Polynomial Cointegration Tests of the Anthropogenic Theory of Global Warming
Michael Beenstock and Yaniv Reingewertz – Department of Economics, The Hebrew University, Mount Scopus, Israel.
Abstract:
We use statistical methods designed for nonstationary time series to test the anthropogenic theory of global warming (AGW). This theory predicts that an increase in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations increases global temperature permanently. Specifically, the methodology of polynomial cointegration is used to test AGW when global temperature and solar irradiance are stationary in 1st differences, whereas greenhouse gas forcings (CO2, CH4 and N2O) are stationary in 2nd differences.
We show that although greenhouse gas forcings share a common stochastic trend, this trend is empirically independent of the stochastic trend in temperature and solar irradiance. Therefore, greenhouse gas forcings, global temperature and solar irradiance are not polynomially cointegrated, and AGW is refuted. Although we reject AGW, we find that greenhouse gas forcings have a temporary effect on global temperature. Because the greenhouse effect is temporary rather than permanent, predictions of significant global warming in the 21st century by IPCC are not supported by the data.
Paper here (PDF)
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Steven Mosher
Suppose that you read a long detailed statistics paper that claimed the earth was flat. What would you conclude?>
Through direct observation it is clear the earth is flat, which the statistics you allude to above confirm. However, statistics also show that it is possible to travel in one direction and arrived back at your starting point. Since both statistical analysis are correct, I must conclude that reality is derived from a combination of the two.
I conclude therefore that the earth is a six sided cube. I offer as additional supporting evidence the statistical analysis provided by others showing the MWP as confined to Europe, which is further confined to a single face of the six sided cube, and would clearly constrain energy flows from long wave radiation as these travel at near light speed and could not turn the corner at cube edge.
“”” Merv Hobden (05:19:43) :
My own opinion is that water vapor is such a powerful blocker of long wave IR – mainly by reflection, because of reststrahlen and the difference of refractive index, that CO2 effects are orders of magnitude lower. A simple water cell, with 1/2″ of water in it will completely block the longwave IR from a 300W tungsten lamp. And, the water does not boil, as the mechanism is reflective, not absortive. Below the cut off wavelength of 4.5microns, the water is completely transparent – the visible and near IR pass straight through. You can put your hand in front of the cell – there is some heating from near IR absorption, but little serious effect. Without the cell -Ouch! “””
Well Merv, I don’t know where you get your physical properties of water or water vapor from; but they don’t jibe with anything that I find in standard handbooks.
Far from being completely transparent below 4.5 microns, water does in fact have very significant absorption bands below 4.5 microns, and one particular band at 3.0 microns, has almost ten times the absorption coefficient that water demonstrates in the range, from about 4.0 microns to beyond 10 microns. Other bands at 2 and 1 microns are very well known; and water vapor starts having significant impact on for example the solar spectrum, at wavelengths from about 760 nm.
As to your belief; well you call it “your own opinion” that water’s interraction with LWIR is primarily reflective; standard textbooks (such as “The Infra-Red Handbook” show no untoward reflection from water out to at least 13 microns; that is no reflectance that is not fully explained by normal Polarised Fresnel Reflection; that changes over that wavelength range in accordance with the refractive index variation. So it is never as much as 5% reflectance at normal incidence, and is mostly under 3% over that range.
Water vapor is a major greenhouse gas; THE major one, and water in its liquid and solid phases also has major climate and weather related effects; clouds for instance.
But I’m with Phil; your water cell demonstration is hardly indicative of what actually happens in the real atmosphere (or oceans either.
@Tom P
Kaufman et al. (2006) indeed says that temperature is not I(1). It does not say what temperature is then: I(0), I(2), FI, trend-stationary? More importantly, Kaufman and colleagues say so, but they do not provide any evidence.
NickB,
Thank you for some reasonable comments. The time frame analyzed could be a big reason for the difference in the two papers.
As an aside, if you use CRU data, I think the warming from 1910-1945 is slightly greater than the warming from 1975-2005.
I would love to see a thorough and convincing refutation of CAGW.
“Steven Mosher
Suppose that you read a long detailed statistics paper that claimed the earth was flat. What would you conclude?”
Let’s make that more realistic. Suppose you did an experiment that showed sub-atomic entities were waves. Then you did another that showed they were particles. What would you conclude?
NickB. (11:26:56) :
grumpy old man (09:50:44) :
What is the feedback mechanism that makes the increase temporary?
The two suspects seem to be humidity levels and cloud formation behavior.
