Guest post by Steven Goddard
There is no question that some of the greatest minds have been scientists. Da Vinci, Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Edison, Einstein, Fermi, Feynman are a few names that come to mind.
But how about the consensus? One of the most famous cases of consensus science gone ridiculous involved the theory of Continental Drift. In 1912, a German scientist named Alfred Wegener introduced the theory that the continents were not stationary, but rather moved.
Any child can see that the continents fit together like a jigsaw puzzle, yet the scientific community took over 50 years to stop ridiculing Wegener and accept his theory.
“Utter, damned rot!” said the president of the prestigious American Philosophical Society.
“If we are to believe in Wegener’s hypothesis we must forget everything which has been learned in the past 70 years and start all over again.” Geologist R. Thomas Chamberlain
“further discussion of it merely incumbers the literature and befogs the mind of fellow students.” Geologist Barry Willis
Sound familiar?
http://travel.state.gov/images/maps/brazil.gif
http://www.globalkids.info/v3/content/africa.jpg
Several earlier scientists had also observed the obvious – from Wikipedia :
Abraham Ortelius (1597), Francis Bacon (1625), Benjamin Franklin, Antonio Snider-Pellegrini (1858), and others had noted earlier that the shapes of continents on opposite sides of the Atlantic Ocean (most notably, Africa and South America) seem to fit together. W. J. Kious described Ortelius’ thoughts in this way:[1]
Abraham Ortelius in his work Thesaurus Geographicus … suggested that the Americas were “torn away from Europe and Africa … by earthquakes and floods” and went on to say: “The vestiges of the rupture reveal themselves, if someone brings forward a map of the world and considers carefully the coasts of the three [continents].
Not only do the continents fit together, but Wegener observed that their geology matched.
http://www.scientus.org/Wegener-DuToit.jpeg
And the fossils match.
. 
http://www.scientus.org/Pellegrini-Wegener-1.gif
We see a parallel to global warming. The earth is not warming out of control. Sea level is not rising out of control. The Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are not collapsing. The IPCC documents have been shown to be littered with junk science and fraud. The hockey team has been shown to be misusing their positions. Yet the consensus hangs on to the ridiculous, for the same reasons they did from 1912 to 1960. No one wants to “forget what they learned and start over again.”
Tom P (15:36:25) :
” That is why there has been much work since Arrhenius in better understanding these complexities. But the approach of Arrhenius has a firm underpinning in thermodynamics. To say that an increase in CO2 cannot possibly warm the atmosphere is to reject some basic tenets of physics. ”
Are you referring to his first or second paper on the subject?
HINT – He revised almost all his own work in the second paper…
Everyone else – see my previous posts re back radiation – AGW disproven full stop.
Are you ignoring this because it also disproves the greenhouse effect “theory”. ?
ADVISORY HINT – Please check thread title before answering.
AND derek with a small d, change your name I was posting here first.
I do not want to be confused with you, maybe you might not want to be confused with me either come to think of it from your point of view.
Whoops –
That link is to another preoccupation of mine. THis is the right one:
http://iamyouasheisme.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/is-terra-burningand-how-do-we-know/
Sorry for my typos above.
Pamela Gray said:
I think there are really two very important questions there, and separating them out is what helps to increase climate understanding.
The first question, hard for non-physicists to understand, is how an apparently insignificant trace gas, increasing by a few ppm every decade, can actually do anything to the surface temperature of the earth.
The second question, hard for anyone to know the answer to, is what actual effect this has had on the surface temperature of the earth.
The reason the second question – well the answer to the second question – is so tricky is that climate is full of many complex effects. These different effects are often inter-linked, sometimes reinforcing, sometimes cancelling out. And many unknowns, or poorly knowns.
You can see this in the last million years of the earth’s temperature history at the Science of Doom article – An Inconvenient Temperature Graph
Back to the first question, well there is a whole series starting at CO2 – An Insignificant Trace Gas? – Part One. This might answer your question.
But one point worth noting is that the “skeptical” scientists whose work is featured here like Dr Roy Spencer, Prof Lindzen – are all people who understand and agree with the radiative effect of CO2 at the earth’s surface.
Their real question, and mine, is all about the feedbacks – and about the other effects of climate.
More CO2 having a warming effect – “all other things being equal” – is basic physics. It didn’t start with the IPCC. It didn’t start with observations of temperature changes and scientists trying to find a cause.
“Dr. Dave (11:13:45) :
No one has to prove AGW wrong. The believers in AGW have to prove it true.”
