Guest post by David Middleton
A framework containing the basic assumptions, ways of thinking, and methodology that are commonly accepted by members of a scientific community.
These examples point to the third and most fundamental aspect of the incommensurability of competing paradigms. In a sense that I am unable to explicate further, the proponents of competing paradigms practice their trades in different worlds. One contains constrained bodies that fall slowly, the other pendulums that repeat their motions again and again. In one, solutions are compounds, in the other mixtures. One is embedded in a flat, the other in a curved, matrix of space. Practicing in different worlds, the two groups of scientists see different things when they look from the same point in the same direction. Again, that is not to say that they can see anything they please. Both are looking at the world, and what they look at has not changed. But in some areas they see different things, and they see them in different relations one to the other. That is why a law that cannot even be demonstrated to one group of scientists may occasionally seem intuitively obvious to another. Equally, it is why, before they can hope to communicate fully, one group or the other must experience the conversion that we have been calling a paradigm shift. Just because it is a transition between incommensurables, the transition between competing paradigms cannot be made a step at a time, forced by logic and neutral experience. Like the gestalt switch, it must occur all at once (though not necessarily in an instant) or not at all.
–Thomas Kuhn, 1962. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Vol. II, No. 2 p. 150
What is the current paradigm?
- Human activities, primarily carbon dioxide emissions, have been the primary cause of the observed global warming over the past 50 to 150 years.
- The atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration had stabilized between 270 and 280 ppmv early in the Holocene and had remained in that range prior to the mid-19th century when fossil fuels became the primary energy source of the Industrial Revolution.
- Anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions are causing the atmospheric concentration to rise at a dangerously rapid pace to levels not seen in 100’s of thousands to millions of years.
- The climate sensitivity to a doubling of pre-industrial carbon dioxide concentration “is likely to be in the range of 2 to 4.5°C with a best estimate of about 3°C, and is very unlikely to be less than 1.5°C,” possibly even much higher than 4.5°C.
- Immediate, deep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are necessary in order to stave off catastrophic climate change.
- The scientific consensus regarding this paradigm is overwhelming (~97%).
Why is the paradigm collapsing?
- There has been no increase in the Earth’s average surface temperature since the late 20th century.
- Every measure of pre-industrial carbon dioxide, not derived from Antarctic ice cores, indicates a higher and more variable atmospheric concentration.
- The total lack of predictive skill in AGW climate models.
- An ever-growing body of observation-based studies indicating that the climate sensitivity is in the range of 0.5 to 2.5°C with a best estimate of 1.5 to 2°C, and is very unlikely to be more than 2°C.
- Clear evidence that the dogmatic insistence of scientific unanimity is at best highly contrived and at worst fraudulent.
The paradigm is collapsing primarily due to the fact that the climate appears to be far less sensitive to changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations than the so-called scientific consensus had assumed.
One group of scientists has steadfastly resisted the carbon dioxide-driven paradigm: Geologists, particularly petroleum geologists. As Kuhn wrote,
“Practicing in different worlds, the two groups of scientists see different things when they look from the same point in the same direction. Again, that is not to say that they can see anything they please. Both are looking at the world, and what they look at has not changed. But in some areas they see different things, and they see them in different relations one to the other. That is why a law that cannot even be demonstrated to one group of scientists may occasionally seem intuitively obvious to another.”
Petroleum geologists tend to be sedimentary geologists and sedimentary geology is essentially a combination of paleogeography and paleoclimatology. Depositional environments are defined by physical geography and climate. We literally do practice in a different world, the past. Geologists intuitively see Earth processes as cyclical and also tend to look at things from the perspective of “deep time.” For those of us working the Gulf of Mexico, we “go to work” in a world defined by glacioeustatic and halokinetic processes and, quite frankly, most of us don’t see anything anomalous in recent climate changes.
So, it should come as little surprise that geoscientists have consistently been far more likely to think that modern climate changes have been driven by overwhelmingly natural processes…
APEGA is the organization responsible for certifying and licensing professional geoscientists and engineers in Alberta, Canada.
This study is very interesting because it analyzes the frames of reference (Kuhn’s “different worlds”) in which opinions are formed. Skeptical geologists are most likely to view climate change as overwhelmingly natural. Skeptical engineers are more likely to view it as a matter of economics or fatalism. The cost of decarbonization would far outweigh any benefits and/or would have no measurable effect on climate change.
The Obsession With Consensus
In nearly 40 years as an Earth Scientist (counting college), I have never seen such an obsession with consensus. In geology, there are many areas in which there are competing hypotheses; yet there is no obsession with conformance to a consensus.
The acceptance of plate tectonics was a relatively new thing when I was a student. This paradigm had only recently shifted from the geosynclinal theory to plate tectonics. We still learned the geosynclinal theory in Historical Geology and it still has value today. However, I don’t ever recall papers being published claiming a consensus regarding either theory.
Most geologists think that granite is an igneous rock and that petroleum is of organic origin. Yet, the theories of granitization and abiogenic hydrocarbon formation are not ridiculed; nor are the adherents subjected to “witch hunts.”
