From Tom Nelson, it was too good not to repost, especially when Lewandowsky hands out moral lessons while being immoral himself with his labeling skeptics as “moon landing deniers” with a gussed up survey and statistical slight of hand that turned out to be a an academic scam used as a tool to dehumanize people that have legitimate doubts about the science.
Now that Lewandowsky has declared the AR5 draft leak issue “dishonourable” (something not even the IPCC itself said in their statement) I expect we won’t see any use of AR5 draft information by his mouthpiece pawns, John Cook and Dana Nuccitelli on “Skeptical Science”, because well, using that new “dishonourably” obtained information would be wrong according to Lew.
Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, a researcher of climate change denial at the Cognitive Science Laboratories at the University of Western Australia, said the premature leak of the report was “dishonourable.”
“Science is one of the most transparent endeavours humans have ever developed. However, for the transparency to be effective, preliminary documents ought to remain confidential until they have been improved and checked through peer review,” he said in an emailed comment.
“The leak of a draft report by a reviewer who has signed a statement of confidentiality is therefore regrettable and dishonourable.”
“However, what is worse than the leak itself is the distortion of the content of the draft chapter by some deniers (no, they are not skeptics),” he said.
Prof Lewandowsky said that the report’s statement that humans have caused global warming was a “virtual certainty” meant it’s authors had 99% confidence in that view.
“That’s up from ‘very high confidence’ (90% certain) in the last report published in 2007,” he said. [Hey Stephan: How, specifically, were those 90% and 99% numbers calculated? What, specifically, changed between 2007 and now that accounts for the alleged 90% reduction in uncertainty?]
“In other words, the scientific case has become even stronger and has now reached a level of confidence that is parallelled only by our confidence in some very basic laws of physics, such as gravity or thermodynamics.”
To claim otherwise by cherry-picking part of a sentence out of context is absurd, he said.
“Although it illustrates the standard approach by which climate deniers seek to confuse the public. Climate denial lost intellectual respectability decades ago, and all that deniers have left now is to misrepresent, distort, or malign the science and the scientific process.”
For the last few years, my new passion has been rock climbing…Most airlines [Wait, with the fate of my grandchildren allegedly hanging in the balance, this guy still takes unnecessary fuel-guzzling trips to climb on rocks?!] can handle that, whereas few take sailplanes as check-in luggage
and as a result CO2 concentrations in our atmosphere has risen from 280 ppm (parts per million) to 390 ppm at present; a 40 percent increase.
Or, Joe, to put it another way, it has gone from roughly three hundredths of a percent to roughly four hundredths of a percent of our atmosphere, and we’re worried about Venus like meltdown (according to Hansen, with his “boiling oceans” absurdity) if we get as high as six hundredths of a percent by the late 21st century.
Mars, on the other hand, has an atmosphere that is 95% CO_2, much like that of Venus! According to your theory, then, since the only relevant difference between the atmosphere of Venus and that of Earth is the CO_2 level, the only relevant difference between the atmosphere of Earth and Mars is CO_2 level. We can therefore safely conclude, I’m sure, that the mean surface temperature of Mars is much higher than that of Earth.
Empirical test time:
Mars (95% CO_2) mean temperature 210 K (surface pressure ~0.00630 bar
Earth (00.04% CO_2) mean temperature 287 K (surface pressure ~1 bar)
Venus (95% CO_s) mean temperature 735 K (surface pressure 93 bar)
Goodness, it looks like the assertion that Venus is proof that we need to worry about CO_2 concentrations is complete, unmitigated bullshit because Venus is nothing at all like the Earth as far as its atmosphere is concerned. For one thing there is a whole lot more of it. For another, CO_2 concentration alone seems completely incapable of warming Mars to the point where you wouldn’t freeze solid (if you didn’t suffocate or die of a brain embolism from boiling blood first in an atmosphere that would feel like a hard vacuum to you) in a few minutes of exposure. For a third, “40% increase” is a clever way of concealing the two facts that the absolute magnitude is a tiny fraction of a percent (compared to venus) — that we could endure a 4000% increase and still end up with only 1% CO_2 in our atmosphere.
