Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach (see Update at the end)
I had tweeted the following:
Various people either liked or retweeted this, including my mad mate and human lightning rod, James Delingpole. This post started because someone named Robin Whitlock tweeted the following:
Delingpole is a knuckledragger, pure and simple. It’s a wonder his brain hasn’t shrivelled by now, or perhaps it has…
To which I replied:
Ah, schoolboy insults. They make you look so sophisticated and wise.
Sadly, Mr. Whitlock declined the opportunity to actually say what was wrong with James Delingpole’s ideas, and instead said;
Okay, Mr Eschenbach, let’s see how much you actually know about it. Debate CC with me if you dare
Now, I’m always happy to debate climate change, but not in 140-character chunks. So I said:
I’m happy to debate, although I don’t see how I can do so on Twitter. My blog is available. What do you wish to debate?
Of course, nothing is that simple. Before debating the ideas, the charming man has to start with the seemingly obligatory ad hominem arguments about my education, my ancestry, and my general unfitness for human consumption, viz:
Ha, okay, just seen this. That tells me everything for a start: You’re a ‘professional’ climate change denier
A “professional climate change denier”? If so, where’s my dang paycheck? I am an amateur scientist, and proud of it. I’m one of the few amateur scientists to have anything peer-reviewed published in Nature Magazine. It was only a “Brief Communications Arising”, but it was solidly peer-reviewed. In addition, at present, I have more than sixty citations to my publications in the scientific journals … not bad for a self-taught man with absolutely no scientific education.
He followed this with:
Construction Manager and former Accounts Manager. That is, not a climate scientist.
This scientifically challenged person thinks that reading a very slanted bio written by my enemies tells him “everything” about the scientific validity of my claims … yeah, that’s the ticket. No need to debate the issues, just accuse your opponent of being unqualified … amazingly, this good fellow actually seems to think this makes the slightest difference as to whether my scientific claims are true.
He then goes on to a series of tweets, which I’ve condensed into one for easy reading:
So, let’s go on to some of the statements mentioned here. First, the “eight tenths of a degree” statement. That’s being way too optimistic. Even 2 deg C is probably too optimistic. Most climate science says we’re heading in the direction of 4 or even 6 degrees C. Furthermore, at 2 degrees C, melting permafrost releases methane into the atmosphere, which is even more dangerous than CO2.
I also see that you draw on climategate again, when the scientists involved were cleared of any wrongdoing by several investigations. You say that greenland has only lost a small fraction of it’s total ice mass but the evidence indicates that Greenland’s ice loss is accelerating and will contribute to sea level rise in the order of metres over the next few centuries.
OK … let’s take that one at a time. First, I have no idea which “eight tenths of a degree” he’s talking about. Apparently, he’s talking about some claimed warming by 2100, but from memory, I’ve never claimed that it would be 0.8°C. I’m not sure what I’m missing here …
He then says regarding Climategate that “the scientists involved were cleared of any wrongdoing by several investigations.” Because I was actually discussed in the Climategate emails, which revealed that the people at UEA lied to my face, I can assure you that the whitewashes that were done were pathetic imitations of a real investigation. In fact, the Brits said that the only reason that criminal charges weren’t laid because of their lies was that the statute of limitations had expired. And Acton’s “investigation” of the actions of Briffa and Jones never interviewed either one of them … investigations? Don’t make me laugh. See Steve McIntyre’s excellent blog for dozens of well-informed and researched articles on the subject. I fear Mr. Whitlock is far out of his depth on this one, as both Steve and I were involved in the actual event.
He next claims, without attribution or citation, that “most climate science” (whatever that might be) says we’ll warm by “4 or even 6 degrees C“. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find folks other than wild alarmists who make that claim, so I’d be interested in his sources.
Finally, he says that if the arctic warms by 2°C it will somehow release huge amounts of methane … again, this is not scientifically supported. Instead, it is based on … wait for it … climate models:
The new study found the rate of old carbon released during the past 60 years to be relatively small. Model projections conducted by other studies expect much higher carbon release rates—from 100 to 900 times greater—for its release during the upcoming 90 years. This suggests that current rates are still well below what may lay ahead in the future of a warmer Arctic.
This is typical of all of the claimed dangers of CO2. We have computer models, we have lots of alarmist claims, we have failed sequential doom-casting, in the above quote we have “this suggests” and the other usual weasel words, “might happen” and “could lead to” and the like … but what we don’t have is any evidence that anything out of the ordinary is happening. Yes, people say that we’ll get a ten foot sea level rise by 2100 … but there is no sign of acceleration in the rate of rise despite the warming of the last three centuries.. Similarly, people say we’ll get mega-methane from arctic warming, but actual studies show no such increase happening despite the warming of the last three centuries. The bizarre truth is that we are studying a claimed phenomenon (increased warming due to humans) when we have no actual evidence that anything out of the ordinary is occurring. No unusual warming. No increase in extreme events. No increase in rainfall. No change in sea level rise. No increase in methane. If Mr. Whitlock has any such evidence, I hope he produces it.
Finally, in general the claimed sensitivity of the earth to CO2 has been falling. It used to be 3°C per doubling, then 2°C per doubling, and now it’s about 1°C per doubling. Given the claimed future increases in CO2 (which may never come to pass), this pretty much rules out his four to six degree C warming scenario.
