Guest essay by Dr. Vincent Gray, Wellington New Zealand
The beginnings of the scientific study of the climate can be traced back to ancient India in 3000 BC, and it has been developed by the Greeks. Arabs, Chinese, and every subsequent generation.
Measurement instruments such as rain and wind gauges, barometer thermometer, hygrometer were added over the years.
Networks of weather observations were set up in Italy as early as 1654. Joseph Henry at the Smithsonian Institute in the USA set up a United States network in 1849 .The first official Meteorological Office in the world was set up in London in 1854 under Admiral Robert Fitzroy. He had already sailed around the world with Darwin as captain of the “Beagle: and been the Second Governor of New Zealand, dismissed prematurely because he was too sympathetic to Maoris.
He published the first daily weather forecast in the “Times” in 1860. The following year a system was introduced of hoisting storm warning cones at principal ports when a gale was expected. Fitzroy invented a barometer which still occasionally turns up on the Antiques Roadshow.
Soon most nations had an official weather service. The quantity of observations became so large that it was only with the advent of the computer in the 1950s that methods were developed to organise them and to use them to provide a reliable forecasting service.
This came about with the development of numerical computer models. They would begin with established climate systems like atmospheric and ocean circulation patterns shown here.
Then the models were built up by adding a range of variables on a grid on and above the earth.
Even with the increasing power of supercomputers, the forecast skill of numerical weather models extends to about only six days.
Factors affecting the accuracy of numerical predictions include the density and quality of observations used as input to the forecasts, along with deficiencies in the numerical models themselves.
Although post-processing techniques such as model output statistics (MOS) have been developed to improve the handling of errors in numerical predictions, a more fundamental problem lies in the chaotic nature of the partial differential equations used to simulate the atmosphere and ocean currents where small errors grow with time (doubling about every five days).
In addition, the partial differential equations used in the model need to be supplemented with parameterizations for solar radiation, moist processes (clouds and precipitation), heat exchange, soil, vegetation, surface water, and the effects of terrain.
In an effort to quantify the large amount of inherent uncertainty remaining in numerical predictions, ensemble forecasts have been used since the 1990s to help gauge the confidence in the forecast, and to obtain useful results farther into the future than otherwise possible. This approach analyzes multiple forecasts.
It should be noticed that nowhere in this effective system is there any mention of carbon dioxide or of “greenhouse gases” They have no place in a scientific study of the climate. Most meteorological organisations do not even bother to measure carbon dioxide over land territories
The climate models favoured by “Climate Change” “scientists” completely ignore the scientific discoveries of genuine climate scientists since time immerorial. They promote completely different computer models based on the following absurd principles
· The earth can be considered flat
· The sun has a constant intensity, both day and night.
· All energy exchanges are by radiation
· Energy entering the earth equals that leaving
· All change is caused by changes in:greenhouse gases
· Natural influences are merely :”variable”
It is unsurprising that such a model has no value for future climate forecasting. The advocates prefer to provide “projections” far into the future. Successful simulation of past climate is proof of the modls, while failure is due to “natural variability”. They emulate the Indian doctor who could forecast the sex of an unborn child with a money back guarantee it he was wrong.
If you want to know about climate science switch on or read about the weather forecast.
.
I Would like to acknowledge the excellent articles on this subject at \Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meteorology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerical_weather_prediction
Nick Stokes says: November 8, 2013 at 8:32 pm
“No, I’m asserting that the posts’ claims about GCM’s are specific and totally wrong. Do you have any comment on that?”
Without arguing about the merits of the post’s claims, I would simply point out that the GCMs’ calculations (ahem, predictions/projections) of what the climate actually does “are specific and totally wrong.” To paraphrase Richard Feynman about the scientific method, if your calculated outcomes (read computer models) based upon your guess (read theory) do not match real world observations (read Data), then you are wrong. It doesn’t matter who you are, what government you represent, what cause you so fervently support, you are wrong. Period!
CO2 continues to go up. Temperatures go up, down, sideways, around in circles. CAGW is based on a false premise, sorry, it’s not your fault that it is wrong.
“Post hoc ergo propter hoc, Latin for “after this, therefore because of this”, is a logical fallacy (of the questionable cause variety) that states “Since Y event followed X event, Y event must have been caused by X event.” It is often shortened to simply post hoc. It is subtly different from the fallacy cum hoc ergo propter hoc, in which two things or events occur simultaneously or the chronological ordering is insignificant or unknown, also referred to as false cause, coincidental correlation, or correlation not causation.”-Wiki
Ad hoc non propter hoc- Also not because of.
