By David Stockwell writing in Quadrant Online
As CO2 climate models falter and even the IPCC backs off its estimates, it just may be that a radical shift in thinking is looming. Wouldn’t it be funny if it was the sun all along?
Remember Thomas Kuhn and his paradigm shift? According to his Structure of Scientific Revolutions, theories change only when anomalous observations stress the ”dominant paradigm” to the point that it becomes untenable. Until then, failure of a result to conform to the prevailing paradigm is not seen as refuting the dominant theory, but explained away as a mistake of the researchers, errors in the data, within the range of uncertainty, and so on. Only at the point of crisis does science become open to a new paradigm. So, does Kuhn inform the current climate debate, help identify important information or an alternative paradigm?
Climate models can be seen as encapsulating the dominant theory, even though they are composed of many different theories regarding land, the ocean and atmosphere. Despite their differences they are also similar in many ways, sharing terminology such as the ‘radiative kernel’. Lets agree, for the purpose of argument, that the dominant AGW paradigm is of global temperature’s high sensitivity to CO2 doubling, resulting in an increase of around 3°C, which appears to be about the central estimate of the climate models.
Does the 15-year ‘pause’ in global temperatures stress this theory? Certainly to some, the stress has already reached a ‘crisis’; while to others the divergence can be explained away by natural variation, uncertainty, and errors in the data.
Do failed models and their predictions of increasing extreme events, like hurricanes, droughts and floods, stress the climate models? Possibly not. From a physical perspective, these phenomena lie at the boundaries of the theory. Hurricanes, droughts and floods are ‘higher order’ statistics — extremes not climate averages. Surface temperature is only a part of the greater global climate system. Because anomalous behavior at the margins can be discarded without sacrificing the main theory, their power to confirm or reject the dominant paradigm is somewhat limited.
Ocean heat content, however, is in a unique position. The world’s oceans store over 90% of the heat in the climate system. Arguably, therefore, increases in ocean heat determine overall global warming. Ocean heat represents the physical bulk of the global heat store, and so should carry the most weight in our assessment of the status of AGW. Observations of ocean heat uptake represent the crucial experiment — observations capable of decisively dismantling a theory despite its widespread acceptance in the scientific community. The ARGO project to monitor ocean heat with thousands of drifting buoys is the crucial experiment of the AGW stable.
A number of climate bloggers have remarked on the very low rate of ocean heat uptake (here, and here, and here), much lower than predicted by the models (here, here, and here). The last link is about Nic Lewis, a coauthor on Otto et al. 2013, who feels that recent findings of low climate sensitivity, many based on ocean heat content, have led a number of prominent IPCC authors to abandon the higher estimates of climate sensitivity. That may not be a ‘catastrophe’ for the dominant AGW paradigm, but it is certainly a lurch by insiders towards the lower ends of risk and urgency.
The IPCC panel preparing the AR5 report may not have been devastated when they changed the likely range of climate sensitivity, which had stood at 4.5–2°C since 1990. The lower extimate has now been dropped from 2°C to 1.5°C. What has not been appreciated is that increasing the range of uncertainty is impossible in a period of Kuhnian ‘normal science’, where new information always decreases uncertainty.
The ‘blow-out’ in the range of likely climate sensitivity can only mean one thing: We are no longer in a period of ‘normal’ science, but entering a period of ‘paradigm shift’.
Until the scientific revolution, explaining away anomalous results will be the normal behavior of the status quo. For example, Nic details a series of erroneous statements and misrepresentation by the UK Met Office of peer-reviewed studies observing relatively modest aerosol forcing and climate sensitivity (here and here).
What new theory could possibly replace the dominant paradigm? Clearly there is a great deal yet to know about natural climate variation and the influence of the Sun on global temperature and climate. While many studies have found a strong correlation between the sun and climate, other studies have discounted a strong solar influence. I personally think that miss-specified models have contributed dismissal of solar influence, and have developed an alternative ‘accumulative’ theory of solar influence (here, here and here).
