Burt Rutan writes in via email about an exchange he had with the proprietor of the website Scholars and Rogues, Brian Angliss. Burt writes:
I recently read a treatise showing that CAGW theory is a fraud. I thought it was a good summary and agreed to have my name used as a supporter of the facts when it was published by the Wall Street Journal. You can find it here:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204301404577171531838421366.html
Then, shortly after publication, an alarmist engineer wrote and “open letter to Burt”.
http://www.scholarsandrogues.com/2012/01/27/open-letter-to-burt-rutan/
I usually ignore these diatribes, but found a few moments to respond:
Scroll down to comment #4 for my answer.
I’ve reproduced Burt’s answer here for all to see:
Brian,
In my background of 46 years in aerospace flight testing and design I have seen many examples of data presentation fraud. That is what prompted my interest in seeing how the scientists have processed the climate data, presented it and promoted their theories to policy makers and the media.
What I found shocked me and prompted me to do further research. I researched data presentation fraud in climate science from 1999 to 2010.
I do not have time here to define the details; if interested in my research, a PPT or PDF can be downloaded at:
http://rps3.com/Pages/Burt_Rutan_on_Climate_Change.htm
In general, if you as an engineer with normal ethics, study the subject you will conclude that the theory that man’s addition of CO2 to the atmosphere (a trace amount to an already trace gas content) cannot cause the observed warming unless you assume a large positive feedback from water vapor. You will also find that the real feedback is negative, not positive!
Specifically, the theory of CAGW is not supported by any of the climate data and none of the predictions of IPCC since their first report in 1991 have been supported by measured data. The scare is merely a computer modeled theory that has been flawed from the beginning, and in spite of its failure to predict, many of the climate scientists cling to it. They applauded the correlation of surface temperatures with CO2 content from 1960 to 1998 as proof, but fail to admit that the planet has cooled after 1998 in spite of the CO2 content increasing.
The failure of the IPCC machine is especially evident in the use of “models” to justify claims, so it might be worthwhile to just look at modeling and science.
Modeling is more correctly a branch of Engineering and there are some basic rules that have been flouted by CAGW _ CO2 modelers.
Firstly there has to be a problem analysis which identifies relevant factors and the physical, chemical and thermodynamic behaviors of those factors within the system.
Any claim that this has been done in the CO2 warming problem is PREPOSTEROUS.
There are perhaps a thousand PhD topics there waiting to be taken up by researchers.
We could start with work on understanding heat transfer between the main interfaces; eg Core to surface / surface to ocean depths/ ocean depths to ocean surface / ocean surface to atmosphere and so on, not having yet reached the depth of space at just slightly above absolute zero.
To claim that the entire system of atmospheric temperature moderation has been described by the fluctuations of atmospheric CO2 content while excluding the other obvious factors such as atmospheric water vapour content, solar flux and orbital mechanics is just nonsense.
The whole point of modelling when done correctly is that it links accurately measured input of the main factors and accurately measure target output. Where you have major input factors that are not considered and poor and uncertain measurement of all factors then all you have is a joke or more seriously Public Fraud based on science.
You do not have science.
CO2 is not a pollutant. When the Dinosaurs roamed, the CO2 content was 6 to 9 times current and the planet was green from pole to pole; almost no deserts. If we doubled the atmospheric content of CO2, young pine trees would grow at twice the rate and nearly every crop yield would go up 30 to 40%. We, the animals and all land plant life would be healthier if CO2 content were to increase.
Do the study yourself. Look at how and why the data are manipulated, cherry-picked and promoted. I will bet if you did, you too would be shocked.
The mark of a good theory is its ability to be falsified by new data. The mark of a good scientist is the ability to accept that.
Burt
The Difference between an Environmentalist and a Denier.
You can easily tell if someone is a true environmentalist, i.e. an advocate for a healthy planet – he is one who is happy to hear the news that the arctic ice content has stabilized. He is one who celebrates when the recent climate data show the alarmist’s predictions of catastrophic warming might be wrong. The denier, if he is an eco/political activist, always denies new data that show the planet may be healthy after all. The Media usually defines deniers as those who deny the scientist’s computer model predictions. However, denying the measured climate data meets a better definition in the world of science.
Bill Illis says:
January 29, 2012 at 6:53 am
“I think we should ignore the guy who made Wikipedia useless – not even the education field will allow its use anymore even though Wikipedia had the potential to be the greatest resource the planet has ever seen.
Why would we respond to a guy who did that and allow discussion on Burt Rutan’s response to be highjacked.”
_____________________________
Can we get an Amen?
