Post by Dr. Ryan Maue (cross posted at my Policlimate)
“Must watch TV: Nye expounds on theory of racism”
Much “debate” has erupted in the liberal mainstream media concerning the effects of global warming on Hurricane Irene. With a few notable exceptions (Henry Fountain awesome), many of the journalists butchered the science and generally constructed disjointed narratives that quoted a variety of favorite experts which left me wondering why they even bother (Politico). Rush Limbaugh provided a compelling alternative explanation for the hurricane hype: “Politics is part of everything. The weather’s been politicized; the climate’s been politicized…Both Obama and the media were hoping for a disaster to revive his presidency and help prove climate change theory…The New York Times is trying to say that this violent hurricane is indeed indicative of global warming. It was a tropical storm when it left New York.”
But Bill Nye takes the “anti-science” crusade to a new level by showing up on Fox Business with my KFI 640 Saturday friend Charles Payne and embarrassing the hell out of himself. Once you watch the video and read the transcript, you will be left in amazement at his utter lack of comprehension of the topic at hand on national television! But, alas, Media Matters thinks Nye owned Payne (h/t to Andrew Revkin to Tweeted this). And CBS News headlines it as a story! Unbelievable!
The left actually thinks Bill Nye is a brilliant ambassador for their brand of global warming alarmism — a legitimate guy that understands the science and can articulate an explanation. However, Nye has no credentials or expertise with respect to global warming and hurricanes, at all. Not one iota.
Video is embedded or to go to CBS News and watch the Fox Business embedded video there. “Heady stuff, but Nye receives my respect for retaining his patience in outlining a life’s worth of work in a six-minute segment.” says Andrew Nusca. He has no idea that what Bill Nye is saying is disjointed and amateurish. Intricacies? Nye got almost everything wrong.
I transcribed my own transcript from the first 3 minutes of this (all I could take). Emphasis — bold and italics are my comments.
Charles Payne: While hurricane Irene brought more than just wind damage and flooding to the east coast, it’s revived a national debate as to whether global warming might be causing an increase in hurricanes and other extreme weather. In fact a recent cover story in Newsweek declared that this kind of wild weather may be quote “the new normal”. Here with insights on this is Bill Nye, otherwise known as the science guy.
Ok Bill, I’m going to come right at you. Um…Hurricane Irene – proof of global warming?
Bill Nye: Oh, I don’t think the word proof is what you are looking for – evidence of, a result of, yeah, yeah. Now here’s what the people will tell you that run these climate models. Now everybody, the word model in this usage is a computer program. A very sophisticated computer program. So you take data from satellites about the thickness of clouds and the extent of cloud-cover over the sea. You take data about the temperature of the sea surface. You take data about the existing weather say in North America or the Gulf of Mexico as this storm moves into it. Then you compute how much rain fell out of it, how much energy must have been put into it to create that much rain. It takes many months to analyze an event like Irene. Now the climate colleagues that I have will not tell you today that Irene was evidence or a result of climate change but check in with them about March next year after they have a few months to collect all of these millions and millions of data from weather services and satellites and compile them and run a climate model and show that Irene was a result of the world having more energy in the Earth’s atmosphere.
(Ryan: First of all, charitably, I think Nye is confusing a real-time operational weather forecast with a climate model. Climate models do not assimilate satellite observations of a given event — and it wouldn’t take months and months to compile the data. I have everything sitting on my server which generates my old FSU weather map page. Check back with them in March — that’s when they’ll have their climate model results back proving Irene was the result of more energy? This is a pretty unconventional way of doing climate or extreme event attribution. Bill Nye follows the “anti-scientific” method: I’ll give you the answer now, and then in 6-months, check back when I have the proof. )
CP: But here’s the thing here bill, ever since Katrina, right, we’ve heard that every year the hurricane season is going to be more devastating and apocalyptic, and the reality is we haven’t seen that. So how can Newsweek say “hey, this is a new normal”? is that irresponsible – is there any science behind that?
(Ryan: this is a great question by Payne. Since global hurricane activity — the number of storms, hurricanes, and Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) is at historical lows — collapsing since Katrina — as I showed in my recent GRL peer-reviewed paper, how on earth can you attribute one hurricane (Irene) to climate change.?)
