All you can do is laugh.
Brandon Shollenberger writes at Lucia’s about the new Fuzzy Math consensus “proof” paper from the ever entertaining John Cook at Skeptical Science, rated with the help of 27 of the SkS kidz club. The method is simple:
“Each abstract was categorized by two independent, anonymized raters.”
With a simple premise like that, what could go wrong? Well for starters, they don’t seem to understand what the word “independent” means. Shollenberger continues:
==============================================================
That makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is that people would make topics in the SKS forum like:
Does this mean what it seems to mean?
second opinion??
how to rate: Cool Dudes: The Denial Of Climate Change…
That’s right. The “independent” raters talked to each other about how to rate the papers. This must be some new form of independence I’ve never heard of. I’m not the only one thrown off by this. Sarah Green, one of the most active raters, observed the non-independence:
But, this is clearly not an independent poll, nor really a statistical exercise. We are just assisting in the effort to apply defined criteria to the abstracts with the goal of classifying them as objectively as possible.
Disagreements arise because neither the criteria nor the abstracts can be 100% precise. We have already gone down the path of trying to reach a consensus through the discussions of particular cases. From the start we would never be able to claim that ratings were done by independent, unbiased, or random people anyhow.
One must wonder at the fact an author of the paper calls the work independent despite having said just a year earlier, “we would never be able to claim” it is independent. Perhaps there is some new definition for “never” I’m unaware of.
And it gets even more hilarious. Read it all at Lucia’s.
For those who don’t know Inigo Montoya:
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Cynical Scientist says:
You fail to understand the nature of scientific publishing.
Maybe I understand a different part of the elephant. In the fields I follow, plenty of arguments get published.
But regarding climate research, I don’t think your “dying theory” and supersymmetry analogy works at all. Across dozens of journals, there seem to be new findings by different teams every month. Subjectively (I haven’t counted, but someone probably has) it looks to be drawing more interest than a few years back.
“BA says:
May 16, 2013 at 4:42 pm”
First link seems to be behind a pay-wall, contains only an abstract and apparently disproves ALL other studies. Second link seems to be behind a pay, contains only an abstract and refers to computer simulations. Third link takes me to WUWT and the “The Spencer Challenge to Slayers/Principia” thread. Can you find any post I have made where I have stated CO2 is not a “GHG” and that there is no GHG effect?
In the meantime, have a look here;
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/02/4-carbon-dioxide-is-already-absorbing-almost-all-it-can/
As you can see “heating” effects/potential above 250ppm/v are negligible, and with all the “noise” in the system would likely not be measureable. The points I have made are that the AGW hypothesis claims the ~50% (The airborne fraction) of the ~3% (Human contribution) of ~390ppm/v CO2 is causing warming AND driving climate to change in a bad way. There is no evidence for that all.
Izen and BA
Simple question — were either of you two involved in the Cook study as “raters” or in any other way?
Eugene WR GAllun
This study cannot claim to be scientific if it is not reproducible. So how do you reproduce a study using a database that is dynamically updated?
@- Eugene WR Gallun
“Izen and BA
Simple question — were either of you two involved in the Cook study as “raters” or in any other way?”
Not me.
Why, do you think it would significantly alter the reality that AGW is acknowledged as the correct explanation of recent climate change by all but a tiny fringe in the scientifically literate?
@- Poptech
“This study cannot claim to be scientific if it is not reproducible. So how do you reproduce a study using a database that is dynamically updated?”
You have mistaken what reproduce means in the scientific method. The study methodology can be followed with different raters and a different database and that would be reproducing the study.
What you are claiming is that the study could not be exactly REPEATED, but that is true of almost all scientific research.
izen, if the study is not reproducible because the database contents change how can we know it is valid? What is or is not included in the Web of Science database at any given time is at the discretion of Thompson Reuters and scientifically meaningless when quantified.
So if someone builds a database that only has 100 papers in it that meet this criteria and you get the same results that would be scientific confirmation?
Using this logic doing the same study on the Poptech database would be scientifically valid.
Izen, does the Web of Science include every peer-reviewed papers and journal? If not how can you determine consensus?
