This essay covers the seven beliefs that are necessary for a Paris Protocol to make sense. The reader is invited to rate the probability of each belief being true. Using their probabilities the reader can then calculate their “Skeptic Score”.
The Kyoto Copenhagen Paris Paradigm
The Seven Beliefs Required for Acceptance of the Paris Protocol
Guest essay by David Swinehart
In 1997 a large number of countries meeting in Kyoto, Japan reached an agreement to reduce “greenhouse” gas emissions. The United States signed this agreement along with Australia, Canada, Japan and all of the European Union countries. The after mentioned countries ratified the treaty amongst others. The United States Senate, however, never ratified the treaty, and Canada has since withdrawn. With the treaty set to expire at the end of 2012, an attempt was made to negotiate a replacement in Copenhagen in 2009, but the parties failed to reach a legally binding agreement. In December 2015, another attempt will be made in Paris to negotiate a replacement to the, so called, Kyoto Protocol.
If the United States had ratified the Kyoto Protocol, the nation would have been required to reduce its total “greenhouse” gas (GHG) emissions by 6% from its 1990 level during the period 2008 to 2012. As of 2010 the United States had not reduced its total emissions, but rather had increased emissions by about 10% despite a rather large decrease in emissions per capita starting in 2007-2008 caused by the recession. Recent discussions about a new protocol are centered on major countries like the United States reducing total emissions 80% by the year 2050.
The impetus for a treaty to reduce “greenhouse” emissions was a set of beliefs, a paradigm, fostered and promoted by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). In this article, we will focus only on the essential beliefs, each of which is necessary, for a global treaty to reduce “greenhouse” gas emissions to be a reasonable course of action. Also, we will consider some of the objections to those Beliefs.
As an added bonus, you will have the opportunity to calculate your “Warmist Score”, or more accurately, your adherence to the “Paris Paradigm” (or lack thereof, your “Skeptic Score”).
The following is a set of Beliefs that are espoused by supporters of a Kyoto type treaty. It is also contended that every Belief is necessary and, taken together, sufficient for such a treaty to be acceptable, i.e. the failure of any one of these Beliefs would make such a treaty pointless, but on the contrary if all Beliefs are true, then a Kyoto type treaty would be prudent. Opinions vary and you may feel that one or more Beliefs are not necessary, or perhaps, you may feel that important elements have been omitted. In either case, you are encouraged to make comments.
The Paris Paradigm (a set of seven assertions all of which are necessary to justify a treaty)
1. Unprecedented global warming caused by humans both in rate and magnitude. Since 1850 due to mankind, the earth has warmed faster and to a higher temperature than at any other time in the last 1,000 years, if not longer.
- Accelerating warming. The rate of temperatures increase will accelerate resulting in the period from 1850 to 2100 having an increase in temperature from 2.0° to 4.5°C; or perhaps more.
- Very harmful. This warming has had a significant net harm to the world causing more deaths, economic loss, hurricanes, tornados, droughts, flooding, growth in deserts, increases in malaria, heart attacks, loss of food supply, forced human relocation, wars and deforestation among other harmful effects. The increase in the warming rate mentioned in Belief 2 will cause even greater harm to the world.
- CO2 to blame. The prime cause of all of this is CO2 emissions by humankind.
- Can be controlled. By reducing human emissions of GHG’s (primarily CO2) through a global treaty, warming and its bad effects can be avoided.
- Better than the alternative. The solution will be less harmful than doing nothing or any other proposed solution (adaption or geo-engineering).
- No cheaters. All major emitting countries and regions will comply with the treaty or if they do not, they can be forced into compliance.
What is your Skeptic Score?
To see where you fit on the Warmist/Skeptic scale, fill in the probability of each of the seven Beliefs being true on the blank lines provided in the following table, then multiply all of them together (Click here for a Discussion of Each Belief).
For example, if you were to estimate that each Belief has a 97% change of being correct, the product would be 0.97 multiplied seven times or approximately 0.81. Your Warmist Score would be 81% and you would be a true believer. Your Skeptic Score would be the additive inverse, i.e. 1.0 – 0.81 or 0.19 (19%). (Click here for Skeptic Score Explanation).
Table of Probabilities for the seven Beliefs:
____ Unprecedented global warming caused by humans
____ Accelerating warming
____ Very harmful
____ CO2 to blame
____ Can be controlled
____ Better than the alternative
____ No cheaters
====
____ Warmist Score (the product of the seven Beliefs). The Skeptic Score is 1.0 – the Warmist Score.
The Seven Beliefs
We will now discuss each of the seven underpinnings of the Paradigm and the reasons that might lead to doubts as to the accuracy of each one. The reader may evaluate the certitude of each assertion and arrive at his/her own probability as to its reliability. There is a place following the discussion of each Belief to write your subjective probability. You can then insert those probabilities into the seven Beliefs table.
