Martin Hovland writes in with this statement. It seems that AGU Position Statement keeps costing them members.
He writes:
Although I have been a long-time member of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), I hereby refuse to pay my membership fees. The main problem is the organization’s Position Statement on the purported “Human impacts on Climate” This statement includes the following statements: “During recent millennia of relatively stable climate, civilization became established and populations have grown rapidly. In the next 50 years, even the lower limit of impending climate change—an additional global mean warming of 1°C above the last decade—is far beyond the range of climate variability experienced during the past thousand years and poses global problems in planning for and adapting to it.
Warming greater than 2°C above 19th century levels is projected to be disruptive, reducing global agricultural productivity, causing widespread loss of biodiversity, and—if sustained over centuries—melting much of the Greenland ice sheet with ensuing rise in sea level of several meters. If this 2°C warming is to be avoided, then our net annual emissions of CO2 must be reduced by more than 50 percent within this century. With such projections, there are many sources of scientific uncertainty, but none are known that could make the impact of climate change inconsequential. Given the uncertainty in climate projections, there can be surprises that may cause more dramatic disruptions than anticipated from the most probable model projections.”
As an active communicator in geophysics, spanning subjects ranging from marine geology to climate science, and an expert reviewer for the IPCC Working Group 1 on the up-coming Assessment Report 5 (my comments have just been submitted to the organization), I can no longer bear to support the AGU.
Martin Hovland
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It appears to me that weaning oneself off the Cool-Aid involves a fair bit of self mental immolation. Perhaps not all at once. Reality can be rather shocking, after all. For some, best taken in bite-sized chunks. If the first chunk be propaganda recognition not exactly a bad place to start.
Let’s respect his decision, regardless what he said in the statement
“As an active communicator in geophysics, spanning subjects ranging from marine geology to climate science, and an expert reviewer for the IPCC Working Group 1 on the up-coming Assessment Report 5 (my comments have just been submitted to the organization), I can no longer bear to support the AGU.
Martin Hovland”
Just what is he saying here? The reason the AGU say what they do is because they follow the IPCC reports.
So what has he been actively communicating in his career in climate science?
Garrett said “We all have our biases, and Dr. Hovland will not be an exception”
Firstly, you do not know the guy so have no right to say that.
Secondly, some people have principles to which they adhere.
Autism from the triple vaccine is the worst argument I have ever seen for one sided consensus science. The paper mentioned was ably supported by many other doctors and representatives of NGOs such as save the children. It took a number of brave researchers to gradually break down the work and force the GMC to review the work one more time.
This was a prime example of how consensus anti-science destroys.
Garrett:
Most universities (internationally at least) are not-for-profit organisations and researchers are often akin to civil servants with very secure jobs. Sure, their research may sometimes get funded by private companies and organizations, but not their salaries.
Naive and ill informed.
The triple vaccine issue is similar to the Dr. Marshal problem. This is the Dr that proved beyond reasonble doubt that most stomach ulcers wer caused by bacteria. He was ridiculed for years (~~ 10 I think) by the ‘consensus’ until eventually and, out of sheer frustration, fed himself the bacteria. The paper that followed was finally accepted by the concensus and , thanks to Marshal, many people have been saved the danger of operations and possible death. That includes me.
I despise people like Garret, Rabett who cannot take their minds from hell to the open air. Who do not have the ability to discuss the science with an open mind and who can only throw ad homs like confetie in order to satify their egos. It’s people such as you that cause so many to suffer unnecessarily.
Too right.
Washington state, where I live, has one of the highest state gasoline taxes in the US (In the top 10 as of July 2011). Yet, because we have several refineries in the state, outgoing Gov Gregoire has proposed an additional of $1.50 per barrel of oil refined in our state. It’s not enough that she taxes the hell out of her own constituents, but wants to taxes those in other states who may use gas refined in WA. Talk about cojones.
Well, since I started the fire, it would only be proper if I responded to comments from folks as well.
Smokey @ur momisugly 68:
For all of the models and evidence that has been provided by various persons, including Ben Santer. In fact he did an excellent job of discussing this during a Congressional Hearing. While I am sure most people at this website may not like his channel, the best place I can find the video is at greenman3610 on youtube. To be fair and keep on target, skip to 1:20 in the video to get past greenman’s opinion and straight to the discussion at the hearing.
