Guest essay by Eric Worrall
h/t Marc Morano – who believes the climate never ever changes?
Almost nobody of course – pretty much everyone knows about ice ages, that large climate shifts have occurred in the past and will occur again in the future. People who take an interest in climate change mostly agree that the world is a little warmer today than it was at the end of the Little Ice Age (around 1850).
But some climate advocates persist with strawman misrepresentations, that climate “deniers” think the climate doesn’t change.
Why conservatives keep gaslighting the nation about climate change
Republican climate rhetoric shifts (again), but the goal remains the same.
By David Roberts
Updated Oct 22, 2018, 5:01pm EDTIn recent years, leaders of the Republican Party have become aware that denying the existence of global warming makes them look like idiots. Changes in climate have become obvious, not just to scientists, but to ordinary people — they can be directly measured, with such exotic instruments as a “thermometer.” Majorities of every group except the most conservative Republicans (who will trust their media over their lying eyes) believe it is happening.
Denying visible, tangible reality is a dicey business, even for the modern US right. It makes the party look like a death cult. So Republican climate-communication strategy has undergone something of an adjustment.
Not a large adjustment, mind you. The GOP remains dead set against doing anything about climate change, against any policy that would threaten the profits of fossil fuel companies. That is the non-negotiable baseline, despite a few fringe figures who signal otherwise (until the time comes for votes).
But front-line, hardcore denialism of the “it’s a hoax” variety has largely receded to the base. Republican leaders and spokespeople have moved back to the next line of defense: Yes, the climate is changing, but we don’t know to what extent humans are responsible.
…
When President Trump or other leading Conservatives call climate change a “hoax”, I doubt very much they are claiming that the climate is static. What they are calling a hoax is the wild exaggerations, the continuous demands for government money, the endless claims that the world faces some kind of imminent climate emergency.
Climate advocates who misrepresent the views of their opponents are probably well aware of this.
Why do climate activists sometimes misrepresent what skeptics believe?
It’s called a straw man argument, easy to knock down. They don’t want to talk about the obvious flaws in the CAGW theory.
It also frames the argument by setting up a false premise and biasing whatever counter evidence is presented. It works because people are easily primed to think in a narrow channel. Once tagged as suspect, the opponent is forced to spend effort on reclaiming respectability and not making his case. It’s a simple brilliant underhanded tactic that almost always works.
It’s part of a strategy with tactics not limited to forcing “climate change”.
Why do they (Warmians) do that?
Because they don’t like being told that they’re wrong, and they might get found out for being wrong, and – well, it’s just like being told you have to move into your own apartment, now and stop sponging off Mom and Dad. They don’t want to hear that part, either.
Cheers!
“Why do climate activists sometimes misrepresent what skeptics believe?”
Because activists know that it isn’t about science, or math, or statistics, or numbers, because all of that is complicated (no, not all of it), and they also know that most people are innumerate, and happily so (seriously, people will practically brag that they can’t do math in their heads, or balance a checkbook – if they still use those).
If the actual job of selling climate change is to show that the world’s climate (whatever that is) may have warmed X degrees over Y time (to the Nth of a degree, maybe, when you add the error bar, but be sure to downplay any doubts in the data)…you know most people’s eyes glazed over two minutes in.
Better, easier, and more profitable to put a picture of a starving polar bear on a melting ice flow and put a link to PayPal…Generation Click will be there, and their parents, not wanting to be left out of the “kewl” buddy buddy stuff with their kids, will make a show of turning their lights off for an hour once a year.
…ice
flowfloe…Danke.
A straw man often accompanied with absurdity and comedy: a straw clown.
The alarmists are able to get away with their straw man arguments in large part because of the silly hair on fire rhetoric employed by CAGW skeptics, led by Trump, with claims that “global warming is a hoax”.
It works much better when skeptics simply state that the climate has always changed, it is warming now for more or less the last 20 thousand years since the peak of the last glaciation event, but that what exactly causes climate to vary is not well understood yet. The alarmists are being simple-headed in their focus on CO2 generation when most real climate science experts understand that there are a great many factors that affect climate, both globally and locally, that are not CO2 related. We simply believe that we need to understand the climate mechanism far better than we do today before taking drastic actions that will cause great economic harm to billions of people on the planet today.
See? How hard is that to defend? It is totally defensible.
But the instant the hoaxers open their yaps, it creates a humongous opening for the alarmists to practice their misdirection and lying.
Also, note to 95% of the writers and commenters at WUWT – stop trying to make climate alarming skepticism about political ideology and partisan politics. Real science has nothing to do with either corrupting influence, whether from left or right, or Democrat or Republican. Real science is solely about the facts and the theories and the means of property testing them out. Ideology and partisanship only perpetuates exactly what the alarmists wish to perpetuate … i.e., “us vs.them”.
What happens if you tell them, yeah, and it’s changing toward the cooler climate now?
Well, see, that doesn’t fit into their “meme”, because they can’t imagine a perpetual winter.
*chuckle* They’re so cute when they’re still naive. Because this has never BEEN about the science!
Then don’t let them drag you down into the ideological cesspool.
Playing on their ideological field is playing to their strengths, because it allows them to paint it as “us vs. them”, instead of arguing the science.
Duane — WTH?
Great video here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoSYq9WflJk
If you like it please leave a comment here- which is where I found it, with a referral from WUWT
https://rogerfromnewzealand.wordpress.com/2018/10/22/mainstream-news-on-global-warming-theory-and-its-validity-not-by-mark-levin-and-patrick-j-michaels-american-association-of-state-climatologists-former-president/comment-page-1/#comment-2073
It’s not just climate. In every debate, people tend to misrepresent the other side’s view. It’s easier to justify you own when you characterise the othe side as driven by bad motives.
Indeed. And this is the one that really galls me …
WTH makes these clowns think that most climate skeptics give a damn about anybody else’s profits?? Why would we?? What I do care about … other than the truth … is all of the life-giving, life-saving, life-transforming technology made possible by cheap and abundant energy.
We’re supposed to be trying to be civil, but at every turn, they accuse us of wanting to kill off the planet and it’s inhabitants … all for profits for companies we have no relationships with. It’s illogical … and it’s galling.
How are we suppose to remain civil in the face of such disgusting accusations??
The NPC Snob Mob Beliefs:
1. We are better than you.
2. We are right.
3. We are tolerant.
4. We are diverse.
5. We are intelligent.
6. We are destroying your memorials.
7. We are rewriting your history.
8. We are the future.
9. We are in lockstep.
10. You are misogynists.
11. You are xenophobes.
12. You are racists.
13. You are white supremacists.
14. You are Uncle Toms.
15. Your flag is offensive.
16. Your laws are meaningless.
17. You are uneducated.
18. You are unwashed.
19. You stink.
20. You are less than an animal
21. You are wrong.
22. You are guilty.
23. You are rape apologists.
24. You are planet polluters.
25. You are climate deniers.
26. You are patriarchal dictators.
27. You deserve in civility.
28. You deserve to be silenced.
29. Your opinion is a hate crime.
30. You deserve death.
Mike Bryant
The advantage we sceptics have of course is that we are informed.
We are subject to exactly the same media bias as the alarmists yet we trust ourselves to examine the other side of the debate and make informed decisions on the balance of probabilities.
In my experience alarmists invariably refuse to consider the alternative to AGW so remain ignorant of the possibilities.
HotScot,
“The advantage we sceptics have of course is that we are informed.”
“Informed” is relative.
“We are subject to exactly the same media bias as the alarmists yet we trust ourselves to examine the other side of the debate and make informed decisions on the balance of probabilities.”
I would argue that most alarmists don’t frequent sites like WUWT, so they are not exposed to the same media bias as skeptics. Skeptics are exposed to a different media bias, one that often discounts and discredits much valid science. Inquisitive alarmists more often go to sites that claim to have all the “right” answers to skeptics’ arguments, another kind of bias.
“In my experience alarmists invariably refuse to consider the alternative to AGW so remain ignorant of the possibilities.”
In my experience, many (but not all) skeptics make sweeping generalizations and assumptions about those they consider “alarmists.”
Also in my experience, many (but not all) skeptics refuse to consider the possibility that climate models might be valuable to our understanding of climate, how it changes, and the mechanisms by which it changes. In doing so, such skeptics limit the scope of information they are willing to evaluate.
Like many alarmists, many skeptics are subject to confirmation bias and to thinking the other side simply doesn’t understand the science. Alarmists often jump to the conclusion that weather extremes are signs of climate change; skeptics jump to the conclusion that they are not. Both sides also tend to allow political and policy agendas influence their thinking about the science.