1. Unprecedented global warming caused by humans both in rate and magnitude.
The warming since 1850 (165 years ago) is estimated by the Hadley Climate Research Unit to be about 0.79°C, a rate of 0.48°C per century. If this rate were to continue for the next 100 years (to the year 2115), the world would be 0.48 °C warmer than today. Since most of the world experiences a typical daily temperature variation of 6°C or more, this hardly seems threatening.
The key to this Belief is the phrase: “human caused”. If only half the rate is caused by humans, anthropogenic global warming (AGW) would be even less threatening.
But is it an unprecedented rate? Unfortunately, we do not have thermometer data going back 1,000 years, and multi-proxy data filters warming rates because of uncertainties in timing of the different proxies. IPCC uses global land and ocean thermometer data from the Hadley Climate Research Unit (HadCRU) going back to 1850. Using the latest HadCRUT data, the highest 25 year rate ended in March, 2007 with 2.15 °C per century warming rate (the 25 year rate has slowed since then).
However, Berkeley Earth has land only data going back to 1750 showing the period ending in September, 1782 to have the highest 25 year warming rate at 6.55 °C per century. Land data will have higher warming rates than the ocean, so those rates cannot be compared to combined land and sea data. However, it reasonable to assume that the highest 25 year warming rate for combined land and sea data, if it were available, would also end in September, 1782.
HadCRU also maintains the oldest thermometer database, which goes back to 1659. This database is only for Central England and therefore not global. Using yearly data only, the highest 25 year warming period ended in 1716 with a warming rate of 7.16 °C per century. Again, this would suggest the period ending in 1716 to have had the highest 25 year global warming rate.
Together, this makes it highly unlikely that since the year 1659 the highest 25 year global warming rate ended in March, 2007, and even less likely that the highest warming rate in the last 1,000 years ended in 2007.
Unprecedented magnitude? The problem with this argument is the well documented Medieval Warm Period (MWP) (~900 CE to 1300, estimates vary). If MWP was approximately as warm as, or warmer than the present, how can we be sure that the current warming was caused by humans? Of course, the MWP could be strictly due to natural causes and the present warming due strictly to human causes, but if the General Circulation Models (GCM) cannot be used to explain the MWP and the subsequent Little Ice Age (LIA, ~1400 to 1850) then the GCM’s yield a ‘one-off’ answer. They lack confirmation of a ‘control period’ for comparison. Hence, there is no confirmation of their reliability and no confirmation that humans are the cause of the current warming period (CWP).
But didn’t the IPCC deny that there was MWP? Yes, in its 2001 report, it did, but it has subsequently backed off. They made the contention despite over 100 papers confirming the MWP in the oceans as well as all the continents including Antarctica. These papers were authored by more than 800 scientists (see here). IPCC TAR (2001) featured a proxy series produced by Michael E. Mann, et al. (MBH99) which had no MWP or Little Ice Age (LIA). Using numerous proxy data sets, Mann constructed a graph purporting to show a “hockey stick” (uptick in temperatures) at the end of the 20th century. A version of “hockey stick” graph, though prominent in TAR, was conspicuously absent from the two subsequent assessment reports of 2007 and 2013.
The problems with the “hockey stick” are multifold. See discussion by Dr. Ross McKitrick here. It relied on the Sheep Mountain, bristlecone pine tree ring data from the Rocky Mountains. Without bristlecone data there is no “hockey stick” (see top of page 2 of the previous link) and, of course, a small area of the Rocky Mountains does not represent the entire earth.
But even when included, and through a statistical trick, weighting it many times more than other proxies, the composite series “rolls over” (a down tick in temperatures) after 1980 requiring the deletion (“hide the decline”) of the data past that point. See the discussion by Steve McIntyre here and the video by Prof. Richard Muller here. Also, see the updated (2009) Sheep Mountain data here. For a less technical review, see here.
Of course, there is nothing magical about 1,000 years. Other candidates for periods since the end of the last Ice Age (~10,000 BP) that are warmer than the present are: the Roman Warm Period (~2,100 BP), the Minoan Warm Period (~3,400 BP) and the Holocene Optimum(s) (intervals between ~9,000 and ~5,000 BP) (see comparison graph here). Indeed for the vast majority of time since life began to flourish in the Cambrian Age, the earth has been hotter than the present time.
Estimate your probability that Belief 1 is correct _______.
2. Accelerating warming?
IPCC produced a graph presumably showing global warming rates on the increase (see Figure 1). The graph uses a well known trick. In any length of a rugose (noisy in appearance) data set, one will encounter short portions steeper (flatter or of opposite sign) than the length as a whole. If the steeper portion happens to be at the end of the data set, it will appear that the rate of change is accelerating when it is just the rugosity of the data. For example, the HadCRUT4 data series ending June, 1913 had 50, 25 and 15 year cooling rates of -0.42, -0.83 and -1.70 °C per century respectively. There was no predictive power in observing that cooling rates were strengthening. In fact, the world warmed after that, to about the year 1940, when it began to cool again.