==============================================
But enough of what passes for a debate on Mr. Whitlock’s planet. Here’s the part that drives me nuts in discussions like this:
• Nobody knows why the globe was generally warmer in Roman times
• Nobody knows why the globe generally cooled after Roman times
• Nobody knows why the globe generally warmed up again in Medieval times
• Nobody knows why the globe greatly cooled after Medieval times, leading to the “Little Ice Age” in the 1600s/1700s.
• Nobody knows why the Little Ice Age didn’t descend into a real Ice Age.
• Nobody knows why the earth started generally warming at about 0.5°C per century since the Little Ice Age.
• Nobody knows why this warming continued through the 20th century.
• Nobody knows whether the ~ 0.5°C warming of the 21st century is 100% natural and just a continuance of the warming of previous two centuries, or whether some or all of of the warming is due to humans.
• Nobody knows why there has been a two-decade “hiatus” in the ongoing three centuries of warming.
Given our total inability to understand or explain the climate of the past, the idea that a Tinkertoy computer model of the climate can tell us what will happen in the next hundred years is … well … let me describe that claim as “extraordinarily optimistic” rather than say “stunningly foolish” …
I’ve invited Mr. Whitlock to continue the discussion here, to avoid the 140-character limit. Let’s see if he is man enough to step up to the plate.
If he does, please keep the ad hominems not just down but out. This place is, or should be, about debating the science and not debating the man or woman behind the science.
Best regards to all, including Mr. Whitlock,
w.
PS—When you comment please QUOTE THE EXACT WORDS THAT YOU ARE DISCUSSING, so we can all be clear on both your subject and who you are addressing.
[UPDATE]
I assume I’m supposed to be frightened … but in fact I’m mystified. I ask why, despite his bluster, he hasn’t shown up to debate. He replies that he won’t tell me how he is “deploying his forces”.
Say what?
Nobody knows what a graphical illustration of “Acceleration” looks like. If they did all the “accelerating” nonsense would stop instantly.
Nobody knows.
That’s why it’s called science.
Steven,
But we do know from observations of the climate system that adding a fourth molecule of CO2 per 10,000 molecules of dry air has no measurable impact upon GASTA.
Hence, CACA is caca and you’re out of a job. And should be ashamred ot the millions of deaths and trillion in lost treasure the losses of which to which you’ve contributed.
You know no such thing.
And when you volunteer. ..it’s hard to be out of a job.
Silly goose.
“And when you volunteer. ..it’s hard to be out of a job”
Volunteers are notoriously unreliable.
Just ask Nick Stokes.
Andrew
Steven,
A volunteer job is still a job.
You do it because you get something out of it, or you wouldn’t volunteer. It doesn’t have to be pay.
Steven Mosher April 28, 2017 at 10:18 pm
Nope. Not even wrong. It’s not called science because “nobody knows”.
Science is a PROCESS for using the things we do know in order to find out the things we don’t know.
But you know that, so I must assume you’re just trying to cause trouble. Either that or the meaning of your comment is totally opaque.
w.
Mosh is famous fro being opaque, being clear isn’t his thing.
Tom Trevor April 29, 2017 at 8:00 pm
The problem is that he’s damn smart, and when he gives up on the drive-by posting style he has interesting ideas. Grrr …
w.
Fox would get a lot of eyeballs if it lined up a debating team of skeptics and challenged warmist advocates to debate them for a dozen 90-minute segments. (This is something PBS should have done a decade or two ago.)
Until now, warmists, being ahead, followed the advice of their PR counselors not to give skeptics a chance to close the public perception and governmental policy gap by engaging in debates. Maybe now, with Trump in office, they’ll feel that the gap has closed already, and they need to take a chance.
PS: If such a debate is televised, I suggest that it not be live, but rather assembled from segments of each side’s presentation with multi-hour-long gaps between them, to give the responding side time to get its act together.
Each segment should be on a different sub-topic of the debate.
Every couple of years maybe another debate-series could be held, with a large turnover in debaters and sub-topics.
That’s because science is not a verbal war.
If you want to challenge science you actually have to do better science.
Current science explains the warming since 1850 remarkably well.
The temperature of the surface is a function of radiative forcings: GHGs ( co2, methane, etc) aerosols, and solar forcing. The residual, the difference between observations and the radiative forcing..that’s your internal or unforced variability. .it looks like amo.
There is no need to explain anything before this time. It would be nice buts it’s unnecessary. The only way to dislodge this theory is with a better theory. Science trumps science. Debate is not a form of falsification or a form of improving science.
Debate is theatre and rhetoric. Entertainment.
Steven Mosher:
You assert
I never cease to be amazed that you have the gall to spout complete bollocks such as that I have quoted here.
If “current science” did explain “the warming since 1850 remarkably well” then the committed warming would not have disappeared.
In reality, the climate models are curve fitted to the historic annual global surface temperature anomalies (GASTAs) by “parametrisation” of “radiative forcings: GHGs ( co2, methane, etc) aerosols, and solar forcing”. Such curve fitting provides no explanation of the warming since 1850.
I choose to make the unlikely assumption that you don’t know the truth of these matters, so I will reveal to you how wrong you are by explaining the missing committed warming.
The explanation for the 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.
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 way past the half-way mark 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 only rose ~0.8°C over the entire twentieth century.
Simply, the “committed warming” has disappeared (perhaps it has eloped with Trenberth’s ‘missing heat’?).
This disappearance of the “committed warming” is – of itself – sufficient to falsify the AGW hypothesis as emulated by climate models. Hence, it demonstrates that you are asserting rubbish when you claim, “Current science explains the warming since 1850 remarkably well”.
