by Walter Starck (in Quadrant Online)
The average temperature for the Earth, or any region or even any specific place is very difficult to determine with any accuracy. At any given time surface air temperatures around the world range over about 100°C. Even in the same place they can vary by nearly that much seasonally and as much as 30°C or more in a day. Weather stations are relatively few and located very irregularly. Well maintained stations with good records going back a century or more can be counted on one’s fingers. Even then only maximum and minimum temperatures or ones at a few particular times of day are usually available. Maintenance, siting, and surrounding land use also all have influences on the temperatures recorded.
The purported 0.7°C of average global warming over the past century is highly uncertain. It is in fact less than the margin of error in our ability to determine the average temperature anywhere, much less globally. What portion of any such warming might be due to due to anthropogenic CO2 emissions is even less certain. There are, however, numerous phenomena which are affected by temperature and which can provide good evidence of relative warming or cooling and, in some cases, even actual temperatures.
These include growth rings in trees, corals and stalactites, borehole temperature profiles and the isotopic and biologic signatures in core samples from sediments or glaciers. In addition, historical accounts of crops grown, harvest times, freezes, sea ice, river levels, glacial advances or retreats and other such records provide clear indication of warming and cooling.
Recent Warming Nothing Unusual
The temperature record everywhere shows evidence of warming and cooling in accord with cycles on many different time scales from daily to annual, decadal, centennial, millennial and even longer. Many of these seem to correlate with various cycles of solar activity and the Earth’s own orbital mechanics. The temperature record is also marked by seemingly random events which appear to follow no discernable pattern.
Over the past 3000 years there is evidence from hundreds of independent proxy studies, as well as historical records, for a Minoan Warm period around 1000 BC, a Roman Warm Period about 2000 years ago, a Medieval Warm Period (WMP) about 1000 years ago and a Modern Warm Period now developing. In between were markedly colder periods in the Dark Ages and another between the 16th and 19th centuries which is now known as the Little Ice Age (LIA). The warmer periods were times of bountiful crops, increasing population and a general flourishing of human societies. The cold periods were times of droughts, famines, epidemics, wars and population declines. Clearly life has been much better in the times of warmer climate, and there is nothing to indicate that the apparent mild warming of the past century is anything other than a return of this millennial scale warming cycle.
Good News Unwelcome to Alarmists
This rather good news about a possibly warmer climate has not met with hopeful interest from those who purport to be so concerned about the possibly dangerous effects of anthropogenic global warming (AGW). On the contrary, their reaction has overwhelmingly been a strong rejection of any beneficial possibility. It is apparent that their deepest commitment is to the threat itself and not to any rational assessment of real world probabilities or the broader consequences of any of their proposed remedies.
Fabricating a Hockey Stick from Hot Air
This blanket rejection of any possibility other than the hypothetical threat of AGW has led to some strange behaviour for people who modestly proclaim themselves to be the world’s top climate scientists. Not only have they ignored and dismissed the hundreds of studies indicating the global existence of a Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age, they have set out to fabricate an alternate reality in the form of a graph purporting to represent the global temperature for the past thousand years. It portrays a near straight line wiggling up and down only a fraction of a degree for centuries until it begins an exponential rise gradually starting at the beginning of the 20th century and then shooting steeply up in the latter part of that century. This hockey stick-shaped graph was then heavily promoted as the icon of AGW. It appeared on the cover of the third climate assessment report of the IPCC published in 2003 and was reproduced at various places in the report itself.
Among the emails between leading climate researchers released in the Climategate affair were a number which revealed a concerted effort to come up with some means to deny the existence of the MWP. The implement chosen to do this became known as the Hockey Stick Graph.
The methodology used to construct the graph involved the use of estimates of temperatures from a very small sample of tree growth rings from the Yamal Peninsula in far northern Siberia and ancient stunted pine trees from near the tree line in the High Sierras of California. This data was then subjected to a statistical treatment later shown by critics to produce a hockey stick form of graph even when random numbers were used as raw input data. To make matters even worse, the same tree ring data also indicated a significant decline in temperature for the 20th century, but this was hidden by burying it in a much larger number of data points from instrument measurements. The resulting study was published in the prestigious scientific journal, Nature in 1998. Remarkably, this very small, highly selected and deceptively manipulated graph was proclaimed to be an accurate representation of global temperatures and the extensive body of contrary evidence was simply ignored.
full essay here: http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2012/11/speak-loudly-and-carry-a-busted-hockey-stick
Doesn’t a “30C” daily drop in temperature (avg ~18F world wide) through all of the excessive co2 in the atm, prove that even if there is a slight loss in cooling due to co2, it’s insignificant in the Earths ability to radiate heat through air?
“The average temperature for the Earth…”
Might as well stop reading right there. There is no such thing.
Wow, doesn’t all of the “revisionism” of climate science history by all of the alarmists make them the true deniers?
“………….for a Minoan Warm period around 1000 BC,…………”
Is this correct as per the post?
a picture, a thousand words ….
http://i47.tinypic.com/2i7mfex.jpg
Equally deceptive is the matching atmospheric CO2 level hockey stick which “confirms” the correlation and false hypothesis. This is banker driven, credit default swap faux science to FORCE Carbon commodity markets. The bankers first removed a stable Gold and Silver based monetary system, replaced with a fiat “trust” currency that they could inflate on demand. They now wish to convert to a decreasing based energy system that will automatically inflate as supplies are forced to be restricted to “save” the planet. See “Fractional Reserve Banking Begat Faux Reality” and then follow the money. Grant fed climate “scientists” are the handmaidens of this bank fraud.
I’m in the choir and I like the preaching.
Unfortunately, the current US administration is tone deaf and sleeps in on Sunday.
We will soon be hit with a tidal wave of “carbon” laws and attendant indoctrination.
It seems that we are now at this stage as per the Quadrant article.
When they realised that global warming had stopped they shifted gear onto extreme weather. Unfortunately, observations are not on their side as many have pointed out time and again.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/climatic-phenomena-pages/extreme-weather-page/
Anthony:
Thankyou for publishing this excellent summary.
I commend everybody to use the link so they can read all of the article. It is all very much worth reading. It states the basic facts and their clear implications in plain English.
It is truly excellent. Again, thankyou for bringing it to my attention.
Richard
It’s illegal to play ice hockey with a broken stick, as I examined here:
http://drtimball.com/2011/only-in-climate-science-can-you-play-with-a-broken-hockey-stick/
However, they were also playing with the wrong piece of equipment. Tree rings, the substance of the hockey stick are primarily measures of precipitation. They were playing tennis with a hockey stick.
And that is the core of the problem with AGW. To keep the meme alive, Warmists, some through delusion and extraordinarily pitiful science, others through nothing more than falsified data, keep hollering so as to make it appear that there is massive confirmation.
A good summary and an interesting comparison to the Italian earthquake legal decision. The IPCC is, however, straightforward in saying that they provide “scenarios”, not predictions.
The 5C rise, if it occurred, would be catastrophic on the basis of their unfolding of the consequences, but the IPCC does not say that it will occur. Indeed, even the idea that human activity is responsible for the majority of the last 0.7C* of warming is, by the IPCC, only very likely, even if it is at the 90% certainty level recently advised. That 90% means that there is still a 10% chance that humans are not responsible for recent warming.
The caveats are present. It is the MSM and normal human understanding that have turned the probability into a certainty. We do not take a 90% certainty to mean that we could be surprised. We act as if 90% certainty means that someone did 90% of the work required to show 100% certainty: the “thing” is certainly happening, but we have not done the work (or cannot do the work) to make that assertion.
CAGW is a debacle that will be solved naturally in time. Through a number of indications of temperature “stalling”, lack of key IPCC-defined signatures, PDO/AMO and solar models of heating causitive factors, within two years we easily could see the tide turning on CAGW. “Acidification” of the oceans will become the issue then, for the real agenda as easily seen in the pronouncements of Erhlich, Suzuki, Greenpeace and the WWF, plus Hansen and Strong, is to shut-down the consumption by humans of the inorganic resources and biological production of the planet. In this way the non-human biosphere will be “saved” through direct non-harvesting of our living foodstuff and environmental alteration (“degradation”) of the biosphere. When CAGW becomes unsaleable, other tactics still applicable to a growing and consuming human population will be used.
Personally, I see 2010 as the tipping point, the point at which the positive warming of the planet reached its peak. By 2015 I expect we will see declines that are progressive. Sealevels are also likely to drop for a couple of years anyway, as they are going into the back half of a normal short-term cycle right now, but they, too, should hesitate to rise as they always do during a cooling phase. Hansen et al will modify their temperature histories to maintain the illusion of continued warming, without doubt, in the same way that the sea-level rises were given a 0.5mm/yr rise to account for the post-glacial, isostratic rebound – a technically correct “adjustment” that creates a more “worrisome” number without actually representing a greater problem.
When will pieces like this get into the mainstream? Forbes already has had some skeptical articles. Bloomberg, who benefits from the panic, not yet. But it is coming. Trouble is, the economic and social damage of CAGW is in the relative speed of the two factions on the issue.
The article ends with:
A WAKE-UP call perhaps?
Perhaps the world’s politicians (not leaders, they are another bunch) have noticed that famine – 2008: Egyptians riot over bread – and high food prices can lead to civil unrest and ultimately the overthrow of the government that does nothing to correct the problem. Egypt — Revolution and Aftermath
The US government is not immune to this type of threat US Military Reveals Coup Plan To Topple Obama: … report red-lined to President Putin this morning warns that “various elements” within the US Military establishment are “actively planning” for the overthrow of President Barack Obama prior to the November elections…. And if the USA is not immune are other world politicians?
One can only hope this wake-up call has been heard.
Jeff Alberts says:
November 27, 2012 at 7:44 am
“The average temperature for the Earth…”
Might as well stop reading right there. There is no such thing.
__________________________
Keep reading because that is just what is said.
