News No logic for inaction - Global Warming

[Andre]

No period in the last million years has been this warm with the only factors considered x. With CO2.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Carbon_Dioxide_400kyr-2.png

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:2000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png

Not done with that, yet. And

Try not to have a good time . . . This is supposed to be educational." Lucy van Pelt (Peanuts)

We have discussed the http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/medieval-warm-period.pdf . I have shown that at the end of the first millennium multiple proxies all over the world show warming, without balancing cooling, convincingly challenging the SPM about the second half of the 20th century being the warmest 5 decades in the last 1300 years.

The obvious problem is that natural factors, without greenhouse gasses could cause more warming than today, making the global warming idea very doubtful

Then we have mentioned the Holocene Thermal Optimum, roughly 9000-6000 years ago, when http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/geog/downloads/634/270.pdf and this happened when the CO2 was stable but lower than today. But we had a waning summer insolation maximum of the Northern Hemisphere (milankovitch cycles), so that seems to make sense. However the Holocene thermal Maximum was also evident on the Southern Hemisphere under cool summer insolation conditions:

http://tinyurl.com/2tlgy3
http://tinyurl.com/3b7uz3
http://tinyurl.com/2s3dwq
http://tinyurl.com/358w3l
http://tinyurl.com/2w86g8

It must also be noted that both the Greenland Ice Sheet and the Antarctic Ice sheets survived this millenniums long warmer periods without any problem, challenging the melting scare. So, besides solar insolation which opposed warming on the southern hemisphere and the CO2 much lower than today, there was still natural variation making it warmer than today.

Then we have the previous interglacial period the Eemian, Ipwichian or Sangamonian some 120,000 years ago. This was when the hippopotamus swam in the Rhine in Germany and in the Thames in the UK suggesting sub-tropical conditions in areas currently with moderate climates. Would be tough to state that this period was not warmer than today. The CO2 levels were lower of course, comparable with the pre-industrial times.
Incidentely, one of the warmest periods in the distant geologic past is considered to be the early Tertiary Paleocene era from 65-55 Million years ago. How about its CO2 levels? Comparable to today!:

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/292/5525/2310
http://droyer.web.wesleyan.edu/royer_dissertation.pdf (fig 4.3 page 102 of the PDF count)
Double source showing robustness of the stomata method.

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/CO2-KT-PETM.GIF

So it is obvious that the natural variability in climate is grossly underestimated in the Summary for Policy makers. It can be warmer than today, without excess CO2 and without increased orbital forcing. It may also be noted that this is not foreseen in any model, so it can’t reproduce it either. Nevertheless, this variability shows that CO2 is not necessarily a major climate driver if at all.

Why is this chapter neither in the SPM nor in the ISPM?

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

Not done with that, yet. A very educational post here.

We have discussed the http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/medieval-warm-period.pdf . I have shown that at the end of the first millennium multiple proxies all over the world show warming, without balancing cooling, convincingly challenging the SPM about the second half of the 20th century being the warmest 5 decades in the last 1300 years.

The obvious problem is that natural factors, without greenhouse gasses could cause more warming than today, making the global warming idea very doubtful

Then we have mentioned the Holocene Thermal Optimum, rougly 9000-6000 years ago, when http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/geog/downloads/634/270.pdf and this happened when the CO2 was stable but lower than today. But we had a waning summer insolation maximum of the Northern Hemisphere (milankovitch cycles), so that seems to make sense. However the Holocene thermal Maximum was also evident on the Southern Hemisphere:

http://tinyurl.com/2tlgy3
http://tinyurl.com/3b7uz3
http://tinyurl.com/2s3dwq
http://tinyurl.com/358w3l
http://tinyurl.com/2w86g8

It must also be noted that both the Greenland Ice Sheet and the Antarctic Ice sheets survived this millenniums long warmer periods without any problem challenging the melting scare. So besides solar insolation which opposed warming on the southern hemisphere and the CO2 much lower than today, there was still natural variation making it warmer than today.

Then we have the previous interglacial period the Eemian, Ipwichian or Sangamonian some 120,000 years ago.. This was when the hippopotamus swam in the Rhine in Germany and in the Thames in the UK suggesting sub-tropical conditions in areas currently with moderate climates. Would be tough to state that this period was not warmer than today. The CO2 levels were lower of course, comparable with the pre-industrial times.
Incidentely, one of the warmest periods in the distant geologic past is considered to be the early Tertiary Paleocene era from 65-55 Million years ago. How about its CO2 levels? Comparable to today!:

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/292/5525/2310
http://droyer.web.wesleyan.edu/royer_dissertation.pdf (fig 4.3 page 102 of the PDF count)
Double source showing robustness of the stomata method.

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/CO2-KT-PETM.GIF

So it is obvious that the natural variability in climate is grossly underestimated in the Summary for Policy makers. It can be warmer than today, without excess CO2 and without increased orbital forcing. It may also be noted that this is not foreseen in any model, so it can’t reproduce it either. Nevertheless, this variability shows that CO2 is not necessarily a major climate driver if at all.

Why is this chapter neither in the SPM nor in the ISPM?

To be honest I think you're not seeing the bigger picture, and you are accusing the scientists of being fraudulent and making erroneus claims, frankly I think you are wrong, and so does the scientific community, however I see that science does not convince you any more than evidence does, so it's perhaps best if you contact the scientific world to alert them to their serious mistakes, if you're right you'll be famous if you're wrong they'll tell you so, and believe me if I was half as qualified as they are, I'd be doing a much better job of trying to persuade you you are wrong.