In other words, alarmists and skeptics are flip sides of the same coin, with normal human variability in beliefs and normal human weaknesses when it comes to propensity for bias (generally speaking). And each side tends to think they are better, smarter and more informed.
How do we get past this stalemate?
– Start recognizing propaganda for what it is.
– Stop insulting each other through assumptions and generalizations, and instead recognize the individual
– Stop seeing science through policy
– Recognize that climate science is exceedingly complex and that many of the debates non-experts have are part of the conversation of those better qualified to debate them, and that these questions are either ongoing or already resolved. In other words, have a little more humility and respect for expertise while also being careful whom one regards as an expert, as well as keeping in mind that science is a process subject to error as well as self-correction.
This last seems a great stumbling block, for different reasons. Some skeptics have been convinced that scientists are not credible, while some alarmists believe that more questions are “settled” than is actually the case.
Kristi, a seemingly fair argument, which tends toward a tu quoque (you’re another) fallacy.
The IPCC is still a primarily political organization, not a scientific inquiry, and the models have seemingly not become more accurate since the Charney report in 1979.
Embracing Mann and his hockey stick was egregious, and some advocates still hold Mann out as an expert on climate change.
Fair treatment of scientific claims means using the same standards consistently, not continuing to accept what has been found implausible. The greens are True Believers, as per Eric Hoffer’s definition in “The True Believer”, and quasi religious in their behavior.
An appropriate way to record the transition to totalitarianism.
Nicely done.
In Europe, since Roman times, in every experiment in authoritarian government the governing classes eventually granted themselves the privilege of state murder.
Democrats turning into a hostile and ambitious mob suggests the old path could be followed, even in the US.
One can see them lusting for it.
But the popular uprising has gained enough of a following to thwart the most evil of ambition.
They do it deliberately even when we provide the accurate term “Skeptic”. Calling us deniers is an insult; it’s derogatory; it’s also a lie. (Nice list!)
Yes, I could not care less if a company fails, if it fails because it is providing something people don’t want it at too high a price. I want companies to fail, if they do that, because it means another company is providing stuff cheaper and/or better.
If somebody can provide a fuel for my car that is better than petrol, great. But that better means cheaper with the same efficiency.
“The GOP remains dead set against doing anything about climate change, against any policy that would threaten the profits of fossil fuel companies.“
A fact that is being ignored is that higher energy costs (can we say “renewables”) threatens the profits of everyone (except the well connected). Everyone likely understands that climate change cannot be controlled in any predictable manner by a political party.
So true.
The Left always uses a “straw man” somewhere in the debate most especially if they feel they are losing. I commented on various blogs the first year President Obama was in office. Being around politics all my life I knew better than to use his name when discussing my concerns regarding the policies he was proposing. I carefully worded my objections. Yet I was regularly attacked as being an “obvious racist,” with the only reason that I could possibly be objecting to “his wonderful policies” was because he was African American and I was obviously not. Now how those attacking me knew what color I might be is still beyond me. A conservative African American came to my defense. Not knowing what color he was he was also attacked as a racist. When he pointed out that he was black he was then attacked as being an Uncle Tom. Seldom did anyone actually intelligently debate the policies.
Climate alarmists must misrepresent the views of skeptics, as the skeptical position is far too rational to oppose when stated accurately. The only defense the alarmists have left is to discredit the skeptics and the best way to do this is to make the skeptical position seem more ludicrous than the alarmist position which means they require a massive misrepresentation of both the skeptical position as well as their own.
I believe they never hear what the conservatives say. Words are spoken, sounds are heard, but no understanding is transmitted. They hear what they believe they hear, and refuse all understanding. That’s my experience so far.
After all this time, and they still don’t understand what we are objecting to. Sometimes they even use the same sentences, then twist the logical of that sentence into something unrecognisable.
Yes, the scientific debate can be boiled down to the non zero magnitude of the ECS, which is a very simple and specific point of division, yet no alarmist can comprehend that this is the focus of the debate. Their incoherent position is that the ECS is what the IPCC says it is and no debate is required, so to support this, they believe that the skeptics think the ECS is zero which is an indefensible position.
If this whole fiasco has taught us anything, it’s that money speaks louder than science. This being the case, it can surely overcome fake science. This may be why Trump seems to be getting more traction by emphasizing the economic harm the proposed solutions present in his explanations for why Paris makes no sense.
I am confused. In what way is believing that the ECS lies within the range given
by the IPCC (with confidence intervals) incoherent. It would at the least appear to
be a coherent viewpoint. And it is consistent with known laws of physics, climate
records and climate models. In contrast there is no coherent sceptical position other
than simply stating that it is wrong — without providing any coherent rationale for why
it is wrong or where the error is. Furthermore simply stating that the IPCC’s value for the
EPS is wrong would logically imply that it could just as well be too low as too high but again
no skeptic seems to take that viewpoint (unless you count as skeptics those who think there are tipping points that could cause a “hothouse earth”). So the skeptics aren’t really sceptical but rather have their own preferrred value of the ECS (i.e. lower than the IPCC) without every providing a coherent justification for why the IPCC and the climate scientists got it wrong.
Oh Percy, you are really a little dim. The ECS is observed, but removing the other factors from the observation is the whole, entire argument. Stating the IPCC can do that is simply assertion. The IPCC cannot prove it at all, which is why they have to run tens of models hundreds of times to get a single forecast that is close to accurate.
And sceptics just have to say “you cannot prove it”. That is the whole, entire sceptic position in every science. You don’t have to prove anything yourself. And of course if you see the IPCC’s ECS running hot, you know it is too high.
Percy wrote:
This demonstrates the EXACT point of the strawman argument. In point of fact, Percy, reams have been written regarding what the ECS really is; the errors made by mainstream climate scientists in their derivation of it; why such a high ECS is un-physical; and why evidence and first principle physics supports a low, non-catastrophic, ECS. You, however, willfully choose to ignore all of that, and ascribe to us skeptics incoherence.
And then you wonder why so many skeptics have little patience left for alarmists.
rip
Percy believes an the mainline ECS range of 3 C is coherent while skeptics who generally believe ECS to be 0-1.5 C is incoherent.
It is hilarious that anyone can be this dense.
Percy: Your “coherent rationale for why the IPCC is wrong
or where the error is” exists already, but is kept out of public
view or discussion, on purpose. See:
http://www.knowledgeminer.eu/climate-papers.html
The pattern recognition paper part 8, covering 1600 AD to
2050 AD. Global warming since 1600 is explained in detail and CO2 contributes Zero to climate change. This part 8 paper is the last of a series, starting with part 1 at 8,500 BC and covering the entire Holocene, explaining each and every temp spike, either up of down, for more than 10,000 years. JS.
Percy,
That ECS cannot lie in the upper half of IPCC’s range of 1.5 to 4.5 degrees C per doubling is shown by the outputs of 31 of 32 GC models. They derive high ECS, but their temperature forecasts have been shown too hot by actual observations.
That range was first derived by Charney in 1979. He then had two estimates with which to work, ie Manabe’s of 2.0 degrees C and Hansen’s of 4.0. To those, he added an arbitrary 0.5 degree C margin of error, et voilà!
Despite almost 40 years of observations showing that even Manabe’s guess was too high, Charney’s range remains unchanged and its central value of 3.0 degrees C “canonical”.
co2isnotevil:
ECS (Climate Sensitivity) is very variable and is merely a statistically manipulated value; but has been derived from a particular set of conditions taken as a norm.
It is thus meaningless in the context of prediction.
It comes from the Planck equation : (change in)E = K*(change in)T. Where E is energy, T is temperature and K is the coefficient which we call “Climate Sensity ECS).
Where water is concerned : at phase change K = Zero and as water is a major constituent in the atmosphere the effect on ECS considerable and variable.
Fortunately for the Earth the combination of gravity and the physics of water results in a remarkable stability in the Global Temperature.
Won’t go into details here! But this sceptic does NOT think that ECS is Zero. Merely that it varies to provide thermostatic process with, of course, leads and lags.
Alasdair,
The ECS is variable only when measured as a change in temperature per change in forcing and exhibits an intrinsic 1/T^3 dependence. When you convert the change in temperature to a change in emissions per the Stefan-Boltzmann LAW, the ECS is remarkable constant from pole to pole, that is, about 1.62 W/m^2 of surface emissions per W/m^2 of forcing. Even monthly averages quickly converge to this ratio.
