Maundering inconvenient truths

[Andre]

Don't you think this is bias behavior? Discounting all prediction models?

Look again, I said: Claiming that prediction models proof something should be considered a criminal act.

I'm happy if you run a prediction model and declare that you expect / forecast such and such to happen. If you're right then you are still inbusiness. You have a white swan. The riskier the forecast, the bigger and the more beautiful white swan.

But the general gist is that there is a body of evidence that global warming is true. Models predict that the temperature will rise so much, etc etc., suggesting that the prediction models are proof.

This is something I've seen you do before too, accuse those of us who are non-partial

Please, show the case. This way it's a bit cheap.

 

[Andre]

Andre you are getting much too upset about this. The remark was not aimed at you.

It's not personal. It is just the mechanism. So somebody has reservation against global warming and immediately a herd of warriors character murder him.

For instance:
http://www.realclimate.org/
http://www.monbiot.com/

So the witch hunt continues. A very interesting study indeed.

 

[Pythagorean]

Please, show the case. This way it's a bit cheap.

https://www.physicsforums.com/search.php?searchid=717907

 

[Andre]

Okay the search didn't work for me. But please be a bit mild, whenever I show that things don't add up, I get kicked around immediately. There is a certain manager here with some issues. That makes a bit paranoid

 

[Pythagorean]

Okay the search didn't work for me. But please be a bit mild, whenever I show that things don't add up, I get kicked around immediately. There is a certain manager here with some issues. That makes a bit paranoid

Fair enough. I'm sure anal retentive online professionals don't like me either. I come here to learn and share knowledge if I can, but not to preach or listen to preaching or pretend I'm a great intellectual.

I simply entered Andre as the author and hominem as the subject. You have about two pages of using the ad hominem defense, and you tend to put fearmonger along side it (committing ad hominem while accusing someone of it)

I'm not disagreeing with you that things don't add up, but when you use words like fearmonger and ad hominem in the same sentence against someone like me (who could care less about whether people are afraid of global warming or whether it's anthropogenic), it casts doubt on your ability to actually study the subject without bias, even if you may be right about some of your biases.

In your other thread (in https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?p=1340069#post1340069"), you said "We're using the scientific method here" and while you didn't explicitly say "I'm holier than thou", it sure came off that way to me.

I must say though, it was interesting to learn we had horses in Alaska, and I do think the Mammoth was killed off by human hunting. We used to be able to hunt whales too and that was genocide.

 

[Skyhunter]

No, it is not, as has been demonstrated here and https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=169202.

I think that I will go with the conclusions of the climate researchers at Cal. No offense Andre, but I am confident that they are more qualified to analyse the Vostoc ice cores than you.

As for your simple model "proving" that feedback doesn't exist...

Here is a simple model that demonstrates the opposite.

And here is the authors summary:

Summary

While this is just a simple model that is not really very Earth-like (no convection, no clouds, only a single layer etc.), it does illustrate some relevant points which are just as qualitatively true for GCMs and the real world. You should think of these kinds of exercises as simple flim-flam detectors - if someone tries to convince you that they can do a simple calculation and prove everyone else wrong, think about what the same calculation would be in this more straightforward system and see whether the idea holds up. If it does, it might work in the real world (no guarantee though) - but if it doesn't, then it's most probably garbage.

N.B. This is a more pedagogical and math-heavy article than most of the ones we post, and we aren't likely to switch over exclusively to this sort of thing. But let us know if you like it (or not) and we'll think about doing similar pieces on other key topics.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/04/learning-from-a-simple-model/

Oh, and my bad.

I thought Gore may have been intentionally misleading.

After reading this however I will withdraw such judgement.

Now, it there is a minor criticism one might level at Gore for his treatment of this subject in the film (as we previously pointed out in our review). As it turns out though, correcting this would actually further strengthen Gore's case, rather than weakening it. Here's why:

The record of temperature shown in the ice core is not a global record. It is a record of local Antarctic temperature change. The rest of the globe does indeed parallel the polar changes closely, but the global mean temperature changes are smaller. While we don't know precisely why the CO2 changes occur on long timescales, (the mechanisms are well understood; the details are not), we do know that explaining the magnitude of global temperature change requires including CO2. This is a critical point. We cannot explain the temperature observations without CO2. But CO2 does not explain all of the change, and the relationship between temperature and CO2 is therefore by no means linear. That is, a given amount of CO2 increase as measured in the ice cores need not necessarily correspond with a certain amount of temperature increase. Gore shows the strong parallel relationship between the temperature and CO2 data from the ice cores, and then illustrates where the CO2 is now (384 ppm), leaving the viewer's eye to extrapolate the temperature curve upwards in parallel with the rising CO2. Gore doesn't actually make the mistake of drawing the temperature curve, but the implication is obvious: temperatures are going to go up a lot. But as illustrated in the figure below, simply extrapolating this correlation forward in time puts the Antarctic temperature in the near future somewhere upwards of 10 degrees Celsius warmer than present -- rather at the extreme end of the vast majority of projections (as we have discussed here).

