Romania and the Netherlands," says an EC spokesperson. "Infringement proceedings are likely to follow."

The UK is being sued first because it is the furthest behind. EU member nations were meant to meet the targets by 2010. Those failing were given an extra 5 years' grace to comply, but the UK will still miss the target by some margin.

"The UK is the only member state not expecting to comply with the limit values before 2025, in London, and 2020 at the earliest for 15 other zones in the UK," says the EC spokesperson. "In terms of population exposure, London is the biggest of the EU's cities concerned with NO2 emissions, and the worst in terms of the compliance gap."

more

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn25118-european-commission-sues-uk-over-polluted-air.html