by Judith Curry
The manufactured consensus of the IPCC has had the unintended consequences of distorting the science, elevating the voices of scientists that dispute the consensus, and motivating actions by the consensus scientists and their supporters that have diminished the public’s trust in the IPCC.
Our paper has just been accepted for publication. A link to the final manuscript is provided here [consensus paper revised final]. Below is a ‘reader’s digest’ version of the main arguments made in this paper
Introduction
The United Nations initiated a scientific consensus building process with the objective of providing a robust scientific basis for climate policy, under the auspices of the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC). The key IPCC consensus finding from its latest assessment report is this statement:
“Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations.”
The IPCC consensus findings on attribution have been echoed in position statements made by many scientific organizations. The IPCC consensus is portrayed as nearly total among scientists with expertise and prominence in the field of climate science. The idea of a scientific consensus surrounding climate change attribution has been questioned by a number of people, including scientists and politicians. Much effort has been undertaken by those that support the IPCC consensus to discredit skeptical voices, essentially dismissing them as cranks or at best rebels, or even politically motivated ‘deniers’.
Students of science are taught to reject ad populam or ‘bandwagon’ appeals, a sentiment is articulated by the motto of the UK Royal Society: ‘nullius in verba’, which is roughly translated as ‘take nobody’s word for it’. How then, and why, have climate scientists come to a scientific consensus about a very complex scientific problem that the consensus-supporting scientists themselves acknowledge has substantial and fundamental uncertainties?
Consensus and dissent
The debate surrounding the consensus on climate change is complicated by the complexity of both the scientific and the associated sociopolitical issues. Underlying this debate is a fundamental tension between two competing conceptions of scientific inquiry: the consensual view of science versus the dissension view. Under the consensual approach, the goal of science is a consensus of rational opinion over the widest possible field. The opposing view of science is that of dissension, whereby scientific progress occurs via subversion of consensus in favor of new experiments, ideas and theories.
When is it reasonable for a person to conform to a consensus and when is it reasonable to dissent?
With genuinely well-established scientific theories, ‘consensus’ is not discussed and the concept of consensus is arguably irrelevant. For example, there is no point to discussing a consensus that the Earth orbits the sun, or that the hydrogen molecule has less mass than the nitrogen molecule. While a consensus may arise surrounding a specific scientific hypothesis or theory, the existence of a consensus is not itself the evidence.
The issue of challenges to the IPCC consensus statement on attribution is not analogous to Galileo-like revolutionaries. Rather these challenges are associated with a concern about the oversimplification by the IPCC of a complex issue in the interests of policy making. How to reason about uncertainties in the complex climate system and its computer simulations is neither simple nor obvious. Scientific debates involve controversies over the value and importance of particular classes of evidence as well as disagreement about the appropriate logical framework for linking and assessing the evidence. The IPCC faces a daunting challenge with regards to characterizing and reasoning about uncertainty, assessing the quality of evidence, linking the evidence into arguments, identifying areas of ignorance and assessing confidence levels. An overarching concern is how the issue of climate change is framed scientifically and how judgments about confidence in complex scientific arguments are made in view of the cascade of uncertainties.
Given the complexity of the climate problem, ‘expert judgments’ about uncertainty and confidence levels are made by the IPCC on issues that are dominated by unquantifiable uncertainties. It is difficult to avoid concluding that the IPCC consensus is manufactured and that the existence of this consensus does not lend intellectual substance to their conclusions.
Consensus and bias
If the objective of scientific research is to obtain truth and avoid error, how might a consensus seeking process introduce bias into the science and increase the chances for error? ‘Confirmation bias’ is a well-known psychological principle that connotes the seeking or interpreting of evidence in ways that are partial to existing beliefs, expectations, or an existing hypothesis. Confirmation bias usually refers to unwitting selectivity in the acquisition and interpretation of evidence.
Princeton philosopher Thomas Kelly provides some insight into confirmation bias, arguing that a prior belief can skew the total evidence that is available subsequently in a direction that is favorable to itself. Kelly also finds that individuals tend to be significantly better at detecting fallacies when the fallacy occurs in an argument for a conclusion which they disbelieve, rather than for a conclusion in which they believe. Kelly identifies a further source of confirmation bias in the consensus building process, whereby as more and more peers weigh in on the issue, the higher order psychological evidence of what others believe can eventually swamp the first order evidence into virtual insignificance.
With regards to the IPCC, cognitive biases in the context of an institutionalized consensus building process have arguably resulted in the consensus becoming increasingly confirmed in a self-reinforcing way, to the detriment of the scientific process.
Role of scientific consensus in decision making
The mandate of the IPCC is to provide policy‐relevant information to policy makers involved in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Based upon the precautionary principle, the UNFCCC established a qualitative climate goal for the long term: avoiding dangerous climate change by stabilization of the concentrations of atmospheric greenhouse gases. The IPCC scientific assessments play a primary role in legitimizing national and international policies aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The main practical objective of the IPCC has been to assess whether there is sufficient certainty in the science so as to trigger political action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This objective has led to the IPCC assessments being framed around identifying anthropogenic influences on climate, environmental and socio-economic impacts of climate change, and stabilization of CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere.
This relationship between expertise and policy is described as the linear model of expertise, or ‘speaking truth to power’, whereby first science has to ‘get it right’ and then policy comes into play. The influence of science on policy is assumed to be deterministic: if the scientific facts are ‘sound,’ then they have a direct impact on policy. In the linear model, the key question is whether existing scientific knowledge is certain enough, or there is a consensus of experts, to compel action.
Dutch social scientist Jeroen Van der Sluijs argues that the IPCC has adopted a ‘speaking consensus to power’ approach that sees uncertainty and dissent as problematic, and attempts to mediate these into a consensus. The ‘speaking consensus to power’ strategy acknowledges that available knowledge is inconclusive, and uses consensus as a proxy for truth through a negotiated interpretation of the inconclusive body of scientific evidence. The ‘consensus to power’ strategy reflects a specific vision of how politics deals with scientific uncertainties and endeavors to create a knowledge base for decision making following the linear model of expertise.
The linear model of expertise works well for ‘tame’ problems, where everyone essentially agrees on both the problem and the solution. Successes in managing tame problems are evident in the domains of engineering and regulatory science. Climate change has been framed by the UNFCCC/IPCC as a relatively ‘tame’ problem that requires a straightforward solution, namely the top-down creation of a global carbon market. However, climate change is arguably characterized better as a ‘wicked problem’ or a ‘mess’. ‘Messes’ and ‘wicked problems’ are characterized by multiple problem definitions, methods that are open to contention and solutions that are variable and disputed, and ‘unknown unknowns’ that suggest chronic conditions of ignorance and lack of capacity to imagine future eventualities of both the problem and the proposed solutions.
Unintended consequences of the IPCC consensus
The consensus approach used by the IPCC has received a number of criticisms. Concerns have been raised about the need to guard against overconfidence and overemphasize expected outcomes. The consensus approach being used by the IPCC has failed to produce a thorough portrayal of the complexities of the problem and the associated uncertainties in our understanding, in favor of spuriously constructed expert opinion. Further, concerns are being raised that the IPCC’s consensus claim is distorting the science itself, as scientists involved in the IPCC process consider the impact of their statements on the ability of the IPCC to defend its previous claims of consensus.
While the IPCC’s consensus approach acknowledges uncertainties, defenders of the IPCC consensus have expended considerable efforts in the ‘boundary work’ of distinguishing those qualified to contribute to the climate change consensus from those who are not. These efforts have characterized skeptics as small in number, extreme, and scientifically suspect. These efforts create temptations to make illegitimate attacks on scientists whose views do not align with the consensus, and to dismiss any disagreement as politically motivated ‘denialism’. The use of ‘denier’ to label anyone who disagrees with the IPCC consensus on attribution leads to concerns being raised about the IPCC being enforced as dogma, which is tied to how dissent is dealt with.
The linear model of expertise places science at the center of political debate. Scientific controversies surrounding evidence of climate change have thus become a proxy for political battles over whether and how to react to climate change. Therefore, winning a scientific debate results in a privileged position in political battle, hence providing motivation for defending the consensus. As a result, it has become difficult to disentangle political arguments about climate policies from scientific arguments about the evidence for human-induced climate change. The quality of both political debate and scientific practice can suffer as a consequence.
The linear model of expertise ‘speaking consensus to power’ tends to stifle discussion of alternative policy approaches. The IPCC has framed its assessment around the UNFCCC policy of stabilizing greenhouse emissions, focusing its scientific assessment on the attribution of climate change and the sensitivity of climate change to greenhouse gases. The narrow focus on issues of attribution masks major political implications, marginalizes issues around adaptation and development, and fails to engage with alternative approaches and to generate ideas to inform its ‘solutions’.
While the public may not understand the complexity of the science or be predisposed culturally to accept the consensus, they can certainly understand the vociferous debates over the science portrayed by the media. Further, they can judge the social facts surrounding the consensus building process, including those revealed by the so-called “Climategate” episode, and decide whether to trust the experts whose opinion comprises the consensus.
In summary, the manufactured consensus of the IPCC has arguably had the unintended consequences of distorting the science, elevating the voices of scientists that dispute the consensus, and motivating actions by the consensus scientists and their supporters that have diminished the public’s trust in the IPCC.
Ways forward
The linear model of climate science expertise conceals uncertainties, ambiguities, dissent and ignorance behind a scientific consensus. The most important actions that are needed with regards to climate science – particularly in context of the IPCC assessment reports – are explicit reflection on uncertainties, ambiguities and areas of ignorance (both known and unknown unknowns) and more openness for dissent in the IPCC processes. Greater openness about scientific uncertainties and ignorance, and more transparency about dissent and disagreement, would provide policymakers with a more complete picture of climate science and its limitations. In the context of iterative risk management, policy makers need insight into the rate of learning, as well as what is known and unknown.
Moving forward requires a reassessment of the ‘consensus to power’ approach for the science-policy interface that has evolved in the context of the IPCC and UNFCCC. The challenge is to open up the decision making processes in a way that renders their primary nature more honestly political and economic, while giving proper weight to scientific reason and evidence.
There are frameworks for decision making under deep uncertainty and ignorance that accept uncertainty and dissent as key elements of the decision making process. Rather than choosing an optimal policy based on a scientific consensus, decision makers can design robust and flexible policy strategies that account for uncertainty, ignorance and dissent. Robust strategies formally consider uncertainty, whereby decision makers seek to reduce the range of possible scenarios over which the strategy performs poorly. Flexible strategies are adaptive, and can be quickly adjusted to advancing scientific insights.
Conclusions
The climate community has worked for more than 20 years to establish a scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change. Perspectives from multiple disciplines support the inference that the scientific consensus seeking process used by the IPCC has had the unintended consequence of introducing biases into the both the science and related decision making processes. The IPCC scientific consensus has become convoluted with consensus decision making through a ‘speaking consensus to power’ approach. The growing implications of the messy wickedness of the climate change problem are becoming increasingly apparent, highlighting the inadequacies of the ‘consensus to power’ approach for decision making on the complex issues associated with climate change. Further, research from the field of science and technology studies are finding that manufacturing a consensus in the context of the IPCC has acted to hyper-politicize the scientific and policy debates, to the detriment of both. Arguments are increasingly being made to abandon the scientific consensus seeking approach in favor of open debate of the arguments themselves and discussion of a broad range of policy options that stimulate local and regional solutions to the multifaceted and interrelated issues of climate change, land use, resource management, cost effective clean energy solutions, and developing technologies to expand energy access efficiently.
JC comment: The paper has been published in a new online journal, CAB Reviews. http://www.cabi.org/cabreviews/. My reasons for publishing in this journal are that CAB Reviews invited me to write the article and suggested the topic, it exposes me to a new audience, and it avoids the partisan sniping of publishing a paper like this in a climate-related journal. I have to say that I was enormously pleased by the editorial handling of this manuscript, and the reviews contributed to improving the paper. One reviewer self identified as a historian of science, and the other seemed to be in the field of science and technology studies; both had substantial familiarity with the topic of climate science. Interestingly, the most controversial sections in the opinions of both reviewers were the Introduction and section on Consensus and the Philosophy of Science.
I’m experimenting with a new format for blogging about my published papers, by providing a reader’s digest version, let me know if you think this is effective (I hope that some of you will read the entire paper).
This is a technical thread; please keep your comments relevant.
My first reaction is also to criticize the introduction:
I have said it before and I say it again. In my view attribution is not the key finding. I think so, because IPCC was not created to present attribution but to estimate the significance of climate change that was expected to occur before there was any basis for attribution at all. Attribution is, of course, one tool in performing the task for which IPCC was set up but it’s not the key finding.
What would be the key finding? politically this is the one that seems to matter. Also, it is used as the litmus test for supporting the IPCC consensus.
The task of IPCC is about future, not about past. Thus attribution may be one of several key findings but not the key finding.
If only one or very few key findings are considered they must be about future.
Concerning the attribution I don’t think that the relative shares of natural and anthropogenic are important, the absolute size of the anthropogenic is because that affects projections to the future. The absolute rate of anthropogenic warming and the relative shares are certainly closely related but they are not not equivalent, because even the overall warming has uncertainties and can be defined in many ways.
It’s unfortunate that factually most important issues may differ from those that have most political weight. IPCC should concentrate on those issues that are most relevant for making informed policy decisions. Others may then bring up the arguments that may be most effective in promoting the policies. That’s not a task of IPCC:
Well, if humans haven’t caused any of the recent past warming, then there will be little motivation to do much about AGW.
You believe that?
Pekka, this is the key finding because policy debate is driven by the assertion of warming from anthropogenic influences, and that without curtailing human-induced emissions, disaster will befall. Remove the anthropogenic finding, and there would be little interest in or politicisation of the warming issue.
I tried to make it clear that attribution of recent warming is one very important issue in estimating what we expect to happen in future. How important it is in comparison with other approaches is an issue for science to find out, but it’s not known for certain that it’s the most important. Therefore it is not the key finding.
I understand very well that it’s also the easiest argument to explain to non-specialists, but my view is that IPCC should not put particular weight on this argument. This view is certainly contrary to those of many “alarmists”, perhaps even more than it’s contrary to the views of moderately skeptical people. I would like to see an IPCC that emphasizes objectivity more than power of direct influence which means that [IPPC] must include all doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands and buts as Stephen Schneider formulated the requirements set for scientists.
When it’s obvious that the influence of CO2 is growing with increasing concentrations it’s perfectly conceivable that it has been less than half of the past warming but will soon dominate and perhaps cause major damage. Studying this possibility (it’s likelihood and it’s consequences) is the task of IPCC. The key findings are those that tell about the future irrespectively the answer about the past.
‘its likelihood and consequences’. Pekka, when the IPCC has seriously and systematically understudied natural processes, thus failing attribution, and seriously and systematically emphasized the possible negative outcomes of warming instead of its obvious vast benefit, you have to ask yourself: How did the IPCC get tasked so mistakenly?
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Kim,
1) IPCC does not do science. It reports on science.
2) What makes you think that the natural processes are not studied or that IPCC does not report on those studies?
1. Silly diversion, beneath you, Pekka.
2. Failure of their predictions, projections, what have you. They missed the obvious boat, and, apparently deliberately.
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3. What about their Frankenstein characterization of the effects of warming. If nothing else, this is a huge fail. How was it not deliberate?
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Kim,
1) It’s not silly, because it’s based on the fact that the climate science community is wider than IPCC community.
2) You only make those claims. Try to substantiate them. Actually all climate science is about natural processes, there’s nothing to study besides them. All climate model development is based on research of natural processes and so is everything else climate scientists study.
Pekka, that’s pretty sad. You’ve talked around, but not addressed my argument. The models, the IPCC, have failed. Maybe it’s for the reasons I propose, ya think?
This isn’t even my thesis, it’s an emergent phenomenon of the debate. Wha hoppen? You don’t seem curious.
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Kim,
I don’t agree with your assertions. When that’s combined with the complexity of the issues, I cannot give answers that you accept.
I don’t agree that IPCC has failed in an obvious way although I do agree that it has not been particularly successful in the areas covered by WG2 and WG3, because the IPCC model is not good when there’s as little solid science as there’s in many fields covered by those WG’s.
WG1 has perhaps outlived it’s usefulness. The WG1 reports are, however, pretty good (although nothing is perfect). The problems are not principally with the WG1 reports, but they are often misused and claimed to support something they do not really support. Some other approach would almost certainly be better in future also for covering the physical science basis. A heavy report every 5 years or so is not the best way.
The dodge that the IPCC does not do science is tired and cynical.
Pre-climategate they were held up regularly as the gold standard of climate science. Their well documented editing process is designed to falsify information and mislead people. Their multiply documented suppression of doubts, ignoring of warnings of mistakes and publishing of untruths is overwhelming to all but extremists.
“1) IPCC does not do science. It reports on science.”
I concur with you IPCC does not do science. But it also reports on psedo-science that favors AGW BS only. So are those CAGW promotors selected by IPCC as co-authors, they do not do science. They only promote CAGW propaganda to cheat the general public funds and taxes. IPCC directs the CAGW promotors to produce false science to achieve its goal.
Pretty pusillanimous, Pekka(hi moshe). Dodging good questions doesn’t make them go away, and you are taking up the habit.
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Pekka, how does a body report on science without studying it ?
Pekka
It’s pretty clear to most readers of IPCC AR4 that the key paradigm supported by this report is a) the attribution of “most” of the warming past ~1950 to increased human GHG concentrations and b) the mean climate sensitivity of 3.2C (the two pieces if the same “consensus” paradigm, that must be defended against all dissenting views).
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If this paradigm is broken, IPCC can fold up. It is its “raison d’etre” – therefore it must be defended at all cost.
Pretty simple, actually.
Max
.. or perhaps the key misconception.
I agree with you, Pekka. The report by Curry and Webster seems to follow two paths. One is the “consensus findings” of the IPCC regarding the role of greenhouse gases on warming over the past century, and the other is a review of philsosophical views of consensus in science. While the role of greenhouse gases in warming over the past 100 years is somewhat relevant to the issue, the real issue we face is: For various future scenarios of world energy consumption by sector and fuel, what are the expected environmental consequences? Assuming that the more the future resembles business as usual, the environmental impacts are greater, what is the technical feasibility and cost of shifting from future scenarios with greater environmental impact to scenarios with lesser environmental impact? Is there a consensus that we know the answers to these questions? I think not.
a.) Legitimate consensus comes from attraction, not promotion.
b.) Contentious consensus comes from promotion, not attraction.
The UN’s IPCC mistakenly followed path (b.) and led world leaders astray.
I wonder why WG1’s reports have been misused?
Maybe because key scientists involved talk to the media about eg a future humanity forced by heat to live underground. Maybe becasue key scientists involved throw around absurd fossil fuel denier tropes to dissenting opinions. What do you expect the average person listening to make of this?
With all the professors paid to study “how to communicate climate issues” it is a wonder nobdy has yet discovered this simple fact – non-scientists (and the media especially) will always seize onto a colorful narrative but will skip over caveats.
When you put all the caveats in footnotes, or none inside the bold text conclusion statement, this is only reinforces this habit – It’s the McDonalds food of science. This is why Dyson called it “bending over backwards” to communicate how your results could be wrong.
Actually the introduction was criticized mainly because i mentioned the NIPCC
Judith, why did the reviewers criticize your mentioning the NIPCC?
Probably because NIPCC refused to follow lock-step consensus opinions from the United Nations’ IPCC. A tyrannical one-world government can not function if skeptics are allowed to challenge Big Brother.
NIPCC = Not-the-IPCC
The purpose of the IPCC report is to accurately summarize the most up-to-date state of climate science research and understanding. The NIPCC wouldn’t even exist if the IPCC weren’t saying there was a current and increasing climate problem due to CO2 and other GH gas emissions.
The NIPCC’s brief is to argue there isn’t. They are acting in the same way a lawyer would, having been engaged to make the best possible case for his client,
Just to continue with the above.
If anyone doubts this, they might just like to consider what may happen if a group of scientists reported that climate sensitivity was around 1 deg C. That’s a little lower than even the lowest of the consensus estimates but, subject to the usual process of peer review, the paper would be accepted. Indeed such papers have been accepted by the IPCC.
The paper would almost certainly be also be accepted by the NIPCC and the groups who were behind them like Heartland and the CSCDGC. 1 deg C is just about low enough to receive their tick of approval. But what would happen if they’d come up with a higher figure? Or what would happen if they wanted to revise that figure later? Downwards would be no problem of course. But they certainly wouldn’t be allowed to revise it upwards no matter what new scientific evidence they might present.
That’s the difference. The NIPCC isn’t rational or scientific. They are only interested in selective evidence to help their case.
tempterrain wrote: The NIPCC’s brief is to argue there isn’t. They are acting in the same way a lawyer would, having been engaged to make the best possible case for his client,
Unlike politics or law, science doesn’t rely on the adversarial system in its search for “truth”. Although there may be violent controversies, most scientists don’t have the time or desire to audit the work of others (as McIntyre does). As Schneider said, scientists are ethically bound “to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but — which means that we must include all the doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands, and buts”. Feynman describes these obligations more fully in Cargo Cult Science. Auditing should be a relatively unproductive activity under these circumstances.
By failing to follow the ethical tenets of science to fully disclose doubt, uncertainty and counter-argument, both the IPCC and the NIPCC have written reports unworthy of being called “scientific reports”. If their reports don’t qualify as science, they could be termed “propaganda”. The first sentence of the Wikipedia article on propaganda says: “Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position by presenting only one side of an argument.” Unfortunately, the dictionary definitions are substantially different.
When climate scientists testify in front of Congress and present only one side of the story, they are acting as policy advocates and harming the authority of all other scientists who appear before Congress. This is particularly true when scientists spend their time arguing rather than laying out areas of mutual agreement and disagreement.
“That’s the difference. The NIPCC isn’t rational or scientific. They are only interested in selective evidence to help their case.”
This is exactly the case with the IPCC also.
The IPCC isn’t rational or scientific. They are only interested in selective evidence to help their case. IPCC is a body of motivated activists with an agenda.
“They are only interested in selective evidence to help their case. This is exactly the case with the IPCC also.”
Not so. There are many examples of papers accepted by mainstream science which have presented arguments and evidence helpful to the so-called skeptical position. You should know what they are and who wrote them- you’ve probably cited them yourself often enough.
But is there a single example of an organisation like Heartland ever accepting a ‘paper’ which hasn’t been helpful to their position? Has the NIPCC ever given due weight to anything they might consider ‘warmist’?
It is the alarmist scientists who publish an endless stream of nonsense papers, like the various hockey-sticks. These papers, having passed pal-review, get prominent space in IPCC reports, including the iconic graph on it’s cover.
The skeptical scientists don’t publish that many papers, first because the difficulty getting them approved by journals, due to the same foe-review process, second – because you can’t write many papers on a non-phenomenon, on something that isn’t there. You can’t prove a negative, or write papers about it.
The bottom line: the IPCC acknowledges only alarmist papers, as per the activist bias of it’s authors.
The authors are also selected on basis of their pre-existing acceptance and agreement with the IPCC stated mission: that of proving AGW, and highlighting the negative consequences.
(Does any positive consequence of warming ever get mentioned in any IPCC report ?)
I encourage readers to read the actual NIPCC Reports. See the 2009 Front Matter for the purpose. e.g.,
It includes alot of published science ignored by the IPCC.
Judith
Please update your references to the NIPCC reports.
Craig D. Idso, Robert M. Carter, and S. Fred Singer, Eds. Climate Change Reconsidered: 2011 Interim Report of the Nongovernmental Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), Chicago, IL: The Heartland Institute, 2011. ISBN-13 – 978-1-934791-36-3, September 2011
Craig Idso and S. Fred Singer, Climate Change Reconsidered: 2009 Report of the Nongovernmental Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), Chicago, IL: The Heartland Institute, 2009. ISBN-13 – 978-1-934791-28-8 June 2009
(PS You cited an earlier 2008 summary by Singer, not the 2009 or 2011 NIPCC reports.)
tempterrain
Do not confuse readers with false definitions.
NIPCC = Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change
tempterrain
You have it slightly wrong, so let me correct you.
The purpose of the IPCC report is to promote and defend the “CAGW” paradigm with the claim that most of the warming since ~1950 was caused by increased human GHG concentrations and that the mean 2xCO2 climate sensitivity is 3.2C.
The purpose of the NIPCC report is to question the above “CAGW” paradigm by presenting dissenting views.
IPCC scientists are publicly funded with billions of dollars of taxpayer funds, while NIPCC relies on private donators and, as a result, has a much more limited budget.
Max
I think you nailed it with this one, Judith. Your line of argument has been getting increasingly focused and concise over the past two years of blogging. I think you could actually nail about 95 of these to a door somewhere.
You sure about that? I thought it was getting somewhat more uncertain myself.
Judith, your write up includes two statements which I would like to try and put together. These are as follows.
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With genuinely well-established scientific theories, ‘consensus’ is not discussed and the concept of consensus is arguably irrelevant. For example, there is no point to discussing a consensus that the Earth orbits the sun, or that the hydrogen molecule has less mass than the nitrogen molecule. While a consensus may arise surrounding a specific scientific hypothesis or theory, the existence of a consensus is not itself the evidence.
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Given the complexity of the climate problem, ‘expert judgments’ about uncertainty and confidence levels are made by the IPCC on issues that are dominated by unquantifiable uncertainties.
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Getting on my hobby-horse, I would argue that the reason that there is no need for a consensus on well established theories, is because the empirical data supporting those theories is overwhelming. It is just that simple.
So this brings up the importance of what you write in the second quote. namely “unquantifiable uncertainties.” In other words there is no empirical data to support the IPCC consensus. Again, I feel it is just that simple. I would suggest that you are making a mountain out of a molehill.
Well, it is not that easy to define the IPCC consensus out of existence. I am trying to argue that explicit consensus seeking on a complex wicked problem is a bad strategy
Yes, and that “explicit consensus seeking” puts the lie to your temporizing: “The manufactured consensus of the IPCC has had the unintended consequences of distorting the science
Distorting the science was vital to achieving the consensus. It was not “unintended”.
Judith, you write “Well, it is not that easy to define the IPCC consensus out of existence”
IMHO, it IS that easy. But then disagreements are what good discussions are all about. Incidentally I should have written “insufficient empirical data”; not “no empirical data”.
@ Jim Cripwell,
“IMHO, it IS that easy”
You’d have to be either a simpleton or a genius to think that !
TT you write “You’d have to be either a simpleton or a genius to think that !”
Why? IF, and it is an enormous IF, but if the IPCC had sufficient empirical data to prove that CAGW was real, then there would be no debate going on. Climate Etc. would not exist; nor would WUWT. The scientific issue would be completely and utterly settled. There would have been a Michelson/Morley type measurement made, and we would know, from actual measurements, what the numerical value of total climate sensitivity was.
It is only becasue the IPCC does NOT have sufficient empirical data that it has to resort to subterfuge. It has to pretend that the output of non-validated models is the equivalent of empirical data, and rely on meaningless, hypothetical numbers like no-feedback climate sensitivity.
The fact of the matter is that the IPCC cannot prove that CAGW is valid, simply because it lacks the necessary empirical data to do so.
So what sort of experiment would you suggest? What would the ‘Cripwell Experiment’ be?
There isnt 100% proof so deniers can operate the gap. Look at creationists. The existence of science deniers tells you nothing.
TT you write “So what sort of experiment would you suggest? What would the ‘Cripwell Experiment’ be?”
I cannot suggest an experiment. If I could, I would have done so years ago. So far as I can see, there is no chance of doing such an experiment in the foreseeable future; the atmosphere is too chaotic and unpredictable for one to be contemplated.
But here is the issue that you refuse to address. CAGW is an extremely plausible hypothesis. But it is still just a hypothesis. It will remain a hypothesis unless and until enough empirical data is produced to turn it into either a theory or a law in physics. The IPCC and the proponents of CAGW have carefully ignored the problem that not enough empirical datra exists to prove that CAGW is real. That is the issue.
Until people like yourself acknowledge that the IPCC has not provided enough empirical data to prove that CAGW is true, we will continue to have this sort of discussion. The proponents of CAGW can go on hiding their collective heads in the sand for ever; we deniers can never prove that CAGW is wrong. But the IPCC has not proved that it is right; and can never prove that it is right until they provide enough empirical data to do the job.
tt
You should know that Creepwill has no idea of what kind of experiment would have to be done to change his mind. That is because his mind is not changed by empirical fact
I seem to have attracted Steven Mosher, tempterrain and lolwot. So, let me take the opportunity to ask a question to any or all of you, based on your definition of what “empirical data” means. Is there sufficient empirical data to support the conclusion that “Most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations”?
We conclude that the simultaneous global warming of the atmosphere and mixed layer alone is uninformative for attribution, but the magnitude of ocean heat uptake, the homogeneity of the spatial pattern as well as the distribution of warming below the mixed layer strongly argue for the 20th-century warming being largely externally forced.
Jim Cripwell,
So you’re saying that you can’t actually think of what scientists need to do to confirm that adding ever increasing amounts of GH gases is very likely to cause serious climatic problems?
Furthermore, you don’t think its even possible for them to do more?
And, as you’re convinced that restriction of GH gas emissions is undesirable, you’re quite pleased to be able to claim that their efforts just aren’t good enough?
Look, Jim, why don’t you carry on living in your own fool’s paradise. You obviously don’t understand what empirical evidence is, and even if you did, no doubt it would never be good enough for the “proof” you require. You’ve made this point so many times. If anyone missed your first comment on the topic , its unlikely they missed your next thousand!
Some of us like the atmosphere as it is, or rather as it was. We don’t want GH gas concentrations to rise any further than they have. Ideally we’d like them back at something like 350ppmv. If you think higher levels are safe, why don’t you provide the proof?
lolwot: Look at creationists.
For climate science, that is a bad strategy. Look to the science. There are new books and peer-reviewed publications nearly every day. The assertion that CO2 will cause global warming is based on the assumption that CO2 will change the climate from one (approximate?) equilibrium to another. Yet nothing in the system is ever in equilibrium, nor even in steady-state. Temperatures everywhere on earth, in the ocean, and in the lower troposphere are caused by the processes of heat transfer at the particular conditions present at particular times and places, and the effects of CO2 increases on those processes are unknown everywhere.
TT you write “Look, Jim, why don’t you carry on living in your own fool’s paradise. ”
Thank you very much indeed for this message. I seem to have struck a nerve somewhere. I have no intention whatsoever just going on “living in my own fool’s paradise”. I will continue to write about the physics as I understand it, and I hope, but dont expect, that the proponents of CAGW will respond their version of what they think the physics is. I think my physics is correct.
But personal attacks such as this one are very encouragiung indeed.
tempterrain and Steven Mosher
I think you guys don’t understand exactly what Jim Cripwell (and many other rational skeptics of the CAGW premise) are saying.
It doesn’t have to be a “repoducible experiment”. Any empirical scientific evidence will do. If you are in doubt what that means, check Feynman.
It’s what’s lacking for IPCC’s CAGW premise.
That’s why the IPCC CAGW premise is not “science”.
Quite straightforward actually.
Max
@TT:
You seem to be laboring under the false premise that science is capable of answering every valid question. Worse, you seem to be laboring under the false premise that science is capable of answering every valid question NOW.
The unfortunate truth is that most questions cannot be answered by the scientific method, now or ever. My bet is that climatology can be, someday, but that’s just a bet. Unless you can produce a proof that a solution exists, you’re now arguing outside your beloved epistemology.
max and qbeamus
Thanks for the support. I asked a question, which I think may be unanswerable by the proponents of CAGW; though I think it is a perfectly reasonable question. Namely :-
Is there sufficient empirical data to support the conclusion that “Most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations”?
I think if the answer is either yes or no, I can show that the answer makes no sense. I doubt if Steven, tempterrain or lolwot will touch the question with the end of a barge pole. But we will see.
Feynman is dead. There is no way to ask him. There is no way to know what his answer would be. Those who think they know are just guessing. They are incapable of thinking in the way Feynman thought.
Ask a brilliant somebody who is alive.
The messiness of the problem is not the driver of conflict between policy/science in *This* situation; It is a refusal to appreciate the time scale over which it occurs.
Take the quintessential low-info, high stakes, etc etc example: Asteroid coming at Earth, you have 6 weeks to save the planet. Here, resources go to the Consensus method, no? Let’s just hope the UN is not involved.
Despite claims to make AGW into a similar situation (“we’re already past the tipping point”), the +.2C/decade will not trouble us for awhile. In the meantime, we’ll know alot more about what happens to this temperature plateau, which if sustained, will pretty much rule out AGW.
There is no rush to give a definitive answer, becasue 1. we can’t for sure currently, 2. we can’t change the outcome currently, 3. we’ll know more in the future.
SUT,
“1. we can’t {know?] for sure currently, 2. we can’t change the outcome currently, 3. we’ll know more in the future.”
Does this ‘logic’ just apply to climate change or is it useful with other things too? So you are saying it’s never a good idea to do anything? Its always better to postpone any decision indefinitely? Because, the longer it is postponed the more will be known?
SUT,
True. But there is also another reason for conflict. It is that the CAGW alarmists are strongly advocating policies that suit their ideological beliefs. These policies are impracticable, nearly useless even if they could be implemented, and economically irrational. They would be very damaging and make no real difference to the climate.
The fact that the CAGW alarmists are advocating such stupid policies, and advocating policies that are based on their ideological beliefs, discredits them (the proponents of such policies – CAGW alarmists).
Judith:
It’s easy to define the IPCC consensus out of existence when this consensus is represented to be a “scientific” consensus. The claims of IPCC Working Group I reference no statistical population. It follows that the claims of Working Group I are not refutable by reference to observed events in this population. Thus, these claims lie outside science, by the definition of “science.” There is not a scientific consensus because the consensus is not scientific.
Judith I’ll start by congradulating you on your paper having been published and on the evolution of your public conclusions on the state of climate science.
While I agree with what Judith has written in her paper, I am confused as to why such a paper would have to go through any type of peer review process. It does not provide any new scientific conclusion, it provides a simple common sense analysis of of the tactics employed by the IPCC and what happaned as a result.
This paper is not a science article, but a paper on the sociology and philosophy of climate science. There are entire journals devoted to the philosophy and sociology of science. If you read much of the literature on the sociology of climate science, it seems mostly about analyzing denialism. So our paper is a contribution to that body of literature
“congradulating” Blow your nose before you attempt to say that. It’s “congratulating”.
Same with “happaned”. It’s “happened”.
As for peer review, this article can be regarded as part of the world’s ongoing forensics about what happened to “climate science”. Crimes have been committed.
There is a typo…”The consensus approach used by the IPCC has received a number of criticisms. Concerns have bee raised”….
thx
“Concerns have bee raised about the need to guard against overconfidence and overemphasize expected outcomes.” I read this sentence several times, trying to parse it. Leaving aside the obvious typo, I think I understand it to mean that concerns were raised about two needs: (1) the need to “guard against overconfidence,” and (2) the need to “overemphasize expected outcomes.” Is this the intended meaning? That there are two more or less universally acknowledged needs, and some people are concerned about them? Or does it mean instead that some people feel that scientists should guard against overconfidence, and that scientists should not overemphasize expected outcomes?
(I’m a linguist, so this counts as a technical comment from me :-).)
Mike, read the full paper, and let me know if this got lost in translation for the readers digest version (I think it did)
I should have done that in the first place!
I think this sentence in the RDV comes from this sentence in the FP:
“Oppenheimer et al. [48] warn of the need to guard against overconfidence and argue that the IPCC consensus emphasizes expected outcomes, whereas it is equally important that policy makers understand the more extreme possibilities that consensus may exclude or downplay.”
Another way to say this in a short version might be “Concerns have been raised about the need to guard against overconfidence, and to consider/ discuss a variety of possibilities, not just a/the consensus outcome”; or “…and to consider/discuss not just the consensus outcome, but also more extreme/ other possibilities.”
Is this the intended meaning? Or am I erring by not including the further discussion in the remainder of the paragraph (or maybe the following couple paragraphs) of the FP?
It is hard to write unambiguously, esp. when people may be reading with a pre-biased opinion!
BTW, I think you were very brave to quote Michael Crichton.
I suspect it means “overemphasizing expected outcomes”. I.e. guard against that too.
I think anyone who couldn’t figure that out, and who also thought it noteworthy they could ignore the “n” left off of “been” without thinking the message was about an insect or spelling competition, probably isn’t up to understanding the debate itself.
Dr. Curry, considering the fun stuff happening in court rooms in the future, do you claim to have won a Nobel award?
While the “reader’s digest version” is a great idea, in this case the paper has quite more meat than you guess from the “reader’s digest”. Which, as some have said, looks like just common sense with too many words. But the entire paper is not.
Suggestion: Edit in PDF the “reader’s digest”.
An excellent paper that is thought provoking and contributes to the intellectual debate of one of the major issues of our time. If only some of the major networks would present this kind of analysis of socio-political elements of climate change rather than the much easier off the shelf advocacy pieces that is their standard operating procedure. The public would benefit greatly over the pablum they are presently given.
You are a scientist.
“If only some of the major networks would present this kind of analysis of socio-political elements of climate change rather than the much easier off the shelf advocacy pieces that is their standard operating procedure. The public would benefit greatly over the pablum they are presently given.”
Who is the mother of ten-thousand things, you need answer first.
Professor Curry, you have done more to advance science and a return of integrity to government science than I imagined possible. Congratulations!
You are a skilled communicator.
Rather than throwing out the consensus that the warming by the end of the century will be 3-6 degrees C, we should be planning around that. I don’t agree that when there are a few dissenters, the consensus should be thrown out. Rather, each dissenting view should be examined closely for its evidence of correctness, which is the current approach. Yes, there is uncertainty because CO2 isn’t the only thing happening, but that alone leads to 3-6 degrees that can be enhanced or reduced by other less predictable factors, which is why that is where the planning should start, not with the assumption that we know nothing, or that everything is equally possible, which is not a realistic view of our knowledge.
Yawn. Another lame attempt to invoke the Precautionary Principle. Since “planning around that” leads inevitably to incurring insupportable costs and severe and murderous economic abuse of the world’s poorest, the recommended “precautions” are worse than the event itself.
Fail.
What kind of planning do you have in mind that would do that? You are making assumptions. More sensible things can be done than doing nothing.
Brian H,
So you think there is something wrong with the “precautionary principle”? You don’t believe in taking precautions? I don’t like to pry into your personal life, but I’m just wondering how many kids you have :-)
The precautionary principle is (1) a falacy and (2) not the same thing as “taking precautions.”
I’ve heard the precautionary principle expressed in a number of different ways, but if we’re going to talk about it, let’s define it. Wikipedia mentions a number of those formulations, but the first one is, “If an action or policy has a suspected risk of causing harm to the public or to the environment, in the absence of scientific consensus that the action or policy is harmful, the burden of proof that it is not harmful falls on those taking the action.”
The falacy arises because no account is made for the plausibility of the potential harm, and because no weighing of competing costs is made.
It is easily revealed by applying the principle to another familiar case, which CAGW believers can be expected to reject. “Should one accept Christ as their savior?” Applying the precautionary principle, the answer is, obviously, yes. No scientific evidence exists, or can exist, that one’s soul will not live in eternal torment for failing to take this action, and doing so is clearly not harmful, so it would be incumbent upon us to take this action, under the precuationary principle. (One might argue that following the dictates of Christianity is harmful, because it requires giving up actions that feel good. Never mind trying to answer the diffuclt question of how we are truly best off to live; that line of argument equally well defeats all of the policies advanced by CAGW advocates.)
“Taking precautions,” on the other hand, is more akin to the “no regrets” policy options Judith sometimes advocates. Implicit in the meaning of the term is a weighing of the plausibility of the harms and of the competing costs of our options. Trivially costly options that provide a small chance of a large payoff might well be sensible ways to “take precautions.” But the preferred policy choices of CAGW advocates do not qualify. Which, of course, is why they are forced to produce spurious logical devices like the precautionary principle.
The most relevant formulation for climate policy is that of the 1992 Rio declaration:
Principle 15
In order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach shall be widely applied by States according to their capabilities. Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.
The requirement of cost-effectiveness is part of this formulation. Everyone may still have her or his interpretation on the meaning of this formulation.
I’m afraid the Rio ’92 formulation just begs the question. Once we’ve agreed that a measure is “cost effective,” we’re not likely to disagree that we ought to do it, are we? It does nothing to advance our consideration of a proposed policy.
qbeamus,
You are right that this formulation does not tell what to do but leaves that for further considerations. That’s exactly the point.
No UN decision supports absolute precaution, IPCC hasn’t even considered that as it doesn’t fall within its tasks. Requirements to take very strong actions in absence of all proof of cost-efficiency have been presented by some individuals and some organizations, also by representatives of some governments. Such requirements have been presented in UNFCCC conferences but not accepted beyond the Kyoto protocol, which was not ratified by USA.
Jim D, 3-6 C by the end of the century? Where did you find those consensus numbers at?
Figure on 2-4.5 degrees per doubling and 1-2 doublings of CO2.
Jim,
“1-2 doublings” means you think CO2 ppm will go from 560 – 840, or 560-1120?
Don’t say 560 – 840, or 560-1120 (ppm CO2), you’ll give Bill McKibben apoplexy! On the other hand, carry on. Hehe.
JimD, You say that “each dissenting view should be examined closely for its evidence of correctness”, whilst simultaneously making the assertions that “the warming by the end of the century will be 3-6 degrees C” and “but that [CO2] alone leads to 3-6 degrees”. You first need to apply your test of evidence to your own assertion, and that does not mean an appeal to consensus, but hard, empirical evidence.
The whole point about examining the consensus is that assertions like these are not waved through because of political need, but severely challenged by the scientific method that demands repeated attempts at falsification. To falsify, you have to construct multiple independent experiments that remove all trace of coincidence or third party factors, so that the prime suspect doesn’t just unequivocally remain as the cause, but has a strong explanation for being so. For the supposed relationship between CO2 (and specifically man’s emissions) and global temperature, which is the heart of the IPCC’s case, this has not been done. Indeed, it is laughable that the IPCC says that because they don’t know what is causing the warming, it must by default be CO2.
