Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
The current climate paradigm believed by most scientists in the field can be likened to the movement of balls on a pool table.
Figure 1. Pool balls on a level table. Response is directly proportional to applied force (double the force, double the distance). There are no “preferred” positions—every position on the table is equally attainable and probable.
The current climate paradigm is as linear and as mechanistic as that pool table. At its heart is the belief that the controlling equation for the future evolution of the climate is:
Forcing Change of 3.7 watts/metre^2 = 3°C Surface Temperature Change
This can also be written as:
∆T = λ ∆Q
where ∆Q is the change in forcing, ∆T is the change in temperature, and lambda (λ) is the climate sensitivity of 3°C / 3.7 w/m2 = 0.8 degrees C for each additional watt/m2 of forcing.
Everything else is claimed to average out, leaving only that relationship. The ratio between the imposed forcing and the supposed resulting temperature change is assumed to be a constant, called the “climate sensitivity”. There is much discussion as to the value of the climate sensitivity, which swirls around whether there is net positive or negative feedback from things like clouds and water vapor. According to the prevailing theory and equation, if the climate sensitivity is high, a small forcing change is said to cause a larger temperature change, and vice versa.
Me, I don’t believe that equation one bit. I discussed problems with the equation in “The Cold Equations“. For me, the idea that surface air temperature slavishly follows forcing goes against everything I know about complex natural flow systems. I cannot think of any complex natural flow system which is linear in that manner with respect to its inputs. I find it completely astounding that people actually believe that the global climate system, with all of its intricate feedbacks and forcings and resonances and chaotic nature, is that linearly simple. But that is the current paradigm for the climate, a completely linear system.
I am neither a climate sceptic, nor an AGW believer, nor an agnostic on the subject. Instead, I am a climate heretic. I think that the dominant climate paradigm is completely incorrect. I hold that there is no level pool table. I say that there is no constant “climate sensitivity”. Instead, there are preferred states. I say, and have discussed elsewhere, that the temperature of the Earth is kept within a fairly narrow range through the action of a variety of natural homeostatic mechanisms.
So what is a homeostatic mechanism when it’s at home?
The concept of “homeostat” is a more general version of the word “thermostat”. A thermostat keeps temperature the same. A homeostatic mechanism keeps something the same. A familiar version is the “cruise control” of a car, which keeps the car’s speed the same. Per Wikipedia, homeostasis is “the property of a system, either open or closed, that regulates its internal environment and tends to maintain a stable, constant condition.” Not a bad definition. It is a natural governor which regulates some aspect of the system.
The first thing to understand about climate homeostasis is that it has nothing to do with feedback. This is because in general the controlling mechanism involves a regime shift, rather than a variation in some feedback value. The current furore about the exact level of feedback in the system, while interesting, is not directly relevant, as variations in feedback are not a feature of the control mechanism.
To see why the control mechanism regulating the earth’s temperature does not involve feedback, here is the evolution of the day and night in the tropical ocean. The tropical ocean is where the majority of the sun’s energy enters the huge heat engine we call the climate. So naturally, it is also where the major homeostatic mechanism are located.
At dawn, the atmosphere is stratified, with the coolest air nearest the surface. The nocturnal overturning of the ocean is coming to an end. The sun is free to heat the ocean. The air near the surface eddies randomly.
Figure 2. Average conditions over the tropical ocean shortly after dawn.
As the sun continues to heat the ocean, around ten or eleven o’clock in the morning there is a sudden regime shift. A new circulation pattern replaces the random eddying. As soon as a critical temperature/humidity threshold is passed, local circulation cells spring up everywhere. These cells transport water vapor upwards to the local lifting condensation level. At that level, the water vapor condenses into clouds as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3. Average conditions over the tropical ocean when cumulus threshold is passed.
Note that this area-wide shift to an organized circulation pattern is not a change in feedback. It has nothing to do with feedback. It is a self-organized emergent phenomenon. It is threshold-based, meaning that it emerges spontaneously when a certain threshold is passed. In the “wet” deep tropics there’s plenty of water vapor, so the major variable in the threshold is the temperature.
Under the new late-morning cumulus circulation regime, much less surface warming goes on. Part of the sunlight is reflected back to space, so less energy makes it into the system to begin with. Then the increasing wind due to the cumulus-based circulation pattern increases the evaporation, reducing the surface warming even more by moving latent energy up to the lifting condensation level.
Note that the system is self-controlling. If the ocean is a bit warmer, the new circulation regime starts earlier in the morning, and cuts down the total daily warming. On the other hand, if the ocean is cooler than usual, clear morning skies last later into the day, allowing increased warming. The system is regulated by the time of onset of the regime change.
