Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[DC]

Almost everything I object to here is anti-science. The constant smearing and insults, that is the opposite of science. The "opinion and anecdotes as facts", the refusal to give a straight honest answer, the strawmen arguments, the appeals to authorities, the dishonest re-stating of somebody, rather than quoting them, there is anti-science here on every page.

The leading questions, the moved goalposts, it goes on and on. The fallacies are thick, and the irony of it constantly missed by the most toxic commenters.

Your post I quoted, it's a good example of the anti-science that is a constant.

ok indeed namecalling and all that is suerly not scientific, but not anti science. i thought you meant people here are making false claims contradicted by science etc. but seems rather not.

 

[Buckaroo]

In the scores of pages R-j has posted on in this thread, has anyone been able to tease out a coherent position that he holds with respect to AGW? I tried to get him to state it succinctly quite a ways back, but with no luck. I've seen about twenty pages of back and forth about locally cold winter episodes, but can make neither head nor tail of what he thinks they demonstrate. I'm kinda wondering why so much effort is being put into pushing back against vapor.

 

[quarky]

Foolishly, I feel the need to simplify the debate; not for myself, necessarily:

Suppose we focus on a single aspect of some of the changes that have been occurring.
How about the polar ice cap?

It would be hard to argue that it isn't melting.
Never mind, for a moment, what may be causing that.

Can't we agree what the results might be, in that lost reflectivity?
Oceans picking up heat, that they were denied for a very long time?

Simply addressing this factor; not even requiring any effects of increased GHGs; isn't the outcome rather predictable; unemotional; indisputable; regardless of the size of that contribution to warming?

I can imagine a stance within this small bit of data, which might revel in the new shipping lanes opening up, and how this might actually save a huge amount of fuel being consumed...and then we'd see some math equating the saved fuel and the absorbed solar radiation; some talk about the effects of various ocean streams being disrupted...that sort of thing.

I see I have become irrelevantly nebulous.
It's too late to start at the beginning.

 

[r-j]

Can't we agree what the results might be, in that lost reflectivity?
Oceans picking up heat, that they were denied for a very long time?

Simply addressing this factor; not even requiring any effects of increased GHGs; isn't the outcome rather predictable; unemotional; indisputable; regardless of the size of that contribution to warming?

I can imagine a stance within this small bit of data, which might revel in the new shipping lanes opening up, and how this might actually save a huge amount of fuel being consumed...and then we'd see some math equating the saved fuel and the absorbed solar radiation; some talk about the effects of various ocean streams being disrupted...that sort of thing.

Quite reasonable. The arctic is no doubt prime real estate for argument, as well as exploitation.

Knowing what is causing the rapid changes would be very scientific. Discussing what it means would be most rewarding.

 

[aleCcowaN]

Well, quarky, I summarize it this way: there are people with science in their hand and people with names and adjectives (they try first using adjectives and when they fail, they become angry and start using names).

I criticize my fellows in two aspects. A few of them, for paying too much attention to press articles and half-baked studies when they announce extreme risks and impending catastrophes. No matter there's a grain of truth deep inside all that. I think the exaggeration just comes as a reaction to the apparent social inaction, but I think that not only to be wrong but extremely counter-productive.

To me, a much wider group of fellows debate the wrong way. They let scientific topics to become prose with an excess of personal pronouns. They are trying apparently to be kind and to explain, but in fact they are letting that die-hard manipulating deniers decide about the epistemology to be used to discuss on the topic, and they decide it to be rhetoric (the art of using language persuasively with complete neglect to the notion of truth). The additional problem is that of all the rhetorical verbiage being fatten with the spurious use of term like science, scientific, scientist, method, and an endless list including sample, statistics, "statistically significant" and an endless und so weiter. They have, in summary, let the denialists to command the flow of the conversation, which automatically starts to be filled with crap, what was exactly what many denialists wanted from the very beginning: "don't let it derail, let it decay" is the motto of such denialists. Their goal is a subject that must remain "controversial" -a lot of smoke and overlapping voices where the subject is being discussed so people won't want to participate- and also to remain "unapproachable" -as the confusion only lets advance the one who already knows it-, the final goal being to numb any ability to the society to react politically. About the science, they have indeed no problem with it: there's no problem in a group of brainiacs really knowing what is going on.

When science is not being discussed, the r-js poke their heads in, and an invasion of polemicists of 100% words, follow. And that is what is happening right now. Let's do science and they'll dispel soon.

 

[greybeard]

Imagine being the lone climate scientists in the early seventies trying to warn everyone about global warming. or the small group. They were laughed at. Mocked, Called names and people said to ignore them.


