DailyClimate.org is pleased to offer two opinion pieces by notable climate scientists commenting on the recent release of the climate science emails.
Get a load of this headline:
Opinion: Snippets of stolen emails cannot make the Earth flat
Wow, make the earth flat? That has to be some sort award winning headline for the most stupid strawman argument ever. But then, look who is writing it – Supermandia
The first paragraph sets the nauseating tone:
Here is what we know: The Earth is round, smoking is linked to lung cancer, and humans are changing the climate by emitting massive amounts of heat-trapping carbon dioxide and other gases. Like extra blankets at night, those emissions are warming the planet. The physics of greenhouse gases has been understood for more than 100 years. It is not new science.
[Update: Hmmm, commenter John-X points out this reference from Mike Mann’s PSU meteorology dept (shown below) which really throws a wet blanket on that statement.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Does the atmosphere (or any greenhouse gas) act a blanket?
At best, the reference to a blanket is a bad metaphor. Blankets act primarily to suppress convection; the atmosphere acts to enable convection. To claim that the atmosphere acts a blanket, is to admit that you don’t know how either one of them operates.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Of course, the rest of this is just a BS strawman argument, most skeptics (and certainly no skeptical scientists) don’t dispute the greenhouse effect, only the magnitude of the effect and confounding factors such as feedbacks and sensitivity. The phrase about smoking and lung cancer is right out of the slimer playbook championed by people like Romm and Gore, who have used such tactics before. The only purpose for it being there is to tar people you disagree with a broad brush.
But wait, there’s more sliminess. How about we link the climate debate to illegal steroid use too?
… Killer heat waves, devastating droughts and wildfires, and unprecedented floods are expected in our warmer world and we are witnessing these events now. Climate is the canvas and weather is what is painted on that canvas. Change the canvas and all weather is affected. The extra heat and moisture that human-caused warming is adding to the climate is like injecting steroids into our weather.
Scott Mandia must think everyone is stupid except him, because time and time again it can be demonstrated that there is no trend in severe weather that links to climate. Even NOAA puts the kibosh on such linkages, such as with the Russian heat wave wrongly blamed on climate change.
But hey, if you think of yourself as “superman of climate” I suppose supersized-ego powers come with the cape. You can read Scott Mandia’s super opinion here.
From the press release:
John Abraham is an associate professor of Thermal Sciences at the
University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, Minn. He teaches and carries
out research in the areas of thermodynamics, heat transfer, fluid
mechanics, and climate monitoring. He is co-founder of the Climate Rapid
Response Team.
Scott Mandia is Professor of Physical Science at Suffolk County
Community College, Long Island, New York. He has been teaching weather
and climate courses for more than 20 years.
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“Alex the skeptic says:
November 23, 2011 at 2:26 pm
During the night, when its cold, I’ll be covering myself with air containing 0.038% CO2 so as to keep myself warm. This atmospheric blanket is guaranteed to keep me warm all night long. /sarc off”
So this is also why when I exhale under the covers I get warmer, the CO2 in my breath… wow, I didn’t know that….
Why isn’t it like putting ‘good’ weather on steroids?
“Of course, the rest of this is just a BS strawman argument, most skeptics (and certainly no skeptical scientists) don’t dispute the greenhouse effect, ”
AHEM! Not true! The Dragon Slayers, among others are all scientists and they have disproved the greenhouse effect, by both theory and experiment. I am a scientist by training and career myself (although not in the climate field).
A “greenhouse effect” from back radiation is impossible according to the laws of thermodynamics. Cold CANNOT heat warm! I am surprised that WUWT still cling to such lukewarmist beliefs!!!
Darren Parker:
“This blanket is woven from the same thread as the Emperor’s new clothes”
LOL. It is truly amazing to see all the references to “blankets,” and “insulation” among actual “climate scientists,” and their supporters, with copious caveats about how that is not actually a “correct analogy”–and/but that they need to use that analogy for the commonfolk to visualize some magical undefined, unproved phenomenon in their uneducated, weak minds. Or something like that. It’s eerie. Bottom line is that there seems to be no way to prove (or disprove?) the notion of an “atmospheric greenhouse effect.” Me, I think convection erases any greenhouse magic.