If we construct a linear scale between 287 K and 735 K, it has to span 448 degrees. If we take 95% and 0% (to the nearest percent) that’s 95 chunks. If we divide, we observe that if Venus had an atmosphere that was 1 bar at the surface, and if there was a simple linear relationship between concentration and temperature, then if we bumped atmospheric CO_2 to a whole 1%, we’d observe a temperature increase of less than 5K.
Of course there isn’t the slightest reason to think that the relationship is linear, and there are excellent reasons to be certain that whatever relationship there is between surface temperature and CO_2, it is hardly independent of surface pressure and that the 93 bar surface pressure might have just a tiny bit to do with its surface temperature. And we would expect this, too, to significantly reduce the warming of Earth, not increase it, given its paltry 1 bar atmosphere.
Of course we completely ignore both insolation — roughly twice as great as that of Earth — and its albedo — 2-3 times that of Earth — in this analysis as well.
So if you were advancing this as a warning — “Earth is like Venus! We must stop emitting CO_2 or melt!” I suggest you reconsider the meaning of the word “like”. I think you will find that Venus is just about as unlike Earth as it is possible to be for a planet that is roughly the same physical size. For example, do you think that the clouds of sulfur dioxide and sulfuric acid that lie above the CO_2 atmosphere further down might not exactly correspond to the atmospheric chemistry of Earth?
Sometimes things leave me almost speechless. Most often, I have to admit, it is the terrible physical arguments advanced by people that wish to assert that the GHE doesn’t exist. However you sir, have managed to equal them in absurdity by invoking Venus in the same paragraph that you warn of impeding doom because CO_2 in our atmosphere has reached 0.04%.
Good for you!
rgb
In related news:
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/12/maurice-newman-fights-back-no-slur-is-to-vicious-for-robyn-williams-and-the-abc/
So he did his undergraduate work at Washington College in Maryland, USA, huh?
That school has a lovely tradition on May Day–on-campus public nudity. See:
http://elm.washcoll.edu/index.php/2011/04/may-day-the-naked-truth/
United States higher education at its finest.
Rgbaduke
Supergenius indeed !,when you mangle much of Western astronomical achievements to get a modeling agenda based on the calendar based clockwork system of Ra/Dec to work,you are hardly anything more than a mathematical rogue,a mathematician might not care but a person wishing to get to the bottom of this climate modeling mess may make some effort to discover why people are behaving in a less than civilized manner.
Simple test.
Copernicus discovered that the forward- backward-forward motions (retrograde motion) of the other planets is an illusion created by the Earth’s own orbital motion as we periodically overtake those planets –
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap011220.html
Newton created an absolute/relative space and motion – a sort of double modeling which tried to account for apparent retrograde motions by an alternative point of view from the one held by Copernicus,Galileo and Kepler as it involves a hypothetical observer on the Sun rather than the proper perspective that retrogrades are merely an illusion created by a moving Earth –
“For to the earth planetary motions appear sometimes direct, sometimes stationary, nay, and sometimes retrograde. But from the sun they are always seen direct,…” Newton
Any reader and I mean any reader could easily tell you that all planets move in a single direction around the Sun and one of the observed effects of a moving Earth is that planets sometimes are left behind as the Earth overtakes them just as a car moving in an inner circuit on a traffic island will see a slowing moving car in an outer lane appear to fall back in their view.You don’t need to stand in the center of the traffic island (imitating Newton’s view) to figure out what the backward motion is,you simple know that the car you are in is moving faster.
Forget the genius of genuises,that was always an excuse for authority or genius by association beloved of theorists who use the astronomical arena as a dumping ground for reckless conclusions,Newton had a specific idea in mind when he resorted to distorting the main Western insight which put the Earth in motion between Venus and Mars and that idea now is wrecking havoc with Western civilization and especially at the juncture where planetary dynamics and terrestrial effects meet.
