(Note: this originally published on Dr. Spencer’s blog on April 25th, and I asked if I could reproduce it here. While I know some readers might argue the finer points of some items in the list, I think it is important to keep sight of these. – Anthony)
by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
There are some very good arguments for being skeptical of global warming predictions. But the proliferation of bad arguments is becoming almost dizzying.
I understand and appreciate that many of the things we think we know in science end up being wrong. I get that. But some of the alternative explanations I’m seeing border on the ludicrous.
So, here’s my Top 10 list of stupid skeptic arguments. I’m sure there are more, and maybe I missed a couple important ones. Oh well.
My obvious goal here is not to change minds that are already made up, which is impossible (by definition), but to reach 1,000+ (mostly nasty) comments in response to this post. So, help me out here!
1. THERE IS NO GREENHOUSE EFFECT. Despite the fact that downwelling IR from the sky can be measured, and amounts to a level (~300 W/m2) that can be scarcely be ignored; the neglect of which would totally screw up weather forecast model runs if it was not included; and would lead to VERY cold nights if it didn’t exist; and can be easily measured directly with a handheld IR thermometer pointed at the sky (because an IR thermometer measures the IR-induced temperature change of the surface of a thermopile, QED)… Please stop the “no greenhouse effect” stuff. It’s making us skeptics look bad. I’ve blogged on this numerous times…maybe start here.
2. THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT VIOLATES THE 2ND LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS. The second law can be stated in several ways, but one way is that the net flow of energy must be from higher temperature to lower temperature. This is not violated by the greenhouse effect. The apparent violation of the 2nd Law seems to be traced to the fact that all bodies emit IR radiation…including cooler bodies toward warmer bodies. But the NET flow of thermal radiation is still from the warmer body to the cooler body. Even if you don’t believe there is 2-way flow, and only 1-way flow…the rate of flow depends upon the temperature of both bodies, and changing the cooler body’s temperature will change the cooling rate (and thus the temperature) of the warmer body. So, yes, a cooler body can make a warm body even warmer still…as evidenced by putting your clothes on.
3. CO2 CANT CAUSE WARMING BECAUSE CO2 EMITS IR AS FAST AS IT ABSORBS. No. When a CO2 molecule absorbs an IR photon, the mean free path within the atmosphere is so short that the molecule gives up its energy to surrounding molecules before it can (on average) emit an IR photon in its temporarily excited state. See more here. Also important is the fact that the rate at which a CO2 molecule absorbs IR is mostly independent of temperature, but the rate at which it emits IR increases strongly with temperature. There is no requirement that a layer of air emits as much IR as it absorbs…in fact, in general, the the rates of IR emission and absorption are pretty far from equal.
4. CO2 COOLS, NOT WARMS, THE ATMOSPHERE. This one is a little more subtle because the net effect of greenhouse gases is to cool the upper atmosphere, and warm the lower atmosphere, compared to if no greenhouse gases were present. Since any IR absorber is also an IR emitter, a CO2 molecule can both cool and warm, because it both absorbs and emits IR photons.
5. ADDING CO2 TO THE ATMOSPHERE HAS NO EFFECT BECAUSE THE CO2 ABSORPTION BANDS ARE ALREADY 100% OPAQUE. First, no they are not, and that’s because of pressure broadening. Second, even if the atmosphere was 100% opaque, it doesn’t matter. Here’s why.
6. LOWER ATMOSPHERIC WARMTH IS DUE TO THE LAPSE RATE/ADIABATIC COMPRESSION. No, the lapse rate describes how the temperature of a parcel of air changes from adiabatic compression/expansion of air as it sinks/rises. So, it can explain how the temperature changes during convective overturning, but not what the absolute temperature is. Explaining absolute air temperature is an energy budget question. You cannot write a physics-based equation to obtain the average temperature at any altitude without using the energy budget. If adiabatic compression explains temperature, why is the atmospheric temperature at 100 mb is nearly the same as the temperature at 1 mb, despite 100x as much atmospheric pressure? More about all this here.
7. WARMING CAUSES CO2 TO RISE, NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND The rate of rise in atmospheric CO2 is currently 2 ppm/yr, a rate which is 100 times as fast as any time in the 300,000 year Vostok ice core record. And we know our consumption of fossil fuels is emitting CO2 200 times as fast! So, where is the 100x as fast rise in today’s temperature causing this CO2 rise? C’mon people, think. But not to worry…CO2 is the elixir of life…let’s embrace more of it!