UC Berkely professor Richard Muller has said, “Anyone claiming another cause would have to show that it correlates with the temperature record at least as well as CO2.” As shown in the figure above, a simple regression model of accumulated total solar insolation (CumTSI) with global temperature gives a higher correlation than greenhouse gas and total solar insolation. In large part this is because accumulation shifts the phase of solar effects by 90 degrees bringing it into phase with global temperature, even though the pattern is obscured by the timing of major volcanic eruptions last century. In the accumulation theory, global temperature rises while solar activity is above the long-term solar constant. It is an immature theory, admittedly, but it works over annual- to million-year time scales and explains some very specific features such as ‘chaotic’ dynamics, 20th century warming and the current ‘pause’.
Climate skeptics don’t want to say we told you so but, well, we told you so. Even though we do not yet have an accepted theory of solar influence, there are 25 unique models in the AR5-sponsored CIMP5 archive, most with a climate sensitivity untenable on observations from the last decade.
Take out Occam’s razor and cull them – deep and hard.
Dr David Stockwell, Adjunct Researcher, Central Queensland University
I agree that the primary force behind man-made global warming is a political force, not a science force. the political people are in the powerful places in higher education, in the govt, in funding sources such as dept of energy funding Mann’s dissertation, in the environmental advocacy groups, groups, and in the international governance world – the NGOs.
Manmade climate impact is just another avenue of criticizing and weakening our Judeo-Christian, capitalistic/commerce-based society. In contrast, there is a clear history of Marxist-guided thought in many fields of society, from family values to education to the environment.
While these aims are often noble, or have a noble façade, the end-game is Marx’s end-game: overturn capitalism and evolve to communism.
It is fine to be concerned about pollution affecting our environment, or our health. It is fine to ponder whether we are over-crowding our planet. It is fine to ponder whether carbon fuel emissions are making serious changes to the dynamics of our atmosphere that could result in disaster. It is fine to ponder whether nuclear energy will lead to great illness and great zoned-off Chernobyl areas of our planet. It is great to ponder whether the presence of nuclear weapons can only lead to their use, in a nuclear war nightmare, and possible “morning after” wasteland effect.
For political reasons, these are merely tools for Marxists to get a hold on politics. Great portions of our society, especially young adults, sympathized with the “occupy” movement, with its nebulous political aims, but which were obviously quite against business as usual – the prevailing “cultural hegemony.”
On various topics, I and many of us agree with the Marxists on various specifics: I think banks should not be “too big to fail,” and should be more accountable. I agree that the lobbying forces in the U.S. congress are too powerful. Etc.
But I do not favor their comprehensive one-size-fits-all revolutionary answer to all of this.
As a starting place for those who are not familiar with the complex agenda of the Marxists, here is a link to the “original port huron statement” – you can look this up on Wikipedia and elsewhere, and see how Marxism influences have developed in the United States since the turn of the century 100 years ago (maybe start with Emma Goldman), progress to the 1060s Port Huron statement and SDS, then investigate forward – some of the SDS people are still around. This statement is comprehensive. The Marxists have activism in many areas of our society, with many of these captured in the port huron statement…
http://www.sds-1960s.org/PortHuronStatement-draft.htm
SDS planned the Kent State demonstrations even though they were not Kent State students, went there, had some demonstations including, I recall, bombing one unoccupied building – a storage shed or something – got regular students involved, and thus made it seem to be a spontaneous student demonstration with an unprovoked govt shooting of students.
The govt should have never pulled a trigger. But there was violence – the bombing – from the SDS before the Man pulled the trigger. This is the type of thing the SDS wanted – not a college kid getting killed, but demonstrations and to pain the govt as oppressive jack-booted thugs. Lesson learned, as the ‘occupy’ movement, far more vast, was largely free of incidents outside of tear gas, which I don’t think of as very extreme (having been in a tear gas situation once myself).
I agree: this man-made global warming stuff is politics, not science. I invite you all to start reading th ehistory that is very much available, but simply is not in our textbooks.
jim Steele says:
November 1, 2013 at 9:07 am
Well said. However I fear that CACA, like Marxism, will remain a dangerous zombie long after shown false. The dead dogma will be kept walking by those in power who benefit from it.
Earth is a water world, & its usually homeostatic climatic fluctuations IMO owe largely to the properties & feedback effects of H2O in its various states, regulated by solar radiation & magnetism, plus factors such as orbital mechanics, plate tectonics & the planet’s internal heat sources.