Let’s stop at this point in our examination of the tropical day and consider the idea of “climate sensitivity”. The solar forcing is constantly increasing as the sun rises higher in the sky. In the morning before the onset of cumulus circulation, the sun comes through the clear atmosphere and rapidly warms the surface. So the thermal response is large, and the climate sensitivity is high.
After the onset of the cumulus regime, on the other hand, much of the sunlight is reflected back to space. Less sunlight remains to warm the ocean. In addition to reduced sunlight there is enhanced evaporative cooling. Compared to the morning, the climate sensitivity is much lower. The heating of the surface slows down.
So here we have two situations with very different climate sensitivities. In the early morning, climate sensitivity is high, and the temperature rises quickly with the increasing solar insolation. In the late morning, a regime change occurs to a situation with much lower climate sensitivity. Adding extra solar energy doesn’t raise the temperature anywhere near as fast as it did earlier.
So climate sensitivity varies … which means, of course, that the constant “temperature sensitivity” that they claim exists must be an average temperature sensitivity. Fair enough, let’s take a look at how that works.
Suppose the early morning regime and the late morning regime are the same length, maybe three hours each. In that case we take the simple mathematical average. But here’s the problem. As noted above, when it’s warm the cumulus circulation starts up earlier than usual. More hours of cumulus means lower sensitivity.
On the other hand, when the ocean is cooler than usual, the clear skies prevail for more of the morning. As a result, the average climate sensitivity rises.
In other words, in the all-important tropical region, climate sensitivity is not a constant in any sense. Instead, it varies inversely with temperature.
Moving along through the day, at some point in the afternoon there is a good chance that the cumulus circulation pattern is not enough to stop the continued surface temperature increase. When the temperature exceeds a certain higher threshold, another complete regime shift takes place. Some of the innocent cumulus clouds suddenly mutate and grow rapidly into towering monsters. The regime shift involves the spontaneous generation of those magical, independently mobile heat engines called thunderstorms.
Thunderstorms are dual-fuel heat engines. They run on low-density air, air that rises, condenses out the moisture and rewarms the air, which rises deep into the troposphere.
Figure 4. Afternoon thunderstorm circulation over the tropical ocean.
There are a couple of ways to get low density air. One is to heat the air. This is how a thunderstorm gets started, as a strong cumulus cloud. The sun plus GHG radiation combine to heat the surface, warming the air. The low density air rises. When that gets strong enough, a thunderstorm starts to form.
Once the thunderstorm is started, the second fuel is added to the fire — water vapor. Counter-intuitively, the more water vapor there is in the air, the lighter it becomes. The thunderstorm generates strong winds around its base. Evaporation is proportional to wind speed, so this greatly increases the local evaporation.
This, of course, makes the air lighter, and makes the air rise faster, which makes the thunderstorm stronger, which in turn increases the wind speed around the thunderstorm base, which increases the evaporation even more … a thunderstorm is a regenerative system like a fire where part of the energy is used to run a bellows to make the fire burn even hotter.
This gives thunderstorms a unique ability that, as far as I know, is not represented in any of the climate models. It is capable of driving the surface temperature well below the temperature that was needed to get it going. It can run on into the evening, and at times well into the night, on its combination of thermal and evaporation energy sources.
Thunderstorms can be thought of as local leakages that transport heat rapidly from the surface to the upper atmosphere. They cool the surface in a host of ways, utilizing a combination of cold water, shade, wind, spray, evaporation, and cold air.
And just like the onset of the cumulus circulation, the onset of thunderstorms occurs earlier on days when it is warmer, and it occurs later (and sometimes not at all) on days that are cooler than usual.
So again, we see that there is no way to assign an average climate sensitivity. The warmer it gets, the less each additional watt per metre actually warms the surface.
Even what I describe above doesn’t exhaust the variety of self-organization to decrease incoming sunlight and move more energy aloft. If the day continues to warm, the thunderstorms self-assemble into long, long rows of thunderstorms called “squall lines” (not illustrated). Between these long lines of thunderstorms there are equally long areas of clear descending air. Instead of the regime of individual “doughnut-shaped” circulation around each thunderstorm and cumulus cloud, it has all been replaced by long cylinders of air which sink in the valleys between the serried rows of thunderstorms, and rise up through their centers. This increases the rate at which the energy can be moved from the surface and converted into work.
Like all of the regime shifts, the change from individual tropical thunderstorms to squall lines is temperature dependent and threshold based. It occurs at the warmest temperatures.
Finally, once all of the fireworks are over, first the cumulus and then the thunderstorms decay and dissipate. A final and again different regime ensues. The main feature of this regime is that during this time, the ocean radiates about the amount of the energy that it absorbed during all of the previously described regimes.
Figure 5. Conditions prevailing after the night-time dissipation of the daytime clouds.
