By P Gosselin
The idea that global warming could paradoxically shut down the Gulf Stream, plunging Europe into a new cold spell—a scenario popularized by the film The Day After Tomorrow—is a powerful narrative.
However, the latest episode of Klimaschau (Issue 237) challenges these alarmist predictions, scrutinizing the scientific evidence and the methods behind the claims. The segment focuses on skepticism regarding the imminent “tipping” of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).
Recall how climatologists like Stefan Rahmstorf from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) argue that Arctic warming is weakening the AMOC due to an influx of freshwater, potentially causing Europe to become colder and drier.
Rahmstorf relied on cherry-picked data
For example, a 2021 study co-authored by Rahmstorf suggested the AMOC was at its weakest point in over a millennium. Rahmstorf has also been quoted predicting the AMOC could completely cease in 50 to 100 years. Yet, a sharp rebuttal by Kilburn and colleagues (2022) in the same journal. This counter-study accused Rahmstorf’s team of using “selective” or “cherry-picked” data to arrive at their conclusion.
The EIKE Klimaschau video presents criticism that challenges the reliability of the computer models often used by the PIK. Engineer and blogger Frank Bosse (Klimanachrichten) dismisses the PIK’s models as inherently unreliable and susceptible to manipulated data input. He points to the actual, unfiltered measurement data from the RAPID Project. This raw data shows the AMOC has been oscillating unspectacularly around a mean value between 2004 and 2024, with only one clear anomaly around 2010. This directly contradicts the models predicting a dramatic collapse.
Arctic Ice: Not Melting as Fast as Predicted
Further challenging the premises of the AMOC collapse theory (which relies on massive freshwater inflow from melting ice), the EIKE video cites a 2025 study by England et al: The research, which reviewed apocalyptic melting scenarios, concluded that the decline in Arctic sea ice has “significantly slowed down” over the last two decades.
Crucially, there has been no statistically significant decline in September sea ice area since 2005.
Conclusion
The EIKE video concludes by linking the current alarmist methodology to the historical controversy of Michael E. Mann’s 1999 “Hockey Stick Study”. The implication is that the use of selective, non-representative data to generate dramatic claims is a recurring pattern in certain climate narratives.
Dr. Rahmstorf’s home page:
https://www.pik-potsdam.de/~stefan/
Wow, he spends a lot of other peoples’ money spewing the same lies AlGore:The Goreacle spews.
Besides that it looks like he’s in love with himself.
According to the map at the top of this paper the Gulf Stream has stopped already.
Yes, the map is rubbish..!
Actually, the map should either be replaced or deleted since the current flows are totally wrong. Since it appears at the top of this post it could seriously give the wrong impression to anyone who has not read many articles about world current flow. Would someone please either delete it or replace it with a correct world current flow map.
It’s the best that AI could do.
Many years ago I watched a propag… experiment on TV showing us plebs why and how this happens.
They used an Aquarium with warm water,created and artificial stream and then poured some cold water in it to diffuse the stream.
The only problem was that the water was suddenly dropped into the system and that It’s volume was roughly 10% of the streams volume.
They used kinetics and mass and blamed the cool water for the effect.
On top of that there was room for the stream to readjust the direction as result of the greenhouse effect(the glas as decisive factor making any diversion impossible)
Before experts discovered the Lysenkoist? potential of Co2 – during the bad old time of ice age scare this was so much of not a problem that they wanted to melt the arctic with soot and it seems that those 42 superexperts were not worried about collapsing the Gulf Stream by warming up the region with a massive albedo reduction.
Sadly there is no thing on this planet these days that doesn’t get trashed by the almighty Co2.
Even a petawatt system that moves that moves billions of gallons per second will be stopped dead in its tracks by a nanosized molecule and a bit more water in our boiling oceans.
What I would like to see in the ocean currents modelling is the impact of the “Dynamic Earth” (author Wylie). Continental Drift or Plate Tectonics. Some readers might be thinking “come on – it’s only five centimeters a year”. The problem is that the movement is constant, and the impact on currents can be fast, both geologically and real-time. The closing of the Panama Isthmus is great example. This occurred about three million years ago, and produced a significant change in ocean currents and an acceleration of the intra-glacial portion of the Ice Age we are in. This was a real Tipping Point. Wait a while for it.