8. THE IPCC MODELS ARE FOR A FLAT EARTH I have no explanation where this little tidbit of misinformation comes from. Climate models address a spherical, rotating, Earth with a day-night (diurnal) cycle in solar illumination and atmospheric Coriolis force (due to both Earth curvature and rotation). Yes, you can do a global average of energy flows and show them in a flat-earth cartoon, like the Kiehl-Trenberth energy budget diagram which is a useful learning tool, but I hope most thinking people can distinguish between a handful of global-average average numbers in a conceptual diagram, and a full-blown 3D global climate model.
9. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A GLOBAL AVERAGE TEMPERATURE Really?! Is there an average temperature of your bathtub full of water? Or of a room in your house? Now, we might argue over how to do the averaging (Spatial? Mass-weighted?), but you can compute an average, and you can monitor it over time, and see if it changes. The exercise is only futile if your sampling isn’t good enough to realistically monitor changes over time. Just because we don’t know the average surface temperature of the Earth to better than, say 1 deg. C, doesn’t mean we can’t monitor changes in the average over time. We have never known exactly how many people are in the U.S., but we have useful estimates of how the number has increased in the last 50-100 years. Why is “temperature” so important? Because the thermal IR emission in response to temperature is what stabilizes the climate system….the hotter things get, the more energy is lost to outer space.
10. THE EARTH ISN’T A BLACK BODY. Well, duh. No one said it was. In the broadband IR, though, it’s close to a blackbody, with an average emissivity of around 0.95. But whether a climate model uses 0.95 or 1.0 for surface emissivity isn’t going to change the conclusions we make about the sensitivity of the climate system to increasing carbon dioxide.
I’m sure I could come up with a longer list than this, but these were the main issues that came to mind.
So why am I trying to stir up a hornets nest (again)? Because when skeptics embrace “science” that is worse that the IPCC’s science, we hurt our credibility.
NOTE: Because of the large number of negative comments this post will generate, please excuse me if I don’t respond to every one. Or even very many of them. But if I see a new point being made I haven’t addressed before, I’ll be more likely to respond.
mpainter says:
May 2, 2014 at 8:24 am
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The problem here sadly is more political than scientific.
The empirical evidence that our oceans respond as a SW selective coating rather than a near blackbody to incoming solar radiation is solid. The oceans would heat about 98C beyond the -18C that climastrologists claim in the absence of atmospheric cooling and DWLWIR. This alone is enough to destroy the whole idea of a net radiative GHE. The foundation of the whole inanity is simple –
1. Incorrectly calculate the “surface” temperature in absence of an atmosphere as -18C by mis-applying S-B equations to the oceans.
2. Note that this incorrectly calculated temperature is 33C below current near surface temperatures.
3. Claim radiative gases in the atmosphere are raising this temperature 33C.
Empirical experiment shows the -18C figure in step 1 to be totally wrong for 71% of the planets surface. This totally invalidates AGW. But this answer is not what Lukewarmers want, because it means they made the same embarrassingly simple mistake as the alarmists. The loudest Lukewarmer voices here are desperately trying to find any other “sciencey” sounding excuse as to why “CO2 warms, but far less than we thought”. Not for the sake of science but for ego.
They are now joined and cheered on by all the AGW promoters who are now desperate for the face saving “soft landing” the Lukewarmer position can provide. Look at all the support recently given to the idea of a single voice for sceptics based on the Lukewarmer position. Many of those supporting the idea were AGW believers.
I would argue that just tuning the Lysenko dial from “high” to “low” is no solution. Sceptics must turn the Lysenko dial to “off”. While the resulting explosion will cause some flash burns for lukewarmers, the total destruction of the AGW fellow travellers is worth the pain. If global warming is not totally destroyed, the fellow travellers will just slink off and try again with another manufactured crisis the world cannot afford.
tjfolkerts says:
May 2, 2014 at 9:52 am
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Tim, unlike other sceptics, I’m not easily sidetracked. You challenged on my empirically based claim that the oceans in the absence of atmospheric cooling and DWLWIR would heat to around 80C and this means the net effect of our radiative atmosphere is cooling of the oceans.
