An Expensive Urban Legend
by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
About.com describes an “urban legend” as an apocryphal (of questionable authenticity), secondhand story, told as true and just plausible enough to be believed, about some horrific…series of events….it’s likely to be framed as a cautionary tale. Whether factual or not, an urban legend is meant to be believed. In lieu of evidence, however, the teller of an urban legend is apt to rely on skillful storytelling and reference to putatively trustworthy sources.
I contend that the belief in human-caused global warming as a dangerous event, either now or in the future, has most of the characteristics of an urban legend. Like other urban legends, it is based upon an element of truth. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas whose concentration in the atmosphere is increasing, and since greenhouse gases warm the lower atmosphere, more CO2 can be expected, at least theoretically, to result in some level of warming.
But skillful storytelling has elevated the danger from a theoretical one to one of near-certainty. The actual scientific basis for the plausible hypothesis that humans could be responsible for most recent warming is contained in the cautious scientific language of many scientific papers. Unfortunately, most of the uncertainties and caveats are then minimized with artfully designed prose contained in the Summary for Policymakers (SP) portion of the report of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This Summary was clearly meant to instill maximum alarm from a minimum amount of direct evidence.
Next, politicians seized upon the SP, further simplifying and extrapolating its claims to the level of a “climate crisis”. Other politicians embellished the tale even more by claiming they “saw” global warming in Greenland as if it was a sighting of Sasquatch, or that they felt it when they fly in airplanes.
Just as the tales of marauding colonies of alligators living in New York City sewers are based upon some kernel of truth, so too is the science behind anthropogenic global warming. But there is a big difference between reports of people finding pet alligators that have escaped their owners, versus city workers having their limbs torn off by roving colonies of subterranean monsters.
In the case of global warming, the “putatively trustworthy sources” would be the consensus of the world’s scientists. The scientific consensus, after all, says that global warming is…is what? Is happening? Is severe? Is manmade? Is going to burn the Earth up if we do not act? It turns out that those who claim consensus either do not explicitly state what that consensus is about, or they make up something that supports their preconceived notions.
If the consensus is that the presence of humans on Earth has some influence on the climate system, then I would have to even include myself in that consensus. After all, the same thing can be said of the presence of trees on Earth, and hopefully we have at least the same rights as trees do. But too often the consensus is some vague, fill-in-the-blank, implied assumption where the definition of “climate change” includes the phrase “humans are evil”.
It is a peculiar development that scientific truth is now decided through voting. A relatively recent survey of climate scientists who do climate research found that 97.4% agreed that humans have a “significant” effect on climate. But the way the survey question was phrased borders on meaninglessness. To a scientist, “significant” often means non-zero. The survey results would have been quite different if the question was, “Do you believe that natural cycles in the climate system have been sufficiently researched to exclude them as a potential cause of most of our recent warming?”
And it is also a good bet that 100% of those scientists surveyed were funded by the government only after they submitted research proposals which implicitly or explicitly stated they believed in anthropogenic global warming to begin with. If you submit a research proposal to look for alternative explanations for global warming (say, natural climate cycles), it is virtually guaranteed you will not get funded. Is it any wonder that scientists who are required to accept the current scientific orthodoxy in order to receive continued funding, then later agree with that orthodoxy when surveyed? Well, duh.
In my experience, the public has the mistaken impression that a lot of climate research has gone into the search for alternative explanations for warming. They are astounded when I tell them that virtually no research has been performed into the possibility that warming is just part of a natural cycle generated within the climate system itself.
Too often the consensus is implied to be that global warming is so serious that we must do something now in the form of public policy to avert global catastrophe. What? You don’t believe that there are alligators in New York City sewer system? How can you be so unconcerned about the welfare of city workers that have to risk their lives by going down there every day? What are you, some kind of Holocaust-denying, Neanderthal flat-Earther?
It makes complete sense that in this modern era of scientific advances and inventions that we would so readily embrace a compelling tale of global catastrophe resulting from our own excesses. It’s not a new genre of storytelling, of course, as there were many B-movies in the 1950s whose horror themes were influenced by scientists’ development of the atomic bomb.