What you are calling the Planck equation is irrelevant to the ECS and all K can quantify is the heat capacity of the matter being heated and cooled and which affects only the rate of heating and cooling and not the sensitivity of its final temperature to changes in input which is a function of the input forcing alone (keeping the system constant). This misunderstanding is a result of the IPCC’s inappropriate assumption of approximate linearity of the sensitivity to temperature in violation of its intrinsic 1/T^3 dependence. They did this in a vain attempt to conform to Bode’s linearity constraint so they could apply feedback to support what the laws of physics can not. This manipulation would not be required if they used power in and power out, instead of temperature out, but when you do this, the sensitivity is necessarily bounded to be less than about 0.35K per W/m^2 which is far from enough to justify the existence of the IPCC/UNFCCC which assumes it’s somewhere between 0.4 and 1.2C per W/m^2.
The actual Planck equation is E = hv, which quantifies the energy of a photon as a function of its frequency while Planck’s Law describes the spectral properties of an ideal emitter. Planck never established a linear relationship describing the sensitivity and ascribing his name to this kind of bogus relationship is an insult to his legacy.
The sensitivity is given EXACTLY by dT/dE = 1/(4εσT^3), where ε is the ratio between the emissions of the system and the equivalent black body emissions of a surface at a temperature of T and σ is the Stefan-Boltzmann constant. Planck surely knew this as he was well aware of the constraints imposed by the Stefan-Boltzmann LAW.
we use scientific argument, they use inductive logic. While they remain ignorant of science and believe induction is “as good” we’ll never get it across.
alarmists/libs don’t distinguish between social science and natural science. They manipulate natural science evidence to fit their position. Facts are fluid.
You can explain scientific extremists like Mann, but not philosophy doctorates like Roberts. Roberts probably knows nothing about climate science. He believes the (1) “science to be settled”, and his side to have all the answers such as the (2) climate is changing, (2) 95% of it is due to human activity (more CO2), that (4) will lead to catastrophe. Roberts is more of the Green activists mentality. Activists don’t so much misrepresent as: slander, lie and vilify. One can’t misrepresent ideas one does not grasp.
you know, it’s not all one sided. How many times have I read here “leftists all believe……” or “socialists think such and such …..” or “Democrats all want ……” And the purported beliefs of the leftists/warmists tend very much to the extreme.
There’s definitely a touch of the pot and the kettle when it comes to the climate/political “debate”.
It’s 1 AM here and I’m turning off. I’ll check tomorrow to see the insults that I’ve earned. Nighty night.
Metamorphic eh?
No, but but not Igneous of him, either.
Or even Cretaceous.
Is that you Mosher?
Smart Rock – you are entirely correct. Misrepresenting the opposition happens both ways.
A “Collective Qualification”. “The Russians did it.” Implies that every Russian in the geographical location called Russia dropped what they were doing collectively to do what was allegedly done.
A “Collective Qualification”. “Japan leads the world in whale research”…Exactly who in Japan is leading the entire world which is also struggling every day to further the exacting knowledge, but alas, the entire country of Japan leads the world in whale research.
A “Collective Qualification”. “Girls just want to have fun.” This implies that ‘all’ girls want to have fun.
A “Collective Qualification”. China is building coal fired power stations. This implies that all of china is building power stations.
A “Collective Qualification”. Just one of the many reason our chief means of communication is of such poor quality, and deteriorating by the day.
From: https://www.gurdjieff.org/excerpts3.htm
For an exact study, an exact language is needed. For an exact study, an exact … An inexact speech cannot serve an exact knowledge.
Nice observations Smart Rock.
You nailed it Smart Rock.
There’s another blog I visit who had a now shut down political section. Almost every post on there started with a straw man argument to the point I started out my responses with “Straw man argument” then pointed out why it was. This of course led to responders pointing out my own straw man arguments in return, Oops….I kept up the tactic, improved my responses and I would say all but one thread contributor also upped their game which led to more thoughtful exchanges (IMO). The one wasn’t dumb by any means but just couldn’t let go of his straw man beliefs and hated having them pointed out.
Well, ‘Smart Rock’ just go disagree with some of your leftist compatriots on any given point – try to act like you mean it – and just see what happens.
Deviation is not allowed on any point.
hoax is used tBoth sceptics and warmists alike use climate change as de-fact global warming. Climate change is a vast subject as defined by IPCC and UNFCCC. They use the word climate change like a blind man using a light pole — for support and not for enlightenment.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
That’s I ask: Do you mean Co2 induced climate change? or: Do you mean Co2 induced global warming?
CO2 induced global warming.
sjreddy
I stand corrected.
Many people do not realize that AGW is just a conjecture. AGW seems plausible at first but upon closer inspection I find that it is full of holes and I cannot defend it. For example, the AGW conjecture depends upon the existence of a radiant greenhouse effect caused by trace gases in the Earth’s atmosphere with LWIR absorption bands. Such a radiant greenhouse effect has not been observed in a real greenhouse, in the earth’s atmosphere, or on any planet in the solar system with a thick atmosphere. The radiant greenhouse effect is science fiction so hence the AGW conjecture is science fiction as well. If CO2 really effected climate than the increase in CO2 over the past 30 years should have caused at least a measurable increase in the dry lapse rate in the troposphere but that has not happened. There is plenty of scientific rationale to support the idea that the climate sensitivity of CO2 is zero. It is all a matter of science.
It is always good to realist that global warming advocates aren’t exaggerating when they state that skeptics don’t believe in science and deny the existence of the green house effect. It sorts of proves the entire argument made in the original article.
The radiant greenhouse effect has not been observed anywhere in the solar system. it is a scientific fact. Since CO2 is not a source of energy, the only way that an increase in CO2 can cause warming is for an increase in CO2 to increase the thermal insulation characteristics of the atmosphere. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has very significantly increased over the past 30 years yet no increase in the thermal insulation characteristics of the atmosphere have been detected. This is all a matter of science.
The radiant greenhouse is observed everyday on earth. Otherwise how else do you
explain its temperature? And it can be measured in the lab trivially.
Percy: please supply details of the experiment whereby an artificial atmosphere has been created in a laboratory, and various concentrations of water vapour and CO2 have been introduced under controlled conditions. Then state how much warming a 1ppm change in CO2 concentration brings about. That might be a good place to convince someone that we face dangerous man-made global warming due to CO2 – a real experiment, with repeatable results,
Apparently mankind has added about 16ppm of CO2 as part of the 410 or so currently in the armosphere. Where is the experiment to demonstrate physically that this causes warming beyond natural variability?
Then there’s the ocean acidification nonsense. Deliberate misuse of the word ‘acidification’ aside, where is the laboratory experiment using seawater to demonstrate what difference 16ppm of CO2 in the air makes to pH? Remember that seawater is a buffered solution.
A real greenhouse does not stay warm because of the action of trace gases with LWIR absorption bands. A real greenhouse stays warm because the glass limits cooling by convection. It is entirely a convective greenhouse effect that keeps a real greenhouse warm. So too on earth where gravity and the heat capacity of the atmosphere combine to provide a convective greenhouse effect that has nothing to do with the LWIR absorption properties of some trace gases. As derived from first principals, the Earth’s convective greenhouse effects keeps the Earth’s surface on average 33 degrees C warmer than it would be otherwise. 33 Degrees C is the amount derived from first principals and 33 degrees C is the amount that has been measured. Any additional warming caused by an additional radiant greenhouse effect has not been observed. The convective greenhouse effect has been observed on all planets in the solar system with thick atmospheres. An additional radiant greenhouse effect has not been observed anywhere in the solar system.
Creating a column of air with the same pressure gradient and depth that is found in the Earth’s atmosphere is not possible in any known laboratory. However it is very easy to show that an increase in pressure will cause an increase in temperature.
William Haas: agreed entirely! In the experiment I propose however, I’m just looking for reproducible verification that CO2 can change temperature, rather than looking for a mechanism that regulates the planet’s temperature. If the pressure in the experiment is kept constant. that’s fine.
Countless billions spent (name your currency), and the simple notion behind the CO2 scare hasn’t been shown to be correct in a modern laboratory. Yet the IPCC said years ago that ‘we have no spare planet to experiment with’ – pathetic.
Carbon 500
It would seem to me that the pressure MUST be kept constant for the experiment to be valid. The same would apply to all other variables such as water vapor content and spectrum and magnitude of the energy source.
RAH: agreed – we’re talking about bench based real, verifiable experimental science.
Greetings to you Carbon500:
An experiment by Woods, in 1905, demonstrated that a greenhouse, in effect, warms only because of the suppression of convection. His experiment involved two identical boxes, one having ordinary plate glass, and the other used a transparent (I think synthetic) form of halite. Halite is 100% transparent to the same wavelengths that plate glass is about 11% opaque ( ~ 89% transparent) to.