I dont know if anyone can answer this question I agree that it is difficult to measure average world temperature, but is to easier to measure world global temperature differences? The illustration I use is a house with two rooms; one at +50 C the other at -50 C. It makes no sense to say that the average temperature of the house is 0 C. But if one room heat to +51 C, and the other -49 C, does it make sense to say the house has been heated by 1 C?
It seems to me that a few years ago the warmists stopped talking about data and framed CAGW in a moral sense, in other words it became a purely moral issue, to believe in it gave one a higher moral ground than not to believe in it. Nevermind the facts; they want to shame people in to conformity – thinking that one is immoral if one is skeptical. As more and more people become skeptical, the warmists cry becomes more and more shrill. Now they want us to believe that we are seeing terrible weather events due to carbon dioxide alone, without an intermediate warming step. I think that current weather and climate are well within normal variation.
But what really bothers me about warmists is that they want others to do as they say, not as they do. I think that they should lead by example, and give up using electricity and home heat and driving cars and flying on jets and air conditioning. If they really believe, then they should all get together and live in a carbon-free community of their own making, and live like the Amish.
Minoan Warm Period 3000 years ago
Roman Warm Period 2000 years ago
Mideval Warm Period 1000 years ago
Kind of sounds like we were due for another warm period anyway.
No. Because it’s water vapor, not CO2, doing almost all of the heavy lifting (and warming) here. The warming caused by CO2 is rather small and is easily conflated with natural variance.
Congratulations to the CAGW community for their very effective propaganda campaign,which has brain-washed “true believers” like MiCro into thinking that CO2 is the cause of all warming and other other taxable disasters.
JackT says:
November 27, 2012 at 7:52 am
No, it makes them true liars. Blatant liars. Liars for hire. The worst kind of liars. And their lies have contributed to the deaths of millions of people worldwide. The implications go way, way beyond history revisionism or broken temperature alarmism. How they sleep at night is a real mystery.
“The purported 0.7°C of average global warming over the past century is highly uncertain.”
” Not only have they ignored and dismissed the hundreds of studies indicating the global existence of a Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age, they have set out to fabricate an alternate reality in the form of a graph purporting to represent the global temperature for the past thousand years. ”
Let’s see if I get this straight. We are certain of a LIA, but uncertain of a rise in temperatures since the LIA. Certain of a MWP, but uncertain about the rise in temperatures
But then we find
“Clearly life has been much better in the times of warmer climate, and there is nothing to indicate that the apparent mild warming of the past century is anything other than a return of this millennial scale warming cycle.”
So, the LIA was certain ( where? how cold? how do we know?)
The rise of .7c is uncertain.
But, we are certain this uncertain rise is a “return of a millennial scale” warming.
Also, what the writer fails to take notice of are the reconstructions that use no tree rings.
details. details. details.
A good skeptic looks at all the evidence.
An fire inspector comes upon a the scene of a fire. He finds a gas can.
Somebody points out that lightning has been know to cause fires. In fact, the very scene the inspector is examining was burned to the ground 100 years ago by a lighting strike.
He thinks its a human set fire.
Somebody argues that lightning explains fires, in fact, this very spot was burned by a lightning caused fire.
Fires happened in the past. Big fires. Those fires were set off by lightning. Therefore, the null hypothesis is that all fires are set by lightning.
Hmm, ya, there is that matter of the gas can. Nevermind that. The science is settled. Ligthning cause fires and millennial scale “cycles” “cause” the rise in temperature. Kinda weird
to see that skeptics think this science is settled.
Interesting program on TV last nite (National Geo?) on a significant N Atlantic cooldown 4200 yrs ago causing a severe drought in the Middle East/east Africa that practically dried up the Nile! The Egyptian & Mesopotamian cultures were almost wiped out.
Cooling can cause disasters in areas even far from the cooling.
Jim Cripwell says:
November 27, 2012 at 8:34 am
I dont know if anyone can answer this question I agree that it is difficult to measure average world temperature, but is to easier to measure world global temperature differences?….
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It is especially difficult when those who are ‘guardians of the data’ are continually messing with it. link
In my honest opinion the best bet is to look at what plants thrive where. If you can no longer get your tomato plants to set fruit it is getting colder. WUWT: The day of the killed tomatoes WUWT: Mexico’s biggest freeze since 1957 means US produce price will skyrocket
I would also be looking at the October Northern Hemisphere snow anomalies link In other words how soon is it getting below freezing in the fall?
Let us face it the real concern is (or should be) the food supply and therefore the growing season. Too cool to plant, to cool to set fruit/seed and too soon to freeze. These types of records have been kept long before anyone started measuring with thermometers.
When do you plant in the spring? When the guys fishing start sitting on the river bank instead of standing. A primative but effective measure of the soil warmth.
One measure that never seems to be mentioned is the change in temperature of caves. For example in 1970 the caves in lower Indiana was 52.5 F Vermont is in the forties and Sonora Texas ~70F.
CO2 instead of being castigated as the devil should be hailed as our savior because it make plants grow and makes them more drought resistant. C02-Enhanced …Yield (Yield increases observed among eight genotypes of tomato)
In the mid latitudes of W. Europe, based on the 350 year long CET records, there wasn’t much warming in the summer months except for the natural cycles.
However winters have similar natural cycles but with an average warming of about 0.4C/century, which translates to annual 0,26/century.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/MidSummer-MidWinter.htm
NASA GISS experts dismiss the CET as a local anomaly, but in their scientific wisdom tell us that a single tree from the Arctic circle in Yamal is an excellent representative of the global temperature trends.
Travesty and a swindle.
Steven Mosher says:
November 27, 2012 at 9:07 am
You’re daft, Mosher. The word “settled” doesn’t appear in the article even ONCE–only YOU put it there.
But he does point out that the Hockey Stick is one “study” based on very flimsy data using a bogus mathematical algorithm. (If you need somebody to spell out the “settled” consequences, I’d be happy too: PURE BS!)
There are numerous studies based on much more tenable data for the three warming periods immediately preceeding this one. And as a geologist, I put a million times more credability in those studies than what Mann perpetrated on mankind.
I suggest you have a cup of coffee before making an intellectual fool of yourself.
Mosh except the fire inspector in this case is paid more if it is a human set fire, so that’s how he calls it.
This was very well demonstrated by Burt Rutan in his talk on WUWT-TV. His observations of the data for global average temperature is at around 11.39. But it is well worth viewing the entire talk:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/11/26/another-wuwt-tv-segment-engineer-and-aviation-pioneer-burt-rutan-on-why-he-doubts-global-warming/
vukcevic says:
November 27, 2012 at 9:30 am
“In the mid latitudes of W. Europe, based on the 350 year long CET records, there wasn’t much warming in the summer months except for the natural cycles. However winters have similar natural cycles but with an average warming of about 0.4C/century, which translates to annual 0,26/century.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/MidSummer-MidWinter.htm
NASA GISS experts dismiss the CET as a local anomaly, but in their scientific wisdom tell us that a single tree from the Arctic circle in Yamal is an excellent representative of the global temperature trends.
Travesty and a swindle.”
I’ve always wondered how there could be a century scale “local anomaly” when it comes to “global warming”. If the air temperature in one or more locations shows no trend, how could this be so if CO2 globally is increasing? Over the large time scales associated with planetary climate change, I would suspect that no place would be immune to a general rise in temperature over, say, 100 years or more.
Steven Mosher says:
November 27, 2012 at 9:07 am
The data for the MWP and the LIA are much more comprehensive and of much better quality than the data that is used to claim a 0.7C rise over the last century.
@Steven Mosher
Confounding quantitative and qualitative data again?
I’ll try to clear it up for “you” (*). Qualitatively we realize from many lines of evidence that it has warmed since the “LIA”, but question the accuracy of the quantitative assertion of 0.7 C of warming to some hypothetically relevant “average global temperature”.
(* – Since I know you understand this; I’m just wondering who is it you’re trying to confuse.)
Steven Mosher says:
Let’s see if I get this straight. When deliberately you twist and distort what was said, very rarely do you get anything straight. But, you knew that.
Johanus says:
November 27, 2012 at 8:58 am
MiCro says:
November 27, 2012 at 7:35 am
Doesn’t a “30C” daily drop in temperature (avg ~18F world wide) through all of the excessive co2 in the atm, prove that even if there is a slight loss in cooling due to co2, it’s insignificant in the Earths ability to radiate heat through air?
“No. Because it’s water vapor, not CO2, doing almost all of the heavy lifting (and warming) here. The warming caused by CO2 is rather small and is easily conflated with natural variance.
Congratulations to the CAGW community for their very effective propaganda campaign,which has brain-washed “true believers” like MiCro into thinking that CO2 is the cause of all warming and other other taxable disasters.”
Johanus, that’s my point. The co2 is doing almost nothing, and as such it’s not even increasing water vapor.
“The purported 0.7°C of average global warming over the past century is highly uncertain. It is in fact less than the margin of error in our ability to determine the average temperature anywhere, much less globally.”
I agree with the general premise that 0.7C is small relative to measurement error, but the implied concept that adding more stations makes the margin of error greater is nonsense.
If the stations were merely kept in the same places in open rural areas, away from confounding variables like aircraft and expanding blacktop, then having a larger number in diverse positions would decrease measurement error.
Its factors highlighted in Watts surface station project, plus moving and updating equipment, plus artifacts like UHI and the corrections applied for UHI that screw everything up.
And if all of the known error from adding and altering stations could be correctly accounted for, and the trend really were 0.7C/100 years, the question would still loom unanswerable by anybody here: What should the trend have been? Higher, lower, just what its been? How would one prove that, other than arbitrary curve fitting exercises?
It was about 5F too cold for lunch-break basketball today in Raleigh.
@ Mosh, what you need to do is show us the “gas can” – aka, the much-ballyhooed “human fingerprint” to the warming. Find it, and maybe you too have a Nobel Prize in your future.
“There are, however, numerous phenomena which are affected by temperature and which can provide good evidence of relative warming or cooling and, in some cases, even actual temperatures.
