The ever sharp Bishop Hill blog writes:
While perusing some of the review comments to the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report, I came across the contributions of Andrew Lacis, a colleague of James Hansen’s at GISS. Lacis’s is not a name I’ve come across before but some of what he has to say about Chapter 9 of the IPCC’s report is simply breathtaking.
Chapter 9 is possibly the most important one in the whole IPCC report – it’s the one where they decide that global warming is manmade. This is the one where the headlines are made.
Remember, this guy is mainstream, not a sceptic, and you may need to remind yourself of that fact several times as you read through his comment on the executive summary of the chapter:
There is no scientific merit to be found in the Executive Summary. The presentation sounds like something put together by Greenpeace activists and their legal department. The points being made are made arbitrarily with legal sounding caveats without having established any foundation or basis in fact. The Executive Summary seems to be a political statement that is only designed to annoy greenhouse skeptics. Wasn’t the IPCC Assessment Report intended to be a scientific document that would merit solid backing from the climate science community – instead of forcing many climate scientists into having to agree with greenhouse skeptic criticisms that this is indeed a report with a clear and obvious political agenda. Attribution can not happen until understanding has been clearly demonstrated. Once the facts of climate change have been established and understood, attribution will become self-evident to all. The Executive Summary as it stands is beyond redemption and should simply be deleted.
I’m speechless. The chapter authors, however weren’t. This was their reply (all of it):
Rejected. [Executive Summary] summarizes Ch 9, which is based on the peer reviewed literature.
Simply astonishing. This is a consensus?
(h/t to WUWT reader Tom Mills)
UPDATE: There’s an update to the story at Dot Earth.
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/09/does-an-old-climate-critique-still-hold-up/
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Ash says:
“Are the later studies wrong, and the one you cite correct? I would imagine that would be your assertion. On what basis?”
On the sensible basis that the official ARGO site itself shows deep ocean cooling: click
Just as he misrepresented my comment, Mr Ash deliberately misrepresented Garry’s numerous examples of financial self-dealing above, by claiming that Garry said that every climate researcher – from Ph.D’s on down to grad students – and every reviewer is in it for the money. “That’s what you’re asserting about not just some, not even most: but every researcher with whom you disagree.”
That is a verifiably untrue statement, and people who invent words for others should remember that it’s easy to fact check here.
Ash is a crank blinded by cognitive dissonance. No matter how many facts are presented, he simply moves the goal posts like so many in the warmist crowd do, pretends to ‘study’ graphs provided that clearly refute his alarmist position, and re-states the words of others to mean something different – a straw man argument – and then knocks down the straw man. We’re on to that kind of misrepresentation here.
To put the goal posts back to their original position: the AGW hypothesis states that increasing anthropogenic CO2 will lead to runaway global warming and climate catastrophe.
But there is no empirical evidence presented. Skeptics say, if that is so, then show that an X increase in CO2 causes an X increase in global temperature. That is what must be demonstrated, or the hypothesis falls to the level of conjecture. Spending $Trillions on an unproven conjecture is lunacy, and the onus is on those proposing such a lunatic idea to defend it; skeptics have nothing to defend, because skeptics have nothing to prove.
Smokey, you have dismissed climate research by saying it is influenced by money. Not just some of it: all of it. If you are now saying that not all researchers are corrupt, then you are saying some of the research is valid. You simply cannot have it both ways.
CO2 is rising in the atmosphere. I hope that’s beyond dispute. Satellite and surface measurements find less energy is escaping to space at CO2 absorption wavelengths. Ocean and surface temperature measurements find the planet continues to accumulate heat over a timeline of decades. If you reject this line of evidence, please explain why, and what you would accept as proof – or disproof – of the anthropogenic climate change hypothesis.
Calling your interlocutors names like “crank” is a schoolyard way of engaging in debate. I’ve been civil and courteous, and I see no reason why you can’t do the same.
But Mr. Ash, the climate was warming BEFORE the industrial revolution at the same rate. What on earth makes you think it’s related to CO2 and Armageddon?
Paul Daniel Ash (09:15:47) : “Evidence that every climate researcher – from Ph.D’s on down to grad students – and every reviewer is in it for the money… It is your hypothesis, and it is up to you to prove it. ”
I thought you had mis-posted your above response, because I never said (or believed) that “every reviewer is in it for the money.”
