Guest post by Jim Steele
Currently children are being asked to lead a political charge for “climate change action”. Climate is very complex, and most adults have a very poor understanding of all the factors affecting climate change. Thus, many people believe our children must have a far inferior understanding of climate change and are just being used as pawns in the politics of climate change. Many adults see student strikes as silly political theater, not validation of any climate theory or proof of an impending climate crisis.
But perhaps I underestimate the knowledge and intelligence of our student “climate strikers”. So, I am offering a $1000 award to the student who unequivocally outlines why 1) rising concentrations of CO2 are the cause of recent climate change, and 2) why that change is catastrophic.
I warn participants, I devoted my whole professional career towards scientific research and education that promotes wise environmental stewardship. Nonetheless I became a climate skeptic. I observed too many people eager to blame climate change for environmental problems that were caused by other factors and had real remedies. So, I suspect no adult, never mind a child, can meaningfully determine that recent weather or recent changes in a species abundance have been driven by rising greenhouse gases.
But you may prove me wrong.
Furthermore, to encourage good scientific thinking, if there is no winner in this climate challenge, I will still guarantee a $500 “runner-up” prize to the student who demonstrates the best scientific thinking, even if their conclusions are wrong.
Here are the requirements:
1. The student must be 21 years or younger. Nonetheless I encourage each student to discuss climate change with your parents, teachers and friends as well as contacting scientists.
2. The student must email their arguments in a document that is no larger than 5000 words. They must state their name and age and type “The $1000 Student Climate Challenge Award” in the subject line. Email the document by December 1, 2019 to naturalclimatechange@earthlink.net.
3. The student must use the foundation of scientific inquiry, the “null hypothesis”. In other words, the student must show that current weather/climate reflects a change that exceeds natural climate change. That requires choosing the appropriate time frames for discussion.
4. Students must go beyond simple correlations. Correlation is not causation. Although CO2 concentrations are higher today than they were 200 years ago, higher concentrations are not evidence of causation.
5. Students must address relevant alternative hypotheses. For example, why is Arctic warming the result of CO2 warming and not the result of natural oscillations that drive warmer waters into the Arctic?
6. Students must address why warming is catastrophic. If warming is caused by rising CO2, why would a longer growing season be catastrophic? Or if there is less sea ice why would the resulting increase in photosynthesis be catastrophic? Or what is the evidence of a trend in larger or more tornados?
7. Consensus is not evidence. Consensus is merely political theater. Arguments must be based on evidence. Politically motivated scientists tried to refute Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity using a “consensus” argument and writing “100 Authors Against Einstein”. The consensus was still wrong.
8. Avoid arguments from authority. As Carl Sagan wisely advised “arguments from authority carry little weight – authorities have made mistakes in the past.” For example, John Muir’s ideas were published in popular papers and magazines regards the formation of Yosemite Valley by glaciers. The geological authority from Harvard, Josiah Whitney, suggested otherwise and tried to smear Muir as just an “ignorant shepherd”. But Muir was mostly correct! Likewise, I warn that using the word “denier” will not make your arguments more correct.
9. Students can enter as many times as they want. You may want to change your arguments when new information comes to light. Simply note that your new entry replaces your last.
As student essays roll in, I will periodically report in my What’s Natural newspaper column, and on my landscapesandcycles.net blog, regards failed common arguments and why it will disqualify your essay from the award. That will allow every student to improve their argument and re-submit.
I wish every student the best and hope their sincere essays will promote better scientific discourse and understanding.
Sincerely Jim Steele
Director emeritus, Sierra Nevada Field Campus, San Francisco State University
Will everyone be awarded a “participation trophy”?
I think I can do it!
OK, my submission is in!
Could the challenge be simplified by saying “prove global warming is manmade without using
GCMs and use the scientific method.”
Alex
The very super glue..
I think it would be more interesting to offer the prize to so-called climate scientists and activists! I imagine there would be no entries, even if the prize money had 3 more zeros on the end. They are already awarded billions of dollars annually to avoid subjecting climate change to the principles of valid scientific enquiry.