Our modern equivalent is the 2004 movie, “Day After Tomorrow”, in which all kinds of physically impossible climatic events occur in a matter of days. In one scene, super-cold stratospheric air descends to the Earth’s surface, instantly freezing everything in its path. The meteorological truth, however, is just the opposite. If you were to bring stratospheric air down to the surface, heating by compression would make it warmer than the surrounding air, not colder.
I’m sure it is just coincidence that “Day After Tomorrow” was directed by Roland Emmerich, who also directed the 2006 movie “Independence Day,” in which an alien invasion nearly exterminates humanity. After all, what’s the difference? Aliens purposely killing off humans, or humans accidentally killing off humans? Either way, we all die.
But a global warming catastrophe is so much more believable. After all, climate change does happen, right? So why not claim that ALL climate change is now the result of human activity? And while we are at it, let’s re-write climate history so that we get rid of the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice age, with a new ingenious hockey stick-shaped reconstruction of past temperatures that makes it look like climate never changed until the 20th Century? How cool would that be?
The IPCC thought it was way cool…until it was debunked, after which it was quietly downgraded in the IPCC reports from the poster child for anthropogenic global warming, to one possible interpretation of past climate.
And let’s even go further and suppose that the climate system is so precariously balanced that our injection of a little bit of that evil plant food, carbon dioxide, pushes our world over the edge, past all kinds of imaginary tipping points, with the Greenland ice sheet melting away, and swarms of earthquakes being the price of our indiscretions.
In December, hundreds of bureaucrats from around the world will once again assemble, this time in Copenhagen, in their attempts to forge a new international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. And as has been the case with every other UN meeting of its type, the participants simply assume that the urban legend is true. Indeed, these politicians and governmental representatives need it to be true. Their careers and political power now depend upon it.
And the fact that they hold their meetings in all of the best tourist destinations in the world, enjoying the finest exotic foods, suggests that they do not expect to ever have to be personally inconvenienced by whatever restrictions they try to impose on the rest of humanity.
If you present these people with evidence that the global warming crisis might well be a false alarm, you are rewarded with hostility and insults, rather than expressions of relief. The same can be said for most lay believers of the urban legend. I say “most” because I once encountered a true believer who said he hoped my research into the possibility that climate change is mostly natural will eventually be proved correct.
Unfortunately, just as we are irresistibly drawn to disasters – either real ones on the evening news, or ones we pay to watch in movie theaters – the urban legend of a climate crisis will persist, being believed by those whose politics and worldviews depend upon it. Only when they finally realize what a new treaty will cost them in loss of freedoms and standard of living will those who oppose our continuing use of carbon-based energy begin to lose their religion.
PS: Fred – I have downloaded your presentation and will be distributing to colleagues (mostly skeptics).
“the “skeptic movement” as a whole seems to expend most of their energy taking their case directly to the policymakers and the public and publishing in less serious journals”
Because the journals that you regard as serious won’t publish papers that question their pre-conceptions but rather accept self peer reviewed work that is frankly shoddy.
As a ‘physicist’ you should understand that the keystone of alarmist logic is that since we understand all the processes of the climate and all the influences on it from the sun and the oceans, we may assign any unexplained warming to Man.
The presumption that we understand the climate is flawed and only a fool would argue with that.
You may consider yourself a ‘physicist’ but your inability to understand the logic of your position shows you don’t think like one.
Joel,
Ok, so maybe once in a while a fad might come along, but nevertheless, I agree that,
“we don’t have any viable substitute for basing policy decisions on the best understanding of the current scientific view in the peer-reviewed literature”.
Which science disciplines would you listen to? Do you prefer hard sciences? Would you submit at the other extreme, to policies decisions based on developmental psychology?
Joel,
It seems to me you are sincere in your beliefs, so I would like to ask, in your opinion, what are the “arguments that have most often been thoroughly debunked in the scientific realm.”
I want to cross reference the skeptical arguments with those that have been “debunked” and then examine the “debunking” arguments.