So if that is not a mistake, please provide a retraction or an apology or both.
Garry, read my response to Smokey. You both attempted to invalidate climate research by saying scientists had “vested financial interests” in pushing the anthropogenic hypothesis.
If what you meant was “only some do,” then in what way does this possibly refute all climate research?
And if it wasn’t an attempt at refuting all climate research, then why did you bring it up in the first place?
the climate was warming BEFORE the industrial revolution at the same rate
What a surprise, another assertion.
@ur momisugly Paul Daniel Ash (13:26:33) : quoted DCC:
“the climate was warming BEFORE the industrial revolution at the same rate”
To which El Cabeza de bloque responded:
“What a surprise, another assertion.”
No surprise at all. It simply means that you never bothered to go to the link that I gave you at 10:11:42 today. That goes a long way in explaining why you never learn anything.
The link, if I must spoon feed you, has a chart of thermometer readings in central England from 1669 to 2007. In case you were not listening in History 101 either, the industrial revolution is generally considered to have started in 1800. CO2 has increased at an accelerating rate since then. There is absolutely no sign of any accelerating increase in warming (CO2 signal) in that chart. The measured temperature increase is a relatively steady 0.26 degrees Celsius per century, less than half a degree Fahrenheit.
Now stop being such a jerk.
I did go to that link when you posted it. I couldn’t imagine that was what you were referring to when you said “the climate was warming BEFORE the industrial revolution at the same rate” because, as the Wiki page clearly states, that data shows “From 1910, temperatures increased slightly until about 1950 when they flattened before a sharp rising trend began in about 1975.”
Not only do you not read the science, you don’t read the sources you provide for your own arguments, and then presume to lecture me for not reading them.
I was actually embarrassed for you when I read your response.
Paul Daniel Ash (07:01:11) :
No, but that’s a fallacy of composition. Your list grabs things from the popular media (the “acne” entry led to someone’s blog filled with airy assertions about how climate change will affect your skin) as well as scientific studies and acts like they’re all equal.
And here again, you’re conflating different sorts of people and saying they’re all the same. Gore’s not a scientist, and I’m assuming that by “Patchouli” you mean Rajendra Pachauri, who’s also not a scientist. “The RC crowd?” Does that refer to the Real Climate blog?
To answer your question on RC, yes
Both sides commit the error of taking the worst arguments of the other side and saying it represents the whole. Some, but not all supporters of the scientific consensus view do so ofpreconceived notions about capitalism and industry, and use it as a justification to advance an agenda. Some, but not all skeptics (or realists, or whatever term you prefer) take that view because it supports their political views about the government and academia.
Neither group helps their side of the debate. But neither group should define the debate.
OK, I wasn’t clear about the Warm List. Does it all reference peer reviewed science, probably not, does much of it… yes it does. The point I was trying to make here is that Pachauri, as a PHD and referred to as a leading climate scientist (I’ve never seen him correct anyone on it, but at the very least he holds the mantle of representing scientific consensus in the form of the IPCC reports), and the RC crew have never spent any time that I have seen, distinguishing what they consider to be solid science verses the crap. They will come flying, fangs out, like spider monkeys attacking anything that they consider skeptical and have, many times, applied the label of bad science to things that really turned out to be pretty good science… but when it comes to bad science that supports the CAGW (even some of the non peer-reviewed stuff that made it into the IPCC reports) the silence has been deafening.
So to summarize… I see the point you’re making and agree. At the same time, the most recent Lindzen paper was first critiqued on this site by Roy Spencer, which, majority speaking, covered the same points that the RC crew later raised with it. Maybe I’ve just missed all the times Gavin, Jones, and Mann have gone after poor pro-CAGW research. If you can point me to some I’d be interested to see.
Wow, sorry for the formatting there – did not mean to bold the whole thing!
Mods any chance you could help a brutha out?
[Done. ~dbs]
The quote you mention is irrelevant. It has no relationship to CO2 signal. Mauna Loa measurements began in 1958 and show an essentially monotonic increase since then. (Google it.) You have completely missed the issue which is that you have to show a correlation between CO2 concentration and temperature and then rule out all alternate possible causes before you can conclude causality. But there isn’t even a correlation. Check the geologic record. Hint:
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/PageMill_Images/image277.gif
No need to be embarrased for me. You have enough to worry about. Since it’s clear that you know nothing and have no ability to think logically, I resign from my unpaid position as your tutor. Please put on your pointy hat and go sit on a stool in the corner.