And scientists already know all of this and in fact I've seen all this before in another forum, and seen it utterly trampled under an experts evidential and professional opinion. So mostly I don't even have to read it again, as I've seen it denounced and rejected, I assure you he is not the only person who has to face this criticism of his work, there's a constant barrage of groups trying to destroy the evidence. So far global warming remains, and until it is convincingly destroyed I'm in the science corner, yep I agree with them, they have the qualifications, so my opinion is that since I don't know even a thousandth of what they know, then I'll go with them until I see something convincing the other way backed by scientists not the Australian businessmans laymen shake your cane at the environmentalists groups and stare worryedly at your profit margin.

By the way scientists when they make that assertion mean in the last x 100000 years, it's patently absurd to compare a period 20 million years ago with today.

The medieval warming perios simply is not global, I don't know how I can clear up your misinformation here, this is why scientists do not take it as apt for comparisson, it mostly affected the Northern hemisphere, with the south getting average temperatures and in some cases lower than average temperatures, that is why they don't compare it. Remember average not anecdotal. Ie if you take all the evidence and average it the Northern hemisphere shows a marked increase, the Southern a typical average.

And yes factors in addition to CO2 are accounted for? Are you accusing scientists of being lazy or sloppy with that link?

The eocine miocene or whatever periods probably are explained solely by milankovich cycles, sun spot activity, volcanic activity or lack of it, etc,etc,etc and of course the land coverage which is probably the single biggest contributer, the albedo of a large joined land mass is much different from our current lay of the land so they are not taken into consideration, they are too far from the modern day to get any reliable comparrison so scientists tend to look back to the Ice age when making their case.

 

[ptabor]

THERE IS NO GLOBAL WARMING, RUSH LIMBAUGH TOLD ME SO. HE IS UBER SWEET POLITIKAL ANALYST >> YOUR STUPID LIBERAL SELF LOATHING DEMOCRATIC "SCIENTISTS"

HAHAHAHAHAH

sorry, I couldn't resist.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

THERE IS NO GLOBAL WARMING, RUSH LIMBAUGH TOLD ME SO. HE IS UBER SWEET POLITIKAL ANALYST >> YOUR STUPID LIBERAL SELF LOATHING DEMOCRATIC "SCIENTISTS"

HAHAHAHAHAH

sorry, I couldn't resist.

Actually I think many of them are Republicans

 

[ptabor]

Their political leanings mean nothing to me. The data and evidence will speak for itself.

I was merely jesting. I listen to talk radio on the way to the uni because a) the same station gives weather and traffic reports and b) the music stations play nothing but absolute garbage over and over again.

It irks me how the far right demagogues this issue and downplays it as a liberal ploy to make us feel guilty for our way of life. I think al gore's movie has done more to hurt the "green" cause than help. It's given the right wing nuts (rush in particular) much needed ammo for their ad hominem attacks on what is a scientific issue.

 

[Andre]

And scientists already know all of this.

No they most certainly do not. Otherwise it would be really fraundelent. What they usually know is the textbook knowledge of so many years ago and of course every latest nut and bolt within their own speciality. Glaciologists have no idea about the mammoth megafauna steppe of Siberia. Paleontologists have no idea about the big differences between the carbon dating and calendar dating. So who has the big picture anyway?

Now how many more people would bother for instance to study the next literature list.

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/ext-refs-new.pdf

The medieval warming period is most definitely global and I have shown several dozens publications which support that. Maintaining that the Medieval Warm period was not global is getting increasingly more fraudulent, unless you can come up with a comparable number of proxies that balance it with cooling.

Furthermore I do not compare the Paleocene with today. That's a strawman. What I do show is that there is evidence that suggest that the Paleocene warming is not due to elevated CO2 levels as has been assumed before.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

No they most certainly do not. Otherwise it would be really fraundelent. What they usually know is the textbook knowledge of so many years ago and of course every latest nut and bolt within their own speciality. Glaciologists have no idea about the mammoth megafauna steppe of Siberia. Paleontologists have no idea about the big differences between the carbon dating and calendar dating. So who has the big picture anyway?

Now how many more people would bother for instance to study the next literature list.

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/ext-refs-new.pdf

The medieval warming period is most definitely global and I have shown several dozens publications which support that. Maintaining that the Medieval Warm period was not global is getting increasingly more fraudulent, unless you can come up with a comparable number of proxies that balance it with cooling.

Furthermore I do not compare the Paleocene with today. That's a strawman. What I do show is that there is evidence that suggest that the Paleocene warming is not due to elevated CO2 levels as has been assumed before.

Well the only one I've met is more than well aware of all the links you gave before this new list, I should know he has to dismiss the claims on a regular basis, have you not considered even for a moment that if you are so sure you should send your thoughts to a climatologist? If the answer you get back is positive then you have changed science for the better, if however as I suspect they trample on your ideas and provide adequate reasoning why there not accurate, or where the figures have been manipulated or where there evidence that the Northern hemisphere was much warmer than the south is wrong etc. Wait I know I'll go dredge up some quotes. If I can find them, answers from a climatologist.

All models have been validated as we have discussed before, though I agree that simulations run over 100 years are not reflective of the Earth's future (they aren't really intended to be in most cases).

Global dimming has been included in climate models for decades. One of the best validations was when Pinatubo went off (1991), J. Hansen accurately predicted the timing and magnitude of the resulting global cooling (due to global dimming) - i.e. before the cooling occurred.

The question of if anthropogenic climate change is 'good or bad' is not a scientific one.

We know conclusively that the additional CO2 observed in the atmosphere is anthropogenic.

There are a large number of independent reasons why that is so, but one reason has to do with isotopes.

CO2 has various isotopomers because of the existence of 12C, 13C, 14C, 16O, 17O, 18O, etc.