Indeed, if we reach 2020 without any detection of the “committed warming” then it will be 100% certain that “current science” is so wrong that all its projections of global warming are complete bunkum.
Richard
Mosher,
You said, “There is no need to explain anything before this time. It would be nice buts it’s unnecessary.”
If you can’t explain past warming (or cooling) then you aren’t in a position to invalidate the hypothesis that all, or most, recent warming is spurious correlation with anthropogenic activities. As I demonstrated in a previous post, (using BEST temperatures) the correlation of temperature with population is higher than it is with CO2. But, that doesn’t prove causation.
Mods,
This is a repost of an item that vanished. Please post the original if it is found in the ‘bin’ otherwise please post this. With thanks in anticipation
Richard
Steven Mosher:
You assert
I never cease to be amazed that you have the gall to spout complete bollocks such as that I have quoted here.
If “current science” did explain “the warming since 1850 remarkably well” then the committed warming would not have disappeared.
In reality, the climate models are curve fitted to the historic annual global surface temperature anomalies (GASTAs) by “parametrisation” of “radiative forcings: GHGs ( co2, methane, etc) aerosols, and solar forcing”. Such curve fitting provides no explanation of the warming since 1850.
I choose to make the unlikely assumption that you don’t know the truth of these matters, so I will reveal to you how wrong you are by explaining the missing committed warming.
The committed warming is explained 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.
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 way past the half-way mark 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 only rose ~0.8°C over the entire twentieth century.
Simply, the “committed warming” has disappeared (perhaps it has eloped with Trenberth’s ‘missing heat’?).
This disappearance of the “committed warming” is – of itself – sufficient to falsify the AGW hypothesis as emulated by climate models. Hence, it demonstrates that you are asserting rubbish when you claim, “Current science explains the warming since 1850 remarkably well”.
Indeed, if we reach 2020 without any detection of the “committed warming” then it will be 100% certain that “current science” is so wrong that all its projections of global warming are complete bunkum.
Richard
Mosher writes
A hypothesis can be undone by inclusion of a fact that wasn’t initially considered. A hypothesis can be undone by pointing out a logical flaw. There are many ways science can be done without providing a new hypothesis. Don’t underestimate the value of disproving a theory over creating a new theory. Without the former, nobody would do the latter.
No warming in eighteen years, That’s my theory/rebuttal to your nonsense.
No need to provide an alternative theory to explain anything — that’s the Scientific Method, which you are clearly incapable of understanding.
Your theory has been falsified.
You fail.
Live with that, learn, and grow as a person.
Mods:
26 hours have passed since I twice tried to post a reply to Mosher’s post. Both attempts vanished.
I would be very grateful if you were to check the ‘bin’ for them. If you find them then please post the first one, or if you don’t find them please tell me so I can again try to post my reply to Mosher.
Richard
[Nothing pending, nothing in queue. Request you repost. .mod]
Mods:
Many thanks for all your trouble. It has now appeared: how and why I know not.
Richard
Writes Clyde Spencer April 29, 2017 at 12:13 pm:
An friend of mine, named Byron, used to argue that warmer climates were in fact caused by more people. The evidence is quite plain: look at the populous nations of the warm Equator; look at Antarctica, very cold, no people at all. Rooms full of people are usually warmer than rooms without people: empirical evidence, no less!
We should keep this hypothesis under our hats. No need to suggest to the ecochondriacs that reducing the population is the way to cool the Earth. . . Or have they already thought of it?
/Mr Lynn
Willis Eschenbach, you and James Delingpole each have earned a reputation for rationality and wisdom. A plague on your ill-informed and ignorant detractors. In Australia we have the shocking situation where the largest bank Westpac is now officially on the side of the enemies of civillsation. Westpac has announced that it now has a low-carbon lending policy, and has cancelled plans to contribute to funding Adani’s Carmichael Mine. Westpac has lined up with GetUp!, Greenpeace, 350.org, WWF Australia, AVAAZ, the Australian Greens and their ilk. This interlinked cabal of anti-energy, anti-humanity organisation pushes the racist line that 300 million people who do not own a light bulb should be denied access to the electrical energy they crave because they are only Indians. Proof of the malign nature of these self-styled anti-coal groups lies in their enthusiastic promotion of Earth Day in Myanmar, where severely inadequate electrical power is generated 74% by hydro and 20% by gas, with the remainder diesel. These people are not anti-coal; they hate all energy.
If Carmichael does not go ahead, the likely alternative is that India’s ample coal reserves will be used. One of the problems is the cruel social disruption involved in shifting very large numbers of families for new mines or the extension of exiting mines.
Thanks for your kind words, Michael. I read today about Westpac’s lunacy. However, what will likely happen is that IF Adani can thread its way through Oz’s insane bureaucratic regulatory maze, some other bank will step up. That’s what happened when the World Bank decided not to fund Indian coal plants. It was a perfect opportunity for Chinese banks to step in …
w.
Thank you Willis, let us hope the Chinese do step up
“Westpac has lined up with GetUp!, Greenpeace,…” So, If a green energy business fails and defaults on the loan who pick up the tab? The bank and share holders or your tax dollars?
Willis, the reason so many alarmists have to use what I call “summarising” statements (“denier”, “most climate science”, “not a climate scientist”, “evidence indicates”, …) is that they have an awful suspicion that if they allowed a calm, detailed discussion to occur, they would be shown up very badly.
You are quite correct to insist on specifics. They will always, always cave rather than get involved in that.
Hey Robin Whitlock,
Since you are an expert on climate science, please answer one simple, basic question:
What is the actual evidence that man’s CO2 is causing serious global warming?