During the nighttime, the surface is still receiving energy from the GHGs. This has the effect of delaying the onset of oceanic overturning, and of reducing the rate of cooling. However, because there are no clouds, the ocean can radiate to space more freely. In addition, the overturning of the ocean constantly brings new water to the surface, to radiate and to cool. This increases the heat transfer across the interface.
As with the previous thresholds, the timing of this final transition is temperature dependent. Once a critical threshold is passed, oceanic overturning kicks in. Stratification is replaced by circulation, bringing new water to radiate, cool, and sink. In this way, heat is removed, not just from the surface as during the day, but from the body of the upper layer of the ocean.
And as mentioned above, by dawn the combined effect of clear skies and oceanic overturning has lost all of the heat of the previous day, and the cycle starts over again.
So let me recap.
1. There are a series of temperature thresholds in the tropics, each of which when crossed initiates a completely new circulation regime. In order of increasing temperature, these are the thresholds for cumulus formation, thunderstorm formation, and squall line formation.
2. The time of crossing of each temperature threshold depends (on average) on whether the local area is warmer or cooler than usual. As a result, the entire system is strongly homeostatic, tending to maintain the temperature within a certain range.
3. Feedback does not play any significant part in this temperature control system. Nor do small changes in the forcings. The system adjusts by means of the timing. The various regime change occur either earlier or later in the day (or not at all), to maintain the temperature.
4. In each of these separate regimes, the climate sensitivity is quite different.
5. The climate sensitivity for the tropical ocean varies inversely with the temperature.
My conclusion from all of this is that the climate, like other flow systems far from equilibrium, contains homeostatic mechanisms. One effect of these mechanisms is that the tropical temperature is constrained to remain within a fairly narrow range.
And that’s why I describe myself as a climate heretic. I think the earth has a thermostat, one that is not represented in any of the current generation of climate models. I don’t think that climate is linear. I think that climate sensitivity is not a constant at all, but is a function of temperature. And to return to the title of the post, I think that the debate should not be about feedback at all, it should be a debate about the types and the effects of the various natural homeostatic mechanisms.
And all of those are definitely heresies to the latest IPCC Council of Nicean Climate …
My best to all,
w.
RE: Willis Eschenbach says:
August 15, 2011 at 10:13 am
Thanks again for responding.
RE: “…It also has the other polar issues (ground angle, thick atmosphere, long cloud shadows) that ensure that little solar heat actually makes it into the ground…”
I’d never thought about the “long cloud shadows” before. However that is the sort of point my mind seizes upon, and mulls over: Simple, practical matters. One doesn’t need to utilize the math (which you are so adept at) to begin to distrust the Real Climate conclusions. Often a brief comment by an unknown here at WUWT gives me a mental cud to chew for a week.
I read that paper you linked us to, that you wrote back in 2006. Whew! The alarms were going off in the back of my mind back then, but I never began to look hard at Alarmist statements, and to doubt them out loud, until McIntyre came out with the posting , “A New Leaderboard At The US Open,” on August 8, 2007.
If I had known about your paper of 2006 it would have galvenized me earlier.
Once again, I didn’t need to brush off my rusty math skills to doubt. Although there are scriptures which warn us that we should be careful about judging others, “lest ye be judged,” I have been a naive chump in my time, and have been stung by waking to the fact I’ve been played for a fool by con artists. Therefore I recognize certain behavior, having met it before, and cannot help but become highly suspicious when I see it again. The behavior of Real Climate, and Hansen, set off around sixty hooting alarms in my head. And that was just day one, back in 2007. They have only increased my suspicion during the four years since then.
Merely being suspicious may not convict anyone in a court of law, but in the court of public opinion Abraham Lincoln’s statement kicks in, “You can fool some of the people some of the time…”
Sadly, I am suspitious to a fault, now. I doubt all data. For example, as soon as I heard they threw out “outlier readings” on Mauna Loa, all their data, which is tantamount to gospel, was under a cloud in my mind.
Another bit of gospel I doubt is the CO2 levels as revealed by those little bubbles in ice cores. I was reading about the mechanics the air undergoes, during the sixty years (at the very least) between the time it is in fresh fallen snow, and the time firn turns to ice, and I felt my credulity being stretched to the breaking point. Sometime I’d be interested to hear your opinion on this topic, (which got Zbigniew Jaworowski into such trouble.)
Smoking Frog says:
August 15, 2011 at 2:25 am
No. If Boltzmann radiation were a negative feedback, it would be impossible for the temperature of the earth or any other object ever to increase.