Yes, they use models. Guess what? They also use models with the UAH satellite data to figure out temperatures because remote sensing does not directly measure the item. They are our best understanding of the dynamics of the world around us. And so far, besides people complaining about using models, not one has provided a better option.
The best we can do is compare the current environmental conditions to those that existed in the past. At this point, the rate of increase in CO2 which we currently observe best matches events that caused massive extinctions. Granted, we are looking at different mechanisms so we can’t do an apples to apples comparison. But, it does seem reasonable to claim that the human species has been able to thrive due to a relative calm climate, especially over the past 5,000+ years.
And no, I am not against someone providing an alternate explanation that can be backed up with evidence. SHOW ME DATA! Yes, there is onus on skeptics to prove things. Right now, most skeptics will make a claim about a singluar event or place, e.g. Himalayan glaciers in the IPCC. I think more than enough people have acknowledge the 2035 metling is wrong. Good. Let’s drop it. Stop bringing it up. Because skeptics will just bring up 10 other things that scientists must do due diligence to point out errors and/or misconceptions in the skpetics arguement.
Heck, look what the physics community has done in the last few months. A number of measurements were made at CERN suggesting particles traveling faster than the speed of light. The folks invovled were so concerned/confused they posted an aritcle, prior to peer review, for people to look at. Why? They wanted others to provide feedback to try and figure out what they could have done wrong. They did hold a news conference proclaiming Einstein was wrong. They reached out to the scientific community to gather more information. THAT is scientific method.
Trust me, with two little kids, I would love to be able to tell them everything is going to be fine. And leave out attacks on people, whether it is Gore, Mann, or anyone else. Show me data.
Example: Monckton has claimed (not sure if he still does) that Arctic ice has recovered by showing data from 2007-2009. Not only is this irresponsible, it is unethical. He just happened to leave out the prior 30 years show a long term decline. And now, when we include the most recent data, we are back on the decline. Take a look.
And what alarmist predictions have failed? So far some of the earliest and simpliest models, with best estimates of how the human population would behave wrt CO2 releases, have NOT failed. Unless we are still talking about the Himalayas. Don’t pull a Monckton. Provide evidence.
Why am I concerned about AGW? Because I have analyzed the data. I have run global coupled ocean-atmosphere models. I have worked on paleoclimatology and remote sensing. I know what history/science tells us. This may be one of the first times in human history when science has a responsibility to step up and warn society about an impending danger. Most historical data I know of suggests that some other forcing started the warming (planetary/orbital dynamics), CO2 lagged a bit but they became a positive feedback. This is the first time where it looks like CO2 is not a feedback, but is actually the primary forcing. Yes, that is a concern. We don’t know who the Earth system will respond since we don’t have a good historical analogy. The best we can do is look at periods of similar conditions/rates of change. And the one thing we can say is not may species survived those events.
Ah, so the IPCC can be safely ignored, since they have no regard for expert reviewers.
Smokey: “It’s simply the argumentum ad ignorantium fallacy: ”
I call it the “It’s raining harder than it was 5 minutes ago, we’re all gonna drown!” fallacy.
Onto the next response:
RACookPE1978 @ur momisugly 71:
Remember, correlation does not imply causality.
Yes, I will deny that higher levels of CO2 since 1950 have increased all plant growth. I will admit that using more and more fertilizers and plant many mode seeds has increased plant growth, especially agricultural crops. CO2 alone will not make plants grow larger. They need enhancement from other nutrients as well.
Try here. Better right, check out this document on page 3 that explcitly states using por soils and judicious use of fertilizers sa real ways to increase world food production.
As for the barage on use of fossil fuel, you should look at the micro-cultures of people and tribes in Africa. It would be impractical, if not impossible, to try and set up a grid capable of reaching all of these people, but they still require access to other regions. And what has been a major source in sovling some problems? Solar panels. They provide sufficient energy for charging small devices, e.g. cell phones, that make is possible for folks to maintain contact with the rest of the world. And in a crazy twist of fate, people (mainly women) are starting small businesses in villages to provide this service to neighbors using small business loans available to them. The neighbors don’t have to travel as far to get their devices charged and it actually costs less. So we have a win for the people, the environment, and free markets!