These include growth rings in trees…….”
Good evidence of relative warming or cooling????? Actual temperatures?????
Where is the evidence for this. How would one know a change in tree rings is caused by warmer temperatures vs more rain vs more CO2 vs more sun vs a hormonal growth spurt vs gently talking to them in the hope of motivating wood production?
RockyRoad says:
November 27, 2012 at 9:01 am
No, it makes them true liars. Blatant liars. Liars for hire. The worst kind of liars. And their lies have contributed to the deaths of millions of people worldwide. The implications go way, way beyond history revisionism or broken temperature alarmism. How they sleep at night is a real mystery.
________________________
Very true.
If there are any ‘Crimes Against Humanity’ in this mess, it has been done by the ‘Blatant Liars and Liars for hire’ who not only promote CAGW but the end of a viable civilization just as we are entering a cooling phase.
5 January 2011: World food prices at fresh high, says UN
Sunday December 5 2010 BRITAIN IS FREEZING TO DEATH “MIDDLE class families are among millions of Britons who cannot afford to heat their homes this winter, as elderly ride on buses all day to stay in the warm… a shocking picture has emerged of the bleak months ahead for 5.5 million households.”
Keeping the country short of water is now government – and EU – policy
They are pretty darn blatant about their aim to drive us all into poverty too.
I can not wrap my head around the fact that there are so many who KNOW they are intentionally condemning there children to poverty. I questioned one Prof. at a local college about it and he told me he explained it to his 10 yr old daughter and she was “Ok with it.” This is the same kid who was talking about buying a horse when she got out of college to me a few minutes before…. MAJOR DISCONNECT! These cocooned middle class socialists wouldn’t know what real poverty was if it bit them on the bum. What is more poverty is for us not them…. they think.
Talking about the average temperature of the Earth is nonsensical because of the extremes. Death Valley and Libya cannot be compared to Arctica and Antarctica. Here in UK we have the “benefit” of the Gulf Stream, which makes winters milder and summers cooler and both wetter. Compare with the Taiga in Russia or Southern Canada which are on the same latitude. The only way that temperatures can be said to be higher or lower is by comparing temperatures from individual sites over many years and only then if the thermometers are not situated on heat islands as most of them are.
RockyRoad says: @ November 27, 2012 at 9:31 am
….There are numerous studies based on much more tenable data for the three warming periods immediately preceeding this one. And as a geologist, I put a million times more credibility in those studies than what Mann perpetrated on mankind.
_______________________________
Geologists seem to be the only group not “seduced” by the CAGW BS because Geologists take the long view and are a lot harder to BS.
I am also more inclined to believe in what is ‘carved in stone’. It is a lot harder to adjust.
[snip. No chemtrails comments, please. Site policy. — mod.]
“The data for the MWP and the LIA are much more comprehensive and of much better quality than the data that is used to claim a 0.7C rise over the last century.”
Yeah, all those Vikings with their thermo couples and high-res thermometers and satelites kept really accurate MWP temperature records, I don’t think.
MiCro said:
“Johanus, that’s my point. The co2 is doing almost nothing, …”
Sorry. I misinterpreted the preposition ‘through’ in your sentence as having an ‘instrumental’ intent (i.e. ’caused by’):
Doesn’t a “30C” daily drop in temperature (avg ~18F world wide) through all of the excessive co2 in the atm…’
I still think it’s true that warmists have convinced a lot of folks (including the MSM) that ‘warming by CO2’ is a bigger problem than ‘warming by H20’.
Using Mosh’s analogy of the gas can – sure it may well be present – but did it ever have any gas in it? THAT is the true skeptical question, is it not?
Two Unanswerable Questions
I teach MBA Statistics, but I am not a statistician. I am an Engineer by trade who holds three advanced degrees in Business. However, I do have a love for and appreciation of math. As such, I am always skeptical of any use of data or data sets. This is especially true when it comes to Climate Change and the human contribution to the same. There are two questions which particularly disturb me the most, and until they are answered, I don’t have any confidence whatsoever in the current debate.
The first question is: “Is it possible to derive a single temperature that represents the average temperature of the earth for any given year?” Several scientists have clearly shown that this is not possible. There are several reasons for this answer. The first point being that the start and end points are purely arbitrary and using a calendar or solar year is still arbitrary. The second point is that our earth consists of solids, liquids and gasses each of which have their own temperature cycles. The third point is that the earth exists in four dimensions and selecting a single point to represent an average temperature of only one of the three elements can only be considered as arbitrary. It is certainly not a statistically valid number no matter how many statistical methods and tests were used to derive the number. A single, non-dimensional (it has a measurement value, but not a space/time value assuming that Einstein’s relativity is correct), number does not take into account the fact that we live in a space-time continuum that consists of four dimensions. Therefore, one must, if they are honest, conclude that no single number can represent the “average temperature” of the earth for any given period. I don’t care which side of the debate you are on.
The second question presupposes, that somehow we could magically derive an answer to the first question, and is: “Given that an answer to the first question is found, what is the “Ideal” temperature of the earths’ solids/liquids/gasses?” Does anyone know? Can they know? I think not.
My view is that until someone can answer definitely these two questions, then most of the Climate Change debate is no more than a flailing of the wind. And until someone on either side of the debate can provide me with such answers, I will continue to be skeptical of any claims.
Steveta_uk says:
November 27, 2012 at 10:26 am
“Yeah, all those Vikings with their thermo couples and high-res thermometers and satelites kept really accurate MWP temperature records, I don’t think.”
Maybe the thermocouples were bigger back then, eg, the Vikings barns that are being exposed now in Greenland?
The idea that a higher accuracy of an average temperature for the Earth leads to a better understanding of the climate music and its rules is a bad idea, along with the idea to reconstruct the average temperatures of the warm/cold times, because the ‘absolute average temperature for the Earth’ never have a scientific value in natural science.
A scientific value can begin if there is coherence of two or more functions in nature while the nature of the functions is more relevant than the absolute value of the function. And this is easy to understand because the accuracy in time of the climate frequencies is better than the reconstructed temperatures over time. Moreover the climate frequencies can be analysed and can be taken to find heat oscillators and its heat source for a physical heat current from warm to cold.
Unfortunately most of the capacity of people involved in climate war is used to fight against fallacies created by the mob in the social community, which includes bloggers, consumers of climate soap stories and well paid authorities in the universities and institutes.
AFAIK nobody in the climate science community talking about anthropogenic warming has taken the reconstructed temperature frequencies to be analyzed in the data of UAH, RSS, hadcrut4, etc. as a physical reality of heat ; the nature of these real oscillators are the key to the understanding the solar heat system.
V.
Steveta_uk says:
November 27, 2012 at 10:26 am
Actually, the evidence of the LIA and MWP could well be considered ‘more’ valid than a current temp data ‘rise’ of a few tenths of a degree – in the context of proxy data really just being an assessment of ‘differences’ and trends over an extended period of time. I don’t necessarily agree with the temperature values assigned or ‘put onto’ proxy data – but the trending is the most useful information as it is this that demonstrates the real likely natural variation of earths temps with time – contrast to a few decades of UHI affected and potentially maladjusted air temperature measurements, averaged, homogenised and tortured til they squeak, etc, etc!
There are three basic ways of reasoning:
Deduction (logically unassailable eg the theorem of Pythagoras)
Induction (arguing from the general to the particular eg the sun will rise tomorrow)
Analogy (of which the less said the better)
Whoever is so intellectually bankrupt as to use analogies, do not hesitate immediately to consign their opinions to the flames (whether caused by lightning or “gas can” it matters not).
Anthony,
Thanks for posting this hard-hitting critique of the state of ‘climate science’ and the problems with the current debate. An excellent piece.
My favourite excerpts (from the full essay):
“When serious shortcomings of the hockey stick study began to be exposed and questioned the climate alarmists closed ranks and proclaimed their preeminent authority and expertise but refused to engage in any genuine scientific debate with their critics. Instead, they appealed to a supposed consensus of experts, peer review, and personal denigration of any who dared to disagree.”
And…
“The essential difference between belief and science, or between alarmists and sceptics, is that the former assert certainty while the latter admit room for doubt. False claims of certainty and expertise by alarmist researchers have been a major obstacle to any rational public debate of the matter.”
Truisms. Thanks again. Kudos to Walter Starck.
Steveta_uk says:
“Yeah, all those Vikings with their thermo couples and high-res thermometers and satelites kept really accurate MWP temperature records, I don’t think.”
Again, the confounding of qualitative and quantitative data.
Evidence from the Vikings tells us qualitatively that the North Atlantic Region was warmer around 1000 AD than it is today. Added to that evidence is qualitative evidence all around the world that it was warmer in a lot of locales (spread out mind you such that one could reasonably conclude although without absolute certainty that most locales) circa 1000 AD than it is today. Therefore; the quantitative assertion that the world is 0.7 degrees warmer now than it was then is likely to be either in error or essentially irrelevant qualitatively.
But, of course, we could all be wrong and global average temperature is actually being (and has been for centuries) controlled by aliens.
simon abingdon: Induction (arguing from the general to the particular….
Er, I think it’s actually the other way around. But I would not dismiss analogy so lightly. An analogy may be purely illustrative. Or it may point to instantiations of general propositions. In either case it can be used or misused.
Can you please point it out to me? I saw no such statement, to that effect.
There appears no doubt that temperatures have levelled off over the past 16 years
A few of the main reasons for the leveling off are …….
1. they have run out of adjustments they can feasibly make
2. too many people are watching now
3. there are very few remote stations left for them to misplace.
4. Most of the airpoart and carpark station are already concreted.
You can bet they will still try though !!!
100 degrees C?
A bit of a nitpick, but I think the author has mixed up Celsius and Farenheit. The temperature range between the coldest and hottest places on earth are typically less than 100 degrees Celsius (180 deg Farenheit) and only occasionally due temperatures vary by as much as 54 deg F in a day at any given location.