Different sources and sinks fractionate these isotopomers in different ways and so by studying that fractionation we can constrain certain source and sink values.

In particular CO2 produced from fossil fuels has a different isotopic structure due to having originated in plant tissue, which has a specific isotopic signature (depleted in 13C). It has also been isolated from the atmospheric source of C14 (cosmic ray N interactions, and other nuclear processes) which has a relatively short half life. So they have almost no C14.

We also can measure the decline in the oxygen concentration of the atmosphere (a result of additional combustion), if the ocean were a source of CO2 it would also be a source of O2 for various reasons simple and complex.

Another reason has to do with possible places where CO2 can come from and/or go to and the time-scales involved.

On time scales around 100 years or less there is only the oceans and the biosphere (the biggest reservoirs of carbon like limestone, operate on much longer time-scales).

Various independent estimates show that the carbon content of the oceans is increasing by 1-3 PgC per year, and that the source of that increase is atmospheric CO2.

The biosphere is also taking up CO2 (and yes the CO2 fertilization effect is well known here), but is also a source of CO2 due to deforestation. In balance the amounts of CO2 in the biosphere is increasing.

If the oceans or land were causing the rise in atmospheric CO2 (on the relevant time-scales) they would hold less CO2, not more.

Let me dispel your idea that dedicated scientists are idiots and that all truth comes from untrained, only slightly interested, teenagers and conspiracy theorists.

It is true that antropogenic contribution to the total terrestrial greenhouse effect is small, and that water vapor is by far the largest contributor to the greenhouse effect. I once had a long discussion with others about this issue

Now taken without any context or knowledge of science, this may seem important to some, or to somehow disprove global warming, or to imply that climate scientists are idiots, etc. etc.

But in fact this has been known for hundreds of years, and is the first thing a climate science course (even at an undergraduate level) should teach you.

Fact #1: Based on the radiative characteristics of the sun, and a reasonable value for the albedo of the earth, we can calculate what the surface temperature of the Earth should be. I first performed this calculation as an undergraduate about 20 years ago.

That temperature is -30 C.

This can be validated by predicting the surface temperature of other bodies in the solar system that lack an atmosphere.

Now in the face of that fact we also must conclude that all atmospheric water vapor would freeze out on the surface of the earth, thus increasing the Earth's albedo, and decreasing its average temperature even more. This idea is sometimes known as snowball earth.

So the non-anthropogenic greenhouse effect accounts for about 45 degrees of additional warming. A critical bit of warming (and information), yes?

Fact #2: Based simply on a Henery's law argument we can predict that an increase in global temperatures will also increase atmospheric water vapor. Simply put a warmer atmosphere can hold more water, and our atmosphere is always roughly at equilibrium being in contact with large volumes of liquid water (i.e. the oceans).

This is known as a positive feedback and implies that any increase in atmospheric CO2 will be followed by an increase in atmospheric H2O.

Once consequence of this is the 'runnaway greenhouse effect' wherein an increase in temperature increases H2O, which increases atmospheric temperatures, which increases H2O, etc. etc.

This sort of thing is why we cannot use simplistic models (such as I mention above) to generate useful answers to complex questions.

Your link not only uses a simplistic model, but does so in an intellectually dishonest fashion.

Now we can take the predictions of warming in context.

The overall climate sensitivity of the Earth system to a doubling of CO2 is an often used benchmark for comparing predictions.

This climate sensitivity takes into account the water vapor feedback I mention above, and many many other things... too many to list here.

The climate sensitivity predictions are in the range of 2-4 degrees for a doubling of CO2.

Note that we have not yet reached a doubling (and your link is not looking at a doubling).

When we do reach a doubling current estimates are that anthropogenic CO2 (including feedbacks like increased water vapor) will account for 5-10% of the total greenhouse effect.

You can call this 'next to no effect' if you like, that is a judgement call. Most scientists call this 'a large effect' and note that CO2 will more than double if we continue business as usual.

Sadly there was a thread where he went through every theory counterproposed against global warming and showed in detail how they were accounted for or why they were dismissed by the so called idiots in labs, but I think it's burried in the Archive somewhere. Maybe I can pesuade him to check out your stuff, I'm sure he has better things to do with his time like climatology modelling though and it's not like he hasn't seen it all before anyway

Look, science proceeds by proposing things that can be wrong. Then allowing time for independent verification and reproduction.

The ice age predictions in the 70's are nothing like the current consensus on global warming; and on the relevant time scales discussed in the literature (not news magazines) it has not been debunked. We are still due.

Sure consensus has been wrong in the past, what's your point? I'm not claiming infallibility.

Whatever future consensus consists of it will certainly include the increase in atmospheric insulation due to anthropogenic greenhouse gasses. It's as near a fact as anything in science. Climate change is more uncertain

https://www.physicsforums.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=9085&stc=1&d=1170769808

but this plot: Is very well tested and part a) has nothing to do with models.

Validations are published in the scientific literature. We've discussed it before remember? Just like your protein folding model. I can't look up my post on the topic ATM.

But there's lots of other stuff, like the Hansen paper on Pinatubo (Hansen, J., A. Lacis, R. Ruedy, and M. Sato, 1992: Potential climate impact of Mount Pinatubo eruption. Geophys. Res. Lett., 19, 215–218..), like stratospheric cooling, like surface temperature warming, like ocean surface warming, like an energy imbalance between incoming short wave and outgoing long wave radiation, etc. All in the open literature.

Heh, yeah its actually IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - we were both wrong) I used to work at the IGPP (Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics). Anyway, the IPCC has both a scientific and a political portion. But the science they present is the best of the best. They have published before, the 2001 report represents the best science at that time, just as the 2007 report will. Nothing political about that.