<snip>

What Gore should have done is extrapolated the temperature curve according this the appropriate scaling -- with CO2 accounting for about 1/3 of the total change -- instead of letting the audience do it by eye. Had he done so, he would have drawn a line that went up only 1/3 of the distance implied by the simple correlation with CO2 shown by the ice core record. This would have left the impression that equilibrium warming of Antarctica due to doubled CO2 concentrations should be about 3 °C, in very good agreement with what is predicted by the state-of-the-art climate models. (It is to be noted that the same models predict a significant delay until equilibrium is reached, due to the large heat capacity of the Southern ocean. This is in very good agreement with the data, which show very modest warming over Antarctica in the last 100 years). Then, if you scale the Antarctic temperature change to a global temperature change, then the global climate sensitivity to a doubling of CO2 becomes 2-3 degrees C, perfectly in line with the climate sensitivity given by IPCC (and known from Arrhenius's calculations more than 100 years ago).

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/04/the-lag-between-temp-and-co2/

 

[Andre]

I simply entered Andre as the author and hominem as the subject. You have about two pages of using the ad hominem defense, and you tend to put fearmonger along side it (committing ad hominem while accusing someone of it)

There is a slight difference here. If chicken little proclaims that the sky is falling, calling that fear mongering is not an ad hominem. There difference is "being" versus "doing/making". The main verb in an ad hominem is "to be" in the form "you are a crook hence you are wrong". Chicken little is adorable but she is wrong making that statement - No ad hominem.

I must say though, it was interesting to learn we had horses in Alaska, and I do think the Mammoth was killed off by human hunting. We used to be able to hunt whales too and that was genocide.

In Europe men and mammoths have co-existed for 50-60,000 years, where the mammoths disappeared at the onset of the Bolling Allerod event 14,500 years ago.

At the transition of the Bolling Allerod event to the Younger Dryas (12,700 Cal years BP, 10,700 Radiocarbon years ago), both men (Clovis) and mammoths disappeared without a trace in North America. Men (Folsom) returned much later.

Shortly at the end of the Younger Dryas 11,600 Cal years ago, when the Mammoths thrived in Northern Siberia, (Taimyr peninsula) they disappeared suddenly without a trace and without any single piece of evidence that men were witnessing the tragedy. Men had disappeared already 30,000 years ago in that area.

Conclusion: Mammoths perished allways at a major climate transition, regardless if men were around or not. So whodunnit?

 

[Andre]

I think that I will go with the conclusions of the climate researchers at Cal. No offense Andre, but I am confident that they are more qualified to analyse the Vostoc ice cores than you.

I reckon you would. I guess I'm too old to play the kid that exclaimed that the emperor wears no clothes. Indeed I do not analyse ice cores. I analyse the reasoning of the analysers. It was better it the analysers sticked to analysing only.

As for your simple model "proving" that feedback doesn't exist...

Strawman, I said that the nett resulting feedback is not positive.

Here is a simple model that demonstrates the opposite.

Were are the data? I only see some expressions. The test is with the actual data. So why would a mere mathematical expression have the power to refute data testing?

Back later.

 

[edward]

Strawman, I said that the nett resulting feedback is not positive.

Andre, your lack of respect for others on this forum is getting to be annoying.
Strawman : Are you really that desperate.?

The strawmen are the scientist who took money from Exxon and the other big oil companies to attempt to discredit AGW.
This has given many of us good reason for keeping a watchful eye on global warming skeptics.

http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,1876538,00.html

The largest single funder for AGW studies has been the Untied States Govenment., not some strawman or corporation who has a vested interest.


Karner's overall nett negative feed back assumption was based on doing an statistical analysis of satellite tropospheric data over time. This proves nothing except that he has convinced himself that two older studies were possibly inaccurate.

It is easy to weight a statistical analysis of anything to get a desired result. It happens all of the time in the pharmaceutical industry.