To then promote the precautionary principle as a response to the untested and unsubstantiated (by empirical observed evidence) is a far greater error than even dong nothing. You only have to look at one of the major policy responses across the world, that of energy supply, to see the havoc wreaked to national economies and personal finances, pushing millions into fuel poverty and denying further millions access to cheap electricity, the supply of which is the one thing that has done more than anything to improve living, health, and even environmental standards.
As well as Dr Curry’s new paper, for which I for one and very thankful she has written, you should also read the “..Delinquant Teenager…” book by Donna Laframboise, a Canadian journalist. It is a damning critique of the IPCC and many of those in it. There is a logical conclusion here: as the IPCC is not the scientific body it purports to be, but a political product for political goals, it’s promotion of the concensus must also be political, therefore not scientific, and so not worth the paper it’s written on.
Jim D
The problem IS the forced “consensus”.
You have missed the whole point of Judith’s article.
It is not true that “CO2…alone leads to 3-6 degrees that can be enhanced or reduced by other less predictable factors”.
That’s the “consensus” paradigm all right, but that does not make it correct at all.
Is it a “forced paradigm” view?
Is IPCC open to other views?
If evidence for other explanations were presented, would IPCC accept this evidence – or would itbe rejected out of hand to defend the “forced consensus” paradigm?
Think about the above questions before you answer.
Max
It is not forced consensus. Other factors are taken into account. Natural variability could be as much as 0.2 degrees C when averaged over decades according to all their papers. Some invoke negative feedbacks that are not supported by decreasing cloud-cover in decades of warming. We have seen the other explanations. They don’t stand up to data.
Jim D
Before getting too distraught, may I encourage to you reexamine the major assumptions involved and their consequences.
First, see Lord Monckton:
Secondly, on the technical side, see the major correction to future probabilities identified by Ross McKitrick:
Cheering Up the Dismal Theorem, DISCUSSION PAPER 2012-05, MARCH 16, 2012
Thirdly, research into alternatives is much more cost effective at this stage than premature massive expenditures on mitigation.
Science consensus should be separated from cost-benefit analyses. If people agreed on the next century’s warming rate first, that would be a step forward, but we are not even there yet. I think that some policymakers are actually seeing the warming effects now, so this might be happening by default. The Arctic sea-ice is the canary in the coal-mine here that something is changing, possibly even faster than expected.
Jim D
The next glaciation is also due in about 1500 years! What confidence is there climate models that anthropogenic global warming will be sufficient to overcome natural cooling?
Why has the last 16 years global temperature d trend been about flat compared to the warming of the previous 16? Which models predicted it?
Despite great “confidence”, until we quantify, verify and validate ALL the major natural as well as anthropogenic, we stumble on with very dim sight.
Credibility of climate predictions revisited, G. G. Anagnostopoulos, D. Koutsoyiannis, A. Efstratiadis, A. Christofides, and N. Mamassis (2009)
if you prefer to think in terms of analogies, the past climate serves as a good reference. We last had these kinds of CO2 levels 30 million years ago, about when Antarctica became the first major glaciated region. The Cretaceous had 600 ppm over 65 million years ago. We know the Cretaceous was an iceless hothouse. The next ice age wasn’t due for 20k to 50k years, but CO2 levels such as now, would prevent that just through analogy with 30 million years ago. Skeptics/contrarians haven’t yet explained the paleoclimate with alternate theories to the already consistent GHG theory, and until they do, they will have trouble with getting their theories accepted.
“The mid-Cretaceous was characterized by geography and an ocean circulation that was vastly different from today; as well as higher carbon dioxide levels (at least 2 to 4 times higher than today). This indicates that the mid-Cretaceous climate system was different from that of today or any we might have in the future. Explanations evoking ocean and atmospheric circulation patterns radically different from today have been proposed to explain the climate of the mid-Cretaceous; however, there is no scientific consensus on how the Mid-Cretaceous warm climate came about.”
From the skeptics at the NOAA.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/globalwarming/cretaceous.html
Do they say anything about the even warmer earlier periods that had higher CO2 levels, or would that just be coincidence? Wikipedia is more up to date on the Cretaceous climate, but you should also look for Prof. Richard Alley’s talk at the AGU as a leading paleoclimatologist.
And our knowledge of co2 levels millions of years ago is probably on par with knowledge of temps inthe Middle Ages, a subject of controversy
Interestingly they can look at fossil stomata to indicate that CO2 levels were high enough to have significant effects on plant physiology.
I’m sure the paleo department at the NOAA will be depressed to learn that you think they have less credibility than Wikipedia. Even if I thought CO2 was the primary temperature driver and even if I had confidence in paleo reconstructions from that far back, I wouldn’t think that could tell us much about today’s climate. Heat transport matters and it matters regardless of what drives temperature. As far as a coincidence that co2 and temperatures match, that is based on this chart?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Phanerozoic_Carbon_Dioxide.png
or this chart?
http://deforestation.geologist-1011.net/PhanerozoicCO2-Temperatures.png
I’m going to go out on a limb and guess there is no consensus that such a coincidence exists.
steven, the last ‘cold’ period was the end of the Permian, that had ice caps and temperatures more similar to now, and coincidentally low CO2 levels too. This was 250 million years ago. The NOAA thing is anonymous without references for further information, but I guess the NOAA name is enough for some to believe because it is the government after all. I would be more inclined to look at what Richard Alley has to say, or anyone who puts names to their words.
I don’t mean to diss NOAA, but that page was last modified in the Bush administration when government scientists had to be careful what they said to the public, and had the White House looking over their public statements for approval.
Jim, they have contact information. You can write them and ask if they were forced to word it that way. Of course if they change it now I will have to assume it was because of pressure from the Obama administration.
Moving forward…
Fixing the IPCC is easy.
J Curry should be appointed to run it, replacing the current incumbent who can retire to India.
Apologies, if strictly speaking the above is considered off topic.
Great idea, but the powers who control the IPCC want to keep their “convenient idiot” as he does their bidding without question. Dr Curry would knock over all the jam jars, resulting in the loss of a cosy gravy train for many people.
“Fixing the IPCC is easy.”
Yes. Close it down.
If it refuses to close, ignore it.
It has a purely negative impact. (Intended or unintended…)
Its parent, the UNFCCC, is the organization that wrote the charge to the IPCC, that it provide support for the assertion the CO2 is the bete noire thus enabling massive wealth transfers. Ending the IPCC is not enough. The UNFCCC must also go.
Fixing the IPCC is easy.
How about the IPCC be given one last chance to do what they are told or otherwise they’ll just be closed down and the job given to someone else.? I’m sure Heartland would be able to come up with something much more palatable, and for a fraction of the cost, too.
Might want to think about why so much acrimony on the issue. Is it a deep concern for the planet or something more crass? IMO, “follow-the-money” is the fundamental driver behind the IPCC and their supporters.
No money is more the concern of its critics!
Is there a no consensus about the non-consensus about the consensus?
lets start a betting pool for which position Judith will take in the Romney administration.
Off topic
The head of North Dakota’s emergency management agency: NDEMA.
I’ve had my nominations on the floor for awhile, now, but you’ll have to read the blogs.
============
NSF Director would be amusing.
Perhaps as head ofFEMA?
> FEMA also helps states and local governments repair or replace public facilities and infrastructure, which often is not insured,” the CBPP report explained. “This form of discretionary federal aid would be subject to cuts under the Ryan budget. If it were scaled back substantially, states and localities would need to bear a larger share of the costs of disaster response and recovery, or attempt to make do with less during difficult times.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oqXk5XxHKx8
Moshpit will arguably indulge into denizens’ fantasy outing here. Keep them coming!
The one thing we know is that under Ibama’s sequestration plan, which he signed into law, huge cuts in Federal spending are coming January 1st.
Speculation by way of Obama-esque misinterpretations and misrepresentations of what Romney plans is fun, but avoids reality. Sort of like the current President.
Neva-ud-it.
How about we start a pool to see if there is consensus on whether Mosher is a Gavin -type Stockholm Syndrome choke hold.
Everything I have read indicates to me that the IPCC was formed with the prior understanding that anthropogenically produced CO2 was likely the main cause of temperatures rises; its mandate was to determine the magnitude of the impact AND what to do about it. While it might be more correct in a legalistic way to suggest that the mandate was to determine if “likely” was correct, and then determine the magnitufe of the impact, I think not: if so, then one possible outcome would have been to deconstruct the IPCC. That was never in the cards.
Let’s consider well this point in the context of the task of the IPCC: was there a possible outcome of any work such that the IPCC would cease to exist? I suggest the answer is “no”, and so your conclusion is unavoidable: the IPCC was created not to determine the correctness of the “problem”. And note that the problem is not just that temperatures would rise with more manmade CO2, but that large detrimental planetary consequences would unavoidable result through the rise.
The Malleus Mallificarum, the witchfinder’s manual of 1496 ( thereabouts, I forget which year it came out) was the result of a mandate to two clerics. The mandate was investigative, but based on the premises that a) witches exist, b) are active and c) cause social damage. Chapters were devoted to determining who was a witch and then what to do about them. It was inevitable that witches would be found, bound and burned because the investigative techniques were designed to find that which was presumed to exist.
The AR series of investigations have been exactly like the MM. Its work looks for the signal that is presumed to be present. And like the MM, their very existence – indeed, the very existence of the IPCC – cements the existence of the condition it is said to be looking into.
Consensus management has been a theory for businesses. Having been part of companies in which this theory was being promoted, I can tell you that consensus management involves consensus to the views of the top management. It is not a system that generates consensus from the bottom up and informs the top, but the other way around. An ill-defined set of beliefs is espoused at the top, send down and work is done to defend them, which comes back up and is seen as technically-based confirmation. It is not. Unless the line of reasoning is so flawed it defies laws such as gravity, the work is directed at confirming the initial expectation. And I can tell you that intelligent, educated people can find apparently rational arguments for supporting the irrational.
It might be of value to you to send your thoughts to existing and former management gurus and their victims on the IPCC and its drive for consensus. This is, after all, what Kennedy was dealing with in the Cuban missile crisis. Fortunately for all of us, he recognized that some had the end result as a premise for their thoughts, not as a possible outcome of their thoughts and so turned the other cheek.
Doug
For background, see:
IPCC History and Mission
To understand “human-induced climate change”, it is essential to equally understand “natural climate change
One major political problem is the UN’s equivocation in the FRAMEWORK CONVENTION ON CLIMATE CHANGE, Article 1, Definitions:
Not much equivocation in that dictionary-defying, Orwellian, definition of climate change.
Yes. Well said, Doug. The comment on “consensus management” is particularly apt.
Excellent post, Doug. My experience in government accords with yours in business.
Doug, thank you for causing me to search ‘Malleus Maleficarum’ ; the description in wikipedia made me smile:
The main purpose of the Malleus was to attempt to systematically refute arguments claiming that witchcraft does not exist (&) discredit those who expressed skepticism about its reality…,
Apparently the M-M also claims that witches were more often women than men – I naively thought that all witches were women, so I searched ‘male witches’ and came across a book that challenges the marginalization of male witches by feminist and other historians
:-)
Congratulations and thx, Judith, on your cogent assessment of problems
of the IPCC regarding consensus and confitmation bias.
I like yer salutory, ‘While a consensus may arise surrounding
a specific scientific hypothesis, the existence of a consensus
is not itself the evidence.’
You raise the issue of the IPCC mandate. Seems that confirmation bias
was built into the IPCC ‘mission’ statement.
“I am trying to argue that explicit consensus seeking on a complex wicked problem is a bad strategy.”
Agreed. So one must take a step back and ask why seek it in the first place. It’s a corruption of the way science is supposed to work, and is as far as I can see nothing but a naked desire to influence policy… and arguably to amass and consolidate power.
.” If, however, consensus is aimed at by the members of the reference group and arrived at by intent, it becomes conspiratorial and irrelevant to our intellectual concern. ”
I like that sentence, which would be equaly relevent to many political arguments.
Yes. I read the paper which makes the points like the above very clear, but avoids entering into the errors made by the IPCC in attribution. I believe they made two fundamental mistakes: they ignored climate change before the middle of the 20th century and the transport delay of the oceans in percolating the pre-1940 heat to the rest of the world. See my website.
“Princeton philosopher Thomas Kelly provides some insight into confirmation bias, arguing that a prior belief can skew the total evidence that is available subsequently in a direction that is favorable to itself.”
Of course the faithful will scornfully call it my own confirmation bias at work, but this phenomenon looks to me to be much more relevant for them. Many truly seem incapable of accepting any arguments against…or any real world data that does not support…. CAGW. I get a perverse kick out of hanging around Revkin’s site…mostly a rank swamp of warmist propaganda to read the majority of commenters. I call them climate zombies. They can read and write, but they can’t think. Intellectually undead. Sad.
Speaking of zombies, Joss Whedon is now endorsing Romney:
Hah, hah, hah! It’s funny, but it’s a spoof.
About Consensus and Facilitation
http://www.learn-usa.com/transformation_process/~consensus.htm
What’s Wrong With Consensus
http://www.learn-usa.com/transformation_process/acf003.htm
What American Citizens Need to Know About Consensus and Facilitation
http://www.learn-usa.com/transformation_process/acf004.htm
The Delphi Technique — What Is It?
http://www.learn-usa.com/transformation_process/acf001.htm
The Delphi Technique — How to Disrupt It
http://www.learn-usa.com/transformation_process/acf002.htm
The InterGovernmental Panel on Climate Change is a Political Process intended to achieve Political Consensus.
Supposed “Scientists” are only there as a “Priesthood” intended to give blessing to the pre-ordained Political Agenda.
The deemed consensus articulated by IPCC then is quoted as “a source of authority” to justify the political agenda.
The whole purpose of the IPCC is to produce a summary which ca be “labelled” as a consensus. The option of articulating that there may be “no consensus” (a result which is very plausible in a strict scientific sense) will not even be considered.
all the best
brent
“If you read much of the literature on the sociology of climate science, it seems mostly about analyzing denialism.”
In other words propaganda, whether intentional or not, masquerading as science.
The beginning reads to me like–e.g., the manufactured consensus had the ‘unintended consequences of ‘ causing the global warming community to circle the wagons and refuse to admit any fact that would undermine the original liars. I get it but I don’t see the cause and effect. Blaming serial lying on a the failure of the consensus meme is like blaming the terror attack on the American Embassy in Libya on an obscure video that no one ever saw.
Readers of Climate Etc can verify for themselves:
• PUBMED review articles on “Consensus”: 4,894 articles
• Fraction of these “consensus” article referenced by Curry and Webster: 0.0%
Hmm … zero-percent coverage of the literature on the processes by which scientific concensus is achieved.
Has the climate-change community ever seen a more egregious case of cherry-picking than Curry and Webster’s analysis? :eek: :eek: :eek:
To pre-suppose that climate-change consensus is uniquely different than other forms of scientific consensus … well … that presumption is pretty obviously just plain wrong, eh? :?: :?: :?:
Conclusion: The Curry-Webster survey “Climate change: no consensus on consensus” so sparsely covers the existing literature relating to scientific consensus, as to contribute little to the debate relating to the scientific study of climate-change.
I went through the first 100 of the referenced 4894 abstracts referenced. They are all from the medical literature and all these target rather obscure issues of medical, physiologic or biochemical issues. None of them are “meta,” ie none refer to the value and process of forming consensus, or the hazards therein. Many of the medically-related consensus statements of very recent years have been discredited or revised,as more information becomes available. The appropriate use of a pubmed search in the Curry-Webster discussion would be “o.o%.”
Rick
Restricting to the keyword “difficult” yields dozens of outstandingly cogent examples, eh Rick? :) :) :)
The word “hockey” will get you quite a few articles about that sport…
fan has pointed to a pile of literature he probably has not read and cited it as a source for you to sort through. It’s rather like a freshman who turns in a paper with one reference 1. GIYF.
fan is well meaning. I suspect he works in a field where he is not subject to tough questions from people who simply refuse to take his word for it.
Fan yet again smiles on October 28, 2012 at 7:14 pm.
On October 28, 2012 at 8:04 pm, Rick reports having “went through the first 100 of the referenced 4894 abstracts referenced.”
That is all.
“Key words: climate change, consensus, consensus, decision making under uncertainty”
Is the repetition of “consensus” a typo?
Joy, your conclusion is worthy Joshua himself. All I can say is “Huh?”
It’s not complicated pokerguy!
The scientific literature includes many thousands of articles that affirm explicit consensuses in regard to problems both wicked and messy.
The Curry and Webster article does not recognize any of this literature, and neither is any reason given for ignoring it.
That’s not good science. It’s “cherry-picking”, eh? :?: :?: :?:
A concrete meta-example of consensus construction, relating to scientific issues that are “messy” and “wicked”, is provided by Alla et al. Spreading the word on sports concussion: citation analysis of summary and agreement, position and consensus statements on sports concussion.
The available scientific evidence suggests (but does not prove) that high-school athletes suffering mild concussions are at-risk for neurological complications — Alhzheimer’s disease for example — that may emerge 50-70 years later.
The long time-scales, and uncertainty of the science, and the severity of the potential downside, all certify concussion policies as a “wicked, messy” problem.
The problem becomes especially “wicked and messy” when Sally and Bill *strongly* desire to stay in the game, eh?
Because (being teenagers) Sally and Billy have little regard for adverse consequences that are decades in the future … adverse consquences that are purely hypothetical. :eek: :oops: :eek:
For Curry and Williams to wholly ignore (without giving any explanation!) the immense scientific literature of consensus-creating methods for grappling with this class of “wicked messy problems” … is just plain wrong, eh? :?: :?: :?:
Hey Fan
You said
“For Curry and Williams to wholly ignore (without giving any explanation!) the immense scientific literature of consensus-creating methods for grappling with this class of “wicked messy problems” … is just plain wrong, eh? ”
Judith suddenly started writing with someone else?
tonyb
You are entirely correct climatereason … the authorship is “Curry and Webster” not “Curry and Williams”. Doh! ;)
Another example more familiar to people would be Mad Cow disease. This may take decades to develop (they still don’t know) after eating the affected meat, but preventive action was swift based on just seeing a few cases, and knowing what caused them, rather than waiting for the full scope to play out.
I’m sorry fan. I didnt see any METHODS described in the selection of literature you provided.
Long ago we ask CRU for there station data. They pointed to a huge pile and said ‘its in there”. The ICO found that this type of response was non responsive.
So, if you have anything on “methods” for creating consensus ( delphi type stuff would be instructive for example ) then that would be a much better pile to point at. Or, rather, since the IPCC has employed a consensus creating “method”, you could always go to their bibliography and point to the literature they used to justify their method.
That’s probably your best bet. Point to the literature the IPCC used to justify their approach…
opps. thats going to be really easy or impossible
Blows to the head and concussions damage the brain? Boxing is associated with Parkinson’s? This is not exactly a wicked, messy problem. Seems pretty straight-forward to me :):):);0
pokerguy –
Have you ever stopped to consider why you’re so obsessed with me?
He’s motivated by your reasonings, Joshua.
…*of* Joshua.
Well Joy, my inclination would be to ask professor Curry. I’m confident she’ll be able to answer your question, though of course not to your satisfaction. I suspect the issue is one of semantics.
“Dutch social scientist Jeroen Van der Sluijs argues that the IPCC has adopted a ‘speaking consensus to power’ approach that sees uncertainty and dissent as problematic, and attempts to mediate these into a consensus.”
I must say again, this is a mischaracterization of the whole IPCC/consensus debacle.
The consensus climate scientists are not speaking anything TO power. They are speaking FOR power, to the powerless (except of their annoying ability to vote). The IPCC and its apparatchiks were appointed by, empowered by, funded by and answer to, the progressive governments of the Western world. Including the US, which hasn’t had a genuinely conservative administration since Reagan.
All these former 60s protesters can’t get over the fact that THEY ARE IN POWER. They are the willing mouthpieces and propagandists for the most powerful people in the world.
The consensus sees uncertainty and dissent as problematic because the powerful always see dissent as a problem. They are not the poor, under funded independent voices of reason trying to get through to the awful overlords of government. They are the means by which those governments are seeking to consolidate, and increase, their power over their subjects.
It would be laughable, if it weren’t so sad.
And on another point, what is this business about “trying” to “arrive” at a consensus?
When was there not a consensus among government funded scientists regarding globalclimatewarming change.
When was there a debate among “climate scientists” about the need to centrally plan the energy economy?
When were the papers that argued against CAGW published. and by whom?
To these simple eyes, the “consensus” was born as a fully grown, ravenous adult, when Hansen monkeyed with the thermostat in the congressional hearing room in 1988.
Are we really going to pretend that there has been some careful, considered “critical analysis” of the various legs of the CAGW chair? Paleo-climate, climate models, temperature series, attirbution studies, that resulted in the current “consensus?”
When did that debate happen?
Just in:
Just out:
http://msgboard.snopes.com/politics/graphics/uniform.jpg
Holy false dichotomy, Batman!
You made me do it:
http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/post/34535861355
practice charity.
ah nevermind, you have no idea how that works
It would be a false dichotomy if the subject said that there were only two competing conceptions. Absent that claim, you don’t have a false dichotomy.
You have an observation that there are two conceptions ( there could be more) of science that are in competition here. Not exactly a fallacy. Not a false dilemma.
Joshua, you need to work a little harder at understanding your opponent.
Of course hit and run is fun. I know. I do it. But you might consider adding other tools to your bag of bias.
Joshua,
Reading whole paragraphs is a good tool to add.
See for instance, with our emphasis:
Arguably, two opposing views might not be strictly incompatible. But opposing views are usually seen as, well, opposite.
Moshpit’s right: absent the expression we just emphasized, there would be no dilemma. Notice how he never precluded the possibility that there was none. Just that you have not shown it. You hit and run.
Not enough charity, perhaps.
“The debate surrounding the consensus on climate change is complicated by the complexity of both the scientific and the associated sociopolitical issues. Underlying this debate is a fundamental tension between two competing conceptions of scientific inquiry: the consensual view of science versus the dissension view. Under the consensual approach, the goal of science is a consensus of rational opinion over the widest possible field. The opposing view of science is that of dissension, whereby scientific progress occurs via subversion of consensus in favor of new experiments, ideas and theories. The third view of science, questions the entire notion of scientific progress”
Why does this moshpit altered paragraph make sense?
Well, it makes sense because the writer hasnt asserted, as one does in a false dichotomy, that there are only two alternatives. Typically, false dichotomy functions by saying There are two choices A or B. B is illogical for the following reasons. Therefore A. That is the structure of an argument from false dichotomy. Im a sophist, trust me.
I actually think Judith has it wrong. I dont think there are two notions of science underlying the debate. There are two characterizations of science used in the debate.. broadly speaking myths we have about actual science behavior. They are stories we tell ourselves and each other about science upon reflection to win arguments. For the most part when people are doing science, they are just doing it.
Steven Mosher said:
“There are two characterizations of science used in the debate.. broadly speaking myths we have about actual science behavior. They are stories we tell ourselves and each other about science upon reflection to win arguments. For the most part when people are doing science, they are just doing it.”
The most honest comment about science I have seen for months. Period. Thank you.
Moshpit,
I mostly agree with your characterization of science.
Quite frankly, I could not care less to parse Judy’s post furthermore. Joshua obviously should have meant dichotomy simpliciter , and not false dilemma. There’s no such thing as a true dichotomy.
In any case, if Joshua ever wanted to formulate a constructive criticism to Judy, he could have taken a different stance than the one he did. His despair of conversing with Judy is arguably justified.
***
Nevertheless, you have to admit that:
> Holy false dichotomy, Batman!
was funny. I don’t think it’s my youngest spends half of his awaken hours dressed in Batman (he even mimicks his somber, tragic gaze) alone explains why I still find it funny.
In fact, it’s more than funny. Please recall that Robin’s biggest talent was to invent such superlative:
http://popwatch.ew.com/2009/12/28/holy-batman/
This has the potential to become a very amusing meme machine.
Holy Copycats, Batman!
I have grandchildren too old to be wearing batman costumes.
I watched the original b/w broadcasts of Batman and was old enough at the time to think it was pretty stupid. I watched mostly because we only had two channels. The “Holy Whatever, Batman!” line was an instant classic however.
I never liked comic books much either vastly preferring Reader’s Digest in pre-teen years. I’m Am Joe’s Fond Memories.
Springer –
I never read your post. You’re actually not the center of the universe.
Once again, you draw a mistaken conclusion based on insufficient evidence.You really have a habit of doing that, don’t you?
Yeah sure you didn’t read it. You go ahead and keep on telling yourself that if it makes you feel better, coward.
ya the comment was funny.
Yes Joshua is frustrated in his attempts to have a dialog with Judith.
I put that down to his unreflective use of appeals to “motivated reasoning”
One thing is clear. To establish, via test, that human perception and cognition is subject to bias from motivational structures, presupposes a position outside these influences to even set up the test. That is, we have to posit that there is a point of view free of bias to establish that there is bias. This is fundamental for example in constructing a test where two tribes watch the same play and judge the rightness or wrongness of a particular call. Somebody has to pick the test material.
Why does this matter? It matters because underlying the science of bias, is the tacit assumption that there is a bias free viewpoint.
In all of Joshua’s interactions with Judith he never grants her the benefit of the doubt. He never works from the assumption that she might actually be in possession of a relatively bias free viewpoint, or a view point where she has made a diligent effort to control for her bias.
The attribution of bias to a partner in dialogue is often justified. But ordinarily we justify it after granting the other side the benefit of the doubt and excluding all other possible explanations for why they hold the position they do. After I have exhausted all other explanations, for lets say, Dave Springer’s unwillingness to reason together, I might explain it to myself in terms of his bias or his motivated reasoning. This is an explanation for his behavior not a statement of fact. That explanation would give me reason not to discuss things with him anymore.
But if I start my dialogue with Judith or anyone else, expecting them to be biased by their motivations, I get no where. It colors every response even the responses to the charges of bias. I hold out the explanation of bias as a consequence of my interaction not as a pre requisite. To be sure, if you expect to find bias, you will most assuredly find it.
steven –
Even if that were true, and I don’t think that it is, my contention with Judith and others is that her (and their) arguments are based on an assertion of a “vast asymmetry” in either the degree of bias or the impact of bias on the different sides of the debate. Such an assertion might be valid, but to be stated as a viable conclusion the assertion needs to be backed up with verified evidence. Such validation is lacking.
If you want to engage in a discussion with me about the impact of motivated reasoning, then we should do so in the appropriate context. It’s all well and fine for you to throw down some criticism without grounding it in something that I’ve actually said – but we won’t get very far if you continue in such a vague manner.
Let’s look back to what I said in this particular thread that relates to the notion of motivational reasoning:
Judith first wrote a post basically misrepresenting Kahan’s study of motivated reasoning in the climate debate by focusing not on the significant findings (that more expertise tends to propel people further down the path of their original orientation) but on the insignificant findings (that “skeptics” tend to be more science or math-literate – as imperfect as that measure was in their study).
And then she went on to dismiss the notion of the influence of motivational reasoning as an influence on “skepticism” without any scientifically or evidence-based analysis to back up her argument.
And now she has gone on to selectively comment on the the influence of “confirmation bias” (a related concept) on the “consensus” viewpoint on climate science, again without any scientific approach to validating her argument. If she takes the notion of confirmation bias seriously it is illogical for her to dismiss the influence of motivate reasoning, and even more invalid for her to so consistently note a substantial influence of those factors when discussing the opinions of those she disagrees with. Anyone who takes motivated reasoning or confirmation bias seriously has to acknowledge the universality of those influences in how we reason – unless they can prove in some way some asymmetry both from a theoretical standpoint as well as in an evidential standpoint.
So maybe instead of focusing the argument on me personally, you might engage with the argument that I’m presenting. I know that you’re very loyal to Judith and apparently therefore think that I should grant her some special dispensation that I wouldn’t grant anyone else. That doesn’t work for me, however, because I am a skeptic.
IMO, it isn’t a matter of granting anyone the “benefit of a doubt.” I am asking Judith to address, with some level of seriousness, the flaws I see in her reasoning.
I don’t think that anyone has a “bias-free viewpoint.” That is why I am a skeptic. I think it is theoretically possible but not likely and certainly not frequent. But regardless, whether or not I grant anyone the benefit of the doubt w/r/t having a “bias-free viewpoint” is not germane to the validity of Judith’s arguments. The validity of her arguments stands outside of my perspective on her arguments, whether my perspective is the product of my biases or not.
So if you really want to stick up for her, do so by adding validating data or evidence to her arguments. Explain, for example, why it is valid for her to focus so selectively on the influence of confirmation bias on the “consensus” viewpoint, even as she specifically considers the question of the related phenomenon of motivated reasoning affecting the arguments of “skeptics” to be only so much bulls–t?
Sorry for taking a break to prepare my house for Sandy. Please excuse, but this if the first break I’ve had in two days.
I say it’s a false dichotomy because the caricatures that Judith creates don’t exist in reality in any significant sense. She creates straw man caricatures of “consensus” and then knocks them down, and she creates idealized pictures of “the dissension” view so she doesn’t have to consider the flaws of many “skeptics.”
Hi joshua
hope you and your family stay safe during the storm. unfortunate that it seems to be coinciding with a very high tide.
tonyb
Attaboy Joshua! Ride that storm!
Best of luck to ya. If you drown I hope a tree knocks you unconscious first so you don’t suffer much. That’s about as much charity as I can dredge up for you. Sorry, you’re just way too big of a putz for sympathy. It’s like wishing a child molester gets a fair trial. You know it’s the thing to wish for but you really wish the other inmates in the prison gut him like a fish.
thanks, tony.
Not to jinx anything, but thus far it’s not too bad at my house – power not out (lights flickered a couple of times), not much water in the basement – just a minor leak, no trees down yet, although I’ve got some huge ones and they’re whipping around like crazy. Winds are just reaching their peak now (gusts up to 65 mph) and should be there ’till about 4-5:00 AM. We aren’t expecting that much more rain. Even if I lose the power to run my pumps, and the ground gets saturated, I have hope that I won’t have more than 4′ or 5 ” in water in my basement. That much or less I can handle w/o too much trouble. I may come through this in much better shape than last year’s storm “Irene.”
Here’s the best way to get the picture:
http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lat=40.03354&lon=-75.1749671&unit=0&lg=english&FcstType=graphical
My partner’s parent’s house in Northern Jersey just got hit by a tree that broke through the bedroom wall – sounds pretty major, they’re getting up in years and not in great health but they have two children that live nearby so they’ll be OK although their house isn’t.
Looks like NY and other coastal areas are getting slammed pretty bad. Just heard that cars are floating around in the East Village. This is one storm that may just come close to living up to the hype.
Wow! Gusts in NYC up to 80 mph.
The economic cost of this storm should be substantial. Interesting to watch federal government haters like Christie singing a different tune asking for fed help. Let’s hope that Romney, if he gets elected, doesn’t maintain his ant-FEMA policies (of course, he has changed on virtually all his other stances so he may well do so on that issue also).
Joshua,
Are you denying that the CAGW crowd are not continually telling us that there is a consensus of scientists that CAGW is real and the consequences are likely to be serious bla bla bla fill in the dots – e.g. a real threat to all we have and even to life on Earth.
Are you denying that climate scientists don’t repeatedly state there is a consensus of climate scientist who believe the climate scientists (or however you want to say it)?
Peter
No.
“because the caricatures that Judith creates don’t exist in reality in any significant sense” – Joshua.
My thoughts exactly – Judith is shadow-boxing with caricatures.
This being the case, what kind of caricatures do you think you two most resemble Michael?
Joshua
I see David Springer is very concerned for your safety as well….
Let us know how you get on and the situation with your parents house. All the best
Tonyb
Your “partner”. Well that explains the misogyny. I suspected as much.
Here’s a clue for you. Christie has an obligation to request federal money because the citizens of New Jersey have already paid for the aid. It’s the only way they can get part of the their money back and they deserve to get it back. The problem is bureaucrats in Washington take a cut of the money for doing nothing so the states don’t get back what they put in after they pay the salaries, perks, and generous retirement plans of the federal employees who manage the funds. Federalists like me believe it’s better to let states determine how they want to tax and spend their own citizen’s money. It’s called state’s rights and is spelled out in the US constitution’s Bill of Rights where it says The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Write that down.
Springer –
Getting you to jump through hoops is like playing with a well-trained seal.Throw you a little cyber-fish and you jump through right on command.
I usually use the term girlfriend but in this case used partner because knew that you’d go a jumping, and formulate yet another conclusion with insufficient evidence.
It seems that you are inexhaustible. Don’t you ever get tired of proving my point for me?
Actually, I wrote my comment above (7:37) before I saw the 6:01 comment from you and the follow-on exchange with willard. I think that between the two of you, you have covered the points I was trying to address.
Warmist Stephan Lewandowsky resurfaces: Now he writes an unreviewed blog post suggesting that we shouldn’t trust unreviewed blog posts
It also explains why climate deniers expend considerable effort to negate the existence of that consensus, using the usual array of deceptive techniques such as pseudo-experts, or pointing to unreviewed blog-posts as “evidence” for their contrarian positions.
http://tomnelson.blogspot.ca/2012/10/warmist-stephan-lewandowsky-resurfaces.html
Hilarious :)
Brant,
Laughter is good for the soul.
I agree that Lew’s post is un-pier-reviewed. That said, I’m not sure if this matters much:
> There are a number of interesting aspects to the results, and I am highlighting three that I find particularly noteworthy or intriguing.
Lew’s post is more a shoutout than a commentary.
willard,
Interesting that you seem to have such a canny sense of “Lew’s” state of mind together with an unexpected, stand-up, stick-up-for-Lew!, quck-draw reflex . Hmmm…
So, willard, just thinking out loud:
-Lew is perhaps some sort of gee-we-sure-had-some-real-blow-out-wild-and-crazy-grab-ass-good-times-together-in-that-can’t-get-a-date-leper-colony-dork-pit-fraternity-of-ours!–didn’t-we? good-buddy of yours for whom you’ve retained an enduring, frat-rat, palsy-walsy regard? Warm?
-Or, alternatively, Lew is perhaps a doofus-screw-up, idiot brother-in-law of yours whom you grudgingly help out as the need arises for the sake of your poor sister who, against everyone’s advice and warnings, married the moronic bozo anyway? Warmer?
-Or, just possibly, Lew and you, willard, are Siamese twins? Warmist?
mike,
Thank you for the kind words and the intriguing conjecture.
Perhaps there’s a simpler explanation. Basic familiarity with reporting might suffice to understand of what Lew does in that post.
Have you read it yourself?
see willard practice charity. he does so selectively.
see Moshpit targets me. he has little else.
Douchebag vs. Douchebag
Very fine entainment. Gentlemen my hat is off to you.
And Springer makes it a “ménage à twat”
And Howard…?
I actually like the principle of charity. I like when you practice it. I’m amused when you don’t. Think of this as an object lesson. on any given day I can come to a willard comment and chances are he is not practicing what he promotes
How is this this related to the topic at hand.
Its simple … come on..
My own charity is not related to brent’s comment.
Something else might be at work here.
Arguably something quite threatening.
willard,
Yr: “Arguably something quite threatening.”
You know, willard, your comments often leave me with the slightly eerie and uncomfortable feeling that I’m dealing, in you, with some sort of Krell-like, higher intelligence and that us useless-eater denier-helots on this blog are like your lab-rat equivalents in some one or another of your Ascended-Master, Philosopher-King experiments and that fan is like your “Igor”-inspired, really-creepy, cyborg-gofer, lab-assistant creation and that lolwot is, like, your Robbie-the-Retard-Robot, private-joke sidekick.
And, in that regard, I somehow can’t shake the further feeling that more often than not your comments have no rational content but are intentionally obscure, provocative, and equivocal nonsense. Almost, even, as if your comments might be, like, you know, a bunch of super-sophisticated, mind-freaking, verbal-Rorschach-ink-blot-like, zinger-assaults on the very sanity of us tacky, un-illuminated, anti-science Morlocks who think Michael Mann is a litigious, pudge-muffin, Mr. Smarty-Pants crybaby and that he has recently made a complete, Nobel-laureate-wannabe, freak-show fool of himself to our immense, vulgar-peasant hyper-amusement.
But my sense of the matter might be misguided, I realize.
I see nothing threatening at play willard.
What I see is simple.
I see a reader over reading Dr. Lew’s post.
I see you point that out and give a good alternative reading. It’s just a shout out.
I think your observation is apt wrt dr. Loo.
I note that you rarely take this charitable approach to others.
That is all.
I didn’t nickname him Creepy Willard for nothing, pal.
Moshpit,
Fair enough.
I dig that you’re on that charity mission and
will take the point, because it’s an ideal that has value.
Please do not mistake mischievousness for unkindness.
I try to keep my doodles sanguine and constructive,
(a combination which seems to mesmerize mike)
if only because I agree with The Benshi:
> [B]ut who wants to read through all the off-topic dreck and frequent belligerence.
http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/post/1204304526
Enough of me for the evening
And in fact for a while: my neverending audit
nears its end: 3333 posts
ought to be enough.
Too much to do, so little time.
Science is corrupt.
Yup.
PS: I hope Bart R will tag me at Judy’s after my “David Rose Lies on the Mat” serie.
Howard | October 29, 2012 at 12:37 pm |
“And Springer makes it a “ménage à twat””
Props where props are due I always say.
+1
So on your planet “never” comes along in about three years?
http://wayback.archive.org/web/*/http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com
http://web.archive.org/web/20100114142333/http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/
The first time neverendingaudit was crawled (1-14-2010) there are ten quotes on the page. Three of those quotes belong to Mosher.
Is there bromance in the air or is this yet another sad tale of unrequited love?
Tune in next Monday to “Two and a Half Douchbags” to find out!
.
David,
Here’s a nice story for you (I hope Tom pays attention):
> While living at Walden, a visitor one day asked Henry David Thoreau did he read the story in the paper about the man in Concord who committed suicide. “I don’t need to read the story”, he answered, “I understand the principle.”
http://www.theawl.com/2012/06/how-silence-works-trappist-monks
Replace “suicide” with “character assassination”, and you get what I believe is the main game being played, including here.
(And no, Mosphit, there is no double standard: my tumblog never had the intention, nor the impact, nor the weaponry. It’s only a computer model, so to speak.)
You could say that it took me three more years than that other David.
There is also this quote I stumbled upon recently, by a guy who wrote many other things than twisted Oliver’s **1984**:
> Revenge is an act which you want to commit when you are powerless and because you are powerless: as soon as the sense of impotence is removed, the desire evaporates also.
http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/post/34541152967
I hope one day you’ll realize what it is to live without this sense of impotence.
Due diligence,
w
I hope someday you can learn to not take yourself so seriously.
A more plausible possibility, David, would be my need to stay in character, who is both terse and turgid; for whom language is a social art, and for whom style matters, a value that has currency on the Internet, a process that approximates eternity.
mike | October 29, 2012 at 5:29 pm |
willard,
Yr: “Arguably something quite threatening.”
You know, willard, your comments often leave me with the slightly eerie and uncomfortable feeling that I’m dealing, in you, with some sort of Krell-like
…..
Awesome. It gets better every time I read it.
I’m sticking with my initial assessment that your “character” is that of being not wrapped too tight. But whatever. I don’t pretend to understand the mentally unbalanced. I just try to avoid them which I was doing quite well in your case until you decided you needed to focus your attention on me. That was a mistake on your part.
Springer,
I believe that you’re the one Standing so close to me. And when I say “I believe”, that means I could document it. Please look up “Archivist” in the Flame Warriors roster.
And now you’re denying dropping off the glove first. I offered a fair warning and you still wanted to instigate a brawl. I tried my best to stay gentle while threading on you, as the poet implored.
Don’t you think you’ve had enough? There’s nothing in it for me. At least Peter Davies enjoyed it.
You’re not a Big Dog, and perhaps never will. The best you could target is to become an affectionate troglodyte. Please mind your manners. Just a bit.
Goodbye,
w
mike,
When I was talking about something “threatening”, I was alluding to a pinteresque comedy of menace:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comedy_of_menace
Sorry for the misunderstanding.
Yeah, that’s it: the Auatralian/American Chemical Society of India Pale Ale Guzzlers deserve so much respect for endorsing modern trends in the use of pseudo-science in the Western world to forward the socio-political goals of the Left and the Governmental-Education Complex.
brent | October 28, 2012 at 9:38 pm said: ”It also explains why climate deniers expend considerable effort to negate the existence of that consensus.
Brent, if somebody ”denies” that climate is changing; he needs a shrink! Big / small / localized / global climatic changes are constant. Climate never stopped changing for one day in 4 billion years =========== Confusing climatic changes with the phony GLOBAL warmings – is the root of the crime. ”Denying” GLOBAL warmings is one thing; – because they are concocted lies, ”denying climatic changes is the sick / expensive / ignorant / destructive joke.
Warmist branded the nutters as: ”Climate Change Deniers”. to show to the world that, they are a common sense deficient loonies. Same as branding somebody a ”denier” that the moon is spinning around the earth – because those loonies cannot distinguish between ”the universe spinning around the earth”, from ”the moon is spinning around the earth”. Can you get it? one is real, the other is not;
http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/climate/
brent | October 28, 2012 at 9:38 pm | Reply
After fixing that for Big Lew I agree completely!
Throw in pal reviewed journals, liberal media, and old Europe too then me and Big Lew will have reached a consensus.
Interesting, Judith, that only seem to think that confirmation bias only affects the IPCC. Also interesting that you think that motivated reasoning doesn’t pass at est ofyour BS meter, but that here you talk about confirmation bias.
When will you ever stop being so selective in how you apply criteria, Judith?
This is even less coherent than usual, anonymous Joshua; too much Sunday dinner wine, perhaps? It is, however, consistent with your unrelenting animus against Judith. But honestly, man – if that’s what you are – do you have nothing more to contribute?
have you stopped beating your wife. practice charity Joshua. Show us you understand Judiths perspective.
