From his blog http://www.drroyspencer.com/ which I’m repeating here to help get wide exposure.
A Challenge to the Climate Research Community
I’ve been picking up a lot of chatter in the last few days about the ’settled science’ of global warming. What most people don’t realize is that the vast majority of published research on the topic simply assumes that warming is manmade. It in no way “proves” it.
If the science really is that settled, then this challenge should be easy:
Show me one peer-reviewed paper that has ruled out natural, internal climate cycles as the cause of most of the recent warming in the thermometer record.
Studies that have suggested that an increase in the total output of the sun cannot be blamed, do not count…the sun is an external driver. I’m talking about natural, internal variability.
The fact is that the ‘null hypothesis’ of global warming has never been rejected: That natural climate variability can explain everything we see in the climate system.
Doctor Majogo Brifberth here, says CO2 causes global warming, and that’s that. QED.
http://thegarv.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/witchdoctor1.jpg
eadler @ur momisugly February 2, 2011 at 12:29 pm references graphs at http://www.skepticalscience.com/climate-models-intermediate.htm
These graphs are a great source of frustration. They reveal that promoters of the CAGW theory either do not understand skeptical questions or do not want to confront them. There are several flaws in those graphs. Let’s start with their definition of anthropogenic forcings. It includes not only CO2 emissions and other GHGs, but also aerosols. Do you want to defend the quality of aerosols inputs over multiple decades over multiple geographical areas? The data do not exist, but that does not stop the incorporation of aerosols into the models – and only by incorporating such data do the models get a good fit. I have spent an excessive number of my days examining the data sources for aerosols in the models. I could not have a good argument against those who say that the inputs were arbitrarily and capriciously chosen. For myself, I would say they were conveniently chosen. Persistent use of these graphs by promoters of CAGW theory suggests to me that the CAGW is on very weak ground.
We could also discuss initial-state problems of the models, but that would make this post too long. But perhaps, we can make this quick observation. The fossil record, ice core drillings, and even biological residue confirm that the earth’s climate in its history has changed more – without human intervention — than what we have experienced since humans started pumping CO2 into the air. The models do not explain this natural variability; furthermore, the claim that they have matched history in the last 120 years is not accurate because of their use of dummy variables.
@Robert David Graham February 2, 2011 at 12:03 pm:
I don’t think so. Models are something you use after you’ve got settled science, like in modeling buildings (or windmills) so they don’t fall down or get blown over. Models are something engineers use to make sure they recognize all the stresses and deflections.
Models built on assumptions and formulas untested in the real world can only give GIGO results – who knows if they are right or not? You can code anything you want to – but is it reality? As Dr Spencer says, they all assume the meme is correct.
Science is reality, reality, reality – empirical, empirical, empirical. It ain’t science till it works in the real world, over and over and over, when prediction isn’t guesswork, but KNOWING what the result will be. Because it has been repeated, over and over and over.
Models not based on all that repetition is just guesswork. You can say that theories are “just” guesswork, but that ain’t true. Hypotheses are guesswork supported by some evidence. Before hypotheses you have suggestive concepts that are untested. After hypotheses you have theories, when comprehensive evidence makes the principle all but certain. After theories you have scientific laws, and boy, there aren’t many of those!
But theories don’t come from models. Models as applied in recent years come from theories. Not the other way around. Actually, models come from hypotheses much more often as applied in recent years. But running models doesn’t give anything useful, just some guys stroking themselves into thinking it is reality. If that is useful, okay, but I don’t think so. Gawd, especially when there is so much evidence that refutes the models – stuff they won’t put in because it would mean starting the model all over again.
Every formula used in the code of a model should be 100% solid and repeatable empirical fact. If it isn’t what in the world is it doing in there?
And if they don’t have enough repeatable empirical fact, they should stop writing code and go do some real science.
But they have to justify the expenditures on Crays, so they write on and on… they can’t admit that the code they are writing is based on nothing proven in the real world.
As I get it, all this started when someone decided that everything could be reduced to math. At some point that idea got taken over, and they began to think of the math as the real thing. That was, I think, pretty much in 1905 with Einstein’s work. He became the shining beacon, and thought experiments became more real than reality. Models are modern day analogs to Albert’s thought experiments. It was the beginning of the end, in a way. But it was the beginning of imaginary science taking over real science. As much as I admire Albert, I just think we’ve gone down some primrose path. Okay, off the soapbox now…
Theo Goodwin @ur momisugly 74
A troll? I consider myself someone interested in what we know about the world, and in making decisions based on the best knowledge we have. If you consider that viewpoint “trolling”, well, there’s not much to discuss with you.
