A layman’s view of the strange period of history we are living through
Guest post by Caleb Shaw
During hot spells in the summer I often find it refreshing to click onto Anthony’s “Sea Ice Page,” and to sit back and simply watch ice melt. It is an escape from my busy, sweaty routine, as long as I avoid the “Sea Ice Posts” where people become anxious, political, and somewhat insulting, about the serene topic of ice melting. However by September there is no way to avoid the furor generated by melting ice. It reaches a crescendo.
I used to like the September Panic because I often could hijack a thread by bringing up the subject of Vikings. I’d rather talk about Vikings floating around during the MWP, than a bunch of bergs floating around and melting today.
The September Panic also entertained me because I used to learn about all sorts of things I didn’t know about. The debate always involved people clobbering each other with facts, and hitting each other over the head with links. In the process you’d learn all sorts of fascinating trivia about Norwegian fishermen in the 1920’s, and arctic explorers in the 1800’s, and even some science.
For example, fresh water floats on top of saltier water, unless it is the Gulf Stream, which is saltier water floating on top of fresher water because it is warmer, until it gets colder.
This science crosses your eyes, in a pleasant manner, and leads inevitably to discussions about thermohaline circulation, which is fascinating, because so little is known about it.
It also leads to discussions about how the freezing of salt water creates floating ice that is turned into fresh water by extracting brine, which forms “brincicles” as it dribbles down through the ice at temperatures far below zero and enters the warmer sea beneath. This in turn leads to discussions involving the fact that, with such large amounts of brine sinking, surface water must come from someplace to replace it, and in some cases this surface water is cold, while in other cases it is warm.
The fact the replacing waters can be warmer leads to discussions about the northernmost branches of the Gulf Stream, and how these branches meander north and south. This in turn leads to talk of the unpredictable nature of meandering, the further downstream you move from the original point where the meandering starts, and this, (if you are lucky,) will lead you to Chaos Theory and Strange Attractors.
(In the case of the Mississippi River, the subject of meandering leads you to the Delta, plus the topics of Engineers, New Orleans, and Murphy’s Law.) (In the case of psychology, the meanderings of the human mind leads to the conclusion humans are utterly unpredictable, unless they are psychologists, in which case they obey Smurphy’s Law, which states a psychologist will succumb to whatever ailment he is expert in.)
In conclusion, the September Panic can be a source of fascinating thought, providing you are willing to drift like a berg and wind up miles off topic.
I’ve been through this all before, during the Great Meltdown of 2007, and its September Panic. Those were great times, for in the period 2006-2007 the so-called “consensus” put forward a great propaganda effort, including the movie “An Inconvenient Truth,” and won Oscars, Peace Prizes, and a sound thrashing from Skeptics.
Congress debunked Mann’s “hockey stick” in 2006, an English Judge rebuked Al Gore for falsehoods in his movie in 2007, and also in 2007 Hansen had to back off his “adjustments” due to the work of McIntyre at Climate Audit. When Rush Limbaugh mentioned McIntyre’s victory, Climate Audit was overwhelmed by traffic, which was one reason the existence of WUWT came to be known by me, and many others.
In essence the “consensus” experienced a debacle in 2007, for its attempts at propaganda drew so much attention that all its flaws stood naked in a glaring spotlight, and ordinary people began to understand the emperor had no clothes.
All this happened before the 2007 ice-extent hit its record low, and added a quality of desperation to that year’s September Panic. Desperate for proof, Alarmists felt the low ice-extent proved Al Gore was right, and the IPCC was right, but, by using such dubious and refutable sources, they effectively were putting their heads on a chopping block. Or climbing out on a limb. Or swimming like fish in a barrel. (Take your pick.)
At this point a new word, a word most people had never used or even heard before, became quite common in the climate debates, and the word was “obfuscation.” (It would be interesting to compare how often that word was used in 2007 with how often it was used in 2005.)
The Alarmist’s obfuscation has now persisted for five years, which means that the melt-down of 2012 is a bit boring. It is a case of “been there, done that.” No longer do I often learn things I didn’t know about. One hears the same, tired, old arguments from 2007, and one knows it is hardly worth replying, because Alarmists are not interested in the vast and awesome complexity of a chaotic scientific reality, preferring the simplicity of a “belief,” which they grip with white knuckles.
About the only interesting and new approach on the part of Alarmists is their attempt to misuse psychology, and to make it a way of marginalizing and ostracizing those who point out their mistakes. Though appalling, this is interesting because it seems a perfect example of Smurfy’s Law.
Formerly the definition of “Liberal” was “generous,” and one thing that old-time Liberals were very generous about was giving minority viewpoints a fair hearing. In any discussion of Dams, Deserts and Droughts, they would hear the views of ordinary engineers, meteorologists, and hydrologists, but also insist upon hearing the views of extraordinary Native American rain-dancers. They desired “diversity,” and had contempt towards those who would not consider, or at least be considerate towards, “alternative views.”
Strangely, this concept has now vanished among some who formerly wore the tag, “Liberal.” Gone is their desire for “diversity,” replaced with a fawning regard for the “consensus.” The very same people who sneered at convention when young are now guilty of being the very thing they sneered at: Blindly conventional.
In a way this is a normal part of maturing. Churchill stated something like, “Those who were not Liberal when young had no heart; those who do not become Conservative when older have no brain.”
However there is a significant difference between the ordinary process of maturing, and people who enact Smurphy’s Law. In the ordinary process of maturing there are some core values which endure the battering of youthful idealism, as it gets hammered into the tempered steel of maturity. As the poetry of William Blake is subtly altered from “Songs of Innocence” into “Songs of Experience,” the poetry remains poetry; the heart remains a heart. However, in the case of Smurphy’s Law, those core values either are completely abandoned, or were abandoned in the beginning. (After all, psychology attempts to measure the human spirit with calipers and thermometers, and sometimes has a hard time conceding things such as “heart” and “poetry” even exist.)
At the risk of being poetic rather than scientific, I’ll state that our youthful ideals are like sails that haul us against the wind of a world that can be stormy and can leave our sails in tatters. Our core values are like a keel that keeps us from capsizing, so that even if we lose our hearing like Beethoven did, we still can produce a Ninth Symphony. Without such a keel of core values we can flip-flop, and end up enacting Smurfy’s Law, and see ourselves opposing the very free speech we once stood for.
This, and not the bergs bobbing about in the arctic, is the real melt-down that has occurred, and which we have been witness to. The very people who once were most adamant about free speech are now vehemently opposed to it. The very people who were most open minded to the most bizarre alternative-lifestyles now have minds clamped tighter than clam’s, (certain that they themselves are oysters and hold pearls.)
What a joke. Those who once were Liberals now are not, while those who never wished to be called Liberal now are.
It is a great struggle we are involved with, (defending free speech and open-mindedness,) but it does get tiresome, which is why I occasionally use Anthony’s “Sea Ice Page,” to flee to the North Pole, where I can serenely watch the bergs bob about and melt.
It is a great relief to escape the nonsense of Smurfy’s Law for a time, and to instead consider that which is awe inspiring: Creation is an incredible place, a chaos that has no business being orderly, but is.
Everywhere you look there are marvels too complex for even the hugest computer to handle: The vast meanderings of the Gulf Stream; the mysterious, pulsing appearances and disappearances of huge amounts of water into and out-of Thermohaline Circulation, the metamorphosis of a ripple on a front into the vast circulation of a huge storm with an eye, and so forth, from the deepest depths to the upper atmosphere, and on through solar winds to the sun.
Of course, even when you think you have escaped the bother of petty politics for a while, you’re liable to get dragged back to reality, even when hiding up in the Arctic.
For example, the Cryosphere Today map will show open ocean, as you read a news item about a fifteen-by-eleven-mile pack of bergs, containing ice as much as eighty feet thick, closing down a drilling operation in that area of “open ocean.”
http://www.adn.com/2012/09/10/2619205/shell-halts-chukchi-sea-drilling.html
At this point I always feel I am being dragged kicking and screaming from the sublime to the ridiculous. I “don’t want to go there,” but I have to.
In a way it reminds me of being the father of teenagers. They might tell me they were heading down to the Public Library to study, but I would get to thinking that such study seemed a bit out of character, so after a half hour I’d go check the Public Library to see if they really were there.
It is a sad state of affairs when you cannot take scientists at their word, and have to go check up on them as if they were teenagers, however some have earned this disgrace: They cannot be trusted. And this besmirches other scientists, good and honorable men who are just trying to do their work, but who suddenly notice a layman like me scowling over their shoulder. (Ever try to work with someone hovering over your shoulder? Half of the time it makes your hammer hit your thumb.)
Unfortunately science has earned such scrutiny. I no longer trust that the Arctic Ocean is ice-free just because Cryrosphere Today maps it as ice-free. I double check, using perhaps the DMI sea-surface-temperature map:
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/satellite/index.uk.php
And I am then puzzled by the fact this map shows sea-surface-temperatures below the freezing point of salt water for large areas the Cryosphere map shows it as open ocean.
So I say the heck with maps, and resort to my lying eyes. The North Pole Camera has drifted far south of the pole, into Fram Strait. You can tell where the camera is by using the Buoy Drift Track Map at
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/northpole/DriftTrackMap.html
And this shows you that, according to various Cryosphere maps, the camera should either be showing half ice and half open water, or should show a nice view of fishes at the bottom of the sea. Instead it has a view of ice in all directions, with the summer’s melt-water pools freezing over, when the camera’s lens itself is not frosted over. When you check the site records you notice that, even though it has drifted south of 82 degrees north, temperatures have at times dipped below minus ten Celsius.
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/northpole/819920_atmos_recent.html
At this point you start to feel a bit like the father of a teenaged daughter who has discovered their child is not at the Library, who wonders where the heck the girl has gone.
One can continue on to the satellite view, which, if clouds are not in the way, shows the “open ocean” is remarkably dotted by white specks of ice.
Though one could perhaps then argue about whether the bergs amount to more-than or less-than 15%, and whether this means the water is officially defined as “open ocean” or not, such quibbling is a bit like discovering your teenaged daughter flirting at the ball field, and having her argue that the fact she has a book with her makes the ball field a “library.”
One simply has the feeling that truth is being stretched dangerously close to its limits.
Considering young scientists usually begin filled with idealistic zeal, and hunger and thirst for the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, it seems a wonder they can wind up stretching truth and resembling a psychologist suffering from Smurphy’s Law. How could they sell out to such a degree?
The reason for selling out is always the same: Money.
I can not say for certain that, when I was young and sleeping in my car, I would not have been tempted by a grant for 1.7 million dollars. Perhaps even Beethoven would have been tempted to make pizza, rather than the Ninth Symphony, if someone had offered him 1.7 million dollars. (One interesting short piano work of Beethoven’s is entitled, “Rage Over A Lost Penny.”) Money is the root of all evil, and when we see scientists swayed by their patrons we should perhaps say, “There but for the Grace of God go I.” (And also, “Blessed are the poor.”)
In any case, it seems we live in a time when some scientists are working under the thumbs of benefactors and patrons who desire results presented with a certain political “spin.” If it is possible to present data concerning the melt of the Arctic Ice Cap in a way that makes it look more extreme, because this may make a carbon tax more possible, the scientist will be under great pressure to do so.
The scientist is in essence working with a frowning boss scowling over his shoulder. The only way we can counter-balance this effect is to also look over his shoulder, and give the poor fellow the sense that “the whole world is watching.” This will likely make scientists miserable, and also make them yearn for the days when they were ignored and could work in peaceful obscurity, however it will also keep them honest, which is for the best for all, in the long run.
Even as we behave in this somewhat petty and parental manner, we should not forget what brought most of us to examine the clouds and seas and sunshine and storms in the first place: Our sense of wonder. Others may focus their thinking to the cramped line-items of musty, budgetary chicanery for a narrow political cause, if they so chose, however the vast truths of creation remains open for the rest of us to witness, and to wonder about, if we so chose.
For example, ice-melt in the arctic may be the sign of many different possible things, including the advent of the next ice age. Open water may not only lose heat to outer space, but might lead to arid regions having increased, glacier-creating snowfalls. There are all sorts of ideas and realities to discuss and wonder about, starting with the surprisingly early snows that just buried the sheep in Iceland.
This September, the farmers of Iceland have something real to panic about. And perhaps that is the most important thing about dealing with truth: To stay real.
Caleb,
That was a great post. Interesting, easy to read and insightful. Out of lots of good paragraphs, this one stood out for me (emphasis mine):
“The scientist is in essence working with a frowning boss scowling over his shoulder. The only way we can counter-balance this effect is to also look over his shoulder, and give the poor fellow the sense that “the whole world is watching.” This will likely make scientists miserable, and also make them yearn for the days when they were ignored and could work in peaceful obscurity, however it will also keep them honest, which is for the best for all, in the long run.”
Thanks a lot.
Arfur
Thank you for a beautiful and poetic essay.
the endless repetition of the following meme does not take into account all the rightwing govts of europe which have enacted CAGW policies, despite objections from citizens across the political spectrum.
and another dubious bloomberg poll doesn’t take into account people like me who have always voted for labor candidates (US Dems) or green candidates, but who read the climategate material and took note that the temperatures have not been performing according to the CAGW team’s predictions:
1 Oct: Bloomberg: Mark Drajem: Global Warming Links Democrats, Independents Isolating Romney
Democrats and independent voters overwhelmingly accept the scientific evidence that human activity is warming the earth’s temperature, while almost two out of three Republicans don’t.
Among likely voters, 78 percent of Democrats and 56 percent of independents believe humans are warming the earth, according to a Bloomberg National Poll. That finding is consistent with other polls that show undecided voters, and majorities in contested states such as Ohio and Virginia are in line with President Barack Obama and most Democratic candidates in wanting to address the issue…
A drought affected two-thirds of the lower 48 U.S. states this month, one of the worst such dry spells on record, and temperatures there for the first eight months of the year were the warmest since records were first kept in 1895, according to government data…
“One problem for Republicans is that they are painting themselves into a climate-change corner,” Daniel J. Weiss, director of climate strategy at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, a self-described progressive group with ties to the Democratic Party, said in an interview…
“If you don’t agree there is a limited government solution, an effective coping mechanism is to deny the problem,” Alex Bozmoski, director of the Energy & Enterprise Initiative at George Mason University, said in an interview. A veteran of Republican campaigns, Bozmoski said that his group is pushing for cuts in all energy subsidies and for some taxes to shift from income and capital to be placed on the carbon dioxide emissions…
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-01/global-warming-links-democrats-independents-isolating-romney.html
Beautiful
Thank you – a wonderful read.
Regarding the former liberal thinkers, I’m constantly amazed by the double-think that they are inflicted with. While being amazed that some of us “deniers” would doubt the word of the consensus of climate scientists, and while they insist that it makes no sense to assume a world-wide conspiracy of scientists all lying to the public, they can in the next breath condemn GM food and say that of course the scientists are lying about it being harmless and cannot be trusted as they all work for multinationals like Monsanto.
Even more confusing is that when a world-reknowned biologist, Steve Jones, warns that climate change is a real and present danger, they of course believe him as a trusted source, but when the same man says the GM food is completely safe, this being his actual area of expertise, then they reject what he has to say.
This really is Orwellian double-think.
A bit off topic, but the first paragraph reminded me of a poem I had to learn at school 60 years ago called ‘The Ice-Cart’ by Wilfred Gibson.
Well worth a read on a hot day.
Thank you, Caleb/
This is indeed a layman’s obfuscation.
Excellent, Caleb.
