There’s an article in the New York Times pushing a something called “the five stages of climate grief” done by a professor at the University of Montana. This got me to thinking about the regular disaster forecasting that we see published in the media about what will happen due to climate change.
We’ve seen this sort of angst broadcast before, and it occurred to me that through history, a lot of “predictions of certainty” with roots in scientifically based forecasts have not come true. That being the case, here is the list I’ve compiled of famous quotes and consensus from “experts”.
Top Ten Science based predictions that didn’t come true:
10. “The earth’s crust does not move”– 19th through early 20th century accepted geological science. See Plate Tectonics
9. “The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in explosives.” — Admiral William Leahy, U.S. Atomic Bomb Project
8. “That virus is a pussycat.” — Dr. Peter Duesberg, molecular-biology professor at U.C. Berkeley, on HIV, 1988
7. “I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.” — Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
6. “Radio has no future. Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible. X-rays will prove to be a hoax.” — William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, British scientist, 1899.
5. “There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will.” — Albert Einstein, 1932
4. “Space travel is bunk.” — Sir Harold Spencer Jones, Astronomer Royal of the UK, 1957 (two weeks later Sputnik orbited the Earth).
3. “If I had thought about it, I wouldn’t have done the experiment. The literature was full of examples that said you can’t do this.” — Spencer Silver on the work that led to the unique adhesives for 3-M “Post-It” Notepads.
2. “Stomach ulcers are caused by stress” — accepted medical diagnosis, until Dr. Marshall proved that H. pylori caused gastric inflammation by deliberately infecting himself with the bacterium.
1. “Telltale signs are everywhere —from the unexpected persistence and thickness of pack ice in the waters around Iceland to the southward migration of a warmth-loving creature like the armadillo from the Midwest. Since the 1940s the mean global temperature has dropped about 2.7° F.” — Climatologist George J. Kukla of Columbia University in Time Magazine’s June 24th, 1975 article Another Ice Age?
So the next time you hear about worldwide crop failure, rising sea levels, species extinction, or “climate grief” you might want to remember that just being an expert, or even having a consensus of experts, doesn’t necessarily mean that a claim is true.
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Coz’
That very important work is being carried out by our intrepid host, Anthony Watts at http://www.surfacestations.com.
Check out his discoveries and the various causes of the placement problems.
So pretty much all of you are arguing that “science,” as you misunderstand it, produces a bunch of hogwash — crap.
…Except science has made possible every single thing you’ve done today. Yesterday. The next and on.
“Science” is the application of the scientific method, of finding out what does what based on testable phenomenon, to greatly simplify things.
Did all of simply will our plumbing to work this morning? Or was plumbing something worked out through trial and error through ages?
Does your car run because someone threw nuts and bolts together? Because you said Shazam! and pressed the gas pedal?
It’s fine that you like having your heads in the sand… But I don’t understand why you would brag about it.
Love and kittens.
Some classic partially-informed responses here. It’s unfortunate that some of your commenters are less than meticulously polite, but I’ll answer them one by one, just the same.
Jeff: Antarctic ice is increasing? Possibly – some reports suggest an increase of 0.8% per decade (against a decrease of 3% per decade in the Antarctic.
Other authors suggest that Antarctic ice has been reducing in recent years.
The jury’s still out on that one.
The melting point of (calm) seawater at normal marine salinity is -2C. There’s plenty of literature which suggests that temperature is the principal control on melting of Arctic ice. NASA are good at observing the globe from space, and the evidence they have collected provides much of the information base which serves to prove the impact of global warming.
Virgil: The disappearance of Arctic summer ice is not a one-off: it’s a steady decrease over several decades which is accelerating. As the map of Arctic summer sea ice quite clearly shows.
Meanwhile, Arctic winter ice formation happens every year and there was more open water area to re-freeze this year. Individual winters vary (as do summers – note it’s trends that we’re interested in) but I’m not aware of any information to suggest a systematic increase in Arctic winter ice over years or decades but if you have some then I’d be pleased to see it.
