Guest essay by Steve Goreham
Originally published in The Washington Times
On September 23, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is scheduled to release the first portion of its Fifth Assessment Report (AR5). AR5 will conclude once again that mankind is causing dangerous climate change. But one week prior on September 17, the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) will release its second report, titled Climate Change Reconsidered II (CCR-II). My advance review of CCR-II shows it to be a powerful scientific counter to the theory of man-made global warming.
Today, 193 of 194 national heads of state say they believe humans are causing dangerous climate change. The IPCC of the United Nations has been remarkably successful in convincing the majority of the world that greenhouse gas emissions must be drastically curtailed for humanity to prosper.
The IPCC was established in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environmental Program. Over the last 25 years, the IPCC became the “gold standard” of climate science, quoted by all the governments of the world. IPCC conclusions are the basis for climate policies imposed by national, provincial, state, and local authorities. Cap-and-trade markets, carbon taxes, ethanol and biodiesel fuel mandates, renewable energy mandates, electric car subsidies, the banning of incandescent light bulbs, and many other questionable policies are the result. In 2007, the IPCC and former Vice President Al Gore shared the Nobel Peace Prize for work on climate change.
But a counter position was developing. In 2007, the Global Warming Petition Project published a list of more than 31,000 scientists, including more than 9,000 PhDs, who stated, “There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.” At the same time, an effort was underway to provide a credible scientific counter to the alarming assertions of the IPCC.
The Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change was begun in 2003 by Dr. Fred Singer, emeritus professor of atmospheric physics from the University of Virginia. Dr. Singer and other scientists were concerned that IPCC reports selected evidence that supported the theory of man-made warming and ignored science that showed that natural factors dominated the climate. They formed the NIPCC to offer an independent second opinion on global warming.
Climate Change Reconsidered I (CCR-I) was published in 2009 as the first scientific rebuttal to the findings of the IPCC. Earlier this summer, CCR-I was translated into Chinese and accepted by the Chinese Academy of Sciences as an alternative point-of-view on climate change.
Climate Change Reconsidered II is a 1,200-page report that references more than one thousand peer-reviewed scientific papers, compiled by about 40 scientists from around the world. While the IPCC reports cover the physical science, impacts, and mitigation efforts, CCR-II is strictly focused on the physical science of climate change. Its seven chapters discuss the global climate models, forcings and feedbacks, solar forcing of the climate, and observations on temperature, the icecaps, the water cycle and oceans, and weather.
Among the key findings of CCR-II are:
· Doubling of CO2 from its pre-industrial level would likely cause a warming of only about 1oC, hardly cause for alarm.
· The global surface temperature increase since about 1860 corresponds to a recovery from the Little Ice Age, modulated by natural ocean and atmosphere cycles, without need for additional forcing by greenhouse gases.
· There is nothing unusual about either the magnitude or rate of the late 20th century warming, when compared with previous natural temperature variations.
· The global climate models projected an atmospheric warming of more than 0.3oC over the last 15 years, but instead, flat or cooling temperatures have occurred.
The science presented by the CCR-II report directly challenges the conclusions of the IPCC. Extensive peer-reviewed evidence is presented that climate change is natural and man-made influences are small. Fifteen years of flat temperatures show that the climate models are in error.
Each year the world spends over $250 billion to try to decarbonize industries and national economies, while other serious needs are underfunded. Suppose we take a step back and “reconsider” our commitment to fighting climate change?
The Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change is a project supported by three independent nonprofit organizations: Science and Environmental Policy Project, Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, and The Heartland Institute. Steve Goreham is Executive Director of the Climate Science Coalition of America and author of the book The Mad, Mad, Mad World of Climatism: Mankind and Climate Change Mania.
Very good. The various heads of state cannot keep turning a blind eye to the huge amount of sound science that refutes the need to decarbonize. They’re waking up already, sooner or later they’ll have to admit it – and then band together to shut down the IPCC and stop the incredible and egregious waste of taxpayer dollars.
This will be very helpful for someone like myself. I am not a scientist and any time I’m in a discussion with AGW believers I get so sick of hearing “show me peer reviewed papers, show me peer reviewed papers, if it’s not peer reviewed its a lie…” It’s like a broken record.
I’m looking forward to this report.
It’s the CACA pal-reviewed papers that are the lies.
TonyU~
Not to detract from WUWT, but go here http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.ca/
to find lots of research papers which counter the lies of the AGW crowd.
And that just One of several sites…
the title of the article is,
A Science-Based Rebuttal to Global Warming Alarmism
in it it says,
The global surface temperature increase since about 1860 corresponds to a recovery from the Little Ice Age, modulated by natural ocean and atmosphere cycles, without need for additional forcing by greenhouse gases
And yet, there is no evidence or theory regarding the cause of a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age that is natural and not compounded by anthropogenic emissions associated with the increase in population and agricultural land use changes during the agricultural revolution in the early 1700s (as well as the wide-scale European planting of the American potato-leading to a population explosion).
American and European deforestation was also rampant at this time and the introduction of coal as a common fuel source began in earnest in the late 1800s, these all contributed to changes in methane (primary) and (some) CO2 levels.
http://www.lenntech.com/images/methem.jpg
I also note that the article’s author is an electrical engineer with an MBA degree, hardly the kind of credentials for an essay disclaiming a proven scientific fact that has been known for over 100 years.
Carbon Dioxide and other green house gasses warm the atmosphere and human sourced emissions are causing global warming. This is an undeniable scientific fact.
To adequately address a “little ice age’ that we are supposedly recovering from, the only scientific proof one needs is to show, clearly and without reserve, that this event was not a global phenomenon but rather a localized one in northern Europe.
http://www.meteo.psu.edu/holocene/public_html/shared/articles/littleiceage.pdf
All one needs to do is look at the actual temperature curves of global temperatures since the little ice age that was created by ACTUAL SCIENTISTS, not paid free-market advocates who care not for the actual science but would rather see free market principles unleash the power of unregulated polluters into the world and destroy the lives of your children and grandchildren – as actual scientists clearly state will happen if we do not effect significant changes in our business as usual.
http://ourchangingclimate.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/shakun_marcott_hadcrut4_a1b_eng.png?w=899&h=713
Warming Alarmism
A.D. Everard says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:14 pm
Very good. The various heads of state cannot keep turning a blind eye to the huge amount of sound science that refutes the need to decarbonize.
____________________
Perhaps you are right. It wasn’t so very long ago that I was glum and nearly without hope as to the future of the free world and all of mankind, but times are changing.
Here’s hoping that the most recent election in Australia will serve as a bellwether for rollbacks of green tyranny, worldwide. Most people do the right thing when they know the truth.
jai mitchell says:
“And yet, there is no evidence or theory…”
Get back to us when you understand the concept of a ‘theory’. Right now, you’re just winging it. A theory makes accurate, repeatedly testable predictions. AGW has never been able to do that.
You also have no understanding of the climate Null Hypothesis. Everything currently observed has happened before — and to a much greater degree. Nothing we observe now is either unprecedented or unusual. That is the starting point of the Null Hypothesis; a corollary of the Scientific Method. Because you have the Scientific Method wrong, your conclusions will necessarily be wrong.
The heartland institute is a conservative/libertarian think tank well known for its position on climate change skepticism and is funded by several other conservative foundations and major corporate players in tobacco, pharmaceutical, and oil and gas. The fact that its report is considered an acceptable alternative by China is hardly heartening given that country’s track record on truth and sunshine in its environmental issues. The IPCC is comprised of thousands of scientists from 195 countries across the world that voluntarily contribute their time to the collection and analysis of climate change data. The two are not equivalent in their outlook, mission, level of expertise, level of participation, objectivity, or any other measure I could think to use as a basis of comparison.
In other news, who has been banning incandescent lightbulbs?
Richard Feynman is rolling in his grave…http://youtu.be/b240PGCMwV0
TonyU – the irony, if one could call it that, is that the CAGW hypothesis remains to be proven. The onus in on those that seek to foist the meme on the rest of us to prove their case.
I find one useful approach is asking a believer what it would take to falsify their faith based acceptance of the institutionalised CAGW meme. Here, one might make a few suggestions. An absence of statistically significant warming for 17+ years and observed cooling since 2008 might be a good start – against the inconvenient background of increasing atmospheric CO2.
Actually, in reality it’s very tiresome because one instinctively realises that it’s not about the science or environment. It is ideology.
Is any of this stuff peer reviewed? Because it would be fantastic if it was.
Deb Rudnick says:
“The IPCC is comprised of thousands of scientists…”
Paid scientists. Bought and paid for. Contrast that with the thirty-thousand plus professionals, all with degrees in the hard sciences [including more than 9,000 PhD’s], who flatly dispute the IPCC’s failed CO2 narrative.
The UN/IPCC was set up specifically to prove that human emissions are the primary cause of runaway global warming. They failed. There is no such verifiable, testable scientific evidence. Conflating what China may or may not be doing doesn’t help your unscientific argument, either.
Finally, if you are unaware that governments are banning incandescent lightbulbs, you have been asleep for the past decade.
Thanks for the link Otter
“The IPCC is comprised of thousands of scientists from 195 countries across the world ”
Most of whom have ties to radical green organizations.
Thanks
JK
Deb Rudnick says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:46 pm
The IPCC isn’t composed of thousands of scientists. Its conclusions & summary for political leaders are written by a cabal of around 50. Many of those it counts as scientists are in fact bureaucrats & a lot of the scientists it lists don’t want to be associated with the scam any more.
Tens of thousands of real scientists recognize IPCC for the anti-scientific hoax it is.
Jai Mitchell apparently has not or can not read. He has continually repeated point after point that has been shown to be false by many posters on this site. He is getting boring.
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
The recovery from the LIA is no different than the recoveries from the Dark Ages Cold Period, other cold periods since the Holocene Climatic Optimum, the 8200 BP event & the Younger Dryas, just as the warm periods in between the cold periods were also natural, as is the current one. The warm periods are recoveries to the trend line from the cold periods that preceded them. They’re all natural cycles (or chaotic variations, if you prefer) around the trend since the HCO, which is markedly down in temperature.
It is incumbent upon CACA charlatans to show that the current recovery is any different from those which preceded it.
Correction; Has become boring.
This quote gave it away as Heartland Institute (HI) propaganda:
“Earlier this summer, CCR-I was translated into Chinese and accepted by the Chinese Academy of Sciences as an alternative point-of-view on climate change.”
before I got to the end where it is implied that HI partly pays for it. In fact, everybody agrees the NIPCC offers ‘an alternative point-of-view on climate change’. Skeptical Science would agree! Is there anybody here still thinking that the HI is trying to do anything else but arguing in favour of those who see no need to diminish global exhaust of CO2 because they profit from the present economic setup?
But it is a cause for celebration. I have argued we need MORE co2 in the atmosphere, not less. I base my arguments not on computer speculations about the future, but on measurements from the past and present. More jungle greening and increased food supply? How can this be?
THE PAST
THE PRESENT
“The global surface temperature increase since about 1860 corresponds to a recovery from the Little Ice Age…”
I keep hearing this – we had it for the umpteenth time from Akasofu. But it explains nothing. It’s in the nature of things that, if you have a period of warming, then before that it was cooler. But if you said, it warmed because it was cooler before (so no need for GHG), people would laugh at you. The fact that you’ve given a name to the cooler period (LIA) doesn’t make it any different.
I should have left out the last abstract as it is pure speculation based on models. 😉
Try again, and this time in English. Who is laughing, it makes complete sense? See coming out of the last glaciation. Who laughs?
Is Tony Abbott the only national leader in the whole world who will say that he does not believe humans are causing dangerous global warming?
Nick:
” The fact that you’ve given a name to the cooler period (LIA) doesn’t make it any different”
It is a useful reminder that a warmer climate is preferred to a colder climate. (nasty things happen due to crop failures)
Nick Stokes says:
September 10, 2013 at 5:13 pm
The names of previously observed climatic fluctuations show that they are natural. It is warmer now than during the LIA, naturally. Before that, during the Medieval Warm Period, it was warmer, naturally. Before that, during the Dark Ages Cold Period, it was cooler, naturally. Before that, it was warmer during the Roman Warm Period, naturally. Before that, it was cooler. Before that, during the Minoan Warm Period, it was warmer. Before that, it was variously warmer & cooler. Before that, it was the warmest of the Holocene. Before that, there was the cold event at 8200 years BP. Before that, it was warmer, although not as warm as during the later Holocene Optimum. Before that was the really cold Younger Dryas. Before that, it was warmer & the ice sheets were melting. Before that, there was the 90,000 year-long Wisconsin glaciation, during which the temperature also fluctuated in about the same way as since then, only with much larger swings in amplitude. Before that was the Eemian Interglacial, which was much warmer than our current one. Naturally.
Hence, it is incumbent upon CACA charlatans to show that the warming of c. 1860-2000 was somehow not natural.
This they have not done & cannot do.
Jai Mitchell needs to read more carefully….
Among the key findings of CCR-II are:
Doubling of CO2 from its pre-industrial level would likely cause a warming of only about 1oC, hardly cause for alarm.
Read more: http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/climatism-watching-climate-science/2013/sep/10/science-based-rebuttal-global-warming-alarmism/#ixzz2eXTUePoE
Follow us: @wtcommunities on Twitter
Dbstealey,
you have absolutely no scientific mechanism that can explain a “natural” variability that is producing the warming that would constitute a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age. Not solar variability, nothing.
by the way, your steve goddard sea ice graph you posted is so full of holes it made me want to get some ham, bread and mustard. I suggest you check your links before you post them. He understated the 2012 sea ice loss by over 600,000 square kilometers.
The simple fact is that there is no scientific basis within this “science based” rebuttal which only goes to show the extremist right-wing rag that is The Washington Times.
