Guest essay by Eric Worrall
One Nation Federal Senator and hardcore climate skeptic Malcolm Roberts, who recently skewered TV Physicist Brian Cox on national TV, has demanded the Australian Chief Scientist provide evidence that humans cause climate change. The response so far is less than confident.
One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts asks chief scientist for proof humans cause climate change
One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts is yet to be convinced that climate change is real and is caused by humans.
He has asked chief scientist Dr Alan Finkel to spell out his logic in asserting that human-induced carbon emissions have been rising since the start of the Industrial Age, that this causes global warming and that warming produces climate change.
Senator Roberts told a Senate committee on Thursday his requested summary of the logic and the empirical evidence behind climate change did not need to be long.
“Like me – short and simple,” he said.
…
It had also been established that atmospheric CO₂ levels had been rising measurably from human activity since the start of the Industrial Age and that global temperature was rising.
The effect of warming on climate wasn’t clear.
“We have models to try to predict what that will be and that’s difficult,” Dr Finkel said, adding that models did predict significant climate change.
…
I suspect this challenge is going to get very uncomfortable for Australia’s chief scientist.
Malcolm Roberts, a qualified and highly experienced mining engineer, is one of the few elected Australian politicians with the skill and meticulous attention to detail required to dissect anything the bureaucrats who run government science organisations can throw at him.
His demand for proof that humans cause warming has struck at the weak point of the entire AGW scare campaign – because there isn’t any proof available to provide. Just a load of conjecture, based on a weak set of models which don’t work very well.
Most people agree that adding CO2, considered in isolation, should produce a mild warming effect. But the entire climate scare campaign is based on models which assume that the initial warming effect from anthropogenic CO2 is dramatically amplified by feedback, by climatic responses to the initial warming.
The problem is there is no evidence this amplification is actually occurring – models which assume amplification perform woefully when compared to real world observations, far worse than models which assume no amplification, or very little amplification.
I think it is a fair bet that the Roberts challenge to the Australian scientific community is going to be very interesting to watch. They government scientists cannot simply ignore Roberts. The current Aussie government almost lost the last election, so they desperately need the continued support of Roberts and other small party and independent senators to maintain control.
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Reblogged this on Climatism and commented:
WATCH THIS SPACE! Senator Malcolm Roberts challenging Australia’s premiere science body – the warmist CSIRO – to provide proof that human CO2 emissions cause “global warming.” At present, NO empirical evidence exists. Only predictive models that, currently, do not observe reality.
At last, an “Australian politician with the skill and meticulous attention to detail required to dissect anything the bureaucrats who run government science organisations can throw at him.
“His demand for proof that humans cause warming has struck at the weak point of the entire AGW scare campaign – because *there isn’t any proof available to provide. Just a load of conjecture, based on a weak set of models which don’t work very well.*
“Most people agree that adding CO2, considered in isolation, should produce a mild warming effect. But the entire climate scare campaign is based on models which assume that the initial warming effect from anthropogenic CO2 is dramatically amplified by feedback, by climatic responses to the initial warming.”
One point that still bugs me. Sorry I don’t have all the references to hand, but doesn’t the official “97% Consensus” as explained by the IPCC say that the man made warming started in 1950? I know there are more recent papers that try to say it started during the beginning of the “Industrial Revolution”. I know that the activists like to say that because it fits in with their obsession with dismantling western civilization and returning to feudalism.
But why do those on the skeptic side concede the point? Why argue about something that is not remotely scientific, is not in the official IPCC position, is not in the “consensus” and literally makes about as much sense as the Flat Earth society?
I can see why the activists have a problem with the official IPCC position. If the “man made warming” started in 1950, what about the cooling in the 70s? How do you explain the warming trend in the 40s that is almost the same slope as the 90s? How do you explain the “pause”? How do you answer the objection that natural warming since the end of the Little Ice Age is responsible for most if not all of the modern warming? It makes very little sense even to someone who has the time and inclination to study it. That is because it is based on faulty science cobbled together to prove a faulty political point.