More like has he stopped beating his dead hobby horse. Joshua chooses not to understand her perspective… it is a concerted effort on his part. If he chose to understand her perspective, he would lose out on beating his hobby horse to death again.
Joshua, when did you stop beating your wife? If you wonder why I would ask, re-read your post!
I Am Joe’s Misogynistic Anonymous Coward
– – – – – – – – –
Judith Curry,
Your ‘readers digest’ version still was ‘over-verbiaged’ to the detriment of inhibiting clear understanding.
That said, I philosophically like very much the thrust of your research that seems to find that the only real approach that an open and free society will ever voluntarily accept is an open and transparent pursuit of and debate on the totality diverse inclusion of all the climate science community.
Thanks for your efforts to bring debate and openly transparent science out.
John
John, if you’re going to chide Judith for her prose, why say
“…to the detriment of inhibiting clear understanding.”
when you could have said
“…to the detriment of its clarity.”? – which would have been both grammatically correct, less verbose and, um, clear?
And what on earth does “…transparent pursuit of and debate on the totality diverse inclusion of all the climate science community.” mean?
eeesh…
tomf0p,
You are correct. My wording / grammar was goofy as is sometimes the case. I knew it two seconds after pressing the comment submit button. Should have corrected it. The US baseball world series game 4 distraction was not an excuse. : )
No disrespect to Judith meant by my lax prose.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we all had a person proofreading before we send?
John
Judith Curry,
Your ‘readers digest’ version still was ‘over-verbiaged’ which I think inhibits clear understanding.
That said, I philosophically like very much the thrust of your research. You seem to say that the only real approach that an open and free society will ever voluntarily accept is a vigorously open and transparent climate science process that includes of all the climate science community.
Thanks for your efforts to champion both the debate and more openly transparent climate science.
John
NOTE: That comment is a revised version of a previous comment @ October 28, 2012 at 9:41 pm . The revision is based on editorial like comments by tomf0p @ October 29, 2012 at 1:39 am. Thanks tomf0p!
John
The manufactured consensus of the IPCC has had the unintended consequences of distorting the science.
The IPCC climate science was distorted by smoothing out the multidecadal oscillation in global mean temperature before 1970 and claiming the warming phase of the multidecadal oscillation after 1970 is man-made as shown.
http://bit.ly/OaemsT
This is the hockey stick for the climate of the 20th century. Before 1970, the multi-model mean represented the secular GMST. However, after 1970 the multi-model mean represented the warming phase of the multidecadal oscillation. The handle of the hockey stick is the secular GMST before 1970. The blade of the hockey stick is the warming phase of the multidecadal oscillation since 1970.
This distortion allowed to exaggerate the climate sensitivity by the ratio of the trends after and before 1970 by 0.2/0.06 = 3.3, which gives true climate sensitivity of 3/3.33 = 0.9 deg C for doubling of CO2.
This is distortion of science.
Reproduceable results to testable hypotheses.
That is all.
“Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century” WOW!
should state: ”most of the IMAGINED increase in global average temperature”
1] nobody knows what is ”the average temperature” One cannot compare one unknown with another unknown. Nobody knows what was last year’s temp; how can one know what was the WHOLE GLOBAL temp 60y ago?
IPCC shouldn’t be blamed – demand controls supply of bullshine. 1] Without knowing what’s the temp on the WHOLE planet – but calling it GLOBAL; temperature, should be enough proof of dishonesty. 2] monitoring on few places, B] only the hottest minute, but ignoring the other 1439 minutes = prove of the scam. 3] the monitoring places are NOT evenly distributed; if between two monitoring places is 100km, and temp goes up by 2C, but between next two monitoring places distance is 1500km, and temp goes down by 0,5C -> statistic would show increase in temperature; even though is decreasing. 4] the S/H has less than 25% of the monitoring places – N/H 75% … what a science… what a scam… 5] thermometer can monitor room temp, but one thermometer for 50000km2… what a sick joke…Unless the two hurdles are crossed = the whole conspiracy is the biggest crime ever::: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/unavoidable-two-hurdles-to-cross/ .
THE TRUTH ALWAYS WINS ON THE END
Judith,
The use of ‘denier’ to label anyone who disagrees with the IPCC consensus on attribution leads to concerns being raised about the IPCC being enforced as dogma, which is tied to how dissent is dealt with.
I’m just wondering if you’ve ever discussed this with Prof Lindzen whenever you’ve been discussing tactics in your Republican climate team?
He likes the term ‘denier’. He prefers it to ‘sceptic’. Listen to just after 9:30 on:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p009yfwl/One_Planet_Climate_change_pot_plants_and_small_frogs/
When you are losing on the science just go below the belt. Sad. Really sad. On the other hand a tried and tested tactic to divert attention from losing the intellectual battle.
dennis adams,
??
Was this meant as a reply to the above or did you post this here by mistake?
Dang, should I read Judith’s short paper first or the centralising-government style 320-Page White Paper on “Australia in the Asian Century.” Mmm, hard choice …
Faustino,
I reckon I may be able to help you with that choice. Here is a short article on the 320-Page White Paper on “Australia in the Asian Century.” http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/in-depth/meaningless-promises-replete-with-pure-spin/story-fng5k1ek-1226504883718 . Once you’ve read it I reckon you will focus on Judith’s paper instead.
It is behind a paywall so I hope it is acceptable to post it in full. The connection to this thread is that it shows how spin is being used to win elections instead of focusing on good policy –climate change politics is also being spun and used for political advantage.
Yes, Peter, I’d read Sheridan’s take on it.
Pater, a Peter Smith in Quadrant suggested that “A simple rule for governments to follow is to make it as easy as possible for businesses to produce things that other businesses or people will be prepared to pay their hard-earned cash to buy. All economic policies should be measured against this “good economics” benchmark.” The White Paper eschews this advice.
Faustino,
I expect the latest government White Paper on Asia integration does make many apparently sensible statements like the one you mentioned.
However, there is a big difference between including such statements in a ‘White Paper” and demonstrating by their actions they believe and are genuinely committed to such polices.
It is very easy to take pieces of good advice and dress them up in spin and call them a policy. However, I find it hard to trust them given the history of the White Papers produced by this government so far? They are basically ‘spin’ documents. Here are two examples:
First, the Government’s white paper on Energy assumes 75% of Australia’s electricity will be generated by technologies that do not currently exist or are unlikely to be viable in the foreseeable future.
Second, the Government produced a white paper on Australia’s Defence in 2009. It was well regarded. It committed to 3% pa real growth in defence spending for several decades. It was for new submarines, ships, aircraft, army, electronic weapons, communications and interoperability with our allies. However, in the 2012 budget the government made massive cuts to the Defence budget and back tracked on everything. It cut back Australia’s Defence budget as a proportion of GDP to levels it was at in 1938, before the start of WWII (when everyone believed in peace and pacifism). The government used the money it extracted from Defence budget to hand out as welfare payments and bribes to like the carbon tax.
Given all this, and given that every government in trouble tries to sdistract the electorate by rolling out a new vision for our integration with Asia, I can’t see the value in spending time on this 320 page document of what will inevitable be pure spin and just a rehash of all the previous White Papers on integration with Asia, or whatever they are called.
JC,
I like this readers digest. Its great.
‘Yes’ to that.
And ‘Yes’ to that too.
Next steps:
IPCC AR4 be totally open and honest – admit to their BS and confess all their past sins! :)
Royal Society, and all the various Academy of Sciences dump their policies advocating CAGW and confess their sins
Australian Government – dump the Carbon Tax and ETS and dump their wasteful and economy damaging policies of subsidising renewable energy and mandating it so consumers have to subsidise it (by tow to ten times the cost of conventional power.
Australian governments and local governments – dump their policies that have seriously damaged people’s wealth but virtually making their houses worthless in places where the local council has proclaimed projected sea level rises preclude development, and effectively preclude sale of their houses – in many cases they are their life’s savings.
Peter,
Even the readers digest “Rather than choosing an optimal policy based on a scientific consensus, decision makers can design robust and flexible policy strategies that account for uncertainty, ignorance and dissent.” is a loaded statement. It presumes a (pro-AGW?) consensus from which there is dissent. Surely the position we want is that of no consensus whatsoever, so an open scientific debate and continued discovery can be conducted.
Ilma,
Yes, I take your point. My opening sentence should have said:
“I like this readers digest format. It’s great.”
While agreeing with you on that specific point, I do believe the author should be given a great deal of credit for her ability to communicate with many climate scientists and for highlighting the consequences of the consensus approach on climate science and the effect it is having on the policy debate. Judith has been doing this. She should be given credit and support.
I agree with this part of Judith’s statement you quoted:
“decision makers can design robust and flexible policy strategies that account for uncertainty, ignorance and dissent.”
Judith is doing a good job of making scientists aware that the policy prescriptions many of them and IPCC have been advocating are not appropriate.
If AR5 is less biased towards promoting economically irrational and impractical policies than AR4 was, Judith should be given credit for her role in such change. We can only hope. In the meantime we can keep supporting progress towards better policies.
The BASICs of denialism?
Declare Variables (something is happening) .etc……
10 (Nothing is happening) IS TRUE
20 IF (Something is happening) IS TRUE, THEN (but it’s natural) IS TRUE
30 IF (Something unnatural is happenening) is TRUE, THEN (but it’s good) IS TRUE
40 IF (Something bad was happening) IS TRUE, AND T > 1998 THEN (Something Bad is no longer happening) IS TRUE
45 IF (something bad is happening) IS TRUE, THEN (Who cares about polar bears anyway) IS TRUE
50 IF (Something bad is happening) IS TRUE, THEN Remedial Cost >> Affordable Cost
60 On ERROR ((Something bad) could be happening or not happening) [REM SYNTAX uncertainty] GOTO 10
Judith: Off-topic, but I would be interested in hearing about the reliability of predictions that Sandy is about to make a sharp turn to the west and make landfall at an unprecedented manner (perpendicular to the New Jersey coast, perhaps 30 miles inland from where I live.) A day later it is projected to turn north and return to its previous course. In the mid-Atlantic region we usually experience fairly straight northerly tracks that bend towards the east that seem very different from those in the tropics. Are the forces that steer hurricanes this far north the same as in the tropics? The predicted course changes are attributed to a major front moving in from the west, a phenomena that may not be common in the Gulf or Caribbean.
Frank, my company CFAN makes hurricane predictions. We predicted the formation of Sandy on Oct 16 and have pretty much had the correct track since Oct 23. We have been conducting briefings for the energy/power sector (our main clients). We have also been predicting the large size and large storm surge for the past week. This storm has been pretty predictable. The track has now started its turn. The track is driven by the atmospheric circulation patterns, so once the storm makes it to the higher latitudes, it is subject the whims of the midlatitude weather patterns. We also do see fronts affecting the Gulf storm; a classic example this past year was Debby, which originally looked like it would track into the Gulf, but then turned right across Florida.
It is difficult to avoid concluding that the IPCC consensus is manufactured and that the existence of this consensus does not lend intellectual substance to their conclusions.
Insiders evidence for the above statment:
First let me say that in general, as my own opinion, I feel rather unconfortable about using not only unpublished but also un reviewed material as the backbone of our conclusions (or any conclusions).
I realize that chapter 9 is including SRES stuff, and thus we can and need to do that too, but the fact is that in doing so the rules of IPCC have been softened to the point that in this way the IPCC is not any more an assessment of published science (which is its proclaimed goal) but production of results.
The softened condition that the models themself have to be published does not even apply because the Japanese model for example is very different from the published one which gave results not even close to the actual outlier version (in the old dataset the CCC model was the outlier).
Essentially, I feel that at this point there are very little rules and almost anything goes. I think this will set a dangerous precedent which might mine the IPCC credibility, and I am a bit uncomfortable that now nearly everybody seems to think that it is just ok to do this. Anyways, this is only my opinion for what it is worth.
http://bit.ly/ultFkQ
well, i don’t agree with the fact that the earth orbits the sun , i d better say a frame centered on the sun makes the desctiption of motion of the planets more simple, then, the eath orbits the sun… for any terrestrial inahbitant, it is obvious the sun orbits the earth!
And well please prove me that sun orbits the earth is more false(!) then earth orbits the earth!
The annual stellar paralax is the evidence.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_parallax
Sorry but I think you are all crazy, scientists and all .. arguing about consensus, we should put it in the hand of businessmen and we’ll get something done, instead of petulant arguing. Don’t you believe the data are you blind, have you lost your minds ? even civil engineers and risk management have accepted AGW. Its a fact accept it get over it… You think scientists are special or something ..get real
We are cooling, Bob; for how long even kim doesn’t know.
===============
Bob,
The reinsurance industry is making billions off of high storm loss premiums. They also fund the studies that justify the rates. For starters.
Shallow declarations like ‘you are all crazy’ are just a lazy guy’s way toignore the evidence.
Hunter
If an insurance company was actually making the sums that you suggest, then another insurance company would offer insurance at a slightly lower cost and increase their market share.
Two economists are standing on the street together, and one of them sees a $20 bill in the gutter. He says, “I’m going to go get that $20 bill lying in the gutter.” The other economist says, “That can’t be a real $20 bill. Someone would have already picked it up.”
Denial functions to protect the ego from things that the individual cannot cope with. While this may save us from anxiety or pain, denial also requires a substantial investment of energy. Because of this, other defenses are also used to keep these unacceptable feelings from consciousness. We know that climate change is hard to accept because it is complex, long drawn out, challenging to our world views and without a clear external enemy.
Are you denying all climate change but anthropogenic climate change?
================
Bob’s comment rests on observations of anthropogenic change that are quite anti-climatic.
Bob,
I would suggest you are deomonstrating ego protection rather well.
denial also functions to keep your hand out of my wallet.
Now, perhaps we should discuss AGW in terms of anxiety disorder.
Psychologizing ones opponents is a stupid pet trick. bad dog.
Bob, you get to win every argument you have if you get to give both sides. Moreover claiming people who don’t agree with you are somehow en masse mentally defective smacks of fanatacism of the first order.
You clearly have no idea what “deniers” are denying. It most certainly isn’t climate change, in fact if anyone is denying climate change in this debate it’s those who seem to believe that it has never happened before and therefore must be unnatural and caused by evil humans.
There probably isn’t a sceptic alive who denies climate change, yet you pontificate on their mental state in being in denial of climate change.
The argument isn’t about whether humans cause the climate to change it’s about how much they cause it to change and whether it will be catastrophic when it does. My own position is that we have no convincing proof that the rise in temperature at the end of the 20th century was caused mostly by human emissions. But even if it was we are looking at a rise of 1C for 560ppm.
In any event, I don’t believe that CO2 output will be reduced anytime soon because out here on planet earth we have India, China, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa pulling millions of people out of abject policy and they’re not going to cut back on emissions on the basis of catastrophic doom-laden forecast when their lives are already worse than the forecasts.
As for the “prophecies and prophets” (all religions have them), Let’s see what they say about their abilitiy to forecast the future:
“In sum, a strategy must recognise what is possible. In climate research and modelling, we should recognise that we are dealing with a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore that the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible.”
IPCC Working Group I: The Scientific Basis, Third Assessment Report (TAR), Chapter 14 (final para., 14.2.2.2), p774. (h/t JunkScience).
There you are in their own words, they cannot predict the future and you tell us that anyone who doesn’t believe this is mentally ill.
Please don’t overstate your case. Plenty of skeptics at least doubt, and surely some deny, that climate change is presently happening–and some do so for good (if not thoroughly sufficient) reasons. At this point, there are sufficient reasons to question the quality and integrity of the underlying temperature data to at least remain agnostic on what we have observed. Furthermore, what we have observed is insufficient to convincingly prove much of anything about “global average temperature.” Investigation of ocean heat content will greatly improve our knowledge and understanding, I expect, but the other side of that coin is a confession that there is room to greatly improve them.
Modes of Denialism in Climate-Change Risk Assessment
Abstract Neglect of the existing scientific literature relating to the evolution of scientific consensus is a pernicious mode of climate-change denialism.
—————–
Background A PUBMED search for scientific review articles containing the keywords “consensus” and “smoking” finds 217 examples.
Example Exemplary of this consensus-related literature is the “wicked, messy” scientific problem of tobacco addiction:
Conclusion The “wicked messy” problems associated to scientific consensus in regard to tobacco addiction evidences striking parallels with the “wicked messy” problems of scientific consensus in regard to climate-change.
Evaluation The article Curry-Webster analysis “Climate change: no consensus on consensus” (2012) is inexplicably derelict in its assessment of the existing consensus-related literature, and for this reason the Curry-Webster analysis is an insubstantial contribution to the climate-change debate.
————
Comment The preceding is a tough criticism of Curry-Webster (2012), yet hey … the Curry-Webster neglect of the scientific literature is plain-as-day, eh? :shock: :eek: :oops: :?: :!:
“The preceding is a tough criticism of Curry-Webster (2012), yet hey … the Curry-Webster neglect of the scientific literature is plain-as-day, eh? ” –
Sadly, yes.
Well frankly you put forward a very weak argument. My paper is on the philosophy and sociology of science, not on the agreements made by medical doctors on treatment procedures, which is what virtually all of these papers refer to. In medical treatments, consensus represents negotiated agreement on the best available treatment, with many replicable examples related to the effectiveness of the treatment.
Trying to make an analogy between medical treatments and the science and policy associated with a very complex wicked problem, fraught with disagreement, large uncertainties and substantial areas of ignorance, well frankly it is not useful or illuminating particularly with regards to the science.
In any event, my argument stands alone based upon logic, it does not require published research from the medical field as ‘evidence’
Your opions are novel, Judith!
… that medical judgments are, somehow, *not* scientific judgments?
… that the process(s) of arriving at medical consensus are, somehow, *not* relevant to climate-change consensus?
Because these views are scarcely self-evident, perhaps you (and your coauthor) might give some account as to how you justify them?
After all …
As with the science of medicine, similarly with the science of climate-change, eh Judith?
To refuse the teachings of fellow scientists, is to refuse all learning! :) :) :)
Welcome Back John Sidles!
You are as irrelevent, impotent, disconnected, dishonest, and tangential as ever I see.
Please come back again when you can’t stay so long!
Pffffffffffffffffffffffffffft. You know the rest.
Professor Curry,
You challenge the world’s most sophisticated propaganda artists, now using public funds and Stalin’s techniques to control the entire globe instead of just the USSR.
The Climategate emails that emerged in late Nov 2009 were the tip of a sixty-four year cancerous growth on government science after the United Nations was established on 24 Oct 1945.
Continued funding of the AGW campaign, without debate in the election campaign, shows your opponents concern for public opinion.
Here’s a brief summary of the challenges ahead: http://omanuel.wordpress.com/about/#comment-1581
“The preceding is a tough criticism of Curry-Webster (2012), yet hey … the Curry-Webster neglect of the scientific literature is plain-as-day, eh? ” – JC.
No.
There are significant uncertainties – the differences in disease progress, individual genetic differences in response to both disease process and response to interventions, our incomplete knowledge of the complex reality of the human body , not to mention the range of evidence available to support specific treatments.
Systematic reviews are one of the most effective ways to deal with the latter……which is what the IPCC reviews are in essence.
You could label Cochrane reviews and the like as ‘manufactured consensus’, but you’d be wrong.
I’ll take a systematic review any day, over a personal view which ignores much of the relevant literature and indulges in pop-psych babble and pop-culture references.
Interesting how this allegedly egregious omission slipped by CAB Reviews:
A peer-reviewed reviews journal, complementing the subject coverage of CAB Abstracts, by focusing on animal science, global health, veterinary medicine; applied plant sciences; agriculture; nutrition and food science; natural resources and environmental sciences. CAB Reviews provides scientists and students in these fields with timely analysis on key topics in current research. It is an authoritative resource that highlights cross-cutting themes.
Their purview includes some aspects of medicine. They apparently understand the difference here between consensus based medical treatment protocols and climate science/policy.
If you are going to insist on the analogy, then reflect on this for a moment. Consensus medical treatments and their establishment have a strict protocols and regulatory environment. Go read Andrew Montford’s latest book to understand how very far climate science and the IPCC process is from anything like this.
David, is Fan the self-proclaimed healer of warriors?
http://faculty.washington.edu/sidles/FRIAS_2011/
Michael,
Speaking of our brilliant Bishop’s analysis, here’s how his previous political hit job ends:
Truth to power, Michael. I’m sure Lord Lawson and other right-wing populists snickers when they read this [1].
Yup.
[1] http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/post/2799273653
C&P error in my post above.
The quoted part should have been;
“In medical treatments, consensus represents negotiated agreement on the best available treatment, with many replicable examples related to the effectiveness of the treatment. ” – JC.
Judith,
Not sure who your 10:24am response is directed towards…..or what it means? Though the answer to the first may clarify the latter.
“Interesting how this allegedly egregious omission slipped by CAB Reviews:
A peer-reviewed reviews journal, complementing the subject coverage of CAB Abstracts, by focusing on animal science, global health, veterinary medicine; applied plant sciences; agriculture; nutrition and food science; natural resources and environmental sciences. CAB Reviews provides scientists and students in these fields with timely analysis on key topics in current research. It is an authoritative resource that highlights cross-cutting themes.” – JC
Yeah, I’m sure “Strategies for the Early Weaning of Piglets”, likewise got a testing review.
wonder if there is a consensus on weaning of piglets. let me know what you find out
If there is, I’m sure CAB Reviews will be leading with it: weaning of piglets being only slightly lower on their priorities than consensus in climate science.
fan of ever more bs,
Please do continue your impersonation of the naked emperor.
Wow. Talk about cherry-picking.
Fan fails.
Searching on the word consensus.
Roll tape on a random sample of his googling
BACKGROUND:
Tobacco use has significant adverse effects on oral health. Oral health professionals in the dental office or community setting have a unique opportunity to increase tobacco abstinence rates among tobacco users.
OBJECTIVES:
This review assesses the effectiveness of interventions for tobacco cessation delivered by oral health professionals and offered to cigarette smokers and smokeless tobacco users in the dental office or community setting.
SEARCH METHODS:
We searched the Cochrane Tobacco Addiction Group Specialized Register (CENTRAL), MEDLINE (1966-November 2011), EMBASE (1988-November 2011), CINAHL (1982-November 2011), Healthstar (1975-November 2011), ERIC (1967-November 2011), PsycINFO (1984-November 2011), National Technical Information Service database (NTIS, 1964-November 2011), Dissertation Abstracts Online (1861-November 2011), Database of Abstract of Reviews of Effectiveness (DARE, 1995-November 2011), and Web of Science (1993-November 2011).
SELECTION CRITERIA:
We included randomized and pseudo-randomized clinical trials assessing tobacco cessation interventions conducted by oral health professionals in the dental office or community setting with at least six months of follow-up.
DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS:
Two authors independently reviewed abstracts for potential inclusion and abstracted data from included trials. Disagreements were resolved by consensus. The primary outcome was abstinence from smoking or all tobacco use (for users of smokeless tobacco) at the longest follow-up, using the strictest definition of abstinence reported. The effect was summarised as an odds ratio, with correction for clustering where appropriate. Heterogeneity was assessed using the I² statistic and where appropriate a pooled effect was estimated using an inverse variance fixed-effect model.
Strike 1
Pulmonary Langerhans Cell Histiocytosis (PLCH) is a relatively uncommon lung disease that generally, but not invariably, occurs in cigarette smokers. The pathologic hallmark of PLCH is the accumulation of Langerhans and other inflammatory cells in small airways, resulting in the formation of nodular inflammatory lesions. While the overwhelming majority of patients are smokers, mechanisms by which smoking induces this disease are not known, but likely involve a combination of events resulting in enhanced recruitment and activation of Langerhans cells in small airways. Bronchiolar inflammation may be accompanied by variable lung interstitial and vascular involvement. While cellular inflammation is prominent in early disease, more advanced stages are characterized by cystic lung destruction, cicatricial scarring of airways, and pulmonary vascular remodeling. Pulmonary function is frequently abnormal at presentation. Imaging of the chest with high resolution chest CT scanning may show characteristic nodular and cystic abnormalities. Lung biopsy is necessary for a definitive diagnosis, although may not be required in instances were imaging findings are highly characteristic. There is no general consensus regarding the role of immunosuppressive therapy in smokers with PLCH. All smokers must be counseled on the importance of smoking cessation, which may result in regression of disease and obviate the need for systemic immunosuppressive therapy. The prognosis for most patients is relatively good, particularly if longitudinal lung function testing shows stability. Complications like pneumothoraces and secondary pulmonary hypertension may shorten life expectancy. Patients with progressive disease may require lung transplantation.
OPPS no consensus Strike 2
Abstract
OBJECTIVES:
Relatively little evidence is available in the published studies on the prevention of penile cancer and premalignant conditions of the penis. The present review examined the current evidence available in preventing penile cancer and pathologic subtypes of premalignant conditions and their treatment. The recommendations made in the present review formulate the basis of the recent 2009 International Consultation on Urologic Disease Consensus Publishing Group.
METHODS:
The association of human papillomavirus subtypes and penile cancer is well-established, although the etiology, natural history, and treatment of premalignant lesions have mainly been reported in retrospective case series with short-term follow-up. The exact pathologic role of chronic inflammatory conditions, such as balanitis xerotica obliterans in the etiology of penile cancer remains largely unknown.
RESULTS:
Some of the potential strategies for the prevention of penile cancer could include circumcision, reducing the risk of transmission of penile human papillomavirus infection with male vaccination, early treatment of phimosis, smoking cessation, and hygienic measures. Implementing some of these measures would require extensive cost/benefit analysis, with significant changes in the global health policy.
CONCLUSIONS:
Owing to the current levels of evidence from published studies, firm guidelines cannot be formulated for the treatment of premalignant conditions, although preventative measures, such as reducing human papillomavirus transmission, could become strategic health targets.
Copyright (c) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Arrg. dick jokes, strike 3
basically fan, you would do well to actually cite something that was relevant about the METHODS for generating consensus. You know, go to IPCC literature and look for the authority they cited
SRs look at what there is evidence for, ie what the consensus is.
What are you having trouble with exactly??
As i said if the cites exist produce them. or you can continue to steal pages from the skeptic playbook and wave your arms.
Steven, you just reproduced some of them above.
What point do you think you are making???
Laframboise and McKitrick on the IPCC provide an interesting
biography of the IPCC ‘Insiders’ Club,’ a self selecting group,
many allied to activist environmental organizations such as
Greenpeace and WWF.
http://www.ecofascism.com/review27.html to environmental organizations
and WWF.
“The use of ‘denier’ to label any one who disagrees with the IPCC consensus on attribution leads to concerns being raised about the IPCC being enforced as dogma, which is tied to how dissent is dealt with.” – JC.
Urgghhh.
Fascinating to see a piece on the science so chock-full of unsupported opinion.
A fine piece of manufactured dissent.
Right out of the Merchant of Doubt playbook.
You might like this example: There is a youtube of Dessler debating Lindzen. Lindzen pointed out that Dessler had used the change in weather balloon velocity instead of actual temperature data sets. Dessler pointed out that Lindzen smoked.
Or perhaps: Schwartz pointed out that following the 97/98 El Nino that the temperature decay curve, an indication of sensitivity, suggested that sensitivity is approximately 1.1C per doubling. Schmidt and Annan rebutted with, can’t be! That disagrees with the models :)
So thanks to MoD, Lindzen=smoker, Schwartz=model infidel, Spencer= Evangelist, Christy=hangs out with Evangelist, the sum is denier, denier, denier…
Ahem … Michael, if yer take a look at the IPCC fast track
‘Insiders Club’ Who’s Who, yer might jest discover ‘a fine
piece of manufactured consent.’
Unfortunately the essay that heads this thread and many of the posted replies are rendered irrelevant by a fundamental and egregious mistake.
Consensus is a property of the scientific research findings, NOT the scientists, or the IPCC or all the scientific organisations that have endorsed AGW.
The consensus of the scientific data is merely reflected by the scientists, groups and media.
> Consensus is a property of the scientific research findings […]
Just like “being a consensus” is a property of consensual sex.
Are you wasted already today or just still half looped from last night?
I did not know you were interested in ontoclimatology. But since you are, you should wonder how sex can happen without any agent involved. Or instead of answering, perhaps you should ask Joe Sixpack what “consensus of the scientific data” means to him.
No, please don’t ask him about his conception of consensual sex.
Please mind your answer, there are ladies reading.
Ah. I guess I should wait until you’re sober before asking you a question.
I understand that may not be easy. Is there some time of day and day of the week that is more likely? I’m thinking you might have to sober up for weekly visits to your probation officer, for instance.
David,
We’re in an e-salon. Even if I was to be as charitable as Moshpit, I honestly don’t think you have the stuff. Please focus on Judy’s post for your upcoming comments.
Consider this a fair warning.
Dave, just a clue, willard will not be bullied. You actually have to think. He’s not in this debate with you. he’s above it.
Mosher
Gag me with a spoon…
re; willard won’t be bullied
Have you ever seen an anonymous coward who could be bullied? That’s one of the benefits of anonymity. Duh. Nothing personal or lasting is on the line for them. Like the little bitches they are they can let their hair down and feel brave without reserve.
David Springer,
My name is my honor, even if it’s a pseudonym, and perhaps even more so: I take more time to ponder, to be prudent and to stay in character than in real life, where I sincerely hope you are a considerate, decent human being, and that you only come here to cleanse yourself from otherwise unsustainable fantasies.
willards refusal to be bullied has nothing to do with his secret identity. He simply refuses to play your game. That takes discipline. and commands respect.
Fascinating. What game am I playing?
> What game am I playing?
http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/troglodyte.htm
The problem with your characterization is I never lose control. Control is my middle name.
Bestiaries are only imperfect images of the real beasts, David.
Speaking of control:
> In dwelling, live close to the ground. In thinking, keep to the simple. In conflict, be fair and generous. In governing, don’t try to control. In work, do what you enjoy. In family life, be completely present.
— Lao Tzu
All denizens should keep that one in mind.
Yes, David, you can remind me of that second sentence.
Entertaining link though. But you see, Willard, I’ve been a flame warrior for 21 years and counting now. I fit no particular pigeonhole in that list. I invented many of those styles and use them at will. You’d get far more insight about me by examing the categories I avoid rather than the ones I adopt.
I’m of British descent. Lao Tzu doesn’t impress me. We conquered China in that era with a few wooden ships. Keep that in mind.
Repeatedly using my first name is pretty affected by the way. It only comes across as a weak attempt change the dynamics. I’m not your friend. I shudder at the thought. Playing the familiar won’t get you anywhere.
David,
You do seem a natural, but I’m willing the possibility that it’s an acquired skill you are so mightily diplaying (in which case mike could certainly learn a few tricks from you) that it’s quite possible you might be the one who invented most of these archetypes and that your English lineage can make you feel you have once upon a time conquered China, but please bear in mind that these are archetypes, which means they’re not all exclusive (e.g, one can be a Philosopher, but also indulge into being a playful Big Cat), nor are they “greedy”: you don’t have to share all the traits of a Big Dog to act as one most of the times; and no, Dave, in case you I don’t think you’re a Big Dog, I don’t believe you act like on, since the impact of your comments do not feel like it.
Springer,
In case you wonder, of course.
izen,
That is why it is called “manufactured consensus”.
Sorry you missed that part.
err not so fast.
You need to follow the argument.
“consensus” is an appeal made in the broader public debate over AGW.
schematically, it goes like this.
A: The science says GHGs cause warming.
S: But scientist X disagrees. look a squirrel.
A: X, is an exception, the consensus of experts is that GHGs cause warming.
It really only functions in the public debate. Hansen doesnt believe in AGW because all his peers agree with him. Mann doesnt believe in AGW because all of her peers agree with her. No scientist who believes in AGW believes in it because of the consensus. Consensus, as a reason for belief, is an appeal that is restricted to those who cannot evaluate the science on their own. This appeal, of course, backfires because there are many who cannot evaluate the science, but think that they can. They are smart enough not to buy the appeal to consensus, but too dumb to challenge the science.
Since you brought “her” up, there are many not in the consensus that think “she” is too dumb to provide the science and that “she” is not an isolated example. There are even some that look at simple things like say, diurnal temperature range, and say to themselves, “Self. That is a bit peculiar.” Since a decrease in diurnal range is typically associated with increasing humidity, an increase in diurnal temperature range would be a PD odd feedback for increasing CO2 concentration. You know, it almost screams, “Look here!”
Since everyone is too dumb to challenge the science, what’s a skeptic to do?
Steven Mosher
Oops. Not so fast, yourself.
Judith expressed a slightly different process, which is closer to the reality here.
IPCC forced a consensus process in order to promote what an insider group of scientists had agreed was the paradigm:
“most” of the warming past ~1950 was “most likely” caused by increased human GHG concentrations and the mean 2xCO2 climate sensitivity is 3.2C.
Any paper or scientific finding, which contradicted this paradigm was rejected by the consensus process.
Max
I think most sceptics accept the fact that there is some evidence of AGW being partly responsible for the ~0.7degrees C rise in global temperature over the past 150 years.
The problem is the IPCC is unequivocal that this rise in temperature is solely due to the increase in the amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere. All the following are equally likely to have same level of contribution to the past 150 years’ temperature rise; however they are routinely ignored or derided by the IPCC and its contributors.
1. The effects of the huge increase in irrigation over the past century.
2. The use of temperature data, which routinely underestimates the Urban Heat Island effect.
3. Changes in solar radiation – all stars are ‘variable’, our Sun is no different, the amount of radiation it emits varies over time.
4. Natural climate cycles caused by the eccentricity of our planet’s orbit around the Sun.
5. And last but not least, the continual and persistent downward manipulation of historical temperature data by many national climate/weather centres to ‘prove’ the recent past was much cooler than today. Without exception, whenever there is an adjustment in the official temperature records, the recent past gets cooler.
Finally, the Global Warming Industry has become a hugely expensive gravy train. Once you are on the gravy train, it is in your own self-interest to maintain the status quo. So AGW, a mildly interesting non-problem, has morphed into CAGW, a really scary problem for which there is no scientific justification or evidence and always requires more research.
Like all my geologist colleagues in the private sector, I believe the concept of CAGW to be a complete hoax and condemn the IPCC for perpetuating this myth.
Peter Miller
All the items you list are factors.
Some would argue that co2 derived AGW is of little consequece as one item amongst many that is lost in the loud noise of natural variability and the other impacts man is having.
I once did some research on the irrigation aspect and was staggered as to the amount going on and the threoretical impact it could have, Also undoubtedly UHI has a large practical impact, as urban areas are where most of the planets population live. The up to 4/5Degrees C temperature difference urbanisation can make dwarfs the co2 signal.
Can co2 enhance the effects of rain/storms/hurricanes/temperatures etc? No doubt some here will argue it has a huge effect. I can’t see it in the historic record and await others to make a definitive argument that the physics proves it must.
tonyb
you are talking BS phillip miller.
Lets take the “problem” you start with: “IPCC is unequivocal that this rise in temperature is solely due to the increase in the amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere”
Utter bull. There are at least three falsities in that single sentence. It’s as if you haven’t even read the IPCC report summaries let alone the actual report.
1) The IPCC doesn’t claim anything about attribution is unequivocal.
2) The IPCC doesn’t claim the rise in temperature in the last 150 years is soley due to man.
3) The IPCC doesn’t even claim all the warming caused by man is due to CO2.
Yet you’ve managed to claim all three!
You then say: “All the following are equally likely to have same level of contribution to the past 150 years’ temperature rise”
Just isn’t true. That might be your level of ignorance but climate scientists have a better grasp of those subjects than you are willing to give them credit for. Even I do. I can see your list is certainly not comprised of things that “are equally likely to have the same level of contribution…”. In fact some of the things on the list show you are markedly naive.
“Like all my geologist colleagues in the private sector, I believe the concept of CAGW to be a complete hoax and condemn the IPCC for perpetuating this myth.”
And you’ve obviously done such sterling research to come to that conclusion. Keep up the good work! Nice nod to “private sector” so we know where your obvious ideological bias derives from.
Wow!
Definite case of “Toys out of the Cot.”
So let’s start with the fundamental basic concept behind the CAGW hoax:
Do you agree that rising temperatures cause increased global humidity levels and therefore more clouds, which trap heat and lead to runaway global warming, or CAGW?
I assume you are employed by government, or a student, and therefore do not care if your taxes are totally wasted on unreliable, expensive ‘renewable’ energy projects and subsidies.
But anyhow, nice tantrum, very impressive.
Not liking taxes is no excuse to make up strawmen to give that view a fake aura of scientific justification.
The science of patterns, mathematics, indicates a global warming of only about 1.5 deg C by 2100.
http://bit.ly/TIVGEJ
This pattern is established by the enormous heat capacity of the oceans and their fixed cyclic pattern since 1880.
Reader’s Digest should be capitalized.
I Am Joe’s Stomach Throwing Up a Little Into Joe’s Mouth
Don’cha git sick and tired of closed -society -centralized –
bureaucracy and their shamen preaching top down control
… by expert committee?
I do. ( sigh )
O/t
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NYMgHKx3Wc.
See how the second girl and the male dancer capture the spirit
of the dance! : )
“Don’cha git sick and tired of closed -society -centralized –
bureaucracy and their shamen preaching top down control
… by expert committee?”
Nah. Never. Can’t get enough. I expect it. Like Schweik possibly, I embrace being ground down into an inconsequential pulp. The nice thing about being a pessimist is that there is always fresh material! And because there is always fresh material… well one can be optimistic!
“For example, there is no point to discussing a consensus that the Earth orbits the sun, or that the hydrogen molecule has less mass than the nitrogen molecule.”
Judith, just a bit of a pedantic correction wrt to terminology. It may be better to refer to hydrogen and nitrogen as ‘elements’ and not molecules in the context of mass comparison. I understand hydrogen and nitrogen naturally occur as dimers and as such are ‘molecules’. But from a mass comparison basis, one should speak about the differences between the two in their elemental form as this reduces them to their most basic level.
FWIW
“…or that hydrogen has less mass than nitrogen.”
I suggest this instead. Again, I know this is quite pedantic.
You didn’t even get the pedantic part right. Maybe think twice about telling an atmospheric physicist the correct way to refer to atmospheric gases.
You cannot simply substitute the consensus for fact.
Not so fast. Science is not a democracy. The head count fallacy has been recognized as irrational since Aristotle. Even if science were a democracy, for every scientist who supports the notion of human-caused global warming, there are more than ten who consider that notion pure vanity, and they have made their names public…
That is not science, but it has been the official line ever since. No science, just bureaucratic conclusions contrary to science, an excuse for a brand new tax… Both Galileo and Einstein were famous deniers of centuries-old theories. They were right. The consensus was wrong…
As Dr. John Christy told us just last week, having lived among the world’s poor, their lives there are brutal and short. Those who kick the poor in the teeth while pretending to soak the rich do not merit the votes from either.
~Mr. Linder (Hearing On Protecting Lower-Income Families While Fighting Global Warming, Thursday, March 12, 2009, U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Ways and Means, Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, Washington, D.C.)
The Left seems very comfortable with consigning the developing and Third World to an energy-deprived future. The most amazing thing is that some refuse to admit global warming has become a Left vs. right issue. Does anyone still believe it is about science?
That is why it is referred to as the Great Warming HOAX.
“The IPCC process by which it arrives at its conclusions lacks balance, transparency and due diligence. It is controlled by a tightly knit group of individuals who are completely convinced that they are right. As a result, conflicting data and evidence, even if published in peer-reviewed journals, are regularly ignored, while exaggerated claims, even if contentious or not peer-reviewed, are often highlighted in IPCC reports. Not surprisingly, the IPCC has lost a lot of credibility in recent years. It is also losing the trust of more and more governments who are no longer following its advice. Until it agrees to undergo a root and branch reform, it will continue to hemorrhage credibility and trust. The time has come for a complete overhaul of its structure and workings.”
(Dr Peiser)
@- Wagathon
Whatever critique there may be of the IPCC methods it is merely reflecting, however inelegantly, the overwhelming consensus in the scientific research. It is the observational data and the logical inferences that can be made from that information from which emerges a consilience or consensus of the research. Individual scientists and groups like the IPCC only express that common message in the data, they do NOT manufacture it.
The tide, if not tsunami of research that contributes to this knowledge concensus can be seen here –
http://agwobserver.wordpress.com/
If you want to see the papers that do not conform to the common story then the few that have appeared are discussed here –
http://agwobserver.wordpress.com/anti-agw-papers-debunked/
But then I can go to the list of hundreds of papers that are not on the debunked list which raise enough questions that any clear thinking individual has to wonder about the consensus position
And you are from the planet Zarg or Zorn?
It is self-evident ‘Climate science research’, as practiced by the contributors to the IPCC, is an unsustainable gravy train, supported by manipulated data, distorted conclusions and individuals who routinely abuse the name of science. As evidence, take a quick peep at Patchy’s lifestyle and ask who ultimately pays for him to live like a Marharajah of yesteryear.
The methodology used by the high priests of ‘climate science’ to milk the faithful is indistinguishable from those who run the pseudo-christian, far right, cults of America’s Bible Belt. Very simply, it is: “Be one of the chosen who has seen the light, but first give me lots of your dough.”
And please don’t use the classic alarmist ploy of mixing the non-problem of a little AGW with the unsubstantiated hoax of CAGW.
I was going to write a blog post along the same lines concerning the IPCC, but I haven’t been able to do it as that thing called life has been getting in the way. I was having a nice back and forth with a friend and fellow musician who is a retired physics professor at my Alma Mater about the validity of the 2003 Soon / Baliunas paper. (was it a “game changer”… no, but, as a meta-analysis, it was good enough). It was criticized to a higher degree than the typical meta-analysis because it was in conflict with the IPCC “consensus”.