Karner states: “The revealed antipersistence in the lower tropospheric temperature increments does not support the science of global warming developed by IPCC [1996]. Negative long-range correlation of the increments during last 22 years means that negative feedback has been dominating in the Earth climate system during that period. The result is opposite to suggestion of Mitchell [1989] about domination of a positive cumulative feedback after a forced temperature change. Dominating negative feedback also shows that the period for CO2 induced climate change has not started during the last 22 years. Increasing concentration of greenhouse gases in the Earth atmosphere appeared to produce too weak forcing in order to dominate in the Earth climate system.”

http://www.warwickhughes.com/hoyt/allfeedbacks.htm

 

[Andre]

Andre, your lack of respect for others on this forum is getting to be annoying.

Well, as usual there is the tendency to shoot the messenger.

Strawman : Are you really that desperate.?

Why, thank you for your concern. it has improved significantly after reading your post

The strawmen are...

From your following statement I infer that we do not have a common definition of a straw man fallacy. Please do click the link to understand why I could not let an alleged statement stand.

...the scientist who took money from Exxon and the other big oil companies to attempt to discredit AGW.
This has given many of us good reason for keeping a watchful eye on global warming skeptics.

Thank you for giving the opportunity to address this complicated fallacy.

Firstly: It basically says: If you don't believe in global warming then you are a crook. If you're not a crook, we'll make you one. After all, there is always money. However, I know most of the climate sceptics. I also know that this Exxon thing is a fiction. Certainly Exxon is funding a huge amount of institutes as do all large coorporations. Exxon has even made top priority of saving the tiger from extinction, which is logical of course. A lot of institutes get funding from a multitude of corporations, among which, Exxon. Some associates from those institutes are working on climate issues with competing ideas, without the global warming bias. That's the real story of the massive bribery tales. Finally, there may be climate skeptics on the pay roll of Exxon, I don't know them, but it could be. Those that I know are not funded by anybody or get paid independed of their visions. If honest people have an opinion, would it change anything if some crooks had the same opinion?

Secondly: as said numerous times before. Bribery ad hominems do not change the truth. Whenever **fill in your own favorite worst enemy of manking here** says: water boils at 100 degrees celsius; you cannot say that this is wrong because he is a crook.

Thirdly: Science is about attempting to proof theories to be right, by the failure of attemps to proof that they are wrong. That's Popperian philosophy. Whenever I have some weird ideas, like planet Venus having converted the rotational energy to heat due to internal mechanical failure, or the Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum being caused by a empty Arctic ocean bassin filling in, or the Ice ages being caused by pulsating poles, I ask the experts to proof us wrong. If they can't, we may be on to something. Therefore, the scientific method demands global warming to be subject to rigourous fail safe testing since so much depends on it.

But the problem is that this testing may reveal that global warming is wrong. How to handle that?:

http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,1876538,00.html

Thanks for the link. So if global warming is not robust to withstand falsification, you either accept failure or you attempt to prevent falsification by shutting up the opposition, because so much is at stake?

Karner's overall nett negative feed back assumption was based on doing an statistical analysis of satellite tropospheric data over time. This proves nothing except that he has convinced himself that two older studies were possibly inaccurate.

It is easy to weight a statistical analysis of anything to get a desired result. It happens all of the time in the pharmaceutical industry.

http://www.warwickhughes.com/hoyt/allfeedbacks.htm

Brilliant link. thanks.

But what kind of fallacy is that? I guess the fallacy of the accident. "Karner uses statistics to falsify global warming. With statistics you can weight a statistical analysis of anything to get a desired result. So proving anything you like, proves nothing."

What Karner did with satelite data was essentially the same what I did with ice core data, investigate persistency of noisy data. There is no way to predict the next data point from previous data points. It's a random walk, but feedback, always having inertial delay when processed again in the system, does influence the direction of the next datapoint. Negative feedback resists change and tends to reduce step size away from the average (non persistent). Positive feedback propagates change and tends to increase the step size away from the average value (persistent). This is something you can observe. Even if it's statistics, it's rather a impossible position to hold of seeing negative feedback behavior but nevertheless claiming that it must be positive feedback otherwise global warming won't work.

 

[Kirsten-B]

This thread was about my Gore critique and yet I do not see a single comment about the facts that it contains.

 

[Pythagorean]

You and Al Gore are competing for a sleep remedy? You're in the lead so far, but that's just because Al Gore told his personal stories with visuals and music and made me feel like I really knew him... before falling asleep.

 

[Kirsten-B]

You and Al Gore are competing for a sleep remedy? You're in the lead so far, but that's just because Al Gore told his personal stories with visuals and music and made me feel like I really knew him... before falling asleep.