 

[Andre]

I wonder you want to impress with "I-know-a-climatologist". Who doesn't? there are thousends of them nowadays. It's a popular breed. I know a few too. But never mind

This is known as a positive feedback and implies that any increase in atmospheric CO2 will be followed by an increase in atmospheric H2O.

That's the mainstay of the global warming thought and it's highly neccesary since withoutm CO2 reradiation physics is way too small to scare anybody as can be seen http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/modtran-rad-bal.GIF . Just about one degree celcius per doubling CO2 after attaining thermal equilibrium, which takes a few centuries. The direct theoretical value is roughly about 0,698 degrees.

So the positive feedback is an hypothesis which requires proof. It has been attempted to see the rather large temperature dip after the Pinatubo eruption as positive feedback (Soden et al 2001 I believe) but the carefully avoided to look at any other similar type eruption, and there were two of them Agung, Indonesia and El Chichon mexico, and although the three showed stratospere warming (lower graph), only Pinatubo showed clear lower tropophere cooling (upper graph).

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/reproduceability.jpg

while there was also similar trophospheric cooling without any volcanic forces. Hence the cooling curve after Pinatubo proofs nothing, no positive feedback. Then Olavi Karner had his own way of calculating the random walk characteristics of temperature series which proved no positive feedback here:

http://www.aai.ee/~olavi/2001JD002024u.pdf

It appears that the positive feedback is spoiled by another player providing clear negative feedback, the clouds.

Discussions with 'experts' here http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/debate/debate.aspx?did=1&pg=1&f=

Discussion with one of the expert, when the site was down:

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/refuting%20the%20Greenland%20paleo%20thermometer.pdf

I linked to that before. It could help to click a link occasionally.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

I wonder you want to impress with "I-know-a-climatologist". Who doesn't? there are thousends of them nowadays. It's a popular breed. I know a few too. But never mind

No one I know atleast four or five PhD in physics and two in neuropharmacology too, but since that's kind of irrellevant I am unlikely quote them even if they were regulars on forums, the point is this guy knows what he's talking about, I seriously don't get the same impression from you. I couldn't give a damn if you told me you knew the Pope, this is a discussion: not a who knows the most expertest expert in climatology.

That's the mainstay of the global warming thought and it's highly neccesary since withoutm CO2 reradiation physics is way too small to scare anybody as can be seen http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/modtran-rad-bal.GIF . Just about one degree celcius per doubling CO2 after attaining thermal equilibrium, which takes a few centuries. The direct theoretical value is roughly about 0,698 degrees.

So the positive feedback is an hypothesis which requires proof. It has been attempted to see the rather large temperature dip after the Pinatubo eruption as positive feedback (Soden et al 2001 I believe) but the carefully avoided to look at any other similar type eruption, and there were two of them Agung, Indonesia and El Chichon mexico, and although the three showed stratospere warming (lower graph), only Pinatubo showed clear lower tropophere cooling (upper graph).

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/reproduceability.jpg

while there was also similar trophospheric cooling without any volcanic forces. Hence the cooling curve after Pinatubo proofs nothing, no positive feedback. Then Olavi Karner had his own way of calculating the random walk characteristics of temperature series which proved no positive feedback here:

http://www.aai.ee/~olavi/2001JD002024u.pdf

It appears that the positive feedback is spoiled by another player providing clear negative feedback, the clouds.

Discussions with 'experts' here http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/debate/debate.aspx?did=1&pg=1&f=

Discussion with one of the expert, when the site was down:

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/refuting%20the%20Greenland%20paleo%20thermometer.pdf

I linked to that before. It could help to click a link occasionally.

Have you discussed it with experts? I mean I'm not convinced but then I don't have the same level of expertese as an expert, have you tried rasing your issues, what did they say?

So global dimming does not need to be accounted for is that what you are saying?

 

[Andre]

Have you discussed it with experts?

So, you still have not looked at the NERC discussions when you asked that question. Perhaps you did not even see the links.
Do try. It's Prof Collin Prentice and Dr Tim Lenton versus Andre:

http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/debate/debate.aspx?did=1&pg=1&f=

and singled out a discusion here:

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/refuting%20the%20Greenland%20paleo%20thermometer.pdf
http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/refuting%20the%20Greenland%20paleo%20thermometer1.pdf


I did not talk about global dimming, which was never global anyway.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

So, you still have not looked at the NERC discussions when you asked that question. Perhaps you did not even see the links.
Do try. It's Prof Collin Prentice and Dr Tim Lenton versus Andre:

http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/debate/debate.aspx?did=1&pg=1&f=

and singled out a discusion here:

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/refuting%20the%20Greenland%20paleo%20thermometer.pdf
http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/refuting%20the%20Greenland%20paleo%20thermometer1.pdf I did not talk about global dimming, which was never global anyway.

I will read them, but I have to pop out in about five minutes, so give me time to read them, but can you answer the question? Have your forwarded your ideas to the scientific the wider science community say written to nature or NS or SA magazine?

I have addressed these issues in replies to previous postings. The pre-industrial CO2 concentration of 280-290 ppm has been replicated on multiple ice cores measured by independent groups. The Antarctic ice core measurements are extremely consistent with one another backward in time through the Holocene and through several glacial-interglacial cycles. There is no scientific basis for the claim that CO2 levels were above 500 ppm at any time during the past 800,000 years.

Jaworowski is not an expert on the subject, and his criticisms have no merit. They were made before there were multiple high resolution CO2 records available that clearly made them unsustainable. The ice core community consists of physicists who are well aware of processes that can, under some circumstances, cause problems for ice core measurements.

Leaf stomatal analyses provide a controversial proxy for CO2 concentration. CO2 measured in ancient air bubbles is not a proxy. If the two differ, very few scientists would accept the stomatal estimate.

