From Friends of Science. Be sure to visit their page and bookmark it.
COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING
MYTH 1: Global temperatures are rising at a rapid, unprecedented rate.
FACT: The HadCRUT3 surface temperature index shows warming to 1878, cooling to 1911, warming to 1941, cooling to 1964, warming to 1998 and cooling through 2011. The warming rate from 1964 to 1998 was the same as the previous warming from 1911 to 1941. Satellites, weather balloons and ground stations all show cooling since 2001. The mild warming of 0.6 to 0.8 C over the 20th century is well within the natural variations recorded in the last millennium. The ground station network suffers from an uneven distribution across the globe; the stations are preferentially located in growing urban and industrial areas (“heat islands”), which show substantially higher readings than adjacent rural areas (“land use effects”). Two science teams have shown that correcting the surface temperature record for the effects of urban development would reduce the warming trend over land from 1980 by half.
There has been no catastrophic warming recorded.
MYTH 2: The “hockey stick” graph proves that the earth has experienced a steady, very gradual temperature decrease for 1000 years, then recently began a sudden increase.
FACT: Significant changes in climate have continually occurred throughout geologic time. For instance, the Medieval Warm Period, from around 1000 to1200 AD (when the Vikings farmed on Greenland) was followed by a period known as the Little Ice Age. Since the end of the 17th Century the “average global temperature” has been rising at the low steady rate mentioned above; although from 1940 – 1970 temperatures actually dropped, leading to a Global Cooling scare.
The “hockey stick”, a poster boy of both the UN’s IPCC and Canada’s Environment Department, ignores historical recorded climatic swings, and has now also been proven to be flawed and statistically unreliable as well. It is a computer construct and a faulty one at that.
MYTH 3: Human produced carbon dioxide has increased over the last 100 years, adding to the Greenhouse effect, thus warming the earth.
FACT: Carbon dioxide levels have indeed changed for various reasons, human and otherwise, just as they have throughout geologic time. Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, the CO2 content of the atmosphere has increased. The RATE of growth during this period has also increased from about 0.2% per year to the present rate of about 0.4% per year,which growth rate has now been constant for the past 25 years. However, there is no proof that CO2 is the main driver of global warming. As measured in ice cores dated over many thousands of years, CO2 levels move up and down AFTER the temperature has done so, and thus are the RESULT OF, NOT THE CAUSE of warming. Geological field work in recent sediments confirms this causal relationship. There is solid evidence that, as temperatures move up and down naturally and cyclically through solar radiation, orbital and galactic influences, the warming surface layers of the earth’s oceans expel more CO2 as a result.
MYTH 4: CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas.
FACT: Greenhouse gases form about 3% of the atmosphere by volume. They consist of varying amounts, (about 97%) of water vapour and clouds, with the remainder being gases like CO2, CH4, Ozone and N2O, of which carbon dioxide is the largest amount. Hence, CO2 constitutes about 0.039% of the atmosphere. While the minor gases are more effective as “greenhouse agents” than water vapour and clouds, the latter are overwhelming the effect by their sheer volume and – in the end – are thought to be responsible for 75% of the “Greenhouse effect”. (See here) At current concentrations, a 3% change of water vapour in the atmosphere would have the same effect as a 100% change in CO2.
Those attributing climate change to CO2 rarely mention these important facts.
MYTH 5: Computer models verify that CO2 increases will cause significant global warming.
FACT: The computer models assume that CO2 is the primary climate driver, and that the Sun has an insignificant effect on climate. You cannot use the output of a model to verify or prove its initial assumption – that is circular reasoning and is illogical. Computer models can be made to roughly match the 20th century temperature rise by adjusting many input parameters and using strong positive feedbacks. They do not “prove” anything. Also, computer models predicting global warming are incapable of properly including the effects of the sun, cosmic rays and the clouds. The sun is a major cause of temperature variation on the earth surface as its received radiation changes all the time, This happens largely in cyclical fashion. The number and the lengths in time of sunspots can be correlated very closely with average temperatures on earth, e.g. the Little Ice Age and the Medieval Warm Period. Varying intensity of solar heat radiation affects the surface temperature of the oceans and the currents. Warmer ocean water expels gases, some of which are CO2. Solar radiation interferes with the cosmic ray flux, thus influencing the amount ionized nuclei which control cloud cover.