.

Have you got anything to counter the article DC and I linked to r-j.

It seems to show the above statement is totally wrong.

 

[aleCcowaN]

I am 59 and well remember watching the Horizon programme about the possibility of an imminent ice age that was made in the 70s, and taking it seriously.

I am not saying that it's a myth that there was press and TV coverage about the threat of an imminent ice age in the 70s. I am saying it's a myth that the majority of scientists were predicting in the 70s that the world would cool, let alone that they were doing so with the same confidence with which they are now saying that it is warming and will continue to do so.

Not only that, but I remember -I'm younger, but not so much- the speculation about nuclear winters -that was indeed the concern- and the study of nuclear winters as possibly triggering a new ice age if there were favourable conditions.

There's proof of that, the fake cover

the real one

and the real cover for the date in the fake one

If global cooling and an ice age had been so much dealt and a concern in the seventies, well they wouldn't have had to resort to such false covers and false propaganda. There would be plenty of documents to prove it. [Does somebody remember the scientific work citing and analysing all the papers on warming cooling during the sixties and seventies?]

The fact is that they don't even resort to the false cover too much but they only repeat "cooling ... yada yada ... that's why the public is sick of you ... yada yada" and all the usual crap we see here periodically. It's the bicycle: they tell you that it stands alone and to prove it they pedal constantly. So low them stoop.

 

[tsig]

When one wants to attempt to discredit an issue he opposes, the easiest way is to call it "conspiracy theory".


Either that or understanding individuals with similar ideologies doing similar things is not a conspiracy is above your head?
And if you've got to put words in my mouth, as bolded above... back to kindergarten with you.

Here are your actual words.

How droll. Trying to label me a conspiracy theorist for pointing out how the self loathing global socialist ideology held by most leftists/AGW alarmists who are also strong environmentalists is only mucking things up.

You will notice that the words you accused me of not understanding are not your original post. If you want to accuse someone of misquoting you at least quote yourself accurately.

The phrases "above your head" and "back to kindergarten" don't serve to strengthen your argument.

 

[Pixel42]

We probably agree on that. The difference might be, is that I see the global warming alarmists cult not looking at the bigger picture. The small, but incredibly vocal, fringe cult of doom over climate change must make real climate researchers cringe. I know they make climate history experts shake their heads in despair.

The vast majority of climatologists agree that the world is warming, that human activities are largely responsible, and that the speed and extent of the warming is cause for serious concern. Hardly a "small, but incredibly vocal, fringe cult of doom".

 

[quarky]

Well, quarky, I summarize it this way: there are people with science in their hand and people with names and adjectives (they try first using adjectives and when they fail, they become angry and start using names).

I criticize my fellows in two aspects. A few of them, for paying too much attention to press articles and half-baked studies when they announce extreme risks and impending catastrophes. No matter there's a grain of truth deep inside all that. I think the exaggeration just comes as a reaction to the apparent social inaction, but I think that not only to be wrong but extremely counter-productive.

To me, a much wider group of fellows debate the wrong way. They let scientific topics to become prose with an excess of personal pronouns. They are trying apparently to be kind and to explain, but in fact they are letting that die-hard manipulating deniers decide about the epistemology to be used to discuss on the topic, and they decide it to be rhetoric (the art of using language persuasively with complete neglect to the notion of truth). The additional problem is that of all the rhetorical verbiage being fatten with the spurious use of term like science, scientific, scientist, method, and an endless list including sample, statistics, "statistically significant" and an endless und so weiter. They have, in summary, let the denialists to command the flow of the conversation, which automatically starts to be filled with crap, what was exactly what many denialists wanted from the very beginning: "don't let it derail, let it decay" is the motto of such denialists. Their goal is a subject that must remain "controversial" -a lot of smoke and overlapping voices where the subject is being discussed so people won't want to participate- and also to remain "unapproachable" -as the confusion only lets advance the one who already knows it-, the final goal being to numb any ability to the society to react politically. About the science, they have indeed no problem with it: there's no problem in a group of brainiacs really knowing what is going on.

When science is not being discussed, the r-js poke their heads in, and an invasion of polemicists of 100% words, follow. And that is what is happening right now. Let's do science and they'll dispel soon.

I don't want them to dispel. I hate to say that I want them to get more educated; that sounds obnoxious...

But it is often the contrarian opinion here that brings forth the debate and the science.

Perhaps I'm too mellow about this...
But in my brief experience here, I've seen people 'come around'.
There's no end of former woosters here, and, in a way, they make for the best of critical thinkers.

