Guest post by David Middleton
Introduction
When debating the merits of the CAGW (catastrophic anthropogenic global warming) hypothesis, I often encounter this sort of straw man fallacy:
All that stuff is a distraction. Disprove the science of the greenhouse effect. Win a nobel prize get a million bucks. Forget the models and look at the facts. Global temperatures are year after year reaching record temperatures. Or do you want to deny that.
This is akin to arguing that one would have to disprove convection in order to falsify plate tectonics or genetics in order to falsify evolution. Plate tectonics and evolution are extremely robust scientific theories which rely on a combination of empirical and correlative evidence. Neither theory can be directly tested through controlled experimentation. However, both theories have been tested through decades of observations. Subsequent observations have largely conformed to these theories.
Note: I will not engage in debates about the validity of the scientific theories of plate tectonics or evolution.
The power of such scientific theories is demonstrated through their predictive skill: Theories are predictive of subsequent observations. This is why a robust scientific theory is even more powerful than facts (AKA observations).
CAGW is a similar type of theory hypothesis. It relies on empirical (the “good”) and correlative evidence (the “bad”).
The Good
Carbon dioxide is a so-called “greenhouse” gas. It retards radiative cooling. All other factors held equal, increasing the atmospheric concentration of CO2 will lead to a somewhat higher atmospheric temperature. However, all other things are never held equal in Earth and Atmospheric Science… The atmosphere is not air in a jar; references to Arrhenius have no signficance.
Atmospheric CO2 has risen since the 19th century.
Humans are responsible for at least half of this rise in atmospheric CO2.
While anthropogenic sources are a tiny fraction of the total sources, we are removing carbon from geologic sequestration and returning it to the active carbon cycle.
The average temperature of Earth’s surface and troposphere has generally risen over the past 150 years.
Atmospheric CO2 has risen and warming has occurred.
The Bad
The modern warming began long before the recent rise in atmospheric CO2 and prior to the 19th century temperature and CO2 were decoupled:
The recent rise in temperature is no more anomalous than the Medieval Warm Period or the Little Ice Age:
Over the past 2,000 years, the average temperature of the Northern Hemisphere has exceeded natural variability (defined as two standard deviations from the pre-1865 mean) three times: 1) the peak of the Medieval Warm Period 2) the nadir of the Little Ice Age and 3) since 1998. Human activities clearly were not the cause of the first two deviations. 70% of the warming since the early 1600’s clearly falls within the range of natural variability.
While it is possible that the current warm period is about 0.2 °C warmer than the peak of the Medieval Warm Period, this could be due to the differing resolutions of the proxy reconstruction and instrumental data:
The amplitude of the reconstructed temperature variability on centennial time-scales exceeds 0.6°C. This reconstruction is the first to show a distinct Roman Warm Period c. AD 1-300, reaching up to the 1961-1990 mean temperature level, followed by the Dark Age Cold Period c. AD 300-800. The Medieval Warm Period is seen c. AD 800–1300 and the Little Ice Age is clearly visible c. AD 1300-1900, followed by a rapid temperature increase in the twentieth century. The highest average temperatures in the reconstruction are encountered in the mid to late tenth century and the lowest in the late seventeenth century. Decadal mean temperatures seem to have reached or exceeded the 1961-1990 mean temperature level during substantial parts of the Roman Warm Period and the Medieval Warm Period. The temperature of the last two decades, however, is possibly higher than during any previous time in the past two millennia, although this is only seen in the instrumental temperature data and not in the multi-proxy reconstruction itself.
[…]
The proxy reconstruction itself does not show such an unprecedented warming but we must consider that only a few records used in the reconstruction extend into the 1990s. Nevertheless, a very cautious interpretation of the level of warmth since AD 1990 compared to that of the peak warming during the Roman Warm Period and the Medieval Warm Period is strongly suggested.
[…]
The amplitude of the temperature variability on multi-decadal to centennial time-scales reconstructed here should presumably be considered to be the minimum of the true variability on those time-scales.
[…]
The climate of the Holocene has been characterized by a roughly millennial cycle of warming and cooling (for those who don’t like the word “cycle,” pretend that I typed “quasi-periodic fluctuation”):
These cycles (quasi-periodic fluctuations) even have names:
These cycles have been long recognized by Quaternary geologists:
Fourier analysis of the GISP2 ice core clearly demonstrates that the millennial scale climate cycle is the dominant signal in the Holocene (Davis & Bohling, 2001).
The industrial era climate has not changed in any manner inconsistent with the well-established natural millennial scale cycle. Assuming that the ice core CO2 is reliable, the modern rise in CO2 has had little, if any effect on climate.
The Null Hypothesis
What is a ‘Null Hypothesis’
A null hypothesis is a type of hypothesis used in statistics that proposes that no statistical significance exists in a set of given observations. The null hypothesis attempts to show that no variation exists between variables or that a single variable is no different than its mean. It is presumed to be true until statistical evidence nullifies it for an alternative hypothesis.
Read more: Null Hypothesis http://www.investopedia.com/terms/n/null_hypothesis.asp#ixzz4eWXO8w00
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Since it is impossible to run a controlled experiment on Earth’s climate (there is no control planet), the only way to “test” the CAGW hypothesis is through models. If the CAGW hypothesis is valid, the models should demonstrate predictive skill. The models have utterly failed:
The models have failed because they result in a climate sensitivity that is 2-3 times that supported by observations:
From Hansen et al. 1988 through every IPCC assessment report, the observed temperatures have consistently tracked the strong mitigation scenarios in which the rise in atmospheric CO2 has been slowed and/or halted.
Apart from the strong El Niño events of 1998 and 2015-16, GISTEMP has tracked Scenario C, in which CO2 levels stopped rising in 2000, holding at 368 ppm.
The utter failure of this model is most apparent on the more climate-relevant 5-yr running mean:
This is from IPCC’s First Assessment Report:
HadCRUT4 has tracked below Scenario D.
This is from the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report (TAR):
HadCRUT4 has tracked the strong mitigation scenarios, despite a general lack of mitigation.
The climate models have never demonstrated any predictive skill.
And the models aren’t getting better. Even when they start the model run in 2006, the observed temperatures consistently track at or below the low end 5-95% range. Observed temperatures only approach the model mean (P50) in 2006, 2015 and 2016.
The ensemble consists of 138 model runs using a range of representative concentration pathways (RCP), from a worst case scenario RCP 8.5, often referred to as “business as usual,” to varying grades of mitigation scenarios (RCP 2.6, 4.5 and 6.0).
When we drill wells, we run probability distributions to estimate the oil and gas reserves we will add if the well is successful. The model inputs consist of a range of estimates of reservoir thickness, area and petrophysical characteristics. The model output consists of a probability distribution from P10 to P90.
- P10 = Maximum Case. There is a 10% probability that the well will produce at least this much oil and/or gas.
- P50 = Mean Case. There is a 50% probability that the well will produce at least this much oil and/or gas. Probable reserves are >P50.
- P90 = Minimum Case. There is a 90% probability that the well will produce at least this much oil and/or gas. Proved reserves are P90.
Over time, a drilling program should track near P50. If your drilling results track close to P10 or P90, your model input is seriously flawed.
If the CMIP5 model ensemble had predictive skill, the observations should track around P50, half the runs should predict more warming and half less than is actually observed. During the predictive run of the model, HadCRUT4.5 has not *tracked* anywhere near P50…
I “eyeballed” the instrumental observations to estimate a probability distribution of predictive run of the model.
Prediction Run Approximate Distribution
2006 P60 (60% of the models predicted a warmer temperature)
2007 P75
2008 P95
2009 P80
2010 P70
2011-2013 >P95
2014 P90
2015-2016 P55
Note that during the 1998-99 El Niño, the observations spiked above P05 (less than 5% of the models predicted this). During the 2015-16 El Niño, HadCRUT only spiked to P55. El Niño events are not P50 conditions. Strong El Niño and La Niña events should spike toward the P05 and P95 boundaries.
The temperature observations are clearly tracking much closer to strong mitigation scenarios rather than RCP 8.5, the bogus “business as usual” scenario.
The red hachured trapezoid indicates that HadCRUT4.5 will continue to track between less than P100 and P50. This is indicative of a miserable failure of the models and a pretty good clue that the models need be adjusted downward.
In any other field of science CAGW would be a long-discarded falsified hypothesis.
Conclusion
Claims that AGW or CAGW have earned an exemption from the Null Hypothesis principle are patently ridiculous.
In science, a broad, natural explanation for a wide range of phenomena. Theories are concise, coherent, systematic, predictive, and broadly applicable, often integrating and generalizing many hypotheses. Theories accepted by the scientific community are generally strongly supported by many different lines of evidence-but even theories may be modified or overturned if warranted by new evidence and perspectives.
This is not a scientific hypothesis:
More CO2 will cause some warming.
It is arm waving.
This is a scientific hypothesis:
A doubling of atmospheric CO2 will cause the lower troposphere to warm by ___ °C.
Thirty-plus years of failed climate models never been able to fill in the blank. The IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report essentially stated that it was no longer necessary to fill in the blank.
While it is very likely that human activities are the cause of at least some of the warming over the past 150 years, there is no robust statistical correlation. The failure of the climate models clearly demonstrates that the null hypothesis still holds true for atmospheric CO2 and temperature.
Selected References
Davis, J. C., and G. C. Bohling, The search for patterns in ice-core temperature curves, 2001, in L. C. Gerhard, W. E. Harrison, and B. M. Hanson, eds., Geological perspectives of global climate change, p. 213–229.
Finsinger, W. and F. Wagner-Cremer. Stomatal-based inference models for reconstruction of atmospheric CO2 concentration: a method assessment using a calibration and validation approach. The Holocene 19,5 (2009) pp. 757–764
Grosjean, M., Suter, P. J., Trachsel, M. and Wanner, H. 2007. Ice-borne prehistoric finds in the Swiss Alps reflect Holocene glacier fluctuations. J. Quaternary Sci.,Vol. 22 pp. 203–207. ISSN 0267-8179.
Hansen, J., I. Fung, A. Lacis, D. Rind, Lebedeff, R. Ruedy, G. Russell, and P. Stone, 1988: Global climate changes as forecast by Goddard Institute for Space Studies three-dimensional model. J. Geophys. Res., 93, 9341-9364, doi:10.1029/88JD00231.
Kouwenberg, LLR, Wagner F, Kurschner WM, Visscher H (2005) Atmospheric CO2 fluctuations during the last millennium reconstructed by stomatal frequency analysis of Tsuga heterophylla needles. Geology 33:33–36
Ljungqvist, F.C. 2009. N. Hemisphere Extra-Tropics 2,000yr Decadal Temperature Reconstruction. IGBP PAGES/World Data Center for Paleoclimatology Data Contribution Series # 2010-089. NOAA/NCDC Paleoclimatology Program, Boulder CO, USA.
Ljungqvist, F.C. 2010. A new reconstruction of temperature variability in the extra-tropical Northern Hemisphere during the last two millennia. Geografiska Annaler: Physical Geography, Vol. 92 A(3), pp. 339-351, September 2010. DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-459.2010.00399.x
MacFarling Meure, C., D. Etheridge, C. Trudinger, P. Steele, R. Langenfelds, T. van Ommen, A. Smith, and J. Elkins. 2006. The Law Dome CO2, CH4 and N2O Ice Core Records Extended to 2000 years BP. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 33, No. 14, L14810 10.1029/2006GL026152.
Moberg, A., D.M. Sonechkin, K. Holmgren, N.M. Datsenko and W. Karlén. 2005. Highly variable Northern Hemisphere temperatures reconstructed from low-and high-resolution proxy data. Nature, Vol. 433, No. 7026, pp. 613-617, 10 February 2005.
Instrumental Temperature Data from Hadley Centre / UEA CRU, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Project via Wood for Trees.
The theory–we are changing the chemistry of the atmosphere and therefore we are changing the rate of heat exchange, contributing to an average temperature that is different from what it would be without our activities–seems perfectly plausible, if useless. But I can’t get past these temperature estimates that claim precision in global average to a 10th of a degree not only during periods when 99% of the planet wasn’t within 100 miles of a thermometer, but before even the invention of the thermometer.
Quite who are we to believe, invented temperatures or Brughel’s paintings? I believe the paintings because he had no reason to lie.
It continues to astonish me the way even most “skeptics” accept claims of precision that are obviously bogus. Prior to weather satellites, no claim can be made as to the average temperature of the earth. Period.
I could paint a snowy day right now, late at night in mid spring. I just have to find the leftover Christmas cards, to copy.
A rich patron is not going to buy a painting of snow when there is plenty of the stuff to see through your window for free. No, you pay for something different. The same with hills, or the Tower of Babel. These are things that you order for your gallery if you don’t already have them.
Robert Carnegie – I’ve a cheap van Gogh painting of a starry night if you’re interested.
Can I see the actual night sky looking like the van Gogh one before I speak to my bank? 🙂
And I’ll have to hide under my bed for a while first to see if the world ends or not… it looks like it.
White paint is cheap…
A simple observation belies the entire question. As human CO2 emissions have gone up exponentially, atmospheric CO2 ppm has gone up linearly and even at a slightly lower slope recently. Thus, if we are having no effect on atmospheric CO2 concentration, we cannot be thus affecting the climate through our emissions.
It’s a simple observation that does not require arguing or thrashing about the science.
You, obviously have not read many WUWT articles and the comments following, tim maguire.
Skeptics may have to use the absurd impossible accuracies and claims of precision that NOAA uses in bluffing the world; but that does not mean we believe NOAA’s bluffs.
By the way, Mankind is not changing the chemistry of the atmosphere. Alarmists claim CO2 was 280ppm ‘before’ man’s influence.
Current CO2 levels are around 400ppm.
Where over a hundred years ago, CO2’s atmospheric component represents 2.8 molecules of CO2 per 10,000 molecules of CO2.
Currently, CO2’s atmospheric component represents an increase of 1.2 CO2 molecules per 10,000 molecules of atmosphere.
A 1.2 molecule increase per 10,000 molecules over one hundred years represents a miniscule increase per year.
What is interesting is all of the ranting and frothing alarmists perform over a 1.2 molecule CO2 increase.
Predicting every thing from hell on Earth to people fleeing the coasts.
It is a wonder that alarmists still believe their own CO2 fantasies and nightmares, even after thirty years of abject failure.
The null hypothesis for determining the climate sensitivity is that Joules are Joules, COE dictates linearity in the energy domain and that the 1.6 W/m^2 emitted by the surface that arises from each W/m^2 sets the surface emission sensitivity of 1.6 W/m^2 per W/m^2 of forcing. When 1.6 W/m^2 is added to the current surface emissions of 385 W/m^2 at the current average temperature of about 287.5K, and then converted back to a temperature, the temperature increases by about 0.3C corresponding to a sensitivity of 0.3C per W/m^2 which is below the lower limit of the range claimed by the IPCC of 0.8C +/- 0.4C per W/m^2.
The linearity is confirmed here where surface emissions across the planet are plotted against the post albedo incident power from the Sun where the temperature is measured.
http://www.palisad.com/co2/sens/pi/se.png
+10 × 1,000,000
Thank you !!
