Bishop Hill writes of a new paper, one so “toe curling” it is worth mentioning here to get more exposure. He writes:
This is science? This is progress?
Reports on Progress in Physics, a journal published by the Institute of Physics here in the UK, has published a paper by Raymond Orbach, an engineer at the University of Texas at Austin. It’s available in return for free registration, and I actually think it’s worth it, if only because it’s so toe-curling.
In some ways the paper’s title tells you all you need to know about it. `Our Sustainable Earth’ looks at (you guessed it) eight climate myths propagated by bad people. Like every other set of climate myths you have ever seen, each of the myths is entirely devoid of sources – Orbach has taken them from this page at his university’s website. Where they got them from is a mystery.
In fact, absence of citations is a bit of an issue. Here’s how Orbach starts to deal with claims about the medieval warm period.
Climate scientists now understand that the Medieval Warm Period was caused by an increase in solar radiation and a decrease in volcanic activity, which both promote warming. Other evidence suggests ocean circulation patterns shifted to bring warmer seawater into the North Atlantic. Those kinds of natural changes have not been detected in the past few decades.
Interesting claims – but where did they come from? We are not told. We are expected to take Prof Obach on trust. At the risk of repeating myself, one would never get away with this kind of thing on a blog.
(PS: Note to Prof Orbach – the ocean near the top of the globe is the Arctic (with a c in the middle). And it’s Santer not Senter.
You couldn’t make it up. Oh, wait…
It’s the juggernaut of misinformation that drives AGW. How much more trash are they going to load into the back of their artic? 😉
o gawd….not again
We have ‘Artics’ here in the UK. Short for ‘Articulated Lorry’, which is what Americans call ‘Semi-trailers, I believe. ‘Finding Artic warming especially high during the past decade’ is worrying – we don’t want those blooming great trucks catching fire on our roads, do we?
In the UK an ‘artic’ is an articulated lorry.
Orbach should have consulted RealClimate before he published his nonsensical paper. The discussion of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) in the Orbach paper…
“Other evidence suggests ocean circulation patterns shifted to bring warmer seawater into the North Atlantic. Those kinds of natural changes have not been detected in the past few decades.”
…is contradicted by the RealClimate AMO webpage:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/11/atlantic-multidecadal-oscillation-amo/
RealClimate writes: “This pattern is believed to describe some of the observed early 20th century (1920s-1930s) high-latitude Northern Hemisphere warming and some, but not all, of the high-latitude warming observed in the late 20th century.”
Orbach also notes how the GISS Land-Ocean Temperature Index data includes the Arctic, but he should have noted the bogus method GISS employs to extend land surface temperature data out over open ocean (in areas with seasonal sea ice). In effect, GISS deletes Sea Surface Temperature data so that they can replace it with land surface data, with its greater variability. Refer to:
http://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/2010/05/31/giss-deletes-arctic-and-southern-ocean-sea-surface-temperature-data/
Another hastily-scrawled memegurgitation? I think so. What is doubly irking, however, is the “Artic”. That’s about as slap-dash as it gets. Noting p** me off more than grammatical laziness, coupled with geographic ignorance. There is just no excuse for it at all. Then add in the vacuous, tossed-together ‘science’…???
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/execute.csh?amsutemps
NB: lowest global sea level temp for this day in past 10 years!
That statement alone is beyond parody.
Wait wait wait… so what did they blame Chinese coal for just the other day?
He needs to do a science refresher.
“The climactic consequences of this human dominated increase in atmospheric CO2 define a geologic epoch that has been termed the ‘Anthropocene.'”
I’ve found that “c” missing from Arctic. He put it in the “climactic” consequences.
This is a professor with tenure at University of Texas?
Is the University accredited?
I wonder who the reviewers were on this ?
(PS: Note to Prof Orbach – the ocean near the top of the globe is the Arctic (with a c in the middle). And it’s Santer not Senter.
Maybe he found Santa at the Artic?
Mike Bromley the Kurd says:
October 12, 2011 at 1:36 am
“… What is doubly irking, however, is the “Artic”. That’s about as slap-dash as it gets. Noting p** me off more than grammatical laziness, …”
================================================================
‘Noting’? Murphy’s Law with a vengeance! 😉
hey check out figure 8 and myth 3, apparently the hotspot exists after all! I assume he is using the ‘thermometers dont measure heat, wind measures heat by proxy’ argument for claiming the existance of the hot spot.
This whole thing reads like an advanced high school student’s essay, no maths i notice.
“Sunspot activity …does vary in a regular
11-year cycle, but since at least 1950, average sunspot activity
has remained flat.”
-umm so either its stable since 1950, or its flat. And I’m pretty sure its not flat, I notice there are no citiations for this claim.
-umm so either its an 11 year cycle, or its flat since 1950, cant really be both. And I’m pretty sure its not flat, I notice there are no citiations for this claim.
*mod oops feel free to unmangle my last posts:)
“Flawn academic center”? Is that flawed English for “flawed”?
Mike Bromley the Kurd: “Noting p** me off more than grammatical laziness…”
Bad spelling is also quite annoying.
As noted on Climate Realist, 4% x 4/10,000ths = 16/1,000,000ths = 1/62,500th part of the atmosphere, meaning that 62,499/62500ths are perfaectly natural. More importantly, as AR$ et al notes, these are estimates, not detailed figures. (This guy needs to read his history too, & read the lette rfrom Sir Joseh Banks (President of the Royal Society) to the Lords of the Admiralty in 1817, regarding the “much abated” ice cover in the Arctic Circle due to an unknown source of warmth!) If they can show me how they make a very small number create a very big number, I’ll take 0.01& of their gross profits, because they’ll be genius’s! This crap needs loading in with the Met Office study that the UV & EUV variation from Solar output causes “weather”, but not “climate”!!!!!! They really have become so amazingly arrogant that they must think everyone is so stupid to be taken in by it all, but that’s what you get when one becomes so arrogant!!!
Prof Orbach really likes commas.
What’s ‘toe curling’ is googling Prof Orbach and seeing this from the UT Austin announcement of his hiring. Aug 1, 2009 “has been appointed director of The University of Texas at Austin’s Energy Institute, a multi-disciplinary institute that combines the strengths of the university’s schools and colleges to advance solutions to today’s energy-related challenges.”
This has to be some kind of joke directed at Dr Orbach, doesn’t it?
From the above, the enitre quote somehow did not get into the post. here’s the entire quote, “Dr. Raymond Lee Orbach, the U.S. Department of Energy’s first undersecretary for science, has been appointed director of The University of Texas at Austin’s Energy Institute, a multi-disciplinary institute that combines the strengths of the university’s schools and colleges to advance solutions to today’s energy-related challenges.”
This gentleman was a DOE Undersecretary for Science? God save us all, 1984 is here.