MYTH 6: The UN proved that man–made CO2 causes global warming.
FACT: In a 1996 report by the UN on global warming, two statements were deleted from the final draft. Here they are:
1) “None of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed climate changes to increases in greenhouse gases.”
2) “No study to date has positively attributed all or part of the climate change to man–made causes”
To the present day there is still no scientific proof that man-made CO2 causes significant global warming.
MYTH 7: CO2 is a pollutant.
FACT: This is absolutely not true. Nitrogen forms 80% of our atmosphere. We could not live in 100% nitrogen either. Carbon dioxide is no more a pollutant than nitrogen is. CO2 is essential to life on earth. It is necessary for plant growth since increased CO2 intake as a result of increased atmospheric concentration causes many trees and other plants to grow more vigorously. Unfortunately, the Canadian Government has included CO2 with a number of truly toxic and noxious substances listed by the Environmental Protection Act, only as their means to politically control it.
MYTH 8: Global warming will cause more storms and other weather extremes.
FACT: There is no scientific or statistical evidence whatsoever that supports such claims on a global scale. Regional variations may occur. Growing insurance and infrastructure repair costs, particularly in coastal areas, are sometimes claimed to be the result of increasing frequency and severity of storms, whereas in reality they are a function of increasing population density, escalating development value, and ever more media reporting.
MYTH 9: Receding glaciers and the calving of ice shelves are proof of global warming.
FACT: Glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for hundreds of years. Recent glacier melting is a consequence of coming out of the very cool period of the Little Ice Age. Ice shelves have been breaking off for centuries. Scientists know of at least 33 periods of glaciers growing and then retreating. It’s normal. Besides, glacier’s health is dependent as much on precipitation as on temperature.
MYTH 10: The earth’s poles are warming; polar ice caps are breaking up and melting and the sea level rising.
FACT: The earth is variable. The western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer, due to cyclic events in the Pacific Ocean, but the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder. The small Palmer Peninsula of Antarctica is getting warmer, while the main Antarctic continent is actually cooling. Ice thicknesses are increasing both on Greenland and in Antarctica.
Sea level monitoring in the Pacific (Tuvalu) and Indian Oceans (Maldives) has shown no sign of any sea level rise.
More FACTS and MYTHS? See what Professor deFreitas has to say. Click here.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
From CodeTech on November 21, 2012 at 5:35 am:
But you have to identify the TYPE of insulating property.
Many coats and jackets have a tough “windproof” outer layer, preventing wind chill. Your leather jacket “warms” you by getting rid of wind chill heat losses.
Sweaters, like many coats and jackets, including the insulated “windproof” ones, are fluffy. They have at least one layer of insulating dry air, retained by assorted fibers and other materials.
If you sweat enough to get the fluffy stuff wet, then you’ve made a path for increased heat loss, similar to increased heat loss from thunderstorms.
There is no planetary GHE equivalent to a “windproof” outer layer.
So the clothing analogy holds as far as it can.
Science_Author:
“Consider a long radiation-proof and perfectly insulated cylinder full of air. Shake it well so that the internal temperature is uniform from top to bottom. Then stand it on end and wait for equilibrium. What happens is that, as molecules fall they lose potential energy and gain equivalent kinetic energy. But temperature is a measure of mean KE, so, if a region of air somehow loses height in the cylinder, it will end up with a higher temperature.”
Although I did not agree with the logic of Robert Brown’s post here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/24/refutation-of-stable-thermal-equilibrium-lapse-rates/, I am convinced by a paper mentioned in the attendant comments, namely, Velasco, S., Roman, F.L. and White, J.A., 1995, Eur. J. Phys. v17, 43-44, that, contrary to what I believe you are here contending, there would be no detectable lapse rate at equilibrium. (Several commenters on that post interpreted Velasco et al. as holding that there would be no temperature difference at all between the gas column’s top and bottom, whereas my interpretation is that a difference in mean molecular translational kinetic energy would indeed exist between two levels but that it would be undetectable in practice, and, the Uncertainty Principle being what it is, perhaps even in principle.)
In any event, you may find the arguments elicited by that post interesting. I know I did.
