Guest essay by Joseph D’Aleo, CCM, Weatherbell Analytics
National Academies of Science defines a scientific theory as
“a well-substantiated explanation of the natural world that can incorporate facts, laws, inferences, and tested hypotheses.”
Dr Richard Feynman, Cornell Physicist in a lecture explained how theorys that failed the test of data or experiment are falsified (“wrong”) and must be discarded.
Global Warming Theory Has Failed
(1) Warming not ‘global’. It is shown in satellite data to be northern hemisphere only
(2) It is now not warming. Warming (global mean and northern hemisphere) stopped in the 1990s
(3) Models suggest atmosphere should warm 20% faster than surface but surface warming was 33% faster during the time satellites and surface observations used. This suggests GHG theory wrong, and surface temperature contaminated.
(4) Temperatures longer term have been modified to enhance warming trend and minimize cyclical appearance. Station dropout, missing data, change of local siting, urbanization, instrumentation contaminate the record, producing exaggerating warming. The GAO scolded NOAA for poor compliance with siting standards.
(5) Those who create the temperature records have been shown in analysis and emails to take steps to eliminate inconvenient temperature trends like the Medieval Warm Period, the 1940s warm blip and cooling since 1998. Steps have included removal of the urban heat island adjustment and as Wigley suggested in a climategate email, introduce 0.15C of artificial cooling of global ocean temperatures near 1940.
(6) Forecast models have failed with temperature trends below even the assumed zero emission control scenarios
(7) Climate models all have a strong hot spot in the mid to high troposphere in the tropical regions. Weather balloons and satellite show no warming in this region the last 30 years.
(8) Ocean heat content was forecast to increase and was said to be the canary in the coal mine. It too has stalled according to NOAA PMEL. The warming was to be strongest in the tropics where the models were warming the atmosphere the most. No warming has been shown in the top 300 meters in the tropical Pacific back to the 1950s.
(9) Alarmists had predicted permanent El Nino but the last decade has featured 7 La Nina and just 3 El Nino years. This is related to the PDO and was predicted by those who look at natural factors.
(10) Alarmists had predicted much lower frequency of the negative modes of the AO and NAO due to warming. The trend has been the opposite with a record negative AO/NAO in 2009/10
(11) Alarmists predicted an increase in hurricane frequency and strength globally but the global activity had diminished after 2005 to a 30+ year low. The U.S. has gone seven consecutive years without a landfalling major hurricane, the longest stretch since the 1860s
(12) Alarmists have predicted a significant increase in heat records but despite heat last two summers, the 1930s to 1950s still greatly dominated the heat records. Even in Texas at the center of the 2011 heat wave, the long term (since 1895) trends in both temperature and precipitation are flat. And when stations with over 80 years of temperature data were considered, the number of heat records last July were not extraordinary relative to past hot summers.
(13) Extremes of rainfall and drought were predicted to increase but except during periods of strong El Nino and La Nina, no trends are seen
(14) Alarmists indicated winter would become warmer and short. The last 15 years has seen a decline in winter temperatures in all regions. In places winter have been the coldest and longest in decades and even centuries.
(15) Alarmists had indicated snow would become increasingly rare in middle latitudes especially in the big cities where warming would be greatest. All time snow records were set in virtually all the major cities and northern hemisphere snow coverage in winter has increased with 4 of the top 5 years since 2007/08. Also among the east coast high impact snowstorms tracked by NOAA (NESIS), 11 of the 46 have occurred since 2009.
(16) Alarmists had indicated a decline of Antarctic ice due to warming. The upward trends since 1979 continues.
(17) Alarmists had indicated Greenland and arctic ice melt would accelerate. The arctic ice tracks with the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation and the IARC shows the ice cover was similarly reduced in the 1950s when the Atlantic was last in a similar warm mode. In Greenland, the warmth of the 1930s and 1940s still dominates the records and longer term temperatures have declined.
(18) Sea level rise was to accelerate upward due to melting ice and warming. Sea levels actually slowed in the late 20th century and have declined or flattened the last few years. Manipulation of data (adjustment for land rises following the last glaciation) has been applied to hide this from the public.
(19) Alarmists claimed that drought western snowpack would diminish and forest fires would increase in summer. Snowpack and water equivalent were at or near record levels in recent winters from Alaska to the Pacific Northwest and Northern Rockies. Glaciers are advancing. Fires have declined.
