NOTE: Many new updates below.
A few people complained that Christopher Monckton’s rebuttal to Professor Abraham was a bit long, and a perhaps a bit hard to read due to it being jam packed with essential points.
I’m advised that a new version exists. Here then below, is a condensed and more tightly formatted version, for easier reading.
Click image below for the PDF file:
John Abraham’s presentation is here:
http://www.stthomas.edu/engineering/jpabraham/
(NOTE: He uses Adobe presenter – may not work on all browsers)
====================================
UPDATES:
Jo Nova has a good discussion on the entire issue:
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/07/abraham-surrenders-to-monckton-uni-of-st-thomas-endorses-untruths/
=========================
From comments at ClimateProgress, this email address works for pro and con:
I sent an email in support of John Abraham to St. Thomas University and he responded with a request that indications of support for his efforts to debunk Monckton be sent to Dr Susan Alexander (slalexander@stthomas.edu), who is managing the University’s response to Monckton.
=========================
Whether you are pro or con, there is a signature gathering campaign over at Hot Topic in New Zealand, home of the new ETS tax. It reads like a who’s who of AGW activists.
http://hot-topic.co.nz/support-john-abraham/
Reports are that they won’t take opposing comments. Easy to test.
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Smokey says:
“Belief systems are hard to overcome with facts and logic”
Smokey, I agree, and understanding this is key to understanding the dynamics of the current political and climate change debates. Here’s an very interesting read on this topic:
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/07/11/how_facts_backfire/?camp=misc:on:share:article
Dave
regarding the current “sci-fi writers” mentioned – sorry, but their plots stink and the characters are pathetic.
And are they ever BORING!!!!
The ‘Climategate’ travesty
“Even in these intellectually debauched times, is hard to credit the cynical and brazenly corrupt farce of the ‘investigations’ into the ‘Climategate’ email scandal centred around East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit.”
http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/6147814/the-climategate-travesty.thtml
Yikes, is this Gal angry. I think I’ve found another Journalist worth reading. I’ll be running out of fingers soon.
Pointman
Comment transferred from “Comment of the Week” thread.
@David UK,
I cannot believe that a half-decent legal advisor would have allowed Lord Monckton to go on a taped TV programme and call the University of St. Thomas a “half-a*sed Catholic Bible College”. That type of Anglo snobbery may play well in English upper-class and elitist circles, but this is in America. If he was hoping for a sympathetic response from the College Board, or the funders, or even the student body, I would say that chance has now gone. He compounded his mistake with several other own goals, such as snide references to Fr. Dease and even the local Catholic Bishop.
Monckton seemed to be full of sound and fury, and Jones led him on, possibly thinking he was doing him a favour (but it made for good TV!). All he has done is expose himself to a damaging countersuit, should he go to law, as the University lawyers have now reminded him (in a roundabout way). He should have remembered that “revenge is a dish best eaten cold”, and I think the job of a good legal adviser would have been to remind him of that.
To me, Monckton comes across as a windy blusterer. Whatever, he now has no real recourse now except to continue an unproductive campaign on the Internet, which will probably end in failure.
On ebay, when you want to misrepresent an object you use a false question eg: Leonardo? painting to advertise a cheap print.
The good lord makes no rebuttal in his screed. A series of questions means nothing if substance has been ignored as by Moncton ( if he bought a fish shop would he be a chipmonck is an example ).
Go see if utube has the Penn and Teller piece that explains classic misdirection.
The best 🙂 was Christopher lecturing everyone that there is not such thing as an archdiocese. Of course, this, in spite of the fact that there is an Archdiocese of Moncton in Canada.
John McManus: July 16, 2010 at 12:49 pm
Go see if utube has the Penn and Teller piece that explains classic misdirection.
They don’t have to. Your comments have been perfect illustrations of it.