In Icehouse climatic periods, the greenhouse gas water vapor comes out of the air & liquid water out of the oceans to be deposited as ice on the continents & sea surface. In Hothouses, water returns to the seas & increases concentration in the air, although as gas & not necessarily the droplets that form clouds, which depend upon CCN availability. Both gas in the air & liquid in the oceans move heat around & up & down the planet.
CO2 is a minor player above low levels, although important in the first 200 ppm as a GHG & plant food, since life also features in the climate system of earth. Higher concentrations are good for life, up to a point, but add very little to global GHE. Methane is a transient player.
Why are alternative models not summarized together in one post? Norman Page had a new one released, another one for the next 500 years, of F. Steinhilber & Beer, came out this year…..There is a Russian model, the Akasofu model and a lot more out there…..
Its a pity, that Anthony is “mumbling-oriented” instead of being “model performance-oriented”…
All those, who mumble about AR4 and AR5 models get their post….many others, who present
ingenious new approaches, get turned down….Too bad….
“In recent months Salvatore Del Prete has been perhaps the most strategic contributor at WUWT.”
Agreed up to a point.
Salvatore has a applied a bludgeon whereas I’ve tried to supply a rapier.
Only history will judge.
milodonharlani says:
“…I fear that CACA, like Marxism, will remain a dangerous zombie long after shown false. The dead dogma will be kept walking by those in power who benefit from it.”
Exactly right. It will remain until those promoting it have passed on, because even if some lemmings do not financially benefit, there is always this:
I submit that there are multiple paradigm shifts occurring. The overlap between science and politics blurs the distinctions between them. They cannot be disentangled as simply as this article attempts to do. I offer a single example as evidence.
In the 1970’s, it was considered crucial by the US government to reduce fossil fuel consumption. This resulted in a 55 mph speed limit being imposed on the entire country. Today, it is considered crucial by the US government to reduce fossil fuel consumption, but no such solution is being proposed. The proposals being proposed today are completely different because they have completely different political drivers, and the science used to justify the politics is hence completely different despite having the same ostensible end goal (reducing fossil fuel consumption).
As for the science paradigm on its own, I don’t see where replacing a paradigm that fits only a segment of the historical data with another paradigm that only fits a segment of the data is of any value in changing any minds in the climate debate. Those who are looking for a “single driver” to explain temperature variation over the last few decades have lost the debate before they have begun. There are dozens of drivers, perhaps thousands. Untangling them all to the point where a specific driver can be shown to be responsible for a specific amount of change is unlikely to happen, in my humble opinion, in my lifetime. In the meantime, CO2 continues to rise and temps continue to remain flat or even decline, suggesting that the CO2 driver itself is far less of a factor than previously thought.
But if warming resumes, regardless of the reason, politics dictates that it will be CO2 that gets the blame, and taxation and regulation will be the answer. Since the real goal is not to actually reduce fossil fuel consumption, I shall continue to purchase private transportation that can easily exceed 55 mph.
Paul Vaughan.
Hi Paul.
I noticed this from your link:
“The decadal circulation signal is coherent with the rate of change of total column ozone. A widespread misconception is that total column ozone tracks the solar cycle. It does not. The solar cycle drives changes in total column ozone, so the solar cycle is a quarter-cycle ahead of decadal total column ozone.”
I noticed that the ozone response above 45km and towards the poles is opposite to the ozone response below 45km and towards the equator with the former being dominant hence a cooling stratosphere and growing ozone holes when the sun is active and a warming stratosphere and shrinking ozone holes when the sun is inactive.
Does that fit with your data or not ?
Stephen.
If the proponents of Catastrophic CO2 induced global warming admit that their theory is wrong, they would also admit that the skeptics have been and are right — the skeptics that have been demonized and name-called and cursed and ridiculed. That second thing may be the hardest.
I think that the number that ultimately admit their error will be dwarfed by the number that claim that “given the information available at the time” they were right.
What has not been appreciated is that increasing the range of uncertainty is impossible in a period of Kuhnian ‘normal science’, where new information always decreases uncertainty.
Come again? Follow the data. When the data changes, you change your statistics. It doesn’t matter if sqrt(N) is increasing if the Sum(Variance) is faster.
