By Christopher Monckton of Brenchley
I have just had the honor of listening to Professor Murry Salby giving a lecture on climate. He had addressed the Numptorium in Holyrood earlier in the day, to the bafflement of the fourteenth-raters who populate Edinburgh’s daft wee parliament. In the evening, among friends, he gave one of the most outstanding talks I have heard.
Professor Salby has also addressed the Parliament of Eunuchs in Westminster. Unfortunately he did not get the opportunity to talk to our real masters, the unelected Kommissars of the European tyranny-by-clerk.
The Faceless Ones whose trembling, liver-spotted hands guide the European hulk of state unerringly towards the bottom were among the first and most naively enthusiastic true-believers in the New Superstition that is global warming. They could have benefited from a scientific education from the Professor.
His lecture, a simplified version of his earlier talk in Hamburg that was the real reason why spiteful profiteers of doom at Macquarie “University” maliciously canceled his non-refundable ticket home so that he could not attend the kangaroo court that dismissed him, was a first-class exercise in logical deduction.
He had written every word of it, elegantly. He delivered it at a measured pace so that everyone could follow. He unfolded his central case step by step, verifying each step by showing how his theoretical conclusions matched the real-world evidence.
In a normal world with mainstream news media devoted to looking at all subjects from every direction (as Confucius used to put it), Murry Salby’s explosive conclusion that temperature change drives CO2 concentration change and not the other way about would have made headlines. As it is, scarce a word has been published anywhere.
You may well ask what I might have asked: given that the RSS satellite data now show a zero global warming trend for 17 full years, and yet CO2 concentration has been rising almost in a straight line throughout, is it any more justifiable to say that temperature change causes CO2 change than it is to say that CO2 change causes temperature change?
The Professor headed that one off at the pass. During his talk he said it was not global temperature simpliciter but the time-integral of global temperature that determined CO2 concentration change, and did so to a correlation coefficient of around 0.9.
I had first heard of Murry Salby’s work from Dick Lindzen over a drink at a regional government conference we were addressing in Colombia three years ago. I readily agreed with Dick’s conclusion that if we were causing neither temperature change nor even CO2 concentration change the global warming scare was finished.
I began then to wonder whether the world could now throw off the absurdities of climate extremism and develop a sensible theory of climate.
In pursuit of this possibility, I told Professor Salby I was going to ask two questions. He said I could ask just one. So I asked one question in two parts.
First, I asked whether the rapid, exponential decay in carbon-14 over the six decades following the atmospheric nuclear bomb tests had any bearing on his research. He said that the decay curve for carbon-14 indicated a mean CO2 atmospheric residence time far below the several hundred years assumed in certain quarters. It supports Dick Lindzen’s estimate of a 40-year residence time, not the IPCC’s imagined 50-200 years.
Secondly, I asked whether Professor Salby had studied what drove global temperature change. He said he had not gotten to that part of the story yet.
In the past year, I said, four separate groups haf contacted me to say they were able to reproduce global temperature change to a high correlation coefficient by considering it as a function of – and, accordingly, dependent upon – the time-integral of total solar irradiance.
If these four groups are correct, and if Professor Salby is also correct, one can begin to sketch out a respectable theory of climate.
The time-integral of total solar irradiance determines changes in global mean surface temperature. Henrik Svensmark’s cosmic-ray amplification, which now has considerable support in the literature, may help to explain the mechanism.
In turn, the time integral of absolute global mean temperature determines the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. Here, the mechanism will owe much to Henry’s Law, which mandates that a warmer ocean can carry less CO2 than a colder ocean. I have never seen an attempt at a quantitative analysis of that relationship in this debate, and should be grateful if any of Anthony’s readers can point me to one.
The increased CO2 concentration as the world warms may well act as a feedback amplifying the warming, and perhaps our own CO2 emissions make a small contribution. But we are not the main cause of warmer weather, and certainly not the sole cause.
For the climate, all the world’s a stage. But, if the theory of climate that is emerging in samizdat lectures such as that of Professor Salby is correct, we are mere bit-part players, who strut and fret our hour upon the stage and then are heard no more.