I wish I could have written that so well.
Just to be pedantic…
“Those who were not Liberal when young had no heart; those who do not become Conservative when older have no brain.”
I believe the phrase originated with Francois Guisot (1787-1874): “Not to be a republican at twenty is proof of want of heart; to be one at thirty is proof of want of head.” It was revived by French Premier Georges Clemenceau (1841-1929): “Not to be a socialist at twenty is proof of want of heart; to be one at thirty is proof of want of head.”
It is unlikely to have been Churchill since he went from being a conservative to a liberal later in life.
Great quote though:-)
Thank you Caleb and Anthony, for a lovely post.
I’m sorry, but there are MANY conservatives without a brain. Nobody questions the intelligence of the people who agree with them; even though they PROBABLY agree for STUPID reasons. Like political reasons. This post is really about political stripes, not science or clear thinking. Smurphy’s Law indeed.
Sorry to be off topic, but has anyone been able to get onto the JoNova site the last couple of days?
It was working for a while, but seems to have disappeared again 🙁
It is the long weekend and footy finals weekend down here, so that may explain why its not getting fixed.
Reblogged this on Climate Ponderings and commented:
+10
An excellent article.
Seems to sum up the the whole climate “debate” beautifully……..
Exceptional essay I thoroughly enjoyed it. When a piece like that produces thoughts to ponder on it has achieved its goal. Thank you.
Excellent post.
I loved the idea of equating the scientists to teenagers :-).
Good essay but I’d steer clear of the political liberal vs conservative stuff because all politics has been corrupted by two faced creeps.
Interesting read, however I cannot help feeling sorry for the scientists with everybody looking over their shoulders making sure they get the “right” answers. It is not as if you can even re-train in a different scientific discipline to escape the scrutiny very easily, as it is well know that global warming is the cause of all natural phenomena.
By the way, you have repeated a common misquote: “money is the root of all evil”.
NO! “The love of money is the root of all evil”. The first three words are absolutely critical and change the whole meaning. Money is an inanimate object, numbers in a bank’s computers. It is as capable of great good in the hands of the right people (Bill Gates, Warren Buffet) for whom money is means to right the injustices of this world as well as great evil in the hands of the wrong ones.
By the way, the correct Churchill quote is:-
“If you’re not a Liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you’re not a Conservative at forty you have no brain.”
And the reason he said that was because when he was 20 he was a member of the Liberal party and he later moved to the Conservative party and was justifying his action. The phrase is more party political than philosophical. In the UK the “Conservative” pro-capitalist party has many “liberals” in it and the “Liberal” party is more “social democrat”. So if you strip out the party politics, a better way for an American to understand it is:
“If you’re not a socialist at twenty you have no heart, if you’re not a capitalist at forty you have no brain.”
In the UK “liberal” (lower case L) has a generally different meaning from the US. Here it is as much a right-wing concept as a left-wing one. It stresses “freedom” as much as “generosity”. Thus a liberal is in favour of free markets and has a deep hatred of racial or sexual prejudice. Read the Economist if you want to understand what a “liberal” is in the UK. I am very definitely a British liberal at the ripe old age of 52. Even though I have long since voted for the Conservative Party, I am very glad to say my intolerance of intolerance is as strong as ever!
Sceptics are getting it wrong about Arctic ice. No, I don’t mean our guesses about ice extent but shouldering some sense of guilt about getting those guesses wrong. We tend to nit pick about inviible ice because we don’t want to admit there is less ice than we wished for. We shouldn’t fuss about it. Unless Anthony is holding out on us, we haven’t got a government funded super computer to calculate the ice activities in the far north. So when our optimistic hopes of a recovering ice sheet go wrong, well it was only a guess anyway.
The official predictions are however more serious. When more ice melts than they predicted they’re not more right, they’re still wrong. Some of the future warming is predicated on a declining ice sheet but if that arrives early, where does that leave their prediction? If we arrive at a tipping point early and there’s no tip, well that’s another part of their science that is a bust.
We should be seeing thoughtful comments about having to rethink how much ice there may have been in the past (eg during the MWP) and what it does to the climate models. Instead we get jeering from them and gleeful chants of ‘it’s worse than we thought!’ No it’s not. The ice melted and we have not burnt to a crisp or drowned.
We let them get away with claims that declining ice is responsible for the recent harsh European winters, despite there being no correlation between ice extent and winter temperatures in countries like the UK. They tell porkies like that and we ignore them because we’re hiding our heads because we wanted the ice to recover in our time frame, not that of the planet.
We have to admit to ourselves that the ice in the Arctic has probably reached a tipping point. The key anchors between the ice and the islands of the Arctic Basin are not reforming quickly enough to make the ice stable in the spring and early summer. If the ice isn’t pegged to the land it floats out of the Arctic and melts. That way any ice that reforms in the winter is vulnerable as soon as the melt starts. Indeed, it’s vulnerable during the winter as it flows out and gives us a false sense of increasing ice because it fuels the ice along the Greenland coastline. That is not to say that the anchors won’t reform but at the moment there isn’t any sign they’re going to. It seems likely that the Arctic will reach a new normal which may be very similar to 2007/2012 in appearance but don’t hold your breath. That doesn’t mean it will continue to decline or might not recover slightly but we won’t know for at least a decade.
But so what? How can we say that the current situation isn’t normal? The climate modellers can’t because we already know that their models do not model reality. We shouldn’t be having September panics. We should leave that to those who have a super computer that can’t get it right.
Very interesting and well written piece. I would just suggest that as well as money, a motivation for some scientists to act like teenagers is an underlying belief that they are indeed saving the world. If the data doesn’t quite fit the belief, well it’s more important to get the message out anyway. Wasn’t that Schneider’s approach?
Delightful and eloquent summary.
Perhaps their next censorship tactic will be to tempt skeptic blogs with multi-million dollar buyouts to stop blogging.
Thanks for a great article! An excellent explanation of the current state of the climate debat.
And it is true:
Progressives now want everything to stay as it was,
Conservatives now want things to evolve the way they are destined.
Very strange indeed. Confusing actually.
No, that is unfair. It is not “double-think” to agree with somebody on one subject and disagree with them on another.
“Double-think” is the ability to say you believe one thing while at the same time acting in the completely opposite way. Thus the department of Government charged with prosecuting a war becomes the “Ministry of Peace”. Throwing people you disagree with in jail becomes a way of promoting “freedom” and, of course, “everybody is equal, but some people are more equal than others”.
I am a great Orwell fan!
J B Williamson says:
October 1, 2012 at 12:54 am
Just to be pedantic…
———————-
Also, just to be pedantic, Churchill was most definitely a Conservative later in life, I was there under his Conservative governments 1940-45 and 1951-55.
I have reposted this on my facebook page. Not that very many read my stuff but of those that do maybe one third will refuse to read it because the link is from that evil fossil fuel paid d**ier site and is therefore wrong. Two thirds minus an outlier will completely ignore it and the one other bloke, the outlier, who agrees with me will put a “like” underneath.
Climate is so passe….(Add your own French accent)
Ivor Ward
“pat says:
October 1, 2012 at 12:30 am
the endless repetition of the following meme does not take into account all the rightwing govts of europe which have enacted CAGW policies, despite objections from citizens across the political spectrum.”
The only “endless repetition” of a meme I see for starters is that europe has “rightwing governments”. Europe has a few centrist government who have stood up against global warming… the czech’s come to mind. Europe’s idea of rightwing is relative to stalin being a moderate.
As to “objections from citizens across the political spectrum.” “All” is really only recently has the fact the evidence of fraud, lies and outright theft has become so far over the top even the socialists are having a hard time justifying it to themselves.
For those of you who got tired reading that a quick summary.
Caleb doesn’t trust scientists cos they tell him stuff he doesn’t want to hear.
Caleb likes the “things are complicated so we know nothing” logical fallacy.
Caleb likes concocting really really long winded insults.
AndyG55 says:
October 1, 2012 at 1:18 am
Andy, Joannes site is accessible to me.
J B Williamson at 12:54 am:
Thanks for the provenance of the saying. Clearly Chuchill was repeating a well known phrase and twisting it to justify his own decision to move from the Liberal Party to the Conservative Party. He was a member of the Liberal Party and First Lord of the Admirality during WW1 where he was a disastrous failure, his term ending with the massacre at Gallipoli.
After WW1 he moved to the Conservative Party where he was Chancellor of the Exchequer for a while where he undertook the disastrous policy of moving us back on the Gold Standard at a penalising pre-war rate causing devastating deflation. Our economy only recovered when he was kicked out of the job and the policy reversed.
He finally got it right when he fell out with the Conservatives over their policy of ignoring Germany’s re-armament and appeasing Hitler. The rest is history.
An entertaing read.
But JB Williamson has it wrong. Churchill served as a minister in the Liberal govt. during WW1 then as a Conservative from 1924 onwards until his retirement as an out-going Conservative Prime Minister in 1955.
Excellent post. Arctic melts, Antarctic freezes. But alarmists ignore this.
The ”precautionary principle” is banded about by the alarmists. It is not a scientific principle and following it would lead to man’s extinction. We would certainly still live in caves.
So, how much of the Arctic sea ice needs to melt away before you start sitting up and taking notice?
Every professional engineer who sees the Trenberth ‘Energy Budget’ knows the claim the Earth emits IR as if it were a black body in a vacuum is bogus. it’s because they measure coupled convection and radiation and you can never have a perpetual motion machine.
Many physicists go a bit deeper and work out that Trenberth’s outrageous mistake is to
replace UP PV – DOWN PV with UP PV- DOWN PV + DOWN PV = UP PV. PV refers to the Poynting Vector, the measure of temperature you make with a pyrgeometer. The claim that all UP PV can do thermodynamic work plus the other mistake, to claim DOWN emissivity at TOA =1, is the source of the perpetual motion machine.
None of the models can predict climate. Real scientists and engineers know it but they are outvoted by the pseudo-scientists like the 1000s who devote themselves to pyrgeometers imagining that the W/m^2 on the dial is a real energy flux. Poor saps.
Baa Humbug says:
Andy, Joannes site is accessible to me.
I got nothin’ 🙁
A question if I may. How good is satellite coverage of the polar region with instrumentation good enough to distinguish 15% ice cover? Has good coverage been available for all of the “satellite era”
The post was going along well until…
“Money is the root of all evil, and when we see scientists swayed by their patrons we should perhaps say, “There but for the Grace of God go I.” (And also, “Blessed are the poor.”)”
Some can handle money and not compromise their principles while others cannot. Just because a seemingly higher percentage of climate scientists fall into the latter, don’t blame money or greed. Blame the individuals lack of desire to remain committed to the scientific method.
I’m new at this, and hesitate to do this, but here goes:
Caleb said:
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/satellite/index.uk.php
And I am then puzzled by the fact this map shows sea-surface-temperatures below the freezing
point of salt water for large areas the Cryosphere map shows it as open ocean.
The link does not show that. The temperature scale goes from 0 to 34 deg. C. Sea water freezes at -2 or less depending on salt consentration. The scale itself is ridiculous. It should go to -3 or lower.
Good post. Wasn’t 2012 the predicted year that the arctic would be ice free in 5 years?
How on earth did they find that sheep? Was it the ‘scat’?
Good post.
Thanks.
son of mulder says:
October 1, 2012 at 1:41 am
The reason politics is corrupted is because people continue to believe that principles don’t matter. As long as the electorate votes for “a candidate that can win,” instead of for candidates who have principles we’ll get two-faced, ill-defined “Professional Politicians.” Politicians who’ve compromised for the sake of expediency have moved us to the point we’re now inhabiting politically. They don’t do it by sacrificing the other guy’s principles…
If you want a totalitarian state, say so and vote for politicians who’ll give it to you – and I’ll fight you every step of the way.
If you want liberty, find a politician who understands what that means, votes on it consistently, and vote for them – I’m with you all the way.
The rest of you, who aren’t sure what you want – stay home, stay out of the way!
At the end of the day, as this essay indicates, it’s all about keeping the alarmist establishment honest.
This, as we all know, is a thankless, difficult task. If they weren’t grant and/or media addicts, the task would be a lot easier.
Whenever I see a silly, snotty remark on WUWT, such as Lazy’s one today, I am reminded of Edmund Burke’s statement: “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
In this case ‘the triumph of evil’ represents victory by the high priests of the CAGW cult and economic Armageddon for the rest of us. So, we have to do something and one of those somethings is spreading the word that climate reality is rarely what the Establishment says and that it can be found on sites like WUWT, Jo Nova and Climate Audit.
Brilliant piece of writing, I didn’t want it to stop.
By the way did you see this/ – http://iceagenow.info/2012/09/record-snow-brazil/
Nice post, well put – captures the essence of how modern scientific “truth” is often pursued very well! However, one small but important point, which actually adds to the metaphor rather than taking anything away….”the LOVE of money is the root of all evil”. Money itself, of course is inanimate and required in this world in order to live. However, the love of it (as we all know) corrupts and drives the telling of lies, which of course is what this post is all about.
Nice work!
“And this besmirches other scientists, good and honorable men who are just trying to do their work, but who suddenly notice a layman like me scowling over their shoulder.”
What? No female scientists involved?
Disko Troop
“Add your own French accent”
Try pressing Alt 130 🙂
Great piece, Anthony. Did you invent Smurphy?
What a great essay. Thank you Caleb, I really enjoyed reading that.
There obviously need to be more of us leaning over shoulders and inducing ‘thumb-hammering’
LazyTeenager says:
October 1, 2012 at 2:11 am
And, as usual, LT has nothing to say of any relevance except the usual ad hom.
An excellent post overall, but I have to disagree with:
“The reason for selling out is always the same: Money.”
Some may sell out because of their ego.
Some never “sell out” but are nevertheless corrupted by confirmation bias or the noble cause.
Some may merely lack the ability to question what they perceive as authority.
It is just as wrong to portray all CAGW promoters as being bought and paid for by “Big Government” as it is to portray all skeptics as being part of the fictional “well-funded well-organized denial machine”.
Jo WAS back, has she gone again? I’m off to check.
http://joannenova.com.au/wp/2012/09/bingo-were-back/
Great post, made me smile.
Getting to Jo Nova’s site: use Anthony’s link on the main page. Works for me.
Beautifully written, engaging, informative, thought-provoking. Nice job.
Fantastic piece. Beautifully written.
Thanks for this great article!
Simply wonderful, Caleb. You, sir are also a poet. Respect..!!
“The reason for selling out is always the same: Money.”
Bingo! This is where modern climate science has gone very wrong. The amount of money attached to the subject of “climate” is now staggering (in the billion$ of dollars). Meanwhile, many, many other much more important societal problems go unresolved.
Also, speaking of people who actually LIVE nearest to the arctic, why didn’t anyone panic when Alaska saw record cold and snowfall earlier this year?
So Very, Very Cold In Alaska For January with Impressive Records
Record cold wave breaks 13 low temperature records
Anchorage breaks seasonal snow record
Lazy Teenager:
I read your post. It fails in its attempts to demean and misrepresent the excellent and thought-provoking argument. Your post consists only of three statements, and each of them is so wrong as to beggar belief.
So, the only things achieved by your post are demonstrations that you have chosen a correct screen-name and you lack ability at reading comprehension.
Richard
Simon says:
“This is indeed a layman’s obfuscation.”
Simon, I’d love to read your take on this. If you submit it, I’m confident Anthony would post it.