On related note, seriously, Mr. Angliss, “human- caused climate disruption“?
Really?
If you only knew how ridiculous and sophomoric that statement makes you appear, without even considering the rest of your weak argument.
CO2 rise is likely mostly anthropogenic, but it’s not a sure thing. If what would be caused by outgassing is lower than human emissions, the level of non-human CO2 would not increase since the equilibrium state would be reached without outgassing. Of course, I’m not sure that outgassing could plausibly explain that amount of CO2.
What would be interesting is if non-fossil fuel based CO2 is also rising.
Mr. Connely says: CO2 increases affect the radiative balance logarithmically, this is well known. Since CO2 is increasing nearly exponentially, the radiative effect is nearly linear.
Sir, you are wrong R.Gates has said numbers of times CO2 effects can not be expressed logarithmically.
Other than that you’re just wrong about the exponential increase of CO2. Less than two ppm per year is not exponential.
Not only do I agree completely with Burt Rutan but I feel I must express my admiration of him for designing the most magnificently beautiful twin engine airplane the world has ever seen. It’s a pity they turned out to cost as much as a small jet, but that wasn’t Burt’s fault. Ladies and gentlemen, gaze upon this flying machine with awe:
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://rps3.com/Images/Pages/Starship/Starship%2520page/star1385%252012×9%2520lg.jpg&imgrefurl=http://rps3.com/Pages/Starship.htm&h=801&w=1068&sz=274&tbnid=t4Qlu5TBYU1msM:&tbnh=96&tbnw=128&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dbeechcraft%2Bstarship%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=beechcraft+starship&docid=IB7iWy7xjdRgYM&sa=X&ei=Y4IlT5y3DeaKsQLRkq2MAg&ved=0CD8Q9QEwAw&dur=2532
Am reading The delinquent Teenager. WOW is all I can say. I knew of the shady side of the IPCC but no anywhere near the actual BS pulled by the IPCC. Every journalist in the world should read this book and it is definitely Pulitzer material.
Smokey: CO2 always follows temperature. Therefore, CO2 is an effect of changing temperature, not a cause.
And eggs always hatch into chickens. Therefore chickens can’t lay eggs. Great logic!
Richard wrote: “I have made this point many times. It is an incontrovertible fact that at least 22 models MUST be wrong. Does that give any faith that one might be right? ”
The loons don’t think like that. They have a whole department dedicated to analyzing all the models statistically. They then take an average based on the analysis and call it a scientific result.
It really is true. I saw a lecture by a chief loon priest explain it all. Thankfully I have forgotten his name.
Fantastic to see that Burt Rutan has such street credibility that the CAGW “thought police thugs” have appeared en mass in an orchestrated smear campaign.
At first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
CAGW is definitely as dead a doornail. Although they still fight it is clear that skepticism has won.
Now the sooner we can cut off taxpayer funding to all these CAGW clowns (“scientists”, unelected agencies, NGO’s), the sooner we can get back to real problems: restoring Western economies, lowering the cost of energy, improving the environment and helping the poor.
Amen to the death of CAGW.
Simple question people never seem to ask, or least I have never seen asked. How did CO2 level reach 5x-9x the current levels historically before cave men existed? How is it possible that the minor jump this time is human induced but the proven historical higher levels were always natural before?
“Smokey says:
January 29, 2012 at 8:33 am
nomnom,
You are truly clueless. Burt Rutan is accurate when he says human CO2 emissions are only around 3% of the total. The numbers come straight from the UN/IPCC. The rest of your silly criticisms are equally ridiculous.”
No Rutan says 3% of the atmospheric CO2 is human caused. See the difference? He’s claiming just 3% of the 390ppm is caused by man. Just 11.7ppm. So he’s claiming most of the CO2 rise documented by Mauna Loa and other sites is not caused by man. Which is completely incorrect.
“As for the deceptive William Connolley, the CO2 lag behind temperature can be clearly seen on a chart of the past 400,000 years.”
But Rutan calls that chart into doubt. He cites the Beck CO2 study that disagrees with ice core data. Therefore he shouldn’t accept ice core data is accurate enough to a lag between CO2 and temperature.
“On all time scales, from months to hundreds of millennia, CO2 always follows temperature. Therefore, CO2 is an effect of changing temperature, not a cause.”
Wrong. CO2 is a greenhouse gas and is therefore a cause of warming.
“Connolley can get away with his lies on Wikipedia. But not here on the internet’s Best Science site.”
You are the one lying.
“mkelly says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:34 am
Other than that you’re just wrong about the exponential increase of CO2. Less than two ppm per year is not exponential.”