So do you have something intelligent to offer or is it just your nature to insult people?

 

[edward]

Well, as usual there is the tendency to shoot the messenger.

No one is attempting to shoot the messenger, that is only your perception. As for your post and your long winded condescending self approved version of the world ; it is mostly smoke and mirrors. It is common knowledge that Exxon was funding AGW sceptics, denying it only discredits you. So let's just cut to the chase here.

Karner only proved to his own satisfaction that he might be correct. Others have not come to the same conclusion, nor obtained the same results.

When NASA attempted to replicate Lindzen's iris hypothesis they came up with data that essentially disproved it.

Given the current political and scientific concerns about global warming, Lindzen’s colleagues in the Earth system science community were very interested in his findings. One litmus test for whether or not a new hypothesis is true is whether other scientists can reproduce the same experiment and arrive at the same findings as the original experimenter. Two teams of scientists—one based at NASA’s Langley Research Center (LaRC) and the other at the University of Washington—replicated Lindzen’s experiment and arrived at surprisingly different conclusions. (Only the LaRC team’s experiment is presented here in part 1.)

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/Iris/

 

[Kirsten-B]

Edward,

In the posting above, you comment on oil companies funding sceptics. What about the funding of AGW research by extreme environmental groups like Greenpeace? What about the various projects that were funded by the US that were lobbied for by the same? It seems unfair to mention only one side.

As for the Iris hypothesis article you linked, that was a 5 year old article where the three scientific teams came to different conclusions (not surprising since there are three different locations being observed at three different times) and at least the two teams listed in the article stand by their findings. Both teams are very reputable. Is there an update? Surely there must be more by now.

 

[Skyhunter]

Edward,

In the posting above, you comment on oil companies funding sceptics. What about the funding of AGW research by extreme environmental groups like Greenpeace? What about the various projects that were funded by the US that were lobbied for by the same? It seems unfair to mention only one side.

As for the Iris hypothesis article you linked, that was a 5 year old article where the three scientific teams came to different conclusions (not surprising since there are three different locations being observed at three different times) and at least the two teams listed in the article stand by their findings. Both teams are very reputable. Is there an update? Surely there must be more by now.

An important distinction should be made here about funding.

Funding for research is how science is advanced.

Funding for propaganda is how agendas are advanced.

 

[Kirsten-B]

That's right Sky, and both the oil companies and the environmental groups are looking to get their agendas advanced. One usually uses their own money to do it. The other lobbys the government to get the money to do it.

 

[edward]

Edward,

In the posting above, you comment on oil companies funding sceptics. What about the funding of AGW research by extreme environmental groups like Greenpeace? What about the various projects that were funded by the US that were lobbied for by the same? It seems unfair to mention only one side.

I did mention the other side. The biggest contributor to AGW studies is the United States Government. Greenpeace, unlike Exxon has no ulterior profit motive involved in whatever financial contributions they may have made.

As for the Iris hypothesis article you linked, that was a 5 year old article where the three scientific teams came to different conclusions (not surprising since there are three different locations being observed at three different times) and at least the two teams listed in the article stand by their findings. Both teams are very reputable. Is there an update? Surely there must be more by now.

I would like to see an update on that myself. I am concerned that the acceptance of AGW by the majority may hamper further scientific studies on both sides of the issue. This would be totally wrong and I hope that it never happens.

In a way that is how we got ourselves into the fossil fuel predicament. It was cheap and plentiful, so for the most part, we just quit looking for cleaner energy sources.

 

[Skyhunter]

I reckon you would. I guess I'm too old to play the kid that exclaimed that the emperor wears no clothes. Indeed I do not analyse ice cores. I analyse the reasoning of the analysers. It was better it the analysers sticked to analysing only.

Strawman, I said that the nett resulting feedback is not positive.



Were are the data? I only see some expressions. The test is with the actual data. So why would a mere mathematical expression have the power to refute data testing?

Back later.

Not a strawman, a poor choice of words.

You are claiming that there is no net positive feedback evident in the ice core data. I don't believe you to be qualified to make that claim. I found your analysis of the date to be amateurish and biased. You start with an erroneous assumption as to how the feedback should look, and then when it doesn't meet your false assumption you declare it evidence that AGW is a hoax.

By your own words it is based on analyzing the reasoning of a person or persons you do not even know. Not very scientific. I think the term you would use for that is "ad hominem".