The warming rate since 1998 has been essentially flat, so IPCC has decided not to update their Figure 1 in their last report. Apparently a slowdown in the short term warming rate has no predictive power. Only increases in short term warming rates have predictive power.
Figure 1. Global Mean Temperature from the IPCC AR4. All periods end in 2005 (source here)
When comparing warming rates, the lengths of the data sets should be held equal to prevent the filtering effect of longer lengths. Considering all series of 25 year in 154 year record of HadCRUT4 data, the maximum rate of warming ended in the month of February, 2007. It has slowed down since then, and since 1998, whether using HadCRUT4, NOAA, NASA, BEST, UAH or RSS data, there has been little warming. RSS data even shows some cooling. In fact, Ross McKitrick has indicated in a 2014 paper (see here) that the data demonstrates a statistically “trendless interval of a 19 years duration at the end of the HadCRUT4 surface temperature series, and of 16 – 26 years in the lower troposphere [UAH and RSS]”. The HadCRUT4 data also shows the warming rate for the last half the twentieth century slowing down compared to the first half.
Trend calculations for rugose data have no predictive power. To make predictions, one needs a model. The GCM’s are not up to the task and the failures have been well documented. Knappenberger and Michaels have shown (see here) that an average of 108 models have over predicted the rate of warming every year for the last 16 years straight and “the observed rise is nearly 66 percent less than climate model projections.”
Regional estimates for the GCM’s are even worse. Dr. Roy Spencer posted a graph comparing climate models to observations (four balloon and two satellite data sets) for the Topical Mid-Troposphere (see Figure 2). Even the model with the least rate of warming is well over the observed rate (for a spaghetti plot of the same, see here).
Figure 2. Tropical Mid-Troposphere 20S-20N 73 CMIP-5 Models and Observations Linear Trend 1979-2012 (source here)
The failure here is especially damaging to AGW theory as positive feedback due to increases in water vapor should have been the strongest in the tropical upper troposphere. Its absence there removes the “heart” of positive feedback mechanism on which AGW theory relies.
CO2 was estimated to be about 285 ppm in 1850 using Law Dome data (see here) and about 400 ppm in 2014 using Mauna Loa Observatory data. This implies that we would be approximately 40% of the way to doubling it. We have warmed about 0.79 °C since 1850 according to HadCRUT4 data. At the present rate CO2 should double from 1850 levels in about the year 2100 (to make your own estimate NOAA data here) implying another 1.2 °C raise by then, if the effect of CO2 is linear. If the effect of CO2 is logarithmic, temperatures would raise only about another 0.8°C by 2100. In addition, the previous calculation assumes that all warming over the past 165 years was due to CO2. If that is not the case, the implied warming will be proportionally less.
Estimate your probability that Belief 2 is correct _______.
3. Very harmful.
The case that global warming has caused a net harm to the world is very hard to make. Since 1950, life expectancy worldwide at birth has risen from about 47 years to about 75 years (see here). There is approximately twice the number of deaths from excessive cold weather than excessive heat (see table 4 Cumulative U.S. Deaths here). The world per capita GDP grew from 884 dollars in 1870 to 7,814 dollars in 2010 (see Historical Statistics of the World Economy: 1-2008 AD, Maddison Project, Excel sheet here, website here). Increased temperature would reduce heating costs, but that would have only a trivial effect on GDP.
Food production per capita index has grown from about 78 in 1961 to about 105 in 2005 (see here). It is possible that the increase in temperature since 1961 has been partially responsible for increases in food production with an increase in the growing season length, but the temperature increase was so small as to have had little effect on this. The increase in atmospheric CO2 probably helped much more with agricultural production (see video here) than the small increase in temperature.
A much more important reason than temperature for the good numbers in life expectancy, GDP and food production is the use of fossil fuels to power transportation, electricity, farm and life saving equipment.
The IPCC warned of increased extreme weather events and increases in diseases such as malaria. However, there has been no trend in normalized hurricane damages, frequency of landfall or intensity since 1900 (see here). It has been over 9 years since the last major hurricane hit the USA on Oct. 24, 2005 (Wilma) – the longest spell on record without a major hurricane. Flooding has not increased in the United States over records of 85 to 127 years. There has been a decline in tornado devastation in the US, see here. Dr. David Legates testified: “…droughts in the United States are more frequent and more intense during colder periods.” AGU published a report: “Elevated carbon dioxide making arid regions greener” (also see video). Malaria – The World Health Organization said: “Increased prevention and control measures have led to a reduction in malaria mortality rates by 47% globally since 2000 and by 54% in the WHO African Region.” Worldwide death rates due to extreme weather have decline 97.9% since the 1920’s (see Figure 3).
Figure 3. Global Death and Death Rates Due to Extreme Weather Events, 1900-2008 (source here)
If the increased global temperature had the potential of hurting us in some way, we are doing an excellent job of adaption and hiding any negative effects.
Estimate your probability that Belief 3 is correct _______.
