UPDATE: this meeting is canceled, I will not be attending – Anthony
I’m pleased to announce that I and the entire WUWT community have been invited to a meeting and demonstration of computer modeling skills with Dr. Kevin Trenberth on November 10th in Boulder, CO. at NCAR. This meeting has been a behind the scenes negotiation with WUWT regular “R. Gates”, who has direct contact with Dr. Trenberth.
While some might question the wisdom of attending such a meeting, especially given some of the history, I’ll point out that a trademark of skeptics, illustrated here daily, is to listen to all available evidence and ask questions about it. This forum on how computer modeling works in climate science will provide just such an opportunity. I have tentatively agreed to attend.
One of the caveats I put forward is that Dr. Trenberth will not refer to me nor anyone in attendance as a “denier” such as he did with his AMS address. He has agreed to this. He has also agreed to allow me a short introduction and to have the event videotaped in entirety with it placed on the web unedited at some future date.
The Nov. 10th tentative agenda is:
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Thursday November 10, 2011 9AM-1:30PM
9:00 arrival and greet in Damon Room
9:15 Dr Trenberth talk w/ Q&A
10:30 computer modeling demonstration in the visualization lab
11:15 short tour of the building-optional
11:45 lunch, on their own, in our cafeteria-optional ( we could reserve tables for the group)
1:00 explore climate exhibit floor and weather trail-optional
1:30 depart??
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This meeting is free and open to any WUWT readers that can get there, but this is strictly a pay your own way event. I’m paying my own way as well.
Unfortunately, Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. will be in Florida at the time, and other scientists that I have invited have declined due to schedule conflicts and/or inability to justify travel for a half day event.
I can have up to 20 attendees, so attendance is strictly via RSVP.
If you can attend please use this contact form, providing your name and a valid address and email. This is required in order to get a visitor badge at the security gate.
Registration will be open until Tuesday and is on a first come first served basis. I hope you’ll be able to join me in person to help ask some serious questions. Thank you for your consideration.
Trenberth is mostly an observational data person. If you expect him to defend or know about every detail of the climate models, you have the wrong person. He is as critical of models as anyone in climate science, and they have to prove themselves to him via matching the data.
What questions to ask?
How naive are we as a group?
Does anyone think that a computer program of this complexity can be “demonstrated” in 45 minutes, let alone provide sufficient time for a Q&A period within the 45 minutes? This will be a demonstration of the OUTPUT of the computer program, flashy graphics showing which parts of earth warm up how fast in full animation on a giant screen with a running commentary so high level that not one word of it will be anything to do with the science or the computer code itself.
This is a trap, plain and simple. Shovel you in, shovel you out, instant press release full of half truths and misrepresentations about the discussion and the reaction to it to follow immediately.
I’d go, but I’d go on a condition. The condition being that a list of questions be posted on WUWT immediately following the meeting, and that Kevin Trenberth agree to answer each and every one of them personally. I’d also request that whatever official relationship there is (if any) between R Gates and K Trenberth be revealed.
I cannot take seriously anything associated with R. Gates, now including Kevin Trenberth. In saying this, I am not trying to be mean.
I applaud Anthony and others who attend. You are both noble and energetic. However, I cannot believe for one minute that you will get genuine responses to questions.
As regards questions you might put to Trenberth, ask him once again to answer Pielke’s criticisms of his “heat hidden in the deep oceans” idea. The two questions are as follows:
“There are two major issues, however, with the new study that the authors [that the news article reports on] did not seem to recognize:
1. If heat is being sequested in the deeper ocean, it must transfer through the upper ocean. In the real world, this has not been seen that I am aware of. In the models, this heat clearly must be transferred (upwards and downwards) through this layer. The Argo network is spatially dense enough that this should have been see.
2. Even more important is the failure of the authors to recognize that they have devalued the use of the global average surface temperature as the icon to use to communicate the magnitude of global warming. If this deeper ocean heating actually exists in the real world, it is not observable in the ocean and land surface temperatures. To monitor global warming, we need to keep track of the changes in Joules in the climate system, which, as clearly indicated in the new study by Meehl and colleagues, is not adequately diagnosed by the global, annual-averaged surface temperature trends.”