The shrieking hype with which the mainstream news media bigged up Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda, ruthlessly exploiting lost lives in their increasingly desperate search for evidence – any evidence – as ex-post-facto justification for their decades of fawning, head-banging acquiescence in the greatest fraud in history shows that they have begun to realize that their attempt at politicizing science itself is failing.
Whether they like it or not, typhoons are acts of God, not of Man.
I asked Professor Salby whether there was enough information in the temperature record to allow him to predict the future evolution of atmospheric CO2 concentration. He said he could not do that.
However, one of the groups working on the dependence of global temperature change on the time-integral of total solar irradiance makes a startling prediction: that we are in for a drop of half a Celsius degree in the next five years.
When I made a glancing reference to that research in an earlier posting, the propagandist John Abraham sneeringly offered me a $1000 bet that the fall in global temperature would not happen.
I did not respond to this characteristically jejune offer. A theory of climate is a hypothesis yet to be verified by observation, experiment and measurement. It is not yet a theorem definitively demonstrated. Explaining the difference to climate communists is likely to prove impossible. To them the Party Line, whatever it is, must be right even if it be wrong.
The group that dares to say it expects an imminent fall in global mean surface temperature does so with great courage, and in the Einsteinian spirit of describing at the outset a test by which its hypothesis may be verified.
Whether that group proves right or wrong, its approach is as consistent with the scientific method as the offering of childish bets is inconsistent with it. In science, all bets are off. As al-Haytham used to say, check and check and check again. He was not talking about checks in settlement of silly wagers.
In due course Professor Salby will publish in the reviewed literature his research on the time-integral of temperature as the driver of CO2 concentration change. So, too, I hope, will the groups working on the time-integral of total solar irradiance as the driver of temperature change.
In the meantime, I hope that those who predict a sharp, near-term fall in global temperature are wrong. Cold is a far bigger killer than warmth. Not that the climate communists of the mainstream media will ever tell you that.
Nick Stokes says:
November 17, 2013 at 2:02 pm
“To get the momentum you divide by a velocity.”
The speed of light is very large, true, but so is the frequency, and the wavelength is correspondingly small. The mass is tiny, too. If my calculations are correct, the absorption of a 15 micron IR photon should produce a delta-V of some 0.6 mm/sec on an individual CO2 molecule.
The CO2 molecule must emit that photon before it can reabsorb another but, since that is in a random direction, the mean delta-V imparted by emission is zero. So, after a few million ground originating photons are absorbed, you can get a pretty significant delta-V upward.
Stephen 1:08pm: “The phenomena of surface or near surface cooling that Trick refers to are local to areas and times when surface radiative cooling exceeds redelivery back to the surface from the descending column. Usually an inversion develops.”
So….if I have got Stephen’s point right, Stephen is willing to go with the shallow tray of water can freeze up to a max. 170F ambient still night since he tells us to expect conditions w/o DWIR (no inversions)?
On still summer nights I’ve experienced (w/no inversions) it might get down to 85F only half the allowed no DWIR max. for freezing small trays of water & I have yet to experience small trays of water freeze.
The min. for DWIR reportedly measured is 130 W/m^2 under a cold dry arctic column. No readings of 0 W/m^2 DWIR have yet been found on earth, google for those if any Stephen. Fill us in.
Bart says: November 17, 2013 at 2:52 pm
“So, after a few million ground originating photons are absorbed, you can get a pretty significant delta-V upward.”
There’s a very simple calculation you can do. The energy/time/m2 of the photons is about 300 W/m2 (up IR). Divide by c: 10^-6 newtons/m2, or 1 micropascal. 10^-11 bar. That’s the momentum force exerted by the whole photon streamn and what I call pretty small.
Stephen Wilde says:
No…It is not mechanical energy that matters. First, you are kind of confused about this whole thing: Generally, the energy of random motions of molecules is called “thermal energy”. Yes, in an ideal gas, this will just be due to the kinetic energy of the molecules, but it is different from bulk kinetic energy. In particular, it is high entropy. So, using “mechanical energy” to refer to what is really thermal energy already gets you off on the wrong foot.
Second, mechanical energy of an object is only conserved if no non-conservative forces act on something. In this case, there are interactions between the parcel of air and the surrounding air. The surrounding air can do work on the parcel both via the buoyant force and via the expansion or compression that occurs.
