From Dr. Roy Spencer’s Global Warming Blog
by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. For the uninitiated, while Politico is allegedly a news organization, it has a history of supporting Progressive and Leftist causes.
To be fair, the summary lead at the top of the article is pretty good: “A common refrain: Climate policy hurts the poor, and the continued use of fossil fuels is a boon for humanity.“ But, at best, today’s Politico article entitled, “Meet the 4 influencers shaping Chris Wright’s worldview” is a mix of truths, half-truths, and misleading innuendoes. The article is by Scott Waldman. The four alleged influencers of Energy Secretary Chris Wright’s views on climate science and energy policy are, in order, Bjorn Lomborg, me, Alex Epstein, and John Constable.
I will let the others speak for themselves. What follows is, verbatim, the article addressing my influence on Sec. Wright. I don’t need to comment on everything because some of it is true. I will only offer clarifications where appropriate. Why? Because there are a lot of untruths circulating about me and unless I address them from time to time, those things become part of a narrative that is difficult to dislodge.
Quotes from the article are in italics; my response & clarifications are in bold:
Spencer, whose work was cited as a resource in Wright’s report, is a research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville and is listed as an adviser to the Heartland Institute, which promotes climate misinformation. I used to give talks at Heartland conferences, but haven’t in recent years. I don’t have a formal relationship with them. I don’t speak for Heartland Institute, but I thoroughly disagree with the claim that they promote “climate misinformation”. That shoe fits Politico much better.
While some of Spencer’s work on atmospheric temperatures and other areas of study has been funded by NASA and the Energy Department, he has attacked federal climate researchers as being biased because they receive taxpayer money, and he has claimed that people alive today won’t experience global warming. On the first point… true. On the second point, I believe what I have said is that most people today will never notice global warming in their lifetimes because it is too weak (about 0.02 deg. C per year) compared to natural climate, seasonal, and day-to-day weather variability. In my book, people who believe they have witnessed human-caused global warming are about as delusional as flat-Earthers.
Spencer also served as a visiting fellow for the Heritage Foundation, which produced the Project 2025 policy proposal that has guided the first months of President Donald Trump’s second term.
The groups Spencer has been affiliated with have received millions of dollars in donations from foundations that oppose regulations, but he claims the American public has “been misled by the vested interests who financially benefit from convincing the citizens we are in a climate crisis.” That includes environmental groups and journalists, in his telling. And I stand by that claim. Look at the artwork at the top of this article, and see if you can figure out what it implies.
“Climate change is big business for a lot of players,” he wrote in a Heritage Foundation publication. “That includes a marching army of climate scientists whose careers now depend on a steady stream of funding from governments.” True. And I have said my career also depends upon that funding.
For years, Spencer has worked with organizations that have received funding from an interlinked network of fossil fuel companies — a multitrillion-dollar global industry — as well as wealthy foundations with billions of dollars in holdings that support groups opposing climate and energy regulations. What are you implying, Scott? That I’ve been paid off by this multitrillion dollar global industry? I know that’s what you are doing. But they have never funded me. At most, I have giving an occasional invited talk, which I receive honoraria for when offered (standard practice, and the same has applied to environmental organizations I have spoken to).
He states on his website that he has not been paid by oil companies, but a court filing in 2016 revealed that he received funding from Peabody Energy, the coal giant that for years spent millions of dollars on funding climate denial groups. That was one of my invited talks: As I recall, it was a Peabody board of directors meeting, and they wanted someone to provide a counterpoint to a Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) talk given at the same meeting. Peabody never funded me to do work.
Spencer has appeared before Congress a number of times, typically as a Republican witness attacking climate policy and downplaying climate risks. He served as the climatologist for the late conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh, who regularly promoted climate denialism on his show. Again with the “climate denialism” mantra? You really don’t have a second gear, do you, Scott? I don’t deny “climate”. I don’t even deny recent warming. I don’t even deny that recent warming is probably mostly due to humans.
Like Lomborg, Spencer claims climate policy will hurt the poor even as science has overwhelmingly shown the effects of global warming would disproportionately affect the world’s most vulnerable populations. “Science” has shown no such thing. Opportunistic researchers have indeed made such claims, though. But Lomborg, Epstein, and Roger Pielke Jr. are better at refuting those claims than I am.
He authored a book entitled: “Climate Confusion: How Global Warming Hysteria Leads to Bad Science, Pandering Politicians and Misguided Policies That Hurt the Poor.”
Spencer did not respond to a request for comment. True. I long ago learned which media outlets cannot be trusted to represent what I say fairly.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
I have long considered Politico to be just a bunch of dishonest leftist hacks; they may once have been honest and objective, but if so, it was so long ago that I have forgotten it.
This hit piece just confirms my belief that they are just a bunch of dishonest leftist hacks.
Politico has never been honest and objective. It’s just that in the past, like most of the media, they made an effort to hide their biases.
These days they, like most of the media, where their left-wing bias proudly.
“just a bunch of dishonest leftist hacks”
And much less. !! Very low on the human morality and honesty chain.
On par with the Gruniad etc.
Politico “sold” many thousands of expensive subscriptions to the Biden federal government, which have all been cancelled, due to DOGE.
.
Those subscriptions served as a subsidy for Politico, which in turn still issues hit pieces on real scientists like Roy Spencer
It is called one hand washes the other.
.
The same with the subsidized, government-influenced Corporate Media, which in turn issue 100% pro-Biden coverage and 100% anti-Trump BS.
I’ll be much more impressed when politico and waldman get sued. Anything less and they’ll continue to malign Spencer et al.