The conversation about this presented another thread relevant to the IPCC. Has there ever been another organization created that has had such dominance and control over what is considered the “consensus” when examining a particular field of science.? The AMA and ADA lay out some guidelines and offer services in regard to the associated fields of science, but they are not so concerned with consensus building. Though psychology does have the DSM, they really don’t have an organization that pushes consensus like climate science and the IPCC. Can anyone else come up with a branch of science that is so centered around one specific organization?
Good point. I know of no parallel in the whole of science, which makes this a good measure of the unique degree of politicization that has befallen climate science. Note that two of the three IPCC working groups are not even looking at the science, rather they assume CAGW.
The precedent for the IPCC was the massive report that supported the Montreal Protocol on stratospheric ozone, but that was an ad hoc advocacy measure. It worked so well that the UN created the IPCC, with some of the same people, like Robert Watson.
The subject becoming politicized has nothing to do with the IPCC.
The reason it became politicized is because science discovered something about how the climate works that is inconvenient for right-wing libertarian ideology. Much as how biology found out something about the origin of species which was inconvenient for religious fundamentalist ideology.
Both groups have politicized the respective issues by defining it in terms of them vs us. So the climate skeptics see it as a Leftist conspiracy and the religious fundamentalists see it as an atheist/secular conspiracy. Both groups hate the fact there is a consensus (but can’t decide whether to pretend it doesn’t exist or admit it does exist but pretend it’s because of corruption). Both groups feebly try to rationalize the intellectual might against their position by claiming all them scientists only accept the idea because of group-think/losing their funding/money or being atheists/leftists.
And that last one is a self-fulfilling prophesy, because which groups are going to tend to weigh in to defend the science the strongest when it’s attacked by right-wing ideologues or creationists? Yep leftists and atheists respectively. It also helps of course that political and religious extremists are largely in a minority, so their opponents will almost always by “coincidence” be in the “enemy camp”.
If the IPCC didn’t exist, if Al Gore didn’t exist, the scientific knowledge would still exist and some other body instead would be asking, investigating and reporting the inconvenient science. Similarly if Richard Dawkin’s and the NAS didn’t exist there would still be that inconvenient theory of evolution.
The calls by climate skeptics for improvements to the IPCC are as fake concern trolling as creationist calls for “better teaching” in schools. Both groups actually seek the reduction of prominence, possibly the complete eradication from the public sphere, of an area of science that inconveniences their ideologies.
The subject becoming politicized has nothing to do with the IPCC.
Really? Consensus is a political mechanism, not one of science. If an organization such as the IPCC were around supporting, say eugenics or the use of the lobotomy, I guarantee it would have been much much harder to to push back against the scientific consensus agreed to in such an organization. The IPCC does not enhance the work of science, it hinders it.
Before the subject of climate change became controversial during the 2000s, the great scientific/social dispute in the United States was over evolution. While this causes much frustrated hand-wringing and hair-pulling among scientists, I never heard one (from inside a graduate evolution program) play the ‘consensus’ card. The argument was always made from known facts, not majority rule. The very playing of the consensus card makes my skeptical sense tingle. When you have to reach for rhetorical ploys to make your argument, you show a lack of confidence in your position.
Lookup “project Steve”
Great comeback re; evolution and project Steve. It appears to be an “own goal” though as rather than impeach the warmists you instead impeach the darwinists, hoisting both (and yourself too) with the same petard.
Why do you think the US still uses English units rather than metric? Why do you think the positive terminal of voltage is still used when the electrons go the other way? These are just a few of the facts that show once a position is entrenched, it is very hard to change. The IPCC blew it, but governments and the press have run so hard with the positions they took, that they can’t turn around in the face of facts that disagree with them. They are hanging on hoping the issue will fade away so they do not look like the mistaken people they probably are.
What “facts” disagree? When did they come to light?
Your example is 180-degrees out of phase.
English units are more intuitive as they relate to the scale of things people use in the real world of everyday life and dirty-filthy commerce on a regular basis. Also, carpenters work more efficiently using fractions. In other words, we still use English units for practical reasons, not to flaunt our traditions at Frenchification.
Red hot positive and negative ground are as easy to remember like lefty-loosy-righty tighty. Everyone knows that nothing fails more than British motorcar positive ground electrical systems.
These are examples of common sense “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”
IPCC consensus is an example of common bureaucratic newspeak “it’s broke, so lets form a Blue Ribbon Task-Force to tell us everything we have done is AOKAY.”
Relevant: http://weknowmemes.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/united-states-vs-the-rest-of-the-world.jpg
We still use English units of measure for four reasons.
1) because we can
2) because it pisses people off
3) too many signs and labels would need to be changed
4) 47% of Americans don’t have the IQ to grok two systems at once
Howard
how much is 1 ft 1 inch divided by 3?
and how much is 1.1 m divided by 3?
There are no “English units”, there are actually 2 systems: In one “pound” is the unit of mass, in the other it is the unit of force.
And when electricity comes along, even the US goes metric (A, V, W).
Hope this does not make Howard’s blood pressure go up to whatever it is in the “English units” he pretends to use.
Alexej Buergin | October 30, 2012 at 4:52 am | Reply
Howard
“how much is 1 ft 1 inch divided by 3?”
4 1/3 inches. Easy peasy.
” and how much is 1.1 m divided by 3?”
Ouch. 0.3666666666666666666666666666666666666666667 meters and I needed a calculator to get it.
1) Well done, David. Now show me 4 1/3 inch on a ruler.
2) The second answer is wrong. The correct answer is 0.367m or 367mm. That is about the precision a carpenter can get. Re-read Howard’s second sentence about the scale of things in the real world (and think about the relation between the real world and what is shown by a calculator).
Rule of thumb: Use the correct digits plus the first one that is questionable.
Holy Blown Fuses, Batman! I wasn’t aware anyone was dumb enough to use a positive ground electrical system. That must play hell on sourcing electronic components in a modern vehicle. Probably makes no difference in the time just past horse and buggy where everything in the electrical system was resistive, like light bulbs, and didn’t care about which way the current flows.
Actually it would not matter. All electronics would be built accordingly. It is just conveniant that everybody does it the same way, and that is why car parts are usually metric, batteries have 12 V, and one drives on the right side of the road.
The art in the sciences comes with making broad connections using discrete pieces of information. These pieces come with caveats, nuances and limited applicability, accompanied by uncertainty. Into this vacuum steps expert panels, assembled and charged by some payer, these panels, in their collective wisdom are to provide consensus statements.
The payers, the assemblers of the expert panels, then charge the individual experts with going out and spreading the consensus meme.
It has been said on this blog months ago, experts may make less accurate predictions than someone off the street, who knows little or nothing about the topic, will more likely than not give a gestalt opinion which proves more accurate. How is this so? Expert panels may loose the perspective of how the information has nuances, caveats and limit applicability. Expert panes may lack a step back perspective; i.e., providing the view on whether or not their consensus makes sense. Does their consensus fit into a broad context? The art of the artisan, uniquely fitting the discrete pieces together, gets lost in the very process of expert panel consensus building. For instance, behold the camel: a horse assembled by a committee.
Push back comes when the dromedary enters a horse show, spits in the eye of the judges, and otherwise sullies the expert panel’s consensus.
Now, the payer cares not a whit for art. After all, the payer had assembled and charged those who others said were experts, to come to a consensus, an actionable consensus. Art is for art’s sake. However, in the case of the climate science consensus, the creature created, may not be fit for purpose.
Curious why it “has” to be a left-right issue?
I’m so far left that I can’t see any significant differences between what is supposedly the two parties in the US, and I’m quite unconvinced by arguments which focus on absurdities like globally averaged temperature changes induced by a “greenhouse effect” driven by fractional changes in a trace gas.
I find the paper itself interesting though, actually doing some writing for a class on the different manners of handling issues like this in social and natural sciences.
Pingback: Transterrestrial Musings - Mann’s Hockey Stick
quote re IPCC
“…It does not carry out new research nor does it monitor climate-related data. It bases its assessment mainly on published and peer reviewed scientific technical literature.”
unquote
The error was made right there: after an assessment of the current science, the IPCC is in the best position to recommend areas of study which might improve the science. Instead it merely mentions, report after report, that the science is deficient in its understanding of e.g. aerosols, clouds etc. By now we really should have addressed these. Simply reporting deficient science is not enough.
Live with uncertainty is all well and good if nothing can be done about it. That, however, is not the case here.
JF
Reading fourteen pages on what CONSENSUS means was a chore but I had to know it. You have made an excellent survey of what is available and I completely agree with your suggestions that are mostly implied, timidly. You are just too mild in making suggestions, no doubt because you think it is an enterprise worth salvaging because there must be some truth in the anthropogenic aspect of climate change.Unfortunately there is none which puts me squarely in opposition to your assertion that “The issue of challenges to the IPCC consensus is not analogous to Galileo-like revolutionaries.” Frankly, I think the IPCC consensus is evil for science and whether you admit it or not this article is in opposition to it. Remember that Galileo did not start out as an opponent of Aristotle but his heliocentric views developed over time. His statement that “In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual” pretty much sums up where I stand on the consensus issue. And it is not simply because some of my work directly contradicts it but also because it has a mind-killing influence on those who take it as revealed truth. Let me explain. I wrote a paper on Arctic warming that proved two things: first, that laws of physics excluded the greenhouse effect as its cause, and second that North Atlantic currents started to carry warm water into the Arctic at the turn of the twentieth century. It was based on experimental observations of Kaufman et al. who showed that the warming started suddenly at the turn of the twentieth century, and of Spielhagen et al. who directly observed the influx of warm Atlantic water into the Arctic at the present time. My abstract put it this way: “It is likely that the cause of this warming was a relatively sudden rearrangement of the North Atlantic current system at the turn of the century…” I sent a PDF to a physicist who had written about climate for his comments and got this one back: ‘It may well be that there was a “relatively sudden rearrangement of the North Atlantic current system at the turn of the century that directed warm currents into the Arctic Ocean” but you have no proof of this assertion…’ I told him to tell me what he thought the explanation was if I was wrong. “I don’t think you were wrong. I think you made a conjecture…” was his way of wriggling out. But he had written a book called “The Climate Debate” and checking his book I found this quote from Scholaski: “The branch of the North Atlantic current which enters it by way of the edge of the continental shelf round Spitsbergen has evidently been increasing in volume, and has introduced a body of warm water so great, that the surface layer of cold water which was 200 meters thick in Nansen’s time, has now been reduced to less than 100 meters in thickness.” I told him to apologize but have not heard from him since. But this was not all. He also told me that “Spielhagen et al. believe that Arctic warming entirely due to greenhouse gases. They are just as sure of their opinion as you are of yours. Kaufman et al. do not come out and say it but they evidently believe the same thing – braying incessantly about the warmest decade in 2000 years.” And this is where that consensus comes in. He cites them as some kind of authorities when in fact they are mindlessly regurgitating the consensus view. They both produced valuable experimental evidence and by rights they should have published first except that their thinking processes go on hold as soon as something contrary to the consensus comes up. I actually wrote to Kaufman about the possibility of ocean currents but was simply ignored. When thought is missing you don’t have a scientific process any more, you have just highly skilled technicians who produce valuable data they simply do not understand themselves. And this is not the only case where consensus has suppressed real science.
Arno
I am currently writing an article on arctic sea ice extent during the period 1918-1949
I do not know for sure about the warm Atlantic water influx you describe, but it is clear that the IPCC literature- and as represented by Hadley and Chapman and Walsh-underestimate the extent of the warming 1918-1940. The apparent stability of the ice extent can be seen here;
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2011/09/17/more-cherry-ice-from-joe-daleo/
Science moves on and one of the problems with the recent historic record (until 1950) is that Russian sea ice has largely been excluded. Also due to the methods of collection of data the ice extent at the time tended to be mapped as solid, rather than calculated to reflect the many gaps and channels it tends to have in late summer. We are also missing- for obvious reasons- the 1940-1945 data, some of which included warm years and saw the Russian Northern route convoys established.
I suspect that the minimum ice extent in the warmest years 1918-1949-was around the levels seen in the early 2000’s but not as large as the drop we saw in 2007.
This warming-possibly due to warmer currents-seems to be a regular occurence.I wrote here about the arctic melting that commenced around 1816
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/06/16/historic-variation-in-arctic-ice-tony-b/
The methods of collecting data from modern satellites raises question about what they see as ‘ice’ and what they see as ‘water,’ as water can sit on top of the ice in late summer. That is not a subject I am currently pursuing but hope to write about in a future article.
tonyb
“The methods of collecting data from modern satellites raises question about what they see as ‘ice’ and what they see as ‘water,’ as water can sit on top of the ice in late summer. That is not a subject I am currently pursuing but hope to write about in a future article.”
That’s basically why you look at both area and extent.
area measure is going to be sensitive to water on the ice and open areas within the pack. extent is not. you can also look at the ratio between the two to get an index of “concentration”
Hi mosh
Will you be appearing on WUWT TV? Didn’t see your name in the invitees.
Tonyb
There isn’t a studio in the world big enough to fit Willis Echenbach’s and Mosher’s head in it at the same time. Since Willard is some kind of mental case that Tony Watts feels obligated to humor and enable we can pretty much count on Mosher’s exclusion from that particular party. No big deal. Mosher is accustomed to it.
Wuwt tv will be an interesting animal. My current work is probably too specialized and boring. small town suhi
Mosh
I am concerned that the production standards of WUWT shoud be good-If it should come over as amateurish it would suffer against Gores efforts . The little i saw of that last year came over as quite professional..Mind you Ive yet to see virtually any climate person from either side of the debate come over well on tv.
I do worry that much of the stuff could be esoteric-like yours probably is- and also that Anthony is preaching to the choir.
However, he is a smart man and a media professional so I am sure he has thought this through. Its very enterprising and I wish him luck.
tonyb
Very observant. I would rather die (figuratively) than change my opinion about the policy advocates who are masquerading as climate scientists and corrupting my profession (science). For the record, I’m not a Tea Partier, a church-goer, or a creationist. Unfortunately, possibility of devastating climate change concerns 6 billion people (including my children), not just me.
The problem with abandoning the consensus approach comes when climate scientists are forced to admit that they are asking people to purchase an insurance policy against the possibility of devastating climate change. The developed world probably can afford to pay for insurance, but will be reluctant to pay large amounts without a clearer idea of the costs and benefis. The developing world can’t afford it (unless alternative energy becomes much cheaper).
Well I don’t need a consensus. I have looked at the evidence myself and I am quite satisfied with the key conclusions (to date) that the IPCC have published so far as reflecting what the evidence is telling us.
That to my mind is that human activity is very likely going to dominate global temperature changes in the 21st century and a significant warming taking us to a period of unparalleled heat for possibly millions of years.
It is useful though for people who don’t have time to look at the evidence to inform them that most climate scientists accept certain things and let them then consider the matter from a “lots of doctors say X so what should I believe?” approach.
So yes there is a consensus. Is it important? To me, no. To others who don’t have the time to check, probably.
Consensus? How about the 31,000 scientists (9,000 of them PhDs) who have signed the Project Petition?
You mean this list?
http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/filesDB-download.php?command=download&id=660
Which evidence is this that supports the consensus?
What sort of hypothesis favors a consensus over evidence?
I’m curious as someone who has read all of the major (and many minor) reports from the IPCC over the years intermixed with my general science and mathematics studies. Never seen any evidence that a global average temperature actually has any physical validity, much less that one calculated from a few thousand datapoints biased heavily towards northern hemisphere locations, much less the urban influences.
Do go on though, I’m curious if you can also help me with this annoying issue regarding the Navier-Stokes equations, since they are apparently trivial matters if done by climate modeling groups, winning a prize for proving their non-singular nature would be nice.
It’s a good question about the Navier Stokes equations. What is known is not indicative of high accuracy. Models are still required to be verified by test data by the FAA where public safety is involved. Same for medical procedures or drugs. There is a good reason for this.
Tonight, eight days before the election we live in interesting times:
1. I see the problem as a tyrannical one-world government
http://omanuel.wordpress.com/about/#comment-1615
2. Porter Stansberry has another interpretation of the election
http://pro.stansberryresearch.com/1210THIRDLIA/LPSINA38/
We agree the upcoming election is anything but boring !
With deep regrets,
– Oliver K. Manuel
Former NASA Principal
Investigator for Apollo
omanuel | October 29, 2012 at 6:01 pm | Reply
“Tonight, eight days before the election we live in interesting times:”
No sweat. Obama’s going down faster than Monica Lewinsky ever did and Monica went down pretty fast.
The electorate shifted rather radically to Republicans after 2008.
See here: http://www.redstate.com/2012/10/26/why-i-think-obama-is-toast/
Judith,
…..a sentiment is articulated by the motto of the UK Royal Society: ‘nullius in verba’, which is roughly translated as ‘take nobody’s word for it’.
But aren’t you saying that action on reducing CO2 emissions is unnecessary at the moment? That the costs outweigh the benefits? And that the scientific uncertainty justifies this stance?
And you’re asking us to take your word for it?
I don’t think she said that.
No she didn’t but that won’t stop tempterrain and his cowardly anonymous ilk from putting words in her mouth. What consequence is there to an anonymous handle on the internet to being caught in a lie or looking stupid other than changing to a different cowardly anonymous name that has no history behind it?
Hey, tempterrain, are you asking us to take your word for that?
“Take nobody’s word for it” means be rationally skeptical and insist on “empirical evidence” rather than just “somebody’s word”.
Too bad the RS drifted away from its motto.
Max
Huffington Post (today): In Hurricane Sandy’s Fury, The Fingerprint Of Climate Change
HOLD ON YANKEES, BE BRAVE; WE ARE PRAYING FOR YOU.
Australians know what cyclone can do, Hurricane is same beast, different name. A week from now, you will look back and laugh at it.
No electricity, no transport for few days; the hurricane is giving you a good example of what the CO2 molesters from BOTH CAMPS intend to force on the western countries; to be regular occurrences. No fossil fuel to be used / no new power stations built – by increasing of the population, will be regular ‘’blackouts’’
The nutters from both sides of the sandpit, as Carbon Bashers are equally guilty, for every future blackouts and transport disruptions
The IPCC was set up by a politician and staffed at the top levels with political lackeys. It’s mission is to show the effects of global warming. They have to show this or fail their mission, which is why they so blithely fudge the data and use grey material to build their reports. Their findings are a foregone conclusion and thus their reports are a product for one purpose only, to support Agenda 21, the takeover of the world by the UN. The IPCC was never set up to be scientific, only to appear scientific. Why else would virtually ever reputable scientist eventually quit the IPCC’s ranks?
Don’t agree with the consensus? Maybe you can pick up a few tips from these guys.
http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/
Feynman’s example of “confirmation bias”:
We have learned a lot from experience about how to handle some of the ways we fool ourselves. One example: Millikan measured the charge on an electron by an experiment with falling oil drops, and got an answer which we now know not to be quite right. It’s a little bit off, because he had the incorrect value for the viscosity of air. It’s interesting to look at the history of measurements of the charge of the electron, after Millikan. If you plot them as a function of time, you find that one is a little bigger than Millikan’s, and the next one’s a little bit bigger than that, and the next one’s a little bit bigger than that, until finally they settle down to a number which is higher.
Why didn’t they discover that the new number was higher right away? It’s a thing that scientists are ashamed of–this history—because it’s apparent that people did things like this: When they got a number that was too high above Millikan’s, they thought something must be wrong–and they would look for and find a reason why something might be wrong. When they got a number closer to Millikan’s value they didn’t look so hard. And so they eliminated the numbers that were too far off, and did other things like that. We’ve learned those tricks nowadays, and now we don’t have that kind of a disease.
http://www.lhup.edu/~DSIMANEK/cargocul.htm
Scientific debate should never be decided by consensus. It should be “decided” by empirical evidence that vaidates, or otherwise, the hypothesis in question.
Joseph Postma’s new paper (22 October 2012) looks for empirical evidence of a GHE, and finds none. He puts forward cogent arguments as to why this lack of evidence is to be expected. All should read this ground-breaking work, which also cites my paper (March 2012):
http://principia-scientific.org/publications/Absence_Measureable_Greenhouse_Effect.pdf
Doug Cotton
Thank you for the link. Like I have said many times before, nearly every week a paper is presented that should make a reasonable person question the consensus. This is another paper that does just that. Little by little the chips are falling away.
This is standard skydragons stuff. They don’t believe there is any downward infrared flux affecting the surface temperature despite how easy that is to measure. It even has a spectrum. Look at MODTRAN to see the spectrum. This is all well understood physics, not even climate science per se.
No Jim – you misunderstand. Read my paper published in March, or my comments quoted in Postma’s new paper on pp 47-49. We never said the backradiation is not there. What you can never prove is that the net rate of transfer of thermal energy from the surface to the atmosphere can be affected by such backradiation. Why? Because we can show why, and also why the non-radiative cooling accelerates to compensate and thus nullify any effect. There’s far more to it than just measuring the backradiation.
Postma goes far further and, with solid empirical evidence, shows that carbon dioxide cannot have any effect whatsoever on climate. All climate change can be shown to be linked to natural cycles. (The MWP was just as warm as the present – as recent research has shown.) Please read my previous post.that got promptly deleted from SkS because they have no valid contra argument.
I have had arguments with various of the “slayers” before, and I don’t think it is worthwhile to pursue. If you think in terms of net radiation at the surface it is upwards, but less so with GHGs. This is where your argument against energy fluxes goes wrong. Think of why the surface cools less on cloudy nights. CO2 has that kind of blanketing effect. I think some of the quotes towards the end of this paper make very entertaining reading, but not because of any reasonableness in them.
A quote from Postma (p51) that I find entertaining.
“It is a travesty that the scientific institution would
have ever accepted through review and promoted the pretense that the atmosphere provides twice
as much heat as the Sun, just because a bunch of ideologues agreed for it to be so. If this brand of
ideological speciousness is allowed to continue to be passed off as science, then without a doubt this
has marked the end of the evolutionary development of the human mind and what lies ahead for
humanity is a slow decline back into a permanent dark age of unconsciousness. Alarmism based on
the atmospheric greenhouse effect really is just that depraved, and is one of the absolute worst
psychological conditions that the human mind has ever developed. The atmospheric greenhouse
effect is one of the worst analogies that has ever been created, and given the degree of alarm and
expenditure of monies and an entire field of specious alarmist science that has been justified on its
pretext, one of the most damaging to human fecundity.”
“Postma goes far further and, with solid empirical evidence, shows that carbon dioxide cannot have any effect whatsoever on climate. All climate change can be shown to be linked to natural cycles.”
And that would be where Postma went over the deep end. The Earth is like a thermodynamic onion of interacting layers. You can’t generalize that any thing has no impact “whatsoever” just like the modelers can’t say that all temperature change requires external forcing without specifying the time frame.
It’s a thin little blankie, probably not adequate in the long run, but better than nothing. And the plant pets like it.
=======================
captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | October 30, 2012 at 8:58 am |
You’re a lot smarter than you look.
It’s not quite as simple as being thin. Those goofy “space blankets” that fit in a package the size of a book of matches can be extremely effective. But if you’re already adequately insulated they do almost nothing more.
When there is a liquid water surface the temperature pretty much rises until the shade from clouds balances the heat from the sun. That’s about 70% cloud cover empirically speaking. In that environment add a bit more CO2 and you get more negative feedback from clouds. But not everywhere. Over land, and especially over frozen land, liquid water is in short supply and the shade producing clouds don’t form. Under those conditions CO2 is more effective. Even space blanket thin.
David Springer, Yep, even a space blanket full of holes has an impact and the colder you are the more you appreciate the impact. That is the non-linear problem, CO2 regulates but doesn’t dominate.
The other problem is time constants. Solar has an 11 year cycle with a longer decay. So you have cumulative impact with thresholds. Pretty wicked problem.
I like to illustrate the fallacy of the tiny amount of CO2 can only have a tiny effect with the following example.
Take one black car and one white car, identical except for color, sitting in the sun. Measure the surface temperature difference. You will find it to be quite large. Yet the difference between the two vehicles is just a few grams of black pigment in the paint.
CO2 works like that black pigment.
Now park both cars in the shade so they don’t get any direct sun. Now you will find little difference in the surface temperature. CO2 works that way too. In nature clouds provide the shade and negate the effect of CO2 when they are there.
The GCM debacle was predictable enough. They don’t model the water cycle well. They’re great on radiation but the surface energy exchanges are dominated by latent energy in the global average and hugely dominant over tropical oceans where most of the energy enters and exits the system. The north pole is a minor detail and only becomes important as a staging area for continental glaciation when the orbital parameters of the planet conspire to give ice formation the advantage.
Principia Scientifica is a sham. It’s a privately owned website created very recently pretending to be a legitimate publisher.
Example:
http://bit.ly/OaemsT
In IPCC’s multi-model mean, where is the multidecdal oscillation after 1970? Has the multidecdal oscillation stopped to exist after 1970?
Why did not the multi-model mean represent the warming phase of the multidecdal oscillation from 1910 to 1940?
Why did not the multi-model mean represent the cooling phase of the multidecdal oscillation from 1940 to 1970?
constitutes!
JC
This is an excellent article.
You have taken the side of Feynman.
You will have a clear conscience on this issue when the exaggeration is exposed in the next five years.
Thank you.
U – biqu – it – us arrows
one – way – streets,
highway,
low
way,
mis – nomered freeways,
go right – go left – look up –
look
down.
Carl Gaussian thinking on
un – CERTAIN – ty
by the I – P – C – C …
further yer – travel – – – away
from the CON – SENS – US
more pre – cip – it – us
the increase in speed of
declining odds …
Lets yer ignore out – liers,
lets yer ignore possible
( impossible? )
visionary and black swan
out – liers,
( out – liars ? )
Random thoughts from a random person
( with help from Nassim Taleb.)
Beth Cooper
Why does your po-et-ry mimic real life?
tempterrain –
Google on “Project Petition” and it will take you to the website describing the petition, naming the signatories, etc.
http://www.petitionproject.org/
Cut & paste still too complicated for you, Chad?
JC
I have found a typo if you want to publish somewhere your “reader’s digest” version.
Delete “the” in the following:
“….IPCC has had an intended consequence of introducing biases into [the] both the science and related decision making processes.”
Jim and others.
There are now dozens of members of Principia Scientific International, and numbers are growing significantly each month. So it’s hardly appropriate to refer to the original eight or so who called themselves the Slayers. PSI is far, far bigger now.
In your posts above you show no indication of having understood the (new) points being made, in particular by Prof Claes Johnson, Joseph Postma and myself. There is a summary of my points on pp 47, 48 & 49 in Postma’s October 2012 paper. If you had even read that, or my paper published back in March (both on the PSI website) then you would realise your statement about net radiation is way off track as far as our explanation of what is really happening. There’s no point in your reiterating “standard” stuff from the well-propagated hoax. We’ve all studied it, probably better than yourself. What you haven’t done is come to grips with what we are explaining – and why it is the true reality.
Doug
Those papers aren’t published. They’re posted. Stop abusing the term publish. Principia Scientific has all the publishing credentials of a blog. You act like it’s owned by Nature or Springer-Verlag fercrisakes. Please stop. Have a shred of dignity for a change.
And Jim … I wonder why you quoted the above from Postma, without quoting his logic that led to that conclusion. So I will quote it for others who have not yet read at least pp 47 to 49*
“Greenhouses do not create heat; they simply trap heated air…air which is heated through contact with objects that are heated by sunlight. The atmosphere does not trap heated air because it isn’t a physically rigid barrier – it is a gas and so it naturally flows and cools heated objects.
Greenhouses do the opposite of what the open atmosphere does. The atmosphere does not cause heating via its back-radiation because there is no evidence that this occurs, and this is not how a real physical greenhouse functions in any case. If a real physical greenhouse cannot heat by backradiation, then neither can the atmosphere. Trapped radiation cannot heat itself up and increase its own spectral temperature; radiation with a spectral temperature of -180C will always be radiation of a -180C spectral temperature, and this radiation cannot induce heating above its own spectral
temperature nor can it interact with itself to increase its own “Wein-peak” frequency. This is probably related to a fundamental restriction from the Laws of Thermodynamics. Radiation cannot increase its own temperature, nor the temperature of its own source.”
* http://principia-scientific.org/publications/Absence_Measureable_Greenhouse_Effect.pdf
The Postma paper is simply wrong from from the basics on. His earlier papers have been discussed in length here before and the recent contains at least many of the same errors.
A paper that gets all the basics wrong cannot compare in a meaningful way any empirical data with the theory. Such a paper is of no real value for anyone, it may only confuse those incapable of understanding the physics.
The abstract start with the claim that “A contextual flaw underlying the interpretation of a back-radiative greenhouse effect is identified.” That means naturally only that Postma has a basic flaw in his argumentation. He does not know what he is talking about.
On this we agree. Hallelujah.
Prove your allegations with just one point – if you can. I seriously doubt that you have any understanding of radiative heat transfer and why radiation does not always transfer heat. Johnson and Postma are light years ahead of you.
And their explanations are backed up by historic climate records. All climate is “controlled” by natural cycles (eg ~1,000 year and 60 years) and current temperatures are no warmer than those experienced 900 to 1000 years ago. In other words, long term cooling will set in probably within 100 years. Carbon dioxide levels have nothing to do with it.
That was done last time Postma’s paper was discussed here. It’s really unnecessary to repeat everything every time Postma or some other distributes BS one more time.
The source of this text is the most certain distributor of “papers” that lack all real value. David Springer brought this up and a Google search of Principia Scientific reveals that to everyone who has followed climate discussion at all. Nothing worth further commenting is ever expected from that source.
It’s also impossible to prove anything to persons who don’t see themselves what kind of crap that paper is. By taking such a text seriously they have shown that they cannot understand or accept any proof even when it’s explained carefully.
Yes, well my paper “Radiated Energy and the Second Law of Thermodynamics” has been published since 12 March 2012 here: http://principia-scientific.org/publications/psi_radiated_energy.pdf
In that time, to my knowledge, there has been no valid refutation of Sections 1 to 5 therein, nor of Prof Claes Johnson’s work upon which it was built.
Now Joseph Postma has picked up on it, following numerous emails among the ever growing number of scientists joining Principia Scientific International – all with a common goal of exposing the fraud and hoax which AGW is.
When you guys begin to argue with physics, rather than mere language, then this discussion may become fruitful – and you will learn why backradiation from carbon dioxide has no net effect on surface temperature, and never can have.
Doug Cotton
Claes Johnson’s work was thoroughly refuted in the discussions of this site. Your abstract alone provides a full proof that you don’t know at all what you are talking about. You have no understanding of the Second law.
If the BS freight train can escape exposure before the 2012 presidential election, they may be able to continue to deceive and enslave the public:
For reasons given below, I don’t think they will make it.
http://omanuel.wordpress.com/about/#comment-1595
http://omanuel.wordpress.com/about/#comment-1615
Please allow me to recommend the outstanding National Institute of Health website NIH Consensus Development Program: FAQ.
It is shocking and inexplicable (to me) that so many Climate Etc regulars — including Judith Curry herself :oops: — are speaking-out authoritatively regarding the infeasibility of “wicked messy” consensus-building … without ever having studied the hundreds of well-document instances, spanning many decades, in which scientific consensus *has* been achieved … even in facing-up to the “wickedest messiest” problems.
Seldom has the Dunning-Kruger effect been more prominently in-evidence here on Climate Etc … those whose knowledge of scientific consensus-building is *least* are speaking-out with the *most* confidence.
It is striking that the *less* folks know about *real-world* consensus-building, the *more* these same folks are adamantly yet irrationally certain, that the consensus-building is infeasible.
Which is an utterly wrong opinion, eh? WUWT, indeed! :eek: :?: :shock: :oops: :!:
Yep.
Though I think some of it is explained by misunderstanding the difference b/n an individuals perspective and that of an entire field.
Fan, the difference between NIH and those promoting AGW propaganda as science is shown below, in bold:
1. “NIH . . . conferences produce evidence-based consensus statements addressing controversial issues”
2. Al Gore and the UN produced faith-basedpseudo-consensus statements and peddled them as science
3. As the date approached for the people to vote on the wisdom of spending public funds to pinch off the tailpipe of the US economic engine in a sea of growing poverty, unemployment, and homelessness, the UN’s and Al’s messages UN were avoided in the presidential debate.
Thanks again, Fan, for the link to the NIH website.
According to IPCC’s multi-model mean, the mutidecadal oscillation has ceased to exist after 1970:
http://bit.ly/OaemsT
Why?
Judith Curry
Thanks for an excellent and balanced summary of how the IPCC forced consensus process has defended the prevailing paradigm against all other scientific viewpoints.
It appears from the comments that many of your denizens on both sides of the debate have a problem accepting a balanced view – for one side, your argument doesn’t go far enough in condemning IPCC, others defend the consensus against any criticism.
Max
+10
Pearl-clutching over the word ‘consensus’ doesn’t have any effect on the evidence.
Not the word “consensus”, Michael but:
> the IPCC forced consensus process
which reminds me why I was alluding to “consensual sex” a while ago.
Maybe that is wine is so popular at COP events :)
I figured it was because you were a pervert. Who the f*ck else would connect science with sex?
Springer,
Here’s what Ludwig Wittgenstein says in his **Philosophical Remarks**:
> The meaning of a question is the method of answering it: then what is the meaning of ‘Do two men really mean the same by the word “white”?’ Tell me how you are searching, and I will tell you what you are searching for.
Not that this should impress you, since it’s only an Austrian, a queer Asperger to boot.
The meaning of “consensus” depends upon its uses. Looking at the many uses “consensus” will lead you to what “scientific consensus” means. There is something in “consensual sex” that is shared with “scientific consensus”.
Michael
You are right.
That is precisely the problem.
There is no scientific evidence in support of IPCC’s “CAGW” paradigm (as willard knows).
That’s why he changes the subject when that topic arises.
Max
> There is no scientific evidence in support of IPCC’s “CAGW” paradigm (as willard knows).
Actually, I believe that “CAGW paradigm” makes little sense, except perhaps as a strawman for sloganeering effect. I’ve said so many times, but manacker is thick as a brick. And the poet sheaths his pen while the soldier lifts his sword.
Willard, “Actually, I believe that “CAGW paradigm” makes little sense, except perhaps as a strawman for sloganeering effect. ” No doubt, but that is part of politics. The one side has merchant of doubt and fat tails, the other has a line in the sand.
Willard the waffler writes:
I agree with you Willard. It makes no sense at all (because it is not supported by empirical evidence).
Max
So Max feels violated by the IPCC?
Oh great. See what you did, Willard? You have all the other perverts feeling empowered now.
Michael
Naw. Not really.
IPCC has lost all relevance. They just don’t know it yet.
Max
> IPCC has lost all relevance.
That’s why manacker is here telling us that repeatedly, over and over again.
That comment was pretty partisan for someone who’s supposed to be above such things.
Springer,
I do admit being a partisan of pragmatic relevance.
Which reminds me of this joke:
Descartes walks into a bar.
The bartender says, “Are you having a beer?”
Descartes replies:
> I think not
and ipso facto ceases to exist.
So instead Descarte walked into a Temperance Union meeting?
”
So instead Descarte walked into a Temperance Union meeting?
”
That’s putting Descartes in front of the hoarse.
Springer rides at Judy’s:
“Are you having a conversation?”
A cousin of the Chessire Cat asks him.
He replies, “Yes, I think I would!”, then
Springer and the cat disappear.
willard (@nevaudit) | October 30, 2012 at 11:01 am |
“Descartes walks into a bar.”
You have a real problem with originality, huh? That particular joke has appeared on the internet approximately 4,720 times. You bore the crap out of me.
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4LENN_enUS461US461&q=Descartes+walks+into+a+bar.+The+bartender+says%2c+%22Are+you+having+a+beer%3f%22+Descartes+says%2c+%22I+think
Funniest thread I’ve read for a long while, thanks, in no particular order, to David S, Willard, JCH and Heinrich
Naw, Willard.
I just have to repeat it several times for the slow learners like you.
Everyone else has already figured it out for themselves.
Max
So Max feels violated by the IPCC?
Who here doesn’t? They “forced” the poor unwashed to accept the consensus, which is, of course completely fabricated, and without supporting evidence of any kind from observations or physical theory.
Let’s see: Judith and her business partner, who sell forecasts, toss out some phil-of-sci word-salad, and then:
”
It is difficult to avoid concluding that the IPCC consensus is manufactured and that the existence of this consensus does not lend intellectual substance to their conclusions.
”
You see – The existence of a consensus cannot possibly have anything to do with the consilience of evidence and the convergence of expert opinion.
I was amazed when Dr Curry selflessly stood up to advocate for scientific integrity.
But now she’s offering free advice on the lending practices of “intellectual substance” to international scientific organizations!
Is there ANYTHING about science that Dr Curry won’t deign to protect from other climate scientists?
Or maybe the “IPCC consensus” just a competing business model?
Curry and Webster – Needs more cowbell.
Poe’s Law. I think you’re being sarcastic but it’s hard to tell for sure.
Say, fan, Dunning and Kruger aren’t the last word on ‘experts’.
In ‘The Black Swan Taleb examines ‘The Scandal of Prediction,’
the ‘expert’ problem and tragedy of the empty suit. He cites a
five year study of political and economic experts, involving about
27,000 predictions. (Tetlock 2005) Turns out that experts’ error
error rates were many times greater than they estimated and there
was no difference in prediction error rate between PhDs and those
with undergraduate degrees. Experts tend ter dig in on a theory and
be prone ter confirmation bias.
This on ‘certainty’ from Bertrand Russell:
‘One of the painful things about our time is that those who feel
certainty are stupid and those with any imagination and under-
standing are filled with doubt..’
The quote seems more applicable ter the consensus confidence
of the IPCC than ter doubting Thomas skeptics, couldn’t yer say,
fan? By the way, do yer know the secret language of fans, fan? :-)
”
Experts tend ter dig in on a theory and be prone ter confirmation bias.
”
Oh yes. That’s why I consult my friends at the office when trying to decide on which chemotherapy treatments should be performed on people who have been diagnosed by their amateur dentists.
I invite you to take a flight with Common-Man Airlines. No experts allowed.
The one-of-kind aircraft are designed by telephone sanitizers, and piloted by whichever dope-head happens to be at the airport first that day.
Glad to hear I’m an amature. I guess that makes me safe from failure to diagnose lawsuits.
This is fer u fan.
That was strange. But I watched it twice so I guess it wasn’t strange in a bad way.
Nice.
Here’s for our troglodyte:
http://www.victoriaspast.com/Fandance/fandance.htm
FOAD
And just when our troglodyte were bragging about his control prowesses:
> FOAD can be used in many different scenarios. However, no matter what scenario the word is used in [it] is a way vent emotional instabilty [sic.] in a given situation.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=foad
captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | October 30, 2012 at 10:30 am |
“Pretty wicked problem.”
Weather is a wicked problem. Climate not so much. It only appears to be a wicked problem by the huge amount of obfuscation generated by a legion of over-thinking climate boffins who have a vested interest in making it more complicated than it is. In general all experts have a vested interest in making their area of expertise obtuse to outsiders. In the old days the experts controlled the literature in the art but that’s no longer true in the internet age and they have not adjusted to the new reality that anyone with a broad background can become an overnight expert in any particular subject. The new scientific genius is the generalist who can reach deeper on demand into any particular area. The specialist is quickly becoming obsolete.
Climate still has the “weather” issue on longer time scales. The main “wicked” problem is the internal transfer, just like weather. So you still have a complex problem with simplistic tools used to “solve” and overly simplistic definitions of the “problem”. It is a battle of semantics not science.
So any real expect should say, “FIIK, but there are indications of this…” Which I believe is the “Italian flag” or “Monte Hall” school of decision making.
I still have to disagree. Small fluctuations that might effect the price of tea in China from time to time but overall it’s pretty predictable. Even the ice age takes predictably timed jaunts between only two semi-stable states. Most of the time, regardless of what else happens or whether sun is a young weakling or a strong 5-billion year-old middle aged star, the earth has no permanent ice at or near sea level. The continents are currently arranged so that under the right orbital parameters (warmer winters, cooler summers) permanent ice cover can gain a foothold on dry land and advance southward at an accelerating pace with a positive feedback effect from increasing albedo. The orbital parameters change like clockwork and so do the glacial/interglacial periods.
So I really have no idea what it is you consider so wicked about any of that. The only wicked part is regional variation on the edges of the envelope. The envelope is mean annual temperature is lower in New York City than it is in Charleston, NC by the general rule of 3 degrees Fahrenheit for every degree of latitude. You can take that to the bank. The edge of the envelope is it won’t be exactly the same difference every single year. There is a butterfly effect but it’s a highly constrained effect.
” The continents are currently arranged so that under the right orbital parameters (warmer winters, cooler summers) permanent ice cover can gain a foothold on dry land and advance southward at an accelerating pace with a positive feedback effect from increasing albedo. ”
But the foothold and rate of expansion from that foothold are not the same. Conditions are set up to transfer more precipitation to land storage but there are a few billion new inhabitants that impact the “normal” cycle. Since that has never been the case, what will happen is not predictable. What new chain of events will result?
Even the longer term cycle of glacials changes without that new variable. The Antarctic Circumpolar current more prominent now than it was .8 to 2.8 million years ago. The rate of ocean overturning changes, so a new solar orbital cycle increases in dominance.
It is in many ways more predictable than weather because of the slower rate of change, but over a similar time scale, just as unpredictable. That is the difference, time.
Copout. Over longer timescales we can’t test predictions so you’re just speculating about instability. There’s no evidence of chaotic climate behavior in the past. It’s very stable and even in the most unstable state (the modern ice age) it flips back and forth between two stable states as predictable as orbital mechanics. That’s my story and I’m sticking with it.
Copout?
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-fa_IDVMYqrM/UHBo7G5aA1I/AAAAAAAAESc/DW9qH5j3RSo/s912/past%2520few%2520million%2520years%2520of%2520tropical%2520ocean%2520temperatures.png
If you pull a IPCC and make the range of projection wide enough, then you can claim predictability, that would be a copout I would think. If you narrow the range of what would be a useful projection?
