The 4th International Conference on Climate Change – Chicago, Il., USA
Consensus? What consensus?
by Roger Helmer MEP
I’m writing this in the Marriott Hotel in Chicago, where I’m attending the Heartland Institute Climate Conference (and I’ve just done an interview with BBC Environment Correspondent Roger Harrabin).
Ahead of the interview, I thought I’d just check out the Conference Speaker’s list. There are 80 scheduled speakers, including distinguished scientists (like Richard Lindzen of MIT), policy wonks (like my good friend Chris Horner of CEI), enthusiasts and campaigners (like Anthony Watts of the wattsupwiththat.com web-site), and journalists (including our own inimitable James Delingpole).
Of the 80 speakers, I noticed that fully forty-five were qualified scientists from relevant disciplines, and from respected universities around the world — from the USA, Canada, Mexico, Russia, Sweden, Norway, UK, Australia and New Zealand.
All of them have reservations about climate alarmism, ranging from concerns that we are making vastly expensive public policy decisions based on science that is, to say the least, open to question, through to outright rejection of the Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) model.
Several of these scientists are members or former members of the IPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
But how do 45 sceptical scientists stack up, you may well ask, against the 2500 on the official IPCC panels? But of course there aren’t 2500 relevant scientists on the IPCC panel. Many of them are not strictly scientists at all. Some are merely civil servants or environmental zealots. Some are economists — important to the debate but not experts on the science. Others are scientists in unrelated disciplines. The Chairman of the IPCC Dr. Ravendra Pachuari, is a Railway Engineer.
And of the remaining minority who are indeed scientists in relevant subjects, some (like my good friend Prof Fred Singer) have explicitly rejected the IPCC’s AGW theory. Whittle it down, and you end up with fifty or so true believers, most of whom are part of the “Hockey Team” behind the infamous Hockey Stick graph, perhaps the most discredited artefact in the history of science. This is a small and incestuous group of scientists (including those at the CRU at the University of East Anglia). They work closely together, jealously protecting their source data, and they peer-review each other’s work. This is the “consensus” on which climate hysteria is based.
And there are scarcely more of them than are sceptical scientists at this Heartland Conference in Chicago, where I am blogging today. Never mind the dozens of other scientists here in Chicago, or the thousands who have signed petitions and written to governments opposing climate hysteria. Science is not decided by numbers, but if it were, there is the case to be made that the consensus is now on the sceptical side.
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Joel Shore, Wren,
Joel Shore;
No…I am just seeing the reason why climate scientists talk about the radiative forcing and climate sensitivity in terms of a doubling of CO2, since it is the fractional increase in concentration that is relevant when the relationship to concentration is approximately logarithmic.>>
So we agree that CO2 is logarithmic. Now let’s look at earth’s radiance to space as temperature increases in that context:
“normal” CO2 = 280 ppm
280 + 100 = 380 (+1.7 w/m2)
380 + 100 = 480 (+1.2 w/m2)
480 + 100 = 580 (+1.0 w/m2)
580 + 100 = 680 (+.85 w/m2)
680 + 100 = 780 (+.63 w/m2)
Earth Radiance from 15 degrees C
15 degrees C = normal
15 + 1 = 16 (+5.53 w/m2)
16 + 1 = 17 (+5.59 w/m2)
17 +1 = 18 (+5.65 w/m2)
See any problem yet?
By the way, still waiting for Barefootgirl to answer Theo Goodwin’s question (in comment May 18, 2010 at 6:49 pm):
So, please barefootgirl, tell me, are there empirical hypotheses that can be stated as universal generalizations and used to explain forcings and predict their behavior?
davidmhoffer says:
May 19, 2010 at 11:15 am
Joel Shore, Wren,
Joel Shore;
No…I am just seeing the reason why climate scientists talk about the radiative forcing and climate sensitivity in terms of a doubling of CO2, since it is the fractional increase in concentration that is relevant when the relationship to concentration is approximately logarithmic.>>
So we agree that CO2 is logarithmic. Now let’s look at earth’s radiance to space as temperature increases in that context:
“normal” CO2 = 280 ppm
280 + 100 = 380 (+1.7 w/m2)
380 + 100 = 480 (+1.2 w/m2)
480 + 100 = 580 (+1.0 w/m2)
580 + 100 = 680 (+.85 w/m2)
680 + 100 = 780 (+.63 w/m2)
Earth Radiance from 15 degrees C
15 degrees C = normal
15 + 1 = 16 (+5.53 w/m2)
16 + 1 = 17 (+5.59 w/m2)
17 +1 = 18 (+5.65 w/m2)
See any problem yet?