The climate changes. It is naturally variable. This is good. Cheer up and enjoy your life. It is truly wondrous.
Steven Mosher: “So yes, C02 warms the planet it does not cool the planet.”
Steven, No CO2 does not “warm the planet” any more than insulation warms your house. Think clearly and you will speak clearly. The Sun warms the planet. CO2 changes equilibration.
Nonsensical Warmist Quote of the Day
“What we are doing is pumping huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere. That’s why it is seen as a driver. It’s being driven.” (Nick Stokes today at 11:06am)
What we are doing is pumping huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere.
So?
That’s why it is seen as a driver.
By whom?
It’s being driven.
Being driven does not make a thing a driver.
**********************************
Bottom line, Steven Mosher and Nick Stokes:
CO2 UP — WARMING STOPPED.
Explain that.
Nick Stokes own model only shows the amount of adjustments made to HadCRUT temp data.
Garbage in equals garbage out no matter who creates the model.
lol, Scott — Well done. Good for you to check Stokes’ bogus evidence (“… they don’t have the grid resolution for that. So they add a direct model for it. Here… ” – Stokes on 11/8/13 at 11:32pm)
The “model” is the temperature “adjustments.” LAUGH-OUT-LOUD.
Scott says: November 9, 2013 at 2:14 pm
“Nick Stokes own model only shows the amount of adjustments made to HadCRUT temp data.”
I’m not sure what you mean by my “own model”. But if it is TempLS, then that uses only unadjusted GHCN data. And yet, it gives very similar results to HADCRUT and GISS.
In admitting that GCMs cannot run computational fluid dynamics for tropospheric convective circulation, Nick Stokes has proved Dr. Gray correct. The foundation physics of the AGW hypothesis contains the very faults Dr. Gray points out, and in parametrising vertical circulation for grid squares, these critical errors are transferred into GCMs.
This means that GCMs are little more than a two layer horizontal circulation model with energy and fluid transfer between the layers parametrised by the failed “basic physics” of the “settled science”.
GCMs show atmospheric warming form increasing CO2 because they are programmed to show warming.
This means that GCMs are essentially a climate propaganda tool.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/10/14/90-climate-model-projectons-versus-reality/#comment-1448553
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/10/08/the-taxonomy-of-climate-opinion/#comment-1441009
Steven Mosher says:
“Model answers fall within the range established by observations.”
Steve, did you really say that?
I suggest, with due respect, that the climate models cited by the IPCC are crap (pls see Engineering Handbook for technical definition of “crap”).
Regards, Allan
Here is the evidence:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/28/models-fail-land-versus-sea-surface-warming-rates/#comment-1432696
Reposted below regarding evidence of aerosol fudging of climate models, from DV Hoyt, for Pamela:
Best personal regards, Allan
Please also see
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/27/reactions-to-ipcc-ar5-summary-for-policy-makers/#comment-1431798
and
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/19/uh-oh-its-models-all-the-way-down/#comment-1421394
[excerpt]
…– the (climate) models have probably “put the cart before the horse” – we know that the only clear signal in the data is that CO2 LAGS temperature (in time) at all measured time scales, from a lag of about 9 months in the modern database to about 800 years in the ice core records – so the concept of “climate sensitivity to CO2” (ECS) may be incorrect, and the reality may be “CO2 sensitivity to temperature”
I think you would agree that the use of “CO2 sensitivity to temperature” instead of “climate sensitivity to CO2” (ECS) would require a major re-write of the models.
If you wanted to stick with the ECS concept, then you would have to (as a minimum) delete the phony aerosol data, drop ECS to ~~1/10 of its current values, add some natural variation to account for the global cooling circa 1940-1975, and run the models. The results would probably project modest global warming that is no threat to humanity or the environment, and we know that just would not do. Based on past performance, the IPCC’s role is to cause fear due to alleged catastrophic global warming, even if this threat is entirely false, which is increasingly probable.
Meanwhile, back at the aerosols:
You may ask why the IPCC does NOT use the aerosol historic data in their models, but rather uses assumed values (different for each model and much different from the historic data) to fudge their models (Oops! I guess I gave away the answer – I should not have used the word “fudge”, I should have said “hindcast”).