Andre you accuse the scientific community and the worlds governments of a grand conspiracy to plunge the world into a totalitarian state. And yet, when someone questions your questionable sources, you accuse them of fallacy.

See any contradiction there?

I'll make it easy for you.

You show me a peer reviewed study that explains the warming and cooling trends contained in the data without CO₂ and then we have something to talk about. You cannot do this because there is no way to explain past and present climate without CO₂!

I am not saying that CO₂ explains everything, it does not. There is an ocean of ignorance about climate and how the planet will react to the AGHG forcings.

I have seen experiments go badly wrong with disastrous effects. We only have one planet. I suggest we stop this experiment now. The projected results are not looking favorable for the subject.

 

[Kirsten-B]

Edward,

Money and power. Oil = money, Greenpeace = power. Both are just as bad and neither should be involved in furthering their agendas by corrupting science, yet both try to do it.

As for the "fossil fuel predicament," I read that the problem was conservation and pollution. Pollution was reduced by adding pollution equipment in cars. Conservation was a problem because certain politicians could not get campaign contributions from oil companies. So they started yelling conservation, we are going to run out next year. Back in the 70's there was little geologic data to refute this claim. They gave tax breaks to people for solar and etc. That changed along with the oil lobby getting the tax breaks reversed. The story is different now because we are using so much more, especially China and India are stressing the supply so much that it made a large contribution to the price increases of recent years. (mid east instability being the other) Thats just oil prices, the gas prices in the US went up more because environmentalists stopped independent refiners from opening up (i bet the oil companies did not lobby against this, all they did was upgrade their existing refineries). So now what do you have? Oil companies sell more gas for 3 times the price. Exxon/Mobile in the first 3 months of this year had record profits of 9.8 billion. That will not change until a whole lot of people change to electric cars that are charged by, for instance, a solar charger in their driveway at home.

 

[Kirsten-B]

Comment from Sky,

"You show me a peer reviewed study that explains the warming and cooling trends contained in the data without CO2 and then we have something to talk about. You cannot do this because there is no way to explain past and present climate without CO2!"

You do not need one, NOAA data sets are available on line. Compare the world temp and the ENSO and see where it comes from. But do not make the same mistake that the rest did by using a basis temp (ocean) from 20 years before. You have to use the ocean temp from the year before. You cannot forget the 11,000 year solar high that we have experienced in the last 70 years and the way it heated the oceans during this time.

CO2 in the vostoc ice cores lags temps. There is no evidence that even supports the claim that CO2 amplified temps in this time. Temperature increase in the last 100 years lead 80% of the CO2 rises. The global cooling from 1944 to 1975 correlates very well with ENSO, not the hypothesized and now disproven idea that global smog cooled the world during this time. And finally, there is no way, using AGW theory, to explain the leveling out of temps in the last 5 years.

 

[Skyhunter]

IIn a way that is how we got ourselves into the fossil fuel predicament. It was cheap and plentiful, so for the most part, we just quit looking for cleaner energy sources.

Jimmy Carter foresaw the problem 30 years ago. The policy he set in motion was changed by Ronald Reagan.

It wasn't because it was cheap, it was because it was profitable.

I don't think that we run the risk of not studying the AGW enough. There is so much that is still unexplained that there will be no shortage of funding for research.

There is a problem for the denialist think tank funding however. Murdoch has quit funding them, and I believe that Exxon has approached the Union of Concerned Scientists, to come to an agreement where they will stop funding think tanks to spread "uncertainty."

The problem with the denialists, is they are not being objective. I don't see any evidence of "warmers" being convinced of AGW as gospel truth.

I do see plenty evidence of denial from the skeptics, without any real evidence, or with cherry picked and distorted evidence. The most vocal of the climate deniers are not scientists. Nor are they propagating scientific findings.

When I read the scientific papers I see little bias, whether it be Lindzen or Mann. I will say that Lindzen has written some op-ed pieces that I found to be somewhat ludicrous. But on the whole climate scientists are in agreement about GHG's and there contribution to GW.

To claim that there is little or no evidence to support the current conclusions of the scientific community, using questionable sources and then ignoring evidence and the work of 10's of 1000's of real scientists is IMO ludicrous.

 

[Kirsten-B]

Sky's comment,

"Jimmy Carter foresaw the problem 30 years ago. The policy he set in motion was changed by Ronald Reagan." If I recall correctly, Carter was the guy who could not get money from the oil companies and Reagan was the one who did.

As for the rest of the comments, can you show me a measurment of AGW? To this point it has all been calculated and the observations do not support it.