Talking about debating. This article is well worth a read. It seems not all skeptics stay that way….
https://theintercept.com/2017/04/28/how-a-professional-climate-change-denier-discovered-the-lies-and-decided-to-fight-for-science/
I read this. Interesting. It really seems like his arguments are emotional, at least here. OK, I can understand why you might want to do SOMETHING about climate change, or to at least “hedge” -as he says. But so does everybody on this blog. Anthony often makes the point that he is probably ten times more “green” than anybody else. We can all hedge, but not because we believe all this nonsense, but because we want to be economical, good shepherds of the earth, non polluting, etc! Bankrupting the world for a tenth of a degree is not hedging.
Chimp
OK I see your problem. And it is not easily sorted. Please detail for me why they are such a pack of lies and if you can, point to a reputable study that agrees with you. I’ll be waiting when you find one.
What exactly did Hansen get right?
If we’re on the Venus Express, as he says, leading to boiling oceans, then why has so much more CO2 (~55 ppm) in the air since 1988 had such little effect?
http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/guest/evans-david/hansen-1988-a-b-c-scenarios-600.gif
The recent super El Nino would have spiked above Scenario C last year, but it assumed CO2 cuts. Instead CO2 has risen steadily since 1988.
Mmm this is more up to date….
http://www.realclimate.org/images//hansen88.jpg
Simon,
It also uses GISTEMP, which is a work of anti-science fantasy. It doesn’t even rate as fiction. It’s a pack of lies.
Yet, even so, you’re not showing the post-El Nino reversion to the mean and it still couldn’t breach Scenario B, which the label on your graph mischaracterizes.
Should you be interested in the differences between Scenarios A and B, Steve puzzled them out back in 2008:
https://climateaudit.org/2008/01/18/hansen-scenarios-a-and-b-revised/
I should also have added that until recently, when Schmidt took over, GISTEMP was created by Hansen himself, who had every reason to try to make the “data” resemble his scenarios.
The series has most recently been perverted by Karl’s totally unjustified “pause buster” corruption of SST “data”.
Thanks to Bill Illis, from here on April 4:
Chimp
So why aren’t you using NOAA or any of the other surface based data? I wonder?
Simon,
Because they are antiscientific packs of lies.
Chimp
OK I see your problem. And it is not easily sorted. Please detail for me why they are such a pack of lies and if you can, point to a reputable study that agrees with you. I’ll be waiting when you find one.
I do so love people pretending to ignorance /sarc . Is that a tip in Troll 101?
Simon,
Elsewhere in these comments, I’ve done so. Every reputable study has found the same.
Only the self-serving Team covering its own ar$e has found otherwise.
All the so-called “surface data sets” are pure fantasy.
Chimp
Since there are sooo many…..Just give me your best one?
Chimp
Your silence is telling. Come on, just one investigation into current climate data that says it is unscientific?
Simon,
No silence. I just didn’t see your usual standard issue CACA request.
1) No such paper could get published. But the facts speak for themselves.
2) It’s not needed. The Climategate emails tell all.
That there is a conspiracy is not in doubt. You can speculate about the conspirators’ motives, but that it exists and is extensive is obvious to anyone who bothers to look.
Have you bothered to look at Mikes’ Nature trick, for instance?
“Talking about debating. This article is well worth a read. It seems not all skeptics stay that way….”
OK, read that article. He says he was a “professional skeptic” (riiiiiight…) whose mind was changed and he became a believer. Well, here’s a skeptic (a real one). I am always willing to be convinced, so I was all agog – what incredible evidence had he encountered that I had missed, despite begging all and sundry since 2008 to post some positive evidence that might change my mind. And what do I get: “Well, I changed my mind about this, Hanson was right about something unspecified, and my beliefs were left in tatters about that.” But, yet again, NO ACTUAL EVIDENCE! It’s a propaganda piece pure and simple. If that guy cannot write a follow-up that includes the actual evidence that performed this miraculous conversion, I call him out, I don’t believe he was ever a skeptic, let alone a “professional” one.
I suspected as much.
Thanks.
According to Wiki:
According to Wiki:
That’s one guy. I’ve read about many, including scientists, who have moved from the warmist camp to the skeptic camp. Several scientists who switched said that, basically, they simply believed the ‘consensus’ until they did some research and discovered it was nonsense. They also said they believed it because it had never occurred to them before that scientists could be so dishonest or so incompetent.
It would seem that this Taylor that you are bragging about used climate activist money to finance his new think tank after breaking with the Cato Institute. Doesn’t that make his opinion highly suspect? Certainly as suspect as any skeptic who is being vilified as being paid by big, dirty oil … whether they are or not? This appears to be a clear cut case of an opinion on the climate debate being influenced by money … is it not?
The alarmists really hate debate. They also seem to viscerally hate skeptics. Maybe it’s because they lose when they are confronted with the facts or when they have their made-up facts challenged.
My favorite debate was on the CBC show, The Current. Lawrence Solomon demolished two alarmists and really got up the nose of the host, Anna Maria Tremonti. By the end, she was spitting mad. link
There haven’t been many debates but I wonder if there’s a list and a score card.
Willis has citations. There are lots, maybe the majority, of PhDs who don’t. Just saying.
Willis — adding to your list of “Nobody knows”es:
.- Mumbling about Milankovic notwithstanding, nobody really knows with any certainty why the Earth is subject to periodic glaciations
– Nobody knows why the glaciations are interrupted by warmer interglacial periods.