Can we have a once-and-for-all (at least until the science changes) discussion on the following:
Regardless of the misnomer, does the Greenhouse Effect exist on earth?
Is CO2 really a GHG? Does it work as a GHG in the earth’s atmosphere?
Does it really take an exponential increase in CO2 to double the warming from CO2 (assuming both of the above are true)?
Yes, I’m aware nothing is settled in science, but these topics keep coming up and are repeatedly rehashed but I never see any new research being conducted or cited on any of these.
Thanks
rgbatduke says: November 20, 2012 at 2:49 pm
says: “…….no evidence of any sea level rise” in a couple of places. ……… There is overwhelmingly sound evidence of global sea level rise. At the whopping rate of roughly 3 mm/year, on average, nearly constant over nearly 100 years. That is 30 cm a century, around a foot a century. This not “no” SLR, it is “unimportant” SLR — so far. Why not state it correctly, and back it up with the simple tide gauge/satellite data? ……” Cites: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Current_sea_level_rise
And bear in mind the satellite data is perhaps even more likely to be in error than the tide gauge data, with the latter only registering an average rise of 1.7 mm per year (range up to 2.7 mm/yr) in the last half of the century. See http://ilrs.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/GRASP_COSPAR_paper.pdf re some of the problems with current satellite data.
Douglas 1997 (paywalled but here it is in Wikipedia) may be the best estimate of tidal gauges: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Recent_Sea_Level_Rise.png
Douglas 1997 shows about 18 cm in 120 years, ie 1.5 mm per year … this using tidal gauges selected for the following criteria:
1. Each record should be at least 60 years in length
2. Not be located at collisional plate boundaries
3. At least 80% complete
4. Show reasonable agreement at low frequencies with nearby gauges sampling the same water mass
5. Not be located in regions subject to large post-glacial rebound
Facts?? They don’t need (or want) facts; they have the Temple of Gore to pray to….
Don’t the smaller leaf stomata over the past few thousand years indicate that CO2 was higher then? I’ve seen it argued that the ice cores don’t measure CO2 as accurately as stomata, owing to diffusion, etc.
Sasha requests on November 21, 2012 at 6:29 am:
Already done.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/18/about-that-overwhelming-98-number-of-scientists-consensus/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/18/what-else-did-the-97-of-scientists-say/ – long detailed breakdown
Short version with more links:
http://sustainableoregon.com/97percen_%20of_scientists.html
Mike Jackson;
Why not go and read Postma’s paper instead of simply sneering?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Because I’ve read a considerable amount of their drivel on their site already, and I’ve debated the matter in excessive detail with them before. In fact, I suspect their disciple in this thread is someone I’ve debated before under a different name. Makes the same mistakes and comes up with the same circular arguments. I’ve tried to provide a couple of simple explanations that prove my point without going into excessively complex arguments. The Earth is hotter than the moon and gets the same insolation. End of discussion. The reasoning presented by this crew of magicians to explain this defies an incredible amounts of known physics, and would take many hours of writing to debunk in totality. I’ve already been there, done that, know how much time it takes, and have neither the time nor the energy right now. The last time I did it their rebuttals descended to things like “well, what if someone was standing in front of the door of the room and that changed the measurements?”
In this thread alone it was first proposed that temp could be maintained without energy input, then when I pointed out that a subsequent point by the same person required energy input, the story changed to say that energy input was required after all. The rebuttal to my sweater example has sufficient errors in it that responding to them in full would take at least four or five hours of my time. Knowing that it will end up with some lame retort like “oh yeah, well what if someone was standing in the doorway” I’m just not interested. Further, there are several excellent articles on this forum already explaining exactly how the GHE works, search for the series by Ira Glickstein. I also recommend the various articles and comments by rgbatduke (Robert Brown) in his responses to the science presented by Nikolov and Zeller. S_A’s arguments above share a lot of N&Z’s arguments some of which have merit, but as a whole picture, suffer from the clear criticisms pointed out by rgbatduke which are already available on this site, and which deal with the matter in the kind of detail required to continue this discussion. Half truths are the most difficult to debunk because they are half true, but debunked they have been, just read the articles I’ve pointed you at.