Stan: ‘define record’. Yes, I’m talking about the period since satellite measurements began. But, nevertheless, the scientific literature suggests that the Arctic ice cap has been permanent for 700,000 years. Its disappearance in summer is not a minor perturbation in our weather patters.
It’s also true to say that for long periods of geological time, for example during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods, there were no polar ice caps at all on this planet. The drawback is that sea level was up to 200 m (660′) higher than it is today. Which is unfortunate if you live in New York, San Francisco or London. Or Paris. Or Miami. Or Sydney. Or Boston. Or Vancouver. Or Seattle. Or Shanghai. Or Hamburg …
Yes, it’s a problem of epic proportions. So what would I do to reverse the trend? Well, the likelihood is that this trend can’t be stopped completely within the short term, since the CO2 already released (remember that we are apparently intent on burning much of the carbon budget of the past 200 million years in Earth history within just a few decades) will continue to cause temperature rises for years to come. Nevertheless, every action we take to reduce our carbon consumption will have an effect in slowing those changes.
The technology in offshore wind and onshore solar power already exists to supply much of our energy needs without requiring recourse to nuclear energy. At home, we have been using electricity supplied by a wind power company since 2003 and at no extra cost. So you can switch today.
Transport is a harder problem to solve. Biomass offers a partial (but far from complete) solution and using diesel engines reduces carbon consumption by 30-40%.
Nevertheless, for some purposes (including aviation) it’s likely that we will continue to need to use hydrocarbons for some considerable time to come. We’ll need more fuel-efficient planes (like the A380) and we should use alternative surface transport for short haul where it’s practicable (as in Europe where we have the Eurostar and TGV network).
Although the operating cost of renewable energy technologies is extremely low, the upfront investment cost of building many large offshore wind farms and extensive onshore solar installations including coatings of our rooftops will be high, but the cost of carbon-based energy sources has risen 10-fold since 1998 and will continue to rise, bringing these alternatives into more economic reach.
Occams Edge: We’re not talking just a 26 year observation period – we’re discussing a disappearance of ice from the Arctic for the first time in 700,000 years. That’s not trivial.
I made no reference to the NorthWest passage. If you look at map of Arctic summer sea ice, you could see it as more or less navigable in 1978, when there was over 40% more summer sea ice than there is today. So I can’t see the relevance of that particular remark.
Sam: the increase in temperatures from 1910 to 1940 did not pre-date the anthropogenic release of CO2. That process started with the onset of the Industrial Revolution in the late 18th Century, and the release of CO2 from anthropogenic sources has increased steadily since then. The faster rate of temperature rise from 1910 to 1940 was caused by a natural increase in insolation (see above – this then fell from around 1940 to 1975) added added to the anthropogenic CO2 effect.
The crux of the matter centres around the different timescale and magnitude of these processes within recent times.
The insolation effects (once dominant, prior to the Industrial Revolution) now increasingly manifest themselves on the global temperature curve as (relatively) low level ‘noise’, superimposed on the larger (and increasingly large) effect of rising anthropogenic CO2.
Imagine adding a low amplitude sinusoidal wave (representing the insolation effect) to a progressively steepening quadratic curve (recording the CO2 effect) and you will more or less exactly mirror the observed global temperature curve.
The corrugated (if still steepening) form of this composite curve also provides the explanation for why the observed rise in global temperature is neither precisely uniform nor perfectly described by comparison with the CO2 curve alone.
As noted by many global warming sceptics, at some times (1990s, 1900-1950) the observed rapid global temperature rise reflects a positive reinforcement of CO2 and insolation effects, whilst at others (from 1950-1975, for example, as discussed above) the insolation effect acts as a partial counterbalance to the CO2 rise and global temperature remains relatively static or may even fall slightly.
Nevertheless, the CO2 contribution is becoming increasingly strong over time, as atmospheric CO2 levels continue to rise and as this rise continues to accelerate. It’s worth reiterating again that global CO2 concentrations have risen by well over 20% since 1958 and are presently rising at >0.5% per year.
Please see this link for further details: Climate change in the public debate.
Cozumelkid: The effects of urbanisation (the so-called ‘heat island’ effect) are systematically removed from long-term climate analyses. Meteorologists and climatologists have thought of that one. And note that the Arctic Ocean is not close to any of these local sources – that’s a key point here.