DirkH says:
The climate models do incorporate it as a negative feedback; it is the “default” negative feedback. Smoking Frog, a negative feedback does not necessarily imply that no change is possible; it depends on the gain of the feedback. The effect of the Stefan-Boltzmann-Law is that heating up a body becomes harder the hotter it is already; nothing more. The emitted radiation removes heat and thus it is a negative feedback; and it depends on the 4th power of the temperature, so it is a non-linear negative feedback.
Of course it is true that a negative feedback does not imply that no change is possible, but it does imply that the temperature is lower than it would be without the negative feedback. There is no such thing as being without Stefan-Boltzmann radiation (SBR), but calling it a negative feedback implies a possibility of being without it. To entertain this nonsense, we have to ask what the temperature would be without SBR, but this question has no answer, so the only temperature we can talk about is the one we have in the first place.
(Whether the climate models model it CORRECTLY is a different question – Roy Spencer has published a paper disputing this; saying they get the temperature response on a warming ENSO event wrong; reacting too slowly)
That’s not a question of whether they are modeling SBR correctly. It’s a question of whether they are modeling the climate system correctly. Modeling SBR incorrectly would consist of assuming that an object radiates either more or less than it receives. By the same token, if I calculate the time it takes a body to fall from a certain height, and I neglect air resistance, this doesn’t mean that I am modeling gravity incorrectly.
First, Willis, I agree with most of what you said.
However, no matter how complex an equation, the first derivative is always a straight line. The question should not be whether ∆T = λ ∆Q is valid, but instead over what range it gives reasonable results. For the sake of argument, if that form is assumed to be sufficiently accurate, the question becomes – How should lambda be determined? By simply taking the first derivative of Stephan’s equation (λ=T/4Q), at 15C, λ=0.185, not even close to the 0.8 you (maybe IPCC) provide. Using this (more correct) value means that a 4 W/m2 increase (from doubling CO2) should produce a temperature increase of only 0.74C. (I have no idea where the IPCC gets its 3C value.)
My other problem with your article is your claim that homeostasis
“has nothing to do with feedback.”
I totally disagree – in any system, there are only forcings and feedbacks. Forcings include the energy from the Sun, various orbital parameters, the period of rotation, and the like. (Basically, things that do not change based on the surface temperature.) Feedbacks include clouds, snow, ice, and the like. (Anything that changes when a forcing changes and also causes a change in the surface temperature.) Your article quotes the wikipedia definition of homeostasis, but if you had read further you would have seen that homeostasis is simply a form of negative feedback. When you continue
“variations in feedback are not a feature of the control mechanism.”
you miss the point that when clouds block the heat of the Sun, that is the definition of feedback (since the Sun evaporated the water, that became the clouds, etc.).
Yes, I have read several replies above where you try to say that feedbacks don’t really mean feedbacks (or something like that), but the fact that several people have questioned you on this means that the article is not as clear as it should be.
So, as many others have said above – It really IS about the feedbacks.
The article is interesting in my opinion since it gives some mechanistic insight on one of the many homeostatic temperature regulators. BUT it is not a way of proving the equation is incorrect. I encourage everybody to read the comment form EdH (August 14, 2011 at 5:58 am). It goes straight to the point. The two reasoning lines (feedback equation and homeostatic mechanisms) live on different dimensions . The only way to prove/dismiss the null hypothesis here is to verify experimentally if the system behaves like that while in equilibrium or to find the way, again experimentally, to define the value of lambda which (in my understanding), if far to be “settled”:
Joachim Seifert says:
August 15, 2011 at 7:03 pm
Joachim, my apologies, I fear I didn’t read either your previous post or this one. I have limited time. If you want to engage with me, your chances are much better if your submission is brief, clear, interesting, and cited. Yours is a long, rambling screed obviously copied and pasted from some other discussion. Pass.
Thanks,
w.
Robert Clemenzi (Aug. 16 at 7:29 pm):
The existence of the functional relation ∆T = λ ∆Q is logically in doubt. In addition to being functional, the relation from ∆Q to ∆T may be non-existent or ambiguous.
Dave Worley says:
August 15, 2011 at 8:23 pm
The Constructal Law shows that this kind of homeostasis, involving the maximization of some internal variables of the system, is a common and predictable feature of all flow systems far from equilibrium. Web site here, Bejan’s constructal analysis of the climate here.
w.
Robert Clemenzi says:
August 16, 2011 at 7:29 pm
Thanks.
Not true at all. The derivative of
3 x^3 + 4 x^2
is
9 x^2 + 8 x
which is hardly a straight line.
“Over what range”? Before you can talk about range, you need to show that it is meaningful, that it actually represents reality in some way. What evidence do you have that the claimed relationship between TOA forcing and surface temperature is correct? I’ve discussed the bad math behind it in The Cold Equations, do you dispute the flaws I note there?