(20) Alaska was said to be warming with retreating glaciers. But that warming is tied intimately to the PDO and thr North Pacific pattern NP and happens instantly with the flips from cold to warm and warm to cold. Two of the coldest and snowiest winters on records occurred since the PDO/NP flipped cold again (2007/08 and 2011/12). January 2012 was the coldest on record in many towns and cities and snowfall was running 160 inches above normal in parts of the south. Anchorage Alaska set an all time record for seasonal snow in 2011/12. In 2007/08, glaciers all advanced for the first time since the Little Ice Age. In 2011/12, the Bering Sea ice set a new high in the satellite era. Latest ever ice out date records were set in May 2013.
(21) Mt. Kilimanjaro glacier was to disappear due to global warming. Temperatures show no warming in recent decades. The reduction in glacial ice was due to deforestation near the base and the state of the AMO. The glaciers have advanced again in recent years
(22) Polar bears were claimed to be threatened. Polar bear populations instead have increased to record levels and threaten the populace.
(23) Australian drought was forecast to become permanent. Steps to protect against floods were defunded. Major flooding did major damage and rainfall has been abundant in recent years tied to the PDO and La Nina as predicted by honest scientists in Australia. All years with La Nina and cold PDO composited show this rainfall. Drought was associated with El Ninos and warm PDO fro 1977 to 1998
(24) The office of the Inspector General report found that the EPA cut corners and short-circuited the required peer review process for its December 2009 endangerment finding, which is the foundation for EPA’s plan to regulate greenhouse gases. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) report confirmed that EPA’s Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) program-which EPA acknowledges is the “scientific foundation for decisions” – is flawed, echoing previous concerns from the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) that the agency is basing its decisions on shoddy scientific work.
(25) Of 18,531 citations in the 2007 IPCC Assessment Report, 5,587 or 30% were non-peer-reviewed material, including activist tracts, press releases, and in one amazing case, “Version One” of a Draft. In important instances, IPCC lead authors chose non-peer-reviewed material, or papers of low credibility, favoring their argument, in the face of prolific peer-reviewed material to the contrary. Instances include alleged climate relevance to malaria, hurricanes, species extinction, and sea levels.
Given the failures of global warming science, just a few mentioned here, the most disreputable alarmists like Oreskes, Cook and Trenberth and the demagogue party have tried to convince the uniformed by using the consensus argument. See the latest failed attempt here. It was also described on Forbes here.
“Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had. Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics.” Michael Crichton 17 January 2003 speech at the California Institute of Technology
Related articles
- Benchmarking IPCC’s warming predictions (wattsupwiththat.com)
- Schellnhuber Slips, Confirms Ocean Cycles Do Play A Major Role, Yet Hasn’t Added Them To Climate Models (notrickszone.com)
- To the Horror of Global Warming Alarmists, Global Cooling Is Here (forbes.com)
Said this before but worth repeating here: “A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.” Martin Luther King If you have the proper science, you can mould consensus, if you don’t you simply rely on whatever “public’ consensus exist with all its biases, prejudices, misinformation, and systemic beliefs.
Any wonder that Al Gore and Michael Mann won’t debate!
Great work Joseph. Thank you for putting this together.
Please check this sentence for meaning:
(19) Alarmists claimed that drought western snowpack would diminish and forest fires would increase in summer.
Please check typo of the word “the” in #20
(20) Alaska was said to be warming with retreating glaciers. But that warming is tied intimately to the PDO and thr North Pacific pattern NP
Here is a quote descibing many a “scientist” that still supports global warming. “He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts…for support rather than illumination.”
– Andrew Lang (1844-1912)
We must take care not to do the same as some of our skeptics have this propensity as well.
Reblogged this on danmillerinpanama and commented:
An excellent summary of the man-made global warming fiasco. President Obama and friends are charter members of the brave new consensus club demanding that “deniers” be held accountable. This is how Organizing for Action’s Climate change Day of Action report I received recently begins:
Oh well.
Science is the cover for the real agenda. Control the flow of energy. Reward your supporters and punish your enemies.
Science is based on the explanation of processes involved in the production of experimental evidence. From the very beginning, this was a “solution” to a problem. The problem was anything, and everything, that was needed, to implement the solution.
Doug Allen says
“Any wonder that Al Gore and Michael Mann won’t debate!”
_________________________________________
I have no doubt that Al Gore and Michael Mann would love to debate each other. It’s the only debate they would win.
Of all the institutions with which Feynman was associated, why single out Cornell? He taught there for five years. He was an MIT undergrad & Princeton PhD, but worked longest at Cal Tech.