From the actual article in reference to Roy we have
And if you look for any actual evidence you might look at the WHO where they say
And now you need to carefully look at what is said.
Firstly risks are appearing, not incidents.
Secondly the [result of] the risk will become more severe [in the future] as opposed to has already become more severe.
And finally a non-scientific claim that it will be harder to adapt when there is absolutely no acknowledgement of any benefits that may come from the warming.
AR6 actually explicitly acknowledges that there is no evidence of the increased incidents of fires or flooding because they’re lost in the noise. AR6 quotes papers that suggest there is evidence but those are typically modelled results and their technical summary from the balance of evidence is…there is no actual evidence now, or expected by the middle or end of the century.
Like calling Michael Mann a faker, fraud, scofflaw and deadbeat? So sue me! The journalist didn’t seem terribly spiteful, and Dr Spencer’s responses seemed to more about justifying facts, rather than contradicting them. Rather than respond when asked for comment, Dr Spencer says –
Really? Is he implying that some unnamed media outlets are “untrustworthy”? Oh dear, unless they “represent” what he says “fairly”, they’re not to be “trusted”?
Dr Spencer is not above being patronisingly sarcastic to commenters on his blog (fair enough – it’s his blog), and appealing endlessly to his own authority to support his strange belief that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter – but he gets agitated if someone treats him as he treats others, providing implications rather than facts.
One has to laugh – the pot calling the kettle black!
Has Mickey Mann paid his fine of half a million yet?
His record at complying with court orders is less than stellar.
Anthony Watts –
Having been subjected to Roy Spencer’s sneering sarcasm on more than one occasion, and getting “banned” (not complaining- his blog, his rules), presumably for not being reduced to a quaking jelly, I have to smile at Roy’s reaction to a journalist who apparently stated some facts – and presented them in a way that Roy didn’t like.
Hopefully, Roy will exercise better judgement than Mann, and preserve some of his self respect.
Quite funny.
Indeed, Dr. Spencer’s grasp of radiation physics is unfortunately no better than that of any of the other climate “scientists” (and he is, as you say, quite patronizing and arrogant about it). If it were, he would probably not be so confident about this claim:
“I don’t even deny that recent warming is probably mostly due to humans”
I guess everybody is entitled to their point of view, whether based on fact or fantasy. Opinions have whatever value you want to give them – generally worthless, in most cases.
For example, Dr Spencer routinely suppresses opinions voiced on his blog – arbitrarily – apparently based on his personal likes and dislikes. He places no value on the opinions of others, and ensures nobody else has the opportunity to even listen to opinions he judges as unworthy.
Rather like Willis Eschenbach, a contributor on this blog – he threatens to censor any comments he doesn’t like, his stated dictum is “Shape up or ship out”. It’s the Willis way, or no way at all! Quite humorous, really.
I note from Dr Spencer’s responses that he is not complaining about fact as much as implication, and even says “What are you implying, Scott?”.
Once again, from Winston Churchill –
And yes, Dr Spencer has banned me from his blog. He didn’t like my attitude, possibly preferring fantasy to fact. Expressing his “outrage”, perhaps?
Maybe his ego is frail, and easily bruised.
He thinks that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, and doesn’t like me pointing out that it doesn’t.
I can see why you might well be banned from blogs run by individuals. They have every right to ban people who annoy them. You appear to be able to be quite annoying.
I agree. Are you disagreeing with anything I said, or just trying to “annoy” me? My ego is not particularly fragile, and not easily bruised – unlike people like Michael Mann, Roy Spencer, or Willis Eschenbach, so you might be wasting your “outrage”.
If you are so “annoyed” because I point out that adding CO2 to air does not make it hotter, or that four and a half billion years of sunlight has not made the Earth, the oceans or the atmosphere, hotter, all you have to do is demonstrate that I am wrong.
I find facts and reproducible experiment more persuasive than opinions by people like you. What about you? Do you value my opinions? You probably can’t understand why I’m laughing at you.
No, just pointing out the obvious. Although you have already reinforced the point yourself quite adequately.
That’s obvious. Do you have any other obvious things you’d like to point out? Water is wet, ice is cold – that sort of thing?
Sorry, feel free to ban me if you choose to be annoyed. I don’t mind.
“or that four and a half billion years of sunlight has not made the Earth, the oceans or the atmosphere, hotter”
You don’t think sunlight makes the Earth warmer?
It certainly hasn’t after four and a half billion years of continuous sunlight.
Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.
Alas, that option is only open to the moderators, Michael.
No he doesn’t.
Scientific test of proposed conjecture : Please provide a link to where Roy Spencer says anything even remotely resembling “Adding CO2 to air makes it hotter”.
.
There are approximately 8 billion people on Earth.
The only one of those who ever uses the phrase “adding CO2 to air makes it hotter” is a certain … [ checks panopticon, oh yes ] … “Michael Flynn”.
I didn’t mention “say”, I said “thinks”. GHE supporters never say anything that can be proven wrong – just make implications.
Provide a link to where he indicates he doesn’t think that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter. He certainly has implied in the past that it does – “back radiation” and all that implied nonsense.
If he now accepts reality, I applaud him. Go on, tell me that you don’t believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter!
Oh? You’re a mind reader?
And then you ask for “a link to where he indicates he doesn’t think …” after writing that you didn’t mention “say”, only “thinks”. Pray tell, how can Roy Spencer “indicate” what he does or doesn’t “think” without “saying” something?
Yes. All he has to do is say what he thinks. If I’m wrong, I apologise.
That’s what you would do, isn’t it?