As to your questions –
“A) Are you saying the ground/ocean surface would be above -18C? If so where does it get the extra energy, since it will be radiating more power to space as thermal IR than it is receiving as sunlight.”
My claim clearly only related to the oceans. No “extra energy” is required to heat our oceans. UV/SW heats at depth and accumulates due to slow speed of non-radiative return to the surface. Use standard S-B calcs that treat the oceans as an infinitely thin superconducting blackbody and you will get the incorrect -18C answer.
“B) Suppose one spot ( say 1 km^2) on earth was 1500 C lava. Are you saying that the entire atmosphere would eventually reach 1500 C for a 100% non-radiative atmosphere?”
Only if you could stop the atmosphere expanding and being swept into space by solar wind then a non-radiative atmosphere would indeed super heat. Gas conduction within the atmosphere is poor, and empirical experiment proves the surface is far better at heating the atmosphere than it is at cooling it. A non-radiative atmosphere could still be heated by the surface, including contact with magma and addition of volcanic gases, however it would no longer have an effective cooling mechanism. A point to note – there are no planets or moons in our solar system that have managed to retain an atmosphere without strongly radiative gases.
But my main point of contention with Dr. Spencer is his point 10. The oceans cannot be treated as a blackbody or even close. Without a radiatively cooled atmosphere to evaporatively cool our oceans they would become a giant evaporation constrained solar pond with temperatures topping 80C. The foundation dogma of the Church of Radiative Climatology is dependant on the oceans being at -18C in the absence of atmospheric cooling or DWLWIR. Empirical experiment proves this false. AGW is quite simply a physical impossibility.
Brian says:
May 1, 2014 at 8:57 am
#9 – Of course there’s a calculable average global temperature. How useful that is to establishing past long term trends in the face of inconsistent instrument records, comparative proxies and varying grids is a a very real question.
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JBJ says:
May 1, 2014 at 2:39 pm
Just look at this year’s (and other years) temp records for the Arctic (80+ degs North) … see anything unusual? http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
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Your two comments raise an issue that has been discussed on this site and I have observed for years – and downloaded the data from Environment Canada to confirm – the AVERAGE temperatures are increasing. BUT the HIGH temperatures (in general) are NOT increasing; the LOW temperatures are not going as low. I have reviewed many locations, and this phenomenon is present in many locations.
A professional organization I belong to is suggesting that design standards need to be changed to account for the “modelled” regional warming expected in the next 50 years. Trouble is, when you look at places with 50 to 100 years of temperature data in that province, it isn’t getting “hotter” because of high “summer” temperatures, it is getting “hotter” because there are less “Extreme” cold temperatures, the “Extreme” minimum monthly temperatures are trending up, the Mean minimum monthly temperatures are trending up while the Mean maximum temperatures are essentially flat and the “Extreme ” maximum temperatures are trending down.
Sample only:
http://tinypic.com/r/fkyw6h/8
Oops. http://tinypic.com/r/fkyw6h/8
Konrad,
I understand and agree with many of your arguments — although I think you also are missing some key points. Too bad we can’t actually sit down for an hour or two with a white board and some textbooks.
Let me outline my key concerns…
1) At a practical level, there never will be atmospheres without GHGs and DWLWIR. CO2, H2O, NH3, and CH4 are common throughout the solar system, so every atmosphere which forms will have GHGs and hence will have DWLWIR (or if it makes some people happy, “will have less UWLWIR than they would have had if there were no GHGs”). So any discussion of what might happen with no GHGs is the most academic, implausible sort of scenario.
2) I think you are ignoring the cooling at the poles. Yes, a “solar pond” can warm at the bottom well above typical surface temperatures (and this typically requires unusual salt gradients, so already this 80 C number is not going to be typical of ocean water with relatively uniform salinity). But near the poles, the water gets very little solar energy, cools and sinks. This large-scale convection brings cold water to the depths of the ocean and ultimately back to the “solar ponds” near the equator. And again, this “real experiment” clearly shows that the deep oceans are cooled below the surface temperature, not warmed above it.