———
Makes sense, clouds would seem to be the answer. This would indicate that the system is very stable, and would explain why we have not had runaway warming in the past. I do not see how humidity levels could be directly responsible, though.
George Smith,
What gets really weird is when you put water vapor into a huge, tall column, apply a strong gravitational force. For this experiment you need to find a water planet and roll it into the lab, which can be difficult and expensive.
Anyway, when you illuminate it with the solar spectrum your results are well within accepted parameters for a while and then you start getting evaporation, condensation, coronal discharges, arcing, and strong emissions of X-rays and gamma rays. The X-ray and gamma ray discharges last up to 3.5 milliseconds and could have a pulse repitition frequency of over 30 Hertz, making a horrible buzzing interference with lab your equipment.
You’d think an Earth temperature black body wouldn’t be emitting gamma rays unless you blast it with an energy beam from the Death Star, but the phyics of thunderstorms is frustratingly elusive.
Let’s make that more realistic. Suppose you did an experiment that showed sub-atomic entities were waves. Then you did another that showed they were particles. What would you conclude?>
That they’re wavicles?
davidmhoffer, probably. My point is that verifiable contrary results that cannot be explained require thought rather than dismissal.
It’s Miller time.
Davidmhoffer,
I think he’s refering to the famous Schrodinger’s physicist experiment. You put a physicist in a box. When you open the box he’ll say either that light is a particle or that it’s a wave, but until you open the box he’s saying that light is BOTH a particle and a wave. It has something to do with the superposition of quantum states or probabilities, or something. It’s been a while since I’ve taken a physics class. All I remember is that we shoved the professor into a box and ran off to a keg party.
i knew the flat earth part of that would trip folks up . lemme splain another way.
you get the gist is the Moorian argument. The point I would make is that many people approach these problems in the “common sense” manner.
( hmm maybe it was wittegenstein, whatever)
Especially when operating in the normal science paradigm. radiative physics is a given ( or rather it’s given a secure status owing to a variety of factors, like we design crap that actually works by using modtran etc ) when somebody shows me a paper that claims to contradict it, it’s usually a waste of time to even read it. I can confidently ( with some measure of probablity that I dont need to compute ) just reject it on its face as being wrong.
That’s the tactic at least.
Steven Mosher,
Especially when operating in the normal science paradigm. radiative physics is a given ( or rather it’s given a secure status owing to a variety of factors, like we design crap that actually works by using modtran etc ) when somebody shows me a paper that claims to contradict it, it’s usually a waste of time to even read it. I can confidently ( with some measure of probablity that I dont need to compute ) just reject it on its face as being wrong>
On one level I agree, but in the AGW debate I think that’s poor tactics. The bulk of the people in this forum have some level of knowledge of basic physics and math. For you to dismiss a paper such as the one you refer to above for your own purposes is one thing. To dismiss it in a forum such as this is not far off. But the vast majority of those swayed by the AGW arguments are not so technical and so are easily pursuaded by well worded, but wrong, arguments. Winning the debate is just as much about getting the science right as it is about understanding what arguments the public at large finds persuasive and how to correct the impression that those that are wrong leave. The world went from flat to round to flat to round many times in history. Those who knew the facts were over whelmed by the tide of opinion informed by junk science such as that with which AR4 is riddled.
At the peak of the tech bubble, friends would bring me investment prospectus and ask for my opinion (having been in that industry all my life). I recall one brought to me by a lawyer of considerable intelligence and repute. After reading it I told him this “this is the best prospectus I have ever read. It is detailed, covers every business question one might ask, has an excellent business plan and demonstrates good balance between revenue projections and cost containment”. So I should invest? he asked. I responded “well, as good as the prospectus it, they don’t actually have a product. There’s 200 pages of business case here, but no product. Not even a proposed product. Were does the money go for R&D when there isn’t a product, and where does the revenue come from when there’s nothing to sell?”
I managed to keep an unscrupulous investment scheme from picking my lawyers pockets. He phoned my a year later to report that they raised $40 million and then went bankrupt. The problem with AGW is that they’re not trying to pick a few people’s pockets, they’re trying to pick everyone’s pockets. and if they have a report that shows the earth is flat…. and people are accepting it…. then yeah, I have to read it and be able to refute it as my small part of keeping their hands out of my pockets.
although I contiue to be of the opinion that the flat earth is consistant with a 6 sided cube.
If this paper does get published please let me know – populartechnology (at) gmail (dot) com
I would like to add it to the list,
500 Peer-Reviewed Papers Supporting Skepticism of “Man-Made” Global Warming
Yes it does give the paper more credibility if it is published. No it does not matter if it is published in Nature or Science, there are plenty of reputable climate journals to get it published in.