”
…anyone with a broad background can become an overnight expert in any particular subject…
The specialist is quickly becoming obsolete.
”
Soon, everyone will be an expert climate scientist, just like Chris Monckton.
Happy days ahead.
Nuclear reactors everywhere will soon be remotely operated by a guy with a nervous tick named Bubba, and your medical prescriptions will be issued by ‘Charlize’ from the tattoo parlour. Aircraft carriers will be constructed from plans drawn up by local organic farmers.
And don’t worry about your car – Drs Curry and Webster will have that transmission working by morning.
”
Your comment is awaiting moderation.
”
Interesting. Who let the dog out?
Hound dog
Monckton is what he is.
Hansen is not.
Big difference.
Max
”
the new reality that anyone with a broad background can become an overnight expert in any particular subject. The new scientific genius is the generalist who can reach deeper on demand into any particular area. The specialist is quickly becoming obsolete.
”
In the age of the internet, everyone’s a Monckton.
BTW – don’t worry about your car. Consensus has it that Drs Curry and Webster will have that nasty transmission fixed by tomorrow.
Manufactured AGW consensus faces a slight problem:
The powerful force at the core of the Sun that
a.) Made our elements
b.) Birthed the world five billion years (5 Gyr) ago
c.) Totally controlled Earth’s climate as life appeared 3.5 Gyr ago
d.) Sustained life’s evolution into the most talented forms on Earth today
e.) And now extends out from the Sun’s core, ~120 AU beyond planet Earth [Nature 489, 20-21 (2012)]
http://www.nature.com/news/voyager-s-long-goodbye-1.11348
Otherwise, Maurice Strong, Al Gore, the UN’s IPCC, world leaders might enslave the world with a post-1945 version of Stalin’s USSR directing us to UN’s Agenda 21 (UN’s own site is down for pre-election maintenance)
http://www.crossroad.to/text/articles/la21_198.html
We have been blessed to be able to watch this classic drama unfold.
Yer gotta read the chapter, Heinrich, lol. Distinctions are made about knowing how to … and knowing what will eventuate, predicting future events like stock market crashes or the length of wars. And failing
ter note our low success rate.
Beth –
You might make sense to other people if yer jus’ tried composin’ yer wisdom in the form of sentences. Prolly too much to ask – but think of the re-wards…
Anyway – I’m guessing that stock market crashes and the durations of wars are somewhat less directly constrained by the laws of physics than the planetary climate. Who knew?
I’d insert a Russell or Feynman quote here – but I have been temporarily overcome with ennui.
You are so wrong. Consider the commonplace kitchen appliance called the oven. Ask a panel of physicists to predict the type and color that will be popular 5 years hence. See, they would have no idea, and they would have to make a WAG. Therefore, there would be no point in asking them to predict what would happen if said oven 5 years off into the future were properly installed and somebody turned the knob to Broil. I mean, the idiots couldn’t even get the color right.
Right.
Because future kitchen appliance styling and thermodynamics are just the same.
That is, of course, why companies such as GE employ so many physicists – it’s for predicting the ovens of the future. Badly.
I get it. Really. I do.
And it’s far worse than just commonplace kitchen appliances…
Nobody could have predicted the popularity of Justin Bieber five years early, therefore science is a crooked enterprise. QED.
> Consider the commonplace kitchen appliance called the oven.
For troglodytes, an oven is like a carbecue, but inside the house:
http://www.carbecue.net/
> I’d insert a Russell or Feynman quote here – but I have been temporarily overcome with ennui.
http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/ennui.htm
To cope with that, here you go:
http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/tagged/RussellForBloggers
http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/tagged/FeynmanForBloggers
A work on regress.
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@tempterrain (far above)
“Does this ‘logic’ just apply to climate change or is it useful with other things too? So you are saying it’s never a good idea to do anything? Its always better to postpone any decision indefinitely? Because, the longer it is postponed the more will be known?”
Consider the following thought experiment: I have a time machine and go back 20 years. With my knowledge of the future, could I (with no training now) be a good doctor, pilot or policeman in the 1980’s? No.
What about stock analyst or political consultant (again with no training)? I would be the best of the best in these fields – Buy Apple! Watch out for subprimes in ’08! Concentrate the ground-game on FL in 2000!
-> In areas that forecast large systems, a little time is worth all the expertise in the world. The ability to wait for future experience to develop delivers huge returns on knowledge.
Not going “all-in” for a Green economy now does not preclude the ability to adapt in the future. Consumption and industrial policy are quite malleable even in the short term when there is broad legitimacy for the change – think WWII in the U.S. However the costs of immediate mitigation are lost opportunities, with the possibility of delivering no tangible benefit in the future: either due to incorrect science, or uncooperative foreign nations.
The inability of even our best and brightest to look into complex systems and make even decent predictions is what gives rise to the “high discount rate” associated with start-ups. It is ultimately this discounting for uncertainty (not just the time value of money) that tips the scales between (potential) current losses & (potential) future losses.
In what may go down as the high water mark of climate denial dementia Watts Up With That? has already begun denying that Sandy was a hurricane,
What in Willis’s comment was not accurate? He wrote that Sandy would no longer be a hurricane when it hit the coast. Was he correct?
Sandy has just been described on the BBC as a post cyclone tropical stiorm. I thought it lost its hurricane status (category 1) some time ago?
tonyb
At the time of landfall, it was a hybrid, was declared post tropical storm pretty much right at landfall. The wind speeds were equivalent to a category 1 hurricane. So this is semantics. But I’ve deleted the statement about being Category 1 at landfall.
No consensus on hurricane status. Typical. Isn’t that just precious?
judith
“hybrid?”
as in “bastard?”
Sure ’nuff.
Max
Note to Willard
http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/filibuster.htm
My toolbox overfloweth.
Are we having fun yet?
For our context, I prefer Thick as a Brick. Goes well with the Can’t Get Enough Satisfaction algorithm.
Still wondering how to plug in Don’t Stand So Close to Me.
Willard the waffler tosses out another senseless algorithm instead of plugging in his brain.
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It may take a decade or so, but “consensus” is starting to swing the other way, I suggest. Principia Scientific International continues to add to its numbers scientists who know that carbon dioxide does not control our climate.
On 22 October 2012 Joseph Postma published on the PSI site what must be one of the most comprehensive papers ever peer-reviewed on the topic. See …
http://principia-scientific.org/publications/Absence_Measureable_Greenhouse_Effect.pdf
Prof Claes Johnson was the first to put forward computations supporting the now-established fact that not all radiation striking a target actually transfers heat to that target. Radiation is not a bombardment of photons that explode like hand grenades and heat anything they collide with. If the radiation comes from a cooler source it is merely scattered and, energy-wise, the result is similar to reflection.
In my own paper published on PSI on 12 March 2012 I discussed Johnson’s work and the quantification of heat transfer by radiation. Postma has cited my paper and included a detailed summary I wrote – see pp 47 to 49.
The main effect of backradiation comes from water vapour – perhaps 100 times more effective than carbon dioxide in slowing the radiative rate of surface cooling. However, this radiative cooling makes up less than 30% of all heat transfer from the surface to the atmosphere. The important point is that the rates of non-radiative cooling can accelerate to compensate for any slowing of radiative cooling, thus leaving no net change in the overall rate of cooling.
Climate change follows natural cycles, most notably 1000 and 60 year ones. Recent research has established that there were world wide temperatures similar to this period about 900 to 1000 years ago. So it appears the world will reach a 1000 year maximum in the coming 100 years or so, if not already. The superimposed 60 year cycle has been declining since about 1998, but did cause alarm in the 30 years before that. The cycles were not so well recognised then, so the IPCC et al made the huge mistake of assuming that 30 year trend should be extrapolated upwards for ever.
In a nutshell, carbon dioxide does not, and never will have any effect on world temperatures.
http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-262391
You are sadly mistaken, Pekka, but obviously not prepared to learn by reading beyond an abstract, which you have probably misinterpretted anyway.
I seriously doubt that you have any idea of what the three of us are saying, along with support from many other scientists who are swelling the ranks of Principia Scientific International because they realise the whole carbon dioxide thing is a hoax at best, but more likely outright fraud.
It’s your choice if you want to be a party to such. Perhaps I have a more questioning mind and a better “feel” for physics, based on my experience since the early 1960’s..
It really isn’t rocket science. The vested interest of the UN/IPCC lies in advancing world governance.
The main practical objective of the IPCC has thus been to ‘conclude’ that there is sufficient certainty in the science so as to trigger political action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Advancing world govt by satellite!
LOL.
No, a crackpot response to the basic common sense that can’t understand that the UN isn’t interested in world governance.
An incoherent response LOL!
…to incoherent crackpottery.
LOL^2
Sufficient certainty? Here’s* a list of just some of the scientists at PSI who are sufficiently certain that 1 molecule of CO2 in 2,500 does not control climate. Maybe it’s not rocket science, but nor is it the flat Earth pseudo science that supports the biggest hoax the world has ever known.
Now, for the last time, read Joseph Postma’s new paper dated 22 October, 2012 – if you want to learn with an open mind that is. But if the thought of being influenced to change your mind troubles you too much, or you have vested interests in the status quo, then chicken out of reading it.
* http://principia-scientific.org/index.php/about/why-psi-is-proposed-as-a-cic.html
This is off topic on this thread. I suggest week in review for this discussion.
Perhaps we could all consider what sort of empirical evidence would in/validate and quantify AGW.
How about being able to distinguish between originary radiation from the sun, and back-radiation from CO2 ?
Commissario, lunghezza d’onda?
Czar In the US nowadays, every sticky problem has to have a Czar. So how about Czar Photon? He could issue little photo passports?
http://www.montalbano.rai.it/dl/portali/site/page/Page-cbbaf188-90bf-4fa1-be7a-1fe00df83c42.html
:-) My great powers of detection – aka babylon.com – render that as
“Commissioner, wavelength”
Is it really that simple?
The CO2 radiation is infrared (vibrational) and probably some microwave (rotational). Incoming solar is much shorter–visible, UV. If you look closely at the conceptual model for the radiation balance (e.g., as described in ICPP 4) you should be able to find more detail and references. But that is a my generalist view from a 36000 foot level–a lot of folk here are much more into the stuff. I am happy with just that much. Great series, huh?
This is so naive. Read Section 6 of my paper* and see the notches caused by carbon dioxide and water vapour as they absorb some of the incoming solar radiation in the 2 micron range and then send some backradiation to space. You are at a very early stage in your reading. You also need to study Postma’s October 2012 paper linked above.
*http://principia-scientific.org/index.php/about/why-psi-is-proposed-as-a-cic.html
Doug Cotton
newclimatechangetheory
Can you read? I wrote
“But that is a my generalist view from a 36000 foot level–a lot of folk here are much more into the stuff.”
That was an intentionally’simple answer that pointed to other material and encourages reading–no more, no less. Note that Montalbano’s original question was:
“How about being able to distinguish between originary [sic] radiation from the sun, and back-radiation from CO2 ?”
Well, the most fundamental distinction is energy–frequency, wave length–distribution. Those are the observables available [used] and they do discriminate between incoming solar and IR radiations. At that simple–yes, even naive–level of discrimination it has nothing to do with either your or anybody else’s Rube Goldberg machine–excuse me, theory.
So I am very pleased that I was so sufficiently naive with my answer. Thanks for the encouraging feedback. Because of your kind help it stresses me, however, to advise you that you might like to throttle that ego back a little. Honey attracts more flies. If you’ve got good suggestions, you can make them in a civil manner. Maybe someone would listen then.
Aaah, a little more business on a couple of other things you wrote…
“You are at a very early stage in your reading.”
Well now, that depends on how much reading I intend to do on the subject. I may have completed my reading ;O)
“You also need to study…”
Oh, why?
Regards, mwgrant aka Catarella
PS If you want to provide a link to your paper then you should provide the correct direct link. Get a coach.
You are still limiting your thinking to radiation. See my post below, written before reading yours.
Hi Doug,
Let me try different words. My interest in climate change really is peripheral and follows retirement from a career in other fields of environmental science. I may be one of the few people frequenting the climate blogs not trying ‘solve’ anything. I was giving Montalbano my most basic ‘chemical physicist’ answer to how can on to distinguish between the solar (UV/vis) radiation and GHG (IR) because the question was indeed how to distinguish between them. In addition, I am neither qualified nor inclined to extend my comments to the details of where my knowledge is at a conceptual level–I don’t work on the specific problem nor it it likely I will. So I have other priorities.
So yes you are correct in that I am willfully limiting my thinking, but not because I advocate one approach (to CC) over the other–I don’t know enough for that. It is just that after decades of wrangling, cajoling, doing the right thing on my own time, to many times putting up with stupidity, I am just going to do/look at/enjoy the morsels of science that interest me. I pay my salary ;O).
For the record I intuitively feel something is not right at a very fundamental level. This is largely because no one speaks with quiet confidence. And that is an important cue.
You did come back and write more, though. I appreciate that (concurrent) response and will take a look at them.
Regards mwgrant aka Catarella
Sorry for the delay in response–Halloween duties.
Sorry – if using the above link, select “Radiated Energy” in the “Publications” menu. Or go directly here.
Those who still believe the carbon dioxide hoax need to come to realise that energy balance does not determine climate. It’s the other way round. Climate determines energy balance. Climate itself is determined by the incident solar energy which fluctuates in long term natural cycles probably related to planetary orbits.
Earth’s surface temperature cools as heat from the Sun is transferred back to the atmosphere. This process is dominated by sensible heat transfer, not by radiation which accounts for less than 30% of such transfers.
All that backradiation can possibly do (according to physics) is slow that 30% of cooling which is due to radiation. Meanwhile, the other 70% merely accelerates to compensate, thus leaving no net effect on the overall rate of cooling. What comes in from the Sun will get out again by one means or another. When there are long periods of natural warming there will of course be a build up of energy being retained. The thermometers tell us that, without even having to measure the energy balance. But the opposite is the case when cooling sets in.
Backradiation is not the cause, because it cannot transfer heat to a warmer surface. It can only slow radiative cooling. See my peer-reviewed paper on PSI recently cited by Joseph Postma in his October 2012 paper.
Doug Cotton
.
As a footnote, let’s consider what actually happens when radiation leaves a warm source …
The EM energy in radiation from a warmer source is partly converted to thermal energy in a cooler target. However, that portion of it represented by the area under the Planck curve for the cooler body is not converted to thermal energy in that target, because it can resonate – as explained by Prof Claes Johnson. Instead, that portion of the energy is re-radiated as part of the cooler body’s S-B quota, and some of the energy in that new radiation will be converted to thermal energy iff it strikes a cooler body. The process continues until it reaches a target at absolute zero which cannot emit anything. This helps explain why the average temperature of emissions in space is between 2 and 3 deg.K.
The fact is, that there can be no transfer of energy to a warmer target, because if there were, then that energy (now in the form of thermal energy) could escape by means other than radiation. No empirical evidence anywhere suggests that this happens.
So, if to you the word “absorb” means that EM energy in radiation from a cool source is in fact converted to thermal energy in a warmer target, temporarily raising the temperature of the target even more, then I have to say that warmer targets do not absorb EM energy in this fashion. Instead, they use the energy in the incident radiation to create instantaneously some of their own S-B quota of outgoing radiation. Thus they don’t need to convert an equivalent amount of their own thermal energy to EM energy, a process which is more complex than merely “bouncing off” the incident energy. So, yes, the radiative cooling rate is slowed as I have agreed. But, the energy in the incident radiation was never converted to heat which could have caused sensible heat transfer. Hence rates of sensible heat transfer are not affected by backradiation from a cooler atmosphere. Yet the IPCC energy diagrams imply that they are, and also imply that far more heat exits the surface by way of radiation than is really the case.
So, much of the observed radiation is not transferring heat from the surface, but instead “bouncing off” energy from the backradiation. So a much higher percentage of actual heat transfer must be due to sensible heat transfer than is implied by the IPCC diagrams. And the rate of cooling by sensible heat transfer is quite free to increase to compensate for any slowing of the much smaller proportion due to radiative cooling.
If all this is not enough to make you and other readers question those energy diagrams, then I don’t know what would be.
Doug Cotton
Sydney
Author of “Radiated Energy and the Second Law of Thermodynamics”
NewClimate man
So radiation from a cooler body cannot warm a warmer body.
Does this imply that the warmer body somehow checks the source and credentials of radiation (photons?) before taking it on board?
Yes Vassily. You’ll find a comprehensive explanation of the process in Sections 2 to 5 in my paper published last March. The cited paper by Prof Johnson will also explain the resonating process for you. Then there’s also a page or so which I contributed to Joseph Postma’s October paper starting on p 47. You might also do well to read Clausius – written in 1850.
Well ok, but for the benefit of us poor lay people then :-
– photons carry carry information of how warm the body that emitted them was ?
– bodies (atoms?) approached by photons, effectively check this information, and reject/ignore photons that have come from a cooler body ?
It’s funny you say that, I thought the back-radiation effect was supposed to be due to the outgoing photons “checking” the incoming photons to see if they can “get by”, which then “requires” the warmer surface to increase in temperature before it can radiate “normally”.
I don’t see why that makes any more sense than photons from one source being unable to further excite atoms which are already emitting more energetic photons.
Max,
All that is only your imagination. That’s not what back radiation is about. Photons interact with each other so weakly that these interactions have no influence on the incoming or outgoing radiation. (The interactions are important in a laser but in general not elsewhere.)
“All that is only your imagination. That’s not what back radiation is about. Photons interact with each other so weakly that these interactions have no influence on the incoming or outgoing radiation.”
I seem to recall asking someone how a cold surface causes a warm surface to increase in temperature, given the issues with heat transfer in that direction, and was told roughly that “the radiation from the cold body prevents the warm body from radiating effectively, so the temperature rises to a new radiative equilibrium” or something along those lines.
There was a vague allusion to an insulating effect, but insulation usually involves reducing thermal conduction or reflecting radiation from the colder body.
Is there some reason why radiation emitted from a cold surface towards a warm surface would have a similar effect as reflecting radiation emitted from the warm surface towards the cold surface?
Max,
Surfaces may reflect radiation but they do it usually very weakly for thermal radiation. Basically every surface radiates at an intensity determined by its temperature and absorbs almost all thermal IR that hits it. (Some rather exceptional solid or liquid surfaces reflect a significant share of thermal IR rather than absorb almost all of it.)
When a cold surface and a warm surface can radiate towards each other, there’s always more radiation from the warmer to the colder than vice versa, because the temperature affects the intensity of emission. Neither surface can, however, influence the radiation from the other one (excluding the fact that they influence the temperature of the other by their radiation). What I wrote in this chapter is what the Second Law tells about radiative energy transfer between two surfaces.
“Surfaces may reflect radiation but they do it usually very weakly for thermal radiation. Basically every surface radiates at an intensity determined by its temperature and absorbs almost all thermal IR that hits it. (Some rather exceptional solid or liquid surfaces reflect a significant share of thermal IR rather than absorb almost all of it.)”
Indeed, it was my understanding that temperature determines radiation, not the other way around.
“When a cold surface and a warm surface can radiate towards each other, there’s always more radiation from the warmer to the colder than vice versa, because the temperature affects the intensity of emission. Neither surface can, however, influence the radiation from the other one (excluding the fact that they influence the temperature of the other by their radiation). What I wrote in this chapter is what the Second Law tells about radiative energy transfer between two surfaces.”
Ok, you state that neither surface can influence the radiation of the other, except where they influence the temperature of the other.
The heat flow between a warmer and colder surface already includes the radiative flux.
Adding the radiative flux to the overall heat transfer is just a book-keeping error, as it is already included. That appears to be why an insulation-type effect is invoked… but I fail to see how an exchange of photons (rather than reflection of photons) could produce an insulating effect, what am I missing?
One mechanism of energy transport in atmosphere is that where GHG molecules emit radiation at one point and absorb at another. Adding more GHG’s makes the distance traveled by a photon before it gets absorbed shorter. Although more GHG’s means that more photons are emitted and absorbed, the reduction in the distance they travel before being absorbed leads to less net energy transfer. This corresponds to more insulation.
“photons carry carry information of how warm the body that emitted them was ” They certainly do – read my paper. Haven’t you noticed that the Sun’s rays warm you more than the Moon’s?
Max :
Pekka seems clear that photon-on-photon action is minimal.
And I believe there is no reason a photon from a colder body cannot warm a warmer body. This is still consistent with the overall photon traffic from warm-to-cold exceeding that of cold-to-warm going in the opposite direction.
photon-on-photon action? That is kinda stimulating in a geeky kinda way :)
Net is used by most folks because of the back radiation issues. Photons are not the sharpest tacks in the box, they just flow until they run into something.
Photons do not equate directly to thermal energy, an exchange of radiation in one direction does not require an exchange of thermal energy in the same direction.
I can see why someone unfamiliar with quantum mechanics may confuse the two, and might not see the importance of such a distinction.
Indeed, the tendency to associate “infrared” with “heat” is understandable, but claiming “infrared from a colder surface heats up a warmer surface” is about as sensible as stating “red light from a colder surface heats up a warmer surface”, and it is only our inability to see infrared wavelengths directly that keeps this from being obvious.
Vassily:
If I may: You are correct, and Max™ is wrong.
A body that absorbs a photon does so independently of the temperature of the body that emitted the photon.
A cold body emits fewer and longer-wavelength photons than a hot body – but the photons have no ‘memory’ of the temperature of the emitter.
In fact – since any ‘cold’ object whose temperature is above absolute zero MUST emit photons, any other objects nearby that are not perfect reflectors MUST be heated to a higher temperature than they would have been if the ‘cold’ object were not there.
BTW – Max™ – This has nothing to do with the details of quantum mechanics that you pretend to know so much about. It’s classical radiative physics.
When it is said that IR from a colder surface heats a warmer surface that is said relative to no surface, i.e. free space without any source of radiation. More energy comes to the warm surface when there is a cool surface in front of it that when there’s just free space there.
Every photon carries energy. When it’s emitted the emitting body looses that energy, when it’s absorbed the absorbing body receives the energy. This is energy transfer and those processes occur in both directions between two bodies. The net energy transfer goes in one direction but that’s formed as difference of transfers in each direction. There may, of course, by other types of energy transfer as well but the radiative energy transfer is not directly influenced by that.
Quantum mechanics is needed in some considerations but photons can easily be discussed also without it as long as the details of emission and absorption are not considered.
I agree with Pekka here, and photons are not necessary to explain the problem, it just complicates the problem. It’ basic heat transfer as in textbooks.
“There may, of course, by other types of energy transfer as well but the radiative energy transfer is not directly influenced by that.”
It depends on what you mean by directly. If a body (or a system) is not in outer space (or similar conditions) and other forms of heat (and/or energy) transfer is possible, they will for sure influence the radiative energy transfer. It’ basic physics.
Edim,
I didn’t say that photons are not needed in the explanation. On the contrary, trying to explain what happens without photons gets really messy. It may be possible to explain the same physics without photons but that would be really complicated while photons make everything rather simple.
What I said is that much can be explained without quantum mechanics. QM is also needed to explain the emission and absorption spectra like the fact that CO2 emits and absorbs strongly at 15 um and less at other wavelengths. Many considerations can, however, be presented before it’s necessary to take up QM.
“A body that absorbs a photon does so independently of the temperature of the body that emitted the photon.”
Indeed, and the transfer of thermal energy between two bodies by photons is the radiation emitted minus that absorbed. Speaking of such exchanges per photon is just as nonsensical as if you look at the photons from one source alone.
A body emitting at a given temperature will not absorb more photons from a colder body than the colder body receives from it. How exactly is an increase in the thermal energy of the warmer body supposed to arise from a heat flow towards the colder body?
“A cold body emits fewer and longer-wavelength photons than a hot body – but the photons have no ‘memory’ of the temperature of the emitter.”
I never claimed they did, but the overall flux which determines the transfer of thermal energy does depend on the temperature of both bodies.
“In fact – since any ‘cold’ object whose temperature is above absolute zero MUST emit photons, any other objects nearby that are not perfect reflectors MUST be heated to a higher temperature than they would have been if the ‘cold’ object were not there.”
Again note that you are explicitly describing an exchange of photons back and forth, while claiming it produces a transfer of thermal energy from colder to warmer surfaces.
You are describing something like an insulating effect except rather than it leading to a reduced rate of cooling, you’re suggesting it actually raises the temperature of the radiating body when it warms the environment?
“BTW – Max™ – This has nothing to do with the details of quantum mechanics that you pretend to know so much about. It’s classical radiative physics.”
Considering a single side of an exchange of photons between two bodies can be better understood by examining the results of single photons being emitted from one of the bodies and absorbed by the other.
It is useful to understand the result of each photon imparting energy upon the atoms of the other body, and the response of said atoms.
Looking at it one photon at a time you can easily see that there is indeed energy transferred from the colder body to the warmer body.
The actual mechanism by which that energy is imparted upon those atoms, and the interaction of those atoms with other atoms in the warmer body can be described in terms of kinetic, vibrational, and rotational motion. The net result of each individual photon on each atom is then averaged over the entire body, and the actual transfer of thermal energy can be distinguished from the individual contribution of a single photon.
If a single photon can not decide the direction of heat flow, one can ask if photons in a single direction can do so?
If a single side of the radiative transfer is not sufficient to describe heat flow, we can breathe a sigh of relief, because thermodynamics holds after all.
Max,
Your comment is mostly consistent with standard thinking, but what do you mean by the words: “.. the actual transfer of thermal energy can be distinguished from the individual contribution of a single photon”?
Those words make me wonder whether you still have some misconceptions about physics.
Another remaining issue seems to be that you don’t see how close your thinking is to the main stream and how the differences are mostly more semantic than real.
Joseph Postma, author of the latest and most comprehensive PSI paper, has commented here – others may wish to read what he has written.
If we look at Trenberth’s energy budget diagram on page 314 here we see 333 W/m^2 backradiation and only 396 W/m^2 for radiation from the surface to the atmosphere or direct to space. I would argue that, 333 of the 396 is merely scattered backradiation which, as explained in my earlier posts, does not transfer any (new) heat from the surface. So only 396 – 333 = 63 W/m^2 is transferring heat. Sensible heat transfer is shown as 80 + 17 = 97 W/m^2. Hence we have a total of 63 + 97 = 160 W/m^2 transferring heat from the surface. Of this, 97 / 160 = ~61% is transferred by sensible heat transfer. However, of the 63 W/m^2 of radiation we see that 40 W/m^2 goes straight to space. Hence carbon dioxide can have no effect on that cooling. That leaves only 23 W/m^2 being absorbed by the atmosphere.
So, we have 23 / 160 = only14% of heat transfer from the surface can possibly be affected by water vapour, carbon dioxide and their colleagues, (whom I refuse to call GHG’s) and it is not too hard to imagine other cooling processes accelerating to compensate for any slowing of this 14% of all heat transfer from the surface..
“A body that absorbs a photon does so independently of the temperature of the body that emitted the photon.” I repeat, this statement is simply not correct. Read Johnson’s, Postma’s and my own papers which all explain why. I’ve given you the references above, and have no more time to waste explaining reality to you. Be careful you don’t get sunburnt by all that backradiation at night.
Cute comment.
But “back”radiation is probably a bad description, since as I understand it, the heat first absorbed and then re-emitted by GHGs, is scattered elsewhere in the GHG, rather than being sent uninterrupted back to earth or out to space (other than above the altitude known as the Effective Radiation Level). Scattered GHG radiation warms the earth by warming the GHG, leading to slower conductive/convective earth-to-atmosphere cooling.
(Preparing to be shot down in flames, I have my parachute at the ready)
Backradiation is a bad decription. Atmospheric radiation is better. The atmosphere gains its energy from the surface pre-dominantly by the non-radiative modes (direct contact) and secondarily by the net radiative exchange surface-atmosphere. This gained energy has to be radiated to space and only the so-called GHGs can transfer the heat to space. They look more like roof windows in a greenhouse.
Yes. Backradiation is, indeed, a bad term as it appears to imply that the radiation would be different from normal “forward” radiation. It’s “back” only by direction which is opposite to radiation from the surface. More precisely it’s that part of radiation emitted by the atmosphere that happens to reach the surface.
How could that work? All of the atmosphere has a non-zero temperature, and thus emits IR.
I’m wondering why the atmosphere is described as heated from below almost exclusively though. The layers within a few meters of the surface are fairly directly heated by the conductive/radiative transfer from the ground, with convective/advective processes distributing energy upwards into the troposphere against the lapse rate.
Just because the surface mostly emits IR doesn’t mean the sun doesn’t also emit IR. Solar IR contributes to the temperature of the atmosphere as well, not just the upward IR from the ground and direct ozone heating by solar UV.
Agreed. Back radiation is a perfectly good term if you know what the target is, but not in a noisy atmosphere.
Because the sun is so hot almost all energy emitted by sun is at wavelengths less than 2 um, i.e. visible, near IR, and UV. Sun emits also at longer wavelengths but much less and only insignicant amounts of that happens to hit the Earth.
The Earth surface releases so much energy as IR alone that it would be much colder without something else in addition to the solar radiation that gets to the surface and is absorbed. That something else is IR from atmosphere.
Better than “atmospheric radiation,” in my opinion, is the term “vector irradiance in the IR band.” Under this usage, at a space point in a field of electromagnetic radiation the radiative heat flux is the vector difference between two vectors. One is called the “vector radiosity.” The other is called the “vector irradiance.” The vector irradiance is the vector sum of those Poynting vectors that are incident upon the referenced surface. The vector radiosity is the vector sum of those Poynting vectors that are transmitted through or reflected by the surface. The magnitude of the vector irradiance is the “irradiance.” The magnitude of the vector radiosity is the “radiosity.”
Terry,
While your proposal is formally true, it’s not really useful due to the almost total lack of coherence in the radiation. The practical calculations require handling each photon without any coherence with the others. Under such conditions working with electromagnetic fields or Poynting vectors is only a major distraction.
Pekka (Nov. 1, 2012 at 7:13 pm):
As the term “IR irradiance” is already in use ( http://www.espo.nasa.gov/tc4/docs/April07_meet/042507pm/Breakout_ER2/BBIR_Bucholtz.pdf ) and the term “UV irradiance” is also in use ( http://www.mps.mpg.de/homes/natalie/PAPERS/jasr_uv.pdf ) it seems to me that the term “IR vector irradiance” or something similar could profitably be used in place of the term “back radiation.” The latter term has the logically unacceptable characteristic of ambiguity regarding the direction of the associated vector with consequential violation of the law of non-contradiction.
“The Earth surface releases so much energy as IR alone that it would be much colder without something else in addition to the solar radiation that gets to the surface and is absorbed. That something else is IR from atmosphere.”
Uh, the surface with the sun directly overhead would be hotter without the atmosphere, while the surface on the far side would be colder, like the moon, right?
I am beginning to get very irritated with some of you here. You’re supposedly scientists or interested in science and yet are incapable of getting the point I’m making and responding rationally to it.
I am giving the TRADITIONAL physics teaching that it is THERMAL INFRARED HEAT from the Sun that we feel as heat from the Sun and which is what heats up matter.
The phyisics of radiant heat is bog standard in thermodynamics. We cannot feel shortwave infrared as heat, because it is not a thermal energy. Thermal means “of heat”. That’s why the invisible infrared from the Sun is divided into categories, because some of the invisible infrared is not heat. Near Infrared is in the category of Reflective not Thermal energy, in the category of Light, not Heat. We cannot feel shortwave from the Sun. This is a real physics fact.
Light, shortwave from the Sun, cannot move the molecules of matter into vibration which is what it takes to heat matter. It isn’t physically big enough, it isn’t physically capable of this. Shortwave from the Sun works on the electronic transition level on meeting matter, this does not convert to heat, it takes bigger more powerful heat from the Sun, thermal infrared, to move molecules of matter into vibration. That’s how real heat from the Sun heats land and oceans and us.
Rub your hands together, that is mechanical energy causing the molecules of your skin to vibrate, heating up your skin, raising its temperature. This is what the direct invisible thermal infrared heat energy from the Sun is doing. Thermal infrared direct from the Sun penetrates several inches into our bodies, so heating us up internally as well as externally.
What we have from you who claim the AGWScienceFiction fisics that “shortwave from the Sun heats the land and oceans and claim that thermal infrared direct from the Sun, doesn’t” is a claim that is gobbledegook in traditional physics. Really, gobbledegook. I’m making a very important point here.
At least have the courtesy to pay enough attention to what I am saying to get the point I’m trying to make.
You give two different versions of why the real direct heat from the Sun doesn’t play any part in heating the Earth’s land and oceans.
The first is that “there is an invisible barrier like the glass of a greenhouse which prevents the heat from the Sun, thermal infrared, aka longwave, getting through from TOA”, and the second, “that the Sun produces very little heat and we get only a tiny bit of that and it’s insignificant”
The Sun is radiating out heat from the millions of miles thick millions of degrees hot Corona, this is the heat we feel from the Sun. You obviously are completely oblivious to how stupid both your versions sound which claim this doesn’t exist.
We know what radiant heat is. In traditional well known tried and tested and used in countless applications radiant heat physics. The third way heat is transfered, conduction and convection being the other two.
You can continue to ignore my saying this, but if you are really scientists then you cannot ignore that this NASA page is giving traditional physics in saying that the HEAT WE FEEL FROM THE SUN IS THERMAL INFRARED, LONGWAVE.
http://science.hq.nasa.gov/kids/imagers/ems/infrared.html
“Far infrared waves are thermal. In other words, we experience this type of infrared radiation every day in the form of heat! The heat that we feel from sunlight, a fire, a radiator or a warm sidewalk is infrared.”
“Shorter, near infrared waves are not hot at all – in fact you cannot even feel them.”
IT CONTRADICTS YOU.
DEAL WITH IT.
In conclusion, I quote from Prof Johnson and trust you know that “frequencies” relate to the temperature of the source … the immediate absorption and re-emission Johnson talks about is not the absorption to which you refer which involves conversion of EM energy to thermal energy. There is no heat transfer when the source is cooler than the target.
“A blackbody thus absorbs and emits frequencies below cut-off without
getting warmer, while absorbed frequencies above cut-off are not emitted
but are instead stored as heat energy increasing the temperature.
A blackbody is thus like a high-pass filter, which re-emits frequencies
below a cut-off frequency while capturing frequencies above cut-off as
heat.A blackbody acts like a censor which filters out coherent high-frequency
(dangerous) information by transforming it into incoherent (harmless) noise.
The IPCC acts like a blackbody by filtering coherent critical information,
transforming it into incoherent nonsense perceived as global warming.”
Oh, and I nearly forgot. If all photons transfer heat, then plastic in your microwave oven ought to get hot with such high intensity radiation.
So what would be a sensible general commentary then?
– all photons possess energy, of varying levels/wavelengths. Different substances are differently affected by different photons – all/some of : reflection, absorption, none (transparency). Any others?
Q1: Can only IR photons cause a body to heat?
Q2: Are there any effects of photon absorption other than heating?
Q3: What is the specific effect of visible light photons on the land and oceans?
Q4: What is reflection exactly? Instantaneous absorption and re-emission ?
Q1: Can only IR photons cause a body to heat?
“To heat” is not well phrased, I assume you mean “to undergo an increase in temperature”, heat or heat flow is a process of thermal energy transfer which can only spontaneously take place from warm to cold bodies. To do otherwise requires work be performed on the system.
IR photons can transfer thermal energy, as can photons of any wavelength, but IR photons from a cold body will not produce heat transfer to a warmer body.
Q2: Are there any effects of photon absorption other than heating?
I would say that photon absorption and emission involves a transfer of energy, and can take part in a heat flow between a warm and cold body.
Q3: What is the specific effect of visible light photons on the land and oceans?
From the sun? The same effect as the infrared and UV photons which reach the surface? Heat flows from the 6000 K~ sun to the 250~300 K land and oceans in the form of thermal radiation.
Q4: What is reflection exactly? Instantaneous absorption and re-emission ?
Reflection is usually found in bodies with low absorptivity (and thus emissivity) but it is easier to describe in terms of wave characteristics where the direction of propagation is altered, rather than the waveform being absorbed by the surface.
“Your comment is mostly consistent with standard thinking, but what do you mean by the words: “.. the actual transfer of thermal energy can be distinguished from the individual contribution of a single photon”?
Those words make me wonder whether you still have some misconceptions about physics.”
You can treat a single side of a system undergoing radiative transfer as a single photon process, but you can not determine the thermodynamics of that in that manner.
Discussing back-radiation in a way that suggests it transfers thermal energy from a cold surface to a warm surface can be examined by breaking it down to single photon events.
The exchange of a single photon from a cold surface to a warm surface will impart a certain amount of energy per photon, which can then be extended to a calculation of the total energy transfer in the cold -> warm direction. Subtracting that from the warm -> cold direction gives the net radiative transfer, and that allows one to properly determine the heat exchange between the two bodies.
It is then easy enough to see that the only manner in which one could conclude that a cold -> warm energy transfer led to an increase in the temperature of the warm body is if you neglect that the warm -> cold transfer already includes the cold -> warm portion and accidentally counted it again.
“Another remaining issue seems to be that you don’t see how close your thinking is to the main stream and how the differences are mostly more semantic than real.”
Not sure how this could just be a semantic difference, but I’m open to the possibility that the descriptions I’ve heard of back-radiation from cold -> warm bodies weren’t presented in a way that allowed me to grasp the principle behind it properly.
Max I think the point here is that the idea of back-radiation is confused to the point of being flawed. Heat radiated from the earth’s surfaces and absorbed by GHGs is mostly not sent back to earth, it is distributed elsewhere in the GHGs. Which would cause overall GHG heating, other things being equal. Which would cause the cooling of the earth to the atmosphere to slow down. Which would mean the earth ended up warmer.
Max,
You understand better the physics than what people mean by the warming effect of backradiation.
When someone says “backradiation makes the surface warmer” you must understand what they refer to by warmer. I.e., “warmer than what?” The answer is “warmer than the surface would be without the backradiation”. More specifically “warmer than the surface would be if it were heated by the same amount of solar radiation and it would emit as much as it’s temperature makes it emit but there would not be any IR from the atmosphere that would hit the surface”.
You do agree that the surface would be colder in that case than it’s now, don’t you?
“More specifically “warmer than the surface would be if it were heated by the same amount of solar radiation and it would emit as much as it’s temperature makes it emit but there would not be any IR from the atmosphere that would hit the surface”.
You do agree that the surface would be colder in that case than it’s now, don’t you?”
I think this is where my problem arises, I don’t think the downward radiation from the atmosphere has a significant on the temperature of the surface, free atmospheric gases do not fit the properties of a thermal insulator.
If downward radiation from the atmosphere influenced the surface temperature, then upward radiation from the surface should influence the temperature of the sun.
I can’t see a way that such an influence couldn’t be used to produce a perpetual motion machine.
Max,
Actually the radiation from the Earth does influence the temperature of the sun but so little that’s impossible to observe that.
Again, I don’t see how that wouldn’t produce a runaway feedback loop.
I put a black bag near my lamp, the lamp heats the bag up, the bag emits IR, some of the IR from the bag makes it back to the several thousand K filament in the light bulb.
If that raises the temperature of the filament, it should emit more radiation and warm the bag up further as well, right?
Which should emit more IR back towards the filament, which decides to stop heating up because it’s convenient, or does it keep going?
I was under the assumption that the IR from the bag emitted towards the filament is subtracted from the total flux towards the bag, I’m not sure why that would cause the filament to compensate by heating up or what-have-you.
A runaway situation requires strong positive feedback. We have here a positive feedback but not so strong.
I’m still not sure why I couldn’t take that effect and use the back-radiation heating a light bulb to counter the efficiency losses in a generic heat-engine-o-matic 5000, then once everything is running, simply plug the light bulb into the heat-engine-o-matic 5000?
“The exchange of a single photon from a cold surface to a warm surface will impart a certain amount of energy per photon,” This statement is incorrect. and so what follows is also. You people need to read Johnson, Postma and my own papers to understand what happens in reality.
The EM energy in radiation from a cooler source is never left in the target. It is immediately re-emitted and cannot be used by the target for any other purpose than immediate re-radiation.
Hence the process is called “pseudo scattering” or in my paper I coined the term “resonant scattering” because of the resonance which Prof Claes Johnson describes. So stop making up your own ideas about what you think happens, because it doesn’t and most climatologists spread these incorrect assumptions among themselves and the public, so you all get misled.
Try applying their ideas to one of those plastic bowls you put in your microwave oven. It does not get warmed in a 750 watt MW oven, but it certainly does in front of a 750 watt electric radiator. The radiation intensity is similar. But the big and only difference is the frequenciy of the radiation. In the MW oven low frequency radiation gets scattered by the plastic and some passes right through it following a random path of scattering. It then warms water inside the plastic bowl (not by atomic absorption but by rotating molecules and causing frictional heating) but it does not itself warm the bowl. The bowl only warms by conduction where it is in contact with some water that was warmed first. But it is quite a different story in front of a radiator. Think about it!
Sunburn is caused by UV. Microwaves pass through plastic but definitely heats food. Weirdly irrelevant argument but par for the course when you pull it out of your arse.
See post above. You are off the track and need to think a bit more about it all – as I have for thousands of hours.
UV doesn’t cause sunburn and microwave radiation doesn’t heat food? And I am off track? To paraphrase Albert – be as silly as you need to be but no sillier.
The heat in the atmosphere is a measure of the kinetic energy of molecules. Very different to the small proportion of molecules that are actively absorping/emitting photons in the specific frequencies at any one time.
http://www.atmos.illinois.edu/earths_atmosphere/index.html
http://www.heliosat3.de/e-learning/remote-sensing/Lec7.pdf
All heat comes from the sun – and more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere doesn’t change the direction of entropy or even the rate of entropy production. The world does warm however as a result of a decrease in the mean free photon path.
I say this without any real hope that you will see sense – but if you have spent thousands of hours on this you seem to have wasted your time.
1. Can’t you take a joke about sunburn?
2. Microwaves don’t heat food – they heat water molecules in the food.
3. In the matters where you are correct you are not teaching me anything after more than 50 years’ of my involvement with physics.