Great read Caleb – fine literacy is not lauded much these post-normal-everything days. Yesterday, I flew over the Fram Strait on my way back from Beijing – a trip I’ve made four times in the past two years. Multiple trips to the washroom gazing out the porthole at northern Russia, the Arctic Ocean and the east coast of Greenland probably caused some concern for my health from the flight attendants. It was the only place to stand up and get a decent view. There is a lot of glorious white at the top of the world at this time and you feel the wonder that you describe. I’m a geologist and engineer but that doesn’t diminish the wonder.
“Nature has made man a passionate creature, desirous not of pleasure but of power ; the passions themselves are not simple emotions, but charged with and mastered by the appetite for power; honour consisteth only, in the opinion of power; the worth of a man is, as of all other things, his price; that is to say, so much as would be given for the use of his power; the public worth of a man, which is the value set on him by the commonwealth, is that which men commonly call dignity. Leave men to themselves, they struggle for power, competition, diffidence, vainglory driving them. Sober half-hours hush with their lucid intervals the tumult of the passions ; even so on earth they bring no beatitude.”
W.G. Pogson-Smith.
Bernard J.:
Your post at October 1, 2012 at 2:47 am says in total
I don’t know to whom your question is addressed, but I give my answer then pose a question to you.
I would not “start sitting up and taking notice” if all the Arctic sea ice were to melt. Indeed, I would appreciate the benefits of improved transport and trade from the removal of Arctic sea ice. However, the continuing growth in total sea ice (that results from the growth in Antarctic sea ice) is something worth monitoring because it may (improbably) be indication that another ice age is initiating.
Why do you ask?
Richard
Extremely well written, Mr. Shaw. If you were a warmist who wrote that well, I might disagree with everything you said, but still praise you on your skill with the written word. Wonderfully done!
I think Lazy’s attempt to sum up your essay, not only confirmed several of your points, but also demonstrated Lazy’s complete lack of appreciation of the arts.
pat says:
October 1, 2012 at 12:30 am
—
It’s a strange world when socialists are considered right wing.
Watt a wonderful post, I have printed some copies to leave in obvious places, unfortunately, politicians don’t read.
AndyG55 says:
October 1, 2012 at 1:18 am
It is there and running.Go into the TOOLS then click on OPTIONS then click on REMOVE INDIVIDUAL COOKIES then look for joannenova.com.au and delete it.
See if that works.
Caleb, since you gave us such a delightful post I’m going to give you something right back. You’re the inquisitive type is seems, a scientist at heart, so I hope you can get something out of this little analysis of the disappearing ice.
I am also going to take a stab at clearing up some of the misinterpretations I see people making in regards to the decrease in the sea ice in the Arctic Ocean.
Take a look at this graph of the PIOMAS (U.S. Navy) average ice thickness from 1980 through part of 2012. Sorry, that’s not all of 2012 but it’s not plotted yet. Look closely at the date curves. Every five years since 1980 the thickness has more or less constantly shown less and less to where by 2012, there is about 1.3 meters of thickness missing.
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/schweiger/ice_volume/Bpiomas_plot_daily_heff.2sst.png
Taking that figure of 1.3 meters over the 32 year period, this gives a loss of 4 centimeter per year, if viewed as at a constant rate (which it isn’t, but close), that has melted and never returned as ice over the following winter.
I have a small frame and my index and middle fingers are right at four centimeters across, now that’s not very much ice, in thickness I mean, since the arctic is always thinner at the Russian and Alaskan shores, thick north of Greenland and northern Canada, this small variance in thickness can express itself as a rather large decrease in the extent covered as we’ve seen.
I’m going to concentrate on this four centimeters to try to give some scale, energy wise, to help explain what has been happening up north. I’m also going to go a bit off conventions in that this computation is much clearer if we work in centimeters and not meters most of the time.
Since it takes about 335 joules to melt one gram of ice into water and that cubic centimeter of water occupies one cubic centimeter we know immediately that the energy we will be dealing with about 1350 joules, per square centimeter to melt the four centimeters of thickness each year, that is the energy imbalance occurring year after year and has decreased the ice thickness in the arctic to it’s present day average value given by PIOMAS anyway.
One way of looking at this, you get a huge amount of energy across the Arctic Ocean, that would be 14.5 million square km x 1350 joules/square centimeter gives 196 quintillion joules each year, now I’d call that one huge, right? However, when you convert this same 1350 joules across a time period of just ninety days (half of the melting season to be extra conservative), 86,400 seconds per day, 10,000 square centimeter per square meter, you end up with just 1.75 watt/square meter needed to perform that extra melt. Equating that to a temperature rise at the 273 K level is 0.37°C. That’s right, just 273.37 K radiating compared to 273 K would supply this 1.75 Wm-2 needed if absorbed, which it isn’t. However, note that flux of energy could come from air above, current below, or most likely some unknown combination of many factors. Most likely some comes from radiation variance from decreased average cloud cover or decreased cloud thickness and also warmer currents flowing into the Arctic Ocean or warmer air at the interface, both of the later by conduction. Also, any increased in average wind velocity would accelerate sublimation.
The bottom line is a mere four additional centimeters of ice melting in a year can so easily be explained over an entire summer with the sun up 24/7 for half of the year. Oh, forgot to include soot. When I saw that PIOMAS graph I knew that was the simple answer we needed. Could it possibly rain an extra inch and a half each year just as it has retreated, or by a combination with snow year after year? Sure could, and I’m sure one day it will once again, year after year, just as it has thinned, will begin restoring this missing average thickness, a few centimeters at a time.
I really see no real problem and that 0.37°C rings a loud bell with me, that is the same figure I have come up with for the recent (post 1950) warming, both air and surface sea temperatures, after removing the more than apparent unadjusted UHI and a blob of misapplied adjustments climatologists stuff into every temperature chart. That’s just my viewpoint.
Hope you enjoy (and hope it’s error free, not peer reviewed of course, yet, but I’m sure it will be in a hour or two ☺)
What a beautiful article. Thank you! If you care to entertain an idea that money alone is not the sole corrupting force in the area of Smurphyism, and would prefer a higher order explanatory mechanism or system, then consider the issue of “status” within the group. Of course, money plays a huge role in “status,” too. But a perception by others of one’s own intrinsic “expertise” also plays a large part. And of course, religious piety on the road to higher status is one of the psychological rewards within cult groups. This is why I see many similarities between the Gaia worshipping environmentalists, who ironically think themselves atheists, to the system of influences in Scientology and other more overtly religious cults. I think the groupthink of many CAGW alarmists, and of the most severe political progressives, for that matte (as there is a large overlap in their populations), is approaching cult-hood.
I enjoyed this article. Thank you.
I had no problem getting Jo Nova’s website about 15/20 mins ago.
I wrote the above essay nearly a month ago, while successfully quitting cigarettes, and my mood was not good.
While I continue to be grouchy, my mood is a little better, especially because I communicated with some polite and helpful people, concerning questions I had about Arctic Sea Ice.
I emailed both NSIDC and NPEO, and in both cases I received prompt, friendly and informative replies.
Therefore, if, as “Lazy Teenager” suggests, I come across as “anti-scientist” in the above essay, I deserve rebuke, and apologize.
What I meant to communicate is a dislike towards “politicized” science, and also towards the fact there has been a refusal on the part of certain individuals to admit their ideas were debunked over five years ago.
The people who responded from NPEO and NSIDC were not remotely like that. They were interested, shared what they knew freely, freely admitted what they didn’t know, and seemed far more inclined to fuel curiosity than to repress it.
Hopefully I’ll find time to share what they shared with me. However, if I don’t find time, I recommend that people avoid leaping to conclusions, especially the conclusion that all scientists are but the puppets of `politicians. Give people a chance. Have the common courtesy to politely ask questions, and you may be surprised at the polite responses you receive.
We are the first generation to witness the changes the Arctic goes through. To pretend we understand the complexities of that chaotic system seems both presumptuous and arrogant. Rather we should be humble, be in awe and full of wonder, and should continue to study as much as possible, with an open mind.
Earlier this year I was back working for a while on the UC Berkeley campus. Seeing the weird world again reminded me of the stark contrast between the Free Speech movement and what life is like on campus now. They are the keepers of the Revolution, apparently. Almost every day I’d walk up the hill and stop in the Geology building (McCone – I just looked it up) to return borrowed fluids. There was an office just inside the door to the right from the north gate entrance with a poster proclaiming support for unions and the Occupy movement. Naturally, that got me thinking about how little difference there was between what this academic supported and either Bolshevism or the NSDAP of Germany. Both were all about workers’ rights in theory. The practice turned out to be something different as we know now. Are they really all so blind at these ‘higher’ institutions of learning? Or do they all just pat themselves on the back and congratulate each other for toeing the party line?
If you haven’t done so already, have a look at “The Road to Serfdom”, by FA Hayek. There you’ll get a good grounding in the difference between classical liberalism and socialism. You’ll realize the radicals never really were liberal in the true sense. And you’ll see how we are truly in great danger of following the same path to totalitarian control as Hayek described. You have to wonder how a very free thinking nation (Germany) in the latter half of the 1800s could become the home of the Nazi Party only a few decades later. Hayek explains how the Left used the industrialists and the aristocracy to crush the middle class (a power play). The State rewarded those who would go along with its plans. The tacitcs used in Germany 80 years ago are much like how larger US corporations today go along with the government agenda to get special deals.
Our own form of state-industrial corruption produces quasi-nationalized corporations enjoying special mandated markets and protection from competition, while growing State power. We pay for that in many ways, higher prices, slower innovation, higher unemployment, and a reduced ability to compete in the global economy. It’s all reflected in our stagnant economy today. Add to that Union corruption feeding worker dues back to elect politicians who perpetuate the corruption. Voters are further duped by media (again large corporations slavishly producing what amounts to state propaganda, just like Pravda and Izvestia). Ecomagination in living color, and another network on the go warping our childrens’ minds. The feedback loop includes universities where goverment pays for ‘research’ to support the agenda, dutifully reported by media to support State policy.
Who still believes this is a free nation with a free market? It’s almost time to stick a fork in it unless we take it back. That means we wake up and vote the rascals out. Get invovled in local politics and fight back against the phony liberals who dominate school boards and city councils. The ones with no other responsibilities happily go to meetings, browbeat reasonable and responsible leaders, and with the help of local press (trained in corrupt ‘journalism’ schools), shape public opinion and further the radical agenda. When the Left lose their elected positions, they have no jobs or businesses to go back to, so they fight harder and dirtier to keep what they have.
It’s amazing how far we’ve fallen. Slowly, but surely, over the last century the rot has spread quietly. Even our basic institutions that provided the moral and intellectual foundation of our country are now freely ridiculed and attacked. That is by design (read Hayek), but we let them get away with it. Now it’s our turn to defend freedom, but the last thing we want is to be lured into the trap of violence. That may be the next step in the radicals’ game plan. It’s evident in rhetoric from DHS and deliberate efforts to increase religious and ethnic divisions, and attacking traditional institutions. WUWT helps provide the right kind of ammunition we need. Many thanks to Anthony and everyone contributing here.
We still have a Republic. Can we keep it?
OK. Such a brilliant and well written piece. Thank you.
Your misquotation of scripture draws it down a little, but not much.
“The LOVE of money is the root of [all kinds] of evil.” Paul was correcting those who love money and thereby violate the 10th commandment (and often the 1st). Similarly, today’s problem is scientists who love money (and advocacy) more than accurate science as you so well describe.
And “Blessed are the poor in spirit”, i.e., the humble. Humilty, open mindedness, graciousness, etc. are some of the surest marks of maturity. There are many biblical warnings against the dangers of too much riches (see above), but poverty is not inherently noble or righteous either. Thankful contentment is.
Ok. This is a scince blog, not a literary cirtique blog. I have to say, you are a good writer and the sing-songy meandering style of the post was wonderfully in line with the substance of the words, a mark of good writing. Keep ’em coming. My distraction by those minor Biblical misquotations is more of a reflection of my hangups than of anything else.
What the world really needs is a billion more people like Caleb and a billion less like lazy teenager. GK
I love your writing, but you took an easy shortcut on:
“The reason for selling out is always the same: Money.”
Some have the opportunity, and some would take it. Many more do not, and many would not. The reasons for beliefs (AGW, politics, theology, stock-picking schemes) are like fish in the sea.
RE: Robert A. Taylor says:
October 1, 2012 at 3:52 am
“….The link does not show that. The temperature scale goes from 0 to 34 deg. C. Sea water freezes at -2 or less depending on salt consentration. The scale itself is ridiculous. It should go to -3 or lower.”
Actually the temperature scale goes a little below zero. Look carefully. The purple extends to around minus one, where the white begins. I assume they didn’t go any lower because the map is a measure of sea water temperature, and below that temperature the water isn’t water any more. Perhaps they should go a little lower to cover the state where water is sort of slushy. I remember that, when the sea froze up in Maine, it went through a brief state when the water was sort of oily. Thanks for commenting.
I live in Arctic North Norway. This does not make me any kind of expert, but I can tell you this, it is not getting warmer where I live. We have just had an unusually cool, wet summer. The vegetable garden has been a complete bust this year. We are wondering, living where we do, where is all this warming?
No. It’s love of money that’s the root of all evil.
But great post.
Celeb,
Thanks for that piece! I used to believe the global warming scare, and it was obfuscation that helped to open my eyes. I read about Mann’s Nature graph with the truncation hidden under many other curves. Then I read a link that purported to explain how this was legitimate. The issue was so stark, but the ‘explanation’ went on for page after page, and brought in endless other data sets! I realised that this was just a deliberate attempt to befuddle anyone trying to get at the truth!
I was shocked, but I shouldn’t have been, because in 1975, as a young post doc, I left science because I realised that the group I had joined was far more interested in papers and results, than it was in the accuracy of those results. Software development looked far more interesting and honest – either what you created worked or it didn’t!
Well done Caleb! A very enjoyable and entertaining read.
As we soon enter the 16th year of a zero global warming trend, it’s becoming painfully obvious the Warmunistas got it all terribly wrong, and even their feeble attempts to re-calibrated Hadcrut4 to get the line moving again from lower left to upper right, won’t save their failed models and theory.
So, in the interim, we’ll all just listen patiently (or not so patiently) to the newest model or study that “conclusively shows” the Warmunistas are right and Warmageddon is just around the corner, while hoping our ocular muscles don’t cramp up permanently from all the constant eye rolling…
Again, nice job Caleb.
Excellent essay Caleb. Thank you.
Seeing Lazy Teenager’s gut reaction to being forced to look in a mirror and denying what he saw was a priceless added bonus.
I enjoyed Caleb Shaw’s ruminations, but even more these two remarkable comments they stimulated:
– wayne (October 1, 2012 at 6:18 am) on Arctic-ice physics, and
– Hoser (October 1, 2012 at 6:42 am) on The Road to Serfdom
Though ostensibly on different topics, they neatly clarify the illiberal morass into which, as Caleb notes, free scientific inquiry seems to be plunging, thanks to the increasingly oppressive role of the State, and the concomitant oppression by its supporters and sycophants, who under the guise of ‘political correctness’ want to punish anyone who does not toe the line. How far are we from Stalin—and Lysenko?
/Mr Lynn
May I suggest vanity is a greater factor than greed in this scientific corruption? Who doesn’t want to be a Planetary Savior, and know what is good for other people’s grandchildren? Especially now when we have doubts that there is an old man in the sky?
Thanks Caleb for an enjoyable read. Thanks too to wayne says:October 1, 2012 at 6:18 am for a great perspective.