Joel:
Thus, I think that it is incumbent on scientists who are “skeptics” on AGW to prevail on their fellow scientists to change their views by presenting their evidence in a scientific forum…and I actually applaud Dr. Spencer for working to publish his papers in reputable scientific journals.
The problem is money. Huge amounts invested in finding results that meet the political agenda – AGW. With the work of Steve MacIntyre and others indicating an un-level playing field, it’s doubtful traditional science forums remain valid. Rather, it seems that Pielke and Spencer and Plimer, Lindzen etc. take their work to the public – who then demand their representatives pay attention (as in Utah recently.) This may not be the “democratization” of science, but it is a citizens’ action that is undoubtedly having a positive effect.
We shall see if this effect causes the traditional forums to re-consider skeptic research. But it is likely a matter of survival for them.
Shirley,
“P.S. The consensus position is very clear, consisting of the following points: (1) the climate is getting warmer; (2) CO2 is the cause for this warming; (3) in particular, the CO2 released by burning fossil fuels; (4) this will turn into a problem if we don’t do something about it. Obviously y’all know this, since you are reading and posting comments on a blog created to deny exactly those four points, multiple times per day. Or is that just a coincidence?”
Let’s take each point.
1) Climate is getting warmer. Yes, everyone agrees on that but as to the amount of warming, even the scientific institutions can’t agree.
2) CO2 is the cause for this warming. Nobody, not even the IPCC makes such a ridiculous claim. The IPCC position is that greenhouse gases (not just CO2) accounts for the majority of the warming, not all of it. Then you have very credible scientific opionion that humans are altering the climate but CO2 is only a minor part of this (Roger Pielke et al). There is also very robust evidence that most of the warming is natural with CO2 playing a minor role and further evidence that warming has stopped since 1998.
3) See point 2.
4) This will turn into a problem. Not much consensus on this and with good reason. Most scientists understand the limitations of computer models.
Regarding the Precautionary Principle:
Authoritarians (Fascists and Communists) murdered at least 100 million people last century. It seems that we would be wise to take precautions against authoritarianism in all it’s various forms, given the track record.
Dr. Spencer opines:
Only when they finally realize what a new treaty will cost them in loss of freedoms and standard of living will those who oppose our continuing use of carbon-based energy begin to lose their religion.
I fear the rude awakening will come too late — after the next authoritarian-backed mass bloodletting, not before. Because people are not generally precautionary about the things they should be.
Joel Shore
Yes, in a perfect world I’m sure what you suggest would be the way to tackle this debate. But this particular field has become very politicised.
I am not a scientist and have never been one, although my education was scientific (electronics and physics). I have followed the debate for about a year now and a lot of the practical science seems to depend on funding, and what I have picked up on (and please correct me if I am wrong) is that obtaining funding for climate research often depends on meeting political criteria ( the fads and paradigms you mention). Anecdotally, it would seem a lot easier to obtain funding for research that is likely to align with pro AGW orthodoxy.
This would seem to make it a lot more difficult for those scientists with a sceptical outlook to actually produce the work that their better funded peers would actually take note of. You need to do the research and offer your paper for publishing before you can obtain peer review.
As for the rest of the”sceptical movement”, I can only speak for myself, but I suspect many are like me, in that we ask questions when we see or hear of things which don’t add up or don’t accord with our personal experience. When we don’t get answers, are called deniers or are told “the science is settled” yet see more and more complex mechanisms and models proposed to account for climate predictions which don’t accord with observation, then we doubt that th scientists have it right.
I am reminded of the increasing complex models (based on spheres, deferents and epicycles) proposed by Ptolemy to account for observed planetary and stellar motion when the orthodox view was of a geocentric universe.
Roy Spencer (08:14:46) :
turbobloke:
There have already been hundreds of studies that supposedly support the theory of manmade global warming. What I am suggesting are studies that examine alternative hypotheses for most of the warming. But, at some point, sure, some combination of the two is most likely.