Sorry for the long post, but it’s important that these issues are discussed in a less than flippant and bollocks-to-you kind of way.
Kind regards to all of you from London.
Thanks, Roads. Nice to have someone inject some real facts and sense into the discussion.
Some people have made decidedly ignorant responses to Anthony’s post. Roads, it doesn’t matter if one study says so about the ice if its not true:
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/current_anom_south.jpg
But I see where you become confused, in that we are talking about two different things, ice area and sea ice volume, I believe it was.
Several of you seem to think that Anthony is trying to say that science is never right-hogwash, Anthony is saying that science can be wrong-Don’t take things on faith, duh!
Systematic removal of Urban Heat Island effect, eh? Not necessarily. Population data is used, but if a city’s population stays constant and its energy usage goes up, which is true of certain places, the heat island will still increase.
The other stuff you said, utter unintelligible religious nonsense about how CO2 evidently explains everything. No it doesn’t. It is not a god.
“The CO2 contribution has become increasingly strong” Well, sure, but is it big now, and is it more important than anything else? Maybe, maybe not, maybe it never will be. These are quantitative questions. Your response are so thoroughly qualitative that all I can say is they are “not even wrong” so to speak, so that I actually can’t discount what you say, only say that it is meaningless garbage without actual falsifiable numbers.
The data, incidentally, have certainly not been corrected for creeping microsite biases. Which is the whole point of the surfacestations.org project. Of course, certain scientismists posting here don’t seem to get that scientists are human beings, they are fallible, they can make mistakes and let errors creep into there data. And most importantly, like any human, when they screw up, they will reluctant to admit it. And they have been.
the more you know the less practic is the knowledge….good post!
Incidentally, your comment that there haven’t been any trends in natural forcings is so patently and pathetically false its almost amusing. Solar activity, for one thing, is higher now than it was during the Maunder Minimum, for instance. Now you can argue that the effect is tiny. Fine, whatever. But if you argue it didn’t happen at all, you are a solar change denier.
The official position of the alarmists on the midcentury cool period is not natural forces masking CO2 but MANMADE particulate pollution masking CO2. Shame on you for not knowing the official explanation.
And on this “one way trend” we are going on that “exceeds” natural cycles: False. I was warmer during most of the previous interglacials in the last half million years, it was much warmer during the the first half of the Tertiary, the last half of the Cretaceous, the Jurassic, Triassic, end of the Permian, The first half of the Carboniferous, the Devonian, most of the Silurian, most of the Ordivician, and the Cambrian. We half well within the range of natural variation, thank you:
http://www.geocities.com/andrewwerdna28/Klimacht1_files/image002.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/andrewwerdna28/Klimacht1_files/image004.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/andrewwerdna28/Klimacht1_files/image006.jpg
I think most people who have commented here have a poor idea how the nature of science “should” work. It appears that most people have their opinion made up. They then Google for evidence that supports their views. I think that is a big problem today; Google and easily accessible information has made everyone an expert “in their own eyes.”
Climate change is a complex issue and it is a very difficult to understand completely, even by people much more intelligent, educated, and experienced in the field than you or I. If someone states that a reduction of Arctic sea ice is evidence of global warming, their are critiques to that statement. Whining “Oh what about Antarctica, what about Antarctica?!” is not an argument.
The problem is that too many people just want to feel superior that they are “in the know” about the truth about global warming. Just like they are in the know about the 9/11 conspiracy, and the illuminati.
Arguing endlessly over whether or not diminishing Arctic sea ice is caused by global warming is rather foolish. You’re fighting over whether or not it supports your theory. That is not scientific. Science would dictate that you examine the evidence and then base a hypothesis around it. Not try and pigeon hole every environmental event. Get over yourself and examine each fact after you can admit that you may in fact be wrong. Correction, that that page you found using Google was inaccurate.
I probably should have added “the population bomb” of the 70’s/80’s to the list. Remember that one?
Oh, and that “solar insolation” fell during the midcentury cool period is also wrong. Highly misguided actually.