So, imho,
kid gloves are indicated.

Alienation and hostility, however wrapped in poetic language skills, has the potential of solidifying the stance of bad science.

Next thing you know, there's a new tea-party.

Not sure if I've gained maturity, or simply lost my balls.
Tough call.

 

[AlBell]

Would you accuse those who accept the reality of evolution as "holding the status quo as an unquestionable dogmatic truth" and the frustration they understandably show when arguing with creationists as "hate"?

Some people on this thread will deeply resent that comparison, but it really is an accurate one.

I doubt most will be anything but pleased at the comparison.

 

[lomiller]

Well I didn't intend to make him the subject of my post, rather I was using him as an example. But just to reply to what you are saying, in his movie he made a bunch of no-no's when it came to compiling and interpreting his data. That's not to say nobody ever does this (Einstein fudged his data numerous times) but I don't think we should be making life altering decisions based on that.

As per my previous link his presentati0on is fine it’s the allegations against it that turn out to be unsupportable from the science.

That aside, the man consumes more energy just for himself than nearly every other person on the planet,

These are also allegations long since shown to be false. Specifically a political propaganda piece took a single years CO2 emissions and presented it as his CO2 footprint. What they didn’t mention is that this was almost entirely one time as part of a renovation he was doing to reduce his overall CO2 footprint and that the emissions of the project were “paid for” with carbon offsets, which is precisely the process he enforces for managing CO2 emissions.

All of the above contentions are fine, except the last one. We don't actually know the finely grained derivative of climate history. We have a pretty good idea of the overall picture, but you have to keep in mind that something like ice cores don't keep daily records of data, and under warming periods can even lose data.

If we were talking decade scale effects you may have a valid point, but ice cores have more than sufficient resolution to evaluate century scale changes, and there is nothing like the current warming anywhere in them. O-D events show very rapid cooling in some places, but the warming from these events is more gradual.

Never say that. It happens all the time that we have piles and piles of evidence that people take for granted, but meanwhile there are silent dissenters who we all dismiss as kooks, only to make a discovery one day that they were actually right all along. Most of the time, those guys are just kooks. But you really never know. You can't consider yourself to be much of a scientist or even a skeptic if you can't accept that something you hold dear to yourself as being true might actually be wrong.

The nature of science is always that anything could be overturned with the right evidence. The role of the sceptic is to insist that this evidence be given before we consider any of it overturned. A sceptic does not say “I think the science is wrong even though there is no evidence to support my contention.” A sceptic challenges people who say this to provide evidence.

Well, alluding to what Randi said recently, dictionaries don't define. That said, from my perspective, a climate denier will claim outright that there is no climate change. Your definition may differ.

In this case your definition is the odd man out. There are climate deniers who:
- Deny temperatures are changing
- Deny they are being caused by greenhouse gasses
- Deny greenhouse gasses can cause warming
- Deny CO2 levels are increasing
- Deny Human CO2 emissions are responsible for CO2 levels increasing
- Deny the temperature changes are large
- Deny the temperate changes are extraordinarily rapid.
And more.

 

[aleCcowaN]

So, imho,
kid gloves are indicated.

Those with 4 inches thick foam are very forgiving.

Alienation and hostility, however wrapped in poetic language skills, has the potential of solidifying the stance of bad science.

Next thing you know, there's a new tea-party.

Not sure if I've gained maturity, or simply lost my balls.
Tough call.

I think you're right when a next door denier is involved. You have to think that denialists from Sing Sing, paroled this morning, are who are debating here and next door deniers and nay-sayers are some of those potentially readings these posts. Write for the deniers. Deal with the denialist as they deserve.

Anyway, in my experience deniers only change when: they can follow "all the science" -it's very unlikely they are able to, it's even more unlikely that they are willing to devote enough time- , and mostly when denialists' questions are properly answered -without letting them dilute the answers with endless verbiage and repetition- and when "warmers" pose the right questions and they go without reply.

I'm still waiting for newcomers and some other like r-j to reply my questions. That about the sea level not raising is very interesting and every real sceptic should be eager to reply that, as every real sceptic had to ask such question to him or herself in that moment (if not, sceptic, just the label)

 

[AlBell]

Considering the uncertainties at the time regarding the effect of the orbital cycles on the onset of the next glacial period, plus the physical effect of sulfate aerosols, there was a scientific basis to postulate a possible cooling event. But even then there were much less articles referring to it than to global warming.