– Nobody knows whether 30 and 60 year cycles of temperature and precipitation (AMO and PDO) are real. Neither are the causes understood.
– Nobody knows all that much about ENSO although we’re quite certain that it’s a real phenomenon
“Tomorrow Never Knows”
Willis mentioned methane. Alarmists routinely claim that ‘methane is 30 times more powerful GHG than carbon dioxide‘. I don’t see how or why. Methane is a symmetric, so a non-polar molecule. It shows a few vibration modes which give rise to infra red absorption (here), but it is not a 30 times more powerful GHG than CO₂. Methane’s vibration modes are already covered by water since water is H₂O, but methane H₄C. They both have hydrogen sigma bonds. Water is more polar (because oxygen is more electronegative, methane more symmetric, and oxygen has two lone electron pairs opposite to the hydrogen sigma bonds). More polar molecules are more powerful GHGs than less polar molecules. Unsurprising that water is the most powerful GHG (as the chart above shows). Adding a lot of methane to the atmosphere (say 1ppm) will be like adding 1ppm water vapour (almost unnoticeable). Because the atmosphere already has lots of water (averaging 10,000 ppm or more)! So the methane GHG effect will be overwhelmed by the existing water GHG effect which is already absorbing where methane can absorb.
Compare the two camel humps [called Spectral Intensity] above. The LHS (red) is solar output (warming). The RHS is earth infrared output (ultimately to space, so cooling). Notice how methane’s only peak of interest is the right-most one [ ~ 7.7 µm]. Its other 2 peaks happen where earth does not output IR!. Yet this 7.7 µm is already covered by H₂O.
Conclusion: Methane is not a dangerous GHG. Runaway warming due to methane release is nothing to be worried about. The GHG of note is obviously water: H₂O, which we can do nothing against because like CO₂, water is the stuff of life itself.
Mark. I’m not sure that I disagree with you, but I did notice that the vertical scale for your absorbance chart(s) doesn’t seem to be labeled. I couldn’t really figure out what the dimensions might be or whether it was the same for all the gases. So I decided, what the heck, I’ll go look for some data. I found some here: https://srdata.nist.gov/gateway/gateway?keyword=absorption+spectrum.
The spectra for CO2, CH3 and H2O are at http://webbook.nist.gov/cgi/cbook.cgi?ID=C124389&Units=SI&Type=IR-SPEC&Index=1#IR-SPEC , http://webbook.nist.gov/cgi/cbook.cgi?ID=C74828&Units=SI&Type=IR-SPEC&Index=1#IR-SPEC , and http://webbook.nist.gov/cgi/cbook.cgi?ID=C7732185&Units=SI&Type=IR-SPEC&Index=1#IR-SPEC
They are difficult to compare precisely. And there are some differences in the baselines. For example — different molecular weights and CO2 was run at 200 mmHg pressure while CH3 was run at 150 mmHg. But I’ll be damned iif I can see how a 20 or 30 times difference in absorbance could by hypothecated based on that data.
It’s one of Will Happer’s presentation slides from this document. The document seems to be a summary of his talk ‘Why has global warming paused‘.
Alarmists tend to not bother giving evidence for their ideas. Alarmists don’t explain how the climate is supposed to work. Because they don’t ‘debate the science‘. Without debate they are preaching to the converted who don’t need to see any science. So I have no corresponding (alarmists or believer) chart showing the most important GHG absorption spectra below the curves for black body radiation and solar absorption. I could do my own but it’s tedious to get that data for H2O, CO2, O3, CH4, and N2O. All to the same scale.
Mark. You might want to look at the pages I linked to above. They seem to contain real IR spectrograph curves for water, CO2, and methane. My problem is that even though on paper I have the training to interpret them, that training was more than 50 years ago. And I’ve only ever seen one real IR spectrograph output in my life– 57 years ago. My feeling is that properly interpreting them requires some hands on experience that I don’t have.
That said, I don’t see anything that looks remotely like a 30x or 20x or even 10x difference between CO2 and CH4 IR absorbance. The only thing I can see that might remotely explain the numbers we’re quoted is that CH4 with its four single bonds presumably has many more bending modes (8 more?) than CO2 with its two double bonds.
I think I could use some help here from someone who understands this stuff a lot better than I do.
Wonderful comment, mark4asp. I too have been wondering where this magic multiplier comes from. Check out this page: https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/understanding-global-warming-potentials
And this passage:
Note the “accounts for some indirect effects…” bit. I.e., the figure is not methane’s direct on outgoing radiation, it is a modelled value based on all sorts of putative outcomes from chemical conversions to other stuff (methane being quite reactive). Also note the “over X years” stuff. These figures are also put through a mill that includes all sorts of overall lifetime projections.
None of this is, of course, ever mentioned when horror figures like 30x or 72x are trotted out.
Climate Change Rule One. Never pick an argument with Willis…..
When asking the true believers for evidence it’s always the skilless models, the faux consensus or the manipulated data used for never ending, nor appearing claims of doom.
That about sums them up.
Rule 2:
If you do – come prepared or fold your tent before it gets blown away.
Climate change debate is 97% political. Anthropogenic global warming arguments may perhaps be debated in scientific terms, but so far efforts seem futile.
Willis, what most annoys these paid up “academics” who I find are almost always responsible for the worst hate on social media, is that you are as good or better than them, but you don’t bow down to the academic consensus as they know they must and that you’re free to research outside the academic box.
But from their perspective you are in what other industries would be called a “black leg” or a “union breaker” or in religious context a breakaway sect.