BTW, for those monitoring the AMSU site, the new “sea surface” temperature is from AMSR-E on the Aqua satellite, using Frank Wentz’s (RSS) retrievals. We have not yet replaced the NOAA-15 AMSU with the Aqua AMSU on the website, however. But we’re working on it.
Dear Dr. Spencer,
1) Turboblocke is the name now, I had to change it after a rabid anti-scientist started posting using the “Turbobloke” name elsewhere and I don’ want to be confused with him
2) Scientists know there are many uncertainties in the AGW theory and research is being carried out on them. http://climate.nasa.gov/uncertainties/
3) The IPCC report specifically states that there are areas of low scientific understanding. They are being actively researched.
4) Given that as you say in your Global 101 that the CO2 enhanced greenhouse effect is not contoversial, why would anyone expect to get funded for research that seeks to exclude the effects of CO2?
I don’t think there are any reputable scientists who claim that CO2 is the only influence on the climate.
BTW I would have thought that the Shaviv and Svensgard are two cases that disprove your claim.
Fred H. Haynie (09:13:38) :
http://www.kidswincom.net/climate.pdf
Thanks Fred! Looks like good analysis.
No sooner do we acknowledge the bbc starting to thaw a little we get this, surely the most daft suggestion yet:-
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8324954.stm
Where do they get these stories, and then just broadcast it without any thorough checking.
Re: Joel Shore (11:59:26)
Heh, thanks for that link Joel, I hadn’t seen that before. Weart’s description of a “radiative ping-pong ball greenhouse effect” is very funny. It conjured up a hilarious mental image that really had me laughing. It is also entirely incorrect and so wrong-headed that I hardly know where to begin.
Let’s take your statement:
“In a nutshell, what is important is not whether or not a photon get absorbed once or zero times but actually the distribution of levels from which the photons are emitted that successfully escape to space. The higher this distribution of levels is in the troposphere, the colder the temperature and hence (by the Stefan-Boltzmann Eq.) the less radiation that gets emitted.”
This is entirely incorrect. The IR radiation that originates in the troposphere is the result of the release (radiation) of latent energies by water vapor as it changes phase at altitude in the troposphere. This radiation is the strongest in the upper-most levels of the troposphere precisely because it is so cold there.
As water vapor rises through the atmosphere, if it fails to encounter a nucleation seed (speck of mineral dust, airborne bacteria, etc.) by the time it reaches ~700 mbar (where the temperature is 0C), it can continue to rise as supercooled water vapor. Upon reaching an altitude of ~300 mbar, where the temperature is -42C, that temperature causes the supercooled water vapor to spontaneously crystallize, due to crystal homogeneous nucleation, without the need for an external nucleation seed.
When this irreversible freezing process occurs, the latent heat of sublimation is released (radiated) and it is quite large. Recent investigation indicates a lower bound for this energy to be ~50% greater than the simple sum of the latent energies of condensation and fusion, due to a change in entropy. Here is a link to that paper:
http://www.phy.mtu.edu/~kostinsk/jas_entropic.pdf
This is supported by the atmospheric cooling rates calculated with the LINEPAK line-by-line code using the Intercomparison of Radiation Codes in Climate Models (ICRCCM). Take a look at figure 1 in this paper:
http://esto.nasa.gov/conferences/estc-2002/Papers/B4P2%28Mlynczak%29.pdf
As can be seen, the atmospheric cooling (due to radiation) is calculated to be the strongest at ~300 mbar, where the irreversible freezing of supercooled water vapor releases the latent energy of sublimation. The Stefan-Boltzmann Eq. is of no concern here.
At the link you provided, Weart said:
What happens to infrared radiation emitted by the Earth’s surface? As it moves up layer by layer through the atmosphere, some is stopped in each layer. (To be specific: a molecule of carbon dioxide, water vapor or some other greenhouse gas absorbs a bit of energy from the radiation. The molecule may radiate the energy back out again in a random direction.