It’s accelerating. Just look at the data. Why do you think they call it the Keeling **Curve**?
Seriously why are so many commenters slapping down facts and celebrating ignorance?
Gates says:
“…when we get a year that eclipses 2010 ( or 1998) in temperature, it will be “recovery from the Little Ice Age” for many skeptics, as a way most likely, of reducing their cognitive dissonance.”
Gates misunderstands scientific skepticism. Skeptics are generally immune to CD because skeptics have nothing to prove, therefore cognitive dissonance cannot apply. The alarmist crowd is badly afflicted with cognitive dissonance [Orwell’s “doublethink”]. They have the irrational ability to hold two contradictory thoughts at the same time, just like Gates is doing. Temperatures have been flat to declining for almost fifteen years, but Gates believes that isn’t real. He truly believes that there is a lot of hidden heat in the pipeline, which will jump out any time now. Doublethink. Cognitive dissonance. Usually incurable.
HarrisonN, thanx for making clear that you’re a lunatic with that ridiculous analogy. Rises in CO2 always follow rises in temperature, on all time scales. I provided verifiable evidence showing that is true. You provided a baseless opinion.
R. Gates says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:11 am
WOW!
mkelly says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:34 am
Mr. Connely says: CO2 increases affect the radiative balance logarithmically, this is well known. Since CO2 is increasing nearly exponentially, the radiative effect is nearly linear.
Sir, you are wrong R.Gates has said numbers of times CO2 effects can not be expressed logarithmically.
________
That is not what I said at all, but you knack for misquoting can probably be expressed exponentially.
R. Gates says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:11 am
But of course, when we get a year that eclipses 2010 ( or 1998) in temperature, it will be “recovery from the Little Ice Age” for many skeptics, as a way most likely, of reducing their cognitive dissonance.
But of course, if we get 10 years with no increase in temperatures, it will be “aerosols”, or “hidden heat”, or “natural cooling”, or (pick your favorite excuse since you seem to have used them all) as a way most likely, of reducing their cognitive dissonance.
Yes, all models are wrong. It’s good you recognize that. However, we just had William C. telling me to go look at models to “understand” how climate works. I hope you see the problem. Models are being used as THE evidence behind the alarmism. Your typical non-scientist trusts computers. The result is many people actually believe the models are evidence. Just look at all the peer reviewed nonsense we see based on models. These are PhDs that don’t understand that models are no more than a biased guess.
Here’s a tough problem for you. Go out ask 23 registered democrats who they believe would make the best president in the 2012 elections. Do you think you will get an unbiased answer? How many models are built by skeptics? Need I say more?
If William M. Connolley is allowed to post in this thread, then I am out of it.
For the same reason I wouldn’t have a dinner with the KGB officer who tortured me.
Here’s an excellent essay written by Trenberth related to models and uncertainty:
http://www.nature.com/climate/2010/1002/full/climate.2010.06.html
And here’s a very appropriate quote from the end of the essay:
“The timescale dictated by the IPCC process brings with it the risk of prematurely exposing problems with climate models as we learn how to develop them. In other disciplines, this might not matter so much, but what to do about climate change is a high-profile, politically charged issue involving winners and losers, and such results can be misused. In fact — to offer one more prediction — I expect that they will be.”
R. Gates says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:11 am
Here’s a bit of a mind experiment to show how climate models can be “wrong” in the sense of not being 100% accurate, but still useful, and it even tells you why. Place a drop of water at the top of a window and write a computer model that tells me the exact path that drop of water will follow. Now the models will know the force of gravity, and the molecular attraction between water and glass, and even impurities in the glass, but no model can tell you exactly the path that water drop will follow, but every one of them, or at least the consensus of them will tell you that the drop of water (if it was big enough and the glass pane not too tall) will end up at the bottom of the pane).
And this example precisely illustrates my previous comments about “Gates’ models”. Of course the model will find the drop at the bottom of the pane. The model has a preconceived conclusion even if the run itself fails its hypothesis: that of the route.
Climate models, as promoted by warmists are structured the same, The conclusion is assumed: there will be warming. Even the methodology is assumed: the warming will be due to CO2 (uinlike the relative certainty of gravity). Being unable to predict either the assumed methodology OR any other mechanism falsifies the assumed conclusion. No amount of dressing up or down will fix that. Lipstick on a pig.
aaron says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:33 am
CO2 rise is likely mostly anthropogenic, but it’s not a sure thing. If what would be caused by outgassing is lower than human emissions, the level of non-human CO2 would not increase since the equilibrium state would be reached without outgassing. Of course, I’m not sure that outgassing could plausibly explain that amount of CO2.