One of the most frequent methods of attempting to quantify and justify the so-called consensus on climate change has been the abstract search (second hand opinions). I will only bother to review one of these exercises in logical fallacy, Cook et al., 2013.
Second Hand Opinions.
These sorts of papers consist of abstract reviews. The authors’ then tabulate their opinions regarding whether or not the abstracts support the AGW paradigm. As Legates et al., 2013 pointed out, Cook defined the consensus as “most warming since 1950 is anthropogenic.” Cook then relied on three different levels of “endorsement” of that consensus and excluded 67% of the abstracts reviewed because they neither endorsed nor rejected the consensus.
The largest endorsement group was categorized as “implicitly endorses AGW without minimizing it.” They provided this example of an implied endorsement:
‘…carbon sequestration in soil is important for mitigating global climate change’
Carbon sequestration in soil, lime muds, trees, seawater, marine calcifiers and a whole lot of other things have always been important for mitigating a wide range of natural processes. I have no doubt that I have implicitly endorsed the so-called consensus based on this example.
The second largest endorsement group was categorized as “implicitly endorses but does not quantify or minimize.” Pardon my obtuseness, but how in the heck can one explicitly endorse the notion that “most warming since 1950 is anthropogenic” without quantification? This is the example Cook provided:
‘Emissions of a broad range of greenhouse gases of varying lifetimes contribute to global climate change’
Wow! I contributed to Romney for President… Yet most of his campaign war-chest didn’t come from me. By this subjective standard, I have probably explicitly endorsed AGW a few times.
No Schist, Sherlock.
One of the most frequent refrains is the assertion that “climate scientists” endorse the so-called consensus more than other disciplines and that the level of endorsement is proportional to the volume of publications by those climate scientists. Well… No schist, Sherlock! I would bet a good bottle of wine that the most voluminous publishers on UFO’s are disproportionately more likely to endorse Close Encounters of the Third Kind as a documentary. A cursory search for “abiogenic hydrocarbons” in AAPG’s Datapages could lead me to conclude that there is a higher level of endorsement of abiogenic oil among those who publish on the subject than among non-publishing petroleum geologists.
These exercises in expertise cherry-picking are quite common. A classic example was Doran and Kendall Zimmerman, 2009. This survey sample was limited to academic and government Earth Scientists. It excluded all Earth Scientists working in private sector businesses. The two key questions were:
1. When compared with pre-1800s levels, do you think that mean global temperatures have generally risen, fallen, or remained relatively constant?
2. Do you think human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures?
I would answer risen to #1 and my answer to #2 would depend on the meaning of “human activity is a significant contributing factor.” If I realized it was a “push poll,” I would answer “no.”
Interestingly, economic geologists and meteorologists were the most likely to answer “no” to question #2…
The two areas of expertise in the survey with the smallest percentage of participants answering yes to question 2 were economic geology with 47% (48 of 103) and meteorology with 64% (23 of 36).
The authors derisively dismissed the opinions of geologists and meteorologists…
It seems that the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely nonexistent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes.
No discipline has a better understanding the “nuances” than meteorologists and no discipline has a better understanding of the “scientific basis of long-term climate processes” than geologists.
The authors close with a “no schist, Sherlock” bar chart:
The most recent example of expertise cherry-picking was Stenhouse et al., 2014.
The 52% consensus among the membership of the American Meteorological Society explained away as being due to “perceived scientific consensus,” “political ideology,” and a lack of “expertise” among non-publishing meteorologists and atmospheric scientists…
While we found that higher expertise was associated with a greater likelihood of viewing global warming as real and harmful, this relationship was less strong than for political ideology and perceived consensus. At least for the measure of expertise that we used, climate science expertise may be a less important influence on global warming views than political ideology or social consensus norms. More than any other result of the study, this would be strong evidence against the idea that expert scientists’ views on politically controversial topics can be completely objective.
Finally, we found that perceiving conflict at AMS was associated with lower certainty of global warming views, lower likelihood of viewing global warming as human caused, and lower ratings of predicted harm caused by global warming.
So… Clearly, 97% of AMS membership would endorse the so-called consensus if they were more liberal, more accepting of unanimity and published more papers defending failed climate models. No schist, Sherlock!
What, exactly, is a “climate scientist”?
35 years ago climatology was a branch of physical geography. Today’s climate scientists can be anything from atmospheric physicists & chemists, mathematicians, computer scientists, astronomers, astrophysicists, oceanographers, biologists, environmental scientists, ecologists, meteorologists, geologists, geophysicists, geochemistry to economists, agronomists, sociologists and/or public policy-ologists.
NASA’s top climate scientist for most of the past 35 years, James Hansen, is an astronomer. The current one, Gavin Schmidt, is a mathematician.
It seems to me that climate science is currently dominated by computer modelers, with little comprehension of the natural climate cycles which have driven climate change throughout the Holocene.
Climate scientist seems to be as nebulous as Cook’s definition of consensus.
What is the actual consensus?
The preliminary results of the AMS survey tell us all we need to know about the so-called consensus…
89% × 59% = 52%… A far cry from the oft claimed 97% consensus.