Thats not how science works. AGW is a hypothesis, which is a tentative explanation or assumption. To be valid, the hypothesis must be testable, and, more importantly, it must be refutable. AGW is neither, in part because peer review governs who may receive funding for research, and attempts to refute AGW do not get funded and the results, if self funded, are not easily published.
When a hypothesis is tested, it is either supported or refuted. If the hypothesis is refuted, then an alternative hypothesis is posed and the process continues. If a hypothesis is not refutable, it does not meet the minimum requirements of the scientific method.
Hypotheses and theories can never be proven true using the scientific method. Therefore, science advances only through disproof. To be scientific, theories can never be proven true, but all theories must be refutable.
It is a myth that scientists are beholden to the truth. Most scientists in academia and who have tenure and who do research requiring grants are held hostage by the prevailing paradigms. Graduate students soon learn the folly of trying to disprove their professors paradigm and getting that PhD, let alone getting tenure down the road, by saying everyone else is wrong.
Disproving the existing paradigm and getting the disproof accepted by those who careers are based on teaching and researching this false paradigm is a monumental task.
So when you think about the story of the emperor wearing no clothes, think about scientists who support AGW publicly. They really have no choice. Seems only retired scientists or rich ones are in a position to debunk the AGW scam, and MSM does not give them much attention.
Does anyone think a lowly patent officer could get his theories on special relativity and quantum mechanics published today. Peer review = censorship by those who have a vested interest in the prevailing paradigm.
Academic science is now in the Dark Ages, the only difference is those who question a prevailing paradigm are labeled denialists or skeptics, and not heretics. At least Copernicus got his views published, and Galileo would have had no problems so long as he presented his ideas as an hypothesis and not proof (he did not really have proof and was wrong in some aspects of his hypothesis).
Scienceofdoom:
This is why downwards longwave radiation at the earth’s surface demonstrates the absorption and re-emission of the earth’s radiation by “greenhouse” gases including CO2 and CH4>
First of all, its RADIANCE not radiation. Second, the earth has a tiny, tiny amount of its own radiance, due to its hot core, friction from tides, and so on. Most of earth’s radiance is second hand radiance. That is, it absorbs energy from the sun and re-emitts it at a longer wave length. So….
Any energy absorbed from the earth by CO2 would be third hand from the Sun. So at any point in the process, we’re talking about energy from the Sun. At no point are we talking about any NEW energy. Just energy from the Sun and where it went and for how long.
Since there is no NEW energy being put into the system, and the amount of energy being put in will, over the long term, equal exactly the amount of energy coming out, all you get at most is a short term fluctuation. If I am wrong, then you have invented perpetual motion.
Tom P.
The warming trend we’ve seen, whether measured by ground stations or satellites, is statistically significant at the 95% level.
—-
Warming from when, statistically significant at the 95% level compared to what? Are we warmer now than at any time in history? Hardly. What is the basis of your argument? Perhaps if we had 300-400 years of satellite data, oceanographic data, and a continuous unadjusted temperature record using thermometers in non-urban settings going back about 1000 years I might agree with you. To base this argument on a mere 30-40 years of data is ludicrous. The historical written evidence from the Medieval warm period, combined with archeobotanical and archaeological evidence, indicates that that era was warmer than our current era. One of the remarkable features of recent environmental sciences is that no sooner do we discover new methods of measurement and discover new phenomena, we discover that we are at some critical crisis point with regard to whatever phenomenon has just been uncovered. Like many readers at this site, I am not convinced that a few degrees warmer will necessarily result in global catastrophe, and the revelations that Greenpeace and WWF were the sources of the most alarmist prophecies with which our children and the public and general were terrorized renders AGW polemics completely hollow. Worse, the terrorizing of children via this propaganda – and they have been overtly targeted – is a form of child abuse.
Scienceofdoom:
More CO2 having a warming effect – “all other things being equal” – is basic physics>
The point being that if you actually knew anything about physics you would know that all other things are NEVER equal. Every action has an equal and opposite re-action. Gosh darn, I think a physicist said that. The act of heating something up cannot, and does not, exist in isolation. It has consequences.
Heating something up IS a feedback loop all by itself. The amount of energy it takes to heat something up 1 degree is a roughly linear relationship. The amount of energy it radiates back out as a result goes up exponentialy. So to maintain a linear temp increase you need an exponential power increase to keep up.
Derek (16:02:14) :
All of Arrhenius’ work concluded CO2 created warming, whether on its own or in combination with water vapour.