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/irradiance.gif
Where is it, huh?
tmulcahy, don’t applaud this fool. Nothing that comes out of his mouth is a fact that isn’t also propaganda, and the rest is just wrong.
I don’t belive in Dr. Marshall descovery
Thank you for this post. I can see from the above comments that it has people thinking and talking, and that’s the only way science will ever get it right. Science is not about having all the answers at the beginning – science is (as one commenter noted above) about applying the scientific method. This involves a decent amount of guessing in the beginning – but with the understanding that it’s just educated guessing at that point and will take a lot of testing, question asking, discussing, researching, experimenting, and fixing before we have real answers.
So, yes, people throughout history were wrong. The Earth is not flat. Lightning is not punishment from the Gods. But you have to be wrong sometimes before you can be right.
And for any of you, regardless of what side you are on, to be so damn sure that you are RIGHT is your critical error. The question you should be asking yourself is not “how can I prove to everybody that I am right?” The question you ask yourself should be “how can I come to understand this question better and promote understanding of this question among others?” This involves a whole lot more asking than telling.
I, personally, don’t feel like I know enough about the issue to have a definitive position. Maybe I never will. I feel in my gut that human behavior is having an effect on our atmosphere – it seems like an obvious conclusion to me – if you are involved in a system, you necessarily have an effect on that system. But I do truly believe that nature will correct – whether or not humans are around long enough to see the correction. Nature always has a way of fixing the problem. Whether humans would like to admit it or not, this planet does not NEED us to keep spinning. And, while we may destroy ourselves, we are not in a position to destroy the system.
“‘Oh what about Antartica?’ is not an argument”
mryantho, They have presented “evidence” by showing that the Arctic is “melting” which is supposed to be consistent with their theory (actually, its “not inconsistent”). If that’s good evidence that global warming is happening and is all our fault and we are all going to die, then isn’t it okay to point out they are cherry picking, using evidence and ignoring contrary evidence? Oh, that’s right, its okay for them to ignore this becuase its irrelevant, becuase they are just “right”, and becuase its necessary to distort the truth to fight that category five denial! How is melting ice in the Artic evidence of global warming if Antartic ice freezing isn’t evidence against it? Hint: Neither is evidence of either hypothesis. This is all fluff to get foolish citizens like Roads to become Patagonian Sheep following the Great Shepherd Gore. The facts are important, it is not acceptable to distort them just becuase your hypothesis is “right”. Especially if its actually “wrong”. Quit adding epicycles.
Roads strikes me as a Realclimate Kool-aid drinker. NASA claims “unusual atmospheric conditions” led to the dramatic melting. Those conditions would be the Pacific Decadel Oscillation and the Atlantic Multidecadel Oscillation both being in positive phase. Explanation and graph showing the uncanny relationship between the two cycles and Arctic temps can be found here.
Marvelous dissections of the Gang of Ten’s attempts to suppress UHI effects are found here.
What, you thought we were a bunch of knuckle-dragging Creationists over here?
mryantho makes a very similar argument to the one I was about to make. Thanks for saving me 5 minutes. In science it is always possible to poke holes in someone else’s research. This is because the nature of discovery forces every scientist to make judgments and choices. How should this be measured? How should this be calibrated? What does this result mean?
If you think global warming is not happening then fine. Stop for a second and allow yourself to be wrong. Everyone hopes you are right. Dont search for information that supports your preconceived opinion. Search for information from credible journals and seek to learn.
If you think global warming is real then fine (I am in this category). Stop for a second and allow yourself to be wrong. Again, dont search for information that supports your preconceived opinion. Search for information from credible journals and seek to learn.
One area where the two sides are not equal though is in effect. If global warming is happening then we must act now. If you have honestly sought out the information and you dont think GW is happening then dont just start chiding and using straw-man arguments against the other side. The only purpose in that is to make yourself look smart.
“Correction, that that page you found using Google was inaccurate.”