It was there that in 1974, Feynman delivered a commencement address on the topic of cargo cult science. CCS has the semblance of science, but is only pseudoscience due to a lack of “a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty” on the part of the scientist. He instructed the graduating class that “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool. So you have to be very careful about that. After you’ve not fooled yourself, it’s easy not to fool other scientists. You just have to be honest in a conventional way after that.”
Sad that his biographer James Gleick suffers the ignominy of being the brother of shameless fraudster Peter.
I’ve got 500 dollars to help fund a well designed, statistically significant survey with meaningful definitions to counter this 97 percent b.s. We’re winning on the science but this is also about politics and P.R.
Anthony, would you be willing to consider something like this? There’s no doubt in my mind there are enough skeptics out there who’d be willing to dig deep to fund such an enterprise.
If you accept that the GHE has failed ALL tests, then surely you must accept that the GHE is a fiction, which is what the PSI group of scientists have been saying all along.
And, even as we speak, Pierre Gosselin’s No Tricks Zone blogged today that, “The European Institute for Climate and Energy (EIKE [Europäisches Institut für Klima und Energie]) based in Germany has issued a three-part rebuttal* to the German Ministry of Environment’s alarmist pamphlet…”
Pierre’s blog contains the summary of the third part translated , ” In the last of the three-part series rebutting the scientific claims and the assertions of the made by the UBA, EIKE sums up as follows:
“The claim made by the UBA over the supposed scientific consensus of dangerous climate damage caused by CO2 is ABSURD, BASELESS AND FALSE!”
Love to see a translation of the information leading up to that statement. Maybe the wheels of the AGW bandwagon are really coming off the vehicle!
*In German [unfortunately], issued June 5 and found at http://www.eike-klima-energie.eu/news-cache/das-umweltbundesamt-staatlich-verordnete-klima-doktrin-faktencheck-zur-uba-broschuere-und-sie-erwaermt-sich-doch-letzter-teil/ .
Simon C-S says (June 5, 2013 at 12:25 pm): “If you accept that the GHE has failed ALL tests…”
Sorry, I missed the part where the so-called GHE “failed all tests”. Could you point it out, please?
Gary,
The whole AGW/CAGW business is grounded in and synonymous with the GHE. Without the claimed CO2 GHE there would be no claimed (C)AGW. If AGW has failed, then GHE has, they cannot be separated.
It’s strange therefore that Anthony is vigorously defending the GHE yet proclaiming AGW has failed, it just doesn’t add up. It is PSI who have the line that maintains an integrity, that BOTH the GHE and CAGW claims have failed, with good, robust physical explanations why.
May I add:
CO2AGW scientists predict positive water vapor feedback. Specific humidity has declined since 1980, falsifying the theory.
http://suyts.wordpress.com/2013/06/05/climate-update-earths-atmosphere-holding-more-water-or-something
MichaelS says:
June 5, 2013 at 12:22 pm
Doug Allen says
“Any wonder that Al Gore and Michael Mann won’t debate!”
_________________________________________
I have no doubt that Al Gore and Michael Mann would love to debate each other. It’s the only debate they would win.
You’re both being unfair. They seem like a right pair of mass debaters to me.
I just posted this on Blackboard, but it looks like this thread is perhaps more relevant.
I regularly read WUWT, Blackboard, SkS, and Mother Jones (just the environmental section) but I only comment when 1) I know (or at least think I do) something about the subject and/or the discussion focuses on some specific data and it involves either physics, data interpretation, or rarely, scientific method and 2) I think I have an original thought to contribute. This comment is more to ask a question than comment.
I have noticed on SkS and MJ that articles on climate change focusing on surface or atmospheric temperature rise have declined or almost vanished, perhaps due to the distinct possibility it may not be happening in accord with some expectations. The focus seems to have shifted to other things being the clear indicators of global warming: rising ocean heat content, particularly 0-700 m depth, sea ice variability, weather “extremes,” and “consensus” although it is still unclear to me exactly how the consensus view is defined, except perhaps that a “consensuser” knows it when he/she sees it. I have looked at the data for, and have (at least think I do) a rudimentary understanding of, most things listed above except ocean heat content.
So, finally, my question: can anyone point me to a decent review article(s) on ocean heat content with respect to historical record, forcings (either as source or sink), and current understanding in the context of AGW etc? I have looked at the data and some of the sources on the ocean page here but I have a lot to learn.
As an aside, Brandon Shollenberger deserves praise for his patience and steadfast adherence to reasoned discussion. I read a discussion thread on SkS recently in which he was roundly and repeatedly insulted and snipped by commenters and moderators but he admirably maintained a high level of discussion. I had a similar experience on MJ on the topic of arctic sea ice extent data and can only admire Brandon’s mindfulness.