Izen said “If you really have a credible explanation for the surface climate that did not require the role of CO2 in converting outgoing longwave photons to thermal energy within the atmosphere you would overturn more than just climate science. The first two Laws of thermodynamics would fall as well.”
H2O. Water cycle and state changes of H2O. If anything it’s the “back radiation” theory that stretches the second law of thermodynamics. The oceans and H2O in the atmosphere are the control of the earth’s climate. Whilst CO2 might be the control of Venus (given the amount) even that is debateable as i suspect its more to do with the sulphur dioxide cycles.
Step back a moment – do you know anything about alternative geometries (such as spherical or taxi) in mathematics (as opposed to euclidian)? If you change a premise you can create logically consistent universes with its own proofs and laws. If that premise does not reflect reality though these proofs are little more than mental exercises. Now take a look at Hansens projections of temperature and CO2. The closest match to reality is the non-increasing CO2 projection. In any other field would not the premise be questioned?
@- Poptech
“Using this logic doing the same study on the Poptech database would be scientifically valid.”
No, because it does not contain a representative sample of the published research, which the other databases used do.
But you raise and interesting point. Your own work using a wide definition {often disputed!} of research papers that ‘doubt’ aspects of AGW strongly supports the findings of this research. You claim around a thousand papers NOT supporting AGW from a total of many, many thousands over the time period you cover. That is obviously a tiny percentage of the papers published in this field every month. So your own collection of ‘skeptical’ papers confirms that they are a very small, <5%?, of the total papers published. The vast majority of which either implicitly or explicitly endorse AGW.
Your own work shows this research is consistent with the findings of every survey of the literature. It is vastly and overwhelmingly endorsing the mainstream understanding of the climate which includes the potentially disruptive effects of climate change from rising CO2.
Izen, please provide an objective criteria for determining if a database has a representative sample of “the published research”.
You are not making much sense, if over a thousand papers are published in this field every month how come the cartoonist only found 11,000 for 20 years?
How many papers in the cartoonist’s “study” explicitly endorse AGW?
Why is the cartoonist lying that they surveyed of over 12,000 peer-reviewed climate science papers?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/97-percent-consensus-cook-et-al-2013.html
When their paper explicitly states that when you eliminate non-peer-reviewed papers and ones that are not climate related you only have 11,991 papers.
“The ISI search generated 12 465 papers. Eliminating papers that were not peer-reviewed (186), not climate-related (288) or without an abstract (47) reduced the analysis to 11 944 papers”
Surely the cartoonist can do basic math?
You also have not answered this question – Does the Web of Science include every peer-reviewed papers and journal? If not how can you determine consensus?
I will wait while you seek council from the crusher crew.
@- Tim
” If anything it’s the “back radiation” theory that stretches the second law of thermodynamics. The oceans and H2O in the atmosphere are the control of the earth’s climate. ”
The 2nd LoT is actually integral to the explanation of how downwelling LWR slows the cooling rate of the surface increasing the temperature gradient between the surface and the tropopause.
@-“… If that premise does not reflect reality though these proofs are little more than mental exercises. Now take a look at Hansens projections of temperature and CO2. The closest match to reality is the non-increasing CO2 projection. In any other field would not the premise be questioned?”
And it is questioned in this field. The answer turns out to be that the energy imbalance that is adding heat to the climate system is not in doubt. But the way in which that energy is distributed between the atmosphere, oceans and the surface has resulted in more energy going to cause a small temperature rise in the oceans and less heating of the atmosphere.
So the ‘question’ raised by the discrepancy between Hansens’s projections of surface temperature in the 1980s and the present trajectory is answered by the increased amount of energy entering the deeper oceans.
Since the fifties many have tried to find alternative theories to explain the observed energy changes and rising temperatures of air, surface and oceans. But as the post here that BA links to in a previous reply that has Roy Spencer challenging the ‘skydragons’ indicates, nobody has come up with anything credible.
If you want to understand the role of CO2 in the climate energy balance I would recommend working through the Science of Doom site link on the right and the ‘CO2 an insignificant trace gas’ posts. Its very comprehensive and you will need to revise your basic calculus but it does explain the basic physics and deals with the failure of the various alternative hypothesis put forward to explain the empirical observations.