By the way, I don’t believe for one second that you read that reference until I repeated it, then you frantically went looking for some miniscule point. Sorry, but you didn’t find it.
To Mr Paul Daniel Ash.
You claim to be interested in learning. Fine, but it does not seem that you respect any answers you have been given. You gainsay the data and refuse to recoginize established facts.
If you really want to learn than you must study. But, be carefull. If you study junk science all you will have is the ideas of fools. On the other hand if you study the truth your opinions might just change. We respect intellegent and well reasoned opinions.
Open your mind. I suggest you start by rereading your own posts. They do you no credit. You announce yourself as closed minded and unwilling to fairly consider contrary opinions. And you probally think you are comming accross as open minded and reasonable. Your posts are neither.
You do not seem to be aware that it is clearly documented in the climate gate e-mails, news and blogs, that numerous freedom of information act requests for information laws have been broken by AWG climate scientists. Where have you been? Under a rock? Intentional ignoracnce makes an awful agruement.
Tell me how do you deal with the fact that number of surfact tempature measurement points have been selectively reduced? That fact is not in dispute. However, if you wish to further show your ignorance by disptuing it go for it.
To me, it is inconceivable that in a period of time when global warming research is at an historical high, When we are told that the whole world is in peril, that the number of used tempature measurement would be in a staggeraing decline. This is not due to lack of money for research. Nor is it due to lack of need. Only a fool would think we do not need better data. (Or perhaps a fraudster) Anyone who claims that more surface tempature data points are not needed, and also claims the AWG is a serious concen is lying. To claim that statistical analysis can fill in the missing data with reliable accurcary is simply stupid.
There is no lack of money. There is no lack of need for good unbiased data. But, the powers that be will spend billions for analysis of data and only pennies for data? The only logical conculsion I can reach from these facts is that the data is not important to decision makers. It is mearly a cover for political activities. They are interested in apperance, presentation and public image, but not science. By your posts you identify yourself with this crowd. Can you actully deny the need for addtional raw data? Are you that anti-scientific?
If there was any real interest in finding the truth on the part of the AWG specualtions we would be buried in data. There would be no need for FOI actions to get a look at the data and methods. But, if there is fraud and misues of data than what we are observing would be consistant.
Your focus on a warming trend from 1975 to 1998 (I read at RC that trends of less than 30 years have no meaing in climate research under the IPCC standards.) So why do you place any importance on this 23 year tend?
Your focus seems to be conisitant with other self deceived warmers. Why is it that that they seem to be so statisitically challenged? Perhaps it relates to some flaw in thier education.
Your invalid warming trend ended 10 years ago. The only statisitcally significant trend according to a reasonable reading of the IPPC standard would be the cooling trend that ran from 1938 to 1974. Which is even longer past than the insignificant warming trend which your friends seem to drool over. Get with the times and wake up. The warming is over.
That appears to be is why they shifted to from Global warming to climate change. Still blaming the very friendly CO2 for the change. But, now they are predecting cooling as much as warming. (Spin rather than science is not impressive to the educated)
We agree either cooling or warming is likly. All in according with the natural pattern.
We remember the outragous statements made by the Priests of the AGW religion. We remember the false clamis that, England, Washington DC and even the artic will be free of snow by now. How many times do we have to listen to wolf before we have a right to doubt the one calling the meaningless warning?
I wonder how thourghly must the AGW specualtions be discredited by real world data before this fraud is dropped?
Move along. Nothing to see here. The real news is at
http://preview.tinyurl.com/yhu7lev
some miniscule point
You said:
The link that you provided to support your assertion says, clearly:
It is not “some miniscule point.” The link that you provided not only fails to show what you asserted, it is not ambiguous or debatable, but clearly shows the exact opposite of what you claim.
Calling me names does not advance your argument, nor does attempting to minimize your error.
Dr, Lacis weighs in, with his own words:
““There is a great deal of irony in this basically nonsensical stuff, some of which I find rather amusing. The global warming denier blogs, where this issue first came up, seem to think that I was being critical of the I.P.C.C. report in the same way as seen from their perspective, and, as a result, I have received e-mails from the denier crowd hailing my remarks and commending me for “speaking up” on this important topic.