4. CO2 to blame.
The Treaty’s solution to the “problem” does not include any other aspect than to limit GHG’s primarily from the reduction of CO2 from fossil fuel use. If the AGW is due to land use changes, changes in aerosols or changes in stratospheric ozone, by ignoring these, the treaty will fail to accomplish its goal. Likewise, if natural causes such as galactic cosmic rays, ocean turnover (AMO, PDO, etc.), and chaotic variations in cloud cover, etc., are important, the treaty will be ineffectual.
Methane is also a GHG, but has a small effect in relation to CO2, because of its minuscule amount in the atmosphere, and IPCC has been particularly poor at predicting its growth (see Figure 4). General Circulation Models using the IPCC predicted methane growth will over estimate global warming.
Figure 4. IPCC Modeled Grow in Methane vs. Observed (source here)
From 1010 to 1850 (which includes the MWP and LIA), CO2 levels varied by -5.6 to 4.3 from a mean value of 280.9 ppm according to Law Dome data. GCM’s which rely primarily on changes in CO2 have no chance of explaining the MWP or the LIA. Therefore, they lack important natural factors that influence the climate.
We have already seen some of the failures of the GCM’s with heavy reliance on CO2 to predict global average temperature and middle troposphere temperature (see discussion of Belief 2). They are also notably inaccurate in predicting regional temperature trends using CO2 (see Figure 5).
Figure 5. Modeled vs. Observed Global Surface Temperature Anomaly Trends. (Deg C/Year) 1880-2012. Map Contour Range = -0.025 to +0.025 Deg C/Year. Trend Maps Available from KNMI Climate Explorer (source here)
If the warming since 1850, or more importantly any future warming, it is caused mostly by natural variation or human causes other than GHG’s, then the treaty’s solution will not work.
Estimate your probability that Belief 4 is correct _______.
5. Can be controlled.
The contemplated treaty would regulate greenhouse gas emissions, mostly CO2 emissions. Here we will assume Belief 4 to be correct (that CO2 is the primary cause of warming) and also that there will be substantial compliance with the treaty (see Belief 7).
If this is the case, how long will it take a treaty to change atmospheric CO2 content? Humans are not the only contributor to CO2 in the atmosphere (nor the primary contributor, nor is CO2 the primary greenhouse gas (see Figures 6a and 6b). Antarctic ice cores would suggest that CO2 levels were rather constant until the 20th century, but plant stomata reconstructions suggest otherwise (see here and here) and 19th century laboratory measurements are highly varied (see here).
Figure 6a. CO2 Origins (source here) Figure 6b. Greenhouse Effect Based on Gas Concentrations and Adjusted for Heat Retention Characteristics (source here)
Some people estimate that we are already past a “tipping point”. If that is the case, wouldn’t it be better to concentrate our efforts on adaption?
If major CO2 producers (China, United States, India or Russia) or regions with high population grow (Africa or South America) do not enter into the Treaty, it is likely the CO2 reduced in those participating countries will just be offset by increases in the non-participating countries especially CO2 associated with manufacturing.
The question then becomes: can a treaty limit CO2 emissions and if so, will controlling CO2 emissions by a treaty control global temperatures?
Estimate your probability that Belief 5 is correct _______.
6. Better than the alternative.
The “0.8°C warming since 1880 is moderate, non-alarming, and coincides with dramatic improvements in life expectancy, health, and per capita income, and dramatic reductions in mortality related to extreme weather” (see here and Figure 7).
Figure 7. Global Progress, 1 A.D.-2009 A.D. (as indicated by trends in word population, gross domestic product per capita, life expectancy, and carbon dioxide [CO2] emissions from fossil fuels) (source here)
By estimates (based on IPCC accepted data), it is 50 times more costly to reduce CO2 emissions than to adapt to global warming, see website here or the following video.
Dr. Richard Tol, lead author for several IPCC Assessment Reports including the last one, has estimated that up to a 1°C additional increase in global temperatures would be beneficial to the world economy and a 2°C increase would be neutral (see Figure 8).
Figure 8. Fourteen Estimates of the Global Economic Impact of Climate Change (source here)
At the same time that current technology such as windmills, solar panels and electric cars has been proven to be ineffective in reducing CO2, even when given large subsidies, and with European governments such as Germany and Spain abandoning these subsidies, it is contended that no future technology, such as CO2 capture or solar radiation management (see here) will be feasible in the next 50 to 100 years. It is also contended that there is a “moral hazard” to such solutions at the same time ignoring any moral hazard in the fact that “[a]round 1.2 billion people worldwide—roughly the population of India—are still living without access to electricity with most concentrated in Africa and Asia. Another 2.8 billion rely on wood or other biomass for cooking and heating, resulting in indoor and outdoor air pollution attributable for 4.3 million deaths each year”. (From the World Bank, see here).
Estimate your probability that Belief 6 is correct _______.
7. No cheaters.
Canada and Australia have backed away from capping CO2 emissions, and even Germany recently abandoned its stringent targets for reduction.
