CO2, is there anything it can’t do? Add it to the list.
Over at WaPo, they call them “supersized”. From Counsel and Heal News (h/t to Gene Doebley):
Carbon To Blame for Oversized Blue Crabs
The use of genetic engineering or steroid enhancements to enlarge certain food products has been popular but highly controversial in the history of the food industry. Based on new research, it seems like certain animals, such as the blue crabs, have found another way of growing that does not require a lab setting. According to research, the side effects of pollution, particularly the emission of carbon dioxide, can lead to oversized blue crabs. Researchers found a link between the growing size of these crustaceans and the growing rate of carbon found in the waters. Although these crabs are growing bigger and faster without the help of scientists, this trend might not be safe for the marine environment.
Hmmm. They seem a little unclear on the giant crab mechanism:
Although carbon dioxide is emitted into the air, it dissolves into the water and saturates the oceans with carbon, which can change how these marine ecosystems work. Saturated waters become acidic, which is detrimental for certain marine animals, such as oysters and corals. These living creatures have calcium carbonate shells, which forms at a much slower rate when the waters become acidic, even if it is only by a small amount. Meanwhile, other creatures, particularly the blue crabs, thrive on the carbon in the water.
…
“Higher levels of carbon in the ocean are causing oysters to grow slower, and their predators – such as blue crabs – to grow faster,” said marine geologist, Justin Baker Ries from the University of North Carolina.
Full story here
Lessee, oysters grow slower, so they won’t reach breeding maturity and replace themselves as fast, and somehow this makes the crabs grow faster?
Maybe this is why it doesn’t make sense, from WaPo, it is recycled news:
The research showing the effects of carbon on marine organisms was published in the journal Geology in 2009. The study, led by Ries and co-authored with Anne L. Cohen and Daniel C. McCorkle, and found that crabs, lobsters and shrimp grew bigger more rapidly as carbon pollution increased. Chesapeake blue crabs grew nearly four times faster in high-carbon tanks than in low-carbon tanks.
Seafood lovers rejoice!
But, ah, another “not in the real world, aka ocean” experiment conducted in tanks. No mention of “giant, oversized, or supersized crabs” in the paper it seems. We’ve been down this road before with “tanked” experiments where they try to extrapolate captive life experiments to the real ocean.
Marine calcifiers exhibit mixed responses to CO2-induced ocean acidification
Abstract
Anthropogenic elevation of atmospheric carbon dioxide (pCO2) is making the oceans more acidic, thereby reducing their degree of saturation with respect to calcium carbonate (CaCO3). There is mounting concern over the impact that future CO2-induced reductions in the CaCO3 saturation state of seawater will have on marine organisms that construct their shells and skeletons from this mineral. Here, we present the results of 60 d laboratory experiments in which we investigated the effects of CO2-induced ocean acidification on calcification in 18 benthic marine organisms. Species were selected to span a broad taxonomic range (crustacea, cnidaria, echinoidea, rhodophyta, chlorophyta, gastropoda, bivalvia, annelida) and included organisms producing aragonite, low-Mg calcite, and high-Mg calcite forms of CaCO3. We show that 10 of the 18 species studied exhibited reduced rates of net calcification and, in some cases, net dissolution under elevated pCO2. However, in seven species, net calcification increased under the intermediate and/or highest levels of pCO2, and one species showed no response at all. These varied responses may reflect differences amongst organisms in their ability to regulate pH at the site of calcification, in the extent to which their outer shell layer is protected by an organic covering, in the solubility of their shell or skeletal mineral, and in the extent to which they utilize photosynthesis. Whatever the specific mechanism(s) involved, our results suggest that the impact of elevated atmospheric pCO2 on marine calcification is more varied than previously thought.
- Received 7 March 2009.
- Revision received 16 July 2009.
- Accepted 21 July 2009.
PDF here: http://www.unc.edu/~jries/Ries_et_al_09_Geology_Mixed_Responses_to_Ocean_Acidification_full.pdf
Bigger crabs, bigger crops and bigger trees too….Thanks Carbon Dioxide!
But the scary thing is we are getting smaller and turning into Hobbits, so soo we will be on the blue crabs menu ratrher than they being on our! /sarc
Well, it does keep the funding rolling in. What’s next? Weather caused by CO2? Nah, shirley not!
Growing faster, okay, but larger? I always thought that was food supply …. and predation, i.e. fishing/crabbing.
The entire world is “special” these days, not just physics.
“Marine calcifiers exhibit mixed responses…”
Also to consider here is that the genetic variability of many of these creatures is extremely high. Each year produces thousands or millions of offspring, of which only a few survive to breeding age.
That sort of strategy means that in cases of environmental change, the population can be replaced quickly with descendants more adapted to the new conditions.
Exactly, how much carbon dioxide does it take to saturate sea water? I suspect far more than we will ever see on our planet Earth.
“According to research….” then it must be true.
They should do these experiments with their personal insects.
Ok, bring em on…. Love a good old fashioned crab boil, bigger crabs means less effort picking the meat out, Where’s the problem ?
Of course this could lead to an unsustainable increase in pot sizes needed to cook em in……
Cheers, Kevin
Giant crabs? I believe global warming also increases butter production. Other than having to re-tool for larger pots, does anyone see a downside?
well, they claim that AGW causes smaller brains too, so they have that going for them as well !!
http://www.brainbasedbusiness.com/2007/03/expect_smaller_brains.html
“Lessee, oysters grow slower, so they won’t reach breeding maturity and replace themselves as fast, and somehow this makes the crabs grow faster?”
Clearly the previously-giant mutant oysters used to beat up and devour the crabs. Thanks to CAAGW (Crab Approved Anthropogenic Global Warming), the [dinner] tables are turned! BWAHAHAHAH!
Sorry. Long day.
So next time you go to your favorite fast food joint and they ask if you want your order “super sized”, you just blow in their face. If they look startled, just say the CO2 you just exhaled should be a sufficient answer.
This is a joke, right?
A-may-zing.
Crustaceans use hemocyanins instead of hemoglobin for oxygen transport. Instead of an iron atom they have to have a pair of copper atoms to bind molecular oxygen.
Basically all their copper goes into hemocyanin, as crabs and lobsters have evolved to use as little copper in all other metabolic systems as they can; for instance the Cu-Zn superoxide dismutases have been replaced by the normally mitochondrially targeted Mn-SOD.
Crabs and Lobsters are mostly copper limited as their growth needs hemocyanin, hence copper, to support aerobic respiration.
Do not forget the very low pO2 where these animals live.
err… correlation / causation confusion – claimed carbon capturing crabs create Carolina crustacean carbon calcifiers conflict – yawn… I’m bored of these people.
Ohhh noes, the ocean is becoming acidic! Wake me when it becomes remotely neutral.
I thought April the 1st had already gone?!
I’m not entirely convinced that most of these climate “scientists” didn’t, at one point in their careers, work for the Enquirer or The Weekly World News. It’s tabloid science. I wonder how big Bat Boys will be in 40 years? That’s the real question. And do they have a fondness for seafood? This may be our only hope — Super Sized Bat Boys.
This is my favorite part of the WaPo article:
“At UNC, marine geologists are analyzing video of the slaughter that took place when they put mud crabs and oysters in tanks they intentionally polluted with carbon over three months for a 2011 study.
It was like watching lions tear apart lambs. The crabs scurried from their side of the tanks, banged on the shells of the traumatized oysters, pried them open with a claw in a way similar to what humans do with a knife at restaurants and gobbled them down.”
——
Just what exactly were they expecting the crabs to do?
Great. Now they’ll turn us all into metrosexuals.
😉
I see the narrative… Now the mutants are not nuclear contamination anymore but Co2 made.
Poor Godzilla if it was invented today it would be cause of Co2…
Newbie question.
Warming oceans emit CO2.
How can oceans become more “acidic” while they are out gassing CO2 due to global warming?
Shouldnt temp and pressure determine solubility ,not higher atmospheric CO2 levels.
Sorry, this is a bit rude but I couldn’t resist.
Three prisoners in a cell. Two of them are having an argument. The third man asks what the fuss is about.
“You know that bit in the paper about crabs getting bigger?” asks the first prisoner.
“Yeah.”
“Well do crabs walk sideways or forwards?”
“Sideways, it’s lobsters that walk forwards.”
“See”, said the first prisoner pointing to the second man’s pants, “they aren’t going to get any bigger, you’ve just got a bad case of lobsters.”
Giant blue crabs are nothing new.
My friend Dr. Mike had a bad case of giant blue crabs when we were back at university.
I told him to stop picking up his dates in the sleazy downtown hotels.
Problem solved.
So, animals which the AGW hype industry claimed were going to be destroyed by OA are now growing larger. And they are doing this growth now, in the absence of any evidence of pH changes. And the authors offer no mechanism to link the alleged cause, CO2, to the allged effect, super sized crabs. And the authors offer no reason why now these animals are faring well (allegedly) while shellfish are diong poorly (allegedly). What a buncha maroons.
I hope they don’t do this experiment on Mike M. I would hate to see him become any more crabby than he already is.
Important public service announcement: Do not throw your toothpicks into the toilet. Crabs can pole-vault.
Climate change to blame for bumpier flights.
Possibly…..
According to models……
http://www.news.com.au/travel/news/climate-change-blamed-for-bumpier-flights/story-e6frfq80-1226615357985
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22063340
Lots of lazy speculation and silly humor, no references to research in the comments. Telling. Typical of WUWT comments.
One of the most ignorant and illogical comments was made in response to:
“Higher levels of carbon in the ocean are causing oysters to grow slower, and their predators – such as blue crabs – to grow faster,” said marine geologist, Justin Baker Ries from the University of North Carolina.
The comment: “Lessee, oysters grow slower, so they won’t reach breeding maturity and replace themselves as fast, and somehow this makes the crabs grow faster?”
NO. CLEARLY that was NOT the connection made between crabs, oysters and carbon.
Ries’ conclusion, to paraphrase what’s already clear as fresh air (sorely needed here!), was that carbon causes oysters to grow slower and also causes their predators to grow faster. No relationship between slower-growing oysters and faster-growing crabs was stated or implied. The link, which occurred in the same sentence, was too hard for the commenter to figure out: Each type of creature is affected by carbon, but in DIFFERENT ways.
Where exactly in one’s brain can one make such a nonexistent connection? And why? I suggest a deficiency in analytical prowess. Or reading too quickly without grasping the content. Or jumping to an assumption (a common error made by conservatives) based on a previously held belief: that scientists doing this work are 1) dumber than you and 2) wrong for any reason (no matter how true, logical or verified) that doesn’t fit your previously held schema that holds AGW can’t be true.
Moving on towards a more science-based approach at comments…
Let’s try to figure this out instead of ignorantly putting down research you really don’t have a scientific context for, or understand, eh? Grasping at straws. This is for the poster, too.
Maybe respiratory systems are related. Just a starter hypothesis. Why suggest that? Research on insects in prehistoric times reveals that they grew larger with greater amounts of oxygen in the atmosphere that powered bigger muscles. They got smaller when faced with evolutionary pressures like birds evolving to become efficient hunters, as well as lower oxygen content in the atmosphere. http://insects.about.com/od/evolution/f/Why-Prehistoric-Insects-Were-So-Big.htm
Maybe we can infer something using *educated* guesswork. Maybe not. But at least use existing science and research, not supposition, voodoo and inventing fact-free hypotheses based on scant evidence (phlogiston, for example) to account for what you don’t understand.