Little do they realize that the basic thrust of my criticism of the I.P.C.C. draft was really to register a clear complaint that I.P.C.C. was being too wishy-washy and was not presenting its case for anthropogenic impact being the principal driver of global warming as clearly and forcefully as they could, and should.”
…
“Had I been asked to write this chapter (which I wasn’t), I would describe “understanding and attributing of climate change” as simply a problem in physics, which it actually is. I would have started the Executive Summary with: Human-induced warming of the climate system is established fact.”
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/12/nasa-scientist-adds-to-views-on-climate-panel/“
No response to Dr. Lacis’ comment?
@distant-onlooker (10:23:17) :
“No response to Dr. Lacis’ comment?”
Try using the find command working backwards from your post. Better yet, read all the posts.
“distant-onlooker (10:23:17) :
No response to Dr. Lacis’ comment?”
a) he should stop using the word “denier”.
b) Probably they went to town on him and he had to recant to keep his job.
Sufficient for you?
I had been checking back to see if Lacis’ follow up ever happened, glad to see it did. A couple of points unresolved for me at least:
1.) From the closing he characterization by the IPCC reviewers it sounds like they are now saying this was just robust debate. Why in hell was their first response that Lacis didn’t understand the process?
2.) After reading these additional comments, Lacis defense that his language was proper and just misinterpreted sounds a little flaky. Could it be that his real problem with the draft was that it wasn’t authorative/hard enough… that’s what he’s saying now so I guess so. Still, why on earth would you invoke Greenpeace to imply wishy washy(?) Hell, he slams the use of anthropological in the summary statement but then uses it repeatedly to explain himself. Typically when I see a very technical writer who is capable of clearly explaining himself become very overly technical and confusing in his explanations I become suspicious – force of habit. Hell, I’ve even used this trick before to “throw off the hounds”. I admit, this suspicion could be the result of a very quick first read off of my mobile – I’ll try and sit down and dig through it again in more detail later.
So in summary for now, let it be known that Lacis is a true believer in Global Warming (should I find it intesting that he doesn’t call it Climate Change), that any hint of skepticism is just those crazy “deniers” misreading/misleading, that Greenpeace in Climate language means wishy-washy and overly conervative and not overreaching, that AGW is just a simple physics problem, and that despite having no way to distinguish natural temperature variation from human induced temperature variation they are 95% sure that CO2 is to blame for nearly all of the observed variations in temperature.
Did I miss anything?
I like how you guys quote everything in your original post except Lacis’ response where he says your interpretations of his comments to the IPCC were wrong.
Well played.
Had I been asked to write this chapter (which I wasn’t), I would describe “understanding and attributing of climate change” as simply a problem in physics, which it actually is. I would have started the Executive Summary with: Human-induced warming of the climate system is established fact.
While I disagree with his logic and assertion of “fact”, I think on a second read I’m starting to see the point he’s trying to make. Maybe Andy’s reply in the comments says it better than I can:
In a way, that was my point. They overstated the definitiveness — I still feel that is true — and missed the strength of the case. I wish I’d thought of expressing it that way in the original post. Dr. Lacis pretty much hammers that here.
Maybe I could take a stab at my own explanation of it… Lacis thinks they spent too much time in the weeds trying to overstate how solid the case is, when if they had outlined the entire chapter differently they could have outlined a clearer, and more solid case.
In a weird way, and maybe this is because I have to spend lots of time wordsmithing stuff for nontechnical audiences and tend to put a lot of meat into my statements, I think I might agree with him. Maybe this other review statement by him might help explain:
The chapter starts by putting the cart ahead of the horse – attributions are made left and right without ever laying a foundation to stand on. The objective of the Assessment Report should be to produce a clear and convincing documentation of climate change, and avoid becoming a punching bag for climate change critics and skeptics.
He then goes on to lay out what he sees as the proper format for it. A clear roadmap for a statement is better than puking out a bunch of caveated assertions in no particular or coherent order – on that I think we can agree.