TinyCO2 says:
October 1, 2012 at 1:48 am
They always are, Tiny. That is one of the things Caleb mentioned in his beautiful assay, which you haven´t read, apparently.
JAFSupO
I was going to pick Caleb up on that, but he wasn’t quoting St Paul or anyone else. It’s his statement, so he can say what he likes!
If I might be so bold.
This post is deserving of being a “sticky” for a day or two.
Could be that the Domain Name Server (DNS) you’re using (the address pointing to a preferred and usually a secondary DNS are defined in Linux or Windows) is sl-o-o-o-o-w in updating their tables or still caching old addresses; she has bounced around from wordpress blog back to another server under her normal format the last couple of days.
Here’s what her ‘name’ (her URL or uniform resource locater) in the ‘link’ resolvers to presently:
http://223.27.18.253/
Just checked that IP address above worked okay from the central US!
.
Bernard J. says:
October 1, 2012 at 2:47 am
So, how much of the Arctic sea ice needs to melt away before you start sitting up and taking notice?
==============
An ice free arctic would generate trillions of dollars in economic development and jobs. A lot of unemployed Americans and Europeans would probably sit up and take notice at that point.
Many of those folks have been praying for a change in climate for quite awhile; from the politicians that believe the solution to all problems is to pass a law, create a new regulation, and add another tax.
Forgetting that businesses are free to move under trade laws, while people are kept in place by immigration laws. Thus jobs move freely to avoid tax, while people cannot avoid tax except by losing their jobs. Exactly as we are seeing in the US and EU.
Thanks for an entertaining obfuscation.
I found it obfuscating to argue by anecdote. If you have a problem with the methodology and protocol of passive microwave satellite measurement of the ice, man up and say so. If you don’t trust one grid square or buoy, why trust the whole system? If you do trust the whole system, don’t cherrypick for rhetorical advantage.
I found it obfuscating to equate links to newspaper accounts to links to the peer-reviewed literature. It is fun to learn science and history, but they aren’t the same. One Skate does not a science make. Or refute.
I found it obfuscating to focus on the reaction rather than the news – yes, there is less ice, dramatically less ice, than previously in the Arctic. And why is that?
I found it obfuscating to wring the hands and clutch the pearls over tenured professors, and overlook the scientists who work for commercial and lobbying interests directly, whose work is spun and suppressed. Were you paying any attention during the whole Big Tobacco, “smoking doesn’t cause cancer” thing?
But nice writing! Good luck with staying off cigarettes! Excellent way to reduce your carbon footprint.
Jon says:
October 1, 2012 at 4:49 am
“What? No female scientists involved?
Wordsmithing is tough as those quibbling with Caleb’s text show. Recently, someone mentioned “Sand County Almanac” as a good read (compared to Silent Spring) but I know a person that won’t suggest “Sand County” to anyone because of its sexist tone. Leopold (1887-1948) was an environmentalist before it was p. c. to be one, and he wrote using the conventions of his era.
So, Jon, in the quote above, makes a similar point to that of the anti-“Sand County” person. We are sure Caleb was unintentional in his slight, as was Leopold in his excellent essays.
So here is a link to a female of exceptional talents (just to balance the issue):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmy_Noether
Caleb, a wonderful essay. If the curing took a month, the final polish was lustrous.
Thanks for the head’s up that the North Pole Web Cam is now far from the North pole! This past week I was a) surprised that it was still quite light on some of the images, and b) not working on others. Thanks to you, I find out that the web cam is at 80.202°N 2.338°E. It seems to me that in addition to the data and time in the upper left of each image, they need to add the GPS position.
We are the first generation to witness the changes the Arctic goes through. Caleb, this is certainly not true. The settlers of Viking Greenland could write volumes about Arctic environment changes if they weren’t fighting for their survival. Perhaps they did witness and record those changes in a jounal that didn’t survive the glacier. The Inuit also have observed Arctic changes over the centuries, but their record of that history, too, is missing. We are the first generation where billions of people can bear witness.
To pretend we understand the complexities of that chaotic system seems both presumptuous and arrogant. No argument with you there, sir.
** Resquest to Anthony and Mods: On the Ice Page, at the “Drifting ‘North Pole’ Camera.” Please change “Source” to “Source and Location Map” or add a Location Link to the full scale map.
Great post, and yes it is about time we had some way of verifying the satellites open Arctic water claims as they seem to be having problems with anything between 0-70% ice on cloudy days. And no I don’t mean another stupid model, I mean actual, real verification. The occasional overflight would do…
An excellent read. Well put Caleb.
Smurfy or Smurphy?
But I enjoyed the article.
“I used to like the September Panic because I often could hijack a thread by bringing up the subject of Vikings. ”
Please link. Because, you are preaching to the choir on this website, and it would be interesting to see how you held up with a critical audience. By your words, you did well.
Urederra says @ October 1, 2012 at 8:03 am
They [official predictions are however more serious] always are, Tiny. That is one of the things Caleb mentioned in his beautiful assay, which you haven´t read, apparently.
Oh I read it, poetic meanderings and all. The words model and prediction weren’t mentioned. The climate models aren’t wrong because the ice hasn’t melted, they’re wrong because it’s melted too fast. In essence he was mocking the warmists for making too much of the September low. I think the hysteria extends to the sceptic community.
It was a fine essay but made the same mistake that the warmists make – denying the bleedin’ obvious. The ice has melted folks. It’s not a trick of the climate scientists or a matter of interpretation, it’s melted. The other side don’t win just because the Arctic melts. They do win if you start denying the facts.
They make too much of the ice melt, but be fair, it’s their only enduring red flag.
We try too hard to pretend the ice hasn’t melted. Like many of you, I’ve been hoping the ice would return since the tales of baby ice on Climate Audit. Unfortunately it remains stubbornly endangered. Those ice pods are losing too many adult members to fill the Arctic. Like the warmists we can speculate why the ice isn’t returning and or make unskilled predictions about how soon it will return but to retain credibility, sometimes you have to concede the point to the other side.
For those who doubt there’s a lot of open ocean use the satellite images, not the interpretations. Now we don’t have images going a long way back to compare the current situation with the past but why shouldn’t there be less ice now than at any time since the MWP? Why is it a problem to you that after hundreds of years of warming, we would be at a minimum? Do you know for sure that the short cooling period of the 50-70s was enough to reset the ice to the durability of pre 30s ice?
http://lance-modis.eosdis.nasa.gov/imagery/subsets/?mosaic=Arctic.2012274.terra.4km
Lazy teenager,
a) are you still a teenager? Guess so, you still sound like one.
b) if there were a baseball game going on at the park, you could tell your parents you were studying physics with Calebs’ daughter.
Lazy thought this article was all about him, isn’t that just like the spoiled brat teenage !
From where I live, I can look at the glaciated peak of Mt. Baker, a 10,700 foot volcano not far from Bellingham, WA and Vancouver, BC. I’ve been looking at for over 1/2 a century. During that time, there has been precious little change in that glaciation.
This article is excellent, timed as it is to meet the seasonal onslaught from the warmists. An entertaining side light this year, the antarctic sea ice is setting new records daily for increased extent. http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm/11760/Cold-Hard-Fact-Antarctic-Sea-Ice-is-at-Record-High
Thank you very much, Anthony Watts, for this excellent article, bordering as it does on the poetic.
TinyCO2 says:
October 1, 2012 at 10:19 am
—
You would have a point. Had the ice melted because it was getting warmer.
“””””…..Formerly the definition of “Liberal” was “generous,” and one thing that old-time Liberals were very generous about was giving minority viewpoints a fair hearing. In any discussion of Dams, Deserts and Droughts, they would hear the views of ordinary engineers, meteorologists, and hydrologists, but also insist upon hearing the views of extraordinary Native American rain-dancers. They desired “diversity,” and had contempt towards those who would not consider, or at least be considerate towards, “alternative views.”……”””””
Well you didn’t conclude the definition of “liberal” being “generous”.
You forgot to add ; generous “with other people’s money.”
I’d like a dollar for every time somebody who has almost no idea who Winston Churchill was, remember some quote from Winston Churchill of something he never ever said.
There’s even a radio ad; maybe it’s a Mercedes Benz used car ad, that blatantly misquotes one of Churchill’s most famous sayings concerning the RAF in the Battle of Britain. If you can’t be bothered to get his sayings correct; then don’t “quote” him.
No, What we know for sure is that CO2 does not drive climate, precisely because of the cooling period of the 50-70s.
oh, by the way, How do you know that the pre 30s ice was durable? What short of satellite was used to test it?
Should be start citing Amundsen again?
Thank you Caleb! It was a beautiful, pleasant read and you touched so many aspects of the situation!
It is strange how far right could some former liberals get with the time. Strange their wilfully submission, their closed eyes in front of blatant lies they ignore as long as their goal gets through.
And again, you put the finger where the pain is: “In the ordinary process of maturing there are some core values which endure the battering of youthful idealism, as it gets hammered into the tempered steel of maturity.”
Trouble is, if core values have been thrown over board for a “greater cause”: there are no core values left. “Without such a keel of core values we can flip-flop, and end up enacting Smurfy’s Law, and see ourselves opposing the very free speech we once stood for.”
That’s true. This is why the lost liberals do not care for the right of free speech, or for the scientific method, or for such petty things like honesty or integrity.
There is still hope that some of them realise what they lost and try to pedal back.
Meanwhile we have learned to look and keep an eye on the data and on what scientists in the area are doing. It was great to see the reception Shakun et al, Gergis et al, Lew and other deservedly received.
It is great to see real debate, see science, talk about science without politicisation.
Btw as there have been also questions about Jo in the blog – she is online and has a great post on free speech here:
http://joannenova.com.au/wp/2012/09/tyrants-always-want-to-silence-the-critics/
Canuckdriver, the glaciers on Mt. Baker have been receding markedly since 1980. Some have lost 20 to 40% of their volume.
See here, as one example:
http://issuu.com/mspelto/docs/mount_baker_glaciers
One of my favorites!
What a wonderful post — science defended by poetry. So beautiful.
“It would be interesting to compare how often that word was used in 2007 with how often it was used in 2005”
http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=obfuscation
Big peak starting Aug 2006, ending jan 2007
I just noticed a comment over at Dr. Curry’s blog that adds a bit more credence to what I laid out above. Sorry Caleb, hope you don’t mind me using you thread to drive home some of your brilliantly word concepts on the *real* science in relation to this hyper-ventilation over missing sea ice quantities.
Here’s the comment made after I wrote my comment above by Chief Hydrologist on October 1, 2012 at 3:07 pm:
See the range in fluxes, there is that very same 1.7 Wm-2 flux (between 1.9-0.5 = 1.4 and 2.4-0.5 = 1.9 Wm-2) popping up again and this time it appears to be confirmed by two independent series satellite measurements and acknowledged by IPCC itself buried within the text.
Also while I’m here, I need to add one more influence that is definitely affecting this long term four centimeter decrease in sea ice thickness, that is the warmer temperatures found during the six months of nighttime. That is also definitely occurring as seen in DMO’s north of 80N temperature plots. This would be an effect not melting ice but merely causing less thickness to be added each year as the series progresses.
There are so many fact pointing in the same direction to merely ignore them all. At least a few, philincalifornia and Mr Lynn, that did take the time to let this sink in and I’d appreciate anyone who is able to put this in smoother and clearer words.
Lazy teenager hovers over this site from the foggy heights of his pc in Oz, occasionally dripping hilarious pseudo-profundity.
Lazy’s, three silly statements do not a summary make and he really “really really” is too old to be using ‘cos’ in place of ‘because’.
Apart from the delightful contradiction in the terms logical and fallacy, Lazy’s use of the expression is simply lazy, ambiguous polemics. What he actually means is that he disagrees with the article but is unable to think of a reasoned explanation.
In Lazy’s second statement the premise is quite simply a fallacious assumption, unconfirmed by the content of the article. The entire sentence can therefore be nothing other than a non sequitur, a formal fallacy (not a logical fallacy).
“It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope…”
dvunkannon says:
Thanks for an entertaining obfuscation…
You yourself were the obfuscation. Projecting as usual? You forgot to mention that the Antarctic ice has recently reached all-time high (in satellite records that is) – which neatly cancels out the whole recent Arctic ice-melt.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Caleb, thank you. That was poetry and real science – and even though the quotes were a little mangled, you drew on the best of our culture’s spiritual roots that underpin both the sciences and the arts. I’ve been thirsting for this kind of write-up here for a while and it’s wonderful to see it so well received.
please,please,please remember that it is the LOVE
of money that is the root of every evil l!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Caleb, thanks for your post. It’s a good thing to be reminded to enjoy and be in awe of and enjoy what surrounds us. (I would add “and Who put it there.” “Fear” in the KJV would be better understood today as “awe of something bigger than you are”. It could be the bully on the playground or the teacher that stopped him and helped you. I go further but that would venture into “snip” territory.)
Thanks for an excellent article, Caleb.
Money is probably the primary corrupting agent, but there are others, as some folks have pointed out. Status is a strong runner-up.
Status is hard-wired into us. In a prehistoric tribe, status could easily mean the difference between survival and death.
The Economist had an article about a psychology experiment, giving an example of how social status works: when people were asked whether they would prefer to earn $100,000 a year when everyone else they knew was earning $50,000 a year, or earn $150,000 a year, when everyone they knew was earning $200,000 a year, the answer given by the majority was that they would prefer to earn the lower amount — as long as it was more than other people earned, they were happy. Above a basic income level, greater social status is more important than an arbitrary number of dollars.
Another example of status: during the Roman civil war when Caesar’s army was marching in the Alps, they came upon an extremely destitute, dirt-poor village. One of Caesar’s lieutenants jokingly asked Caesar how he’d like to be the head man of that no-account village. Caesar answered, “Better head man here than second man in Rome.” Status is deeply ingrained. It goes back to Cain and Abel, and it often trumps money.
But of course, money is the common denominator. And the more status within the clique, the more money accrues. Take away the money and the clique falls apart. So they know they’re peddling “carbon” lies, but the group viciously turns on any apostate. Every action is designed to keep the money flowing. We see it not only in mainstream climastrology, but in universities and government bureacracies like GISS, NOAA, USHCN, etc.
I like how the graph shows the following lines: Average, 2005, 2007, and 2012. Why were those years chosen; they aren’t equidistant in time? What about 2002, or 2006 or 2009? Now the selection of years for the graph might be innocent, and there might in fact be a downward trend over time, but some could be forgiven for suspecting that showing those three particular years would tend to accentuate the idea of a steady downward trend, particularly in the minds of unsuspecting readers, rather than the actual up-down-noisy spaghetti graph we get with more complete data.
Caleb, have you ever question to yourself whether it may be that the real anomaly is not the coming and going of a meter or two across the entire Arctic Ocean yearly but instead it is the very, very thick ice shoved up against and vertically about the northern Greenland and Canadian coasts?
That is a rather backwards way to look at a physical situation and possibly it was some huge weather even over years in the far past that created this very thick multi-year ice. Everyone tends to view this very thick ice as ‘normal’ but possibly the opposite could also be the case.
That thought tends to surface in my mind every now and then but have found no definitive data one way or the other.
@Lucy Skywalker – “I know you are but what am I?” The playground turnabout earns you a LOL.
And ice forming in the dark cancels ice melted in the sun? Err, no. About as much as rain falling in the Pacific Northwest ‘cancels out’ sunshine in Death Valley. Antarctic diversion, she no be working, ma’am.
Thanks for trying, Jim & Sun,
Tried the dns number, gets me to a directory page, but i can get no further.