Note: I will not engage in debates about the validity of the scientific theories of plate tectonics or evolution.
Very wise to note that, David. Unless preempted, the “E” word exponentially increases the probability of thread hijacking.
What, by bringing religion into “science”. Surely not? 😉
I thought climate science was currently all about belief in an unprovable hypothesis, AKA consensus, with no control planet etc. , so infinitely arguable, while the phoney net grid CO2 increasing in fact renewables coin in their wholly regressive subsidies on every measure of their claims – that are justified in the name iof the uprovable belief?
Pay or burn! Sound familiar?
The hijacking of unprovable climate modelling in denial of the long term evidence, soo Vostok Core at end. is all about exploiting irrational human fears and belief for profit using what makes the supposed problem worse in science fact.
Good old time religion, nothing changed through our scientific EVOLUTION since the Moche. Those who want a fast buck from whatever populist belief they can create in the hard of science from the larger problems du jour – the troughing ministers, officials, academics who live off our taxes, etc. – are the modern equivalent of priests, tributes and sacrifices are the subsidies, the iconic pyramids windmills, solar farms, tidal barrages, etc. Like the Moche’s mud pyramids, all are technically unnecessary to deliver the desired result of maximum CO2 reduction and long term affordable and sustainable electrical supply at the increaing levels required to maintain a developed civilisation.
On the established climate record we will need a adeqaute response to the next major long term climate state of the ice age, FAR longer than the short planetary hot flush we are currently enjoying, while our orbit is circular and we are slowly returning to the steady state high albedo ice age, as we have many times before.
In fact you could say the evangelists are right about the length of history, if you limit your definition of history to modern humans and forget every other living thing on Earth, including the Neanderthals. . We may only last this warm snap before the slowest ever ice Armageddon finishes off our unprepared post industrial society as it regresses into science denying superstitious beliefs in thermal runaway (see Vostok core re that again), and we become Neanderthal 2.0, waiting to thaw out of one of the glaciers that Al Gore said would disappear some time ago. Another priest who has done well from the promotion of false science that doesn’t work as he claimed, because, most likely, it can’t and won’t. Bad Science – AGBS.
The real science denial is the dishonest support for the actual malfeasance of the supposed remedies, of course. Climate will most probaly do what it did the last few ice ages, with a bit of noise on the main cycle from the briefly “civilised” but ultimately insignificant and puny organic froth (see Vostok core again, unable to adapt its society to the reality of relentless and cyclic natural change..
FUTURE: Get real or be Neanderthal 2.0. Who knew? We did. But believed otherwise for selfish and fast human lifetime related buck..
The only serious climate question in fact is what kicks our short warm snaps off? I suggest they end naturally as the 100.000 year impulses degcline to the stable ice age condition. I am going to post on a development of that, already suggested here, but in a hopefully clearer and more evidence based way than the first “two state binary switching idea”. The evidence says it’s not quite like that, but the two state limits idea clearly has merit, our warm spell already hit its high limiting condition 10,000 years ago, with a bit of noise over those 10,000 years relative to the major change. The warming change occurs very fast, over hundreds of years, leading CO2 rises, not following them, as we know, then decays gradualy over thousands of years as the ice advances towards the equator, until solar radiation balnces out in a new equilibrium that locks in the next stable long term ice age, what I would suggest is the planet’s natural climate, based on solar radiation alone.
That remains stable with some further cooling, until the next major heat injection into the global climate system, on the MIlankovitch cycle period ….. go figure …… to be continued……
?dl=0
Good Job! Thoroughly Debunks CAGW. In simpler terms It’s impossible for 1 molecule of Anthropogenic CO2 to significantly affect the average Temperature of 62,500 molecules of atmosphere.
Actually it isn’t.
The reason why more CO2 has very little impact on temperature is because the only region where CO2 absorbs energy that is within the envelope in which the earth is radiating IR energy, is just about saturated.
If CO2 levels were at 25ppm and increased to 50ppm, it would have a substantial impact on temperatures.
CO2 works by absorbing a photon with certain frequencies. It almost immediately transfers the energy gained to other molecules in the atmosphere, then is ready to absorb the next photon that comes along.
This gives one molecule of CO2 the ability to transfer heat to many other molecules.
Nonsense!
Physics is nonsense.
Interesting take there.
Right . Beer’s Law .
And the equilibrium temperature of a body of any particular spectrum is easily calculated . And apparently the lumped surface + atmosphere spectrum as seen from the outside actually causes that equilibrium to be about 23 degrees below that of a gray ball in our orbit .
“This gives one molecule of CO2 the ability to transfer heat to many other molecules”.
I’m not quite sure what you are saying here. Are you saying that one CO2 molecule has the ability to transfer the total amount of ‘heat’ to many other molecules each, or that some fraction of the ‘heat’ is distributed among many other molecules?
I’m saying that one molecule of CO2 transfers energy to the molecules around it over and over and over again. Thousands to millions of times per second. Depending on how often it is hit by a photon with the right energy levels.
The thermalization (collision with other molecules dominating re-radiation) is only true in the lower troposphere. In the upper troposphere in the tropopause where atmospheric pressure is much less, greenhouse gases are able to radiate energy to space (and downward as well). But CO2 in the tropopause is still subject to that logarithmic function of rapidly diminishing performance above 50 ppm.
Bob Armstrong April 17, 2017 at 12:24 pm
Beer’s Law: the warmer the beer, the faster it releases CO2 to the atmosphere.
So… The trick is to drink it faster than it warms… 😉
David.
Yes, that would be the ecologically responsible thing to do, but could lead to subsequent outgassing.
Robert, it’s still true in the troposphere, it just that since there is a longer period between collisions there is a greater chance that the CO2 molecule will radiate before it collides with something.
Then there’s Cole’s Law: Thinly sliced cabbage that when consumed can cause release of greenhouse gases. 🙂
And lets not forget Bean’s law. I believe it is associated with methane and known for its room clearing properties.
Not quite accurate. It can transfer the absorbed energy through a collision to only one other molecule. It may then absorb another photon and subsequently transfer energy to another molecule. On the other hand, another molecule may transfer that energy back to it through another collision and it won’t happen to absorb another photon. It’s a complicated process.
Your statement meant to me that, when I first read it, one CO2 could continuously transfer heat to many other molecules after just absorbing one photon. Not true.
Doesn’t this work out to one molecule of CO2 per 2500 other molecules? This has always seemed like a HUGE number of other molecules to energize with just one molecule. I’ve never quite understood how this is supposed to work at the atomic/molecular level, given such numbers.
Wouldn’t there be some sort of accumulating damping effect throughout all those collisions, progressively weakening the next molecule’s share of the transferred energy? Wouldn’t there be some sort of cumulative damping effect from molecules vibrating in one direction, while other molecules vibrated in ways to cancel some of those vibrations?
Nonsense, while what you say is in theory correct, the amount of energy able to be transferred to other molecules (or reradiated) is strictly limited to the availability of photons at the right wavelength. No photons, no warming. Those photons are representative of a very narrow slice of the EM spectrum there is not much power in that narrow band.
” the equilibrium temperature ” Nonsense. The atmosphere is not at equilibrium.
“of a body of any particular spectrum is easily calculated” Nonsense. There are bodies that are not at equilibrium and do not have a grey body spectrum. For those you cannot ‘easily calculate’ such delusion.
Looking at figure 1, CO2 only has one peak that is in the region where the earth is emitting most of it’s IR energy.
1) The peak is almost completely saturated already.
2) If the earth did warm, the region of peak emissions would move away from the CO2 peak, making CO2 have even less impact than it does now.
MarkW, this seems to be correct despite the brick-bats being thrown at your comments, although your language is somewhat imprecise. There is a good explanation of the basic physics of the Greenhouse Effect in this link :
http://acmg.seas.harvard.edu/people/faculty/djj/book/bookchap7.html
It says quite explicitly that once a gas concentration reaches a point where the atmosphere becomes highly opaque, to the Earth’s IR radiation, increasing the concentration further has a rapidly diminishing effect.
I see many comments to the effect that the Greenhouse effect doesn’t exists. It seems quite obvious to me. It’s just that it is not necessarily the dominant effect.
Good review of the basic issues.
The greenhouse effect of CO2 doesn’t need disproving in order to disprove the alarmists’ case. It’s been well understood for over a hundred years that it has a logarithmic shape which means that further increases will have only small effects. Indeed, the problem is for the alarmists to somehow find a way to negate the effect of that logarithmic relationship.
Meanwhile, as for the ‘record temperatures’ I could offer an analogy that a man climbing a hill with a steady slope will always be ‘at a record height’ which is higher than any point he has previously been at. That says absolutely nothing about how high he is, how fast he is climbing or how long it will take him to reach the summit, though.
Bottom line to both of these arguments is that science is based on measurements, not on hyperbole. With no actual figures the statements are meaningless.
+ 1
Agreed. Nor does the theory really address WHY this relatively minor increase in temperature is so bad.
Not to mention that the minor increase is a figure pulled out of thin air.
The other way to debunk the surface heating by back-radiation nonsense (another of the GHG pseudo-hypotheses) is simple maths. If 1 unit of energy is radiated away from the surface and half is ‘reflected’ back, the net change in surface energy is -1+0.5 = -0.5, i.e. COOLER. That is of course a very simplistic model, but it illustrates the point.
The only way the atmosphere could heat the surface is if it were a heat source, which clearly it isn’t.
By your logic, blankets do nothing to keep people warm, since they aren’t heat sources.
Mark W: and ilma630 is correct: blankets do not warm people. “Keep people warm” is a wonderfully imprecise term: blankets reduce the rate at which people lose heat, and they do not do it by capturing long wave IR in excited wool molecules.
Or the height of the summit!
I keep coming back to one thing – climate sensitivity. That is almost certainly an arm-waving number, an approximate guess. How could it be otherwise? There is not even proof that this number is a positive value. Yet to get catastrophic warming that number not only has to positive, but has to be absurdly large.
Given the climate of the Earth has been relatively stable for millions of years, a large value for climate sensitivity is highly unlikely. Sensitive systems are rarely stable. Stable systems tend to be massively buffered. It would take some truly extraordinary evidence to prove otherwise.
Exactly. The IPCC made a wild guess about the magnitude of the climate sensitivity where the main criteria was that it had to be large enough to justify their formation. They will never acknowledge the actual sensitivity as it would preclude their reason to exist and self preservation is a prime driver of any bureaucracy, especially when there’s trillions of dollars at stake. This is why conflicts of interest are a problem where this one arose as the IPCC maneuvered itself to become the arbiter of what is and what is not climate science based on what they published in their reports.
chimp:
I have twice attempted to post a long reply to your latest post but both attempts have vanished (I hope they are in moderation and one may reappear but I don’t know that). This is a pity because I think our debate could be productive for each of us.
Richard
Kristian:
You need to escape from your American culture of ‘try, try and try again’ so you can accept reality. You are behaving like one of the rejected contestants who when told their singing is rejected doesn’t walk off the stage but starts to sing again.
I repeat, I do “see your point” and I disagree with it.
I have repeatedly told you I stand by my view that the 10 (n.b. TEN) different methods to measure climate sensitivity which I have cited and linked do not use the same procedures so cannot be using the same set of assumptions and they are obtained from different source data, but they each provide a similar determination of climate sensitivity being ~0.4°C for a doubling of CO2 equivalent.
It is a stretch to suggest their similar determinations are a coincidence.
Your response is to say to me
But that IS your opinion because people have measured it in the 10 different ways I have told you.
If you choose to ‘sing again’ I will ignore it.
Richard
Tenn:
You say
No, climate sensitivity can be and has been measured. i.e.
.
Empirical – n.b. not model-derived – determinations indicate climate sensitivity is less than 1.0°C for a doubling of atmospheric CO2 equivalent. This is indicated by the studies of
Idso from surface measurements
http://www.warwickhughes.com/papers/Idso_CR_1998.pdf
and Lindzen & Choi from ERBE satellite data
http://www.drroyspencer.com/Lindzen-and-Choi-GRL-2009.pdf
and Gregory from balloon radiosonde data
http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/OLR&NGF_June2011.pdf
And the low measured value of climate sensitivity indicates that feedbacks are negative so – as you suggest – the system is stable.
Indeed, because climate sensitivity is less than 1.0°C for a doubling of CO2 equivalent, it is physically impossible for man-made global warming to be large enough to be detected . If something exists but is too small to be detected then it only has an abstract existence; it does not have a discernible existence that has effects (observation of the effects would be its detection).
Please note that this indication of negligible climatic effect of emissions of CO2 from human activities assumes the above article is correct when it asserts
but that assertion is probably wrong (ref. Rorsch A, Courtney RS & Thoenes D, ‘The Interaction of Climate Change and the Carbon Dioxide Cycle’ E&E v16no2 (2005) ).
Richard
Huh? In what way is “climate sensitivity” ever measured? It is always just assumed.
Climate sensitivity can be calculated from the observations of temperature and CO2…
https://judithcurry.com/2016/04/25/updated-climate-sensitivity-estimates/
The problem is that the calculations yield a much lower sensitivity than the models do.
Other things are measured and climate sensitivity is calculated.
True.
I agree that we can theoretically calculate an ECS from Stefan-Boltzman or other first principles, but my simple argument would be that it’s never going to be repeatedly observed thanks to our chaotic, multi-variate, non-linear climate system. Meaning, regardless of what you calculate from first principles, or through endless data gathering and back-fitting, we have a system that is responding to multiple inputs. So, you’re unlikely to see it respond predictably with only the change in a single variable. This, of course, has been flogged to death long before by many others… But, it should be noted that we usually fail to consider the full implications of this. Meaning, we regularly point to the failure of temps to correlate directly with CO2 as evidence that CO2 isn’t the main forcing. But, knowing that we have this chaotic system, we have to acknowledge that the many variable inputs could also be masking a higher sensitivity to CO2 than the current temperature records indicate. Not saying it is…just saying that it’s a possibility that should be acknowledged.
rip
Kristian:
You ask and say to me
No! I wrote
I stated source data and the links are to the actual papers so if you use the links you can read all the details of the methods.
The Idso paper was published in 998 and lists eight different ‘natural experiments’ that each provides a similar result. Its abstract says
The other two papers are much more recent (2009 and 2011) and they also derive a climate sensitivity of ~0.4°C for a doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration. These three papers use completely independent source data (i.e. surface measurements, ERBE satellite data, and balloon radiosonde data), and different methods conducted by completely independent analysts.
Richard
1998 and not 998. Sorry
Richard
commiebob:
You say of climate sensitivity measurements
That is only true in the same way that measurements of density are obtained by other things being measured and density being calculated.
Richard
Richard,
The concept of density exists and is valid. We can’t be so sure about the concept of ECS. It might not be valid or exist at all.
That trivializes the problem beyond all belief.
The reason why the true value of the ECS is hard to determine is because it’s definition was purposefully designed to obfuscate the underlying truth.
1) Forcing is defined as an instantaneous difference in flux at TOS which excludes the cooling effect from cloud albedo.