Insects are similar to crustaceans. But most crustaceans, being larger, have different breathing mechanisms. I wonder if respiration is related to the crustaceans’ increased size? “Crustacea usually have gills that are modified appendages.” — http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthropod#Internal_organs
I’m not getting anywhere so far, I have to admit, but it was fun to pop the balloons of the windbags here along the way! 😀
Now, if any real scientists are reading this, will you please help those with limited abilities to understand? Hoping I lit the fire of understanding…until some dullard’s inane “Yeah right–trust Wikipedia, loser!” comment comes flying by.
FYI, Dullard: Wikipedia, despite being a user-sourced entity with concomitant risks for accuracy in specific articles, has been researched and pronounced as nearly as factually accurate as Encyclopedia Brittanica, according to the science journal, Nature: http://news.cnet.com/2100-1038_3-5997332.html
“Anthropogenic elevation of atmospheric carbon dioxide (pCO2) is making the oceans more acidic…”
The oceans are alkaline. Adding more CO2 makes them less alkaline, not “more” acidic. My BS detector went off, and I don’t have to read any more of this drivel.
Reg Nelson says: “Just what exactly were they expecting the crabs to do?”
Join claws and sing Kumbaya?
Giant crabs!
We’re doomed!
First:
“According to research, the side effects of pollution, particularly the emission of carbon dioxide….”
CO2 is a side effect of pollution?
Are they mad (OK, that was a rhetorical question)?
CO2 is essential for life on the planet Earth.
Second
“CO2, is there anything it can’t do? ”
Nope.
Bumpy plane rides climate change’s newest problem
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/technology/news/article.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10876366
Maybe it’s not the CO2. Maybe it’s the colder temperature favoring survival and growth of shellfish. I’ll take the 2009 paper referenced above and raise you a 2011 paper:
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Climate-related+hydrological+regimes+and+their+effects+on+abundance…-a0256170402
And if you’re going to reference giant crabs, why not go the full Monty and include 1957’s “Attack of the Crab Monsters”? These crabs got smarter as they ate more people. Cheers –
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_of_the_Crab_Monsters
It will be a big test of Mr. Watts’ integrity if he posts my previous comment. And replies with some measure of civility, which I’ve frequently done without here. Would you at least note your mistake in making the “Lessee…” comment?
I admitted mine, being unable in 20 minutes to help figure out the mechanism for why blue crabs are growing larger. At least I started with established science. (Well…maybe not established to a Creationist, lol.) But, then again, I don’t claim to be an expert in anything but writing and editing.
Are you truly expert enough on blue crabs and ocean carbon absorption to make an educated comment? Or preaching, on a pulpit glaringly empty of evidence, to a choir of those who also refuse to believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?
[Note that your previous comment was posted. — mod.]
Be afraid. Be very afraid…
Yeah, right, I’ll make a note.
Does not more CO2 equals more plankton, equal more food for fish, equal more food for crabs equals bigger crabs.
As that might be seen as something that would be good from more CO2, work on the chemistry of the shell is what makes them bigger not that there is more food in the food chain.
So the authors claim that the oceans are growing “…more acidic…” Where did they document the oceans as having an average oceanic pH level? What about the pH varying with time and place? When I took Chem 1, the pH scale was logarithmic and anything over 7.0 was a base. Perhaps a “climate scientist” ™ who is lurking will be kind enough to attempt to explain why a pH of 7.9 is more acidic than a pH of 8.0.
“Holy Crab BatMann it’s a street fight!”
“the hockey stick will defend us.”
[BatMann reaches for a small device and taps away furiously as the climate villains disappear into thin air]
kapow!
ker-plop!
zamm!
thwacke!
“nice blocking BatMann, but what does that have to do with the hock…”
plop!
[BatMann stands alone. Fades.]
/sarc brought on by dissident crabs in the camp
@ Watcher. Have you seen the warmlist? (Linked right at the top in the very first sentence.)
Atter wading through all those claims, why would you take ANY of it seriously? Even if ANY of it is true, why would ANYONE think it matters? It would be a natural development along with natural changes, something occuring constantly. Relax and laugh already.
If you don’t want to scroll to the top of the page, here’s the URL. Have a look:
http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm
Sorry – butter fingers to me = “Atter” should read “After”
Watcher says:
“…preaching, on a pulpit glaringly empty of evidence, to a choir of those who also refuse to believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?”
Watcher, I challenge you to post your “overwhelming evidence of AGW”. Make sure it is measurable and testable, per the Scientific Method. Avoid the usual Argumentum ad Ignorantium fallacy, wherein you presume that CO2 is the cause of AGW simply because you cannot think of any other cause.
In fact, there is no measurable, testable evidence for AGW. AGW is a conjecture. It is not a testable hypothesis because there are no empirical measurements of AGW. Further, because you are a true believer in AGW, the onus is upon you to provide scientific evidence and measurements to support your conjecture.
And Anthony Watts’ integrity is not the issue here. Yours is. The alarmist crowd is devoid of scientific integrity. They universally ignore the Scientific Method, they hide out from any real debates, and they refuse to admit it when they are found to be flat wrong.
Commenters are making fun of this ridiculous crab scare for a good reason. Do a WUWT archive search for ‘acidification’, and you will find that the daily variation in ocean pH is far larger than what is being claimed as ‘acidification’. The entire “carbon” scare has become ridiculous, and claims like giant crabs do nothing to correct that foolishness.
GlynnMhor says: April 8, 2013 at 3:23 pm: “Also to consider here is that the genetic variability of many of these creatures is extremely high. Each year produces thousands or millions of offspring, of which only a few survive to breeding age. That sort of strategy means that in cases of environmental change, the population can be replaced quickly with descendants more adapted to the new conditions.”
It is this weak grasp of evolution that surprises me on a blog that has a fairly savvy audience – you see this view among educated blog commenters…the genetic drift explanation of the emergence of new species.
Well, “Watcher” is sure a bigger crab.
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
…….. who also refuse to believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?
======================================
Why do so many people use this phrase “overwhelming evidence”, but then never say what it is. Go on Watcher, humor us – 10 bullet points please.
Actually, looking over that warmlist again, I noticed “giant oysters invade” so I guess they are not as hapless as these researchers fear. Aggressive little buggers, when roused (a bit like climate scientists).
In a few hundred years, these shellfish will be as big as we are. And then …
http://cdn.superbwallpapers.com/wallpapers/meme/why-not-zoidberg-14333-1920×1080.jpg
Watcher;
“I admitted mine, being unable in 20 minutes to help figure out the mechanism for why blue crabs are growing larger.”
Frankly I don’t give a d–n why they are (supposedly) growing larger, but now I REALLY, REALLY, WANT A DOUBLE ORDER of them delicious little (whoops, HUGE) devils.
Nothing in the seafood world is as delicious as a nicely pan fried soft shelled blue crab…………………… Hard to get in most parts of the world.
Lighten UP, you guys are WAY TOO SURE OF YOUR PREDICTIVE ABILITIES, crabs have been eating oysters for a long time, and humans have been eating both for a long time as well.
Cheers, Kevin.
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 4:58 pm
…………….Research on insects in prehistoric times reveals that they grew larger with greater amounts of oxygen in the atmosphere that powered bigger muscles.
————————————–
Thanks Watcher.
This is why I come to wattsupwiththat. You learn something new everyday.
I did not know they did research on insects in prehistoric times.
I’ll have to check for the article you mentioned in wikipedia.
Many climythology ( I love that term) scientists would be right at home doing research in prehistoric times because they like not having to archive or share their data.
cn
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
…….. who also refuse to believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?
Now that’s a strawman if I have ever seen one.
Why is it that all natural climate change deniers bring this up, time after time?
‘Non-believers’ come is many shapes and forms and almost all believe in AGW, just not in CAGW.
Many believe that the extra anthropogenic CO2 causes some warming but that this is insignificant.
Many believe that the extra anthropogenic CO2 causes some warming but that ‘natural’ phenomena overwhelm the effects.
Many believe that the extra anthropogenic CO2 causes some warming but that this actually beneficial.
Many believe that the extra anthropogenic CO2 causes some warming but trying to prevent this is economically and socially unjustified as the cost of preventing this is many times higher than trying to adapt to this.
However, many ‘non-believers’ find that this whole Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming, Anthropogenic Global Warming, Climate Change, Climate Disruption, Extreme Weather, Climate Chaos quasi-religious scam is causing mass hysteria or collective obsessional behavior among a certain, un-educated gullible, segment of the population. Useful idiots (Karl Marx) edged on and whipped up into a frenzy by the ‘intellectual elite’ and politicians with an agenda.
Yea, I don’t see a downside here. I could write a Willis story about those family vacations to Destin years ago, hunting blue crab off the beach and off piers, with nets and string and chicken wings, then having an incredible family feast of boiled crab in melted butter.
Wraith says:
April 8, 2013 at 4:24 pm
Great. Now they’ll turn us all into metrosexuals.
😉
——————
:> Crab-Pe-ople-Crab-Pe-ople.
To Watcher:
You speak of larger while Anthony spoke of faster.
Growth size and growth rate are two separate things.
philincalifornia says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:31 pm
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
…….. who also refuse to believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?
======================================
Why do so many people use this phrase “overwhelming evidence”, but then never say what it is. Go on Watcher, humor us – 10 bullet points please.”
—–
I’m not doing research for you. More laziness on the part of readers here, anyone?? YUP. I’ve done research for 12 years on this issue. Can you say the same?
The overwhelming evidence is in the IPCC reports, RealClimate.org, SkepticalScience.com, and a host of other science sources you’ve obviously ignored as an Echo Chamber subscriber. Join Sarah Palin who “reads all of em…that have been put in front of me.” Can you possibly put real scientific evidence in front of you and ignore the BS on this site and in other skeptic sites?
Few if any postings here are science based. WUWT is based on cherry picking evidence to support previously held beliefs and nit-picking at science it doesn’t agree with, using the stone knives and bearskins of prejudice, fear, anger and sometimes pure nuttery. Not science. Science does not cherry-pick. It examines all relevant evidence, then winnows out chaff.
If the oil companies and the CIA believe in global warming due to human causes, and the latter are designing defense scenarios to deal with the fallout…you better believe it’s real. Only dummies don’t trust facts.
It just occurred to me that is possible, but by no means confirmed in any way (hence overwhelming evidence etc., ad. infinitum), that what we continue to witness could be a lower anthropogenic susceptibility to CO2 toxicity.
Or Hypercapnia.
From Wiki: “Hypercapnia is generally caused by hypoventilation, lung disease, or diminished consciousness.” Hmmmmm diminished consciousness……..
You don’t suppose that a lower threshold to CO2 driven “diminished consciousness” might exist somewhere around 350.org ppm for some members of the genus Homo constitutes, say, a tipping point?
Hey!!! I’m a crab (born July 18, never mind the year) and only 4’10 1/2″!!!! Explain me! Folks used to say the growing season must be short in NE Oregon.