But I wish that those like Mr. Roberts who challenge the fakers would stick to the IPCC version of the man-made warming nonsense. It is much easier to refute. It makes no sense even to those who pretend to “believe” it.
You can pull out the widely published charts and papers that provide the underpinning of the models and show them to be absolute nonsense.
All the activists really have is the models. They are based on the same assumptions as the IPCC reports. There are no new models based on “warming since the Industrial Revolution”. They are based on warming since 1950. Without the dire predictions (projections? Guesses?) of the models they have no case.
No one mentions that we have already warmed .8c since the industrial revolution, which is past halfway for the 1.5c goal and almost halfway for the 2c. And the effects from that are?
Even the IPCC says that up to 1.8C rise is beneficial. After that they’re not sure.
“which is past halfway for the 1.5c goal and almost halfway for the 2c.”
As it’s never going to happen, the question is entirely irrelevant.
These might interest you.
285 papers from 60’s-80’s reveal global cooling ‘consensus’
http://notrickszone.com/2016/09/13/massive-cover-up-exposed-285-papers-from-1960s-80s-reveal-robust-global-cooling-scientific-consensus/#sthash.oupuECzs.dpbs
The ‘scientific consensus’ on global warming is a fabrication
http://theclimatescepticsparty.blogspot.ca/2016/09/the-so-called-global-warming-scientific.html
The Right Climate Stuff
http://www.therightclimatestuff.com/
Global Warming Debunked at Senate Hearing 3/26/13
Tropopause Rules : where AGW went wrong
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/12/12/tropopause-rules/
AGW climate model simulations inconsistent with observations
http://notrickszone.com/2016/10/13/scientists-climate-model-simulations-that-include-anthropogenic-forcing-are-not-compatible-with-observed-trends/
And for comic relief
GOP lawmaker tricks Obama’s climate advisor
http://www.climatedepot.com/2016/09/21/gop-lawmaker-tricks-obamas-climate-adviser-with-arctic-melting-article-from-1922/
It isn’t as if there is no conversation aside from here or at JoNova
FB Group : Destroying the Greenhouse Effect
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1018871188127092/
Global Warming Petition Project
http://www.petitionproject.org/
I had some thoughts on the ‘consensus’ but am rather sure they were filtered out by the spam filter. Way too many links. You could check the sidebar at oldephartte.blogspot.ca and get some of my notes there.
Look at the basic assumption of the alarmists.
Namely that all increases in temperature are man made. It’s a whopping assumption.
They need to be able to extract out the natural change first, but they don’t. They make the null hypothesis that there is no change.
It’s that lack of proof of the null hypothesis, certainly over the short to medium term, that’s the issue and the cause of their inability to forecast in advance.
The normal talking point: “It had also been established that atmospheric CO₂ levels had been rising measurably from human activity since the start of the Industrial Age”
You could even question if the rise in CO2 is caused by humans. Yes we have put a lot of CO2 in the air, but only half of this gives a rising level, and natural processes exhale and sink a 20 fold amount. A little unbalance in these sources and sinks would override any human source.
Look at the yearly variation in CO2 which is 2 to 3 times larger in Arctic and nearly stable in Antarctica.
It is possible to find it here, even if it not so easy: http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/dv/iadv/
Summit on Greenland has a very large variation!
I watched the video of Australian Chief Scientist Dr Alan Finkel’s “explanation” to Senator Malcolm Roberts of what he said was the link between CO2 and climate change.
The alarmist Fairfax Melbourne Age Online site covered it under the tendentious heading “Schooling for Climate Sceptic” (or similar)
I was staggered at how absolutely simplistic and lacking in content Dr Finkel’s exposition was.
