From an AP story interview, we have a what I’ll call a “Lubchencoism”.
“There is a well-orchestrated and fairly successful effort under way to confuse and sometimes cherry-pick information,” Lubchenco said.
Heh. Apparently she’s never reviewed how USHCN and GHCN came to have their station lists.
But here’s the quote that had me ROTFL
“I don’t view our role as trying to convince people of something,” she said. “Our role is to inform people.”
Apparently she’s never read the NOAA CCSP synthesis report. See this:
NCDC: Photoshopping the climate change report for better impact
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Smokey said: “CO2 induced runaway global warming will be proven at about the same time the flying saucers arrive.”
Hey Smokey don’t insult the possible aliens out there by comparing/using them in the same sentence with the CAGW pseudoscience. 😉
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Kwik & Smokey,
The AGW hypothesis is very clear about the expected effects and the early signs. Warming of the polor regions is one of those early signs, and is what is being observed right now in the arctic, and no amount of slicing the data into 2 year or 5 year chunks (as we’ve seen some posters here on WUWT do) to deny the long term trend is honest. The arctic sea ice has not had a positive anomaly in 6 years, and if the sun is THE major driver of the climate on earth (as so many AGW skeptics like to believe) than why could not even a deep and prolonged solar minimum boost the arctic sea ice into a positive anomaly range? AGW models show that the sun is only a minor player and that GH gas concentrations play a much bigger long term role than the relatively weaker solar cycle. Now I am truly open to the AGW hypothesis being wrong, and if the arctic sea ice recovers and goes into a long term positive anomaly situation (over more than just a few months) than I will start to seriously doubt AGW. Right now though, the climate is behaving as if AGW theory is essentially correct.
Also, when speaking about the absorption of CO2 by the oceans, one must speak of NET gains or losses on a global basis. The basic chemistry of this is not in dispute, and somewhere around 30% of human emissions of CO2 have been taken up by the oceans. We pretty much know how much CO2 humans prooduce, and we know how much is winding up in the atmosphere, so it is not hard to figure out how much the oceans are absorbing. Also, ocean acidification levels are rising, and this a secondary way of knowing the CO2 is going to the oceans. Essentially, the chemistry on this is straight forward, and accepted by thousands of scientists. Until I see an explanation for where the excess CO2 would be going, or how the oceans are acidifying without hte uptake of CO2, I would favor the data that shows it is going in the oceans.
Finally, to equate the AGW hypothesis with a “runaway greenhouse” effect is not accurate. The hypothesis in a pure form only says that human caused CO2 accumulates in the tropospohere and will warm the planet more than would be expected above natural variations and cycles and the first signs of this happening will be the warming of the polar regions.
R. Gates (09:20:23) :
I repeat; Plot the stations on John Dalys web-site yourselves.
Compare.
Are they correct?
If they are ( those I checked was correct), what is your conclusion?
G.L. Alston (09:13:49),
I think you’re confusing me with someone else. I’ve always acknowledged that CO2 can have a slight warming effect. But the effect is so insignificant that it can be completely disregarded for all practical purposes. As I said in my post above:
There is no real world, measurable evidence showing that an X increase in CO2 causes a Y increase in temperature. The speculation is based primarily on computer models that can not make reliable predictions.
CO2 is entirely beneficial. No evidence has shown that an addition of CO2 is harmful. The CAGW scare is based only on conjecture; speculation by the alarmist crowd driven by their need to be proven right. So far, they have been wrong.
I am a skeptic. Simply show me the empirical evidence that for a quantifiable rise in CO2 there is a corresponding quantifiable, testable, measurable rise in global temperature, and I will accept that. Just because there is no such evidence does not make me a “denier,” but rather, a scientific skeptic in the truest sense of the word.