David Stockwell wrote,
“Observations of ocean heat uptake represent the crucial experiment — observations capable of decisively dismantling a theory despite its widespread acceptance in the scientific community.”
Judith Curry wrote,
“A paper published Science finds reconstructed Pacific Ocean heat content has been significantly higher throughout the vast majority of the past ~10,000 years in comparison to the latter 20th century.”
http://judithcurry.com/2013/11/01/pacific-ocean-heat-content-for-the-past-10000-years/#more-13583
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/75831381/Rosenthal%20ocean%20temps%20Supplementary%20Materials.pdf
As Mosher points out, the earlier uncertainty ranges are not bound by data as much as expert opinion and anchoring. So the real issue is how a range of uncertainty changes as you move from Post-Normal science driven by urgency and lack of data to a Normal science driven by data and hypothesis testing.
I have been posting these TSI charts a lot lately. So many Sun, solar and TSI articles. Maybe scientist should get out side and look at the sun a little more often.
TSI reconstructed chart.
http://lasp.colorado.edu/lisird/tsi/historical_tsi.html
Latest TSI data I have.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/pmod
“Count not his broken pledges as a crime: He MEANT them, HOW he meant them — at the time.”
[Said of PM Lloyd George]
Sorry guys. but Leif is right. Solar insolation changes are too small to drive “climate change”. The same is doubly true for CO2 changes.
“Climate change” is simply energy flux distribution changes in the system, with the total energy in the system remaining constant.
For example, simply lowering the Stevenson screens from 6′ to 3′ would raise the average temperature, that is the same affect as increasing CO2 levels. Changes in lapse rates are one of the causes of ‘climate change’.
Call me a pedant but the title of this should be ‘C’ change. C is for century. A C change is so major a change it occurs once a century approximately. It has nothing to do with the sea.
For reference, Muller’s argument about CO2/volcano/warming correlation is based on this figure: http://static.berkeleyearth.org/pdf/annual-with-forcing.pdf
The use of the cumulative sum of TSI is slightly mind-boggling. I’d love to hear the physical justification for that. Also, the period from 1950-present is not a great one to use for judging correlation fits, as the trend in low-frequency changes is pretty linear over that time. Using a longer period gives you more structure to work with, and there are TSI reconstructions that go further back. Unfortunately, the fit to normal TSI doesn’t work well that far back, and presumably the fit to cumsum(TSI) wouldn’t either: http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics/Solar_vs_temp_500.jpg
Zeke,
SkS is cherry-picking, as usual. This chart covers a much longer time frame. Can you spot the LIA?
Ulick Stafford (@ustafford) says:
November 1, 2013 at 11:18 am
Call me a pedant but the title of this should be ‘C’ change. C is for century. A C change is so major a change it occurs once a century approximately. It has nothing to do with the sea.
>>>>>>>>
Actually a “sea” change does have something to do with the sea.
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/312800.html
Zeke, What would the Berkeley chart look like with the ENSO cycles included too? The meme lately seems to be shifting from volcanoes to ENSO.
Also the fit seems horrible in the 17-1800’s.
Genghis said:
“Climate change” is simply energy flux distribution changes in the system, with the total energy in the system remaining constant.”
Correct unless something changes global albedo which alters the proportion of ToA insolation able to reach the surface and enter the oceans.
“Solar insolation changes are too small to drive “climate change”.
Correct as regards TSI in isolation but Incorrect as regards wavelength and particle changes because such solar changes alter global albedo out of all proportion to TSI changes due to solar effects on ozone amounts in stratosphere and mesosphere.
“The same is doubly true for CO2 changes.”
Correct. The effect of CO2 is miniscule compared to solar and oceanic effects.
“Climate change” is simply energy flux distribution changes in the system, with the total energy in the system remaining constant.”
Correct because even when solar variations change the amount of energy entering the oceans the air circulation changes to apply a negative system response.
“for example, simply lowering the Stevenson screens from 6′ to 3′ would raise the average temperature, that is the same affect as increasing CO2 levels. Changes in lapse rates are one of the causes of ‘climate change’.”
Correct. Now just expand that principle to expansion and contraction of the entire atmosphere
when GHG quantities change.