This reminds me of the Amazing Randi $1,000,000 paranormal challenge. No one ever collected that money because no one could ever scientifically prove paranormal abilities. When someone’s abilities were put to a scientific test, they failed, 100% of the time!
Am I equating the abilities of climate scientists with the abilities of psychics? Why, yes! Yes I am! (Apologies to all my psychic friends.)
Perhaps you underestimates the skills of Children of lets say 14 jears, and who decides if he/she succeded.
Both Einstein and Feynman made statements to the effect that in order to really understand something you have to be able to explain it to a child. Feynman also said that if the issue could not be explained in that way, then we do not understand it.
I get the impression, given our current understanding, that it would be impossible to explain climate change to a child.
Most people don’t seem to get Mosher. He hasn’t the patience to respond in anything but short replies that appear as condescending drive-by snipes (and maybe they are). But at least one point he makes is entirely valid for both skeptics and true-believers alike — make your arguments rigorous and complete. Yes, his are curt and incomplete most times (I’ve observed them here for over ten years) and maybe he’s just tired of making them or maybe it’s easier to be a gadfly. Still, his point is correct. Let’s be as self-critical as other-critical. You may not be right, but at least you did your honest best to demonstrate you are.
Not everyone that posts to WUWT understands the general science of climate. That, however, is no excuse for rejecting the various valid criticisms of the copious outputs of CliSci. One just needs to separate the wheat from the chaff, as it were.
To me, there are two clear invalidations of CAGW: One, and most importantly, no Hotspot (Its just physics.). And two, invalid UN IPCC climate models.
Dicking around with minutia (e.g. Mr. Mosher’s Wandering in the Weeds) are fun (and even educational) distractions, but will get you nowhere in making climate policy: If to fundamentally alter our society, economy and energy systems based on the assumed impacts of a single, very minor gas in our atmosphere.
Dave,
Who, here or elsewhere, really, truly understands the “general science of climate”?
There are several data points which raise valid questions regarding the ‘mainstream climate science conjecture’ that CO2 and other human GHG emissions are irreversibly changing climate for the worse in a heretofore unprecedented rate or extent.
Mosher does not see his role as separating wheat from chaff or otherwise offering wise advice. He is a self-appointed “drive-by shooter” who truly believes in his own intellectual superiority.
Yet he fails to address not only the harder, but also the easier! “problems” with the enhanced GH effect scare!
But hey, he “outed” the infamous Gleick. For that tour de force, we are forever grateful.
Just grow up, big guy, and accept that your pet theories lack hard data.
Or are you that afraid of losing your job?
I, for one, do understand the general science of climate. Unlike, however, “Mr. Mosher And The Weed Wanders” I don’t engage in arguing about the number and nature of the nits one picks. Speculating about the possible future impacts of minor temperature changes on South American Tree Frogs or the range of the Monarch Butterfly is not useful when trying to determine if one should support the fundamental alteration of our society, economy and energy systems.
The physics of radiative gasses is known. It is speculation about water vapor, clouds, convection, ocean currents, etc. that gets one in trouble. If speculation about those things leads one to develop UN IPCC climate models that predict a Hotspot, and a Hotspot doesn’t develop, then one should really reconsider the speculations used in such model development. Additionally, those UN IPCC climate models have a bad record for temperature predictions.
I have developed large computer programs that predicted the operations of highly complex systems. If the assumptions used are not based on empirical observations, then the outputs are incorrect; GIGO. Hell, the UN IPCC climate models cannot even get the past correct, especially for the early 20th Century warming.
The take-home message is: Computer models only produce output consistent with their design and the parameters chosen for incalculable phenomena. If you start with the assumption that CO2 significantly affects temperatures, then the model output will show higher temperatures associated with assumed higher CO2 levels. UN IPCC climate modelers admit that they adjust models and parameters until they get an ECS that “seems right.”