Nick Stokes,
Did the IPCC blame man’s greenhouse gas emissions for most of the Warming between 1910 to 1940? What do you blame the rise in temps (1910 to 1940) on? Please answer both questions. PS Don’t blame coming out of the Little Ice Age as people will laugh at you.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/image/j/l/warmingtrend.gif
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/_nhshgl.gif
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A2.gif
jai mitchell says:
“I also note that the article’s author is an electrical engineer with an MBA degree, hardly the kind of credentials for an essay…”
And your credentials are …what, exactly? An EE is a degree in the hard sciences. Unlike your own lack of scientific qualifications, that denotes scientific credibility. So naturally, you revert to the usual ad hominem attack.
Despite asking repeatedly, no one has ever produced verifiable, testable scientific evidence showing that human-emitted CO2 has any measurable, quantifiable effect on global temperature. That idea is based solely on Belief, not on scientific measurements.
The only verifiable connection between CO2 and global temperature shows that ∆T is the cause of ∆CO2 — not vice versa. The alarmist cult started out with a faulty premise, so it is no wonder that their conclusions are wrong. But their egos and their Belief systems do not allow them to admit that they were wrong from the get-go. Thus: jai mitchell.
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
And yet, there is no evidence or theory regarding the cause of a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age
============
As there is no evidence of theory regarding the cause of the little ice age.
The problem for climate science is they don’t know what caused the little ice age so of course they don’t know why we are in recovery from it. So, since they don’t know, they have no alternative but to blame it on humans. Exactly like the superstitious high priest of old.
What we do know is that the LIA had nothing to do with CO2, yet the climate cooled and warmed substantially.
I see the mention of the sunset of the good old style light bulb. I was told that if you break a CFL bulb you are supposed to call HazMat in California?
Is that true?
“The fact that you’ve given a name to the cooler period (LIA) doesn’t make it any different.”
A bit of a straw man. I think the point is that the current warm period, like the other warm and cold periods of the Holocene, are within a range of natural variation, demonstrably so, neither unprecedented in magnitude or rate of change. Therefore, it is unnecessary to attribute that change, absent some extraordinary evidence, to anthropogenic increases in CO2, particularly when the current uptrend in temperatures began some 300 years ago.
Jai:
Had you bothered to spend even seconds researching, you’d have learned that, contrary to the lies you’ve swallowed hook, line & sinker, the LIA was global.
Mesoamerica:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0033589404001449
South America:
Villalba, R. (1990). “Climatic fluctuations in Northern Patagonian during the last 1000 years as inferred from tree-rings records”. Quaternary Research 34 (3): 346–60. Bibcode:1990QuRes..34..346V. doi:10.1016/0033-5894(90)90046-N
Villalba, R (1994). “Tree-ring and glacial evidence for the medieval warm epoch and the Little Ice Age in southern South America”. Climatic Change 26 (2–3): 183–97. doi:10.1007/BF01092413
Sébastien Bertranda, Xavier Boësa, Julie Castiauxa, François Charletb, Roberto Urrutiac, Cristian Espinozac, Gilles Lepointd, Bernard Charliere, Nathalie Fage (2005). “Temporal evolution of sediment supply in Lago Puyehue (Southern Chile) during the last 600 yr and its climatic significance”. Quaternary Research 64 (2): 163. Bibcode:2005QuRes..64..163B.doi:10.1016/j.yqres.2005.06.005
Inka Meyer, Sebastian Wagner. “The Little Ice Age in Southern South America: Proxy and Model Based Evidence”. Springer Netherlands. Retrieved 2010-02-09
Thompson, L.G., Mosley-Thompson, E., Davis, M.E., Lin, P.-N., Henderson, K. and Mashiotta, T.A. 2003. Tropical glacier and ice core evidence of climate change on annual to millennial time scales. Climatic Change 59: 137-155 (The sainted Lonnie Thompson, no less!)
Araneda, A., F. Torrejón, M. Aguayo, L. Torres, F. Cruces, M. Cisternas, R. Urrutia (2007). “Historical records of San Rafael glacier advances (North Patagonian Icefield): another clue to ‘Little Ice Age’ timing in southern Chile?”. The Holocene 17 (7): 987–98. doi:10.1177/0959683607082414
East Africa:
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2001Geo….29…83J
South Africa:
Holmgren, K., Tyson, P.D., Moberg, A., Svanered, O. (2001). “A preliminary 3000-year regional temperature reconstruction for South Africa”. South African Journal of Science 97: 49–51.
Antarctica:
Kreutz, K.J., Mayewski, P.A., Meeker, L.D., Twickler, M.S., Whitlow, S.I., Pittalwala, I.I. (1997). “Bipolar changes in atmospheric circulation during the Little Ice Age”. Science 277 (5330): 1294–96. doi:10.1126/science.277.5330.1294
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/ap/qr/2002/00000058/00000003/art02371
http://waiscores.dri.edu/MajorFindings/MayewskiRes.html
http://igloo.gsfc.nasa.gov/wais/pastmeetings/abstracts00/Das.htm
D.M. Etheridge, L.P. Steele, R.L. Langenfelds, R.J. Francey, J.-M. Barnola, V.I. Morgan. “Historical CO2 Records from the Law Dome DE08, DE08-2, and DSS Ice Cores”. Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy, Oak Ridge, Tenn.
M. Angeles Bárcena, Rainer Gersonde, Santiago Ledesma, Joan Fabrés, Antonio M. Calafat, Miquel Canals, F. Javier Sierro, Jose A. Flores (1998). “Record of Holocene glacial oscillations in Bransfield Basin as revealed by siliceous microfossil assemblages”. Antarctic Science 10 (3): 269–85. doi:10.1017/S0954102098000364
Rhodes et al: “Little Ice Age climate and oceanic conditions of the Ross Sea, Antarctica from a coastal ice core record”. Clim. Past, 8, 1223–1238, 2012
Australia:
Erica J. Hendy, Michael K. Gagan, Chantal A. Alibert, Malcolm T. McCulloch, Janice M. Lough, Peter J. Isdale (22 February 2002). “Abrupt Decrease in Tropical Pacific Sea Surface Salinity at End of Little Ice Age”. Science 295 (5559): 1511–4. Bibcode:2002Sci…295.1511H. doi:10.1126/science.1067693. PMID 11859191
Pollack, H. N., Huang, S., Smerdon, J. E. (2006). “Five centuries of climate change in Australia: the view from underground”. J. Quaternary Sci. 21 (7): 701–6. Bibcode:2006JQS….21..701P. doi:10.1002/jqs.1060
NZ & Pacific Islands:
Nunn, P.D. (2000). “Environmental catastrophe in the Pacific Islands around AD 1300”. Geoarchaeology 15 (7): 715–40. doi:10.1002/1520-6548(200010)15:73.0.CO;2-L
Winkler, Stefan (2000). “The ‘Little Ice Age’ maximum in the Southern Alps, New Zealand: preliminary results at Mueller Glacier”. The Holocene 10 (5): 643–647. doi:10.1191/095968300666087656. Retrieved 2010-06-27
Who made this so complicated?
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/mei/
The oceans rule the global temperature in the short term. The period of supposed global warning from 1975 to 1998 was a period dominated by El Nino. During El Nino’s the oceans release heat and the atmosphere becomes warmer. From 1999 through now, we are have been in a ENSO neutral state, neither El Nino or La Nina predominates. Global temp.’s have stagnated. In 1977, after suffering through a period of mostly La NIna’s for the past 7 years, the concern was global cooling, but the oceans decided to switch and give us back some of the heat they took.
Now “they” dare say the reason for the current stagnation is because the oceans ate the heat, yet why did the same “consensus” not bother to explain the obvious effect that the 1977-1998 El Nino’s would have on global temp.’s.
Yet we are constantly told of current and worse future catastrophes due us because 1 in 20,000 parts of the atmosphere changed from something to CO2.
I’ll put my money on the enormous oceans rather than 1/20,000.
@Nick Stokes – I suggest you bone up on the null Hypothesis. That would help with your lack of understanding.
One hopes that “Creedence Two” or CCR-II as it’s called here, will not be hidden behind a paywall.
Nick Stokes says:
September 10, 2013 at 5:13 pm
I keep hearing this – we had it for the umpteenth time from Akasofu. But it explains nothing.
==========
temperatures go up and down naturally and have been doing this for as far back in time as we are able to look. there is nothing in the current warming that is outside of what has been observed to be natural variability, so no explanation is required.
Nature varies because variety is the nature of Nature. Otherwise you and I would not be here. Nature would have stopped at algae. Mission accomplished. Science underestimates natural variety because we have no real grasp of infinity. We see 100 years as a really long time.
jai,
“… there is no evidence or theory regarding the cause of a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age that is natural and not compounded by anthropogenic emissions…..”
It’s always amazed me how alarmists cite an absence of scientific understanding of warming as proof it must therefore be human caused.
With climate being so complex there are so many possibilities that it is ludicrous to rule out everything in order to accommodate the fabricated AGW.
Where is your mind?
glenncz says:
September 10, 2013 at 5:52 pm
Heat content of the oceans is about 1120 times that of the air.
‘Nuff said.
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
That graph of CH4 levels (it would be nice if you’d describe a link instead
of throwing it out willy-nilly) ends at 2000.
Check out http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2009/10/08/the-ups-and-downs-of-methane/ for discussion of methane’s own pause from 1999-2009 or so. There don’t seem to be many graphs or discussion about methane since 2010.
That page includes a graph with the obligatory IPCC “projection” from about 2000.
The stall in CH4 levels is probably not well understood, I’ve heard references to reduced flood times on rice paddies and better management of natural gas production. Given the claims that melting in the tundra, methane hydrates in the seas, and all the fracking going on are going to make methane levels soar, I conclude it’s simpler to ignore it for now. It seems a lot of people have concluded the same. Given the monthly updates on graphs for CO2 and temperature, it’s curious CH4 is so neglected.
Tracking CH4 levels, sources, and sinks might be a good project for you, it would even be useful.
Steve Oregon says:
September 10, 2013 at 6:02 pm
The preposterous, laughable (!) hypothesis (not a theory) that CO2 is the main driver of climate change on earth has been repeatedly falsified (in both senses of the term).
Whatever may drive climate change, it isn’t CO2, which is more an effect than a cause.
Just as Galileo falsified the geocentric model of Ptolemy, without absolutely confirming Copernicus’ heliocentric system, by observing the phases of Venus, so too have real scientists long ago, indeed from the git-go, shown CACA false, without necessarily being able to agree on an alternative hypothesis. It could well be that there is no primary driver.
With climate science in at best the toddler stage, we just don’t know yet.
Global warming theory = TempC increase = 3.0C per doubling CO2 = 4.33*ln(CO2ppm)*C-24.8C
Observations = Reality / Real Earth Response = 1.2C per doubling CO2 = 1.73*ln(CO2ppm)*C-10.1C
Theory versus Reality.
Belief System versus Measuring.
[Snip. By now you should know better than to label those you disagree with as “denialists”. — mod.]
Nick,
The point is that temperatures have increased and decreased forever, and we don’t know why. What we know is that these changes before 1860 were not caused by human-produced carbon dioxide, and in the Dark Ages and earlier it also seems unlikely that land use changes could be involved. What this does is slap us in the face with our extraordinary level of ignorance of natural climate cycles. The argument, famously made by Phil Jones after climategate was that he believed human derived carbon dioxide was causing warming, because we can’t think of anything else that could be doing it. That is in the running for the most ridiculous scientific argument I have ever heard. First, it assumes that there are no unknown unknowns (i.e., we have accounted for every single mechanism that can have a significant effect on climate). When stated this way the argument for human derived carbon dioxide as the main driver seems even weaker. There is no other field of science studying a complex system in which this argument would be taken seriously, let alone become a “consensus” position. Until you can give me a plausible theory explaining how earth entered and emerged from ice ages in pre-industrial times, I will not be convinced that we understand enough about natural climate cycles to have any level of confidence about the quantitative contribution of carbon dioxide vs. natural cycles. By the way Jai, I am a “real scientist” (not climate) and I am a CAGW skeptic precisely because the behavior and statements revealed by climategate and by the broader climate science community afterward (e.g., defending “hide the decline”) were so unlike the behavior and attitudes of every professional scientist I know in biomedical research that I was immediately suspicious. It should be noted that there are excellent climate scientists in the world who are not afraid to publish findings that dispute one or more aspects of the consensus position (dozens are cited with abstracts in the Hockeyschtick blog). However, very few papers of this type are mentioned in IPCC reports. I doubt AR5 will be any different. This is yet another reason to doubt the consensus conclusions. Ignoring contrary evidence isn’t characteristic of real science.
fly in the narrative, shoo, fly shoo!
himalayan glaciers old as katmandu
poley bear population growing too.
skip tuvalu, my darling.
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
The global surface temperature increase since about 1860 corresponds to a recovery from the Little Ice Age, modulated by natural ocean and atmosphere cycles, without need for additional forcing by greenhouse gases
And yet, there is no evidence or theory regarding the cause of a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age that is natural and not compounded by anthropogenic emissions associated with the increase in population and agricultural land use changes during the agricultural revolution in the early 1700s (as well as the wide-scale European planting of the American potato-leading to a population explosion).