Scott Mandia:
Opinion: Snippets of stolen emails cannot make the Earth flat>>>
REPLY: No more than they can make it round. What they can do is expose “scientists” saying it is flat when they clearly know it is round.
SM:
Here is what we know: The Earth is round, smoking is linked to lung cancer, and humans are changing the climate by emitting massive amounts of heat-trapping carbon dioxide and other gases.>>>
REPLY: What we know is that the “consensus” was that the Earth was flat, until the “skeptics” proved it was round. What we know is that the “consensus” was that smoking was not linked to lung cancer until the “skeptics” proved it was. What we know is that the “consensus” that CO2 may cause catastrophic warming not only isn’t even a consensus, but some of the key proponents knew darn well they were making it up or grossly exagerating. Incidently, there used to be a “consensus” that you could cure disease through blood letting and bumps on peoples heads would tell you if they were crazy or not.
SM:
Like extra blankets at night, those emissions are warming the planet. The physics of greenhouse gases has been understood for more than 100 years. It is not new science.>>>
REPLY: If the physics of “greenhouse gases” is like “extra blankets at night”, then in fact it is brand new science. That’s clearly not what the known physics of the last 100 years has been saying.
SM:
… Killer heat waves, devastating droughts and wildfires, and unprecedented floods are expected in our warmer world and we are witnessing these events now.>>>
REPLY: We are? Oddly, all the statistics about weather related deaths show that cold is number one by a country mile, all other weather related deaths have been dropping. Agricultural output is several times higher now than it was just a few decades ago. Have the crops been growing several times as fast during these devastating droughts and unprecedented floods? Since we’re on the drought/flood topic, how does warming cause both increases and decreases in precipitation world wide at the same time? Where are these wildfires by the way? In the flooded areas that are producing more food than ever before? Or in the drought areas that are producing more food than ever before? Last I checked the numbr one cause of “wildfires” was human carelessness. That means not putting your campfire out properly Scott, not breathing too much.
SM:
Climate is the canvas and weather is what is painted on that canvas. >>>
REPLY: Goodness grascious, no. Climate is the long term average of the weather. In other words, for your analogy to be accuracte, weather is not so much the canvas, but the brush that paints the picture called “climate”.
SM:
The extra heat and moisture that human-caused warming is adding to the climate is like injecting steroids into our weather.>>>
REPLY: Oh dear, you really do have a problem with the science, don’t you. The earth has been warming since the last ice age at more or a less a constant rate. Hasn’t speeded up recently, in fact, as all four major temperature records show, it has slowed to a crawl and may even be entering a cooling cycle. In the meantime, the global cyclone energy index has been falling for three decades. Did I mention that weather related deaths world wide have shown a steep decline (except for those due to cold)? How about them crop yields we’ve been seeing, all up, and up a lot in the last few decades. By the way, since any warming is more pronounced in cold areas than in warm areas, and weather is driven by the differential in temperatures between areas, that would suggest that the temperature differentials would be smaller, leading to less extreme weather and a more stable climate.
From the Press Release:
Scott Mandia is Professor of Physical Science at Suffolk County
Community College, Long Island, New York. He has been teaching weather
and climate courses for more than 20 years.>>>
REPLY: Is he like the “climate scientists” exposed in ClimateGate 2.0? Saying one thing in press releases and another when actually discussing the actuall science? Perhaps some of his former students would like to comment? Does he spin fables at work too, or just in the press?
Makes you think this isn’t so far off (certainly on this side of the ‘Atlantic Sea’.
W H Auden
The Fall of Rome
The piers are pummelled by the waves;
In a lonely field the rain
Lashes an abandoned train;
Outlaws fill the mountain caves.
Fantastic grow the evening gowns;
Agents of the Fisc pursue
Absconding tax-defaulters through
The sewers of provincial towns.
Private rites of magic send
The temple prostitutes to sleep;
All the literati keep
An imaginary friend.
Cerebrotonic Cato may
Extol the Ancient Disciplines,
But the muscle-bound Marines
Mutiny for food and pay.
Caesar’s double-bed is warm
As an unimportant clerk
Writes I DO NOT LIKE MY WORK
On a pink official form.
Unendowed with wealth or pity,
Little birds with scarlet legs,
Sitting on their speckled eggs,
Eye each flu-infected city.