[snip too much of a rant – try xanax – mod]
Claims like this one are both idiotic and true. After all, crabs are a carbon based life form dependent on various forms of carbon compounds for life, so of course carbon is responsible for any giant crabs, anf the bigger they are, the more carbon they need. If the “researchers” found otherwise, now that would be a startling discovery.
Other Andy @ 5:55 PM. Thank you for the new, at least to me, phrase “natural climate change deniers.” I suggest that its use be encouraged.
Watcher. You’re a hoot. rofl
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 6:03 pm
=================
In other words:
“No I can’t”. Thank you.
Pamela Gray says:
April 8, 2013 at 6:06 pm
Hey!!! I’m a crab (born July 18, never mind the year) and only 4’10 1/2″!!!! Explain me! Folks used to say the growing season must be short in NE Oregon.
==================================
Thanks Pamela, you just reminded me, I’m a crab too. I was wondering how I put all that weight on since last Thanksgiving.
Dare I say it …………. eating too many oysters !!!!!
Addendum for Watcher:
It’s overwhelming, but you would have to do research ??
Not at your fingertips ??
OK, 3 bullet points. I won’t be so greedy this time.
Link to the research on “functional extinction” of oysters:
http://www.aibs.org/bioscience-press-releases/resources/Beck.pdf
Chuck Nolan says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:47 pm
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 4:58 pm
…………….Research on insects in prehistoric times reveals that they grew larger with greater amounts of oxygen in the atmosphere that powered bigger muscles.
————————————–
Thanks Watcher.
This is why I come to wattsupwiththat. You learn something new everyday.
I did not know they did research on insects in prehistoric times.
——
The quote above refers to research done now on insects living in prehistoric times. A quirk of English allows a part of a sentence to ambiguously refer to either of the two components, “research” or “insects.”
Duh. Playing rhetorical games with a language you don’t fully understand does not make you look bright.
Jerome,
My BS meter is still spinning after reading your missive.
Crabs and shellfish create their protective shell, breathe and to an amazing extent eat in the same way. They also have blood and internal mechanisms to show they are cousin creatures. So when one AGW paper says one functionally similar creature grows and another declines given the same conditions, then any sane person would reckon the “science” is pure loony tunes.
@watcher
1) larger insects were the result of no competition from other lifeforms, MUCH higher O2 atmospheric concentrations supposedly of over or approaching 30% but insects use spiracles and blood O2 transfer and ventilate the same as mammals do.
2) if you had followed the many prior discussions here concerning ocean “acidification”, you would have learned all you wanted to know about the topic like the fact that plants remove so much CO2 and it’s ionic products carbonates, etc that they change the pH of entire bodies of water as they ‘grow’ and that these changes dwarf the miniscule alterations caused by CO2 water atmosphere exchange. The oceans have such massive buffering capacity that worrying about tiny trace amounts of CO2 “acidifying” the ocean are completely laughable and absurd. Further, even if every jot of known fossil fuel was burnt, there would not be enough CO2 produced to “acidify” the ocean – period.
The whole topic is absurd and actually so stupid that it defies belief and thus all the stupid jokes.
Watcher says:
“I’ve done research for 12 years on this issue.”
But when asked for data, Watcher does a cop-out:
“I’m not doing research for you.”
If Watcher’s ‘evidence’ comes from censoring blogs like RC, SkS and the UN/IPCC, no wonder he is on the wrong track. The plain fact of the matter is that global warming has stalled, even as CO2 continues its steady rise. The consternation among the climate alarmist crowd is so thick you could cut it with a knife. The planet is not doing what they endlessly predicted it would do, and as a result people like Watcher can only emit ad-homs like “Sara Palin”. Pretty weak tea, no?
Watcher claims that “Few if any postings here are science based,” ignoring the fact that WUWT has won the internet’s “Best Science & Technology” site Award for three years running. That is the consensus. How did RC and SkS do? In fact, those thinly-trafficked echo chambers didn’t even make the playoffs. That is because they are entirely pseudo-science based, and they routinely censor inconvenient skeptics’ comments.
The only honest kind of scientist is a skeptical scientist — and honest scientists are nowhere to be seen on SkS or RC. “Watcher” gets his comments approved here, but skeptics are censored at alarmist blogs. Why? Because they can’t handle the truth.
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
It will be a big test of Mr. Watts’ integrity …………….
—————————
Again Watcher, I’m impressed.
I did not know alarmists knew the word integrity.
I’m pretty sure Al Gore, Peter Gleick, Mike Mann, Jim Hansen, Phil Jones and the rest of the team would have to check the dictionary for the definition.
I’m believe it’s not a word that gets used a lot during their conversations. I don’t recall reading it in their emails.
Aren’t you embarrassed to be on their side?
Didn’t you learn that you’re judged by the company you keep?
If you sleep with dogs……………..
One thing you needn’t worry about is Anthony Watts’ integrity.
cn
Watcher,
I’ve noted you use the same buzz words and paraphrase constantly. Then you accuse us of the very same things.
That is a classic case of projectionism.
What’s more, your science class children on holiday paddling and swimming to reams of dead corals and high acidification merely yards from the sewage pipe only makes us look at you with a mixed bag of sadness and mirth.
Clay Marley wrote;
“I could write a Willis story about those family vacations to Destin years ago, hunting blue crab off the beach and off piers”
If Willis caught blue crabs on the Pacific Coast of the USA he would have been the first and only person to do so, they are strictly an East Coast Creature. South Carolina up towards Delaware and the Great Chesapeake Bay is their haunts. Great eating when you can get them, try the soft shelled ones (April to May), a great epicurean delight……
The West Coast gets the Dungeness Crab, the Snow Crab and the King Crab, OK, but not nearly the same as the Blue Crab. I have had FRESH King Crab in Anchorage, boy that was a treat. Much better than the frozen ones we get here in the “lower 48”.
I just noticed a funny itch, maybe it’s a ……..
Cheers, Kevin.
Off topic, gag faculae. Read if you’d like a few minutes of molar grinding.
http://www.livescience.com/19466-climate-change-myths-busted.html
I’ve been catching blue crabs from coastal NC around Florida and on through Texas for more than 40 years. My empirical datat shows that unfortunatley, they are not getting any bigger. How much extra CO2 would it take to make them grow to the size of King crabs? That should be our goal.
Giant crabs can usually be fixed with Kwellada (R). Though we did have a brave soul in a logging camp so driven to distraction he sprayed them with a can of Raid. Needless to say everyone heard about it an instant afterwards.
@ Watcher
I gave up on pop culture after engineering school and have dedicated decades to serious study of science and history with a college level understanding. AGW has been an outcome based, publicly funded fraud to create more government….plain and simple. The Triassic insects may have lived in a 31% O2 environment [questionable proxy data]….but the flying insects and reptiles indicate that the atmosphere was also far denser. Fossil Pterodactyls have twice the wingspan of todays largest condor…and since “lift” is a function of wing area….double the wingspan would require FOUR times ambient the atmospheric pressure. It is obvious that the Earth’s atmosphere is under constant erosion from solar wind and from ionization from cosmic/solar rays. Millions of years mean lots of erosion. There are very few linear relationships and very few constants in the Universe. Click on my post name and visit my website where many defects in current dogma are refuted. Don’t let the giant blue crabs fool you.
I thought ocean acidification was supposed to dissolve the shells.
Let’s not forget the biggest shells grew and the oceans were totally dominated by the shell species (Ammonites and Trilobites) at a time when CO2 was many times higher than today. 8 feet across Ammonites and 1000s of species of truly scary Trilobites (the best fossils from the Atlas mountains in Morocco show a lot more detail).
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d1/Asteroceras_BW.jpg
http://digsfossils.com/fossils/pics/trilobites/morocco-trilobite001a.jpeg
Carbon dioxide supposedly causes hot weather, cold weather, droughts, floods, storms, lack of storms, increase of ice coverage, melting of ice and the list goes on. Now we find that it causes big crabs and small oysters. I wonder why the higher carbon dioxide (AKA acidification) didn’t disolve their shells, as we have been warned about. Rubbish!
I am still trying to get my head around traumatized oysters. Really?? Do they need counseling, at least if they survived the onslaught? I always thought they had a very primitive nervous system, and no brain to speak of. Traumatized??
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 4:58 pm
Now, if any real scientists are reading this, will you please help those with limited abilities to understand?
===
Well ok, but you have to pay attention:
This is exactly the way those endangered soon to be extinct corals do it…
You know, the ones that are dying from bleaching……..
“These varied responses may reflect differences amongst organisms in their ability to regulate pH at the site of calcification, in the extent to which their outer shell layer is protected by an organic covering, in the solubility of their shell or skeletal mineral, and in the extent to which they utilize photosynthesis.”
Sorry Bill Illis but arthropod exoskeletons are made from chitin, not calcium carbonate etc.
“Chitin (C8H13O5N)n (pron.: /ˈkaɪtɨn/ KY-tin) is a long-chain polymer of a N-acetylglucosamine, a derivative of glucose”
Other_Andy says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:55 pm
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
…….. who also refuse to believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?
Now that’s a strawman if I have ever seen one.
——–
In what possible way is that a straw man?
It’s a reality. Certain segments of the (mostly US) population refuse to accept overwhelming evidence for AGW. This still accounts for those segments who believe in various interpretations or reasons why AGW or CAGW isn’t occurring. Certainly there are those who have varying explanations (or lack thereof, basing their conclusions on hearsay or worse) for global warming. But basically, they’re denying the facts that credible science has overwhelmingly revealed. In that sense, they can all be grouped together as believers in something other than evidence science has revealed.
I don’t think you understand the concept of a straw man argument.
Check it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man
I think watcher needs to turn off the car before closing the garage door , seems to be a little crabby !
Watcher, unlike many alarmists, you must have a sense of humor.
Using the word science and IPCC in the same paragraph.
I don’t care who you are, that’s funny. (h/t to Larry the Cable Guy)
IPCC is a political organization …. they don’t need no stinking science.
Have you read how and why the organization exists? We have.
And referring to RealClimate.org and SkepticalScience.com as science sources, wow.
Were you involved with Lew and Cook and fake survey or did you get asked which editors should be canned for allowing skeptics to publish? No? Some alarmists were.
Thanks again, Watcher. Integrity from an alarmist, I needed a good laugh.
cn
Watcher,
Your comment @7:18 pm above is nothing but a series of baseless assertions:
“…overwhelming evidence for AGW”? Really? What scientific ‘evidence’, exactly?
And:
“…those segments who believe in various interpretations or reasons why AGW or CAGW isn’t occurring.” Another baseless assertion.
And:
“…basically, they’re denying the facts that credible science has overwhelmingly revealed.”
O really? What ‘facts’ would those be? That is simply another un-cited assertion.
And:
“…evidence science has revealed.”
What “evidence science has revealed”??
If it were not for baseless assertions, “Watcher” wouldn’t have much to say.
As the CAGW theory goes up in…ice…, there will be a concerted effort by the CAGW grant whores to switch the narrative from global warming (which hasn’t been happening into its 17th year) to: ocean acidification (aka inconsequential pH neutralization), propagandizing one-off weather events happening somewhere on the planet (purposefully avoiding any record snow/cold events of course) ye ol’ Ocean Heat Content and, of course, “catastrophic” sea rise (currently at around a scary 10″ per century..).