Fuller description here:
http://www.newclimatemodel.com/the-gas-constant-as-the-global-thermostat/
People are getting there, step by step.
dbstealey,
The sun could certainly have had a role in earlier periods of climate change. The fact that there is no trend in TSI (its slightly going down if anything) since 1960 during a period where we saw pretty rapid warming strongly suggests that it is not a major factor in modern warming. You can always do something silly like the author of this post did and use the cumulative sum of TSI to force it to go up, but if there were any physical basis for that (e.g. if the climate impact of solar irradiance over time were cumulative) the Earth would have burned to a crisp long ago.
A ‘sea change’…..er, maybe not just yet.
President Obama issued an executive order Friday directing a government-wide effort to boost preparation in states and local communities for the impact of global warming.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/nov/1/obama-orders-government-prep-global-warming/
I’m so disgusted with this socialist psuedoscience sewage spewage, I cannot find acceptable words to continue that would not be justifiably .
MtK
Mosher(A) — “The prior range ( 2-4.5) was the result of a ‘expert’ assesment. Not data. not theory. not anything normal at all.”
Mosher(B) — “Even if one found unknown effects for the sun that would not upset radiative theory. Those changes are all on the edges.”
lsvalgaard — “Well, he is wrong about that as I have shown you many times. There has been no Grand Maximum.”
Some considerations: The first is that expert assessment is not necessarily a theory, but it is a part of every new theory. Specifically, we have social expectations that it is the experts producing the new theories based on their assessments of things. We needn’t, of course. One can construct a single hypothesis or a whole tapestry on the justification of “Because, why not?” But we should expect that experts are going to be better at making new theories, or paradigms, that are not at odds with existing data. Non-experts not having the awareness of the same breadth of things by definition. (No reason that amateur experts are not every bit as well informed as people employed as experts.) But there are all manner of odd ideas about what counts as a theory.
If the pre-extant theory is math, and the new ‘expert opinion’ is not a necessary consequence of that math, or is not math itself, then it is a new hypothesis. Which is what we call an expert assessment that is not experimentally grounded as yet.
If the pre-extant theory is math, and the necessary math consequences are used to give rise to metaphysical statements (eg. “Time dilation is real.”) then it is a new metaphysic. It’s introduction is post-hoc and modifies or breaks extant metaphysics. That causes paradigm shift. For if the new metaphysic is held as correct, then all the old metaphysics need to be brought into agreement. eg. The hypothesis wasn’t falsified, the metaphysics — interpretive framework — for the math has been. Which is a bit loose, since modern metaphysics rely on the ‘real’ of things we cannot access directly.
If a hypothesis is not a necessary consequence of the existing math, it is unrooted. It simply cannot justify itself. Nor need it. There’s no requirement that we bolt metaphysical explanans onto everything instead of going commando with Hypothesis non Fingo. The hypothesis itself is an expert assessment. And any introduced metaphysics, also unrooted, are also expert assessment.
But a metaphysic is simple a narrative collection of existential statements and relations between things stated to have existence. Or denied it. And such metaphysics may be little more than one line statements that are indifferent from a mission statement. eg. “Survival of the fittest.” From these, one can derive boundary tests and conditions that permit falsification of the metaphysic as if it were numerical in nature. But it is not required that everything derived is necessary. They are largely quite loose and fuzzy things and require us to make leaps of intuition and question begging to make use of them. In which case, they inspire, but are not necessarily required, of any new hypothesis or theory.
And then there’s the ‘gaps.’ Instrumental gaps or changes that frustrate things. cf Leif’s statements about the Grand Maximum. The sunspot counts were used as inputs to correlative models. The instrumentality (equipment and process) of counting sunspots changed. But the past models were not first-principle theories, they were consequences and correlates of the specific instrumentality. Change that, and you need new models. Or, as Leif has suggested in a powerpoint on the subject, emplace a corrective factor on old data to serve as a ‘sanity test.’ The hazard being that you now have to correct both your corrections and your model. This can cause a paradigm shift as there is no possibility to provably correct measurements not made. cf. Sun-spots may now be reclassified not based on size but the better ability to detect a halo or group.