3) Whether or not the deep areas get warmed, the surface is STILL governed by its own energy balance. To maintain the SURFACE at 80 C would require the 880 W/m^2 of average input. With an IR-transparent atmosphere, that means 880 W/m^2 of average sunlight, which ain’t gonna happen. Tropical regions will not average much above 500 W/m^2 even in the best of circumstances. Even with GHGs, there is not going to be enough input to warm the surface of the ocean to 80 C. So the SURFACE of the ocean will be similar in temperature to the surface of the land, not similar to the potentially 80C deep waters.
4) You say “The foundation dogma of the Church of Radiative Climatology is dependant on the oceans being at -18C in the absence of atmospheric cooling or DWLWIR. Empirical experiment proves this false.” Where is the empirical experimental proof? Where is such a body of water with no atmospheric warming/cooling and no IR active materials above it? Where is a body of water with 240 W/m^2 of solar input (and no other input) that has a surface temperature of ~ 80 C rather than ~ -18 C? Solar ponds certainly don’t count, since 1) they DO have warm IR active materials above them, 2) they tend to be close to the tropics, with and average of more than 240 W/m^2, and 3) they have surface temperature similar to the surrounding land, not similar to the ~ 80 C bottom.
Dr. Spencer wrote:
“10. THE EARTH ISN’T A BLACK BODY. Well, duh. No one said it was. In the broadband IR, though, it’s close to a blackbody, with an average emissivity of around 0.95. But whether a climate model uses 0.95 or 1.0 for surface emissivity isn’t going to change the conclusions we make about the sensitivity of the climate system to increasing carbon dioxide.”
Confusion of a black body earth surface is one of many collective technical errors made by climate scientists. In defense of this error, some have argued it is an “approximation” of 0.98 to 1.0. It is now a different “approximation” of 0.95 to 1.0. The emissivity of an object is a given physical property of the object that must be determined either by measurements or by valid alternative scientific methods. I wonder where the figure of 0.95 comes from.
70% earth ground surface is covered by water. Omegascope has measured the emissivity of water being 0.67 at 38°C. Note that Wilber in 1999 measured emissivity for a number of materials including water over the wavelength range 4-16 μm; and found water around 0.98 over this wavelength range. Many have misinterpreted Wilber’s results as water’s emissivity being 0.98. The emissivity value we need is the mean value over the wavelength range 2-100 μm, or 4-70 μm as a good approximation.
Many calculations will be significantly altered for every different value of the emissivity. For example, in the IPCC 2007 Earth Energy Budget Diagram,
390 surface radiation would be simply wrong but 370.5 if the emissivity is 0.95;
350 and 40 are therefore at least one of them wrong as their sum must be 370.5;
324 back radiation and 324 absorbed by surface: one of them must be wrong;
… …
Tim Folkerts says:
May 2, 2014 at 8:16 pm
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I far prefer empirical experiment to whiteboards and I only trust textbooks on atmospheric physics written before 1990 😉
The problem facing climastrologists is they have slipped up and based their scam on claims that can be empirically tested. -18C for the oceans in the absence of atmospheric cooling or DWLWIR? We can test that.
We can go to the Atacama desert and pick a spot 6000m above sea level. According to the calcs of climastrologists there would not be enough DWLWIR to keep water from freezing as most radiative gases exist below this level. We dig a pond 25m deep and 50m square. We insulate the sides and base and line it with black plastic. We fill it with fresh water. We float a SW/IR transparent plastic film on the water surface to prevent evaporative cooling. We stretch a second and third SW/IR transparent cover over the surface at 1m spacings to minimise atmospheric cooling.
Now according to the dogma of the Church of Radiative Climastology that pond should become a solid block of ice. Instead it is going to heat. (It won’t reach above 80C because at that point the low atmospheric pressure will allow it to turn to steam and blow the covers off the experiment). But any temperature much above 15C and all of the radiative GHE hypothesis and AGW is instantly disproved.
While an adventure in the Atacama desert might be fun, we could of course test more simply in the lab – http://i42.tinypic.com/315nbdl.jpg
When you understand the science of selective coatings you will be able to answer – why does the water sample respond near to S-B calcs when it is 1mm thick but results rapidly diverge as it gets deeper? How deep are our oceans?
As to supporting empirical proof outside these expensive options, I have all ready run the preliminary versions –
“Shredded lukewarm turkey in boltzmannic vinegar” – which uses clear acrylic blocks with differing levels of SW absorption.