“Scarecrow Repair” has already responded to this point (better, and more politely, than I would have).
.
In English the difference between the verbs “to imply” and “to infer” is quite subtle, I often have to take a few seconds to double-check which one is applicable myself … and English is my mother-tongue !
Way back at the end of 2009 Dr. Spencer wrote an “alternative world” article outlining some of his “thoughts” on the greenhouse effect :
https://www.drroyspencer.com/2009/12/what-if-there-was-no-greenhouse-effect/
The first paragraph of that article states :
Your inference from that sort of statement, or whatever distorted version you came across elsewhere on the Internet, was “He thinks that adding CO2 to air [ only ] makes it hotter”.
Your inference is incorrect.
.
Later on in that article Dr. Spencer makes another, even more “non-intuitive” (to me, at least) point about “greenhouse gases” :
This point is expanded on in a second article by Dr. Spencer at the start of 2013 :
Your inference that such subtle and multi-faceted arguments can be reduced to “He thinks that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter” is completely unjustified.
The greenhouse effect exists Michael, thanks be to God. Why are you so desperate to dispute the life-giving process that rescues us from a perpetual winter?
Any enhancement of that natural effect by mankind burning stuff is marginal at most. There’s no climate emergency! In fact to the extent that there is any minor warming, it’s all good.
Your peevish tirades only make one wonder if you might not be a bot designed to sow discord among sceptics and discredit climate realism by spouting nonsense.
None of what you have quoted Dr Spencer as saying (rather than thinking), mentions CO2 at all, which is rather my point.
Nor does Dr Spencer’s article, I believe. Not only that, but Dr Spencer talks about a “greenhouse effect”, and provides the following definition –
— which doesn’t mention CO2 either.
I am drawn to the conclusion that Dr Spencer thinks that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter in some fashion. Certainly, four and a half billion years of sunshine and an atmosphere have not heated the Earth.
Maybe he thinks the Earth hasn’t warmed at all due to a mythical greenhouse effect, and hotter thermometers are caused by excess man-made heat, but he hasn’t said so.
None of the things which you have quoted say anything measurable or verifiable at all. Meaningless word salad, if you like.
Once again your “beliefs” are incorrect.
The first article describes how his “thought experiment” is set up as follows :
Later on he explains why for a non-GHG planet “[e]ventually, the atmosphere would still become ‘isothermal’, with a roughly constant temperature with height” :
The worst thing is that you appear to genuinely believe that you are able to infer what people “really think, deep down”, but are unable to make the connection between “the greenhouse effect” and the presence of “greenhouse gases” [ = “infrared absorbers / emitters” ] in a planet’s atmosphere.
.
Such “reasoning” says a lot more about you than it does about Dr. Spencer.
I, and others, have repeatedly explained to you how the voices in your head are wrong.
“Later on he explains why for a non-GHG planet “[e]ventually, the atmosphere would still become ‘isothermal’, with a roughly constant temperature with height” :”
No it won’t. What do you think happens to the potential energy gradient with height? It’s not constant, and it’s not (completely) cancelled out by the density gradient either. (Reduced, definitely, though)
Dr. Spencer also thinks that the colder atmosphere can develop a positive amount of radiant power to the warmer surface, and that it is possible to convert temperature (energy) directly, and constantly, into power. He has some serious physics misconceptions. That’s because he’s a “climate scientist”, not a physicist.
The first article I linked to was for an “idealised” non-GHG atmosphere.
As Dr. Spencer put it at the end of my extract from his second article :
Including the effects of changes to the potential energy would be another “complication / wrinkle” to add to the “basic / stripped down” planetary model.
I know he is referring to a non-GHG atmosphere, but my counterargument is independent of the presence of GHGs (or large-scale convective movement, i.e. thermals). Regardless of the type of air molecules, you are going to have to counteract the potential energy gradient with something if you want to have a zero kinetic energy (temperature) gradient. What would that “something” be?
If he is ignoring the potential energy gradient entirely, well, then he has removed not just GHGs, but gravity itself. That is more than just “idealized”.
In the ideal atmosphere in Roy’s thought experiment, why do you think potential energy translates to a temperature difference?
If the atmosphere is at rest, it has to be isoenergetic. But it has a potential energy gradient in a gravitational field, so in order to be isoenergetic, that gradient has to be counteracted by another opposite energy gradient. The obvious candidate is a kinetic energy gradient, i.e. temperature.
Since you have no idea what “energy” means, this is all just so much Greek to you, though, isn’t it?
The question was actually aimed at Mark, who seems to have a much better grasp of logic than you do, being that he has not yet beclowned and contradicted himself. I notice that he hasn’t tried to answer.
The obvious candidate to your isoenergetic requirement is that with increasing altitude (ie increased potential energy per molecule) comes decreasing density (ie fewer molecules per volume).
Perhaps you have an actual reference to back your claim up?
Sure, you can argue that the potential energy gradient is cancelled out by the density gradient. People have tried that argument before. Now bearing in mind that potential energy varies (almost) directly with altitude (with a slight reduction for the decreasing gravitational field, on the order of a few percent over the depth of the entire atmosphere), are you going to argue that density varies inversely with altitude? Does the density of our atmosphere look like it is proportional to 1/h? Does the density of air at 2 meters off the ground feel like it is half the density at 1 meter? Does the density at ground level (h=0) appear infinite to you?
I’ll start looking for references when you can explain this math and how it doesn’t match our observed atmospheric density profile at all.
Actually I’m wondering why the potential energy gradient needs to be balanced with anything at all at equilibrium in this thought experiment.