.
[excerpt from]
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/15/one-step-forward-two-steps-back/#comment-1417805
Parties interested in the fabrication of aerosol data to force-hindcast climate models (in order for the models to force-fit the cooling from ~1940 to ~1975, in order to compensate for the models’ highly excessive estimates of ECS (sensitivity)) may find this 2006 conversation with D.V. Hoyt of interest:
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=755
Douglas Hoyt, responding to Allan MacRae:
“July 22nd, 2006 at 5:37 am
Measurements of aerosols did not begin in the 1970s. There were measurements before then, but not so well organized. However, there were a number of pyrheliometric measurements made and it is possible to extract aerosol information from them by the method described in:
Hoyt, D. V., 1979. The apparent atmospheric transmission using the pyrheliometric ratioing techniques. Appl. Optics, 18, 2530-2531.
The pyrheliometric ratioing technique is very insensitive to any changes in calibration of the instruments and very sensitive to aerosol changes.
Here are three papers using the technique:
Hoyt, D. V. and C. Frohlich, 1983. Atmospheric transmission at Davos, Switzerland, 1909-1979. Climatic Change, 5, 61-72.
Hoyt, D. V., C. P. Turner, and R. D. Evans, 1980. Trends in atmospheric transmission at three locations in the United States from 1940 to 1977. Mon. Wea. Rev., 108, 1430-1439.
Hoyt, D. V., 1979. Pyrheliometric and circumsolar sky radiation measurements by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory from 1923 to 1954. Tellus, 31, 217-229.
In none of these studies were any long-term trends found in aerosols, although volcanic events show up quite clearly. There are other studies from Belgium, Ireland, and Hawaii that reach the same conclusions. It is significant that Davos shows no trend whereas the IPCC models show it in the area where the greatest changes in aerosols were occurring.
There are earlier aerosol studies by Hand and in other in Monthly Weather Review going back to the 1880s and these studies also show no trends.
So when MacRae (#321) says: “I suspect that both the climate computer models and the input assumptions are not only inadequate, but in some cases key data is completely fabricated – for example, the alleged aerosol data that forces models to show cooling from ~1940 to ~1975. Isn’t it true that there was little or no quality aerosol data collected during 1940-1975, and the modelers simply invented data to force their models to history-match; then they claimed that their models actually reproduced past climate change quite well; and then they claimed they could therefore understand climate systems well enough to confidently predict future catastrophic warming?”, he close to the truth.”
_____________________________________________________________________
Douglas Hoyt:
July 22nd, 2006 at 10:37 am
MacRae:
Re #328 “Are you the same D.V. Hoyt who wrote the three referenced papers?”
Hoyt: Yes
.
MacRae: “Can you please briefly describe the pyrheliometric technique, and how the historic data samples are obtained?”
Hoyt:
“The technique uses pyrheliometers to look at the sun on clear days. Measurements are made at air mass 5, 4, 3, and 2. The ratios 4/5, 3/4, and 2/3 are found and averaged. The number gives a relative measure of atmospheric transmission and is insensitive to water vapor amount, ozone, solar extraterrestrial irradiance changes, etc. It is also insensitive to any changes in the calibration of the instruments. The ratioing minimizes the spurious responses leaving only the responses to aerosols.
I have data for about 30 locations worldwide going back to the turn of the century.
Preliminary analysis shows no trend anywhere, except maybe Japan.
There is no funding to do complete checks.”
“TODAY is the 24th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. ” (Allan MacRae at 6:11am today)
ON topic — for it is demonstrable evidence that the wall of AGW, too, will one day fall.
Truth wins.
(yes, it is in German — but, we do not to understand their language to read the joy on their faces ….
just look at them on the train as they hear that they are now arriving in West Berlin…)
Thank you for reminding us, Mr. MacRae.
“… a time for JOY” — it will happen.
“… we do not need to…”
Thank you Janice,
Your video brought me joy as I recalled those wonderful days when the Berlin Wall was opened. I stayed up for several nights watching CNN broadcast from Berlin. It was such a great development for humankind!
When one visits countries like East Germany, and I have visited a few, one meets good people who are living in cesspools. When one leaves, one actually feels a sense of guilt for abandoning these good people to their lives under horrible repressive governments and dreadful living conditions.