Where I don’t agree, is that the only thing necessary to accomplish his goal is a simple reformat and wordsmithing. Many of those legal-sounding caveats are in there because they need to be, not because someone just didn’t know how to write clearly. Take, for example, from the final version of the report in question:
There is observational evidence of an increase in intense tropical cyclone activity in the North Atlantic since about 1970, with limited evidence of increases elsewhere. There is no clear trend in the annual numbers of tropical cyclones. It is difficult to ascertain longer-term trends in cyclone activity, particularly prior to 1970
If the legalese was removed from this statement, it would verge on the patently/provably false. With the fuzzy wording (limited, no clear trend, difficult to ascertain, etc) there is much more wiggle room for defense since probably 2/3 of the statement is caveat.
If one were truly concerned with the summary being a tidy, solid and clear document I think you’d have to remove attributions like this. Stick to the solid stuff, and forgo the death by a thousand cuts of restating every alleged attribution of AGW.
So in summary, I’m not sure how heavily he was “misinterpreted, misused and otherwise taken out of context” – at least intentionally. I have yet to see anyone really try and make the case, and not get shot down for it at least, that he’s a secret “denier”. Speaking for myself, I also find that the summary is unclear and does not do a good job at making its point.
Maybe where the ultimate misunderstanding here is that the “deniers” seem to think that these reports should clearly represent the science of climate change – the good, the bad and the ugly of it – whereas Lacis seems to think that the objective is to make the case for anthropological global warming.
Hans Moleman (15:29:29) :
I like how you guys quote everything in your original post except Lacis’ response where he says your interpretations of his comments to the IPCC were wrong.
Well played.
His comments were added after the post was made, links to his initial follow-up where put into the post, and links to his continuing follow-ups are posted here in the comments.
Perhaps you could share where he said “we’re wrong” and what exactly he said “we’re wrong” about?
NickB. (18:04:11) :
“Perhaps you could share where he said “we’re wrong” and what exactly he said “we’re wrong” about?”
Sure.
“Simply astonishing. This is a consensus?”
Hans,
You quote a rhetorical question that came from the original Bishop Hill blog post as your “proof”? When exactly did Lacis say “[hey Bishop Hill, your rhetorical question was wrong, yes in fact this is consensus]”?
What you’d find if you actually read Lacis’ statements is much more nuanced. Lets see what he actually says about consensus in his first response to Revkin:
This IPCC sausage making process might be perceived as disconcerting to some sections of the public who image science to be a very orderly process of truth seeking and consensus making.
…
Any science document when it is published, is being deliberately put forth as a public target to be ruthlessly attacked to see if it will withstand any and all criticisms that can be mustered. That is the nature of science. Factual correctness, and not consensus, is the objective. Thus, criticisms are welcome, encouraged, and solicited. Any errors large and small, omissions, or other shortcomings need to be identified and corrected. That, after all, is the science objective of the IPCC report.
Up to this point, I’m not sure there is any disagreement at all between the “deniers” (on this site at least) and Lacis (and maybe many other AGW believers) – not with the way Lacis described it there at least. Please note that this in no way implies agreement on theory, etc (do I need to say it again that Lacis is a “believer”?) – just agreement on how science is supposed to work.
The split seems to start here:
The other aspect of the IPPC AR4 report is the political posturing component as exemplified by the Executive Summaries. Here, the need for group consensus appears to trump the need for factual correctness.
In the latest response, he finally seems to get to the point he’s trying to make. His real issue seems to be that “The global warming denier blogs, where this issue first came up, seem to think that I was being critical of the I.P.C.C. report in the same way as seen from their perspective”. This is an funny statement, because it seems like he’s saying that “deniers” are not allowed to agree with his IPCC criticisms unless they also share the same underlying perspective (belief) on AGW.
I imagine he might clear this up on future responses. After digging through these comments yet again, I still think the disagreement ultimately boils down to the purpose of the IPCC report (representing the science vs. making the AGW case), but I don’t think he has made it clear at all where, specifically, there is disagreement with the “denier” camp about the content (meat and bones) of the report.
I’ll say it again, I do not think the goals he outlined could be accomplished without removing some of the heavily caveated attributions that he seems to dislike because of the legalese, and we (or, I at least) dislike because we think it’s junk science
NickB. (07:51:53) :
My proof comes from this statement made by Lacis that you quoted above: “Human-induced warming of the climate system is established fact.”
Lacis statement is definitely nuanced, but not on the subject of the “consensus” referred to in the rhetorical question.