“How black were my oceans?” – which compares temperature response to solar illumination of water free to convect and evaporatively cool between clear water in an insulated black tub and water dyed black.
I am in the process of drawing up the build diagrams for these for a thread at Talkshop so many others can replicate my work.
Of course for engineers much of this is very old news. You could try a get a copy of –
Harris, W. B., Davison, R. R., and Hood, D. W. (1965) ‘Design and operating characteristics of an experimental solar water heater’ Solar Energy – in which researches at Texas A&M discovered why you never make the surface of evaporation constrained convecting solar ponds black. (How did climastrologists treat our oceans?)
Oh and Tim, apparently I have to remind you again that I am nowhere referring to salinity gradient solar ponds. We are talking evaporation constrained solar ponds. You and other readers can build one for yourself – http://i40.tinypic.com/27xhuzr.jpg
There is now way around it. Hand flapping about ocean currents, or false statements about solar ponds only working near the tropics won’t do. The bottom line is climastrologists used blackbody calcs on our deep UV/SW transparent oceans. The claim of “-18C for the “surface” in absence of an atmosphere” is completely false. So too is AGW hypothesis.
Jinan Cao says:
May 2, 2014 at 8:45 pm
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You raise a very good point about the IR emissivity of water.
This is difficult to quantify as it actually changes with temperature. Further to this water actually reflects some LWIR.
Figures given by IR imaging suppliers vary between 0.67 and 0.98. Many IR detectors such as mine only measure between 8-14 microns. By setting the emissivity setting on the instrument to 0.95, a reasonable reading can be obtained. But assuming 0.95 for the purposes of calculating the ability of water to radiatively cool will lead to errors. These high emissivity numbers are for setting instruments for in situ measurement with ambient IR being reflected from other sources and vapour over the measured surface etc.
In #4, you say
I fully agree that CO2 absorbs IR radiation and, in general, that that would cause the gas to get warmer. However, if I had a gas at some temperature and added more emitters, wouldn’t it cool off faster? Why do you think that CO2 (or any greenhouse gas) will absorb more radiation than it emits? One of the Kiehl-Trenberth energy budget diagrams shows the “lower” atmosphere absorbing about 544 W/m2 of IR and emitting about 642 W/m2 – the difference being due to evaporation and convection. From just those numbers it follows that increasing the amount of any greenhouse gas should produce more emission than absorption – ie, any increase should cool the lower atmosphere.
Perhaps my problem is with the definition of “lower atmosphere” – 2 feet above the surface? 10 feet? A full kilometer?
The importance of the southern ocean cooling is enormous. You can see that there begins to the circulation, but also current of superficial is cooled below Africa.
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/record/23/11/25c.gif
http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/sst/contour/global_small.fc.gif
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
I suggested that this thread is being usurped by discussion of the cause of recent rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration, and I said it is time to cease that debate in this thread.
At May 2, 2014 at 3:37 pm you have replied saying
Indications and interpretations of available data are all that matter scientifically.
What people “want” to see is not important (except politically).
But, as this thread demonstrates, you ignore any and all information which refutes your desire to believe “it is our emissions which cause the CO2 increase in the atmosphere”.
As I said in this thread here
Your iterations of your belief do not – and cannot – change that reality, and they add no value to this thread.
Richard
Bart says:
May 2, 2014 at 4:55 pm
This is noisy data of bulk measurements processed in entirely different ways. The match isn’t going to be perfect. Constraining the result to have a perfectly matched linear trendline is an arbitrary standard for determining goodness of fit.
Bart, the scale factor is at least a factor 2 too small for the amplitude. The factor heavily depends on the difference in T and dCO2/dt slopes, but the amplitude of the temperature effect doesn’t, that is a straightforward temperature dependence. If – as is now the case – there is near zero slope in temperature over the past 17.5 years, you need a huge factor to match the slopes, which increases the amplitudes. Opposite, if there is a huge increase in temperature and a small slope in dCO2/dt – as it was in previous decades – then you need a small factor. In both cases the amplitude of the variability is affected, which is counter the physical T-CO2 relationship, which is between 4 and 8 ppmv/K.
It is quite simple: the short term variability and the long term slope are completely independent of each other.