“It is apparent that their deepest commitment is to the threat itself and not to any rational assessment of real world probabilities or the broader consequences of any of their proposed remedies.”
Bingo. I suspect that the primary reason most of the usual suspects got into climate science in the first place was their desire to save the planet. The science is secondary to “the cause.” So if the evidence contradicts preconceived ideas, it has to be fudged or ignored.
Kevin says
“… having a larger number in diverse positions would decrease measurement error. ”
Only if “global temperature” (whatever that is supposed to be) was homogeneous … which it isn’t.
The AGW thesis is a POLITICAL MOVEMENT, akin to communism or radical islam or Nazism. Just as these two latter groups invent(ed) enemies (kulaks, jews, christians, etc.) the frauds who promote the fraud of AGW seek either money and fame (Gore, Mann, etc., ) or are simply seeking a new route to rid the world of capitalism (which, to the communist/socialist is the root of all evil in the world).
It is no coincidence that the AGW movement gained traction soon after the fall of the USSR. Also, it is no coincidence that just about all AGW proponents are liberal progressives, socialists or communists. (Please recall that Hitler was a socialist too).
“REAL SCIENTISTS” can produce an infinite quantity of hard core, irrefutable facts and evidence to show that AGW is a fraud, but it WILL MAKE NO DIFFERENCE AT ALL, because the AGW proponents are not interested in the science. Science has absolutely nothing at all to do with the AGW dogma. It is merely a tool, a vehicle , a ploy to impose a political order (a tyranny) upon the great unwashed masses.
Rest assured, if this ever comes to pass, the ruling elites – those that are screaming the loudest about AGW – will not for one minute cease flying about in private or chartered planes, nor will they give up their massive gas guzzling SUVs, nor their numerous LARGE vacation homes or yachts.
The AGW crowd is simply a self anointed extension of the ruling aristocracy – the Kings and Queens and Royalty – that ruled Europe for a thousand years. A group of people that believe they are superior, smarter, better, more sophisticated, more cultured than the average person (whom they hold in total contempt).
Frankly, if ever the AGW proponents are finally shown to be a fraud and generally accepted by all to be such, they should be executed, hanged; for promoting the biggest “scientific” fraud in the history of the world, and more so, for promoting an ideology whose goal is simply the establishment of a tyrannical form of govt that will enslave all of us.
The world has already experience Nazism and communism which produced MORE THAN 100,000,000 CORPSES. We do not need to experience all of this again.
It’s possible to have bad data, to have corruption of data, to misinterpret proxies but the thing that can’t be denied is the physical evidence in Greenland and written accounts of real people, drawings done. The historical record as revealed as the ice retreats in Greenland reveals trees that are 1000 years old, animals dated to be 1000 years old making it undeniable that this has happened before. If it happened before what are the chances it’s only happened twice in history? We have drawings of the Thames freezing over in winter for years.
Mann himself wrote a good paper documenting some of the physical undeniable evidence of the mwp. http://www.meteo.psu.edu/holocene/public_html/shared/articles/medclimopt.pdf. In it he tries to discredit the global nature but subsequent studies in the last few years have laid that document to waste. It’s quite clear now that the mwp was global by numerous peer reviewed published studies. It would be funny to see Mann update that article now. Check out this site for supporting documents http://www.populartechnology.net/2009/10/peer-reviewed-papers-supporting.html#MWP
I also found it unbelievable like an earlier writer that Greenland somehow for hundreds of years could locally get so much hotter than the rest of the world. How would that be possible? If so, then how could the few dozen or so boreholes possibly be indicative or reliable of a global temperatures over this time period? We don’t need all the studies that have been done over the last 10 years to show that temperatures were as warm as today millennia ago all across the globe. The data was already there. They ignored it and left a huge logical conundrum that they refused to even speculate about. They just said its a mystery and went on building models that assumed something that seemed on the face of it to be indefensible.
That’s the thing that turned me. I saw they will answer certain questions that conform to their model and turn away data that doesn’t. That’s fine for a “theory in development” but it is not what we expect from “settled science”. String theorists can shake their head when they can’t explain something but at least the theory isn’t considered “settled”. It’s fine if someone has a model that says co2 is a primary force but if they can’t explain basic questions then the theory is not settled. That’s simply a fact. They can deny that their theory is just a conjecture but it is the truth. It can’t be proven or settled because they can’t explain basic things that contradict the theory.
The biggest problem I have is that the only really good data we have is recent data. Because of the massive problems with proxies not covering 1% of the land surface and water over this time period and the inaccuracies with these data it is hard to give much credence to models which are made to fit this suspect data regardless of mwp or how good they can be made to fit it… If the models are correct they have to be validated with current data because the other data is either suspect or was used in the construction of the models. Therefore it is preeminently important that the most recent data confirm the theory. Since it does not conform to current data either for land temps, ocean temps, moisture, tropospheric temps, this means it is likely purely contrivance or luck that the fit to older proxy data works. We have to assume that if the models either don’t conform to current temps or behavior of the system they must be wrong and it must be explained how this nonconformance exists and why they didn’t predict it or to show other corroborating data that show the validity otherwise any scientific person must put these theories in a holding bin. You don get in science to have your theory upheld even as it fails and wait for something to disprove it. That’s not how science works. Either your theory works or it doesn’t and if it doesn’t then you can keep working on it but you can’t say “hold on” it’s going to be okay. That’s not how science works. That’s how religion works. I don’t believe any scientist could disagree with a word I’ve written. Therefore it’s ridiculous to argue its settled. What’s settled?
In 2000 the ipcc said the models conform to the historical record to such a degree that we can eliminate the idea the warming from 1978-1998 was caused by anything other than co2. Their great logical fallacy was to think that they had conformance to proxies to such a high degree that the level of natural variability nature could provide was not sufficient to explain even a part of the warming from 1978-1998. Therefore they were able to estimate the probability they were wrong by assuming that this variability was within bounds they had observed. However, since 1998 it is clear that the variability is vastly more than they projected. They never saw the models differ from proxy data by more than a short period for small temperature differences however now we have 0.4C variation in just the last 16 years from the models. According to their mathematical basis for saying that it was 95% settled a 2% probability event to have this much variance. Even more statistically unlikely that it woudl happen immediately after they claimed success. whats the chances of that? a 2% chance occurance just happens to hit just after you claim success? In defense, they claim that there are periods in the record that ar long with flat temperature trends but in all those cases they had an explanation for that. Whether aerosols or volcano eruptions they thought they understood why these variances occurred and had modeled them to some extent to show that the models fit the historical record quite closely and where they didn’t fit they could explain why. Fine. I can see how a scientist even a reasonable scientist would be secuced by such logic. However immediately after having proclaimed victory and therefore being able to estimate the probability of their theory being settled the earth decides to have a totally unexplained completely out of scale massive natural variability that is well beyond any previous variability. Clearly their explanations for past temperature variance must be flawed or else something else completely new and never seen before is happening but however you look at it the mathematical basis, the scientific basis of their 95% claim, the idea that this is settled is totally unglued. Before they could explain why variances occurred. Now they simply say : trust trust but any scientific person must understand that the scientific basis of their confidence has become completely laid false by the last 15 years. Their working model used the conformance of the models as statistical basis for saying it was TRUE. Now that the natural variance is clearly not what they said back then the entire basis has fallen apart. It may still be true that co2 has an enormous effect on temperature but the statistical basis and the scientific argument for that has been devastated.
@Juan Slayton
Depends whether you’re trying to predict a specific instance of an outcome or formulate a new general law of nature. Compare predicting the instance of sunrise tomorrow having observed the consistent generality of past sunrises with predicting an unfailing and unending generality of future sunrises on the basis of the experience of a mere trillion of past instances.
And despite your apparent optimism to the contrary, analogies invariably mislead, usually deliberately.
clue = finding a gas can at the scene of a house fire in no way rules out that lightning could have started the fire…….and then the heat from that fire igniting the gas can making it appear that the big fire started at the gas can.
BobN says: November 27, 2012 at 11:56 am
………
In Siberia, the winter temperature can drop to -60C while in the temperature in Death Valley, California occasionally exceeds + 50C.
Juan Slayton says:
November 27, 2012 at 11:31 am
simon abingdon: Induction (arguing from the general to the particular….
Er, I think it’s actually the other way around. But I would not dismiss analogy so lightly. An analogy may be purely illustrative. Or it may point to instantiations of general propositions. In either case it can be used or misused.
Quite. Analogies can be used to explain unfamiliar concepts – like Voyage charters – to a non-maritime background.
As noted – misuse is possible. Same as with cars and computers and Coca-Cola and – you get the picture.
BobN says:
“A bit of a nitpick, but I think the author has mixed up Celsius and Farenheit. The temperature range between the coldest and hottest places on earth are typically less than 100 degrees Celsius (180 deg Farenheit) and only occasionally due temperatures vary by as much as 54 deg F in a day at any given location.”
A typical tropical high would be about 35 C and a typical Antarctic low would be about -60 C, a range of 95 C.
The lack of an effective greenhouse effect in deserts (little H2O/clouds) causes huge range of temperatures between day and night, sometimes from upper 90’s during the day to lower 30’s at night (in F).
So, 100 C and 30 C are pretty good numbers.
The madness inflicted with the Hokey Stick continues. GM, the great example of screwing over capitalist investors for the pleasure of unions, has released another unwanted all-electric car unto the market:
The US is BROKE, we cannot afford a $7500 tax credit so people can pretend they are Green by paying twice as much out of pocket for a tiny car inefficiently powered by electricity from fossil fuels generated elsewhere. We have a plethora of cars getting 40mpg or better, that aren’t even hybrids.
If they really must propagate their eco-insanity, why not make the tax credits for super-efficient vehicles, which will be bought by people who can’t afford vehicles that are larger and/or will cost them more at the pump? Perhaps an additional credit for vehicles certified for 100% biofuels, like ethanol or biodiesel?