Currently, China is the leading emitter of CO2 followed by the United States (see Figure 9). India is currently in third place, but both India and China have higher growth rates of emissions than the United States. Russia’s emissions are close to those of India.
Figure 9. 2008 Global CO2 Emissions from Fossil Fuel Combustion and some Industrial Processes (source here)
President Obama has negotiated an agreement with China in which China will aim to cap its CO2 emission by around 2030 if allowed to continue with its emissions growth until then, if in return the United States will cut its emission by more than a quarter by 2025 (see here). India, with half of its population without access to electricity, was not willing to agree even to the generous terms offered to China when Obama recently visited there.
The continent of Africa with the highest population growth in the world suffers the same lack of electricity as India, and South America, also with a high population growth, is only somewhat better off. Countries such as Brazil and Peru, currently with rather low CO2 emissions per capita have very strong growth rates in CO2 emissions (see more here).
The question is: can we rely on countries such as China, Russia, and African and South American autocracies to adhere to their commitments?
Estimate your probability that Belief 7 is correct _______.
Your Skeptic Score
As you may have guessed, your Warmist Score roughly corresponds to your estimate of the probability that a Kyoto type treaty is a good idea. A score of 0.00 makes you a skeptic’s skeptic and 1.00 makes you a believer’s believer.
Note: if you feel that anyone of the listed Beliefs is not necessary to support a treaty, simply assign a value of 1.00 to that Belief. That will effectively remove it from consideration.
Note for the statistically literate: You may not feel that every one of the Beliefs is independent of the other. If you do, feel free to use Bayesian inference to update your probabilities.
For the rest of us, if A and B are related, so that if A happens, B is more likely to happen, then the probability of both happening is more likely than simply taking the product of probability A and probability B considered separately. Since we are dealing with subjective probabilities here, and human nature being what it is, one will most likely over estimate the probability of B, having been prejudiced by having already considered A and thereby compensate somewhat for non-independent probabilities.
In any event, the score is only a crude estimate of where you fall on the Warmist/Skeptic scale.
David Swinehart has a BS in physics and MS in geophysics and 45 years experience as an exploration (oil and gas) geophysicist. He is currently semiretired.
Question 4, CO2 to blame? Only makes sense for someone answers yes to the previous questions. And since I didn’t, the questionnaire is a bit meaningless.
Red Adair could do it, but he’s dead.
Plug volcanoes.
Joke.
“Red Adair could do it”
I think his method was to explosively blow out the flame before plugging.
My guess is that’s not a recommended procedure for a volcano, but I could be wrong?
They sometimes blow themselves out.
“They sometimes blow themselves out.”
And requiring a really big cork.
Maybe they should drop a nuke down one and see what happens.
Maybe that takes the pressure off for a few hundred years.
A Russian think tank strategist has suggested using geologic warfare against the US by setting off the Yellowstone Hot Spot supervolcano with a high-yield thermonuclear explosive. IMO, it wouldn’t work, but here is a jocular discussion of the possibility of nuking an ordinary volcano:
http://io9.com/5844668/what-would-really-happen-if-you-nuked-a-volcano
An untuned down, all up Tsar Bomba of 100 MT might do it, if the geologic conditions were remotely favorable, but it would have to be buried & precisely located.
How would the Russians smuggle such a behemoth, three-stage device (at least) into the country undetected, then put it in place secretly? ICBM or bomber-delivery wouldn’t work, even with penetrating warheads.
The Tsar Bomba as detonated yielded 50 to 58 MT.
If triggered, the effect of the Yellowstone will not only be local, but global. Hard, so the Russians will soon get a “refund” …
mikerestin: Dropping a nuke down a volcano did save the earth a while back when they were having trouble with a really big crack.
Sajsal,
I guess the Russian advocate of apocalyptic geologic warfare figures as long as it wipes out the USA but only musses up the hair of Russia, then it’s a good deal.
Mark,
Here’s the documentary on the event you describe:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crack_in_the_World
milodonharlani,
Well no. What I’m referring to, is that Yellowstone is the largest super volcano on Earth and when it erupts, we will get a ash cloud covering the whole world and it will remain there for some years. Yellowstone is not “dead”, we don’t know of that many eruptions in the past and how those were triggered, so nobody can tell when it is due again. When it erupts, it will become a very difficult situation and we can talk about “Global Change” for sure, as there will be not much of sunshine reaching places where the photosynthesis normally take place. Soon we will run out of food supplies … It will erupt sometime in the future, but hopefully not too soon … (San Andreas Fault is another location where bad stuff is going to happen in the future for sure …)
That’s my point about “refund” … Like peeing in the wind …
Was there not a few “scientists” that advocated drilling along the San Andreas fault and use ” strategically placed” nuclear devices to prevent the “Big One” not so long ago?
asybot,
That sounds very stupid, almost like trigging Yellowstone, but this is regional effect, not global.