After calibration of the devices, he then did his measurements: because the plate glass was 11 % opaque to LWIR, the halite-greenhouse actually became WARMER than the plate glass greenhouse. To nullify the effect, in round two of the experiment, he interposed plate glass between each of the halite and plate glass “greenhouses”, so both would receive the same amount of solar IR radiation, to include the downwelling LWIR. When he did that, the temperature difference between the two was negligible, showing that the suppression of convection was the culprit in making a greenhouse warm (or should I say, ‘warmer’ than ambient).
I’ve often thought of an experimental design, which might put to rest this myth of “greenhouse” gasses (like CO2, CH4, and the like). I cannot see why such an experiment could not be done, and quite easily. As far as I can tell, the only thing it would lack is the funding, as there would be substantial engineering and construction costs involved.
Viz., a minimum of three “greenhouses” would be needed, so if it were to be expanded to four, five, six … it is just a matter of how much funding is available. We construct (the nominal number of the) greenhouses, and they must be absolutely identical in all respects: the same framework, same size and shape, same color, and absolutely the same materials, in all respects. All would have to be completely air-tight, WITH THE EXCEPTION of our “control”, and I’ll explain that below.
Instrumentation would need to be calibrated, so that it is obvious that differences in temperature would be measurable to a small error band, say, nominally, 0.1 Celsius degree, and 0.01 preferable. We would also require a method to check the concentration or composition of the internal atmospheres of the greenhouses (stay with me — — — I’m going somewhere with this!), both before, and then after, the experimental run(s).
As I said, all “greenhouses” would need to be completely air-tight (no intrusion of ambient atmosphere into, or loss of ‘atmosphere’ out of the sealed ‘greenhouses’, except for one, which will serve as “control”. The “control” greenhouse will be able to vent to the outside atmosphere via an ‘underground’ piping system (since I assume we’ll construct these “greenhouses” on the surface of Planet Earth); there would be no pump or other device, so the “control” greenhouse simply contains, for the most part, the atmosphere that we all breathe. The “control” can vent at will (most likely during the day as things heat up inside), and then “inhale”, for lack of a better term, at night, as things cool.
At this point, you’re asking, “That’s it?”. Not by a long shot. We have identical greenhouses, “X”-number of which are completely sealed, and one “control” which is able to vent remotely as circumstances require. The other “greenhouses’ will have varying concentrations of carbon dioxide, hence the need for absolute isolation from the outside. Nothing goes in, except what we put in, and nothing comes out. Let us, for the purpose of this proposal, state that we will have a total of six “greenhouses”, which would be one ‘control’, and five ‘experimental’. In ‘experimental’ greenhouse #1, we have, for all practical purposes, sealed ambient atmosphere, at about 410 ppm, or whatever the Mauna Loa concentration is at the time the experiment commences. In exp #2, we have at least TWICE ambient, so a nominal 800 (or perhaps 1000) ppm. Exp #3 should be somewhere in the multiple thousands (2,000? 3,000? 4,000? 5,000? Aw, heck, I don’t know — — pick a concentration, any concentration … … ), and so on with the remaining ‘experimental’ greenhouses; I should imagine that the last one would be well into the percent range, or if one is of a mind to try it, see what would happen if we set one “greenhouse” to the same concentration as Venus, or about 95 – 96%, with only Argon as the other constituent.
Ideally, we should do the experiment simultaneously in say, three, or possibly, four different locations: all “greenhouses” would need to be an absolute maximum of 10 – 15 metres apart, and there should be no obstructions, so each one gets the identical amount of solar radiation during the experimental run. We should choose an unpopulated temperate zone location, a sub-tropical location, and perhaps something like an island. If we have several locations, the experiment, or experiments, must be run during the same time period (which would mean that records would need to be kept for 24 hours, unless, by happenstance, they are all in the same time zone).
Here’s the kicker: H-nought is that there will be no temperature difference (and a numerical value for this would be agreed upon in advance; nominally, we could choose 0.25 Celsius degrees, or 0.5 Celsius degrees, or … ). We do know that even under the stringent circumstances required here, there will be small experimental errors and differences, so I should imagine that the experiment will need to be run multiple times, with a view to canceling out the random errors.
H-1, of course, will be that as the concentrations of “greenhouse” gasses increases, the internal temperatures of the affected greenhouses will increase, for the most part, in lock-step with their greenhouse gas concentrations. To a first approximation, we could state that the expected increase would match the official IPCC estimate that each doubling of the concentration would produce about 3.2 Celsius degrees of increased warming.
Side benefit of this might be a better estimation (“empirical”) of the so-called ECS value ascribed to carbon dioxide. The skeptic position (you, me, Anthony, JoNova, Tim Ball, Lord Monckton, etc etc etc … ) is that this so-called ECS is seriously small, probably not much different from zero. If, on the other hand, it is closer to some non-zero integer, we might obtain a better estimate. I do not know that this is the case, but why should we defer from making the attempt?
Normally, I would refer to this a about a half-pfennig’s worth of input. I seriously doubt this amounts to much more than a millionth-of-a-peso, but there it is.
I welcome your thoughts, and critique, with all my best to you and yours,
Vlad
Vlad: thanks for your highly detailed response to my earlier comments. I’ve read about an experiment by R.W. Wood in 1909 using rock salt instead of glass, the rock salt being transparent to infrared, and finding that this made no difference to the temperature of the air inside the greenhouse. The use of Halite is something I’ve not come across before.
I think that your experiments are exactly the sort of approach that needs to be used – I thoroughly enjoyed reading your descriptions. Expense shouldn’t be a problem; considering the money that’s been wasted on the whole CO2 business, I would imagine that setting up an experiment like this would be relatively cheap – but who would put up the grant money given current attitudes?
It seems to me that the climate/CO2 debate has been dominated by mathematically minded people – various physical laws are often quoted, calculations done, computer models set up – but the simple, basic need for laboratory investigation has been pushed aside. Now retired, I spent several years involved in commercial vaccine research. Suppose a researcher finds, say, a new substance, maybe a protein, that could stimulate a good immune response. Much about its molecular structure could be deduced by physical and chemical methods – but until this putative vaccine is tried in a biological system – for example, animal immunisations and clinical trials in humans, no-one can state with certainty that the vaccine will work.
Proper science, in other words. Yet no-one has undertaken basic experiments to prove or disprove the supposed effect of CO2, and stuck a thermometer into an apparatus such as you suggest.
Truly incredible.
Hi Carbon:
I believe we could debate all day long about the costs. I will only say that it is well beyond my meager means (my wife and I are raising four grandchildren).
We’ll leave it at: it will cost some money, and some time.
My BAD!!!!!!!!!!!! Very sorry, and I beg, most humbly, your forgiveness: when I stated “halite”, I was using the geological name for “rock salt”. I do not know why I keep forgetting that I need to use some lay terms when discussing here. Most have adroit science skills, so it slips my mind that some obscure technical term is outside of some posters’ expertise.
It is astounding; we can do a simple, basic experiment, and do it multiple times, but no one, as far as we can tell, is willing to do it. It boggles the mind that some dissertation-seeking grad student couldn’t set this up.
One thing: if you are willing, please look for any additional holes in the idea. I almost wonder if there isn’t some place out there that would seriously consider attempting this, or at least funding it. I know it would involve MUCH more than Anthony’s ‘surface stations’ project, but there might be someone who can and would do the leg work, and that “heavy lifting”. If ever some funding came through, it would not be difficult to monitor as some energetic young folk carry out the task.
What amazes me the most is that the Nick Stokes’, Percy-what’s-his-names’, Harry TwinOtters’, Kristi Silbers’, Anthony Bantons’ (a.k.a. toneb), Jim Hansons’, Gavin Schmidts’ ad infinitum ad nauseum, wouldn’t JUMP at the chance to prove all of us wrong. They’re more comfortable sitting at their keyboards, running their hopeless computer models, pontificating at all of us ‘great unwashed’, and wouldn’t dare stoop to actually getting their hands dirty. Yet, it is such a golden opportunity for them.
My regards to you and yours,
Vlad
Vlad: thanks for your reply. I really should have looked up what halite is before posting – very sloppy and unscientific of me, not your fault at all!
I note with interest that you are a geologist. After reading Al Gore’s propaganda book years ago, it came as a breath of fresh air to read professor emeritus Ian Plimer’s book ‘Heaven and Earth’ and also the late professor Robert Carter’s ‘Climate – the Counter Consensus’, both of which (not surprisingly) gave a far more convincing narrative on the CO2 tale.
I see that there are now more books available putting forward a sceptical viewpoint, and that can only be a good thing.