Richard Tol (12:11:33) :
It would hardly be I(0) so I assume Kaufmann believes it should be at least I(2). You’re familiar with the statistics: what do you calculate it to be?
steven mosher:
Of course, I follow Lucia’s work, it’s excellent.
I’m more about understanding the physics than the statistics. I hope others will perform statistical analysis of the terabytes..
It would be interesting to see some work which covers:
a) analysis of some individual models forecast vs reality for temperature predictions 2001-2010 (rather than ensembles – how good is one model?)
b) analysis of specific models forecast vs reality for other outputs, 2001-2010:
– ocean temps in specific regions
– humidity
– cloud cover
– albedo
– tropopause height in different locations
c) analysis of the “hindcast results” of specific models, 1950-2000:
– regional temps
– ocean temps in specific regions
– humidity
– cloud cover
– albedo
– tropopause height in different locations
And in a journal would be even better but not essential of course.
Now this would be interesting.
Maybe there are papers around which have done this.. (I know about the Douglass and Christy paper), I have been looking at other areas so far.
Steven Mosher,
What’s more interesting is that the Earth IS flat in most climate models. It’s wrapped around a sphere but the underlying mathematics is still a flat (and 2D) non-rotating surface with Coriolis forces added artificially. Instead of vertical coordinates they use pressure coordinates to make the math easier, but as objects move “up and down” they don’t conserve their momentum, they tend to stay over the same spot on the surface. Gravity is also constant with altitude.
I don’t think a finer mesh is going to get any such model to output an accurate plot of equilibrium temperature versus CO2 level.
Is CO2 being measured anywhere besides Mauna Loa? Isn’t it a little disingenuous to extrapolate global CO2 levels from the measurements at a volcano?
According to the USGS (http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/maunaloa/current/monitoringdata.html), “gathering SO2 and CO2 data while Mauna Loa is quiet is important to establish normal background levels for gases emitted from the volcano.”
If they’re still establishing normal background levels, than any variation so far tells us… what, exactly?
Is there another CO2 monitoring facility at Mauna Loa? I mean, one that’s not intended to monitor volcanic gasses? Please tell me there is.
George Turner
What’s more interesting is that the Earth IS flat in most climate models. It’s wrapped around a sphere but the underlying mathematics is still a flat (and 2D) non-rotating surface with Coriolis forces added artificially>
Seriously? My six sided cube would therefore be an improvement? OK, all joking aside…. seriously?
Some Guy:
Excellent point!
VS (09:34:02) :
I’d like to see your results from the whole period of GISTEMP, 1880 to present, and Hadcrut, from 1850. Truncation of a series will tend to hide any I(2) behaviour. Both full series show very similar positive second derivatives.
Phil, George,
Firstly, the water cell has very thin windows, made from large microscope cover glasses.
Secondly, a tungsten lamp is a broad band emitter with less than 2% of its energy input transformed into the visible. 48% of its input is transformed into the near IR, the rest comes out as ‘heat’ – longwave IR to well above 5micron. So a 300W tungsten lamp outputs 144W in the near IR, and the water cell was used to isolate this spectral area.
Thirdly, the water absorption spectrum is continuous, from 2E-4 1/cm in the visible through to 5E3 1/cm at 10microns. There are peaks at around 3micron, 2 micron, and 1.5 micron, but they are generally part of what is a logarithmic increase with wavelength, unlike the discrete absorption lines seen with CO2. This spectral response continues over the full longwave range, only dropping by an order of magnitude from 10 micron into what we call the TeraHertz region.
If we clear the measurement of the reflectivity due to the difference of refractive index of the glass, water, and back into air, the difference is only about 10% at normal incidence. I did check for Fabry-Perot resonance, due to the thickness of the cell wall – it was not apparent, and with no water in the cell the ouch! factor was still very significant.
Water cells have been used in microscopy for at least 150 years, to protect valuable objectives from heat radiation. There are now specialist glasses to perform that function, but most of these block out the near IR as well as longwave IR. If ordinary soda glass alone was effective, I am sure that our Victorian ancestors would have made good use of it – but that was the crown glass in their objectives after all. Glass can be used in greenhouses at the relatively low intensity of the transformation from the near IR to longwave IR, however absorptive glass would rapidly perish if you used it alone in front of an intense long-wave IR source. In the above experiment close to 100W of heat was going somewhere – less the reflection and absorption of the bulb envelope – if the glass in the cell absorbed it, the water would boil, if the water absorbed it, it would boil.