Based on BAMS definition, global warming is happening. So, I would be among the 89% who answered “yes” to question #1 and among the 5% who said the cause was mostly natural.
When self-described “climate scientists” and meteorologists/atmospheric scientists are segregated the results become even more interesting…
Only 45% of meteorologists and atmospheric scientists endorse the so-called consensus. When compared to the 2009, American Geophysical Union survey, the collapsing paradigm sticks out like a polar vortex…
In reality, about half of relevant scientists would probably agree that humans have been responsible for >50% of recent climate changes. And there might even be a 97% consensus that human activities have contributed to recent climate changes.
However, there really isn’t any scientific consensus if it is defined this way:
So… Why is there such an obsession with a 97% consensus? My guess is that it is to enable such demagoguery.
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Excellent article! Permission to repost?
Great article, David Middleton, and thank you very mu;ch.
I learned the geosyncline theory in geography lessons when I was thirteen. I didn’t find it at all convincing. Our geography teacher told us that some German guy had a theory about continental drift, and pointed out the fit between South America and Africa. He seemed to think there might be something in it, but I wasn’t convinced about that, either. This was 1959.
No. Sorry. It is unprecedented for me to entirely disagree with a post but this is simply wrong.
That is not what Kuhn meant by a paradigm shift. No Kuhnian paradigm shift is required to convince scientists of the falsity of most climate science.
At the very most, if there is a necessary paradigm shift, it is to make the majority of scientists brought up on the success of the linear models of the universe, to understand that the number of cases to which these apply in the real world are vanishingly small.
The problem is, in any case, not with science itself, but with non-scientific humans and their inability to grasp the metaphysics and the physics of science itself. They have to substitute understanding with belief. And belief is infinitely manipulable by the cynical.
What we see is not bad science driving political and economic decisions, but bad political and economic decisions driving science.
Personally I suspect that at some deep instinctive level, the population level of the world is invoking the sort of deep Trotsykite impulse to smash anything and everything and to revert to internecine warfare, which is probably a Darwinian mechanism that evolved aeons ago to deal with overpopulation.
Since everywhere I look I see rationalisation for hatred destruction and violence.
Climate-change-the-myth is not a scientific issue: It is part of a broader social, psychological and political issue that is probably the most dominant and crucial issue of the early 21st century. And that issue is the death of democracy and the so called working class engendered by the success of capital and technology in eliminating the need for Labour. Sure people have the vote, but the whole thrust of those who have the power is to make that vote meaningless. by both manipulating the perceptions of the population via mass media, and by subverting the political organisations so hat in t he end the unelected dominate the elected, and are all talking the same narrative.
That is a process that really started with the rise of Marxism in the early 20th century, and morphed into a huge exercise in deep propaganda, post WWII. Today the truth is politically irrelevant: all that counts is what people believe, and manipulating that belief is the fully paid job of the serried ranks of the professional ‘communicators’.
If you want a paradigm shift, it is to understand that the truth has all but vanished in society, and has never featured in any great way: That of and by itself is not always a huge problem – the right things can still happen for the wrong reasons – but today we are at an existential crisis point, and the wrong reasons are almost directly opposed to the Darwinian imperative of actual existential survival of cultures, nations and peoples.
Climate changers are not just wrong, they are really dangerous. And that is the story of just about every other modern social and political ‘progressive’ impulse today.
In their haste to sweep away the old and let the true glorious triumph of human nature that they feel must happen out of near anarchy, the Left is destroying all the conventions that bind cultures together, and the pessimistic view is that instead of Glorious Revolution to a bright new future, what will result is bloody destruction. Instead of freedom, enslavement to whatever ideology holds the most AK47s. Until the ammunition runs out, and the technology to produce more has be smashed by the Green Luddite tendency.
In the modern narrative, civilisation itself is an evil to be eradicated: And a return to a life that is ‘Nasty, brutish, and short’ – but ‘much more natural‘ is what is being engineered.
We are at war, but we are not yet sure quite who the enemy is..
Now THAT was a really good rant! VERY succinct and perceptive in my view.
What we see is not bad science driving political and economic decisions, but bad political and economic decisions driving science.”
Interesting how people here come to the same basic conclusions, starting with very different world views. To me, this nonsense started with the overpopulation movement – where things like genocide of entire peoples (for example, withholding food aid from places like India and Egypt and letting millions intentionally starve) was openly discussed in the 60s and into the 70s – very brazenly stated – to global cooling, global warming , and now “climate change” – the same movement for at least the last 50 years, just more and more devious w/r/t their underlying intentions, as time has gone on. The underlying principals are always the same – significantly increased governmental control in the developed countries, ‘cuz “they” know best and YOU don’t, coupled with significant population reductions in the 3rd world.
Dig into it, and some of the same ghouls – Ehrlich and Holdren are two perfect examples – are involved in all this for decades. You are right – the truth is optional, the ends justify the means, and it isn’t “scientific” in any meaningful way. I don’t throw around the term “evil” often, but this just might apply.
+googol.