The CAGW grant whores are on the ropes and are doing a very poor job of channeling Ali’s “rope-a-dope” strategy. I guess they’re desperately hoping the empirical evidence will miraculously get tired.
They’re running out of time and options, especially with: the PDO in its 30-yr cooling phase, solar cycle #24 the lowest since 1906, SC #25 could be the lowest since the 1645-1715 Maunder Minimum and a 30-yr AMO cooling cycle starting around the time SC #25 starts… Ouch…
Regardless, CAGW theory has already been invalidated by their own criteria (NOAA’s 2008 State of Climate Report suggesting 15yrs of flat temperatures sufficient for model invalidation) and it’s only a matter of time before they’ll have to throw in the towel to at least try and save some modicum of credibility.
I expect we’ll see many more pal-reviewed papers like this one being rolled out as the grant whores futilely try to keep the hoax alive for as long as possible. So much grant money, so little time….It’s getting pathetic.
First they give us this statement of ravenous CO2 polluted crabs:
Then we get this statement of confused CO2 inebriated crabs:
Sounds like AGW. CO2 makes things warmer and colder at the same time, as well as making crabs eat more oysters and less at the same time.
And besides, crabs growing 4 times faster means a larger harvest and saves the endangered watermen of the Chesapeake.
Other_Andy says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:55 pm
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
Why is it that all natural climate change deniers bring this up, time after time?
‘Non-believers’ come is many shapes and forms and almost all believe in AGW, just not in CAGW.
—-
This brings up a highly relevant point about belief.
Belief largely is the purview of religion. People come to beliefs based on many factors, including evidence, hearsay, the persuasive power of their peers, associates, family, community members, and individual experience. Science, however, isn’t based on belief, but evidence and reason.
For example, many believe Jesus is a savior with superhuman powers to defy death, multiply dead creatures, heal wounds, etc.–despite ZERO supporting evidence of any miracle, life after death and so forth. Only scant evidence even allows for his physical existence. All of the rest is hearsay, not worth the paper it’s written on, except for historical value. Yet millions believe it. Nations and entire cultures have grown and been toppled for this and similar beliefs. The stunning power of an utter falsehood has destroyed uncountable lives.
Such is the power of belief: blind, dumb, angry, hating, fearing belief has caused more deaths and torture and societal disruption and dislocation in our world than anything combined. Yet it has molded our world and society more than any natural force. And belief in love for one’s neighbor (a quintessentially liberal idea) has molded society for the better. (Interestingly, there is scientific support for altruiism even in animals…which belies at least part of the “dog-eat-dog” belief about competition for survival.)
Skepticism of AGW is largely belief-based. Not science based.
However, support for the AGW theory is largely evidence-based, thus scientific and more grounded in reality.
Scientists using the scientific method take in all available evidence, create a working hypothesis to account for it, test the hypothesis, adjust it if it doesn’t work well, and keep re-evaluating and adjusting to fit more and more pertinent facts. If science kept discovering things that countered the prevailing evidence for AGW, it would publish and note those studies and evidence, and adapt the hypothesis accordingly. But it just doesn’t show up!
Most studies that show evidence against global warming, like those of Willie Soon and Patrick Michaels, to name a few egregious examples, have been debunked as deficient in methodology or evidence or both.
AGW skeptics however do the opposite. They believe studies that counter AGW evidence, despite the obvious (to qualified scientists) flaws and errors and cherry-picking in those discredited studies. (And certainly most lay persons don’t fully understand the science–so maybe it’s like rooting for the “underdog” to support those studies.) AGW skeptics cling to those bankrupt studies blindly, as if they believed dead, rotting fish were pet dogs that have been tossed overboard by mistake. This is a quintessential facet of religion, not science.
It’s weird to me. It’s as if skeptics seem to depend for their very lives on NEVER changing what core ideas they cling to–all based on opinions of their peers, community leaders, priests, friends, families, Fox News, or whatever they trust. It’s as if all of reality were only the tiny segment that fits their pre-existing worldview, not something that can be discovered and refined with new and mounting evidence. And the more conservative the individual, the less likely he/she can learn new things and adapt to change. The less likely they are to trust science, which is based on discovery and constant change based on hard evidence. Science itself is liberal in nature! Thus reality itself is liberal in nature.
I think it’s fear at work, controlling conservatives’ actions and beliefs. Fear of change, fear of obliteration, fear of invasion. They are wired that way. There’s a reason why it’s mostly conservatives who support open carry for guns, and oppose gun control laws, and support police and other measures designed to protect “Me.” According to one study, “Republicans had larger right amygdalas, which are associated with sensitivity to fear.” –http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/health/2012/09/03/conservatives-and-liberals-have-different-brains-studies-show/
Support for and understanding of science, vs. blind belief in unsupported ideas (like creationism and virgin birth and alien abduction) largely falls along lines marked “liberal” for the former and “conservative” for the latter. Not totally, but largely. Hence, if you’re liberal, you’re likely to make better sense with a wider range of ideas and understanding of the reality of the world than most conservatives. Again, generally, not universally.
It has also been shown that on average, liberals’ IQs are 7-10 points higher than conservatives’:
Intelligence Study Links Low I.Q. To Prejudice, Racism, Conservatism:
“Are racists dumb? Do conservatives tend to be less intelligent than liberals? A provocative new study from Brock University in Ontario suggests the answer to both questions may be a qualified yes.” –http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/27/intelligence-study-links-prejudice_n_1237796.html
Another reason liberals support measure to counteract AGW has to do w/ the differences between liberal tendencies and conservative tendencies: “…the studies point toward conservatives’ tendency to avoid something called self-harm, while liberals avoid collective group harm.” This goes hand in hand with support for freedom of religion and for having no gun controls, and with liberal tendencies to support environmental and social justice causes to prevent harm to large and diverse groups in society, and have diffuse impacts (global warming being a prime example!) rather than specific impacts on local communities. http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/health/2012/09/03/conservatives-and-liberals-have-different-brains-studies-show/
THE BOTTOM LINE:
AGW is real. BUT don’t just *believe* it. Test it. Again and again and again. Like science does. Science is self-correcting, since it always seeks the truth, and only reality can supply the truth.
Liberals are mostly smart; there are excellent reasons why smart liberals understand and support the science behind it. You may not be able to understand it because your brain may be wired differently. If you don’t understand this, you could be one of those without even the mental acuity to analyze your lack of mental acuity! Like Patrick from Spongebob ironically says, “Stupid people are always blissfully unaware of just how stupid they really are! (droooooool)”
For you who are stuck in AGW, CAGW or GW skepticism, never examining new facts, never thinking you could have missed something–you’re mired. You can’t learn and you can’t change. The facts *don’t matter*. You’ll keep sucking in only facts that fit The Main Idea stuck inside you (Protect Myself, Don’t Worry About Others?), always rejecting those facts that counter your rigid beliefs.
Facts you won’t be able, apparently, to accept, include the overwhelming number of dead, cold, hard facts that lead 97% of climate scientists to the conclusion that AGW is wrecking our planet, it’s happening NOW, and we have to do things to slow, stop and ideally reverse it.
It’s sad, but no one can teach you skeptics what you’re incapable of understanding. The best advice I can give is stay in church and be nice to other people. It’s the best you can do.
And that’s good enough…so long as you don’t overreach into the so-called global warming “debate.” Debate which, in a truly fact-based world, is totally unnecessary. Because debate over irrevocable facts isn’t debatable. The only debate possible is over interpretation of the facts in the bigger picture, in this case, the planetary climate. To quote the dumbest tautology in history, “It is what it is.” To finally put it as bluntly and succinctly as possible:
AGW IS.
Watcher? Are you backed by green financing to do this? You don’t have to answer, of course, that’s your business, I’m just trying to work out why you are here. You’ve come in angry and you seem to shout at everyone for the foolishness of our ways – yet you don’t provide what Anthony does and many others here do, which is direct links to DATA. We’re talking SCIENCE now, not what somebody claims or can show in a graph if they torture the facts enough.
You keep going on about overwhelming evidence, yet you don’t seem to be able to name it or point to it (or any segment of it). The “proof” needs to be the science, the data, the methods that can be examined, replicated, or torn apart. If we can’t tear it apart – hey, it might be robust. That’s what science is about – testing and questioning and yes, a whole heap of skepticism.
I’m sure you’ll understand that, given it does not seem to be your intention to educate any of us, I can only conclude that you are here to ensnare newbies into doubting the genuine science of this site and others like it, and point them in the direction of sites that back the CAGW consensus (sic).
Tell me I’m wrong and point to that one piece of paper that scientifically supports your “overwhelming evidence”. It shouldn’t be hard to do, you are so sure, after all.
It also surprises me that you should accept the decades of poor behaviour of “climate scientists”, the dodging of questions, the hiding the methods, the destrustion of data, the lying, the cheating and the thieving – all seen, shown, even admitted to. Have you questioned any of that? Have you shown your anger their way? Does it not make you think twice when ALL of the government funding (billions of $$$) goes to alarmist claims and NONE to research against the meme?
As for warming, even the IPCC has seen fit to publish there has been none for a longer period than the initial warming used to trigger the panic (which, I believe was 13 years, I’m sure someone will correct me if I’m wrong).
Just to repeat: Give us a link to that that one piece of paper that scientifically supports your “overwhelming evidence”.
You’ve come to the wrong house to play “my science is bigger than your science.”
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 6:03 pm
I’m not doing research for you. More laziness on the part of readers here, anyone?? YUP. I’ve done research for 12 years on this issue. Can you say the same?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
12 years!! ROFL
Joseph Olsen said it all for me, I have made this same point in the past. I have a similar background to Joseph. I have been studying the environment and writing papers since the 60’s. Joseph used his real name and referenced his web site. Your nom de plume says it all.
Thanks WUWT for keeping it real. I learn something everyday and I get a few good guffaws too.
Watcher must be an English Professor or PhD Lit. student that hasn’t graduated yet …
Please for give me, but I prefer lobster 🙂
” Skepticism of AGW is largely belief-based. Not science based.
However, support for the AGW theory is largely evidence-based, thus scientific and more grounded in reality. ”
Jesus wept! Will someone please explain the scientific method to this poor deluded creature, in words of one syllable, so even he can understand it? Oh wait – maybe it’s a lady here. Watcher, is your name Susan by any chance? 🙂
Watcher apart, this thread is hilarious – on a day when we in the UK have felt desperate for a few laughs, given all the vitriol flying around. Watcher too is hilarious, in a sense; but such bone-headed ignorance makes me a bit sad. And it’s unkind to laugh at disability.
Watcher says:
“I don’t think you understand the concept of a straw man argument.”
Sure watcher.
You come here, tell me what I believe and deny, misrepresenting my position and tell me that is not a straw man.
You are confused, contrarian and contradictory person aren’t you Watcher.
Here is another example.
First you write that you “don’t claim to be an expert in anything but writing and editing.” and then you state that you’ve “done research for 12 years on this issue.”
Now, what is it Watcher?
And by the way (If true), nobody gives a hoot that you’ve “done research for 12 years on this issue.”
Dazzle us with facts and empirical research instead of trying to argue from authority.
That is another fallacy, an “Argumentum Ad Verecundiam”.
You might want to also look that up in Wikipedia…….