Hypotheses and measurements? Certainly. CO2 is measured increasing at 2ppm/year. Absolute humidity is ~4% higher than it was in 1970, roughly the volume of Lake Eirie (484 km^3), increasing the greenhouse trapping of water vapor. Both of those, incidentally, can be demonstrated as GHG’s in the average high school lab. Clouds have uncertainties, most definitely – high clouds primarily trap energy, low clouds primarily reflect sunlight – current thinking is that the overall effect is somewhat positive, but there’s definitely room for better measurements there.
Satellite data over the last 30 years or so seems to indicate a negative correlation in global cloud coverage to temperature – as it gets warmer, we get fewer clouds – but again which clouds they are is very important. I’ve spent some time looking at ship log data reporting clouds from the 40’s-80’s, and how they tie in with satellite data; they seem to have stayed essentially flat in the 1940-1970 period, but that’s much less certain data.
As to Florida? I have no opinion on cloud cover over Florida, although I’ll note that it’s a _tiny_ part of the overall world. And weather shifts are everywhere – I’ve been spending a lot of time shoveling the snow due to the jet stream moving south, apparently in response to Arctic warming.
Mike says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:10 pm
Not at all, because it is the AGW’ers that are the “ingrained religious or politial beliefs” crowd.
If you don’t believe me, you apparently haven’t read Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth”, have you?
Have you?
And you haven’t determined the origin of the Global Warming/Global Warming/Climate Change/Global Climate Disruption faction of humanity, have you? It really is a veritable cesspool of cult and Fabian Socialist acolytes.
@Helen Hawkins:
The ones who often berate those of us who believe in the existence of God are actually comparing apples to oranges. There is no conflict in my mind between scientific reason and faith.
Quite so, but it’s perfectly simple to see why this happens. We are dualistic creatures – meaning we have two centres: what conventional psychology would call left-brain and right-brain. The left being concerned with the intellectual, logical, analytical etc and the right with the creative, emotional, intuitive etc.
Science, in its purest form at least, is entirely a left-brain activity. We don’t bring the emotional or creative into it any more than we’d bring isotope analysis to bear on the paint on a Rembrandt in order to deduce what was in the painter’s mind.
Since the advent of post-normal science, we’ve seen an unprecedented level of emotion surrounding what should be an emotion-free field. If we can stand far enough back we see a rather bizarre spectacle: that of the right-brain in combat with the left. Indeed, much of human activity can be viewed in these terms, greatly enhancing our understanding of any number of unnecessary conflicts.
When Archimedes had his flash of inspiration regarding displacement, this thought had its origins in his right-brain. But he then had to go into purely left-brain mode in order to conduct the experiment that would prove his right-brain intuition correct. The result of his left and right being in complete harmony? A Eureka moment.
Science and the metaphysical are not opponents: they are twin windows into the nature of reality. As such, we need them both – and in equal measure.
Louis Hissink says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:34 pm
I’m a geologist and have never been under such a constraining viewpoint.
I think a much better test would be to challenge the AGW crowd to publish global temperature maps for each season for the next ten years, i.e., now through 2020. Make them lower troposphere maps so that they can be compared directly to the satellite measurements. No mish-mash of models either, each one stands on its own. A prediction of real physical temperatures like this will tell us if the models, which ARE AGW theory, have any value. I’d bet against them.
KR says:
February 2, 2011 at 1:36 pm
KR, that’s a model not data. To demonstrate that a GCM model might reasonably represent the real world you have to have it make a prediction that could be verified by real world data or evidence. The GCM models have failed on at least two counts:
(a) They failed to predict the plateau in temperatures of the last decade
(b) They predict a middle atmosphere “hot spot” which is not observed in the real world.
@max Hugoson February 2, 2011 at 2:29 pm:
I have no idea at all if it is connected to these two Aussie scientists, but in 1989 I listened to a nutritional tape in which it argued exactly the same thing as Marshall and Warren found. The speaker said that since 1950 veterinarians had been treating pig ulcers with Pepto Bismol and antibiotics. He argued that ulcers in humans were exactly the same as in pigs and that the same treatment would be as effective in humans as it was in pigs. He did also claim that veterinarians had tried to convince MDs of this ever since the 1950s. I don’t have the tape anymore, and I have no idea if the guy was blowing it out his arse and trying to steal the thunder from Marshall and Warren. But I suspect that Marshall and Warren weren’t the only Wegener types on this issue. It was as simple enough premise that must have occurred to people long before Marshall and Warren. But they did the lab work and they should get the credit. Someone needs to, and it is good they did, because the stink raised made the whole issue a bigger deal – as it should have been. Good on them.