Oh wait, that actually makes some sense, therefore it cannot be allowed. They’ll stick with prices of two and a half times more for limited near-worthless vehicles, powered by fossil fuels elsewhere, incorporating exotic materials extracted elsewhere yielding toxic wastes that are poisoning someone else. Because that’s the Green way of saving the planet.
vukcevic says:
In Siberia, the winter temperature can drop to -60C while in the temperature in Death Valley, California occasionally exceeds + 50C.
one of those is summer, the other is winter, that’s not an “at any given time” as the author put it..
logiclogiclogic asks:
“What’s settled?”
That sounds like a worthwhile list to create, I’ll start:
1) The Sun radiates energy in mostly UV & Visible, some IR.
2) The Earth absorbs energy from the Sun.
3) The Earth has an atmosphere.
4) The Earth’s atmosphere absorbs energy and radiates IR.
5) Mann is an @$$, a charlatan, and a Fake Nobel Laureate.
6) Data had to be severely manipulated (tortured) to produce the hockey stick.
7) Results produced from torturing data are properly characterized as fiction.
8) Basing policy on fiction is usually not wise.
9) Advocacy, Noble Cause Corruption, and Conflicts of Interest have subverted climate science.
10) Al Gore is a charlatan and a real Nobel Laureate.
No problem getting a 100 degree C range across the world for part of the year at least. Typical winter temperatures in Vostok – the Russian base in Antactica – are around minus 70 C (close to minus 100 F), while the northern hemishere has plenty of places above 40 C every day. So the typical daily worldwide range in the northern summer is above 110 degrees C, or 200-odd degrees F.
In the northern winter, tempertures below minus 50 C are common in Siberia, while the hottest parts of Australia and Southern Africa will usually exceed 40 C on a daily basis – not too often above 50 C, though.
John West says:
November 27, 2012 at 12:46 pm
“The lack of an effective greenhouse effect in deserts (little H2O/clouds) causes huge range of temperatures between day and night, sometimes from upper 90′s during the day to lower 30′s at night (in F).”
In these conditions it shows just how small the effects of co2 are, and the daily average temperature change (~18F follow the link in my user name, there’s 4 pages with analysis of NCDC data) hasn’t changed as co2 has increased.
1) This proves almost all of the greenhouse effect is from water vapor.
2) If there’s no appreciable difference in daily temperatures from co2 only, it can’t force any water vapor differences.
I hit send too soon….
3) None of the temperature changes over the last 100 years could be from co2 (because it doesn’t show up in the daily change data).
It has to be from something else!
Kev-in-Uk says:
November 27, 2012 at 10:49 am
Using Mosh’s analogy of the gas can – sure it may well be present – but did it ever have any gas in it? THAT is the true skeptical question, is it not?
==============================================================
And the fact that there is a consensus of Fire Marshals that say fires can only start with gasoline. (the fire marshals that get g’ment grants to prove that fire only start with gasoline)
Threadjack: Why do I feel we are always playing Whack-A-Mole: Global Warming Threat: Permafrost Thawing Across Siberia And Alaska Poses New Concern, UNEP Reports – http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/27/global-warming-permafrost-thaw-siberia_n_2196876.html
People who believe magic math that makes hockey sticks
is needed to look into magical boreholes where that “space for the roots/canopy, light/canopy, water/canopy/roots, 15 individual elements in proportion/roots, pollutants/toxic substances contacting canopy/roots, temperature canopy/roots” thing
vanishes, and suddenly, a tree, is a treemomotur
because we don’t have enough equipment
to look into the atmosphere around us and determine whether a certain spectra of infrared light has been growing in the atmosphere. We can’t check the atmosphere for infrared light because the task is too difficult,
but we can use magic hockey stick making math to interpret readings from magical boreholes that become readouts from magically,
treemomiturs.
And since we can’t make head nor tails of any of the above, everybody had better just lay down their old useless energy purchases
and buy energy from Al Gore’s Occidental Oil ‘Alternative Energy’ systems,
ignoring the election where we decided not to put his policies into effect,
because if we don’t,
we could all die.
Yeah that’s leadership. No, that’s Libtardship
‘What’s the average temperature of the planet?’ Silly to believe you could know the answer.
‘What should it be?’ Sillier still.
StanleySteamer:
At November 27, 2012 at 10:57 am you ask and say
Some time ago a group of us attempted to publish an analysis of these issues which addressed your questions, but the paper was blocked from publication by nefarious method.
The entire subject was covered in my submission to the UK Parliamentary Inquiry (i.e. whitewash) into climategate, and a draft of the paper is its Appendix B. Your post suggests you may want to read it. It is at
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmsctech/memo/climatedata/uc0102.htm
Richard
JA:
At November 27, 2012 at 12:04 pm you say;
Please be aware that only an ignorant idiot would make such a claim.
H1tler was a fascist who attempted to exterminate socialists: he rounded up socialists and put them in extermination camps (along with Jews, communists, romanies and radical Christians).
Richard
Steven Mosher says: “A good skeptic looks at all the evidence.”
A great skeptic or believer analyzes the evidence instead of taking others at their word.
richardscourtney: “…only an ignorant idiot would make such a claim.”
(That Hitler was a socialist.) But what did der Fuhrer himself say?:
“We are socialists, we are enemies of today’s capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions.”
— Hitler, May 1, 1927; quoted in Toland 1976, p. 306.
I will grant you, however, that the claimant was indeed an ignorant idiot. : > )
It was relatively easy to measure the temperature of a planet using satellites. And from what I understand, satellite measurements show the earth has warmed over the last 30 odd years.
Re: Mosher November 27, 2012 at 9:07 am
I agree with Steven Mosher that you cannot start dismissing the instrumental records and then take for granted that the MWP or the Minoan Warming did take place. Besides, I fail to see any correlation between global warmth and prosperity. The Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution began in the middle of the LIA. The Middle Ages were times of widespread misery.
However, I don’t understand his analogy of the gas can. We don’t have a fire that we know was started by lightning and a new fire where we find a gas can. We rather have a fire that we don’t know how started and then we find a gas can that we’re pretty sure was placed at the fire scene *after* the fire had already started. So it may well be playing some role in the current fire but it surely didn’t initiate it and we’re not sure how much of a role it’s playing right now.
Juan Slayton:
re your post at November 27, 2012 at 4:41 pm
You are not the first to have taken H1tler at his word instead of observing his actions. There was inadequate preparation for a World War because many others made that mistake.
In politics, actions speak louder than words. And the ultra-right always pretends to be socialist.
Similarly, few countries with the word Democratic in their title are democracies. Fascists also pretend to be other than they are and for the same reasons.
Richard
Could someone provide a peer reviewed study confirming the existence of the Minoan Warm Period? Sounds interesting but I dont remember seeing any reference to it before.
Mikel Mariñelarena says:
We cannot “take for granted that the MWP or the Minoan Warming did take place.”
The MWP, the RWP, the Minoan warming, the Holocene Optimum, etc., are all found in numerous ice core proxies from both hemispheres — from the Arctic, to Greenland, to the Antarctic, and they correlate closely with one another. So that is not something that we just “take for granted”; that is verifiable, empirical, scientific evidence. If you refuse to accept such definitive evidence, that pretty much confirms that you are anti-science.
Next, you say, “I fail to see any correlation between global warmth and prosperity.” That only means that you fail to see any correlation. It’s probably hopeless trying to point out that Greek civilization flourished during the Minoan warming, and that Roman civilization expanded and grew during the Roman Warm Period, and that civilization in general prospered during the Medieval Warm Period.
Civilization benefits from global warming, and it starves when the planet cools. Warmth is good; cold kills. That is why the global warming scare is such nonsense. A couple more degrees of warming would be entirely beneficial to humanity. Cold is the real threat.
LetsBeReasonable:
At November 27, 2012 at 4:56 pm you say
Not “easy” but perhaps “relatively easy” depending on what you mean by “relatively”.
The satellite data only exists since 1979. There two analyses of the MSU data from the satellites. These are the remote sensing systems (RSS) analysis which is slightly different from the University of Alabama at Huntsville (UAH) data set, but the two data sets are sufficiently similar that either can be used as illustration.
The RSS system is outlined at
http://www.ssmi.com/msu/msu_data_description.html
and it says there that the temperature trend of the lower atmosphere for the period from 1979 to October 2012 is 0.133 K/decade.
However, that does not inform about the warming over the twentieth century because there were periods of cooling from ~1880 to ~1910 and from ~1940 to ~1970.
Indeed, the RSS data shows slight cooling over the period since January 1997 (i.e. the most recent 15 years and 10 months prior to October 2012) which is about half of the time since 1979 when the satellite data started to be obtained.
This recent data was plotted by Werner Brozek on another thread. His plot also included HadCRUT3 data and HadSST data: it can be seen at
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1997.25/trend/plot/rss/from:1997.0/trend/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1997.1/trend/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1997.25/plot/rss/from:1997.0/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1997.1
Richard
Birdieshooter,
Here are some charts found in the peer reviewed literature, or charted from peer reviewed data:
http://www.greenworldtrust.org.uk/Science/Images/Main/Warm_periods.jpg
http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/lappi/gisp-last-10000-new.png
http://www.climate4you.com/images/GISP2%20TemperatureSince10700%20BP%20with%20CO2%20from%20EPICA%20DomeC.gif
http://www.murdoconline.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/gisp2-ice-core-temperatures.jpg
richardscourtney: “…only an ignorant idiot would make such a claim.”
this statement is not only false, it is a logical fallacy called ‘argument from intimidation’.
mr slayton was absolutely correct; his statement, entirely accurate and truthful.
Struth mate! Good on ya!
I particularly appreciated your discussion of the duty of care and the legal precedent set by the Italian court. From a legal perspective does this decision set a precedent as regards burden of proof when predicting things climate?