 

[Skyhunter]

That's right Sky, and both the oil companies and the environmental groups are looking to get their agendas advanced. One usually uses their own money to do it. The other lobbys the government to get the money to do it.

Neither Greenpeace nor Exxon fund research into global warming. Greenpeace lobbies congress and has some access to the media, as well as lots of members to raise awareness of issues it is concerned with.

The Exxon agenda as outlined in this http://www.environmentaldefense.org/documents/3860_GlobalClimateSciencePlanMemo.pdf is quite specific about the strategy and funding. Exxon funds think tanks to promote their agenda.

I would not consider Greenpeace to be an extreme environmental group. ALF and ELF are extreme environmental groups.

But I digress.

Let us look at the motives of the two groups.

Greenpeace motive:

Save the whales.

Exxon motive:

Profit.

So I contribute to Greenpeace and live a low carbon lifestyle.

 

[Moridin]

Greenpeace is a political organization with many goals. One of which happens to be a raving assault of globalization. It has also shown that they are not afraid to use unorthodox methods, as well as not being able to separate a harmful pollutant from water.

For an interesting look at their past.

http://web.archive.org/web/ INSERT Asterix /http://www.greenpeace.org/

Sorry for the strange formatting, but the correct one broke the forum design.

 

[Kirsten-B]

Like the memo says, the funding is through the API (American Oil Institute). Exxon Mobil gives them money for this.

Now let's look at Greenpeace. Their lobbiest goes to a member of congress and has them get money for a certain scientist who, like the API, will give them the desired result.

Either way, this is how science is corrupted and both sides are as guilty as the other regardless of the motivation.

 

[Skyhunter]

Comment from Sky,

"You show me a peer reviewed study that explains the warming and cooling trends contained in the data without CO2 and then we have something to talk about. You cannot do this because there is no way to explain past and present climate without CO2!"

You do not need one, NOAA data sets are available on line. Compare the world temp and the ENSO and see where it comes from. But do not make the same mistake that the rest did by using a basis temp (ocean) from 20 years before. You have to use the ocean temp from the year before. You cannot forget the 11,000 year solar high that we have experienced in the last 70 years and the way it heated the oceans during this time.

CO2 in the vostoc ice cores lags temps. There is no evidence that even supports the claim that CO2 amplified temps in this time. Temperature increase in the last 100 years lead 80% of the CO2 rises. The global cooling from 1944 to 1975 correlates very well with ENSO, not the hypothesized and now disproven idea that global smog cooled the world during this time. And finally, there is no way, using AGW theory, to explain the leveling out of temps in the last 5 years.

A. I don't understand how you can conclude that NOAA scientists have made a fatal flaw in their analysis of the temperature data.

B. What does El Nino have to do with GHG concentrations and their effect on climate?

The fact that CO₂ lags temperature is no surprise. In fact it had been predicted 30 years ago and is well understood by the scientific community.

Andre would call that a strawman argument, since the point is irrelevant.

It is quite effective however since on the surface it appears to contradict what people thought they knew about global warming.

Here is a great question and response from a climatologist:

Dear Jeff,

I read your article "What does the lag of CO2 behind temperature in ice cores tell us about global warming?" You mention that CO2 does not initiate warmings, but may amplify warmings that are already underway. The obvious question comes up as to whether or not CO2 levels also lag periods when cooling begins after a warming cycle...even one of 5,000 years?

If CO2 levels on planet Earth also lag the cooling periods, then how can it be that CO2 levels are causally related to terrestrial heating periods at all? I am not sure what the ice core records are related the time response of CO2 to the cooling trends. If there is also a lag in CO2 levels behind a cooling period, then it appears that CO2 levels not only do not initiate warming periods but are also unrelated to the onset of cooling periods. It would appear that the actual CO2 levels are rather impotent as an amplifier either way...warming or cooling. We are talking about planet Earth after all and not Venus whose atmospheric pressure is many times larger than Earth's.

If there is also a time lag upon the onset of cooling, then it appears that some other mechanism actually drives the temperature changes. So what is the time difference between CO2 levels during the onset of a cooling period at the end of a warming period and the time history of the temperature changes in the ice cores?

Dear John,

The coolings appear to be caused primarily and initially by increase in the Earth-Sun distance during northern hemisphere summer, due to changes in the Earth's orbit. As the orbit is not round, but elliptical, sunshine is weaker during some parts of the year than others. This is the so-called Milankovitch hypothesis [this really should say "theory" -- eric], which you may have heard about. Just as in the warmings, CO2 lags the coolings by a thousand years or so, in some cases as much as three thousand years.