I just wonder how many people did think of it… and actually do something with it.
Climate Science is in its infancy. Climate Science is not ready yet to prove anything. The necessary order:
1. Develop the tools to measure data accurately, eg:
A. temperatures all over the Earth, including sea surface and depths, land surface and at various elevation in atmosphere.
B. percent and type of cloud cover, with albedo measurements
C. solar energy input (insolation) across EM spectrum as well as solar wind (charged particles)
D. undersea volcanic activity as well as net global volcanic activity
etc.
This is all being developed, but only so recently that we have to reconstruct the Earth’s climate history via proxies and scattered anecdotal reports and records (eg sea captains’ readings of ocean temps).
The data, meaning raw data, must be generally available, not locked up at Hadlely CRU with access restricted to the anointed. Ongoing comparative studies of this data with with various bio and geo proxies (tree rings, ice cores, etc) can gradually discern the usefulness, if any of those proxies. A generally accepted climate history of the Earth might evolve.
Climate scientists ought to be humble enough to acknowledge that without the above, any computer-model-based prediction will be garbage, as in GIGO. Global warming, at present, is not even a scientific theory. It is speculation.
They, the global warming supporters, intend to keep the claim alive until at some time they have a democratic majority to enforce their desires or to get it through international agreements. Anyway if they let it collapse under the weight of proof climate change is not happening because of man they will not be able to revive it.
cochrane says:
February 2, 2011 at 12:11 pm
Sorry, but you’ve missed one of your time periods. The first two that you show (a 75% and 90% chance of there being global warming due to man) are ok, but the VERY first you mention (from 1900 to 1945) is what I’ll call Period 0 and apply a 10% chance of it supporting global warming (I believe that’s even generous; it could be 0, negating the other three). I’ll allow your assumptions of the other three time periods, so the cumulative probability of man being the cause of global warming since 1900 is:
Multiply 0.1 by 0.75 by 0.90 by 0.7 and you get 0.04725.
There is a 4.7% chance that the hypothesis is correct.
(You can’t cherry pick data to support a bias.)
KR writes:
“Satellite data over the last 30 years or so seems to indicate a negative correlation in global cloud coverage to temperature – as it gets warmer, we get fewer clouds – but again which clouds they are is very important. I’ve spent some time looking at ship log data reporting clouds from the 40′s-80′s, and how they tie in with satellite data; they seem to have stayed essentially flat in the 1940-1970 period, but that’s much less certain data.”
You really do not understand the words ‘hypothesis’ and ‘prediction’. “Seems to indicate a negative correlation” does not belong in science but in hunches.
Warmista, not necessarily you, want me to endorse a fundamental restructuring of our economy, at considerable cost to me, yet they cannot so much as explain or predict cloud behavior over a chunk of Earth the size of the state of Florida. Is that preposterous or what? It certainly is not scientific?
Mike says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:10 pm
“KR above nailed it, but I’ll add a little here. First evidence GW is caused mainly by human GHG emissions can be found here and you can follow links to peer reviewed papers.”
“http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.htm
http://www.skepticalscience.com/its-not-us.htm”
Goodness, people, this is a discussion forum. Don’t assign homework. If you cannot state the matter clearly, concisely, and in your own words, then you do not understand it.
KR says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:00 pm
This question/challenge was cross-posted on Skeptical Science (http://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php?a=7&p=5#38769) – they are currently up to >20 peer-reviewed papers from multiple discussion threads, primarily the “It’s not us” thread (http://www.skepticalscience.com/its-not-us-advanced.htm), that rule out natural cycles as the major cause. The highest percentage was that ~15% of recent changes could be attributed to natural variation (Schwartz et al. 2010, http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/2009JCLI3461.1).
“I would consider the challenge busted.”
Can you state the argument in one of those papers in your own words, clearly, and concisely? If not, why are you directing us to them? You do not understand them, right? This is a discussion forum. After you have stated a position in your own words, then you can give links.
i read your blog daily keep up the good work.what has happened to climate depot? i havent been able to get it for 2 days is there a bit of skull duggery going on here?