Altogether elsewhere, vast
Herds of reindeer move across
Miles and miles of golden moss,
Silently and very fast.
I had one of those Superman suits when I was about seven years old. Please shoot me if I ever wear one again.
Oh. God save students at Suffolk County Community College, Long Island, New York.
Scott Mandia “knows” the earth is round. Unfortunately for him, it is actually an oblate spheroid.
As for that costume, given the waders, you have to wonder where that hockey stick has been.
But… But… but warmist “climate scientists” use a plane-parallel (flat Earth) model to simulate this planet in their science papers, models and equations. So exactly who is a “Flat Earther” here? Not the skeptical scientists I know, they prefer a spherical atmosphere in their science. I think this is propogana rule #17, blame the opposing side for what your side itself is doing.
Some may tend to trivialize this fine point but it has a surprisingly large effect on any analysis results. Using a plane-parallel basis, horizontal radiation never leaves the Earth’s atmosphere. After travelling thousands of kilometers horizontally that radiation is still at the same altitude above the surface. But using a spherical and actually a realistic model of the atmosphere, horizontal (and of course also nearly horizontal) radiation quickly leaves the Earth climate system simply BY THE CURVATURE.
I read such a post of a climate scientists mocking those skeptical as believing in a flat Earth and I just have to laugh out loud! It is they who are the clowns as this Scott Mandia (“superman of climate”) so clearly shows to world.
As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. Unfortunately for Mandia most of them would be expletives.
Sorry for the mental images, but I have to ask – am I right in assuming his thigh high boots are actually fishing waders and not purchased from some type of (eeeuwe) rubber specialty shop.
Supermandia: “The physics of greenhouse gases has been understood for more than 100 years. It is not new science.”
Yeah, it kinda is.
Geez, for a Superhero, Kaptain Klimate here, with his Avenging Hockey Stick of Klimate Justice, just can’t seem to get anything right.
With his, “more than 100 years” reference, he must be going back to Svante Arrhenius, who can’t quite be said to have “understood” “the physics of ‘greenhouse gases.'”
Arrhenius massively miscalculated the absorptive and radiative properties of CO2.
But, Arrhenius seems to have been a prototype for The Team:
“Arrhenius’ high absorption values for CO2, however, met criticism by Knut Ångström in 1900, who published the first modern infrared spectrum of CO2 with two absorption bands. Arrhenius replied strongly in 1901 (Annalen der Physik), dismissing the critique altogether.”
And (though we have no historical record of this), probably denounced Ångström as a right wing denier, funded by Big Oil (or maybe it was Big Steam back then).
But if Kaptain Klimate really believed Arrhenius ” understood” “the physics of ‘greenhouse gases'” over a hundred years ago, he might be advising a bit more caution in any attempt to reduce CO2:
“If the quantity of carbonic acid in the air should sink to one-half its present percentage, the temperature would fall by about 4°; a diminution to one-quarter would reduce the temperature by 8°.” – Svante Arrhenius, “Worlds in the Making,” 1908
And if Kaptain Klimate really believed Arrhenius ” understood” “the physics of ‘greenhouse gases'” over a hundred years ago, he might be forced to become, as Arrhenius was, somehting far more sinister than a mere denier. Arrhenius was enthusiastically pro-industry, pro-coal, and pro-CO2:
“By the influence of the increasing percentage of carbonic acid in the atmosphere, we may hope to enjoy ages with more equable and better climates, especially as regards the colder regions of the earth, ages when the earth will bring forth much more abundant crops than at present, for the benefit of rapidly propagating mankind.” – Svante Arrhenius, “Worlds in the Making,” 1908
“Rapdily propagating mankind!” That’s what makes Paul Ehrlich’s head explode!
“…. the Earth is round, smoking is linked to lung cancer, and humans are changing the climate by emitting massive amounts of heat-trapping carbon dioxide and other gases …..”
Tobacco smoking = human CO2 emissions is often raised, by people who should know better, to fool the gullible I suspect.
The apt analogy would be something like: smoking 40 cigarettes a day is beneficial even necessary for good health, but smoking 41 will cause deadly lung cancer.
Sorry, left out the link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svante_Arrhenius#Greenhouse_effect
I read this in John-X link
“Curiously, the surface of the Earth receives nearly twice as much energy from the atmosphere as it does from the Sun” HUH
how did the atmosphere get twice as much energy?