2) Sensitivity is defined in the non linear units of degrees per W/m^2 of forcing rather than in the demonstrably linear units of W/m^2 of surface emissions per W/m^2 of forcing, which under current conditions is 1.6 W/m^2 of surface emissions per W/m^2 of post albedo solar forcing.
3) The definition of forcing considers 1 W/m^2 of instantaneous incremental solar energy the same as a 1 W/m^2 instantaneous decrease in surface emissions owing to the increase in absorption by the atmosphere upon instantly doubling Co2 which assumes that the entire W/m^2 of extra absorption is ultimately returned to the surface as is the case with 1 W/m^2 of incremental post albedo solar input.
4) The definition of ECS is further obfuscated by expressing it as the effect of doubling Co2, ignoring the fact that ECS actually operates on solar forcing and the 3.7 W/m^2 of forcing claimed to arise from doubling Co2 is not actual forcing, but that doubling Co2 is EQUIVALENT to a 3.7 W/m^2 increase in post albedo solar forcing.
5) Sensitivity is defined ‘incrementally’ which allows them to ignore the current steady state of 1.6 W/m^2 of surface emissions per W/m^2 of forcing giving them the wiggle room to claim that it’s 4.4 W/m^2 per W/m^2 of forcing.
6) They claim that the current steady state of 1.6 W/m^2 of surface emissions per W/m^2 of forcing is the ‘zero feedback’ effect, when in fact, it’s the final result after all positive, negative, known and unknown feedback like effects have been accounted for. If this is the ‘zero feedback’ response, then the net feedback must be zero.
7) The claim that it is incrementally 4.4 W/m^2 of emissions per W/m^2 of forcing was arm waved into existence by asserting positive feedback amplifies the ‘zero feedback’ response, where Bode’s analysis simply doesn’t apply to a passive system like the climate.
8) Chaos is invoked as making the ECS less predictable, where chaos is only relevant in the transition from one state to another (it’s called weather), but has no bearing on what the next state (temperature) will be.
Apparently, the many layers of obfuscation work and has bamboozled many people, including ostensibly intelligent scientists from many disciplines.
chimp and commiebob:
Mass can be measured. Volume can be measured.
One divided by the other is density.
And
Change to radiative forcing can be measured. Change to temperature can be measured.
One divided by the other is climate sensitivity.
So
There is no difference in principle.
I listed three papers that use different analysis methods of different source data analysed by different people at different times. Each of those papers concludes that climate sensitivity is ~0.4°C for a doubling of CO2 equivalent. If you have a dispute with any of those papers then please explicitly state it: arm waving about the existence of climate sensitivity and the complexity of determining it ‘doesn’t cut it’.
Richard
Like this
https://micro6500blog.wordpress.com/2016/05/18/measuring-surface-climate-sensitivity/
co2isnotevil:
Thankyou for that excellent summary.
You say
Yes!
And when climate sensitivity is measured the result is a value that incorporates the combined effects of all the feedbacks both known and unknown.
Richard
I have no trouble at all with the papers. The first line in Lindzen and Choi reads:
They do not assert, as you have done, that they have measured climate sensitivity.
It could be wrong, Humans are probably responsible for 40-60% of the rise in CO2. It could be less than half.
Richard,
Mass and volume can be measured. It’s not at all clear that change to radiative forcing and change to temperature can be measured in anything like the same way. Mass and volume are physical constants more or less independent. They are the only factors in determining density.
Not so the possibly mythical ECS. Change to temperature is not solely as a direct result of radiative forcing. There are feedbacks that can vary. Even if ECS should exist, it won’t be the same at all times under all conditions.
IMO equating such a dubious, nebulous (clouds!), possibly nonphysical concept as ECS with the arithmetic concept of density is a stretch, to say the least.
David Middleton April 17, 2017 at 6:13 pm
CO2 ppm might have been as high as 330 during the Eemian, depending upon which proxies you credit. Thus, I’m guessing that some 70 out of the 120 ppm increase since c. AD 1850 might be man-made, ie 58%.
That’s a very reasonable interpretation.
Although the Eemian was naturally warmer than now, so the human contribution could be higher than ~60%.
commieBob:
All measurements are estimates from observations.
Lindzen & Choi were saying they measured climate sensitivity when they wrote
Richard
chimp:
You say to me
All parameters are defined by humans.
And many parameters are NOT “the same at all times under all conditions” (e.g. electrical resistance can vary with temperature) but that does not prevent them being measured under specified conditions.
The specified condition for climate sensitivity is the existing climate state when measurements are taken. That is why I think it important that the three papers I cited are from times two decades apart and I said they were from different times. Their similar indications imply variation in climate sensitivity has not been significant in recent decades.
Of greater importance is that I keep talking about climate sensitivity but you keep talking about ECS (i.e. equilibrium climate sensitivity). I don’t think the two are significantly different because the predicted “committed warming” has not happened.
The lack of discernible “committed warming” suggests there is negligible difference between climate sensitivity and equilibrium climate sensitivity.
The explanation for “committed warming” is in IPCC AR4 (2007) Chapter 10.7 which can be read at
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch10s10-7.html
It says there
In other words, it was expected that global temperature would rise at an average rate of “0.2°C per decade” over the first two decades of this century with half of this rise being due to atmospheric GHG emissions which were already in the system because equilibrium had not been reached.
This assertion of “committed warming” should have had large uncertainty because the Report was published in 2007 and there was then no indication of any global temperature rise over the previous 7 years. There has still not been any significant rise and we are now less than three years short of the “first two decades of the 21st century”.
So, if this “committed warming” is to occur such as to provide a rise of 0.2°C per decade by 2020 then global temperature would need to rise over the next 3 years by about 0.4°C. And this assumes the “average” rise over the two decades is the difference between the temperatures at 2000 and 2020. If the average rise of each of the two decades is assumed to be the “average” (i.e. linear trend) over those two decades then global temperature now needs to rise before 2020 by more than it rose over the entire twentieth century. It is estimated to have risen by ~0.8°C over the entire twentieth century.
Simply, the “committed warming” has disappeared (perhaps it has eloped with Trenberth’s ‘missing heat’?).
Additionally, and incidentally, this disappearance of the “committed warming” is – of itself – sufficient to falsify the AGW hypothesis as emulated by climate models. If we reach 2020 without any detection of the “committed warming” then it will be 100% certain that all projections of global warming are complete bunkum.
Richard
Chimp:
My first attempt to provide this reply to you has vanished. This is a second attempt.
You say to me
There is nothing special about climate sensitivity being a physical parameter. All physical parameters are defined by humans. And physical parameters often vary with the conditions at the time they are measured; e.g. electrical resistance varies with density.
The conditions at the time of a measurement are important and that is why I pointed out that the measurement sets I cited were obtained at “different times” which were two decades apart. The fact that they obtained similar value for climate sensitivity implies that variation in climate sensitivity has been negligible over recent decades.
Of greater importance is my consistently stating climate sensitivity and you mentioning ECS (i.e. equilibrium climate sensitivity).
The lack of discernible “committed warming” suggests there is negligible difference between climate sensitivity and equilibrium climate sensitivity.
The explanation for “committed warming” is in IPCC AR4 (2007) Chapter 10.7 which can be read at
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch10s10-7.html
It says there
In other words, it was expected that global temperature would rise at an average rate of “0.2°C per decade” over the first two decades of this century with half of this rise being due to atmospheric GHG emissions which were already in the system because equilibrium had not been reached.
This assertion of “committed warming” should have had large uncertainty because the Report was published in 2007 and there was then no indication of any global temperature rise over the previous 7 years. There has still not been any significant rise and we are now less than three years short of the “first two decades of the 21st century”.
So, if this “committed warming” is to occur such as to provide a rise of 0.2°C per decade by 2020 then global temperature would need to rise over the next 3 years by about 0.4°C. And this assumes the “average” rise over the two decades is the difference between the temperatures at 2000 and 2020. If the average rise of each of the two decades is assumed to be the “average” (i.e. linear trend) over those two decades then global temperature now needs to rise before 2020 by more than it rose over the entire twentieth century. It is estimated to have risen by ~0.8°C over the entire twentieth century.
Simply, the “committed warming” has disappeared (perhaps it has eloped with Trenberth’s ‘missing heat’?).
And, incidentally, this disappearance of the “committed warming” is – of itself – sufficient to falsify the AGW hypothesis as emulated by climate models. If we reach 2020 without any detection of the “committed warming” then it will be 100% certain that all projections of global warming are complete bunkum.
Richard
chimp:
This message appeared in the wrong place but hopefully this copy of it is where intended.
I have twice attempted to post a long reply to your latest post but both attempts have vanished (I hope they are in moderation and one may reappear but I don’t know that). This is a pity because I think our debate could be productive for each of us.
Richard
richardscourtney says, April 17, 2017 at 2:48 pm:
Exactly. And they are all based on ASSUMPTIONS about physical cause-and-effect relationships and nothing else.
There is absolutely NOTHING in the ERBS and CERES ToA radiation flux data suggesting a climate sensitivity to a rise in atmospheric CO2 above ZERO. There is simply nothing going on:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/04/17/the-good-the-bad-and-the-null-hypothesis/#comment-2478392
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/04/17/the-good-the-bad-and-the-null-hypothesis/#comment-2478917
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/04/17/the-good-the-bad-and-the-null-hypothesis/#comment-2478924
THEORETICALLY, there is a “climate sensitivity” to +CO2_atm. In the real world we have yet to spot one. We are simply unable to establish the causal link +CO2_atm => +T in the real Earth system.
Stay cool 😎 Richard, and stay well!
Richard,
Sorry WordPress or M0ds made it so hard on you. I try to remember to copy before posting, but often forget, with prompt regret.
Couldn’t agree more that there is little to no difference between ECS and CS, if such a thing exist.
Kristian:
I wrote
and you have replied
The 10 (n.b. TEN) different methods do not use the same procedures so cannot be using the same set of assumptions and they are obtained from different source data, but they each provide a similar determination of climate sensitivity being ~0.4°C for a doubling of CO2 equivalent.
It is a stretch to suggest their similar determinations are a coincidence.
And I add that in this thread we have pseudoscientists claiming there is no scientific null hypothesis and you claiming independent measurements are merely assumptions. This is not good.
Richard
Richard,
You appear not to get my point. It doesn’t matter what method they use. They ALL start out with the basic assumption that there IS indeed a direct causal link between some “radiative forcing” from an increase in atmospheric CO2 (and/or H2O, CH4 or whatever) and an absolute net rise in surface temperature. Most likely straight from some lab result. But this is completely circular. They’re begging the question. What we want to find out is what CAUSED an observed rise in temperature. In the REAL EARTH SYSTEM. Then we can’t start out by concluding that we already know, BEFORE we start investigating. If you, say, observe some rise in DWLWIR somewhere over a specific time period and you simultaneously observe a rise in T_s, you have absolutely NO reason to assume that the rise in T_s was CAUSED by that rise in DWLWIR. You don’t know. ESPECIALLY if the rise in DWLWIR that you observed were restricted to Clear-Sky conditions and to a tiny section of the full IR spectrum. You have no way of knowing. The same goes for OLR at the ToA. If you observe that the Clear-Sky OLR emitted specifically within the narrow CO2 part of the full spectrum has gone down over some time interval, while the T_tropo/T_s went up, you cannot conclude that this specific reduction in CO2 emission to space is what CAUSED the rise in T_tropo/T_s. It doesn’t work like that. First of all you need to look at All-Sky, and second of all you need to look at Earth’s TOTAL OLR flux to space.
Again, THEORETICALLY, there would be a “climate sensitivity” to +CO2_atm. ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL (or just feedbacks to original “forcing”), there would be a “climate sensitivity” to +CO2_atm. In reality, we haven’t found one. We have no way of saying, empirically, that there is an actual “climate sensitivity” to +CO2_atm in the real Earth system discernibly different from ZERO. In fact, real-world observations (ERBS+CERES vs. UAH) strongly suggest there isn’t one.
If they really looked, they would see an increase in the forcing from co2, but they would also see a reduction in the forcing (spectrums) from water vapor.
The use of the word estimate is an admission that they don’t have sufficient information to call their process a measurement.
Honesty is important. Real scientists are honest. Alarmist ‘scientists’ insist that they have precisely performed measurements which are, in fact, not even wild-ass guesses. We shouldn’t stoop to the level of the alarmists.
Kristian:
It is obvious that we have a difference of opinion. All I can do is iterate my view for clarity.
I stand by my view that the 10 (n.b. TEN) different methods I cited do not use the same procedures so cannot be using the same set of assumptions and they are obtained from different source data, but they each provide a similar determination of climate sensitivity being ~0.4°C for a doubling of CO2 equivalent.
It is a stretch to suggest their similar determinations are a coincidence.
Richard
Chimp:
Thanks for your message that says to me
I admit to some disappointment because I had hoped we had disagreement which may have enabled us to have a useful debate from which I could learn.
Richard
Richard,
I must say I find your position on this subject peculiar. Are you suggesting that you have referenced ten different ways of actually measuring “climate sensitivity” in the real Earth system that all somehow independently lead to a similar result?
Do you not agree with “Climate Science” that “climate sensitivity” (λ) is simply ΔT_s/RF (K/(W/m^2))? And do you not agree that all of these different “methods” or “procedures” will still in the end have to have this relationship as their basic – and common – theoretical/mathematical premise when estimating their “climate sensitivity”? If so, can you really not see that the giant ASSUMPTION being made here simply resides in that formula. You ASSUME a priori that the calculated “radiative forcing” from an increase in e.g. CO2_atm is the direct CAUSE behind some observed absolute rise in temperature. It doesn’t matter what method you use to get there. You HAVE TO go through that equation. And you HAVE TO assume a direct causal link between your observed temperature rise and the “radiative forcing” from a concurrent rise in CO2_atm. There is no escape. “Climate sensitivity” to +CO2_atm in the real Earth system is but a circular idea. Until it has actually been SHOWN empirically – in the real Earth system – that there’s an actually traceable and consistent causal link from +CO2_atm to +T. It hasn’t been shown, Richard. Not anywhere. Not even remotely so. It is ONLY ever assumed. But the data doesn’t support the assumption. The data refutes the assumption.
Kristian:
You say to me
There is nothing “peculiar” about my position.
I am “suggesting” nothing.
In this thread I have repeatedly referenced and linked to three papers which between them provide reports of ten different ways of actually measuring “climate sensitivity” in the real Earth system using different data sources, and they each result in a determination that climate sensitivity is ~0.4°C for a doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration. It seems you have failed to read the papers I have referenced and linked.
Richard
No, Richard. You simply refuse to see my point. It doesn’t matter what method you use. Ultimately, you need to go through the ΔT/RF = λ equation to get to an actual “climate sensitivity” estimate. That means at some point in your analysis you will HAVE TO ASSUME that the RF is in fact directly responsible for an observed rise in T. You can’t.
This implies you think the sum of all of the forcing is what matters, how do you know they all stay the same and sum? Hint, they don’t.
Kristian:
You say to me:
Absolutely not!
I do “see your point” and I disagree with it.
However, you are metaphorically putting your fingers in your ears and shouting ‘Lah! Lah! Lah!’ to what I have said to you.