Now following Nick Stokes it may be unreasonable to expect the CS to know all the nuances and the latest findings on climate change, but what I am continually amazed at is how few of the ardent warmist people I talk to actually can explain even in outline the theory they purport to believe in.
Most say “its CO2 wot does it” and are content to leave it at that -much the same as did Dr Finkel !
But surely the Chief Scientist might be presumed to know a bit more about climate change theory than the average member of the public.
Finkel started off by describing the initial work by Arrhenius ( whom he wrongly described as Swiss when I understand he was Swedish-but let that go)
Finkel said that Arrhenius showed that CO2 absorbed and then emitted long wave radiation thus warming the atmosphere.( I know – it is better described as slowing the rate at which the atmosphere loses heat energy to space)
Finkel then described Ultra Violet light from the sun passing through the atmosphere warming the earth and oceans which release long wave radiation which is absorbed by CO2 thus warming the atmosphere
.
He then adverted to the annual growth of CO2 at 2ppm ( which he did not explicitly say but left understood was all man -made) and said 2016 would be the hottest year on record
He then concluded somewhat elliptically with “after that we have models” leaving me wondering the import of that remark.
This simplistic presentation was trumpeted by the Melbourne Age as the “education on climate change needed by” Senator Roberts.
The large number of gaps in Dr Finkel’s presentation in the orthodox theory of enhanced global warming include:-
:-
He made no mention of the claimed greenhouse effect of water vapour, nor that there is not only more of it than CO2 by a factor of ten thousand, but that each water vapour molecule has about twice the absorptive and emissive power of a CO2 molecule.
Nor did he explain the claimed forcing role of CO2 and the subsequent claimed feedback loops caused by increased water vapour etc resulting from the warmer atmosphere being able to hold more vapour which in turn has increased as it will have been released by the now warmer oceans having higher evaporation rates.
.
Also not mentioned was the logarithmic relationship between CO2 and temperature ,with all the implications that has for CO2 emissions and the Paris Agreement targeted controlled increases in global temperature of 1.5 and 2 c ( my sub point being without positive feedback effects or with very limited such effects then those targets would seem quite reachable without the need for large scale changes in emissions)
Nor did he distinguish long term trends in global temperatures from periodic upticks associated with El Nino events nor was there any mention of the role of the oceans in absorbing CO2 or regulating global temperatures.
There was so much from the IPCC reports that he might have used but in common with my experience with warmists (many of them don’t even know what the IPCC has found and when you tell them they don’t want to believe you), he too seemed unaware of the findings of the IPCC ( not that I am suggesting the IPCC is the last word but that given it is the Bible or Koran of the true believers you might think they might at least know their scripture)
Just one example not mentioned is the admission by the IPCC that the warming emissions from atmospheric CO2 are about 2.5 WM2 compared with solar heating reaching earth surface (I think) about 130 WM2.
Nor did Dr Finkel mention any of the most recent (2013-14) findings of the 5th IPCC Report particularly:-
their admission their models did not match observations:- ,
that there had been a long period (15 years plus) of static temperatures not predicted by their models
that their predictions of Antarctic sea ice were wrong both in size and sign, and
that they were now reducing the range of predicted temperature increases from earlier predictions or projections
Given his Government appointed position it would be too much to expect Dr Finkel to give a sceptical analysis of prevailing climate orthodoxy.
However if I as a retired economist with no formal science studies at all can give what I hope is a reasonably accurate outline of the prevailing theory of enhanced global warming sufficient for the understanding of a layman, then I think it a fair question to ask why does such an explanation seem beyond our highly paid chief scientist?
What is telling to me in the overall situation is the speed with which the media morons jump in on the politically correct side of an issue they know nothing about. Also, if Finkel cared thing 1 about his credibility one would think his reply would include some references to PR papers or technical explanations from those “experts who toot the same horn. Maybe he likes dramatic charts drawn in Crayon by Mighty Mike Mannn.