Colin Prentice, Prof. Earth System Science, University of Bristol

Yes very interesting, I'll read the rest when I get back.

I read it, seems like the scientists are informed. They have a different conclusion than you. From what I can understand of the last link they are comparing two different effects.

I'm not sure the last link has any real relevance, since we can't know all the factors involved in the last ice age, we can't really use that as evidence now that our models are wrong, not within accuracy, therefore I'd say it's interesting but what exactly does it prove?

The second link I'm not qualified to answer so I won't, and to be frank I didn't understand some of it, so I'll refrain from making comment on the parts I didn't understand.

However that said he is giving you the same answers to these questions as I did in some cases, so I'm sure this is a matter of what and who you believe, as I say though, if you are proven correct and scientist debunk GW then I'll go with that, if not and for now like all good sheep I'm sticking with the concensus, it's not a bad thing to follow the heard sometimes, particularly when your a knowless laymen like myself

 

[Andre]

The problem with those answers is the substantiation. Even a lay man can observe that I back every statement with a multitude of references, they reply with textbook wishdom. Repeating the mere old stuff that is getting refuted, should not sound too convincing. The only thing that Prentice produces after repeated appeals for substantiation is a ten year old borehole study that happens to proof nothing due to extreme low discrimination.

..Prentice: Leaf stomatal analyses provide a controversial proxy for CO2 concentration. CO2 measured in ancient air bubbles is not a proxy.

Notice also that for the sake of the discussion Prentice is happy to betray a complete new game, that of stomata proxies which has shown robustness by duplication as I showed earlier, the ferns and the Gingko and the Metasequoa all ending up with in the same range. The same is true for Holocene proxies of Wagner et al 2005. (I'll produce that study tomorrow). The air in ice bubbles is a very complicated story due to a multitude of processes, which is simply waved away.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

The problem with those answers is the substantiation. Even a lay man can observe that I back every statement with a multitude of references, they reply with textbook wishdom. Repeating the mere old stuff that is getting refuted, should not sound too convincing. The only thing that Prentice produces after repeated appeals for substantiation is a ten year old borehole study that happens to proof nothing due to extreme low discrimination.
Notice also that for the sake of the discussion Prentice is happy to betray a complete new game, that of stomata proxies which has shown robustness by duplication as I showed earlier, the ferns and the Gingko and the Metasequoa all ending up with in the same range. The same is true for Holocene proxies of Wagner et al 2005. (I'll produce that study tomorrow). The air in ice bubbles is a very complicated story due to a multitude of processes, which is simply waved away.

I'm not going to deny you're making a valuable contribution by prodding scientists, I think if you really want to make a difference you need to become one yourself though, and I firmly do believe personally from what I've seen that everything that can be is being accounted for and there is an anomally and this is due to CO2, until I see absolute evidence to the contrary, I don't see a reason to change this position. I've talked with you before about this and I do agree the models always will need revising, but the idea that there is nothing but natural forcings to global warming is liable to remain contraversial until either a) someone produces enough contrary proof to overturn the established theory, or b) the models are confirmed as rubbish and the Earth moves slowly towards another ice age in perhaps x thousand years. Also in one of those lectures the idea was to convey the message simply so in order to debunk some of your ideas would no doubt take some real expertise, which is probably why I didn't understand some of the third link.

However I tend to agree, using very old models broadly to dispute modern models is fraught with danger and open to misinterpritation, so as a scientist if I were one, I would be wary of making broad assumptions with a spotty picture of the event at best.

 

[Andre]

Very little to add to this:

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=156df7e6-d490-41c9-8b1f-106fef8763c6&k=0

...

Step One Scientists for decades have postulated that increases in carbon dioxide and other gases could lead to a greenhouse effect.

Step Two As if on cue, the temperature rose over the course of the 20th century while greenhouse gases proliferated due to human activities.

step Three No other mechanism explains the warming. Without another candidate, greenhouses gases necessarily became the cause.

He has recanted: "Like many others, I was personally sure that CO2 is the bad culprit in the story of global warming. But after carefully digging into the evidence, I realized that things are far more complicated than the story sold to us by many climate scientists or the stories regurgitated by the media...


..Dr. Shariv's digging led him to the surprising discovery that there is no concrete evidence -- only speculation -- that man-made greenhouse gases cause global warming. Even research from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change-- the United Nations agency that heads the worldwide effort to combat global warming -- is bereft of anything here inspiring confidence.

In fact, according to the IPCC's own findings, man's role is so uncertain that there is a strong possibility that we have been cooling, not warming, the Earth. Unfortunately, our tools are too crude to reveal what man's effect has been in the past, let alone predict how much warming or cooling we might cause in the future.

All we have on which to pin the blame on greenhouse gases, says Dr. Shaviv, is "incriminating circumstantial evidence," which explains why climate scientists speak in terms of finding "evidence of fingerprints." Circumstantial evidence might be a fine basis on which to justify reducing greenhouse gases, he adds, "without other 'suspects.' " However, Dr. Shaviv not only believes there are credible "other suspects," he believes that at least one provides a superior explanation for the 20th century's warming.

"Solar activity can explain a large part of the 20th-century global warming," ...etc

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

Very little to add to this:

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=156df7e6-d490-41c9-8b1f-106fef8763c6&k=0

Method Wrong + Answer Correct = Bad Science

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modus_ponens

Reminds me of this logical argument, that suggests a fallacy if the tennants are incorrect.

Ok pardon me but I finally get your point, the scientists and the science could be wrong and are not acknowledging their mistake, I'm not qualified to argue why they may think their theory is right, but I think this is valuable and you should be talking to scientists not me which you obviously are. After all I'm a laymen so what you say to me is meaningless in the context of GW.