This is also incorrect, as no tropospheric gas re-emits any absorbed upwelling IR (UIR) due to radiative decay, and that can be easily demonstrated with simple observation. Take a look at this radiance plot of surface measurements during a cloud-free night and day.
http://www.srrb.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/surf_check?site=desr&mos=June&day=2&year=2008&p1=dpsp&p5=dpir&p6=upir&ptype=gif
As can be seen, even though during daylight hours the UIR increases by 200 W/m^2 (50%!) the downwelling IR (DIR) fails to respond. These energies (photons) travel at the speed of light. If it were true that tropospheric gases re-emitted (due to radiative decay) any of the upwelling IR they absorbed , there would HAVE to be an increase in the DIR in response to the tremendous increase in UIR, but there is not.
The only tropospheric gas that emits IR is water vapor, due to it changing phase and releasing latent energies.
Joel, I think you need to seriously reconsider your position, as it is unsupported by the information at hand.
Now, I wonder why THAT would be (given on-going and scheduled ‘votes’ in governing bodies and the like –
– and for the 90W * minds, surely the headstart the IPCC has had in their several ‘summaries for policymakers’ sets the precedent?
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* 90W, literally, “ninety-weight”, as in ‘gear lube’ which possesses a thick viscosity at room temperature; viscosity, a measure of the resistance of a ‘fluid’ being deformed by shear stress or extensional stress
.
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The red herring by the AGW true believer, Joel Shore, that skeptics should keep to their place and only discuss the failures of AGW in forums he approves is rather transparent and condescending.
AGW promoters have not had any problem dominating every aspect of the public square for over 20 years.
At this point, real tax dollars, in very large sums, and real treaties, that directly impacts each of us are at stake. We on the skeptic side are, it seems to some of our AGW friends, too uppity in pointing out the failures and falseness of their theory. That is clearly an effort of distractoin on their part.
All reasonable people should never forget the ad homs, the threats against professional standing, and the calls for criminalization of cilmate dissent, by the AGW community.
Now, with the public opinion joining the facts, and not supporting AGW, the true believers are suddenly calling for the debate to be limited to peer review processes (controlled by AGW promoters)?
No. Way. Ever.
Stefan,
Great post on the Spiral Dynamics model, which explains a lot about how worldviews evolve, both in cultures and in each of us throughout life. Thanks for introducing it in this context!
Green is not the end of the road, and getting beyond its conceptual limitations to what Claire Graves, Don Beck and Ken Wilber call “second tier” is the challenge.
Didn’t read all the comments, but I agree with all your points bar one. To wit, you said:
“And as has been the case with every other UN meeting of its type, the participants simply assume that the urban legend is true. Indeed, these politicians and governmental representatives need it to be true. Their careers and political power now depend upon it.”
What makes you think the politicians actually believe the AGW myth? Most would not understand the science, nor care what the science was telling them… what they DO care about, is how they can use the myth to feed their misguided policies to the masses.
If, by some miraculous turn of events, the politicians find the public becoming informed about the AGW myth and their support-base vaporises, they will simply blame the scientists that informed them it was a consensus. How is this different to the “WMD reports”? Oh wait, the WMD reports weren’t even in the public eye… the IPCC documents are.
The politicians will not be hurt by this… much like the GFC bankers there is no perceived downside risk for the politicians pushing the AGW line. Once the support shifts, so will they… but they will have to find another taxation policy basis for bailing out their massive GFC fiscal stimulus debt.
This is my broad take on the realpolitik… politicians survive by being nimble and flexible when it comes to policy. They cannot afford to be too attached to dogma unless they are a fringe party like the Greens.
RW (13:09:16) :
Vast amounts of research have been carried out into all factors which influence the climate.
Would you please enumerate the areas of climate and the dollar amounts allotted to each of them so we can see the data that has led you to this conclusion?
We all know that billions have gone in to co2. So will you show us how much has gone in to these other areas you speak of?
I previously said (21:30:51):
“The actual water vapour content in the upper troposphere has declined by 17% from 1948 to 2008 at the 400 mb pressure level (about 8 km altitude).