REPLY: Ditto, that. – Anthony
Donald L. Klipstein says:
Since 1959, nature has been *removing* CO2 from the atmosphere. See:
http://www.tyndall.ac.uk/global-carbon-budget-2010. So, it appears
unlikely that the modern atmospheric CO2 increase is mainly a result of
warming.
Making pronouncements based on an alleged carbon budget that isn’t even closed, let alone provably attributed, is just silly.
david,
your debunking of the skydragons is commendable. Personally I think they should join the list of topics that are not welcomed here, like chemtrails, especially since they use fake names to appear in several places to promote the nonsense.
Here’s a survey of all the surveys, at Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveys_of_scientists'_views_on_climate_change
The two 97% surveys referred to are Doran and Anderegg. The flaw in the first (“Doran”) survey was that it asked innocuous, hence irrelevant questions that skeptics would endorse, namely that the Earth has been warming and that “human activities” have played a significant role in the warming. Here are quotes from a few WUWTers on the topic:
It would eliminate rewriting-effort if you kept a file of your comments for recylcling later. I’ve been keeping a file of favorite comments of others from WUWT, under about 500 category-headings. (I’m up to 46 megabytes of a Word file—or 7300 pages. I’ve sent it (in two parts) to Steve Goreham for use in his online collection of quotes.)
Science(fiction)_Author says:
”The temperature at the base of the atmosphere sets the surface temperature primarily by conduction.”
That’s exactly backwards; the sun heats the surface which then heats the atmosphere (lower). The amount of energy the surface receives from the sun “sets” the surface temperature which by conduction, convection, and radiation heats the base of the atmosphere which having absorbed heat radiates IR which in turn slows the net heat loss radiating from the surface.
Ok, let’s back-up a bit. Your entire argument boils down to since PV=nRT and n and V are essentially constant and R is constant then T is directly proportional to P by what is essentially a constant “C” = V/nR such that T = CP, therefore if you know the pressure you know the temperature. Furthermore, the pressure value determines the temperature value. Right?
Wrong. This is a complete misapplication of the Natural Gas Law.
If the pressure determined the temperature a beach in Iceland (@ur momisugly sea level pressure of 14.7 psi) would have the same temperature as a beach in Florida (@ur momisugly sea level pressure of 14.7 psi).
You’ve confused cause and effect. The adiabatic lapse rate is determined by a combination of factors such that it can be used as a tool for estimating temperature from pressure or pressure from temperature but is not determining the factors like temperature itself. It is not an intrinsic property; it is an extrinsic property that arises from intrinsic properties such as density, composition, gravitational field, etc. Ask yourself this: If we dropped our atmosphere onto Mars would it have the same lapse rate? The answer is NO because even though the density is still the same the weight isn’t, therefore, the lapse rate is not an intrinsic property.
The existence of the greenhouse effect is not in question; it has been measured all around the world. Engineers have been taking the greenhouse effect into account in calculations involving outdoor cooling rates for decades. As you know, a body radiates based on its temperature as described by the Stefan-Boltzmann equation. Back in the day when estimating the radiant heat loss from an outdoor object we would subtract the “apparent sky temperature” from the body’s temperature in order to calculate the NET radiation from the body. The body still radiates based on its temperature but it is also receiving radiation from the atmosphere proportional to the “apparent sky temperature” such that the NET radiant heat loss is the difference in the body’s temperature and the “apparent sky temperature” in the Stefan-Boltzmann equation. This is how we used to account for “backradiation” or the “greenhouse effect” even though we didn’t use either of those terms and we had a pretty limited table of “apparent sky temperature” values. These days, they use a much more accurate method for accounting for the GHE in such calculations. Please read:
http://www.asterism.org/tutorials/tut37%20Radiative%20Cooling.pdf
What’s in question is the magnitude of GHE “enhancement”, the results of such “enhancement”, and what may be causing such an “enhancement”.
davidmhoffer says:
November 20, 2012 at 8:05 pm
Science_Author;
For example, you cite Venus as an example of such a radiative GHE. It is not. Its atmosphere of CO2 is so massive that hardly any Solar radiation gets through to the surface
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
And yet it is hot. Hotter than Mercury. How’s that work? Oh, I see… you say:
Science_Author;
The atmosphere of any planet will have a temperature gradient based on the adiabatic lapse rate. This is as it says, adiabatic, and thus does not require the addition of energy.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
It certainly does, it requires the addition of energy at the bottom of the atmosphere, i.e. the planet’s surface. When heat is added at the top of the atmosphere you get a stable profile (not adiabatic, in the stratosphere for example).