RunngMoose,
Your “interesting read” calling for regulation of speech due to the information glut is reminiscent of Wilson’s Committee on Public Information. Yes, perhaps humans are vulnerable to fanatical beliefs and demagogues, but it should have noted that free speech is one of the first things demagogues want to get rid of. This usage of Jefferson’s quote should be put in context:
“It’s one of the great assumptions underlying modern democracy that an informed citizenry is preferable to an uninformed one. “Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government,” Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1789. ”
In the context of the constitution, it is obvious that Jefferson did not just “trust” the people, but thought that division of powers with checks, balances, super majority protections, juries and standards of proof were necessary. In addition to these internal checks, there were the external checks of a free press and an armed citizenry.
Just because “belief systems are hard to overcome with facts and logic”, doesn’t mean they can’t be overcome. Lack of openness and transparency by East Anglia and the “team” destroyed their credibility. Just because humans are social animals vulnerable to collective identities and fear contagions, doesn’t mean that they don’t have rationality and ability to detect dissembling and spin.
RunngMoose,
Interesting article, thanks. Skeptics are much less prone to dig in their heels and take a closed-minded position on questions like AGW, and whether co2 controls the climate because skeptics are just asking questions, not proposing a new hypothesis.
Skeptics only ask the believers in the catastrophic AGW hypothesis to back their argument up with falsifiable facts and data. Not with computer models. Models amount to the opinion of their programmers. They are not evidence.
Since the AGW’ers don’t have verifiable proof of their hypothesis, they tend to throw tantrums when skeptics ask for real evidence. The current tantrum involves throwing as much mud at Mr. Monckton as they can, rather than discussing his points one by one.
All skeptics are asking is for some testable evidence that co2 or a slightly warmer, more pleasant climate are problems. Asking questions is not taking a position. Sceptics are saying: show us convincingly, using real, uncorrupted data, that co2 is the bad boy they claim it is. At that point the warmists usually refer to their computer models.
I find it interesting that the trolls appear expert on how to misrepresent things they’re selling. AGW springs to mind …
Pointman
It’s always worth ploughing through his long submissions, for little gems like this one , in his recent reply to QUESTIONS FROM THE SELECT COMMITTEE CONCERNING MY RECENT TESTIMONY:-
“,,,If the members of that faction would care to step outside their air-conditioned offices and go out on to the National Mall, they would be able to conduct a remarkably simple experiment. If the Sun shines directly upon their balding pates, they will notice that it is warmer than when the clouds are in the way. If that phenomenon takes place globally, natural “global brightening” and hence “global warming” occurs.”
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/reprint/questions_from_select_committee.pdf
Joe Spencer:
I followed, read and guess what ? A blacklist.
Eli Rabbett: “Of course, this, in spite of the fact that there is an Archdiocese of Moncton in Canada.”
That’s good, Eli. If Monckton’s airy dismissal of the reality of an archdiocese is indicative of his scientific pronouncements, I doubt that Abraham has much to worry about on that score.
The way I see it, Monckton has adopted a high-risk strategy and may well have made a grievous miscalculation.
If he had really been intent on suing for libel, he would have done so without the “public option”. Clearly, in going public he was hoping that, having privately failed to bully the university into submission, he could drum up support from influential people to do the deed for him.
But I think people would be wary about being associated with an attempt to suppress free speech and scientific enquiry, especially for someone whose scientific reputation is unproven and whose pronouncements tend towards the “colourful”.
Whichever way the issue goes, I make two predictions:
1. Monckton’s reputation will suffer from his efforts to suppress speech that is critical of him
2. Win, lose or draw, Monckton will claim victory.
I think his best response would have been to put together a YouTube video consisting of a series of snippets, each snippet from three sources: Monckton’s original speech, Abraham’s critical speech, and then Monckton’s rebuttal. Ideally, the latter would be done in a light-hearted, unoffended, conversational tone whose cumulative impact would induce viewers to be light-heartedly dismissive of Abraham.
This is psychologically nearly impossible, of course, for a battler. But it is what would still be his best course of action, even if it would take months, and technical assistance, to put together. Because Monckton’s original YouTube talk got 1.5 million hits, a sequel would likely do well also, and maybe even solidify the damage he has inflicted on the warmist case.
