Global warming

[CapelDodger]

1. Evidence can explain things
2. Statistics is science
3. Economics is science

Evidence explains nothing, it's passive, it just sits there and gets observed. Explanations - hypotheses, theories, the case for the prosecution/defence, whatever - explain evidence.

Statistics is scientific, but not a science. Economics is not scientific, it's more akin to history (which is also not scientific).

And lastly, climate science does in fact rely heavily on statistics.

http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11175&page=12

"Climate is conventionally defined as the long-term statistics of the weather (e.g., temperature, cloudiness, precipitation). "

That's a definition of climate, not of climate science. Climate science is concerned with explaining the observed climate. (More properly, observed climates, since it has other planets to work with.) Those explanations are drawn from, and so are fully integrated with, the wider sphere of science - thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, fluid dynamics, to name but a few.

http://geography.uoregon.edu/amarcus/geog620/Guest-Readings/zwiers-IntJClim-2004.pdf

"The study of the climate system is, to a large extent, the study of the statistics of weather

."​

(My emphasis)​

Given that climate is conventionally defined as the long-term statistics of weather (see above) this boils down to "the study of climate is the study of climate".​

pervasive

per•va•sive

adjective
Definition:​

present everywhere: spreading widely or present throughout something​

Synonyms: all-encompassing, enveloping, invasive, omnipresent​

Arithmetic is pervasive in economics, but economics as a discipline does not rely heavily on arithmetic. Economics is a body of theories that attempt to explain what the arithmetic reveals. These theories draw on a wider sociological discipline (which includes history) concerned with human behaviour.

Climate science is a body of theories that attempt to explain the observed statistics of weather (aka the climate) by reference to established science. Cake science (it exists; cakes and pastries are a massive business) is a body of theories yadda yadda. There's nothing intrinsically special about climate science. Or cake science.​

Beer science is another matter entirely, of course.​

​

 

[CapelDodger]

Then you, thinking such, must eschew all conclusions favoring AGW based on statistics.

Could you run me through the the train of logic that leads you to this conclusion? It may seem obvious to you, but I can't see it.

So you have no-

tree rings
ice cores
global temperatures
satellite temperature inferences
hockey stick
ice Mass balance
sea ice calculations

which leaves you with...

The observable real world and a sound body of science to explain it. I don't really need statistics to see what's going on around me, and in this day and age "around me" is pretty much global. And my observations are not unexpected. Bump up the CO2-load, bump up the temperature. Hey, look what's happening. The tree-line moves northwards and upwards, Alpine glaciers retreat, ticks move into new territory, extreme (from a human perspective) weather events become more frequent.
Despite decades of contrarian knawing at the Hockey-Stick, the blade just keeps getting longer. It must be dispiriting. It probably explains why Diamond thread-hops so compulsively.

There's no refuge in the past, so I don't seek one. Global climate reconstructions are interesting but not terribly relevant. There's no historical equivalent to our current situation.

 

[mhaze]

Could you run me through the the train of logic that leads you to this conclusion? It may seem obvious to you, but I can't see it.

The observable real world and a sound body of science to explain it.

I don't really need statistics to see what's going on around me, and in this day and age "around me" is pretty much global. And my observations are not unexpected. Bump up the CO2-load, bump up the temperature. Hey, look what's happening. The tree-line moves northwards and upwards, Alpine glaciers retreat, ticks move into new territory, extreme (from a human perspective) weather events become more frequent.
Despite decades of contrarian knawing at the Hockey-Stick, the blade just keeps getting longer. It must be dispiriting. It probably explains why Diamond thread-hops so compulsively.

Why, now that you mention it, a particularly bad type of ant did move up here from the south, Mexico and thereabouts. We call them Fire Ants.

Now I flat out never though to blame that on man made Global Warming!

 

[CapelDodger]

No, 10 mm per year over 10,000 years, instead of a decrease that lasted only a few thousand years at the start of the 20,000 year period like you wanted readers to believe was the case.

You're using global figures here. You originally referred specifically to Antarctica, which is what I was responding to. Antarctic ice-mass is inherently stable (latitude, altitude, configuration). Last to respond, first to stop responding. A few thousand years, in the middle of the Big Melt that swept Big Ice from the Pennines.

Yeah, right. (sarcasm)

You think I can't spot a specious argument? Try me.