—–
If you have a point to make, why not just make it rather than going through a lot of steps?
Smokey says:
May 19, 2010 at 11:01 am
Joel Shore, May 18, 2010 at 8:06 pm…
Joel would be advised stick to things he knows something about, which don’t include either the OISM Petition or human nature. Explaining the Petition he says:
So, basically, what you had was a Soviet-style election: Bombard scientists with deceptive propaganda and only record the “Yes” votes. And, now we have Smokey defending it. I guess that old saying is true: Politics makes strange bedfellows!
Aside from being wrong about my politics [I have always been registered Independent/Decline To State], Joel incorrectly presumes that a voluntary petition is a “Soviet-style election.” That’s an amazing disconnect from reality.
Joel is trying to convince us that more than 31,000 professionals with degrees in the physical sciences, including 9,000 PhD’s, are so brainless that they didn’t understand the meaning of what they were downloading, printing out, signing, stamping, and mailing in.
=====
That 31,000 isn’t as many as it may seem. It is from a huge pool of people. It includes people in more categories than just those who are employed scientist and engineers in the U.S., a group that totaled 18,927,000 according to the National Science Foundation. Even if the pool was restricted to that group, the 31,000 would represent only 1 out of every 610.
http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/wmpd/pdf/tabh-5.pdf
Wren;
If you have a point to make, why not just make it rather than going through a lot of steps?>>
We agreed that CO2 is logarithmic. Do we also agree that earth radiance rises as temperature rises?
Smokey says:
If you look at the credentials of the signers in detail, I think you’ll find them not that impressive. I am amongst the very best qualified ***JUST*** by virtue of the fact that I have a PhD in physics and I would argue that such a credential alone does not in fact make me qualified to judge the merits of the data and arguments in the “paper” that accompanied that petition (and the merits of the petition statements). It is only because I have probably spent well over a thousand of hours over the last decade studying climate issues as a “hobby” that I can see the deceptiveness and errors in that paper. Few scientists, even if they have as closely aligned a background as I, have that sort of time to invest….or the inclination to do so. (Also, scientists are not used to being actively deceived by their fellow scientists and thus are not very good detectors of such deception.)
So, I am not surprised that out of the millions of people in the U.S. that have the necessary credentials to sign that petition, they found 31,000 who were willing to sign. That represents only a small fraction of those qualified to sign even by their extremely diluted standards. As polling has shown, the more specifically qualified scientists are to comment on the merits of climate science, the more strongly lopsided is the agreement with the consensus view.
davidmhoffer says:
Since, I can’t read your mind, I am not yet sure where your confusion is. However, my guess is that you are just rediscovering the fact that in the absence of feedbacks (other than that implied by Steffan-Boltzmann relation), the climate sensitivity is around 1.1 C for a doubling of CO2. [Actually, your numbers won’t quite bear that out because you are mistakenly using the temperature at the surface rather than the effective temperature at which the earth system is emitting back out into space [which corresponds to a temperature higher up in the troposphere], but they would if you correctly used the ~255 K value.]
I am having a conflict of interest. I like to read scientific, peer-reviewed magazines such as Science and Nature and Geophysical Research letters. According to your view, these magazines, with their hundreds of articles are alarmist literature that require religious belief to digest. Now, I am not religious and still ‘believe’ most of the science published there to be reasonable, as I assume, it is not part of a plot by some 50 or so believers that hijacks the scientific community. I can also not really find a climate hysteria in these magazines, but I am open minded and listen if you point those out to me. If your ‘real scientists’ outnumber the ‘AGW believing scientists’, the ‘real scientists’ should take over and run the peer reviewed show. I agree with you, there is no reason for alarmism or hysteria. Why do you create them?