Watcher;
“Facts you won’t be able, apparently, to accept, include the overwhelming number of dead, cold, hard facts that lead 97% of climate scientists to the conclusion that AGW is wrecking our planet, it’s happening NOW, and we have to do things to slow, stop and ideally reverse it.”
Well, what to say to such an insulting “I’m Right and You’re Wrong” Diatribe?
Climate Science is a JOKE………………………………………….
AGW is an UNPROVEN hypothesis. The IR absorbing gases in the atmosphere simply act to DELAY the flow of energy though the Sun/Earth/Atmosphere/Universe System by causing some SMALL portion of the energy to make multiple passes through said system. This energy is travelling at the speed of light, which is STILL significantly faster that heat flows though any other material (water, soil or gas). This delay is on the order of a few tens of milliseconds, and since there are about 86 million milliseconds in each day this delay HAS NO EFFECT ON THE AVERAGE TEMPERATURE OF THE EARTH.
Thanks for playing, now where are those delicious pan fried soft shelled crabs I ordered a while back ? (Moderators; can you make sure they make it to my table as soon as they come out of the kitchen, much obliged)
Cheers, Kevin.
Watcher, you did it again – you used the “overwhelming evidence” phrase.
Go on, no more weasel word essays please. I’m down to two bullet points ??? Is that too much to ask ??
Tick tock, tick tock.
Can I do it for you:
1) http://www.soundboard.com/sb/crickets_sounds_audio
2) http://www.soundboard.com/sb/crickets_sounds_audio
….. and by the way, since I got my Ph.D. in carbon chemistry at age 23, I’ve been writing peer-reviewed papers in Science, Nature, PNAS, Cell, JBC, Biochemistry, JOC, JCS, et al. for 35 years.
Go for it
ok, one more time….
IT’S NOT POLLUTION !!!!!
thanks for letting me vent.
Watcher
“Facts you won’t be able, apparently, to accept, include the overwhelming number of dead, cold, hard facts that lead 97% of climate scientists to the conclusion that AGW is wrecking our planet, it’s happening NOW, and we have to do things to slow, stop and ideally reverse it.”
Facts, where are the facts?
Are you really that uninformed that you are quoting that absolutely bogus ‘survey’ that has been thoroughly discredited?
And even if it was true that “97% of climate scientists came to the conclusion that AGW is wrecking our planet”, since when truth decided by consensus?
ANOTHER fallacy…..
Two surveys have purported to show that 97% of climate scientists supported the “consensus”. However, one survey was based on the views of just 77 scientists, far too small a sample to be scientific, and the proposition to which 75 of the 77 assented was merely to the effect that there has been warming since 1950.
The other paper did not state explicitly what question the scientists were asked and did not explain how they had been selected to remove bias. Evidentially, it was valueless.
[snip – multiple blog policy violations in this comment – mod]
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
It will be a big test of Mr. Watts’ integrity if he posts my previous comment.
Not a big test,or a test of any kind. Did your computerr model tell you this?
Why not publish it? After all,it’s not like you are posting at SkS,Real(bwahahahaha) Climate,or any other fatuous eco-cultists site,who remove and ban EVERY thing posted by real skeptical people. Any who,thanks for the laughs.Great comedy show you got going there.
Watcher;
If the oil companies and the CIA believe in global warming due to human causes, and the latter are designing defense scenarios to deal with the fallout…you better believe it’s real. Only dummies don’t trust facts.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Uhm… is this the same CIA that was positive that Iraq had WMD’s? The same CIA that before that wanted the US government to prepare a defense strategy to deal with the impending ice age? That CIA? Or is there a different CIA that you are referring to?
@ Watcher:
OK, this conservative historian of science will bite. You write:
“Such is the power of belief: blind, dumb, angry, hating, fearing belief has caused more deaths and torture and societal disruption and dislocation in our world than anything combined. Yet it has molded our world and society more than any natural force. And belief in love for one’s neighbor (a quintessentially liberal idea) has molded society for the better.”
Perhaps you should move beyond your “obviously” focus on science and look at a little history. Besides teaching courses on Darwinism, History of Science, History of Technology, Scientific Technology, and Environmental History I teach a course on Technology and Warfare, which has entailed becoming somewhat familiar with the sorry tale of humanity’s urge to wipe out other sections of humanity.
Let’s see: when millions were killed as China’s dynasties fell, through the cycles of dynasties from the 1st millenium onward, was religion at the root of the conflict?
How about when Cyrus the Great began the long cycle of aggresssion against other Mediterranean societies? Religion? How much of the Greek defence in the Persian wars was based on religion, or the destuctive Pelopponesian wars which brought Greek society so low that Philip of Macedonia walked all over Greek society. How about Alexander the Great’s humiliation of Persia? The wars between Rome and every other society around the Mediterranean? Geman defeats of ROman legions? A quick reading of Charles C. Mann’s 1491 – and it is in one sense highly depressing – reveals that the Americas were a bloodbath long before Columbus arrived.
Ghengis Khan’s mission of death and conquest was another bloodbath that had nothing to do with religion (neither had Attila the Huns at the end of the Roman period).
Yes, the Crusades in the Medieval Era, and the wars of aggression launched by Muslims intent on converting the world, were religious in nature. But the One Hundred Years War was not. Most warfare conducted by Europeans in Medieval and Early Modern Europe and in the development of colonial powers were not religious, but motivated instead by the quest for commercial and financial power.
Again, the Thirty Years’ War WAS religious. But its effects, shattering to Europe as they were, paled in comparison to the effects of the efforts of that prime megalomaniac, Napoleon, who lost half a million men in only one of his campaigns, against Russia. Religious motivation? Hardly.
Moving along, skipping over the patently non-religious American Civil War, Crimean War, Franco-Prussian War, Zulu Wars, Boer War etc. we come to the Russian-Japanese war. Not a religious motivation in sight. And then the First and Second World Wars, both underpinned by scientific theories of racial superiority and the bloodiest wars in history. The Chinese Civil War, won by Mao – again, not religious. The Viet Nam and Korean Wars, and all proxy wars of the Cold War – not religious. And the death caused by all the wars in the 20th century again do not compare to the deaths due to genocide by totalitarian governments, primarily the Nazi’s and Mao’s Communists: neither of which was a standard, superstitious religion according to your bigotted descriptions, Mr. Watcher.
Perhaps you need to pay more attention to facts and take of the blinders of your prejudice. Agape, or brotherly love, is a virtue developed by Christians, 2000 years ago, reflecting earlier Jewish values. Neither the Romans nor the Greeks possessed this concept of love. It certainly long predates the emergence of now sadly defunct classical liberalism, or its modern socialist perversion. Liberalism is an outgrowth of Christian society, not an independent invention.
Perhaps it is you who are afraid: of the truth!
There is a kind of bait and switch here.
First, we are told that ocean acidification — caused by increased CO2 ocean uptake as atmospheric CO2 levels climb from today’s ~ 400 ppm — will prevent calcifiers from growing, will cause some to be dissolved or become extinct.
But then people do the research, and find (as Ries did in his 2009 Geology paper) that many species actually add more shell, are better calcifiers, going from today’s CO2 levels up to 600 ppm CO2, or up to 900 ppm CO2, and even higher in some species. That was good research. So we learn, as in so many things having to do with warming, that the initial headlines are wrong, that nature is more resilient, because nature has seen these CO2 levels before and can handle them.
So what happens next? We are told that ocean acidity increases are bad not because they decrease calcification — that was yesterday’s scare story — but because they INCREASE it!
So if anything changes, it is bad. Clearly, there are limits, there always are. But it doesn’t seem like we will reach those limits, whatever they are, for quite a while.
Sounds like someone wants it both ways, and I don’t think it is Ries, I think it is the people who fund him and other researchers. There has to be a bad story from your research, we don’t care what it is, just find it.
Whatcher wrote:
“For you who are stuck in AGW, CAGW or GW skepticism, never examining new facts, never thinking you could have missed something–you’re mired. You can’t learn and you can’t change. The facts *don’t matter*. You’ll keep sucking in only facts that fit The Main Idea stuck inside you (Protect Myself, Don’t Worry About Others?), always rejecting those facts that counter your rigid beliefs.”
The essence of skepticism and true science IS the examination of facts, IS identifying missed data, IS realizing facts DO matter and that being rigid in one’s position IS doomed for failure.
Upon a true skeptical analysis of CAGW theory, it now seems painfully obvious CAGW is an invalidated theory. Here are just a few salient points:
1) CO2 Climate Sensitivity: 2C~4.5C isn’t happening. A more skeptical view would put it at around 1.0C or less; certainly below 2C, which even the IPCC admits wouldn’t be a problem.
2) Ocean Acidification: From 1850’s to 2012, ocean pH has only dropped from around 8.15 to around 8.10, which is STILL alkaline and NOT a problem. For 100’s of MILLIONS of years, atmospheric CO2 concentrations were 3,000 ~ 4,500ppm and the oceans were STILL alkaline and teaming with life.
3) Warming Trend: The global warming trend has stalled into its 17th year, despite 50% of total manmade CO2 emitted since 1750 occurring over the last 10 years. The 0.80C in warming in the 20th century is NOT unprecedented and can easily be attributed to the strongest 63-yr string of solar cycles in 11,400 years occurring between 1933 and 1996.
It interesting the warming trend ended the year after these strong solar cycles ended, isn’t it…
4) Polar Ice Extents: Total global polar ice extents are still close to the 1979-2008 average. The Arctic extent has fallen since 1995 (when the AMO entered its 30-yr natural warming phase) and the Antarctic is setting ice extent records (currently about 972,000 KM^2 above the 1979-2008 average.
5) Water Vapor: Climate Models depend on a rapid increase in WV for CO2 climate sensitivity to reach 2.0C~4.5C. NASA’s 22-yr NVAP-M water vapor report released in 2012 shows no increasing trend in water vapor occurring over the past 22 yrs. Without increasing WV, CAGW is dead in the water…so to speak…
6) Extreme Weather– Empirical evidence shows floods, droughts, rainfall, tornadoes, cyclones, hurricanes, snowfall, etc. are at or near 100-yr historic averages. The ONLY thing that HAS increased is the politicized reporting on one-off weather events and Doppler Radar that has greatly increased the reporting (not incidence) of F0~F2 tornadoes. F3 and up tornado incidence at 100-yr levels.
7) Glacier Melts: This has been going on for the past 11,400 yrs. Get over it. Once glaciers start growing again, THEN start worrying, because it may mean we’re heading into a new Little Ice Age or a full-blown Ice Age, which could kill billions of people.
I could go on, but you got nothin’, Watcher.. Just invalidated GIGO CAGW models and weather propaganda.
You ironically seem to exemplify the very things you say you despise…. Telling…very telling.
Watcher, you lost all credibility when you made the statement “Liberals are mostly smart;” and used studies by liberal professors to support that assertion. You mean the liberals who thought communism was the wave of the future and Eastern Europe was a ecological paradise (John Kenneth Galbraith just before the fall of the Eastern Block showed it to be a cesspool). That list of “smart” liberals could go on for pages. But then then you’re a liberal so you and your ilk must be smart right and anyone who disagrees with you must be dumb? Right? You put yourself right up there above Dyson, Christie, Motl, and Curry to name just a few. What ignorant arrogance.