What is specious is you trying to give readers the impression that the major loss of ice (and therefore rise in sea levels) was over a span of few thousand years at the start of the 20,000 year period.

That wouldn't be specious, it would be misleading. Of course I said nothing to suggest that the catastrophic shift from glacial maximum to intergalacial took place at the start of that period. I assumed general knowledge of the last glacial-interglacial phase-shift, which certainly didn't follow right after the glacial maximum.

The chart I linked clearly shows that over 65 percent of the last 20,000 year time period, the sea levels have risen many times faster than the rise that you walarmists are excited about happening over only the last 5 years or so.

The graph shows three very distinct phases : a slow increase in sea-level (and, by proxy, global temperature) followed by a very steep increase giving way to a yet slower increase over a period that includes the discovery of agriculture and politics. And now has a human population of six billion plus.

On that basis, you want us to jump off an economic cliff.

If by "us" you include you, I'm neutral on that. If you want it, do it. All I want is a quiet life.

That's specious.

You came up with it, so nobody's surprised.

Oh this just gets funnier and funnier. Now the walarmists want us to stop growing food too? ROTFLOL!

Could you go into more detail on that rather idiosyncratic exegesis?

At this point you switch focus from me, CapelDodger, to "the walarmists". I find this dehumanisation rather alarming.

Yet the walarmists insist we jump off an economic cliff.

They really want to see you do it on YouTube. That's what I'm picking up from the chatter.

Tell us, SPECIFICALLY, what measures will be needed to immediately freeze greenhouse-gas emissions and see a 90 percent cut in those emissions by 2050 as proposed by Gore and his friends. Let's see if my concerns are just alarmism.

And then you start giving orders. So it seems I wasn't falsely alarmed.

Note the Gore twitch. It does you no favours.

 

[CapelDodger]

Why, now that you mention it, a particularly bad type of ant did move up here from the south, Mexico and thereabouts. We call them Fire Ants.

Now I flat out never though to blame that on man made Global Warming!

Why would you? They probably got carried across an ecological barrier by modern transport. Hitching a lift, essentially. The fire-ant problem predates AGW.

 

[David Rodale]

Evidence explains nothing, it's passive, it just sits there and gets observed. Explanations - hypotheses, theories, the case for the prosecution/defence, whatever - explain evidence.

Statistics is scientific, but not a science. Economics is not scientific, it's more akin to history (which is also not scientific).





That's a definition of climate, not of climate science. Climate science is concerned with explaining the observed climate. (More properly, observed climates, since it has other planets to work with.) Those explanations are drawn from, and so are fully integrated with, the wider sphere of science - thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, fluid dynamics, to name but a few.

(My emphasis)​

Given that climate is conventionally defined as the long-term statistics of weather (see above) this boils down to "the study of climate is the study of climate".​

Arithmetic is pervasive in economics, but economics as a discipline does not rely heavily on arithmetic. Economics is a body of theories that attempt to explain what the arithmetic reveals. These theories draw on a wider sociological discipline (which includes history) concerned with human behaviour.

Climate science is a body of theories that attempt to explain the observed statistics of weather (aka the climate) by reference to established science. Cake science (it exists; cakes and pastries are a massive business) is a body of theories yadda yadda. There's nothing intrinsically special about climate science. Or cake science.​

Beer science is another matter entirely, of course.​

​

Many Americans have what some (most?) would consider and odd affection for British humor. Monty Python and the Holy Grail has become a cult classic here. At this point, your arguments remind me of the scene where Arthur wants to cross the bridge, but the Black Knight refuses passage. Who can forget this:

Black Knight: None shall pass.
Arthur: What?
Black Knight: None shall pass.
Arthur: I have no quarrel with you, good Sir Knight, but I must cross this bridge.
Black Knight: Then you shall die.
Arthur: I command you as King of the Britons to stand aside!
Black Knight: I move for no man.
Arthur: So be it!

Arthur cuts off the Black Knight's left arm.

Arthur: Now stand aside, worthy adversary.
Black Knight: 'Tis but a scratch.
Arthur: A scratch? Your arm's off!
Black Knight: No, it isn't.
Arthur: Well, what's that then?
Black Knight: I've had worse.
Arthur: You liar!
Black Knight: Come on you pansy!

Arthur cuts off the Black Knight's right arm.

Arthur: Victory is mine! We thank thee Lord, that in thy mercy...