American and European deforestation was also rampant at this time and the introduction of coal as a common fuel source began in earnest in the late 1800s, these all contributed to changes in methane (primary) and (some) CO2 levels.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
So, the Little Ice Age was ended by anthropogenic CO2 and not any natural occurrence. Since the CO2 was 280-300 during that period, what level do you want to control the climate? The beginning of the LIA started without a decrease in CO2 and started with the Great Famine, which rolled into the Black Plague. Is that the optimum climate you REAL CLIMATE SCIENTISTS want? Oh, yes, and I note a population explosion caused it, also. Shades of P. Ehrlich, do we need to reduce the earth’s population to 450 million? If I recall correctly the only bomb in the “Population Bomb” was Ehrlich’s predictions. Why does he have any credibility?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I also note that the article’s author is an electrical engineer with an MBA degree, hardly the kind of credentials for an essay disclaiming a proven scientific fact that has been known for over 100 years.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Is Mr. Mitchel a degree snob? I’ve worked with engineers for about 40 years. A very high percentage of those folks were good at math, knew how to handle data and were very adept at finding workable solutions to very complex problems. If Mr. Goreham has done engineering before and after the MBA, I won’t hold that degree against him. However, if you believe the degree is not significant, my terminal degree was a doctorate in organic chemistry (stereochemistry, x-ray crystallography and molecular mechanics). My degrees are, I believe, in something known as a “hard science.” From what I’ve seen of “Climate Science”, I’m not sure much of the research is of the quality to let you out with a Master’s in the school I attended. Besides, I learned long ago that it is not the bright shiny credentials, but what you actually do after you receive them.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
All one needs to do is look at the actual temperature curves of global temperatures since the little ice age that was created by ACTUAL SCIENTISTS, not paid free-market advocates who care not for the actual science but would rather see free market principles unleash the power of unregulated polluters into the world and destroy the lives of your children and grandchildren – as actual scientists clearly state will happen if we do not effect significant changes in our business as usual.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
“ACTUAL SCIENTISTS” don’t publish wild doomsday predictions by press release. Know enough about theory, hypothesis and law to understand the difference and what falsifies the first 2. Actual scientists evaluate data with ERRORS and don’t make up some silly error-free plots. The “actual science” of AGW has been falsified numerous times: Hansen’s 1988 predictions for NYC, the ICE FREE ARCTIC that was supposed to happen this year or last year, the continuing rise in the mythical global temperature for the last 20 years that hasn’t happened, Mann’s hockey stick. I’d be really embarrassed at those failures. ACTUAL SCIENTISTS don’t seem to be affected by prediction failure after failure.
I like the idea of being in the pay of the evil free marketeers. I suppose I am, since I work in industry. However, I’ve not gotten my share of the loot for being a AGW skeptic. Besides, I hear the real money, $5 billion/year, is in the trough for those who find AGW. No AGW and the trough dries up.
Deb Rudnick says: September 10, 2013 at 4:46 pm
Not quite. In fact, far from it. The IPCC is (currently) comprised of 195 nations (or so-called “nations”) i.e. governments. Certainly there are some scientists (Myles Allen is one who comes to mind and Thomas Stocker is well on his way to proving himself to be another) who, if asked, may well claim that it is the scientists who constitute the IPCC.
Indeed, many have been known to mistakenly grant themselves the status of “Nobel Laureate” and/or variants thereof – notwithstanding the fact that this is an unearned laurel. The 2007 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Al Gore (also not a scientist in case you were wondering!) and the organization known as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Is not extremely ironic that an organization which has given its blessing to conclusions and claims that gave rise to – and continue to feed – the “climate wars” should have been awarded a “Peace Prize” of any kind, let alone a “Nobel Peace Prize”?! But I digress …
While scientists – and others – do participate as “voluntary” members of the “author teams” that produce the “products” of the three IPCC Working Groups, they continue to be paid for their IPCC work by their respective institutions and organizations.
Furthermore, in many instances, they are reimbursed for any expenses they might incur, such as … oh, I dunno … travel to far-away lands and accommodation and meals to support their participation in author meetings. Consequently, while their involvement may well be “voluntary” – and/or even motivated by their dedication to “the cause” – I think you can rest assured that they are not sustaining any significant hardship or deprivation.
It also may well turn out to be inaccurate to claim either that there are “thousands” or that they are from “195 countries”. Consider the report of AR5’s WG1, for example. According to an IPCC “Fact Sheet” for Working Group I, this IPCC AR5 “product” involved:
209 Lead Authors and 50 Review Editors from 39 countries and Over 600 Contributing Authors from 32 countries
The review of the FOD by 659 Expert Reviewers from 47 countries
The review of the SOD by 800 Expert Reviewers from 46 countries and 26 Governments
And the key paper to be “approved” later this month, i.e. the Summary for Policymakers, generated 1855 comments from 32 Governments.
Your math may vary; but to my mind this is a far cry from “thousands of scientists from 195 countries”. It is within the realm of possibility, however, that when similar stats are posted for WGs II and III, they will make up the “shortfall”; but until then, I’m afraid your claim fails.
Who’s #194?
So you would trust a bunch of people who are paid handsomely by the UN and green activists groups both of whom actively advocate one-world socialism with an all-powerful government run by “our betters” to tell all us plebes how to “properly” live (eg agenda 21), before you would trust a group run by people who favor individual liberty over all – funding aside. That is rich. Your entire “take-down” of the NIPCC was one giant ad hominem devoid of rational or scientific thought.
Also for your parting shot about incandescent light bulb bans. The answer is the US Congress (among others) with the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 which phases out incandescent bulbs starting with the 100 watt bulb in October 2012 and will end in a phased schedule with the ban of the 40 watt incandescent bulb at some point in the future.
Are you incapable of doing even minor internet resource searching?
I am afraid my previous post is in moderation because I used the common SI derived unit of measure equal to 1 joule per second, which when capitalized is also our host’s last name.
“Is not extremely ironic that an organization which has given its blessing to conclusions and claims that gave rise to – and continue to feed – the “climate wars” should have been awarded a “Peace Prize” of any kind, let alone a “Nobel Peace Prize”?! But I digress …
While scientists – and others – do participate as “voluntary” members of the “author teams” that produce the “products” of the three IPCC Working Groups, they continue to be paid for their IPCC work by their respective institutions and organizations.”
In the last years the norwegian peace prize committee have become more leftist political. Increasingly they are more giving the prize to promote their own leftist agenda. Giving the peace prize to Al Gore, IPCC and later Obama are good examples.
Dear Nick,
In the Copenhagen Diagnosis (available here: http://www.ccrc.unsw.edu.au/Copenhagen/Copenhagen_Diagnosis_LOW.pdf)
it says:
“Are we just in a natural warming phase, recovering from the “little ice age”?
No. A “recovery” of climate is not a scientific concept, since the climate does not respond like a pendulum that swings back after it was pushed in one direction. Rather, the climate responds like a pot of water on the stove:…”
Can you (or your friends) please justify the claim that a recovery is not a scientific concept with regards to the climate.
I’m struggling to find any scientific basis for the claim, and believe (like most climate science) it is simply fabricated by scientific frauds.
Thankyou in advance.
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 6:14 pm
[Snip. By now you should know better than to label those you disagree with as “denialists”. — mod.]
Will I be moderated for pointing out that Jai denies reality?
[Reply: Only if it is intended as a pejorative. ~mod]
I see that jai mitchell, Deb Rudnick and Nick Stokes are all getting a well-deserved thrashing here. Their comments all have one thing in common: they emit their personal Beliefs as fact, when they are only opinions; just their beliefs. They lack real world facts proving that catastrophic AGW exists.
jai mitchell says:
“you have absolutely no scientific mechanism that can explain a ‘natural’ variability that is producing the warming that would constitute a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age. Not solar variability, nothing.”
It is clear that you don’t understand the Scientific Method, or the climate Null Hypothesis, or Occam’s Razor, so you end up making unsupportable statements like that. You just don’t understand that skeptics have nothing to prove! Our job is to tear down conjectures and hypotheses, if at all possible. That is how science advances. In this case, it’s easy.
By demanding that skeptics must provide a “mechnaism”, you are in effect demanding that skeptics must prove a negative. But AGW is not our conjecture! It is your conjecture. You own AGW. It is the albatross around your necks. You have produced absolutely zero testable, quantifiable scientific measurements showing that AGW even exists [it may, of course. But if it exists, it is so minuscule that it cannot even be measured, so anyone worrying about something so insignificant is simply being a worrywart, like Chicken Little].
If you ever admitted that catastrophic AGW forms your basic Belief, then like Saul on the road to Damascus, the scales might fall from your eyes: you might understand that empirical observations always trump your beliefs. But there are NO empirical [real world] observations of catastrophic AGW — or of ordinary AGW, for that matter.
Your catastrophic AGW religious belief is completely emotion-based, thus it cannot be logically argued in a scientific forum. It is only science if it can be quantified; measured. That is the key to science. Since there are no testable, quantifiable AGW measurements, you folks fall back on your emotions. Your beliefs. That is all you have. But that is not good enough.
Thank goodness for the comedic talents of Jai Mitchell.
He has a great source of knowledge at his fingertips here at WUWT, yet he’s firmly determined not to learn anything. And to be a showoff about it as well.
Comedy Gold!
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
‘…disclaiming a proven scientific fact that has been known for over 100 years.’
—–
I’m very curious as to which scientific fact you are referring?
OT: Any news about Watts et al 2012? It had been announced a year ago that the paper will be “submitted within weeks”. What happened?
[So, how many other threads are you going to repeat this “Oh by-the-way-off-topic-disruption of other people’s conversations? Mod]
Deb Rudnick says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:46 pm
‘The heartland institute is a conservative/libertarian think tank well known for its position on climate change skepticism and is funded by several other conservative foundations and major corporate players in tobacco, pharmaceutical, and oil and gas.’
—–
You forgot to impeach the Koch brothers!
/sarc
By mass, specific heat capacity of water is 4 kilojoules per kilogram, atmosphere is 1 kj/kg.
A 4 to 1 ratio.
By volume, 1 cubic meter of seawater has a mass 800 times the cubic meter of air above.
So, the heat capacity of seawater is 800 x 4 = 3200 times greater than atmosphere at sea level.
“My advance review of CCR-II shows it to be a powerful scientific counter to the theory of man-made global warming.”
One thing that we demanded from the IPCC and and got was.
1. An open log of all reveiwer comments and the authors respones to them
2. An open process for signing up to be a reviewer.
3. An Errata process whereby mistakes, like glaciergate , can be addressed.
4. No conflict of interest statements by the authors.
So,
1. Can we get all drafts of the report
2. can we get the reviewer comments posted online
3. How come there was no invitation to review
4. Did the authors sign “no conflict of interest” Before they were accepted as authors
There are cycles in nature that happened well before humans started having much of an effect. We don’t know much about why they occurred. Why did temperatures go up during the MWP? Why did they go down during the LIA? Presumably the latter may have had to do with a low sunspot cycle but Leif said awhile back that low sunspot cycle could mean more active sun and the LIA could have been due to volcanic aerosols (he actually was referring to cold events near the Maunder and Dalton minimums). Interesting that even top solar scientists are unsure of even things like this that some think are settled.
But the temperatures were able to return back to more “normal” or average temperatures on their own in the past so it is equally possible they could do so now as well.
Much is made of the MWP possibly not being global,but just northern hemisphere. Then we are told to be very afraid due warming in the arctic and northern hemisphere during recent years. Seems like they just pick any argument that suits them and then use the exact opposite argument when it suits them for a different time period.
Hey Facebook stock is up because its recovering from its IPO low.
There I explained it.
So,
1. Can we get all drafts of the report
2. can we get the reviewer comments posted online
3. How come there was no invitation to review
4. Did the authors sign “no conflict of interest” Before they were accepted as authors
You have a point Steve. One difference, however, is that the IPCC uses taxpayer money and has millions to spend. And has taken a strong advocacy position involving spending even more money. However, I would not mind seeing some of this information. After I read the report itself.
Dr. Judith Curry at Climate etc has a thread on a second excellent book by Donna LaFromboise regarding the IPCC.
Dr. Curry also states the following regarding the IPCC and AR5;
‘When I first saw the list of IPCC Authors for the AR5, I was excited by all the new names including some excellent scientists that are well known to me and whose integrity and honesty I trust absolutely—-A few years ago one said to me how excited he was to be part of the IPCC.—-I ran into another last fall who had become jaded by the process. He said it was a constant struggle between the newcomers who want to ‘tell it like it is’ versus the old hands who are worried primarily about what was said in AR4 and not providing fodder for the skeptics’
My thoughts: Would it not be a wonderful thing if the IPCC lost its prominence by simple attrition of honest and talented scientists while the NIPCC experienced accretion (I had to look up that word) of those same scientists.
Of course Government backing, politics, the Media and money are huge obstacles. Nevertheless, Science, by its nature will someday prevail, and a huge lesson of what not to do will again be learned.
It is clear that you don’t understand the Scientific Method, or the climate Null Hypothesis, or Occam’s Razor, so you end up making unsupportable statements like that. You just don’t understand that skeptics have nothing to prove! Our job is to tear down conjectures and hypotheses, if at all possible. That is how science advances. In this case, it’s easy.
#############
Sadly, that is how skepticism works in philosophy and how the defense works in a court case. But its not how skepticism works in science. Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.
“The IPCC was established in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environmental Program.”
=======================================================================
The UN. Politics on a global scale. I’m sure someone will correct me if I’m wrong but didn’t the UN put Syria on whatever they call their panel on human rights?
Why trust the politicians they put on a science panel?
Jai, Deb and Nick are just following a well establshed strategy by the warmers. If the LIA and MWP exist, then all of the work done by Mann et.al. is invalidated. Consistently dendro-chronology has failed to show these variations, just as it failed to show Mann’s massive temp rise in the late 20th C (thus, Hide-The-Decline). Hence, the LIA and MWP must disappear. Jai isn’t even being particularly original. This lot have been claiming LIA was a European phenomenon for at least the last 10 years despite a ton of evidence to the contrary.
Steven Mosher says:
September 10, 2013 at 8:08 pm
Sadly, that is how skepticism works in philosophy and how the defense works in a court case. But its not how skepticism works in science. Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.
================================================================
I think you hit on something there. No one loses by trying to honest and finding out they were wrong. But when one takes attempts to prove you wrong personally, where does that leave scientific inquiry or any other kind of inquiry? Look at sue-happy Mann or the Climategate emails, “Why should I give my data when you’ll just try to find something wrong with it?’ or words to that effect.