And I mostly agree. Over the past 201 years, the relationship between CO2 and temperature has not always been consistent… until the last 50 years. Then the relationship is very strong. On this website you can find links to numerous other website including ones from NOAA, AGU, AMS, and others that all come to the same conclusion.
And we continue:
RockyRoad @ur momisugly 73:
I know potholer54 recently had some information posted here based on information he pointed out and backed up with evidence on his youtube channel. The reason this was amusing is that potholer54 actually used things Monckton himself said and they went to the sources to prove they were being misquoted (at a minimum).
If you want to get into ad-hominem attacks, how about the Wegman report, Ben santer pointing out Pat Michaels hypocrisy during a Congressional hearing, or even climategate. To this point, there has not been a single “criticism” that has not been reviewed and shown to support the majority of work in climate science.
Recently, Burt Rutan and a number of folks posted an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal. While we could spend hours discussing the misrepresentations the WSJ has consistently shown wrt climate change, the more incredible fact is that a number of other items were psoted in other journals, incuding Forbes and finally back in the WSJ. One of the best, in which someone actually shows the misinformation presented in original opinion piece is from Louis Derry at Cornell.
These opinion pieces keep using the same complaints that have been discredited time and time again. It sure seems teh original 16 have the real reputation problem.
And finally (for now):
RockyRoad @ur momisugly 75:
Really? I left out temperature? As if the list of other items is not enough (and I did use etc to imply other things like temperature). Therefore, I officially add temperature to the list.
As for Smokey refuting arguements, such as a rise in CO2 does did not cause artic sea ice loss (and others arguemnts but I am only writing the one), he did no such thing. His criteria to get his result would require a second Earth which we could use like a laboratory. Well, we don’t have a second Earth, just the one were stuck on. And we do the best we can. Remember, for most sciences like geology, oceanography, meteorology (and others), we are trying to look at the Earth like a beaker, but it is a very dirty beaker. We do the best we can given the conditions.
As for “… can’t think of anything except CO2 that causes these things, then it must be CO2. Sheer ignorance.”
NO! Shee ignroance is NOT providing another plausible casue. Other things have been studied. Other possibilities have been considered, but no matter how much we try, all arrows point back to CO2. Other items weren’t ignored, they never had any empirical evidence to support them, e.g. cosmic rays and clouds, a requirement made by Smokey! Can’t have it both ways.
So according to Smokey, scientists have to prove things to 100% (which never happens in science), the opposite side does not have to do any work, just complain when they don’t like the answer, let alone provide reasonable alternative with empirical evidence to back them up. Climate science should not be treated like Sisyphus with a never ending uphill battle.
And the only plot included says “they have failed”. Well, only if you manipulate the data to get your result. The plot he links to indidcates data came from here. Well why don’t you try it! Select mean temperaute, in July in 2011 and, say, 1965 or 1976. You will see that while there may be pockets of the country that show some below normal temps in 2011, almost 75% of CONUS is above normal. And in the earlier years, there is more of the country below average with some pockets above. And it is similar in other months like January. The plot he links to is desgined to confuse people that don’t understand science and has no explanation. BE RESPONSIBLE!
Why do people buy life insurance? Are they really that convinced they are going to die? And soon? It would make more sense to save the money early in one’s life and only buy the insurance much later in life, but that’s not what people do. Seems to go against logic and science to do something “just in case.” By the same arguement, shouldn’t we address AGW… just in case. Oh, and if you study the Earth, it is providing a slew of information that indicates the impacts are occuring and they are due to AGW.
So, we do know that CO2 has increased steadily for years. We do know from isotopic analysis that the source of the additional CO2 is from human use of fossil fuels. We do know that solar activity has not been outside of typical conditions to explain document global warming. We have looked at other natural effects (El Nino, volcanoes, and others) and when we remove the natural variations, we still see a long term increase in temperature.
So, if we connect the dots, CO2 is causing the warming, warmer temperatures is the primary culprit of melting ice in the Arctic, therefore it is reasonable to assume the increase in CO2 is causing the ice caps in the Arctic to melt. Seems easy to me.