The alarmist crowd hates having their feet held to the fire when we ask for solid evidence of their hypothesis. But look where “Trust us” has led: it is now clear that GISS and NOAA “adjusts” its raw temperature data, and that CRU scientists completely fabricated many years of temperature data. Do you think Michael Mann is refusing to publicly archive his publicly financed data, code and methodologies because they can withstand falsification? No. He stonewalls such requests because he knows damn well that his hypothesis will be decisively falsified in short order.
I do not “deny” that CO2 has an effect, and I never have. But if the effect is so tiny that numerous other forcings overwhelm it, then there is no need to spend another dime on any kind of mitigation, sequestration, “carbon” credits, or anything related to CO2.
The money would be better spent on the many other areas of science that are currently starved of funding because the CO2/CAGW lobby sucks up the available funds. And it is now clear that they have gamed the system to their own benefit. The world needs more true skeptics, and fewer true believers.
Smokey (12:58:52) :
As always….like a knife!! Your posts get me fired up. Irrefutable, untouchable logic.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
smokey — I think you’re confusing me with someone else. I’ve always acknowledged that CO2 can have a slight warming effect. But the effect is so insignificant that it can be completely disregarded for all practical purposes.
Look, mainstream science seems to have a reasonable grip on CO2, so unless you’ve published your alternate physics theory somewhere, I would classify your statement as ideological.
As per my recent post elsewhere —
“The skeptical side alone has a wide range. At the extreme we have outright deniers, deniers who claim to be skeptics, and so on. There are those who –
a) think it’s a leftist plot
b) think there’s no evidence of warming at all
c) question the underlying physics/math
d) get the physics but think it’s being misapplied
e) get the physics and the application but distrust individuals
f) agree in principle but not the conclusion(s)
g) agree in principle and the conclusions but not the solution(s)
h) agree in principle but distrust the political results
I tend to think of a-c as flat out deniers, d-up as the actual skeptics, and f-h as the lukewarmers. It’s the skeptics on up who can follow the scientific argument. Most of the posters on this site seem to be somewhere in the a-c range where ideology rules all. Most of the skeptic sites giving hell to the alarmists are in the d-g range. Lucia, Watts, and McIntyre are all “lukewarmers” as per the definitions above. Certainly the serious skeptical community isn’t in the denier/hoaxer range.
About the only thing any of these groups have in common is the belief that politicians will do much harm. It’s what we can all agree upon. It’s the only thing.
As a skeptic (e-g) I’ve been called an oil company shill, ignorant denier, and so on at the believer sites. Meanwhile at PJM I’ve been labeled as one of “them” who want to hike the price of gas and take away their freedumbs.”
****
Point is, I see your statement as c) question the underlying physics, and that is the denier range.
You’re free to disagree with my range list, of course.
Well Lubchenko, just needs to examine her own scientific demonstrations to see how cherry picking works.
For example, she demonstrated how ordinary tap water, containing chlorine, and probably Fluoride too, when dyed with an “ordinary laboratory blue dye” kept at room temperature, is apparently perfectly capable of supporting coral reefs, and shell fishes; but if the ordinary tap water, along with Chlorine and maybe Fluoride, is dyed yellow with an ordinary yellow laboratory dye, and chilled with deka grams of dry ice per litre of ordinary tap water; then it no longer can support coral and shellfish growth.
Well that was the presumption one would make from her demonstration to a bunch of lawmakers apparently ( I saw the video myself).
I think the ordinary blue/yellow laboratory dye is called PhenolPhthalene, or something like that. Well its over 50 years since I last used that dye, so they may have better ones today.
Yeah Jane; you sure know how to pick cherries.
Air is 20% oxygen, 79% nitrogen and 0.0385% CO2
Inconvenient truth:
Air, pure oxygen and pure nitrogen all absorb more heat than pure CO2.
For proof, see here: “AGW Debunked for £3.50”
and for verification see here: “Specific Heat Capacity of Gases”
If CO2 is a greenhouse gas, so too are oxygen and nitrogen.
AGW R.I.P.