It was just as warm in the 1930’s as it is today. The AMOC didn’t collapse in the 1930’s.
In the Alarmist calendar year zero is 1950 – ish.
Ergo, that didn’t happen. Michael Mann knows his Orwell. In the present he attempted to rewrite climate history, the past, in an attempt to write his climate future – net zero etc etc etc
Who controls the past controls the future….
The only place the AMOC ever collapsed was in a silly movie (The Day After Tomorrow).
Indeed, the Medieval and Roman Warm Periods were warmer than today, and it didn’t happen then either.
“computer models”
Whilst they are evidence of nothing whatsoever, the climate crew religiously take them as gospel. Think of some numbers and throw them into the digital blender.
World Weather Attribution Methods
Climate science is having it both ways, always correct, and the terms are always couched in modals and conditionals: can, could, might, may, possibly, suggests etc etc
AMOC could
potentially causing
The important thing is maintain a degree of alarm in the public. That’s where the mass media comes in.
“‘We don’t know where the tipping point is’” – Inkl
They don’t really know that there is one. But this does require some blind belief in the mix. And the science is, of course, settled.
Efforts are underway to better understand and monitor the AMOC, including the launch of early warning systems. Scientists emphasize the need for more research… – Climate Telegram
More money at any rate.
You never get more research without more money. Climate science is not a volunteer charity operation. If it were, we would still be calling it “The Greenhouse Effect” as no thinktank anywhere would have ever done a survey that said that people find greenhouses appealing and the term must be changed to promote worry in the general public.
For some additional background reading:
https://scitechdaily.com/how-the-florida-current-has-defied-changes-for-40-years/
https://scitechdaily.com/climate-puzzle-scientists-uncover-mysterious-halt-in-the-atlantic-conveyor-belt-slowdown/
https://scitechdaily.com/defying-doomsday-forecasts-critical-ocean-current-is-still-going-strong-after-60-years/
There is now no longer a single falsifiable hypothesis in the whole of Climate “Science”. Every single one has been shown to be false.
It is not a “powerful narrative”, it is just another lie.
It gets ever more desperate. Moonbat’s latest offering is a case in point
There’s a catastrophic black hole in our climate data – and it’s a gift to deniers
Climate sceptics tell us that more people die of extreme cold than extreme heat. What’s the truth? – The Groan
One of the best lessons I ever got from tertiary education was skimming. With people like Monbiot it’s essential.
They have no proof, only computer games and lies.
And they are wearing rather thin now.
In the linked article, Moonbat spouts about not having enough data in large parts of the world and still thinks the world is going to hell as proved by a few decades of pleasant warming 🤣🤣🤣
PS I’m glad you read the Guardian, so I don’t have to 😉
The truth is undeniable that more people die in cold weather than warm. In the Northern Hemisphere, including the U.S. and Europe, deaths typically peak in January. The lowest number of deaths generally occurs in the summer months like July, August, or September.
In the Southern Hemisphere, deaths peak during its winter months (June-August).
Yes, you skim the author’s name and know you can move on.
It’s not the shutdown of the Gulf Steam that will cool Europe climate, but rather a shut down of the typical mild SW winds that the UK and Europe enjoy.
In my view it’s been the increase in the wind coming from the milder SW due to shifts in weather patterning that is largely behind the warming of the climate here in the UK. The UK climate cools when more northern blocking reduces that mild SW air flow and replaces it with colder air from the north.
I have always had doubts about the claimed impact that the warming of the Arctic is having. Due to the fact that while l have been keeping a record of the first snowfall of the winter for nearly the last 50 years here in North Lincolnshire England. There has been no signs of a warming trend in this record over that time In fact over the last 5 years the average first snow date has been earlier then the average was between 1977-92.
So am having real doubts about the recently claimed warming of the Arctic when it’s having such little impact on the timing of the first snow here in England.
What about the snows of Switzerland? Warming is causing the disappearance and ….the skiing will be “ovah”…….it’s terrible.
THey still have Cuckoo clocks, Emmenthal and Gruyere. And the money gnomes.
And a reasonably functioning democracy. And their own currency. And BIS.
Are you really hoping for democracy in the UK?
I did once, but that was a very long time ago.