Radiation back into space from the heated surface of the planet covers the range 5 – 60microns. What the experiment demonstrates is the huge difference between water, and gases such as CO2. Water vapor is very little different to water in its spectral response, the lower molecular density decreases the effect, and the effect is further diminished at lower pressures, but this also applies to CO2.
What I would like to see is the experimental method used to establish the ‘reflectivity’ of CO2 – it does not seem to be apparent – most sources only state the absorption, as is the case for water. Is this just a theoretical calculation stuffed into a computer model, or is it based on some real science? I would love to find out!
davidmhoffer (10:25:53) :
“When the system stops oscillating, the amount of energy going from Sun to Earth will equal exactly the amount of energy being radiated back by the Earth. Hence, the change in the amount of CO2 “slice” causes a temporary oscillation, but no long term temperature change.”
No. You are still confusing power and energy. The power flows stabilize to the same level, but you have charged up the “capacitance” energy of the Earth, and it is therefore hotter.
davidmhoffer (10:36:46) :
” Once the lake fills up and gets to the top of the damn, the flow rate downstream goes to the same amount it was before.”
Exactly! The flow rate is the same, but there is now the potential energy of the mass of water stored behind the dam.
The key to falsifying the AGW hypothesis is to show that either the “capacitance” is not changing as a result of anthropogenic emissions, or that the magnitude of that change due to anthropogenic emissions is insignificant, not in denying well established radiative physics.
steven mosher (10:34:08) :
Skeptic2: Here I show how sunspots correlate with the temperature data.
Warmist: Your pal said the data was screwed up.
Skeptic2: But, you said it wasn’t.
Bart:
The key to falsifying the AGW hypothesis is to show that either the “capacitance” is not changing as a result of anthropogenic emissions, or that the magnitude of that change due to anthropogenic emissions is insignificant, not in denying well established radiative physics>
You are correct and missing the point all at the same time. Yes the lake fills up and so there is potential energy stored in the lake. And yes, that slice of CO2 charges the earth capacitor making it hotter. BUT:
The AGW Hypothesis is that doubling CO2 adds 3.7 watts/m2 being radiated toward earth surface resulting in a direct rise of 1.1 degrees. At a mean earth temperature of 288 K (15 C) a temperature increase of 1.1 degrees would result in a rise in earth radiance to outer space of 6.1 watts/m2. We can delve into ever more detailed analysis of the who said what who meant what variety, but that math does not work. In order to achieve the proposed temperature increase the AGW Hypothesis is built on the assumption that there is a long term positive feedback from CO2 that exceeds the resulting long term negative feedbacks. In the most ridiculous version a tipping point driving runaway warming happens. THIS is the point I am trying to make about the physics.
They are claiming that if the height of the damn goes up one meter, that the height of the water will go up two meters. They are claiming that the CO2 “radiates” the surface with 3.7 watts/m2 when all it can do is slow down, temporarily, the amount of energy being radiated out by the planet to space. My point is that there IS NO EXTRA 3.7w/m2 from CO2, there’s no energy generated by CO2 in the first place. Raising the damn doesn’t create water that flows from the damn into the lake does it? That’s the AGW claim! They attribute to the damn the ability to create water like they attribute to the CO2 the ability to create 3.7 w/m2. They compound attributing CO2 with the ability to create power with over estimating the temperature change by assuming a linear temperature increase versus power input while ignoring an exponential increase in radiance as a negative feedback. They compound THAT by assuming that the acceleration of fossil fule consumption from 1950 to 1990 will continue… not the rise in consumption, the ACCELERATION in the rise of consumption. Well, we ought to be at about 300 million bbl per day by now OOOPS we’re only at 100, the acceleration went away.
I was making a point, and my point stands. your point that technicaly there’s a bit of energy held back that results in a slight temp increase? fine. CO2 still doesn’t create power/energy/calories/watts/ergs/btu/hsp and any explanation that says it does is malarky. There are better words, but the mods will let malarky through. The insertion of an extra layer of CO2 creates a fluctuation that damps out and the amplitude of the oscillation is out of proportion to the final change in temperature. That’s what the original paper that started this thread said, thats what I was trying to explain, AND THAT’S WHY THE REAL WORLD ISNT DOING WHAT THE CLIMATE MODELS PREDICTED.
I find your attempt distract people from the crux of the argument by raising a slight technicality and then claiming that I am denying well established physics to be… a warmist tactic that is disengenuous to the core. again, other words are more accurate, but I am sticking to ones the mods will allow.