BN: well there’s a lot more science behind that than just saying it’s not. But, uh, that aside. That’s only 6-years – in geologic time in terms of climate events, is not very long. Furthermore there is a lot of debate about this cool thing or remarkable thing is that the Sea-surface in the Pacific gets warmer, in the Pacific Ocean! Okay, tens of thousands of nautical miles away. As that gets warmer, it will strangely serve to decapitate certain hurricane or cyclonic storms off the coast of Africa – and actually get a few fewer hurricanes.
(Ryan: no kidding Nye, however, you haven’t come up with any science. Nye then launches into a tortured explanation of the El Nino Southern Oscillation warm phase — El Nino where the waters in the tropical Pacific cyclically become anomalously warm. But, it’s not “tens-of-thousands nautical miles away” — that’s more like the distance to the moon. There is actually little consensus in the climate community about the future of El Nino as the planet slowly warms. The CMIP3 models used for the IPCC AR4 report fail to reproduce historical ENSO events or variability, and therefore are useless prediction devices for the future. We already have a pretty good handle on the “teleconnection” effects of El Nino and La Nina on Atlantic hurricane development with research pioneered by Dr. Bill Gray and furthered by Dr. Phil Klotzbach who produces Colorado State’s seasonal hurricane forecasts. 2011 is a neutral-to-building La Nina year, so we should expect weaker vertical shear in the Main Development Region of the tropical Atlantic. It’s bizarre that Nye brought up El Nino which contradicts his original assertion that Irene was evidence of global warming.)
CP: But Bill, that’s not…
BN: This is another thing that’s very hard to show.
CP: But the Pacific Ocean, getting warmer, but that’s not from man.
(Ryan: excellent point again Charles. The tropical Pacific does not have a strong global warming signal over the past 30-years, which is due to the cyclical nature of ENSO on 2-7 year time scales. Our sea-surface temperature (SST) records get worse as you go backwards from the beginning of the satellite era in 1979. Nye has no answer.)
BN: (waving hands): you’re acting that you are dismissing those things like they they are not relevant.
(Ryan: Nye is defeated, and he knows it. After wagging his finger like Judge Judy, he pretty much has spent his arsenal of facts on this issue.)
CP: I’m not dismissing it, but you have so much information, I want to get to all of it. Are you saying though that it’s manmade, though?
BN: Well the world is getting warmer, uh, everybody, the world is getting warmer. I believe the debate is whether humans are causing it…Do we not agree that the world is getting warmer?
(Ryan: The world is getting warmer — so Irene has to be influenced by global warming. Maybe Irene did NOT reach its maximum potential because of global warming — has anyone considered that. Why must ALL of the climate change effects be a certain sign? Why didn’t Irene reach Category 5? Why did it weaken so fast if the SSTs were so warm? This is where the real tropical cyclone researchers will take over from the media hacks, and, yes, they will come with an answer in March. But, they will follow the “scientific” method and not the “I’ll get the proof later” Bill Nye “anti-science” method.)
CP: I have no idea. Someone told me that it’s warmed 1-degree over the past 100-years. I’ll take their word for it.
(Ryan: Charles is right.)
Show continues to talk about racism and shows the Al Gore “racism” clip – but Nye then really goes off into a different realm discussing that. I’m convinced that Fox News booked Nye knowing that he would butcher the science, and force me to write this post.
I’ve known several people who habitually wear bow ties, and I don’t trust any of them.
Bill Nye explaining AGW is real because different breeds of dogs can successfully mate…
Well, it really isn’t the dumest AGW argument I have heard – its about average.
It also made my head explode, but that too is becomming normal…sigh.
This is great!! Please, we NEED MORE BILL NYE ON TV. PLAYING A SCIENTIST! There is no better person (aside from Al Gore) to be the face of the modern day climate science cult. Maybe someone in congress will get a clue and invite him to testify on global warming (complete with Jim Hansen-approved sweaty bow tie) – what a great show that would be!! [LOL]
R. Gates says:
August 30, 2011 at 4:31 pm
===========================
You bring entertainment (wedgy-style).