@- Poptech
“You also have not answered this question – Does the Web of Science include every peer-reviewed papers and journal? If not how can you determine consensus?
I will wait while you seek council from the crusher crew.”
No need to wait, I need no council from whatever a crusher crew might be.
I doubt the Web of science includes EVERY peer reviewed paper and journal associated with this subject. But I also doubt that it omits a significant percentage that would change the basic finding of many studies and meta-analysis of the literature that finds that less than five percent are explicitly or implicitly rejecting the mainstream understanding of the climate.
From what database, and total number of papers {peer reviewed and otherwise} did you draw your list of papers expressing skepticism of AGW or its effects? Are you really able to credibly claim that there are NOT twenty papers endorsing AGW and its effects for every paper in your list?
Eugene WR Gallun says:
Izen and BA
Simple question — were either of you two involved in the Cook study as “raters” or in any other way?
Simple answer: no
BA says:
May 16, 2013 at 2:45 pm
“…I did not see “catastrophe” anywhere in the paper, nor in your declaration that “Human carbon dioxide emissions are not warming up the planet.” So when I mentioned that the surveyed scientists and papers disagreed with your declaration, and you shifted to “a catastrophe will happen,” I call moving goalposts.”
Alarmists proponents of Man Made global warming have produced a paper with an intention to impose an artificial consensus on the subject, It’s a devious and misleading tactic and very unscientific. At every turn, you have been inferring that I am unaware of the topic we are discussing and you are suggesting that I pulled the term “catastrophe” out of my hat, as if to exaggerate an opposing argument for my own benefit, This is untrue and again, deceitful (a trend is emerging), within the context of this publicity stunt, a blatantly obvious attempt to promote the creditability of Alarmist papers you may not have read the term “catastrophe”, and it proves how dishonest the terminology used actually is, a simple internet search can demonstrate this point by using the term “list of global warming catastrophes”.
Notice how the majority of search results are from Anthropogenic global warming proponents, all promoting papers and new studies by various scientists, research groups etc… who’s results suggest that Human carbon dioxide emissions are causing an unprecedented rise in global temperatures (which again, is untrue, there is precedence) Notice how the reoccurring term “catastrophe” is used in context with the subject of Anthropogenic global warming, You may also notice a complete set of alarmist terminology being used along with lists of attributed disasters and effects from “scientific studies” ranging from “Alien invasion” to earthquakes, volcanoes, super-storms and every other form of disaster imaginable. All of this alarmist rhetoric is backed by “so-called science” and their research into human emissions of carbon dioxide.
How can you defend a paper promoting a consensus on this “so-called science” and pretend to have any credibility or demonstrate that you have a good sense of judgment, or even remain grounded in reality for that matter.
Also, to directly answer your question about how you noticed I didn’t make “a declaration that Human carbon dioxide emissions are not warming up the planet”.
My view is clear, Human carbon dioxide emissions, a fraction of the total composition of carbon dioxide in the earths atmosphere, which is a gas, Warms and cools with the rest of the earths atmosphere including the oceans and the land surface, It does not “cause” the warming or cooling. Any trace contribution made by human’s is beneficial and necessary for the earth to maintain a healthy “carbon cycle” which biological process need and have evolved to take advantage of over millions of years.
Patrick says:
First link seems to be behind a pay-wall, contains only an abstract and apparently disproves ALL other studies. Second link seems to be behind a pay, contains only an abstract and refers to computer simulations.