We should expect to hit many new records (minimum ice extent, warmest year, etc) during the next El Nino since the oceans will become an additional source of heat for the atmosphere. How many more decades of the warmest decade being the most recent decade do we need. Don’t we have enough evidence to warrant concern?
To repeat then, over the past 201 years – and one can go back to the Roman era to continue the longer-term trend – only one 25 year period of that entire interval (from 1973 through 1998) did CO2 increase at the same time that temperatures increased.
Since 1997-1998, temperatures have been steady/declining while CO2 continues to increase. You cannot claim any 50 year interval of CO2 and temperature relationship.
You claim a precautionary principle must be forced on the world. In doing so, you ARE demanding that a 100% guaranteed failure is being forced down the world’s throat in the name of “maybe” preventing a part of of a fraction of one percent of warming … that “may” occur but only after hundreds of years of continued CO2 production at the current levels. Maybe. Further, you have not established nor can you establish! – that any actual harm IS occurring NOW from continued CO2 production at today’s levels.
What concern? Given two choices -(1) By deliberately restricting energy, clean water, food, heat, material protection and storage, faster more reliable shipping, better sewage collection and treatment, more irrigation water and farming, less expensive pesticides,more effective fertilizers, better tooling, and safer food preparation and handling …. all in the name of CAGW “concern”. You – deliberately then and without cause will murder hundreds of millions, and continue condemning billions to short lives mired in sewage, squalor and disease.
(2) Providing less expensive energy, concrete, steel, and more electricity worldwide competitively and without third world/UN/IPCC/”green corruption” government bribery and manipulation. Billions live better, more productive lives. In all cases, life expectancy rises and birth rates decline. Ecology – which now CAN BE afforded – IS afforded and the world is cleaned up of the localized dirt and pollution now found outside of the richer, more capitalized first world countries.
But, you see, enviro’s DON’T WANT better lives for billions. They demand rather – in their public books, their speeches, their legislative actions political funding decisions, and their massed public demonstration the death of billions.
“By the same arguement, shouldn’t we address AGW… just in case.”
I’m getting a bit tired of this argument. Given the complexity of the global climate system and how little we actually know about it, how can we possibly know that what we do won’t make things worse?
Often, it actually *IS* better to do nothing than to do something.
I would say the problem is not AGU itself but the fact that AGU and similar organisations are not democratic and open enough in their decision chain.
Was the position statement discussed and decided within a forum in the organisation? Or was it only decided by a small group who influenced the ones who could decide over the head of the majority?
We have seen with APS and Ivar Giaever who tried to organise a discussion within the organisation that such was not possible.
Not sure if it was the same with AGU but I ask myself if the members have their say and they elect or dump the lead if a majority of them want to do so even in interim not only “at election time”?
With a more open and transparent organisation such political statements would not pass through if they are not supported by the organisation.
So my guess would be that such organisations will pass sooner or later a reorganisation process or will be marginalised.
Maybe this will be the learning of climate change after all.
RACookPE1978 says:
February 10, 2012 at 10:12 am
Well said.
…………………………………………
Sensor operator says:
February 10, 2012 at 7:45 am
The best we can do is compare the current environmental conditions to those that existed in the past. At this point, the rate of increase in CO2 which we currently observe best matches events that caused massive extinctions. Granted, we are looking at different mechanisms so we can’t do an apples to apples comparison. But, it does seem reasonable to claim that the human species has been able to thrive due to a relative calm climate, especially over the past 5,000+ years.
The last 5,000+ years has been in an interglacial, and if you’d really compared “the current environmental conditions to those that existed in the past”, you’d have known that we’re following the same pattern now, back into glacial. Carbon dioxide lagged by around 800 years all the dramatic rises of temperature which ended glacials every 100,000 years – it is shown to be utterly irrelevant to these great changes between global cooling and global warming when gazillions tons of ice melted and raised sea levels 300ft+.
And no, I am not against someone providing an alternate explanation that can be backed up with evidence. SHOW ME DATA! Yes, there is onus on skeptics to prove things. Right now, most skeptics will make a claim about a singluar event or place, e.g. Himalayan glaciers in the IPCC. I think more than enough people have acknowledge the 2035 metling is wrong. Good. Let’s drop it. Stop bringing it up. Because skeptics will just bring up 10 other things that scientists must do due diligence to point out errors and/or misconceptions in the skpetics arguement.