4. When are you going to read those papers?
I quote from your first link: “Atmospheric greenhouse gases (water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, and other gases) trap some of the earth’s outgoing (infrared) energy, which causes the atmosphere to retain this heat and warm. ” This statement is totally incorrect.
When (if ever) you come to understand what Prof Claes Johnson (professor of applied mathematics) has proved (in comprehensive computations) that radiated EM energy is not converted to thermal energy in a warmer target, then you may realise that “a decrease in the mean free photon path” can have no effect. Where in all your considerations do you take into account the potential increase in the rate of sensible heat transfer which accounts for at least 60% of all heat exiting the surface and more than 85% of all heat transferring from the surface to the atmosphere – ie without passing through the atmospheric window? (See my calculations in a recent post above.)
Doug Cotton | November 1, 2012 at 10:38 pm said: ” This statement is totally incorrect”.
+1
1. yeah right
2. you will find that most food is mostly water – and this is not anything to do with plastic not warming.
3. I thought I was old. I have degrees in engineering and environmental science and decades of experience.
4. I have read enough. Claes, yourself, Postma – I am not going to waste any more of my time.
Your calc’s are pretty silly and your discussion more so.
So have I got this right? : Doug says that radiation is somehow conditionally tethered to its source, and if this source is colder than a destination body the radiation encounters, this tether will prevent the radiation from acting on the destination object.
Chief Hydrologist | November 1, 2012 at 5:50 pm said: ”when you pull it out of your arse”
WRONG. you are puling those things from Karoly’s and Flannery’s ar/ses; you should wash them first, to see them clean from close up and recognize that they are wrong. That’s why you are ”saving the planet” from the non-existing GLOBAL warming; by wasting money and labor on sequestrating CO2 in the ground, on the farms.= the mother of all stupidity!!!
Reason for you ”RELEVANT ARGUMENTS” look silly and you cannot understand them – because they don’t come out of Karoly’s and Flannery’s butts. CO2, H2O, methane are not a GLOBAL warming gases; if you have read my post I recommended long time ago – you wouldn’t had to make bigger fool of yourself than you are naturally. If Karoly & Flannery allow you to learn things that are correct and proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, have a go now; open your mind and don’t stay a fanatic bigot forever:
http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/methane-ch4/
Stefan,
You are a wack job with a tin foil hat, several roos loose in the top paddock and an echnida up your arse. You are so flat out being a drongo that you have forgotten the basics, if you ever knew them, of science and civilised discourse.
I have looked at your site and if you expect me to waste more of my time with your crapulous and crazed rants you are even crazier than I think.
Regards
Chief Hydrologist | November 2, 2012 at 2:51 am driveled: ”Stefan, You are a wack job with a tin foil hat, several roos loose in the top paddock and an echnida up your arse. You are so flat out being a drongo that you have forgotten the basics”
Is this your best ”scientific tantrum? It only shows that you are getting ready for the Straight Jacket.
When to a normal person is pointed out that he is wrong -> he apologizes and takes it on board; throwing tantrum doesn’t change the truth! I didn’t want to humiliate you any more – you had a time to think. Unfortunately; for thinking, you need to use your own brains; not what others are instructing you. Instead, as soon as you see that on my blog doesn’t say that CO2 is the offender -> you panic and run away from the real proofs, before reading the rest. Closed mind is for making fool of yourself; don’t blame me for it
It’s the biggest Australian shame: to corrupt farmers – to waste time and money in carbon sequestration. you are fanatically supporting crimes. Bashing new production of methane, is THE crime of the millenia
to use your attitude, so you can understand: if you are genuine ”chief hydrologist” then I must be the Pope of Rome! Wetting the bed, doesn’t make one a hydrologist. b] you being a ”feather brains” doesn’t make you a ”Chief” Real chief has responsibility, therefore, they have an open mind. Your enemy will not show your faults; but will use them against you. I was giving you constructive advice; instead, you poop yourself. Well continue to regurgitate Karoly’s, Hansen’s, Plimer’s and Flannery’s excrement; until they take you to loony-farm – then you will realize that I was your friend. just relax…
Doug do you plan to actually marshal an argument here, or are you just going to noisily lurk and tell people to go away until they agree with you ?
Global warming also contributes to the observed increase in CO2 concentration in the atmosphere as shown => http://bit.ly/RxSKGA
Climate is controlled by natural cycles as explained in this post.
Doug Cotton | November 1, 2012 at 10:56 pm said: ”Climate is controlled by natural cycles”
Doug, welcome back to the sandpit, as a ”born again, real Skeptic”
You are very close to the truth on the atmospheric heat exchange / wastage and the phony GLOBAL warming; BUT, climate is controlled by H2O, on many different ways. Those ”cycles” that are in the ”Pagan Beliefs” are concocted in a confusion, AND because when they were concocting them – there was no scrutiny. For them was: if anything shows twice = is a cycle – and if it didn’t show on time = it was another cycle…?
The only natural cycles are: day and night, summer and winter cycle, and Paris Hilton’s menstrual cycle. Even El Nino and La Nina are not cycles; because they don’t come at same intervals. P.s. I wish you success, with the theory, that is most definitely NOT new, I have being trying to prove that CO2 has nothing to do with any ”greenhouse” simulation; I have given it a name in my book: ” Shade-Cloth Effect” Get much more supporting evidences, if you want to have a chance of success. Your English is impeccable; you can become a treat to the pagan beliefs -> they will start pointing to you that: you and Joseph didn’t invent the wheel; Good luck! http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2011/08/29/hello-world/
No, it was Prof Claes Johnson who first documented the most important concept which is fundamental to understanding radiative heat transfer. Joe Postma and I merely elaborated on it, with help from many of the other 120 or so members of Principia Scientific International.
Regarding natural cycles, how about you read what I actually said, rather than assuming I was talking about ENSO cycles. Maybe the string of comments starting here, along with my March 2012 paper and the other papers mentioned will clarify what I am saying for you.
.
Q.7 Why not just treat all radiation as having a thermal effect each way?
“If you do not accept the resonant scattering hypothesis, then you must say that the radiation is
either reflected or absorbed when it strikes the Earth’s surface.”
Or re-radiated without warming.
Example two plates. One is warmed from some heating source, the other plate is heated by radiant energy from the warmed plate.
The passive plate’s temperature can not be made warmer than plate being heated.
One call this “resonant scattering” or re-radiating.
One can have re-radiating with substance which cold, but it seems to me that warmer the object gets one gets more re-radiating – or if you like
“resonant scattering”.
So in two plate above, when second is warmed up to near the temperature of plate heated, the second plate re-radiate or resonant scatters “more”.
Another issue with: http://principia-scientific.org/publications/psi_radiated_energy.pdf
“But, when the surface is already warming and there is a net inward flow of energy, then clearly such radiation from the cooler atmosphere cannot transfer thermal energy to the warmer surface, for to do so would
amount to heat flow from cool to warm, which violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics.”
I would say temperature of the atmosphere is irrelevant- because temperature atmosphere is not about the radiant properties of the atmosphere, rather the temperature of atmosphere is the kinetic energy of gas molecules- the velocity of gas molecules and the density of the gas.
Or one make gas molecules in the atmosphere excited by beaming some energy at it. The gas could basically remain the same temperature but get highly excited and emit radiation. The energy emitted from these gases molecule depend what kind energy you directed at them- not the temperature of gas.
And of course the rise of the human species in conjunction with learning how to burn fossil fuels is a natural cycle, and so you are correct sir.
Doug Cotton | November 2, 2012 at 1:30 am said: ”No, it was Prof Claes Johnson who first documented the most important concept which is fundamental to understanding radiative heat transfer. Joe Postma and I merely elaborated on it”
Dough, it is exiting, to have somebody that can stand up for the truth. You are closer to the truth than others; BUT, you are still prisoner of their pagan beliefs = using too much of their beliefs, connecting to your genuine proof – same as tailoring mans trousers, by using 70% measurements from an elephant. I did read big part of your statement, will point couple of mistakes, sorry.
1] cooling is happening day and night – O&N take the heat from the surface and ”re-radiation” stops. Those gases collect heat (reason when windy – cooling increases) Then they expand and CARRY the heat up; they don’t ”radiate’ that heat to the neighboring gases b] when ”cooler” upper atmosphere warms up, because of H2O +CO2 presence (intercepting sunlight) YES, they don’t warm the warmer ground, BUT, they slow down cooling = cooler days / warmer nights = both camps blaming CO2 + H2O in the atmosphere, tops the stupidity! Effect is beneficial. In my book says: horizontal winds cool your french-fries, VERTICAL winds cool the planet (the ones that keep the hang-glider and 80kg man up, for hours) Forget radiation
2] sunlight deposits ALL the heat on the first 2-3m of surface water – some colors of the light penetrate to 100m in seawater, a bit more in fresh (they don’t go to the bottom of the sea, as gbaiukie craps) B] the important factor mistaken by all is: ”that heat is radiated deep down”. C] Because all the heat is created close to the surface – conduction of it down is, like this:one molecule evaporates – by ”evaporating” takes lots of heat from the neighboring molecule -> if that neighboring molecule of water goes from 25C down to 20C – sinks down; because its temp is closer to 4C, than the rest of the molecules on the surface – and that’s how it caries heat and OXYGEN down, to replenish the water, for the critters that need it. Similar as: when in swimming-pool you stand on somebody’s shoulder – you jump up / but in the process you push down the other guy = one molecule takes some heat from the neighbor and evaporates – the neighbor sinks, because becomes colder / denser than the surrounding.
Dough, your only mistake is: you are mixing your gold nugget with their pagan crap. My English is limited, but when you get time; go to my website – in 8-9 posts; arm yourself with real proofs that will support why CO2 doesn’t create blanket effect and MUCH MORE. CO2 &H2O (water vapor), NOT GUILTY!!! CO2 + H2O = GREEN. They are back to front on everything! Cycles were / are always localized, NEVER GLOBAL!!!
Doug
If you want to do yourself and ideas a favor, start doing some comprehensible blogs. Handwaving and assumed authority just doesn’t cut the mustard here.
PS One of our PSI members has studied cycles – see details here.
Hi, Judith: I liked this post a lot but with Hurricane Sandy had been too busy to comment before now. You provide a really useful framework for thinking about the IPCC process and its utility and limitations. It’s perhaps useful to view the IPCC and all the surrounding context as a both-and kind of opportunity versus either or.We shouldn’t be choosing being IPCC and some alternative so much as we should have a diverse set of assessments underway. I explore that more fully in today’s post at:http://www.livingontherealworld.org/?p=762
Bil Hooke
A “both-and” kind of opportunity regarding IPCC and an alternative sounds good at first glance, but the problem with IPCC’s forced “consensus” process is that it hasexcluded “both-and” thinking by excluding any views which dissented from the “consensus” view, as Dr. Curry points out.
As a result climate science itself became corrupted.
A Rasmussen poll showed that close to 70% of US poll respondents believed that climate scientists are “fudging” the data. IPCC must take the full blame for this sorry state of affairs.
IPCC has outlived its usefulness and should be quietly abandoned and replaced with a neutral body of climate scientists, engineers, etc., (but no political appointees!) who are objective and open to all scientific viewpoints.
Max
Doug Cotton
I appreciate the references and ensuing discussion here. Looking more closely I quickly came across the statement on your webpage (and elsewhere I’m sure):
“Radiation which is received from a source which is cooler is rejected by being re-emitted with exactly the same frequency and energy that it had before it arrived. ”
This is a nice morsel, both as physics and as a linchpin argument. The former is interesting because of the latter and because the statement is suggestive. At the quantum mechanical level how does a receiving body discriminate whether or not a photon is from a source at a higher temperature from a photon (same energy) that is from a source at a lower temperature? (Wording here,e.g., ‘discriminate’, makes me a little uncomfortable in context of potential core QM interpretation issues, but I hope you get my the intent.) In particular I am keeping in mind that blackbody radiation is manifested as distributions of energy and not single values, and temperature is an intensive thermodynamic concept.
mwgrant
Reflecting, probably a language thing…
I suspect your are meaning to write in the macro context (not QM), my read of second half of statement definitely in QM frame …
Kindly read the papers to which I have referred you and you will find your answers.
The plastic in the 750 watt microwave is not heated by the high intensity radiation (photons if you like) whereas the same bowl in front of a 750 watt electric radiator is heated by a similar intensity of radiation. So the bowl “detects” the frequency difference. Many seem to think that would not be possible and that all photons are the same and all cause warming. The frequency of the microwaves is less than that of the spontaneous radiation emitted by the bowl itself at room temperature. But the frequency of the radiation from the electric radiator is greater. That’s all that matters. That is a simple demonstration of how a surface “pseudo scatters” radiation which has lower frequency than its own emissions, and is not warmed by such radiation. This is the whole point of Prof Claes Johnson’s “Computational Blackbody Radiation” paper. So I have provided at least one example of empirical evidence which is not in conflict with what he has said. There has never been any empirical evidence to disprove what he said, and never will be. I have explained more in the first five sections of my paper.
Water vapour radiates with many more spectral lines than carbon dioxide, so its radiation is more effective per molecule in slowing the rate of radiative cooling of the Earth’s surface. It is also much more prolific in the atmosphere, so its overall effect on this slowing is probably of the order of at least 100 times the effect of carbon dioxide. Hence it is not at all surprising that low cloud cover slows radiative cooling quite noticeably and, while it is present in that particular location, the rate of cooling by non-radiative processes cannot accelerate fast enough to compensate. But that is a local weather event, not climate. Over the whole Earth and over a lengthy period there will be compensation. In any event, what is being compensated for is almost entirely due to water vapour, with carbon dioxide having less than 1% of the effect on that mere 14% of all heat transferred from the surface which enters the atmosphere by way of radiation.
Other than a cursory look and search for a few key concepts. I really hadn’t started to look, that was on the list, but you kept pushing read the papers. You should have let me play quietly with my morsel above. This is now going to take some time.
The molecular physics at top of section 5 of your March 2012 paper is thoroughly mangled—100%, absolutely no doubt–and undermines credibility even before looking at the rest of the paper. Note the text in question may be conceptual sideshow (or may not) — just tripped on this starting out in a scan on another matter — but it leads one to ask, ‘how much of what you have written do you understand?’ I would suggestion at a minimum you need to get that story straight. I will provide detailed points sometime over the weekend. In any case one always likes to give the benefit of the doubt, because changes in perception occur in the course of a review of a paper. Let me emphasize that this has nothing to do with either plastic bowls or the atmosphere. But for now it is just text that is fixable.
You won’t understand Section 5 of my paper until you work through the computations by Claes Johnson – professor of Applied Mathematics. Keep thinking about the microwave oven and the electric radiator. Why does the plastic bowl react differently?
Bear in mind that (since March 2012) there has not been any valid peer-reviewed published rebuttal of my paper. Be the first! But try to understand what Claes is saying first. He, Joe Postma (pp 47-49) and myself are all saying the same thing – along with many others who support us from the 120 or more members of Principia Scientific International.
(continued)
Whether or not you agree with the description of resonant scattering, the characteristics of the process are these …
(a) When spontaneous radiation from a given source strikes a target at a higher temperature than the source, then the energy in that incident radiation does not go through the process of being converted to thermal energy.
(b) The target can more easily use the EM energy in the incident radiation to emit a corresponding portion of its own S-B quota of radiation, based on its own temperature.
(c) There is a natural law (Second Law of Thermodynamics) which dictates that the energy in the incident radiation can only be used to supply energy for the immediately re-emitted radiation. So that re-emitted radiation is not transferring energy that was originally in the target – rather it has the appearance of “pseudo scattering” the incident radiation from the cooler source.
This is the reason why there is thus no heat transfer caused by radiation from a cooler source.
Footnote: The low frequency radiation in a MW oven is equivalent to spontaneous radiation from a (very) cold source. Hence it does not transfer heat by atomic absorption to any material at room temperature. Only at certain frequencies does it resonate with water molecules (and some oils) causing the water molecules to physically rotate (or “flip”) through 180 degrees, in phase with the frequency. This causes generation of thermal energy by a friction-like process which should not be equated to the atomic absorption discussed in (a) to (c) above.
Doug
Ok fair enough, this one was pretty clear. It’s not that radiation from a cooler source doesn’t affect a warmer source, but rather that for some reason such radiation is just immediately re-emitted and scattered.
(Which must mean all radiation carries a fingerprint of its source’s temperature).
We know “all radiation carries a fingerprint of its souce’s temperature”. because that temperature corresponds to the peak frequency in the Planck curve for the radiation. That’s why we can make certain types of infrared thermometers.
Having once studied theoretical chemistry and post-doc’ed in electron-molecule scattering processes, I still understand some molecular physics. Do you ever read what people try to tell you? It seems not to be the case. I’m not trying to rebut and indeed I indicated the the text in question could be a conceptual sideshow. I told you that you text at the top of Section 5 is embarrassingly in error and suggesting you that you might want to fix it. No skin off my back one way or the other.
PSI… Das ist ein Spaß, ja?
Auch ist es nicht ein Witz
You only consider the concept of “pseudo scattering” to be in error because you haven’t been taught this stuff. Johnson has solved a dilemma which left Einstein baffled all his life. This is ground-breaking physics and applied mathematics which is not yet in text books or university courses.
How about you give me your explanation as to why a similar number of photons striking the same plastic bowl have such a different effect, which is clearly dependent upon the frequency of the radiation?
Doug,
Thanks for your followup @10:12. FYI my last (10:33) comment was before I saw that…
I still intend to look at the material but that will take time. To be frank I have my doubts at this point but do not wish to prejudge. The latter likely doesn’t phase you but that’s fine by me. I appreciate your focus on backradiation but have some other digging to do in that regard. Again I have no goal of overall rebuttal.
Correction: instead of “similar number of photons” read “photons with similar total energy”
“Auch ist es nicht ein Witz”
Sie haben Recht. Es ist kein Witz! Dafür tut’s mir leid.
“You only consider the concept of “pseudo scattering” to be in error because you haven’t been taught this stuff.”
I didn’t say boo about pseudo-scattering. I said your molecular physics at the top of the section is screwed up, terribly mangled.
Here is a clue…here it isn’t the electrons, and the electrons don’t vibrate between states. You are DOA in molecular physics 101. Look at your energies: your temperature regime of interest corresponds to IR energies associated with the vibrational excitations in molecules; you are well below electronic excitations (visible and UV energies). Don’t even attempt to throw out anything else UNTIL you tidy up that mess. That is my simple point. It looks like you are blowing smoke.
“Johnson has solved a dilemma which left Einstein baffled all his life. This is ground-breaking physics and applied mathematics which is not yet in text books or university courses.”
Could be or maybe not. I can’t say, though I am quite comfortable skeptical. But I can say the quote has absolutely nothing to do with the gist of my comment. That also detracts from your advocacy.
By what process then do you explain the spectral lines of emission of, say, carbon dioxide at typical atmospheric temperatures? Many writers in the climate literature attribute these to changes in energy states causing production of photons, but I’m willing to learn and acknowledge that there are numerous misconceptions in such literature..
You did not mention the energy ranges of the emission lines. However, because you say ‘lines’ the answer is most likely vibrational transition—but keep in mind that we are not talking about electrons here—we are talking about the bending and stretching of the molecule—those are the motions quantized. (I have also presumed by virtue of context that by atmospheric temperature you are referring to the mode of the blackbody pdf. )
Here is a little more info that may prime the pump. Donald Rapp’s recent book might be of interest if you want to see a discussion in the climate change context. I have not read it yet but on Amazon I was able to browse much of the book, but I think what you can see now is very limited. It looks like a good entry for those want to get some information on some of the underlying core science disciplines. (I did have a statistical mechanics book of his years ago and as I recall it was quite readable. ) Intro books molecular structure, molecular spectroscopy usually have an overview chapter or two. Some good oldies from Dover.
http://www.newagepublishers.com/samplechapter/001243.pdf is an introductory chapter to molecular spectroscopy,my annotations in square brackets[]:
[mwg]First here is a list of the energy regions of interest associated with molecular and nuclear structure. More to the the you asked, each listing includes the type of transition(s) typically associated with the listed region or range. For example in item 3 you will see that in the case of the infrared region it is the transitions between different vibrational states. (Vibrations are things like the stretching of bond(s), the bending of the molecule as depicted and is discussed on page 113.) Also note that item 4 indicates the energy region associated with electronic transitions (outermost or valence shell) in molecules—visible and ultraviolet. The infrared region corresponds to a blackbody temperature mode on the rough order of a few degK to to a few hundred degK; the visible/UV are in the range of a few thousand to tens of thousands degK.
1.Radio Frequency region – 106 – 1010 Hz or 10 m – 1 cm, wavelength: The energy change with the change of spin of a nucleus or electron is of the order of 0.001 to 10 J mol–1 and falls in this region.
2.Microwave region – 1010 – 1012 Hz or 1 cm – 100 μm wavelength: Energy changes due to molecular rotations are observed in this region, with ∆E of the order of 100 J mol–1.
2.Infra-red region – 1012 – 1014.5 Hz or 100 μm – 1 μm wavelength: Molecular vibrations give one of the most valuable spectroscopy observed in this region. Energy separation in molecular vibrations is of the order of 104 J mol–1.
3.Visible and ultra-violet regions – 1014.5 – 1016 Hz or 1 μm – 10 nm wavelength: Energy separation between the valence electrons observed in this region is of the order of kJ mol–1.
4.X-ray region – 1016 – 1018 Hz or 10 nm – 100 pm wavelength: Energy changes involving the inner orbital electron excitation of an atom or a molecule, could be of the order of 105 kJ mol–1.
5.γ-Ray region – 1018 – 11020 Hz or 100 pm – 1 pm wavelength: Energy changes involve the re-arrangement of nuclear particles, having energies of 109 – 1011 Jg–1.
Figure 4.4 in the pdf is a schematic of the energy regions.
Also note this a simple (but sufficient) and in reality it get more complicated, vibronic transitions, vibrational-rotational transitions, etc. But that is excessive detail.
I’ve got errands, if I think of any other quick answer stuff I’ll throw it out. I apologize for any typos I am really looking over my shoulder at the clock.
HTH mwgrant
Many thanks for your time spent on all this. I can see that I stand corrected and need perhaps to just refer to changes in energy states. I still believe the overall concept that radiation with frequencies below Johnson’s “cut off” merely resonates in some way such that (a) it provides energy for immediate re-radiation at the same frequency and intensity, and (b) the energy in that incident radiation can never become thermal energy. Hence the “cooler” radiation cannot affect non-radiative cooling of the target. The latter can increase to compensate for slower radiative cooling.
The above statements do, however, only relate to spontaneous radiation. There are apparent partial exceptions with artificially generated radiation such as microwaves and lasers. This is probably because their distribution is not a Planck curve fully enveloped by the Planck curve of a warmer target. Instead, their distribution is more like a spike which extends well above the upper Planck curve, even though its total area may be less than that under the Planck curve of the target.
Discussion of the importance of these Planck curves and how they are used to determine the one way heat transfer is in my paper, the main points in which I consider still valid.
Please also note the discussion of observed temperatures in the Appendix. Since writing there have been other papers confirming similar world-wide climate in the MWP, thus helping to support the evidence for a ~1,000 year natural cycle. And of course temperatures have continued to decline slightly (as in Roy Spencer’s plots) for the rest of this year, as I predicted will happen until about the year 2028, due to the 30 year decline in the natural 60 year cycle which is very obvious I suggest.
Thanks also to Max for the comment below. I was aware of the process in a microwave oven, as explained in the Appendix of my paper, and I totally acknowledge that radiation from a cooler source slows the rate of radiative cooling of a warmer body. But it cannot slow the rate of non-radiative cooling which, in the case of Earth’s surface, dominates and adjusts to compensate.
This leads to the conclusion that all the backradiation has no effect on the overall rate of cooling of the surface..
.
You’re welcome. I got to exercise my brain a little along with some rusty German. You’ve definitely piqued my interest in the balance and especially ‘backradiation’. So a little unplanned, easy-paced self-education on the subjects seems to be in order for now. Have fun.
Dielectric heating (a near field effect such as that found in a microwave) is not the same as radiant heating (a far field effect such as that found by standing outside during the day) and should not be presented as a proof or disproof of anything regarding infrared radiation.
A microwave causes molecules with certain properties to rotate and align themselves with respect to the alternating electric field inside a microwave oven. THAT effect is responsible for heating other molecules within the substance.
There is another effect which can be found by aiming a powerful radio or microwave source at something from a distance which is more akin to the absorption of infrared radiation resulting in an increase of thermal energy in the body.
As for a molecule “knowing” what the frequency of an incident photon is and deciding to “reject” it, this is why I brought up quantum effects.
An excited state can spontaneously decay if there are no other influences (and one neglects relaxation >.>) but the only effect of a photon with less energy than one responsible for the initial transition to an excited state would be to reduce the probability of a spontaneous emission somewhat.
That could be described as reducing the rate of cooling by emission of radiation, but it is absolutely incorrect to describe it as a negative rate of cooling.
In a thermal bath both surfaces will tend towards an equilibrium according to their absorptivity and emissivity, the rate at which this process occurs may vary, but without performing work on the system it will proceed towards such an equilibrium.
If the bodies were not initially in equilibrium and the colder body emits towards the warmer body the only effect would be to increase the time it takes to reach equilibrium by reducing the rate at which the warmer body cools.
If this process led to a rise in the temperature of the warmer body there is no reason to expect a transition towards equilibrium, indeed there is no reason this process would be expected to cease, beyond I suppose the energy density increasing until an event horizon is formed.
When I turn on my lamp, the wall beside my desk heats up rapidly, which emits radiation into the room, as the returning radiation from the room does not cause the wall to implode into a black hole, I can safely conclude that back-radiation from a cool surface will not raise the temperature of the warmer surface that initially radiated into the cooler surface.
Thamks Max – please see my post above.
I can thank you as well, it’s always good to have a reason to doubt your own knowledge, as it forces you to consider how you may be wrong.
Looking at the discussion above I noticed a couple of things that stood out, but was not sure why, and after checking my own understanding I realized most of the issue is a matter of terms not being defined in the same way by everyone involved. When I read “heat” or “energy” or “infrared” I immediately think of certain things, but that is not always the case.
It’s useful to try a personal challenge in situations like these: attempt to get across the same information without using the same terms.
Judith Curry I found your above digest quite revealing.
So much so that I’ve done a paragraph by paragraph review.
I invite you to take a look. I think it’s a shameful game you are playing
and I try to explain why.
~ Dr. Curry’s “Climate change: no consensus on consensus” – challenged ~
http://whatsupwiththatwatts.blogspot.com/2012/10/dr-currys-climate-change-no-consensus.html
A review of Dr. Judith Curry’s reader’s digest to “Climate change: no consensus on consensus”
citizenschallenge:
It is easy to show that the methodology of the investigation by which the IPCC reached the major conclusions of AR4 was not scientific. Thus the “actual science” that you reference in criticizing Dr. Curry’s paper is fictitious.
I’ve spotted this, frankly I find it to be incoherent.
Science is what we do when we separate what “is” from what “isn’t” before we pass it along to others.
Going into a discussion about data collection or experiments is fine, but that isn’t science in and of itself. Similarly a consensus is exactly the sort of reason we need science; a room full of brilliant individuals with beautiful models arranged into an elegant hypothesis does not outweigh a single ugly fact which falsifies that hypothesis.
A consensus should be of no importance in science, you can argue this if you want, but that is a case of your opinion about my opinion regarding particular sets of shared opinions among this group or that group.
Trusting a consensus is fine, not everyone is concerned with doing science.
Dr. Curry isn’t infallible either, you can act as though she has claimed to be if you would like, but she will happily tell you how much she doesn’t know. It’s a regular topic on her site here, after all.
She can be trusted regarding the existence of a consensus within the IPCC, however, given her actual experience with the IPCC itself. So I wouldn’t be so hasty to dismiss her writing as a “shameful game”, or at least lay out your argument in a more easily read fashion?
Max,
What we mean by scientific knowledge is always defined by consensus. That’s really the only way of separating weak speculation from “scientific knowledge”. Only the community of scientists can determine what should be considered scientific knowledge and what not and they do it by consensus. There are no written or otherwise fixed rules for that. Empirical evidence plays naturally a central role in the judgment of scientists but the scientific community is also the only judge concerning weighing of various factors.
As long as there’s no consensus we don’t have solid scientific answers, but what’s consensus and what’s not is one more issue without formal rules. Each scientist makes his decision on that for her or his own needs. In practice that’s mostly not a problem while it certainly is sometimes. In case of climate science there are many issues where consensus is strong and other issues where consensus is clearly lacking. Much of the public argumentation concerns the dividing line between the clear cases.
Uh, yeah, I gotta utterly disagree with the idea that “only the community of scientists can determine what should be considered scientific knowledge and that it is done by consensus”, it goes completely against what I understand science to be.
I gotta defer to Feynman’s wisdom here: http://www.fotuva.org/feynman/what_is_science.html
“Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts.”
So Max, you think Feynman was not trying to enhance scientific consensus? Accomplishing that was his life’s work. His goal. If his work never enhanced the consensus, he would have been an abject failure.
He fully recognized the human liability. Do you?
Can you give me an example of a consensus proving a hypothesis?
Can you explain how a strong consensus differs from a weak consensus?
What level of evidence trumps a consensus? Is there any evidence which is worth less than a consensus? How many experiments does it take to invalidate a consensus?
Should we take a vote to find the answers to those questions?
Tune in tomorrow for the results on the new episode of America’s Next Top Scientific Position!
It is utterly naive to speak of a consensus without looking at the funding and vested interests of the consensees.
In the case of the CAGW consensus, the funding is all from a single source – government – and of course government has a huge vested interest in promoting the selfsame CAGW consensus, since this will allow it to expand its revenue base and powers over society.
Pekka:
Like many terms of the natural languages, the English term “science” makes ambiguous reference to the associated ideas. One of these ideas is “demonstrable knowledge.” Another is “the process that is operated by people claiming to be ‘scientists’.” The demonstrability of the knowledge is independent of the consensus. On the other hand, the process is dependent upon the consensus.
By conflating the two ideas, one can arrive at the false conclusion that in climatology the process that is operated by people claiming to be ‘scientists’ is demonstrable knowledge. It isn’t.
Actually, the knowledge of the outcomes of events that is provided for us by the IPCC general circulation models is not demonstrable. That it is not demonstrable is a consequence from the non-existence of the underlying statistical population. The “science” of global warming is only the process that is operated by people claiming to be ‘scientists’.
The false appearance that the “science” of global warming” is demonstrable knowledge can be dispelled by disambiguation of the language of climatology. One way in which this disambiguation can be accomplished is via the Daubert standard of the federal courts of the U.S. and most of the courts of the states of the U.S. Under the Daubert standard, “science” references the idea of “demonstrable knowledege.” and not “the process that is operated by people claiming to be ‘scientists’. Under the Daubert standard, testimony cannot be represented in court to be “scientific” if it is merely the position of a “consensus.”
Is selectively hiding data from those who question your conclusions one of the associated ideas ?
When I wrote that scientific knowledge can be determined only by the consensus of the community of scientists I didn’t tell what I mean by the community of scientists. That’s again something that cannot be defined by any rules but is known only by the said community.
The whole idea is that science is fundamentally a free enterprise. Everyone who feels capable of producing science may try to contribute to the progress of science by new results (which include new criricism of old results). If that attempt succeeds in raising the attention of the community and get accepted as scientific work that particular person becomes a member of the community.
I did refer to the fact that each scientist makes her or his own judgment on what is accepted by the scientific community. When most make the same judgment that’s “consensus on consensus”. In all that I have written I refer by consensus to an mutual agreement where people have made their mind individually – but taking properly into account what they know about the thoughts of others. The consensus that I refer to is not a “manufactured consensus”, i.e. it is not a statement confirmed by formalized process where the minority views are put aside by majority or by individual based on their position.
Standard university text books of natural sciences contain mainly material that has been accepted by the consensus of scientists. It’s very unlikely that what is written in them will later turn out to be basically wrong (some details will certainly change). That material is a typical case of scientific knowledge confirmed by the consensus of the scientific community. No formal body has the authority to tell what’s correct physics. If the scientists would disagree widely they should win (Lysenko in Stalin era was an example of an attempt of the opposite).
Terry was talking about “demonstrability”. What is that? Who accept that something is demonstrable or has been demonstrated? My answer is that only the scientific community can do that and that they do that by consensus.
Perhaps I could summarize by saying a real consensus is an actively good thing, and fake/manufactured consensus is an actively bad thing (even if turns out to be correct).
It’s true that only experts in a field can really decide if a consensus exists, but this begs the question of who is paying the experts, what their motivations are, and how the process of consensus-forming has worked.
Well non-experts can certainly comment on the latter, indeed may outrank experts in the matter – experts such as world-ranking climate scientist professors whose thinking is “Why should I show you my data when I know you’ll try and find something wrong with it?”. And other experts who fail to voice any criticism of this.
I agree fully that there are many science related issues that are decided from outside science. Those include funding of science and the use of scientific knowledge in decision making to mention only two of the most important ones.
Pekka (Nov. 4, 2012) at 3:32 am):
As I’ve used the term, “demonstrability” is synonymous with “refutability” and “falsifiability.” The property of demonstrability is imparted to the knowledge that is created by an inquiry by the existence of the statistical population that underlies each theory that is a product of this inquiry. A theory predicts the probabilities of the unobserved but observable outcomes of the events in this population. A theory is tested by comparison of the predicted probabilities to the observed relative frequencies in a sample that is randomly drawn from the underlying population. If there is not a match, the theory is falsified by the evidence. Otherwise, it is said to be “validated.” For brevity, I’ve omitted description of details that are a result of sampling error.
The inquiry that was the source of the conclusions reached by the IPCC and is reported in AR4 lacks the statistical population that underlies its theories. Thus, the knowledge that was produced by this inquiry is not demonstrable. As the knowledge is not demonstrable, the methodology of the inquiry that produced it was not “scientific” under the disambiguation of the term “scientific” that is provided for us by the Daubert standard. Among the non-scientific methodologies is the one in which test data are replaced by the consensus of a group of people who claim to be “scientists.”
Terry,
Statistical significance is only of several factors that must be considered in judging the sufficiency of evidence. Some scientific hypotheses allow for direct testing of the type where the statistical significance is decisive, but that’s rather an exception than a rule for what can be considered scientific knowledge. You may see that easily by picking a physics textbook and thinking point by point why what you read there is part of scientific knowledge.
One of the most common ways that a hypothesis becomes generally accepted scientific knowledge is trough accumulation of multiple evidence without conflicting evidence that has survived later criticism. The “multiple evidence” may or may not contain testing where statistical significance has been an important factor. More often than not most of the multiple evidence is accumulated when then hypothesis is successfully developed further and extended to cover additional factors.
Falsifiability is a property of scientific hypotheses but I doubt that many scientists have ever met a need to think whether the hypotheses they are considering are falsifiable, because they would never even start to consider something that is not. That’s not an issue for scientists, not even for scientists interested in philosophy of science. That may be an issue for philosophers who want to list typical signatures of science but the point is moot as soon as we are looking at something that is known to be science. Scientific community is the authority on that as well.
Pekka (Nov. 4, 2012) at 2:20 am):
As you seem to sense, as the size of the sample upon which the climate models have been tested is nil, Working Group I’s claims lack the slightest degree of statistical significance. However, the topic that interests me most directly is the logic (or lack of same) of the methodology by which IPCC Working Group I reached its conclusions in writing its section of AR4. As it turns out, though these conclusions were reached by a consensus of people claiming to be “scientists,” one can show that that their methodology was illogical and unscientific.
In exposing this state of affairs, one must deal with a linguistic phenomenon that tends to disguise it. In the series of video recorded lectures entitled “Tools of Thinking” the academic philosopher James Hall stresses that inferences must avoid the fallacy of equivocation. As he describes equivocation, it is the use of terms that can be interpreted in several different ways in reaching a conclusion that is false but seems to be true. He offers as an example an incident in which his father asked by telephone whether he was smoking. Hall was certain that his father meant to ask whether he sometimes smoked but Hall elected to deceive his father by interpreting the question as asking whether he was smoking at that instant and answered no. In this way, Hall led his father to a false conclusion that would seem to his father to be true.
I have performed an investigation into the use of language in the literature of climatology, the results of which are published in the article at http://judithcurry.com/2011/02/15/the-principles-of-reasoning-part-iii-logic-and-climatology/ . One of my findings is that climatologists interpret the term “science” and the related term “scientific” in two different ways thus being guilty of the fallacy of equivocation. In AR4, Working Group I incorporates this fallacy into its argument, thus reaching a conclusion that is unproved but that seems to about half the population of the United States to be true.
The presence of this fallacy is revealed when the language of Working Group I’s argument is disambigated by assigning a different term to each of the two ways in which climatologists interpret “science” thus avoiding the potential for deceit via equivocation. The nature of the two terms is immaterial. However, as the U.S. courts have already disambiguated “science,” it is convenient to adopt their naming convention. Under this convention, the term “science” references “demonstrable knowledge.” It does not reference “the process that is conducted by people claiming to be ‘scientists’.” Under this particular disambiguation, judgement by consensus is not the process that we judge theories in science.
You seem to argue that for many people who call themselves “scientists,” logic is not a strong suit. You may be right. However, the topic of logic is not the way in which people DO think but rather is the way in which people SHOULD think. That climatologists SHOULD think in ways that differ from the ways they DO think is demonstrated by the conclusions from my research.
Terry,
What I have written so far in this thread has in no way been specific to climate science. I had in mind physical sciences although most should apply equally well to other sciences (in some of the other fields it may be more difficult to identify what is science and what something else).
The case of climate science is certainly not quite as clear as that of most fields of physics but with few exceptions it’s still straightforward to conclude which activities are science and which not. (That’s not the same distinction as that between good and worse science or work.)
The idea of IPCC is to some extent contradictory to the ideals of scientific work. In general it’s not good for science that some organization is set to make judgments of the whole field. That gives too much power to a limited number of individuals. That’s even more true when the situation persists as long as IPCC has existed in spite of the fact that the authorship of the assessment reports has changed from report to report.
I’m not at all as negative concerning the outcome as you. I do think that each of the WG1 reports has been quite good. Some clear faults in presentation have been brought up, mostly of the nature that the text is formally right but may be misleading for most readers, but those don’t change my general view on the reports.
Another problem is that expressed recently by professor Hans Schellnhuber. Those worries concern the summaries accepted line by line by government representatives rather than the scientists who have written the bulk of the reports. That brings in national interests that should not be mixed with scientific appraisal. Similar worries apply also to the selection of lead authors by the same government representatives. Here compromises are made to satisfy some political goals rather than choosing the authors solely to get the best and most objective report that could be produced. (The political considerations may influence in both ways. it’s not at all clear that they make the outcome more alarmist as the governments have also differing attitudes.)
Pekka, you wrote: “You may see that easily by picking a physics textbook and thinking point by point why what you read there is part of scientific knowledge.” earlier today.
When a particle collider produces data, that data is analyzed for statistical significance, the term used most often in public being “sigma” with sigma representing how unlikely it is for that event to be background noise. The higher the value for sigma, the more 0’s you add when you say “there is a 0.00001% chance that this was random noise”, essentially.
Physics is about match two things to theoretical descriptions of reality, directly observable forces, and statistically significant data on subatomic particles plus the forces at play involving said subatomic particles.
Physics is not done by consensus.
Chemistry is not done by consensus.
Astrophysics is not done by consensus.
Geology is not done by consensus.
Biology is not done by consensus.
Climatology is not done by consensus.
While there my exist a consensus regarding certain aspects of those fields and others, that is something you go “huh, that’s neat” about and then move on, as for the most part it has no real significance in science to say “9 out of 10 _____ists agree!” because science is a way to determine one way or the other if said experts are correct.
Max,
Science is not done by consensus, but the only proper way something becomes accepted as well established scientific knowledge is consensus of the community of scientists.
Doing science is one thing, deciding what is speculative, what well established and what something in-between is another. Consensus should have no role in the former but it’s the only valid tool that we have for the latter.
Pekka, you write “Science is not done by consensus, but the only proper way something becomes accepted as well established scientific knowledge is consensus of the community of scientists.”
I always had a suspicion that you, Pekka, were so much a believer in CAGW, that it distorts your obvious considerable knowledge of physics. How anyone with your knowledge can write such nonsense, I have no idea. The only basis on which physicists should ever agree that some hypothesis has a sound basis, is the empirical data; nothing else. I dont care what qualifications any group of physicists has, or what appointmnets they may hold; if they dont have the empirical data to support what they claim is true, then there is no basis in physics to believe that it is true. And any group of “physicists” that tries to claim some from of consensus, without adequate empirical data, simply are not physicists.
Jim,
You, Terry and everyone else is forced to refer to something that must be interpreted in some way. There are no absolutes in scientific evidence.
When I refer to established scientific knowledge I mean something that has been confirmed often enough to reach a level of certainty that’s stronger than best and statistically most significant experiments can alone produce (there are exceptions where a single experiment may be deemed reliable enough, but that’s exceptional).
What I’m saying that for scientific knowledge there are no authorities above the scientific community. Measuring the level of consensus within the scientific community is difficult, but for well established scientific knowledge measuring not normally needed as it’s existence is so obvious.
I have tried to make it clear that the requirement of consensus in the sense I use the word is very stringent. Such a consensus must be almost unanimous, some scattered contrary opinions don’t change it but they must be a really minimal distraction in the unanimity as they are for typical issues of textbook physics.
When a scientific issue gets as politicized as the questions about climate science have become there is the possibility that a really small minority is loud enough and gets so much support from outside science that unwarranted confusion is created. This observation is relevant for climate science, where many main stream scientists claim that there is a real wide reaching consensus while skeptics claim that that’s not true.