One last thing I would like to know. How many of the people you are referring to as ‘believers’ are actually religious, compared to how many of the delegates at the Heartland conference?
Brighton Early
friendsofginandtonic.org
I see that Wren and Joel have their talking points in order: out of millions of people qualified to sign the OISM Petition, “only” 31,000 have signed.
So let’s deconstruct that silly argument: the alarmist contingent has repeatedly tried to get the *same* group of people to sign their petitions supporting CAGW — and they have come up with only about one-tenth the number of signatures.
Which of course also refutes Joel’s last sentence above. Truth be told, the only “consensus” for CAGW is in those groups paid to find evidence of CAGW — and there is still no verifiable, testable evidence showing that human activity drives the climate.
REPLY: Just to add to that, I’m sure Joel will have a ready answer as to why the organizer of that Oregon petition won last night in Oregon:
Robinson is Republican nominee for District 4 seat in Congress, will face DeFazio in fall
http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2010/05/us_rep_congressional_district_2.html
Science researcher Art Robinson beat small businesswoman Jaynee Germond by a wide margin to win the Republican nomination for the District 4 seat in Congress. He will face longtime incumbent Rep. Peter DeFazio in the fall general election.
Gosh, an arch skeptic in Congress? Can’t wait for November. – Anthony
It is simply not the case that all the signatories to the Oregon Petition hold a degree in the physical sciences. Most of them are actually engineers, incuding software engineers. Now engineers are skilled and useful people, but not necessarily informed about other disciplines. Of the rest a sizable proportion (>10%) are medical people, including vetinarians. Now my Doctor was magnificent with my allergies, but I am not sure I would go to her with a problem in radiative transfer physics.
There must be over 5 million people eligible to sign the petition, so 31,000 collected over a decade is a drop in the proverbial. When Scientific American contacted a sample of actual climatologistys who had signed, 10% had no memory of the petition, which should give the truly sceptical pause before relying on its conclusions.
On the other hand the report of the IPCC WG1 which deals with the Physical Sciences had over 600 contributing authors, every last one a published and practising climatologist. There’s a list here: http://www.eecg.utoronto.ca/~prall/climate/AR4wg1_authors_table.html
Now I do not claim that every last one of these would applaud every sentence of the executive sumamries, and there has been a single resignation from this number, but clearly Roger Helmer’s assertion that there are just about 50 ‘true believers’ is nonsense.
What of the other half of his comparison, that there are 45 scientists from relevant disciplines and repected institutions speaking? Well, in amongst the politicians and Heartlanders starting with his ‘friend’, S Fred Singer… Singer (born 1924, retired) wrote on his website that most glaciers are in fact expanding not retreating, a statement that he must have known is false but which echoed round the internet for a long time http://www.monbiot.com/junkscience . He gave as a source ‘a paper in Science’ which turned out not to exist.
Then there’s Pat Michaels, retired State Climatologist, who in testimony to Congress erased two of Jim Hansen’s three projected climate scenarios, leaving only the highest as evidence of exaggeration. Some have described this as ‘fraud, pure and simple’.
Then there are Georges Carlin (EPA, retired), Marsh,(retired from Argonne National Laboratory) listed as ‘University of Chicago’ though if anyone knows his connection to that seat of learning, I am all ears – and Kukla (born 1930, retired). Of course we have Monckton http://www.altenergyaction.org/Monckton.html and Nils-Axel Morner (born 1928, retired) dowsing enthusiast http://www.edf.org/documents/3868_morner_exposed.pdf ,
Ian Plimer http://bit.ly/entingplimer and so on and so forth. Try as I might I couldn’t get the numbers of those actually meeting Helmer’s description into double figures …. anyone able to help?
Brighton Early says:
May 19, 2010 at 12:55 pm
I am having a conflict of interest. I like to read scientific, peer-reviewed magazines such as Science and Nature and Geophysical Research letters. According to your view, these magazines, with their hundreds of articles are alarmist literature that require religious belief to digest. Now, I am not religious and still ‘believe’ most of the science published there to be reasonable, as I assume, it is not part of a plot by some 50 or so believers that hijacks the scientific community. I can also not really find a climate hysteria in these magazines, but I am open minded and listen if you point those out to me. If your ‘real scientists’ outnumber the ‘AGW believing scientists’, the ‘real scientists’ should take over and run the peer reviewed show. I agree with you, there is no reason for alarmism or hysteria. Why do you create them?