Yes. It does. You cannot arbitrarily remove the trend and assume it has no effect. Nature has no means of failing to respond to the trend alone when it is responding to everything else.
Empirical and measured evidence shows that the CO2 reaction on temperature changes is between 4 and 8 ppmv/K very short term (seasons) to multi-millennia. The real effect seen in the short term (2-3 years) variability is 4-5 ppmv/K.
There are two variables at work which influence the slope of dCO2/dt: a straightforward, caused by the slightly quadratic human emissions and a slightly negative from the temperature increase, which only may give a positive slope if another unknown temperature affected process is at work.
Thus there is no reason to suppose that the whole slope is due to the temperature increase of 0.4 K since 1960.
I’m not sure what that means.
The only way that nature can dwarf the human contribution is if the sinks are reacting very fast on increased CO2 ánd the natural circulation increased tremendously. But the latter will affect the residence time, the 13C/12C ratio, the 14C bomb spike decay,… For which is not the slightest indication… To the contrary: the residence time seems to grow over time.
That the response of the sinks is too slow to accomodate for human emissions can be seen in the observations: we are currently over 100 ppmv over the historical equilibrium for the current temperature, but the sink rate is not more than 2 ppmv/year, while there is no indication of a firmly increased carbon cycle.
Sure there is. Right here.
Sorry Bart, an increase in rate of change of CO2 is no proof for an increased circulation if there are several possible causes, including human emissions, which have double that slope:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em4.jpg
Re: #7
Given that CO2 lags temperature by 800 yrs (+/- 200) in the geological record.
Even without mankind, a peak in CO2 resulting from the MWP would be expected to appear smack dab in the middle of the late 20th century; right around now, in fact!
No wonder warmists hate the Medieval Warm Period!
What ALL the above sadly proves is that it doesn`t take anywhere near 400 closet warmists per 1,000,000 deniers to screw their deeply educated up the junction heads into pronouncing a warmist clap-trap message of the most unscientific kind possible and thus giving their opponents little more than a good sucking! Well you just give them little more than a nice bit of well paid over-time in pouring the gravy back and forth.
You just want to argue without making waves such as those which, ok JS, prevent us from suffering near cryospheric cold over-night and thus dramatically influence the stupidly useless “average” global temperature `kalculashun` but have little effect during the `real` heat of day.
Quite how some of you have the patience(paid effort?) to keep reminding all of the real science involved in maintaining habitable conditions on most of the globe I just do not know………………
“What?!”
@ferdinand meeus Engelbeen, “Ron there is very little diffusion of CO2 between ice layers. In the “warm” coastal cores that gives a broadening of the resolution from 20 years to 22 years at medium depth and from 20 to 40 years at full depth (70 kyears) in the Siple Dome ice core”
The inaccuracy of ice cores is far worse than you believe.
The firn zone: Transforming snow to ice
The age of the gas in an occluded air bubble is less than the age of the surrounding ice. This age difference (the so-called Δage) depends on temperature and the amount of snowfall. The value of Δage can range from a few hundred years to several thousand years.
…
Scott Wilmot Bennett says:
May 3, 2014 at 1:53 am
Re: #7
Given that CO2 lags temperature by 800 yrs (+/- 200) in the geological record.
Even without mankind, a peak in CO2 resulting from the MWP would be expected to appear smack dab in the middle of the late 20th century; right around now, in fact!
No wonder warmists hate the Medieval Warm Period!
Goosebumps!
JohnWho says: May 2, 2014 at 10:24 am
Dr Who, please read the following.
Regards, Allan
*************
The “mainstream” global warming debate centres on the magnitude of Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (“ECS”) to atmospheric CO2, which is the primary subject of contention between global warming alarmists (aka “warmists”) and climate skeptics (aka “skeptics”).
Warmists typically say ECS is high, greater than ~~3 degrees C [3C/(2xCO2)] and therefore DANGEROUS global warming will result, whereas skeptics say ECS is 1C or less and any resulting global warming will NOT be dangerous.
The scientific evidence to date (increasing atmospheric CO2, but no net warming for ~17 years) strongly suggests that if one had to pick a side, the skeptics are more likely to be correct.