As to your conjecture that climate scientists don’t understand the sign of heat flow: yes, you’re right; some people aren’t really smart.
may Io ask for help from someone good with equations please.
This is the Penman equation…
Penman’s formula: E0 = (0.015 + 0.00042T + 10−6z) [0.8Rs − 40 + 2.5Fu(T − Td)] (mm day−1), where T is the daily mean temperature (i.e. the average of the extremes), z is the elevation (m), Rs is the solar irradiance of the lake’s surface, F stands for (1.0 − 8.7 × 10−5 z), u is the windspeed at 2 m, and Td is the dewpoint temperature.
What I need to know is, which has a stronger influence on the equation, T temperature or Rs solar irradiance?
Thankyou in advance
davidmhoffer:
You are correct that the earth’s radiation is 2nd hand. The sun warms up the earth, the earth emits radiation at a different range of wavelengths (as Planck’s formula explains).
There seems to be a lot of confusion over this topic.
(Here’s an analogy. I know it’s analogy. Analogies don’t prove anything, they illustrate) – If you put a roof on your house it’s warmer at night than without your roof. No new energy has been created and yet it works and the house is warmer.
Not a perfect illustration – because the roof also stops the sun’s energy coming in as well as stopping the (2nd hand) earth’s energy leaving. Whereas CO2 doesn’t absorb solar radiation, instead it passes right through..
Back to the “that’s perpetual motion therefore it can’t be true” argument –
All that happens with CO2 and other “greenhouse” gases is that some of the energy that leaves the surface of the earth, instead of heading off out into space is absorbed and re-radiated. It is radiated both up and down. No new energy is created.
This adds some warming at the earth’s surface. It is not “perpetual motion”. If the sun switched off, the earth would cool down very quickly.
Upwards longwave radiation from the surface of the earth is around 390W/m^2.
Upwards longwave radiation at the top of the atmosphere is around 240W/m^2.
Where does the missing energy go? What happens to it?
Why is there downward longwave radiation at the earth’s surface (it’s not solar, it is at different wavelengths). Where does it come from? And why does this downwards energy match the absorption profile of CO2 (14-16um), CH4, O3 etc?
The answer is easy.
davidmhoffer:
I reread your comment again, and maybe I misunderstood what you were saying or questioning. Apologies if I have.
I was glad to see J. Harlen Bretz’s name surface in this discussion.
The “consensus” in the geologic community against Bretz’s proposition of the great floods that scoured eastern Washington state (and created the magnificent Columbia gorge) was based on the then prevalent “religion” of uniformitarianism (if I recall the term correctly), which had been adopted as a substitute for the biblically based “catastrophism.”
The consensus geologists simply *could not imagine* the huge floods needed to create the channeled scablands, as it didn’t comport with their religion.
It was only after Pardee described the source of the flood waters, what is now known as Glacial Lake Missoula, that the scales were lifted from the eyes of the consensus. And, because the geologic consensus was every bit as abusive to Bretz as the AGW consensus folks are today to anyone who brooks their position, Pardee had to couch his paper in terms that distanced himself from Bretz, so that he wouldn’t be similarly excoriated.
To make a long story short, the “consensus” folks finally came around. Bretz was fortunate enough to outlive most of his critics, and he finally won the Penrose Prize for his brilliant and difficult field geology.
The good news for us today is that things are moving swiftly enough that Steve McIntyre and the other “skeptical” scientists will have their arguments prevail over the “consensus” in a much shorter time.
Most people regard it as axiomatic that if CO2 is a greenhouse gas, then increasing its concentration in the atmosphere must eventually warm the planet. To demonstrate that this is not necessarily so, it should be possible to make a sealed box ‘model planet’ with one or more sides made of glass, a means of setting the internal CO2 concentration, an internal temperature sensor and an external filament bulb ‘sun’. A climatologist or other scientist could be challenged to model its behaviour. Can he predict whether increasing the concentration of CO2 in the box will increase its average temperature, or decrease it? If the modeller feels capable of predicting the climate of the whole planet, then this should be a doddle.
Without cheating, what simple mechanisms could cause an actual reduction in average temperature with increasing CO2? Well, for example if the box contained a mechanism whereby increasing internal temperature tripped a reduction of transmissivity of the glass with some hysteresis (you could do it with a mechanical or LCD shutter), then increasing CO2 would cause the average internal temperature to either rise or fall, depending on the precise settings. Even if the modeller was told the basic mechanism, he could not predict the direction of change without very accurate measurements of all parameters and even a tiny tweak to the mechanism would render his predictions useless.