Still gases are notoriously poor thermal conductors. Anyone thinking the heat energy needed to maintain the adiabatic lapse rate is significant when convection doesn’t play a role should actually calculate the the heat transferred by conduction through a column of air at the lapse rate. A “back of the napkin” estimation will show It is insignificant and can be ignored.
From Science_Author on November 20, 2012 at 9:17 pm:
Trying to hide the URL? What could be embarrassing about http://www.firstgravitymachine.com/testresults.phtml anyway?
Oh, it’s someone hawking their BOOK, because their BOOK has the good stuff with all the answers, who frequently refers to their BOOK in the text, in all-caps, including as well the ORDERING FORM link for the BOOK.
Which as seen on their home page, is all about using the temperature differences between ends of a column of air to create a “PERPETUUM MOBILE OF THE SECOND KIND”! Buy the BOOK, build your own, and you may be the first to generate usable amounts of electricity!
Your standards for scientific proof are noted.
davidmhoffer says:
November 21, 2012 at 8:34 am
There are two separate lines of attack in those who say the GHE does not exist, though. The one fallacious line generally rests on energy conservation for closed systems, of which the Earth is not one having a persistent external power source. This LOA denies that, e.g., a cooler object can heat a warmer object. However, this principle only applies in an isolated system. Ultimately, all actions on Planet Earth lead back to the Sun, which is very much hotter than the Earth’s surface.
Another line says that back radiation exists, but cannot heat the planet’s surface because of feedback effects which tend to nullify it. I have not seen anyone lay out such an argument with compelling empirical evidence, but empirical evidence is also in inadequate supply for establishing that there is no such feedback.
All we can say for certain, I believe, is that, all things being equal, in general circumstances, the effect of greenhouse gases should be to warm the surface beyond what it would be without such an atmosphere. But, whether and by what degree “all things are equal” on Planet Earth is very much a valid topic of debate. Right now, quite frankly, there appears to be very little causal connection running from CO2 concentration to temperature. In fact, quite the opposite is true: there appears to be a strong causal relationship running from temperature to CO2.
I’d also advise against your sweater example. Convection of heat away from your body is the major means of heat transfer. The sweater inhibits that convection. Unless it has a specific IR reflecting layer, as in a mylar space blanket, I doubt significant thermal radiation is inhibited at all.
Be useful to show up another tedious lie:
All those disagreeing with the AGW theory are being funded by “Big Oil”.
There is no such thing as ‘big oil’. What you see as ‘oil companies’ like Shell or BP are energy companies and also diversify in many other areas. Economics works on supply and demand, so if you restrict supply and keep the same demand the prices rise. So restricting all fossil fuel exploration and production will simply raise the prices of what they have and make it last a lot longer. Not to mention the subsidies to diversify into renewables and free carbon permits they sell for millions. Maybe that’s why the Climate Research Unit was partly funded by ‘big oil’.
Although I have a strong scientific background, I am not a climate scientist, and never will be. I am a forest geneticist, so make it a point to argue passionately on matters relating to forest genetics and tree improvement, but leave the climate science to others far more qualified than I am. Thus, I rarely comment on WUWT, preferring to learn from others.
“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.” A quote usually attributed to Abraham Lincoln.
And, while it may come as a shock to some on this forum, not everything you read on the internet is true. Shocking I know, but a word to the wise. Before commenting on any given WUWT story, it behooves you to actually read through the posts ahead of you. In many cases, it would save you lots of embarrassment.
Finally, as an alumnus of NC State, it pains me deeply to agree with rgbatduke. But, it only proves that even the occasional Dookie can have common sense. Maybe the proximity to Raleigh is the source of his cool-headed outlook. I agree completely: there is much that we simply do not know. This is the primary source of my skepticism concerning the theory of anthropogenic CO2 driven global warming – there is simply so much about a chaotic system we don’t begin to understand. Add to this the historical records that clearly show warmer,colder, wetter, drier, etc. conditions under widely varying atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and I remained unconvinced.