“”” Politicians cost lives (18:53:05) :
Air is 20% oxygen, 79% nitrogen and 0.0385% CO2
Inconvenient truth:
Air, pure oxygen and pure nitrogen all absorb more heat than pure CO2. “””
Well for starters, “heat” is not something that gets absorbed by anything. Heat is a process, not a thing; and the process is one of increasing the mechanical kinetic energy of atoms/molecules, which in a fixed volume of a gas, increases the rate of collisions between molecules, and so raises the pressure.
But that is not the point of the effect which we call the “Greenhouse effect”, even though real green houses work on different physical principles.
What we call the greenhouse effect in the atmosphere, involves the absorption; not of “heat”, but of energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation; which is best viewed in its quantum guise, as photons where the frequency and energy are related by Einstein’s equation; E = h.(nu) where nu is the frequency of the EM wave representation; and h is Planck’s constant; arguably introduced to Physics by this equation. It is odd that Einstein did not receive a Nobel prize for his much more famous E = m.c^2 derived from the special theory of relativity; but from E = h.nu the governing formula of the Photo-Electric effect, which was what Einstein received the Nobel Physics Prize for.
Prior to Einsteins exposition, of the PE effect, Physicists were at a loss to understand, why photo electric materials emitted electrons immediately, upon being irradiated with light; no matter how low the light level was attenuated. If the process, was like filling a bucket with water, the expectation was that there would be a delay, before enough energy was accumulated (water in the bucket) to cause the release of an electron. In stead the release was effectively instantaneous, even with the lowest possible light levels. Einstein realized, that only an “energy packet” concept would work to explain that. You either got immediate electron release, or you got nothing.
Rather ironic actually, that Einstein should get a Nobel prize for a clearly quantum effect, since he rejected the quantum theoiry for quite some time.
Maybe Phil or Merrick can check me on this; but to my knowledge; to this day, Classical Physics, has absolutely no explanation for the Photo-Electric effect. The quantum theory seems irrefutable, when you examing the PE effect. Have at it, if you want to try for an alternative explanation.
Arguably, the PE effect, which enables experimental verification of the value of Planck’s constant (h), can be considered the defining formula for (h).
In that case, we have the remarkable result, that Planck’s formula for the Black Body Radiation; one of the epic results of modern Physics, contains absolutely no arbitrary constants.
But in any case, it is the absorption of LWIR photons by CO2 and other GHGs that the warming of the atmosphere relies on, as well as the quite analagous absorption of solar spectrum frequency photons, principally by water vapor. The ultimate effect of warming the atmosphere is the same in either case. The Nirtrogen, and Oxygen molecules, and Argon atom, do not care one iota whether they obtained their kinetic energy from a solar photon excited GHG or from an LWIR photon. The associated energies are of course different (lower for the LWIR), but the effect is the same. Energy is trapped by GHG molecules, and conveyed to the ordinary atmospheric gases by collisions.
Denying the GH effect, is not a productive way of trying to earn a living or scientific recognition. It is other issues of the AGW thesis, that need to be disputed; not the GH effect.
“”” “”” Politicians cost lives (18:53:05) :
Air is 20% oxygen, 79% nitrogen and 0.0385% CO2
Inconvenient truth: “”
That leads nowhere.
The density of silicon atoms, in single crystal silicon is 5.0 x 10^22 atoms per cc.
The typical layer doping levels of often Boron or Phosphorous in CMOS integrated circuits like the ones that function inside your computer or cell phone, is of the order of 10^16-10^18 atoms per CC.
At 10^18 level, that is 50,000 silicon atoms per Boron (or P). So your computer fnctions quite well, with silicon impurity levels way below the density of CO2 in the atmosphere.
So get over it; the fact that CO2 is about 0.0388% of the atmosphere, is quite irrelevent, to the effect that it has.
And NO, I do not believe that CO2 has any appreciable effect on earth’s climate (H2O does); but it is silly to argue that one molecule in 2500 can’t do anything.
” COCKTAIL PARTY PHYSICS.” An essay.