I’d also recommend that Monckton concede any stretchers or loose-jointed logic Abraham has caught. (“Playing for a draw” and avoiding overstatement is the way to win in the long run.) But this is really asking the impossible of an instinctive battler.
John McManus: July 16, 2010 at 3:50 pm
Joe Spencer:
I followed, read [the link] and guess what ? A blacklist.
Thus confirming you have a problem with reading comprehension.
Brendan H: July 16, 2010 at 4:33 pm
Eli Rabbett: “Of course, this, in spite of the fact that there is an Archdiocese of Moncton in Canada.”
That’s good, Eli. If Monckton’s airy dismissal of the reality of an archdiocese is indicative of his scientific pronouncements, I doubt that Abraham has much to worry about on that score.
A knowledge of Canon Law terminology and usage is relevant to the discussion of defamation in a purportedly-scientific presentation on climate change is relevant — exactly how?
toby: July 16, 2010 at 12:43 pm
He should have remembered that “revenge is a dish best eaten cold”, and I think the job of a good legal adviser would have been to remind him of that.
Statutes of limitations being what they are, a *better* legal adviser would say “Strike while the iron is hot.”
Alleagra said:
July 15, 2010 at 8:52 am
“Normally someone with his views would get short shrift but Charles Windsor gets heavy press coverage simply because his mother is the British Queen.”
It wouldn’t have anything to do with the coterie of advisers and personal staff recruited from Greenpeace then… ?
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6689978.ece
One hopes Mr. Watt will forward this sad effusion to the present Science master of Harrow, in hope that he will cane some sense into its wayward author before the old boy disgraces himself further.
Bill Tuttle: “A knowledge of Canon Law terminology and usage is relevant to the discussion of defamation in a purportedly-scientific presentation on climate change is relevant — exactly how?”
What would be relevant is Monckton’s demonstrated relationship to facts and knowledge in a defamation case where the plaintiff’s reputation is the issue. In that case, any public statements could be subject to scrutiny.
Further, if Monckton’s throw-away line is indicative of his general approach to knowledge, it shows both a somewhat cavalier attitude to the facts and a conviction of his own superiority in areas outside of his expertise. It’s likely that he has brought the same attitudes to his study of climate science.
If a court case could be narrowed down to just his presentation and Abraham’s rebuttal, Monckton’s many public statements might be inadmissable, but there’s no guarantee of that.
I sincerely apologize if I was offensive. It’s hard to remain calm over issues like this, but of course that’s no excuse for bad conduct.
Several posters take me to task for ignoring the science. If anyone would like to specify what science I got wrong, I will try to respond directly to the issue(s) involved, and without reference to personalities.
Barton Paul Levinson,
“If anyone would like to specify what science I got wrong, I will try to respond directly to the issue(s) involved, and without reference to personalities.”
You appear to be overly impressed with the correlation of over a century of warming with over a century of rising CO2. Correlation is not causation. You leap from that correlation to alarmism over the possible effects. In the mean time you are not concentrating on the key issue: Are the net feedbacks to CO2 forcing negative, positive or alarmingly positive.
“The Sun hasn’t gotten noticeably brighter in 50 years. We’ve been measuring it from satellites like Nimbus-6 and -7 and the Solar Maximum Mission. If solar output has been flat for the past 50 years, it’s hard to see how it could have caused the sharp upturn in warming of the last 30 years. ”
Obviously solar couldn’t have caused the sharp upturn in warming of the last 30 years just as CO2 increases couldn’t have caused the mid-century cooling. The answer possibly lies in the acknowledged large uncertainty in aerosols, or in internal climate variation due to the multi-decadal climate oscillations being in the negative phases during the mid-century cooling and positive phases during the recent warming. Large variations in aerosols have been found to explain how models with more than a factor of two variation in climate sensitivity are able to “match” the same 20th century climate.