MikeB says:
November 21, 2012 at 3:39 am
I agree that MYTH 3 needs to be changed. It was written a long time ago. If you read the Fact part, you we see that we agree that “human produced Carbon dioxide has increased”, so that is not the myth. I also believe that the vast majority of the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere is due to human caused emissions. Increased CO2 makes the greenhouse effect stronger and will warm the earth a little. We claim that “there is no proof that CO2 is the main driver of global warming.” and that the sun in the main driver of climate change.
My submission to the Canadian Government on coal-fired electrical generating plants here
http://www.friendsofscience.org/index.php?id=545
shows that I expect the CO2 doubling to cause a 0.5 C temperature increase, but there is much uncertainty in this estimate. The water vapour content of the atmosphere near the tropopause declines with increasing temperatures according to radiosonde data, offsetting the warming effect of increasing water in the lower troposphere. When the forcing and feedback cloud responses are correctly separated, the satellite data shows clouds provide a negative feedback response. See
http://www.friendsofscience.org/index.php?id=533 and
http://www.friendsofscience.org/index.php?id=508
I have therefore changed MYTH 3 on the Friends of Science website so it ends with “thus causing most of the earth’s warming of the last 100 years.”
MYTH 11 – Humans can resolve any noticeable difference and do something about a rising CO2 with current politics. (west CO2 = no difference)
Bart,
“Another line says that back radiation exists, but cannot heat the planet’s surface because of feedback effects which tend to nullify it. I have not seen anyone lay out such an argument with compelling empirical evidence, but empirical evidence is also in inadequate supply for establishing that there is no such feedback.”
A bucket of water in the shade outside from the cold water tap in the morning doesn’t warm all day. A bucket of water in the sun outside all day from the cold water tap warms 35c. Back radiation made no difference to the bucket of water, but the sun made a huge difference.
A clear night warms up when it clouds over, scientific evidence of back radiation. The above example scientific evidence it can’t warm a volume of water.
In my above post included less than and greater than symbols, but were not allowed. Therefore the information in the brackets should have been.
(west less than CO2, east greater than CO2 = no difference)
Science_Author says:
November 21, 2012 at 1:24 am
“These frequencies, with corresponding intensities, merely resonate, and the effect is that the radiation is immediately re-emitted without any of its electro-magnetic energy ever being converted to thermal energy in the target. That is, it does not transfer heat. However, the warmer body radiates more intensely [as a result of back radiation] and in more frequencies, and its Planck curve is thus higher and broader,”
If the warmer body radiates more intensely, does that not mean that it would have a higher temperature after all, as per the Stefan-Boltzman equation;
Radiative energy flux = T^4
Or am I missing something?
Brain F@rt alert! The dropping our atmosphere onto Mars was a bad example on my part. That would basically be the equivalent to putting an amount of gas into a larger container since Mars’ gravity is less than Earth’s, which would increase the volume and decrease the density THEREBY changing the lapse rate.
From Science_Author on November 21, 2012 at 6:01 am:
Consider a long radiation-proof and perfectly insulated cylinder full of air.
…
So an equilibrium is established with more molecules per cubic whatever in the lower regions and less at the top. But this means that temperature measurements will be higher at the base of the column than at the top.
Finally found the piece I was looking for. Willis Eschenbach was believing that too, seemed logical, until he actually worked through it. Here is why that is false, without math:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/19/perpetuum-mobile/
It’s quite simple, really. Such a column of air will go isothermal, same temperature top to bottom. Same amount of thermal energy per volume, not per molecule as your belief would have it. Those air molecules with the highest kinetic energy will travel upwards the most, simple physics, conversion of kinetic energy to gravitational potential energy. Gravity would leave less molecules at the top, but they’ll have more energy, and the temperature, based on the average kinetic energy, would be the same as at the bottom.
Goes right back to thermodynamics. Just picture a perpendicular plane intersecting the cylinder somewhere, or put a mark on the outside of the cylinder to denote a level, same thing. If there are more molecules at a higher temperature below, thus more thermal energy per volume below, then hotter would flow to colder, thermal energy would flow upward. This would continue until above and below would have the same thermal energy per volume. Your cylinder of air would go isothermal.
More complete and other explanations are at that link. Go read, hopefully you’ll learn something.