That’s the second I’ve given on this discussion. Plainly I’m struggling to express the intensity of my appreciation for the comments.
Leo Smith,
You echo my concerns. It’s hard for a lot of people to understand why this is happening.
Of course, a big part of the reason is that the ignoratii are being directed toward anarchy. TPTB [the powers that be] seem to want anarchy. I suspect they intend to pick up the pieces.
In the U.S. it would be easy. As the American Patrick Henry warned us at the Constitutional Convention:
This Constitution is said to have beautiful features, but … Your President may easily become King. Your Senate is so imperfectly constructed that your dearest rights may be sacrificed by what may be a small minority, and a very small minority may continue forever unchangeably this Government, although horridly defective.
Where are your checks in this Government? Your strong holds will be in the hands of your enemies. It is on a supposition that our American Governors shall be honest, that all the good qualities of this Government are founded.
But its defective, and imperfect construction, puts it in their power to perpetrate the worst of mischiefs, should they be bad men.
And, Sir, would not all the world, from the Eastern to the Western hemisphere, blame our distracted folly in resting our rights upon the contingency of our rulers being good or bad? Shew me that age and country where the rights and liberties of the people were placed on the sole chance of their rulers being good men, without a consequent loss of liberty? I say that the loss of that dearest privilege has ever followed with absolute certainty, every such mad attempt.
If your American chief, be a man of ambition, and abilities, how easy is it for him to render himself absolute? The army is in his hands, and, if he be a man of address, it will be attached to him. And it will be the subject of long meditation with him to seize the first auspicious moment to accomplish his design.
And, Sir, will the American spirit solely relieve you when this happens? I would rather infinitely, and I am sure most of this Convention are of the same opinion, have a King, Lords, and Commons, than a Government so replete with such insupportable evils.
If we make a King, we may prescribe the rules by which he shall rule his people, and interpose such checks as shall prevent him from infringing them. But the President, in the field, at the head of his army, can prescribe the terms on which he shall reign master, so far that it will puzzle any American ever to get his neck from under the galling yoke.
I cannot with patience, think of this idea. If ever he violates the laws, one of two things will happen: He shall come at the head of his army to carry every thing before him. Or, he will give bail, or do what Mr. Chief Justice will order him.
If he be guilty, will not the recollection of his crimes teach him to make one bold push for the American throne? Will not the immense difference between being master of every thing, and being ignominiously tried and punished, powerfully excite him to make this bold push? But, Sir, where is the existing force to punish him? Can he not at the head of his army beat down every opposition?
Away with your President, we shall have a King. The army will salute him Monarch. Your militia will leave you, and assist in making him King, and fight against you. And what have you to oppose this force? What will then become of you and your rights? Will not absolute despotism ensue? [source]
I’m no smarter than the average person, and if I can think of this happening, certainly people like Obama and Ban Ki Moon can, too. As I tell my friends: stop listening to what they say! Watch what they do, instead. Their actions give them away.
So at the risk of being labeled a ‘conspiracy theorist’ [and not for the first time], I suspect that there are people deliberately fanning the flames of the eco-movement, of ‘racism’, and of class warfare in general.
There is no credible science behind the man-made global warming [MMGW] narrative, and I believe that everything happens for a reason. Draw your own conclusions; I have already drawn mine.
What puzzles me is that scientists have determined that about 95% of the atmospheric greenhouse heat effect (GHE) is attributed to water in the atmosphere, and that the remaining 5% of the GHE is attributed to the greenhouse trace gases of which CO2 represents about 72%, meaning 3.6% (72% x 5%) of the GHE is attributed to CO2 in the atmosphere.
What stuns me is the IPCC AR4 (2007) asserted that only 3% of the CO2 entering the atmosphere is from human activity. So assuming, today, 3% of the CO2 causing warming is from humans, it means only 0.11 of 1% (3% x 3.6%) of the GHE in the atmosphere is attributed to human activity CO2.
And the United Nations wants to destroy the fossil fuel energy system over this trivial human contribution of 0.11 of 1% to the GHE? Has the world gone mad?
Yes, yes it has gone mad.
Why be puzzled? If you ever supply direct links to the IPCC AR4 to moonbats as supporting evidence I guarantee you that they will change the subject to tobacco or Fred Singer honorariums or tell you that your excessive use of capitalization is a proven indication of low intelligence.
They will claim that ALL of the CO2 above ~350ppm is because of human activity. That the tiny 3% “extra” is simply “too much” for nature to handle it so it lingers in the atmosphere building up year after year hanging over our heads like the Sword of Damocles. That is the sophistry they use to then claim that ALL of the additional 50 ppm CO2 is from humans. Taken together with the lie that no warming would have happened if CO2 had stayed at 350ppm, human CO2 is therefore 100% responsible for all the warming. And no they are not required to discuss water vapor because no leftist media outlet has ever mentioned it and therefore it does not exist.
If we could just get the media on our side, and educate the deniers, then we should be able to reach 98% consensus. 😉
* “Immediate, deep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are necessary in order to stave off catastrophic climate change.”