And, here comes Dunning-Kruger again. This is what Wikipedia says about the D-K Effect:
The description fits eerily well to you. Again and again, you incorrectly see errors in what people way, way more competent than you have done while missing your own mistakes, and even after these mistakes have been painstakingly explained to you in many different ways by many different people.
Bart says:
November 17, 2013 at 2:52 pm
Nick Stokes says:
November 17, 2013 at 2:02 pm
“To get the momentum you divide by a velocity.”
The speed of light is very large, true, but so is the frequency, and the wavelength is correspondingly small. The mass is tiny, too. If my calculations are correct, the absorption of a 15 micron IR photon should produce a delta-V of some 0.6 mm/sec on an individual CO2 molecule.
Compared with the rms velocity of a CO2 molecule of about 420 m/sec.
Nick Stokes says:
November 17, 2013 at 4:24 pm
Small compared to what? What mass is it acting on? And, what do you get when you integrate it over time?
This is not unlike those descriptions of a fellow standing in a boiling pot inside a freezer whose average temperature is a pleasant 24C.
Stephen Wilde says:
November 17, 2013 at 1:28 pm
phil:
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/ke.html
“the total kinetic energy of a mass can be expressed as the sum of the translational kinetic energy of its center of mass plus the kinetic energy of rotation about its center of mass. ”
That means both rotation / vibration and translational energy must be summed to obtain total kinetic energy and it is total kinetic energy that determines temperature.
Are your contributions sincere or are you trying to save face ?
The insincerity appears to be all yours! It is not total kinetic energy that determines temperature as I showed above.
(mv^2)/2 = 3kT/2
You use the reference I cited and cherry-pick a sentence referring to total KE but as they explicitly point out elsewhere: “The kinetic temperature is the variable needed for subjects like heat transfer, because it is the translational kinetic energy which leads to energy transfer from a hot area (larger kinetic temperature, higher molecular speeds) to a cold area (lower molecular speeds) in direct collisional transfer.”
Bart says: November 17, 2013 at 6:52 pm
“Small compared to what? What mass is it acting on? And, what do you get when you integrate it over time?”
Small (10^-11) compared to atmospheric pressure. It acts on the whole mass of the air (because of collision exchange). But OK, you could say that it acts on the mass of GHG in the first instance. That’s about 600 gm CO2 + wv subject to 10-6 newton. It gets balanced by a tiny shift in pressure gradient.
You don’t integrate it over time. It’s a small steady force (cf g) which just changes the pressure gradient and moves the distribution of air by a few angstroms.
Phil said:
“The kinetic temperature is the variable needed for subjects like heat transfer, because it is the translational kinetic energy which leads to energy transfer from a hot area (larger kinetic temperature, higher molecular speeds) to a cold area (lower molecular speeds) in direct collisional transfer.”
But we aren’t just considering heat transfer. We are considering whether more rot/vib energy can cause a gas molecule to rise against a gravitational field.
How could it not ?
“No readings of 0 W/m^2 DWIR have yet been found on earth, google for those if any Stephen. Fill us in.”
No readings of DWIR of any amount have ever been made for the reason I stated above. Sensors only record different temperatures at different heights along the lapse rate gradient depending on optical depth.
“Stephen is willing to go with the shallow tray of water can freeze up to a max. 170F ambient ”
No I am not. I will however accept that the air temperature need not be at freezing for radiation from a solid container containing water to result in ice forming on the water. That does not alter the fact that taking the global surface as a whole adiabatic warming is what causes the surface temperature enhancement above S-B predictions. The circumstances that would allow such a freezing event are rare and localised.
D- K cuts both ways so I don’t invoke it.
” mechanical energy of an object is only conserved if no non-conservative forces act on something. In this case, there are interactions between the parcel of air and the surrounding air. The surrounding air can do work on the parcel both via the buoyant force and via the expansion or compression that occurs.”
That cuts two ways in the adiabatic cycle. Within the adiabatic cycle mechanical energy is conserved which is why the atmosphere remains suspended above the surface.
“The surface is radiatively emitting more energy than it is possible for the Earth-atmosphere system to emit. The only way that this radiative energy won’t escape the atmosphere is if it is absorbed by the atmosphere.”