As predicted by the outgoing President Eisenhower, CliSci has been corrupted worldwide by government money and political control. That, added to the green NGO hysteria (aided by foreign disinformation), leads to dysfunctional politics. If you don’t believe that, then maybe, you too, can see CO2 in the air.
Hi Anthony. I’ve been following you since a couple of years ago. I have much respect for your work. I second the petition of a previous commenter about allowing us to add to the $1,000 price. I would like to add that the student must demonstrate correct use of quantum mechanics of fluid in the treatment of the atmosphere’s behavior together with thermodynamics of volume, pressure and temperature variables in the explanation of how CO2 can affect significantly the atmosphere. Thanks. Dr. Jimmy Vigo, PhD Environmental Science & Engineering, UTEP 2006.
Jimmy, with your obviously open mind, how the hell were you able to get them to grant you a PhD in environmental science?
Dr. Jimmy,
Would you be satisfied if instead of students being able to “demonstrate correct use of quantum mechanics of fluid in the treatment of the atmosphere’s behavior together with thermodynamics of volume, pressure and temperature variables in the explanation of how CO2 can affect significantly the atmosphere”, he/ she was able to see CO2 molecules in the air with their own eyes?
Regarding the correlation dispute: If each run of variable x and variable y is INDEPENDENT, then correlations can be treated as possibly significant. As Munshi pointed out
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2725743
CUMULATIVE SUMS, as in temperature, fraction of CO2 in the atmosphere, will likely show spurious correlations.
When I came across William Briggs’ “arcsine” post, I made the effort to download , play with , and learn about the “R” program.
https://wmbriggs.com/post/257/
This program creates a series of “random” +1s, -1s (v1), and the cumulative sum of the random +1s and -1s (v2)
##################
T1<-c(1:50)
v1<-c( rbinom(50,size=1,p=0.5))
v1=2*(v1-0.5)
v2<-cumsum(v1)
lm(T1 ~ v2)
m<-lm(T1~v2)
summary(m)
#####################
Running the program, I usually get a bogus "highly significant" result when computing the correlation between time (T1) and cumulative sum of random variables (v2), but when I run the correlation between T1 and v1, I get the expected result, negligible, insignificant correlation.
If there's a REAL correlation between CO2 and Temperature, the correlation has to be run between
delta temperature and delta CO2 over a year, or whatever. As Munshi pointed out, such correlations show insignificant relationships, sort of like my v1, T1 correlations.
I seriously doubt whether he will get any real challengers, since they only operate on FEELINGS, not logic or scientific reasoning! I could be wrong, though. I applaud your attempts and I hope for the best!
Great contest. Obviously, no child can meet the qualifications, because no adult has had the scientific sense to meet these qualifications. This points out the fact that climate obsessers do not follow science.
People don’t think; they rationalize.
Nice Blog…keep the good work.
So why keep telling us it is beyond question and referring to us as deniers instead of answering our hundreds of what to us in purely grammatical terms we are sure are questions. My main one is if it is science why do you not encourage questions and independent verification if the claims were not fraudulent?
Climate science alarmists are are never going to go away. Too bad there can’t be an annual prize for best student science project, essay or debate. It’s a worthy goal.
Somehow we have to get students to logically refute the alarm and the alarmists. More straightforward.
That’s a great challenge and I would love to see it transformed into a Climate X price. We need fact, we need data, we need knowledge, we need a lot of discussions and we need stories that convey what is and not what some sick minds imagine. We are living in a world where kids freak out from totally imaginary dangers. When I was a kid, we freaked out over nuclear war – it just hung over us. We freaked out over sour rain and a new Ice Age coming. We freaked out over a great many things but we did so for ourselves. We did not hold everyone hostage. And sure enough, pretty much all of those scares remained that, scares although they were eerily real to our minds. But this Climate Change thing is totally unsupported by data and it freaks people out to a degree never seen before. What will they do when really dangerous things happen?