Black Knight: Come on then.
Arthur: What?
Black Knight: Have at you!
Arthur: You are indeed brave, Sir Knight, but the fight is mine.
Black Knight: Oh, had enough, eh?
Arthur: Look, you stupid bastard, you've got no arms left.
Black Knight: Yes I have.
Arthur: Look!
Black Knight: Just a flesh wound.
Arthur: Look, stop that.
Black Knight: Chicken! Chicken!
Arthur: Look, I'll have your leg. Right!

Arthur cuts off the Black Knight's leg.


Black Knight: Right, I'll do you for that!
Arthur: You'll what?
Black Knight: Come 'ere!
Arthur: What are you going to do, bleed on me?
Black Knight: I'm invincible!
Arthur: You're a loony.
Black Knight: The Black Knight always triumphs! Have at you! Come on then.

Arthur cuts off the Black Knight's other leg.

Black Knight: All right; we'll call it a draw.
Arthur: Come, Patsy.
Black Knight: Oh, oh, I see, running away then. You yellow bastard! Come back here and take what's coming to you. I'll bite your legs off!

Now you are saying

Despite decades of contrarian knawing at the Hockey-Stick, the blade just keeps getting longer.

The problem is, there was no such thing as the "hockey stick" prior to the IPCC 2001 report (actually MBH98/99). Up until then, IPCC used the hundreds of previous studies and historical evidence for MWP, using the correct temperature record. The statistically challenged and systematically erroneous Mann hockey stick is nowhere to be found in 2007, yet like the Black Knight, IPCC refuses to formerly admit defeat.

Since you have no limbs left, I think it unfair to lop off your proverbial head. Have at it, however don't expect a response to yet another convoluted nonsensical speech.

 

[BeAChooser]

You're using global figures here.

Why not? We're talking about "global" warming.

Of course I said nothing to suggest that the catastrophic shift from glacial maximum to intergalacial took place at the start of that period.

Yes you did. That exact reason was given by you as to why most of the ice must have melted in Antartica in the first few thousand years of a 20,000 year period.

giving way to a yet slower increase over a period that includes the discovery of agriculture and politics.

The increase from 3000 to 2000 years was 1 mm per year, faster than the one from 7000 to 4000 years ago, and both were much faster than the one occurring the last 5 years. So jumping off that economic cliff may be a bit premature.

Quote:
Tell us, SPECIFICALLY, what measures will be needed to immediately freeze greenhouse-gas emissions and see a 90 percent cut in those emissions by 2050 as proposed by Gore and his friends. Let's see if my concerns are just alarmism.

And then you start giving orders. So it seems I wasn't falsely alarmed.

Now you've become a comic. Well at least you will do less harm at that than if you push for global walarmist economic suggestions ... that you don't wnat to define.

 

[mhaze]

Why would you? They probably got carried across an ecological barrier by modern transport. Hitching a lift, essentially. The fire-ant problem predates AGW.

I seem to recall it was a gradual invasion in the 1980s, in the northward direction.

 

[mhaze]

Now you are saying

Despite decades of contrarian knawing at the Hockey-Stick, the blade just keeps getting longer.
​

The problem is, there was no such thing as the "hockey stick" prior to the IPCC 2001 report (actually MBH98/99). Up until then, IPCC used the hundreds of previous studies and historical evidence for MWP, using the correct temperature record. The statistically challenged and systematically erroneous Mann hockey stick is nowhere to be found in 2007, yet like the Black Knight, IPCC refuses to formerly admit defeat.

Is there a similarity between that hockey stick blade and Pinocchio's nose?

 

[mhaze]

Why not? We're talking about "global" warming.

Funny thing happening over at www.climateaudit.org.

"Unthreaded" messages is a general blog, it is now up to section #18, and McIntyre refuses to start #19 unless people stop talking about CO2 and just talk statistics. So the section is up to about 600 messages and gets slower and slower to load. And that is with the new warp speed server.

Starve'em off by slowing access to a crawl, if they want to talk CO2.

Keep the site pure, says Steve.

Stick to statistics and just auditing the numbers.

Well, what do you expect from a math whiz?

But this CO2 chatter won't quit.

Wonder if they are on to something...

 

[Lucifuge Rofocale]

Now they are reviewing Africa datasets and the results looks interesting also. What would be the excuse this time?

 

[CapelDodger]

I seem to recall it was a gradual invasion in the 1980s, in the northward direction.