I say, and have adduced evidence above, that climate sensitivity is temperature dependent—the warmer it is, the lower the climate sensitivity. As a result, the equation
∆T = λ ∆Q
is not correct over any range. Since climate sensitivity is a function f(T, x, y, …) of the temperature and some other things, maybe humidity and cosmic rays just to pick examples, in any case an equation of the form
∆T = f(T, x, y, …) ∆Q
is needed at a minimum. The problem is, we don’t have a whole lot of knowledge of the function f(T, x, y, …).
w.
RE:Willis Eschenbach says: (August 18, 2011 at 1:30 am)
“∆T = λ ∆Q
“is not correct over any range. Since climate sensitivity is a function f(T, x, y, …) of the temperature and some other things, maybe humidity and cosmic rays just to pick examples…”
I believe in the multi-variable case above that ‘range’ is some hyperspace volume of all the ‘independent’ variables. Of course we may have no way of knowing where we are in some cases.
A really good book showing how homeostasis is the *ideal* approach for systems ranging from the political to the mechanistic to the economic is found in this amazing book.
http://www.amazon.com/Reflections-Logic-Good-Chana-Cox/dp/0739119257/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1313670919&sr=8-3
Reflections on the Logic of the Good argues that a single overarching theory of the good is not possible or desirable. Nor can the common good be achieved by means of the perfect cooperation between the members of the community. In fact, a coherent plan for what Isaiah Berlin calls a “frictionless and factionless society” is a priori impossible. All such plans fail not simply because of a failure of nerve, or commitment, or idealism. The failure of each of these utopian visions is inevitable. In this respect the mathematics of control systems is entirely general and does not distinguish between mechanical, electronic, biological, or social systems. In adaptive systems, multiple automatic control mechanisms are far more effective than any single central plan, no matter how benevolent, rational, or enlightened that single source of control. Even reason itself, on this account, is best understood as a complex, constantly adapting system. In fact, stability and the health of the community is achieved by checks and balances, agonists and antagonists, forces and counterforces, rather than by central guidance and near perfect cooperation.
Willis (Aug. 16, 2011 at 7:29 pm):
The notion that there is, in nature, “the climate sensitivity” (TECS) is scientifically nonsensical, for TECS is defined in terms of the equilibrium temperature ∆T but ∆T is not an observable feature of the real world. In view of the non-observability of ∆T, TECS cannot be observed and thus the claim that under given circumstances TECS has a particular numerical value is insusceptible to being falsified by the evidence.
In regard to the point being made about feedback, it seems that the CO2 sensitivities reported in the new paper by Lindzen and Choi are close to the raw CO2 sensitivities I obtained by analyzing the calculated data returned from the online ModTran utility for clear tropical air. My calculations from this does show a gradually increasing sensitivity (deg C per doubling) beginning at current concentrations (around 400 PPM) and slowly changing from about 0.9 to 1.8 degrees per doubling when the atmospheric concentration gets, theoretically, as high as 18,000 PPM CO2.
The ModTran tool provides a direct indication of total energy radiated to outer space (or to some high altitude receptor) as a function of the atmosphere, weather conditions, and temperature offset that you select. I based my conclusions on the hunt-and-pick temperature required to radiate an output flux of 292.993 W/m2 at my selected CO2 concentrations as *calculated* by the webtool.
http://geoflop.uchicago.edu/forecast/docs/Projects/modtran.orig.html
More thoughts on this.
Imagine a world 100% covered in water with an atmosphere similar to that on Earth but with no other greenhouse gas present except water vapor. The climate is then driven just by the thermodynamics of water evaporation and solar forcing. Due to solar radiation the atmosphere is never in a state of thermodynamic equilibrium as energy and temperature gradients are always present. For simplicity, the axis of rotation is taken as perpendicular to the orbit plane so there are no seasons. Lets call this imaginary world “Water World”. In all other respects conditions on Water World are exactly the same as on Earth. Can such a water covered planet self regulate it’s temperature as the sun’s output gradually increases? The motivation for proposing such a Water World follows Daisy World [1] proposed by James Lovelock to justify Gaia theory. When the planet’s sun is 4 billion years younger it’s output is 33% less than it is today, so under clear skies with an albedo for water of 0.1, the average incident solar energy would be ~ 274 watts/m2. The solar constant slowly increases over the following 4 billion years resulting in a current average value of 342 watts/m2 equivalent to that on Earth today.
The only greenhouse gas present on Water World is water vapor and it’s concentration is determined by thermodynamic balances in the atmosphere. Evaporation transfers latent heat from the surface to the atmosphere, enhancing H2O greenhouse effect and condensing to form low level clouds which increase planet’s albedo. Further heating in the daytime can trigger thunderstorms which transfer heat directly to the top of the troposphere and rain out humidity at the end of the day. The 12 hours of darkness then allow cooling from the surface with a reduced greenhouse effect. The average global temperature is then given by the total Outgoing Long Wave radiation (OLR) at the top of the atmosphere through stefan bolltzman’s law = e*sigmaTeff**4.