To have experienced the harsh reality of East Germany just four months before, and to understand what a terrible place it really was, made the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent liberation of East Germany a truly joyful event. I revisited former East Germany several times in subsequent years, and despite the usual growing pains, it just kept getting better and better.
One further relevant insight was that shortly before my first trip to East Berlin, one of the fearless leaders of the Canadian socialist New Democratic Party was toured through East Germany and returned to Canada extolling the wonders of the “Workers’ Paradise” and recommending East Germany as THE best possible model for the Canadian economy. Quelle surprise!
As explained in a 1994 essay written by Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, excerpted above at
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/11/08/nzclimate-truth-newsletter-no-320/#comment-1470144
“Surprisingly enough the second event that caused the environmental movement to veer to the left was the fall of the Berlin Wall. Suddenly the international peace movement had a lot less to do. Pro-Soviet groups in the West were discredited. Many of their members moved into the environmental movement bringing with them their eco-Marxism and pro-Sandinista sentiments.”
This is why global warming mania has become the New Religion – it appeared just in time to replace the discredited Old Religion of Global Socialism, and adherents of the Old Religion actually expropriated the Environmental Movement, now rudely but accurately referred to as the Watermelon Movement.
For more than a decade, honorable climate scientists have been arguing that the “the science is NOT settled” and have patiently pointed out the fatal flaws in global warming alarmism. They were largely swept aside, ignored and vilified. Several honorable academics (four that I know of) have lost their academic posts. Several have received death threats. Some were actual victims of violence.
We have experienced these brown-shirt tactics in the past and they work, since they effectively intimidate the less honorable and enlist the less intelligent.
We knew decades ago that global warming alarmism was wrong. We confidently stated in 2002:
[PEGG, reprinted in edited form at their request by several other professional journals , the Globe and Mail and la Presse in translation, by Baliunas, Patterson and MacRae]
http://www.apegga.org/Members/Publications/peggs/WEB11_02/kyoto_pt.htm
On global warming:
“Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
On green energy:
“The ultimate agenda of pro-Kyoto advocates is to eliminate fossil fuels, but this would result in a catastrophic shortfall in global energy supply – the wasteful, inefficient energy solutions proposed by Kyoto advocates simply cannot replace fossil fuels.”
I suggest that our two above statements are now demonstrably true, within reasonable probabilities.
I also wrote in an article in the Calgary Herald published on September 1, 2002, based on a phone conversation with Paleoclimatologist Dr. Tim Patterson:
On global cooling:
“If (as I believe) solar activity is the main driver of surface temperature rather than CO2, we should begin the next cooling period by 2020 to 2030.”
I expect that global cooling will be a reality by 2020, and may have already started. The Watermelons have already begun their retreat from global warming hysteria, and have moved on to “climate change” alarmism and “sustainability”, their new mantras to achieve greater political power.
In fact, these disreputable people have discredited true environmentalism with their false alarm. There remain real environmental issues that need to be addressed. Catastrophic humanmade global warming is NOT one of them.
Repeating from 2002:
“Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
Regards to all, Allan
P.S. to Janice:
The newspaper headline in your video reads:
“Berlin is again Berlin!”
Thanks for taking the time to tell me, Allan. I checked back many times last night and was really disappointed that NO one enjoyed that video. So glad that you did! My pleasure.
Thanks for all the great information. You’ve done excellent research and writing (except, I’m convinced that the Sun maintains our planet’s homeostasis with minor fluctuations, but the main drivers of significant climate shifts are the oceans and other forces (and NOT CO2, lol)).
“Berlin is again Berlin!”
And, one day, (yes, it WILL happen) the Envirostalinists so aptly called “watermelons” WILL fall
…………… and we will smile and say: “Science is again Science!”
Truth will win.
Janice
“· The earth can be considered flat
· The sun has a constant intensity, both day and night.
· All energy exchanges are by radiation
· Energy entering the earth equals that leaving
· All change is caused by changes in:greenhouse gases
· Natural influences are merely :”variable”
No doubt climate models have flaws. But it does no good whatsoever to give a list of imaginary flaws possessed by imaginary models. No GCM’s have the above features, except for the 4th point, which is true to a good approximation. This sort of nonsense makes sceptic arguments look silly. However, as someone remarked up thread, at least there are no conspiracy theories this time.