CAGW is supported by models not facts. Your “smart liberals” are the Club of Rome and Paul Erlich’s of our time and they are just as prone to fanatical beliefs as any “dumb” conservative you despise. You accept facts you want to because some authority says they are true and don’t even bother to look at the competing evidence. You’re the worst sort of fanatic. You just assume anyone who disagrees with you or your authorities must be stupid. Try reading the scientists and statisticians who’ve torn great gaping holes in the CAGW religion. Oh wait, you obviously can’t read them because that would be heresy, wouldn’t it?
Watcher Sez: …
“The overwhelming evidence is in the IPCC reports, RealClimate.org, SkepticalScience.com, and a host of other science sources you’ve obviously ignored as an Echo Chamber subscriber. Join Sarah Palin who “reads all of em…that have been put in front of me.” Can you possibly put real scientific evidence in front of you and ignore the BS on this site and in other skeptic sites?”
So you cite “the overwhelming evidence” and when challenged to produce, this is what you come up with?!? Nothing? No citations? Please.
Then finish with a question?
….. and an attempted insult. I would take Palin over you anyday, nimrod. (sorry if snipworthy, Mods)
Classic troll behavior.
You have been challenged to produce the “overwhelming” evidence. If it’s overwhelming it should be easy to produce ………… What is your response ……?
Cue …….. “crickets”.
Once I realise that someone is a troll (probably a paid one) I never respond to them again. Goodbye.
TJR
Watcher says: April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
“[ … ] But, then again, I don’t claim to be an expert in anything but writing and editing.”
———————————–
LOL, shows there too … in your shoes, pal, I wouldn’t be claiming anything at all. And wipe that snot off your nose.
Thanks for the shot from “Mysterious Island,” Anthony! A personal favorite from years ago!
Tick tock, tick tock
Just one
Just one teeny, teeny one
You can phone-a-friend even
For someone who claims to have studied the subject for 12 years, Watcher doesn’t seem to have noticed that the warming stopped 17 years ago. So… what, exactly, is supposed to be “happening NOW”?
Anyway, love the crab story, I’m sure the giant jellyfish will put them in their place.
“””””…..Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 7:42 pm
Other_Andy says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:55 pm
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
Why is it that all natural climate change deniers bring this up, time after time?
‘Non-believers’ come is many shapes and forms and almost all believe in AGW, just not in CAGW.
—
This brings up a highly relevant point about belief.
Belief largely is the purview of religion. People come to beliefs based on many factors, including evidence, hearsay, the persuasive power of their peers, associates, family, community members, and individual experience. Science, however, isn’t based on belief, but evidence and reason……”””””
Some definitive assertions there “Watcher”. Of course the weight carried by assertions depends a lot on who is doing the asserting.
And there is very little credibility that one should place on assertions that are made by those who are ashamed of their own name, to the point they would rather it not be known, so they can not be credited with their enlightening essays.
As for belief and science, how can you possibly separate the two, since 100% of our science is based on pure fiction. There is not one single thing, described in any theory, in any branch of science, that s not a total fabrication of the human mind. Absolutely nothing that is described in any branch of mathematics, actually exists anywhere in the physical universe. We simply made it all up in our heads.
When YOU read a “therrmometer”, no matter what its functioning principle is, it is an act of faith on your part, that the “reading” you take from the instrument, is actually the true Temperature of something; let alone that it is the something whose Temperature you think you are observing.
Or take Black Body Radiation for example: It is said that Max Planck calculated its spectrum by studying the radiation properties of a cavity. Not any cavity, mind you, but one with perfectly reflecting walls, and zero heat loss through those walls. And the Black body itself, is the antithesis of perfectly reflecting walls. It must have a zero reflectance, and 100 % absorptance, for any EM radiant energy from zero to infinite frequency, sans those two end points.
No physical material of any kind, anywhere in the universe, actually has either zero or 100% reflectance or absorptance; not even at any one frequency or wavelength of the radiation,let alone for all frequencies.
So there is no such thing anywhere in the universe, as a black body; nor does Planck’s radiating cavity exist anywhere.
Yet one will find few scientists, who do not believe Planck’s theory of the black body radiation, and the results derived from it; and will willy nilly apply it to actual real bodies, as if it was a scientific fact, instead of the ultimate fiction.
So watch what you believe “watcher”; well in your case it doesn’t matter, since even you are not willing to stand behind what you assert.
I have no problem with those who talk anonymously; they, of all people should know what their ideas are worth.
Watcher;
As you have cited the IPCC as an authoritative source that “proves” global warming, I was wondering if you were aware that of the top 16 radiative forcings that they study, they rank their own LOSU (Level of Scientific Understanding) as either “Low” or “Very Low” in 11 of 16 categories? That they rank their own LOSU as “high” in only a single category?
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch2s2-9-1.html
You see Watcher, if you stick around to learn a thing or two in stead of preaching, you might discover that the very sources you are certain prove what you say, in fact do nothing of the sort. I’m a skeptic not because I’ve rejected the IPCC out of hand, but because I have read it in detail and know what it says and what it doesn’t. You however seem to be operating on the basis of what other people have said about it rather than reading it yourself.
Right, everyone (including me) has had some fun but it’s time to look at the paper. Everywhere one looks one sees potential problems with the methodology as published.
It starts with the statement that seawater surface pH has decreased by 0.1 pH units since the start of the industrial revolution and that seawater surface pH is predicted to decrease by a further 0.3-0.4 units this century. The first statement is to my way of thinking dubious if only because no-one knows what the pH of pre-industrial revolution seawater was. The concept of pH was not proposed until1909 and even though the glass electrode had been disccovered in 1906, the results of investigations were not published until 1922. Glass electrodes (“pH electrodes”) are also sensitive to other ions such as Na+).
A range of test organisms was collected from sites varying from Maine down to Florida. In the data the temperature ranges that these organisms are usually exposed to is given, but the tests were all carried out at a constant temperature of 25C +-1, on the grounds that all of the test organisms are exposed to this temperature at some time of the year. Additionally, the constant temperature was required to maintain the aragonite saturation as a constant.
The water used was obtained from Great Harbour off Cape Cod. It was then micro filtered (0.2 micron) before use. There were no comparative analyses of the chemistry of the test and original source waters. The micro-filtration was presumably to sterilise the water (0.2 micron is a filter that will retain almost all bacteria, but has little effect upon viruses). It has the additional result of removing virtually all of the suspended solids, whether organic or inorganic.
I do not know but wonder whether filter feeders obtain some of their mineral requirements from filtered particulates from the water and whether the absence of particulates has an effect either positive or negative on hunting/scavanging (gilled) species?
The sample tanks were illuminated using an aquarium light source of 8000K giving 426W, 213W or zero for 10 hours per day. No data is given to show that these intense lights (all or nothing as opposed to the natural condition of slow increase to a maximum and then a slow decline to zero) do not have an effect that is not seen in the wild. 8000K lamps, in my experience have an intense UV spectrum, again no data is given to relate this to the natural spectra at the source habitat of the test subjects. The test aquaria were small, 38 litres, or a little over 1 cubic foot (1.34 ft3) and as such should have had little impedence to UV radiation. UV of course has major effects on both life chemistry and inorganic chemistry. No mention is made regarding the ability of the test organisms to escape the light.
The test subjects were fed standardised semi-artificial diets (brine shrimp, edible shrimp and green alga depending on the subject species. There is no mention of how these diets relate to the diets of the test subjects in the wild or even if the diet is available to the test organism in the wild.
The subjects were “acclimatised” to laboratory test conditions before the experiment started, but there is no indication that the test conditions have no effect upon the subjects. Mention is made of the possibility of heat stress but it appears that no attempt was made to either discount this or to allow for it. The acclimatisation period was 14 days at laboratory conditions followed by 14 days at the test conditions before the experiment started. Presumably there was an abrupt change from laboratory conditions to test conditions without a slow acclimatisation. The test was then run for 60 days.
The test water was equilibrated to the test levels of CO2 by bubbling air with a known ,and in most cases, enhanced CO2 concentration continuously through the water. The CO2 level therefore was not subject to diurnal (or seasonal) variation. The same is true of O2 levels. This never occurs in nature. As an aside, their environmental level of CO2 was 409 ppm, somewhat higher than what is usually accepted (395.94ppm on WUWT main page).
So to sum up. A number of organisms were taken from environments ranginging from sub-tropical to sub-arctic, subjected to a number of environmental shocks, fed a diet that was different from their normal, exposed to high levels of UV radiation, at a constant high temperature, a constant CO2 and O2 tension, denied their usual mineral diet, in a sterile environment and the experimenters were able to deduce that OMG its worse than we thought.
My short look at this paper makes me wonder how it was approved for investigation in the form given let alone approved for publication.
OK Watcher, it’s time to put up or shut up:
One bullet point from the “overwhelming evidence”. Just one.
Failing that (which is, of course, inevitable), I suggest you look in a mirror and say to yourself ….
Maybe the alarmists are breathing CO2, that magic gas with hallucinogenic properties, and so experiencing mass hallucinations. What next, giant plankton?
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 7:42 pm
………This brings up a highly relevant point about belief.
————————————————————-
Watcher, belief is all you and I have to go on.
As in most case throughout life, you can think whatever you want and you can put your trust in whoever you want but you don’t know.
Is the globe warming? You and I don’t know but a lot of scientists say it is.
IMHO I don’t think they know either. They’re making literal swags.
They may have some idea but I call bs to 2 decimal places.
I doubt they can figure long term future temperature either.
Seems to me the earth is expecting another ice age anytime now.
I’ve seen how scientists, governments and NGOs work together to build scares like alar, DDT, and influenza of all sorts. It’s their M.O. It’s to save the children or the planet or the poley-bear.
They ended DDT use (allowing millions of people to suffer and die) to save the raptors then they build money making wind mills that chop the raptors to pieces.
Today, they’re all politicians. They’re not to be trusted. Follow the money.
Besides, I like the idea of more CO2 and global warming. It frees up more useful land, grows more food and releases needed fresh water. What’s not to like?
What’s the downside? Where’s the “C” agw?
cn
‘Watcher’ Sez: “Certain segments of the (mostly US) population refuse to accept overwhelming evidence for AGW.”
Certain segments of the Borg Collective refuse to question the substance of “overwhelming evidence”, cannot comprehend the existence of a ‘Straw’/False collective computational error, and see the Global, ongoing, processor Idiot Loop malfunction as a ‘local (mostly US)’ phenomenon.
The wheels of truth grind slowly, but they care not one whit for your yammering protestations of the existence of Climatological Perpetual Motion.
@ KevinK says: April 8, 2013 at 8:10 pm You asked about your order for some pan fried soft shelled. Great idea. I’ll have some too and a bottle of Dagueneau Pouilly Fume. Thx
Hi Watcher,
If you’re genuinely interested in finding out more about violations of the scientific method try spending a bit of time over at climateaudit.org (reading as opposed to commenting as there’s a lot to consider). I can promise you’ll find a lot more than petty nit picking as Steve’s identified some pretty basic flaws in published papers over the years. If it’s truth you’re after you’ll be pretty grateful to him for helping you out.
If you want to know more about the underlying data collection methods have a look at Athony’s surfacestations project. If you’re still certain that the science is settled after that….