Once I get a chance to speak to the said papal figure I'll put the argument to him and see what he thinks, but thanks for making my day very interesting anyway watch this space...

 

[Ivan Seeking]

On topic?

Yes, this is the Political forum and not Earth Sciences [which I shouldn't need to point out to you or anyone else], but as usual you are incapable of allowing any discussion without inserting your fringe arguments. This is about the logic of public policy, which does not take the extreme minority as a consensus.

BTW a most exemplary set of strawmen nicely avoiding the main question with a plethora of sophisticated nonsense. We can go over the list if you like.

No thanks. I take my science from scientists, but I am glad that you were published as a fighter pilot. Congratulations on that. Unfortunately this has nothing to do with AGCC.

Perhaps you would like to provide a logical argument that is free of links and diversions, and free of fringe science arguments, that justifies basing policy on the extreme minority position.

Given the consensus that there is greater than a 90% chance that GW is caused in part by green-house gas emissions, the logical basis for public policy is clear.

 

[turbo]

Given the consensus that there is greater than a 90% chance that GW is caused in part by green-house gas emissions, the logical basis for public policy is clear.

Unfortunately, public policy will not change as long as big businesses and lobbyists are the ones framing the arguments and writing the laws. In my opinion, lobbying should be illegal, and corporate contributions to politicians should be banned and henceforth prosecuted as bribery. We voters elect the congressional representatives from a field pre-approved by vested interests and they scurry off to DC to cuddle up to the money-men and betray our interests. Until this cycle of corruption is interrupted, we will never have an honest representative government.

I recently emailed all of my state's congressional representatives pleading with them to stop Bush from instigating a war with Iran. I got one automated reply from one representative that said essentially "thank you for contacting the office of Rep XXX". You can bet that if my name was Exxon-Mobil, I wouldn't have gotten the brush-off. Where in the Constitution does it say that businesses have rights to congressional representation that exceeds the rights of individual citizens?

 

[sara_87]

the hypocrites that want to save the world by switching of light bulbs when no one is in the room and by telling us to do half flushes etc all have private jets and big cars and go on holidays whenever they feel like it not to mention the big houses...
i know that it is the little things that count but seriously!

personally i think that global warming is going to happen and there is nothing we can do to stop it coz too much damage has been caused and the politicians are just talking about it so much now to get attention and to show everyone that 'we care about the future of your kids'

(maybe someone mentioned this earlier but i couldn't read ten pages of peoples posts as each person writes an essay or so...ever heard of RSI - just kidding)

 

[Andre]

Perhaps you would like to provide a logical argument that is free of links and diversions,

That's the same of asking when did you stop beating your wife. If you want to see evidence you have to accept a link to the source.

How about Nir Shaviv for instance?

http://www.sciencebits.com/CO2orSolar

...

Like many others, I was personally sure that CO2 is the bad culprit in the story of global warming. But after carefully digging into the evidence, I realized that things are far more complicated than the story sold to us by many climate scientists or the stories regurgitated by the media. In fact, there is much more than meets the eye.
...

Summary

As explained above, there is no real direct evidence which can be used to incriminate anthropogenic greenhouse gases as the being the main factor responsible for the observed global warming. The reason these gases were blamed are primarily because (1) we expect them to warm and indeed the global temperature increased, and (2) there is no other mechanism which can explain the warming.

Although this reasoning seems logical, it turns out that (1) We don't even know the sign of the anthropogenic climate driving (because of the unknown indirect aerosol effects), and (2) There is an alternative mechanism which can explain a large part of the warming.

Solar activity can explain a large part of the 20th century global warming, on condition that there is a strong solar/climate link through modulation of the cosmic ray flux and the atmospheric ionization. Evidence for such a link has been accumulating over the past decade, and by now, it is unlikely that it does not exist.

This link also implies that Earth's global temperature sensitivity is also on the low side. Thus, if we double the amount of CO2 by 2100, we will only increase the temperature by about 1°C or so. This is still more than the change over the past century. This is good news, because it implies that future increases in the amount of atmospheric greenhouse gases will not dramatically increase the global temperature, though GHGs will probably be the dominate climate driver.

 

[Andre]

Or Henk Tennekes:

http://climatesci.colorado.edu/2006/01/06/guest-weblog-reflections-of-a-climate-skeptic-henk-tennekes/

Here in the Netherlands, many people have ranked me as a climate skeptic. It did not help much that I called myself a protestant recently. I protest against overwhelming pressure to adhere to the climate change dogma promoted by the adherents of IPCC. I was brought up in a fundamentalist protestant environment, and have become very sensitive to everything that smells like an orthodox belief system.

The advantages of accepting a dogma or paradigm are only too clear. One no longer has to query the foundations of one’s convictions, one enjoys the many advantages of belonging to a group that enjoys political power, one can participate in the benefits that the group provides, and one can delegate questions of responsibility and accountability to the leadership. In brief, the moment one accepts a dogma, one stops being an independent scientist.

cont'd

...
Finally:

From this perspective, those that advocate the idea that the response of the real climate to radiative forcing is adequately represented in climate models have an obligation to prove that they have not overlooked a single nonlinear, possibly chaotic feedback mechanism that Nature itself employs.

Popper would have been sympathetic. He repeatedly warns about the dangers of “infinite regress.” As a staunch defender of the Lorenz paradigm, I add that the task of finding all nonlinear feedback mechanisms in the microstructure of the radiation balance probably is at least as daunting as the task of finding the proverbial needle in the haystack. The blind adherence to the harebrained idea that climate models can generate “realistic” simulations of climate is the principal reason why I remain a climate skeptic. From my background in turbulence I look forward with grim anticipation to the day that climate models will run with a horizontal resolution of less than a kilometer. The horrible predictability problems of turbulent flows then will descend on climate science with a vengeance.