Breaking all the rules…. I propose a simple dependence of cloud cover and water vapor greenhouse effect on incident solar radiance which can maintains temperatures to 0.5 degrees over the last 4 billion years.
full details here http://clivebest.com/blog/?p=2525
Willis, I agree that a derivative of a function produces another function, but when the derivative is evaluated at a specific point, that value is the slope of a straight line tangent to function at that point. And I agree with your statement
I say, and have adduced evidence above, that climate sensitivity is temperature dependent—the warmer it is, the lower the climate sensitivity.
However, I don’t agree with the following claim
As a result, the equation is not correct over any range.
When evaluated at a point, the tangent line is a good estimate of the curve around that point. The question really is one of range around that point.
Stephan’s equation – Qs = ε σ Ts^4
Derivative – ∆Qs = 4 ε σ Ts^3 ∆T = 4 Qs/Ts ∆T
where λ = Ts/(4 Qs)
When Qs and Ts are plugged in, you get λ=0.185 when Ts=15C and Qs=390.
The question of range is – Can this linear approximation be used when ∆Qs = 0.1 W/m2 or 1.0 W/m2 or 10 W/m2, and so forth? Using a spreadsheet, this simple linear equation produces about 0.03% error (0.07C) over a range of +/- 20 W/m2 . At ∆Qs = +100 W/m2, the error is about 0.5% (1.5C), while at ∆Qs = -100 W/m2, the error is about 0.78% (2C). Therefore, it appears that the linear approximation looks pretty good for small changes in forcing and fairly worthless for large changes.
Granted, this is just based on the math and may not apply to a real climate. However, the first step to proving a theory wrong is to understand what it actually says.
That said, the λ based on blackbody equations is more than four times smaller than the IPCC value. So far, I have not been able to find out why. However, that is not the full story. The claimed feedback (about 4W/m2 for doubling CO2) is based ONLY on the absorption of IR radiation. As you correctly point out, many other factors contribute to the value that should be used in that equation. From the data I’ve seen, it is likely that even though CO2 absorbs radiation, simply doubling it does not have any effect on the temperature..
Robert Clemenzi says:
August 18, 2011 at 3:44 pm
Thanks, Robert. Let me see if an example can make it clearer.
Suppose I propose that force equals mass times velocity. Is there a “range” within which that is valid? Well … no. Force equals mass times acceleration.
My point is simple. If the equation is wrong, (except by chance) it is not correct over any range. That’s the problem.
Even with the correct equation, a simple “slope” may not suffice. This is because nature loves to hang out at the edge of turbulence. One result of this is that for a two-sided option (warmer/colder, faster/slower), the energetic cost of going in one direction may be markedly different from the energetic cost of going in the other direction.
For example, consider the amount of solar energy required to drive the clear tropical morning temperature up say five degrees, up to the cumulus threshold.
Now consider how much solar energy it will take to drive it up another five degrees … a huge amount, thunderstorms will step in and oppose the warming. The system is wildly asymmetrical around the point where the cumulus forms.
Which means that, contrary to your claim, frequently the tangent line is not a good estimate of what’s happening around a given point.
w.
Willis wrote: Which means that, contrary to your claim, frequently the tangent line is not a good estimate of what’s happening around a given point.
Over a short enough interval the tangent line is an accurate enough approximation to the function, if the function is absolutely continuous (which most are in practice.) This is the principle behind all methods of numerically solving differential equations. How short the intervals have to be to achieve the required accuracy is studied mathematically, but for practical purposes you have to experiment with the differential equation solvers and differential equations of interest. A good text is “Solving Ordinary Differential Equations: I &II”, by E. Hairer, S.P. Norsett, and G. Wanner. The book addresses chaotic examples as well as many other cases.
I’m a scientific layman, and all you guys leave me in the dust with your discussions of albedo, etc. I have three man on the sidewalk questions I would like to have your answers to:
1) Does the theory of global warming depend on computer models? Haven’t the temperature records shown that global warming has been taking place? Don’t computer models merely have reference to the course that global warming might take in the future?
2) If global warming isn’t taking place, why are most (not all, of course) of the world’s glaciers melting? What has made it possible to navigate the Northwest Passage in summer for the past three years?
3) If global warming is taking place, but is not caused by the burning of fossil fuels, what is causing it? If it’s a “cycle of nature”, what is the cause and nature of this cycle? If it’s a product the ordinary chaotic behavior of weather, why is chaos producing a steady (two steps forward one step back) rise in the Earth’s temperature, instead of the patternless disturbance that we would expect from — chaos?