I mean it’s one thing for “The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals closed the door last month on a five year effort by a coastal village in Alaska to use the common law of nuisance to fight climate change. In Native Village of Kivalina v. ExxonMobil,[1] the small town of Kivalina, located on the Chukchi Sea in Northwestern Alaska, alleged that the greenhouse gas emissions attributable to 22 oil, energy, and utility companies have exacerbated global warming and thereby exposed the village to rising sea levels and flooding. Relying on the Supreme Court’s holdings in American Electric Power Co., Inc., v. Connecticut (AEP),[2] the Ninth Circuit dismissed the suit, holding that the Clean Air Act had displaced the federal common law of nuisance with respect to greenhouse gas emissions.”
states Dustin Till at Marten Law.
And quite another to ponder “the legal basis of their culpability was not in failing to predict the quake but in falsely asserting certainty in their own prediction. In this instance the scientists assured the local population that there was little risk of a dangerous event and that they should all go home, have a nice bottle of wine and not worry. A strong quake took place and several hundred people were killed.”
There might be a silver-lining in this misunderstood cloud……..
Thanks Richard for your input, I found it interesting. I am wondering if the slight cooling since 1997 may lie with in the margin of error? Do you know what the period of time we would need to be able to say the heating/warming would be significant?
On another matter, a report on the permafrost melting has just been released. The concern raised is that this will release massive amounts of methane and carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and act as a positive feedback loop.
Mosher is troubled by the presence of the gas can. Has he considered that the can was placed at the scene after the fire burnt itself out. Or has he considered that the National Firefighters Foundation is awarding grants to study why humans always seem to leave gas cans at fires, be they natural or man-made.
@Doug Proctor: you wrote: “The IPCC is, however, straightforward in saying that they provide “scenarios”, not predictions.”
I am not convinced the IPCC have been straightforward. They have a summary for policy makers designed to give credence to the idea that we must reduce carbon emissions. The IPCC is not straightforward, they are one sided. They speak from both sides of their mouths.
LetsBeReasonable says: “The concern raised is that this will release massive amounts of methane and carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and act as a positive feedback loop.”
The positive feedback loop will be:
1) minor compared to water vapor’s effects as Greenhouse gas
2) limited because the amount of existing IR light is limited
Think of #2 like adding more wood (CO2) to a fire, without increasing available fresh air, as in oxygen (IR light).
That Huffington Post article that osopolitico linked to above, is a perfect example of the next phase of alarmism. Instead of claims that the world will be irrevocably destroyed by 2010, 2012, 2016, or 2020 (if we don’t act right now!!!!), they just continue to push the goalposts back to 2050 or 2100. And people will just allow them get away with it indefinitely. They will do this forever and the same people will always believe in the dogma. This is never going away.
Secondly, for experts who claim to believe in the beauty and majesty of natural climate change, I’ve never seen them attribute anything to a natural cause. Every single climate/weather event is now caused directly by humans. By sheer odds, shouldn’t at least one event have a natural cause, even if as they say, AGW controls most of the climate? How did we gain such power?
Darren, I am a little confused about your response, but are you suggesting that by putting more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere will have no effect because the amount of heat in the form of IR will be the same? I would have thought that like adding a blanket on your bed, you would heat up, despite your body generating the same amount of heat?
As to your first point, even if the effect is minor, wouldn’t any increase in greenhouse gases have an affect, thereby increasing the heat retained by the planet, and therefore increasing the melting of the permafrost?
You also wrote:
“As to your first point, even if the effect is minor, wouldn’t any increase in greenhouse gases have an affect, thereby increasing the heat retained by the planet, and therefore increasing the melting of the permafrost?”
I would not assume the affect would move things measurably in one or the other direction. That is, more water vapor could act in a negative or a positive feedback. The fact is that it’s so complex that most of the IPCC models are way off… Their models do not consider other natural explanations for climate such as Solar Irradiance making it’s way to warm the surface based on solar based changes which cause cloud formation, and stored energy in the oceans causing effects which move the heat around in El Nino and La Nina, which correspondingly affect cloud formation which affects the amount of solar energy getting to the oceans…
I have to laugh. At the bottom of the posting page, just below the link to the full article, is an ad that I imagine is generated automatically, and is probably different for each reader.
Mine is for the Toronto Marlies hockey team.
Oh, the irony…
Jeff Alberts says:
November 27, 2012 at 7:44 am
“The average temperature for the Earth…”
Might as well stop reading right there. There is no such thing.
Sure there is if you want one. An average is a mathematical abstraction and you could calculate an estimated global average temperature from a thermometer on the equator and one at the south pole. The question is how useful a metric would it be. Another question is whether there is sufficiently high quality data collected from adequately representative sites to estimate it reliably.
Duster: You wrote: “Sure there is if you want one. An average is a mathematical abstraction and you could calculate an estimated global average temperature from a thermometer on the equator and one at the south pole.”
I think we agree… but let me add to that…
The Earth is more than the temperature of some of the air one point in altitude take in two places. It does not include water temperature at various altitudes, or soil temperature… or …. There’s enormous amounts of latent heat energy in various forms (gas, liquid, solid) that store and release heat from and to the air.
Frank K. says on November 27, 2012 at 9:43 am:
If the air temperature in one or more locations shows no trend, how could this be so if CO2 globally is increasing? Over the large time scales associated with planetary climate change, I would suspect that no place would be immune to a general rise in temperature over, say, 100 years or more.
+1
And there are many places in the USA rural areas at which this is happening.
Has anyone challenged this bogus idea of an average temperature for the atmosphere, and any lessons to be drawn from it, by instead referring to the changing heat content of the atmosphere—including the latent/sensible heat of airborne water vapor; the same of ocean/land ice; and temperature-sensitive ocean water evaporation changes—and how it’s not possible to measure a meaningful average energy in such a chaotic system?
Why has the world let alarmists use temperature a metric? Haven’t they ever experienced the difference between a 105 degree day in Phoenix, with a rel humidity in the 30’s, with the same temperature but a 75% humidity in Delhi?
LetsBeReasonable says: “… but are you suggesting that by putting more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere will have no effect because the amount of heat in the form of IR will be the same?”
No. The available amount of IR light is for the most part is limited. To often proponents of AGW assume that no matter how much CO2 is added there is always an equivalent (more) IR light for CO2 interact with.
From: Cold Facts on Global Warming / Absorption of Infrared Radiation
“the effect of carbon dioxide is roughly logarithmic. Each time carbon dioxide (or some other greenhouse gas) is doubled, the increase in temperature is the same as the previous increase. The reason for this is that, eventually, all the longwave radiation that can be absorbed has already been absorbed. ”
Think of it this way with Sunglasses representing CO2: You have numerous pairs of sun glasses, each of which blocks (interacts with for CO2) 50% of sunlight. You put on first pair and 50% of the light is blocked and 50% is passed through. You put on a second pair, which again blocks 50% of the light and passes 50% of the light that got through the first pair, ultimately 25% of light is passed to your eyes. You put on a third pair, resulting in only 12.5% of original light being passed to your eyes. With a fourth pair, only 6.25% of sunlight reaches your eyes.
But to the point, the fourth pair of sunglasses can only adsorb 6.25% of the original light because the 1st, 2nd, & 3rd pair have already adsorb 87.5% of existing light. As you can see, doubling and doubling again the sunglasses (CO2) has little effect because of prior absorption of original sunlight.
LetsBeReasonable says: “even if the effect is minor, wouldn’t any increase in greenhouse gases have an affect,”
Yes, but the effect diminishes as the CO2 levels increase as stated above.
Also, realize water vapor accounts for 95.0% of Greenhouse gas effect.
All sources of CO2 amount to 3.62% (natural 3.5%) (man-made 0.12%) of Greenhouse gas effect. Thus a slight increase in natural CO2 would have a minor effect in comparison to water vapor’s Greenhouse gas effect at 95.0%.
The evidence of all this is right before proponents of AGW eyes, but they choose to ignore mother nature. Despite CO2 levels having continued to rise (to recent high levels), Earth’s temperatures have not. Some would even argue the Earth has cooled very slightly vs. rising over the last decade. This is completely counter to the claims of the proponents of AGW. Which would indicate to most people, the claim of AGW is utterly wrong.
@LetsBeReasonable: You wrote: “I would have thought that like adding a blanket on your bed, you would heat up, despite your body generating the same amount of heat?”
It is well believed that CO2’s ability to act as a greenhouse gas is nearing it’s limits. So in taking your example above; It would be like adding the 98th blanket on top of the 97 blankets that are already on your bed.
Even the IPCC mentions this to some extent. They say that the initial warming caused by the extra CO2 that man put into the atmosphere will cause other positive feedbacks, primarily water vapor, and that most of the water vapor will insulate the planet from shedding heat. Their models largely rely on that water vapor being the main feedback that causes the warming. But in fact, water vapor could also act as low lying clouds which increase the reflectivity of the earth thereby acting as a negative feedback which would lead to cooling.
Let me know if this explains it.
Mario
@ richardscourtney
Ignorance in science is often coupled with ignorance of economics and history. There is NO spectrum of economic systems….there is only freedom and personal property rights….OR….there is total control by unelected, primo-geniture oligarchs. From ‘One Pleasant Day in Runnymede’….
“Feudalism, fascism, socialism and communism are merely distinctions with no difference. An individual or small group of individuals have complete control of all property and all human activity. If ever elected, they always rule unopposed. It is no surprise that there are those that lust for this control. It must be a genetic defect that so many long for or accept this type of rule. New World Order is just re-branding of Old World Order.”
Our media, federal government and education system are under near total control of neo-feudalist who believe that they can ONLY be kings….if most of humanity are reduced to serfs. There was almost NO distinction between the economics of Hitler and Stalin….or Mao….or Castro. Total control of energy, property and human activity is the end game of AGW tool.
[snip. Please, no Principia links, per Anthony. Thanks. — mod.]
Has Michael Mann lost his court case against Dr Tim Ball?