My own view is that there is clearly a strong scientific consensus on many issues of climate science but that there are legitimate questions concerning the coverage of that consensus. I do think that some activist scientists have tried to put the stamp on consensus also on conclusions which are in reality not at all supported by consensus. I*m certainly not the only one wondering where the bordering line might be.
Pekka, you write “There are no absolutes in scientific evidence. ”
This is where we differ. There are absolutes in scientific evidence. That is when physics turns into engineering. Experiments have been performed that show that the inverse square law of attraction between electric charges is valid to 15 places of decimals. And the list goes on and on. Certainly, there is no guarantee in the future that something will not be found that will show the absolute was not absolute. We can use Newton’s Laws of Motion to predict solar and lunar eclipses in to the indefinte future, and we can bet the farm that they are correct. And we know that Newton’s laws are not absolutes.
I agree that CAGW is a very plausible hypothesis. I cannot prove that it not correct. But no-one has proven that it is correct. And there will be no proof until the empirical data says that CAGW is correct. Spreading this idea that it is possible to establish that something is true in physics just because a number of learned people believe the evidence, and so everyone else must agree with them, is a load of nonsense. Until CAGW has been proven with hard, empirical data, it remains a hypothesis, and the writings of the Royal Society, the American Physical Society, and the Americna Meteorological Society, among others, on CAGW, deserve to be assigned to the ash cans of history.
Jim,
First you tell that you don’t agree with me
And then you tell exactly what I said:
I wonder what you really think.
Pekka, youn write “I wonder what you really think.”
What I think is that there needs to be a level of proof that can be established by the reliance on empirical data. No, this empirical data will never be absolute. But one needs a level of empirical data to establish that a hypothesis is valid. There has to be enough empirical data to show that an idea is something more than a hypothesis. The extent that the physics has been proven is measured by the degree to which we have enough empirical data to support a threory or a law.
In other words, there has to be a certain level of empirical data before CGAW can be claimed to be something other than a hypothesis. That level of empirical data has not yet, IMHO, been reached.
Jim,
All that I have written in agreement with that. I have said that only scientists together (or the community of scientists) can tell when that level has been reached.
My two essential points are:
– nobody else can tell that
– the scientists tell that as a community using criteria that they consider applicable for that particular case. They don’t do that through negotiation or vote but each one can make her/his own judgment. It’s not done using fixed rules because each case in different in many ways.
Pekka (Nov. 5, 2012 at 7:26 am):
In delivering a model of a complex system that is suitable for policy making, a problem that we face is that information needed for a deductive conclusion is missing. A consequence is for more than one model to be consistent with the evidence. However, only one model can be used in making policy. Thus, the issue arises of how this model shall be selected from amongst the many possibilities.
By tradition, scientists make the selection through the use of the intuitive rules of thumb that I’ll call “heuristics.” Among the available heuristics is consensus.
However, the method of heuristics has a logical shortcoming. The shortcoming is that on each occasion in which a particular set of heuristics selects a particular model, a different set of heuristics selects a different model. In this way, the method of heuristics violates the law of non-contradiction.
An alternative to the method of heuristics that lacks this shortcoming is to select the model by optimization of the inferences that are made by the model. I provide an overview of this topic in the series of three articles that are entitled “The Principles of Reasoning” and published in this blog.
Thus, to conclude, while consensus is an available method of selection it is illogical. A logical alternative is available. However, in the case of climatology, this alternative cannot be adopted in lieu of the underlying statistical population. For so long as climatology lacks the underlying population, the only available method for selection of the model to be used in policy making will be illogical.
Pekka (Nov. 3, 2012 at 3:08 am):
There are sound reasons for interpretation of the phrase “scientific knowledge” as the information that is provided to us about the outcomes of events by the associated model. The IPCC climate models provide us with no such information.
Terry,
I agree on much what you write.
The most severe problem is in my view that the whole “linear model” fails. By “linear model” a I mean that where scientists give one answer by whatever method and that answer is then used by decision makers. It fails because the right questions cannot be presented before the answers have been received and analyzed together with other influencing factors.
Your optimized approach seems to be related to the needs of the same problem and might solve it in some hypothetical cases. As you write climate policy is not a case where that is likely to succeed.
The uncertainties are too large on many of the issues to allow for fully quantitative analysis or optimization. My preferred choice would be policy analysis by a group of experts. They need understanding of climate science but not necessarily any climate scientist as a member of the group. They need also people who are up to date on what is expected from technology development. Issues of economics are crucial for their task as is an ability to judge what’s politically possible. Every single one of the issues I list above is so essential that top level expertize is needed on everyone – and the list is still incomplete.
Actually I would like to see several parallel and independent groups on the task to reduce the possibility that the work gets misdirected in one way or another. Comparing the outcomes of several groups and arguing then on their virtues might be really useful.
If the problems are, indeed, so large that they warrant anything approaching what many claim as required, that would make the effort I propose trivial in comparison.
Max™ | November 3, 2012 at 8:03 pm said: ”Uh, yeah, I gotta utterly disagree with the idea that “only the community of scientists can determine what should be considered scientific knowledge”
Max™, you are not a bird and cannot lay eggs; but you can recognize ”when the egg is rotten” == what they come up with, is rotten to the last taxpayer’s $
In this case I assume birds are scientists and eggs are scientific knowledge.
I may not possess a degree in a scientific field from an accredited institution that represents my dues having been paid, and as such I do not claim to be a scientist, though I do have a good background in physics and mathematics.
I can most definitely perform my own experiments, make my own useful observations, and make use of what I have learned from others as well as on my own to reach sound conclusions about reproducible results. I can “do” science, so if that is “laying eggs” then I suppose I would be a reptile who is starting to grow feathers?
Max™ | November 3, 2012 at 11:12 pm said: ”In this case I assume birds are scientists and eggs are scientific knowledge”
Yes, and it meant: ”you don’t have to be an IPCC climatologist; to know when what they say is offensive to the nose”: .
P.s. if you can do your own science: be my peer reviewer on couple of my posts. Most of the time ”peer reviewers” are the ”rubber stamps” because they work together – me and you don’t. here:: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2012/07/20/water-vapor/
http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/methane-ch4/
http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2011/08/29/hello-world/
be the strongest critique, do your best, to dig something wrong; what YOU think is wrong, not because the contemporary propaganda says so. p.s. if you complain about misspelling – you fix it.- English is your language
this is an official invitation, take it as a challenge; you will be glad you did
Uh, stefan, the arguments you’re giving about things based on biblical reasons or how “things were supposed to be” are rather nonsensical.
I’m not saying this because I’m “a warmist”, I do not consider the CO2 “greenhouse” effect to be a plausible hypothesis.
I’m saying this because your explanations and arguments are not well formed.
inchorent may be fair comment.
Perhaps it could get a run at the on-line Journal of Early Piglet Weaning ?
PS. Given the inherent incoherence of the “paper” I was reviewing, it’s to be expected.
An awful lot of talk there… with “Consensus” being contorted into a straw man. It is Earth Observations driving the current state of climatological understanding, “the collective considered opinion” – Climatologists dang well appreciate that “consensus” is spelled with a small “c” and that it is subject to change as the evidence justifies.
You folks present a false image of what a working “consensus” is and a false impression of how the climatological community operates.
Furthermore your intimations of malfeasance never rise above Urban Legend blahblah.
And yes, my “challenge” probably isn’t perfectly coherent, but than I’m not a scholar, just and interested working man – who’s had it with the crazy-making of the proud contrarian on a matter as important as our Grand Atmospheric Experiment.
A consensus is a political animal, not a scientific one.
You conflate observations (which are involved with science) and a “collective considered opinion” (which doesn’t really matter) while giving the impression that a working consensus is important in science.
Then you go on to accuse malfeasance, excellent word by the way, and while speaking of false impressions you mentioned a “Grand Atmospheric Experiment”… an experiment usually involves some sort of hypothesis, a control, some way to collect important data, and so forth, doesn’t it?
gahhhh need to ban all the climate research
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Max,
I believe you have an unfortunately limited appreciation for our planet’s physical being.
Studying our planet and learning from it, is not like a classroom chemistry experiment.
Stop expecting those standards or even that mindset when trying to understand Earth Processes.
You would benefit from a little history lesson regarding society’s “grand geophysical experiment.”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The 1959 Gilbert Plass article
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=carbon-dioxide-and-climate
Carbon Dioxide and Climate
An article from our July 1959 issue examined climate change: “A current theory postulates that carbon dioxide regulates the temperature of the earth. This raises an interesting question: How do Man’s activities influence the climate of the future?”
By Gilbert N. Plass
page 4
“During the past century a new geological force has begun to exert its effect upon the carbon dioxide equilibrium of the earth [see graphs on page 43]. By burning fossil fuels man dumps approximately six billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year. His agricultural activities release two billion tons more. Grain fields and pastures store much smaller quantities of carbon dioxide than the forests they replace, and the cultivation of the soil permits the vast quantities of carbon dioxide produced by bacteria to escape into the air…”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
also:
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/Revelle.htm
Roger Revelle’s Discovery
“… By way of conclusion, Revelle remarked that “Human beings are now carrying out a large scale geophysical experiment of a kind that could not have happened in the past nor be reproduced in the future.”
When he wrote this sentence, which has since been quoted more than any other statement in the history of global warming, he was not warning against future perils. He did feel some concern about potential harm over the long run, and had begun to point to the problem in public.
But the word “experiment” sounded benign and progressive to Revelle as to most scientists, and in this paper he only meant to point out a fascinating opportunity for the study of geophysical processes…”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And Faustian Experiment it is :-(
Terry Oldberg | November 3, 2012 at 11:56 am | wrote:
“citizenschallenge: It is easy to show that the methodology of the investigation by which the IPCC reached the major conclusions of AR4 was not scientific. Thus the “actual science” that you reference in criticizing Dr. Curry’s paper is fictitious.” <<<
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Max,
Stop telling us how obvious you think it is.
Show us some actual objective evidence!
Where are your particulars?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And for what it's worth let me share my rewrite of my review of Curry's first paragraph:
=================================================
¶1) The manufactured consensus of the IPCC has had the unintended consequences of distorting the science, elevating the voices of scientists that dispute the consensus, and motivating actions by the consensus scientists and their supporters that have diminished the public’s trust in the IPCC.
=================================================
re: ¶1
Curry writes: "manufactured consensus of the IPCC has had the unintended consequences of distorting the science…" <<<
That is an incredibly big and damaging charge.
Where is Curry's evidence!?
Specifically what topics have the IPCC distorted?
Why no list?
Where is Curry's examination comparing the scientific community's assessments with the IPCC's manufactured and published "consensus"?
Where does Curry outline and review the many meetings and conferences and writings and back and forth communication that goes on during this IPCC manufacturing process?
~ ~ ~
Why make the starting assumption: 'IPCC's all sinister'?
{Just because the news is bad for big business? I thought this was science we were discussing?}
The IPCC is actually a small organization tasked with compiling the available legitimate science.
Curry doesn't seriously examine who the IPCC are; what they have been legally tasked with doing; and how they have gone about their task.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Curry writes: "… elevating the voices of scientists that dispute the consensus…" <<<
What is Curry talking about?
What's it supposed to mean?
What point is Curry trying to weave into her story here?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Curry writes: "… and motivating actions by the consensus scientists…" <<<
Scientists read and talk and meet on all sorts of different levels. There are seasons and politics just as in every other professional endeavor. But, it's still a serious organization with a planned process, openly established and openly conducted, and it's produces reports on the state of the science. Fair and square.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Curry writes: ""have diminished the public’s trust in the IPCC." <<<
You won't find anything here about Seitz and Singer and the tactics of manufacturing doubt?
Why not examine the various dirty tricks and PR tactics that have targeted the IPCC and climatologists in general?
Why not ask if there's evidence this "diminished pubic trust" was the product of a manufactured publicity campaign?
=================================================
PS. Here's some of my evidence:
The American Denial of Global Warming –
Perspectives on Ocean Science
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T4UF_Rmlio
===============
A Merchant of Doubt attacks Merchants of Doubt
by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway
http://www.skepticalscience.com/A-Merchant-of-Doubt-attacks-Merchants-of-Doubt.html
“Stop telling us how obvious you think it is.
Show us some actual objective evidence!
Where are your particulars?” ~citizenschallenge
My evidence that a consensus isn’t science?
Ok, a consensus can be right or wrong, yes?
In what way can you determine if something is actually right or wrong?
If there is a consensus that something is one way, can a consensus ever determine otherwise?
“Doing science is one thing, deciding what is speculative, what well established and what something in-between is another. Consensus should have no role in the former but it’s the only valid tool that we have for the latter.” ~Pekka
There is a way to test whether something is merely speculation, or if it is actually well established, we call it science.
Max, I’m asking where is your objective evidence that the IPCC’s statements are not an accurate reflection of the collective state of climatological understanding?
Where is your objective evidence that climatologists are over reliant on some predetermined and unrealistic “consensus” ?
citizenschallenge:
That IPCC climatologists are over reliant on consensus is a conclusion that emerges from consideration of the evidence upon which these climatologists base their conclusions. This evidence does not include a sample that is drawn from a statistical population. A consequence is for their theories to be irretutable by reference to observatonal data. The methodology of the research, then, is dogmatic rather than scientific in style.
Oh, I’m not particularly interested in dissecting everything wrong with the anthropogenic CO2 greenhouse hypothesis for you, you most likely don’t care, as you aren’t interested in science enough to be offended at the idea that a consensus has any role to play outside of the political arena.
That last comment was to citizenschallenge, not you Terry, btw.
Where is your objective evidence that climatologists are over reliant on some predetermined and unrealistic “consensus” ?
Short answer : Climategate. For which they punished or crticised none of their people.
Longer answer: the book The Delinquent Teenager Who Was Mistaken for the World’s Top Climate Expert: An Expose of the IPCC., by Donna Laframboise.
It’s simply beyond all reasonable doubt. And hardly surprisinig – it’s a political body, politically financed, seeking to expand the role of politics on the world.
BB | November 6, 2012 at 1:50 am |writes:
Where is your objective evidence that climatologists are over reliant on some predetermined and unrealistic “consensus” ?
Short answer : Climategate. For which they punished or crticised none of their people.
Longer answer: the book The Delinquent Teenager Who Was Mistaken for the World’s Top Climate Expert: An Expose of the IPCC., by Donna Laframboise.
It’s simply beyond all reasonable doubt. And hardly surprisinig – it’s a political body, politically financed, seeking to expand the role of politics on the world.
===================================================
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Do you actually consider the writings of Donna Laframboise “objective” ?
Look at the intro of her book…
====================
++++++++++++++++++++
“This book is about a spoiled child. Year after year, this child has been admired, flattered, and praised…”
~ ~ ~
Then she goes on about a spoiled over indulged child and on and on with base emotionalizing
Who’s kidding who? This is a passion story Laframboise has written here. There is not a hint of serious science about it. Shame on you.
Is that the best you can do in confronting the challenge of producing objective evidence that demonstrates where IPCC’s “consensus” is different from the balance of evidence available?
Read this tripe she starts her book with:
==========
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“The IPCC has lounged, for more than two decades, in a large comfy chair atop a pedestal.”
“… They say the Climate Bible is…”
“… the media sound more like cheerleaders than hard-nosed reporters…”
~ ~ ~
etc., etc. Then she makes an incredible jump:
=====
“Let us be sensible for a moment. Planet Earth is 4.5 billion years old. During that time it has endured all sorts of perfectly natural climate transformations…”
~ ~ ~
Then it’s ice ages and pharaohs and suddenly she’s quoting Mark Twain.
Who’s kidding who?
This is the stock trade passion story Laframboise has written here. There is not hint of serious science about it. Shame on you.
>>> Is that the best you can do in confronting the challenge of producing objective evidence that demonstrates where IPCC’s “consensus” is different from the balance of the scientific evidence available?
That’s a pathetic answer citizenchallenge, and you know it.
The Delinquent Teenager is not a book about climate science itself, it’s a book about the process of how climate “science” is produced. Which you’d know it you’d read it. The only people who deny the alarmist bias and corruption in the IPCC setup, are those who welcome it. Those like yourself?
T O | November 5, 2012 at 11:13 am |
citizenschallenge, That IPCC climatologists are over reliant on consensus is a conclusion that emerges from consideration of the evidence upon which these climatologists base their conclusions.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
CC: OK. Let’s consider it.
Got any objective lists and facts to share?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
T.O. writes: This evidence does not include a sample that is drawn from a statistical population.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
CC: Can you explain what you mean by that?
And more importantly can you explain how you would improve the processing of Earth Observations, considering how different they are from lab bench experimentation?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
T.O. writes: A consequence is for their theories to be irretutable by reference to observatonal data. The methodology of the research, then, is dogmatic rather than scientific in style.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
CC: Can you explain those sentences in plain English?
More specifically, what is your complaint with how Earth Observations are conducted?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
===================================================
M. writes | November 5, 2012 at 5:35 pm :
Oh, I’m not particularly interested in dissecting everything wrong with the anthropogenic CO2 greenhouse hypothesis for you,
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
CC: Wait a minute; are you saying the entire greenhousegas theory is falsifiable ! ? Please do take the time to explain.
But please, don’t send me a link to Nasif Nahle – unless you can also explain why I should believe a self-contained hermit above the “consensus” of thousands of active scientists and engineers.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
M writes: “you most likely don’t care, as you aren’t interested in science enough to be offended at the idea that a consensus has any role to play outside of the political arena.”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
CC: Do you really believe what you are saying?
Where would computers, and moon landings, and global communication (etc., etc., etc.) be > if experts couldn’t have reached a consensus regarding how the unseen physical world operates?
As for how much I care about real science – try me.
What you got ? ? ?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
citizenschallenge:
You can gain an understanding of what is meant by the phrases “statistical population” and “sample that is drawn from a population” via Web searches on those phrases. What you mean when you ask “how would you improve the processing of Earth Observations, considering how different they are from lab bench experimentation?” I don’t know. I do know that in the processing of Earth observations to conclusions about the causes of global warming, a grasp of the notion of an “independent event” is crucial. Neither IPCC climatologists nor you exhibit this grasp.
A sample drawn from the underlying statistical population supplies the sole basis for falsifying the claims of the associated model. As the IPCC climate models reference no such statistical population or sample, there are not the means by which the claims of these models might be falsified. Thus, the methodology of the IPCC’s investigation into global warming has not been “scientific,” by the definition of this term.
And dear, now CC is beavering away to try and give the impression that a fake consensus like the IPCC one is almost as good and useful as a real one.
It isn’t CC, it’s far worse than no ‘consensus’. Wishing away uncertainty is only for those with ulterior motives.
Judith, an interesting paper, but I would liken it to a discussion between Linux users whether it is helpful to try and have a consensus about Linux or whether they should just all independently agree that Linux is better than windows.
What you miss is “perspective”. If you have a group of people viewing something all from the same perspective, then they will likely have a very similar view. And, it really doesn’t matter if e.g. you compare their individual views or their group “consensus”, you will likely find it is the same thing.
You yourself said your view changed when you started doing commercial forecasting. This was a change in perspective, a change that led you to challenge the consensus view of those who lacked your new perspective.
So, it is interesting that your paper makes only a glancing reference to sceptics:-
“defenders of the IPCC consensus have expended considerable efforts in the ‘boundary work’ of distinguishing those qualified to contribute to the climate change consensus from those who are not [4]. These efforts have characterized skeptics as small in number [13], extreme [50], and scientifically suspect [14]. These efforts create temptations to make illegitimate attacks on scientists whose views do not align with the consensus, and to dismiss any disagreement as politically motivated ‘denialism’ [51].”
This very much understates the position of sceptics who to be frank have been proven to be right despite the repeated high profile assertions that we are wrong. E.g. I have been stating openly since at least 2005 that there was a “pause” in the warming. There is now absolutely no doubt that I was right. I also highlighted the lack of skill of the yearly forecast by the UK Met Office years before they finally gave up (without admitting as much) I even wrote the climategate petition to the cries of derision by “warmists”, yet by the numerous inquiries I was clearly right about that as well. We sceptics have been overwhelmingly right, and in the key measure (predicting the climate) climate researchers have been an abysmal failure.
So, you need to stop focussing on the “consensus” as viewed from the perspective of academia and start accepting the fact that despite our absence of funding, our lack of access to key data and what I can only say is an organisational structure of a “rabble” Sceptics have proven to be far superior to climate researchers at least by our standards, and I suspect even by your own.
So, the question you should be asking is why people like me can be so much better than climate researchers? Unfortunately, we don’t have the research but, I can say that I’m trained both as a scientists and as an engineer so not only do I look at the problem using the different skill-set of the engineer, but I can also see how the different perspective of the scientists leads to another perspective. Then I just happen to have an MBA, which enables me to look at the organisations and politics involved and gives me the skills to make sense of these. This also means I can look outside science and e.g. I can see the financial markets don’t share your perspective (shares are dropping in wind manufacturing companies ahead of the end of Kyoto).
But as the sceptic and stock market views show, the reality is that there are many consensuses. There is the financial market consensus that had been selling up wind for three years. There is the climate research consensus which has assumed that only it’s view has any validity and which has not been a resounding success. There is the green environmental consensus … that no matter what the science says we ought to act anyway, there was the political consensus that there were votes in climate and then there is the sceptic “consensus” … or more accurately “perspective”.
The question you should be asking is why all these “groups” can view the same general thing in very different ways. It’s obvious with the politicians … but sceptics, we share your education, and scientific outlook, but we do not share your view.
And may I humbly suggest that rather than sitting on one side of the Canyon debating with other researchers whether your slightly different perspective of the “thing” provides you with any additional information of its form, you might get a lot more information if you stopped ignoring the glaringly obvious fact that sceptics have a different viewpoint to you and started asking us sceptics on the other side of the canyon what we can see.
Why would we have to “independently agree” that linux is better than windows?
:)
Terry Oldberg | November 7, 2012 at 12:48 am | wrote:
Thus, the methodology of the IPCC’s investigation into global warming has not been “scientific,” by the definition of this term.
==============
“The methodology of IPCC investigations into global warming” ?? Sounds like your complaining about their research methods…
Ahh but doesn’t the IPCC compile the existing scientific work that others do?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Its mission is to provide comprehensive scientific assessments of current scientific, technical and socio-economic information worldwide. . . ”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intergovernmental_Panel_on_Climate_Change
The IPCC exists to justify political action to ‘tackle’ CAGW. A such it compiles reports based on studies that can support this view, strenuously resisting suggestions to be open or objective.
citizenschallenge:
It is a fact that an investigation was conducted by individuals and organizations that included the IPCC. This investigation resulted in conclusions being reached that were published in the report of IPCC Working Group I, AR4.
In this thread, I address the issue of the methodology of this investigation. I ask whether this methodology was “scientific” where by “scientific” I mean that the inferences of global temperatures that were made by the models that were a product of the investigation had the property of being refutable by reference to observed events not available to the model builders at the time they built the models. A review of the report reveals that no such events are cited. Also, the associated statistical population is not cited. From this and other evidence, it may be concluded that the methodology was not “scientific” as I have defined the term.
If the mission of the IPCC was as stated in your quote from Wikipedia and “scientific” is defined as I have defined it then it must be concluded that the IPCC failed in its mission. That the IPCC is able to claim to have conducted a scientific assessment is a consequence from the IPCC’s incorporation of the fallacy of equivocation into its argument as a premise. In particular, the term “scientific” takes on several different meanings.
Curryja | October 28, 2012 at 7:28 pm |
“Well, if humans haven’t caused any of the recent past warming, then there will be little motivation to do much about AGW.”
This is a very telling response. If it is necessary to act regarding a temperature change, then it is necessary to act whether it is human or not. If however, the impulse to act comes purely because it it “manmade” then this we are in fact dealing with a moral question not science.
Yes, but I imagine manmade is more within man’s grasp to unmake.
In my recent conversations at the JudithCurry discussion forum, I’m struck by their long winded grandiloquence, such as: “defenders of the IPCC consensus have expended considerable efforts in the ‘boundary work’ of distinguishing those qualified to contribute to the climate change consensus from those who are not [4].”
~ ~ ~
Trying to inject distrust, simply by making claims, never appreciating or sharing that what we are talking about is dedicated people – researchers and scientists and support staff going out in the field to conducting studies and doing the research and trying to be as accurate as possible in recording their observations. No perfect at/in any part of this endeavor {like every other human enterprise} – but it works and it works well and they have learned a lot that does not deserve the contrived ridicule the “Free corporate Marketers” have orchestrated.
There is a base dishonesty about folks like Curry and commenters at her website – when they are basing all their thinking on an assumption that the science has been inferior. They don’t provide actual specifics regarding ~ our actual factual world full of knowledge and experience that climatologists and related field of researcher have been accumulated ~ but they sure do continue believing themselves.
I think we’ve reach the point it’s obvious that this is all about desperately clinging to one’s fictitious world view (Free Market, no Anthropogenic Global Warming, no need to change a thing about the way we lead our business and lives.) and not about the state of our knowledge. Fear, fear and anger overriding objectivity and reason. OK I’ll get off my soapbox, but for now there it is.
=========================
http://whatsupwiththatwatts.blogspot.com/2012/11/weather-and-climate-summit-lecture.html
Citizenschallenge:
I have to point out that, like many of your previous arguments, your latest one is based upon equivocations exploiting amibuiguity of reference by the term “science” to the associated ideas. To equivocate is dishonest!
T.O. Nonsense
The point I keep trying to bring across is: it’s not about how many big words you can cram into a sentence. It’s about the state of the evidence which you folks do everything you can to ignore.
And it’s about
the voracity of front line scientists
folks I trust and you slander… without objective evidence
Here, learn something, listen to what these folks have to say:
Weather and Climate Summit – Day 5, Jennifer Francis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtRvcXUIyZg&feature=player_embedded
duration 1:24:24
SESSION 9: Jennifer Francis, Rutgers University
Topic: The Arctic Paradox
==========================
Weather and Climate Summit – Day 5, Jim White
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=accdHyNR2OY&feature=endscreen
SESSION 10: Jim White, University of Colorado
Topic: Climate Change Impacts Are Happening Faster and Faster- Greenland, Sea Level Rise and Some Atmospheric Chemistry
This is the first time I’ve seen a warmist defending the keepers of his Faith for their voracity.
Terry may use words that appear long to you, but at least he understands them.
B.C says it’s about ev-id-ence – but Tc says it’s about: “desperately clinging to his a fictitious world where any new excuse to move to a more totalitarian world with more taxes and regulations, is automatically accepted since it boost his ideological preferences.”
Bring on the totalitarian monster. Do you actually believe that tripe?
That brings us the big question: how honest are you folks with yourselves? How much do your fears of having to change habits and expectations cloud your ability to assess the state of our planet? Think about it during your quite hours. Can you be objective?
Real physical evidence is there to be found in droves. For instance the above lectures I’ve tried sharing… any of you actually take the time to listen them? Or to think about what’s happening to the Arctic and the cascading impacts that is having? PS. trying to pretend that it’s all based on models is a glaringly dishonest assessment of what’s happening within climatology.
So again, where is your objective evidence that the IPCC digest or “consensus” of the state of the science does not reflect the actual state of the science?
citizenschallenge:
In your response, you’ve evaded the issue of the morality of your equivocation. You’ve made a deceptive argument and are evidently unwilling to repent.
CC
Do you seriously deny that organizations labor in their own interest? And that since the UN/IPCC is in the business of world governance, it is always going to find “reasons” for world government, regardless of the facts ? How can anyone with more than a few braincells actually such utter tripe such as that that the IPCC – the force behind the science frauds exposed in Climategate – is trying to be objective ? Seriously, how honest are you being with yourself?
Real physical evidence… since the average global temperatures have levelled out for 16 years now, how can you say the the arctic melt is tempperature-related. Do you ever stop to think what you are saying? Indeed do you ever think at all about these issues, or does your political naivete always win out ?
CC
From the youtubes, looks like a lot of arm waving going on.
Max
Such as Prof Phil Jones, and his approach to science of “Why should I show you my data when I know you’ll try and find something wrong with it”.
And the deafening silence from most of the rest of the climate science that followed, betokening their approval, and hence indicating systemic institutional dishonesty.
This is the sort of endemic malfeasance and corruption of science in which CC places such so much trust.
the voracity of front line scientists
folks I trust and you slander… without objective evidence
‘Voracity’ does indeed say it all – excessive eagerness, advocacy supplanting objectivity. Like Climategate showed.
Citizenschallenge is typical of the sequacious flock of ipcc parrots, desperately clinging to his a fictitious world where any new excuse to move to a more totalitarian world with more taxes and regulations, is automatically accepted since it boost his ideological preferences.
Painstakingly oblivious to the obvious vested interest that government has in financing and fomenting climate alarm (and that probably 99.9% of climate science is government-funded), he would have us forget Climategate and the utterly corrupt and biased IPCC, and have us believe the science behind the ‘consensus’ emanates from from a science process based in integrity.
Well yes, citizenschallenge, it’s about evidence, and
that means ev – id – ence, “em – pir – ic ev- id – ence,”
not models, however good – looking… we’ve got a lot of them,
here -down – under, and ruggedly handsome men as well. )
The IPCC is a flawed organisation, citizenschallenge, with a
pre-determined mission to understand ‘human-induced climate
change.
Its insider decision making group are from a self selecting
circle of AGW enviro advocates weighted to Greenpeace and
WWF, with young, unpublished researchers, fast tracked to lead author-ship. Confirmation bias is built in. If yer read Laframboise
and McKitrick’s detailed documentation on the IPCC, the scales
should drop from yr eyes, cc. Also the climategate emails which
are primary evidence, in context, of the efforts of the climate
scientists ter conceal and fudge their flawed data, block FOI and
gate-keep the science journals.
Oh, and models are not data,
they’re guesses about complex,
multi – variable, inter – related…
compluh – compluh – compluh – cated
climate, misty and windy.
By climatologists in cloud towers,
who while away the tenured hours,
modelling, hindcasting,
projecting and imagining …
they understand.
The IPCC is a flawed organization (part of a larger flawed organization, the UN).
Flawed because their whole raison d’etre is to foster and/or become world governance. As such they cannot but conclude that man is warming the globe, for therein lies their pot of gold. And from Climategate and the lack of repentance over it, we know for certain they have morals of sewer rats.
Oops, see immediately below.
Beth Cooper:
In a trial of selected climatologists for criminal fraud, juicier than the climategate emails in its evidentiary value would be an omission in the report of Working Group I, AR4. The omission is of reference to the statistical population underlying the claims of the IPCC climate models. The IPCC’s inquiry into global warming featured no such population.
Thus, in whiling away their tenured hours, IPCC climatologists can’t have been testing their hypotheses. The methodology of the IPCC’s inquiry into global warming was not scientific!
Beth Cooper-
Nicely meted and metered, as usual.
Noting how you enjoy how words are used here is a little book (pdf) you may find interesting or you may be put off by it–but it is very different for a ‘science’ book:
http://archive.org/details/einsteintheoryof032414mbp
Just a momentary change of pace from a different era.
In fairness to Dover publications, they have now reprinted it.
Thx mwg, I’ll order the book, but, but, do yer think I’ll
understand it?
(Jest an escapee from the hu – man – ities yer know.)
Beth
Take a look at the pdf and see…if it looks like a fun read kept going. Only buy the book if you think Dover should be supported for making things like that available. Otherwise , kill the file and say “I wonder what the hell mwg was thinking”. You can understand it to the level you wish, it just whether it’s of interest and you have time. I just thought that you might at least find the style and layout interesting. Maybe it will give you some ideas on a samizdat Climate Collection. Josh uses pen and water color, you use words.
It also might be good to get a refresher of what science looks like when it isn’t when it isn’t being ripped up in the arena, and as it used to be written for lay readers. Notice how it assumes some intelligence on the part of reader, yet does not overwhelm one at time, and is not ‘gee-whizzy’ and is not PC. (It does gush about FDR some but that is understandable in context.)
Besides physics stripped of it ancillaries is one of the core humanities. Anything less and it is just technology.
[rebooting…EOM]
er …citizenschallenge 8/11 @10.17pm, we all make spelling mistakes, I know I do, but … ahem … ‘the voracity’ of front line scientists …don’cha mean ‘veracity’ ? Hmmm, on second thoughts, jest leave it lol.
Thx again mwg, I have the interest and I should employ me time
with more DISCIPLINE.
Beth.
BC: “we all make spelling mistakes, I know I do, but … ahem … ‘the voracity’ of front line scientists …don’cha mean ‘veracity’ ? Hmmm, on second thoughts, jest leave it lol.”
Dang, and that’s not even the first time I screwed that up. Unfortunately typos and misspelling are real monkey on back, particularly when I’m in a hurry. But, I shall continue trying to beat it.
T. O. | November 8, 2012 at 11:32 pm | ”citizenschallenge: In your response, you’ve evaded the issue of the morality of your equivocation. You’ve made a deceptive argument and are evidently unwilling to repent.”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
How about defining what you find deceptive about my argument?
===================
P. | November 9, 2012 at 5:27 pm | ”CC, Do you seriously deny that organizations labor in their own interest? And that since the UN/IPCC is in the business of world governance, it is always going to find “reasons” for world government, regardless of the facts ? How can anyone with more than a few braincells actually such utter tripe such as that that the IPCC – the force behind the science frauds exposed in Climategate – is trying to be objective ? Seriously, how honest are you being with yourself?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Care to define what you mean by “world governance”?
Incidentally, why you have a problem with nations cooperating with each other?
As for the IPCC being the force behind science frauds.
Where is that objective list of those “IPCC frauds”?
~ ~ ~
Oh and how can I possibly image the IPCC is objective?… well it comes from {among other places} reading some of their stuff – give it a try: http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch2s2-5-4.html
…and speaking of objectivity – please don’t refer me to that hysteric Laframboise with her obviously passionate hatred for the IPCC and its scientists.
As for McIntyre master of making a mole sound like a mountain – besides endlessly beating the horse named Mann – What IPCC “frauds” has he uncovered?
As for the stolen emails, I’ve read a bunch of them and when taken in context, they actually don’t reveal “fraud” – dislikes and emotions sure, but scientific fraud ain’t seen any – neither have any of the many investigations.
Where’s that objective list of those perceived frauds?
citizenschallenge:
Thank you for taking the time to reply. The deceptiveness of your argument lies in its reliance upon the fallacy of equivocation. As needed, you could bone up on this fallacy by reading Wikipedia’s article entitled “equivocation.”
You equivocate by failing to distinguish between the various meanings of “science” and related terms such as “scientist” and “scientific.” By this slimy (but possibly inadvertent) practice, you gloss over the fact that the people who execute the inquiry into global warming do not and cannot test their hypotheses, thus failing to match the description of “scientists” under one of this term’s several definitions.
You could avoid equivocation by disambiguating the language of your blog posts such that the various meanings of “science” and the related terms acquire separate terms of reference. For example, you could reference people who test their hypotheses as “scientists” and people who do not test their hypotheses but claim to be scientists as “pseudo-scientists” or “dogmatists.” Disambiguation would, however, undermine the apparent force of your argument for it acquires this force only through your equivocation.
================
T.O. says: Thank you for taking the time to reply. The deceptiveness of your argument lies in its reliance upon the fallacy of equivocation. As needed, you could bone up on this fallacy by reading Wikipedia’s article entitled “equivocation.”
You equivocate by failing to distinguish between the various meanings of “science” and related terms such as “scientist” and “scientific.” By this slimy (but possibly inadvertent) practice, you gloss over the fact that the people who execute the inquiry into global warming do not and cannot test their hypotheses, thus failing to match the description of “scientists” under one of this term’s several definitions.
=================
CC: Terry, you speak in riddles my friend.
What are you talking about?
Can you give any specific examples?
Because to me climatology is an enterprise conducted by dedicated people interested in understanding how our world functions. It continues a tradition of Earth sciences that has done humanity quite well these past centuries. It’s practiced by the sorts of people I can watch and listen to in any one of dozens of university video lecture series such as the ones at UCTV Perspectives of Ocean Sciences. [ http://www.uctv.tv/oceanscience/ ].
People interested in learning about this incredible planet that surrounds us. Observing and recording… learning about and understanding – this is what Earth science is about. All you’ve offered is vague insinuations of distrust. Backed up by a chorus of political paranoia
Can you define your distrust in simple prose.
==============
T.O. says: You could avoid equivocation by disambiguating the language of your blog posts such that the various meanings of “science” and the related terms acquire separate terms of reference. For example, you could reference people who test their hypotheses as “scientists” and people who do not test their hypotheses but claim to be scientists as “pseudo-scientists” or “dogmatists.” Disambiguation would, however, undermine the apparent force of your argument for it acquires this force only through your equivocation.
================
CC: That’s just a bunch of jibber jabber. I’m more rooted in the real world than endless talking. Here let me share the sorts of things I base my understanding and outlook on. Since Tim White did such a nice job of explaining it during his lecture at the Glen Gerberg Weather and Climate Summit, I’ll use three of his slides:
http://www.stormcenter.com/wxcs2012/index.html.
13:30
slide-
“Global climate depends of three factors”
* How much energy we get from the sun
* How much of that energy is reflected back to space (aerosols, ice, etc)… albedo
*Amount of greenhouse gases”
~ ~ ~
16:10
slide-
“Greenhouse gases are a large part of the Earth’s energy budget
* Earth’s temperature without greenhouse gases = -18°C
* Too cold for advanced life?
* Earth’s temperature with greenhouse gases = +15°C
* Cozy
* Greenhouse gases raise the temperature of the Earth by about 33°C (±60°F)… and make the planet habitable
So if we add greenhouse gases…
~ ~ ~
21:30
slide-
“Is it surprising that humans are changing the planet?
– Simply put… we’re impressive, the biggest cause of change on the planet.
– We have altered the Earth’s energy balance and changed climate
– we cause 10 times more erosion than all natural processes
– We make more fertilizer than all bacteria in the world
– We make more sulfate than all ocean phytoplankton
– Our current energy needs equal all harvestable wind energy in the atmosphere
How is this possible? … the power of the exponential !
~ ~ ~
CC: Terry, in closing, of course there’s much more evidence than what Tim presented.
Thing is there is a coherent understanding based on good Earth observations and science and the uncompromising laws of physics.
Where is your coherent complaint?
All you’ve offered is fancy rhetorical hand waving.
You swoon over science, now practice some, show us objective examples . . .
citizenschallenge:
As in your earlier argument , in your most recent one you equivocate. I gather that you have no more cogent argument to offer to us.
CC seems to have this ultra-naive idea that because science is an interesting topic, it can never be corrupted by other factors such as vested interest. .
His laughably childlike trust simply brushes aside Climategate, the well-docmented bias and corruption of the IPCC, and the underlying reality that the dominant funder of climate science – the state – has a monumental vested interest in a finding in favour of CAGW. And that hence much of the ‘consensus’ is politically motivated; state employees looking to find excuses to expand the state and thereby feather their research grants. In short he is quite untouched that the ‘consensus’ is solidly rooted in vested interest.
Climate science today is in exactly the same condition as ‘tobacco’ science was in earlier decades, when the tobacco-funded research industry too conveniently produced findings that benefited its benefactor, namely that smoking was not unhealthy. No doubt climatereason embraced and trusted that vested interest consensus too, and wrote under the moniker ‘tobaccoreason’.
citizenschallenge:
I’ve already presented sufficient evidence of your misdeeds to demonstrate that you committed them. I rest my case.
Well citizenschallenge, yer argument is merely a valedictory
statement about climatology as an enterprise by dedicated people ….
Have U read the climategate emails? … thought not.
Again no particulars.
Why is that?
Why is that? No one has the stomach to go another round with endless empty drivel.
Tomcat, ‘targit find arrow!’
Say, cc, read the climategate emails. WHAT HAVE YER
GOT TER LOSE …except yer innocence?
( in this case yer naivity)
That’s the thing Beth I have read many the emails flagged as “damning”
and find, {as did the various investigations}, nothing to justify a label of fraud.
Of course, Chief H. speaking of drivel, in an isolated echo-chamber you can convince anyone of anything. So come out of your room into the fresh air and day light,
and share that list of specific frauds perpetrated… as you see them.
What have you got to lose… except perhaps your dogma?
The ‘investigations’ of Climategate have themselves been exposed as coverups, mere shams run to protect the guilty. The universities involved ran investigations of themselves and exonerated themselves; what a surprise. To this day they vigorously resist letting the public know how they run things, fighting FOI requests tooth and nail, even though they are publicly funded.
So what is the consensus on cloud, TOA radiative flux, dynamical complexity or low frequency variability of the climate system?
It is not science at fault but the millennialist cult of AGW groupthink space cadet. The memes are fundamentally wrong at the level of organising principles of climate. As a result – they are wrong in effect as the world is not warming for a decade or three more. http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703
But the biggest problem is in the way the wrong science – uncorrectable because of groupthink – is then framed.
The global climate change debate has gone badly wrong. Many mainstream environmentalists are arguing for the wrong actions and for the wrong reasons, and as long as they continue to do so they put all our futures in jeopardy.
My diagnosis is a twofold ethical failure: of pragmatism and perspective (or, more eloquently, of “sense and sensibility”). Many environmentalists argue that climate change is fundamentally a values problem. And yet their interpretation of this has taken a narrow moralising form that systematically excludes consideration of such important ethical values as improving the lives of the one billion people presently living in unacceptable poverty, or even protecting other aspects of the environment.
That narrowness also leads to self-defeating policy proposals based almost entirely in the economy of nature rather than political economy. The result is a fixation on global CO2 levels alone as both the problem and the solution, at the cost of systematic and broad evaluation of the feasible policy space.
But who can be bothered going over this again with space cadets?
PP, et al.,
Please note this is simply more arm waving.
What are your particulars? {Besides “knowing” that everyone is in on it}
Got anything objective?,
… or is it just this gut resentment you have for the news that ‘they’ present?