It IS absorbed by the atmosphere in the form of PE which arises during the process of lifting the mass of the atmosphere off the surface and remains in the atmosphere forever as long as it remains off the surface. And it can vary to retain system stability whilst circulation adjusttments occur in response to forcing elements other than mass, gravity or insolation.
When considering the uplifting of mass against a gravitational field that is a matter of mechanical processes and not radiative processes though one does need radiation from the sun to drive and maintain the mechanical process.
It is pointless to go on here but suffice it to say that many non contributors see the points I have made as valid.
joel
I think I am beginning to glimpse the mental block that the radiative theory induces in its proponents.
The idea is that if a surface beneath an atmosphere reaches a specific temperature then there must be a flow of radiation upward from that surface commensurate with that temperature.
If one has such an upward flow yet the surface remains at the same temperature then one must have a downward flow as well.
There lies the issue.
I think there is no net radiative flow in any direction within an atmosphere around a sphere. Only at top of atmosphere at the interface with space (or possibly at what some call the effective radiating height) is there a purely radiative exchange and that is equal both in and out over time.
Once one is placed inside an atmosphere the mechanical processes involved in the creation and maintenance of the atmosphere are in control and suppress any radiative flows.
Instead, there is just a haze of IR the intensity of which is graduated along the gravitationally induced lapse rate slope with maximum intensity and highest temperature at the surface and lowest intensity and lowest temperature at the top of the atmosphere.
That accords perfectly with the changing proportions of KE and PE up through the vertical column.
It also accords with the reducing density of an atmosphere with height.
And it brings the Gas Laws back in control within an atmosphere which is as it should be.
Note too that since gravity concentrates density disproportionately at lower levels the rate of reduction in density with height far exceeds the rate of reduction of the strength of the gravitational field with height. I have heard some radiation proponents conflate those two parameters as if they were the same but they are not.
I dealt with the issue of IR sensors above. They do not actually measure a net radiative flux. Such sensors only record different temperatures at different heights along the lapse rate gradient depending on optical depth. Their data output has been misused.
Radiative physics incorrectly proposes radiative flows within an atmosphere where mechanical processes are in control and that is where the confusion has arisen.
Of course there can be radiative flows between solid objects at different temperatures within an atmosphere but as soon as one starts to involve non solid materials such as gases whose height varies freely with kinetic energy content then the lapse rate slope absorbs and negates any radiative flows.
There is a radiative flux through an atmosphere, just not within an atmosphere.
In effect, the solar energy incoming gets a free pass straight through whilst within the atmosphere itself there is just that graduated haze of IR from top to bottom.
Stephen Wilde says:
November 17, 2013 at 10:40 am
pochas said:
“But remember that the adiabatic cycle has two phases. First, it picks up energy at the surface and air parcels start upward. Then, it releases energy in the radiating zone and the parcel starts downward. So, there is a net flux arising from convection.”
That is true when radiative gases are present but if not then ALL energy has to be transferred back to the surface on the descent phase before radiation out to space.
Hence my point that if radiative gases are present the circulation doesn’t have to work so hard to get all the energy back to the surface. GHGs provide for leakage to space from the adiabatic cycle.
This is completely wrong. The parcel of air rises following an adiabatic (constant PV^k), when GHGs are present as it rises the probability of emission increases which will lead to additional cooling. When the parcel descends it will follow a lower adiabatic so although temperature rises compared with the high altitude state it will end up at a lower temperature than it started out.
stephen wilde says:
November 18, 2013 at 1:07 am
Phil said:
“The kinetic temperature is the variable needed for subjects like heat transfer, because it is the translational kinetic energy which leads to energy transfer from a hot area (larger kinetic temperature, higher molecular speeds) to a cold area (lower molecular speeds) in direct collisional transfer.”
But we aren’t just considering heat transfer. We are considering whether more rot/vib energy can cause a gas molecule to rise against a gravitational field.
How could it not ?
Because it doesn’t change the translational KE and therefore doesn’t change the temperature or the density so there is no driver!