These are just examples of the how to lie with statistics that pro AGW’s use instead of science. If you have a look through the archives here you’ll find lots of discussions on the manipulation of data by pro AGW data providers. Data is precisely what they don’t provide. Like the Hockey Stick, every piece of ‘data’ provided is fraudulent science, shown time and again, haven’t you read the emails?, and, beginning with Keeling and his choice of measuring his mythical ‘background CO2’ from the largest active volcano in the world, surrounded by immense carbon dioxide producing volcanic activity creating islands in a warm sea, and gosh, such a clever scientist, in less than two years he found a trend and proof that man made levels of CO2 were rising…
..other scientists take years to see if there’s any trend.
Here – an example of real data and junk data, see if you can spot the propaganda figure:
http://www.c3headlines.com/2009/09/the-liberal-attack-on-science-acorn-style-the-ipcc-fabrication-of-atmospheric-co2-residency-time.html
Here’s something relevant to Keeling’s claim that he could measure ‘man-made’ carbon dioxide:
http://carbon-budget.geologist-1011.net/
“A brief survey of the literature concerning volcanogenic carbon dioxide emission finds that estimates of subaerial emission totals fail to account for the diversity of volcanic emissions and are unprepared for individual outliers that dominate known volcanic emissions. Deepening the apparent mystery of total volcanogenic CO2 emission, there is no magic fingerprint with which to identify industrially produced CO2 as there is insufficient data to distinguish the effects of volcanic CO2 from fossil fuel CO2 in the atmosphere. Molar ratios of O2 consumed to CO2 produced are, moreover, of little use due to the abundance of processes (eg. weathering, corrosion, etc) other than volcanic CO2 emission and fossil fuel consumption that are, to date, unquantified. … Based on this brief literature survey, we may conclude that volcanic CO2 emissions are much higher than previously estimated, and as volcanic CO2 contributions are effectively indistinguishable from industrial CO2 contributions, we cannot glibly assume that the increase of atmospheric CO2 is exclusively anthropogenic.”
There’s lots of interesting data noted just on that site, for example: “In spite of Mason (2003) & Kaser (2004), which so well document this drastic example of how deforestation affects the environment, Gore (2006), some two years after these publications still insisted that the Kilimanjaro glacial retreat was caused by global warming, never mind the presence of penitentes confirm that aridity and not temperature was the mechanism. Of notable coincidence, the Mason (2003) reference is buried behind the “premium content” blind of http://nature.com without so much as a volume, page number, or abstract available to the visiting public. ”
So why doesn’t your side want to show the real data, something to hide?
Here’s another example of your data manipulation from the same site:
“In Cleveland & Morris (2006, p. 427) Hans Suess and the Suess Effect, used to account for contamination of radiocarbon dates by various phenomena, are given the following entries:
Suess, Hans 1909-1993, U.S Chemist who developed an improved method of carbon-14 dating and used it to document that the burning of fossil fuels had a profound influence on the earth’s stocks and flows of carbon. (Fossil fuels are so ancient that they contain no C-14.)
Suess Effect Climate Change. a relative change in the ratio of C-14/C or C- 13/C for a carbon pool reservoir; this indicates the addition of fossil fuel CO2 to the atmosphere.
However, this is only half of the explanation offered by Suess. In Suess (1955, p. 415) we read:”
Oops, mustn’t show that, must I??! Further: “The misuse of the Suess Effect as a fossil fuel fingerprint instead of an empirical standard for the correction of carbon dating contamination, lead to an initially idiosyncratic expansion of this concept by Keeling (1979), who sought to include 13C depletion of vegetation and its effect on the atmosphere. The atmosphere is enriched in 13CO2 by the process of photosynthesis, which favours the assimilation of 12C into plant tissue during growth (Furquhar et al., 1989). This is used to differentiate between terrestrial and oceanic CO2 sources (Keeling et al., 2005), and the concept, proposed by Craig (1954), is actually older than Suess’ original research. Moreover, plant based fossil fuel derivatives are therefore considered to be 13C depleted. Following this line of logic, fossil fuel emissions, being derived from plants, should be 13CO2 depleted as well. However, when the Keeling (1979) article expanded its internal definition of the Suess Effect to include this observation, it was once again to the exclusion of volcanic influence.