Why are the molecules above necessarily moving more slowly than those below? They may have more potential energy but they have no way to use it to increase their kinetic energy.
“Why are the molecules above necessarily moving more slowly than those below?”
Try the experiment I suggested below to Mark. Bounce a ball on the floor, and see whether it slows down as it ascends, and then speeds up again as it descends.
That’s not an answer. In the atmosphere, a molecule can only fall as far as the molecules below it and that applies to all of them in the column. If there is no convection/overturning then that’s all they will ever do.
What you need to do is make an argument why the atmosphere in the thought experiment must overturn even at equilibrium. What drives that process.
“That’s not an answer.”
Yes it is. It’s not my fault you don’t understand it.
“In the atmosphere, a molecule can only fall as far as the molecules below it”
So what? That does not contradict anything I said in any way. And the way it’s worded is somewhere between “incoherent” and “false”, just like your self-contradictory claim of “net work”.
“why the atmosphere in the thought experiment must overturn even at equilibrium”
I have no idea what you are trying to say here, it doesn’t sound even remotely relevant. Is this related to large-scale movement of parcels of air, such as thermals? The math behind those turbulent convective movements is an unsolved problem, which means it’s slightly above my pay grade, and way above yours. You should probably not worry about it for now.
We are only discussing gas volumes at rest, not being externally heated or cooled, and thus not subject to large-scale “boiling” or turbulent convection. Molecular Brownian motion is all we need to think about.
But at any rate, the following
Is incorrect. Potential energy is calculated from the centre of gravity, not the ground. And yes, density is proportional to that.
You are thinking of absolute potential energy, but a) that’s not relevant for calculating the kinetic energy of air molecules vertically limited to ground level, and b) contrary to yet another of your bizarre and uninformed assertions, the density profile isn’t remotely proportional to that gradient either. Absolute potential energy only varies by about 1.5% (100 divided by 6300) across the 100 km of atmosphere. How much does atmospheric density vary by in that distance? Any guesses? Is it 1.5%?
It most certainly is relevant when considering the potential energy at 1m and 2m above the ground with respect to how it varies with density.
Density doesn’t change much and neither does the potential energy.
Suggesting its double the potential energy but not double the density as an argument really does put your understanding of the situation out there for all to see.
But you didn’t find any to back up your claim. So its still your (so far) mistaken understanding against Roy’s understanding.
And like before, this is turning out to be a waste of time.
” the potential energy at 1m and 2m ”
Potential energy is linearly related to height in a gravitational field. It takes twice as much energy to raise an object 2 m as it does to raise it 1 m. Remember, potential energy is given by the formula m*g*h.
“Suggesting its double the potential energy but not double the density”
How else would you propose to cancel out the (nearly) linear relationship between altitude and potential energy?
“a waste of time.”
Attempting to teach you your physics certainly is that, as we have seen repeatedly.
But you’re choosing the ground as the reference point but the molecules can never fall that far. Their “ground” is the molecules below and that distance is determined by the density.
Tell me why the ground is a valid choice that makes more sense than the centre of the earth (ie their total PE) or distance to the molecules below as related to the density of the atmosphere (ie the PE that can translate into KE).
“But you’re choosing the ground as the reference point but the molecules can never fall that far.”
Who told you that? What exactly do you think we are breathing at ground level?
“Tell me why the ground is a valid choice”
How much potential energy do you think a ball sitting on the ground has? And if the answer isn’t zero, how is that potential energy going to be converted into kinetic energy, the way it would if you dropped it off the top of a building?
Completely irrelevant.
The atmosphere is sitting on the ground and has zero potential energy.
You want to say the molecules can be treated independently. They can’t. A box of marbles sitting on the ground has zero potential energy even though each marble has some height above the ground.
“The atmosphere is sitting on the ground and has zero potential energy.”
A bizarre claim, unsurprisingly for you. Do you think the atmosphere is some sort of giant solid blob? You know that gas molecules are not fixed in space relative to their neighbours, right? They are free to move around and travel in ballistic trajectories until they bump into something. While traveling in a gravitational field, like anything else, they convert PE to KE and vice versa. Did you somehow fail to grasp the difference between solids and gases?
How far can it fall?
As I said way back in the thread, you need there to be overturning to have any argument about there being a temperature gradient balancing any sort of PE gradient. When it’s all one temperature, there is none.
“How far can it fall?”
That question presupposes a false assumption, which is that all the gas molecules are fixed in space relative to each other. What do you think a gas is?
“you need there to be [macro-scale] overturning”
No you don’t. Who told you that? Do you know what Brownian motion means?
“When it’s all one temperature”
How do you propose to achieve that? And what temperature (and state) would it be, do you think?
How is Brownian motion relevant. Everything you mention is entirely irrelevant. The atmosphere being all one temperature in the thought experiment is a result of it not gaining or losing energy and taking the time to get to equilibrium.
If your theory that a temperature gradient must exist due to the potential energy of individual molecules wrt the ground on the basis that molecules can move, then why don’t we see it in the ocean?
Ocean temperature gradient is opposite to what your theory expects.
“How is Brownian motion relevant.”
It’s the real-world process that replaces this fake requirement of yours: “you need there to be overturning”
Then you said: “Everything you mention is entirely irrelevant”
Only in your made-up fantasy world. Who taught you all the self-contradictory nonsense you spout?
“equilibrium”
You have no idea what that means.
“Ocean temperature gradient is opposite to what your theory expects.”