What genuine good has an inflated ego ever done for anybody?
(Just to be clear, this is not directed at Mosher but his comment spurred it.)
Nick Stokes says:
September 10, 2013 at 5:13 pm
“The global surface temperature increase since about 1860 corresponds to a recovery from the Little Ice Age…”
I keep hearing this – we had it for the umpteenth time from Akasofu. But it explains nothing. It’s in the nature of things that, if you have a period of warming, then before that it was cooler. But if you said, it warmed because it was cooler before (so no need for GHG), people would laugh at you. The fact that you’ve given a name to the cooler period (LIA) doesn’t make it any different.
///////////////////////////
Nick
Please answer the following:
1. Does the temperature increase between 1860 and ~1940 correspond with an increase in CO2 levels during thatb period?
2. If yes, why was there cooling between ~1940 and ~1976 notwithstanding the increase in CO2 levels during that period?
3. Given the increase in CO2 levels between ~1940 and ~1976, if CO2 leads to warming, would you have expected temperatures during this period to (a) rise, or (b) stay about the same (ie., at about the level observed during the mid to late 1930s), or (c) to fall?
4. Given the increase in CO2 levels between ~1976 to say~1998, please explain why the rate of warming during that period was no greater than the rate of warming between say ~1920 to~1940?
5. Given the increase in CO2 levels between ~1996 and ~2012, if CO2 leads to warming, would you have expected temperatures during this period to (a) rise, or (b) stay about the same (ie., at about the level observed during the mid to late 1990s), or (c) to fall?
I put it to you that the temperature record cannot be properly explained without resorting to natural variation, and that being the case there is no logical failure in the submission that what we are simply seeing is a natural recovery trend from the LIA. That statement may not explain the process by which the recovery happens, but does of course explain the event. It is rather akin to asking someone why it is daylight during the day and dark at night and they reply because the sun rises during the day and sets at night. That may not explain the Earth spinning on its axis, but whilst not a full explanation, does explain the observation.
The reality is that we do not understand our climate and how it is driven. Whilst these may not be global events and may be local to just the northern hemisphere and even local to mid to high northern latitudes, we know as fact that there were Minoan, Roman and Medieval warm periods. We do not know why they occurred save that we know that they were not driven by manmade CO2 emissions.
In fact it appears that even before the MWP, there was a wqarm period in Northern Europe around 400AD (which is somewhat before the MWP). How do we know this? Because glaciers are now (ie., late 20th/early 21st century) receding in Norway and as they recede we are finding human artefacts which have been buried by the glacier. See for example
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2408825/Melting-ice-reveals-1-700-year-old-woolly-jumper–experts-say-come.html
Perhaps you would like to explain why it was so warm in Norway some 1700 years ago. I look forward to receiving your explanation on that as well as on the 5 questions above.
Among the key findings of CCR-II are:
· Doubling of CO2 from its pre-industrial level would likely cause a warming of only about 1oC, hardly cause for alarm.
· The global surface temperature increase since about 1860 corresponds to a recovery from the Little Ice Age, modulated by natural ocean and atmosphere cycles, without need for additional forcing by greenhouse gases.
· There is nothing unusual about either the magnitude or rate of the late 20th century warming, when compared with previous natural temperature variations.
/////////////////////////////
The second and third statement are consistent with each other.
However, the first statement is either not consistent with those two statements or is contradictory to them.
My interpretation of these statements is that if the second and third statements are correct, the first statement would appear incorrect. If the first statement is correct then the second and third statements would appear to be incorrect.
I know that the quoted statements are only a summary, but to my mind the summary appears contradictory.
Disingenuous statements are statements made that are known to be incorrect. The warmists have directly and directly promote the green scam lie.
The $250 billion per year that is now being spent on green scams has result in no appreciable reduction in the increase in atmospheric CO2 (there has been roughly $2 trillion spent on the war on climate change). What is the benefit from spending $250 billion/year? Does it make a difference?
A significant world reduction in CO2 emissions would require mass conversion to nuclear power and wartime like rationing of energy and control of ever day life to limit energy use. A reduction of world CO2 emissions of 50%, for example, would require the end of air travel for tourism, the elimination of single family housing, the elimination of private automobile ownership, and so on.
There is no extreme warming problem to solve and spending $250 billion per year on green scams has not significantly reduced the rise in atmospheric C02.
Ignoring reality does not change reality.
Jai,
Call me the apostate, I deny. I acknowledge we have no mechanism, neither do you. I deny. By Bayesian principles it is easier to know what is wrong than what is right. I deny. I cannot understand why anyone would take umbrage at being called a denier. I would be insulted to be cast a believer. I deny. Infidel! That too. Denial is obvious. I deny.
…an oldie, but a goodie: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/08/30/important-paper-strongly-suggests-man-made-co2-is-not-the-driver-of-global-warming/
An important new paper published today in Global and Planetary Change finds that changes in CO2 follow rather than lead global air surface temperature…
Even Al Gore’s newest Climate Reality Project slides show this trend, which he blows off as “typical variation” etc. blah.
Nick, the clear sky recharging of subsurface equatorial ocean layers is an essential component of La Ninas. It is when the oceans gain heat. If this recharging is disrupted the entire system could go into a tail spin that could take a few decades, if not centuries, to bring back to pre-disruption conditions. So the question is, what could cause a disruption of subsurface heating?
It stands to reason that if volcanic ash of an amount sufficient to decrease equatorial solar insulation were present in the atmosphere it could lead to cooler subsurface oceanic temperatures. If these injections into the equatorial atmosphere were frequent enough, it could lead to long term cooling even after the volcanic eruptions halted. Why? As you know, the calmer conditions of El Nino allows the ocean to settle into layers with the warmest layer sitting on top, which also leads to clouds forming overhead as evaporation sets in. However, if this layer is from an earlier clear sky condition (think La Nina) that was hampered by ash, it would not be as warm as it normally is. The climate would struggle to break out of this colder condition as the inertia of the oceanic circulation works through this disruption. It is a plausible scenario for the little ice age.
I’m surprised that Humberto hasn’t been called a hurricane yet. I believe they will before 8:00 or whatever the record is. It’s 1216 am Sept 11 2013.
@Deb Rudnick Sept 10 at 4.46 p
“In other news, who has been banning incandescent lightbulbs?”
The Australian Government did. Not the present one, an earlier one.
Nick Stokes says: September 10, 2013 at 5:13 pm re: recovery from LIA
Nick, there have been plausible periods in the past where the temperature increased, just as there were some that decreased. It is not necessary to attribute a mechanism or time to these, it is enough to observe that they happened.
Once you have a term in which there was a decrease, say 1940-1970 global, using the original graphs rather than the Giss ‘conveniently adjusted’ ones, you have to ask why the temperature appears to have decreased as the concentration of CO2 in the air was increasing.
The IPCC does not appear to have provided a robust, agreed reason for the decrease.
So, there might be an absence of explanation from opposing parties, but that does not overcome the observation that, by whatever mechanisms, these things happen.
The more interesting question is whether there is indeed a warming recovery from a cold spell about the time of the LIA; whether this warming continues; and whether, in an analysis of alleged man-made climate change, this trend should be subtracted from the present day data.
Is the post-LIA trend, loosely named, contributing to our present temperatures or has it peaked and levelled?
Deb Rudnick says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:46 pm
“The heartland institute is a conservative/libertarian think tank well known for its position on climate change skepticism….”
You are mistaking and not understanding the meaning of words:
1] You are using the term “climate change” to mean something like “CO2=CAGW” so that there can be no such thing as climate change unless it is driven by CO2. But that can’t be right. What’s happened is that “mainstream” Climate Science has changed the meaning of the term so that it functions only toward the ends of its propaganda, by which anyone skeptical of its “climate change” is then painted to be someone who is skeptical of climate change or even denies the historical existence of climate change. When it is actually the mainstream Climate Scientists who apparently don’t even have a term for historical, natural climate change.
2] Having a well known position on “climate change skepticism” is hardly the biased or even malign thing you apparently think it is: skepticism is actually at the heart of the practice of real science. The mainstream “climate change” advocates didn’t even notice this.
Of course, man made – deforestation, urbanization, deserts formations etc. that create drier land surface. Not gases – GW/ CC due to gases are impossible. For details click on my name.
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
“And yet, there is no evidence or theory regarding the cause of a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age that is natural and not compounded by anthropogenic emissions associated with the increase in population and agricultural land use changes during the agricultural revolution in the early 1700s (as well as the wide-scale European planting of the American potato-leading to a population explosion).
“American and European deforestation was also rampant at this time and the introduction of coal as a common fuel source began in earnest in the late 1800s, these all contributed to changes in methane (primary) and (some) CO2 levels.”
WOW! That’s some admission Jai!
I can only hope that you realize what you just said. The most recent grand solar maximum http://www.space.com/484-sunspot-activity-8-000-year-high.html and the recent decline http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/09/current-solar-cycle-data-seems-to-be-past-the-peak/ either represents a second Holocene thermal peak or something more akin to what seems to happen at the half-precessional age of all post-MPT interglacials with the sole exception possibly being MIS-11 http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/03/16/the-end-holocene-or-how-to-make-out-like-a-madoff-climate-change-insurer/
If the recovery from the LIA is “not compounded by anthropogenic emissions associated with the increase in population and agricultural land use changes during the agricultural revolution in the early 1700s” then it would seem to have to follow that extension of the Holocene is within our CO2 grasp!
I mean extension of an interglacial such as the Holocene beyond the typical bounds of half-precession age has only happened once in the past million years or so, and that was during MIS-11:
“Recent research has focused on MIS 11 as a possible analog for the present interglacial [e.g., Loutre and Berger, 2003; EPICA community members, 2004] because both occur during times of low eccentricity. The LR04 age model establishes that MIS 11 spans two precession cycles, with 18O values below 3.6o/oo for 20 kyr, from 398-418 ka. In comparison, stages 9 and 5 remained below 3.6o/oo for 13 and 12 kyr, respectively, and the Holocene interglacial has lasted 11 kyr so far. In the LR04 age model, the average LSR of 29 sites is the same from 398-418 ka as from 250-650 ka; consequently, stage 11 is unlikely to be artificially stretched. However, the June 21 insolation minimum at 65N during MIS 11 is only 489 W/m2, much less pronounced than the present minimum of 474 W/m2. In addition, current insolation values are not predicted to return to the high values of late MIS 11 for another 65 kyr. We propose that this effectively precludes a ‘double precession-cycle’ interglacial [e.g., Raymo, 1997] in the Holocene without human influence.” Lisiecki and Raymo, 2005, http://large.stanford.edu/publications/coal/references/docs/Lisiecki_Raymo_2005_Pal.pdf
Which essentially quashed Berger and Loutre’s 2002 modeling ftp://ftp.soest.hawaii.edu/engels/Stanley/Textbook_update/Science_297/Berger-02.pdf, if you have been paying attention to the literature.
So, if I do indeed catch your drift, the only reason we came out of the Little Ice Age is because of anthropogenic emissions. Otherwise we we would still be in it? Or much worse, a Big Ice Age?
I am left to assume here that you have some critical knowledge that has escaped notice by the paleoclimate community (see http://www.clim-past.net/6/131/2010/cp-6-131-2010.pdf or http://www.clim-past.net/8/1473/2012/cp-8-1473-2012.pdf) for instance.
From an “entertainment value” perspective, model results will be entertained.
Otherwise you just shot yourself in the foot. Either we have elevated ourselves, climatewise, carbonwise, obviating onset of the next glacial here at the already older than LIA half a precession old extreme interglacial, or you are advocating for an anthropogenetically unimpeded descent into the next glacial.
Of course, you are invited to provide evidence for something at least compelling, well anything for that matter, that would truly merit being anomalous climatewise that we (meaning the genus Homo) have not already experienced. Meaning something colder since at least the Mid-Brunhes Event or warmer than MIS-11, 5e and the Holocene Climate Optimum.
The famous astronomer Fred Hoyle (1999, Cambridge Conference Network) probably stated it best:
“This is why the past million years has been essentially a continuing ice-age, broken occasionally by short-lived interglacials. It is also why those who have engaged in lurid talk over an enhanced greenhouse effect raising the Earth’s temperature by a degree or two should be seen as both demented and dangerous. The problem for the present swollen human species is of a drift back into an ice-age, not away from an ice-age.”
The thing is, I am not at all sure I disagree with you Jai. I have read and well-pondered what you have written here. Although I academically disagree with you in almost every instance, there is one in which you have convinced me. And that is on the “premise” that CO2 might have an ameliorating effect on climate. If your “premise” is correct, then this is one “pollutant” that we need to quell.
If there is even a chance that the industrial-present age of CO2 pollution could extend provenance of such end-members of our species, which has no clue when they live, then the genetically correct thing to do is strip it from the late Holocene atmosphere. I cite in this instance the fate of:
“The burial in ice of the pre-historic mummified corpse of the famous ‘Iceman’ (e.g., Bahn and Everett, 1993) at the upper edge of an alpine glacier coincided with the initiation of a cold period (‘Neoglaciation’) after the Holocene climate optimum (Baroni and Orombelli, 1996). On longer timescales, evolution of modern humans has been linked to climatic changes in Africa
(e.g., de Menocal, 1995).” Progress in Physical Geography 23,1 (1999) pp. 1–36 ftp://meteor.geol.iastate.edu/data/2005/stuff/adamsetal99.pdf
That would be the 8.2ka climate event. So, you have served to inspire. This you may lay claim to.
“Today, 193 of 194 national heads of state say they believe humans are causing dangerous climate change.”
I think since the recent election down under you can change that to 192 of 194……….