What is interesting to compare is the attitude of the scientists opposed to global warming today. Their attitude tends to be more of the sort "It can't be warming, because... well, just because!".

There is no physical explanation beyond the ones being offered by mainstream climatology, and all the putative avenues have been relentlessly closed by reality.

And more importantly, they can't find a new mechanism for warming without finding an accessory mechanism to counter the warming that we know for sure is associated with the accumulation of GHG.

The debate right now is reduced to making sure the liars can't drown the scientific discourse in the arena of public opinion. Which they try by repeating the same lies, innuendos and insults that were being used ten years ago.

http://townhall.com/columnists/davi...nment-the-alarmists-are-still-losing-n1557387

You don't appear to be winning.

 

[aleCcowaN]

I doubt most will be anything but pleased at the comparison.

What method do you propose to prove who is right, pixel42 or you? Do something to go from innuendo to truth. Can you?

 

[aleCcowaN]

http://townhall.com/columnists/davi...nment-the-alarmists-are-still-losing-n1557387

You don't appear to be winning.

After supposedly reporting on a poll:

Do you believe in man-made global warming? The answer: Less than half of Americans would say yes

The univocal result of this would be ....

 

[lomiller]

LOL, pure arrogance.

You seem to have trouble with the meaning of words. It is not arrogance on my part to demand that you present evidence for your assertions, or to say I have no responsibility to answer or debunk anything you refuse to document. That’s just the basic rules of logical discourse.

I DO so love it when self ownage comes along. There are a number of links to institutions whose very name makes your assertion just plain ignorant. You really should "do the research", old chap.

Indeed I enjoy your self-inflicted wounds, but the fact that climate research reveals the earth’s climate is changing and how much it’s changing doesn’t support your contention that climate research only occurs because there is money to be made from faking the research.

What's a pretty serious charge of academic malfeasance you are making. What evidence do you have to back it up and who in particular are you accusing?

All of them, and it's not as evil as it sounds. They're simply following their beliefs and think it's noble. Maybe they don't realize how badly the policy and those like you promoting it are mucking it up.

This isn’t evidence for the malfeasance you are accusing them of, it’s simply a repetition of your accusation. Given that we have evidence and you don’t it’s a fairly safe bet that you are the one simply following what you believe to be noble beliefs regardless of the damage done.

I'm not interested in quibbling over details, I'm just saying it's bizarre that people are saying how serious the problem is yet only seem to care in making industrialized nations pay based upon past sins.

Deciding what common rules would be fair is the exact opposite of “quibbling over the details” or “making industrialized nations pay based upon past sins”.

More specificly you don’t seem to like the notion that individual CO2 emissions of people in China an the US be comparable and insist on comparing the total emissions of the two nations instead.

When comparing the US to smaller nations like Australia or Canada, you want to do away with the national compositions. Your inability to stick to a single set of goalposts suggests you there is no real reason other than you think you are entitles and that everyone else in obliged to support your imagined entitlement.

 

[quarky]

Arrogance is a piss-poor teaching quality, from what I've seen.


(Yes, that was a bit arrogant of me to say.)

 

[lomiller]

I would like to make it clear that I do not dispute that the earth has gotten warmer only that I have no clear idea about the cause. As far as I'm concerned the jury is still out.

The scientific literature is clear that the earth is warming primarily due to human influences. Whether you "know" this or not isn't really relavant.

Obviously this has happened before man ever walked the earth, but is that what happening now, I don't know. BTW smarmy, you must be stupid to think that way comments are rejected as being closed minded not to mention just plain rude.

There is no scientific literature documenting any comparably rapid warming. There are is the possibility of comparably rapid warming occurring far enough in the past that it’s rate can’t be measured accurately enough to confirm, but it is not “obvious” something has happened just because it can’t be ruled out.

 

[lomiller]

For the most part, you are spot on. Except there are two key areas where they intertwine:

- The environmentalist movement is the biggest driving force against nuclear energy.
- Nuclear power goes a long ways towards reducing the carbon footprint that climate scientists are concerned with.

Irrelevant because most of your so-called alarmists support, or at least comfortable with nuclear power.

Since you brought him up earlier, Al Gore’s position on nuclear is that he’s fine with it but thinks it’s to expensive to be a viable replacement for fossil fuels.

My own is that the nuclear technology available now or in the next few decades won’t scale up to anywhere near the levels required to replace fossil fuels and it requires too much direct government intervention to provide capital, underwriting, R&D, etc. I’d still like to see nuclear triple or quadruple worldwide and I’m one of the least pro-nuclear people in this thread.