So, I again repeat what I have said to you.
It is obvious that we have a difference of opinion. All I can do is iterate my view for clarity.
I stand by my view that the 10 (n.b. TEN) different methods I cited do not use the same procedures so cannot be using the same set of assumptions and they are obtained from different source data, but they each provide a similar determination of climate sensitivity being ~0.4°C for a doubling of CO2 equivalent.
It is a stretch to suggest their similar determinations are a coincidence.
Richard
richardscourtney says, April 20, 2017 at 1:05 pm:
Richard,
No, it is obvious that you do not see my point. Because my “point” is not a matter of opinion. “Climate sensitivity” to +CO2_atm IS fundamentally ASSUMED. No one has ever “measured” it, Richard.
INVARIABLY what everyone’s doing is first to ASSUME a direct causal relationship in the real Earth system between some calculated value of the isolated rise in RF from an increase in CO2_atm and an actual observed rise in T, and THEN they “estimate” the magnitude of this assumed sensitivity from various observations. But the causal link between the observations themselves are ALWAYS simply assumed, Richard. Frankly, I don’t understand why you’re so stubborn on this issue. It is so obvious.
I have read through your sources, and ALL of them start out by ASSUMING the original causal link. Two quick examples follows.
Craig Idso’s “Natural Experiment 7”:
“The same result may also be obtained from the standard resolution of the paradox of the faint early sun (…) Most of the people who have studied the problem feel that the answer to this question resides primarily in the large greenhouse effect of Earth’s early atmosphere – which is believed to have contained much more CO2 than it does today (…) – with a secondary contribution coming from the near-global extent of the early ocean (…). Consequently, based on the standard assumption of a 25% reduction in solar luminosity 4.5 billion years ago, I calculated the strength of the greenhouse effect required to compensate for the effects of reduced solar luminosity at half-billion year intervals from 3.5 billion years ago (…) to the present; and I plotted the results as a function of atmospheric CO2 concentration derived from a widely accepted atmospheric CO2 history for that period of time (…).”
You see the problem right here. Exactly what I’m pointing out to you. Idso starts out by taking for granted that the standard resolution of the “faint early Sun paradox” (what most “of the people who have studied the problem feel” is the answer) is more CO2 in the atmosphere (“the large greenhouse effect of Earth’s early atmosphere”).
You can’t do this, Richard.
Lindzen & Choi (2011) (couldn’t find the 2009 paper, but this is a direct update):
http://www-eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/236-Lindzen-Choi-2011.pdf
“However, warming from a doubling of CO2 would only be about 1 C (based on simple calculations where the radiation altitude and the Planck temperature depend on wavelength in accordance with the attenuation coefficients of wellmixed CO2 molecules; a doubling of any concentration in ppmv produces the same warming because of the logarithmic dependence of CO2’s absorption on the amount of CO2) (IPCC, 2007).”
As you can see, the 1 degree from a doubling of atmospheric CO2 doesn’t have ANYTHING to do with the REAL Earth system. It is a purely calculated value from purely theoretical considerations, and/or controlled lab experiments. It is ENTIRELY dependent on the ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL prerequisite to be true. We know it’s not. We know it from empirical observations in the real Earth system.
This is a consistent pattern, Richard. They ALL make these initial assumptions on causal links between calculated RF and observed increases in T.
It is a pseudo-scientific endeavour.
Kristian:
This is a repost of a post that appeared in the wrong place. Hopefully this one is in the right place.
You need to escape from your American culture of ‘try, try and try again’ so you can accept reality. You are behaving like one of the rejected contestants who when told their singing is rejected doesn’t walk off the stage but starts to sing again.
I repeat, I do “see your point” and I disagree with it.
I have repeatedly told you I stand by my view that the 10 (n.b. TEN) different methods to measure climate sensitivity which I have cited and linked do not use the same procedures so cannot be using the same set of assumptions and they are obtained from different source data, but they each provide a similar determination of climate sensitivity being ~0.4°C for a doubling of CO2 equivalent.
It is a stretch to suggest their similar determinations are a coincidence.
Your response is to say to me
But that IS your opinion because people have measured it in the 10 different ways I have told you.
If you choose to ‘sing again’ I will ignore it.
Richard
richardscourtney says, April 22, 2017 at 8:40 am:
No, Richard. That is NOT my “response” to you. My response is to show you two examples of those “ten different ways of measuring climate sensitivity” that really aren’t and how they distinctly ASSUME the +RF=>+T causal relationship before they start “measuring” some hypothesized “climate sensitiity” to +CO2_atm.
You ignore this and rather just “try, try and try again” to repeat the same talking point of “ten different methods”, in order to avoid addressing my point. Either because you don’t understand it, or because you do understand it, but simply don’t want to admit that you’re obviously wrong about this.
No, it is NOT my “opinion”. Because it’s the TRUTH. It seems you haven’t even read about your “ten methods”, because if you had, you would’ve realised that I’m right. They ALL assume the original causal link before they start “measuring”.
Same for me. These days when challenged by alarmists on any given topic I generally first request evidence in support of the claim that there exists a large and +ve feedback to carbon dioxide climate sensitivity from water vapour amplification. Until that single factor is reliably quantified everything else is pure theology it would seem.
cephus0 April 17, 2017 at 12:24 pm
Even as a layman I get that point. The fact is there’s a HUGE hole in AGW theory that cannot explain how bit-part human CO2 can overwhelm the contribution from orders-of-magnitude more abundant water vapour. To side-step this otherwise fatal flaw they parachute positive feedbacks and amplification into the mix, yet there’s scant evidence of either at the levels required for AGW theory to be valid. This really should be the death knell for AGW theory, or am I missing something?
Since there are bands in which CO2 absorbs where H2O doesn’t, overpowering doesn’t come into play.
An increase in CO2 will cause a decrease in the transparency of the atmosphere.
MarkW: why does that matter? Most would accept that it is indeed possible to quantify the expected CO2 sensitivity in isolation – but it isn’t in isolation. As mentioned many times on this site, the atmosphere isn’t an Arrhenius experiment in a jar. What are the feedbacks, if any, what are their mechanisms and what are their signs and magnitudes? What is the justification for claiming a large positive feedback from water vapour? If this cannot be supported with solid evidence then surely that is the end of CAGW – isn’t it?
At night, water vapor negative feedback cancels out most if not all of any additional dat time warming. That is what is shown by these measurements.
https://micro6500blog.wordpress.com/2016/12/01/observational-evidence-for-a-nonlinear-night-time-cooling-mechanism/?preview=true
I would also ask them to do the calculation of human emitted CO2 as a proportion of the atmosphere. I once did, and the annual production rate is 3-4% of total CO2. As the JAXA satellite has also confirmed, non-industrialized regions, i.e. nature, emits far more CO2 than humans, it can be taken that natural CO2 emissions overwhelmingly dominate man’s.
The CAGW claim that man’s CO2 is the driver is pure arm-waving and ‘finger on the air’ guesswork.
cephus, I might also add that feedbacks have a temporal dimension, they take time yet ECS is treated as a scalar as if all the positive feedbacks can be added. The idea that there can be 4.4Watts extra surface emission for 1W forcing also violates energy conservation at the surface. Now its almost possible to get 1.6Watts per watt with the 0.6 coming from gravitational friction, bio energy and other non radiative energy sources, but 4.4 per watt… not in this universe
Tenn you are spot on with your comment.
Climate Sensitivity is the foundation on which all CAGW claims rest. If that metric is lower than what the alarmists claim then their hypothesis collapses in a heap.
Would really appreciate a paper on the current work being done on determining the value of climate sensitivity and what is the best empirical value to date.
Lawrie Waller:
You say
Please see my above comment that provides links to three papers that each measures (n.b. MEASURES) a climate sensitivity of ~0.4°C for a doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration. These three papers use completely independent source data (i.e. surface measurements, ERBE satellite data, and balloon radiosonde data), and different methods conducted by completely independent analysts at different times.
Richard
Tenn, many people have noted the stability of the earth’s climate and how it is unlikely to be easily perturbed by the addition of a few ppm of CO2. Prokaryotic life probably evolved around the beginning of the Archaean eon about 4 billion years ago, and has been here ever since.
It isn’t a wild guess. it can be calculated or it can be deduced from empirical records. The issues is that the alarmists take it to be a constant, so the rate of warming is independent of actual temperature and actual greenhouse gas concentration. It is useful only within a very small range of changes in other factors affecting temperature.
great piece!
“The climate of the Holocene has been characterized by a roughly millennial cycle of warming and cooling (for those who don’t like the word “cycle,” pretend that I typed “quasi-periodic fluctuation”):”
I find “episodic” works well.
“Episodic” definitely works.
I’ve tried “episodic” too, but “cycle” keeps popping up like and evil weed.
The “greenhouse gas” nomenclature, including cycle, is stupendously stupid.
See Einstein, regarding stupid vs the universe.
Very nice article, Dave. I can’t find anything wrong with it. You are sticking to the evidence. Of course Northern hemisphere temperature reconstructions are not a strong argument either way, and different reconstructions have different supporters, as we know. But the burden of proof is clearly on those trying to demonstrate unusual climate. I sincerely don’t think we have clear evidence to compare which one of the previous and present warm periods was warmer. My opinion is that the distinction goes to the Roman WP on account of being so long. I believe our modern WP could get an honorable second place for the past 3000 years. So warmest in over a millennia could be true.
But reducing climate to temperatures is impoverishing. Climate is a lot more. I have looked long and hard through the scientific bibliography for clear evidence that something unusual is going on with the climate. A clear strong evidence (beyond the usual unsupported claims) on which most experts would agree. I think I found it on glacier extent. Nearly all glacier experts find that the current glacier retreat is unusual for several thousands of years, and essentially has undone all glacier progress for the Neoglacial period of the last 5000 years in most places of the planet. Perhaps that is the evidence of the climatic effect of CO2. It might not affect temperatures as much as the current hypothesis needs, but it seems to affect glaciers more than other indicators of the climate system.
In any case it is good and positive that the Neoglacial trend has been broken, even if only temporarily. Most good periods to humankind are associated to warm periods.
Javier,
This is very-well stated:
And it is a fact most people overlook.
Javier,
IMO there is abundant evidence that the hottest intervals of the Holocene were during its Climate Optimum, ie about five to eight thousand years ago. The next toastiest was the Minoan Warm Period, ~3 Ka, followed by the Roman WP, ~2 Ka, and Medieval WP, ~1 Ka. The Current WP has yet to equal peak balminess of the Medieval WP, let alone the even warmer intervals which preceded it.
The worrisome long-term trend is cooling.
Without a doubt, the Holocene Climatic Optimum was the hottest interval of the Holocene. This is very clear in ice and sediment cores and the Holocene Highstand is recognized globally; sea level was about 3 m higher than it is today.
It also appears that the Little Ice Age may have matched the 8.2 KYA Cooling Event for the coldest interval of the Holocene.
The intervening period, Neoglaciation, was marked by a general advance of glaciers.
Chimp,
Leaving aside the HCO for which ample evidence exists, your classification is hard to defend in the absence of decent global temperature reconstructions for those periods, right?
Are you going to defend it based on Greenland temperatures that show periods of temperature inversion compared to Northern European temperatures?
You cannot defend that the MWP was warmer than now based on anecdotal evidence, and most proxies will not extend to the present nor have enough resolution to give you a clear answer. Of course you are welcome to your opinions. I rather be prudent and say we don’t know.
David,
The 8.2 kyr event was complex, multifactorial, part global and part North Atlantic. One has to be careful before extrapolating it to global climate. I would say that without doubt the LIA was the coldest period in the entire Holocene.
A very nice dissection of the 8.2 kyr event is
Rohling, E. J., & Pälike, H. (2005). Centennial-scale climate cooling with a sudden cold event around 8,200 years ago. Nature, 434(7036), 975-979.
http://www.academia.edu/download/46240278/nature0342120160604-24868-1ho1vi1.pdf
As they say:
“The listed evidence for a multi-century climate deterioration, with an onset well before the meltwater flood of about 8.3kyr ago, indicates that it would be erroneous to attribute all anomalies in climate proxy records around 8 kyr BP to the 8.2-kyr-BP event, in an attempt to map the global impacts of a slowdown in NADW production. Proxies for changes in the meridional extent of major atmospheric circulation features (polar vortex, ITCZ) seem more likely to reflect the underlying deterioration of about 8.5–8.0 kyr ago. In addition, this broad anomaly seems especially evident in summer-biased proxies, and the sharp 8.2-kyr-BP event more evident in winter-biased proxies.”
The meltwater pulse at 8.3 kyr had a huge impact in Greenland cores and the North Atlantic region. The LIA was global in nature, even if it was also stronger in the North Atlantic region. Globally, glaciers point to the LIA as the lowest point so far since the start of the Holocene.
Javier April 17, 2017 at 11:43 am
Yes, I can defend the proposition that globally the HCO was warmer than the Minoan WP, which was warmer than the Roman WP, which was warmer than the Medieval WP, which was warmer than the Current WP so far.
Maybe you know of some proxy data which argues against this finding. All that I’ve ever seen supports it. You name it. Ice cores. Sea and lake sediments. Sea level. Stalagmites. Oceanic isotopes. Pollen. Insects. Precipitation proxies. Those spring to mind.
Possibly some local glaciers might beg to differ, but local and regional differences can mask their signal. Even today, some are advancing while others retreat.
Chimp,
That’s not how it works. The one that makes the claim has to provide the evidence.
And the problem is that for every proxy that shows a warmer MWP, there is another one that doesn’t. For example if you go to Greenland ice cores, this is one of the best available because it has been corrected for uplift, for ∂18O sea levels and calibrated to multiple borehole temperature records.
You see? To get significantly warmer you have to go 2000 years back. And the same problem occurs for other type of proxies. For one that shows a warmer MWP you get another one that doesn’t. That’s why when you analyze not your favorite reconstruction, but a bunch of them, the matter is everything but clear.
http://i.imgur.com/Vg59Mh7.png
But if you practice proxy selection, and reconstruction picking, you can obviously support any belief. Although any claim can be made and supported on part of the data, when most of the data is examined without bias, it is clear that it is unclear. We cannot tell with any degree of certainty if the MWP was warmer than now or not. My opinion from looking at the data that way is that probably we are slightly warmer now, but not by much, but we cannot be sure.
Javier,
Please cite every proxy which you think shows the Medieval WP cooler than now.
In the CET reconstruction, it isn’t even close. There has not yet been a single 50-year interval in the Current WP as warm as three, four or more of them in the MWP, even with the Met’s blatant book-cooking.
The fact is that there is not the least basis whatsoever for imagining that any warming in the past century, if any, can compare to that during previous centuries in prior warming cycles.
Javier,
I think that decreased cloudiness is a better explanation for alpine glacier retreat because north-facing ice fields and glaciers are relatively stable. That probably explains why not all glaciers are reported to be in retreat. They are sensitive to insolation! If it was ambient air temperature alone that was responsible for retreat, then one would expect all glaciers to be in retreat, regardless of their aspect. Additionally, the retreat would be predictable by the regional lapse rate. Retreat should stop when the elevation of the snout get to the level it which it is normally below freezing. However, the bottom line is that glaciers are complex dynamic systems where there are things more important than air temperature and can thus override increasing air temperatures. That is to say, if snow is accumulating rapidly enough in a large enough zone of accumulation, a valley glacier might still move forward even with increasing temperatures at the snout.