But do not make the mistake of assuming that these warmings and coolings must have a single cause. It is well known that multiple factors are involved, including the change in planetary albedo, change in nitrous oxide concentration, change in methane concentration, and change in CO2 concentration. I know it is intellectually satisfying to identify a single cause for some observed phenomenon, but that unfortunately is not the way Nature works much of the time.

Nor is there any requirement that a single cause operate throughout the entire 5000 - year long warming trends, and the 70,000 year cooling trends.

Thus it is not logical to argue that, because CO2 does not cause the first thousand years or so of warming, nor the first thousand years of cooling, it cannot have caused part of the many thousands of years of warming in between.

Think of heart disease - one might be tempted to argue that a given heart patient's condition was caused solely by the fact that he ate french fries for lunch every day for 30 years. But in fact his 10-year period of no exercise because of a desk job, in the middle of this interval, may have been a decisive influence. Just because a sedentary lifestyle did not cause the beginning of the plaque buildup, nor the end of the buildup, would you rule out a contributing causal role for sedentary lifestyle?

There is a rich literature on this topic. If you are truly interested, I urge you to read up.

The contribution of CO2 to the glacial-interglacial coolings and warmings amounts to about one-third of the full amplitude, about one-half if you include methane and nitrous oxide.

So one should not claim that greenhouse gases are the major cause of the ice ages. No credible scientist has argued that position (even though Al Gore implied as much in his movie). The fundamental driver has long been thought, and continues to be thought, to be the distribution of sunshine over the Earth's surface as it is modified by orbital variations. This hypothesis was proposed by James Croll in the 19th century, mathematically refined by Milankovitch in the 1940s, and continues to pass numerous critical tests even today.

The greenhouse gases are best regarded as a biogeochemical feedback, initiated by the orbital variations, but then feeding back to amplify the warming once it is already underway. By the way, the lag of CO2 of about 1000 years corresponds rather closely to the expected time it takes to flush excess respiration-derived CO2 out of the deep ocean via natural ocean currents. So the lag is quite close to what would be expected, if CO2 were acting as a feedback.

The response time of methane and nitrous oxide to climate variations is measured in decades. So these feedbacks operate much faster.

The quantitative contribution of CO2 to the ice age cooling and warming is fully consistent with current understanding of CO2's warming properties, as manifested in the IPCC's projections of future warming of 3±1.5 C for a doubling of CO2 concentration. So there is no inconsistency between Milankovitch and current global warming.

Hope this is illuminating.

Jeff

 

[Kirsten-B]

One more thing, there is nothing wrong with saving the whales or making a profit. But there is something wrong when you corrupt science to do either.

 

[Kirsten-B]

Sky comment:

"A. I don't understand how you can conclude that NOAA scientists have made a fatal flaw in their analysis of the temperature data.

B. What does El Nino have to do with GHG concentrations and their effect on climate?"

You misunderstood me. NOAA publishes both temp and ENSO figures. There are no fatal flaws in the NOAA temp data (although they will downgrade their warming estimates in July because they are eliminating urban heat island effect that skews the data)

The warming effects of ENSO are clear in the temperature record. My point is that ENSO correlates with temperature changes where changes in GHG's do not.

The points made in the letter you provide is not new. But when the tops and bottoms of the peaks on the graph do not support the idea that CO2 was an amplifier. I do agree with the guy in the letter that CO2 was something from biological processes.

 

[Skyhunter]

Sky's comment,

"Jimmy Carter foresaw the problem 30 years ago. The policy he set in motion was changed by Ronald Reagan." If I recall correctly, Carter was the guy who could not get money from the oil companies and Reagan was the one who did.

As for the rest of the comments, can you show me a measurment of AGW? To this point it has all been calculated and the observations do not support it.

Were you alive then?

We just allocated another $100 billion to occupy an oil rich nation. And you are comparing the influence of Greenpeace to the influence of the worlds biggest corporations?

I think your understanding of global politics is as naive as your understanding of climate science.

I don't know what you are looking for when you say measurement. My sense is that you are looking for some simple explanation to a complex system and if you don't get one you will not accept any conclusions.

If you cannot find in all your research evidence that CO₂ contributes roughly 30% of observed warming then I don't think there is anything I can provide you that will change your mind.

Your first fallacy is that AGW is just calculated. That is incorrect and I believe related to your misunderstanding and xenophobic reaction to the computer climate models.