“In point of fact, magmatic carbon is, for the most part, 13C depleted. This is solidly confirmed by numerous studies of deep mantle rocks (Deines et al., 1987; Pineau & Mathez, 1990; Cartigny et al., 1997; Zheng et al., 1998; Puustinen & Karhu, 1999; Ishikawa & Marayuma, 2001; Schultz et al., 2004; Cartigny et al., 2009; Statchel & Harris, 2009) as well as mid-oceanic ridge outgassing (De Marais & Moore, 1984). Moreover, 13C depletion of volcanic emissions is so well known that Korte and Kozur (2010) explore volcanism, amongst other possible causes, in search of an explanation for atmospheric depletion of 13C across the Permian-Triassic boundary. Although many significant carbonates are not 13C depleted, they are eventually subducted etc.etc.”
Too much data, yet?
Here’s some more: “1.2 The Location of CO2 Monitoring Station in regions enriched by volcanic CO2
Volcanic CO2 emission raises some serious doubts concerning the anthropogenic origins of the rising atmospheric CO2 trend. In fact, the location of key CO2 measuring stations (Keeling et al., 2005; Monroe, 2007) in the vicinity of volcanoes and other CO2 sources may well result in the measurement of magmatic CO2 rather than a representative sample of the Troposphere. For example, Cape Kumukahi is located in a volcanically active province in Eastern Hawaii, while Mauna Loa Observatory is on Mauna Loa, an active volcano – both observatories within 50km of the highly active Kilauea and its permanent 3.2 MtCO2pa plume. Samoa is within 50 km of the active volcanoes Savai’i and/or Upolo, while Kermandec Island observatory is located within 10 km of the active Raoul Island volcano.
“Observatories located within active volcanic provinces are not the only problem. There is also the problem of pressure systems carrying volcanic plumes several hundred kilometers to station locations. For example, the observatory in New Zealand, located somewhere along the 41st parallel, is within 250 km of Tanaki and the entire North Island active volcanic province. Low pressure system centres approaching and high pressure system centres departing the Cook Strait will displace volcanic plumes from the North island to the South Island. etc.”
Goodness me, and the spiel that accompanies descriptions of the measuring sites make such a point of saying they are sited in pristine conditions without CO2 production to spoil the measurements.
There’s plenty of data provided that AGW is junk science, you’re just not seeing it.
Alright, a conversation about data! I like it!
First, stop the ad hominem attacks on “fraudulent science”. For all of the claims of bad science, every time these people are investigated, they are cleared. And the e-mails? On climategate? Seriously? If I took all of the emails I sent in one day and selected various parts from different emails, one could probably show, well, absolutely anything. If you take these quotes out of context (and the original authors have responded to these items) you misinterpret what they were saying.
Let’s talk about the one link that goes into great detail about volcanoes and CO2. My background is physics, astronomy, and oceanography so it will take a moment to absorb…
Okay, so as far as I can tell, the author’s main contention is that volcanic sources of CO2 are much larger than anthropogenic sources. Well, the only problem I can find is the only person that appears to be saying this is Mr Casey and every other scientific organization around the world seem to agree that he is wrong. It seems hard to believe that we have missed this apparenty enormous source.
And there is a claim that being on top of a volcano is a problem. Well, it would be if scientists didn’t take into account many factors, including the changing winds over the course of a day at this particular volcano. Maybe a better answer would be to look at data collected at other locations around the world. What do you know, they all agree. So it seems the claim this really isn’t a problem.
And if volcanos were a huge source, you would think major eruptions, which can be seen in the recent climate record, would also be seen in the CO2 record. Unless the author is wrong and volcanos are not a major source, especially compared to anthropogenic sources.
So right now the bulk of you “evidence” is one person with a website that says everybody else has it wrong. Sorry, that is really hard to believe. Maybe the reason we are not seeing “plenty of data that AGW is junk science” is that people are throwing junk science at it.
Show me one paper in a peer-reviewed journal that backs this paper up (and not just papers referenced by Mr. Casey since I don’t have time to make sure he did not misinterpret things).
The problem is in order for him to be right, the increase in volcanic CO2 had to perfectly coincide with the increase of CO2 from anthropogenic sources. That is a huge stretch.