Truly, some bitter paid activist sitting behind the protection of his computer in Denver…somebody who would never survive the light of day in real debate. Not at all.
I would pay though, to see you eaten alive by the real scientists on here.
Let’s put you, Al Gore, and Bill Nye in the same room with the likes of JB, Ryan Maue, and yes, the author of this very site itself, an watch you trip over your ***** so much you strangle yourself in the process.
Wedgy time!
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Philip N. says:
“Obama was hoping for a disaster? ”
Yes he was. So that he could show that FEMA works with a Democrat in the White House. Obama claimed that “this will be a historic event.” It was but not in the way he was hoping. I think Irene will be another nail in the global warming coffin. If the media ever reports the facts.
Re: R. Gates.
How proven is the Greenhouse Hypothesis anyway? The simple description is exactly how a real greenhouse does not work and although Svante Arrhenius did the calculation twice (the second time getting half the first result) is there any cause to believe the answer wasn’t coincidence? Logically, CO2 molecules absorbing IR radiation and then reradiating the energy will be completely neutral so far as that molecule is concerned (except for the fraction of energy that must be lost in the conversion, which will presumably heat it slightly) and if the energy is not reradiated it will result in the heating of that molecule, which will rapidly heat the rest of the nitrogen and other molecules around it. Since heated gas expands, it becomes less dense and so rises. When it gets high enough a proportion of the heat energy on being reradiated will not encounter other molecules and will escape to space.
It strikes me that a blanket of any gas round a planet will be heated in contact with a dry surface and will then take more time to dissipate the heat than bare rock, but a water world, using the very high latent heat of vaporisation of water, will automatically regulate its own heat to the average balance point. I see no significant role for CO2 at all.
R. Gates-
“Newflash to skeptics: Hurricane Irene, and every other hurricane that comes along between now and the end of time will be caused by greenhouse gas induced global warming. Guess what: no greenhouse warming, no hurricanes…oceans freeze solid…party over.”
Actually, by this same logic, all Hurricanes-indeed, all weather, in this case- is due completely to SOLAR induced Global Warming. An equally meaningless hypothetical: Shut off the sun. The Oceans and ATMOSPHERE eventually freeze over and there is no weather whatsoever. So maybe you should stop making stupid comparisons that tell us nothing about the “real issue” that you “address” next?
“Since having zero level of greenhouse gases on earth would result in zero level of hurricanes, and some level of greenhouse gases give us the climate that allow some level of hurricane activity, is it possible that increased greenhouse gases beyond what we’ve seen in 800,000 years might cause some change in hurricane behavior? Hmmm…seems plausible, especially with the increases in ocean heat content and water vapor levels we’ve seen over the past few decades.”
One needs to deal with actual numbers and not naive comparisons that involve assuming a relationship between variables that is the same for raising temperatures by dozens of degrees to the point of having a phase transition thrown in there, will be the same as raising the temperatures a degree or so further. Consider the case where we boil the oceans: Also no hurricanes then! So you are naively assuming a very simple, linear relationship between the overall global climate and hurricanes, which is ridiculous.
What do scientists that actually advocate there being some connection between AGW and hurricanes say? Well they say that when they feed climate model projections of sea surface temperature fields into their hurricane simulation models, the modeled hurricanes get slightly stronger. And guess what? You can translate the slight change they project, in a sort of hypothetical “all else equal” scenario, and look at what this relationship implies for how much change would have been predicted for recent hurricanes. For a warming of a few degrees they predict a small change. For a warming of a half a degree or less (say, the last few decades) their models would predict such a small change in intensity that it wouldn’t even be measurable. So no, AGW can’t have had any significant impact on Irene. When the climate is already sufficiently capable of producing hurricanes, the marginal sensitivity of hurricanes to the climate is, even according to the modelers who believe such an effect will be important, vanishingly small. Which means that the hypothesis that AGW has any effect cannot be shown to be correct: the expected signal is just too small, it isn’t expected to emerge for several more decades if it exists at all. So we have a scenario where no effect can be reasonably claimed to be demonstrated, and the effect that was predicted is sufficiently small that we cannot even tell if the prediction has been falsified, and we won’t know for decades if the predictions are at all reasonable. My guess is they will turn out to have been overestimating the effect of AGW on hurricanes: it won’t ever be large enough to be measurable. Prove me wrong.