A leopard doesn’t change its spots
Trenberth can’t change his ways. We are still all deniers.
My advice to the attendees would be to listen attentively and to not jsut make this a confrontation with preconceived opinions
A useful line of questioning might be: Under what conditions would Trenberth consider a given model to be falsified? What time interval of what extent of deviation between forecast and observation would be considered sufficient proof against a given model? As I see it, he can
1. Declare that this cannot happen, since the science is settled. If he chooses this, it begs the question why we even still need models
2. Demand very long periods of conflicting observations. This begs the question whether the models can be considered supported by evidence after a shorter time than would be required for their falsification
3. Agree to reasonably stringent criteria, that is even a realistically short period of time and a realistically low deviation falsifies a model. This would probably mean that several models still used by the IPCC will already meet those criteria
4. Explain that model parameters can be tweaked and tuned in order to better match reality. At which point one might say that the act of “tuning” a model implies an admission of falsification, and that an old model with a new set of parameters is in fact a new hypothesis, even if it uses the same general equations and computer code.
5. Expel ink. At which point one could probably not do much more than pointing out that trying to falsify hypothesis is an essential part of the scientific method.
In the foregoing, I assumed that you will have an opportunity to respond to his replies – I almost expect that will not be the case though.
The event for the most part is simply an icebreaker and the institute will milk it for pr. Take the opportunity to meet and greet. For many skeptics this will be an eyeopener. A campfire is being struck and the participants can raise the bar of civility. Ask tough questions but avoid the gotcha stuff – it won’t play well the next morning. Consider – if the subject can be adequately wrapped up in 3 or 4 hours of show and tell, there’s not much there to begin with, but you know that’s not the case. More to be learned by studying the people in one of these, than the science.
Do you people really think it is going to be that easy! You are being fooled! It could become a major major mistake to make the visit. Don’t trust these people. Their record is one of deception and hiding data. Comparing us with holocaust deniers etc etc.
I don’t think there will be a video for future release.
I hope I will be wrong this time.
Ken Harvey says:
October 16, 2011 at 12:34 pm
God Bless you and yours, Ken. You get it. So few do. So many, even among sceptics, are mystified by the witch doctor’s garb.
Recently some kid wrote at Judith Curry’s site, I believe, that you could start (fire up) a model and it would tend toward the actual conditions of the climate. I replied that Miller Brewing has a model of their shipping infrastructure and that you can fire it up and it will tend toward the actual shipping patterns used by the company. I then asked if he believed that Miller Brewing has a scientific theory about its shipping patterns. He did not reply.
What is the ideal CO2 level?
Justify.
Can’t find the heat Trenberth is not going to allow himself to be blown off course. He has something planned that will allow him to show ‘deniers’ as crazy idiots and his models to be the absolute truth.
Prepare meticulously. Oh and by the way you all know Gates well enough. If he has been instrumental in organising this little matinée then he will have used his knowledge of this site to persuade Trenberth that he can win the discussion.
Prior to attending, PLEASE review all relevant documentation on Trenberth, among others that contained in Donna Laframboise’s recent work! See how far it got Chris Landsea, attending one of these seances.
In the Q&A (if there is one) ask how they are including the aerosol nucleation effect per CERN in the models.
Obvious trap…but if it weren’t I’d simply ask what evidence would make him change his mind about the use of models (or anything else)…
Everything else will be a waste of 45 minutes.
Theo Goodwin says:
What exactly would you expect the Argo network to see? That network looks at the temperature (and hence heat content) in the upper ocean, not the heat transfer through it. Could you explain to us what measurable parameter(s) from the Argo data would tell you the amount of heat going into the deeper ocean?
While monitoring the total energy would indeed be nice, it does not necessarily follow that because transfer of heat to the deep ocean can affect the global temperature trends on the order of a few years to a decade, it is necessarily a problem on the longer time scales. It can just explain why one can’t trust temperature trends over too short time scales, a fact that is already obvious empirically from the size of the fluctuations seen in the global temperature data (in both the real world and climate model simulations).