As a ‘retired economist’ your summary is rather good, Thomho. You should try to have it accepted in a main-straem newspaper.
‘Given his Government appointed position it would be too much to expect Dr Finkel to give a sceptical analysis of prevailing climate orthodoxy’
There can be no doubt that our chief scientist has an excellent mind, specialising in neuroscience and engineering.
When he says that it is now up to the models and their predictions, which indicate accelerating warming, he does not address the question, what significance level do I attach to them?
After all, he keeps on being asked questions about GCM’s.
He can be hardly expected to answer that one as he is a statutory head.
No doubt he is hearing a lot of grinding of axes in the background noise.
In a lot of ways science is a Cinderella enterprise here in Australia.
Many scientists have to leave Australia to obtain work, some simply, before Uber, drove cabs.
The real shake out Federally here is, Can Australian scientists predict at a level of significance that is of any use, the climate in our many climatic regions out to 10 years?
We are talking rainfall,humidity, drought and temperature.
Will the SA government persist in unsustainable base load power supply, triggering a crisis in defense material supply?
Will SA be able to build our submarines?
What is a realistic engineering answer that we, and the poor, can afford in SA, now Victoria and soon Qld?
The clock is ticking.
These are the national questions best put to the chief scientist by a senator.
For the rest, keep publishing the failed global predictions and confounded CO2 theory.
Eventually someone in Australia will listen.
“lewispbuckingham October 23, 2016 at 2:24 am
Eventually someone in Australia will listen.”
I very much doubt that. Australia is now populated with people who think the productive owe those that sit on their posteriors, on CenterLink benefits, are
Patrick MJD October 23, 2016 at 5:03 am
“lewispbuckingham October 23, 2016 at 2:24 am
Eventually someone in Australia will listen.”
I very much doubt that. Australia is now populated with people who think the productive owe those that sit on their posteriors, on CenterLink benefits, are entitled to the money in your wallet. Sheesh, forget about taxes, they want more. In Aus there is a growing “gap” between those that earn, and pay taxes, and those that draw from the state (They still pay taxes…on “earnings” would you believe?). It’s ~30 years away, but what you see in Greece, Spain and Italy should be a warning to Australia. Nah!!!
I can only hope that it’s ~30 years off. The reason why countries such as Greece and Spain managed to survive is because other countries propped them up.
As more countries go from productive to non-productive, the strain on the remaining productive countries increases rapidly. The collapse when it does come will be much more rapid than many predict.
This same logic works for people as well. As more and more people discover that they don’t have to work, but can rely on government to give them a portion from the labor of those who bother to work, the burden on those who work increases.
This causes more of those who work to consider why they work so hard, but don’t see the benefit of it themselves. They quite and go on the dole. Which of course increases the load on those still working, causing more of them to consider life on the dole as a viable option.
1) Per IPCC AR5 Figure 6.1 prior to year 1750 CO2 represented about 1.26% of the total biosphere carbon balance (589/46,713). After mankind’s contributions, 67 % fossil fuel and cement – 33% land use changes, atmospheric CO2 increased to about 1.77% of the total biosphere carbon balance (829/46,713). This represents a shift of 0.51% from all the collected stores, ocean outgassing, carbonates, carbohydrates, etc. not just mankind, to the atmosphere. A 0.51% rearrangement of 46,713 Gt of stores and 100s of Gt annual fluxes doesn’t impress me as measurable let alone actionable, attributable, or significant.
2) Figure 10 in Trenberth et al 2011jcli24, in addition to substantial differences of opinion, i.e. uncertainties, 7 of the 8 balances considered, 87.5%, showed more energy leaving ToA than entering, i.e. atmospheric cooling.
3) Even IPCC AR5 expresses serious doubts about the value of their AOGCMs (IPCC AR5 Box TS.3).