Cocktail parties are a fixture of technical conferences; I attended many; one very notable one of the Electro-Chem Society in NYC in the early 1970s.
Let’s imagine a cocktail party for the visitors to WUWT; a big one; we’ll have one million attendees; so we need a big ballroom. As is typical of cocktail parties in hi tech confabs, the guys always outnumber the girls about 4:1.
The girls are the exciting ones with that big O2 on their name badge. The guys all wear the N2 badges (stands for Nerd) Everybody mills around on the ballroom floor, and with the guy to gal ratio, everybody moves around looking for an unattached girl. There’s always empty spaces on the ballroom floor, and everyone immediately moves towards an empty space; which promptly moves the empty spaces somewhere else. So it is a dynamic situation. Everybody has a drink of course, and some of them get more excited than others. For many of the guys its a beer; hopefully not one of those Colorado ones made from yellow snow.
I always drank screwdrivers. Actually, I drank ONE screw driver, and then I told the Phaetons that were wandering around supplying liquor, to just bring me the Orange juice. That way I could stay sober, and pick up more G2 from the vartious people I happened to bump into. You do a lot of bumping into at cocktail parties, and you can learn quite a lot, and meet some interesting folks.
If that is all there is to cocktail parties; don’t bother going. The girls are mostly married anyway, and not looking for a nerd, if they are single.
But what really makes cocktail parties tick is the “Special People”. The giants of science or whatever; and everybody at a cocktail party would like to meet some of those, and bend their ear, or try to impress them.
We have a few of them at our million guest WUWT cocktail bash. Actually there are 388 of these special folks at the party. They all have one of those special CO2 badges; stands for Celebrated Obscurity.
See there’s Roy Spencer just over there, with a whisky in his hand. He has a gaggle of attendees. You can only get six people around one person, without someone getting to close for comfort, so we have likely some post docs, or PhDs around Roy. Well the second layer of hangers on can hold 12 people, just like in a 19 strand cable. Mostly Bachelors or Masters candidates I would guess; all shoving and pushing trying to get Roy’s attention.
Periodically one of the Post docs, may hear something slip from Roy, and he may head off to call his publisher, giving then opportunity for some lesser light to break the inner circle.
The third layer of course contains up to 18 folks; just guess how many of them are likely to get Dr Spencer’s attention.
Now I am sure John Christy is in the ballroom somewhere; but it’s a sure bet that Roy has no idea where; because Prof Christy also has a gaggle of pursuers. Periodically the Phaetons arrive for a refill to keep Roy and John working towards an inebriated state.
If you look at the floor from a sky camera, you’ll find Prof Lindzen in there, and Fred Singer; Hansen and Schmidt are also there; even Al Gore, is in that assortment of 388 special folks.
Hey none of them have any idea that those other guys are at the party. John has been trying to get some new info to Roy about Population Densities and UHIs; but they have no idea where the other one is.
You see, with only 388 of these chick magnets in the room, there’s only one for every 2577 guests. If you do the math; you find that on average theres 13.7 layers of guys and gals in between any one of these experts, and the closest other one to them. They have no idea that they don’t have the entire party to themselves.
But the Phaetons seek them out to replenish their egos. I once attended a small cosy gathering of about 650 guests at a n electronics party at the Hilton Hotel Ballroom in Sunnyvale CA. There were only two Phaetons plying the whole floor; well you could go to the bar yourself for a refill. This one in a little black Tutu, with a white ruff collar blouse was a real hottie. She brought me my first screwdriver, and I told her to just make it Orange juice after that; If she could remember that.
Oh she said; that’s why they hire me; I will remember what you are drinking, and keep bringing you that until you tell me otherwise. In fact she said, I can keep track of what everyone on the ballroom floor is drinking, and keep them going all party long. Wow ! that’s incredible.
What’s more she said; if you come back to one of my parties five years from now, and I see you, I will bring you a screwdriver.
That’s why they pay me the big bucks.