[Norway also today. Maybe 191 of 194. Mod]
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
++++++++++
Jai has been taught the following, (which leads to self delusion):
to say things like:
“compounded by anthropogenic emissions”
[What is compounded? Oh – yes the natural warming which represents the bulk of the slight warming that uhm… stopped a long time ago]
“I also note that the article’s author is an electrical engineer with an MBA degree, hardly the kind of credentials”
[Disqualifying anyone without a title to being able to understand basic science.]
“Carbon Dioxide and other green house gasses warm the atmosphere and human sourced emissions are causing global warming. This is an undeniable scientific fact.”
[Conflating what we do not argue about, with what he has been taught to say. Some warming and catastrophic are not the same words.]
“All one needs to do is look at the actual temperature curves of global temperatures since the little ice age”
[But – you said the LIA was regional only?]
“unleash the power of unregulated polluters into the world and destroy the lives of your children and grandchildren”
[As if making people more poor so they suffer and die as a result of regulations that claim that CO2 and pollution are one in the same.]
[Jai – you are not very bright, you’re delusional and unable to understand the words put into your head.]
Jai Mitchell says “Carbon Dioxide and other green house gasses warm the atmosphere and human sourced emissions are causing global warming. This is an undeniable scientific fact.”
It is an established fact that CO2 an infrared transparent container in a laboratory has demonstrated certain infrared absorption bandwidths.
This does not prove anything with regard to feedbacks or photon transmission via intermolecular collision.
The following paper questions the validity of the use of CO2 absorption bandwidths in climate models. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/grl.50935/abstract
jmitchell
I also note that the article’s author is an electrical engineer with an MBA degree, hardly the kind of credentials for an essay disclaiming a proven scientific fact that has been known for over 100 years.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Well J, I’ll try and explain it to you in small words. Electrical engineers are extremely well versed in matters of radiated energy. When an engineer designs a circuit, one of the things she needs to determine is how the temperature of individual components change. The way she does that is to determine from the voltage applied, and the resistance of the component, how many w/m2 will be generated and dissipated at equilibrium. From there, using the surface area of the component, and Stefan-Boltzmann law, she can calculate how much the temperature of the component will rise above ambient temperature.
The way we figure out the theoretical temperature of earth is to measure the energy in w/m2 being generated by the sun and transmitted into the earth system, and what temperature the earth must rise to in order to dissipate the same amount of energy and achieve equilibrium. The way we do this is using Stefan-Boltzmann Law.
Contrary to your belief system, which appears to be based on an ignorance of the physics of interest in this matter, electrical engineers have one of the best groundings in science one could ask for in understanding the issue at hand.
jai mitchell says:
“paid free-market advocates …blah, blah…free market principles unleash..blah, blah…”
——————————————–
Jai kind of gives himself away here. This is what CAGW is really all about.
Peer reviews are worthless if cronyism is in play (or indeed other forms of malpractice). Read Donna Laframboise’s “The Delinquent Teenager” for a fascinating insight into the dark world of the IPCC and how “peer reviews” are orchestrated. A system is required that can identify and qualify the reviewers so that neutrality is observed. Maybe on paper such a system already exists, but in practice, certainly where the IPCC is concerned, it does not.
So disappointing that the NIPCC believes in global warming induced by CO2.
Again we have a debate between two groups that believe in the same nonsense with the only possible result being that global warming has to be taken seriously as there is only a disagreement in the quantification of the effect.
CO2 cools the planet surface as do all gasses as they conduct and convect energy from the surface and radiate this energy out into space. CO2 is better at it.
Remove the atmosphere and the extra heat now trapped in the planets surface has to be radiated at a higher rate which requires that a higher temperature be reached before equilibrium can be restored.
The atmosphere removes energy from the surface and keeps the surface cool. If this were not the case there would be no such thing as an air cooled engine.
Here is a little experiment for you:
Put an air cooled engine in a big 10m^3 box full of CO2 at atmospheric pressure. Run it up to its equilibrium temperature and measure it. Repeat with the CO2 removed i.e. in vacuum (OK you will need a piped O2 supply in both cases to keep the engine running). Which case results in the lowest engine temperature?
It is insufficient just to look at radiative transfers. The system as a whole muct be considered including thermal transfers.
jai mitchell said “Carbon Dioxide and other green house gasses warm the atmosphere and human sourced emissions are causing global warming. This is an undeniable scientific fact.”
Leaving the implication that it is somehow a linear process and ignoring the “undeniable fact” that it is a declining logarithmic process, resulting in the “undeniable fact” that the power of co2 to cause any further warming is essentially ineffective. No matter how much co2 the atmosphere contains, it cannot override or dominate other factors including natural variability. 7000ppm of co2 didn’t prevent a descent into a glaciation in the Ordovician.
Aside from the fact that a goodly amount of co2 is essential for life, co2 is an irrelevance, other factors such as the suns magnetic field and obliquity are far more likely to dictate long term outcomes than any amount of co2.
I suggest further refinement of positions and proceed now with developing epistemologists’ ‘best available technology’ so to speak, for the layman’s choice between rival experts, for which I invite Holocene geology and Climate simulation to a novice-two experts set-up, for the benefit of Knowledge Management overall.
With Dr. Svensmark’s new paper announced last week showing reproducible experimental data confirming Galactic Cosmic Rays (GCRs) are capable of producing <50 nanometer cloud seeds through a newly discovered catalytic process involving GCRs/SO2/O3/H20/NH4, both the correlation and causation processes of the Svensmark Effect can be demonstrably verified.
Once Svensmark's SKY2 experiment is reproduced by other scientists, and the test results are independently confirmed, then roughly 50% to 75% of 20th century warming can be attributed to the Svensmark Effect (Dr. Svensmark's estimates, which require verification) and the catastrophic "C" in the "C"AGW hypothesis can be officially removed, allowing the world to burn fossil fuels without the guilt of possibly killing billions of people in the future….
Moreover, from 2020, the weakest solar cycle since 1645 is projected to start, so the Svensmark Effect will be demonstrated on a galactic scale. Prior to that, the current cycle (the weakest since 1906) will be falling from here, which should cause a NET cooling effect from now until 2020.
From looking at recent Northern Pacific SSTs, it's looking like a possible El Nino cycle could develop late next year…. The IPCC Warmageddon hoaxers will, of course, waste no time in blaming/propagandizing any El Nino induced SAT increase on CO2, but, well, it'll actually be from El Nino induced SAT increases… And so it goes.
To add irony to mix, LFTRs will most likely be a major world energy source after China starts their first test reactor around 2020 (China's announced target date). That'll cause Western countries to urgently develop LFTRs to counter China's comparative advantage.
From 2030 or so, LFTR energy will replace a substantial portion of fossil fuels for electricity production, and battery technologies will be available to replace combustion engines with electric cars (crap!). Accordingly, this whole CAGW scare/hoax will become a moot issue anyway…. Except, of course, for the $trillions thrown down the toilet on CO2 taxes, subsidies, CO2 emission standards, and wasteful wind/solar projects (which will end up on the bottom of the oceans as artificial reefs or in landfills.).
We live in interesting times….
richard verney says: September 10, 2013 at 8:28 pm
“I put it to you that the temperature record cannot be properly explained without resorting to natural variation, and that being the case there is no logical failure in the submission that what we are simply seeing is a natural recovery trend from the LIA.”
Indeed, there are fluctuations that can’t currently be explained; they may as well be called natural variation. But the NIPCC says that because it’s a recovery from the LIA, it can’t be due to GHG. But “recovery from LIA” is just another way of saying it was cold before and now it’s warm. Such a warming is exactly what was predicted to happen, going back to Arrhenius in 1896, when CO2 accumulates. That’s an explanation – “recovery from LIA” just describes the observation.
Steven Mosher says:
Sadly, that is how skepticism works in philosophy and how the defense works in a court case. But its not how skepticism works in science. Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.
—
I think some ‘explanations’ (I assume you mean hypotheses) are immediately disqualified, whether there are other explanations or not, if you are adhering to the scientific method.
From Wikipedia: A hypothesis (plural hypotheses) is a proposed explanation for a phenomenon. For a hypothesis to be a scientific hypothesis, the scientific method requires that one can test it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypothesis
And the money quote: ” A working hypothesis is a provisionally accepted hypothesis proposed for further research. ”
If you are doling out taxpayer’s money, you might not require scientific hypotheses. Scientists with integrity might be able to withstand the lure of money, the rest, definately not. Only skepticism can prevent this situation from becoming a man-made catastrophe 🙂
The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, with section 321 “Efficient light bulbs”
– passed the House on January 18, 2007;
– passed the Senate on June 21, 2007;
– was signed into law by President George W. Bush on December 19, 2007. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Independence_and_Security_Act_of_2007#Support_for_the_bill
But a growing concern about the ban of the incandescent bulb – the lamp with the greatest quality of light – was seen among consumers.
– July 2011: “The House has voted to delay the de facto ban on incandescent light bulbs for at least a year. It is the first step in restoring consumer choice and ending government intrusion into our homes.” (Rep. Joe Barton)
– December 2011: The Congress deprived the Department of Energy the funds to enforce the ban for 2012.
It is indeed very anxious to see how easily the fundamental rights of people have been denied by this Act.
– “People don’t want Congress dictating what light fixtures they can use.” (Rep. Joe Barton)
– The ban of incandescent light bulbs has led to a very reduced choice of light products. It is known that only the light of incandescent bulbs and halogen lamps has a CRI (color rendering index) of 100 and a PF (power factor) of 1. This is the more incomprehensible because the light belongs to the necessary elements influencing our mental and physical health (together with food, water and air). Our sight is more valuable than a possible saving of electricity consumption.
Our environment has much less to endure from incandescent light bulbs than from CFLs or LEDs. This is proven by Greenpeace in Berlin in 2007. By destroying 10,000 incandescent light bulbs, they showed that the clearout of the broken lamps was no problem at all! Imagine what would happen if 10,000 CFLs (containing mercury) were destroyed! A whole quarter should be evacuated!
The burden of toxicity and resource depletion potentials needed to produce the ‘energy saving’ light bulbs is enormous. This has to be stopped immediately!
jai mitchell 013 at 4:35 pm September 10, 2013 says:
“…there is no evidence or theory regarding the cause of a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age that is natural and not compounded by anthropogenic emissions ….” Quite true. Asa a matter of fact, no one seems to have a theory of the cause of Little Ice Age, least of all jai mitchell 013.
Steven Mosher September 10, 2013 at 8:08 pm says:
“…You just don’t understand that skeptics have nothing to prove! …” On the contrary, As a skeptic I strive to not simpy show you the error of your ways but also to aquaint you with an alternate, superior way to understand climate science.
Please do not start thinking I am a warmist, I am on the side of the old science not the new. This does not make me right but I can still stand back, view the big picture and opine like anyone else. I see the problems faced by reasoned argument as two fold…
Government wasting money and imposing unreasonable taxation.
Experimental science being debased by the birth of the new science of consensus.
Nothing new here, governments have always wasted money and imposed unreasonable taxes. People have always complained and been ignored. The science of reason replaced the old science of alchemy and its advocates may still try measure the lumps on your head or stray into the realms of quack medicine. Nothing changed, we are still only human.
Experimental science will probably win the AGW argument with the cold eye of history. If you try to predict the future, time will prove you right or wrong, nobody will care much unless you are Nostradamus and have predictions still in hand.
If you want to win public opinion you might do better to search for a charismatic advocate rather than a scientific argument. History tells us that Feynman’s rules do not apply in science, who you are does matter and it matters a lot more in politics.
William:
This is interesting. The warmists can ignore but not explain the plateau of 16 years when there was no warming.
The warmists will not however be able to avoid providing a scientific explanation for why ‘global’ warming is reversing; the planet is cooling, correlating with the sudden unexplained to the solar magnetic cycle.
The climate change panic button cannot logically be connected to global cooling. The gig will be up.
The planet is cooling which means: 1) There is no climate warming issue (Obviously it appears C02 emissions are beneficial to the biosphere), 2) Spending almost $2 trillion dollars on green scams, $250 billion/yr and counting, was madness, and 3) global cooling could be a real climate change problem.
Comment:
A leaked report to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) seen by the Mail on Sunday, has led some scientists to claim that the world is heading for a period of cooling that will not end until the middle of this century
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/10294082/Global-warming-No-actually-were-cooling-claim-scientists.html
Global warming? No, actually we’re cooling, claim scientists
A cold Arctic summer has led to a record increase in the ice cap, leading experts to predict a period of global cooling.
A leaked report to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) seen by the Mail on Sunday, has led some scientists to claim that the world is heading for a period of cooling that will not end until the middle of this century.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/10/the-wuwt-hotsheet-for-tuesday-september-10th-2013/#more-93537
Nick Stokes
Your post at September 11, 2013 at 12:49 am says
No, Nick, the recovery from the LIA had been happening for centuries before 1896.
That recovery is NOT “what was predicted to happen” unless you are claiming Arrhenius had a time machine to transport himself back centuries in time. Arrhenius merely suggested an explanation – which is now known to be wrong – for what was happening.
And that is how science is done.
1.
An effect is observed; e.g. recovery from the LIA.
2.
An explanation for the effect is suggested ; e.g. It’s CO2 what dunnit, M’Lud.
3.
Attempts to disprove the explanation are made; e.g. observe CO2 follows temp..
4.
If the explanation is refuted then alternative explanations are suggested.
Nick, you are stuck in 1896. It is now 2013 and we are past Stage 3.
Much evidence obtained over the last century shows Arrhenius was wrong.
You need to borrow that time machine you claim Arrhenius had and use it to jump forward to the present.
Richard
EU regulation effectively banning incandescent light bulbs:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2009:076:0003:0016:EN:PDF
Just to make sure that no one misunderstands, that “1oC” should be read as “1 degree C.”
As A lot of people don’t know that, remark.
The mercury from only one Fluorecent tube can contaminate
up to 30,000 litres of water,
beyond a safe standard to drink.