I also note that the dreadful ‘Skeptical Science’ website gets few visitors these days. It didn’t take me long to realise that their true nature early on – rude, incapable of polite discussion, intolerant, – and quite wrong on a couple of points of biology which I raised. This of course they would not admit to when confronted with referenced evidence.
The whole CO2 business will in my view eventually go down as the biggest scientific mistake (or scam?) in history. Let’s hope that a few young scientists take up the proverbial cudgel!
Carbon500,
No water vapor variations, but this might be something like what you want. Or maybe not.
Quite the interesting video there.
Seriously flawed, however.
First, our intrepid host explicitly states that, ‘ … carbon dioxide TRAPS [emphasis mine] heat … ‘. Let us assume for the sake of argument that the statement is true.
If we allow that the carbon dioxide in the tube was “trapping” heat, then the IR camera would have detected a change in the internal temperature of the background; the “color” would have changed as the “heat” from the candle was trapped.
Here’s the second, and the BIGGER flaw in the video: Instead of a candle, let us use a Bunsen burner. A Bunsen’s flame is even hotter than that of a candle, and we can sustain it for a longer period of time. Since, according to our host, carbon dioxide is “trapping” the heat, we should repeat the experiment, but this time, let us have the Bunsen do its “thing” for anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours. If the carbon dioxide is in fact “trapping” the heat from the flame, it should be a short period of time before the interior plexiglass tube is approximating the combustion chamber temperatures of the modern turbofan engine.
Our host, sadly, is completely misleading us: the carbon dioxide in the tube is not “trapping” the heat from the candle flame; it absorbs at its characteristic wavelengths (for our purposes, we’ll go with the 4 – micron and 15 – micron thermal IR wavelengths), and it is doing what carbon dioxide does: it RE-RADIATES the photons in ALL DIRECTIONS, more-or-less equally. That would be TOWARDS the IR camera, away from the camera, up, down, sideways … … …
But, again, our host is misleading us, since the ‘absorption/emission’ scenario is not the only thing that happens when a carbon dioxide molecule absorbs energy. Absorption/emission is but one of several things that can, and do happen, when a proper-wavelength photon is absorbed. There is also:
* bond stretching
* bond flexure
* increased rotational velocity
* increased linear velocity
* and last, but not least, and the most common energy conversion, emission of multiple radio-wavelength photons (in four*pi steradians)
The geological history of the Earth is in diametric opposition to your hypothesis, Ms Silber. At times of high concentrations of “heat-trapping” carbon dioxide, there have been large-scale and lengthy glacial episodes. At times of moderate carbon dioxide concentrations (say, nominally, half of the ‘high’ concentrations, or even less) there have been moderated temperatures, and verdant ecosystems. Factors, hundreds of times more powerful than carbon dioxide, have brushed its puny effects aside.
I know you’ll bring in the tired, old argument that one of the ‘heating’ effects of carbon dioxide is the collision/energy transfer. I understand this process quite well, thank you, and I tried, in vain it would seem, to make you aware of the fact that in the real atmosphere, this is where convection (and/or advection) come into play. I also attempted to make you aware that the widely-used GCM’s in climatological studies, completely suppress convection and advection; the disconnect from reality in these “models” is profound.
Upthread I made a proposal for an experiment. I’ve talked to several PhD’s I am acquainted with, and it would seem that the technology is available to conduct the experiment (although, I have been admittedly vague in describing the goal of the experiment). Several have grant-writing experience, and I have asked them about being co-authors with me, should publication of the results be in order. These are professional Chemists (construction of the model atmospheres), Physicists, who will calibrate and test the measurement equipment, and verify that it is recording and reporting what we want it to record and report, and some Engineers, who can purify the design of the model atmosphere ‘boxes’ (for lack of a better term), and test them for being completely sealed off from the outside.
You’re so certain of your belief; here’s a chance to prove how wrong the rest of us are. You and a whole lot of other people should be chomping at the bit to run some kind of an experiment that will demonstrate, once and for all, how much “heating” carbon dioxide does. Don’t like my idea? Fine! Improve it! Jump in! Science, when you actually do it, is FUN!!!!! My fondest memories are of those times our professors took us out into the field, and taught us how to learn. The classroom was great, but gettin’ yo’ hands dirty, and the orienteering, and figuring out what is working and what is not … well, there’s just nuttin’ to compare to it.
Vlad
The radiant greenhouse effect has not been observed anywhere in the solar system. it is a scientific fact.
Earth is much warmer than the moon, even though they are, on average, the same distance from the Sun. Earth has an atmosphere that produces a significant GHE, the moon doesn’t. Venus is warmer than Mercury, even though Mercury is much closer to the Sun. Same reason. Your statement is patently false.
If you want to make the case that the data doesn’t support a conclusion of high sensitivity to CO2, by all means. But stating that the radiant GHE has never been observed anywhere in the solar system simply discredits you in the eyes of anyone with the simplest of observation skills. You do yourself nor skeptics in general any favours by making such absurd statements.
The Earth’s convective greenhouse effect, which is a function of the heat capacity of the atmosphere, the pressure gradient caused by gravity and the depth of the troposphere, accounts for all 33 degrees C that the surface is warmer because of the atmosphere. Additional warming caused by a radiant greenhouse effect has not been detected on earth or anywhere else in the solar system for that matter. So my statement is patently true.
There you go, Percy, playing the man instead of the ball, by lumping all sceptics about AGW in the same basket because of a single person’s stated opinion. Like people’s skin colour varies from one individual to another, not all sceptics believe the same things.
Ray,
clearly not everyone believes the same thing. But the articles states “front-line, hardcore denialism of the “it’s a hoax” variety has largely receded to the base. Republican leaders and spokespeople have moved back to the next line of defense: Yes, the climate is changing, but we don’t know to what extent humans are responsible.” And then along comes Mr. Haas and proves exactly that. Mr. Haas might not be representative of everyone but there is certainly a vocal minority here who deny the existence of the green house effect.
but there is certainly a vocal minority
I teeny tiny minority. There used to be a lot more of them, but they got debated into the dirt by people with a grasp of the science and most of them went away. I rarely respond to the odd one who pops up now and again, but made an exception in the case of Haas’ comment above because it is ridiculous.
That said, this forum used to abound with people sounding the alarm and doing so by arguing the science. They largely disappeared over time also, and for the same reason. They got debated into the dirt.
So smear the rest of us if you want Percy, but the truth is your side doesn’t come here to debate the science because they keep on looking foolish.
A,/b> teeny tiny minority.
“So smear the rest of us if you want Percy, but the truth is your side doesn’t come here to debate the science because they keep on looking foolish.”
Why would you not expect climate advocates who debate the science here NOT to look foolish?
They are vastly outnumbered, and via self-fulfilling “prophecy”, are shouted down by weight of numbers.
I know because I do.
Being shouted down is not “losing” a debate.
Any echo-chamber – and this is a prime example – makes the minority there “look foolish” as the dog-whistling piles them in to do that. (BUT only in the eyes of those shouting).
The likes of Nick Stokes (for whom I come here), blows many a “discussion” apart with common-sense and knowledge, as does Leif). Plainly coming from a dispassionate scientific standpoint (and it’s taken for granted that that is not the view of the majority here).
This is a Blog David and does not influence the scientific discussion one jot.
Science advocates are not made to “look silly” here.
That you think it so is the nub of the problem, and how places such as this are so polarising.
From the consensus side (what the IPCC says ) and not some idiot like Wadhams.
The shoe is on the other foot.
I never knew that yelling, I’m right and you’re an idiot was the gold standard in how to win debates Anthony.
That’s about all you have ever managed to do.
Interesting that a grown adult can live in such fantasy. Take for example Mr. Banton, who claims anyone who disagree gets shouted down. What he really means is “we get embarrassed after displaying our monumental ignorance but we pat ourselves on the back, tell ourselves we’re getting shouted down to shelter our ego, take our ball and run home to Mommy”.
Nick Stokes offers the only reasonable discourse but far too often he intentionally misrepresents minor issues and obfuscates, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t provide quality opposition at times. The rest, from what I have seen, are either paid to agitate or are so emotionally immature they can’t comprehend they are religious. Belief in CAGW, not the goal post replaced CACC, requires typical willful ignorance of the facts.