However, while solar variation can’t explain the slope of the temperature trend in the 80s and 90s, the fact that it was in a grand maximum for over half a century might well explain the warmth, and may not be a coincidence. The IPCC acknowledges a factor of two uncertainty in solar variation. I’m unaware of any published model runs that gave the solar forcing hypothesis the benefit of this doubt. One would think that a competing hypothesis for some or much of the attribution should be given its due before reaching a conclusion.
“But the models are still the best thing we have for climate prediction under different scenarios, and there is no reason at all to think they’re getting the overall picture wrong.”
The models do a remarkable job on the overall picture. However, the issues at hand are quantitative, not just qualitative. Are the models accurate to the perhaps 0.1 W/m^2 globally and annually averaged that we would like for purposes of attribution of a 0.8W/m^2 energy imbalance over the course of the 1990s? We know from Wentz that none reproduced more than half the increase in precipitation observed in the recent warming. That is significant negative water cycle feedback that they are missing. We know from Spencer and Lindzen that the models have significant problems in matching the observed radiative imbalances at the tropical lattitudes. We know from Roesch that the models average over 3W/m^2 in positive surface albedo bias globally and annually averaged. These are all correlated errors among the AR4 models, that can’t benefit from a linear hope that the errors will cancel when the models are combined into ensembles.
Your error is to get too caught up in a correlation over a mere 120 years and then jumping to alarmism. The direct effects of CO2 can explain perhaps 30% of the global warming. Anything more requires net positive feedbacks. The alarmism requires climate sensitivities that would have CO2 explaining probably 80% or more of the recent warming. A moderate level of net positive feedback isn’t enough.
Most model independent estimates of climate sensitivity are based upon aerosols or solar and in the case of solar don’t account for the amount of uncertainty in solar variation, or if based upon CO2 the estimates of questionable relevance since they cross the ice age/interglacial tipping points. In a non-linear system we aren’t entitled to assume that the sensitivities to CO2 forcing and the other forcings are similar. They are coupled to the climate differently. Some allegedly “model independent” estimates of climate sensitivity are actually model dependent. I recall one by Annan that used models.
Frankly, we don’t know whether CO2 explains 20%, 30%, 60% or more of the recent warming. So the alarmism is unjustified and costly measures premature. If the net feedbacks to CO2 forcing are neutral or negative, then the climate one hundred years from now will be warmer, but at 1 degree C or so, it will be a perturbation of natural variation, so the actual decades around the year 2100 may actually be cooler. That is hardly alarming.
Hopefully over the next decade or two there will be significant advances both in our understanding of solar variation, its coupling to the climate and the skill of the models.
regards
No takers? Oh, well.
[nobody likes to debate writers of trashy novels, waste of time ~mod]
Barton Paul Levenson
You had a taker, but I miss-spelled your name. Apologies, but I don’t see how you could have missed my post. It was right below yours and the last one until now.
Barton Paul Levenson, Reur July 25, 2010 at 7:37 pm
Well actually, I’ve contemplated having intercourse with you here because in the past, when I’ve tried to do that at RC, my comments have been deleted in moderation. Meanwhile, I was waiting with bated breath to see your response to Martin Lewitt whom took-up your invitation on the 24th. Didn’t notice him do that? Oh that’s right, he did a typo, with your name! Hard to work out eh? One of 17 letters was wrong. Tip: he meant you, and apologised later for his mistake.
Martin Lewitt,
Thank you for your response and the polite tone thereof. I’ll try to respond in kind.
ML: You appear to be overly impressed with the correlation of over a century of warming with over a century of rising CO2. Correlation is not causation. You leap from that correlation to alarmism over the possible effects.
BPL: No. The causation is established by solid radiation physics. The correlation is merely confirmation.
ML: However, while solar variation can’t explain the slope of the temperature trend in the 80s and 90s, the fact that it was in a grand maximum for over half a century might well explain the warmth
BPL: Nope. You can’t have a high, steady input that results in a low, steady output and then an increasing rise starting almost halfway through the period. Or rather, you could, but you’d need an incredibly elaborate equation to relate the two, and it would be fudging, not science.