However, BOTH sides of this factious debate are in all probability technically WRONG. In January 2008 I demonstrated that CO2 LAGS temperature at all measured time scales*, so the mainstream debate requires that “the future is causing the past”, which I suggest is demonstrably false.
In climate science we do not even agree on what drives what, and it is probable that the majority, who reside on BOTH sides of the ECS mainstream debate, are both technically WRONG.
Hypothesis:
Based on the preponderance of evidence, temperature drives CO2 much more than CO2 drives temperature, so ECS may not exist at all at the “macro” scale, and may be utterly irrelevant to climate science except at the “micro” (and materially insignificant) scale.
There may be other significant sources of CO2 that contribute to its increase in the atmosphere, but increasing CO2 just does not have a significant or measureable impact on global warming (or cooling), which is almost entirely natural in origin.
I therefore suggest that the oft-fractious “mainstream debate” between warmists and skeptics about the magnitude of ECS is materially irrelevant. ECS, if it exists at all, is so small that it just does not matter.
Wait 5 to 10 more years – I suggest that by then most serious climate scientists will accept the above hypo. Many will claim they knew it all along… 🙂
________
* If ECS (which assumes CO2 drives temperature) actually exists in the Earth system, it is so small that it is overwhelmed by the reality that temperature drives CO2.
Proof:
In this enormous CO2 equation, the only signal that is apparent is that dCO2/dt varies ~contemporaneously with temperature, and CO2 lags global Lower Troposphere temperatures by about 9 months.
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/carbon_dioxide_in_not_the_primary_cause_of_global_warming_the_future_can_no/
CO2 also lags temperature by about 800 years in the ice core record on a longer time scale.
To suggest that ECS is larger that 1C is not credible. I suggest that if ECS exists at all, it is much smaller than 1C, so small as to be essentially insignificant.
Regards, Allan
________
My January 2008 hypo is gaining notice with the recent work of several researchers. We don’t always agree on the fine details, but there is clear agreement in the primary hypothesis.
Here is Murry Salby’s address to the Sydney Institute in 2011:
Here is Salby’s address in Hamburg 2013:
See also this January 2013 paper from Norwegian researchers:
The Phase Relation between Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide and Global Temperature
Global and Planetary Change
Volume 100, January 2013, Pages 51–69
by Ole Humluma, Kjell Stordahlc, Jan-Erik Solheimd
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921818112001658
Highlights
– Changes in global atmospheric CO2 are lagging 11–12 months behind changes in global sea surface temperature.
– Changes in global atmospheric CO2 are lagging 9.5–10 months behind changes in global air surface temperature.
– Changes in global atmospheric CO2 are lagging about 9 months behind changes in global lower troposphere temperature.
– Changes in ocean temperatures explain a substantial part of the observed changes in atmospheric CO2 since January 1980.
– Changes in atmospheric CO2 are not tracking changes in human emissions.
Dr Spencer, THANK YOU so much for providing a post that I can save in my Science/GlobalWarming/Bad Science folder of favorites. Up until now they had all been posts by the alarmists.
I agree it’s strawman argumentation here, and an offending one. I disagree with #7, and the horrible way the argument is being shot down by Spencer, as he simply brushes off that there could be a greater lag between raise in temperatures and raise in CO2 than he obviously thinks is reasonable.
I note Spencer is greeted with warmth by self proclaimed warmists here, and I can fully understand why, as Spencer makes their case minus only how seriously one should take the issue of rising CO2. Hereby the whole sceptic argument(s) can be shot down with “precautionary principle” – something that works wonders with the public in general. A warmist couldn’t ask for a nicer ‘sceptic’.
Worst of all is how well this straw man argumentation is promoted and is being received in general on this site. It reeks of an attitude to become accepted and respected by the warmism pushing ruling elite – so that they, oh the horror, don’t point and laugh at you because of others comments. This is exactly how political self censorship works, by making the individual feel ashamed of what others says or does and then do their utmost to distance themselves from these misguided individuals. Well, I’m most probably one of those a conformed sceptic wouldn’t like to be associated with, and I can assure you that Spencer and the common reaction here has done a good job at scaring me away form speaking my mind here again. A job well done, I must say. Bye.
richard says: May 2, 2014 at 8:15 am and May 2, 2014 at 8:05 am
“Best to stick to co2 causes warming but so small as not to be relevant.”