It seems to me that fully to overturn the consensus opinion on global warming requires an alternative explanation of the things that we can see happening that is at least as plausible as the consensus opinion. That will be the coup de grace that will convert everyone into skepticism about the consensus opinion.
Jesse Fell:
“1) Does the theory of global warming depend on computer models?”
That question is separate from the questions that follow. The answer is yes [with the caveat that there is no theory of global warming, but rather a hypothesis of anthropogenic global warming]. So yes, there has been global warming. But it’s been extremely mild: ≈0.7°C over a century and a half. And there is no evidence showing that it was caused by CO2. Some of the rise may be due to CO2, but real world evidence is lacking.
“2) If global warming isn’t taking place, why are most (not all, of course) of the world’s glaciers melting? What has made it possible to navigate the Northwest Passage in summer for the past three years?”
Answer: the globe has been warming naturally since the late 1600’s – the Little Ice Age. The current warming is on the trend line from the LIA. That is the primary reason that glaciers are receding. And the Arctic has been ice-free at times in the past. There is no proof that this time it’s different, only conjecture.
“3) If global warming is taking place, but is not caused by the burning of fossil fuels, what is causing it? …”
That’s the central question, isn’t it? Read WUWT for a while and you will see a number of possible answers. For an overview of where we are, this little slideshow gives some perspective.
Jesse Fell says:
August 21, 2011 at 6:16 pm
I’m a scientific layman, and all you guys leave me in the dust with your discussions of albedo, etc. I have three man on the sidewalk questions I would like to have your answers to:
1) Does the theory of global warming depend on computer models? Haven’t the temperature records shown that global warming has been taking place? Don’t computer models merely have reference to the course that global warming might take in the future?
Yes, the CAGW theory has been proved valid ONLY in computer models. On earth, temperatures the past 150 years have been dropping, steady, rising, dropping, rising, and steady over periods of time of 2 decades of more. CO2 levels during that time have been steady while temps rose, were steady and fell, and CO2 levels have been steady and have risen while temps have been steady, risen, fallen, risen and been steady. There is no observed relation between temperatures and CO2 levels outside of the computer models. Computer models cannot predict 10 years in the future from baselines of 25 years. There is no reason to believe they are accurate 20, 30, 40 or 80 years in the future.
2) If global warming isn’t taking place, why are most (not all, of course) of the world’s glaciers melting? What has made it possible to navigate the Northwest Passage in summer for the past three years?
No one disputes global temperatures have been rising since the little ice age low points of the mid-1650’s, when these very same glaciers were increasing and crushing villages and churches – PREVIOUSLY retreating before that when these same churches and villages were built in mountain valleys, and when Andean children were being buried on dry ground in front of retreating Andean glaciers! NO climate “scientist” can explain these earlier massive changes, nor can they explain today’s modern warming period. Why is the NW passage (maybe!) open now? The honest among us claim we don’t know – same as before: show me it was closed before today’s 1979-era satellites were built at the peak of the latest ice pack cycle. Tankers crossed the NW passage in the late 1960’s.
3) If global warming is taking place, but is not caused by the burning of fossil fuels, what is causing it? If it’s a “cycle of nature”, what is the cause and nature of this cycle? If it’s a product the ordinary chaotic behavior of weather, why is chaos producing a steady (two steps forward one step back) rise in the Earth’s temperature, instead of the patternless disturbance that we would expect from — chaos?
We don’t know what is causing it, and today’s climate so-called scientists don’t want to find out. They prefer to condemn billions of mankind to short lives of death, disease and early starvation by regulating energy production to to benefit of the governments that pay them their hundreds of billions in project monies every year.
Dear Smokey and RACookPE1978,
Thanks for the answers. As usual, though, answers lead to more questions. Here are some that have been occurring to me:
1) “There is no observed relation between temperatures and CO2 levels outside of the computer models.” As that really true? I’ve read that Keeling’s saw-tooth curve, and the results of other similar studies, show a steady rise in atmospheric CO2; and global warming is happening — no one denies it, as you say (RACookPE1978). And, both the rise in CO2 levels and temperature are more rapid than usual (Let’s avoid the controversial term “unprecedented”). It may be pure coincidence that the two things are happening at the same time; but it is undisputed that CO2 absorbs the heat energy in infrared radiation and, as it warms up, becomes an emitter of infrared itself. Why is there no relationship between rising temperatures and rising CO2?