I think that should be broken out. The idea that getting warmer is “bad” is an absolutely essential element of the paradigm all by itself. If people perceived that warming is better for life the entire paradigm would evaporate faster than Henry Waxman’s ice at the north pole.
Yes. The underlying presumption that warming is bad goes against all historical evidence.
“Why is the paradigm collapsing?”
I would add
– The accumulating recognition of homeostatic mechanisms operating within the climate, as e.g., here.
David
Thanks for an excellent article, from a fellow APEGA member.
Roger Dueck
wow, so bad I dont know where to begin.
Let’s start with a misindentification of the “paradigm”
The SCIENTIFIC paradigm is:
A) Human activities, primarily carbon dioxide emissions, have been the primary cause of the observed global warming over the past 50 to 150 years. ( 95 % certain)
B) The climate sensitivity to a doubling of pre-industrial carbon dioxide concentration “is likely to be in the range of 2 to 4.5°C with a best estimate of about 3°C, and is very unlikely to be less than 1.5°C,” possibly even much higher than 4.5°C.
####################################
Everything else
Anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions are causing the atmospheric concentration to rise at a dangerously rapid pace to levels not seen in 100’s of thousands to millions of years.
Immediate, deep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are necessary in order to stave off catastrophic climate change.
The scientific consensus regarding this paradigm is overwhelming (~97%).
is Not part of the core climate science.
1. Anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions are causing the atmospheric concentration to rise at a dangerously rapid pace to levels not seen in 100’s of thousands to millions of years.
The key here is the word dangerous. That is value judgement. Further, It doesnt matter what past concentrations were. The key beliefs are foreward looking. Erase the paleo record and you lose nothing
of the core science
2.Immediate, deep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are necessary in order to stave off catastrophic climate change. This is climate ECONOMICS. While I believe in the science I think the economic projections are dubious at best.
3 The scientific consensus regarding this paradigm is overwhelming (~97%).
This is not a part of the science paradigm, it is part of the PUBLIC RELATIONS strategy.
4. The atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration had stabilized between 270 and 280 ppmv early in the Holocene and had remained in that range prior to the mid-19th century when fossil fuels became the primary energy source of the Industrial Revolution.
This a peripheral component of the science. See above A and B. All you NEED is A and B.
everything else is unnecessary. nice to have, but not core.
###################################
so the first mistake you make is mis identifying the CORE science that would have to be replaced by a
new paradigm. The SCIENCE of C02 doesnt care about consensus. One man in 1896 knew about the
change c02 would bring. He didnt need any paleo to see this. Didnt need any record of past c02.
didnt need any economic predictions. He just needed physics.
To replace the old paradigm you will need to attack the CORE, you need to attack A & B
To attack A, its not enough to move the contribution of man from > 50% to less than 50%.
That is a minor adjustment. To get rid of the paradigm you have to show NO human effect.
To attack B its not enough to move the lower bound of sensitivity. Saying sensitivity to C02 is
.4 C as opposed the 3C, STILL OPERATES WITHIN the paradigm. To attack this, you have to
do something like Willis. he attacks the very NOTION of sensitivity.
In short, the AGW paradigm is flexible as a science. What is inflexible is the combination of that
science with economics and PR. You dont change a paradigm by attacking peripheral components.
That’s why your nobel prize awaits you if you can attack A or B in a fundamental manner.
Shifting values is not fundamental.
“you need to attack A & B” Not true if warmer is better. Just replace “catastrophic” with a word like “blessed” or “glorious” and we’re done!
“The SCIENCE of C02 doesnt care about consensus. One man in 1896 knew about the
change c02 would bring. He didnt need any paleo to see this. Didnt need any record of past c02.
didnt need any economic predictions. He just needed physics.”
Steve…
The physics are fine as far as radiative forcing is concerned, but not the climate.
The Earth is just a bit more complex than a jar of air.
The “paleo” is essential in understanding how CO2 and the climate were behaving prior to anthropogenic effects.
As far as the definition of the paradigm goes… What, exactly, is it?
If it is simply: Air + CO2 = an un-quantifiable increase in the Earth’s average surface temperature relative to what it would be doing without human input over an unknowable period of time, it’s not much of a paradigm or a scientific theory.
Is this the paradigm?
Human‐Induced Climate Change Requires Urgent Action
Humanity is the major influence on the global climate change observed over the past 50 years. Rapid societal responses can significantly lessen negative outcomes. Human activities are changing Earth’s climate. At the global level, atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide and other heat‐trapping greenhouse gases have increased sharply since the Industrial Revolution. Fossil fuel burning dominates this increase. Human‐caused increases in greenhouse gases are responsible for most of the observed global average surface warming of roughly 0.8°C (1.5°F) over the past 140 years. Because natural processes cannot quickly remove some of these gases (notably carbon dioxide) from the atmosphere, our past, present, and future emissions will influence the climate system for millennia.
Extensive, independent observations confirm the reality of global warming. These observations show large‐scale increases in air and sea temperatures, sea level, and atmospheric water vapor; they document decreases in the extent of mountain glaciers, snow cover, permafrost, and Arctic sea ice. These changes are broadly consistent with long‐ understood physics and predictions of how the climate system is expected to respond to human‐caused increases in greenhouse gases. The changes are inconsistent with explanations of climate change that rely on known natural influences.