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I was looking at several books on the AGW topic before settling on Blunder. In truth, I actually was pretty committed to buying The Hockey Stick Illusion, but it wasn’t available for the Kindle so I had to look at other options. Thanks for your feedback, I’m glad I chose wisely. 😉
Good post, and spot on. I’ve long maintained the view that CAGW fell far short of rising to the status of theory, thinking it best fit the status of hypothesis. However, I was recently challenged on this assertion, that even raising CAGW to status of hypothesis was charitable in the extreme. I am now of the view that the notion of CAGW has never left the realm of conjecture since it has never gone through the rigorous process of dismissing alternate theories. Even the warmers admit that the measured warming must be due to CO2, since it fits their models (i.e. they are arguing from ignorance). Talk about circular logic!
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Feet2theFire says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:48 pm
@Robert David Graham February 2, 2011 at 12:03 pm:
…computer models aren’t empirical evidence. They are a good way of coming up with theories, not proving theories.
I don’t think so. Models are something you use after you’ve got settled science, like in modeling buildings (or windmills) so they don’t fall down or get blown over. Models are something engineers use to make sure they recognize all the stresses and deflections.
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Wrong. First, science is never settled. Second in some engineering and scientific disciplines you have to construct models with uncertainities that cover processes that you don’t necessarily have a full understanding of. Models are tools. just like theories. Third, there are sciences where you cannot do controlled experiments so you are forced to use models.
“I’ve been picking up a lot of chatter in the last few days about the ’settled science’ of global warming. What most people don’t realize is that the vast majority of published research on the topic simply assumes that warming is manmade. It in no way “proves” it.”
So, with a proof we would have something like the “Law of Climate Change”?
That’s a pretty ambitious challenge since even electromagnetism is still just a theory.
Colin in Mission BC says:
February 2, 2011 at 4:09 pm
The “Hockey Stick Illusion” is a wonderful book and I recommend it highly. It is here on my desk. Spencer’s book is a little masterpiece that provides exactly the big picture that everyone needs now, describes and embodies scientific method, and places the focus exactly where it should be: on the non-existence of physical hypotheses that explain how manmade CO2 causes cloud behavior that creates a positive forcing.
Spenser has not stated a falsifiable NULL. Nevertheless, As seen on the ice thread I linked to even Willis agreed that the “null” whatever that is is challenged by the hitherto unseen cycles in the ice record.
So what is the Null? precisely.
You’ll note that nothing in AGW demands that temperatures move outside their historical extremes. AGW merely requires that temperatures with More GHG in the amosphere be warmer than it would be without that GHG.
The early models that suggested CO2 was the key factor typically kept ocean advection of warmth constant or used an average for solar input instead of the increasing trend as reflected in sunspots. Nevertheless, even then models such as Wigley’s in a 1990 Nature paper showed the internal variability, with El Nino factored out, created a 0.4 C /century rise in average temperatures. Even Hansen’s models showed similar natural variability. Often people show the trend from Hansen’s 1988 paper A,B and C scenarios showing how” accurate” he was. But they ignore how his model also predicted uniform rise in sea surface temperatures, which we know just didn’t happen. It was very wrong! His model never included oscillations such as the PDO and therefore completely missed regional ocean coolings. His predicted scenario B average temperature rise was close but his model was really wrong.Sounds ike he was mostly lucky.
Other models relying on CO2 always heated up the temperatures so the temperatures were 2X observed. So they added things lie heat-sponges, which have no more real connection to reality than SpongeBob. Or they added grossly inflated numbers for sulfates to cool the temperatures back closer to observations. They still can’t model El Nino (or El Nina) right, never mind the whole ocean.
When someone argues that the science is settled, it sounds more like they are out of real ammunition. They are seeking a political solution instead of a scientific one!
Steven Mosher,
Since you’ve asked about the null hypothesis in the past, here’s a good definition:
The null hypothesis is the statistical hypothesis that states that there are no differences between observed and expected data.
It’s a very valuable tool. Any alternative hypothesis must be tested against the null. If there is no measurable difference, then the alternative hypothesis should be looked upon as a placebo: something you think works, but doesn’t really.
Because there is no measurable, testable, empirical difference between today’s temperature cycles and temperature cycles during the Holocene, the alternative AGW hypothesis necessarily fails.
Although like a placebo, some folks swear by it.☺
I’d just settle for someone at GISS to state, with scientific certainty, that those anomalies will never, ever go below “zero” again.
That’s their biggest fear – that somehow, that 1 degree rise we’ve seen in the past 150 years will be lost. All of their papers feeding into the self-fulfilling prophecy of AGW depends on ever increasing temperatures.
I mean, they’ve worked so hard to get those numbers up, and constant monitoring of the data to keep them high.