Such facts include:
40 years of false predictions, and denying they are false illustrates your religious position and anti-science slant. The data doesn’t agree with all those doomsayers
Ice core proxy data that shows temperature rising before co2
Plants thrive at about 1200ppm which is why growers inject it into the greenhouses
The little ice age was a horrible time to live for much of the world and warming up a bit since then has been wonderful for everything, don’t forget the thames used to freeze over
Severe weather events have declined precipitously in recent years
Mike’s nature trick
Hide the decline
Adjustments that have cooled the past and warmed the recent history
This has always been a push for global carbon tax, because that’s what dominators and control freaks want: a tax no one can escape. And if you are so dense as to not recognize patterns and see this push all across the world right now, out in the open, then shame on you.
In fact, shame on you for being such a whiny liar. You are lying to yourself which is the worst kind.
I have often argued in defense of anarchy here, and trust me, these right leaning statists despise that nearly as much as people like you, but I want shouted down. In fact, I had a ton of push back an we didn’t agree, but so what? I had my big boy pants on. That’s like. You might want to graduate from intellectual Pampers and put on your own big boy pants
Anthony Barton;
You have no idea what you are talking about because you weren’t around to witness or take part in those debates. This was many years ago when this site was still pretty young. The debates weren’t a lone person being shouted down by the crowd. They were highly qualified people debating specific issues with one or two other qualified people. The crowd mostly observed.
There were claims and counter claims with references, links, explanations, data – real science debates between very small numbers of people, often only two talking to each other.
The alarmists got their butts handed to them because they couldn’t make their case, and one by one drifted away. Today’s WUWT is much more dominated by crowd noise and so Nick gets to pick off the odd quote and make himself look good. But if it was back to the way it used to be, heavy weights going after each other, you’d see what I mean.
Anthony Banton,
You said, “The likes of Nick Stokes (for whom I come here), blows many a ‘discussion’ apart with common-sense and knowledge,…” Nick is a bright and knowledgeable guy. However, he has a talent for convincing the gullible and uniformed that up is down and down is up. I have never known him to admit that he was wrong, even when presented with compelling evidence that he was. He is firmly in the camp of alarmism and and strives to convince everyone that he is right. Some actually believe him. However, that is their problem.
Oh splendid the echo-chamber piles in……
“The debates weren’t a lone person being shouted down by the crowd. They were highly qualified people debating specific issues with one or two other qualified people. The crowd mostly observed.”
Then why aren’t those “highly qualified people” dominating the (as you would have it) debate?
Why are they not swamping media with their rebuttals?
Why does each “whistle-blower” (eg Dr John Bates) turn out to be a damp-squib?
Why doesn’t their input make up the IPCC consensus?
(Cue conspiracy ideation)
No, there are a few notable contrarian scientists that are very vocal on the subject.
Then there is the vast silent majority out there who neither know nor care of this Blog or of Trump’s “Chinese hoax” bollocks.
If there were a debate let alone (butt-kicking science) then your “highly qualified people”(s) views would be the consensus.
It’s not.
Why’s that?
(cue conspiracy or group-think or some other comforting nonsense to confirm your bias).
“Mr. Banton, who claims anyone who disagree gets shouted down. What he really means is “we get embarrassed after displaying our monumental ignorance but we pat ourselves on the back, tell ourselves we’re getting shouted down to shelter our ego, take our ball and run home to Mommy”.”
What a pathetic response Honest.
Ad hom actually.
Why does your “monumental ignorance” trump (pun intended) mine?
What are your qualifications in the field of climate pray?
A deal … you show me yours and I’ll show you mine. Eh?
“Such facts include:
40 years of false predictions, and denying they are false illustrates your religious position and anti-science slant. The data doesn’t agree with all those doomsayers”
Arrhenius in 1896 predicted +5 to 6C for x2 CO2.
The IPCC 120 years later projects 1.5 to 4.5C.
Hansen 1988 (see NS’s Moyhu and many others).
Arctic ice decline is running at greater than IPCC projections.
Wadhams is an idiot. His was not a consensus prediction.
Please state any “failed” predictions FROM THE IPCC that were due to have occurred by 2018.
“The alarmists got their butts handed to them because they couldn’t make their case, and one by one drifted away.”
No, they likely drifted away because they couldn’t be arsed with the down-the-rabbit-hole nonsense that piles in on here to anyone with the patience to not add to the echoes.
Seen it loads of times my friend.
Has happened to me at least 3 times.
It becomes wearing.
And no wonder frustrations have got advocates moderated.
There is nothing you accept here accept ABCD science.
There have even been several threads lately attempting to doubt any surface data, yet we get the lauding of UAH – the cold outlier. And heavily “adjusted”.
It’s hypocricy of the finest order.
The scientific and pragmatic view would be to go with a mean of troposhheric temp series.
But this place has no room for pragmatic climate science.
As the many politically rooted articles demonstrate – it is lead by and it’s raison d’etre is “we hate the lefties”. … who, it seems, want to take your tax dollars and/or impose a UN lead socialist world government.
Nick is supremely knowledgeable, but above all supremely patient to suffer the abuse he gets here.
You can count the rest on the fingers of one hand.
Like I said – it’s Alice-in-wonderland and anyone not fitting that denizen profile is suffocated out (along with a few sprinkled ad homs to boot usually …. andyg55 RIP)
BTW: I have been on here at least 6 years BTW (formerly Toneb).
That denizens do not see that there is massive confirmation bias at play here that totally defeats any IPCC advocates along with a fair sprinkling of D-K sufferers is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
This is a Blog. It is not peer-review (cue choruses of “pal-review”).
Yet we get the snake-oil seller supreme his lordship Monckton coming multiple times for his *peer-review* of hugs and kisses from the faithful.
Every article starts off with a whistle to pile in and denigrate.
So all science that supports the IPCC consensus is wrong is it?
Really?
From ALL Earth science disciplines?
And all *science* that supports ABCD, whether the Sun, Cosmic rays, El Nino, Clouds. CO2 lags temp, it’s the UHI, magic molecule (yet it’s plant food and greening the planet) Or just plain we don’t know everything so we know nothing type logic.
There is almost a complete lack of scepticism of sceptics here.
SO there a rant and well deserved due the “piling in of the echoes as I expected.
Now what’s the point in me saying any more to replies as they come back again?
As I said as is the raison d’etre here.
None.
Said it all.
But not going away my friends.
There may be few Sky-dragon slayers here but there are many that come close.
Then why aren’t those “highly qualified people” dominating the (as you would have it) debate?
They did. Some of them included IPCC contributors who resigned from the IPCC in protest over the way the science was being presented. As for why aren’t they the consensus, those people and those debates never made it to the mainstream media. The whole point is that debate in public never took place. CNN regularly deleted comments on articles showing why the article was wrong. Once they quotes something from the IPCC and when I pointed out in comments that what the IPCC actually said was the opposite, including links to provide it. They deleted my comment and never published a retraction. Fast forward to today, they don’t allow comments on climate articles at all. They’d be called out for misrepresentation of the facts almost every time if they did.
As for what the IPCC got wrong about 2018, almost everything. They were forced to trim their sensitivity estimates again and again, sea level rise hasn’t accelerated, sea ice hasn’t collapsed, they admitted that the models ran too hot, hurricane and cyclone activity is down in both frequency and intensity, the list goes on and on.
Anthony Banton, one more point.
If you’re going to ask what the IPCC got wrong, we first must ask what you are referring to because:
There’s the IPCC reports which say one thing
There’s the IPCC Summaries for Policy Makers which say rather different things
There’s the media reports about what the summaries say the IPCC says.
These are, if you bother to read them all, three completely different things.
I’ve read the IPCC reports, there’s very little truly alarming in them, and I have won debates with people showing there is nothing to be alarmed about by relying solely on IPCC content.
Once again, rather than dealing with counter arguments, Anthony just increases the level of insult.
Anthony Banton,
I too have had technical comments removed from the Australian blog The Conversation, and from Yahoo comments. So, clearly the absence of the minority view (which even the SCOTUS publishes) is not an indication that there are not qualified attempts to get the information to the public. I think that calling the suppression a “conspiracy” is a little over the top, but there clearly is an attempt by the MSM to prevent the public from hearing anything but a consensus.
One person says something that you are able to mis-characterize, and suddenly all skeptics are ignorant of science.
Thank you for proving the author’s point.
CO2 is one conjecture. The climate in balance or equilibrium is their 2nd. This notion of balance drives the ‘fight against climate change‘. A climate is equilibrium is so central to them that they wrote it into the core climate models. It’s how their science ‘thinks’ as well.
The climate is in equilibrium?
I hardly think so. In an equilibrium the entropy production is zero.
Surely you mean a steady state?
I want to agree with you, but my understanding is there is in fact IR bands that are warmed, it’s just a matter of how much heat (energy) and how long the energy stays in the atmosphere and or oceans. Reports vary from 0.14C (negligible) to 2.4C (catastrophic) for a doubling of CO2, and from <10 years to forever. the last 20 years tells us it's close to the minimums reported….but….not zero. HELP!