I’m not talking about liquids. They behave differently than gases. And solids. And plasmas. Not that you would know, of course, since you can’t tell the difference between gases and solids (or liquids) to begin with, and you think the atmosphere itself is a solid. How old are you, anyway? Have you passed grade 3 yet? I’m pretty sure they covered the difference between states of matter all the way back then, if not earlier.
So convincing.
Do you think that changing the topic when you are losing the argument makes you look intelligent? Or honest?
Let me remind you
And water molecules can move and are subjected to gravity and can and will “fall”. What is your argument that the potential energy gradient vs temperature gradient only applies to gasses?
Well, since you have run out of stupid things to say about gases, and changed the subject, effectively admitting that you lost that argument, sure, we can talk about liquids and solids too.
No, I never said gravitational thermal gradients only apply to gases.
Yes, liquids and solids isolated from their environment and allowed to come to rest in a gravitational field will also develop a vertical thermal gradient, for the same reason. (It will not be a steep gradient, so you won’t see it in a human-sized system.) Note that the ocean is nowhere near “isolated”, nor even remotely at “rest”, so don’t go looking there for a disproof. That would be another stupid thing to do, which is why you tried to do it.
No, I haven’t lost the argument. I couldn’t convince you so I’ve changed tack with a more concrete example.
The ocean doesn’t show that characteristic, its warmest at the top which is exactly opposite your theory.
It cools from top to bottom, both in the mixed layer where you can argue mixing impacts it and below the thermocline where you cant, so your theory is wrong. Its really that simple.
You offer no argument why you dont see it even though you claim it exists. The gradient is opposite and its a stupid thing to claim otherwise in the face of the obvious evidence.
But now you’ll claim victory by somehow ignoring the fact. Meanwhile, I’ve lost patience with you again.
“I couldn’t convince you”
of your phoney self-contradictory “physics”, no, you couldn’t. Funny how that works.
“The ocean doesn’t show that characteristic”
I told you why it doesn’t, but your reading comprehension is severely lacking.
“You offer no argument”
I gave you one, but it went in one ear and out the other.
“I’ve lost patience”
That’s not the only thing you’ve lost.
Use of the word “obvious” implies the existence of other, “non-obvious”, alternatives.
Which of the “non-obvious” alternatives to “a kinetic energy gradient, i.e. temperature” would you give most credence to, Oh Wise One ?
See my response to Tim just above. The density gradient is the only “non-obvious” alternative I’ve seen so far. As I mentioned earlier, it does affect the potential energy gradient and hence the kinetic energy gradient, as does the varying strength of the gravitational field, but obviously neither of those can completely cancel it. Not even close.
The reason the kinetic energy gradient is the “obvious” one is easy to see when you bounce a ball on the floor. Kinetic energy and potential energy are traded off one-for-one during the duration of the bounce. Try it and see!
No, I said that Roy Spencer thinks that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, and has even stated his belief in writing, although in a roundabout way. He is talking nonsense, just like you.
Adding air to CO2 does not make it hotter, and four and a billion years of continuous sunlight has not made the Earth, nor any part of it, hotter.
Sorry.
Only you think “makes it hotter”
No, I know that adding CO2 to the atmosphere makes the surface very slightly cooler. As Raymond Pierrehumbert said “carbon dioxide is just planetary insulation” – along with all other atmospheric constituents.
Ask anybody – even NASA.
As an aside, the email from you in my inbox-box included
And yet you are. Don’t you take any notice of yourself?
Interacting with you is generally a waste of time. Your interpretation of the quote if it’s a genuine quote, is no exception. In your mind insulation cools the surface.
And yet you can’t help yourself.
Yes, and both experiment and experience support me, although insulation doesn’t actually “cool” anything. I’m making allowance for your inability to express yourself clearly. There are no “cold rays”. Insulation merely slows the transfer of heat from hot to cold, but the ignorant and gullible think that increasing the insulating properties of the atmosphere by adding, say, CO2, makes the air, or the surface, or something, hotter.
Might I respectfully suggest that you are ignorant and gullible? I won’t suggest that you might be better off not wasting your valuable time writing that you are not going to waste your time interacting with me, of course.
You wouldn’t be that stupid, would you?
Heated earth’s surface warmed by the short wave energy from the sun that passed straight through the atmosphere…radiated as long wave energy, absorbed by the GHGs in the atmosphere and slowed cooling on its way out to space via radiating from the upper levels of the atmosphere.
I have more patience than most. However I expect you to not understand and simply retort with something along the lines of “CO2 doesn’t make the atmosphere hotter, sorry”
Being attenuated by the atmosphere, of course, resulting in a loss of energy of some 30 – 35%. Unfortunately for the ignorant and gullible, insulation works both ways.
Reality shows that four and a half billion years of sunlight, atmosphere, and CO2, has not prevented the surface cooling, but the ignorant and gullible refuse to accept inconvenient fact.
If you believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, good for you! It doesn’t of course, but you are free to believe any fantasy you like. You might even be able to convince other ignorant and gullible people to ignore reality, for all I know.
Good luck.
…you’re not there yet.
If you say so, Tim, if you say so.
Oh, you have a Panopticon? Mine’s been back-ordered for ages.
Do you think mine’s defective? It keeps insisting that “climate scientists” firmly believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter.
None of them seem to have said it doesn’t, so I assume the mind-reading machine is working as it should.
I would hate to think you would say you have a panopticon when you doan know what it is a panopticon jefe.
https://youtu.be/P8ROhP_3-Qk
Oh no, boss – my Panopticon was of Greek origin – “pan” and “optikon” – an all seeing instrument. It was originally supposed to be called a Panencephaloscope, but the nameplates weren’t big enough.