Cleared all temps, cookies etc, still no joy 🙁
“Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage”
tried Firefox on another computer, same thing gets to direction through dns number, then “server not found” :-((
Great post and summary of the process of corruption of science and how the model of a parent looking after a wayward teenager is an apt analogy of the current state of science and the skeptical public.
Your observation about how many who now demand consensus, were champions of protest and rebellion as youths. The very same who chanted don’t trust anyone over 30, and conducted street protests for their right to freely express themselves in any and all ways in spite of the then consensus of society regarding proper public behavior, dress, morality etc.
How times and perceptions have changed as they are now the “corrupt establishment” and the old establishment is the rebellious rebel demanding change and acceptance of minority views.
Larry
Rick Ramer says:
October 1, 2012 at 1:57 pm
please,please,please remember that it is the LOVE
of money that is the root of every evil l!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
===============================================================
Actually, the text does not have the definite article. The love of money is A root of all (every) evil. It’s not the only one. (Roots have branches.) But it is a big one … what can money buy?
thanks…that was awesome
dvunkannon says:
October 1, 2012 at 2:42 pm
@Lucy Skywalker – “I know you are but what am I?” The playground turnabout earns you a LOL.
And ice forming in the dark cancels ice melted in the sun? Err, no. About as much as rain falling in the Pacific Northwest ‘cancels out’ sunshine in Death Valley. Antarctic diversion, she no be working, ma’am.
=======================================================================
And none of them are part of “the globe”. I guess sometimes “Global” Warming is only “Local” Warming when that best explains the Fail.
(PS I think some of our British readers (They are part of the “Globe”.) would welcome a bit of that predicted sunshine.)
Truly most enjoyable and a good way to be reminded to take a deep breath. There is so much we don’t know. We don’t even know that we don’t know it. The trick is, do we remain with eyes and ears open, attentive but not directive? Or we do we raise the screens and quell the critics? The “liberals” suffer from the latter condition. Often it’s about the money. Sometimes it’s about their need to be right. (And I speculate that, out of amour-propre, even somebody who’s been bought will pretend it’s about being right; as you say, Caleb, we are in deep currents here).
Again, many thanks.
Wonderful essay. Reality’s light always shines brightest when it causes the cockroaches of delusion to scurry.
I want to thank WUWT for a good to excellent web site.
I want to thank Caleb Shaw for a very good article, and for replying courteously and promptly to my post.
I have been a skeptic on AGW, especially CAGW from the time the media switched from the dire consequences of the coming ice age to the dire consequences of the coming torrid torment. I never expected computer modelers, climatologists, scientific organizations, and politicians to engender, indulge in, and profit from the CASW hysteria as has happened. Nor did I expect ridiculous unnecessary remedial measures to be taken seriously by anyone with any semblance of sense.
By the bye that is my legal name, although everyone calls me Bobby.
Can you “hear” the “but” coming?
I do not wish to be confrontational nor belligerent. There is far too much of that.
Thank you again for replying to my post of October 1, 2012 at 3:52 am with yours of October 1, 2012 at 7:04 am. I agree with everything you wrote. In fact I almost included the part about the scale in my original post, but decided it was unnecessary. Please check the scale again. I cannot perceive any color difference from the lowest point, perhaps -1ºC, to +1ºC. I have no idea of the actual ice conditions in the area; it could be completely clogged with ice. Obviously ice does not disappear instantly above its melting point. Equally obviously old sea ice is mostly freshwater ice, and melts at a higher temperature. Enough said.
Here comes the “but”. I am very reluctant to continue. You wrote, “this map shows sea-surface-temperatures below the freezing point of salt water.” Note: “below the freezing point of salt water.” It does not if “salt water” means sea water, which is my natural assumption. It cannot because the minimum freezing point is -2ºC, and the color coding does not extend below -1ºC. I am aware that there could be a lot of nearly fresh water, including ice. If this is what you meant you should clarify. You wrote, “the Cryosphere map shows it as open ocean.” I take this to mean normal shipping meets no significant hinderance. If you, in contradicting this, meant it is actually full of icebergs, rotting ice, or an oily film of thin mostly freshwater ice, please clarify.
The link is: http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/satellite/index.uk.php
I am sure these are simple mistakes and may be unimportant in an article for popular consumption, and I apologize for taking so much space. This sort of error bothers me no end. I get enough of it from the CAGW people, other blogs, governments, and institutions. I have limited time, especially on the Internet, limited brain power, limited ability to learn and understand. Please vet things better. I know it takes a lot of time and effort.
(This is not a complaint about Caleb Shaw or WUWT) I hate being given links to things that have been removed, have no connection with what was written, have so much extranious material to be too time consuming to bother with, or contradict my obvious and natural interpretation of what was written.
Again thank you for an otherwise interesting and useful article, and thanks WUWT for even existing.
Blast. I wrote “CASW” when i meant CAGW and worse wrote “ minimum freezing point is -2ºC” when i meant MAXIMUM freezing point is -2ºC.
dvunkannon says:
October 1, 2012 at 2:42 pm
And ice forming in the dark cancels ice melted in the sun? Err, no. About as much as rain falling in the Pacific Northwest ‘cancels out’ sunshine in Death Valley.
==========
That is the logic of using global average temperature as a measure of climate. Thus if one spot on earth was 10 billion degrees, and the rest of the earth was -100 degrees, the climate would be about the same it is today.
The climate in the Pacific Northwest hasn’t changed in the past 60 years. Still wet and cold in the summer, and wet and colder in the winter. Anyone else seen actual climate change where they live? I’ll vote for the Pacific Northwest changing from temperate rain forest to sub-tropical desert.
Robert A. Taylor, it seems Caleb was not speaking of a graphic but speaking of actual buoy data as:
(see his link)
‘ some who formerly wore the tag, “Liberal.” ”
Aside from members of the Liberal Party, who wore the tag “Liberal”?
I can get Jo Nova’s site, but I can’t post comments on it.
Monday’s are my rough day, but it’s quite a delight to sit down at the end of a Monday and see 126 comments at 9:40 PM, Eastern Daylight Savings Time. (Which reads 6:40 PM in the time zone of this blog.)
I replied briefly during my lunch break, when there were something like sixty comments, which I could only skim in a speed-reading manner. At this late hour I can only skim the sixty further comments, and can’t possibly reply as I would like to do.
I really enjoy the flattery. However I also enjoy the challenges. The flattery is pleasing because it encourages me to keep sharing my thought, while the challenges encourages me to keep thinking.
I find great pleasure in the ebb and flow of thought at this site. When a weakness in my ideas is exposed, I of course immediately start thinking of whether the weakness can be defended, whether the idea can be repaired, or whether I should be humble and confess the weakness is a fatal flaw, for that particular idea. However one really neat thing about sifting through 120 comments is that sometimes, even before I can get around to thinking about a particular challenge to my way of thinking, someone else leaps to my defense, and rebuts the challenge. It is a bit like having a free lawyer.
Of course there is no defense for spelling a word I myself coined two different ways. The correct spelling, I suppose, is “Smurphy’s Law.”
I thank “highflight56433” for the link to “Rage Over A Lost Penny.” It was good to sit back and listen to that, with my mother-in-law, wife, and three grandchildren, after a long Monday. It’s really something to realize a genius like Beethoven could be pestered by banal stuff like needing a penny, and having misplaced it. What is even greater is the fact he took that aggravation and made music of it.
Hopefully, (in a small way like Beethoven with his lost penny,) my essay made a sort of music, or poetry, out of the aggravation I feel about the political side of Global Warming. I don’t want to be part of the muck or the muck-slinging, but rather to be one of the crowbars that pry us out of the muck.
I really enjoy the comments that bring the focus back to the topic of what the ice, and lack of ice, may mean. I say “may mean,” rather than “does mean,” because I feel we are pioneers in a new field. Or, to be more specific, a thousand new fields.
When I was a kid there was no such thing as a satellite, and the idea of continental drift was not accepted. Computers? Ha! However we are now on the verge of amazing possibilities, as long as we forge ahead bravely, and don’t cower into some freaked-out retreat into a future stone-age. (Which some environmentalists seem to desire.)
Forging ahead is no big thing. It is simply focusing on what the facts face us with. That is why I enjoy the comments about the current situation, and what it may mean. I’ve enjoyed the recent discussions about Arctic ice, versus Antarctic ice, because it is not talk between people who think science is “settled,” but rather is talk between people who crave to understand. As they bicker about small points it reminds us of how much we need to think about, in order to truly grasp our environment.
For example, that discussion made me compare maps of the Arctic with maps of the Antarctic, because the commenters were quibbling about ice at eighty degrees north versus eighty degrees south, and ice at sixty degrees north versus sixty degrees south. I suddenly realized the eighty degrees north is all Arctic Sea, while eighty degrees south is all Antarctic Continent. I also suddenly realized to have ice at sixty degrees south, as it now is in the South Atlantic, is like having ice nearly to the northern tip of Scotland, making walking from Norway to Iceland quite easy. Of course, the Gulf Stream makes this impossible, but if ice could form so far south in the Northern Hemisphere, (which is does do in Hudson Bay, and also, last winter, in the Bearing Straits,) what would that mean, in terms of the concept of “Albedo.”
Albedo was what was being discussed, vehemently and passionately, on WUWT, at that moment. It is not discussed in the same manner on sites where “the science is settled.” I found myself wondering about the fact the sun is closer to earth when the southern hemisphere ice is reflecting while melting, and thinking that maybe, because that ice extends much further north than northern hemisphere ice extends south, it must reflect much more heat.
Meanwhile another WUWT discussion was raging, discussing how much heat was lost by open Arctic water to the Arctic night, and comparing this with the fact the Antarctic can never lose heat in this manner, for open water cannot exist south of 75 degrees.
I’m not arriving at any particular conclusion. I’m just wondering, and enjoying the process of wondering, for I think wonderment is a good thing. It indicates a healthy respect for chaos, which is what reality consists of. It demonstrates an ability to face facts, rather than having to depend on a preconception. Not that I am against having a theory. However even Einstein knew his theories were not the Ultimate Answer, and knew enough to be humble.
It is no sin to be humble, and you better damn well be humble, if you have the audacity to try to predict the weather. The fact is, you will be wrong. Even the best weathermen are wrong, (just like even Babe Ruth struck out.) (In fact, Babe Ruth struck out a lot, and so do great forecasters.)
The most recent comment, as I write, is from Robert A Taylor, asking me to please clarify what I am suggesting about the specific subject of whether or not there is ice, in an area Cryosphere Today calls “less than 15% ice covered.”
Gosh! I never expected to be seen as such an authority! And, if truth must be known, and I must be humble, I muststate I am in no way, shape, or form such an authority. I’m just a guy who wonders.
My curiosity was tickled by the fact there is a Russian map which showed more ice than the Cryosphere map. When I brought this up on WUWT I did so in an unwise manner, and got soundly thumped by a fellow who pointed out the fact I was a moron and several other unintelligent things, because I didn’t notice that the Russian map involved waters with less than 10% ice, while the Cryosphere map involved 15% ice. I thanked the fellow, for enlightening me, and reducing the chance of my being a moron in the future, ever so slightly.
However curiosity kills this cat, and soon I was wondering how much of the Arctic Ocean was 5% ice-covered. Is there a map for that?
You have to admit that, even if we are talking about a sea that is only 1% ice-covered, that is a lot different from the blue waters of the Caribbean. I was hungry for more knowledge, and did my best to find out.
It is not like I can afford to fly up there and see for myself. I have a hard enough time even loading the arctic satellite pictures into my slow computer, so I can squint at bergs from outer space. However I can poke about the internet and send emails, and did get some polite and helpful answers.
I’m planning to write another essay about what I’ve learned. However, in a nut-shell, the short version is this:
There are guys who have flown out over the Arctic Ocean after the August Storm and even later this September, and south of 80 north it is very open. However it is not entirely “ice-free.” There can even be bergs eighty feet thick. So don’t cruise about up there at top speed, if you own a Titanic.
However if Robert A Taylor wants to know about the arctic, he should do what I did. Ask Royal Dutch Shell and Greenpeace. See how far that gets you.
It will give you stuff for a humorous essay, which I hope to write, but not much that actually teaches you about the facts, and the current arctic reality. To get that stuff go places such as NSIDC. If you are as lucky as I was, you’ll find someone more interested in actual facts than lawsuits and politics.
And man O man! Is it ever a breath of fresh air!
“Even more confusing is that when a world-reknowned biologist, Steve Jones, warns that climate change is a real and present danger, they of course believe him as a trusted source, but when the same man says the GM food is completely safe, this being his actual area of expertise, then they reject what he has to say.”
Incidentally those on the pro CAGW side actually flip that argument 180 degrees the other way around.
They declare “How can you skeptics reject what science has to say about man caused warming on the one hand but on the other hand you completely accept what science says about GM foods being safe?”
Ferd Berple: “The climate in the Pacific Northwest hasn’t changed in the past 60 years. Still wet and cold in the summer, and wet and colder in the winter. Anyone else seen actual climate change where they live? I’ll vote for the Pacific Northwest changing from temperate rain forest to sub-tropical desert.”
I’ve only been out here 10 years, but there’s been a change with the last few years of La Nina. When I arrived, the first 6 years or so were warm and dry in the summer, cool, not terribly cold, and wet in the fall and winter. Where I live on Whidbey Island, annual precip is about 26″, pretty low really, hardly a rainforest. Seattle gets about 10″ more annually than I do, about 70 miles south of me.
But the last few years have brought bitter cold in November and December, then much more mild for the rest of the winter. Very cool springs and summers. Definitely different than from 2002-2007.
Jeff Alberts says:
October 1, 2012 at 10:13 pm
Definitely different than from 2002-2007.
=======
Have a look at the past 25 years. No change. Wet and cold, mixed with longer periods of wet and cold.
http://vancouver.weatherstats.ca/periods/25years.html
Of course, the above stats are Canadian. They don’t have Hansen/GISS historical adjustments, which likely explains why we are not showing the “correct” amount of global warming in Canada.
Brilliantly written, Caleb:
When following your link to Arctic SSTs, you almost made me forget that a mixture of sea ice and salt water remains at its freezing point (ca -2 degC) until all of the ice melts. The maps of sea ice put out by Cyrosphere Today show a line where ice coverage is about 15%. SSTs will remain at -2 degC long after the Cyrosphere Today shows they crossed the 15% line. Today, the temperature off of the coast of Alaska – where sea ice usually visibly retreats from the coast in late June – is still only +2 degC. It sure takes a long time for the Arctic Ocean to warm up.
You almost made me forget that the same space-based technology that is reporting a new low for sea ice coverage in the Arctic is also reporting a new high in the Antarctic. If the scientists working on this project were corrupted by politics or the pursuit of grant money, why didn’t they arrange for a September panic from both poles? It certainly would have been easy to distort the calibration as data collection switched from one satellite to another and thereby create the illusion of a downward trend at both poles. The talented Jeff Id (and presumably many others) looked at this data recently without blogging about any serious problems.
You almost made me forget to ask about the source of the 15×11 mile pack of icebergs bearing down of that drilling platform in the Chukchi Sea. You certainly don’t believe that they are the remnants of one-year-old Chukchi sea ice that hasn’t melted yet. Could this year’s record melt have allowed these icebergs to break loose from one of the few remaining areas of rafted multi-year sea ice? Such icebergs can travel “Titanicly” far from its origins before melting.