Could something like this be used to make the point?
Oliver K. Manuel (12:08:05) :
I wonder whether some of this is an artifact of WW II?
How so?
Up until WW II, basic research science (as opposed to applied technology which has always been competitive and secretive) was mostly an open process; general principles were to be shared. But with the advent of WW II, a cloak of secrecy was dropped over basic research because it was felt that elemental physical principles could be converted into technological advantage, and, thus, military advantage (scientific secrecy was necessary to survival).
This mind set did not end with the Allied victory, as the Cold War started right up from the end of WW II.
And, not only secrecy in basic research, but also, a structure was imposed with people being insulated and layered from each other. Each succeeding layer was supplied information on a “need to know” basis.
Thus, there were some scientists within the “inner circle” with access to all relevant information and others in outlying circles with less information (and possibly less understanding).
Haven’t we seen this in the Climategate with scientists refusing to provide their source data for independent analysis by outsiders not within the “team”?
Possibly, it has become acceptible within some scientific communities for “inner circle” scientists to be aware of certain physical relationships and feel no compulsion to educate “outside the circle” scientists of these physical relationships.
Yes, I know, secrecy is not part of the scientific method — but secrecy and searching for competitive advantage is part of Human Nature.
I suggest, in some circles this desire to retain proprietary knowledge — and retain the benefits, therefrom — as knowledge is power, leads to a self-justification and a willingness to mislead others, to perpetuate their own power, and maybe just as important, their emotional sense of power.
Sound far fetched?
Maybe, but, then, again…
Follow the money…and take into account Human Nature.
These two axioms have a basis in human experience.
Scienceofdoom
Why is there downward longwave radiation at the earth’s surface (it’s not solar, it is at different wavelengths). Where does it come from? And why does this downwards energy match the absorption profile of CO2 (14-16um), CH4, O3 etc?>
Ah, but it IS solar. It started out at the sun as sw. It got absorbed by the earth and radiated back up as lw. some of that gets absorbed by CO2 etc and re-radiated or conducted etc in all directions, some of which goes back down to earth. BUT… we’re still talking about energy that originated at the sun.
Scienceofdoom:
Upwards longwave radiation from the surface of the earth is around 390W/m^2.
Upwards longwave radiation at the top of the atmosphere is around 240W/m^2
Nyet. At 0 C, radiance is about 320 watts/m2. At 30 C, its about 550 watts/m2. You can’t just average the numbers from low to high across the globe and get the right answer either. you get a curve with a peak or high about mid day, but you also get a curve with a peak at the equator as compared to the poles. The average between the lows and the highs is NOT the average of the curve. check out ERBE for example, and you will discover that the planet retains energy at the equator (where it is warmist) and loses it at the poles (which are cooler) which may seem counter intuitive. Temp variance is WAY higher at the poles, so when the planet warms, the temp increase at the poles is out of proportion and the amount of radiance to space also out of proportion.
If you measure all the energy going in at TOA vs all the energy going out at TOA, you will find that they net to zero over time.
More a result of investigation and application of the various physics laws derived (maybe you didn’t really mean axiomatic..).
And a fair proportion of people who understand the radiative forcing from CO2 don’t believe the climate is well enough understood to be accurately modeled.
I think I see what you are saying. There are unpredictable/unknown elements to climate?
But I think that the climate science community already get that point.
Take clouds. In the chapter “The radiative forcing due to clouds and water vapor” in the 2006 book “Frontiers of Climate Modeling” by Kiehl and Ramanathan, the authors of the chapter discuss how well the cloud effect can be quantified. It’s very complex but appears to be around -18W/m^2 radiative forcing – around 4 times the effect of doubling CO2. So lots of discussion then about how much that changes with other climate effects, what improvements need to be made to various measurements that are already being done, what can be deduced so far, how much uncertainty there is, etc.
Or the 100s of other papers on clouds, e.g. Tsushima and Manabe “Cloud Feedback on Annual Variation of Global Mean Surface Temperature” (2001) trying to ascertain the relationships between temperature and clouds.
Well maybe I didn’t get your point.
But if I did – this is what climate scientists spend their time doing – trying to figure out what all the effects are, where they come from and how they can be quantified.
The politicians of climate science are not so interesting to listen to with: “the science is settled“, but the climate scientists are very interesting.