 

[denverdoc]

Unfortunately, public policy will not change as long as big businesses and lobbyists are the ones framing the arguments and writing the laws. In my opinion, lobbying should be illegal, and corporate contributions to politicians should be banned and henceforth prosecuted as bribery. We voters elect the congressional representatives from a field pre-approved by vested interests and they scurry off to DC to cuddle up to the money-men and betray our interests. Until this cycle of corruption is interrupted, we will never have an honest representative government.

I recently emailed all of my state's congressional representatives pleading with them to stop Bush from instigating a war with Iran. I got one automated reply from one representative that said essentially "thank you for contacting the office of Rep XXX". You can bet that if my name was Exxon-Mobil, I wouldn't have gotten the brush-off. Where in the Constitution does it say that businesses have rights to congressional representation that exceeds the rights of individual citizens?

Theres an idea. Limit input from special interest groups, i.e. lobbyists. Colorado passed a bill last Nov that does exactly this. Whether it works or makes such maneuvering even more secret remains to be seen. But until some reform takes place, you're right on Turbo. As to GH gasses, energy efficiency, it'll happen when it becomes profitable to do so. Here's a question--we were assured of a peace dividend when the USSR collapsed. Well what has happened to it? This years defense budget is as bad as the highest under Reagan--includng Iraq, close to 700B. Iraq alone has cost or will after amortization, a trillion dollars. Let's see 10^12/300E^6 is 3333 dollars per every citizen in the US. For what, we might secure access to the big fields in this end game, and extend our current petro consumption more or less mindlessly for another 2 decades. But a terribly shortsighted policy, whether or not it contributes to GH warming.

Divert 400 billion per year to energy programs of all types. instead of mandating a 40 mpg fleet figure, build in some heavy incentives for being the first US automaker to achieve such a figure. No you can't build only motorcycles covered with shells. I know this is a bit ot, but even w/o GH gases the pollution is awful. Plus we need to save it for plastic and for food.

 

[Astronuc]

But wait! There is action.

In Niger, Trees and Crops Turn Back the Desert
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/11/world/africa/11niger.html

GUIDAN BAKOYE, Niger — In this dust-choked region, long seen as an increasingly barren wasteland decaying into desert, millions of trees are flourishing, thanks in part to poor farmers whose simple methods cost little or nothing at all.

Better conservation and improved rainfall have led to at least 7.4 million newly tree-covered acres in Niger, researchers have found, achieved largely without relying on the large-scale planting of trees or other expensive methods often advocated by African politicians and aid groups for halting desertification, the process by which soil loses its fertility.

Recent studies of vegetation patterns, based on detailed satellite images and on-the-ground inventories of trees, have found that Niger, a place of persistent hunger and deprivation, has recently added millions of new trees and is now far greener than it was 30 years ago.

These gains, moreover, have come at a time when the population of Niger has exploded, confounding the conventional wisdom that population growth leads to the loss of trees and accelerates land degradation, scientists studying Niger say.

The vegetation is densest, researchers have found, in some of the most densely populated regions of the country.

“The general picture of the Sahel is much less bleak than we tend to assume,” said Chris P. Reij, a soil conservationist who has been working in the region for more than 30 years and helped lead a study published last summer on Niger’s vegetation patterns. “Niger was for us an enormous surprise.”

It's one small step, but it's in the right direction.

Now if we can only get the US to cut energy consumption by 20% or more.

And coincidentally, I just read an article that provides incontrovertible evidence as to the deleterious effects of higher CO₂ levels - even without the concommitant temperature increases. Noxious plants like poison ivy and ragweed increase growth rates, while nutritional content of food crops decreases - just to name a few of the detriments.

And let's not forget the heavy metals, particularly mercury, which are a direct by-product of using coal (used for more than 50% of electrical production in the US). One can easily measure heavy metals deposition straight back to the power plants from which they are emitted.

 

[turbo]

And let's not forget the heavy metals, particularly mercury, which are a direct by-product of using coal (used for more than 50% of electrical production in the US). One can easily measure heavy metals deposition straight back to the power plants from which they are emitted.

That is a bad problem in Maine, since we are downstream from the Midwest coal-fired plants. People (especially children and women of child-bearing age) are warned not to eat too much fresh fish from Maine waters because of the mercury in the fish and there are similar warnings against eating too much liver or kidney meat from moose and deer due to elevated levels of cadmium, again due to coal-fired plants upwind from us. Our government, in its infinite wisdom, let's the plants continue to pollute by buying "emissions credits" from other companies, so these toxic heavy metals continue to accumulate in our wildlife, our water, and our soils.

 

[denverdoc]

That is a bad problem in Maine, since we are downstream from the Midwest coal-fired plants. People (especially children and women of child-bearing age) are warned not to eat too much fresh fish from Maine waters because of the mercury in the fish and there are similar warnings against eating too much liver or kidney meat from moose and deer due to elevated levels of cadmium, again due to coal-fired plants upwind from us. Our government, in its infinite wisdom, let's the plants continue to pollute by buying "emissions credits" from other companies, so these toxic heavy metals continue to accumulate in our wildlife, our water, and our soils.

This is weak. So we can barter among ourselves with emission credits, but not the rest of the world?!

 

[turbo]

This is weak. So we can barter among ourselves with emission credits, but not the rest of the world?!

Of course. Instead of creating jobs by requiring the installation of scrubbers, etc to make coal technology cleaner and safer, our government protects polluters and their profits so that those of us downwind from the coal-fired plants have to absorb the heavy metals, ozone, etc. It's the American way.