Your Rumble climate show is not on Rumble channel. TRY TO FIX IT.
The use of selective, cherry-picked data is the foundation of their pseudoscience.
It is essentially the Standard Operating Procedure for the Climate Fascists.
“This counter-study accused Rahmstorf’s team of using “selective” or “cherry-picked” data to arrive at their conclusion.”
Ya gotta pick a few cherries if you want to make cherry pie.
Extra points for anyone who can tell us who in the Climate Scam community said that.
Carl Wunsch says the thermohaline current is a fine cocktail party story.
I recall him saying something like, unless the Earth stops spinning, or the isthmus of Panama suddenly rips open, it’s not going anywhere.
The only thing that’s collapsing is the Climate Industrial Complex.
Rahmstorf had an interesting way to do science..
On Realclimate he wrote in January 26:
“””Of the 24 CMIP6 models, a full 23 underestimate the sea surface cooling in the ‘cold blob’. And most of the CMIP6 models even show a strengthening of the AMOC in the historic period, which past studies have shown to be linked to strong aerosol forcing in many of these models”””
And advocated not using CMIP6, but CMIP5 models.
Im October he apparently found one model tuned to show his cold bubble and wrote::
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/10/high-resolution-fingerprint-images-reveal-a-weakening-atlantic-ocean-circulation-amoc/#comments
“””A recent paper by van Westen et al. (2025) has shown that the much-feared tipping point where the AMOC breaks down (first demonstrated in a simple box model in 1961) is also found in a high-resolution (eddy resolving) ocean model – destroying any hope that it might be an artifact of too coarse and simple models”””
So, what exactly changed scientifically?
R. Feynman described the problem talking about scientific ethics in his famous cargo cult speech
https://calteches.library.caltech.edu/51/2/CargoCult.htm
“”” a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty—a kind of leaning over backwards. For example, if you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid—not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you’ve eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked—to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.”””
So what is the difference to those 23 models not showing the cold bubble again?
And the real question why did he not discuss those like an honest, ethic scientist?
“Arctic Ice: Not Melting as Fast as Predicted
Crucially, there has been no statistically significant decline in September sea ice area since 2005.”
Well the seaice volume is the lowest on record and the September minimum was about half of the average from 2004-2013.
Extent is above that of 2016..
And FAR above the extent for most of the last 10,000 years.
Extent or volume?
Arctic sea ice max, min and daily average, since 2005
No trend there. !
My calibrated eyeball tells me that there is a slight downward trend in the min and daily average.
Nothing since 2007, Though. 🙂
To double check the Arctic Ice Volume, I checked the U Washington APL’s BPIOMAS (Available right here on Anthony’s kick arse Sea Ice Reference page). Interestingly, if you checked current page vs one from 2023/24, the rate of loss has dropped from 2.9 1000km^3/decade to 2.8 currently. So either we don’t have a long enough time series of the data collected and all of this is natural cycles or the ice volume is stabilizing, which shouldn’t be happening if we are “increasingly” getting warmer and losing more ice every year.
A closer look.
Here is PIOMAS from 2011 – 2024
Trend indistinguishable from ZERO
The absence of the 2012 data is quite conspicuous! See the WUWT sidebar on sea ice.
Not really 2012 minimum volume was higher than this year. I addressed your point previously but for some reason my reply is no longer here.
It was predicted to be entirely gone by 2014.
My prediction is that the AMOC is going to do what it always does, it never stays the same. What’s more there is nothing we can do about it.
Proponents of the climate crisis myth frequently take the Gulf Stream collapse theory out of their playbook to add a different twist to their alarmism. It falls into the category of the advancing ice age warnings of the 1960s and any other scare tactics so beloved by them but rejected or ignored entirely by the realists.
And ignored by nature.
“climatologists like Stefan Rahmstorf from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) argue that Arctic warming is weakening the AMOC due to an influx of freshwater, potentially causing Europe to become colder and drier.”
I would argue that the AMO and the Arctic Ocean warmed when the AMOC slowed down. The AMOC slowed down during negative North Atlantic Oscillation regimes 1995-1999 and 2005-2012. Because the Gulf Stream does not slow down when the AMOC slows, proportionally more of the Gulf Stream feeds the high North Atlantic and Arctic Ocean.