Alarmists have realised that claiming that human CO2 emissions will turn the Earth into Venus, that the seas will rise à la ‘Waterworld’ and boil away, that the planet will be in flames, that it will become a vast desert with torrential downpours and massive floods, billions of people dying from heat stress and freezing in unprecedented blizzards, makes them look like idiots.
This is not a large adjustment mind you, they still claim the only way to avert an ill-defined apocalypse is to surrender national sovereignty to a UN controlled world government with coercive powers to reduce every individual’s ‘carbon footprint’ to practically zero — carbon-law enforcement and nomenklatura excepted.
Confirmation bias… Read Eric Hoffer’s great book – “The True Believer”. It applies to all mass movements of the enlightened centuries and was recommended reading by Dwight Eisenhower.
My father put “The True Believer” in my hands a few weeks before I headed out to freshman year at UC Berkeley in September 1967. He did not oversell it. Dad merely said, “You might find this interesting.” He did NOT say, “This will prevent you from going insane.”
It did, though. The late 1960s turned out crazier than either one of us anticipated. Great book — mental medicine against the infection of fanaticism that everywhere stalks the free minds of mankind. The U.S. is now undergoing a similar outbreak of mass movements that lead nowhere, led, I’m afraid, by 60s geriatric cases who have indoctrinated the young in the latest doomsday fads and fatuous “solutions.” CAGW is only one of them. The Constitution is obsolete, Judge Kavanaugh will lead us back to the Dark Ages, gender is elective rather than carried in the X and Y chromosomes of every cell, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the wave of the future rather than a pathetic ignoramus who looks good on camera. . . the list goes on and on.
Zealots always have a rationale why totalitarianism will improve the human condition — as long as “WE” run it, understand.
Tom, Good summary! I remain amazed that the “zealots” flatly refuse to carefully consider history or hard data. They must twist both to fit their agenda.
This language makes no sense.
What is a climate advocate or a climate skeptic? How does one advocate for climate?
However, sticking with the terminology as used, why do Climate Skeptics Sometimes Misrepresent What Advocates Believe?
More precise descriptions would be an advocate of climate alarmism and a skeptic of the absurd claims made by the IPCC to lend support to the cause of climate alarmism.
I’ve never misrepresented what alarmists believe as it’s all documented in the IPCC reports which as a body of belief is so ludicrous, it requires no misrepresentation.
I predict that there will be much gnashing of teeth imploring the US to go down and gather up the survivors of this “caravan” after Willard decimates them.
As for the cause? If there is a non-zero probability of it, it has to happen… Eventually.
*Willa, not the rat movie.
You are way off topic, tweak, which probably explains why you seem not to have noticed that the location of the “caravan”, & Hurricane Willard’s predicted path in the next 48 hrs, are hundreds of kilometers apart.
For now. Plus, it will be a rallying mantra preached at us in the not to distant future.
Weather is not climate. Neither is a hot summer.
They have primitive, Manichaean views on the scientific process, epistemology, capitalism and politics. (PS: ‘Manichaean’ is used here in its wider, metaphorical sense). Because they see themselves as good, everyone opposing them must be evil. Because there’s only good and evil, all ‘deniers’ are the same. David Roberts is just a Democrat propagandist. Interesting that he does not seem to have a proper biography anywhere on the web. He says he has a PhD in philosophy; which is surprising given the Manichaean he propagandises. Hard for me to believe that anyone, with a proper philosophy background believes in ‘good versus evil‘, but Roberts is unflinching in his propaganda. Why?
— David Roberts.
That could have come straight out of the Joseph Goebbels crib sheet.
His commitment to his cause forces him into a means-end rationality. What counts is I am winning, not am I right, and certainly not am I playing according to the rules. If you’re not winning, you’re not playing hard enough. His cause is his belief system.
As Pontius Pilate said, “What is truth?”
One side believes they have the truth; the other side thinks “not yet”…and they are skeptical, and with good reason.
And it’s not clear that the believers of CAGW are all acting in good faith. In fact there’s evidence of manufactured evidence.
And as others have asked, if CO2 is so powerful, shouldn’t we have seen really drastic changes when it went from 3 molecules of every 10,000 in the atmosphere to 4?
After one embraces means-end rationality, the only ‘good faith’ is pursuit of the ends. This kind of thinking is common in politics and, commerce. David Roberts clearly seems to think that now the scientists are 95% certain of man-made climate change leading to catastrophe, the only responsible course of action is to stop it (the climate changing) by any means possible. Realistically, I can’t be sure that’s what they think, but from the questions I’ve put to them it does seem they are possessed by their cause.
The two best examples of people claiming the climate doesn’t change (shouldn’t have, except for human influence) are the hockey stick and all those “attribution” analyses. The advocates of the catastrophe theory are the ones who have a problem with natural “climate variability” (aka “change”).
Indeed the irony is the hockey stick only works if you deny well evidenced , at least as well as one ‘magic tree ‘ based claims , past climate change. Mann really is a climate change denier.
When rational logic won’t get the job done as hominem slurs are the next best tactic.
ugh Vox.
David Icke dot com has more credibility
..Why do Climate Advocates Sometimes Misrepresent What Skeptics Believe?…
“Why do Climate Advocates Always Misrepresent What Skeptics Believe?”
There. Fixed that for you…
Straw men “arguments” are a classic way to mislead people. Nothing new, and nothing surprisig about it.
It’s the same as pushing grannie off a hill in her wheelchair, or arguing that women will need to go back to dar allies for abortions.
[dark alleys? -mod]
..Why do Climate Advocates … Misrepresent What Skeptics Believe?…
For the same reason a dog licks his balls.
..,because they can, and no one else is going to…
In short because religions always need an ‘evil other ‘to be against . It is not enough that unbelievers are wrong, what really matters they are ‘deliberate wrong ‘ , by rejecting the true faith , and therefore ‘bad’
The whole ‘denier ‘ , idea came about not because it was accurate or because it had some scientific value , it has none , but a means to label AGW sceptics as having the same moral stance as those that deny the holocaust occurred.
Oddly this approach was require in the first place because the ‘settled science ‘claim did not stand up to the type of critical review which is consider both a normal and required element of science.
The reason is simple ignorance.
Most of them have no idea what skeptics actually believe. Try it out. The next time you’re in a discussion with someone, ask them to summarize the mainstream skeptics’ position. Chances are, they won’t be able to do so.
Either way, that’s not a bad way to start a discussion.
Why do Climate Advocates Sometimes Misrepresent What Skeptics Believe?
Er, sometimes? Maybe I live in a strange part of the world but 99.9% of what I say is misrepresented most-times by the cAGW advocates and their entourage. It is mangled by a curious mob illogicality that is really very imaginative, and I find fascinating to watch such mob behavior.
Hataz gonna H8 and climate change just gives them a big fng opportunity to do so
If we used the proper term GLOBAL WARMING, there would not be a problem. It’s NOT climate change—it’s GLOBAL WARMING. That is the theory—more heat is held than emitted. So STOP calling it climate change. Correct everyone who does. Don’t be unscientific and use words that don’t mean what the speaker says. Call it WARMING, not climate change.
Their goal posts are 1.5C and 2.0C. That is temperature and thus global warming. I use this often – and it works.
Exactly. Thank you.
I do this Everytime with the faithful
AP interviewed Trump and reported he said “EVENLY”! btw Trump tweeted that the headline was FakeNews too:
17 Oct: AP: Trump tells AP he won’t accept blame if GOP loses House
By CATHERINE LUCEY, JONATHAN LEMIRE and ZEKE MILLER
Trump again cast doubt on climate change, suggesting, incorrectly, that the scientific community was EVENLY split on the existence of climate change and its causes. There are “scientists on both sides of the issue,” Trump said…
https://apnews.com/8f4baf7aaddc442dad0a726f3ebe7fff
trust Dana to come up with the following:
22 Oct: Guardian: Trump thinks scientists are split on climate change. So do most Americans
There’s a 97% expert consensus on human-caused global warming, but most Americans are unaware
by Dana Nuccitelli
When queried about the most recent IPCC report, Republican lawmakers delivered a consistent, false message – that climate scientists are still debating whether humans are responsible…
Donald Trump articulated the incorrect Republican position in an interview on 60 Minutes:
“We have scientists that disagree with [human-caused global warming] … You’d have to show me the [mainstream] scientists because they have a very big political agenda”
Americans badly underestimate the expert climate consensus
Numerous papers have shown that over 90% of climate science experts agree that humans are the main cause of global warming since 1950, and when considering peer-reviewed papers, the consensus exceeds 97%.