There are other studies, I just cited a couple of recent ones from the two leading journals, Science and Nature. The temperature/CO2 relationship, in Antarctic ice cores and elsewhere, is important and has been widely studied — these new pieces do not “disprove ALL other studies.” Where did you get that idea? Like most science, they build on what is already known, such this 2012 paper:
“Antarctic ice cores provide clear evidence of a close coupling between variations in Antarctic temperature and the atmospheric concentration of CO2 during the glacial/interglacial cycles of at least the past 800-thousand years. Precise information on the relative timing of the temperature and CO2 changes can assist in refining our understanding of the physical processes involved in this coupling. Here, we focus on the last deglaciation, 19 000 to 11 000 yr before present, during which CO2 concentrations increased by ~80 parts per million by volume and Antarctic temperature increased by ~10 °C. Utilising a recently developed proxy for regional Antarctic temperature, derived from five near-coastal ice cores and two ice core CO2 records with high dating precision, we show that the increase in CO2 likely lagged the increase in regional Antarctic temperature by less than 400 yr and that even a short lead of CO2 over temperature cannot be excluded. This result, consistent for both CO2 records, implies a faster coupling between temperature and CO2 than previous estimates, which had permitted up to millennial-scale lags.”
http://www.clim-past.net/8/1213/2012/cp-8-1213-2012.html
In the meantime, have a look here;
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/02/4-carbon-dioxide-is-already-absorbing-almost-all-it-can
I see why we disagree. I read new research articles by scientists who are studying these topics. You dismiss scientists without knowing what they’ve written, and cite bloggers instead.
Brandon’s argument is a waste of time. No one will care nor will it persuade anyone arguing over the “independence” of the raters. It is like arguing that Oreskes was biased.
Sparks says:
My view is clear, Human carbon dioxide emissions, a fraction of the total composition of carbon dioxide in the earths atmosphere, which is a gas, Warms and cools with the rest of the earths atmosphere including the oceans and the land surface, It does not “cause” the warming or cooling. Any trace contribution made by human’s is beneficial and necessary for the earth to maintain a healthy “carbon cycle” which biological process need and have evolved to take advantage of over millions of years.
Your views expressed here are chaotic rather than clear, although it’s clear that you believe them quite strongly. On the other hand, most scientists who study these topics believe anthropogenic CO2 can and does warm the planet, not by creating heat but by slowing the loss of solar heat back to space. Many studies suggest the consequences will be more harm than good. And absolutely nothing has evolved over millions of years to take advantage of a CO2 rise this rapid.
Poptech says:
Brandon’s argument is a waste of time. No one will care nor will it persuade anyone arguing over the “independence” of the raters. It is like arguing that Oreskes was biased.
Yes, I agree on the futility of both arguments. More interesting is whether their basic conclusions are true.
BA says:
May 17, 2013 at 7:15 am
…most scientists who study these topics believe anthropogenic CO2 can and does warm the planet
The sun warms the planet, which includes carbon dioxide and all the other liquids and gases.
“Many studies suggest the consequences will be more harm than good”
Yes they do, I agree, they are alarmist and based on nothing more than fantasy and an over hyped representation of the facts.
“…absolutely nothing has evolved over millions of years to take advantage of a CO2 rise this rapid.”
Again, more dishonest twisting (what a surprise), Any trace contribution made by humans is beneficial and necessary for the earth to maintain a healthy “carbon cycle” which biological [processes] need and have evolved to take advantage of over millions of years.
by which I mean; carbon dioxide in general is beneficial and necessary for all the biological processes which have evolved to take advantage of it, over millions of years (anthropogenic or not). Mole fractional fluctuations in carbon dioxide or a “rapid rise” as you put it, is irrelevant to biological processes which sequester it as a mechanism to produce sustenance and where more carbon dioxide is beneficial.
Why are you refusing to understand or acknowledge this point.
Sparks says:
The sun warms the planet, which includes carbon dioxide and all the other liquids and gases.
Of course it does, but that’s not what AGW is about. In quoting me you snipped that part of my sentence, going from this:
“On the other hand, most scientists who study these topics believe anthropogenic CO2 can and does warm the planet, not by creating heat but by slowing the loss of solar heat back to space.”
to this:
“On the other hand, most scientists who study these topics believe anthropogenic CO2 can and does warm the planet”
Why are you refusing to understand or acknowledge this point.
What I understand about your points is that they are declarations of your own very strongly held beliefs, which happen not to be supported by logic or science. Sure, CO2 is necessary to life. So is water. That does not mean that more is always better.
BA says:
May 17, 2013 at 9:05 am
“What I understand about your points is that they are declarations of your own very strongly held beliefs, which happen not to be supported by logic or science.”