The sea ice and sheet ice is expanding not shrinking, polar bear population is the highest in decades, the weather (30 years = climate) is less extreme not more, the sea level rise is not accelerating, the GCM’s are repeat failures, the CAGW hypothesis is coming unraveled, COP21 turned into yet another empty and embarrassing fiasco, IPCC AR6 will mimic SNL’s Roseanne Roseannadanna, “Well, neeeveeer mind!!”
Thought that person on the right was female until I started reading this post. Who does his hair? Yuck…
That’s the hair of an ex “pop star”. But he likes to wear t-shirts in his documentaries, and they do show that he does have the muscle structure more akin to that of a woman.
I don’t recognize Aussie celebrities, but the lady on the right needs a little more makeup on her facial hair.
…Oooh, that’s gotta hurt !
I see no reason to go there . . Marcus ; )
Naughty 🙂
“We have models to try to predict what that will be and that’s difficult,” Dr Finkel said, adding that models did predict significant climate change.”
Try impossible. Climate is far too complex to predict, even if we had super computers with 100x the capacity we have today. Finding all the variables, weighting them correctly, etc. is most probably beyond the scope of human ability.
At one time, most people laughed at psychic predictions, but when we made pretty colored graphs and catagorized the predictions as “science”, people foolishly believed. Science can no more predict the future than Madame Freida in her little shop with her tarot cards and crystal ball can.
The prime evidence for greenhouse warming, according to Prof Lindzen and others, is increasing tropical tropospheric temperatures (and therefore temperature-altitude). And the atmospheric warming should be 3x the value of any surface warming, according to Lindzen. And so this should be easily detectable by radiosonde temperature data and DWLWR data (downwelling LW radiation).
But none of the datasets I have seen show any increase in tropical atmospheric temperatures over the last 20-30 years. Ergo, the Co2 greenhouse warming effect must be very small – almost too small to detect.
Can anyone here find a tropical DLR (DWLWR) or radiosonde dataset that shows any warming?
R
Increasing tropical tropospheric temperatures (2 – 3 times the rate at the surface) would be a signature of water vapour feedback in response to warming caused by added CO2 (or any other forcing factor I assume).
Is that Trenberth’s hot spot that models predicted but did not show up in real observations?
>>Trenberth’s hotspot.
Yes, the very same. And if there is no hotspot, there is no increasing greenhouse effect.
And yet I cannot find any evidence of this tropical tropospheric warming. Nor can I find any climate ‘scientists’ who are bothering to look for it. But if there is no warming, there is no increasing greenhouse effect. It is that fundamental.
R
>>signature of water vapour feedback in response to
>>warming caused by added CO2
Both.
As far as I can see the IPCC figures do not include the additional water vapour feedback, as that is too difficult to model. So the main tropical tropospheric warming should be from Co2 alone, with any water vapour effects as additional.
But whether single or combined, it is not there, as far as I can see. And if there is no atmospheric warming, there is NO increasing greenhouse effect.
R
Why do they let them set the premise that the answer to the cause of warming is simply CO2. The original problem was explaining the warming coming out of the Little Ice Age. Co2 is one possible explanation. Having given an explanation for an established and on going trend, it is not legitimate to turn around and say: we believe that OC2 causes warming, it is warming therefore it must be CO2. This is the logical fallacy of Affirming the Consequent.
Global Temps appear to be nose-diving right now. It took a little longer than normal for the 2015-16 El Nino impacts to wear off (but then we’ve seen that before with other big El Ninos). Australia has had a couple of very cold months recently. Temps will be heading back to normal shortly and then the adjusters will be forced to dip even deeper into their bag of tricks.
http://models.weatherbell.com/climate/cdas_v2_hemisphere_2016.png
does Brian Cox use the name Alan Finkel too
As a retired electrical engineer, I would trust another engineer of any sort over a ‘so-called’ “Climate Scientist”, because if I had used the same level and quality of ‘science’ as these alarmist hypocrites, all of my very expensive projects for manufacturing plants would have failed miserably, and I would have been looking for another line of work decades ago. Engineers must produce real world and cost effective results or be fired. “Climate Scientists” are NEVER held accountable for their mis-application of ‘science’ and their utter failures.