Accept no substitutes – of which I believe there is a plethora.
Esscuze mi guapo! My leetle bideo was also to make the point…
could it be that, once again, you are angry at somethin else, an are lookin to take it out on us?
could it be that you are turning ninety or somethin?
Rich, sorry, but I thought you were essaying a little humour, in response to mine.
Ninety? Many thanks – eleventy three next birthday. Or was it eleventy four?
Opinions are like ass holes. Everybody either has one, is one, or sometimes they are both.
So what has happened to the aliens?
https://www.drroyspencer.com/2014/04/do-aliens-cause-global-warming-the-data-say-yes/
That article convinced me that carbon dioxide was innocent. 🙂
I wonder if Dr Spencer plans to do an update on that, to see if the correlation still holds 11 years later.
I thought Spencer’s critique was very reasonable. Politico’s polemic was full of all the usual unpleasant inferences. And Mickey Mann has been elected to the Royal Society over here in the UK. King Charles 1 must be spinning. I have written to the RS describing Mann and his works. No reply yet.
I’m not against freedom of speech, but I am against “hit pieces” based on reporting things that
are patently false under the premise that it’s just “an opinion”. The law should be much more strict regarding libel. When somebody states something in the press, he should be able to prove his allegations in a court of law, and not be able to weasel himself out of it by saying it was just his opinion. In that case, it also be stated in the paper that it’s his opinion only, at best close to the statements themselves, and not as a disclaimer in fine print in a corner that few people read. The burden of proof should lie by the person making the statement, in this case the defendant. The publisher should also have a partial responsibility of oversight as to what gets published, and risk fines if it doesn’t comply. Information today is no longer a civilized thing, but rather the law of the mob. Rules and laws are very hateful things, but unfortunately necessary when too much abuse takes place. The problem is, there’s not really a defined red line that one shouldn’t cross. The challenge lies with legislators, who are unfortunately too busy fighting each other than conceiving adequate bipartisan legislation. Defining what “truth” effectively is, is surely not as complicated as one thinks, because facts are facts.
Yeah? Well, you know, that’s just like your opinion, man…
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-xI1384Ry4&w=705&h=382%5D
https://youtu.be/j95kNwZw8YY
(sorry, had to do it)
That’s your opinion, and I respect it, just like you do mine.
Unfortunately for both of us, the law is what it is. I support the principle that the accused is presumed innocent, until proven guilty, although when the police arrest someone, they are not exactly demonstrating the presumption of innocence.
On the other hand, if I say someone is ignorant or foolish, based on fact, they are perfectly entitled to disagree, and endeavour to show otherwise.
Most don’t, and just complain they feel “offended”, or “insulted” or something – seeking sympathy because they are ignorant of foolish. What do you put your faith in – facts or feelings?
“That’s your opinion, and I respect it, just like you do mine.”
What nonsense. You are free to have any opinion you like. That does not oblige me to respect either it or you. I don’t care in the slightest about your hurt feelings. Nor do I have to.
Exactly. I have the same amount of respect for your opinion as you do for mine.
Thank you for your flattery by imitation.
We are obviously of similar view.
Sadly for you Mr. Vieria, but fortunate for nearly everybody else, we have a few words in our Constitution called the 1st Amendment. It guarantees each of us the freedom to say what we want to say. The Amendment does not say “freedom of only truthful” speech, or “freedom of racially correct” speech, nor are there any other conditions placed on that freedom. Over the years Congress has recognized some limits on freedom of speech which impinge on other Constitutional freedoms such as free association and the right of protest. One such recognized limitation is speech which incites riots and the like but they are few. The alternative, to allow only speech that complies with Government prescriptions as to its content, is what is practiced in every single dictatorial form of government on earth including Communist and ad hoc dictatorships simply because such limitations are necessary to the sustainment of the dictatorship. I suggest you either study or go to one of those countries and observe the consequences. In short, you could not be more wrong.
I think he’s already in the UK or Ireland, isn’t he?
A thicker skin is better than a lawsuit or criminal charge.
I think the law is OK but difficult and expensive to use given the tensions that do exist between free speech and libel. It would be much more immediately effective to use the comments section to criticize the piece and individually single out their advertisers critically and publicly for supporting the article.
Replying to myself. Obviously that can only work if they have a comment section and I’m not sure Politico does.
From the article: “He states on his website that he has not been paid by oil companies, but a court filing in 2016 revealed that he received funding from Peabody Energy, the coal giant that for years spent millions of dollars on funding climate denial groups.”
Really? What climate denial groups would that be?
How do skeptics who post at WUWT get in on this money? Some of us could use a little extra money. And it would be very satisfying to get paid for doing what we love: Making fun of Delusional Climate Alarmists (like the Politico author), who think the end of the World is just around the corner because of CO2.
Scott, there’s no evidence CO2 is anything other than a benign gas, essential for life on Earth. No evidence, Scott. You are operating on a False Premise and don’t realize it, obviously.
I didn’t even get paid for that, Scott. But I did it anyway. Ask yourself why. The answer is disinformation like what you are putting out is detrimental to human society in so many ways, and I’m part of society, so it is necessary to correct your misleading reporting. Or at least, that’s the way I feel, money, or no money.
So many Delusional Climate Alarmists, so little time.
The Leftwing Media is the most dangerous organization on the planet when it comes to being a threat to our personal freedoms. We cannot govern ourselves properly without having the real facts, and the Leftwing Media distorts the facts and causes people to do stupid things like voting for radical Democrats, also known as Communists. That’s you, Scott.
Go away, Scott. Wise up!