I have been through Newton’s attempt to use the predictive convenience of the Ra/Dec system as a bridge between astronomy and experimental sciences,actually know what he was trying to do and can for the most part use imaging to demonstrate what that late 17th century attempt of a mathematician to play an astronomer is now really being felt by the wider world.
rgbatduke says:
December 17, 2012 at 6:33 am
It is good that he mentions Newton’s ‘law of gravity’ as this original piece of fiction was really what started the modeling bandwagon rolling centuries ago and like ‘global warming’ when a theory/model can explain just about everything,then people know there is something radically wrong with the followers of the bandwagon.
“Wild rant, but you’re picking on the wrong person. First of all, Newton was the polymath supergenius to end polymath supergeniuses. The guy invented calculus just so he could invent physics, and then in later life he invented the modern system of banking and currency. He isn’t/wasn’t on the English pound note for F = dp/dt….”
And so on…
Dear God, I wish Dr. Brown had been available to teach me 35 years ago. Then, this forest geneticist.wouldn’t have stunk so badly at physics.
Thank you Dr. Brown, you make learning difficult subjects a little easier.
How can Lewandowsky claim that there is increased certainty of human caused climate change, when the Draft Summary for Policy Makers makes a number of startling admissions of exaggerations and errors in previous reports? For instance, admitting AR4 overstated the role of aerosols, or that there is nor proper evidence for an increase in extreme weather, or a lack of evidence for worsening hurricanes. Now there are many issues with the report, (such as confidently claiming that the missing heat is in the depths of oceans where thermometers rarely penetrate), but for Lewandowsky it must seem as if the IPCC is in denial. But no doubt, after 18 months of research he will find the statistics to “prove” he is right. After all he too that time to produce a paper from a biased survey called “NASA faked the moon landing:Therefore (Climate) Science is a Hoax: An Anatomy of the Motivated Rejection of Science” with statistics to “verify” that we skeptics are nutters, despite in the actual results of a survey only 3 strong climate skeptics out of 125 accepted that conspiracy theory – and a least 2 of those were scam responses.
December 15, 2012 at 3:47 pm
December 15, 2012 at 3:36 pm | Dennis Nikols says:
_______________________________________
Ah! But, if that “leak” was to be obtained through deception and contained some forgery then it would be “honourable”.
—————————
Hold on now, let’s leave Petey out of this.
cn
LKMiller
Many modelers never left a school/college atmosphere and probably your pining for what is effectively Royal Society empiricism (physics) is useful as you seem to assume that it is some sort of intellectual height you have yet to attain – the simple answer is that it is not,it is a theorist’s illusion that some insight which is denied the rest of the population can be understood by mathematicians in a non geometrical way (equations).
Kepler’s look at the correlation between the annual motions of the planets and their distance from the Sun looks daunting at first to the eyes of those who are unfamiliar with the workings of genuine astronomy but linger a little longer and the statement becomes clearer –
“The proportion existing between the periodic times of any two planets is exactly the sesquiplicate proportion of the mean distances of the orbits, or as generally given,the squares of the periodic times are proportional to the cubes of the mean distances.” Kepler
This statement becomes clearer as he writes –
“But it is absolutely certain and exact that the ratio which exists between the periodic times of any two planets is precisely the ratio of the 3/2th power of the mean distances, i.e., of the spheres
themselves; provided, however, that the arithmetic mean between both diameters of the elliptic orbit be slightly less than the longer diameter. And so if any one take the period, say, of the Earth, which is one year, and the period of Saturn, which is thirty years, and extract the cube roots of this ratio and then square the ensuing ratio by squaring the cube roots, he will have as his numerical products the most just ratio of the distances of the Earth and Saturn from the sun. 1 For the cube root of 1 is 1, and the square of it is 1; and the cube root of 30 is greater than 3, and therefore the square of it is greater than 9. And Saturn, at its mean distance from the sun, is slightly higher than nine times the mean distance of the Earth from the sun.” Kepler
Newton with his usual distortions mangled this insight by doing what he did to retrograde resolution – he cheated –
“That the fixed stars being at rest, the periodic times of the five primary planets, and (whether of the sun about the earth, or) of the earth about the sun, are in the sesquiplicate proportion of their mean distances from the sun. This proportion, first observed by Kepler, is now received by all astronomers; for the periodic times are the same, and the dimensions of the orbits are the same, whether the sun revolves about the earth, or the earth about the sun.” Newton
Gerald Kelleher:
Newton was a genius. He will be remembered and honoured so long as there are people to do it.