I don’t know about that, Clyde, but you never get all the glaciers in the planet going in the same direction since 10,000 years ago, so that is not a criterion. Glacier experts generally agree on the current retreat being one in a several millennia event. That makes this period pretty unique in glacier studies.
I agree with Clyde. As some one who has been snowed on during every month of the calendar year in the rocky mountain west I will attest to the fact that snow is possible any time clouds encounter elevated terrain where precipitation will arrive as snow or hail. Glaciers depend upon precipitation to grow, the lack there of will cause retreat.
Javier,
Those experts are dead wrong. The current average retreat, if it’s happening, is clearly not a once in several millennia event.
Glaciers all around the world show the same result as in Alaska, ie current retreat is uncovering remains of forests and other artifacts occurring at about millennial intervals, ie from c. 1000 years ago, ~2000 years ago, 3000 years ago and 5000 years ago. The Egyptian WP, c. 4 Ka, was perhaps less warm than the preceding HCO and the following Minoan WP, or about the same.
Chimp,
So you say, but they are the ones doing the field work on moraines and glacier remnants, Since I ignore your credentials in glacierology, I will go with their expert opinion, and the evidence they show in their publications.
Javier,
I’ve seen the stumps in Alaska and the Alps. I’ve seen the artifacts collected in Switzerland from the Medieval, Roman, Minoan WPs and the HCO. So I’m going with my eyes rather than experts whose funding is based upon the “climate change” bandwagon.
A pretty good discussion on the Alpine pass finds, from 12 years ago:
https://climateaudit.org/2005/11/18/archaeological-finds-in-retreating-swiss-glacier/
On waxing and waning of Alaskan glaciers to the rhythm of the natural millennial-scale and other cycles:
http://juneauempire.com/outdoors/2013-09-13/ancient-trees-emerge-frozen-forest-tomb
But, hey, go with the alleged consensus experts, if that floats your boat. But bear in mind that the consensus has existed to be shown false since 1543. That’s science!
As Feynman taught us.
Chimp,
Ah, consensus doesn’t mean wrong. This is not a consensus of people who have not studied the evidence and are trusting other’s findings. Your eyes don’t mean much on this. Precisely the uncovering of organic remains that are 3000-6000 years old and have been continuously frozen for that time is evidence of unusual glacier retreat.
Relevant bibliography
1. J. Oerlemans. Holocene glacier fluctuations: is the current rate of retreat exceptional? Annals of Glaciology, Volume 31, Number 1, January 2000, pp. 39-44(6)
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/igsoc/agl/2000/00000031/00000001/art00008
“Integrations for a 10 000 year period, driven by random forcing of a realistic strength, show that the current retreat cannot be explained from natural variability in glacier length and must be due to external forcing.
2. Johannes Koch, John J Clague and Gerald Osborn: Alpine glaciers and permanent ice and snow patches in western Canada approach their smallest sizes since the mid-Holocene, consistent with global trends. The Holocene 2014 24: 1639
http://kochj.brandonu.ca/ho_2014.pdf
“Glacier retreat in western Canada and other regions is exposing subfossil tree stumps, soils and plant detritus that, until recently, were beneath tens to hundreds of metres of ice. In addition, human artefacts and caribou dung are emerging from permanent snow patches many thousands of years after they were entombed. Dating of these materials indicates that many of these glaciers and snow patches are smaller today than at any time in the past several thousand years.”
“The global scope and magnitude of glacier retreat likely exceed the natural variability of the climate system and cannot be explained by natural forcing alone. This departure is best explained by the ascendancy of another forcing factor – the increase in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.”
3. Goehring, B. M. et al. 2012. Holocene dynamics of the Rhone Glacier, Switzerland, deduced from ice flow models and cosmogenic nuclides. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 351–352, 27–35.
http://academiccommons.columbia.edu/download/fedora_content/download/ac:152773/CONTENT/j.epsl.2012.07.027.pdf
“After 5 ka, the Rhone Glacier was larger than today, but smaller than its LIA maximum extent. The present extent of the Rhone Glacier therefore likely represents its smallest since the middle Holocene and potential climate warming will lead to further rapid retreat of the Rhone Glacier.”
4. B. K. Reichert, L. Bengtsson and J. Oerlemans: Recent Glacier Retreat Exceeds Internal Variability. Journal of Climate 15 (2002) 3069.
http://www.meteo.psu.edu/holocene/public_html/Mann/courses/EVAT795/Reichertal-JClim02.pdf
“Preindustrial fluctuations of the glaciers as far as observed or reconstructed, including their advance during the Little Ice Age, can be explained by internal variability in the climate system as represented by a GCM. However, fluctuations comparable to the present-day glacier retreat exceed any variation simulated by the GCM control experiments and must be caused by external forcing, with anthropogenic forcing being a likely candidate.”
5. O. Solomina, W. Haeberli, C. Kull, G. Wiles Historical and Holocene glacier–climate variations: General concepts and overview. Global and Planetary Change 60 (2008) 1–9
“The finding of the Oetztal ice man in the uppermost part of a small glacier in the Austrian Alps clearly illustrates that Alpine glacier volumes (not lengths!) have become smaller now than during at least the past about 5000 years.”
6. Bakke, J., Lie, Ø., Dahl, S.O., Nesje, A., Bjune, A.E., 2008. Strength and spatial patterns of the Holocene wintertime westerlies in the NE Atlantic region. Global and Planetary Change 60, 28–41
http://folk.uio.no/joh/GEO4011/Bakke_07GPC.pdf
“The retreat of maritime glaciers along western Scandinavia over the last century is unprecedented in the entire Neoglacial period spanning the last 5200 yrs.”
This is evidence that cannot be faked. They are not going to go downhill with the stones to move the position of a moraine. They know what they talk about and the names there include many of the best glacierologists in the world. They are honest people that defend the influence of solar forcing on glacier extent, because that is what they see, even if it goes against dogma. There is no reason to doubt what they see, and I am sorry if it goes against your beliefs. I don’t have any. I am agnostic about the causes of climate change. Whatever fits the evidence.
Javier,
They are not honest. The Thompsons are a fine example. They didn’t archive their data because, like Jones, they didn’t want to have to defend their conclusions.
“Climate science” is thoroughly corrupt. That alone is reason enough to scoff at your alleged “experts”. That the facts contradict their conclusions only drive nails in their coffins.
But, as I said, please feel free to be suckered by these con artists. I prefer to do my own survey of unbiased evidence from glaciers all around the world, which show that we are still well within normal waxing and waning, on balance.
There is zero evidence in support of the hypothesis of unusual warming or net glacial retreat now.
Better to look for papers by scientists not on the CAGW gravy train, such as those finding alpine glaciers today the same size or larger than during prior warm intervals:
http://notrickszone.com/2014/10/30/more-glacier-studies-confirm-roman-and-medieval-warm-periods-were-just-as-warm-as-today/#sthash.mp0NRVtb.dpbs
You know they’re honest because they’re willing to buck the Borg.
As you must know, glaciers are so variable that anyone could find a selection of them to show today warmer or colder, wetter or drier, windier or calmer than at some point in the past.
But my conclusion is that the preponderance of evidence shows net glacial retreat greater than now globally c. 1000, 2000, 3000 and 5000 years ago. Not to mention during the Eemian.
Glaciers today offer no support whatsoever for the hypothesis that manmade GHGs have altered earth’s climate measurably globally. Locally, yes. But those localities don’t show up in the worldwide picture.
Your bias is so humongous that you think scientific honesty depends on scientists agreeing with your beliefs. Bias doesn’t get any worse than that. But that is your problem. There is no point in discussing science with somebody that has made out of a bias a guiding principle.
Javier,
No, I think it exists based upon what so-called scientists are paid to publish.
Anyone can do a global survey of glaciers and conclude that they are on balance advancing, retreating or staying the same. Honesty comes from fair sampling, which is not evident in your linked papers.
I’m familiar with glaciers on North and South America, Europe and New Zealand, thus sampling the eastern and western NH and SH. They all show the same pattern. As do proxy data from the same areas.
Javier,
It’s not because of my bias toward valid science, but because anyone bucking the consensus is more likely to be practicing science than those cherry picking to try to support it and profit thereby. OTOH, those managing to publish contrary to orthodoxy risk much.
Javier on April 17, 2017 at 10:59 am
But reducing climate to temperatures is impoverishing. Climate is a lot more. I have looked long and hard through the scientific bibliography for clear evidence that something unusual is going on with the climate.
…
Nearly all glacier experts find that the current glacier retreat is unusual for several thousands of years, and essentially has undone all glacier progress for the Neoglacial period of the last 5000 years in most places of the planet.
A very good comment. But I’m not quite sure everybody here reads and interprets it exactly as intended.
Perhaps that is the evidence of the climatic effect of CO2. It might not affect temperatures as much as the current hypothesis needs…
Javier, you certainly know about Joseph W. Chamberlain’s work he did end of the 1970’s, especially
hdl.handle.net/2060/19790010343
concerning the effect of even tiny amounts of trace gasses in the atmosphere.
Do you mean something in that direction?
Not necessarily. The enhanced effect of CO2 on glaciers could be due to something so simple as its absorption band being less saturated over glaciers due to the cold air being drier. A simple physical effect could explain it. The same effect is used to explain that CO2 is acting mainly over high latitudes, during the winter, and at night, that is when most of the warming is taking place.
Javier,
You said, “The enhanced effect of CO2 on glaciers could be due to something so simple as its absorption band being less saturated over glaciers due to the cold air being drier.”
OK, I understand that you are offering a possible cause, and not THE cause for glacier retreat. However, I’d still like to remark that your example MIGHT be applicable to a high-altitude ice field, or a bunch of alpine glaciers. However, in the case of larger systems that coalesce into valley glaciers, they exhibit wasting at the snout until such time as the zone of accumulation fails to provide additional ice and the whole system becomes stagnant and essentially melts in place. Glaciers are such complex systems that they really make poor ‘coal mine canaries,’ particularly with respect to the single parameter of temperature.
I think that what needs to be done is compare the behavior of glaciers on the north slope of E-W trending mountain ranges with that of the glaciers on the south slope. That should give an indication of the importance of insolation versus ambient global temperatures or CO2.
Javier on April 18, 2017 at 2:12 am
I understand your idea, but I have some difficulty to accept temporally and spatially effects of this CO2 guy. Until now, for my little (!!) understanding, it works only over longer time intervals and above greater surfaces, if not even only globally.
The remaining problem is that if CO2 is responsible for glacier retreat as you propose, should it then not a fortiori be responsible for Arctic sea ice decline?
But then: why does this not show similar above the Antarctic, where cold dry air is massively present? I know, this region experiences actually very unexpected sea ice decline
http://fs5.directupload.net/images/170418/yxxv8j3z.png
(source: https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/www.moyhu.org/blog/polview.html)
but to invoke CO2 as its origin is imho somewhat strange, as this decline is very recent in comparison with Arctic and glacier regions.
Surface warming after all can only occur when Earth’s LWIR reaction to SW insolation cannot sufficiently escape to outer space.
But if (!!) I have well understood the process, this in turn can only occur if the absorption / reemission chains within the atmosphere elevate the IR escape altitude up to levels where it is far less efficient than when IR escapes directly trough the atmospheric window. The higher the altitude, the colder the reemission level, the less efficient it is.
And here is my problem with your proposal: why should CO2 build such thin, high columns exactly above the glaciers?
Actually, I don’t think this is an issue, it’s radiating to 3K , doesn’t matter that it’s radiating at -70F, its still 380F warmer. The flux is just higher, same W/m^2. sure it’s not 70F, but the surface only see 80 to 110F colder sky temps anyways. If I remember I’ll do the calculations in the morning.
Well, while I don’t have my pc handy, I can share my excel file if anyone wants it.
https://micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/radiationtransfer.xlsx
micro6500 on April 18, 2017 at 5:28 pm
Actually, I don’t think this is an issue…
… and you are plain right. Google Desktop Search is an amazing tool, but it will upwell you all the deprecated nonsense you stored even 5 years ago.
What I actually read and try to understand is the very slight increase of the atmospheric IR opacity due to an increase of CO2 and consecutively of H2O in the lower atmosphere.
If IR is emitted to outer space directly from the surface, the heat exchange will be more effective than if IR is partly absorbed by H2O or CO2, as the reemission by these molecules does not solely take place up to space, but randomly in all directions, down to surface included (up and downwelling then would form a tiny part of the reemissions’ total).
Maybe you have a better idea…
That’s an unfounded supposition. In fact what is happening is that as IR feedback from Co2 goes up, there’s less from water vapor.
Water vapor emissions at night are dew point temperature regulated, and as air temps near dew point the surface radiation drops to almost nothing, and if continues to cools when the days get longer, it nearly stops. All co2 does is slow this a little, but it is still ultimately limited by water vapor.
https://www.boundless.com/physics/textbooks/boundless-physics-textbook/thermodynamics-14/the-second-law-of-thermodynamics-118/carnot-cycles-413-5630/images/pv-diagram-for-a-carnot-cycle-b0107d64-0aa9-4b8f-b8be-2a39dc64f9cf/
What work does people think the lapse rate is doing?
Javier: You omitted the largest climate change catastrophe of the Holocene: desertification of the Sahara.
The end of the African Humid period is related to the southward displacement of the Intertropical Convergence Zone and associated monsoons due to the shift in summer insolation from the northern to the southern hemisphere with the progress of the 23,000 years precession cycle.
If you are interested I am writing about it around next week at Judith Curry’s blog, Climate Etc.
Javier: I’m interested in this phenomena because it does represent the type of catastrophic climate change that credible AOGCMs should be able to predict. Why should I trust AOGCMs to predict lower rainfall in the Western US or the Amazon being converted to savanna if they can’t hindcast desertification of the Sahara with typical Holocene GHGs and changing solar precession. I understand the concept that a shift in the ITCZ follows precession, but I’m not aware that it was a global phenomena. Rumor has it that a green Sahara in climate models remains green and a brown Sahara remains brown, but I haven’t mastered this subject.
(Hopefully your article will show more wisdom than your comments below on ISIS.)
Excellent, thank you very much for this.
Excellent synthetic post David. You know of course that the reward for a job well done is more work… right? Could you or someone else add the driving mechanisms to this? My – limited – understanding of the mechanisms proposed for CAGW were:
— the mid-topical/mid-troposphere heat bands driving warmth North
— the latent heat in the oceans melting ice caps and stopping the oceanic convective mixing currents
— the feedback from the first driver causing more water vapor to accumulate in driving an ever more reflective heat-trap in the atmosphere
— that the three above would somehow cause the world to dry and increase albedo (although how that worked with the increased cloud cover I never understood).