“Really? What climate denial groups would that be?”
True, I’ve yet to see any group that denies there is a climate. 🙂
I hope Scott Waldman will read this essay by Roy Spencer.
Interesting how most responders here prefer to coagulate together under the mossy rock, rather than actually engaging in the blog.
Perhaps because the responders here are responding to this blog entry, not the other.
I tried responding on Roy’s blog and my comments were not accepted. Happens rather often. I can see why people might come here rather than waste time.
Didn’t DOGE reveal a lot of sweetheart subscriptions to Politico by various federal agencies? So, by their own reasoning, they are Deep State hacks?
Geez, doesn’t this “settled science” cause a lot of people to become unsettled?
+10
Did they mention that you maintain a global satellite-based temperature measuring system that shows quite steady global warming? What’s a guy gotta do?
UAH shows varying levels of atmospheric warming and cooling over the past 46 years with a decadal global trend of +~0.15C. That seems to be far less from the UN’s “world on fire.”
Actually, UAH clearly shows that warming occurs in “events” that coincide with major El Ninos..
Between those El Ninos , there is no warming….
Ah yes, but why? Dr Spencer has been quoted as referring to some sort of warming being due to some nebulous “greenhouse effect” mechanism, which currently has no consistent and unambiguous description.
What do you think “global warming” means? Certainly the Earth as a whole has cooled – no longer molten. Is there another globe, an imaginary one perhaps? Maybe a guy could explain what he is talking about, in some way that makes sense. You certainly can’t.
According to the UK Met Office greenhouse gasses ‘trap’ heat which they then spread in all directions and heat the surface. So you clearly see at what level they operate..
The satellites do not measure temperatures. They measure electromagnetic radiation and then, via algorithm, covert the energy flux to a temperature equivalent.
Lots of technical details such as the exact coverage versus extrapolation between measured areas, aperture, linearization and quantification errors, long term component stability, acquisition angle, frequency banding, and on and on. CERES, for example, has a calculated error band larger than the energy imbalance shown on those flat earth graphics.
In addition, the measurements are made by orbit. There is no simultaneous measurements of all points. In many ways the satellites are better than the glass-mercury thermometers used in the past, but in many ways and thermometer with a +/- 1C error over full scale is better.
The question that has not been resolved is what is causing the modest temperature rise. CO2 has a minute effect on the specific heat of air and more CO2 results is a miniscule temperature rise above air without that mix per joule, thermal not IR energy.
As for the quite steady, no, it fluctuates. The temperature rise is real, but it is not a smooth, steady progression.
Then again, the sun is not constant. The planet is not a perfect sphere. The axial tilt is not constant. The solar orbit is eccentric and not constant and other planets affect the barycenter.
Volcanos are not constant. There is no climate equilibrium point to compare anything to.
“Spencer did not respond to a request for comment. True. I long ago learned which media outlets cannot be trusted to represent what I say fairly.”
😎
That reminded me of an incident years ago.
A religious magazine requested an interview with the head of a religious group they didn’t like.
He agreed to an interview in his office.
They showed up with cameras and audio recording equipment but when they saw he had his own cameras and recording equipment set up to be sure he wasn’t misquoted or what he said wasn’t “spun”, they cancelled the interview on the spot.
Back when I was a faculty member in mechanical engineering, one of my colleague swore that our winters had become warmer and specifically provided a benchmark: that fewer winters now had a lowest temperature below -20F.
A benchmark that could be addressed with data! I looked at the fifteen years considered to be among the coldest in the last century (1961-1975), as against a more recent batch (2001-2015). What I found is that the coldest cohort included 9 winters with minima below -20F and the warmer cohort included only 8. A time-series built from winter minima from 1960-2016 (2016 was when I was analyzing this) showed a linear trend of 1.7F over the 56 years covered, but this series had very large variability. In 2019 we had a winter minimum of -40F!
The conclusion? It would take very dedicated record keeping and accurate instrumentation to notice the trend or difference. I suspect that all current trends in climate are like this. No one can literally see climate change — too small and too slow while also dominated by a lot of variability.
“It would take very dedicated record keeping and accurate instrumentation to notice the trend or difference.”
Well that excludes the UK Met Office then. 🙂
I would wonder how much of the change was due to Urban Heat Island effects?
That isn’t the half of it, Erik. The weather reporting station is at our regional airport. The airport has remained in a rural location since its inception 100 years ago. However, the automated reporting system is located between a taxiway and a runway. Now, before you conclude that this means occasional biases upward from jet exhaust, I will inform you that we have occasional downward temperature spikes in winter that last only a few minutes and are sometimes many degrees; say -35F to -40F. I wrote a WUWT blog about this — my very first one.
Kevin,
Looking at a thermograph trace from an airport site can show all sorts of interesting things. It is normally assumed that the temperature sensors react to “air temperature”, when of course they react to radiation from their environment. Air is generally providing the least contribution to the radiation impinging on the sensor!
Much depends on the orientation of the sensor, ie. what it “sees”, and its sensitivity to particular wavelengths of light. Professor John Tyndall was acutely aware of this in practical terms, as examination of both the text and illustrations of his experiments with gas radiation and absorption.
I haven’t read your WUWT blog, but what did you conclude about the sudden dips?
I looked for your first blog, but it seemed to be about CO2 in bottles. As luck would have it, you said –
Exactly. As Tyndall found – and reducing the amount of radiation reaching a thermometer results in cooling, not heating. CO2 in a bottle acts as a very, very, weak visually transparent fire screen, and Tyndall provides a graphic explains why glass fire screens (favoured in Victorian England) “reduce” the intensity of a fire.