You are not a genius. You – and I – will be forgotten within decades of your demise.
Accept it. Stop fighting against it because you cannot elevate yourself by attempts to demean Newton. And go somewhere else to display your dislike of it because this thread is not about you.
Richard
To elevate Newton as some sort of benefactor to mankind is to demean astronomy, astronomers and by association -terrestrial sciences for,even the followers of Newton themselves at one time readily admitted that they didn’t have a clue how he arrived at his results much as the prescient Allan Poe actually stated –
“The demonstrations throughout the book [Principia] are geometrical, but to readers of ordinary ability are rendered unnecessarily difficult by the absence of illustrations and explanations, and by the fact that no clue is given to the method by which Newton arrived at his results. The reason why it was presented in a geometrical form appears to have been that the infinitesimal calculus was then unknown, and, had Newton used it to demonstrate results which were in themselves opposed to the prevalent philosophy of the time, the controversy as to the truth of his results would have been hampered by a dispute concerning the validity of the methods used in proving them. He therefore cast the whole reasoning into a geometrical shape which, if somewhat longer, can at any rate be made intelligible to all mathematical students. So closely did he follow the lines of Greek
geometry that he constantly used graphical methods, and represented forces, velocities, and other magnitudes in the Euclidean way by straight lines (ex. gr. book I, lemma 10), and not by a certain number of units. The latter and modern method had been introduced by Wallis, and must have been familiar to Newton. The effect of his confining himself rigorously to classical geometry is that the Principia is written in a language which is archaic, even if not unfamiliar.” W.W.Rouse Ball 1908
The old world astronomy of Copernicus,Kepler and Galileo now receives a tremendous rejuventation from modern imaging power,time lapse footage,details clear enough to make planetary comparisons and things like that but it all hinges on interpretative skills which the vicious strain of empiricism inherited from Newton pursues a speculative/predictive venture.In short ,it is time to return to old insights with new tools rather than try to disprove conceptual junk such as the conclusion that the Earth is a greenhouse and humans have control over the temperature dial.
Nobody ever asks what the ‘theory of gravity’ represents but then again the wider population trust people who are paid salaries to project something that is genuine and not counter to daily life on this planet ,something the mathematical modelers do not and do so it the most aggressive behavior.In this section the final word must go to Poe once more –
“Than the persons” — the letter goes on to say — “than the persons thus suddenly elevated by the Hog-ian philosophy into a station for which they were unfitted — thus transferred from the sculleries into the parlors of Science — from its pantries into its pulpits — than these individuals a more intolerant — a more intolerable set of bigots and tyrants never existed on the face of the earth. Their creed, their text and their sermon were, alike, the one word ‘fact’ — but, for the most part, even of this one word, they knew not even the meaning. On those who ventured to disturb their facts with the view of putting them in order and to use, the disciples of Hog had no mercy whatever. All attempts at generalization were met at once by the words ‘theoretical,’ ‘theory,’ ‘theorist’ — all thought, to be brief, was very properly resented as a personal affront to themselves. Cultivating the natural sciences to the exclusion of Metaphysics, the Mathematics, and Logic, many of these Bacon-engendered philosophers — one-idead, one-sided and lame of a leg — were more wretchedly helpless — more miserably ignorant, in view of all the comprehensible objects of knowledge, than the veriest unlettered hind who proves that he knows something at least, in admitting that he knows absolutely nothing” Allan Poe
Greetings!
I wanted to ask you a couple of questions about some places you’ve been to, here is the questionary . Thanks!
My best to you, gerjaison