Also it is an offence to dispose of your domestic florries in your dust bin.(UK that is).
Now who put a 6foot tube in a 2foot 6 inch bin…….Whole?
One often-unsaid aspect of the public discussion on whether human-induced climate change is real, is ideology. Several months ago, the University of Kentucky hosted of forum on climate change with three excellent speakers who were all self-described conservatives. Liberals reported how they better understand that there are thoughtful conservative perspectives on, and solutions to, climate change, thus allowing for a broadened public discussion. In turn, conservatives in attendance learned the same thing. You can watch the recording of this event at http://bit.ly/135gvNa. The starting time for each speaker is noted at this page, so you can listen to the speakers of greatest interest to you.
Dear nick and jai mitchell, please just clarify a few things for me:
Human emissions of CO2 have caused all of the temperature increase since (at least) 1896? Yes or No will do.
Only the human component of CO2 in the atmosphere causes such warming? Yes or No will do.
Human CO2 emissions will cause catastrophic global warming/climate change? Yes or No will do again.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24034954
Hockey schtik, hockey stick, hockey fraud. Where were these periods in Manns stick???? Poor mammoths, if only they had known the evils of coal and oil.
regards
You come to WUWT and talk about tobacco funding, oil funding and the objectivity of the IPCC. Let me re-educate you as to what’s going on beyond your horizon.
FOSSIL FUEL FUNDING
TOBACCO
The BBC is so concerned about climate change that it invested some of its pension funds in a carbon scheme. It also did something else. The BBC Pension fund, as at 31 March 2012, had investments in the following tobacco companies:
British American Tobacco, Imperial Tobacco, Reynolds American, Altria Group, Philip Morris International
—
Al Gore, the climate change campaigner, has been quoted in 1996 by the New York Times saying:
Earlier in the same article the New York Times said:
—
In 2007 the Union of Concerned Scientists issued a report called “ExxonMobil’s Tobacco-like Disinformation Campaign on Global Warming Science”.
The Union of Concerned Scientists has in the past received funding from the Grantham Foundation, which is bankrolled by hedge-fund manager Jeremy Grantham. At the time of the funding the foundation had holdings in tobacco giant Philip Morris. In August of 2011 his fund owned millions of shares in fossil fuel companies such as Exxon Mobil.
—
One of the founders of the wildlife and climate campaigning WWF is Dr. Anton Rupert. The now deceased Dr. Rupert made his fortune from the cigarette manufacturing company called Voorbrand, re-named Rembrandt, now consolidated into Rothmans.
Ref: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1508360/Anton-Rupert.html
IPCC OBJECTIVITY
IPCC Invites In the Activists as ‘expert’ reviewers.
Peer into the Heart of the IPCC, Find Greenpeace
How the WWF Infiltrated the IPCC – Part 1
and there’s lots, lots more on the IPCC and activism.
Doubling of CO2 from its pre-industrial level would likely cause a warming of only about 1oC, hardly cause for alarm.
This statement is wrong. It should actually say; “All things being equal , doubling of CO2 from its pre-industrial level should cause a warming of only about 1°C, hardly cause for alarm.”
I would add that to date, no solid evidence exists that the increased C02 has in fact caused a rise in temperature. The reason is that in nature, as opposed to the laboratory, not all things are equal. Not by a long shot. We also know that the temperature record has been skewed upwards, by as much as 2x what the actual temperature rise has been, due to faulty sensor placement, UHI, station drop-out (mostly from rural sites, which are cooler), etc.
“My Lord, – the prosecution charges that the insignificant increase in global average temperatures which arose from the late ‘seventies and ceased more than a decade and a half ago, was caused by man’s release of carbon dioxide and other radiative gases into the atmosphere. They claim that the supposed warming arises from something that they label the ‘atmospheric greenhouse effect’ which they theorise flows from ‘back-radiation’ and subsequent ‘tipping points’ They claim that the cessation is due to unknown factors but that this cessation is but temporary. They claim that our ‘carbon footprint’ must be drastically reduced, thus transferring the supposed devil status from carbon dioxide to carbon itself. The prosecution’s case rests on a very slim foundation – the ‘green-house effect’
“The prosecution clearly does not understand the very distinct difference between radiation and the transfer of thermal energy – radiation and thermaldynamics. The second law of thermodynamics, stated simply, says that heat travels from hot to cold. The law has been articulated in many verbose versions but when referring to it the law is generally taken to refer to the version of nineteenth century scientist, Claudius. The practical accuracy of the law can be readily demonstrated, while its reverse cannot.
“The foundation of the prosecution’s case consists in essence of the supposed ‘greenhouse effect’ without which it cannot survive. Yet the 2nd law of thermodynamics, which has never been.falsified, demonstrates the no such effect can exist. Without falsification the prosecution’s case has no foundation whatever.
“My Lord, I submit that there is no case to answer.”
So all we need now is a scientific debunking/rebuttal of the ‘CO2 must cause some warming’ consensus (as *any* consensus is unscientific & prone to confirmation bias). Oh, wait a minute, there is, from the scuentists at PSI.
Jai says “Carbon Dioxide and other green house gasses warm the atmosphere and human sourced emissions are causing global warming. This is an undeniable scientific fact.”
I’m not sure what you mean by “a scientific fact”. My training always told me science is limited to the interpretation of evidence, and absolute facts are incompatible with science.
Regarding CO2 warming, I like the following analogy for Beer’s Law. If you are lying on your bed, feeling cold, a quilt will help you to feel more comfortable. Another quilt might help even more, but by the seventh quilt, you will probably not notice much difference. Adding the seventh quilt does not contradict the effect of the first or second quilts.
Now what do we expect to see if you are feeling comfortable under seven quilts, and somebody wants to add an eighth quilt?
A. Not much difference, or
B. The bed will reach a tipping point, causing positive feedback effects and a sudden jump in temperature. Your life will be threatened.
When put into the models, crocodiles crawling out from under the bed and eating you up for breakfast can be shown to be consistent with scenario B.
Where are you on the above scenarios Jai?
There is a simple explanation for the recovery from the LIA. An analogy helps. Consider driving down a freeway at 70 mph, you come to a construction zone and slow down to 50 mph. After the construction you speed back up to 70 mph. There could also be accidents or traffic jams that cause the slowdown. However, as soon as the problem causing the slowdown is removed we speed back up to our cruising speed. Certain problems, like traffic, might slowly dissipate causing a very slow return to our cruising speed.
I believe this is pretty much how the temperature works. An interglacial has a base temperature (cruising speed) that will be maintained as long as nothing gets in the way. However, there can be problems that lead to a reduction. Maybe a cluster of large volcanic eruptions. However, as soon as these clear the base temperature returns. Of course, we’re talking geological time spans. The return to the base temperature can take a couple of centuries because the problem itself (aerosols in this case) is slow to disappear just like the traffic in my analogy.
Essentially it all comes down to a regression to the mean.
We have now reached a milestone in terms of CO2.
In the log relationship, we have now made it to 51% of the doubling impact/forcing.
So, we should have seen 51% of the warming already. And what have got? just 0.75C (or 0.5C taking into account the fake adjustments to the temperature record).
So halfway already and nothing has happened.
——————
Or alternatively, we could look at the forcing in W/m2.
–> Direct Anthro/GHG/Aerosol Forcing 2013 –> 2.1 W/m2
–> Indirect Feedbacks (water vapour, clouds, Albedo) should be –> 1.4 W/m2
–> Total Forcing which should be evident –> 3.5 W/m2
–> Actual Observations (oceans, atmosphere, ice-melt) –> 0.535 W/m2
–> Missing Energy (incorrect theory, faster emissions from Earth not accounted for in theory) –> 3.0 W/m2
Steve Mosher wrote:
Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.
===============
What you say is true, but not in all cases. It’s true for single, or some isolated cases. But the recovery from the LIA is not an isolated event. It is part of a recurring cycle that has existed for several millennia following the last ice age.
Attributing THIS cycle of warming solely or mostley to CO2 requires it to be a unique event, and it is not.
Imagine the prehistoiric “skeptic” who tries to prevent his village from sacrificing children to stop the solar eclipse. They attribute it to an angry god, the “skeptic” claims he has seen it before and it will go away on its own. One has a mechanism, the other does not.
It is quite reasonable to reject a hypothesis for cyclical, recurring phenomena that treats the most recent one as a special event.
And we all know how much time, effort and $$$ have been invested in to prove that the warming of the last 160 years is somehow unique.
Stephen Pruett says:
September 10, 2013 at 6:23 pm
The point is that temperatures have increased and decreased forever, and we don’t know why.
————–
This may be going a little under most people’s heads, but at the risk of appearing to make a complete fool of myself, I’ll say it anyway.
Over the longer term, on the order of centuries or longer, the average temperature at earth’s surface would be expected to increase when the earth is absorbing more energy from space than it is emitting to space, and to decrease when it is emitting more energy than it is absorbing. Also, given the size of the planet, average global temperature would be expected to lag behind the changes in absorption and emission by a considerable period as heat was progressively stored in or removed from the ground or the oceans in response to changes in this absorption/emission balance.
The earth may also display a natural average temperature oscillation over time analogous to the vibration of a piano wire or the swing of a pendulum as the measured rising or falling temperature alternately overshoots the assumed temperature based on a simple analysis of the energy balance. This is merely a supposition on my part. I make no claims concerning the existence of such a mechanism.
While the above doesn’t fully explain the “why” , I think it may go part of the way.
milodonharlani says:
September 10, 2013 at 5:06 pm
jai mitchell says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:35 pm
The recovery from the LIA is no different than the recoveries from the Dark Ages Cold Period, other cold periods since the Holocene Climatic Optimum, the 8200 BP event & the Younger Dryas, just as the warm periods in between the cold periods were also natural, as is the current one. The warm periods are recoveries to the trend line from the cold periods that preceded them. They’re all natural cycles (or chaotic variations, if you prefer) around the trend since the HCO, which is markedly down in temperature.
It is incumbent upon CACA charlatans to show that the current recovery is any different from those which preceded it.
jai mitchell I echo your post.
What we have now is potentially the first ture prolonged solar minimum since the Dalton ,and I think if this prolonged solar minimum (following several years of sub-solar activity in general,started in year 2005) meets it’s potential that the solar /climate correlations will start to manifest themselves in the climatic system of earth.
Those being in response to direct changes in solar parameters and the associated secondary effects to those earth originating climatic items that influence the climate of the earth through random changes, absent any extreme solar changes which I feel will exert an influence on those earth originating random earth climatic items.
Items, such as clouds, volcanic activity, enso etc. etc.
If(IF) the degree of magnitude change and duration of time of the solar changes meets certain criteria.
THOSE BEING AS FOLLOWS:
solar flux sub 90.
solar wind 350 km/sec.
cosmic ray count north of 6500 per minute.
ap index sub 5 ,98+% of time.
solar irradiance off .015% or more.
EUV light wavelengths 0-105nm, intensity of sub 100 or lower.
All of the above sustained. If these conditions are acomplished going forward I am of the strong opinion they will be exerting an ever increasing influence on the climate of the earth going forward both through the direct solar changes and the secondary effects from those direct solar changes.
This recovery(likely over now) from the Little Ice Age was feeble compared to recoveries from past more distant cold periods. Infact I would say this is one of the WEAKEST recoveries from a previous colder period over the past 20000 years.
Deb Rudnick says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:46 pm
Please read Steve McIntyre on IPCC “scientists”:
http://climateaudit.org/2013/09/11/ipcc-and-the-end-of-summer/#comments
Jai Mitchell makes spurious claims with nothing to back them up, and yet claims that WE are the ones that need to provide evidence? There’s a laugh for ya.
At least the Steve Goddard graph of sea ice is a graph, I saw NOTHING WHATSOEVER from Jai Mitchell to refute the graph other than an UNSUBSTANTIATED CLAIM that the graph was incorrect.
Truly it is sad to see that Jai can do no better than that.
Steve Mosher wrote:
Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.
________________________
So, Steve, you apparently believe in the reading of goat entrails, at least until I can come up with something that better predicts the future?
Yes, that is the current status of climate science today. Their models don’t work. They have an explanation from basic physics as to why it has warmed. They’ve jerrymandered data to eliminate prior natural variability and show the effects of current warming in order to bolster their claim and show an anthropogenic ‘finger print’ where none exists.
Then they drop the scientific shroud altogether and proclaim, very unscientifically, that catastrophic consequences are coming, caused by our sins of emissions. The actual science says no such thing. It says CO2 in a plastic CO2 bottle retains LW radiation better than N. That’s all. Gravity says everything falls (accelerates) toward the center of the earth at 9.8m/s/s. Go watch Old Faithful sometime. Realize that the water spewed forth is actually accelerating toward the center of the earth, even as it rises 100’s of feet above the surface . . . and then some of it evaporates into the atmosphere and doesn’t actually fall back on the 9.8m/s/s schedule, as gravity would predict.
Science doesn’t say how people will be affected. Politicians and advocates do. Charlatans who claim to be scientists do.
Real science predicts warming, but not as much as commonly advertised. ‘Runaway’ warming, or ‘tipping points’ do not exist at all in the actual science. Sorry Al Gore.
But I am glad that you, Nick, Jai, and the thousands upon thousands of ‘true believers’ who never dare to post, come to this site. It’s not propaganda here. It isn’t funded by big oil or endowed by some foundation or university.
This is honest and open debate. Largely without ad hominem attacks. Go speak your mind against the CAGW consensus at Skeptical Science or one of the mainstream AGW websites. See how long your posts remain.
There is no ‘big oil’ boogey man funding skepticism. There is no advantage to me, in wasting a lot of time studying actual scientific papers, following the careers of this person and that. I believe my children’s children will benefit greatly from not living under a totalitarian regime. I believe people living in under developed nations will benefit greatly by being allowed access to energy. I’ve made mine. I’m going to be just fine.