…—…—
For example, would you consider that Mann is a alarmist? Maybe even a “AGW believing (so-called) scientist”?
Does he contribute to the hysteria about AGW beliefs? Absolutely “Yes!” == His distortions and infamous/faked/fraudulent graphs appears 7 times alone in the IPCC reports, and is the fundamental basis in Al Gore’s movie and book. HE is the “definition” of AGW hysteria.
But Mann IS also on the editorial board and IS a (anonymous!) peer-reviewing “scientist” on more than 30 different journals and trade publications. Now – How are you going to get past that bias?
Mann/Hansen etc, al are the Inquisition, with Obama and his annointed EPA and NOAA and NASA and GISS and NWS and their (now well-funded by 79 billion in AGW hyped) university heads and departments, etc, etc are the holy ones. And their minions in ABBCNNBCBS are zealously repeating the chants and charts for their masses.
I do not understand the problem some people have here of changes in cloud cover altering the global average temperature. The earth is massive and temperature variations are not synchronised throughout the globe.I see no problem with the pdo causing more clouds and reflecting more sunlight back into space locally as Roy spencer suggests, I accept it as a possibility at least until it is disproved, I am not a scientist though.
Smokey says:
Really…Can you give me an example of a mass-mailed petition on the AGW side where there was no attempt to limit the signers to people who worked pretty directly on the subject?
Anthony says:
And, this proves what exactly? If he was elected a fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, then at least you might have something that gives evidence of his standing in the scientific community (although even that would not necessarily be an endorsement on all views he has on scientific issues). Winning a Republican primary? Not so much.
Joel Shore says:May 19, 2010 at 12:40 pm
If you look at the credentials of the signers in detail, I think you’ll find them not that impressive. I am amongst the very best qualified ***JUST*** by virtue of the fact that I have a PhD in physics and I would argue that such a credential alone does not in fact make me qualified to judge the merits of the data and arguments in the “paper” that accompanied that petition (and the merits of the petition statements). It is only because I have probably spent well over a thousand of hours over the last decade studying climate issues as a “hobby” that I can see the deceptiveness and errors in that paper.
So, where do you draw the line? A PhD in physics, engineering, physiology, music. We’re always hearing form the CAGW contingent that it takes a degree in Climatology, Climate Science, etc.; and Meteorology is not good enough. I’ve spent as much time as you have studying the issues. Clear up this misconception for us. Maybe it’s not the degree, how about GPA. You need to be smart enough and have a degree? I got 4.0 /4.0 through 120 post graduate hours. Good enough for you. Look up the number of degreed individuals that read this blog. As I recall, better than 50% with advanced degrees. But you know better. What a pompous twit, in optical physics.
Paul Daniel Ash says:
May 18, 2010 at 7:06 pm
Erm…
I agree, it’s always best to read before posting.
DaveE.
Joel Shore says:
Since, I can’t read your mind, I am not yet sure where your confusion is.>>
That’s the tinfoil hat in action, great stuff. Keeps the aliens out too.
Joel Shore says:
However, my guess is that you are just rediscovering the fact that in the absence of feedbacks (other than that implied by Steffan-Boltzmann relation), the climate sensitivity is around 1.1 C for a doubling of CO2. [Actually, your numbers won’t quite bear that out because you are mistakenly using the temperature at the surface rather than the effective temperature at which the earth system is emitting back out into space [which corresponds to a temperature higher up in the troposphere], but they would if you correctly used the ~255 K value.]>>
Given your credentials, I accept that I should have used 255 K. Had I done so, I would have arrived at 3.84, 3.88 and 3.93 watts/m2 respectively. Let’s recap my previous comment with those values incorporated:
“normal” CO2 = 280 ppm
280 + 100 = 380 (+1.7 w/m2)
380 + 100 = 480 (+1.2 w/m2)
480 + 100 = 580 (+1.0 w/m2)
580 + 100 = 680 (+.85 w/m2)
680 + 100 = 780 (+.63 w/m2)
Earth Radiance from 255 K:
255K = normal
255 + 1 = 256 (+3.84 w/m2)
256 + 1 = 257 (+3.88 w/m2)
257+1 = 258 (+3.93 w/m2)
Analysis: Given that we are currently at just slightly over 380 ppm, and IPCC AR4 quotes the last few decades as exhibiting a 1.9 ppm/year increase in CO2, it will take about 200 years to arrive at 780 ppm. If we further total the forcing to be expected from 780 ppm we get an additional forcing of 3.68 watts/m2. While calculating sensitivity from 280 to double arrives at a 1.1 degree direct temperature increase, the combination of CO2 being logarithmic and earth radiance increasing exponentially, the sensitivity FROM WHERE WE ARE NOW is only 1 degree.