Please ask him to make a streaming video of the presentation able to be viewed by the non-attendees, and post it on your blog. Ask him to take selected questions on your blog that he can choose to answer or not. Possibly questions can be limited to well qualified scientists (who state their qualifications, and this should not be limited to climatologists). Any other route would be too limited.
I always knew there was a good reason to keep R. Gates around – kudos. Will he be attending?
Sometimes the smallest events can have the largest ramifications, and such an icon could mark a shifting of climate explanation. It may mean nothing, but is the best news, that I have heard for awhile. I hope everyone comes with sharpened pencils and a open, inquiring mind. GK
Dr. Trenberth has a rare talent (among Global Warming advocates) of occasionally putting his finger on the right button, e.g., the travesty. Unfortunately, lately his lock-step devotion to the cause has resulted in little of value in the debate.
My question for Dr. T.: Recently, CERN was able to confirm prior experimental work suggesting that the solar wind may indirectly influence climate by moderatating cosmic rays. Do any climate models presently account for this forcing? Assuming the effect found by CERN and others is real, can any model which fails to account for this influence be consider an accurate approximation of reality?
Robbie says:
October 16, 2011 at 1:59 pm
Do you people really think it is going to be that easy! You are being fooled! It could become a major major mistake to make the visit. Don’t trust these people. Their record is one of deception and hiding data. Comparing us with holocaust deniers etc etc.
I don’t think there will be a video for future release.
I hope I will be wrong this time.
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If no one went it would look even worse, and hyped even more especially since our side has been hammering for times like this. We have no choice but to go, cautious oh, yes. I wouldn’t trust Trenberth and I don’t know the man. Just their ilk makes them untrustworthy.
Anthony,
Thanks for posting this. Having had the pleasure of working with both you and Dr. Trenberth to get this meeting set up, I can confirm that both of you were naturally very upfront in all conditions. Having been the “instigator” of this in some respects, and the go-between in communications I can assure everyone that there is no agenda other than to have an honest presentation and exchange. The tour should also be quite interesting.
Also, I made this offer to Anthony, and I’d be glad to extend it to others, I’d be glad to provide some transportation from Denver International to Boulder if a group of you coordinated coming in at the same time. I have a seven person van and would be glad to assist in this. Anthony could act as point of contact and I’ll be available the day before (Nov. 9th) as I would expect most would come in that day.
It will be very difficult to coordinate twenty people asking questions – it is likely that everyone will want their own air time so there will only be time for one question each and no follow-up.
I strongly suggest that the people attending agree on a small number topics to ask about, and that no more than one or two people ask questions (with conferring between attendees if necessary)
I would open a thread on difficult questions to ask Dr Trembath. I do not mean ranting questions but educated questions. You have time to sort the wheat from the chaff, and you could ask some very penetrating questions.
R Gates
Wish I could be there, but its a long weay from the Uk to Denver.
Well done for helping to set this up-I dont share the sispicions of some others on this blog.
tonyb
As an occasional player of MMP RPG games, I want to believe that weather can be modeled and that climate can be modeled – now or in the future. This could be a great event if the peanut gallery holds back on all the impertinent questions and lets the modelers make their case. It should be obvious from the character of the “pitch” whether this is a public relations event or whether it is an honest presentation on the technical difficulties of making good models. I have no sense of how big a gulf lies between the kind of created worlds that I see in mmp games and weather models that predict the paths of hurricanes, but it’s said that mmp is a billion plus market – and growing. Perhaps the true great modelers of our day are all all employed by Blizzard Entertainment.
I assume that modeling is an established discipline within the engineering community. It should be interesting to hear what kind of line modelers draw delineating climate from weather. It would also be interesting to hear how a modeler knows when he is creating a model that behaves like the real world and when it is a model that just pictures the real world. Obviously, if you just take averaged weather data and use is as an input to your model you don’t have a true model – you’ve got a model that pictures the climate based on “fudge factors.” On the other hand using certain givens seem inescapable. I assume one doesn’t need to rely on models of the sun to tell your climate model what the watts per square meter are arriving at the top of earth’s atmosphere.
Perhaps there should be a Turing test for models….or perhaps the question is how much does an NCAR programmer make as compared to one who works for Blizzard. That would be an impertinent question though.