Final thought; One side of this argument repeatedly asserts ‘consensus’ and denigrates any and all who doubt their knowledge and authority. I now ask you to consider Galileo’s take regarding which side of any debate resorts to appeal to authority, consensus, and relies heavily on punishing and denigrating heretics.
Stephen Mosher wrote:
“Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.”
I am sorry Mosh, that sounds WAY to much like “the wrong answer is preferable to no answer”.
I was always taught as a scientist that sometimes it is better to leave the answer to a question blank than it is to reveal your own ignorance.
TonyU says:
September 10, 2013 at 4:23 pm
Consider please the lack of peer-reviewed science in IPCC:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/7725266/Climate-body-chief-defends-use-of-grey-literature.html
PeterB in Indianapolis says:
September 11, 2013 at 10:08 am
Stephen Mosher wrote:
“Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.”
I am sorry Mosh, that sounds WAY to much like “the wrong answer is preferable to no answer”.
I was always taught as a scientist that sometimes it is better to leave the answer to a question blank than it is to reveal your own ignorance.
###############
Sorry doesnt work that way. the answers given by science are ALWAYS WRONG. the issue is how wrong.
Remaining silent may work with the cops, but not in science, because someone somewhere will always have an explanation and the best explanation wins.
So if you are silent you lose.
This is honest and open debate. Largely without ad hominem attacks. Go speak your mind against the CAGW consensus at Skeptical Science or one of the mainstream AGW websites. See how long your posts remain.
#########
science is not a debate. for the record I’ve endured more ad hominem attacks here than any other place. i draw NO CONCLUSION ABOUT SCIENCE from this factual observation about the society here. basically, the openness or closeness around debate is not a fact that has anything to do with AGW. and the fact that there is name calling on sides is funny but irrelevant
Bill Illis says:
September 11, 2013 at 5:43 am
We have now reached a milestone in terms of CO2.
In the log relationship, we have now made it to 51% of the doubling impact/forcing.
So, we should have seen 51% of the warming already. And what have got? just 0.75C (or 0.5C taking into account the fake adjustments to the temperature record).
So halfway already and nothing has happened.
###############################
wrong. you have to look at all forcings. jeez, if you want to attack the explanation you first have to get it right
The temperature response is a reaction to the sum of ALL FORCING. since the LIA C02 forcing represents about 50% of ALL forcing.
Steven Mosher says:
September 11, 2013 at 10:20 am
The problem with CACA, is that its charlatan purveyors are intentionally, willfully, fraudulently wrong. They’re wrong & know it, but still spew the same garbage for public consumption.
Sisi says @ September 10, 2013 at 5:09 pm
“HI is trying to do anything else but arguing in favour of those who see no need to diminish global exhaust of CO2 because they profit from the present economic setup.”
Absoutely false. My family and myself have profitted handsomely from CAGW alarmism. We would do less well financially if HI prevails, but I see more truth and honest analysis in HI than I do in the IPCC.
BTW. I do not believe that “recovery from the Little Ice Age” is the proper phrase. Such a phrase suggests that the LIA was abnormal and the tendency is to recover from it. Only a huge amount of hubris allows one to claim that any phase of the world’s climate is normal. I prefer the phrase: “emerging from the Little Ice Age.”
Steven Mosher says:
September 11, 2013 at 10:27 am
since the LIA C02 forcing represents about 50% of ALL forcing.
On what planet?
Steven Mosher says:
September 11, 2013 at 10:27 am
Bill Illis says:
September 11, 2013 at 5:43 am
wrong. you have to look at all forcings. jeez, if you want to attack the explanation you first have to get it right
The temperature response is a reaction to the sum of ALL FORCING. since the LIA C02 forcing represents about 50% of ALL forcing.
————————————–
No, you are wrong again.
We are also exactly half-way if the measure is ALL forcing versus the expected ALL forcing doubling level.
http://www.pik-potsdam.de/~mmalte/rcps/index.htm
Yes they can ignore it and they will for quite some time. Read The Road to Serfdom and State of Fear. A crisis, even an imaginary one, give the states a pretense for grabbing more power and making everyone more dependent.
Mosher says:
“Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.”
What if his ‘explanation’ is wrong?
In case you haven’t been watching, the people who are losing are the purveyors of the catastrophic AGW scam. That “explanation” is a bunch of pseudo-scientific nonsense. No credible scientist agrees with CAGW, for the simple reason that there is no testable evidence whatever for CAGW. It is no different than fortune-telling, astrology, rain dances, or phrenology.
If someone cannot produce measurable, testable, quantifiable scientific evidence to support their claim, then their claim is self-serving nonsense.
@Jai Mitchell
There have been other recoveries from cooler temps in the current interglacial period long before the forcings you cite even existed. So why the double standard? Recovery is natural without mankind, but when we’re around and industrially active it is not?
Steven Mosher:
At September 11, 2013 at 10:20 am
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/10/a-science-based-rebuttal-to-global-warming-alarmism/#comment-1414382
you claim
No!
Science is about seeking the closest possible approximation to truth.
Everyone can think they each have a “best” explanation. But an explanation refuted by one or more pieces of evidence is not valid. At any moment the scientific explanation is the valid explanation which agrees with most evidence and – in the event of a tie – uses least assumptions.
Often the only valid explanation is “we don’t know” and in that case the scientific explanation is
WE DON’T KNOW.
But, of course, pseudoscientists always have a “best” explanation.
Richard
The drive by Jai’s only comment attracted common sense like flies on Jai.
Deb Rudnick says: @ September 10, 2013 at 4:46 pm
The heartland institute is a conservative/libertarian think tank well known for its position on climate change skepticism and is funded by several other conservative foundations and major corporate players in tobacco, pharmaceutical, and oil and gas…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
SOOoooo??? The East Anglia Climate Research Unit (Home of Phil Jones and the climategate e-mails) is funded by BP and Shell Oil. Ged Davis (named in one of the e-mails) Was a Vice President of Shell Oil AND wrote the climate scenarios for the IPCC. You can read them yourself in the e-mail: link
The IPCC chairman, Robert Watson, was an employee of the World Bank.
Peter Glieck committed Wire Fraud, a serious offense, when he stole information from Heartland. Richard Muller (BEST) has a Shell Oil VP in his consulting business, Muller & Associates.
Maurice Strong: Chair of the 1972 First Earth Summit and Kyoto was president of Ontario Hydro, an industrial concern which is the biggest source of CO2 emissions in Canada. He has served as president of energy companies such as Petro-Canada and Power Corporation,, and on the board of industrial giant Toyota. In 1981 he had moved on to Denver oil promoter AZL Resources.
Then there is Good old Al Gore whose money comes from Occidental Petroleum and bragged of his tobacco farming days when trying to get votes as a presidential candidate.
Careful what rocks you try to throw, people in glass houses should clean up their own act first.
Pippen Kool says: @ September 10, 2013 at 4:54 pm
Is any of this stuff peer reviewed? Because it would be fantastic if it was.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
It says right in the text:
Actually it is better that: the IPCC that uses so-called ‘grey literature’, that is, articles written by activists like Greenpeace and WWF. See: UN’s Climate Bible Gets 21 ‘F’s on Report Card
milodonharlani says: @ September 10, 2013 at 5:02 pm in reply to Deb Rudnick
The IPCC isn’t composed of thousands of scientists. Its conclusions & summary for political leaders are written by a cabal of around 50. Many of those it counts as scientists are in fact bureaucrats & a lot of the scientists it lists don’t want to be associated with the scam any more.
Tens of thousands of real scientists recognize IPCC for the anti-scientific hoax it is.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Heck there are over 100 scientists and engineers here commenting a WUWT who have mentioned their educational background so we beat the IPCC in the numbers game.
Sisi says: @ September 10, 2013 at 5:09 pm
…..Is there anybody here still thinking that the HI is trying to do anything else but arguing in favour of those who see no need to diminish global exhaust of CO2 because they profit from the present economic setup?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
And you don’t think the TRILLIONS of tax dollars aren’t going into someone’s pocket?
At least the ‘present economic setup’ (or the old one anyway) produced goods and services that improved peoples lives. All that those TRILLIONS of tax dollars has done is cause thousands to freeze to death – In Britian 2,000 extra deaths were registered in just the first two weeks of March
Meanwhile according to the International Monetary Fund In many countries the distribution of income has become more unequal, and the top earners’ share of income in particular has risen dramatically. In the United States the share of the top 1 percent has close to tripled over the past three decades, now accounting for about 20 percent of total U.S. income (Alvaredo and others, 2012).
Three decades, GEE, that is about how long we have been hearing about (and funding) the CAGW mania.
Rich Wright says: @ September 10, 2013 at 5:18 pm
Is Tony Abbott the only national leader in the whole world who will say that he does not believe humans are causing dangerous global warming?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
No you forgot Václav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic from 2003 to 2013. After his presidency ended in 2013, Klaus was named a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute.
richardscourtney says:
September 11, 2013 at 2:26 pm
Steven Mosher:
At September 11, 2013 at 10:20 am
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/10/a-science-based-rebuttal-to-global-warming-alarmism/#comment-1414382
you claim
Remaining silent may work with the cops, but not in science, because someone somewhere will always have an explanation and the best explanation wins.
No!
Science is about seeking the closest possible approximation to truth.
Everyone can think they each have a “best” explanation. But an explanation refuted by one or more pieces of evidence is not valid. At any moment the scientific explanation is the valid explanation which agrees with most evidence and – in the event of a tie – uses least assumptions.
+++++++++++++
Richard: I agree with you, of course. BUT Mosher reveals himself here and no amount of logical discourse can change this. Mosher is right with a single caveate; he’s referring to “political” science. Using a phrase like “best explanation wins” is very valid when discussing topics of political science. As proof, the IPCC’s explanations about man causing climate change that will be catastrophic have won the minds of enough people such that CO2 has gotten labeled as a pollutant, and carbon is taxed, and energy is becoming more costly, and Green’s get my money. Mosher is right because he implies political science.
jai mitchell says: @ September 10, 2013 at 5:25 pm
Dbstealey,
you have absolutely no scientific mechanism that can explain a “natural” variability that is producing the warming that would constitute a ‘recovery’ from the little ice age….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
So you DENY there is such a thing as Heinrich, Dansgaard/Oeschger and Bond Events? Funny NASA and NOAA don’t.
NASA: Heinrich and Dansgaard-Oeschger events
NOAA: A Pervasive 1470-Year Climate Cycle in North Atlantic Glacials and Interglacials by Gerald Bond
Steven Mosher says:
September 10, 2013 at 8:05 pm
Hey Facebook stock is up because its recovering from its IPO low.
There I explained it.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
You forgot the effects of the lawsuits….. August 26, 2013 Judge approves $20 million settlement in Facebook class-action lawsuit and possible up and coming lawsuits NSA Surveillance Lawsuit Tracker …. is that something like a slump in solar sunspot activity? /sarc
@jai mitchell:
Gail Combs, William McClenney, Fabi, BillW, Robert in Calgary, Bob Greene, Ric Werme, milodonharlani, Steve Oregon, ferd berple, George H, David Ball, Tom Moran, and many others have made you into a laughingstock here; a climate clown. Every point you have tried to make has been easily refuted. Debunked! No one agrees with your climate alarmist nonsense, and it is clear that you don’t even understand it yourself.
Your thoroughly discredited/debunked/falsified talking points make no headway here, because WUWT readers know that:
1. You have zero scientific credentials. No CV. If I am wrong, then post your degrees in the hard sciences right here. I and others have asked you before, but the only response from you is the chirps of crickets in the background.
2. You are a self-serving opportunist, who is attempting to make a buck out of climate alarmism. That has been exposed recently by other commentators. But that doesn’t pass muster at the internet’s “Best Science & Technology” site. We know a charlatan when we see one, and you are fooling no one here.
3. Unlike a real scientist, you have no use whatever for the Scientific Method, or for Occam’s Razor, or for the climate Null Hypothesis. They just get in the way of your True Beliefs. You would fit in perfectly back in the witch doctor era.
I would not be so hard on you if you ever engaged in an honest, forthright, question-and-answer commentary. But your childish hit ‘n’ run commentary leaves no room for intelligent discourse. You never respond to an honest, direct question asked of you, or to a point made that refutes what you claim. Never. That makes you a troll, no? A site pest. You have not the slightest interest in science. Your only interest is in self-promotion, which requires that you constantly emit alarmist propaganda, and nothing else.
My advice to you: stop it! Everyone can see what you’re up to. You have zero interest in scientific truth; only in your self-serving CAGW propaganda. You have no credibility. I can assure you that you are wasting your time at a site that is read by many thousands off highly educated individuals, who can tell honest science from your “carbon” nonsense.
Steven Mosher says:
September 10, 2013 at 8:08 pm
Sadly, that is how skepticism works in philosophy and how the defense works in a court case. But its not how skepticism works in science. Science works to explain. doubt is a tool in science, but in the end if you dont have an explanation you lose to the guy who does have an explanation, EVEN IF his explanation is partial and incomplete.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Oh, explanations like phlogiston or the sun circles the earth and if you do not believe we will persecute you and you may even lose your head ( Lavoisier)?
Steven Mosher says:
September 11, 2013 at 10:24 am
“science is not a debate. for the record I’ve endured more ad hominem attacks here than any other place…..”
===========
Give a semblance of respect, and it will be returned.
Twobob says: @ September 11, 2013 at 3:45 am
… Also it is an offence to dispose of your domestic florries in your dust bin….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
So do you mail them to your Parliament member instead?
(Sorry mod. I resisted the first time but not the second)
The question is it seems whether the LIA was a forced event (whether a solar Bond event or an endogenous volcanic event), with an imbalance-induced bounce-back tendency, or just part of a general orbital-explainable temperature decline seen since the Holocene optimum?