Stephen’s theories of climate can gain no traction w/o study of electromagnetic theory. It is astonishing herein Stephen receives so much genuine help towards that end yet spends time searching for false physics and clips theory out of context. Doesn’t take Joel’s sage advice. Observations of climate are enough to prove this. No theory needed.
Stephen 1:31am: “No readings of DWIR of any amount …The circumstances that would allow such a freezing event are rare and localised.”
1) Having these circumstances in Stephen’s experience is evidence of a strong DWIR bath on earth. If DWIR didn’t exist as Stephen insists then bird baths in all of England and in the Sahara would routinely freeze solid on clear summer nights in still air – the max. temperature being well below 170F. Yet as Stephen observes the freezing events are rare and localized – due to existing significant amounts of unseen DWIR energy preventing the freezing of bird baths except in rare circumstance.
2) In Stephen’s theory all macro objects at all temperatures at all times would NOT radiate (emit) electromagnetic energy and absorb electromagnetic energy from their surroundings. Earth surface Tmean would be 10s of degreesK cooler. So far science has not found even one macro object consistent with Stephen’s theory. Perhaps Stephen has found the “one” and is keeping it from us.
“(Stephen) think(s) there is no net radiative flow in any direction within an atmosphere around a sphere….solar energy incoming gets a free pass straight through.”
1) Under Stephen’s inaccurate theory IR telescopes could routinely operate from the humid tropics receiving no blockage of IR from the atm. blocking their view of deep space IR.
2) Penzias&Wilson would not have had to eliminate the hiss from the atm. in their horn antenna in Holmdale Twp., NJ en route to winning the Nobel Prize for the remaining approx. 3K hiss from deep space. That IR telescopes located in Panama could easily observe this 3K radiation in detail and COBE satellite placed into sun-synchronous orbit expense would have been avoided.
There is much more unexplained in Stephen’s incomplete and wrong atm. radiative theory but as he writes there is no point, Stephen simply can’t see the fatal flaws in his narrative logic just as he cannot see the sky glowing in IR from DWIR at night.
Trick, that post is full of straw men and non sequiturs.
IR telescopes would of course be affected by the IR haze along the slope of the lapse rate. That doesn’t mean there is any net radiative flow within the atmosphere in any particular direction other than the solar radiation passing through.
You assume that what I say means no IR present at all which is clearly false. It is just that it isn’t flowing anywhere so DWIR and UWIR within an atmosphere are false concepts.
Instead it is the mass related adiabatic uplift and descent.
Stephen, look at this P-V diagram
http://ej.iop.org/images/0143-0807/33/1/002/Full/ejp406554fig08.jpg
A parcel of air starts near the earth’s surface at point 3, it rises through the atmosphere expanding as it goes along the adiabat until it’s balanced at 4 where it cools to space 4-1 and contracts whereupon it descends along the adiabat 1-2. Once at 2 it is cooler than the surface so it heats up to 3 and starts over. This is an idealized diagram but illustrates what happens, you can make it more complicated by adding water condensation and the change in 𝛾 (k) if you like but it doesn’t change the overall picture.
Stephen Wilde says:
It is impossible to argue against someone who denies basic physics, just making up his own physics to get the desired result. How can one argue against nonsense like “the lapse rate slope absorbs and negates any radiative flows”? All one can say is that it is just made-up nonsense. Arguing with you, I see why when a colleague of mine asks students to give a written explanation on an exam for some result, he always includes the caveat “using correct physics principles”. Your posts here would earn a quick zero from him…You do not use correct physics principles, but instead make up your own principles to get the desired result.
Look, let’s be honest about what is going on here: You start with your desired conclusion that radiative effects are irrelevant and then you distort the science in whatever way is necessary in order to make that true. And, then you marvel at the fact that it works out the way you have forced it to.
It is sad to see someone who probably has the intelligence to understand the way the world actually works but has too much of an ideological mental block to actually learn the way it actually works, preferring to believe instead that if he only wants it to work in a certain way strongly enough then it will in fact work in that way.
Mods- Thanks!
Stephen 6:11am:
“(Trick) assume(s) that what I say means no IR present at all which is clearly false.”
I don’t have to assume because Stephen writes it clearly: “No readings of DWIR of any amount…”
“Instead it is the mass related adiabatic uplift and descent.”