Watcher 6:18 pm
i admit that i only skimmed the article you suggested about the “functional extinction” of oysters.
It was a inclusive article — and they did not mention CO2. So the people you tout as experts don’t recognize CO2 as a danger to oysters.
So what was the point of suggesting we read that article — or do you just like shooting yourself in the foot?
Eugene WR Gallun
Richard of NZ says:
April 8, 2013 at 10:04 pm
*
Wow, nicely done. Richard, and I totally agree with your conclusions.
Watcher 6:19
“Research on insects in prehistoric times”
Research on insects OF prehistoric times
Research on prehistoric insects
Prehistoric refers to that time period during which modern man existed but had no system of writing. So, as written, your sentence refers to only those insects that co-existed with modern man. I think the giant insects you are referring to existed before modern man came into existence.
Did you mention that you were an editor?
Eugene WR Gallun.
Chuck Nolan says:
April 8, 2013 at 10:44 pm
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 7:42 pm
………This brings up a highly relevant point about belief.
————————————————————-
Watcher, belief is all you and I have to go on.
As in most case throughout life, you can think whatever you want and you can put your trust in whoever you want but you don’t know.
Is the globe warming? You and I don’t know but a lot of scientists say it is.
IMHO I don’t think they know either. They’re making literal swags.
==================================
Now we DO know that the ‘scientists’ know tends towards zero …
Met Office’s Private Briefing Document For The Environment Agency
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2013/04/08/met-offices-private-briefing-document-for-the-environment-agency/
“As far as I know, this document, which I obtained through FOI, has never entered the public domain. It is brutally honest in admitting how little the Met’s scientists understand about what affects our climate, and, in particular, what caused the unusual weather last year. This is in stark contrast to many of the hyped up claims, made in public statements in the recent past by, among others, the Met Office themselves.”
Watcher 7:42pm
I think you are really a 15 or 16 year old kid who really needs to get a girlfriend.
Eugene WR Gallun
And CO2 will also cause more turbulence for airliners over the Atlantic. Red all about it……!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22063340
.
Seems like Aircraft Turbulence is increasing due to CO2!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/9979395/Planes-set-for-bumpier-rides-scientists-warn.html
Wow!
Ouluman says:
April 8, 2013 at 10:32 pm
Maybe the alarmists are breathing CO2, that magic gas with hallucinogenic properties, and so experiencing mass hallucinations. What next, giant plankton?
*
Which will choke the whales. Poor whales.
>>And CO2 is also responsible for creating
>>turbulence for airliners.
Actually, I think I see the logic behind this one. We are not all going to find huge crabs, but we will all experience airliner turbulence at some point. So we will all subconsiously think “Global Warming” every time we get it.
That is almost like introducing subliminal clips into films or adverts. Devious, eh?
.
Watcher:
At April 8, 2013 at 6:03 pm you say and ask
Well, I’ve done research on this issue for over 30 years and you assert you cannot say the same. So what?
You claim there is “overwhelming evidence” for AGW but when pressed fail to provide any such evidence.
In reality there is no evidence for discernible AGW; none, zilch, nada.
More than three decades of research conducted world-wide at a cost of over $5 billion p.a. has failed to find any such evidence. In the 1990s Santer pretended to have found such evidence but that shenanigans was soon exposed.
If you think you have any evidence for the existence of discernible AGW then publish it and get a Nobel Prize.
There is certain and incontrovertible evidence that CO2 is a greenhouse gas but no evidence that an increase to atmospheric CO2 concentration from current levels will have discernible effect on global climate. And the AGW hypothesis of such a putative effect is refuted by much empirical evidence; e.g.
Missing tropospheric ‘hot spot’
Missing ‘Trenberth’s heat’
Missing ‘committed warming’
Lack of global warming for at least 16 years despite increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration
etc.
You assert evidence which I say does not exist. To prove me wrong you only need to provide one piece of the evidence you say exists.
Put up or shut up!
Richard
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 7:42 pm
***Editing a huge missive about Skeptisism being a religion then concludes***
“AGW IS”
=======================================================
Irony is always lost on left wing nutcases.
It is you who has put the “A” in GW” in the same way you assume we place the “G” in “od”.
We all know full well at times the Earth warms ever so slightly.
After ~40 years, AGW (not GW) is still an unproven THEORY. Prove the “A” in “AGW”, that’s all we ask. We are not interested in your constant reciting of buzz-words and mantras that prove you are nothing short of brain washed.
KevinK says:
April 8, 2013 at 6:33 pm
Kev, The west coast of Florida is Blue Crab country. Destin is a town in Florida.
” These living creatures have calcium carbonate shells, which forms at a much slower rate when the waters become acidic,”
This is a lie. These organisms can handle any tiny-tiny decrease in pH; they lay down shell just fine. The purported pH change is undetectable as sea water is a complex buffer well able to resist added carbonic acid. Furthermore, the added acidity (in the basic range) is part of an extended equilibrium which cannot affect itself. Metabolically, these organisms lay down shell faster than ever, having more carbonate to make and use. Coral reefs around the world are growing ever faster, while these guys lie ever larger to the public. Lies, lies and more lies.
“Although these crabs are growing bigger and faster without the help of scientists, this trend might not be safe for the marine environment.”
This is completely meaningless speculation meant to alarm people. They have no clue. When the larger crabs run out of food, competing with each other, there will be fewer and/or smaller crabs. The ecology will react and the problem will be handled, if it is a problem at all.
Years ago, a bird flu wiped out 75% of all East Coast sea gulls. With so few gulls, the food supply was huge, so the next generation was a bunch of huge Baby Huey-type gulls, giants compared to the parents. The assumption that their size would be bad for the environment is meaningless as we have no idea what it means to the environment, However, to think that such events have not happened many times in the past is nothing but arrogance on the part of these biologists.
CO2 has been much higher than now during 90% of the last 600 million years and blue crabs did NOT destroy the environment. The 100s of feet thick Cliffs of Dover were NOT built during low CO2 times. Corals clearly thrived with high CO2.
I’m a watcher too. I’ve been waiting for IPCC scientists to re-visit the Global Climate Models for re-work. They could not find the “Tropospheric Warm Zone”. Their hypothesis, as embodied in the models said this zone would be there, yet it isn’t. The scientific method calls for this hypothesis to be re-written, then tested again. No such thing has happened. Instead any actual science has been abandoned. The “science is settled”.
I’m still watching and waiting.
[snip . . repeat . . mod]
Watcher said ,”And belief in love for one’s neighbor (a quintessentially liberal idea) has molded society for the better.”
–fails to note attribution to God, in Mark 12:31. Should be, “…a quintessentially Christian idea…”
Add to the list: Global warming causes dinosaurs and B movies about giant ants. And they thought it was because of nuclear tests. Good thing we can fix THAT error!
They were fed??? No wonder. Fatted crabs who didn’t have to hunt.
From Watcher’s explanation of belief and put down of Christ, I take it he doesn’t believe in God. That means he believes his essential ancestors just crawled out from under a rock somewhere (or taken to the logical conclusion, developed from some single-cell protoplasm way back when). As a systems engineer, I have real problems believing the most complex organism–man–had such a progeny. My work requires all the intellect I can bring to bear on the problem and it pales compared to what Mother Nature puts on display with amazing panoply. So I believe in God–it’s a far more tenable explanation.
thelastdemocrat says:
April 9, 2013 at 6:25 am
Watcher said ,”And belief in love for one’s neighbor (a quintessentially liberal idea) has molded society for the better.”
–fails to note attribution to God, in Mark 12:31. Should be, “…a quintessentially Christian idea…”
—————–
How do we know God isn’t the cause of Climate Change? Maybe She’s having a bit of a laugh at our expense to help pass the time. Giving us something other than wine, women and song to help keep us busy. God the Ultimate Practical Joker.
Or maybe I have it wrong. CO2 seems to be the cause of just about everything these days. Is it possible that CO2 created God, thus solving that age old question: where did God come from; what created God?
Watcher – If you want to be taken in any way seriously, do not use the word “carbon” when you mean carbon dioxide. In the article, the so-called scientists, by using the CAGW buzz word “carbon” in lieu of carbon dioxide, show their true pro CAGW colors, which causes BS meters to peg.
Watcher = pwned
Watcher, I do not have a problem with you voicing your views on this forum, as far as I am concerned the majority of people who post and read this forum live in countries with democracies and are used to free speech.
I have a scientific background but not in climatology, I visit this site regularly because common sense tells me that CAGW theory is flawed.
I have asked these question many times but no advocate of the CAGW theory has ever provided me with answers. Watcher will you please be the first to do so?
1) How can a trace gas rising from 0.0032% to 0.04% possibly influence the climate?
2) If it does then how can the process stall for 17 years when CO2 continues to rise?
3) Why do advocates of global warming insult those of us who don’t believe it, in extreme cases calling for execution? This is what the Catholic Church did in the 16th and 17th centuries to the likes of Galileo and Bruno (who was burned alive). This bigotry has no place in 21st century science and I would be interested in your opinion as to whether this is scientific or appropriate?
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
… believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?
—————-
“Overwhelming evidence” is something for the courts. It is not science.
Science relies on absence of evidence as its proof. If there is no evidence against a theory, then a theory may be considered “correct”. Whether the theory has “value” depends on what it tells us.
So, when a theory predicts warming, if that warming fails to occur that is evidence that the theory is wrong. No matter how many times the theory gets it right, it is the exception that proves the rule.
Thus GR replaced Newton as our accepted theory of gravity, because Newton got it wrong about the orbit of Mercury. We still use Newton for simplicity, but only for those problems where the error has been shown to not be significant.
GHG and CO2 theory has been shown to be wrong at predicting future temperatures. We now have 16+ years of high quality records that clearly establish this. NAAO is on record as saying 15 years would be sufficient to show the GHG/CO2 climate models were not correct.
Thus, by the rules of science we should not be using these models or the theory on which they are based as the basis for temperature forecasting. Instead we should concentrate our attention on competing theories that have shown more skill at forecasting temperature.
Unfortunately the Climate Clergy that control Climate Science are no different than the Church in the days of Galileo. They recognize full well what impact this would have on the power and prestige they enjoy and are not about to willingly give thus up.
Thus the common person in the street is kept in the dark, routinely stampeded over cliffs and systematically robbed of their possessions to maintain the divine right of kings to rule over them. That we are left any crumbs at all is no accident. Without the masses who would feed the collection plate?
ferdberple says
Thus the common person in the street is kept in the dark, routinely stampeded over cliffs and systematically robbed of their possessions to maintain the divine right of kings to rule over them. That we are left any crumbs at all is no accident. Without the masses who would feed the collection plate?
It’s called “The Mushroom Policy” Kept in the dark and fed on s**t
Given the increasing rate of obesity in children (and the population as a whole) over the last 30 years, I assume “research” would show that it tracks well with rising carbon dioxide levels, but it certainly would not be increased food or calorie intake that is responsible. I smell grant money here (or perhaps it is just the acidity from the pickles on my super-sized roast beef and provolone sub).
For your information, Watcher, over 31,000 preacticing degreed scientists have signed a statement (the Oregon Petition) saying that there is no discernible effect of man’s activities or carbon dioxide on climate. Compare that to the 70 or so paranoids associated with the IPCC that are the ones actually promoting the AGW fantasy (while many others even in the IPCC doubt it), and you have a majority of about 450 who reject it to 1 who accepts it. That’s not 97 percent – it’s 0.22 percent (2/9 of one percent) supporting it.