Your comment made October 1, 2012 at 6:35 am suggests that you recognize that the Arctic really is going through some significant changes and that not all climate scientists behave like sleazy politicians. I often wonder what ordinary climate scientists think about their politicized colleagues. Would they think your unnecessarily indiscriminate and cruel remarks were as inappropriate for them as the denier label is for us?
RE: Frank says:
October 2, 2012 at 1:05 am
“…Would they think your unnecessarily indiscriminate and cruel remarks were as inappropriate for them as the denier label is for us?”
I sure hope so. If I was indiscriminate and cruel. However I also said, “…this besmirches other scientists, good and honorable men who are just trying to do their work…” So I guess it is up to the reader to decide whether they themselves are one of the good scientists, or one of the bad ones, or a mix of the two.
…”You almost made me forget to ask about the source of the 15×11 mile pack of icebergs bearing down of that drilling platform in the Chukchi Sea. You certainly don’t believe that they are the remnants of one-year-old Chukchi sea ice that hasn’t melted yet….”
To be honest, I had no idea. Furthermore, people on Greenpeace sites doubted the ice even existed. They checked the Cryosphere map and saw nothing, and concluded Royal Dutch Shell was a bunch of liars. So….I got curious. Wouldn’t you?
Here is part of the conversation I became involved in, with my questions, and the kind and courteous replies from a NSIDC scientist:
“Did a 12 by 30 mile area of ice actually exist, where Royal Dutch Shell said it did?
Yes. I wouldn’t see any reason to mistrust them. Also, in operational ice charts, which track even small isolated floes of ice, the region had been marked as having sparse ice cover.
If it existed, could such ice actually be 82 feet thick, in one spot?
Yes. It’s unusual, but not impossible. The region where that ice came from may have been near Wrangel Island. Sea Ice tends to get pushed up against the northeastern part of the island and it can pile up, or ridge. As winds blow the ice toward the shore, the ice keeps piling up.
When winds reverse, that ice can break away from shore and start drifting in the ocean. These “ridges” can be quite thick – usually
~30-40 feet thick, but 80 feet is possible. I doubt the whole floe was 82 feet thick, but a portion of it was.
When an area is reported to be “less than 15%” ice-covered, can it have masses of ice this large in it?
It’s possible. The floe was 12 x 30 miles, which is ~20 x 50 km. While the grid cells of our output sea ice data are 25 km x 25 km, the actual resolution (“footprint’) of some of the input data is as low as 45 x 70 km. So the floe would make up only ~30% of that “footprint” if it was wholly within one footprint. If it is shared between more than one footprint, then it could easily be near or below the 15% threshold within each sensor footprint. Another factor is that during melt, our concentration estimates tends to be biased low. Usually this doesn’t affect the extent (>15%) much, but when there are isolated small floes present, they can potentially be missed.”
So you see, Frank, there are some really cool scientists in this world. However there are also some frauds. Let’s treat the good ones well, and throw the bums out.
I have saved Caleb’s post for posterity and for future reference and to send it to my grown-up sons and also to my friends, but most of all to my climate ‘enemies’.
My reply to “Frank” may have wound up in the spam filter.
Here is a neat video of sinking brine freezing starfish: http://www.wimp.com/underwatericicle/
This makes me wonder. When the arctic refreezes, how much brine sinks? Does it happen as a sudden pulse, between October and December, and then slow down? Would such a pulse give thermohaline circulation a sort of heart beat?
@Gunga Din
I think your /sarc tag is missing! Or I hope it is. Global Warming (like the future) is here but unevenly distributed. Whoodathunkit?
@ferdberple – I share your concern for over reliance on global average statistics. Perhaps you educate Lucy Skywalker on that issue, it was she that believed Antarctic ice “cancels out” Arctic ice loss.
Since this is probably the last “sea ice” post for quite a while I thought I better inject this here and now.
Here is an interesting relationship that appeared while thinking of how much excess evaporation might have occurred due to the decrease in extent over 2011. Turns out there were actually less area-days exposed this year than last year as you can see in the graph. That does make perfect sense since the extent during the half of the year from Sept.16,2011 – Sept. 15, 2012 was rather extra high, nearly normal.
This chart can also be viewed as how much of the Arctic Ocean was exposed for additional absorption of radiation (less albedo). Seems 2011 was the highest year though 2011 and 2012 are very close to the same value.
http://i45.tinypic.com/v7cemw.png
You asked if anyone had noticed a change. I noticed a change and mentioned it. I’m sure it’s part of the natural cycle for the region, but there has been a change.
I don’t put much stock in “global” or even regional average temperature data, because averaging temperatures over different areas is meaningless.
@Caleb
So in the OP you clutch the pearls over money loving scientists, and in the comments you admit some are OK. How sweet. Caleb, would you care to speculate in broad percentages how many scientists and how much of the published peer reviewed literature related to climate falls into each category? Is it 90% ‘publish crap to curry favor with grant review committee” to 10% “let’s discover something new today!!” or is it 60-40 or what? Who is more at risk for publishing their honest findings, a tenured professor or an “employed at will” scientist working for an oil company?
And since you used the word, care to name a scientist that you think is a fraud?
@climatereflections – You ask:
I think 2005 and 2007 were the years of the previous record minimum.
A magnum opus, Caleb. How are you going to beat that now? I loved the parable of the lost sheep at the end, moved me to tears.
The eighty-foot thick berg you mention reminds me of what happened during the great “melt-down” of 2007. Over the summer, while half the arctic ice cover disappeared, the other half thickened! During the summer? Over vast swaths it actually doubled in thickness when it was supposedly melting. What’s up with that?
Turns out that much of the “melt-down” had nothing to do with melting. The wind and ocean currents that year were such that huge quantities of ice became concentrated in a relatively small area, piling up. Ironically, it may even have meant that there was LESS melting than usual because the thicker ice has less surface area per volume.
It makes me wonder if there’s a chance … just a whisker of a chance, mind you … that this year’s ice is doing something similar.
Incidentally, I prefer to eschew obfuscation.
dvunkannon says:
October 2, 2012 at 8:08 am
Is it 90% ‘publish crap to curry favor with grant review committee” to 10% “let’s discover something new today!!” or is it 60-40 or what? Who is more at risk for publishing their honest findings, a tenured professor or an “employed at will” scientist working for an oil company?
Nice use of ye olde “strawman”! But, briefly, the proof of the scientific merit of what an author publishes is always in the making and taste of the pudding, not in who pays for the pudding or whether s/he is tenured – it is in whether the author follows the principles and method of real science: the first is – of course following the author’s own sceptical examination of his/her hypotheses, methods and data, and conformance of these with known reality to begin with to try to find out if something’s already wrong somewhere – whether the scientist’s “materials and methods” are available for a thoroughly sceptical analysis by anyone who wants to do it and wants to indeed find something wrong with it, because in large measure that is the “science” involved and withstanding anyone’s review of it is a big test of that science; then there’s always the small matter of “prediction success” where the failure of specific predictions according to the scientist’s hypotheses can falsify the hypotheses even if the “materials and methods” pass the test, because it then becomes obvious that something is wrong somewhere in the “science”.
But getting back to the strawman, just who is the “employed at will scientist working for an oil company” of whom you speak, especially compared to the rampant and scientifically bizarre [“crap”], as per the above, grant-funded “peer reviewed” papers we are deluged with a.k.a. “mainstream” Climate Science and likely presented by even tenured scientists? [I don’t really care if they’re tenured.]
dvunkannon says:
October 2, 2012 at 8:08 am
@Caleb
So you see, Frank, there are some really cool scientists in this world. However there are also some frauds. Let’s treat the good ones well, and throw the bums out.
So in the OP you clutch the pearls over money loving scientists, and in the comments you admit some are OK. How sweet.
————————————————
There are enough such “scientists” here just the ones who surfaced:
http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/
And now dvunkannon tell me, in the area where the most & biggest grants in the world are, where the money flows n-fold, will there be less then anywhere else? Not to talk about noble cause corruption? Whom do you think you can fool?
n.b., dvunkannon: some “science” which we know has been funded by B.P. and Shell Oil comes out of the U.K. Met Office’s Hadley CRU, featuring “mainstream” Climate Scientist, Phil Jones – who responded to a request for the data relating to his Hadcru temperature reconstruction graphs with something like ~”why should I respond to someone who just wants to find something wrong it?” Later it turned out that he’d actually lost the data ~”while moving”.
@JPeden – If they’re tenured, they can’t be fired for not producing papers that agree with crooked grant committees, if you believe that crooked grant committees exist. I agree with your description of how science does and should work, and don’t think climate science works any differently. Grant committees are not corrupt old boys networks taking orders from Moscow Central. Perhaps you can remind Caleb Shaw of that when next he clutches his pearls. I agree that open access to data and replication studies are critical. Isn’t that what BEST started as? And how did that turn out, again?
@Larry Plume P. – Retractionwatch is an excellent site! (Full Disclosure: I’ve had dealings with Retractionwatch in connection with an anti-evolution paper.) You wouldn’t happen to know how many climate papers have been retracted, do you? By percent published? Supporting AGW or not? Such a sensitive topic, such scrutiny by hostile skeptics, those papers must be popping up right and left! But you know, when search that site for the word “climate” not much comes up. What’s up with that?
Oooguruk Island June 23rd 2009
http://www.break.com/usercontent/2009/6/oooguruk-island-june-23rd-2009-790036.html
It certainly seems possible to me.
Larry
dvunkannon,
You’re very naive. Read Montford’s The Hockey Stick Illusion to see the corruption. Crooked grant committees most certainly exist. In fact, there are vey few where the deck isn’t stacked. Remember Phil Jones? He’s been exonerated. As if. And Michael Mann has been exonerated. Doesn’t matter that he was allowed to meet with the investigation committee beforehand, and helped formulate the questions he was to be asked. He was exonerated.
And tenure is fine. But academics want much more than tenure. They want the next pay raise. They want to be promoted to more prestigious positions. They want to be included in
holiday vacationsseminars, COP events, and other wonderful travel jaunts to beach resorts and trendy European cities. But if they speak up and tell the truth — that AGW is not proven, but simply a conjecture — they will not get the things they want. And they will eat alone in the faculty cafeteria.Also, note that the basis for the entire “carbon” scare was Michael Mann’s falsified MBH99 hockey stick graph. Even his pals at Nature were forced to issue a Correction.
Really, you are quite naive about the ways of the world.
dvunkannon says:
October 2, 2012 at 2:50 pm
” I agree that open access to data and replication studies are critical. Isn’t that what BEST started as? And how did that turn out, again?”
Imo, the BEST studies have not fared very well at all, 1] concerning the critical question of “mainstream” Climate Science’s specific prediction failure related to the last 15 years involving no GMT warming in the presence of continued atm. CO2 concentration increase – see the joint statement by Drs. Muller and Curry relating to this matter under “Do Judith Curry and Richard Muller disagree?”
http://judithcurry.com/2011/11/13/congressional-climate-briefing-to-push-end-of-climate-change-skepticism/
“We have both said that the global temperature record of the last 13 years shows evidence suggesting that the warming has slowed. Our new analysis of the land-based data neither confirms nor denies this contention. If you look at our new land temperature estimates, you can see a flattening of the rise, or a continuation of the rise, depending on the statistical approach you take.”
And, 2] as to the attribution of any temp increase to CO2 levels obviously hoped for via Best’s introduction of “a new global temperature data product” [McKitrick] and the possible contamination of the temp record itself by “non-climatic biases” [McKitrick] such as land use factors and population/urban heat island effects, Ross McKitrick’s reasoning for recommending rejection of the Best paper’s publication in JGR can be found here:
http://www.rossmckitrick.com/
It appears that BEST has not yet passed the the first tier of peer review necessary for publication anywhere. Many other criticisms have been put forth. Therefore, again, my answer is that BEST has not fared well at all.
RE: Larry Ledwick (hotrod) says:
October 2, 2012 at 4:35 pm
Thanks for that link, Larry. A picture’s worth a thousand words.
Imagine that piling up eighty feet thick.
Thanks to all for the comments, especially the ones that add knowledge. Now I’m starting another essay.
Excellent, except for the noted misquote about (The love of) money. Ponder that one well.
Many superb comments, but I will single out TinyCO2 October 1, 2012 at 1:48 am. Important perspective. The models are very wrong, and certainly cannot be trusted to extrapolate the “meaning” of low NH ice and high SH ice.
Reblogged this on Standard Climate.
Very well done.
I would point out that some of the Warmers are convinced they are right from first principles (not from money) and they then go looking for justification of their “truth”… That is, they are working more from religious conviction than greed. Still needs a lot of monitoring…
So what happened to the sheep? Did it get a nice barn to spend the winter? And how do they find them under the snow? Just amazing…
@D Boehm – As they say on Jeopardy, you should rephrase your statement in the form of a question. What do I know about the academic process? Well, I review papers intended for publication in my field of expertise. I have friends who write grant proposals for a living. My brother-in-law is a physicist studying superconductivity. My father was a tenured professor. So while most of my personal experience of the academic process is peripheral, it does exist. And yours? I won’t make the same mistake and assume your naivete, that you know what you think you know from reading second hand screeds.
But in any case, I recommend to you the attitude of JPeden, that science is what is published, and stands the test of time, not the name on the author line. Mann, Jones, Hansen and a few others are happily demonized, while the list of names of authors in all papers referenced by the IPCC documents must be hundreds, if not thousands long. They’re all in on the scam? All that research is bogus? Science is corrupt from quantum mechanics and the physics of gases on up? This has all been in motion since the time of Svante Arrhenius?
It is much easier to accept the null hypothesis, that mainstream science is mainstream because it is on the whole correct, and a useful description of the real world. (As they say about alternative medicine, if it worked it wouldn’t be alternative.)
@JPeden – I agree with you, BEST really hasn’t gone anywhere. But is was at least an attempt to do science, rather than blogging and lobbying, to establish the contrary position.
I think there is strong confirmatory evidence that the planet is warming, that atmospheric CO2 levels are rising, that this added CO2 is anthropogenic, and that the added CO2 is the best explanation of the rise in global temperatures. I’m personally quite cautious about the feedbacks, and therefore the “catastrophic” aspect, and don’t think that accepting the science forces you to accept any path forward to handling the issues in the political arena.
dvunkannon,
So you will not read The Hockey Stick Illusion. There are lots of folks like you who do not wish to know what is going on behind the scenes.
For the benefit of readers who value the scientific method, the climate null hypothesis (a corrolary of the scientific method) deconstructs the CO2 conjecture. The climate null hypothesis, which has never been falsified, finds that nothing observed today is unprecedented or unusual. It has all happened before, and to a greater degree — during times when CO2 was much lower. In fact, the only provable correlation between CO2 and temperature is that ΔT is the cause of ΔCO2, not vice-versa.
The null hypothesis remains unfalsified, and the alternative conjecture of CO2=AGW remains only a conjecture, with no empirical, testable evidence proving that it exists.
You are correct that the planet is warming. It is recovering naturally from the LIA, and at the same rate; the trend has not accelerated. It has remained constant whether CO2 was low or high. Sorry about your conjecture.
The earlier link I posted on the ice flow is broken now, but I found a second version with the same video.
Larry
dvunkannon says:
October 2, 2012 at 2:50 pm
@Larry Plume P. – Retractionwatch is an excellent site! (Full Disclosure: I’ve had dealings with Retractionwatch in connection with an anti-evolution paper.) You wouldn’t happen to know how many climate papers have been retracted, do you? By percent published? Supporting AGW or not? Such a sensitive topic, such scrutiny by hostile skeptics, those papers must be popping up right and left! But you know, when search that site for the word “climate” not much comes up. What’s up with that?