Interesting climate science at Science of Doom
David
Could something like this be used to make the point?>
It may result in useful information, but it would not serve to make the point. Your external heat source would be roughly linear across the box surface. The sun is shining on a curved surface that spins. So the energy input peaks at mid day and falls to zero from dusk to dawn. But it ALSO peaks at the equator and falls to zero at the poles. Plus, maximum water vapour in the atmosphere about doubles for every 10 degrees C, so there is a LOT more at the equator than at the poles, and greenhouse effect of water is much larger than CO2. Plus temperature variability at the poles is much higher than at the equator, and the amount of energy the planet radiates back out varies with the temp in degrees K raised to the power of 4. In fact, one of my pet theories about the problems facing the climate models is that temperature variance is highest at the poles, and the that’s the area we have the least data on.
In any event, I think you can see where the box just would not anywhere near resemble what actually happens on a planet.
davidmhoffer:
You are correct that there isn’t just one surface radiation value.
And you are correct that at the top of atmosphere (TOA) the incoming and outgoing match. At around 240W/m^2.
The outgoing OLR is the average across the globe across the year. At any one time of course it is different. For anyone who wants to see it, check out the global picture for one month (June 2009).
The question is then, what is the average surface radiation from the earth?
Is it 240W/m^2? No!
240W/m^2 implies a surface temperature of 255K or -18’C. Even allowing for variations this is a long way off the surface temperature.
If you take the average surface temperature of 15’C you get an average of 390W/m^2.
Strictly speaking it’s not the right average which is why temperatures should not have an arithmetic mean applied – but let’s not get into that..
You have to work out the energy for each temperature and average that. (or because radiation is proportional to T^4 we can average that instead).
This works out to approximately 396 W/m^2.
So the surface average radiation upwards is 396 W/m^2.
The top of atmosphere average upwards radiation is 240W/m^2
Still an issue – the surface upward radiation is NOT 240W/m^2.
The simple answer to this measurable phenomenon is the radiation from the earth is absorbed by the “greenhouse” gases and re-emitted, both upward and downward.
ScienceofDoom:
So the surface average radiation upwards is 396 W/m^2.
The top of atmosphere average upwards radiation is 240W/m^2>
I’m not going to go check your numbers but just consider what you are saying. your claim is that 156 w/m2 is being retained as extra energy kept inside the atmosphere over the long term. If you are right the planet should ignite in a few days.
The thing to measure is how much energy is going in versus out at a given point. As you stated, the energy in at TOA equals energy out at TOA. If you were to measure energy in (all wave lengths) at earth surface versus energy out at earth’s surface (again, all wavelengths) you would again get a net of zero over the long term.
davidmhoffer:
The planet won’t ignite.. Of course, you knew that..
What happens to the longwave energy absorbed in the atmosphere and reradiated downwards?
Let’s ask the question first – if this downwards longwave radiation wasn’t there what would the situation be like? – well, the surface temperature would be around -18’C (255K)
So what happens to the longwave energy absorbed and reradiated downwards?
It is not accumulated, stored up and ready to explode.. instead, it increases the surface temperature(compared with the situation if it wasn’t there), which raises accordingly to the annual global “average” of +15’C (288K). (Again, let’s ignore the “averages” issue and think approximately)
If you like, the increase in temperature is the negative feedback to an increase in energy. You put more energy in and the surface temperature raises to a new equilibrium so that energy balances throughout the system.
Would you mind if I put some of your questions onto a page on Science of Doom relating to the CO2 question?
I think your questions have been well put and similar to what a lot of people have in their minds but can’t easily express. This is not an intuitive subject and seeing common questions and how they are answered will help many others.
ScienceofDoom:
Would you mind if I put some of your questions onto a page on Science of Doom relating to the CO2 question>
You may, but I can only keep up with so many blogs and wuwt alone is pretty over whelming, so I can’t commit to answering you on your blog. That said, you are still comparing the wrong numbers. Being old and tired and soon asleep, I will leave you with a simple math problem. If you can come up with the answer to this question, you can answer your own:
Three guys check into a hotel and decide to split a room. The desk clerk says it is $30 and they each give him $10. After they go up to their room the desk clerk realises the room is only $25. He pulls five $1 bills out of the till and gives them to the bell boy. On his way up the stairs, the bell boy starts thinking that the three guys will want to split the change evenly, which will be a hassle for him. He considers keeping the change, but the desk clerk will probably ask if they got their change when they check out in the morning. He decides to compromise. He knocks on their door, explains they were over charged, and gives them each one dollar, keeping two for himself.