R. Gates says:
August 30, 2011 at 4:26 pm
“Newflash to skeptics: Hurricane Irene, and every other hurricane that comes along between now and the end of time will be caused by greenhouse gas induced global warming. Guess what: no greenhouse warming, no hurricanes…oceans freeze solid…party over.”
You do not understand the concept of causality. Greenhouse gases might contribute to global warming but greenhouse gases do not cause hurricanes.
“Now, to the issue: Since having zero level of greenhouse gases on earth would result in zero level of hurricanes, and some level of greenhouse gases give us the climate that allow some level of hurricane activity, is it possible that increased greenhouse gases beyond what we’ve seen in 800,000 years might cause some change in hurricane behavior? Hmmm…seems plausible, especially with the increases in ocean heat content and water vapor levels we’ve seen over the past few decades.”
Are you counting water vapor? I guess if there were no water vapor on Earth then there would be no water on Earth? Or maybe you mean there would be only ice and no liquid water or water vapor? So, are you saying that liquid water is necessary for hurricanes? I do not think you know what you are saying.
Did you know that when you allow yourself to think and write as you do here, you lower your own IQ?
BarryW says:
August 30, 2011 at 6:01 pm
But he must know what he’s talking about! He wears a bow tie!
Are we now talking about Pee Wye Herman?
Didn’t he have a TV show – “Pee Wye’s Playhouse?”
C’mon, you know you’ve all thought they were related.
🙂
OH, I wouldn’t say that Payne was particularly brilliant, just that Nye was particularly bad, ie. he didn’t know what he was talking about.
AFAIK, the current “consensus” on the effects of AGW on hurricanes in the North Atlantic is “we don’t know”. Emmanuel did some interesting work in 2008(?) using seeding and downscaling in an RCM and came up with inconclusive results. It would seem that the jury is still out on this question. They hype about “The New Normal” or whatever seems to be a function of the popular press, sort of like the “we’re heading into a new ice age” stuff in the 70;s. In both cases the press ignored what was actually happening in scientific literature in favor of flashy headlines.
As far as Irene goes? Irene was a fairly minimal hurricane, but moved slowly. In some quadrants of the storm, rainfall was quite heavy and has resulted in substantial flooding, but this seems to be what happens when you have a slow moving tropical storm in the Northeast or anywhere else which is mountainous.
Richard says:
August 30, 2011 at 4:44 pm
“American actress Daryl Hannah has been arrested in front of the White House along with other environmental protesters who oppose a planned oil pipeline from Canada to the US Gulf Coast.”
Was she wearing the mermaid costume?
savethesharks says:
August 30, 2011 at 7:19 pm
R. Gates says:
August 30, 2011 at 4:31 pm
===========================
You bring entertainment (wedgy-style).
………………..
I would pay though, to see you eaten alive by the real scientists on here.
——————————————————————————————-
I don’t know why you’d pay for that. He gets eaten alive by the average commentator here for free!
🙂 I actually enjoy his presence.
So if Bill Nye and or Al Gore have sex with a dog, then no offspring results. And if Bill Nye and Al Gore have sex with each other, then no offspring result.Therefore, there is no difference between Bill Nye and Al Gore.
Hi Dr. Maue,
I just visited WUWT this evening and found your post. Much earlier today I happened on a CBS news article:
Bill Nye: Hurricane Irene evidence of climate change
PBS’s The Science Guy” sees link between hurricane’s destruction and changing global weather patterns
@ur momisugly http://www.cbsnews.com/8601-205_162-20099349-0.html?assetTypeId=30&blogId=&tag=contentBody;commentWrapper#ixzz1WZR83USE
I was the 6th comment on the article, asking how if Irene was a result of global warming, would Nye explain the fact that cyclone levels were at a historic low according to peer reviewed published research – and I linked to your page – and that there had been much worse hurricanes along the east coast in the past, many before the most recent increase in global temps… I even gave a listing including either wind speed at landfall or category, going back as far as one (two?) in the 1800’s.
Presto, this evening my post is gone along with a couple of replies that were supportive. Main stream media politics at work.