Lastly are the ‘math gaps.’ Quantum theory can theorize and model towards bulk matter. But as it gets closer, stateful, discrete, and chaotic affairs begin to dominate. But neither calculus nor statistics ‘do’ stateful and discrete things. None of what is being dealt with is a large enough ensemble to produce ‘smoothness’ necessary for the math to do its job. At the upper boundary of bulk matter, there are enough molecules and links that we can return to calculus/statistical treatments of them. And we can theorize and model down from normal chemistry towards Quantum details. But again, as soon as the features become stateful, discrete, and chaotic, it all begins to break down again.
Such gaps are both metaphysical and mathematical. We assume that the metaphysics of Quantum notions will continue up and through the things we cannot get after and onto bulk matter. But there is a necessary division, or independence between the two. Likewise, we assume that the math we have at the quantum level can bridge that gap as well. But it too is independent of things. From this, a paradigm shift can occur on either side of such a boundary without touching anything on the other side.
So for Mosher(A): No, expert assessments are hypothesis. As are amateur assessments. And it need not be even testable in principle to be considered a scientific one. Scientists being prone to festoon things with all manner of math and metaphysic that we cannot possibly get after. But that Scientists like, anyways.
For Mosher(B), this is absolutely correct. But it’s meaningless as there is a gap between radiative theory and climate theory. Or even any theory regarding gas/fluid dynamics. Such that it is incorrect to state that it is ‘at the edge’ as such consideration are on the ‘other side of a metaphysical and mathematical chasm.’ Just as with quantum theory and bulk matter chemistry.
The problem here, in Climate Science, is that they’re playing on both sides of the gap. They want classic thermo, and they want quantum effects (require it, really), and they want fluid dynamics (require it, really) but don’t want to trouble with the fluid dynamics. Not surprising, as fluid dynamics are ridiculously loose and fuzzy, and require stateful modelling to say anything fine-grained.
But just the same, we do expect that bounds will tighten on uncertainty if the science is a ‘normal’ phase. That is, better math leads to better math. Which is the entire idea beyond ‘Science converging on realtiy.’ as separate from ‘Science is self-correcting.’ But the uncertainties are not instrumental or experimental in nature. They are not the result of bean-counting reality. They are statements of theory about the a priori theoretical variance and error given the instrumental concerns, or theoretical ones. And this is far different in that the theory itself isn’t converging on a theory. The theory is diverging from itself in terms of just raw metaphysics or prediction. This is not an issue of competing theories as there are none credited in professional Science. (Social thing.) And it is not an issue of the instruments themselves. Not that there aren’t problems of the sort Leif highlighted about the Grand Maximum; there are, and they are far worse.
The strict issue with the widening gaps is that the theorists are confessing that their purely theoretical side is converging on an inability to predict anything. And that is not a healthy paradigm. And it is a common, maddeningly common, occurence amongst cults and pop-statistics. Where the system is understood first by its most minimal features, rather than it’s major ones. Which is rather like a theory of humans that starts, foremost, with the structural features of their body hair.
Firgures, wrote all that and apparently Science has just sorted out how Science works…. From some physicists. Good summary at the link:
http://scienceblog.com/67583/physicists-unify-the-structure-of-scientific-theories/
Stephen Wilde says:
“Correct. Now just expand that principle to expansion and contraction of the entire atmosphere when GHG quantities change. (and) Correct unless something changes global albedo which alters the proportion of ToA insolation able to reach the surface and enter the oceans.”
Greenhouse gases (aside from H20, clouds) do not alter the proportion of ToA insolation reaching the surface.
The ocean (via energy and water vapor) creates the environmental lapse rate of 6.5˚C/km. If more energy enters the system, the ocean responds by increasing the water vapor, the lapse rate drops down to 4˚C/km, the atmosphere expands (low pressure) and the surface temperature falls (Willis’s thermostat). H20 is a negative feedback.
Conversely if there is less heating of the ocean surface, there is less water vapor created, the lapse rate increases up to 9.8˚C/km, the atmosphere shrinks (high pressure) and the surface temperature increases.
This is meteorology 101, CO2 and solar insolation changes, don’t play much of a role. Changes in the energy flux in the ocean dominate the ‘climate’.