Climate models predict that global temperatures will continue to rise, with the amount of warming primarily determined by the level of emissions. Higher emissions of greenhouse gases will lead to larger warming, and greater risks to society and ecosystems. Some additional warming is unavoidable due to past emissions.
[…]
http://sciencepolicy.agu.org/files/2013/07/AGU-Climate-Change-Position-Statement_August-2013.pdf
Steven Mosher says:
The SCIENTIFIC paradigm is:
That’s the “scientific” NARRATIVE, promoted by the media and certain self-serving scientists and organizations.
Heck, maybe ‘narrative’ and ‘paradigm’ are the same thing. Or, maybe a narrative is the grub form of a paradigm.☺
It is helpful to understand why pure science puzzles (there are least five major text book changing scientific breakthroughs connected to the science at the heart of the climate wars, of greater importance than the discovery of tectonic plate movement) are not solved and more fun/interesting rather than to talk in generalizations (about why the puzzles are not solved and about the competing theories) to look at a specific example, to set specific objectives for the discussion of the specific example (i.e. discussions are more interesting when the competing theories are defined in a scientific manner and when the key observations/paradoxes/issues are summarized in a document so one can re-look at the summary, which support or do not support the competing theories.
After the first steps in a process, one can move on the practical implications (what will happen next) and policy implications if one or the other of the two theories are correct.
I have worked almost 20 years as a senior specialist in private industry. I help specialists solve problems. In private industry one gets paid and promoted for finding and solving problems, not for writing papers and attending conferences.
There is an optimized method to solving scientific problems. Private for profit scientific investigation has structure, it follows an optimized methodology. Anomalies/paradoxes are summarized in review papers and are never ignored. In private industry one is paid to come up with new theories (look outside the box) and to re-look at old abandoned theories. That structured approach and forced/encouraged looking out of the box, leads to breakthroughs and is the same logical approach one would use to investigate a crime or an airplane crash. In private industry we get excited when anomalies/paradoxes are found, as that indicates there are one or more errors in the base theory/theories. In private industry we specifically look for anomalies/paradoxes as that is an effective means to find a breakthrough.
In private industry a person would be fired, if they were caught hiding or ignoring an anomaly/paradox that disproved their theory or their favorite theory. In private industry, theory belongs to the team, not to the individual. In private industry the senior specialist(s) is paid to ensure analysis and research is without prejudice, to ensure anomalies and paradoxes are correctly labeled as such, to summarize the analysis so it can be understood by a non-specialist audience, to explain without bias what are the pros/cons of the different theories, what are the unresolved issues. These logical steps help to solve problems, lead to breakthroughs.
The suggested subject for structured analysis (to illustrate a practical structured analysis as opposed to an argument, debate, or simple name calling which goes in circles and may never move ahead.) is the Nobel Prize winning astrophysics Thomas Gold’s deep core, extruded super high pressure CH4 theory: (See Gold’s book ‘The Deep Hot Biosphere: The Myth of Fossil Fuels’, :published 1998 for details.)
Comment: The CH4 core hypothesis effects the climate war discussions in two ways. If it is correct, there is a much larger source of CH4 (‘natural’ gas is low C13) and hence CO2 (there is an entire deep earth biosphere which consumes a portion of the CH4 that is moving through the mantel, in the Continental crust) that is constantly moving into the biosphere which implies there is a much large sink of CO2 in the biosphere. The deep core CH4 hypothesis and modifications to the assumed carbon cycle explains Salby and Humlum’s paradoxes which indicate the majority of the recent increase in atmospheric CO2 is due to increases in planetary temperature rather than anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Secondly, the CH4 deep core hypothesis if correct indicates there are massive never to be used up deposits of CH4 (natural gas) which changes the preferred energy source for the future.
Gold in his book lists roughly 50 paradoxes/anomalies (there are at least 20 additional new observations/analysis results that support the deep CH4 core hypothesis and indicate that the late veneer comet theory is not correct) that logically supports the assertion that the source of the earth’s oceans and hydrocarbons on the surface of the planet is super, high pressure, liquid CH4 that extruded from the core of the earth as it solidifies. This super high pressure liquid CH4 (core pressure) breaks through the mantel and travels to the surface of the planet. As it travels, it picks up metals which explains why black coal and crude oil have heavy metals in them and why there are super concentrations of metals in the upper mantle. It also explains why the only commercial helium source is oil reservoirs. The movement of the high pressure CH4 liquid concentrates uranium and thorium which then decayed to produce helium. The super high pressure CH4 breaks the mantel to provide a path for the helium (which is a gas at all pressures in the earth) to rise up to the oil reservoir which the super high pressure CH4 is also the source of. The deep core CH4 theory explains why there is helium associated with oil deposits.
The transfer of core pressure by the super high pressure CH4 is the force that splits and moves the ocean floor underneath the continents. (The oldest ocean floor is 200 million years.) and is the force that breakups and lifts the continents.