JonasM says:
November 23, 2011 at 2:15 pm
Isn’t it a bit early to be saying this is the silliest ever? The new files only came out yesterday. Wait a few more weeks – I imagine that we’ll see sillier.
It is pretty silly thought. LOL.
=====================
JonasM says:
November 23, 2011 at 2:16 pm
I hate when I type fast….. “though”
=====================
Use your other finger and put that one back where it came from.
‘Scuse me while I’m ROTFLMAO.
What ‘Climate Scientists’ say:
70’s: The world is entering another ice age! We’re all going to die!
80’s: The world is warming. We are not certain why, but CO2 may be contributing.
90’s The world is warming mainly because of man-made CO2. We need to stop this now.
00’s: The world is probably going to be destroyed by the CO2 we release. CO2 causes most climate changes.
10’s: The world is going to be destroyed by the CO2 we release. CO2 causes all climate changes. We’re all going to die! Give us all your money, now!
20’s: Do you want fries with that?
Nigel S says:
November 23, 2011 at 6:13 pm
(…)”All the literati keep
An imaginary friend…”
Whoa. I didn’t know I was a literatus.
Sigh, —– CO2’s contribution to energy being returned to earth. I’ll use a ridiculously high number foregoing other energy ridding mechanisms we know about.
Energy reaching the earth is …..239.7w/m2(well, that’s what I just read) assume all of it is converted to IR and emitted outward from the earth. Atmospheric CO2 is ~0.04% CO2 absorbs ~ 15% IR using the 3 bands of absorption. All other IR goes right through it. Of that energy absorbed, because of the omnidirectional emission of energy, CO2 sends less than 1/2 of that back towards the earth. Assume the 0.04% was well mixed and on a plane to where every CO2 molecule would receive IR energy leaving the earth. So, 239.7 X 0.0004 X 0.15 X 0.5 = 0.007191w/m2 That is the non-blanket warmth we get from our CO2. It must be panic time!
Greenhouse effect? So, Earth is now an artificial environment? What on Earth is terminology for?
greenhouse effect?
Full of Sh*t Effect?
Comparing a tiny enclosed artificial environment to the colossal wide open world and what influences it is one of the climate enthusiasts biggest mysteries, it is not an accurate description of any part of any climate here on our planet, well except the artificial parts, the question is, Is our climate artificial?
I know it is not, if you believe that it is artificial then you are wrong and therefore your irrelevant terminology is out of context and also wrong, therefor I believe you have no authority to describe our world to me.
Don’t get me started on that fun guy wearing the cape, he couldn’t even save his hockey-stick!
Supermandia, “…has been teaching weather and climate courses for more than 20 years.”
Not worth promoting?
P.S.
Busfires at Margaret River caused by government burnoff, the helicopter dropping fire bombs must have an AGW designation.
The Earth is round, smoking is linked to lung cancer, and humans are changing the climate by emitting massive amounts of heat-trapping carbon dioxide and other gases
The Earth is not round, it is an oblate spheroid, larger in the southern hemisphere than in the north and there is no evidence that the climate change of the last century is outside the bounds of natural variation.
So he got two out of three wrong.
John of Kent says:
November 23, 2011 at 5:40 pm
“The Dragon Slayers, among others are all scientists and they have disproved the greenhouse effect, by both theory and experiment. I am a scientist by training and career myself (although not in the climate field).
“A ‘greenhouse effect from back radiation is impossible according to the laws of thermodynamics. Cold CANNOT heat warm! I am surprised that WUWT still cling to such lukewarmist beliefs!!!”
The ‘Dragon Slayers’ are scientific fundamentalists, who have chosen to memorize cute slogans and magic formulas, and to dogmatically defend their misunderstandings, rather than to do the hard thinking that’s necessary for mastering the essence of their subject matter. The fact that they are AGW skeptics does not imply that they are automatically right about everything.
Scientific laws are not holy writ. A typical scientific law has a certain range of applicability; outside of that range, it is Peter Principle material. We’re talking Scientific Literacy 101 here. Repeat after me:
The Second Law of Thermodynamics applies to MACROscopic phenomena, not to microscopic ones.