And yet as surveys by Yale and George Mason universities have found, only about 15% of Americans are aware that the expert climate consensus exceeds 90%…
Expertise matters, and people rightly trust experts. But of course, that’s exactly why Donald Trump wants to confuse the public about the 97% expert climate consensus.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/oct/22/trump-thinks-scientists-are-split-on-climate-change-so-do-most-americans
just to show a few examples of how AP’s “EVENLY” ended up in the FakeNewsMSM:
Trump Tells AP He Won’t Accept Blame if GOP Loses House
New York Times – 19h ago
Trump again cast doubt on climate change, suggesting, incorrectly, that the scientific community was EVENLY split on the existence of climate change and its causes.
Trump tells AP he won’t accept blame if GOP loses House
ABC America – 17 Oct 2018
Trump again cast doubt on climate change, suggesting, incorrectly, that the scientific community was EVENLY split on the existence of climate change and its causes.
Trump says he won’t accept blame if GOP loses House
PBS Newshour – 10h ago
Trump again cast doubt on climate change, suggesting, incorrectly, that the scientific community was EVENLY split on the existence of climate…
Trump tells AP he won’t accept blame if GOP loses House
Atlanta Journal Constitution – 19h ago
Trump again cast doubt on climate change, suggesting, incorrectly, that the scientific community was EVENLY split on the existence of climate…
It’s obviously easier to refute a strawman — but it’s also obvious that David Roberts doesn’t know what he’s talking about:
—
Changes in climate have become obvious, not just to scientists, but to ordinary people — they can be directly measured, with such exotic instruments as a “thermometer.”
—
Any “change in climate” that is “obvious” to “ordinary people” isn’t actually anthropogenic global warming, because the increase in anomaly attributed to AGW is *very small* on exotic instruments like a thermometer, and increased over a very long period of time. Warming since not-really-preindustrial times has been about 1C, a change that would be barely visible on a mercury thermometer over the span of hours instead of more than a century. Changes of far greater magnitude happen on an annual, seasonal, and daily basis just about everywhere in the world.
Yeah, the global temperature has cooled by about 0.8C since February 2016, the supposedly, “Hottest Year Evah!”, so the Alarmists ought to be cheering and breathing a sigh of relief that the world is not going to end tomorrow because the temperatures have stopped climbing.
The next question to ask is how cool are the temperatures going to get? All the while, CO2 is increasing in the atmosphere, but the temperatures are cooling. How do the Alarmists explain that? I thought more CO2 in the atmosphere meant higher temperatures, according to the CAGW hypothesis. Temperature and CO2 levels seem to be taking different paths.
Never mentioning what one’s opposition’s real opinion is is a useful debating tactic. So is using ill-defined or undefined terms, such as the “consensus” points in the notorious Cook study. What, pray tell, is “pollution”?
Perhaps best expounded by the words in a famous song {one small change by me}:
“Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend,
Do it in the name of {climate},
You can justify it in the end”
That’s why ‘climate change’ has quotes around it. That ‘climate change’ is different than climate change.
‘ Climate Change ‘ is the version as defined by AGW, the other climate change isn’t.
Any reason they aren’t using ‘global warming’ anymore? Word play. Separating the 2 issues is difficult. The meaning is different. You don’t believe in ‘Climate Change” ? Yes, but not the AGW version. You don’t believe in ‘ global warming ‘? Yes, but not the cause as per AGW.
( and I don’t know how much or any warming there has actually been, perhaps none. It is entirely probable that patterns changed. It’s entirely probable that the record has been altered to fit the agenda)
AGW puts you on the defensive by saying, ” You don’t believe in ‘ climate change’ ?” . How do you respond to that? … If you say, ” No”, you look like an idiot, of course there is climate change. If you agree that there is climate change, then you agree with AGW. Then if you qualify it with, ” Yes, but not your version”, then it’s an appeal to some communist backed board that a so called ‘authority’.
It is well thought out in that regard.
Why do Climate Advocates Sometimes Misrepresent What Skeptics Believe?
The adorants of the church of catastrophic climate evil steady feel at the brink of doom.
ongoing cliffhanging give them the feeling of superiority.
State of nebulous mind.
I’m endlessly having arguments with climate activists that go something like this:
Activist:
Me:
Activist:
I’ve never confused the POLITICAL movement called “Climate Change” with the dodgy science call cAGW, the MSM and general public conflate the politics and science as they are generally clueless about that the climate-change-fear-narrative actual is not about science!
Why do climate activists sometimes misrepresent what skeptics believe?
Well, when they use the phrase, “climate change”, they are using an entirely different definition than skeptics who use this exact same phrase. Thus, by understanding among themselves one definition, they can hijack a skeptic’s use of the exact same phrase, knowing that their own ill conceived definition is the restricted definition, while the climate skeptic’s definition is the proper, broader definition.
For example, I decide that the phrase, “red apples”, means ONLY red apples that are acquired by killing the growers and stealing their apples. Now you tell me that your favorite pie is made from “red apples”, knowing that the phrase, “red apples”, in your usage, has NOTHING to do with killing the growers and stealing.
Thus, I am now able to berate you for enjoying the fruit of dead growers, simply because we are speaking two different languages, many people tuning into our exchange will NOT know that we are talking two different languages, and these many will be captivated by the emotionalism of those using the ill conceived definition that is NOT fully disclosed each time the phrase is used in an alarmist context.
Pretty sneaky, really.
If a person uses the phrase, “climate change”, meaning “human caused climate change”, then this person needs to spell it out every single time. Otherwise, this person is being lazy, overly presumptive, and simply incompetent at using language properly. The correct phrase for climate change believed to be caused exclusively by humans is “human caused climate change”. Do NOT leave out that first part. EVER, or you are being, again, lazy, overly presumptive, and simply incompetent at using language properly.
Choices:
a) They are NPCs and this is what they were programmed to say.
b) They are as bad at mind reading as they are at science.
c) They are disingenuous.
Why do climate (change/ global warming) advocates sometimes misrepresent what skeptics believe? It suits their purpose. Why do climate advocates sometimes misrepresent what climate advocates believe? It suits their purpose.
You keep using that word [sometimes], I do not think it means what you think it means.
Activists/warmists don’t believe in logic they believe in fear and falsified correlation. They have and serve a political agenda equivalent to accusing “teh jewz” of stealing babies to educate them into their satan worshiping religion to then infiltrate the world.
There’s no way to successfully argue with someone who not only doesn’t critically think but also can’t comprehend basic mathematics and physics. You’re wrong because it makes them feel good about themselves to defend their magical lie.
Why do they keep putting the issue in terms of Republican vs Democrat? Do they not know that there is a world outside Washington? Have they ever heard that there is a world outside the United States?
On politicians’ and people into politics, their point of view is competition between these parties with thoughts the party they belong or support could have done better.
The idea that people can ‘see’ a ‘tangible’ climate change is utterly ridiculous. This is a 0.6K average rise in temperature over the last hundred years over the entire planet! In a more enlightened time folk should remark that the Earths temperature was ridiculously stable. What folk actually see is weather doing what it has always done – they just refuse to educate themselves about actual trends.
Far from skeptics not believing in climate change, it is the climate-obsessed who seem to believe that climate and weather would be in a kind of homeostasis without industrial emissions. The responsibility of this lies with the bulk of academia who seem to have grown an outsize anti-industry bias.
Of course this come from Vox. “Death Cult”? Really? That’s the pot calling the kettle black. Talk about projection.
Surprising that none of the comments mention that it isn’t just “climate change” that “skeptics” disagree about with “alarmists”. It’s EVERYTHING. Pick a topic: immigration: conservatives – secure the borders, liberals: open borders. Taxes” conservatives – lower, liberals, higher. National Debt – conservatives, bigger problem than CO2, liberals, CO2 much bigger problem. It’s all about how each of us process information.
Conservatives: Evidence based, analytical, rational. Example: The economic reality is windmills and solar panels will not supply more than 10% of total global energy demand by 2030, and will not reach 30% by 2045..no matter what…it will not happen, that’s not reality. Conservatives: Carefully study Germany’s energy mess. Stop wasting limited capital resources on an unrealistic solution to a non-existent problem. Liberals: Strange combination of willful ignorance and virtue signalling on one hand and devious corruption on the other. Spend more money on renewable’s or we’re all going to die, or even if we’re not it’s still feels like the right thing to do.
Maybe because people think there should be someone to blame. The world as we see it today is due to the revolution of climate as one major factor, some of the human bad habits and activities are boosting.