Quoting from William Astley‘s comment at 10:42 AM on 19 March:
While I have not (yet) read Dr. Gold‘s book, I’ve had his theories in this area expounded to me by a number of popular writers.
I had also been informed by popular writers that those “super concentrations of metals in the upper mantel” had been the results of either hydrothermal/magmatic (could they be called “volcanic”?) processes or were astrobleme-related, possibly punched into the Earth’s crust by processes such as the late heavy bombardment.
But a helluva comment, and a great incentive to get off my duff and read Dr. Gold’s book.
While reading look up the expanding earth hypothesis, especially books by the late Sam Carey.
Dan Kurt
Very nice, but the weakness of the article is that it relies on Thomas Kuhn’s idea of a scientific paradigm, rather than on Karl Popper´s philosophy of science, ‘conjectures and refutations’; I think Kuhn’s model of paradigms is what is corrupting much climate research.
Erm, I’m not a mathematician, but if 97% of scientists are ‘warmists’ and the website Global Climate Petition Project shows over 31,000 named sceptical American scientists (one third PhDs), then the warmists must total over three million. Golly that’s many! Who polled them all and when?
I believe it was Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn who said: “One word of truth shall outweigh the world.” And he was right. Data trumps models and argument, always. The predictions of an incorrect theory will never come true, though it may take time for this to become manifest.
MJD, I agree, it will take time. This current paradigm is taking about as long to die as Peter Sellers in the opening scene of ‘The Party’. I suspect if it was mostly a within discipline shift (without the incredibly unfair onus of saving the grandkids) it would be much quicker … Tying the future of the planet to the issue (and a romantic return to hunter gatherer lifestyles) seems to have got a lot of people engaged and upset.
There is a quicker way, if within scientists were more aware of the reality that ‘science’ will be shaped socially and the broader public were similarly aware of the same, then the progression of this argument could be more critically received, Catastrophic > Alarming > Hiatis > Deep Ocean > EXTREME Weather etc.
It is a wonder how that realisation has not already come in the face of a barrage of ‘medical research’ backflips … We have changed our diet so much that the only hope is that variety is somehow beneficial.
Here is an emerging paradigm that requires much more funding to clarify and quantify:
The Danger Posed by Pickles
From a literary journal on dinosaurs, Univ of Chicago, 8 July 1979
+++++++
I spent the morning at the ROM going over files on the Lower Pleistocene Mammals of Ubeidiya (Jordan Valley) when I came across a light hearted journal that brought back a Proustian recollection of past Christmas dinners at my brother’s house and one of Cyrus’s main loves, pickles.
Here is the article:
Every pickle you eat brings you closer to death. Although leading horticulturalists have long known that cucumis sativus possesses an indehiscent pepo, the pickle industry continues to expand.
Pickles are associated with all major diseases of the body. Eating them breeds wars and Communism.
They can be related to most airline tragedies.
There exists a positive relationship between crime waves and consumption of this fruit of the cucurbit family.
1. Nearly all sick people have eaten pickles. The effects are obviously cumulative.
2. 99.9% of all people who die from cancer have eaten pickles.
3. 96.8% of Communist sympathizers have eaten pickles.
4. 99.7% of the people involved in air and auto accidents ate pickles within 14 days preceding the accident.
5. 93.1% of juvenile delinquents come from homes where pickles are served frequently.
6. All pickle eaters born between 1920 and 1930 have wrinkled skin, have lost most of their teeth, have brittle bones and failing eyesight—if the ills of eating pickles have not already caused their deaths.
Even more convincing is the report of a noted team of medical specialists; rats force-fed with 20 pounds of pickles per day for 30 days developed bulging abdomens. Their appetites for whole-some food were destroyed. In spite of all the evidence, pickle growers and packers continue to spread their evil. More than 120,000 acres of fertile U.S. soil are devoted to growing them. American per-capita consumption is nearly four pounds.
Best advice: eat orchid-petal soup. Practically no one has as many problems from eating orchid-petal soup as they do with eating pickles.
Can someone, among the mathgnoscenti here, help me out with this problem?
Mauna Loa’s CO2 curve, smoothed for seasons, seems to be nearly linearly rising. Arrhenius et seq, declared a logarithmic relation between CO2 concentration and temperature. Mann’s and “other independent scientists'” Hockey Stick iappears to be either an exponential or hyperbolic curve. Suppose we substitute CO2 in the x-axis for year, both are increasing linearly. The CO2 level didn’t start at 0 in 1900, it was over 250, so shouldn’t Mann et al’s curve shown a rise, but a diminishing rate of rise over time, rather than an increasing rate of rise over time (i.e. over CO2 rise in time), rather than an exponentially or hyperbolically increasing rate?
IPCC temperature projections to 2100 include an assumed feedback response over and above the known effect of CO2 alone (~+1C per doubling of concentration) due to increased water vapour, the most abundant ‘greenhouse’ gas in the atmosphere.