The result is that there has been no increase in the total effective amount of greenhouse gases, as characterized by optical depth (transparency to long-wave radiation), in sixty years, as demonstrated by the green line on this graph, according to the radiosonde data.”
http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/FOS%20Essay/Optical%20Depth2008.jpg
tallbloke (04:09:49) said:
“The pyrheliometry data on optical depth seems to say something different. Hoyt found no change to 1968 but Philipona et al who continued the work using the Hoyt time series as a baseline find various changes in optical depth since.”
http://acp.web.psi.ch/acp_publ/documents/proceedings/2002_9_20_Atmos.Res.JFJ_Davos.pdf#page=23
The article shows the measurement of short-wave transmission, which is highly affected by volcanic and human caused aerosols. The article states “Only in 1985 the atmosphere seemed to partly recover from the volcanic aerosol burden reaching again a transparency level of 2 to 3 % below the (1909-1968) long-term reference.”
My comment and graph refers to long-wave optical depth, not short-wave.
Part 3 of the article discusses 4 years of long-wave radiation measurements. It does not discuss any time trend, and considering the large variation of water vapour content, 4 years of data can not determine a time trend.
Shurley Knot (11:04:33) :
(1) the climate is getting warmer;
Data shows the earth is cooling. Global warming in not happening. Global cooling is happening. It is normal for the earth to go through warming and cooling phases.
Look up the data. It will show you this ‘consensus’ view is wrong.
Shurley Knot (11:04:33) :
(2) CO2 is the cause for this warming;
Data shows that what you say is not true.
Shurley Knot (11:04:33) :
(4) this will turn into a problem if we don’t do something about it.
The earth is cooling. There is no problem. There never was a problem. Everything is ok. Stop trying to scare people!
Spencer = creationist = nut
OK that’s it, you are banned- you are nothing but troll bombing each thread with your comments – get out- Anthony
sagi (18:24:25) :
“Green is not the end of the road, and getting beyond its conceptual limitations to what Claire Graves, Don Beck and Ken Wilber call “second tier” is the challenge.”
I agree. And it is interesting because the AGW faction present the debate as being some sort of conflict between those with a “Green – Humanistic” world-view (value-Meme) and those with an “Orange – Materialistic” world-view. Hence the common assertion that skeptics are funded by “Big-Oil” etc.
Conversely, the real debate appears to be between various “Green” world-views (and there are several) and a very rational “Yellow – Systemic” world-view, as presented by many of the “qualified” contributers to this group.
Unfortunately for the world, the majority of politicians are either inclined to a “Red – Egocentric” world view or to “Orange” type thinking or “Green” type views, so will make decisions on that basis.
It is only true statesmen who take a systemic view of the world, and they are unfortunately few and far between.
sagi, Rereke Whakaaro, hello and thanks, it is nice not to be a lone voice on a forum 🙂
Do you think there might be any aspects of the AGW issue that when focussed on, could be the conditions or demands that begin to shift anyone who’s already at exiting-Green to Second Tier, at least cognitively?
What do you think about Green in science? How do we talk to, say, scientists who on the one hand would maintain that the only real forum for truth is their own peer reviewed journals, whilst at the same time, some of these scientists might also be members of an ethical movement, perhaps a Green organisation, like the Union of Concerned Scientists?
Re: hunter (07:50:51) :
Joel Shore,
Your post is so wrong as to make reasonable people doubt your sincerity.
The IPCC is not a scientific panel, for starters.
It is a political panel, carefully organized to sell AGW.
Its leader is not a climatologist.
The fact that the climate is not at all behaving in any sort of unusual fashion is not going to go away, no matter how many scientists allegedly believe it is not so.
Shore’s post was well put and quite correct, your answer though amounts to no more than a shout ‘No! Nóóó!’. Is this how you refute arguments? How do expect AGW-believers to ever lose their illusions if this is all you can come up with?
In general, I find this thread utterly uninteresting, totally off topic. Scientific truth is not decided by consensus; articles and talk about consensus have no place whatsoever in a discussion on climate change. Whether popular opinion on climate change, it will not affect climate change at all. It baffles me how some people seem to think differently about this.