When did you stop beating your wife?, despite the Logical Fallacy of your argument, I will reply in kind, Carbon dioxide is beneficial, this is a logical declaration and it is demonstrated by science to be true.
Sure, CO2 is necessary to life. So is water. That does not mean that more is always better.
In the context of our planet more is better, carbon dioxide is a necessity and is beneficial at much higher levels, regardless of what relationship it has with earths variable temperature, is this not logical and backed up by science?
Sparks says”
In the context of our planet more is better, carbon dioxide is a necessity and is beneficial at much higher levels, regardless of what relationship it has with earths variable temperature, is this not logical and backed up by science?
No, it is neither logical nor backed up by science. In fact, your declaration is not even internally coherent. How can something be beneficial “regardless of what relationship it has with earths variable temperature”?
If temperature warms or cools, that will change length of seasons. How the wind blows, where the rain falls, and much else. Forests can’t move very fast to get out of the way. Are they drought, insect and fire-proof, where you live?
BA says:
May 17, 2013 at 11:26 am
How can something be beneficial “regardless of what relationship it has with earths variable temperature”?
Carbon dioxide in general is beneficial for life which sequester it as a mechanism to produce sustenance even tho temperature is variable.
If temperature warms or cools, that will change length of seasons. How the wind blows, where the rain falls, and much else.
Temperature does not change the length of a season, the length of a season is determined by the earths axis as it rotates around the sun, also, there are cycles of activity on the sun that can determine how warm or cold a season can be and there are tidal forces caused by the moon that effect the weather.
Forests can’t move very fast to get out of the way. Are they drought, insect and fire-proof, where you live?
Forests where I live have evolved to take advantage of insects and fires caused by dryer times. Trees are not fire-proof, but they have evolved a resistance to fire.
In fact, the forests where I live are so evolved, that every-time a “carbon neutral” power company orders some “carbon neutral” wood. The trees must see the logging company coming because they always disappear. /jk
Sparks says:
Carbon dioxide in general is beneficial for life which sequester it as a mechanism to produce sustenance even tho temperature is variable.
The fact that atmospheric CO2 concentration is rising shows that we are pumping it out faster than all natural sources combined can absorb.
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
And much of what is absorbed naturally is not getting sequestered by plants, but going into the oceans where it is raising the pH which is tough for many shell-forming animals and whatever likes to eat them.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120806085240.htm
http://icesjms.oxfordjournals.org/content/65/3/414.abstract
In the past, rising ocean pH played a role, maybe a starring role, in mass extinction events.
http://news.stanford.edu/news/2010/april/prehistoric-mass-extinction-042710.html
Forests where I live have evolved to take advantage of insects and fires caused by dryer times. Trees are not fire-proof, but they have evolved a resistance to fire.
Where are these forests? Must be very different from those I know in the western US, where the frequency of large and destructive fires has been rising,
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/07/060710084004.htm
and millions of acres are infested by insects.
http://www.fs.usda.gov/barkbeetle
Contrary to Brandon’s nonsense looks like I was right again, skeptic authored papers are being classified as either “Endorse AGW” or “No AGW position”.
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2013/nir-shaviv-one-of-the-97/
Also,
Why is this paper not listed in the SS database – “What do we really know about the Sun-climate connection?”?
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0273117797004997
It was published between 1991 and 2011 (1997), includes the search phrase “global warming” and the journal is indexed in the Web of Science (Science Citation Index);
http://ip-science.thomsonreuters.com/cgi-bin/jrnlst/jlresults.cgi?PC=MASTER&ISSN=0273-1177
“BA says:
May 17, 2013 at 6:11 am
There are other studies, I just cited a couple of recent ones from the two leading journals, Science and Nature.”
If you can provide links that are not behind a pay-wall so that we can all read the science rather than the abstract, which is what the Cook study has done, that would be a start. Otherwise you are wasting time.
“I see why we disagree. I read new research articles by scientists who are studying these topics. You dismiss scientists without knowing what they’ve written, and cite bloggers instead.”
I guess you didn’t read who was the source in the graphs. Talk about dismissing scientists.