“…our net annual emissions of CO2 must be reduced by more than 50 percent within this century.”
Absolutely laughable goal! Not gonna happen. Dream on, dreamers.
Sensor operator says:
“For all of the models and evidence that has been provided by various persons, including Ben Santer… Yes, they use models.”
Earth to Sensor: models are not evidence. Empirical, testable, directly measurable data is evidence. Models, even if originally based on reliable raw data, have been massaged until they provide the required results that someone with an agenda paid for: Garbage In, Gospel Out.
And based on your comments, it seems that you believe that scientific skeptics have something to prove. We do not; the entire onus is on those flogging the AGW conjecture. They make the claims. They make the alarming predictions. They collect the grant loot. But they cannot validate their claims because the planet is falsifying them. They cannot produce evidence of global harm from CO2, so their alarming predictions fail. And they are wasting the public’s money based on a repeatedly falsified conjecture.
The climate null hypothesis falsifies the alternative CAGW conjecture. The rate of global warming has remained within close error bars since the 1600’s; the same rising trend both before and after CO2 began to rise. If that doesn’t tell you that the CO2 effect is insignificant, then you don’t understand the null hypothesis, or how it works, or why it is so critical to the “climate change” issue.
I feel we are getting a bit off track, here. My reason for making this active demonstration against one of the most respected scientific organizations in the world is only one: scientific integrity. I refuse being part of an organization with a declared policy of more-or-less forbidding open and frank discussion about one of the most pressing societal questions.
As all scientists dealing with nature knows very well, from the work of Newton to that of Einstein, all our “knowledge” is based on viable theories. The predictions we make on weather and climate are based on numerous constrained theories. Although I have been weary of the gross political status of climate science ever since 2003, it was my review of three of the chapters in the draft AR5 that ‘tipped the bucket’. Thus, it is ‘virtually certain’ that the decision was made thereafter, – I neded to stand up against the deconstruction and political corruption of Western ideas.
My main question to the AGU administration is: why was it at all necessary to make a political stance, in the first place? I cannot really see why you should risk offending some of your members and supporters by making this particular statement. My hunch is that there may be something very wrong with parts of the “climate science”, whitch no longer can be seen as a natural science, but is also part of the exact science of mathematics, etc. If it is necessary to make a political statement in order of “prooving” scientific results, then we are entering the dark ages again.
Martin Hovland –
My main question to the AGU administration is: why was it at all necessary to make a political stance, in the first place? I cannot really see why you should risk offending some of your members and supporters by making this particular statement. My hunch is that there may be something very wrong with parts of the “climate science”, whitch no longer can be seen as a natural science, but is also part of the exact science of mathematics, etc. If it is necessary to make a political statement in order of “prooving” scientific results, then we are entering the dark ages again.
We entered the dark ages some time ago, it’s already an established pattern. Members of the Royal Society tried to get rid of it, managed to get some of it toned down but the warmist green agenda ethos remains. The American Meteorological Society has been taken over so completely that a year of two ago attacks began in general against members, someone put out that any not toeing the party line shouldn’t be able to get work, and recently there was more along those lines. Sorry, writing this from memory and the detail escapes me; there was something recently about further developments on WUWT.
Here’s something I’ve just found on it: http://dailycaller.com/2012/01/30/global-warming-activists-seek-to-purge-deniers-among-local-weathermen/
It began as this says, when they did a survey a while back and found that most members didn’t believe in the ‘global warming’ propaganda, which has now become ‘climate change’ – there’s a concerted effort by some to denigrate their knowledge and they’re very big on calling them “deniers” who should be penalised for holding such a view. The society itself is fully now committed to the cause: http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/global_warming_skeptics_to_tak.html
“When it comes to global warming, the American Meteorological Society has strong views: “Human activities are a major contributor to climate change,” the society says, and “increases in greenhouse gases are nearly certain to produce continued increases in temperature.” ”
Likewise: http://www.geosociety.org/positions/position10.htm The Geological Society of America (GSA)
As for the AGU – it’s been at the forefront of campaigning against “deniers” for some time – http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/11/climate-scientists-plan-campaign-against-global-warming-skeptics/
“November 8th, 2010 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
“The American Geophysical Union plans to announce that 700 researchers have agreed to speak out on the issue. Other scientists plan a pushback against congressional conservatives who have vowed to kill regulations on greenhouse gas emissions.