Further, both 1.1 degree (for CO2 doubling from 280) and 1.0 degrees (for CO2 doubling from 380) are theoretical values, as are the proposed feedbacks from water vapour claimed by IPCC AR4 to arrive at a positive feedback 2 to 4 times direct forcing from CO2. Observation however, suggests that the current CO2 concentration (just over 380 ppm) increased from 280 ppm during a time period when earth surface temperature increased by only 0.6 degrees. Given that the logarithmic function of CO2 should have resulted in 38% increase (380/280) which in turn yields 48% of the forcing arrived at by doubling from 280, we see that the combined sensitivity of CO2 AND water vapour, provided that we attribute 100% of the observed increase to CO2 plus feedbacks, is just over 1.2 degrees. Given that the earth warmed about the same amount in the previous century, 1.2 degrees seems very high as most of it is likely natural, but for now let’s accept that there was zero additional natural warming, and the entire 0.6 degree increase was driven by CO2 rising from 280 to 380.
If we apply Stefan Boltzman and the logarithmic nature of CO2, not to where we came from (280) but where we are now (380) and adjust for the observed sensitivity, we arrive at about 0.5 degrees, feedbacks included, for the next 200 YEARS of CO2 production at current rates.
Question: Where is the catastrophe?
Wren, hope you are still following along.
Barefootgirl, hope you are paying attention. Joel Shore responded to my questions by stating his assumptions about my math, and identifying the error that I made. When you bring that sort of approach to the discussion based on the knowledge that you claim, you will start getting respect around here rather than hostility.
Joel, looking forward to your rebuttal. Keep in mind that if I erred by a factor of THREE, that still results in only 1.5 degrees over the next 200 years, so to convince me that there is some catastrophe on the horizon from CO2 emissions, you are going to have to show me that I erred by a factor of 6 or more. Incidentaly, if you model from TOA at 255 K (as I did on your suggestion) then you are assuming that absorption of upward LW below TOA is 100%. Since we know that this is incorrect, that upward LW from earth surface does in fact escape through the atmospheric window in some proportion, I would think that the TOA number at 255 K is low.
Smokey says:
May 19, 2010 at 10:25 am
yes Smokey our institute has reported the emails to security. And because of them, our institute has implemented more security measures since before these threats started a few years ago, anyone could have walked into our offices.
It is unfortunate that some here think this has to be all political. Scientists are the most objective folks around. And we are very careful not to link our names to any political side. Whenever I do outreach work I first make sure there is no political agenda. It’s one thing to present data and analysis and try to educate folks, it’s another to be tied into someone else’s agenda. I do think there are a lot of “haters” on this site. I see it constantly in hostile, downgrading remarks made towards anyone who disagrees with a skeptics point of view. Which by the way is hard to follow, since I find so many contradicting points made here. Sometimes you believe in rising CO2 levels, sometimes not. Sometimes you believe in the temperature record, sometimes not. It all seems to depend on what point you are trying to make. You don’t subject your few chosen favorite scientists to the same rigor as other scientists. Outright lies are presented as facts. And the cherry-picking that goes on here is worse than anything I’ve ever seen in any published climate paper.
But it’s been very enlightening for me as I now have a better understanding of what type of arguments/tactics you use to try to present your case. I have to prepare for a televised climate debate and you all have helped me tremendously get ready for it. So thank you all very much for that.