By the way, who and what are you talking about? Certainly can’t be me. I have been quite accurate. I have not even said that the evidence I provided is evidence of my “pet theory” whatever that is supposed to be. I simply presented objective facts in light of some stupid arrogance on the part of certain poster who really do think they know what they are talking about, but actually don’t. And I certainly didn’t just “google search” to find my information. The links I have provided are either to my own pages, with information from resources I trust, or to such resources, which check their own information. The image of increasing sea ice anomalies originated at the same place as the record low sea ice extent in the Arctic did, I believe. That is, it originated from Cryospheretoday, which is well regarded as a source for information about sea ice extent.
Regardless of the longterm reliability of current global warming science and theories (which I am skeptical of), isn’t it time we just said to ourselves, “We should be conservationists, with regards to everything?” Science is built to correct itself–that’s a good thing. This is what makes science fundamentally different from religion. But to live rationally, conserving what we value, moves beyond those houses of thought. Huxley was right: we are inevitably sliding towards the society suggested in A Brave New World (see A Brave New World Revisited), and so often we say “Ending is better than mending”, but rationale man says that’s a lot of bunk.
I’m sure someone out there who once thought that the Internet was going to be a bust. 😀
Andrew
Your article by ‘JunkScience’ is aptly named. The author knows less than solar irradiance than he would have you believe, I’d venture. Not least because he can’t spell the word correctly, he’s that well-versed in the subject.
There’s a much more complete version of the solar radiation curve in this link.
You misread much of what I said above. I didn’t say any of the following:
1) ‘there are no cycles in solar insolation.’ In fact, I said the precise opposite. There’s no point in calling me a solar change denier. I’m not. What I said that adding solar influences to anthropogenic carbon dioxide influences provides a near-perfect match for the observed global temperature curve. That’s entirely true.
2) ‘there is a one-way trend in temperature’. I said there was currently a one-way trend in carbon dioxide production and hence in global CO2 levels. .
3) ‘it’s never been warmer in the geological past.’ That’s not true, and I didn’t say it. It was warmer than today in each of those periods, but the point I made was that there was no ice on the planet then. Sea level was 200m higher than today for much of that time. That’s the point here.
It’s interesting that you seem intent on being so extremely rude. Good luck with that approach, since it cuts no ice with me.
2)
[…] { January 18, 2008 @ur momisugly 1:05 p01 } · { Uncategorized } { } check them out here […]
yes this is just propaganda in a moderate disguise, take your 5th century ideals elsewhere.
2007: Second warmest year on record. Get over it bozo.
If you choose to disbelieve scientific consensus, I will grant you that you have a right to do so. Since I am not a climatologist, I readily concede that my understanding of the issue is not as great as IPCC members. However, when a group of thousands of scientists all come to the same conclusion, it behooves you to accept this as reasonably true. If you choose not to do this, you have an ethical obligation to put your money where your mouth is.
In short, if you choose to continue to support politicians who do not believe in AGW, and if you choose to ignore the advice of people who have spent the vast majority of their lives studying the subject, you should also be prepared to bear the brunt of the consequences. Why shouldn’t you be? You don’t believe that they will occur, do you?
So sign yourself up on a list of people who are willing to give up their homes and their jobs to Bangladeshis who won’t have either in 25 years if the climate scientists are correct. Sign off now on an immigration policy that allows millions of refugees into the country if the waters start rising. Author legal agreements that transfer your retirement funds into relief efforts if the worst comes to pass.
Put your self-interest on the line, instead of merely sneering at people who dedicate their lives to advancing human knowledge. C’mon, what are you waiting for? It’s not going to happen anyway, right?
REPLY: Jeff, since you want to label others a “bozo” and since you are in Alaska, you might want to take a look at these.
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2007/12/10/how-not-to-measure-temperature-part-45/
and
http://ccc.atmos.colostate.edu/Alaskacoopsites.php
Then tell me please, if you think those thermometers up there are being affected? Also note that these stations are being found with conditions like this on a regular basis.
Note also, these stations are used by NASA GISS to determine “warmest years on record”.
You missed one of the top 10. Growing up, my father, a physicist and engineer, showed me one of his textbooks from college in the early 1950s showing demonstrably that flight beyond the speed of sound was physically impossible. There it was, all the calculations, drawings, explanations, etc. Wish he had given me that textbook…