2) I’ve read that atmospheric CO2 acts like a dam: when it warms up, it emits more and more infrared radiation in all directions, one of those directions being back down to Earth. This has the effect of bottling up heat at the Earth’s surface. When the Earth’s surface warms enough, the heat that it emits will reach the level of the CO2 “spillway”, and the Earth’s heat balance will be restored — given enough time.
What wrong with the dam metaphor, which I recall was first made by John Tyndale, an early climate change researcher?
3) Nights are staying warmer than they used to — one of the reasons that the European heat wave in 2003 was so deadly. How would a cycle of nature affect only 10 – 12 hours out of the day? Wouldn’t the build up of CO2 in the atmosphere be the obvious explanation — a build up that interferes with the Earth’s ability to shed heat at night?
4) The computer models predicted that global warming would be most pronounced at the high latitudes. This appears to be the case; the northern ice cap is shrinking, and the Northwest Passage has become navigable at least part of the year — eat your hearts out, Frobisher, Cabot, Baffin. Does this show that computer models get at least some things right?
5) Ditto for warmer nights — just what the computer models predicted.
Thanks again,
John
Willis;
Error! Error!
.
4-part trifectas are surely tetrafectas. Or SLT.
😉
Jesse Fell says:
August 21, 2011 at 6:16 pm
Jesse, thanks for the question. Is the globe warming? Sure, as far as we can tell it has been warming in fits and starts for about three centuries. However, you need to distinguish between the fact that the globe is warming and has been for some time, and the “AGW theory”, which states that the post-1950 warming is caused by rising CO2 levels. The AGW theory also states that the lack of warming from 1945-1970 and 1995-2011 are caused by … well … the theory’s not real clear on that part.
The globe is indeed warming, and the glaciers are (generally) melting, although the NW passage hasn’t been open this year. However … this is no surprise, as slow warming has been the planetary theme for 300 years or so.
Unfortunately, nobody knows … and as you point out, calling it “natural variations” or a “cycle of nature” doesn’t explain anything. There are a whole lot of things that we don’t know about the climate, despite the claims of the various theorists.
Well, there is no consensus opinion on what has caused the world to warm for three centuries since the Little Ice Age. Nor do we know why the world cooled for the couple of centuries before that. So I’m not sure what “consensus opinion” you’re talking about that needs to be overturned.
Thanks, for your questions, ask’m if you got’m …
w.
Brian H says:
August 25, 2011 at 7:34 pm (Edit)
” … the quadrifecta of stupidity, bad tactics, bad strategy, and bad manners … ”
w.
Jesse Fell says:
August 22, 2011 at 3:59 am
Agreed. There is a steady rise in bankruptcies, and global warming is happening, nobody denies it … I’m sure you can see the problem, usually expressed as “correlation is not causation”.
Not true. The rise in temperatures (which ended in 1998) was not faster, longer, or larger than the previous rise which ended around 1945.
For the same reason that there is no relationship between increasing bankruptcies and increasing CO2 …
It is not a bad metaphor. However, please do not mistake a metaphor for an actual description of an actual system. It is only a word picture of an idealized system, not a real system.
You don’t seem to understand the nature of climate. It is always changing. At any given point when you choose to measure it, nights will either be “warmer than they used to be” or “cooler than they used to be”. In addition, at any given instant, some places will be warming, some will be cooling, and winters will either be warmer or cooler than they used to be … so saying “X is different than it used to be” means nothing.
Is CO2 the “obvious explanation”? Jesse, at this point CO2 has been claimed to be the “obvious explanation” for everything from wars to acne …
As to “how would a cycle of nature affect only 10 – 12 hours out of the day”, it might be something as simple as a change in night-time clouds which is not related to CO2 … or something much more complex. But since night-time temperatures are always either warming or cooling compared to the day, finding either one shouldn’t surprise you.
People always forget the Antarctic at this point, which (apart from the tiny Peninsula) doesn’t appear to be warming at all … so no, all that proves is that computer models get at least some things wrong.
And the warming for the last 15 years is also just what the models predicted? Not.
The model predictions are huge and complex, and they say that certain areas and times will warm. Given that all areas and times are either warming or cooling at any instant, they have a 50-50 chance of getting any given prediction right. You’ve given us two of their predictions, warming nights and a warming Antarctic … and only one of those two is right. If you want fun, look at the models’ rainfall predictions, they do no better than chance.
But even if they got both right, it doesn’t verify the model’s predictions. For example, the UHI (Urban Heat Island) effect warms cities more at night than during the day … so obviously CO2 is not the only possible reason for night-time warming.
Finally, despite their complexity, the models are merely the functional equivalent of a linear equation plus a short lag (see here and here) … and for me the idea that a linear model plus a short lag is enough to forecast the evolution of the hideously complex climate system is a joke.
Regards,
w.
w.;
Error! Error!
A veritable vice versa of an inversion!