An interesting piece has just appeared in the Guardian about just this subject in an interview with Naomi Klein. Note that the D word is quoted. I have edited it extensively to extract the relevant quotes, but the full version is here:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/sep/10/naomi-klein-green-groups-climate-deniers#start-of-comments
Naomi Klein: ‘Big green groups are more damaging than climate deniers’
Environment movement is in ‘deep denial’ over the right ways to tackle climate change, says Canadian author
10 September 2013
Naomi Klein says green groups have been backing the wrong solutions to climate change, such as the UN Clean Development Mechanism
Klein is worried that some of the things she had said would make it hard for her to land an interview with a president of the one of the Big Green groups (read below and you’ll see why). She was more interested in nabbing the story than being the story; her reporting trumped any opinion-making.
Klein’s first book, No Logo, investigated how brand names manipulate public desires while exploiting the people who make their products. The book came out just weeks after the WTO protests in Seattle and became an international bestseller. Her next major book, The Shock Doctrine, argued that free-marketeers often use crises – natural or manufactured – to ram through deregulatory policies. With her newest, yet-to-be named book, Klein turns her attention to climate change. Scheduled for release in 2014, the book will also be made into a film by her husband and creative partner, Avi Lewis.
Klein’s books and articles have sought to articulate a counter-narrative to the march of corporate globalization and government austerity. She believes climate change provides a new chance for creating such a counter-narrative.
“The book I am writing is arguing that our responses to climate change can rebuild the public sphere, can strengthen our communities, can have work with dignity.”
In a piece you wrote for The Nation in November 2011 you suggested that when it comes to climate change, there’s a dual denialism at work – conservatives deny the science while some liberals deny the political implications of the science. Why do you think that some environmentalists are resistant to grappling with climate change’s implications for the market and for economics?
Well, I think there is a very a deep denialism in the environmental movement among the Big Green groups. And to be very honest with you, I think it’s been more damaging than the right-wing denialism in terms of how much ground we’ve lost. Because it has steered us in directions that have yielded very poor results. I think if we look at the track record of Kyoto, of the UN Clean Development Mechanism, the European Union’s emissions trading scheme – we now have close to a decade that we can measure these schemes against, and it’s disastrous. Not only are emissions up, but you have no end of scams to point to, which gives fodder to the right. The right took on cap-and-trade by saying it’s going to bankrupt us, it’s handouts to corporations, and, by the way, it’s not going to work. And they were right on all counts. Not in the bankrupting part, but they were right that this was a massive corporate giveaway, and they were right that it wasn’t going to bring us anywhere near what scientists were saying we needed to do lower emissions. So I think it’s a really important question why the green groups have been so unwilling to follow science to its logical conclusions. I think the scientists Kevin Anderson and his colleague Alice Bows at the Tyndall Centre have been the most courageous on this because they don’t just take on the green groups, they take on their fellow scientists for the way in which neoliberal economic orthodoxy has infiltrated the scientific establishment. It’s really scary reading. Because they have been saying, for at least for a decade, that getting to the emissions reduction levels that we need to get to in the developed world is not compatible with economic growth.
What we know is that the environmental movement had a series of dazzling victories in the late 60s and in the 70s where the whole legal framework for responding to pollution and to protecting wildlife came into law. It was just victory after victory after victory. And these were what came to be called “command-and-control” pieces of legislation. It was “don’t do that.” That substance is banned or tightly regulated. It was a top-down regulatory approach. And then it came to screeching halt when Regan was elected. And he essentially waged war on the environmental movement very openly. We started to see some of the language that is common among those deniers – to equate environmentalism with Communism and so on. As the Cold War dwindled, environmentalism became the next target, the next Communism. Now, the movement at that stage could have responded in one of the two ways. It could have fought back and defended the values it stood for at that point, and tried to resist the steamroller that was neoliberalism in its early days. Or it could have adapted itself to this new reality, and changed itself to fit the rise of corporatist government. And it did the latter. Very consciously if you read what [Environmental Defense Fund president] Fred Krupp was saying at the time.
It was go along or get along.
Exactly. We now understand it’s about corporate partnerships. It’s not, “sue the bastards;” it’s, “work through corporate partnerships with the bastards.” There is no enemy anymore.
More than that, it’s casting corporations as the solution, as the willing participants and part of this solution. That’s the model that has lasted to this day.
I go back to something even like the fight over NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement. The Big Green groups, with very few exceptions, lined up in favour of NAFTA, despite the fact that their memberships were revolting, and sold the deal very aggressively to the public. That’s the model that has been globalized through the World Trade Organization, and that is responsible in many ways for the levels of soaring emissions. We’ve globalized an utterly untenable economic model of hyper-consumerism. It’s now successfully spreading across the world, and it’s killing us.
It’s not that the green groups were spectators to this – they were partners in this. They were willing participants in this. It’s not every green group. It’s not Greenpeace, it’s not Friends of the Earth, it’s not, for the most part, the Sierra Club. It’s not 350.org, because it didn’t even exist yet. But I think it goes back to the élite roots of the movement, and the fact that when a lot of these conservation groups began there was kind of a noblesse oblige approach to conservation. It was about élites getting together and hiking and deciding to save nature. And then the élites changed. So if the environmental movement was going to decide to fight, they would have had to give up their élite status. And weren’t willing to give up their elite status. I think that’s a huge part of the reason why emissions are where they are.
At least in American culture, there is always this desire for the win-win scenario. But if we really want to get to, say, an 80% reduction in CO2 emissions, some people are going to lose. And I guess what you are saying is that it’s hard for the environmental leadership to look some of their partners in the eye and say, “You’re going to lose.”
Exactly. To pick on power. Their so-called win-win strategy has lost. That was the idea behind cap-and-trade. And it was a disastrously losing strategy. The green groups are not nearly as clever as they believe themselves to be. They got played on a spectacular scale. Many of their partners had one foot in US CAP [Climate Action Partnership] and the other in the US Chamber of Commerce. They were hedging their bets. And when it looked like they could get away with no legislation, they dumped US CAP completely.
The phrase win-win is interesting, because there are a lot of losers in the win-win strategy. A lot of people are sacrificed in the name of win-win. And in the US, we just keep it to the cap-and-trade fight and I know everyone is tired of fighting that fight. I do think there is a lot of evidence that we have not learned the key lessons of that failure.
It’s interesting because even as some of the Big Green groups have gotten enamored of the ideas of ecosystem services and natural capital, there’s this counter-narrative coming from the Global South and Indigenous communities. It’s almost like a dialectic.
That’s the counter-narrative, and those are the alternative worldviews that are emerging at this moment. The other thing that is happening … I don’t know what to call it. It’s maybe a reformation movement, a grassroots rebellion. There’s something going on in the environmental movement in the US and Canada, and I think certainly in the UK. What I call the “astronaut’s eye worldview” – which has governed the Big Green environmental movement for so long – and by that I mean just looking down at Earth from above. I think it’s sort of time to let go of the icon of the globe, because it places us above it and I think it has allowed us to see nature in this really abstracted way and sort of move pieces, like pieces on a chessboard, and really loose touch with the Earth. You know, it’s like the planet instead of the Earth.
And I think where that really came to a head was over fracking. The head offices of the Sierra Club and the NRDC and the EDF all decided this was a “bridge fuel.” We’ve done the math and we’re going to come out in favor of this thing. And then they faced big pushbacks from their membership, most of all at the Sierra Club. And they all had to modify their position somewhat. It was the grassroots going, “Wait a minute, what kind of environmentalism is it that isn’t concerned about water, that isn’t concerned about industrialization of rural landscapes – what has environmentalism become?” And so we see this grassroots, place-based resistance in the movements against the Keystone XL pipeline and the Northern Gateway pipeline, the huge anti-fracking movement. And they are the ones winning victories, right?
I think the Big Green groups are becoming deeply irrelevant. Some get a lot of money from corporations and rich donors and foundations, but their whole model is in crisis.
I hate to end a downer like that.
I’m not sure that is a downer.
It might not be.
I should say I’m representing my own views. I see some big changes as well. I think the Sierra Club has gone through its own reformation. They are on the frontline of these struggles now. I think a lot of these groups are having to listen to their members. And some of them will just refuse to change because they’re just too entrenched in the partnership model, they’ve got too many conflicts of interest at this stage. Those are the groups that are really going to suffer. And I think it’s OK.
I think at this point, there’s a big push in Europe where 100 civil society groups are calling on the EU not to try to fix their failed carbon-trading system, but to actually drop it and start really talking about cutting emissions at home instead of doing this shell game. I think that’s the moment we’re in right now. We don’t have any more time to waste with these very clever, not working shell games.
Much impressed by dbstealy, William Mc and other thinkers today. Some really coherent and well referenced contributions.
As for the AGW supporters whom I view as particularly willful today, the are fewer and fewer straws to grasp. Picking up Mosh’s reasonable point, they have been disproven.
The AGW assertions are literally impossible and we need to move on.
Mario Lento:
Thankyou for your post at September 11, 2013 at 8:26 pm
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/10/a-science-based-rebuttal-to-global-warming-alarmism/#comment-1414812
in reply to my post at September 11, 2013 at 2:26 pm
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/10/a-science-based-rebuttal-to-global-warming-alarmism/#comment-1414598
I agree that my answer to Steven Mosher addressed the nature of “science” and not what you call “political science”, but Steven Mosher said “science” and that is what I answered.
However, you truncated my post in your quotation, and I think the part you omitted does address your point; at least, the part implies it. The part of my post you omitted was this
Richard
The USA partial ban on incandescent lamps was not so much to reduce manmade climate change, but to reduce dependence on energy imports. The legislation that mandated it and several other energy conservation measures was the Energy Security and Independence Act.
Sasha,
That’s what we would call “inside baseball”.
If you could simmer it down to a few pertinent points, we would have something worthwhile to discuss.
Otherwiise, it may be far too esoteric for the average reader…
…I read it all, and I’m still a bit confused.
Sasha says: @ September 12, 2013 at 2:08 am
An interesting piece has just appeared in the Guardian…http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/sep/10/naomi-klein-green-groups-climate-deniers#start-of-comments
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
It looks like someone finally notice the knowledge about the Corporate Foundation – NGO money link and Chris Horner’s Baptist and bootlegger coalition…. is filtering down to the grass roots and the rank and file are not happy.
This is for dbstealey …
What Naomi Klein is saying is that the whole “Green” movement is in a state of intellectual crisis, that it is the so-called “environmentalists” who are doing so much damage, and that the public in the west is waking up to this, so politicians will soon have to reflect their changing opinions. It’s not just the global warming scam that’s falling apart, it’s the whole thinking behind the environmental movement in the last 50 years.
“… Well, I think there is a very a deep denialism in the environmental movement among the Big Green groups. And to be very honest with you, I think it’s been more damaging than the right-wing denialism in terms of how much ground we’ve lost. Because it has steered us in directions that have yielded very poor results …
“… we now have close to a decade that we can measure these schemes against, and it’s disastrous… so I think it’s a really important question why the green groups have been so unwilling to follow science to its logical conclusions…
“… when a lot of these conservation groups began … it was about élites getting together and hiking and deciding to save nature. And then the élites changed. So if the environmental movement was going to decide to fight, they would have had to give up their élite status. And weren’t willing to give up their elite status… the green groups are not nearly as clever as they believe themselves to be. They got played on a spectacular scale…
“I think the Big Green groups are becoming deeply irrelevant. Some get a lot of money from corporations and rich donors and foundations, but their whole model is in crisis.”
Thanks, Sasha.
Steven Mosher says:
September 11, 2013 at 10:24 am
“science is not a debate. for the record I’ve endured more ad hominem attacks here than any other place…..”
This is priceless. I haven’t noticed a WUWT? crying towel on the merchandise page. Not a bad idea. Perhaps some WUWT? skin thickener as well.
richardscourtney says:
September 12, 2013 at 5:29 am
Mario Lento:
+++++++++++
I re read my comment to you. AND I most respectfully intended it to be supportive to your comment… (I should have written sarc.) The crux of my comment was to imply that I think Mosher views himself as a pure science guy… but I mostly see politically motivated comments from him. I say mostly because I don’t read all of his posts. I just don’t know if Mosher can be reasoned with since his MO often seems politically convoluted.
That said, I think you are a voice of strong reason here.
Mario
Actions and words; Harper’s minority Conservative government pulled Canada out of Kyoto years ago, and was rewarded with a potent majority and the virtual wipeout of the Liberal opposition, despite a high-profile parachuted American academic running as leader (lost his riding, too).
Mario Lento:
Thankyou for your post at September 12, 2013 at 10:39 pm
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/10/a-science-based-rebuttal-to-global-warming-alarmism/#comment-1415779
which begins saying
I re read my comment to you at September 12, 2013 at 5:29 am
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/10/a-science-based-rebuttal-to-global-warming-alarmism/#comment-1415052
and I fail to see a problem.
I provided direct link to my original post and your post which commented on it. And my comment which replied addressed the specific point which you had made. If you were joking but forgot a sarc tag then I failed to recognise the joke, but whether or not others saw the joke then I consider my reply was appropriate. Sorry.
I hope there is no misunderstanding now and that we have not fallen out over this matter.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
September 14, 2013 at 1:32 am
“…I hope there is no misunderstanding now and that we have not fallen out over this matter.
Richard”
++++++++++
I think we understand each other clearly. I will be more careful with regard to sarcasm. Nothing falling between us.
Mario
jai mitchell,
I checked all your resourses you listed. Every one of them seems to be based upon the adjusted data that has been pushed upon the world by sheister scientists that are openly concerned only with PROVING that AGW exists and is a huge problem. Mann’s “Hockey Stick” is a sham and calculatedly removes theMMedieval Warming Period in order to prove his theory.
Perhaps YOU have bought all the GW hoopla in a religious manor and are closing your eyes and ears to the doubters…. just like other religious zealots?