Now let’s do the math. They each paid $10 and each got $1 back, so they each paid $9. Three times $9 is $27. The bell boy kept $2. That totals to $29. Where’s the missing dollar?
when you understand where the missing dollar is, you will understand where the missing energy is.
davidmhoffer:
nice question, I hate these because they confuse me, but eventually..
Three times $9 = $27 – that’s what they paid.
The desk clerk kept $25
The bell boy got $2.
So all the maths lines up.
I have a question for you.
If 99.99% of physicists know that:
1. longwave energy radiated from the earth’s surface is around 390W/m^2 (or let’s say 396W/m^2)
2. only 240W/m^2 of this leaves out of the top of the atmosphere
3. the reason for the difference isn’t a measurement error but is the explanation I gave above
How likely is it that the explanation is wrong?
Thanks, I will put some of your questions on a blog page, you are welcome to comment there, but no need to if you don’t have time, my aim there will be illustration of common questions
Thanks!
The hotel clerk has $25
& the bell-hop has $ 2
These 3 guys gave $27 = $9/each
Thanks to all who attempted actual science by raising the issue of the expanding Earth. Notice the ease with which the non-expanding model is crowned with the halo of current consensus.
Notice how this consensual impetus easily overrides the clear evidence of own eyes: when viewing the Neal Adams Earth expansion animation posted above.
In that YouTube video, we can clearly see that the continents fit perfectly together on a smaller Earth. It’s topographically precise. The picture is as clear as a solved jigsaw.
Once any human mind sees the expanding earth model, that should destroy all other explanations, because of the simplicity of its perfect 3D solution.
(Similar to how the simple heliocentric model of the solar system displaced the laughable complexity of the attempted geocentric modelling.)
3D Solutions Rule! OK!
And yet, bright minds here are swayed by consensus dismissal of Earth expansion. Consensus?!
We flit, like butterflies from consensual ghetto to consensual ghetto. Daring not to alight anywhere in between. We always have, with rare exception.
David asked:
“I wonder if many scientists are just ’second raters’ who appear very intelligent because of their lightning fast, but over-simplistic, brains?”
No. They are not second-rate scientists. They are first-class engineers who think they are scientists. Others think they are scientists too, which empowers this delusion. But they should not be confused with scientists –whom they vastly outnumber.
How does one predict the future? That’s what it comes down to. “Are scientists always smart?” is one question we should always be asking ourselves, when we’re considering the future and the problem of risk.
The problem is we’re trying to talk about the future. Maybe you have a scientific model that predicts what your house will be worth in 20 years. But it is still, no matter how sophisticated and grounded in data and expertly calculated, it is still a prediction and the future cannot be known. So we have to always try to judge the risk.
You board a bus and sit in your seat. You are overcome with a powerful feeling that something is desperately wrong. What do you do? Do you tell yourself, “I have no data, no evidence, no rationale, so I am being silly–I shall remain in my seat.” Or do you get off and catch the next bus instead? How do you assess that risk?
Yes scientists are generally smart. But that doesn’t mean we take their theories as gospel when predicting the future. It’s the future. It cannot be known in the way that I know the present. We have to assess risk. Yep, scientists tend to come up with some really cool technology–but that’s never a guarantee. I would speculate that this is why the man in the street doesn’t believe AGW. It’s about the future. They probably, I speculate, see in in the light of a science fiction movie. Science fiction is supposed to be about what we could imagine to be true, in the future, and what that entails. Climate models produce scenarios. These models are so general and vague and so far in the future that people can’t engage with them as a reality. And that’s correct, see, they are not reality. They are a game of risk.
When faced with this argument some people have said to me, “right so you don’t believe the sun will rise tomorrow, because the future cannot be known?” Well, if they have to resort to “the sun rising” as an example of what they are sure about, then where does that leave everything else that isn’t the subject of the laws of gravity operating on giant masses in empty space following cycles that have repeated since man can remember?
It is very easy to be an expert about something that hasn’t happened yet. It is easy to appear to understand a subject. It is great to gather data from the present and build models and try to understand. But the future is about trial and error. How many buildings collapsed, medical procedures failed, vehicles exploded, chemicals leaked, and so on, how many mistakes have been made on the path to knowledge? Maybe it is just me but this seems to me to be common sense.
What I find most worrying is that these scientists proclaimed “certainty” and “consensus” for all practical purposes, about the future. That one fact alone, when out into my risk calculator, says, “don’t trust them”.