——————
Hehe. Good question dvunkannon. Very interesting. Lets check a bit, why are some papers retracted?
One example here:
“Stapel is suspected of having applied for government grants using imaginary data, according to the report. Investigators also are exploring whether he is guilty of forgery by using forged datasets for research and in the written account of research grants.”
I am not sure, dvunkannon didn’t some climate papers have some issues with data? Where data was not available to enable reproduction? Selection criteria not clarified? Unknown adjustment?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/11/27/an-open-letter-to-dr-phil-jones-of-the-uea-cru/
http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/2012/09/27/immunology-paper-retracted-because-documents-were-not-archived-with-due-diligence/
hm lets look some more:
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2008/8/11/caspar-and-the-jesus-paper.html
http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/2012/09/24/invalid-data-prompt-retraction-of-another-paper-from-psychologist-sanna/
Well you are right, WUWT?
“I recommend to you the attitude of JPeden, that science is what is published….”
Yes, I agree that real science does have to be pub;ished [smile] and preferably according to the principles of real science, which include making the study’s “materials and methods” readily available for review.
And only if the process of “publishing” does not include the necessity of first having the “climate” science we are talking about here filtered by “peer reviewers” selected by third sources*; hence it can be published on the Internet by the authors themselves, as per what Steve McIntyre does. Then everyone and their mother can review it.
*In the practice of real science, “peer review” by a few selected reviewers was never intended to warrant the “given truth” of that which is then published. Sure, peer review for traditional Publications can screen the science somewhat, or sometimes almost not at all, but it is only after that when the real review is continued, a principle whose value has been amply reconfirmed by the practice of “mainstream” Climate Science.
I cited McKitrick’s review only as an example of some alleged problems with BEST’s “materials and methods” and its conclusions, which have so far prevented its “publication”, at least in a traditional Journal.
[I’m in no position to confirm what McKitrick says although I do basically understand what he is saying. Meanwhile, Muller has gone right into full-believer mode as to the attribution of any recent warming to CO2, something which Dr. Curry currently disagrees with.]
dvunkannon says:
October 3, 2012 at 8:14 am
“…Well, I review papers intended for publication in my field of expertise….”
Which is?
@Caleb – Google-fu not working? An arcane intersection of knowledge representation and financial data, centered on the data standard known by the acronym XBRL.
@Larry Plume P. – So I asked about retracted papers in ‘climate’ and you respond with examples from immunology and psychology. C’mon it isn’t that hard to enter the word ‘climate’ in the search box… Hmmm, Wegman… Spencer and Braswell… yeah, retractionwatch is really cutting the legs out from under AGW pseudoscience!
dvunkannon says:
October 4, 2012 at 8:00 am
@Larry Plume P. – So I asked about retracted papers in ‘climate’ and you respond with examples from immunology and psychology. C’mon it isn’t that hard to enter the word ‘climate’ in the search box… Hmmm, Wegman… Spencer and Braswell… yeah, retractionwatch is really cutting the legs out from under AGW pseudoscience!
——————————————
dvunkannon, you dug your head in the sand and say you do not see the data issues. It is your right. You know these issues exists as you so carefully avoided to make any mention about in your post and dug your head deeper. A sort of denial. Well that’s it.
CAGW is pseudoscience, as Ivar Giaever said.
Data not found – papers should be treated like this:
http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/2012/09/14/plos-one-gmo-cassava-paper-retracted-after-data-could-not-be-found/
tractionwatch.wordpress.com/2012/09/10/carrion-my-wayward-son-vulture-paper-from-spanish-researcher-suspected-of-misconduct-retracted/
@Larry Plume P. – I didn’t choose retractionwatch as a standard of reference, you did. If there are data problems in a climate paper that merit a retraction, I agree it should be retracted, but don’t bring papers about cassavas as proof about climate science!
The argument that the scientific process works _and_ that AGW supporting science is bogus should be detectable by lots of AGW supporting papers being retracted. Since we don’t see that result, I’d argue that we don’t have support for the idea that AGW papers are bogus. Someone else might prefer to argue that the entire scientific edifice is suspect, but by agreeing that retractionwatch works, I think we are agreeing that the scientific process works – even for climate science.
dvunkannon says:
“I’d argue that we don’t have support for the idea that AGW papers are bogus.”
You would lose that argument with regard to MBH99, Mann08, etc. Those papers were thoroughly falsified by McIntyre & McKitrick, chapter and verse. That indicates that Montford’s The Hockey Stick Illusion has acurately described the self-serving, incestuous clique that runs the climate journal industry.
But since you will not read Montford’s book, you believe what isn’t so.
Caleb says:
October 2, 2012 at 11:34 pm
RE: Larry Ledwick (hotrod) says:
October 2, 2012 at 4:35 pm
Thanks for that link, Larry. A picture’s worth a thousand words.
Imagine that piling up eighty feet thick.
Remember our earlier conversation re Wrangel Island, here’s today’s sat image. Very little sea-ice around now.
http://lance-modis.eosdis.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/imagery/single.cgi?image=crefl1_143.A2012278000500-2012278001000.250m.jpg
dvunkannon says:
October 4, 2012 at 12:17 pm
@Larry Plume P. – I didn’t choose retractionwatch as a standard of reference, you did. If there are data problems in a climate paper that merit a retraction, I agree it should be retracted, but don’t bring papers about cassavas as proof about climate science!
dvunkannon, you dig your hole deeper. We can see that many papers are retracted if the data is missing, but this does not happen with climate papers. Why? They do not show the data even under FOI request but this is no reason for retraction of warmista papers.
cassavas and others are proof of what should happen with such papers. You ignore this and come with answers as if you would not understand what I say.
BTW you say if “climate papers” are not there, is proof of them being scientifically solid? At first all papers which are now there have started not being there!
Then, if we have an area with a deviation to the usual retraction percentage may show different things.
As said, it is clear you do not want to see, so be happy in your hole, I have my eyes open. We can continue ad absurdum or I let you win the debate – i.e. have the last word – I think Pointman had a post on this warmista tactic: change the subject, build strawman, continue to “tear down” the enemy.
CAGW science? All kind of garbage stays there and none will be retracted if it has the CAGW meme inside:
Farting megafauna caused deglaciation, not Milankovitch, but humans killed farting megafauna and caused Younger Dryas:
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v3/n6/full/ngeo877.html
I wonder who started farting again to end the Younger Dryas period?
thinking of funny papers, was the “drowning bears” paper retracted?
http://www.peer.org/docs/doi/7_28_11_Polar_Bear_paper.pdf
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/07/29/inspector-generals-transcript-of-drowned-polar-bear-researcher-being-grilled/
Little Ice Age cause by the conquistadores?
http://phys.org/news/2011-10-team-european-ice-age-due.html
No natural climate change existed?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/10/25/no-global-climate-change-in-the-past-20000-years/
Oh sorry not conquistadores but the green Genghis Khan caused Little Ice Age:
http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/climate-weather/stories/was-genghis-khan-historys-greenest-conqueror
…”You almost made me forget to ask about the source of the 15×11 mile pack of icebergs bearing down of that drilling platform in the Chukchi Sea. You certainly don’t believe that they are the remnants of one-year-old Chukchi sea ice that hasn’t melted yet….”
To be honest, I had no idea. Furthermore, people on Greenpeace sites doubted the ice even existed. They checked the Cryosphere map and saw nothing, and concluded Royal Dutch Shell was a bunch of liars. So….I got curious. Wouldn’t you?
Here is part of the conversation I became involved in, with my questions, and the kind and courteous replies from a NSIDC scientist:
“Did a 12 by 30 mile area of ice actually exist, where Royal Dutch Shell said it did?
Yes. I wouldn’t see any reason to mistrust them. Also, in operational ice charts, which track even small isolated floes of ice, the region had been marked as having sparse ice cover.
If it existed, could such ice actually be 82 feet thick, in one spot?
Yes. It’s unusual, but not impossible. The region where that ice came from may have been near Wrangel Island. Sea Ice tends to get pushed up against the northeastern part of the island and it can pile up, or ridge. As winds blow the ice toward the shore, the ice keeps piling up.
When winds reverse, that ice can break away from shore and start drifting in the ocean. These “ridges” can be quite thick – usually ~30-40 feet thick, but 80 feet is possible. I doubt the whole floe was 82 feet thick, but a portion of it was.
Earlier last month some ice that thick ran aground off Barrow, it clearly was originally land ice maybe some similar pieces are drifting around. Some fragments of the Petermann ice island from 2010 are still around.
http://www.alaskadispatch.com/article/unusual-granite-covered-iceberg-spotted-us-arctic
http://www.ec.gc.ca/glaces-ice/default.asp?lang=En&n=0417829C-1&wsdoc=1B226706-42BF-4B94-A481-E9524C81C436
Some one upthread was asking about in situ observations to back up the satellites, here’s one although it suggests over estimate of the ice.
http://iceedge2012.wordpress.com/2012/09/17/more-swells-and-an-itinerant-ice-floe/
Lars,
The climate journal industry is totally corrupt, as we see in the Climategate emails. A.W. Montford documented it well, and it has only gotten worse. There are hundreds, probably thousands of climate papers that reference MBH98. And MBH99. And Mann08, and so on. And further papers have referenced the papers that referenced Mann’s debunked papers.
Many thousands of papers, which based their conclusions on those falsified papers, would lose credibility if Mann’s papers were retracted. So the journal industry cannot retract. The corruption is endemic, and they cannot allow even one link in the chain to be broken.
@D Böehm – Google Scholar says that MBH98 has been cited almost 1500 times. Of course it has had an enormous amount of scrutiny, and was corrected as a result. But the science stands. The best explanation of post-19th century changes in global temperature away from historic trends is the rise in anthropogenic GHG. To return to the topic of sea ice, changes in Arctic sea ice extent also correlates better with AGHG rise than other causes. This is not to say that GHGs are the proximate cause of ice melting, but that there is a chain of cause and effect.
Climate science isn’t Lysenkoism and Michael Mann has not been given a fleet of black helicopters that hover academic campuses worldwide. Corrupt science does exist – look at the anti-vaccination tragedy of lawyers and ex-Dr. Wakefield conspiring; a result which has killed children. Replication and open access to data are keys to good science being confirmed and bad science being retracted.
@Larry Plume P. – No, I don’t think the drowning bears paper was retracted. There was a recent thread here on WUWT in regards to the author’s censure, which seems to relate to whistleblowing more than science. I looked at the abstract and figures of that paper online, and I think it is a very minor paper that was inflated all out of proportion by the press and politicians. Which is not the fault of the author, or a reason not to publish.
dvunkannon,
To “return to the topic of sea ice”, the IPCC predicted declining ice for both hemispheres. Thus, their models were wrong. Now the alarmist crowd is arm waving over the Arctic. But they are not consistent. When a conjecture is falsified it is time to retract, and re-assess. Instead, the wild-eyed alarmist contingent runs around in circles wailing about the Arctic. Fail, no? Yes.
And your ‘correlation’ with anthropogenic CO2 also fails. You cannot demonstrate any cause and effect. You are simply speculating. That is not science, that is alarmist advocacy. Take your Argumentum ad Ignorantium fallacies elsewhere. This is the internet’s “Best Science” site, not the internet’s “Best Scare” site.
@D Böehm – I’m not sure what your standards of model acceptance are. We know that Arctic models have not kept up with reality – the ice is disappearing faster than predicted. And how did the models of skeptics do? I guess you’re going to have to throw those out also, right?
Just saying one right and one wrong is too simplistic. In the US, you could get into the baseball Hall of Fame easily if you could bat .500! I suggest that you take your own advice to re-assess. If skeptical researchers want to make headway, they have to show better correlations (that can be read as attributional) than other explanations. Get those studies published! Blogging isn’t going to turn the supertanker.
WUWT has won an internet popularity contest for the title “Best Science Site”, don’t read too much into that. There’s plenty of open access primary literature available on the web, no need to read press releases. Read the real stuff yourself!
dvunkannon:
At October 5, 2012 at 12:36 pm you say to Böehm
Sorry, but that simply will not do!
You start by presenting a ‘straw man’ when you ask, “And how did the models of skeptics do?”
The “skeptics” have not provided climate models because they acknowledge there is insufficient information to construct a realistic model. So, it it is silly to ask how models which do not exist have done.
Then you say that in the Arctic “the ice is disappearing faster than predicted”. That is a failure of the models.
Importantly, the models predicted reduced polar ice and not merely reduced Arctic ice. Antarctic ice and total polar ice have both recently achieved a record maximum in the satellite era. Please note that the increase in Antarctic ice is so great that total polar ice has increased despite the reduction in Arctic ice. This is a complete failure of the model prediction of reducing polar ice.
And the reduction to Arctic ice does not alter the fact that the prediction was plain wrong. Please note that it is NOT “one right and one wrong” prediction because there was only one prediction – i.e. reducing polar ice – and the prediction was wrong.
“Skeptics” do publish despite the difficulties imposed by the “Team” which were revealed in the ‘climategate’ emails.
Please try to post reasoned arguments and/or evidenced information instead of ‘straw men’ and falsehoods.
Richard
@Richardscourtney – Sorry, that simply will not do! Lots of skeptics do have models. Bob Tisdale has a model – ENSO did it. Vuk has a model – solar cycles did it. Cosmic Rays did it. UHI did it. Poor siting did it. There are lots of skeptic models. Are you holding them to the same standard? They can’t all be right!
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
Global sea ice is not at a record. I can’t find a data easily for what you are calling ‘total polar ice’, though I don’t see how adding a constant value for the land ice of Antarctica will change things.
richardscourtney says:
October 5, 2012 at 2:23 pm
Importantly, the models predicted reduced polar ice and not merely reduced Arctic ice.
Not simultaneously however, Antarctic sea ice reduced to near its present value in the late 70’s.
http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/wg1/fig2-16.htm
(Yes there is a typo in the axis annotation, it should be 10^6 km^2)
Antarctic ice and total polar ice have both recently achieved a record maximum in the satellite era. Please note that the increase in Antarctic ice is so great that total polar ice has increased despite the reduction in Arctic ice.
This is not true, based on the CT data for sea ice area the recent minimum in the Arctic was 2.234 Mm^2 or 2.52 Mm^2 below average, whereas in the Antarctic the maximum was 16.1 Mm^2 or 1.02 Mm^2 above average. So the correct version is: ‘the decrease in Arctic ice is so great that total polar ice has decreased despite the increase in Antarctic ice’.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
Currently global sea ice area is over 2 Mm^2 below the average for the date.
Phil says:
“Currently global sea ice area is over 2 Mm^2 below the average for the date.”
So what?
D Böehm says:
October 7, 2012 at 8:52 pm
Phil says:
“Currently global sea ice area is over 2 Mm^2 below the average for the date.”
So what?
So Courtney is mistaken!
Richard Courtney is your strawman. Explain why less Arctic sea ice matters.
@D Böehm – Warm Arctic Cold Continents
D Böehm says:
October 7, 2012 at 9:17 pm
Richard Courtney is your strawman. Explain why less Arctic sea ice matters.
I suggest you look up what a ‘strawman’ is, actually Courtney brought up the strawman of ‘total polar ice’ growth in an attempt to avoid dealing with Arctic sea ice loss. Since his statement wasn’t true I pointed out his mistake. He obviously thinks the Arctic loss matters otherwise he’d address the question instead of changing the subject!
You remind me a lot of a former poster here, ‘Smokey’, you ignore all of the parts of a post you can’t deal with and pull out a sentence and make an irrelevant comment about it.