What may happen in your example or as a result of a very large earthquake, is that the San Andrea Fault will crack open and pretty much of the landmass between the Pacific Ocean and the fault will slide into the water. There are quite a lot of people living in the region, so … The politicians of concern and responsibility, know this is a future event, but believes that there’s no sense dealing with it. I.e., when it happens, there are no time whatsoever for evacuation. It could be done as a precaution, but that’s very expensive … The same politicians are probably not around when it happens, so “that day, that sorrow” (not their problem …)
Check out the San Andrea Fault at Google Maps.
Regarding earthquakes in the area, check out the USGS site. Use settings Auto Update checked and “7 Days, All Magnitudes Worldwide”
As you may know, the San Andreas Fault consists of three segments where the Pacific Plate is sliding past the North American Plate. Point Reyes north of San Francisco used to be the western end of the Tehachapis, the range dividing the Central Valley of CA from the Los Angeles Basin. More likely than falling into the ocean is that in about 50 million years, a long island will lie off the coast of the Pacific NW & CA, consisting of Baja & everything north of it to Pt. Reyes but west of the fault. So there will be three times as much beach frontage for whatever creatures may then exist to enjoy.
While I recognize that polling the WUWT audience is not ‘science’, the questions posed force everyone (believers and non believers alike) to interrogate their own understanding of each link in the AGW ‘logic’ chain.
Most honest and informed people will arrive at the conclusion that the probabilities of modest increases in atmospheric CO2 (from all sources) causing any significant hazard are low indeed. The remainder of the people will either beg off that they are not informed well enough to even hazard a rough guess……. or they will blindly assert a high probability to AGW,as the ‘experts’ assert it’s true so it must be true!
Since number 3 is provably false, the only correct score is 0.00.
Anything else is an affront to science.
Number 3 is beyond debate. There is not one scintilla of scientific evidence showing increased extreme weather phenomena during the period in question and warming can be proven to be very beneficial to the global ecosystem, with very few local exceptions, to the exclusion of the null hypothesis.
Since this is another form of the Drake equation, it would be largely meaningless anyway, but with the inclusion of item 3, it becomes a litmus test for your knowledge of the state of the science. The warming to date cannot be proven to have caused any actual harm.
So, my equation looks like this;
1) 0.1 Unprecedented? Not likely. But also not known with any reasonable degree of certainty. I will assign this a 0.1 rather than 0.5.
2) 0.5 Accelerating? From what? The last 20 years rate? It wouldn’t take much to accomplish that. Anyway, there is no way for us to know. The science is not there yet. It is a proverbial coin flip, as far as our understanding allows us to assert.
3) 0.0 For the reasons listed above. Any other number here is unsupportable. Warming has not caused increased deaths. In fact, the opposite can be statistically proven to be true. Warming has not caused an increase in either drought, hurricane, tornadic, or any other extreme weather event. The correlation there is near zero. This has been shown, and the trend data in these events is not statistically different from zero. If its warming, and the trend in dangerous weather is zero, it can be said that we’ve proven the null hypothesis in this case. Further, we can prove that a warmer earth essentially dictates a larger temperate zone, indicating longer growing seasons, more food production and, therefore, a positive effect on economies. It is possible that any of these could be shown to be false in some locality, but then, we aren’t talking about local anthropogenic warming, are we?
4) 0.1 It has not been proven, to any reasonable degree, that our atmosphere operates in the same manner as the contents of a two litre bottle. CO2 to blame? Possibly. But not to the exclusion of a multitude of other, as of yet undefined, causes. 0.2 by itself. Anthropogenic only? What is the equilibrium rate of natural atmospheric CO2 emission? Absorption? What is the delta, given the current atmospheric and oceanic heat content? These are undefined at this time due to the limit of our scientific knowledge and data collection systems. Therefore, anthropogenic causality is, again, a coin flip at best. Therefore; 0.2 x 0.5 = 0.1
5) 0.01 What on earth gives anyone any kind of belief that we are in charge here? This is pure folly. Human’s can no more control the CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere than King Canute controlled the tide. We cannot even end slavery and torture on a worldwide basis, which are things we can control. How on Earth would we possibly control CO2 emissions, the vast majority of which occur naturally?
6) 0.5 Again; no way to know. I know what I suspect, but we don’t have a lab, we cannot conduct experiments, so it’s a coin flip which is the better ‘solution’. But then again, we don’t really seem to have a problem. What is the better solution to global economic prosperity? You wouldn’t attempt to solve that particular problem, so there is no ‘better solution’ in either case. Warming is good as far as the science tells us.
7) 0.001 Russia? China? India? Yeah, you can’t even stop the big players from cheating, let alone the multitude of rogue states and bad actors. Heck, I bet you couldn’t even slow Richard Branson down.
In conclusion; 0.1 x 0.5 x 0.1 x 0.01 x 0.5 x 0.001 is twenty five in a billion. Twenty five chances in a billion that the ‘consensus’ opinion on Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming is correct.