That enhanced ‘greenhouse’ effect should result in a ‘hot spot’ 9 – 12 kms over the tropics:
“The model runs shown in the above diagrams all suggest warming due to CO2 doubling to peak not at the surface in the tropics, but in the troposphere near the 200-300 hPa level, roughly corresponding to 12-9 km altitude. The main reason for the inter-model variation is that the amount of water vapour differs among the models. The expected warming above the tropics is 2-3 times larger than near the surface, regardless of the sensitivity of the particular model. This is, in fact, the very signature of greenhouse warming”:
http://www.climate4you.com/images/TempChangeWithAltitudeForCO2doubling.jpg
Go here:
http://www.climate4you.com/
I should add that no ‘hot spot’ has so far been detected.
This isn’t really true. As Isaac Held explained to me in a discussion here: http://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/blog/isaac-held/2011/12/07/20-the-moist-adiabat-and-tropical-warming/#comment-397 the picture goes something like this:
(1) There are two feedbacks of interest here, the water vapor feedback, which magnifies global warming, and the lapse rate feedback that reduces it.
(2) Overall, the water vapor feedback is predicted by the models to be larger than the lapse rate feedback and hence their net effect is to magnify the warming due to other effects such as CO2.
(3) However, a lot of the water vapor feedback would happen even if the troposphere warmed uniformly. By contrast, the lapse rate feedback is completely dependent on this predicted “hot spot” in the tropical atmosphere.
(4) The net effect of this is that the additional effect of the atmosphere not warming uniformly, i.e., of their being a hotspot is a REDUCTION in warming. Or, to put it another way, if you compare an atmosphere that warms uniformly to one that warms with the predicted “hot spot”, the negative feedback due to the lapse rate feedback is larger in magnitude than the additional positive water vapor feedback you get with this hot spot.
So, at least, at the most basic level, an atmosphere that warmed without the hot spot should show a larger climate sensitivity than one that has such a hot spot.
It is also worth noting that the claim of the lack of a hot spot in the data is not robust: There is clearly the predicted hot spot for temperature fluctuations on, say, time scales of about a year (due to ENSO oscillations, for example). For the long term multidecadal warming presumably due to the greenhouse effect, the data (both satellite and radiosonde) vary considerably from one analysis of the data to another. The overall impression from the data seems to be that the hot spot might be missing or smaller than predicted, but given that this long-term trend in the data is the one most susceptible to artifacts, it is really hard to conclude much from that data and it is also hard to come up with mechanisms whereby the atmosphere would match the model predictions of a hot spot for the fluctuations (where they data is very reliable) but would not match the model predictions of a hot spot for the multidecadal trends (where the data is most susceptible to artifacts that contaminate what they call the “secular trend”). This is why many find the claims of the lack of a hot spot based on the data to be suspect.
Hence… Mann-made global warming… 🙂
Schoolsie,
Your assertion that “Mauna Loa’s CO2 curve, smoothed for seasons, seems to be nearly linearly rising” is not correct. A more careful analysis shows that it is indeed curving upward, with the rate of growth of CO2 more than twice as large in the 2000-2010 decade than it was in the 1960s. See here: http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/ , especially the one titled Annual Mean Growth Rate for Mauna Loa, Hawaii.
Science is about identifying causes and effects.
Political science is about achieving ends, and the ends justify the means. Anything goes.
‘Climate science’, at least in terms a cAGW, should really be called ‘climate political science’.
What is the current paradigm?
You failed to mention that planting trees is not an allowable means of CO2 sequestration. This is very important.
The missing third question:
What personal qualifications inform your opinion?
Good article.
Leftists could not go on living if they didn’t have a “crisis” that will end life on Earth as we know it, unless everyone does as they say, without question.
.
Fluoride in water supply.
DDT.
Hole in the ozone layer.
Acid rain.
Global Warming.
Global Cooling.
Climate Change.
Vaccinations.
whatever !
.
When one boogeyman stops scaring people,
another one will be invented, as sure as Al Gore
invented the internet.
.
And of course the result of not doing what the
pesky leftists say is always the same:
Life on Earth will end as we know it !
.
How many decades of wrong predictions before
people stop listening?
.
What really bothers me is this fact:
When life on Earth does end as we know it,
how will we know if it was caused by fluoride,
the hole in the ozone layer, acid rain, global warming,
global cooling, climate change, vaccinations, or whatever?
.
The leftists have never ‘cancelled’ their ‘life will end’ warnings
for any of the boogeymen listed that I could recall since the 1960s
(there are many others) … so isn’t it a shame that we will all die
not knowing which boogeyman got us?
http://www.elOnionBloggle.blogspot.com
“The only climate blog with a centerfold”
Somebody really needs to get to National Public Radio. They keep harping AGW and it’s making them sound like bigger idiots every day. Stop pandering to the crunchymoms and try a little VERITAS already!
To quote: “Global warming did serve a couple of useful purposes. The issue has been a litmus test for our political class. Any politician who has stated a belief in global warming is either a cynical opportunist or an easily deluded fool. In neither case should that politician ever be taken seriously again. No excuses can be accepted.” Source and more at http://cleanenergypundit.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/global-warming-un-funnelled-from-famous.html