Well the microdynamics of what is going on here, is pretty interesting. The general congregation are relatively boring folks, and it is hit or miss; but once in a while you will collide with someone who happens to be quite interesting; who knows one of those pretty girls with the O2 tags, may be unattached, and find you interesting.
But if it wasn’t for those special folks; the 388 Icons, there wouldn’t be a whole lot of much happening; but in the neighborhood of each of them, a whole microclimate of onformation exchange, and personal interplay is happening; and periodically, you will see some grad student peel off one of those confabs, and head for some gal and then lay on her what he just learned from Tim Ball or Phil Jones; and try to make out that it was his own idea.
Yes; Cocktail parties are just like the atmosphere. The general milling around of the N2s and the O2s despite the 4:1 outnumbering; the whole place looks pretty much the same with just general random walk Brownian motion like events happening.
But the driving force of the real dynamics at the party, is what goes on around one of those odd CO2 or other special characters; and so long as the Phaetons continue to liquor them up; they can energize a pretty good sized bunch of ordinary folks around them.
I’m guessing that John Christy maybe has a red wine in his hand; not one of those so yesterday, Califonia Cabernets; maybe a nice Pinot Noir or something more refined.
Haven’t figured out what Fred Singer drinks; I know with al Gore it is just Coolade.
Yes if you haven’t ever been to a big cocktail party, you simply wouldn’t understand how the atmosphere, and the greenhouse effect really works.
So don’t go knocking those odd fellows, even though they are loners, unaware of any like folks around; they really are the life of the party; well so long as the Phaetons keep coming back; and also remember what they are drinking. Remember each odd fellow, has a liking for a particular drink, and that is what makes him(er) tick. All manner of drinks are available; but each of the special guests has a preference for only a certain kind of drink.
George E. Smith
When you claim that heat cannot be absorbed, that is not strictly true is it? Heat after all is kinetic energy and absorption of kinetic energy is a mode of energy transfer through motion.
But for the sake of argument lets just avoid the hair splitting and change the first sentence to :
“Air, pure oxygen and pure nitrogen all absorb more infrared radiation than pure CO2.”
Then if I can ask you to please comment on my entire post, not just the parts you decide to select in order to take me out of context. Remembering to include that all important conclusion, if you don’t mind.
[snip]
It may or may not be silly to argue that one molecule in 2500 can’t do anything and perhaps we may well differ considerably on that point. But it is a point that you are assuming I actually made when in fact, I did no such thing.
The point I made, if you care to read my post properly, without any convenient and selective omissions, is that 2500 molecules in 2500 (all atmospheric gases) are actually effecting temperature.
Well Pol, have it your way. I believe I explained that heat(ing) is a process, not a product; it’s a VERB.
Yes you got it right gases absorb Radiation not “heat”; In the process they do heat up; ie undergo an increase in Temperature, which is just another way of describing the mean energy (kinetic) per molecule. But before you claim that nitrogen and oqygen absorb more infrared radiation than CO2, you need to look at the absorption spectra of those molecules.
And if you insist on considering heat as a noun, it isn’t absorbed, it is merely conveyed from one bplace to another usually by either convection or conduction; the first comprising mass transport of the material, and the second involving intermolecular(atomic) collisions.
Heat is NOT conveyed by radiation. Photons have no notion of Temperature.
“”” But for the sake of argument lets just avoid the hair splitting and change the first sentence to :
“Air, pure oxygen and pure nitrogen all absorb more infrared radiation than pure CO2.” “””
Your chosen sentence. The word “pure” is one you put in there. None of those things exist in the atmosphere, which is a conglomerate of mixed gases.
So that gets us to consider pure gases which we can get out of high pressure bottles. Well we can get them to at least 7 nines purity; maybe 8, as in 99.99999 or 99.999999 % purity.
so in reality we are comparing them on a strictly molecular basis.
One molecule of CO2 versus one molecule of O2 or one molecule of N2. Feel free to throw in any others; say one molecule of H2O.