“This dismissal us due to Weaver’s (and Mann’s) bizarre refusal to comply with court rules to reveal the hidden evidence that supposedly underpins their science. Honest researchers would have no qualms over a little ‘show and tell’ to convince a jury their science is “settled.” But these charlatans must now think its worth blowing a cool million to keep it hidden. As such, for refusing to come clean both their lawsuits are now scheduled for summary dismissal, plus costs.”
Would seem as if Dr Tim Ball is also launching a counter attack against these two gentlemen.
Thanks Mario and Darren, I appreciate you taking the time to explain this to me. From what you both say, my interpretation appears to agree with your explanation. It would appear that the temperature is increasing, despite the negative feedback from water vapour via cloud formation as the permafrost is melting where previously it was frozen. This melting will cause more CO2 and methane to be released into the atmosphere causing a positive feedback. This is a worrying development. Any thoughts on this issue? I would like to hear your thoughts.
LetsBeReasonable says:
November 28, 2012 at 12:08 am
“Thanks Mario and Darren…From what you both say, my interpretation appears to agree with your explanation. It would appear that the temperature is increasing, despite the negative feedback from water vapour via cloud formation as the permafrost is melting where previously it was frozen…”
No I do not agree that it would appear the temperature is increasing. The temperature is going up and going down and seemingly has been flat since 1997. The idea that measuring the air temperature provides us with the energy balance of the earth is silly. And we do not know, nor can we measure, the sum of the feedbacks with any type of certainty.
What I explained was the logarithmic “warming” effect which CO2 is theoretically claimed to have. There are many many things changing… I do not subscribe to the idea that CO2 or Methane is known to be responsible for what the climate is doing now, will do in the future and has done in the past.
Here’s a question for you that I can not answer. Why has every ice age in documented history begun suddenly after temperatures were increasing to maximal points and while CO2 was on the way up… following not leading temperatures?
LetsBeReasonable says:
November 28, 2012 at 12:08 am
”..It would appear that the temperature is increasing, despite the negative feedback from water vapour via cloud formation as the permafrost is melting where previously it was frozen. This melting will cause more CO2 and methane to be released into the atmosphere causing a positive feedback. This is a worrying development. Any thoughts on this issue? I would like to hear your thoughts.”
This sounds rather like some spoon-fed alarmist rubbish, to be honest, and is based mostly on wide ranging ‘assumptions’. If you are going to mention some of these things, it is probable that you have no grasp of the real scale of the Earth’s Carbon/CO2 cycle for example. The oceans contain many many times more CO2 than the atmosphere, along with methane clathrates, etc, etc. The ocean waters do act as sinks (absorbers) of CO2 but can also be emitters. Similarly, the worlds biomass contains vast quantities of carbon, much of which would be released via methane and co2 should significant changes occur or contrastly can act as sinks by absorbing CO2 (say from planting massive forests, or sudden algal blooms). These changes could be quite large ‘locally’ but are mere snips in the grand scale – it does not mean that they will ‘tip’ the climate into meltdown!
With respect, I think you need to do a lot of reading to understand the scale of the subject matter, and the massive changes previously undergone in the earths climate, before repeating such ‘worrying developments’ (your words) that you have heard (or indeed wish to promote?).
gnomish:
At November 27, 2012 at 6:24 pm you claim I was wrong.
That is all the confirmation anybody needs that I was right.
The assertion that “H1tler was a fascist” is untrue, is daft, and is irrelevant to this thread, so it could be expected that you would agree with it.
Richard
Re Mario Lento says:
November 27, 2012 at 7:46 pm
Or like the balanced Australian with a chip on both shoulders?
richardscourtney says:
November 27, 2012 at 5:15 pm
In politics, actions speak louder than words. And the ultra-right always pretends to be socialist.
Your position depends on a narrow European definition of “right” and “left” established by the “left” there that lumbers the “right” with every social evil, especially authoritarianism.
Which is ironic as both right and left in Europe are fundamentally authoritarian, and the rest of the “social evils” seem to be distributed pretty generally.
When you’re talking, for example, to an American, your statement comes across as nonsense, as it’s based on a definition that is locally irrelevant.
Just so you know.
LetsBeReasonable:
At November 27, 2012 at 7:01 pm you say and ask me;
Answers to your questions depend on what you mean by “significant”.
The ‘lack of warming’ over the last ~16 years is statistically significant according to the “margin of error” claimed by providers of the data sets. Similarly, the periods of ‘lack of warming’ from ~1880 to ~1910 and from ~1940 to ~1970 are statistically significant.
Shorter periods of ‘lack of warming’ exist in the data sets but they are not statistically significant.
The recent period of ‘lack of warming’ differs from shorter periods of ‘lack of warming’ in the data sets in that it is statistically significant and they are not. I explain the significance of this difference at November 26, 2012 at 2:46 am in the thread at
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/11/25/skeptical-science-misrepresents-their-animation-the-escalator/
Simply, the recent ‘lack of warming’ demonstrates that natural climate variability is sufficient to overwhelm any effect of recent rise in atmospheric CO2 and, therefore, recovery from the Little Ice Age is the most likely explanation of recent global temperature rise.
The ‘methane feedback’ scare is completely without evidence and is improbable. Atmospheric methane concentration varies in the air for completely unknown reasons and in unpredictable ways. Melting of permafrost has been happening in Greenland and elsewhere without observation of the speculated “positive feedback loop” on temperature: n.b. global temperature has not risen for ~16 years.
Richard
In my post at November 28, 2012 at 1:41 am where i wrote
“The assertion that “H1tler was a fascist” is untrue …”
If course, I intended to write
“The assertion that “H1tler was not a fascist but was a socialist” is untrue …”
Clearly, I should not write while angry at outrageous falsehoods. Sorry.
Richard
Kevin, I take you don’t accept the UN report presented today at DOHA. I accept what it had to say because I haven’t seen any evidence to the contrary.
I must admit I do dismiss arguments that the earth’s climate has gone through changes in the past because when the conditions existed, modern humans weren’t around so it is immaterial if the climate was hostile to humans. I am concerned about the liveability of the earth now and in the next 50 years.
I accept you premise that there are huge sinks of carbon etc, my concern is with the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. It is growing steadily and the rate will increase with the positive feedback mechanism of the permafrost melting.
I hope you are correct that it will not ‘tip the climate into meltdown’, but we are not sure what the effect of a rapid increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere will be, and that is why it is a worrying development.
Speaking for myself, I don’t dismiss ALL of the instrumental record; just those badly sited thermometer – you know, the ones in car parks etc, etc.
As for global warmth and prosperity take a closer look at ALL of the Holocene and you “can’t fail to see”. The Holocene actually says it all. During ice ages there were more desserts. Finally, take a look at a photo of the Earth from space and look at the biosphere and green areas. Look at species concentration from the equator up to the poles. You “can’t fail to see”.
Richard, I did mean statistically significant, so thank you for your explanation. Do I take it, that over the period from 1880 to present, the temperature change would also be statistically significant.
As you have pointed out the temperature rise over the last 16 years is not statistically significant, I wonder why the melting of the permafrost is occurring. Could the melting be keeping the earth’s temperature constant?
Merovign:
At November 28, 2012 at 2:08 am you respond to my true statement saying
you reply saying
Perhaps it “comes across” to you as “nonsense” but that does not stop it being true. Indeed, H1tler was a European so in this context only the European meanings of “left” and “right” have meaning (regardless of how the American right wants to distort them).
The claim that “H1tler was a socialist” is as offensive as a claim that “H1tler was a Jew” and for precisely the same reason; i.e. he rounded-up both and tried to exterminate them.
Richard
Here in the United Kingdom we are experiencing severe nationwide flooding which naturally is commanding a large proportion of TV news bulletins. Not once have I heard anyone talk about the excessive rain being caused by Global Warming or Climate Change. Most unusual for the BBC who are normally very quick to attribute unusual weather patterns to Climate Change. Perhaps the stinging criticism of biased reporting that they have suffered in recent months is having an effect after all. I did hear one reporter get close to it when he said “These are all time record floods for the last hundred years!”
LetsBeReasonable:
At November 28, 2012 at 2:41 am you reply to me saying and asking;
You raise several issues and I will try to provide adequate but short answers.
Firstly, I strongly commend you to read the entire thread which I linked at
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/11/25/skeptical-science-misrepresents-their-animation-the-escalator/
In that – still ongoing – thread AGW-advocates and climate realists are debating the issues which you raise so you can compare their arguments for yourself.
The temperature rise since 1880 is statistically significant according to the claims of confidence provided by compilers of the data sets. However, those claims are wrong. A group of us attempted to publish a paper on this but it was blocked by nefarious method. The entire issue is explained in my submission to the UK Parliamentary Inquiry (i.e. whitewash) into climategate. Appendix B of that Submission is a draft of the paper and the Submission can be read at
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmsctech/memo/climatedata/uc0102.htm
The permafrost has been melting because the Earth warmed over the last century. Indeed, this melting is some of the evidence that the Earth has warmed.
Think of it this way.
A person who climbs a hill remains at his greatest elevation when walking across the plateau at its top. Similarly, the global temperature rise before 2000 has stopped but global temperature is still high so the hottest recorded years are recent.
Higher temperatures means less permafrost and melting takes time.
However, as you say, the melting of permafrost could be inhibiting temperature rise (just as melting Arctic ice inhibits Arctic summer temperature rise). If so, then this melting would be a negative feedback which acts to inhibit ‘runaway’ global warming; n.b. not a positive feedback.
In this context, I notice that at November 28, 2012 at 2:33 am you say to Kevin
It seems that you need some context of how global temperature has varied both during the time of human existence, so I suggest that you click on this link
http://www.greenworldtrust.org.uk/Science/Images/ice-HS/noaa_gisp2_icecore_anim_adj.gif
The effect of atmospheric CO2 is so trivial that it cannot rise global temperature above the level it had only 2,500 years ago in the Minoan Warm Period and, therefore, your fears oabout effects of rising CO2 are unfounded.