It would seem that CAGW not only violates the null hypothesis as you have so magnificently laid out in the article above, but that since the ‘iris effect’ has been seen, the mid-tropic/mid-tropo heat has a feedback control and doesn’t exist. It seems like that would mean that not only is the postulated CAGW positive feedback cycle undercut by the null hypothesis, but it also lacks a viable physical mechanism at this point and lives only in table-driven (and therefore self-reinforcing) models.
But I don’t have the skills to nail that down. Is that exo-atmospheric level view correct? If so, wouldn’t coupling a narrative of the same powerful grounding as your article pretty much kill any rational support for CAGW?
In any event, thanks for the article above… I will spend quite a bit of time parsing and pondering it.
In the oil patch, we calculate a probability of geological success (Pg) when preparing probability distributions. A geological success gets you “on the curve” (P99). AGW barely gets “on the curve.” CAGW resides at the opposite end of the curve (P10 to P01).
I like it. I publish a short letter to Editor each month and I just appreciate good information. I see two problems in the neighborhood. Kids talking about escaping Earth to live on Mars. Seriously, too.
The second problem is the hypothesis of Man-Made Global Warming is so screwed up in peoples head that they forget, all global warming is solar. Without our Sun, there is no base to warm up our Earth. Sunspots, act more like a thermostat for our solar system, the difference in our Space and Time as Sir James Jeans puts it, mini ice age or another warm day here in Florida. Thus, the man-made warming hypothesis is the production of green-house gases, that retain heat as stated above. How do we explain water vapor and control it.
By the way, there have been over 240 set fires here in Florida since the new year and routinely smell the smoke.. What ever the alarmists hope to gain in CO2 conservation just went up in smoke.
Claims that AGW or CAGW have earned an exemption from the Null Hypothesis principle are patently ridiculous.
You can prove the the claimed relation between the variation in CO2 and temperature is null all you want, the Science and the Main Stream media have moved on. If you read the news, Methane is 86 times more potent than CO2. California has already written regulations based on that fact. There is a methane clathrate bomb ticking and it’s about to go off. And if you prove that’s null, they will find something else!
There is no such ticking bomb.
When methane clathrate bombs have gone off in the past, climate was far warmer than it could possibly ever get under even two doublings of our currently extremely low CO2 levels.
What has caused such rare events in the past, a hot house climate was associated with lowered sea levels, such that clathrates formed under higher pressure were released under lower.
Worrying about methane releases is a waste or time and resources.
Yep… https://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/12/13/defusing-the-arctic-methane-time-bomb/
Yes but methane is 86 times more powerful than CO2. Scientific American tells us so:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-bad-of-a-greenhouse-gas-is-methane/
Chimp April 17, 2017 at 11:18 am
There is no such ticking bomb.
https://www.google.com/#q=methane+ticking+time+bomb
About 29,000 results (0.49 seconds)
Methane: The ticking time bomb – Before the Flood
Methane Burps: Ticking Time Bomb – Resilience
Methane: The ticking time bomb | The Hartmann Report
Methane, A Ticking Time Bomb – Curiosity
Evidence Continues to Mount for Ticking ‘Methane Time Bomb …
Methane gas: A ticking time bomb – About us | Allianz
Seven facts you need to know about the Arctic methane timebomb …
The best geological evidence for the Arctic methane time bomb being a dud can be found in the stratigraphy beneath Lake El’gygytgyn in northeastern Russia. The lake and its mini-basin occupy a 3.58 million year old meteor crater. Its sediments are ideally suited for a continuous high-resolution climate reconstruction from the Holocene all the way back to the mid-Pliocene. Unlike most other Arctic lakes, Lake El’gygytgyn, has never been buried by glacial stage continental ice sheets. Melles et al., 2012 utilized sediment cores from Lake El’gygytgyn to build a 2.8 million year climate reconstruction of northeastern Russia.
The data from Melles et al., 2012 are available from NOAA’s paleoclimatology library. And it is clearly obvious that Arctic summers were much warmer than either the Eemian/Sangamonian (MIS-5e) and the Holocene (MIS-1)…
MIS-11 peaked a full 5°C warmer than the Holocene Climatic Optimum, which was 1-2°C warmer than the present.
Referring back to Vaks et al., 2013, we can see that there is no evidence of widespread permafrost melting above 60°N since the beginning of MIS-11…
Since we know that the Arctic was about 5°C warmer during the Eemian/Sangamonian (MIS-5e) than it currently is and that there is no evidence of widespread permafrost melt above 60°N, it’s a pretty good bet that the MIS-11 Arctic was 6-10°C warmer than the Holocene Climatic Optimum.
The lack of evidence of permafrost melt during MIS-5 tends to indicate that MIS-11 may have been more than 5°C warmer. So, the notion that we are on the verge of a permafrost meltdown is patently absurd.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/12/13/defusing-the-arctic-methane-time-bomb/
You are sadly correct. Even if there was significant multi-decadal cooling, that would only change the name of the eternal enemy as in 1984, and the fight against man-made climate change would simply march on. They already perfected the method in the nutritional wars. It doesn’t matter what is the enemy “de jour”. New evidence will show that we have to persevere against new enemies. Ten years ago it was Al-Qaeda, five years ago the Taliban, and now it is ISIS or DAESH. Surprisingly they all live in the same caves at the same place that need more bombing. Orwell, how damn prescient you were.
The coolest thing about Jihadis hiding in caves…
I wonder if they could come up with a version of the MOAB with a tougher casing. With the idea that it would penetrate the ground before detonating, in order to better transmit all of the explosive energy into the ground. All the better to collapse underground structures.
Mark,
No. The whole idea behind the MOAB is that it’s a fuel air explosive (FAE) bomb. It packs more power per unit weight because its explosive agent doesn’t need an oxidizer. Hence, its energy derives from access to O2 in the air. Its rapid detonation also consumes oxygen, which is one of the ways in which it kills enemies hiding in caves or tunnels. MOAB, like all FAEs, needs a thin aluminum jacket to work, allowing its explosive agent to disperse before ignition.
The US does however have the MOP, an even bigger bomb designed to penetrate before exploding. But it relies on a conventional explosive with an oxidizer. It does however have a very thick jacket.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_Ordnance_Penetrator
Unlike MOAB, it is delivered by a bomber rather than a cargo plane.
Between Specter gunships and MOAB’s, C-130’s have taken out a lot of bad guys over the past 15 years.
David,
Yup. Now the BC-130 can be added to the AC-130!
Javier April 17, 2017 at 11:31 am
Except that isn’t how it happened.
The Taliban arose at about the same time as Qaeda, in the early ’90s. They made common cause, which is why bin Laden returned to Afghanistan after being booted from Saudi Arabia and the Sudan.
ISIS started as a Qaeda subsidiary, “al Qaeda in Mesopotamia”, but splintered away from its parent organization to set itself up first as the Islamic State in Syria (or the Levant), then just IS, globally.
I heard a retired Air Force general say yesterday that the American B-2 Stealth Bomber can carry several MOAB’s at a time.
Trump can hit North Korea’s “Artillery Line” with multiple MOAB’s as he launches his strikes against North Korea’s nuclear and missile test sites.
North Korea supposedly has about 15,000 artillery pieces sitting within range of Seoul and could give Seoul a terrific pounding if uninterrupted, but the MOAB’s would put an immediate halt to anything within its blast range, so the North Korean’s might not have much time to wreak havoc with their close-in artillery.
China better step up and stop that little tinhorn North Korean dictator or they are liable to have a tremendous mess on their hands. They stop him or Trump is going to have to do it.
It’s too late in the game for the U.S. to kick this particular can down the road any farther. Trump doesn’t have the option to punt because North Korea is going to get these dangerous weapons on Trump’s watch.
Yeah, you appease and appease and appease and then comes the time when you have to take action because your previous appeasement has not made things better, it has made things worse. That’s where we are today.
Off topic but interesting… here’s another tidbit. The other point to ponder about the delivery of unpowered airborne ordnance is the ‘lob toss’. Many NATO aircraft, properly equipped and with a trained pilot can cling to altitude invert relative to the horizon then release their ordnance which will continue on a ballistic arc from the point of release.
That means that the delivery vehicle can stand off from the intended point of impact. Obviously if the weapon has some guidance then the ballistic arc is not merely ballistic but guided, with the ballistics just giving it range.
North Korea also has a veritable rabbit warren of tunnels. 50 years ago they wee secure from air power and were seen as a major benefit to NK planning. With the advent and testing of the thermobaric ordance, those tunnels are a nice place to bury permanently the extra gear and any unfortunate DPRK troops caught in the expanding blast wave(s). the value of the thermobaric material is that it is not a point source for the target square wave… it expands along the confines of the enclosure delivering a new source of the shock at the forefront of the material. It has shown itself to be amazingly effective at rendering harmless the occupants (both personnel and equipment) inside the enclosure.
The really fin part that the DPRK should think about is that there are many, many ways to deliver it and that their tunnels – visible to several types of detection – are very vulnerable to counter-mining. But if it worked in the Great Patriotic war, then it has to still work now… right?
Since ISIS exists due to the US invasion of Iraq that was started based on propaganda about nonexistent weapons of mass destruction, I’d say it is all working nicely not to have a safer world, but to have a permanent war to an ever changing global enemy, then Al-Qaeda, now ISIS/Daesh. Innocent civilians all over the world are paying the price.
According to Einstein “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” Apparently lots of people think that more bombs/bigger bombs are going to solve the problem that started with bombs.
Those 15K artillery pieces are scattered along the entire NK/SK border and are all dug in. It’s going to take a lot more than 2 MOABs to take them all out.
Javier, ISIS existed as a branch of Al Queda long before the Iraqi invasion.
ISIS was contained until Obama decided to pull out, so it was your boy Obama who is responsible for the rise of ISIS.
Weapons of Mass Destruction were just 1 of 23 justifications for resuming the Gulf War.
WMDs were found.
MarkW,
According to Iraqis, Syrians and analysts who study the group, almost all of ISIL’s leaders—including the members of its military and security committees and the majority of its emirs and princes—are former Iraqi military and intelligence officers, specifically former members of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath government who lost their jobs and pensions in the de-Ba’athification process after that regime was overthrown.[140][141][142] The former Chief Strategist in the Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism of the US State Department, David Kilcullen, has said that “There undeniably would be no Isis if we had not invaded Iraq.”
So yes, after supporting the Talibans to fight the Soviets, the US has boosted ISIS with the invasion of Iraq. Good job on increasing Yihadism in the world. And Obama is not mine as he has never been the president of my country. Never voted for him, never thought greatly of him. But frankly, it is not as if the presidents of the US are great world leaders as of late, are they?
TA,
B-2 can just barely carry two MOABs. Nork artillery is protected by tunnels with blast doors and ventilation which might survive the O2-consuming FAE explosion. But once they started to roll out their guns, yes we could hit them. Many are out of range of Seoul, but 15,000 implies 2500 six-tube batteries. That is a lot of target aimpoints.
However, Seoul is covered by counter-battery radars, so that return fire could be on its way while the Nork arty rounds are still in the air. Many would get only one volley.
The Nork leadership would be targeted in the first wave of allied attacks, along with command, control and communication centers. Hence it would be up to local commanders surviving along the DMZ to decide whether they should risk attempting bombardment and invasion.
I think they missed a great opportunity over the weekend, kinetic rounds dropped on his viewing stand, Job Done!
Javier,
Here is what happened.
The US didn’t support the Taliban during the Soviet War. It didn’t exist yet. Some Pashtun muj leaders did later become associated with the Taliban, but the fact is that we supported the Taliban’s opponents in postwar Afghanistan. The Taliban were created by Pakistan and Saudi Arabia after the Soviet defeat, as part of the neo-Great Game between Iran and India on one side and Pakistan and China on the other.
ISIS, as noted, is an offshoot of al Qaeda. AQ started in Saudi Arabia in opposition to the Saud dynasty, ie bin Laden was biting the hand that had so well fed his family. Bin Laden opposed the Saudi’s acceptance of US aid in defeating Saddam, who sought to capture the oil-rich Eastern Province of their kingdom, as he had overrun Kuwait. Bin Laden had delusions of grandeur and illusions of military competence, after his experience in Afghanistan.
After the US and its allies liberated Iraq and killed off the leadership of AQ in Mesopotamia, ISIS took its place, with some of its leaders unwisely released from US POW camps in 2009. Then Obama ordered us precipitously to pull out of Iraq (prematurely!), without obtaining a status of forces agreement. Many wiser heads at the time predicted exactly what would happen as a result, and did occur.
Without the moderating influence of a US presence, a Shia-dominated, Iranian puppet regime in Baghdad oppressed the Sunni Arab minority, creating an opening for jihadis to return, regroup and reorganize. Had we kept even a single Brigade Combat Team in Iraq, IS would have had to stay in Syria, where after 2011 it was enlarged by Assad and Putin in order to counter Turkish-backed secular and moderate Sunni rebels against the mass murderous Alawite regime. Assad released radicalized political prisoners and Putin let thousands of Russian Muslim fighters travel to Syria.
Alawites are 11% of Syria’s population, with a few percent more in other Shia groups. The vast majority are Sunni Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen, with some Druze. So of course the Assad regime has had to murder tens of thousands in every prior decade and hundreds of thousands now.
Given the weakness of the Iraqi army without allied support, ISIS was able rapidly to capture Fallujah, Ramadi and Mosul. As noted, this wouldn’t have been possible with even a modest US presence. Obama had to know this, which makes him look like an Iranian stooge.
Now Assad is kept in power only by massive foreign assistance. There is no Syrian national army any more. His fighters are mostly Iranian, Lebanese Hezbollah and Iraqi Shia militia, backed by Russian air, ground combat and service support troops.
If you want to blame outsiders for the disaster in Syria and the subjugation of parts of Iraq, go ahead and castigate Obama for stupidity or worse, but don’t forget Russia, Iran and Turkey. And maybe Britain and France for drawing such idiotic boundaries after WWI. You can blame Bush, too, for not keeping the Iraqi army intact in 2003, if you want.
But it’s not as if the West created ISIS on purpose, as conspiracy theorists charge. Don’t assume nefarious plots when simple incompetence and mistakes suffice. The West didn’t need ISIS as a wedge into the Tehran-Baghdad-Damascus Shia axis. We had that after the Surge turned local Iraqi Sunnis against the jihadis. But Obama cut and ran.
micro6500 April 18, 2017 at 10:56 am
After the debut of US smart weapons in Vietnam, the Norks quit holding their Party congresses. Under Obama, they started them up again, so sure were they that he wouldn’t attack them, despite such an inviting target for laser-guided, 2000# bombs.
Good points, Jim Hodgen. Yes, caves are no longer a good place to hide.
Well, if we could (or have) developed the “Hammer of Thor”, there’d be no need for big (including nuclear) bombs:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinetic_bombardment
MarkW is correct about the origins of ISIS, and you are incorrect, Javier.
Iraq was in good shape after the Iraq war. Bush left Obama a pacified country in Iraq. Obama and Biden bragged about how well Iraq was doing “after the war” in 2011. Then, Obama pulled all U.S. combat troops out of Iraq in early 2012, and ISIS saw its chance to reenter Iraq. The first carbomb in Baghdad since the end of the war in 2008, was detonated two weeks after Obama pulled U.S. troops out.