ML: The IPCC acknowledges a factor of two uncertainty in solar variation.
BPL: Right, but that’s still not enough to make a difference. Let me explain.
The flux density absorbed by the climate system is
F = (S / 4) (1 – A)
where S is the solar constant and A the Earth’s bolometric Russell-Bond spherical albedo. By Lean’s (2000) figures, S averaged about 1,366.1 watts per square meter from 1951 to 2000. NASA gives A = 0.306, resulting in F = 237 W/m^2.
To find the Earth’s emission temperature (not the same as the surface temperature), we can invert the Stefan-Boltzmann law:
Te = (F / sigma)^0.25
where sigma is the S-B constant (5.6704 x 10^-8 W/m^2/K^4 in the SI). This gives Te = 254 K. Given the mean global annual surface temperature of 288 K, we can vastly oversimplify the climate system and say surface temperature will be 13% higher than Te if things don’t change too much.
Now, we’ve warmed 0.8 K since 1880. You can see that to get that much from solar variation, you’d need S = 1380.1 W/m^2, an increase of 13 W/m^2. That’s way more than we’ve ever seen. Annually averaged S has been between 1363 and 1367 for the past 400 years.
ML: That is significant negative water cycle feedback that they are missing. We know from Spencer and Lindzen that the models have significant problems in matching the observed radiative imbalances at the tropical lattitudes.
BPL: Lindzen’s many “iris effect” papers are consistently shot down by other researchers as soon as he publishes them. The 2009 paper with Choi was as well. I’m not at home, but when I get back on Saturday, or as soon as possible after that, I’ll shoot you the references.
ML: Your error is to get too caught up in a correlation over a mere 120 years and then jumping to alarmism.
BPL: No. The warming, and the consequent alarmism, is a matter of radiation physics established since the 19th century. The correlation is just one of the many, many pieces of evidence that have confirmed the theory over the past 60 years.
ML: The direct effects of CO2 can explain perhaps 30% of the global warming. Anything more requires net positive feedbacks. The alarmism requires climate sensitivities that would have CO2 explaining probably 80% or more of the recent warming. A moderate level of net positive feedback isn’t enough.
BPL: Right, but all the best guesses are that the feedbacks are quite high. Doubling CO2 by itself only gets you +1.2 K, but doubling it with water vapor feedback, ice-albedo feedback, etc. makes it more like 3 K.
ML: Most model independent estimates of climate sensitivity are based upon aerosols or solar and in the case of solar don’t account for the amount of uncertainty in solar variation, or if based upon CO2 the estimates of questionable relevance since they cross the ice age/interglacial tipping points. In a non-linear system we aren’t entitled to assume that the sensitivities to CO2 forcing and the other forcings are similar. They are coupled to the climate differently. Some allegedly “model independent” estimates of climate sensitivity are actually model dependent. I recall one by Annan that used models.
BPL: If you use a climate sensitivity below 2 K you can’t reproduce the ice ages accurately no matter how you tweak the other parameters. There’s virtually no chance of the figure being below 1.5 K or about 6 K, with 3 K the best estimate.
ML: Frankly, we don’t know whether CO2 explains 20%, 30%, 60% or more of the recent warming.
BPL: 76% 1880-2008 by my calculations.
ML: So the alarmism is unjustified
BPL: The fraction of Earth’s land surface in severe droughts is growing like crazy, as predicted by the GCMs. That will kill us a lot quicker than sea-level rise, which is a fairly long-term danger.
ML: and costly measures premature.
BPL: The measures will only be costly to the fossil fuel industry. To the economy as a whole it will help.
ML: If the net feedbacks to CO2 forcing are neutral or negative, then the climate one hundred years from now will be warmer, but at 1 degree C or so, it will be a perturbation of natural variation, so the actual decades around the year 2100 may actually be cooler. That is hardly alarming.
BPL: Right, but the chances of the summed net feedback being that low are close to nil.