It would be gradual either way, but did it pass through all points in-between? If not, global warming is surely not to blame. Even if so, it doesn't finger AGW definitively, since it could be down to changes in land-use (apart from anything else). Irrigation, both agricultural and by suburban sprinklers, might explain it. Make the desert bloom, and look who turns up unexpectedly . Or not, whatever, bet your life the explanation conforms to the Law of Unintended Consequences.

 

[CapelDodger]

Now they are reviewing Africa datasets and the results looks interesting also. What would be the excuse this time?

I suggest you exercise your imagination. Try to put yourself in the position of one of these excuse-givers and, with your knowledge of the interesting results, come up with the retort before they do. It would gain you a big chunk of credibility around here, and even out there. You can pitch as many as you like, they're all good.

 

[Lucifuge Rofocale]

May I wait until they finish the revision of Antarctica?
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1985

 

[BobK]

Here is a well reasoned article.Global Warming: Man-Made or Natural?

IN THE PAST few years there has been increasing concern about global climate change on the part of the media, politicians, and the public. It has been stimulated by the idea that human activities may influence global climate adversely and that therefore corrective action is required on the part of governments. Recent evidence suggests that this concern is misplaced. Human activities are not influencing the global climate in a perceptible way. Climate will continue to change, as it always has in the past, warming and cooling on different time scales and for different reasons, regardless of human action. I would also argue that—should it occur—a modest warming would be on the whole beneficial.

 

[Lucifuge Rofocale]

Very good article. Thanks BobK.

Here is a well reasoned article.Global Warming: Man-Made or Natural?

 

[mhaze]

It would be gradual either way, but did it pass through all points in-between? If not, global warming is surely not to blame. Even if so, it doesn't finger AGW definitively,

to the Law of Unintended Consequences.

But...

Fire Ants.
Spreading.
World wide.
Hot ants.
AGW
Ant Global Warming.

 

[CapelDodger]

Why not? We're talking about "global" warming.

This exchange started with your introduction of the 0.5mm pa Antarctic contribution. Over twenty thousand years. Which you compared with a 0.4mm pa global sea-level rise today. For no apparent reason. You swing about between "Antarctic" and "global" in a confused and confusing manner. The Antarctic is by no means representative of the globe. Very much the opposite.

Yes you did.

No, I didn't. I am well aware of the difference between a glacial maximum and a tipping-point, as are most people around here. Your own presented sea-level reconstruction shows a slow melting from the glacial maximum - hardly surprising, given that "maximum" vibe - a rapid melting over the glacial-interglacial tipping-point and phase-shift, and not much happening at all afterwards. That's nearly everybody's understanding of the end of the Ice Age.

That exact reason was given by you as to why most of the ice must have melted in Antartica in the first few thousand years of a 20,000 year period.

You're back to Antarctica, but that aside, what was this exact reason I gave? By your comprehension? I try to be precise, but if I'm failing I'd like to know why.

The increase from 3000 to 2000 years was 1 mm per year, faster than the one from 7000 to 4000 years ago, and both were much faster than the one occurring the last 5 years.

Well there's a thing. Those guys coped, why shouldn't we? The world's a bit different now, of course, but in principle it's encouraging. It may not have been painless back then, it won't be painless now. But we'll cope, in a communal sense.

So jumping off that economic cliff may be a bit premature.

I always say, wait until you're pushed, because maybe you won't be. I don't say it often, of course, since it so seldom comes up in conversation.

Now you've become a comic. Well at least you will do less harm at that than if you push for global walarmist economic suggestions ... that you don't wnat to define.

You made the word "walarmist" up. Unless you stole it. Now you crave a definition. What's that all about?

I'm here for Science, bud. I don't give a toss about policies. I frankly don't care. It's not as if this sort of thing hasn't happened before in this vast Universe.

If you want to froth about policies there's plenty of room on the Politics forum. Trust me, I've been there, done that. Got the T-shirt and ceremonially burnt it. You'll make new friends, and enemies you can get your teeth into.

I wonder how the debate's getting on over there ...

 

[CapelDodger]

But...

Fire Ants.
Spreading.
World wide.
Hot ants.
AGW
Ant Global Warming.

A whimsical parody of a strawman with the haiku element. Clever.

(Clever is always good .)

 

[mhaze]

Very good article. Thanks BobK.

Indeed.