 

[denverdoc]

OT, but don't you love the Orwelliain dbl talk as in the last Clean Air act?

 

[Andre]

$10,000 to debunk global warming!1
http://money.cnn.com/2007/02/02/news/companies/exxon_science/index.htm?cnn=yes
funded by yours truly: Exxon

Talk about desperate! And they certainly have no reason to show bias, do they?

I think the anti-warmers have been duped by a big oil conspiracy. Of course the skeptics claim that they know the truth but no one will listen - that it's a conspiracy of scientists. And they appeal to the scientific expertise of Joe Sixpack to prove their point.

You choose.

Sure go ahead:

I finally found the letter.

http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/02/aei-responds-to-bizarre-criticism.html

I, for one, think that this is not too funny. I, for one, think that 1 million dollars is 100 times more than 10,000 dollars. I also think that there are literally hundreds or thousands of people who are deeply immersed in this extraordinary and ethically problematic business and who are collectively mining billions of dollars a year from their absurd hypotheses that the world is going to face climate emergency in a foreseeable future.

If someone tries to paint the skeptics - who often live as ascetic monks and whose physical safety is at risk - as corrupt people, even though everyone may easily see billions of dollars flowing to the pockets of people whose job is to defend some very different dogmas - such as the silly theory about the catastrophic global warming - he either shows that his ability to judge reality has collapsed to zero, or he shows that he is a financial part of the global warming fraud himself.

http://www.physics.harvard.edu/~motl/aei-president-responds-to-attack.doc

Many of us have received telephone calls and emails prompted by a shoddy article on the front page of today’s Guardian, the British newspaper, headlined
“Scientists offered cash to dispute climate study” (posted at http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,2004397,00.html#article_continue).

The article uses several garden-variety journalistic tricks to create the impression of a story where none exists. Thus, AEI is described as a “lobby group” (we are a research group that does no lobbying and takes no institutional positions on policy issues); ExxonMobil’s donations to AEI are either bulked up by adding donations over many years, or simply made up (the firm’s annual AEI support is generous and valued but is a fraction of the amount reported—no corporation accounts for more than 1 percent of our annual budget); and AEI is characterized as the Bush administration’s “intellectual Cosa Nostra” and “White House surrogates” (AEI scholars criticize or praise Bush administration policies—every day, on the merits). All of this could have been gleaned from a brief visit to the AEI website.

But the article’s specific charge (announced in the headline) is a very serious one. Although most of you will appreciate the truth on your own, I thought it would be useful to provide a few details...cont'd

Conspiracy? Most definitely. It''s called noble cause corruption, if you're absolutely sure that you are right then it's okay to lie and plant false accusations.

 

[Andre]

Just for reference:

http://www.lavoisier.com.au/papers/articles/longversionfinal.pdf

Note for instance about the rewriting of climate history, the hockeystick:

The IPCC has not retracted its egregious error. It carries on as if nothing is wrong with its conduct or its conclusions. If the IPCC were a commercial corporation operating in Australia, its directors would now be facing criminal charges and the prospect of going to jail.

There is more rewriting going on right now; formerly, there was no global warming in America, but there is now:

http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1142

 

[D H]

In my opinion, lobbying should be illegal, and corporate contributions to politicians should be banned and henceforth prosecuted as bribery.

What a stereotypical, off-topic opinion. Do you really mean that, or do you really mean contributions to Republican politicians should be banned and henceforth prosecuted as bribery?

Now that the Democrats are in power, they are playing the lobbyist-financed games that got some Republicans in jail (i.e., golf at exotic resorts):
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/shows/2007/02/20/PM200702205.html"

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland is a Democratic powerbroker. Last year, Hoyer campaigned hard on ethics reforms. And in the wake of several scandals, harangued Republicans in the house.

STENY HOYER: The greed and flagrant absues of convicted felons, former Republican member Duke Cunningham and Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff, hang over this House like a dark cloud.
​

It was former Majority Leader Tom Delay's golf trip to Scotland — courtesy of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff — that inspired many recent reforms.

Still, that hasn't stopped Congressman Hoyer from planning his own lobbyist-financed, springtime getaway. He's headed to the Rio Mar Beach Golf Resort and Spa in Puerto Rico.

But Hoyer's golfing trip — scheduled to begin May 2nd — is completely legal, because it will be a fundraiser for the congressman's political action committee, or leadership PAC.​

Back on topic:
By almost any measure, the world is, on average, a whole lot better off than it was 100 years ago. If that is the price for a fraction of a degree of global warming, it was well worth it.

The US would suffer immense economic damage should we become signatories to the Kyoto protocol. This is one reason why the Senate unanimously rejected the treaty and why neither Clinton nor Bush signed it. And what would be gained environmentally? Very, very little. Killing our economy is not the answer.

 

[turbo]

What a stereotypical, off-topic opinion. Do you really mean that, or do you really mean contributions to Republican politicians should be banned and henceforth prosecuted as bribery?

I am registered as an independent, and I vote for the best candidate regardless of party affiliation. The two-party system is so corrupt as to have institutionalized bribery as "lobbying", which disenfranchises us citizens of our rights to fair representation. Don't try to twist my statements into some straw-man so you can knock them down for "dittos". I am far more conservative in fiscal matters and in the matters of the rights of states and individuals than any Republican I know, and I am far more liberal on social issues than most Democrats. The control that big-money interests have over all facets of our corrupt two-party system should be evident to anybody who has been paying attention. If you can only manage a bit of indignation about such dealings when your favorite party is in the minority, you are one of the sheep and are a crucial part of the problem facing our country.