Fully understanding the temptation and the basic idea sounds to me about right, but also submitted. Makes me wonder how did the free-thinking Columbus convince Isabella I of Castile, the devoted Roman catholic monarch who contributed to the institutionalization of the Spanish Inquisition. Did he say ‘Earth can be illustrated flat, but the edges are so far as not to be relevant’?
My understanding is that AGW was lifted into the mainstream by a worthy cause and irrespective of methods. But now, when the AGW prognostications have fallen flat, the ugly methods and inevitable conclusion become evident. The skeptics depicted here as ‘slayers’ are nothing compared to the misanthropist extremes of the alarmists.
The politicians will soon be looking for a new cause. How about fundamental rights of those struggling with the food/energy bills? Including the average Joe and those having expertise otherwise missing from here? Why not? Even if it means accepting some odd individuals to join here, like fruitcakes, loonies etc by Cameron’s standards. So what?
Narrowing the blog down to puritanism in a specific discipline is another solution, but risks turning it into the People’s Front of Judea parody. But, of course, the blog’s future remains in the hands of it’s creator.
Oracle says:
May 3, 2014 at 2:16 am
The value of Δage can range from a few hundred years to several thousand years.
Δage and resolution are different items: as long as the pores in the snow/firn are open, there is exchange between the air contained in the snow/firn and the atmosphere. Meanwhile snow layers will pile up. In the Law Dome ice cores, at bubble closing depth, the ice is already 40 years old at 72 m depth, but the average air composition is only 7 years older than in the atmosphere, which makes that the Δage is ~33 years. The gas composition (=resolution) is largely from about 10 years around the average, with a small, long tail up to 40 years…
See: http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/law_dome_overlap.jpg
Scott Wilmot Bennett says:
May 3, 2014 at 1:53 am
Re: #7
Given that CO2 lags temperature by 800 yrs (+/- 200) in the geological record.
Even without mankind, a peak in CO2 resulting from the MWP would be expected to appear smack dab in the middle of the late 20th century; right around now, in fact!
No wonder warmists hate the Medieval Warm Period!
=======
Excellent point Scott…..
and trying to make people believe that an extra 4pmm CO2 is overwhelming the system….
…and causing 2ppm to accumulate
Now that is really stupid…………
david(swuk) says:
May 3, 2014 at 2:57 am
Even without mankind, a peak in CO2 resulting from the MWP would be expected to appear smack dab in the middle of the late 20th century;
The MWP-LIA difference is not more than 6 ppmv for 0.8°C drop in temperature. As many skeptics think (I do) that the MWP was warmer than the MWP was warmer than the current period, the increase of CO2 since the LIA caused by temperature is less than 6 ppmv. Warmer seawater temperatures during the MWP mean less absorption of CO2 in the deep ocean waters which return today, not that the difference will be measurable, I suppose…
richardscourtney says:
May 3, 2014 at 12:45 am
Richard, we have been there many times before…
The data simply show that nature can’t cope with human emissions, no matter the huge carbon cycle with its huge fluxes in and out over the seasons.
That is no matter of a changed setpoint, which is quite closely connected to temperature over the past 800 kyear and which for the current temperature is ~300 ppmv, not 400 ppmv.
Any other theoretical explanation beyond the human contribution violates one or more observations. That includes several of the explanations you and others have put forward and that includes the theory from Bart and Salby. Thus, indeed for me it is clear: the human emissions fit all observations, the alternatives don’t.
Jaakko Kateenkorva says:
May 3, 2014 at 5:58 am
Fully understanding the temptation and the basic idea sounds to me about right, but also submitted. Makes me wonder how did the free-thinking Columbus convince Isabella I of Castile, the devoted Roman catholic monarch who contributed to the institutionalization of the Spanish Inquisition. Did he say ‘Earth can be illustrated flat, but the edges are so far as not to be relevant’?
No, he said the earth is round as everyone knows, however using the value for the radius I conclude that the Indies were about 4,000 miles west of us, which is consistent with the observations I have made in Madiera, so I should be able to get there by sailing west. The monarchs’ scientific advisors said that he was wrong and the value for the radius was too small and the Indies were therefore too far away to be reached by sailing west (they were right, they used Eraratosthenes’ value). At no time did anyone argue that the world was flat!