And the more you look and sound like an academic the more they attack, and indeed, if like Salby, Cristy, Spencer, Curry you are an academic, they attack relentlessly.
It’s all in my “book”: “The Academic Ape: Instinctive aggression and boundary enforcing behaviour in academia” (available free if – unlike the alarmists – you know how to use a search engine – and note it is written in a way that means no academic could cite it).
Trouble is, Salby’s claims n origins of CO2 are not backed by Curry. The attack is understandable.
Openness to debating is good. Unfortunately you don’t get very far if you pick the wrong venue. Try debating some subtle point about Jesus on an Islamic blog. OK, some of you not convinced of that and are going to tell me about the time they invited the Vicar and the Imam round for tea and biscuits (may or may not include Jaffa Cakes). What about an experiment then….?
I challenge WUWT to set up a thread to debate the following:
“The theory of a gravity induced temperature gradient in a planetary atmosphere as postulated by Loschmidt in the 1870’s, expanded & explained by Doug Cotton in his book :’) , and verified experimentally by R.Graeff (2007) is the true explanation for how the earths atmosphere works and explains the surface temperature without the need for any Greenhouse Gas Effect”
How about it, Anthony ? (Yes, you are allowed to leave the exiting banned cnuts out of it !)
Thanks, Badger, but we’ve been there and done that. I have given a conclusive proof that a gravity induced temperature gradient is cannot warm a planet. And Dr, Robert Brown gave a different proof that a gravity induced temperature gradient is impossible.
Sorry, amigo, but you have been proven wrong already. It’s not that we think you are wrong. We have two different proofs that you are wrong.
w.
The second proof dosn’t seem to link to anything.
And yet we have gravity and with it, a temperature gradient, just like every other planet with an atmosphere.
schitzree, thanks for the note. Fixed.
w.
AndyG55 May 1, 2017 at 2:43 pm
Yes, we do … but that has nothing to do with either proof, or with the claim that there is a gravity-induced temperature gradient. Read the two proofs again.
w.
“claimed dangers of CO2” … a local editorial board referred to CO2 as a ‘dangerous pollutant’
If Carbon Dioxide were a pollutant then we could say things like:
– pollution is the base of the food chain
– pollution is necessary for life
Good point Thomas – hopefully brings sunshine also to Robin Whitlock.
Yes, I’ve read where we humans exhale CO2 at 40,000 ppm, increasing the amount by 100 times that which we inhale (for a total of 2.3 lbs/day). Thank goodness plants are responding according to Le Chatelier’s principle.
“No-one knows’: What is the ideal climate for this planet, NOR, how to achieve it.
When asking the true believers for evidence it’s always the skilless models, the faux consensus or the manipulated data used for never ending, nor appearing claims of doom.
That about sums them up.
I know WE said no ad hom. but ‘BA(Hons) in Psychology and English Literature’ from UK’s 90th best university (founded in 2005) isn’t much of a qualification for a debate in this field. Somewhat ironic given all the attacks elsewhere on Lord Monckton who has an MA from UK’s best university (founded in 1209).
Don’t say Whitlock is a ‘BA(Hons) in Psychology and English Literature’ ten years ago!?
I would like to point out that Mr Whitlock has yet to join this debate, which I think says it all.
I would like to add my thoughts to this debate (as a layman, but with an interest in science):
1) Since 1979, temperatures have been measured by satellites, which have shown no temperature increase for 20 years apart from during the last El Nino which was predicted years before it occurred.
2) Prior to 1979 temperatures were measured on the ground in all sorts of inappropriate places with equally inappropriate historical “adjustments”.
3) The Earth is a closed system (apart from cosmic dust, meteors and meteorites). CO2 is an inert gas, in nature it is broken down by plants into Carbon and Oxygen and by animals into CaCO3 to form bones (with other elements) and shells. Since the source of CO2 can only be atmospheric, in a closed system, the CO2 that formed fossil fuels and the huge quantities of Limestone and Marble then the concentration of CO2 must have been a great deal higher in the past, but we are here to discuss it (I understand that it was 7000ppm 300 million years ago).
4) The “cure” for this “problem” seems to me to be worse than the problem itself. Wind turbines depleting rare earth metals, with a life-expectancy of about half of what it is claimed. Roads that have to be specially built and strengthened, whose sole purpose is the construction and maintenance of these things and then 800 tons of concrete for there foundations. Each one cannot possibly negate the CO2 produced in their construction. Likewise felling trees to dry, pulverise, reconstitute into pellets and ship across the Atlantic to produce 2/3 of the heat energy by weight that coal would produce.
The only conclusion that can be drawn (if my thought processes are correct) is that either the proponents of AGW are incredibly stupid, or there is some sort of hidden agenda, I think the latter is more likely than the former.
andrewmharding on April 29, 2017 at 3:42 am
1. I would like to point out that Mr Whitlock has yet to join this debate, which I think says it all.
Yes it does!
If I was a warmist, I would ask him to retire off any forum discussing about climate: a worse public relation for the warmist cause I can’t imagine.
2. Since 1979, temperatures have been measured by satellites, which have shown no temperature increase for 20 years apart from during the last El Nino which was predicted years before it occurred.
In 2014, Santer et al. have extracted volcano influence and ENSO signals out of the RSS3.3 TLT series; the residual temperature trend for 1979-2013 was about 0.09 °C / decade (compared with about 0.12 for the original record at that time).