Oh, but I didn’t include item number three in that; 0.0. Zip, zero, nada. .000000025 X 0.0 is Zero. The belief that warming is bad and or dangerous, whether caused by man or not, is completely unsupported in the data at this time. We know that decreased heat content (cooling) is definitely bad for mankind and plant life. There may be some ‘optimum’, heat wise, but we have no scientifically supported definition of what that is. We only know that, as heat has increase, conditions improved.
Any other belief on this matter should be viewed as anti-scientific.
But; the data is incomplete at this time.
Because the probability of assertion 4 is zero, the rest don’t matter.
Proof has been hiding in plain sight that change to the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) does not cause climate change. The science is solid. Only existing data and the fundamental relation between physics and math are needed or used.
The proof and identification of the two factors that do cause climate change are at http://agwunveiled.blogspot.com .
You guys do realize that if the planets “average” temperature was 10 degrees warmer….
They would be complaining about the present ice age
Table of Probabilities for the seven Beliefs:
_.50___ Unprecedented global warming caused by humans
_.25___ Accelerating warming
_.50___ Very harmful
_.50___ CO2 to blame
_.05___ Can be controlled
_.25___ Better than the alternative
_.01___ No cheaters
My score 3.90625 E-6
Anthony, just a small pedantic quibble. Australia did sign the Kyoto protocol, but in December 2007, ten years after the original signatories. The conservative government in power from 1996 to 2007 had steadfastly refused to sign.
The US can only sign treaties with sovereign nation-states. Any other treaties are unconstitutional and thus illegal, and null and void.
Oops … wrong thread.
Just shows you what CO2 can do.
Hey!
You left out Montreal!
Wasn’t restricting CFCs responsible for “the pause” in Global Warming”?
Good point Gunga and don’t feel left out. But I believe that had more to do with the “Acid Rain” topic “du jour” in the seventies before Gore showed up with his sham. It could have been a starting point though. I remember all the pics of dying trees and lakes etc that in some cases were related to natural die-back of forests ( pine and spruce beetle come to mind) than emissions. Actually some of the “damage” shown were upstream (weather wise) from the plants that were supposed to “kill” the said landscape.
If I may be extra picky here … isn’t the rate of temperature the first derivative of temperature? And isn’t acceleration the second derivative? So isn’t an accelerating rate of temperature the third derivative, which is known as the impulse or jerk function (which I don’t think is the intended function)?
I believe it is more accurate to say “with respect to time, temperature will accelerate,” which yields the intended second derivative.
“…which is known as the impulse or jerk function”
Hey hey show some respect, he’s still POTUS for 2 more long years 🙂
That is right!
The office of the Preezy of the United Steezy demands respect.
Am I the first Prob = 1.0 or 100%?
No, just the bravest?
Didn’t need to read that to know I was 0 for warmist and 100 for skeptic
belief 1: 0% please IPCC read ice core reports they show very “inconvenient truth” to say it in gore terms
belief 2 21% now we have a pause but the end of the young dryas does teach us that global temperature can even rise or drop 7degrees C in a few years/decades. so i consider an acceleration can happen even with entirely natural forcings. therefore to give it 0% would be “denying the possibility”
..
belief 3 0% seen what history teaches us all civilizations in the past had their “most prosperous episode” at a warm optimum and declined when the temperature dropped so history proves us that a warmer world means a more thriving world
belief 4 0% i believe CO2 is not the anthropogenic factor CO2 does not alter heat balance if it traps radiation, it also does take longer to absorb radiation this would result in the fact that absolute maxima would drop and absolute minima would rise (real greenhouse effect) Changes in Albedo by land use, water use,… are more important anthropogenic factors that may explain part of the warming we see a different albedo alters the heat balance so if our activities do make the earth’s albedo factor go up then we effectivly contribute to the temperature rise but land use is not CO2 thus 0%
belief 5: 0% i think that we may have some controlling effect by changing how we use the land with patches of green in cities, more trees in streets, less intrusive urbanisation (thus creating urban regions with also green zones), adapting our water managment (rivers lakes,….) but “we control it by reducing C02 is not what will do it
bbelief 6 0% but just for the sake that some used fuels are not endless it is a good idea to start to look for alternative ways but once again that’s a complete other reason
belief 7: no cheaters? heil IPCC with their fourth reich sounds like climate-nazism instead of climate change i would rate that with the infinite biggest minus rate possible but for the sake of the poll i give it 0
total sceptical score: 97%
I suppose I don’t need a survey to know my score would be 0, as I don’t believe any of these items. As for compliance, exactly how would they enforce the treaty? Currently, there is no chance the U.S. Senate will ratify it, so citizens of the U.S. are off the hook anyway. I don’t see economic sanctions doing much, even if the U.S. did ratify the treaty and then violated it. Which countries want to do without U.S. business? Go to war? Yeah, right. To me, this treaty is mostly about posturing, and it would never be enforced. So again, there is no point in signing it or ratifying it. The danger I see will be the governments going dictator on everyone, in the old fashioned one man, one vote, one time regime. After that it is too late to go back, and I will feel sorry for the citizens of those countries that succeed in pulling this stunt.