What would be interesting is if non-fossil fuel based CO2 is also rising.
I suspect it is. With all the destruction of trees in 3rd world counties we could certainly have a situation where the natural CO2 cycle has been changed. I see very little data on this. And, man also has been responsible for some pretty impressive forest fires.
We could in fact be witnessing man-made climate change. However, the actual causes could be
poorly understood.
Macro Contrarian (@JackHBarnes) says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:50 am
Simple question people never seem to ask, or least I have never seen asked. How did CO2 level reach 5x-9x the current levels historically before cave men existed? How is it possible that the minor jump this time is human induced but the proven historical higher levels were always natural before?
Dinosaur farts, don’t you know? Sheesh.
/LOL
Please explain why you believe we haven’t recovered from the depth of then LIA. Doesn’t recovery from historic cold constitute warming in your circles?! Perhaps you should get some of your science from another source other than Connelly’s wiki distortions. In fact, our respect for you would be greatly enhanced, if you would just take a moment, to condemn Connelly’s redaction policies. Or is it possible you are not interested in what is really going on, and science is a subtractive field… not an additive field of inquiry.
William Connelly – Your policies and practices are despicable. One day you will reap the whirlwind of your anti-knowledge actions. There will be quite the audience applauding your tar and feathering fall. Others will hardly notice your passing. GK
I was a true believer in CAGW until I saw Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth. My background in Aerospace R&D gave me enough knowledge to start throwing up red flags as I watched the movie. That movie caused me to actually study both sides of the argument with an open mind rather than swallow the MSM bias. Something few warmists do. When all was said and done; I was officially a true skeptic.
I’ve come to the conclusion that there are only 2 types of people that believe in any form of AGW; those that are stupid sheep with a hate for humans and fossil fuels, and those with an agenda that includes power and control of the masses. While these people sink tons of money into halting the discharge of an odorless colorless gas that is an essential building block of life; true pollutants are not being controlled. These people are far from being true “Environmentalists” as I’ve been since grade school. There is a happy medium that can be struck between man and nature. Making Co2 the enemy is not one of them. Co2 is green.
Macro Contrarian (@JackHBarnes) says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:50 am
Simple question people never seem to ask, or least I have never seen asked. How did CO2 level reach 5x-9x the current levels historically before cave men existed? How is it possible that the minor jump this time is human induced but the proven historical higher levels were always natural before?
______
You’d probably have to go back to the mid-Pliocence or Early Pliocene (more than 3 million years ago) to find CO2 levels as high as they are today. Humans were of course very primative in that time frame and were not affecting CO2 levels. This minor (if 40% is minor!) jump in CO2 levels beyond what the Holocene average was of around 270-280 ppm, is quite easily accomplished through the billions of tons of fossil fuels burned every year and the great changes in land use that humans have undertaken. The issue (among reasonable scientists) is not whether humans have caused the increase in CO2, but rather, what the sensitivity of the climate will be to this rapid increase.
Food for thought to those thinking that humans have not caused the current increase in CO2: During no previous interglacial period did CO2 ever get above 300 ppm, even when some of those interglacials exceeded the Holocene maximum temperatures. If, as some claim, warming always proceeds increases in CO2, then how could it be cooler during this interglacial, yet we see higher CO2 levels? It doen’t add up, and that’s because CO2 levels are now higher because humans have brought the extra carbon out of the ground in the form of burning of fossil fuels.
Aaron;
>>CO2 rise is likely mostly anthropogenic….
It this statement is true, then how do you account for the countless times in past millennia that CO2 has risen substantially above what it is today without humans even being present on the Earth? If those instances were due to some factor or factors other than fossil fuel emissions, then how does your research (or your computer model) control for the possible influence of those other extraneous variables?
The fact that CO2 is now rising while temperatures are falling pretty well sums up the failure of the GCMs I think. Nicola Scafetta also does a nice job of dealing with the failure of the models. http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2011/06/dr-nicola-scafetta-there-is-little-hope.html
R.. Gates says (interminable):
—–
I think climate is the most complex thing scientists have ever tried to study, barring the brain. And it can all be reduced to one linear equation (2*CO2 = ~3C)?
Meanwhile all other factors can be ignored – “First, the models are horrible at predicting natural variability, as that is not their function.” Hey, but never mind, everything else is just noise…
Although the ‘noise’ can drown the ‘signal’, not just for years, but perhaps for decades?
This is not going to end well…