Adiabatic means the parcel energy uplifted is returned on parcel descent with no external environment energy leaked out, see Phil. cycle (which I predict Stephen will not get) so adiabatic convection process is aptly named, no net warming of the surface. Not enough energy alone to keep bird baths from routinely freezing on clear sky still summer nights in England which is not observed.
There is another process Stephen, it is electromagnetic which is diabatic, in which there is net energy flow at planet surface. Sooner or later, to move Stephen’s climate theory ahead with traction he will have to dig into the suggestions of Joel, Phil., Nick, rgb et. al. modern atm. thermo. text books.
The processes I described are far from strawmen, they have been observed, measured published in practice with thermometers, radiometers, spectrometers by physicists who “get” elementary text book electromagnetism theory & experiment unlike Stephen Wilde.
Phil said:
“expanding as it goes along the adiabat until it’s balanced at 4 where it cools to space 4-1 and contracts whereupon it descends along the adiabat 1-2. Once at 2 it is cooler than the surface so it heats up to 3 and starts over.”
That is correct but it doesn’t have to radiatively cool to space to become colder and denser at 4-1.
It is sufficient to maintain the circulation that it cooled as a result of KE being converted to PE.
If it can radiate out to space as well then so much the better. In that case the adiabatic cycle could be less vigorous and would not need to return so much energy to the surface for radiation to space from the surface..
On arrival at 2 it is only cooler than the surface if it arrives at a time of day or season when the surface is hotter. At night or in winter it would actually warm the surface and that will be 50% of the time for the globe as a whole.
Simplify it thus.
During the day the sun heats the surface unevenly and the air parcels travel to 4-1 at which point they are colder and denser even without radiating to space.
They then circulate to the night side and descend to 2 where they are warmer than the surface so they heat that surface or reduce its cooling.
The net effect is that cooling from adiabatic uplift is exactly the same as warming from adiabatic descent and the surface of the entire surface becomes warmer than if there were no atmosphere.
It is the warming effect of descent on the night / winter portion of the globe that makes it so.
Trick says:
Actually, the net effect of convection…at least if you include the processes of evaporation and condensation in the mix…is to transport energy away from the surface (as one would expect given the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and the fact that the temperature decreases with altitude). The main reason for the asymmetry is due to the fact that the process of water evaporating at the surface and condensing at altitude will transport energy from the surface to higher altitudes.
The idea that the adiabatic lapse rate implies that the surface is in net getting heated by convective processes is, of course, a fiction that violates the 2nd Law. The reality is that in the absence of convection, the surface would even be warmer than it is…and the lapse rate would be steeper. Stephen has everything exactly backwards.
stephen wilde says:
November 18, 2013 at 8:58 am
Phil said:
“expanding as it goes along the adiabat until it’s balanced at 4 where it cools to space 4-1 and contracts whereupon it descends along the adiabat 1-2. Once at 2 it is cooler than the surface so it heats up to 3 and starts over.”
That is correct but it doesn’t have to radiatively cool to space to become colder and denser at 4-1.
It is sufficient to maintain the circulation that it cooled as a result of KE being converted to PE.
If it doesn’t cool to space it stays at 4 and never goes to 1!
You really don’t have a clue.
Nick Stokes says:
November 17, 2013 at 9:24 pm
You are mixing macro and micro concepts in a disconcerting way. Everything macro is based on statistical properties. But, those statistical measures do not preclude behavior of a sizable population of discrete components. As for “atmospheric pressure”, how does that arise in the first place? It’s not bouyancy all the way down.
Stephen has, at least, a germ of truth here: to raise mass above the Earth requires energy from somewhere. What are the implications of that? All of those ganged up against Stephen here are busy trying to avoid that necessary truth, seeking to reinforce orthodoxy rather than contemplating those implications. I’m not saying the implications are significant. I am saying that you will never know until you consider them with an open mind.
The prevailing orthodoxy is wrong. Increased CO2 in the atmosphere is not heating the Earth as expected. Starting from that fact is the beginning of the path to enlightenment. That well-trod path has been found to be a dead end. Maybe Stephen’s path is a dead end, too. But, insisting that your path is better, when it has already been determined to be a dead end, is foolish.