Thank you for taking us where the research results take you!! It is very much appreciated, as is your post here.
That is not Daryl Hannah but her twin sister Derrick Hannah. /humor
Charles Payne tweeted back to me:
@cvpayne who books ur guests? you let Nye just talk himself into circles — but you are too polite –
@Ryan Maue I was between rock, hard place & hard break w Nye he tried so hard to justify Gore …we get great guest occasional bad answers
Joe B.,
You have admitted you were wrong about sea ice, and I admire that tremendously, and I sir, couldn’t begin to match your knowledge of weather. You are successful at what you do because you are good at it. I also admire the fact that you have stated quite plainly what the conditions are for you to change your perceptions about anthropogenic climate change. And for me, if 2010 to 2019 is not warmer as a decade than 2000-2009, I shall begin to question my perceptions, and if 2020-2029 is not warmer still, then even more so will I doubt that humans are significantly altering the climate. But, I would suggest you check your rationale for why you think Arctic sea would be increasing in year-to-year extent over the next few decades, and then, if it fails to do so, consider that there might be something to the notion that a 40% increase in CO2, and large increases in methane and nitrous oxide over the highest levels they’ve been at in at least 800,000 years might indeed be having an impact on the global climate, as every single global climate model tells us they will.
O .. M .. G !!!!
I watched the entire video of Charles and Bill … I can’t remember when I have watched something so incredibly stupid. Charles is a brilliant financial guy, probably knows little about climate science, but I bet he could mop the floor with the “science guy”, one hand tied behind his back … unbelievable …!!! … I guess I never really realized Bill Nye was such an incredible idiot.
Bill Nye joins the ranks of a new job description: Used Climate Salesman.
R. Shearer says:
August 30, 2011 at 7:42 pm
ahahahahah .. .in stitches over here ….hahahaha .. OMG! … THAT IS FUNNY!!!!
Theo Goodwin says:
August 30, 2011 at 7:28 pm
R. Gates says:
August 30, 2011 at 4:26 pm
“Newflash to skeptics: Hurricane Irene, and every other hurricane that comes along between now and the end of time will be caused by greenhouse gas induced global warming. Guess what: no greenhouse warming, no hurricanes…oceans freeze solid…party over.”
You do not understand the concept of causality. Greenhouse gases might contribute to global warming but greenhouse gases do not cause hurricanes.
————
And you do not understand complexity or chaos or the basic “three body problem”. Hurricanes are part of the climate system, meaning multiple interrelated causes and effects, and you could no more separate greenhouse gases from the existence of hurricanes on earth then you could, separate the whales from the existence of oceans…they all infer each other. Again, no greenhouse gases on earth, no hurricanes.
Rattus Norvegicus-That’s a pretty reasonable response. The current “consensus” on Hurricanes seems to me to be embodied by:
Knutson, T. R. et al (2010), Tropical cyclones and climate change, Nature Geoscience 3, 157 – 163, doi:10.1038/ngeo779
Which said:
“it remains uncertain whether past changes in tropical cyclone activity have exceeded the variability expected from natural causes.”
The reason being that even if there were and anthropogenic effect due to warming, it is expected by modeling (such as the study Emmanuel did that you mentioned) to be sufficiently small as to not emerge from the noise/variability as a measurable signal for several more decades at least.
This is exactly the point I made in my reply to R Gates above. Indeed, in terms of individual events, attribution to AGW is and always has been universally regarded by actual scientists (as opposed to activists) to be impossible.
Isn’t time to set up a separate website – WUWG – What’s Up With Gates
Joe Bastardi hands Bill Nye his patootie on O’Reilly show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=AgZU5uvM5Ok
And wouldn’t I love to see Dr. Maue on there v. Bill Nye or anyone about hurricanes!
When someone like Bill Nye says the earth is getting warmer, “it’s measurable and irrefutable”, what exactly does that mean? Relative to what temperature (MWP)? What time period constitutes a trend? (For Bill Nye six years is too few to show lack of hurricane activity, but one storm is enough to prove AGW)
That’s a serious question, what does it mean to say that the earth is warming?
Thanks in advance for any serious answers or links to explanations.
Matt