The models are calibrated to the observed record. The more data, the more observation, and the more understanding of the dynamics, the better the models get.

 

[Kirsten-B]

LOL Sky, I was not alive then, like I said, I had to read about it. Personally I would rather concentrate on the science.

The comment about being naive is really insulting. Is that what you do to all of the students who visit this forum who disagree with you? You cannot provide a single scientific study that measures the warming of the GHG hypothesis so you begin the insults? I thought this was a place for learning.

As for the computer models, they have never and they never will. Not only do they not understand clouds and water vapor, but they cannot predict solar, volcanoes, ENSO, PDO or kelvin waves. These things are tuned to death and after 39485723490857 simmulations they are given a large range to account for "Natural Variation." Under these circumstances I can program my Nintendo 007 game to say all the spies were killed by GHG's.

 

[Skyhunter]

How does it not support CO₂ as an amplifier?

I think you are making the same mistake that Andre has. You are assuming that for A to be true then B must fit your preconceived notion as to how the graph should look. This is a simplistic assumption and your analysis is meaningless, since neither you nor I are qualified to interperet the data.

As the letter points out, there is a lot going on, and still huge gaps in our knowledge. But my point is, and let me make it very clear:

Scientists cannot, let me repeat, cannot account for the observed warming and cooling trends today, nor throughout the geological history of our planet without CO₂.

All the climate models include the effect of atmospheric CO₂ because if they did not they would not match the observed record! If you want to question that assumption you must provide a plausable alternative.

 

[Skyhunter]

I was alive then and have a much richer experience from which to draw, than whatever historical literature I might have been exposed to.

I don't mean to sound insulting but when you offer simplistic arguments to complex issues, it demonstrates a certain naivety.

 

[Kirsten-B]

Sky comments:

"How does it not support CO2 as an amplifier?

I think you are making the same mistake that Andre has. You are assuming that for A to be true then B must fit your preconceived notion as to how the graph should look. This is a simplistic assumption and your analysis is meaningless, since neither you nor I are qualified to interperet the data.

As the letter points out, there is a lot going on, and still huge gaps in our knowledge. But my point is, and let me make it very clear:

Scientists cannot, let me repeat, cannot account for the observed warming and cooling trends today, nor throughout the geological history of our planet without CO2.

All the climate models include the effect of atmospheric CO2 because if they did not they would not match the observed record! If you want to question that assumption you must provide a plausable alternative."

Before I begin, can we please avoid the language such as "preconceived notions." I have not made those kinds of accusations with you.

If in fact all of the models all consider CO2 then that is probably why they can not get it right. They have tried to add anthropogenic aerosols in a big way to explain 1944-1976 cooling and to prevent run-away warming scenarios. When you look at the monthly graphs you can see the effects of the different things that affect climate. Vilcanoes, solar and etc. There were record keeping problems around world war 2. You can see these things in the temperature record. Also, you can definitely see ENSO in the temperature record. What you can not see is a temperature departure caused by CO2 when all these things are considered.

As for qualifications, it is not necessary, given all of the literature on this subject, to give simmulation and calculation better weight than observation.

 

[Evo]

When I read the scientific papers I see little bias, whether it be Lindzen or Mann.

You seem to be unaware that Mann's "hockeystick" turned out to be a disgrace for Mann.

The “hockey stick” representation of the temperature behavior of the past 1,000 years is broken, dead. Although already reeling from earlier analyses aimed at its midsection, the knockout punch was just delivered by Nature magazine. Thus the end of this palooka: that the climate of the past millennium was marked by about 900 years of nothing and then 100 years of dramatic temperature rise caused by people. The saga of the “hockey stick” will be remembered as a remarkable lesson in how fanaticism can temporarily blind a large part of the scientific community and allow unproven results to become “mainstream” thought overnight.

The “Hockey Stick” is dead.

But, the “hockey stick” was remarkable. And as such, it will be remembered as a remarkable lesson in how fanaticism can temporarily blind a large part of the scientific community and allow unproven results to become mainstream thought overnight. The embarrassment that it caused to many scientists working in the field of climatology will not be soon forgotten. Hopefully, new findings to come, as remarkable and enticing as they may first appear, will be greeted with a bit more caution and thorough investigation before they are widely accepted as representing the scientific consensus.

http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2005/03/03/hockey-stick-1998-2005-rip/

To claim that there is little or no evidence to support the current conclusions of the scientific community, using questionable sources and then ignoring evidence and the work of 10's of 1000's of real scientists is IMO ludicrous.

So true, so why do you still believe in AGW?