Of course, I know that telling somebody “Don’t worry” doesn’t help, but I am not doing that: I am asking you to look at the evidence because that may allay your fears.
Richard
Walter,
Good article but you have fallen into the trap of stating the mean earth surface temperature to be 0.7degC per hundred years when it is plainly 0.4degC per hundred years.
The Hadley Centre are not known for their climate skepticism (witness Climategate) so take a look at their data:
http://www.thetruthaboutclimatechange.org/tempsworld.html
This graph shows a regression line of 0.41degC per century.
All climate alarmism results from cherry picking start and end dates and then using the raw temperature samples for those two dates.
It is pure pseudo-science.
George Lawson says:
November 28, 2012 at 2:44 am
Perhaps if they dredged the rivers as they used to and maybe stop building on flood plains, these things wouldn’t be so bad. Did anyone ever tell them, the clue’s in the name, FLOOD PLAIN!
DaveE.
Spot on! Excellent post, many thanks.
This is what some of us have been saying for years. About time it was aired on a website that is science based.
LetsBeReasonable says:
November 28, 2012 at 2:33 am
I accept very little produced by the UN or its supposed review body the IPCC !! You should check out who is producing this kind of stuff before ‘accepting’ it yourself! The IPCC and all its machinations have been well shown to be far from balanced in its pesentation and review of the ‘science’ – check out Donna Laframboise’ presentation on WUWT-TV when it is linked up!
As Richard says; it is not for the skeptics to decide what is worrisome and what is not – that’s likely a personal matter for each individual to assess! Suffice to say, that as a qualified geologist and engineer, I do not buy into the science as currently presented – it is deliberately vague and untestable.
Whilst we always welcome genuine questioning – we see too many folk simply re-iterating the warmist/alarmist type mantra, without actually being in full understanding of the basics, and it does become tedious when folk will not read stuff for themselves! I myself did not ‘disbelieve’ until I looked into it all myself a few years ago and there is no one more skeptical than me at the moment!
regards
Kev
Sfo,
Funny you should mention Burt Rutan, because Walter Starck strikes me as being a rather similar character: http://www.coralrealm.com/gd/walterstarck.html
Wonder if they know each other.
Permafrost melted in 1944 also. These things happen naturally and get blown up out of proportion always
http://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2012/11/28/1944-shock-news-permafrost-melting-as-far-as-the-eye-can-see/
Enthalpy! Enthalpy! Enthalpy! Enthalpy! Enthalpy! Enthalpy! Enthalpy! Enthalpy! Enthalpy! It is not enough to measure temperature, pressure must be measured as well. That’s the only way we can truly know if greenhouse gases are trapping more heat on the planet or if volume or moisture are causing temperature variation within a constant equilibrium (net 0)
David Socrates says:
November 28, 2012 at 5:26 am
“Walter,
Good article but you have fallen into the trap of stating the mean earth surface temperature to be 0.7degC per hundred years when it is plainly 0.4degC per hundred years.”
Look again at the opening paragraph. You seem to have forgotten the word “purported”. So whether that purported temperature is 0.7°C or 0.4°C is surely irrelevant to the debate.
One reason for not being worried is that it was as warm in the NH for far longer than recently during the MWP but no runaway heating occurred then. Here’s a link to a chart from the NSF on NH temperatures from 200 AD to the present:
http://www.nsf.gov/news/mmg/media/images/monsoon1_h.jpg
See: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/25/remember-the-panic-over-methane-seeping-out-of-the-arctic-seabed-in-2009-never-mind/ , which contained these quotes:
Here are quotes from other threads:
Average temperaturee of the earth…sounds like a computation with a lot of numbers.
George Lawson says:
November 28, 2012 at 2:44 am
Here in the United Kingdom we are experiencing severe nationwide flooding which naturally is commanding a large proportion of TV news bulletins. Not once have I heard anyone talk about the excessive rain being caused by Global Warming or Climate Change. Most unusual for the BBC who are normally very quick to attribute unusual weather patterns to Climate Change. Perhaps the stinging criticism of biased reporting that they have suffered in recent months is having an effect after all. I did hear one reporter get close to it when he said “These are all time record floods for the last hundred years!”
You must have been listening at a different time than me. I have been hearing engineers on the BBC chattering on about climate change and the need to spend more money (now, there’s a surprise) on sea and flood defences, and how these floods are going to become more frequent, more rain, warmer wetter winters, heavier rainfall, all attributable to climate change, blah, blah, blah. I turned the radio off in disgust, but I suppose it is one way for engineers to try to get more work when the construction industry is fairly moribund.
LetsBeReasonable says:
November 27, 2012 at 7:01 pm
Thanks Richard for your input, I found it interesting. I am wondering if the slight cooling since 1997 may lie with in the margin of error?
To add to what Richard has already said, I would like to make the following comments. Ross McKitrick said that you cannot find the significance on non warming. You can only find the significance of warming. So if it is stated that the world warmed 0.12/decade over 15 years, you can calculate that this warming may NOT be significant at the 95% level, however it could be significant at the 90% level. But if the warming is 0.0000 over 16 years, what does that really mean? To me it means that there is a 50% chance that it cooled and a 50% that it warmed. It seems irrelevant whether the error bars in the warming or cooling was 0.0001 or 0.1 or 1.0 or 2.0 C/century. But we can be 100% sure the temperatures were NOT 100% flat over the 16 years, even though our slope could in theory be flat.
Also, Santer said that if the slope is flat for 17 years, that is very significant, whatever that means. We are rapidly closing in on that.
mr courtney-
it’s incumbent on you either to use words as they are defined – or if you wish to utter idiosyncratic verbalizations, you must define your terms.
on the internet, when you bark, people can tell you’re a dog.
Here is some other social commentary, with music! http://independentnewsofsound.wordpress.com ….. http://youtu.be/pR3g_WbtefU I’m an optimist.
Gnomish:
At November 28, 2012 at 9:28 am you say to me
I am not “a dog”. I am the Devil Incarnate, and I know this because warmists have said it in various forms of words all over the internet.
I keep searching for my horns but they have not started to grow yet. I regret this because I think they would be distinctive.
Richard
vukcevic says:
NASA GISS experts dismiss the CET as a local anomaly, but in their scientific wisdom tell us that a single tree from the Arctic circle in Yamal is an excellent representative of the global temperature trends.
IME such “experts” are rarely able to come up with an objective definition of “local” or “global”. (Similarly for “weather” and “climate”). When pressed they are likely to instead come out with non sequiturs.
LetsBeReasonable says: “… I take you don’t accept the UN report presented today at DOHA. I accept what it had to say because I haven’t seen any evidence to the contrary.”
I have not seen the the UN report at DOHA, but if the report follows past reports from IPCC/U.N./NASA/Mann/Gore/… that Earth’s temperatures are increasing, and the increases are the result of man-made CO2, then I reject the report. The reason is sometime back I chose to analyze the historical global temperature records (using code I wrote), instead of taking the word of either side.
From my analysis it became clear that proponents of Global Warming were being unprofessional and dishonest with both the data and their claims. The proponents of Global Warming were lemon-picking data, adjusting the data towards warming, and were using inaccurate data to make long-term claims (which would require high accuracy).
LetsBeReasonable says: “It would appear that the temperature is increasing,”
Only according to the usual suspects of Global Warming. From the non-alarmists the earth’s temperatures have been declining for the last decade.
LetsBeReasonable says: “This melting will cause more CO2 and methane to be released into the atmosphere causing a positive feedback.”
Even if that is the case, the resulting positive feedback declines as the CO2 and methane levels are increased. As another poster pointed out, we are very near the ppm level of CO2 at which further increases will have negligible effect on Earth’s temperature.
See following CO2 vs. Temperature Plot: http://www.randombio.com/temperatures6.png
Or another way to look at the decreasing warming effect of CO2 as ppm of CO2 is increased: http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/heating_effect_of_co2.png?w=640
Mario Lento says: “Why has every ice age … increasing to maximal points … following not leading temperatures?”
It is mother nature’s way of thumbing her nose at Gore, Mann, & Hansen… 😉
Darren Potter says:
November 28, 2012 at 10:09 pm
I reckon LBR (hint in the name really?) is a bit of a warmist, the way the posts were worded did seem a little ‘pointed’ don’t you think? But anyways, we were pleasant and accomodating, and if they actually do bother to do some research, he/she may enlighten themselves further and may even one day be grateful!.
Darren Potter says:
November 28, 2012 at 10:09 pm
“I reckon LBR (hint in the name really?) is a bit of a warmist, the way the posts were worded did seem a little ‘pointed’ don’t you think? But anyways, we were pleasant and accomodating, and if they actually do bother to do some research, he/she may enlighten themselves further and may even one day be grateful!.”
LBR was friendly and perhaps really believes and is affected by code terms such as “settled” “consensus” taking the “cautionary road” and that “CO2 is at least causing some warming and warming is bad.” It’s going to be difficult to change people’s minds who are rooted in a camp. Most of us, I believe, are sort of in a camp, but really I hope we are the people who seek truth…
I would have thought after 17 years of no more warming trend, some people would stop, and think… what happened to the correlation? Wait, the IPCC said that 90% of the warming up through 1998 was as a result of CO2. But but, then is 90% of all of the not warming also caused by CO2? Can you really have it both ways?
Mario Lento says:
November 29, 2012 at 8:53 am
”..I would have thought after 17 years of no more warming trend, some people would stop, and think… what happened to the correlation? Wait, the IPCC said that 90% of the warming up through 1998 was as a result of CO2. But but, then is 90% of all of the not warming also caused by CO2? Can you really have it both ways?”….
No, no – I think you must have misread the IPCC mantra! – when it’s warming it is because the CO2 is rising which far outweighs any natural warming effects that may be present within the climate. When it is not warming, it is because the natural variation has suddenly overtaken the mighty CO2 warming effect, which itself has suddenly become all weak and feeble, allowing the natural cooling variation to wipe it out and hide it almost completely.
LOL