I wouldnt’t call that “no temperature increase”. Moreover you seem, like do so many people, to solely consider ENSO’s warming part. Imagine I would ask you for eliminating all La Niñas out of UAH6.0!
3. Prior to 1979 temperatures were measured on the ground in all sorts of inappropriate places with equally inappropriate historical “adjustments”.
Well such a sentence calls for some proving material, doesn’t it? And I do not mean unverifiable blah blah originating from the blogosphere. I mean a thorough analysis with valuable results.
4. Since the source of CO2 can only be atmospheric, …, but we are here to discuss it (I understand that it was 7000ppm 300 million years ago).
You are certainly correct. And anyway, this CO2 debate becomes a bit too boring for me. But nevertheless: may I ask you why you write that?
– How many humans did live at that time?
– Is it not more interesting to care about the situation in 100 years, when the Humanity will consist of about 10 billions of people, with a fragile technological infrastructure?
5. Wind turbines depleting rare earth metals, with a life-expectancy of about half of what it is claimed. Roads that have to be specially built and strengthened, whose sole purpose is the construction and maintenance of these things and then 800 tons of concrete for there foundations.
Depleting rare earth metals? Do you mean neodyme, dysprosium and the like? Wow! Do you know how much of these guys is used everywhere you need strong magnetism, beginning with your own computer’s hard disk, every loudspeaker, every smartphone, etc etc etc?
Rare metal depletion is a real problem! But it is caused by billions of PCs and cell phones dropped to waste, and not by windmills where 100% recuperation is requested upon dismantling, e.g. in Germany. And anyway: neodyme is inbetween so incredibly expensive that nobody on Earth would be foolish enough to view it as waste.
6. Roads that have to be specially built and strengthened, whose sole purpose is the construction and maintenance of these things and then 800 tons of concrete for there foundations.
Did you ever consider
– the number of roads built by the shale gas industry to access the boreholes?
– how long is the lifetime of a shale gas borehole?
7.Each one cannot possibly negate the CO2 produced in their construction.
The best will be an english source I guess.
Life Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Utility-Scale Wind Power
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1530-9290.2012.00464.x/full
Well, wind power for electricity production certainly is not the best idea Humanity has ever had.
But please compare the life cycle energy balances of nuclear plants and windmill farms when taking the complete treatment of nuclear waste into account, including full dismantling (no: I didn’t write ‚decomissioning‘, that’s nonsense here).
UPDATE:
I guess I’m supposed to be terrified …
w.
I expect he’s communicating with the SkS kids.
They’re probably getting dressed for battle.
Costumes by Hugo Boss?
Cos-Playtime?
All you want is a discussion. All he wants is a battle. That tells us all a lot about the guy. Fight first, talk later. He deserves no respect.
“the pen is mightier than the sword”, which means that words and ideas are themselves weapons. My writing is how I fight, because I am good at it.
It is easy for well educated people to see through charlatans like RW. He may be good with words but he’s bad on policy and world understanding. Bad understanding leads to bad policy : his love affair with renewable energy. Here is that David MacKay talk again explaining why renewables are pointless.
Robin Whitlock writes
Its important to express yourself clearly to best get your message across but in this forum it’s the message that matters, not its form so much.
If your plan is to regurgitate mainstream science in prose then I wouldn’t bother, Willis wants a discussion of the science itself. A lot of mainstream science is weak at best but it takes a person who understands the science, not a journalis whose gif is expression to discuss. And a participant in discussions not a writer of an “answer” no matter how beautiful that answer may read.
Perhaps nothing to do with Robin, but this image persists in my vitreous humour
http://www.behindthevoiceactors.com/_img/chars/chicken-little-walt-disney-specials-68.7.jpg
Peaceful Mr. Whitlock only thinks in military terms.
I thought this was a debate not a war?
A war of words, ideas, opinions, a battle for public opinion. Its as old as history. Galileo and da Vinci no doubt had to do the same thing, as did Columbus.
Robin,
As you may know, Columbus was actually wrong about the size of the earth and the eastward extent of Asia. Had he not run into the New World, he would have had to turn back or run out of food and water.
Not sure for what you think da Vinci had to fight. He was always able to find work from many and varied patrons, it seems.
No. But a battle of words and ideas is still battle. I am hardly going to show you my hand before I am ready. I have my ways of doing things.
How about leaving the “battle” talk behind and actually engaging in an exchange of information or ideas? A battle seems to imply you’ll be entrenching yourself in an attempt to not lose ground. In the scientific arena, this is perhaps the most certain way to be on the wrong side. It doesn’t allow you to adapt to new and changing information. For consideration, I submit the examples of plate tectonics, Clovis First model, and peptic ulcers. There are actually many examples to be used, but a few will suffice to make the point. In each of these subjects, there was, for all intents and purposes, 100% consensus that plate tectonics was wrong, that the Clovis people were first in North America, and that stress caused ulcers. With scientific advancements, we now know that the overwhelming consensus in each of these fields were wrong. This is actually a long standing pattern with advancement in general.
In the realm of climate science, one of the most important things to first admit is that the science is not settled. Not even close. Anyone saying the science is settled is either ignorant, dishonest, or attempting to sell you something. The next thing to understand is that climate science is a multi-disciplinary field of study. No single person has complete mastery over every possible area of study. Another extremely important point to understand and admit is that within a given subject, such as ECS, there is a range of possibilities which runs from zero to even higher than IPCC ranges. To refuse to admit these lower ranges exist or are a possibility and only stand on the pulpit of high ECS values, is dogma. Dogma is the enemy and the very antithesis of science.