You sound like you might understand why I’m banging on about what I’m banging on about!
Have fun.
The unparalleled expert in Pacific North-West weather and climate behaviors – Prof Cliff Mass – presents analyses of temps records for that region that show incremental warming of only 1 – 2 degrees F since 1900.
(if I recall correctly)
And, as you say –
Well sir, my feelings about climate change are corrolated w the amount of on- and offline publications that state: X.
My feelings are totally corruptable. I travel w the wind.
( sarc:)
But Prof. Spencer, you SHOULD deny that “…recent warming is probably mostly due to humans.” It would be more appropriate to state that recent warming could be possibly somewhat due to humans, but there is plenty of meteorology and physics theory and evidence that modern warming is entirely natural.
On the other hand, it could be qualified as any recently REPORTED warming is probably mostly due to humans and nail it.
“In my book, people who believe they have witnessed human-caused global warming are about as delusional as flat-Earthers.”
And young-Earthers.
I apologise for saying Dr Roy only thought that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter – he actually said so! The fact that it doesn’t, concerns him not at all. After all, he said that it’s well understood by climate scientists that the physically impossible is incontrovertibly true!
Ah, yes. Climate scientists. More ignorant than gullible, or vice versa?
A question for remedial English class students :
What is the difference between “surface warming” and “heating the air” ?
.
From another article by Dr. Spencer I quoted previously in this comment section :
“Adding CO2 [ and other GHGs like water vapour and methane ] to air” results in convection starting up, the establishment of a “lapse rate” and a “tropopause”, and/or the redistribution of heat energy in the atmosphere.
The end result of increasing GHG concentrations by a “large” amount, e.g. doubling them, will be an increase in surface temperatures, the exact amount of that increase depending on multiple feedback factors (not all of which are known).
NB : Dr. Spencer’s “about 1 deg C” number is the purely theoretical “no feedbacks” calculation.
Any additional inferences made by you are unjustified.
No it won’t. Adding CO2 to air will not make it hotter. Adding CO2 to air will not make the surface hotter – by reducing the amount of insolation reaching the surface, it actually makes the surface cooler. Basic physics, and NASA’s measurements are remarkably close to those of John Tyndall, more than 150 years ago.
You are boasting about being both ignorant and gullible. Good for you.
John Tyndal measured the absorptive properties of each individual gas present in the Earth’s atmosphere, after inventing one of the the first “spectrophotometer” instruments.
Graphs comparing the “black-body” spectrum of what would be emitted by a GHG-free “Earth” with the actual “upward radiation”, often with various “atmospheric windows” labelled on it, abound on the Internet.
On this specific point you are correct.
.
A link to a “dumbed down so even children can understand it” explanation of “the greenhouse effect … by NASA scientists :
https://science.nasa.gov/climate-change/faq/what-is-the-greenhouse-effect/
The opening paragraph :
Please PROVIDE A LINK to a peer-reviewed SCIENTIFIC PAPER than includes in its “Conclusion” section anything even REMOTELY similar to :
“Adding GHGs to a planet’s atmosphere will result in surface cooling.”
Of course I am. Why do you even bother telling me what I already know? Flattery will get you everywhere.
Imagine being an Arab, and erecting many thick woollen blankets above you to keep you cool. NASA obviously employs its fair share of fantasists. Yes, you can imagine anything at all – you may imagine you are powerful and respected, if you like.
I don’t bother responding to shouting fantasists without good reason, and, invariably, they can’t provide one.
I’ll point out again that four and a half billion years of continuous sunshine, atmospheric, and all the rest has resulted in the surface cooling, not getting hotter.
Adding CO2 to air does not make it hotter, despite the plaintive cries of the ignorant and gullible.
“Adding CO2 to air will not make the surface hotter – by reducing the amount of insolation reaching the surface, it actually makes the surface cooler.”
Incorrect, the absorption of insolation by CO2 is insignificant (see graph):
However the absorption of radiation leaving the surface and heading to space is significant:
Consequently the Earth’s surface is warmed because energy loss to space is reduced.
Phil, the Earth has cooled after four and a half billion years of continuous sunlight. Your graphs may be accurate, but are quite meaningless.
Yes my graphs are both accurate and meaningful, they describe the situation as it is today. The situation as it was 4 billion years ago isn’t relevant to today’s Earth.
If you say so.
I do the surface is now ~70% covered with liquid water not molten rocks and the atmosphere is substantially different!
Yep – it’s called cooling.
Actually, he did not say CO2 would make the air warmer, he said it would make the ground/surface warmer.
Fair point, except that “climate scientists” go out of their way to ignore ground/surface temperature measurements, and use “air temperature” measurements for some bizarre reason.
I can’t figure out whether they don’t understand English, are fools, or frauds or mentally challenged.
It gets confusing – Willis said that the Earth is cooling from the core to the surface, implying (without saying) that CO2 could heat the air. Another cultist implies (again without saying) that CO2 doesn’t heat the air, but could the surface which Willis says is cooling!
OK then. Adding CO2 to air does not heat thermometers.
Half-truths are the staple of journalism, That’s why its product is called ‘stories’.
Dr Roy Spencer –
He then threatens to ban anybody who “insults” him by disagreeing with him!
Unfortunately, his “real greenhouse” is completely useless – its temperature varies between about 90 C, and -90 C – Earth’s surface temperature extremes.
Oh well, he’ll probably ban me for “insulting” him, by pointing out that the Earth has cooled over the past four and a half billion years – due to the shoddy nature of its “greenhouse” construction. Sad.