So they are all pure substances. not all the same mass, but you can divide by the molecular weights if you want to normalize that.
I suspect you migth find that they absorb INFRA-RED RADIATION about in the order; H2O, CO2, O2, N2.
If I got that order wrong, I suspect Phil will correct me.
So I don’t know that your thesis is supported by the facts.
Now if you want to argue that the thermal energy (kinetic energy due to heating) of those atmospheric molecules all 2577 of them combine to warm (in some small way) the surface of the earth; well I don’t have any argument with that.
That amount of heating isn’t much compared with the heating that the incoming solar energy does to the surface.
But the phenomenon usually known as the greenhouse effect, even though real greenhouses don’t work that way, relates to heating of the atmosphere as a result of capture of outgoing LWIR radiation photons by so-called green house gases such as H2O, or CO2 CH4 as well if you like. Very little of theat LWIR is captured directly by either O2 or N2., even all 25 76 molecules of them (less 1% for the Argon).
You choose a somewhat valueless hill to die on, if you think 0.0389% of the Atmosphere doesn’t do much because it is just Carbon Dioxide.
Far better to choose some more valuable chink in the armor of the AGW mythology to attack; there are plenty of them.
George E Smith
You maintain that it is only greenhouse gases that absorb IR. If that is the case then 99% of the atmospheric gases must be heated by conduction and that is simply nonsense.
I am saying that all gases absorb IR. Even water vapour is transparent to IR at certain frequencies, between 3-4.6 microns I believe. I don’t care what the scientist have to say on this subject and I have spent the last 18 month questioning the science. I conclude that the science is wrong (big surprise) and that all gases absorb IR as do all substances (natural).
I know perfectly well what the science say’s about oxygen and nitrogen being transparent to IR and I know exactly where the claim comes originates.
John Tyndall in his book Contributions to Molecular Physics in the Domain of Radiant Heat was where the claim originated in which he states that oxygen and nitrogen are quote:
“Practically transparent to radiant heat.”
This statement is the origin of such claims as “the science is settled” and “the greenhouse effect is 150 fifty year old established physics”. It is also the origin of AGW fraud as far as I am concerned. From the deeply flawed conclusions of John Tyndall has sprung the entire AGW bandwagon.
If 99% of the atmosphere were transparent to infrared radiation this would mean that only greenhouse gases could absorb and re-emit IR. As all the energy leaving the system must do so as infrared so were is the bottleneck?
No gases are transparent to infrared. To claim that they are is false. At certain frequencies they may be less absorbent but the electromagnetic spectrum huge. Anything above 0 K has absorbed IR. Oxygen and nitrogen have melting points of 54.36 K and 63.15 K respectively. CO2 and water (the two main greenhouse gases) melt at 194.65 K and 273 K respectively.
A gas that is transparent to infrared is called ice. In view of the fact that the Earth (initial) surface is covered by 70% water. conduction is not a viable heating mechanism for the atmosphere. Also in view of the fact that air is a poor conductor of heat, radiation is the only viable heating mechanism for the atmospheric gases. Therefore no gases are transparent to IR.
To imply that 99% of all gases in the atmosphere are heated by conduction is just silly. But that is what the greenhouse hypothesis requires one to believe.
I know the the greenhouse effect is the goose that lays golden eggs but that goose has long since flown dear boy.
Snip away.
Well Pol, I have no idea where it is, that you live; doesn’t really matter; anywhere is ok by me.
But here in the USA, we are (somewhat) free to believe anything that we want to; one of the advantages of livng in a somewhat free country.
So I have no wish to change your mind on anything; including if you want to, that Hydrogen and Helium, being ordinary gases, are able to absorb (not insignificantly) infra-red radiation.
In this day and age, one can Google almost anything up on the web; you might look for the infra-red absorption spectrum of Helium. But that would be something a scientist put together and you know how much you can believe them.
As for the scientific writings of John Tyndall; well lots of scientists predated him. You could study the history of “caloric” to see what some early scientists thought about “heat”.