Thanks.
Simon C-S says:
June 5, 2013 at 12:25 pm
“If you accept that the GHE has failed ALL tests, then surely you must accept that the GHE is a fiction, which is what the PSI group of scientists have been saying all along.”
The GHE is not the theory of CO2AGW.
All other things being equal, an increase in CO2 would lead to a slight warming (because “all other things being equal” means there is no positive water vapor feedback). This is the CO2 GHE at work.
The problem for climate science is that all other things are NOT equal as the climate is a complex non linear chaotic feedback system with more unknown mechanisms than any GCM has parameters.
They certainly have failed many of the tests like NH declining snow, missing hotspot etc. yet they cling on and refuse to see it. I said a few years back that one day we would one day see who the real ‘deniers’ are. How much longer can they continue this farce.
pokerguy says:
June 5, 2013 at 12:24 pm
“I’ve got 500 dollars to help fund a well designed, statistically significant survey with meaningful definitions to counter this 97 percent b.s. We’re winning on the science but this is also about politics and P.R.
Anthony, would you be willing to consider something like this? There’s no doubt in my mind there are enough skeptics out there who’d be willing to dig deep to fund such an enterprise.”
Anyone who still believes that the media would give him the same sort of exposure they give to crooks like Cartoonist Cook and Scientologist Nuccitelli must be living under a rock.
My understanding is that post 1990 climatologists had to agree with the warmist theory from the start in order to be accepted in their programs. I don’t remember exactly where I heard that, but it was already an intuitive feeling of mine. If anyone has anything anecdotal or otherwise to back up the point about climatologists had to agree with the warmists to get accepted, please add it here. Thanks!
If true this means that * the game is rigged * from the start such that nearly all climatologists would take the warmist line without question, and also it means that climatologists are in effect not acting as scientists but politicians or propagandists. And obviously the 97% agreement among climatologists would mean essentially nothing. But even among climatologists this 97% was from a cherry-picked group of respondents that only agreed man had “some role” in climate change. Look at other scientists, like geologists, and especially meteorologists, for a completely different picture, and it’s not a consensus picture.
Maybe it’s time for co-ordinated, full-on assault on the media to absolutely focus on the totally and repeatedly failed science of cagw theory?
Set it out in a similar way to how Joe has done, every damn claim that alarmists have made.
Knock those down that fail the evidence test.
Acknowledge those that PASS any evidence tests.
Likewise those that are marginal. That gains credibility. (One of the problems here is that each side seems to adopt a 100% win attitude on every point. That’s unrealistic, is it not? Unless each agw point really does fail on evidence, of course…)
Serious, world-class scientists to lead the charge.
Every sceptic website to put their name to it.
Multiple influential individuals too.
Just set it all out. The Mother of all Challenges.
Challenge them to counter the observed evidence. We in the UK came within 7-8 votes of economic suicide last night. It’s too close for comfort. These stupid alarmists must be smashed once and for all.
Reblogged this on Johnsono ne'Blog'as.
A quote from Richard Feynman:
“[I]f you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid–not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you’ve eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked–to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.
“Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be given, if you know them. You must do the best you can–if you know anything at all wrong, or possibly wrong–to explain it. If you make a theory, for example, and advertise it, or put it out, then you must also put down all the facts that disagree with it, as well as those that agree with it. There is also a more subtle problem. When you have put a lot of ideas together to make an elaborate theory, you want to make sure, when explaining what it fits, that those things it fits are not just the things that gave you the idea for the theory; but that the finished theory makes something else come out right, in addition.
“In summary, the idea is to give all of the information to help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the information that leads to judgement in one particular direction or another.”
David, UK says:
June 5, 2013 at 12:53 pm
MichaelS says:
June 5, 2013 at 12:22 pm
Doug Allen says
“Any wonder that Al Gore and Michael Mann won’t debate!”
_________________________________________
I have no doubt that Al Gore and Michael Mann would love to debate each other. It’s the only debate they would win.
You’re both being unfair. They seem like a right pair of mass debaters to me.
Well, maybe “half-mass” debaters anyway.
🙂
Ok, seriously, since the supposed science of CAGW by CO2 continues to be shown to be false,
can we call folks who keep promoting CAGW by CO2 as “science” fraudsters?
With a bit of language cleanup such as pointed out above, and probably some comsolidation of points, and graphs and charts illustrating at least some of those points, this would make a fine general circulation all round position paper. Worth a shot.