That 450 to 1 majority gets even bigger if you count all the scientists who haven’t spoken out for fear of losing their jobs at institutions infected with the AGW virus.
Doesn’t a solution have to have a ph below 7 to be considered acidic?
In what salt water body has this occurred due to dissolved CO2?
@ferdberple –
Let us not forget that the documented historical record of non-correlation between CO2 and global temperatures actually goes back at least to the Hittite-Minoan-Mycenean golden age, and that actual observed temperature records show the overall decline, despite minor ups and downs, of temps since the 1930s.
We’ve got a hell of a lot more than 16 years of documented records to show there is no relartionship between CO2 and global temps. It’s more like 3,800 years.
A gentle caution to RockyRoad –
I am a nonbeliever in a supreme being who happens to have a moral code based on honesty, responsibility, well-being and the Golden Rule, and this moral code is a big part of why I am so determined to resist the AGW cabal – it violates every moral principle. At the same time, I have no difficulty comprehending how man could have evolved from a single-celled organism, or taking it back even further, from simple organic compounds.
You should know that there are some theologians who say that there is no conflict between Scripture and evolution. An example is John H. Walton, author of “The Lost World of Genesis One.”
If it surprises you that an atheist would refer you to a theologian, well, we live oin a world where everyone is supposed to be entitled to their beliefs, and I respect others’ beliefs that differ from my own – as long as they accord me the same respect.
The lack of that kind of respect is so central to the AGW crowd’s attitude towards skeptics. But it’s typical of leftist ideologues. Too bad they don’t understand the danger they put themselves in by refusing to listen
Just re read my post wrt questions for watcher. 0.04% is a typo, it should be 0.004%!
I’m a woodworker. Will increased atmospheric CO2 cause walnut, cherry, rosewood, maple, and oak trees to grow faster and bigger? If so, I am idling my car all night long and switching my home heating to coal fueled.
Chad Wozniak says:
April 9, 2013 at 11:24 am
And I wouldn’t disagree with that at all. I prefer to believe God is the quintessential scientist.
But I do take offense with this “Watcher” who (contrary to his name, which is typical) thinks he knows everything about science and religion. I believe we’re still on the frontier in both disciplines.
JK:
At April 9, 2013 at 12:00 pm you ask
The short answer to your question is, Yes.
But I don’t think idling your car will make any difference.
I think you will obtain all the information you want at
http://www.co2science.org/subject/f/forests.php
Richard
JK says:
April 9, 2013 at 12:00 pm
I’ve read where trees are growing 30% faster now than they were 50 years ago so you have reason to be optimistic. However, your token contribution to atmospheric fertilizer would be better spent on another shaper cutter or similar tool–let power plants in China and India stimilate tree growth for you.
“‘Carbon’ to blame for giant crabs”
Methinks they who accuse really ought to find out what their girlfriends have been doing behind their backs.
I was kidding actually, but thanks. And thanks for the motivation to buy another tool. LOL
Point taken Martin.
It can be cold n fizzy or flat n warm: Beer.
.
The yearly C02 cycle is said to drop with the Northern hemispheres plant growth due to land area but it also marks the Southern Hemispheres cooling sea’s.
So what’s the yearly variation on C02 max/min changes year on year? Does amplitude reflect seasonal weather patterns and what causes that funny little step in the cycle?
Chad Wozniak says:
April 9, 2013 at 11:24 am
Well said. I prefer the agnostic’s position that any god is unknowable by me. but I was raised Catholic, and still maintain many Christian values, in particular Commandments 6 – 10, with special emphasis on #9.
Golden Rule #1
Golden Rule #2
The plain, simple fact of the matter is that we don’t really know how the universe works; our current models are about 27% Cosmic Fudge + 68% Magical Mystery Force + 5% “ordinary” matter .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_energy
Watcher, with all your study, you surely must know that for AGW to be a valid theory, it must be falsifiable. Since you seem to fancy yourself an expert on such matters, would you care to share with us what it would take to falsify the AGW conjecture?
I am a bit confused about this. I thought that warm water held less CO2 than cold water. I also thought that generally the seas held the maximum CO2 that they could at any time and released it as the temperature became warmer and would absorb it when cooler. So why are the crabs getting bigger due to global warming. I really would like an explanation if anyone would be so kind as to explain it to me. I will look back for an answer.
I’ve got VERY big pots.
In a lab they raised the level of CO2 to 10 times higher than today and find some marine shells calcify faster and some shells calcify more slowly and one didn’t change at all, and somehow this mutant Chesapeake bay crab story evolves? No wonder some say global warming is a hoax because this story certainly is. Additionally the study finds there is almost no change in shell calcification rates for doubling CO2 (606 ppm) or tripling CO2 (903 ppm)
May have to upgrade my seafood utensils , what do you use for bait ?
Only partly done but the poet in me makes me post. No good place to put it but certainly on this thread humor is not off-topic.
Trenberth
Now in his home beneath the waves
There lives a man who’s seeking heat
The missing heat the ocean saves
While green house gases still accrete
The heat down there accumulates
A growing Kraken yet serene
But skies that now it moderates
Will later turn the seas to steam
Trenberth lives in a yellow submarine
A yellow submarine, a yellow submarine
Trenberth lives in a yellow submarine
A yellow submarine, a yellow submarine
Watcher says:
April 8, 2013 at 5:07 pm
“…..I don’t claim to be an expert in anything but writing and editing.
……….Are you truly expert enough on blue crabs and ocean carbon absorption to make an educated comment? Or preaching, on a pulpit glaringly empty of evidence, to a choir of those who also refuse to believe in the overwhelming evidence of AGW?…”
Watcher, I suggest you may need to do a little more reading and a little less writing, editing and watching.
You will find most here agree the world has been warming a bit the last century or so. Many of us would fully accept mankind is probably having some influence: ie AGW, but not necessarily CAGW. But, questions which arise are; “By how much?” and “Is that normal?” Both questions are surprisingly difficult to answer, and the evidence of this difficulty is that the vast majority of research which has been carried out and is ongoing is attempting to accumulate further data on the matter.
So, we have a vast array of weather stations, endless analyzing, adjusting, and modeling of data from said weather stations, we have the Argo float network, we have the GRACE satellite and GOES, Jason, ICESAT, we have massive budgets allocated to climate change research and climate change mitigation…..
….. and yet, other than modeled doom scenarios, we still have a very scant understanding of our few hundred years of instrument records and our scattered and imprecise proxy records of the past.
We have publications popping up from time to time “proving” it is now hotter than ever before, but sadly not holding up under scrutiny… (Marcott et al) being a recent example, Mann’s “hockey stick” being an earlier case. Marcott interestingly also showing perhaps 25% of the Holocene was warmer than today.
What we have here is a plausible theory, in the early stages of data collection. My own view is that we don’t know enough about it yet, and I suspect some of those making all the claims also know they don’t know, while some on peripheral research (ie , probably all who are not atmospheric physicists), just go with the doctrinal flow.
It takes a kind of blind, dedicated belief to hold your position: “CAGW must be true because they said so”.
You may need to more realistically support your case without using the phrases “97% of climate scientists”, “the majority of climate scientists”, “creationists/creationism”, “overwhelming evidence”, “Skeptical Science.com”, “cherry picking”, “oil company shills” .etc.
Robert L says:
April 9, 2013 at 10:08 pm
“May have to upgrade my seafood utensils , what do you use for bait ?”
Ostrich wings, er, maybe their legs.
Emus will do in a pinch.
So far, what this paper reads like is good news for prospective blue crab (and possibly Australian yabbie–crayfish) farmers.Maybe even lobster farmers. A higher C02 content apparently means bigger crabs and higher yields to the farmer, if these findings prove out in larger trials. Sometimes the most parsimonious reading of a scientific paper is best.
I wouldn’t worry too much about oysters. Somehow they survived the Permian and Cretaceous extinctions and the Paleocene warming.
If there is anything that we truly do need to watch, it’s the creation of large stretches of “dead ocean” that have been depleted of both O2 and CO2 by etrophication. Especially near the coasts. But if we can use wave powered reverse osmosis to produce fresh water from seawater, we can use wave powered reverse osmosis to (or normal, fossil or nuclear fuel powered water heating for reverse osmosis) to produce fresh or fresher water going into estuaries and concentrate farm runoff nitrates and phosphates for recycling. As well as more toxic salts. Just because the scientific evidence does not necessarily support anthropogenic global warming as a problem (and may even point to anthropogenic global warming as a possible prevention for the next Ice Age the Earth appears to be sliding into), does not mean that there are not real ocean pollution issues that need to be addressed, just as it does not mean that chloroflourocarbons were not a problem. (And if environmentalists, grasping at straws to shoot down supersonic transport had not forced a look at emissions in the stratosphere, scientists might not have serendipitously noticed the damage chloroflorocarbons were doing in time to avoid real and lasting damage to the Earth’s ozone layer. Sometimes in barking up the wrong tree, environmentalists can call attention to something important going on in a neighboring tree).
On the credulous side, Stephen King is undoubtedly chortling in his coffee. The “lobstrosities” he wrote about in his Dark Tower novel “Drawing of the Three” may actually be feasible!
Richard of NZ says: April 8, 2013 at 10:04 pm
My short look at this paper makes me wonder how it was approved for investigation in the form given let alone approved for publication.
I hope everyone has had a good look at Richard’s excellent analysis.
There are a huge range of factors which were not considered by the researchers which could have affected the results of this trial.
Some being – the effect of source of species, suitability of acclimatization periods, suitability of feed sources, methods of feeding, suitability of nutrients to species involved, suitability of temperature regime, suitability of sudden on/off light source, suitability of a constant temperature regime, suitability of filtrated water, effect of constant exposure to UV light vs normal gradual change, effect of constant non varying pH and temperature vs normal diurnally varied levels, effect of constant dissolved CO2 and O2 levels vs normal diurnally varied levels, presence or absence of viral pathogens in the water, presence or absence of other pathogens in sourced species, suitability of the aquarium environment for the species involved.
Overall, apparently an appalling bit of so called science.
Um, we have an existence proof that clam and shellfish live happily in acid water. As low as the 4-5 pH range. Basically any freshwater shellfish in the continental USA are such a proof:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/03/08/clams-do-fine-in-acid-water/
The basic thesis that shell formation and shell material can not proceed in acid water is broken.
A second attempt.
Trenberth Live In A Yellow Submarine
Now, in a boat beneath the waves
There lives a man who’s seeking heat
The missing heat the ocean saves
As green house gases still accrete
The missing heat’s the missing key
To melting ice and rising tides
The Kraken that he knows must be
That Davy Jones’s locker hides
(Our soul’s more heavy than we think
A truth that everyone must face
And to what depths our soul may sink!
O’ To what dark and dismal place!)
Our Captain Trenberth can’t withstand
The weight of twenty thousand leagues!
He shuffles in his restless hand
The three steel balls that once were Queeg’s!
His thinking ever deeper moves!
And finds the heat! And gains renown!
His geometric logic proves
ITS IN MODELS! —
All the way down
Eugene WR Gallun