Phil.;
A chain of logic or evidence fails if a link is broken. It is not necessary to show all the links are no good, though many may well be. “Yes, that required piece of evidence is contrary to logical prediction, but these over here are pretty good!” doesn’t cut it.
Caleb;
You have another egregious error, besides the misquote about (love of) money. Icebergs don’t “bob”; that’s moving up and down with waves, and they’re way too heavy. >;(
|8p
Phil:
Not for the first time, you present a falsehood at October 8, 2012 at 7:03 am where you say to D Böehm:
I DID address the subject and I did NOT change it (I wonder why you so often assert others do what you do). And I clearly stated that the Arctic ice loss does NOT matter.
I copy the pertinent post below to save others needing to find it.
Also, your post at October 7, 2012 at 8:19 pm makes two assertions; viz.
1. The rate of ice loss would differ from the two polar regions
And
2. Sea ice has not increased in the Antarctic as much as sea ice has increased in the arctic so, you say, total polar ice has decreased.
Your assertion which I number 1 is not justified and I would welcome a reference to support it because I have not seen such a reference. I have only seen the IPCC predictions of similar cooling in both polar regions.
Your assertion which I number 2 is wrong because it ignores land ice on the Antarctic. The sea ice extent has been increasing
http://www.earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/WorldOfChange/sea_ice_south.php
Nobody knows how the Antarctic land ice is changing but its spread creates the growth in Antarctic sea ice. Using the reasonable assumption that total Antarctic ice is increasing in proportion to Antarctic sea ice then the total growth in Antarctic ice is much greater than the loss of Arctic ice: ~90% of all ice on Earth is in Antarctica.
I do wish you stop your habits of misrepresenting others and stating falsehoods.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
October 1, 2012 at 5:55 am
Bernard J.:
Your post at October 1, 2012 at 2:47 am says in total
Why do you ask?
Richard
richardscourtney says:
October 13, 2012 at 11:15 am
Phil:
Not for the first time, you present a falsehood at October 8, 2012 at 7:03 am where you say to D Böehm:
I suggest you look up what a ‘strawman’ is, actually Courtney brought up the strawman of ‘total polar ice’ growth in an attempt to avoid dealing with Arctic sea ice loss. Since his statement wasn’t true I pointed out his mistake. He obviously thinks the Arctic loss matters otherwise he’d address the question instead of changing the subject!
I DID address the subject and I did NOT change it (I wonder why you so often assert others do what you do). And I clearly stated that the Arctic ice loss does NOT matter.
Really where in this thread did you say that because I can’t find it in your post which I referred to?
I copy the pertinent post below to save others needing to find it.
Pertinent to what?
Also, your post at October 7, 2012 at 8:19 pm makes two assertions; viz.
1. The rate of ice loss would differ from the two polar regions
And
2. Sea ice has not increased in the Antarctic as much as sea ice has increased in the arctic so, you say, total polar ice has decreased.
Better to quote what someone says rather than paraphrase it, it’s not hard to do.
Your assertion which I number 1 is not justified and I would welcome a reference to support it because I have not seen such a reference. I have only seen the IPCC predictions of similar cooling in both polar regions.
You first you asserted that the models predicted equal loss at each pole. Also I think you’ll find that they predicted ‘warming’ in each polar region not ‘cooling’. The consequences of this were projected to be different in the Arctic and Antarctic, notably loss of sea ice in the Arctic and accumulation of snow in the Antarctic, (see IPPC).
Your assertion which I number 2 is wrong because it ignores land ice on the Antarctic. The sea ice extent has been increasing
Since the start of the satellite record, total Antarctic sea ice has increased by about 1 percent per decade.
http://www.earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/WorldOfChange/sea_ice_south.php
Nobody knows how the Antarctic land ice is changing but its spread creates the growth in Antarctic sea ice.
How does it do that? The land is the same area as before, the ice on it is therefore occupies the same area. If you misunderstand the term and think that the landfast ice sheets somehow constitute land ice and that this expands and sea ice is measured relative to it, you are completely wrong and misunderstand how the measurements are made.
Using the reasonable assumption that total Antarctic ice is increasing in proportion to Antarctic sea ice then the total growth in Antarctic ice is much greater than the loss of Arctic ice: ~90% of all ice on Earth is in Antarctica.
This is a completely unreasonable assumption and bears no relationship with reality.
I do wish you stop your habits of misrepresenting others and stating falsehoods.
Pot, kettle black!
In sum, you changed the subject from Arctic sea ice to ‘total polar ice’, you didn’t “clearly state(d) that the Arctic ice loss does NOT matter”, you falsely stated that the increase in Antarctic ice outweighed the loss in Arctic ice and claimed that I was lying when I showed otherwise (I gave sourced numbers), you failed to justify your strange assumption that the Antarctic land area has increased, and that mysterious ‘pertinent post’ which failed to show up.
Richard you have some points to address to establish your credibility.
By the way if you do equate ice shelves with land-ice you should be aware that the mass balance of this ice is increasingly negative, e.g. Larsen, Wilkins, Pig Island, Twaites etc., although this has no relevance to the sea ice except to perhaps reduce the salinity of the polar seas.
REPLY: Phil, you can start talking about credibility when you have the courage to put you name to your words as Richard does. I find your lack of courage as a academic at Princeton troubling as always – Anthony
Brian H says:
October 13, 2012 at 8:43 am
Phil.;
A chain of logic or evidence fails if a link is broken. It is not necessary to show all the links are no good, though many may well be. “Yes, that required piece of evidence is contrary to logical prediction, but these over here are pretty good!” doesn’t cut it.
Would be fine if the facts were dependent on each other, however that wasn’t the case.
Phil:
Your post at October 13, 2012 at 2:57 pm is as illogical, untrue and daft as is your usual practice. It purports to be answering my post of October 13, 2012 at 11:15 am. Your illogicality, falsehood and daftness are demonstrated by the following example.
In the post you claim to be answering I wrote
I justified that statement by quoting the complete post with time stamp (i.e. October 1, 2012 at 5:55 am) where I wrote
Your response quotes my saying
And asks
Clearly, you cannot read.
The remainder of your post is equally ridiculous so I see no purpose in my answering any of it.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
October 14, 2012 at 6:58 am
Phil:
Your post at October 13, 2012 at 2:57 pm is as illogical, untrue and daft as is your usual practice. It purports to be answering my post of October 13, 2012 at 11:15 am. Your illogicality, falsehood and daftness are demonstrated by the following example.
In the post you claim to be answering I wrote
“And I clearly stated that the Arctic ice loss does NOT matter.”
I justified that statement by quoting the complete post with time stamp (i.e. October 1, 2012 at 5:55 am) where I wrote
“I would not “start sitting up and taking notice” if all the Arctic sea ice were to melt. Indeed, I would appreciate the benefits of improved transport and trade from the removal of Arctic sea ice.”
That appeared to be a response to Bernard J in which you appeared to be asking him a question (“Why do you ask”).
It is your habit of claiming to quote something and then not doing so is what leads to problems, you did not “clearly state(d) that the Arctic ice loss does NOT matter”, you said that “you wouldn’t sit up and take notice” which is not the same thing at all. Your lack of concern means that it doesn’t matter to you which is something else entirely. I assume that it would be good for your business?
Your response quotes my saying
And I clearly stated that the Arctic ice loss does NOT matter.
And asks
Really where in this thread did you say that because I can’t find it in your post which I referred to?
Clearly, you cannot read.
No clearly you did not write what you claimed! As I said before if you would actually quote material rather than paraphrase it would be much clearer.
The remainder of your post is equally ridiculous so I see no purpose in my answering any of it.
Richard
As usual you dodge the question, expecting to get a straight answer from you is clearly a waste of time, however I will ask one more time: what is the basis for your assumption that the Antarctic land area is increasing?
Phil:
As usual, in your post at October 14, 2012 at 11:32 am you lie. You say to me
I answered one point you made by showing you had not read the post you claimed to be answering, and I said the rest of your post was similar drivel so I would not bother to address any of it. I have here quoted your response to that.
Importantly, I did answer the question which you lie that I dodged. Indeed, you disputed my answer. So, in addition to demonstrating you can’t read, you now claim you don’t remember your disagreement with what I wrote as a method to lie that I dodged a question.
At October 13, 2012 at 11:15 am in a post addressed to you I wrote
[emphasis added: RSC]
And at October 13, 2012 at 2:57 pm you replied
That response is so inane that I thought it was rhetorical and I did not reply to it. Perhaps that is why you now try to pretend I dodged the question.
The sea ice is spreading because the land ice is increasing due to greater thickness: area is NOT volume. You see, there is this thing called viscosity, and if you find out about it then you will know the rate of ice spreading will be increased by greater pressure. That pressure increase is induced by more weight of ice: i.e. increased ice thickness. And that increase to ice thickness is why the ice spreading has increased to increase the amount of ice pushed out to become sea ice.
I apologise if my failure to take into account your ignorance of elementary physics induced you to think I was dodging the question: I assumed you knew why ice spreads. However, I suspect you are not as ignorant as you pretend to be and you are claiming that ignorance as a method to pretend I dodged your question which was
Area is NOT volume.
Now go away. Your nonsense is becoming a nuisance.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
October 14, 2012 at 12:44 pm
Phil:
As usual, in your post at October 14, 2012 at 11:32 am you lie. You say to me
As usual you dodge the question, expecting to get a straight answer from you is clearly a waste of time, however I will ask one more time: what is the basis for your assumption that the Antarctic land area is increasing?
I answered one point you made by showing you had not read the post you claimed to be answering, and I said the rest of your post was similar drivel so I would not bother to address any of it. I have here quoted your response to that.
No I showed that you didn’t write what you claimed that you did.
Advice to Richard when in a hole stop digging!
At October 13, 2012 at 11:15 am in a post addressed to you I wrote
Nobody knows how the Antarctic land ice is changing but its spread creates the growth in Antarctic sea ice. Using the reasonable assumption that total Antarctic ice is increasing in proportion to Antarctic sea ice then the total growth in Antarctic ice is much greater than the loss of Arctic ice:
Which as I pointed out to you is nonsense, this assumption is not reasonable and shows that you don’t understand how the measurements are made.
The sea ice is spreading because the land ice is increasing due to greater thickness: area is NOT volume.
Indeed it isn’t so why are you talking about volume when the discussion is about area (extent)?
You see, there is this thing called viscosity, and if you find out about it then you will know the rate of ice spreading will be increased by greater pressure. That pressure increase is induced by more weight of ice: i.e. increased ice thickness. And that increase to ice thickness is why the ice spreading has increased to increase the amount of ice pushed out to become sea ice.
You totally misunderstand the situation of the Antarctic ice, ice spreading from the land forms ice sheets not sea ice, it’s often extremely thick, many meters rather than the few meters of sea ice. Sea ice is formed annually by sea water freezing (it thickens often in the Antarctic by accumulation of snow on it). There is very little perennial sea ice in the Antarctic it usually reduces to the same minimum area by the end of the Austral summer (~2Mm^2).
Your original idea that the increase in ‘Land ice’ would be additive to the measured sea ice reveals a complete lack of knowledge about how the measurement is made. The satellites determine the area of the globe that is covered by ice as opposed to seawater and a value that represents the permanent land ice (land + permanent fast ice sheets) is subtracted to give the amount of sea ice. This value is kept constant, the low, nearly constant summer extent shows this to be reasonable. You also ignored the issue of the breakup of the land-fast ice sheets.
http://tinyurl.com/8hsj8do
I apologise if my failure to take into account your ignorance of elementary physics induced you to think I was dodging the question: I assumed you knew why ice spreads. However, I suspect you are not as ignorant as you pretend to be and you are claiming that ignorance as a method to pretend I dodged your question which was
You did not answer the question, which was occasioned by your complete misrepresentation of the facts of sea ice growth in the Antarctic. I assumed that you knew better, unfortunately as you have made clear by this post, you don’t!
Here’s a map of the Antarctic and its associated ice sheets, your proposition is that the area of those sheets increased by the total of the two largest, Ross and Ronne-Filcher over the last six months but that increase will mysteriously disappear over the next six months. Not only that no one has noticed the advance and retreat of 100m high cliffs of ice!
http://tinyurl.com/czyyt9f
Now go away. Your nonsense is becoming a nuisance.
I’m sure that you find out having your lack of knowledge of the subject is a nuisance, the answer is in your own hands, stop posting nonsense!
Phil:
I leave this thread for others to judge your uneducated and anti-scientific nonsense against my clear and logical statements. You don’t read what is written then lie and dissemble as a method to engender responses.
Clearly, there is no purpose in my assisting your ego masturbation further. So, I refuse to provide further answers to your tripe which all observers can easily assess for themselves.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
October 15, 2012 at 11:27 am
Phil:
I leave this thread for others to judge your uneducated and anti-scientific nonsense against my clear and logical statements. You don’t read what is written then lie and dissemble as a method to engender responses.
Clearly, there is no purpose in my assisting your ego masturbation further. So, I refuse to provide further answers to your tripe which all observers can easily assess for themselves.
Ok run away and hide, the discussion will be better for your absence.
REPLY: yet Phil still hides his name and affiliation. I’m not impressed with your taunts sir. – Anthony
I note with interest that “Phil” refuses to reveal HIS funding source(s) and HIS biases to (most likely) simply continue HIS career and future reputation in the CAGW community.
RACookPE1978 says:
October 15, 2012 at 12:50 pm
I note with interest that “Phil” refuses to reveal HIS funding source(s) and HIS biases to (most likely) simply continue HIS career and future reputation in the CAGW community.
That’s not true, I have never refused to do so, no one has asked! I currently do not have any research funding and haven’t for the last 10 years. In the past I have had funding from several sources, including: DoE, Ford, GM, Yamaha, MoD, Rolls-Royce (1971) Ltd., U. K. Tioxide Ltd., U.K. Lucas Aerospace Ltd., Centro Ricerche FIAT, Italy, Exxon Research & Engineering Co., U.S.A., VW.
I have never had a career in the CAGW community.
Now will you reveal your funding sources?
REPLY: yet Phil still hides his name and affiliation. I’m not impressed with your taunts sir. – Anthony
Well I’m not impressed with Richard’s, he comes here and gives us the benefit of his erudition and makes a boatload of errors and when challenged on them blusters and becomes insulting.
I have told you in the past why I choose not to give my name an affiliation, one denial of service/spam attack on my email account which caused significant disruption to my classes etc. was enough! Not due to WUWT I hasten to add, but once bitten twice shy, also most of the other posters on here are anonymous.
Phil:
You wrote
Pot and kettle.
Your are clearly making a psychological projection. Clear off.
Richard
I am a salaried engineer. Been working to improve the world’s power and efficiency and safety since 1974. My first award for conservation efforts was in 1986. I’m paid based on my ability to earn more money for each company based on my knowledge and experience than they choose to pay me each year in earnings. Husband of one, son of two, father of three, grandfather of four …. Degrees and skills include: nuclear engineering, thermodynamics, nuclear and particle and quantum physics, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, structural analysis, FEA and 3D analysis, metallurgy, statistics and its sub-disciples (my MS is in Quality Assurance), fluid flow, heat transfer, computer controls, analog controls, welding, blacksmithing and metal casting (my hobbies).
And, yes, I’m one of Anthony’s vast right-wing conspirators (er, contributors) each paycheck with a donation. And half of my salary goes to those government-paid ivory tower dwellers using MY money to ruin MY children’s future and MY grandchildren’s potential for a better life.