Zero here.
As for unprecedented warming, here’s Frank Lansner’s Vostok chart.
http://www.rockyhigh66.org/stuff/vostok_temp_increases.png
So average is unpresidented, seems about right for the AGW crowd
Two. One-and-a-half, if halvsies are allowed.
Seven!? Nonsense. Only one belief is enough.
“Will I get more money from a nice scam if I can sell this turkey?”
Sheep Mountain is not in the Rocky Mountains. It’s in the White Mountains, a low precipitation range east of the Sierra Nevada straddling the Cali-Nevada border. There ARE bristlecone pines in the Rocky Mountains and growing on the higher mountains (2500+ m elevation) across Nevada and Utah’s basins-and-ranges . Alas, these trees, many over 2000 years old, were not subject to tree-ring analysis for MBH. As in, “we have a geographically large proxy for Western North America, we’re not just looking at rings from a few specimens from a single isolated location in Eastern California…the entire species range shows consistent tree-ring growth patterns.”
They didn’t do this examination and analysis. If climate-change research funding was objective, funding would be provided for this analysis to be undertaken, to get a “truer picture”. The UN, a political body, hired hacks to advance its political agenda. A political organization of third-rate minds was able to find and recruit third-rate minds who had science PhD’s (or were working on earning them) to do the third-rate political minds’ bidding. The third-rate political minds at the UN showcased the third-rate science hockey stick, as did the third-rate-mind politician Al Gore. Then they won a Nobel Peace Prize, a political award, which was decidedly not one of the Nobel science awards (Physiology or Medicine, Physics, Chemistry).
I thought Sheep Mtn was north east of Las Vegas, which would put it closer to the Nevada/Arizona border.
There’s a Sheep Mtn in Colorado as well, maybe he got confused?
1 0.0
2 0.0
3 0.0
4 0.001
5 0.0
6 0.0
7 0.0
Grand Total Skeptic Score 0.001
Well, I’m going to invent a “new math”: that is, I believe every one of these propositions is -100% probable; that is, I think every one of them is not only bullshit, but an affront to rational thought. So, what is my “skeptic score”? Someone, please do the math.
You probably just invented Dark Probability (… or did you?).
The OISM Petition helped sink the first Kyoto Protocol. I see no difference this time. CO2 is still completely harmless, and it is beneficial to the biosphere. Therefore, the U.S. should decisively reject Kyoto II.
I would like to thank every commenter. Your comments have been most enlightening and entertaining. I would especially like to thank the warmists and lukewarmers. I have learned from your comments.
In response, I have the following explanations.
1. “One cannot do science by polling!” Excellent point! I am in total agreement. But please note: this is not a poll, survey or anything resembling those. No data was collected nor was data collection ever intended. This was simple an exercise, for those wishing to participate, in self enlightenment.
2. “Why the product? Why not an average for example[?]” Great question! If you want the probability of flipping seven heads in a row, you multiply 0.5 seven times. That is probability theory. There is no choice. Your score was intended to reflect you ‘subjective’ probability that a Paris Treaty would be a good idea. It was contended that each Belief is necessary. Of course, you are free to say some are not necessary or even all are not necessary. But to the extent that the Beliefs are necessary multiplication is needed.
3. “…there is no theoretical justification for multiplying those probabilities. Probabilities only multiply for independent events.” Valid point! In such cases, Bayesian analysis is used (see note at the end of the essay), but after two variables it becomes rather complicated. An alternative approach is to calculate the most optimistic (from the warmist point of view) probability. For instance, when calculating #2, I simply assumed #1 to be true. If you do that for all Beliefs (assuming all previous Beliefs are true), then you will come up with an upper bound for your “Warmist Score”. If the reader is interested, I suggest putting on your hottest Warmist hat and redoing your probabilities using this approach. Become very much a believer for every point and refrain from using zero for any Belief and even assign 1.0 to some. You may find it enlightening.
BTW, I did not judge any Belief to be zero. #3 ”Very harmful” was my lowest. I certainly agree that the evidence shows no indication that past warming has had any NET negative effect. Never-the-less, some might argue that things would be even better if it had not warmed. I cannot absolutely prove them wrong. Therefore, I had to give some consideration to the point. Also, I cannot prove that accelerated warming (remember that for evaluating #3, I’m assuming #2 to be true) might not be harmful in the future. My highest rated probability was #7 “No cheaters”. Here again I assumed that every major country would join the treaty and that pressure could be brought on China to adhere to it when rating #7.
David Swinehart
I scored 0.0000000
People routinely tell me, “Max, you are a total zero.”
[Shows you what they know. All of the E-M values regularly cross their respective zero. Before they fall to a record low, but then rise again to their maximum. .mod]