Richard Feynman famously said,
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself — and you are the easiest person to fool.
It seems there’s a good chance you believe all the catastrophic predictions and projections commonly found in the mainstream news media. If I’m wrong, please forgive me. With that, you’re going to find sources to reinforce your belief, even further reinforcing the belief you already have. That’s the nature of bias and is simply a part of the human condition. If you’re absolutely sure you are correct, then you’ve fallen victim to your own bias. If you refuse to question your own belief, then you’ve fallen victim to your own bias. Remember, science doesn’t begin with answers, but with doubt. As with Feynman, I would rather live with doubt than with answers that might be wrong.
So, let’s set aside the talk of war and battles, lay down our ad hom spears. Let’s first make an honest attempt to be less dogmatic and to not fool ourselves. Let’s admit that consensus beliefs are often wrong and that there’s still far more that we don’t even know we don’t know. Let’s admit that ranges of possibilities exist and that we each have a bias toward which we lean. This is how true science starts.
Even Shaku Zulu was able to muster his unmechanized army to engage his enemy in less time than you have spent making promises/threats. Are we to collectively hold our breath while you sharpen your pen and wit? Of course, you could be using time to your advantage to make a strategic retreat. Nobody would really blame you. You don’t appear to have the arms necessary to engage in a “battle of words and ideas.” You may be a wordsmith, but unless you can provide a cogent argument based on supportable facts, few people here are going to be swayed by your writing skills alone. You are obviously impressed with your abilities, but it remains to be seen whether you can convince the readers here if your self assessment is justified.
Clyde,
You’d think that, as an expert on “climate change”, which is his avowed beat as a “journalist”, Robin would have all his forces already deployed in battle array, requiring no further mobilization. All the science should be at his fingertips all the time.
The issues are not many, although climate be complex.
1) Has Earth warmed since, pick a date?
2) If so, by how much?
3) Is this much warming out of the ordinary, requiring a special explanation beyond natural variability?
4) Can it be showed with a high degree of statistical confidence, that human activities are that explanation?
5) If yes, then are this warming and the GHGs allegedly responsible for it a good thing or a bad thing?
6) If bad, how bad? Enough to warrant dismantling the world’s energy and industrial systems?
Did I miss an issue?
My views:
1) Yes, since the depths of the LIA, c. 1690. Since the Minoan WP and Holocene CO, no. Earth has been in a long-term cooling trend for over 3000 years. It continues.
2) Since 1690, maybe a bit more than one degree C, with the present insignificantly warmer than the 1930s, if at all.
3) No.
4) No.
5) So far, so good. Warmer and more plant food in the air is definitely better.
6) Not bad. Good.
Joz,
It’s more accurate to say that the hypothesis of continental drift was opposed by the consensus. After the discovery of seafloor spreading, Wegener’s hypothesis was confirmed and the science of plate tectonics began.
While the use of the term “plate” in geology is first attested from 1904, “plate tectonics” dates only from 1967, to the best of my knowledge. Always a good chance that I’m wrong.
It’s similar to the situation with evolution before 1858. Rock layers showed that life changed over time, so the fact of evolution had long been known (although called “development”, and there was even the heretical hypothesis of species “transmutation”), but no good explanation for how it happened came along before then.
WE;
What is Mr. Whitlock accusing you of denying?
He put up a long-winded oratory on his own never-read blog. It’s been up for a couple days and, so far, has exactly one comment … besides 3 of his own. And the one is basically mocking him.
A reference to his interests perhaps.
‘History (particularly if its (sic.!) ancient history), mythology, folklore, spirituality and religion,
Aspects of military history – particularly World War 2 and Vietnam.’
Hoist on his own petard more like.
‘For ’tis the sport to have the engineer
Hoist with his own petard: and ‘t shall go hard
But I will delve one yard below their mines,
And blow them at the moon: …’
Political “Scientist” Michael Mann Prefers Censorship, Slander and Punitive Action Over Debate
“It should trouble everyone in the scientific community that the primary response of its leading voices when they encounter a voice they don’t like is to try to get that person fired from their job. That is doesn’t trouble anyone very much says something,” wrote Roger Pielke, Jr. in a blog post this month.
https://co2islife.wordpress.com/2017/04/29/political-scientist-michael-mann-prefers-censorship-slander-and-punitive-action-over-debate/
This one is pretty good too.
https://co2islife.wordpress.com/2017/04/07/i-am-woman-hear-me-roar-michael-manns-bullying-backfires/
Plenty more on MM in Mark Steyn’s ‘A Disgrace to the Profession Volume 1:’, I hope everyone here has a copy.
Thanks for the comment.
There’s the problem. Unlike many of us who spent several years learning where the evidence leads us, Willis’ opponent is still not ready for battle. About how long is this getting ready going to take? If Mr. Whitlock had sufficient evidence to justify launching a challenge then why is he not already on the field?
The arguments are getting old and tired. The system is way more complex and chaotic than most of the arguments taken into account.
Back in the early days of WUWT someone (I think it may have been Willis) posted a beautiful essay about the hubris of those who thought they could encapsulate climate in a few simple parameters. The essay talked of winds and mountains and oceans and clouds and many other things in a most poetic way. It made the point that climate is complex, well beyond the debate about one atmospheric chemical.
Willis, if you were the author of that beautiful essay I would love to see it again on these pages. I have thought many times that we have really not moved beyond that benchmark.
The man is not debate material. He doesn’t even seem to have touched base with the new talking points in quite a few years.