Allen
I understand your intention, but for clarification (esp to Nick), you might want to consider modifying your “trust in engineers” statement to include only those with considerable commercial (i.e.: non-academic) experience.
The commercial environment’s rigor of accountability is faster and harsher than academia: there’s a fairly short path between bad engineers and dead people.
” include only those with considerable commercial (i.e.: non-academic) experience”
Alan’s bio here.
“…before leaving academia to found Axon Instruments, a global science and technology company based in the US.[4] During this time, he invented a commercially successful device which substantially speeds up drug research.[3][5]
Since then, he has used his wealth…”
…and that wealth is a measure of how the public valued (by purchasing) the device he invented, Nick.
Too bad there’s nothing valuable about the CAGW meme–for those who feed at the trough of grants take taxes that could actually be put to a useful cause.
Alas, the CAGW meme is just another form of theft from the public purse.
“As a retired electrical engineer, I would trust another engineer of any sort”
In fact, Alan Finkel has PhD in electrical engineering.
You trust those with English lit. in matters of science? Got it!
Brain Cox, BBC’s poster boy, here I guess unknowingly, point out the missing 1997-98 El Niño temperature spike. http://www.global-warming-and-the-climate.com/images/Brian-Cox-1997-98.jpg
Vukcevic this is where the australian info is
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/#tabs=Tracker&tracker=timeseries
I keep asking for proof also. A lady at NASA told me that “it was not all in the same place” I said surely for the worst crises mankind has ever known you could get it in one place. She said “that’s not how science works.” I guess I will have to sue the Ontario and then the Canadian government to produce the proof that their cap and trade/carbon tax will change the climate.
The Ad Hominum attacks on Malcolm Roberts have started, with a major article in The Australian (paywalled) http://www.theaustralian.com.au/life/weekend-australian-magazine/true-disbeliever-senator-malcolm-roberts-crusade/news-story/0fd975d7b278dcb6a7d627ca2e62ee3e , a very carefully written story. You will see he denies the anti-semitism and some of the other charges, non the less the counter arguments are rather long winded.
“We don’t need to provide evidence: we have models”.
“His demand for proof that humans cause warming has struck at the weak point of the entire AGW scare campaign – because there isn’t any proof available to provide.”
http://www.carboeurope.org/education/CS_Materials/Bernd-BlumeExperiments.pdf
Whoops, my finger slipped. Did you say you wanted evidence? Here it is! If you don’t believe it, you can test it out yourself. It’s called science.
You can close down your idiot blog now.
Here’s some more science … a fish tank is not a planet.
Kimir Those are a totally useless set of experiments. They are so badly designed that the results would be meaningless. You will have to do better than that.
Hehehe!
Call that science?
You clearly wouldn’t recognise science if it scuttled under your bridge and bit you on the snout.
Back to school for you, child!
Cat …
Kimir is obviously very young with undeveloped critical thinking skills.
I only scanned those experiments, but #11 caught my eye.
“To demonstrate that storms and temperature changes threaten existing vegetation.”
By removing cress sprouts from their growing medium and using a hair dryer to blow hot air on them? Result … “After a short time the plants will be lying irreversibly flat on the ground.” DUH!
This experiment was designed by an ADULT? For teaching CHILDREN? About SCIENCE?
This is appalling.
Kimir:
Your description of the process of science is inaccurate and misleading. In legitimate science we do not merely “test” hypotheses but rather attempt to falsify them. Today’s AGW models are designed for absence of falsifiability. According to IPCC AR4 (report of Working Group 1), in the modern era, falsifiability has been replaced by peer review! So long nullius in verba. With luck we’ll see you again when we emerge from the modern Dark Ages.