ISIS rose, and Obama sat back and fiddled while Iraq and the Middle East burned, and Western Europe was overwhelmed with refugess from the fighting in Iraq and Syria. Then Obama destabilizes Libya and adds to the trajedy. The worst president Evah!
“B-2 can just barely carry two MOABs. Nork artillery is protected by tunnels with blast doors and ventilation which might survive the O2-consuming FAE explosion.”
Good comments, Chimp.
If the people in the caves have access to outside air, then they are subject to the overpressure a big bomb creates. B-52’s would carpet bomb North Vietnamese tunnel complexes with 500 lb. bombs, and they would go into the tunnels afterwards, deep tunnels, and find dead bodies with no marks on them. If you are not sealed away from the outside atmosphere, you will not survive such an attack. If the air can get to you, then the overpressure can get to you.
“I think they missed a great opportunity over the weekend, kinetic rounds dropped on his viewing stand, Job Done!”
I was watching that parade and thinking exactly the same thing. One MOAB would get them all ! It sure would make a mess of that parade ground.
“After the US and its allies liberated Iraq and killed off the leadership of AQ in Mesopotamia, ISIS took its place, with some of its leaders unwisely released from US POW camps in 2009. Then Obama ordered us precipitously to pull out of Iraq (prematurely!), without obtaining a status of forces agreement. Many wiser heads at the time predicted exactly what would happen as a result, and did occur.”
Yeah. Read George W. Bush’s 2007 State of the Union speech where he lays out exactly what would happen if the U.S. pulled its troops out of Iraq too early. He perfectly described just exactly what did happen in Iraq after Obama bugged out in 2012.
Btw, by the end of the Iraq war in 2008, Bush had reduced the Al Qaeda in Iraq/ISIS forces to less than 100 fighters, including al Baghdadi, and they all ran away to hide in Syria until 2012.
TA April 18, 2017 at 5:22 pm
No need to carpet bomb North Korea. Take out the leadership and nuclear infrastructure, including subs, command, control and communications nodes and, if surviving military chain of command rolls out the DMZ guns on standing orders, then cluster munitions on 2500 aimpoints, one per battery, solves that problem. Neither carpet bombing with dumb bombs nor 2500 MOABs required. BTW, the number of GBU-43/Bs reported built is 15.
Steve point beyond mentioning methane is that the media is continually trumpeting some scary thing and attributing it to global warming\climate change. Beat down the claim with reason and facts, and another pops up. It truly is a game of Climate Whack-A-Mole. It doesn’t mean you give up, but you have to be ready.
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2016/07/28/climate-whack-a-mole/
Most media people are dumb but wish to appear smrt, so they align themselves with the noisy sophists (you know – the ones who are more likely to attack them if they don’t go along). Plus, the climatastrophe angle is just too irresistible to journalists – it makes them feel important and virtuously caring. I mean, just look at these morons on CNN congratulating each other for “being first to ‘break’ a story”. What – they are to be admired because they repeat what someone else told them? That’s an accomplishment?
Yes, and this comment from Adler applies to such journalists:
“Any teacher will tell you it is much easier to teach a student who is ignorant than one who is in error, because the student who is in error on a given point thinks that he knows whereas in fact he does not know. . .It is almost necessary to take the student who is in error and first correct the error before you can teach him. . .The path from ignorance to knowledge is shorter than the path from error to knowledge.”
Mortimer Adler
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2017/01/12/yellow-climate-journalism/
@Ron,
My high school football coach put it this way: “There’s a difference between dumb and stupid. Dumb doesn’t know any better. Stupid knows better, but continues to make the same mistake.”
As Ron White says…
The places with methane clathrates are in the ocean were it is deep and cold.
The oceans would need to warm by 5 to 10C before it warmed enough to impact methane clathrates.
1) Even if the surface were to warm that much, it would take hundreds to thousands of years for the heat to get all the way to the bottom of the ocean.
2) If the world warmed that much, the oceans would get deeper, which would increase the pressure meaning the oceans would have to warm even more to release the methane.
3) Even if the oceans did warm up enough to release the methane in the clathrates, the release would be so slow and the journey to the surface so long that all of the methane would be consumed by biological activity long before it could reach the surface.
3a) The recent oil spill deep in the Gulf of Mexico never made it to the surface, it was all consumed before it could reach the surface, and that spill was 5 or six magnitudes greater than any possible release from clathrates.
“they will find something else!”
And in the process undermine the rule of law.
A few years ago, the premier of British Columbia (Glen Clark – New Democratic Party ) said that (paraphrasing) since he was in power he could do whatever he wanted. The following election, the once ruling party held only 2 (two) seats grand total.
David,
Both plate tectonics and evolution are scientific facts as well as bodies of theory to explain those facts, ie observations.
And both are indeed subject to experimentation. In the case of plate tectonics, the observations are the experiments. The theory (and fact) of tectonics predicts that continents and oceanic plates can be observed moving, and that processes such as subduction will be observed (and inferred from observations). Thus the hypothesis of tectonic plate movement is confirmed. It is always confirmed and never shown false.
In the case of evolution, both lab and field experiments testing its predictions can be made, some of which are, as with tectonics, themselves observations. Again, the predictions are confirmed and not shown false. Predictions made upon the basis of hypotheses from religion rather than science have repeatedly been falsified.
Genetics are directly observable and can be empirically tested. The evolution of the modern diversity of species from earlier species relies on the integration of genetics with correlative evidence from the fossil record. This facet of the theory cannot be empirically tested. It can only be tested through observations.
Yes, the observations are the experiment in plate tectonics and much of geology. That was one of my main points. I may not have made it clearly enough.
Evolution and plate tectonics are “concise, coherent, systematic, predictive, and broadly applicable” explanations of the observations. They are robust scientific theories which are based on combinations of empirical and correlative evidence.
David,
The evolution of new species from old is observed frequently both in the lab and in the wild. New species and genera have been created in the lab. Observations of speciation events in the wild have also been recreated in the lab. Thus speciation is a scientific fact, ie a repeated observation.
Much, probably most, speciation occurs in a single generation, so is readily observable. For organisms with rapid reproductive cycles, even gradual evolution is also directly observable.
For the evolution of higher classifications, ie new families, orders, classes, phyla and one domain (Eukaryota), science does rely on inferences from genetics, fossils and every other source of evidence. But there is no alternative scientific conclusion possible from these overwhelming mountains of evidence except the evolution of these new categories from their ancestors.
When we observe a mosquito evolving into something other than a mosquito, we will have observed the true evolution of a new species.
Most, if not all, of the reported observations of speciation at the multi-cellular level depend on the weakest possible definition of species.
I agree that there is no alternative working hypothesis. However, the lack of an alternative isn’t evidence to support a theory.
One of the things that drives me crazy about the C vs E debates is the misconception of the word “theory.” One side says evolution is *just* a theory and the other insists that it is a fact. There is no hierarchy here. Facts aren’t superior to scientific theories. Theories don’t get promoted to facts; although some are elevated to the status of “laws.” The power of a theory is in its ability to predict as yet unobserved facts. In this sense, scientific theories are much like the “unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics.”
Evolution and plate tectonics are very robust, very powerful scientific theories.
From Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speciation
Based on this definition of “species,” Rosie O’Donnell and I are of different species.
David,
In biology, evolution refers both to a fact and to a theory. There is no elevation involved. It is a fact explained by a body of theory. You’re right of course that saying evolution is “just a theory” is to misunderstand what a theory is. But there is no scientific debate between the cult of creationism and the physical reality of evolution.
Before the theory of evolution in the 19th century, the fact of evolution was called “development”. This fact was evident then from the fossil record, comparative anatomy, the geographic distribution of species and other lines of evidence. What is now called “evolution” was then known as “transmutation” and denounced as heretical. But long before 1858 it was obvious to any honest observer, including churchmen, that “development’ had occurred. The favored hypothesis to explain it was serial creation.
Now however we, including myself, observe the evolution of new species and genera in real time. These are often not “weakly defined” species but robust, to include even indisputably new genera, not just species. I suppose that speciation via hybridization sometimes produces “weak” species, still capable of reproducing with their parental species, but not doing so in the wild. However hybridization can and does produce true species, by any definition.
More important than hybridization however among quick and dirty evolutionary processes is polyploidy, ie duplication of all or part of a genome. This is more common in plants than animals (not sure about fungi), but observed in all three multicellular kingdoms. Some 30 to 80% of plant species have arisen via polyploidy, ie in a single generation, and are incapable of interbreeding with their genomically-impoverished mother species.
Defining species as you know is harder for microbes, but when a single point mutation turns a sugar-eating bacterium into a nylon-eater, then evolution has occurred.
Your definition of “species” is way too broad, if it includes family-level differences, as your mosquito example suggests. As noted, new genera have been created in the lab, as long ago as the 1930s, if not earlier. No example of creating a new family comes to mind, but Hawaiian flies alone show how easy such an evolutionary step is in an isolated environment with available niches.
Mosquitoes are members of the family Culicidae. As above, evolution of new families usually has to be inferred rather than observed, but the conclusion is inescapable. We have observed the evolution of culicids from their ancestral flies preserved in Mesozoic amber samples. Analysis of fly genomes also shows from which lineage the family is derived, along with details of anatomy and other lines of evidence.
We have also observed other flies switching from sucking nectar to sucking blood, creating new species in the process, so the transition is not surprising.
David Middleton April 17, 2017 at 12:05 pm
There is no scientific definition of species under which you and Rosie would be considered members of different species.
The short version is that a true species is incapable of reproducing fertile offspring with its maternal species or any other. The only exceptions are in some cases where fertile offspring are possible under artificial conditions, but mating doesn’t occur in the wild due to physical isolation or behavioral differences.
The classic example is of two species in the genus Equus, ie horses and donkeys, which can produce (almost always) infertile offspring, ie mules, so are considered different species.
Thus, for sexually reproducing species, the definition is clear. As noted, it’s harder for unicellular microbes and asexually reproducing multicells.
Your Wiki citation barely scratches the surface of lab creation and recreation of species.
Rosie and I are definitively of different species according to this definition:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species
David,
It should be obvious on its face that that passage describes a type of species; it doesn’t define the fundamental concept of species itself. As I noted, there are instances of speciation in which reproduction is possible, but doesn’t usually occur, for whatever barrier. But for the vast majority of sexual species, the standard definition applies.
And even by that definition, you and Rosie don’t count. With insects, mate choice isn’t subject to whim. If you and Rosie were flies rather than people, you would mate with her.
I can’t tell if you’re being serious or jocular.
Darwin’s book was titled “On the Origin of Species”. At that time the standard definition already applied. To him and to his readers educated in natural science, what was understood by “species” was capability of producing fertile offspring together.
Lumping species into genera was then somewhat subjective. We can now rely on genetics and chromosomes. Linnaeus wanted to lump Homo and Pan into the same genus, but knew he would catch holy hell from the churches if he did that.
If I have to tell you when I’m being jocular (a sarcastic smart @$$), there’s no point in being jocular… 😉
David,
There might be a point. Maybe I’m just a slow audience for your blog stand up routine.
To quote George C. Scott from Patton:
“It’s not important for them to know [when I’m acting]. It’s only important for me to know.”
😉
One thing that has always fascinated me is the vehemence with which some people react to the notion that the mutations that drive evolution need not be 100% random in nature.
To them, even suggesting that God may have had used loaded dice when it comes to these mutations is the logical equivalent to claiming that God created everything 5000 years ago.
>>
One of the things that drives me crazy about the C vs E debates is the misconception of the word “theory.” One side says evolution is *just* a theory and the other insists that it is a fact. There is no hierarchy here. Facts aren’t superior to scientific theories. Theories don’t get promoted to facts; although some are elevated to the status of “laws.”
<<
One of the things that drives me crazy is the idea that “laws” are proven “theories” or “elevated theories.” When arguing Evolution many years ago on Compuserve, we’d get individuals who’d say “Evolution is ONLY a theory.” Our reply was usually, “So what? Theories are what science is all about.” Then they’d say, “But Evolution hasn’t been proven.” It soon dawned on me (at least) that these individuals thought that the scientific method involved the sequence: hypothesis–theory–proof–law.
I don’t know who is teaching this nonsense, but laws are not proven theories. Laws usually come first, and then theories explain those laws. Kepler’s three laws of planetary motion were all derived from Tycho Brahe’s data. There were no theories or proofs that predated these laws. Later Newton came along with his three “laws” of motion, his gravitational “law,” conservation of momentum and angular momentum, and his invention of Calculus to derive Kepler’s laws. Even so, Kepler’s third law is only an approximation. Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity explains these laws more accurately.
Any geologist should know that the law (principle) of faunal succession was formulated in the early 19th century. Darwin’s Theory of Evolution came decades later. Darwin’s theory explains why the principle of faunal succession is true.
Jim
David,
“Evolution and plate tectonics are “concise, coherent, systematic, predictive, and broadly applicable” explanations of the observations.”
Are you excluding the evolution of inanimate matter into living/reproducing living organisms in that statement?
If not, what is the “concise” explanation for that “step”?
If yes, then in combination with the other unobserved aspects you mention, I don’t understand how the “theory” is anything more than an idea . . Much like treating the possibility that a monkey could type out this comment, as a scientific theory for how it came to be . . ; )
PS ~ For an idea to be considered a scientific theory, doesn’t it have to be falsifiable? . . How could the Evolution theory be falsified?
>>
JohnKnight
April 17, 2017 at 9:11 pm
Are you excluding the evolution of inanimate matter into living/reproducing living organisms in that statement?
<<
Evolution is the wrong theory. Evolution does not deal with the origin of life. Theories, hypotheses, and ideas on the origin of life would fall under Abiogenesis. So I would say David is excluding Abiogenesis from that statement as he said nothing about it.
Jim
Jim Masterson April 17, 2017 at 9:03 pm
Yup. Geologists and paleontologists noted succession in their studied strata long before Darwin’s theory of natural selection provided the first clue to evolutionary processes. Prior hypotheses, like Lamarck’s, attempting to explain the observed changes in fossils from period to period in the rocks, weren’t convincing.
The Permian mass extinction event stood out so starkly when discovered in the 1840s that a whole new creation was suggested to explain it.
MarkW April 17, 2017 at 1:38 pm
For your conjectured divine mutations to be a scientific hypothesis, you’d have to show some evidence for them, then make testable predictions about them. Since that can’t be done, it’s not a scientific hypothesis, so of course scientists should reject unsupported imaginary divine intervention out of hand.
Completely natural processes adequately explain observations. Predictions made on the basis of totally natural evolution are confirmed. The God hypothesis can’t even to tested, but all predictions by creationists are found false.
JohnKnight April 17, 2017 at 9:11 pm
As you’ve repeatedly been told, biological evolution is different from abiogenesis, ie the origin of life from its constituent chemical parts. At present there isn’t a single hypothesis or theory for the origin of life, but great strides have been made in understanding how chemical evolution led to the first living things.
Evolution, as noted, is not “just a theory”, but also a scientific fact, observed over and over and over again. Besides of course, a scientific theory isn’t like the commonplace use of that term.