“A new article in the LA Times says that the American Geophysical Union (AGU) is enlisting the help of 700 scientists to fight back against a new congress that is viewed as a bunch of backwoods global warming deniers who are standing in the way of greenhouse gas regulations and laws required to same humanity from itself.
“Scientific truth, after all, must prevail. And these scientists apparently believe they have been endowed with the truth of what has caused recent warming.
“The message just hasn’t gotten across. ”
In other words, it’s much worse than you think…
Oh, and again from a poor memory bank, I recall something about the AMS, that some members wanted a contact list of members to initiate discussion about the politicisation of the society, they were refused, although it had been available previously for other notices and such.
Really, if the members who are appalled by this kind of takeover of their societies and associations don’t find some way to make a stand, then they’ll just have to live with it. The AMS campaign against its own members is a chilling indication of the climate of fear the greenies are generating.
And if you haven’t seen the 10/10 video which targets everyone in the population – there are discussions on it here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/page/2/?s=10%2F10+video
But, as I said earlier, this is only going where the IPCC leads. I don’t know what you’ve written, or what you’ve lectured on, but if you’ve contributed to the party line …? Have you objected to the IPCC pushing this agenda?
Sensor operator says:
February 10, 2012 at 2:19 pm
“Alright, a conversation about data! I like it!
First, stop the ad hominem attacks on “fraudulent science”. For all of the claims of bad science, every time these people are investigated, they are cleared. And the e-mails? On climategate? Seriously? If I took all of the emails I sent in one day and selected various parts from different emails, one could probably show, well, absolutely anything. If you take these quotes out of context (and the original authors have responded to these items) you misinterpret what they were saying.”
Sensor there are separate threads that discuss the e-mails. You should go there, read, analyse and discuss to get a better understanding and also help others see your point of view. Just generally denying there is anything in there is not helping to improve understanding.
Sensor operator says:
“And if volcanos were a huge source, you would think major eruptions, which can be seen in the recent climate record, would also be seen in the CO2 record. Unless the author is wrong and volcanos are not a major source, especially compared to anthropogenic sources.”
You obviously know exactly how many volcanic vents are under the oceans and have a clear view of those and the gases that comes out, but I believe our science is not so far, we just begin to evaluate it, give us a decade or two then we will better know. Maybe the volcanic activity is negligible after all but I trust our data is incomplete.
“We never see most of the earth’s volcanic eruptions, because most of them occur undetected in the deep ocean.”
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/vents/geology/submarine_eruptions.html
Sensor operator says:
“So right now the bulk of you “evidence” is one person with a website that says everybody else has it wrong. Sorry, that is really hard to believe. Maybe the reason we are not seeing “plenty of data that AGW is junk science” is that people are throwing junk science at it.”
There is enough junk science in AGW and the skeptics role is to point it out. The Himalaya glaciers was one of the case, there are other cases too.
This is the role of skeptics, not to build a parallel, different theory.
I trust the human produced CO2 has been beneficial so far. Can you point out to what disasters have been caused by the slight warming that we have lived since mid of previous century? From what I have seen NASA has measured some greening of the world in the last 3 decades of about 10%.
I trust it may be a combination of the warming and the increased CO2 that caused this, could be interesting to see some more scientific work in this direction, it was very scarce, not sure how much money is made available for such studies.
http://www.co2science.org/data/plant_growth/plantgrowth.php
If 10% of the world food is due to increased warming and CO2 since mid of previous century, then
700 000 000 people are now fed due to it. Any many other species survive and thrive due to it.
Another study showed increase of 50% of the biosphere carbon circulation since the LIA. That is huge!
Martin Hovland –
http://www.climatechangedispatch.com/home has several links to articles which you find of interest:
Political science at academies Peter Foster National Post Feb 11 2012
Royal Society Exposed Again in Post Normal Corporate Fraud John O’Sullivan Guest Post Feb 11 2012
The Royal Society is a joke James Delingpole Telegraph Blogs Feb 10 2012
Nullius in Verba: The Royal Society and Climate Change Dr Benny Peiser GWPF via email Feb9 2012