Aloha!
Barefootgirl;
And the cherry-picking that goes on here is worse than anything I’ve ever seen in any published climate paper.>>
You’ve repeated this accusation several times, but not given one example. Given the fraudulent hockey stick, and the tree ring study 50% weighted to a single tree, I think you have to come up with something pretty astounding to be worse than just those two examples.
barefootgirl says:
May 18, 2010 at 9:30 pm
Do you know what the strawman argument is?
Jimbo never said ALL warming was claimed to be anthropogenic
DaveE.
barefootgirl,
No credibility there. Not calling the police when multiple “crazy skeptics” make death threats against you would be completely irresponsible — if your story was true.
So report the names here. You know, the names of the “crazy skeptics” who are supposedly stalking you. Otherwise, it’s clear that you’re fabricating the whole thing. No one in their right mind, especially someone with children, would blow off actual death threats by just tipping company security; in fact security would be legally obligated to notify the police. Death threats are a crime. And most everyone you talked to about it would tell you the same thing: call the police! Now!
But it was a swell story.
Phil Clarke,
Got nothin’, I see.
There have been repeated attempts to get lots of signatures on alarmist petitions. They all fizzled. Every one. That “consensus” seems to be in your imagination, not in the real world.
But I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt: let’s discard 5% of the OISM signatures. That’s a lot, I’m sure there are not that many that are questionable…
…on second thought, let’s throw out 10% of them. No, 20%!
Would you be happy with 25%? 30%? How about discarding 40%?
OK then, if you insist… let’s discard half of the 31,000 signatures. That still leaves way more than all the alarmist signatures… in total.
And Joel Shore, if it weren’t for your incessant appeals to authority, you wouldn’t have much to write about, would you? I’m about as impressed with them as I am with Joe Biden. But I notice that the climate is acting normally, as always, so unlike you I don’t need the politicians running those credibility-challenged organizations to tell me what to think.
barefootgirl says on May 19, 2010 at 2:51 pm
You know they don’t have anything substantive to say when they accuse you of being “haters.” It goes along with the charge that we are “creationists” and sundry other malefactors.
So you think it is OK for a scientist to “cherry pick?”
It’s not ok for any side to be cherry picking. I would have more respect for this web site if there was no cherry picking done in the posts presented here. A justification for starting and end points should always be given with any graph that you show. So perhaps that can be a start for new posts?
I wonder when Anthony is going to mention that the Arctic ice extent is now at the 2007 level? Seems he was quick to mention when it approached the “normal” line but he’s been very quiet about what’s happening today. And it’s almost at the 2006 line (I just looked at the German site), which I would think would merit some discussion since 2006 was the previous record low winter ice extent. It would mean that the ice decline rate has been rather fast this May. Seems to fit with estimates of ice volume given by the APL site. I would think if WUTW wants to be the “science” site to go to that they would give equal coverage of what’s happening in the Arctic today.
There have been repeated attempts to get lots of signatures on alarmist petitions. They all fizzled. Every one.
Oh Really? More than 1,500 of the world’s most distinguished senior scientists, including the majority of Nobel laureates in science, have signed a landmark consensus declaration urging leaders worldwide to act immediately to prevent the potentially devastating consequences of human-induced global warming
Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1997/10/971002070106.htm
More recently, 1,700 UK scientists signed up to a similar petition – http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/news/latest/uk-science-statement.html
You will notice that these are practising scientists, as opposed to say, practising MDs vetinarians and Chiropracters.
Or try this: list the professional scientific bodies who have failed to endorse the mainstream position. Won’t take you long.
Or try this thought experiment : let us assume that the speakers at ICCC 2010 are the ‘cream of the crop’, the best and bravest contrarians. Here is the list: http://www.heartland.org/events/2010Chicago/speakers.html
Leaving aside the demonstrably flexible approach to the truth of some of the delegates – out of 70-plus speakers I count just three women, and not a single non-white. The average age seems about sixty and there are an awful lot of Emeritus/retired folk in there. Where are all the young, bright, black women who agree with you? Roger Helmer is past the official UK retirement age. What does the future hold for your movement, Smokey?