Evolution can easily be falsified, but never has been, nor can it be, since it’s a fact, ie an observation, as well as a body of theory explaining those observations.
As Haldane said, a rabbit in the Cambrian would falsify the theory of evolution. But instead, the fossil record, along with every other possible line of evidence, all show that phyla, classes, orders, families, genera and species of living things have evolved from their ancestors. There is no evidence in support of any possible competing scientific hypothesis.
If you want to go by the Bible, it’s a lot easier to read the fact of evolution into the text than it is modern astronomy, geology, hydrology, you name it. Does an immobile earth literally supported by pillars and a foundation personally laid by God? Does earth have four corners? Is it covered by a solid dome? Do stars fall to earth? Do they sing? Does God sit on the edge of the earth and look down on people who seem to Him to resemble insects?
If you take the irreconcilably contradictory creation myths in Genesis as literally true, then how about God walking on the vault of heaven, personally opening and closing the levers controlling the storehouses of rain, hail and snow? How do you read the hydrological cycle into those passages, in which also God distributes lightning and sends clouds and winds?
Deuteronomy 28:12
“The LORD will open for you His good storehouse, the heavens, to give rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hand; and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow.
Job 22:14 (NLT)
“For thick clouds swirl about him, and he cannot see us. He is way up there, walking on the vault of heaven.
Job 38:4 (NLT)
“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you know so much.
Job 38:22
“Have you entered the storehouses of the snow, Or have you seen the storehouses of the hail,
Psalm 135:7
He causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth; Who makes lightnings for the rain, Who brings forth the wind from His treasuries.
Jeremiah 10:13
When He utters His voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, And He causes the clouds to ascend from the end of the earth; He makes lightning for the rain, And brings out the wind from His storehouses.
Jeremiah 51:16
When He utters His voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, And He causes the clouds to ascend from the end of the earth; He makes lightning for the rain And brings forth the wind from His storehouses.
I should have said “could” easily be falsified.
Cultists have tried for almost 160 years to show the theory and fact of evolution false, but with no success.
MarkW April 17, 2017 at 1:38 pm
Inserting antiscientific conjecture into science based upon religion is at least as bad as doing the same for ideological reasons, a la CAGW. That’s why both mixings of belief systems with science should be vehemently rejected.
Jim,
“Evolution is the wrong theory. Evolution does not deal with the origin of life.”
Yes, I know I’m ignoring that (to my mind somewhat) arbitrary (yet extremely convenient) division of the . . monkey’s hyper-monumental, yet still hypothetical achievements ; )
I’m a bad boy . .
Chimp,
“As Haldane said, a rabbit in the Cambrian would falsify the theory of evolution.”
Can’t go to the (hypothetical) Cambrian to check for rabbits . . please try to avoid silly talk . . you surely meant something along the lines of finding a trilobite fossil next to a rabbit skeleton (in the present ; )
Thing is, your “silly talk” there is potentially indicative of extreme prejudice, as in an inability to stop “seeing” that imaginary past, that’s been assembled over time (which I am quite familiar with, and did not question for most of my life) by people . . not infallible or disinterested super-duper honest gods of some sort. Breaking the habit of assuming that what appears to us (internally) as a result of years of authoritative voices telling us what happened in the distant past, is difficult, but necessary I believe, in order to objectively consider the possibility that we’ve . . been conned, essentially.
In the present, I believe, we face a world of people being conned in a similar fashion to what I am proposing may have happened to us, in regard to evolution. Basic logic pretty much dictates that if it can happen now, it could have happened before, ya know?
PS ~ betcha can’t find a rabbit skeleton on the bottom of today’s ocean, Chimp . . but that hardly demonstrates they don’t currently exist, ya know?
>>
JohnKnight
April 18, 2017 at 2:00 pm
Yes, I know I’m ignoring that . . . .
<<
I appreciate the heads-up–thanks. I’ll ignore your comments from now on.
Jim
Aw, special snowflake Jim got triggered by my not pretending I think it’s logical to assume living things coming into existence, and being able to replicate, are unrelated ; )
John,
The distinction between biological evolution and abiogenesis could not possibly be less arbitrary. What a silly thing to say. As even you must realize, biological evolutionary processes can only operate on living things.
Thus it should be obvious that biological evolution first requires life to arise. Chemical evolution must have played a part in that process.
What is silly is your imagining that we don’t sample the Cambrian all the time. Some of the highest resolution fossils ever found come from Cambrian layers. That’s how we know so much about life in that distant period. We have sampled Cambrian land surfaces as well as the oceans in which multicellular organisms then lived. And so far, no rabbits.
There are plenty of other ways to falsify evolution, and creationists are always trying, but they fail miserably. They’re so steeped in lies however that they know no shame, no matter how often they’re publicly embarrassed. Behe, the guy who hatched the hare-brained old creationism in a new bottle scheme to sneak it into science classes, which he called “ID”, was forced to admit under oath on the witness stand that evolution is a fact.
What is imaginary is your alternative universe in which evolution doesn’t occur. It’s a consequence of reproduction. Sooner or later, it cannot not happen. Even “living fossils”, which appear superficially unchanged for millions or tens of millions of years, thanks to stable environments, probably couldn’t produce fertile offspring with their seemingly similar ancestors.
John,
Here are plenty of opportunities for you to falsify evolution, listed by geologic period. Find fossils out of this succession sequence, which is what has actually been discovered and what is predicted by the theory of evolution:
Cryogenian: Colonies of unicellular choanocytes forming protosponges.
Ediacaran: Poriferans (sponge phylum) with choanocyte feeding cells and calcareous and siliceous spicules.
Cambrian: Larger animals with hard, calcareous body parts, to include the first tiny vertebrates.
Ordovician: Fish with jaws.
Silurian: Bony fish. First vascular plants and arthropods invade the land.
Devonian: Lobe-finned fish evolve into tetrapods. First forests.
Carboniferous: Tetrapods evolve into amniotes, enabling the vertebrate conquest of the land.
Permian: Synapsid amniotes become increasingly mammal-like.
Triassic: First proto-mammals, with both the “reptilian” and mammalian jaw joints.
Jurassic: True mammals with only the mammalian jaw joint and the other jaw bones forming the middle ear.
Cretaceous: Placental mammals.
Paleogene: Primates diversify, including apes.
Neogene: African great apes evolve into chimp and gorilla lines, then humans, chimps and bonobos emerge from the chimp lineage.
Do you suppose that God planted these fossils in this order and made the rocks seem old to mislead us and test our faith?
Two important mutations occurred in the Pliocene Epoch of the Neogene Period leading to modern humans. Early in the epoch, two standard, small ape chromosomes fused, a genetic event associated with upright walking, producing Genus Australopithecus. Toward the very end of the epoch, a single mutation enabled brain growth, leading to Genus Homo.
During the Pleistocene, Homo species grew larger and their brains gradually bigger. The rocks do not lie. Neither does our genome nor any of the other superabundant lines of evidence so vividly displaying human evolution.
Chimp,
“The distinction between biological evolution and abiogenesis could not possibly be less arbitrary.” What a silly thing to say. As even you must realize, biological evolutionary processes can only operate on living things.”
You’re loading the question, so to speak, by inserting the term “biological” like that (It means living order, basically). It amounts to an assumption that there was no non-living process(es) going on, that resulted in things that resembled what we see as life being produced, which at some point produced a simple self replicating version of some sort. Along the lines of an “RNA world” beginning, as opposed to a “whole cloth” style abiogenesis event, along the lines of the “Boltzmann brain” mold. I see no reason to make that sort of assumption . . That said, speaking just within the “naturalism” world-view . .
What I see in the insistence on treating the two aspects as independent, is an extremely handy way to keep the hype-unlikely times hyper-unlikely probability problem at bay. You know, the one that got “solved” by the multi-verse idea? ; )
“What is silly is your imagining that we don’t sample the Cambrian all the time.”
I will not go insane with you guys . . we can ONLY sample things in the present. Looking at a photo of your dead great grandma, is not going back in time . .
John,
You’re being willfully obtuse and trying to distract from the obvious point.
Obviously, Haldane was talking about a fossil rabbit, not actually going back in time 540 million years. It doesn’t have to be a rabbit. It could be a dolphin.
Your cult has deranged you.
Chimp,
“Obviously, Haldane was talking about a fossil rabbit…”
Of course, but they would first have to be a fresh skeleton, down where they could be buried alongside a trilobite. Virtually certain never to occur . . Yet, you sited someone giving that as a falsification means . . Think he might have failed to use his mind objectively in that moment? I do . .
And, when I’ve asked people wed to the Evolution idea how come we don’t see creature lines gradually changing in the fossil record (as Mr, Darwin himself pointed out was a problem for his theory), guess what they tell me? We are only seeing a tiny slice of all the creatures that ever lived in those fossils, so it’s no big deal that we haven’t caught a good example of it happening .. . despite it having to have gone on for many millions of years with regard to virtually all living and extinct creature lines! Yet, I’m told finding a rabbit down there where the trilobites lived is a means of falsifying the “theory”, and that lame idea echoes down into this thread . . amazing.
In a global flood (you know, that “myth” so remarkably ubiquitous among ancient human societies ; ) one would expect bottom dwellers with little capacity to swim, to be buried early (down in the “Cambrian” layers, as you imagine them to be (and they might be, I’m not arguing it’s impossible, just that it’s not a “scientific fact”, but rather a belief.)) . . and that’s just not where one would expect to find dolphin remains either under those circumstances. And they couldn’t later get into that layer, so, your replacement “falsification” means is also rather . . unrealistic. If the global flood happened, one would not expect to find rabbit or dolphin remains in with trilobites.
So, got any logical ways to “falsify” the idea?
John,
Geologic layers are not at all as you imagine them to be. Marine and terrestrial layers alternate. This would not be the case if they were laid down in a global flood, for which there is zero evidence and all the evidence in the world against it.
Animals from all other periods would be mixed up with similarly-sized Cambrian creatures, all in the same layer under your fantasy of size sorting. All the dead animals would fall to the bottom, so that dolphin fossils should indeed lie next to trilobite fossils. Your belief is absurd.
Of course flood myths are common because floods are common. There might even be instances in which local people could see only water for a while, making them think that the whole world was flooded. But its a physical impossibility for the whole world to have flooded higher than the tallest mountains. There is not enough water, obviously, and where could it have come from and where did it go?
As for RNA and proteins, here’s a recent study important in origin of life research. It shows that polypeptides (amino acid stands shorter than proteins) could have helped catalyze the formation of ribozymes, ie RNA strands with enzymatic functions, to include promoting synthesis of themselves. The ribosome is an RNA structure which makes proteins in cells. It also has some non-functional protein coating, but it’s active site is all RNA.
https://www.nature.com/nchem/journal/v9/n4/full/nchem.2739.html
The extent to which peptides and RNA worked together during the origin of life has been a subject of debate. This paper elucidates that part of the process.
And, on the chemical evolution, ie abiogenesis, which preceded biological evolution:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/03/170313135048.htm
https://phys.org/news/2013-12-scientists-closer-rna.html
https://www.nature.com/subjects/origin-of-life
Every year brings us closer to making replicating protocells in the lab.
Noah’s flood was probably the flooding of the Black Sea basin during the Holocene highstand.
Thank you for the continuing education. Well presented information like this enlightens the vast majority of lay persons trying to understand the science or just science in general. Green cultists get the ridicule and contempt them so richly deserve.
ha, David, you weren’t joking around when you said that posting graphs is one of your hobbies 😉
But aren’t you engaging in some debate fallacies yourself? (i.e. there is someone on the internet saying something dumb, therefore I hereby prove that everyone in that group is dumb as well). I’m quite sure that when I was taking my atmospheric physics/chemistry classes the content was very much more specific and falsifiable and thermodynamically valid than what you are talking about here. So I’m not very much convinced by this, since it doesn’t correlate to my experience of how science works.
Cheers,
Ben
(by that I refer to ‘some CO2 will cause some warming’)
I have actually encountered people who think that is the theory and that the models confirm it.
I don’t think I made the generalization that his entire group was dumb… Although Lovejoy, 2014 and some of the other nonsense about AGW being exempt from the Null Hypothesis sometimes makes be wonder if there is a prevalence of dumbness in that group.
The comment and several like it prompted me to put together this post. Much of it was taken from prior posts and comments of mine.
The world is a big place, you’ll find weird things if you look for it. I think a more interesting issue is that WUWT (I read it every other day and I have my students look at it as well. Very educational, albeit not in the sense you think) just completely misses the mark with respect to talking about things that the scientific community is actually working on. Science is made of theory – experiment – observation. All you guys focus on is comparing some (but not all) of the observations with some (but not all) of the computer experiments. As if the world consists of Mann and a couple of graphs. It just doesn’t work outside the confines of the WUWT comment section.
Cheers,
Ben
You say that like you believe there are observations that actually match any of the models.
Well, if you look at figure 21 you see that the observations fall within the uncertainty range of the models, so clearly the models are correct by their own standards. It’s just that at WUWT you guys pretend that models need to be 100% accurate before they can be useful. So by the WUWT standard they are failing, by the standard of their use case they are doing just fine. Just a matter of perspective.
For example, are the computational models used in airplane design 100% accurate? No, that is why we still use wind tunnel models. Still being widely used, and I don’t think you’d blink twice about flying an airbus or boeing.
Note that David has not included the uncertainty range of the observations, or disclosed the exact source of the observations (a favourite WUWT trick is to compare land temperature models with satellite temp observations, which do not measure the same thing
Cheers,
Ben
Ben,
Barely falling within the uncertainty range for 30+ years is not a nullification of the null hypothesis. It is a reinforcement of the Null Hypothesis.
The instrumental data over the past 30 years, both surface and satellite have a relaitvely narrow error range.
RSS does provide an error range for the models and their satellite temperatures:
http://images.remss.com/figures/climate/RSS_Model_TS_compare_globe.png
http://www.remss.com/research/climate
Climate Fail… QED.
and don’t forget, computational experiments are just one arrow in the quiver of science: theory – experiment – observation. The main reason why climate change has such support in the scientific community is because it is backed by over a 100 years of very convincing theory, coupled with plenty of observations (I haven’t been ice skating in my country for over a decade!)
Benben,
The models produce such a range of outputs and have such wide error bars, that they are meaningless, worse than worthless GIGO.
The clearly anti-physical high-ECS runs are kept in just to make the outputs look scary. Any model producing an ECS over two–the upper limit of barely physically possible based upon actual observations–should be thrown out. But then there would be no scare.
The whole modeling enterprise is hopelessly corrupt and corrupting on all of science.
benben, the models are all over the map when it comes to predictions.
Regardless, the actual temperature have been below even the levels predicted for complete cessation of CO2 production, despite the fact that CO2 has been increasing at the upper end of the prediction spectrum.
Beyond that, the mere fact that the models are all over the map despite 40 years of trying to improve them is evidence that none of the models are able to accurately model the climate.
benben: If the models used by airplane designers were as bad as climate models, 99 out 0f 100 planes would crash on take off.
I love the way you warmistas try to claim that if any model is good, all models must be trusted.