CC
You do come very l;ate the discussion, so yes, others here do know a lot more than you. Also I do though get the sense that your touching faith in the climate establishment will hear no evil, no matter what (hence your earlier attempt to brush the Lamframboise book under the carpet, even though your clearly haven’t read it). . Have you heard of say Climategate for example. It had crystal-clear evidence – emails – of efforts to hide data from those who disgaree with the CAGW ‘consensus’, to fiddle the process of what does and does not get into IPCC reports etc etc, and calls to delete evidence to as to cover up what they had been doing.
The science process in climate science is what stinks to high heaven. This doesn’t means everything they ever say is wrong though. It just means they are working to an agenda other than a desire to find the truth. This is very clear, only denied by those who share that agenda. Bear in mind it is all government-funded, and government stands to gain handsomely from a widespread belief in CAGW – which also explains the preponderance of totalitarian-leaning supporters of the ‘consensus’.
citizenschallenge:
Please note that your post is simply more humbug.
citizenschallenge
Some “particulars” concerning Climategate whitewashes:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704075604575356611173414140.html
Max
“ho ho” citizenschallenge, some think it’s funny in this Dr Jones/Alex Kirby climategate email #4894 re the BBC’s “neutrality”:
““““““““““““““““““`
date: Wed Dec 8 08:25:30 2004
from: Phil Jones
subject: RE: something on new online.
to: “Alex Kirby”
At 17:27 07/12/2004, you wrote:
Yes, glad you stopped this — I was sent it too, and decided to
spike it without more ado as pure stream-of-consciousness rubbish. I can well understand your unhappiness at our running the other piece. But we are constantly being savaged by the loonies for not giving them any coverage at all, especially as you say with the COP in the offing, and being the objective impartial (ho ho) BBC that we are, there is an expectation in some quarters that we will every now and then let them
say something. I hope though that the weight of our coverage makes it clear that we think they are talking through their hats.
—–Original Message—–
Prof. Phil Jones
Climatic Research Unit
climate challenge:
Seriously, there is rot and “intent to deceive” throughout the climate establishment. If Climategate was just a few leading members of the IPCC community going off the rails, that would be one thing. But the sullen refusal of the general climate community to put this to rights is what condemns them as a whole.
Now none of this means that (c)agw is definitely false or to be ignored; most here I’m sure agree it needs to be watched very closely indeed. It just means that, by and large, most government climate scientists today are not to be trusted. Which is a problem, because they are the only climate scientists we really have.
… and still no objective list of particulars to be seen… now that’s what I’d call humbug.
I never said climate scientists can’t do any wrong, but I do say they get caught when they do, it’s a big competitive community that reads each others stuff.
I have read some of Lamframbois, her dripping hatred and sneering sarcasm and her totally one sided appraisal are all red flags – her writing needs a healthy doze of skepticism and cross-checking before a word should be taken as gospel. She wouldn’t need to so emotionalize if she had real objective evidence.
CC
You continue to blanket out all the objective lists of systemic malfeasance in climate science, then pronounce there is noone.
OK, so you finally read the dustjacket or a review of Laframboise’s book. And because of the understandbly somewehat bitter incomprehension at such widespread corruption, you choose to believe her facts are wrong. None has been proved wrong. Why don’t you see if you can find a misrake; even the best books have one or two.
Climategate. There is of course the now well-known hiding of data by the IPCC cadre – See the Hockey Stick Illusion – and attempts to hide this by deleting emails, and the whole Hide the Decline saga. Steve Mosher has a good book on it, even the far-left (Guardian) journalist Fred Pearce is less than complimentary. Why not try one? Andrew Montford has a new book, which I have yet to read, which does I believe include coverage of the self-exoneration exercises (‘Inquiries’ into) Climategate that the implicated universities hand-picked and paid for (with tax funds), that by and large would not take evidence form anyone who didin’t defend or deny the malfeasance.
And, far more damning perhaps than any of the above, is the deafening silence from most of the the rank and file climate science community, telling us that such acts of fraud are quite acceptable, as long as it for the right (ie left) political cause.
Instead of being a Climategate and corruption denier, why don’t you expend your efforts on getting of it?
CC:
“I never said climate scientists can’t do any wrong, but I do say they get caught when they do, it’s a big competitive community that reads each others stuff.:
That is what I used to think until I read the climategate mails.
If you read them you would find Keith Briffa and tim Osborn ( along with others ) being called to account by Mann for daring to publish things that did not follow the party line. Phil Jones, Briffas boss and co author was also a mann co author, and was put in a very tight spot. in fact Briffa and osborn were planning a paper much along the lines of work that Mcintyre would eventually write. Under pressure they shut that work down.
The pressure on Briffa continued. Lead review editor J. Overpeck told Briffa he wanted a chart more compelling that the Hockey stick. Briffa complained that Overpeck should not cave in to pressure from Mann. What sat in front of Briffa was mcintyre’s work and he had no idea how to deal with it. So he wrote series of mails to eugene wahl ( listed as confidential) in which he passed on a copy of the chapter he was working on. he asked for Wahls help outside the traceable process set up by the IPCC. In fact, weeks before he had directed explicitly by overpeck to have no direct contact with people outside the process, but rather to do everything by the book. Briffa did not.
Instead he used wahls words without attribution ( and expressed worry about being caught. A fine man was pressured to engage in behavior that
he would not ordinarily engage in. But he was used to getting pressure from others to protect mann’s position, a position he disagreed with. I don’t fault him for caving in under pressure.
This correspondence was requested under FOIA. CRU obstructed that request. Moreover Jones, breaking the law, asked mann to contact wahl and have wahl delete the mails. Mann forewarded the request and Wahl deleted the mails. The PSU inquiry asked mann if he had any involvement in the deletion of mails. He informed them that he had forwarded the request to delete mails. They found that he was not involved. I leave to you to judge that decision.
Mosher, don’t forget that CG1 starts with larch in Russia and all that arguing over relevance of width, and which series. Nor should one forget that one of the links from CG1 to CG2 is the assumptions that Mann was advocating that Briffa did not like, and Briffa was not alone.
I’ve written a letter I’d like to share, but you gotta visit my site since it’s too long for this hopeless “discussion” over here:
Dear Judith Curry fans and other Republicans,
http://whatsupwiththatwatts.blogspot.com/2012/11/dear-judith-curry-fans-and-other.html
Your latest post gives us yet another example of deception by equivocation.
Here we see in the clear that climatereason’s real motivation is political. What he is really after is more government and more taxes. (Not that he’s the only one thusly driven, mind).
And to do this requires the pretense that government climate science isn’t corrupt and biased in favor of justifying more government.
CC you gotta visit my site since it’s too long for this hopeless “discussion” over here:
Yeah I hear you, climate bro’. Damn annoying when people insist on discussing when you’re already telling them wotswot. The e-youth of today just have no respect for authority anymore.
But it’s all there!!! It’s all right there on his site!!!!!!
I think I saw this guy at the fairground selling Slap-Chop but he got fired for being a wanker.
citizenschallenge, why wank ?
So what is the consensus on cloud, TOA power flux, dynamical complexity or low frequency variability of the climate system?
cc, to add ter tomcat’s on climatology malfeasance…
*Tree rings, a flawed proxy fer climate… more likely rainfall
and nutrient influenced.
*Then there’s the small ter negligible sampling process , one
tiny stand of trees ( one giant leap fer climatogy-mankind,)
fergit the rest of the forest that didn’t give the required result,
tsk!
(Cherry picking …mmmm…cherries!)
* Take the Hockey Stick methodology., demonstrated ter
produce hockey sticks au-to-mat-ically,
tsk again!
* But … but … do they get ‘caught out’ by the consensus
coterie? Oh no, with a little help from their friends, they get
whitewashed instead
Tsk!
Beth
Yeah.
But the whitewash didn’t stick.
Gotta start off with a clean base.
Max
The whitewash didn’t stick, j’espere bien, comme ca …
‘Plus douce qu’aux enfants la chair des pommes sures,
L’eaux verts penetra ma coque de sapin
Et des taches de vins bleus et des vomissures
Me lava, dispersant gouvernail et grappin.’
H/t Rimbaud.
Beth
Since you like those cliimate “cause and effect” stories:
A new settler to the Oklahoma plains and his wife have built their cabin and stocked up with plenty of firewood for the winter ahead.
The wife asks her husband: “Are you sure you have enough firewood in case we have a hard winter?”
Her husband doesn’t know the answer, so he goes out and chops more firewood, stacking it all around the cabin.
But the wife is still worried and asks her husband again if he’s sure there’s enough firewood.
So the settler asks a neighbor who tells him that there is an Indian chief, up on the hill, who might know about the coming winter weather.
So the settler climbs up the mountain and finds the Indian chief.
He asks him, “Will it be a cold winter?”
The Indian chief looks over the edge of the cliff across the plains, sniffs the air, and says, “Winter”.
The settler goes back down and chops more firewood, but his wife is still nervous, so she sends him back up the mountain.
This time the Indian chief looks across the plains again, sniffs twice, and says, “Winter. Cold.”
The settler chops even more firewood, but his wife is still worried and sends him up the mountain a third time.
This time the Indian chief stares across the plains again, sniffs three times and says, “Winter. Very cold.”
The settler finally asks the Chief, “How do you know it will be a cold winter?”
The Indian Chief replies, “White man chop lotsa wood. Winter cold.”
Max
Could this be a case of Inter- active causation syndrome, Max? )
Beth
Yeah. We scientists call it ICS.
Max
Petra, do you actually think this here has been a discussion? Not one question seriously answered. For a second I thought Beth had something of an objective list but that melted down in a hurry ~ incidentally – newsflash: Mann’s hockey stick isn’t the reason climatologists have formed a consistent understanding across dozens of fields of study… {including many different paleo-temp reconstruction studies}.
And yes, I include Republicans since they seem to have convinced themselves that Anthropogenic Global Warming is a hoax and that we should shut down Earth observations and willfully ignore the evidence. And it’s Curry’s sort of crazy-making along with this here sort of uppity, yet ignorant, taunting chorus {intent on drowning out any real discussion} that gives them their moral permission for their attacks on science.
=================================
Speaking of Mann here’s the last paragraph of my little missive.
http://whatsupwiththatwatts.blogspot.com/2012/11/dear-judith-curry-fans-and-other.html
“… Instead you endlessly flog Mann and his hockey stick as though dynamic science doesn’t include mistakes and ragged edges. You never mention that all those flaws and uncertainties you consider so sinister where in actuality discussed and were part of the science moving forward. Rather than accepting such facts of science – you intend to continue distracting, misdirecting and avoiding the real issues by forcing your paranoid beliefs {that your life style is under attack and that climatologists are an enemy} into swamping what should be a sober discussion.”
==================================
…. well, our life style certainly is in peril, but it’s Earth’s doped up climate doing the threatening.
citizenschallenge
“not one question seriously answered”
Yep.
That’s the problem skeptics of the CAGW premise of IPCC mention frequently.
The supporters of this premise are unable (or unwilling) to “seriously answer” the specific questions raised by the skeptics of this premise.
A dilemma.
Max
ClimateReason
do you actually think this here has been a discussion? Not one question seriously answered.
Of course they have. You just keep ducking the answers because they don’t suit your preconceived, politically-motivated conclusions. If want to see what a lack of debate is, try Realclimate.
newsflash: Mann’s hockey stick isn’t the reason climatologists have formed a consistent understanding across dozens of fields of study… {including many different paleo-temp reconstruction studies}.
Well firstly this conscious fraud by Mann certainly led the charge. And has not been supported by other paleo studies, as it happens, but that is not the point here. The point here is the systemic intent to deceive that cuts across the whole climate establishment ‘consensus’. Mann is just one example, albeit a poster-child one.
And you way overhype the “consistent understanding”. It’s a hunch, no more.
I include Republicans since they seem to have convinced themselves that Anthropogenic Global Warming is a hoax
The Democrats drive CAGW because it plays to their totalitarian beliefs – more taxes, more regulations, more bureaucracies. This is what drove the issue political to start with. Skeptics (including (some) Republicans) are merely reacting to that.
[Republicans want to] shut down Earth observations and willfully ignore the evidence.
Full marks for creativity. It’s is though the exact opposite of the truth. In fact it’s the alarmists who hide data (from anyone not committed to alarmism), try and shut down debate, etc; and skeptics who want openness.
…attacks on science.
The only attacks on science come from the climate science community, frauds like Mann & co. And what you misleadingly refer to as “attacks on science”, are in fact attacks on corrupt science. But then in common with most alarmists, you don’t care about the process of science, you just want it to line up nicely behind your politics.
It appears to have totally escaped climatereason that the institution of politics has plenty (a) motive, (b) means, and (c) opportunity, to propagandize cagw regardless of the facts. The product of truly staggering naivete.
Either that or he feels the political-end justifies the science-crime.
citizenschallenge:
In the record of the dialogue between the two of us, there is a pattern in which I charge you with a specific kind of deception and you evade a meaningful response by nonsensically calling on me for a listing of deceptions. I have charged you with attempting to deceive the readers of this blog in arguing for manmade global warming. You have attempted to deceive them by inserting the logical fallacy which philsophers call “equivocation” into your argument. You equivocate by referencing several different meanings by the word “science,” the word “scientific,” or the word “scientist.”
The word “science” means “demonstrable knowledge.” It also means “the process that is operated by people calling themselves ‘scientists’.” The process that is operated by people calling themselves scientists does not necessarily produce demonstrable knowledge. Hence, when the term “science” is used without clarification, it can lead people to the conclusion that demonstrable knowledge has been created via a process operated by people calling themselves ‘scientists’ when demonstrable knowledge has not been created.
Demonstrability is imparted to the knowledge that is produced by an inquiry through the existence of a statistical population and a sample of observed events that is drawn from this population. The population is the carrier of the relative frequencies of the outcomes of events. Given that the inquiry has produced a predictive model, it predicts the relative frequencies of the outcomes of the events in the population and these predictions are testable in the sample.
In IPCC Assessment Report 4, the text of the report of Working Group I cites no statistical population or sample. Thus, the knowledge that has been produced by the IPCC’s inquiry is not demonstrable. It follows that when a person fails to disambiguate his terminology in writing about the results from the IPCC’s inquiry he or she can leave the false impression that demonstrable knowledge was created by this inquiry when this is not true.
It is apt to describe the methodology of an inquiry that produces non-demonstrable knowledge as “dogmatic” and to describe the methodology of an inquiry that produces demonstrable knowledge as “scientific.” For the future, you could avoid the offense of which you are guilty via a disambiguation that employs these two words in place of the single word “science.” Under this disambiguation, the people who executed the IPCC’s inquiry were “dogmatists” and not “scientists.”
A lot to talk, but…
… still no objective list of particulars.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
BB: “conscious fraud by Mann certainly led the charge” – wow, you really believe this guy to be incarnate evil or what? What has he done to deserve that… specifically, that is? Thing is, it sure seems like other work supports Mann’s general finding.
Here, I know you don’t like these folks, but at least they do stick to the science and offer sources and links back to real scientists and such.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/broken-hockey-stick.htm
… and I just don’t see where this obsession with Mann is justified considering his work is a tiny piece of the puzzle and it remains consistent with subsequent findings.
Mann’s hockey stick may have lead the media-charge – but to deny that climatologists didn’t have dozens of independent lines of evidence supporting their understanding of Anthropogenic Global Warming is to deny history and fact. This obsession with Mann is a political stunt intend to distract from the full body of evidence available.
More particulars to be sidestepped by CC.
BB: “conscious fraud by Mann certainly led the charge” – wow, you really believe this guy to be incarnate evil or what? What has he done to deserve that… specifically, that is?
He is demonstrably a determined science crook, as we see in the Climategate emails. Hiding data, subverting peer review, etc.
But yes, just one piece of the puzzle (the only person obsessing with him here, is you). The deafening silence from most of his colleagues more of a worry, indicating institution-wide rot.
Citizenschallenge
Agreed. MBH98/99 *only* matter if one is intent on making a spurious argument about ‘the science’ being ‘corrupt’. Which is of course a conspiracy theory and conspiracy theories are for nutters, are they not?
Rational sceptics would have nothing to do with such nonsense, now would they?
BB wrote: ” The point here is the systemic intent to deceive that cuts across the whole climate establishment ‘consensus’.”
OK, you’ve made the charge again.
… can you offer a list of particulars?
A concise objective listing of this “systemic intent to deceive”.
What is it?
How has it been carried out?
Where is the evidence?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
BB wrote: “The Democrats drive CAGW because it plays to their totalitarian beliefs ”
Do you actually believe a large group of America’s wants a totalitarian government? From what depths do those ideas form? Why this need for such ultimate demonizing?
What is [the systemic intent to deceive that cuts across the whole climate establishment ]
Hyping and selling CAGW, falsely implying a high degree of certainty.
Some evidence that you are fond of ignoring, is the biased selection of people to run IPCC publications. Some details in Laframboise’s book, which you can again sidestep if you like.
And speaking of evidence, what evidence do you have that institutions work against their own interests? Public belief in CAGW will obviously benefit the state, giving it excuses for more taxes and agencies; nd the state is also the sole funder of climate science.
So given this blatant conflict of interests, the burden of proof is heavily on those who would maintain there is an intent to be objective, or that there is honesty and integrity, given the documented attempts at crookery revealed by Climategate, and the failure of the profession to so or say anything about it.
BB wrote: “The Democrats drive CAGW because it plays to their totalitarian beliefs ”
Do you actually believe a large group of America’s wants a totalitarian government?
Well they just voted for just such a president, again – on a broad promise of yet more government. The EU, for example, is even more totalitarian, don’t get me wrong.
From what depths do those ideas form?
Common knowledge and commonsense. How you strain to avoid both is truly amazing.
Why this need for such ultimate demonizing?
Seeing this for what they clearly are is not demonizing. Why your dogged need to never see evil, no matter how blatant ?
“Common knowledge and commonsense.” = Prejudices and earlier net comments by other skeptics who have no better support for their claims.
Pekka : “Common knowledge and commonsense.” = Prejudices and earlier net comments by other skeptics who have no better support for their claims.
It is surely common *knowledge* that IPCC leading lights resorted to cheating (see eg climategate), and that most of their colleagues kept schtum.
And it is surely common *sense* that cheating is somehow wrong.
But perhaps highly trained academics see cheating in a different light; ‘noble’ cause corruption, perhaps, ie when you already know your desired outcome, but ‘old-fashioned’ science falls short of the cargo-cult variety.
What utter balls. You know *nothing* about the EU. Confine your opinions to the US please. Full disclosure: I am a UK citizen and a UK resident – and we are often rather less than enthusiastic supporters of the EU. But ‘totalitarian’? Just complete, know-nothing crap.
The EU, for example, is even more totalitarian {than the US}, don’t get me wrong.
BBD: What utter balls … I am a UK citizen and a UK resident – and we are often rather less than enthusiastic supporters of the EU. But ‘totalitarian’? Just complete, know-nothing crap.
Pig-ignorant denial, BBD. The EU is 100% about ramping up taxes and government, by stifling political (tax and regulatory) competition.
BBD,
What you try and call “idiocy”, is just basic political literacy.
The central purpose and effect of centralising political power, is to stifle political competition (eg tax competition) between regimes, replacing it with political monopoly (EUphemism : “single market”). This has the effect of driving up the level of political interference in society, by stamping out the option of regimes with lower levels of political interference that people can move themselves and/or their assets to, should they prefer more_freedom/less_government..
As such is in inherently totalitarian in nature – ie it forces taxes and regulation UP – which is precisely what EU supporters like about it.
You haven’t got a damn think to back up your nonsense claims about the EU. Nothing.
Nor do you have a clue what totalitarianism actually MEANS.
Look it up.
BBD
The essence of a totalitarian system, is that the state has total control. Not rocket science.
BBD, your ignorance of basic political concepts is blinkering your view of the EU.
Ask yourself this : has the EU resulted in more government, or not?
Of course it has, that’s the whole idea. Hence its popularity those with totalitarian leanings (mostly socialist/left).
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/totalitarian
“Of, relating to, being, or imposing a form of government in which the political authority exercises absolute and centralized control over all aspects of life, the individual is subordinated to the state.”
This being the essence, seems little doubt that’s the direction the US and Europe are both increasingly heading.
It adds
” and opposing political and cultural expression is suppressed”
This is less true of them, but is still creeping up, with political correctess attacks on free speech on the increase.
a form of government in which the political authority exercises absolute and centralized control
Climate science is of course one aspect of society under the absolute control of government, being as it is government-funded. Which means it will firstly seek to serve government – barring some sort of well-meaning conspiracy in its ranks to instead serve truth.
Forgot to mention : I’m also a UK resident.
Justify this idiocy with multiple real-world policy examples. This I have to see. And remember, you *also* said:
Let’s see some evidence for these extraordinary claims.
And a UKIP loon, or worse.
Is the EU more totalitarian than the US?
Probably – aren’t its taxes and government controls higher?
Vassily
You need to google ‘totalitarian’. Despite your screen name, you appear to have no understanding that the EU exists as a mechanism to prevent totalitarianism ever taking root in European politics again.
You and others here who accuse the EU of totalitarianism demonstrate a profound and self-serving ignorance of C20th European history.
Furthermore I asked for *evidence* in the form of specific policy examples emergent from Brussels. You provide nothing.
‘Probably’ doesn’t cut it. Either contribute constructively or be quiet.
BBD and Bated Breath
Your debate about the USA versus the EU is interesting to me.
I live in neither, but have observed both very closely.
The USA has a long tradition of representative democracy and personal freedom, which is slowly being eroded by a rapidly growing power of the federal government with ever-increasing numbers of regulations and bureaucrats. It is what is called “scope creep” in the engineering world. The US is a diverse society in many ways, but still has a single underlying culture, which is very strong. Individual states may have their own “agendas”, but there is a common denominator that overrides – all of the citizens feel that they are (US) Americans first.
The EU has no long tradition of personal freedom. Many of the nations had no long history of representative democracy. The EU itself is an organization, which grew out of a loose trade alliance after WWII to a bureaucratic behemoth. Most Europeans with whom I have discussed this do not feel that they have any real voice in what is being decided in Brussels. On top of this, Europe has so many different cultures and languages that it is far from being a homogeneous society. The current debate about “bailing out” Greece, etc. underscores this. A German “feels” that he is primarily a German – the same goes for a Frenchman, a Britain, an Italian or a Spaniard – none will say he is primarily a “European”.
Neither organization is “totalitarian”.
The USA has a very strong Constitution, which guarantees its citizens personal freedoms, and a division of power, which will keep it from becoming a totalitarian state.
If anything, it is the EU’s fragmented culture and history that will prevent it from becoming a totalitarian state.
But there is always that underlying danger, in both places. And “scope creep” is always there.
Just my opinion.
Max
Been off looking at Climategate”” emails. Pretty weak stuff for screaming fraud. Although if you want to think about the science aspect. Here’s a pretty good quote from Ben Santer.
First the damning part:
Wed, 25 Apr 2007 Ben Santer to Phil Jones
1177534709.txt “I looked at some of the stuff on the Climate Audit web site. I’d really like to talk to a few of these “Auditors” in a dark alley.” says Ben Santer
===============
Then the part you folks should think about:
” Keenan’s allegations of research misconduct, although malicious and completely unfounded, clearly require some response. The bottom line is that there are uncertainties inherent in measuring ANY properties of the real-world climate system.
You’ve (Phil Jones) probably delved deeper than anyone else on the planet into uncertainties in observed surface temperature records. This would be well worth pointing out to Mr. Keenan.
The whole tenor of the web-site stuff and Keenan’s garbage is that these folks are scrupulously careful data analysts, and you are not. They conveniently ignore all the pioneering work that you’ve done on identification of inhomogeneities in surface temperature records.
The response should mention that you’ve spent much of your scientific career trying to quantify the effects of such inhomogeneities, changing spatial coverage, etc. on observed estimates of global-scale surface temperature change.
~ ~ ~
The bottom line here is that observational data are frequently “messy”. They are not the neat, tidy beasts Mr. Keenan would like them to be. This holds not only for surface temperature measurements. It also holds – in spades – for measurements of tropospheric temperature from MSU and radiosondes, and for measurements of ocean temperatures from XBTs, profiling floats, etc.
We would like observing systems to be more accurate, more stable, and better-suited for monitoring decadal-scale changes in climate. You and Kevin and many other are actively working towards that goal.
>>> The key message here is that, despite uncertainties in the surface temperature record – uncertainties which you and others in the field are well aware of, and have worked hard to quantify – it is now unequivocal that surface temperatures have warmed markedly over the past 100 years. Uncertainties in the station histories do not negate this basic message… “
You have no idea what it is about, do you ?
Been off looking at Climategate”” emails. Pretty weak stuff for screaming fraud.
Only to those who turn a blind eye to hiding tax-funded data, sabotaging the peer-review process, surreptitiously stitching bits from different graphs together bits to create a false impression (hiding the decline), and then going around trying to destroy evidence of all the above.
You go on to quote others also shown in Climategate to be science crooks, as if that carries weight now.
And mention that temperatures have been rising for the last 100 years, as if that is news or somehow controversial to any but a handful. And if that somehow excuses the abovementioned frauds. Newsflash : not every act of a criminal is criminal; sometimes they walk the dog, go to work…
Time to get all that brown stuff off your nose, climatereason, and lift the scales from your eyes. You speak of a climate science establishment as we all hope and expect it to be – not the skewed political advocacy machine of reality.
somehow climatereason’s name is being blamed for the citizenschallenge crud production
Oops, my mistake, sorry. climatechallenge is not climatereason.
In some ways I can sympathise with CC. Being new to the topic he is gripped by understandable visceral disbelief that the climate profession, put there by taxpayers, has gone so rotten. I can remember thinking the same. Essentially he just hopes it will all be alright again if he just closes his eyes enough.
Guess not.
Why not explain it… what is it about Ben’s description and the process of learning about our planet that you find objectionable, or wrong, or whatever … can you explain?
You are talking like an idiot now. You come here snarling about things you haven’t even begun to research. and then because I noticed you don’t even know what your subject is about, you turn to idiot talk.
From ClimateAudit
Zeng’s recollection of the details of station moves in the appendix was oddly precise despite the passage of 18 years. Her recollection as documented in the Wang submission was also frequently inaccurate in cases where her recollection could be checked against the documentation preserved in NDP039.
The next time that the curtain is drawn on this is on May 23, 2008, when SUNY notified Keenan that the investigation had concluded that there was no misconduct, giving Keenan 14 days to add to the record, while refusing to give Keenan a copy of the report that he was asked to comment on.
After careful review of the evidence and thoughtful deliberation, the Investigation Committee finds no evidence of the alleged fabrication of results and nothing that rises to the level of research misconduct having been committed by Dr Wang.
As the institutional official responsible for this case, I have accepted the Committee’s findings and the Report. You have fourteen (14) calendar days from the date of this letter to provide any comments to add to the report for the record.
On June 4, 2008, SUNY “explained” to Keenan that he
did not receive a copy of the Investigation report because the report did not include portions addressing your role and opinions in the investigation phase.
Two days later (June 6, 2008), Keenan objected, describing the request for comments without access to the report as “Kafkaesque”. Keenan also objected to procedural breaches by the inquiry, including the university’s failure to notify him that an investigation had commenced. Keenan also noted the investigation’s breach of their obligation to interview “all individuals involved in making the allegation”:
The investigation process will include, but not necessarily be limited to, examination of pertinent research data and written materials, interviews with all individuals involved either in making the allegation or against whom the allegation is made, and statements from or interviews with other individuals who might have information regarding the allegation.
On June 25, 2008, without replying to Keenan, the University president sent his final decision to Wang (not sent to Keenan until August 11, 2008)
After studying the report of the Investigation Committee assessing an allegation of data fabrication levied against you and upon further weighing the recommendation of the Vice President for Research, I concur that there is no evidence whatsoever that you have committed data fabrication or any research misconduct with respect to this allegation.
On August 11, 2008 (six weeks later) , SUNY notified Keenan of the SUNY final determination, warning Keenan:
The University’s misconduct policies and the Office of Research Integrity regulations preclude discussion of any information pertaining to this case with others who were not directly involved in the investigation.
There matters rested for a while. The following year, on March 18, 2009, Keenan sent an FOI request to SUNY for the reports of the Inquiry and Investigation Committees. The university turned down the FOI request on April 14, 2009 as an “unwarranted invasion of personal privacy”.
The affair was mentioned from time to time in misconduct literature. In May 2009, Aubrey Blumensohn made a fairly detailed report, strongly criticizing procedures at SUNY:
In the absence of any explanation to the contrary, it seems that the methodology for station selection as described in these two publications was false or at best grossly misleading.
Wang maintains that hard copy records do exist detailing the location of stations selected by himself outwith the published methodology. However the refusal to clarify “method” is inappropriate and a form of misconduct in and of itself. It does not lend credence to Wang’s assertion that fraud did not take place. It would also be necessary to see records of stations that were not selected, in order to confirm that selection was indeed random, and only “on the basis of station history”.
The University at Albany is in a difficult position.
If the University received such records as part of the supposed misconduct investigation, then they could easily resolve the problem by making them available to the scientific community and to readers.
If the University does not have such records then they have been complicit in misconduct and in coverup of misconduct.
If the University at Albany does have such records, but such records are not in accordance with the stated methodology of the publications, then the University has more serious difficulties.
“Investigations” of scientific misconduct should themselves align with the usual principles of scientific discourse (open discussion, honesty, transparency of method, public disclosure of evidence, open public analysis and public discussion and reasoning underlying any conclusion). This was not the case at the University at Albany. When you see universities reluctant to investigate things properly, it provides reasonable evidence that they really don’t want to investigate things properly.
….
reaching Wigley’s attention, who sent a lengthy and thoughtful email on May 4, 2009 to Jones and Santer (their reply is not in the Climategate emails)”
Phil,
Do you know where this stands? The key things from the Peiser items are …
“Wang had been claiming the existence of such exonerating documents for nearly a year, but he has not been able to produce them. Additionally, there was a report published in 1991 (with a second version in 1997) explicitly stating that no such documents exist. Moreover, the report was published as part of the Department of Energy Carbon Dioxide Research Program, and Wang was the Chief Scientist of that program.”
and
“Wang had a co-worker in Britain. In Britain, the Freedom of Information Act requires that data from publicly-funded research be made available. I was able to get the data by requiring Wang�s co-worker to release it, under British law. It was only then that I was able to confirm that Wang had committed fraud.”
You are the co-worker, so you must have done something like provide Keenan with the DOE report that shows that there are no station records for 49 of the 84 stations. I presume Keenan therefore thinks that it was not possible to select stations on the basis of …
“… station histories: selected stations have relatively few, if any, changes in instrumentation, location, or observation times”
[THIS IS ITEM “X”]
Of course, if the only stations used were ones from the 35 stations that *did* have station histories, then all could be OK. However, if some of the stations used were from the remaining 49, then the above selection method could not have been applied (but see below) – unless there are other “hard copy” station history data not in the DOE report (but in China) that were used. From what Wang has said, if what he says is true, the second possibility appears to be the case.
What is the answer here?
The next puzzle is why Wei-Chyung didn’t make the hard copy information available. Either it does not exist, or he thought it was too much trouble to access and copy. My guess is that it does not exist — if it did then why was it not in the DOE report? In support of this, it seems that there are other papers from 1991 and 1997 that show that the data do not exist. What are these papers? Do they really show this?
Now my views. (1) I have always thought W-C W was a rather sloppy scientist. I therefore would not be surprised if he screwed up here. But ITEM X is in both the W-C W and Jones et al. papers — so where does it come from first? Were you taking W-C W on trust?
(2) It also seems to me that the University at Albany has screwed up. To accept a complaint from Keenan and not refer directly to the complaint and the complainant in its report really is asking for trouble.
(3) At the very start it seems this could have been easily dispatched. ITEM X really should have been …
“Where possible, stations were chosen on the basis of station histories and/or local knowledge: selected stations have relatively few, if any, changes in instrumentation, location, or observation times”
Of course the real get out is the final “or”. A station could be selected if either it had relatively few “changes in instrumentation” OR “changes in location” OR “changes in observation times”. Not all three, simply any one of the three. One could argue about the science here — it would be better to have all three — but this is not what the statement says.
Why, why, why did you and W-C W not simply say this right at the start? Perhaps it’s not too late?
—–
I realise that Keenan is just a trouble maker and out to waste time, so I apologize for continuing to waste your time on this, Phil. However, I *am* concerned because all this happened under my watch as Director of CRU and, although this is unlikely, the buck eventually should stop with me.
Best wishes,
Tom
P.S. I am copying this to Ben. Seeing other peoples’ troubles might make him happier about his own parallel experiences.
That’s all to get citizenschallenge started, the time vampire that he is.
citizenschallenge | November 14, 2012 at 1:52 am | Reply
“Why not explain it… what is it about Ben’s description and the process of learning about our planet that you find objectionable, or wrong, or whatever … can you explain?”
Nobody finds learning about our planet objectionable so long as those getting paid to do it are held accountable to whoever is paying for it. If it’s privately funded it’s really none of my business but on the taxpayer dime it’s very much my business. It’s also my business when government policy is based on it. Got that?
The problem with the ass clowns in the climategate mail is they don’t like being questioned by outsiders. Too f*cking bad. If they don’t like it they can lump it.
Seems to me the subject is whether climatologists know their craft.
Whether Earth observations qualify as “science”.
Whether models are useful tools.
Whether Earth observations do indeed support the “consensus” that drastically increasing our atmosphere’s CO2 concentration has resulted in setting off a chain of dynamics that has and will continue to warm our planet.
Beyond that… whether this warming will disrupt society as we know it.
Beyond that… whether people should give hoot.
That’s like saying of the Harold Shipman case, the subject is whether the not-so-good doctor knew his craft.
(Dr Shipman was an English mass-murderer, a doctor who used his medical knowledge to murder 250+ people).
So now climate scientists are to be compared to Shipman. Why not throw in some references to Hitler and Stalin while you are about it?
Idiot.
No, it’s comparing cases, idiot.
Comparing cases to see how citizenschallenge thinks his approach would work in the other case.
If he was skillful, he is innocent or at least it doesn’t matter much..
citizenschallenge | November 14, 2012 at 2:21 am
Seems to me the subject is …
-> whether climatologists know their craft.
No, it’s a question of their motivation, and that of their paymasters.
->Whether Earth observations qualify as “science”.
Everyone agrees they’re needed. So why ask?
->Whether models are useful tools.
Everyone agrees they can be. So why ask?
A better question concerns pretending that models can count as observations.
->Whether Earth observations do indeed support the “consensus”
Temperatures and CO2 are observed to increase, but there is as yet no way to measure the effect of the latter on the former. Only hunches using various bit of physics and models, of what the connection might be. If and when the the CO2->Temperature relationship can be directly measured, the debate will be over.
And we will then be able to address or ignore the issue based on something more solid that the present hunches.
OK read it,
Do you have a point to make?
It’s ironic you dismiss the Santer quote I shared above and then cut and paste that 1500 words courtesy of ClimateAudit. Read the Santer quote again because it speaks directly to what you’re missing with this desperation to find something anything wrong with the findings.
{ Turning moles into mountains doesn’t make moles mountains ;-}
CC: “Do you have a point to make?”
Beyond being an example of the endemic, unrepentant dishonesty that characterizes climate science, and that you strain so hard to to ignore, there is no point.
“Molehills”. Like whitewashes such as the above, where an institution labors to keep internal corruption or bias under wraps. Much like the Climategate coverups that UEA and Penn ran.
What is needed is external investigations, where the investigator doesn’t have a vested interest in the institution under investigation.
“Read the Santer quote again because it speaks directly to what you’re missing with this desperation to find something anything wrong with the finding”
Alert: Time Vampire
The Santer quote: ” Keenan’s allegations of research misconduct, although malicious and completely unfounded, ”
Wilfull ignorance, at best, calculated to distract attention away from the corruption the abovementioned “Inquiry” labored to hide.
Punksta says:
Tomcat says:
BBD says:
No proof whatsoever. Just the same old paranoid conspiracy mindset yakking away in blog comments. This gets you nowhere in the real world. Let’s consider the US for example.
Highlights from the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication’s recent report: Climate Change in the American Mind include:
And:
Briefing and full report here.
Out in the real world, people are rejecting everything you stand for, from the unpleasant right-wing politics (see recent US election) to the lies and paranoia about climate science (see report).
You should take note.
So, would you agree with.
1. Wigley’s assessment
2. Jones 1990
3. The published paper that showed the concerns over data were correct.
choose wisely.
Keenan’s an ass, lets see if you can do better.
steven, I’m surprised. You know enough to know that this is tactical hyper-focus. You know that it is *irrelevant* to the scientific consensus. You know – or you should know – that I know this.
Yes, that’s BBD’s message – the systemic corruption on which the consensus rests, is not relevant to the consensus view.
BBD,
Steven is writing about the process, not about the results. A wrong process may give right results but having a wrong process does certainly add to the risk of erring also on the results.
At the minimum the emails did show that the scientists involved were considering the possibility of applying a wrong process. In some cases they retracted from that but in some others they seem to have proceeded along the wrong path.
The wrong actions are humanly understandable. Reading the recent book of Mann reveals that he has even now not fully understood the mess he has himself helped to create. Beyond certain point many people start to be overly defensive in a way that’s in reality against their own interests. Some of the climate scientists ended up in that when they first reacted unwisely to the challenges of McIntyre and others and then got overly defensive.
Some of the scientific papers were not so good. They contained errors that could have been avoided by better work. They were criticized in a way that contained also weak arguments but was on the other hand justified. Mann started to defend himself against such critique and dug himself deeper in problems. Some the others made similar errors of judgment.
Combining the self-interest in defending own publications with the belief of moral superiority (saving the Earth) made everything worse again, and served in their mind as a justification for further improper choices.
Nothing in the above tells that the errors made are decisive for the overall picture but the trust in science has certainly suffered.
I don’t name any others than Mann, because he has himself provided for me the evidence in his book, while most of the emails leave much for interpretation and are therefore less reliable evidence when the full context is not known.
BBD
Let me give you a bit of advice: don’t argue the meaning or implications of Climategate with Mosher.
Read his book first.
Then read it again.
Then read it once more.
As Mosher and his co-author, Thomas Fuller state in the prefix:
You’ll learn a lot.
Most of all, you’ll learn not to argue about Climategate with Mosher.
Max
pekka
Tactical hyper-focus is a trick. Note that you are now talking about Mann etc. which is *irrelevant* to the scientific consensus on AGW. See how it works?
manacker
I read mosher’s book the week it became available and retain my copy. What I learned led directly to this kind of conversation.
Mann will keep being an issue for as long as alarmists refuse to denounce him.
Saying (wrongly) that he is irrelevant, just won’t do; hiding mistakes or wrongdoing just breeds skepticism. If the climate community had only sacked or otherwise disciplined Mann and the other Climate Crooks, there would likely be vastly more acceptance of the Consensus now (assuming there still *was* a consensus after the Crooks’ input was removed).
BBD,
It’s not irrelevant for science that scientists adhere to right practices. Failures in that have caused scattered scandals in various fields but seldom, if ever, have we seen similar evidence as that apparent in the Climategate emails.
The trust in science is not irrelevant. There’s a conscious attack to erode confidence in climate science but it would have been much less successful without the help provided by unwise actions by several prominent scientists. Continuing to make similar misjudgments adds to the problem.
Stephen Schneider seemed to understand only in part the difficulty in being fully and openly honest and being influential in the public. He considered it more from the moral point of view of one individual. It seems that he didn’t accept that trying to be directly influential backfires because that requires shortcuts and simplifications which may turn out to be wrong. They may turn out to be wrong through further research, but their nature can also be used immediately by the opposition by cherry picking on the weaknesses of the arguments.
This is a long term issue. Winning individual battles is of little help if they weaken the positions and lead to larger defeats later on.
And we have also the fundamental issues related to generally accepted great uncertainties in all pieces of relevant information and in genuinely agreeing on the proper way of reacting to the uncertainties. I have said it before: To me the Precautionary Principle is a correct principle, but it’s application in practice is an unsolved issue. I don’t agree with those that claim that nothing can be done that has real impact on the future, but I do claim that what has been so far has been of little value and that nobody can tell right now what would be better.
BBD
You tell Pekka he has been “sidetracked” to talk about Mann when the real issue is “the scientific consensus on AGW”.
No, BBD. That is NOT the real issue.
AGW is a theory which is generally accepted, but whose magnitude is highly uncertain (see testimony of our hostess before a US congressional committee in late 2010).
The topic of debate is the IPCC premise of “CAGW”, more specifically the lack of empirical evidence supporting this hypothesis (Feynman) and the inability of this premise to be falsified scientifically (Popper).
These are the issues being raised by rational skeptics, not “the scientific consensus on AGW”.
Max
Pekka
Seldom, if ever, has a field of science come under systematic attack like this. Seldom if ever have politically motivated hackers stolen and disseminated emails to mount a politically motivated attack on science. Seldom if ever have specific scientists been systematically targetted and persecuted like this.
Of course I agree that scientists should adhere to the the correct practices, and by and large, they do. We can prove this easily: where is the evidence for widespread scientific misconduct in ‘climate science’ as a whole? Obviously there is none. Obviously the ‘sceptics’ are playing the tactical hyper-focus trick and obviously the best response is to point this out and reject the trick.
This entire ‘climategate’ thing is manufactured. It has been blown *grotesquely* out of proportion. We need to keep the facts clearly in view:
– Climate science is not ‘corrupt’
– Climate science is not the Mannean Hockey Stick
– Climate science is not run from CRU
– The scientific consensus on AGW has emerged from *decades* of the usual scientific dog-fight. It was NOT ‘manufactured’ by the IPCC or Al Gore
And so on. This is a nasty little game which should not be played. Reject the tactical trickery. Don’t be played.
Let me be clear on this. I do not endorse the Mannean Hockey Stick, nor do I endorse any actual misconduct by any scientist. Nor will I ever do so. This is *not* about winning individual battles. I’m not even contesting this stuff. I am pointing out that it is irrelevant except to the contrarians.
That is because they have no scientific case to make and this sort of muck-raking is *all they have*. The very act of playing their game ensures that you lose.
We can talk about the Hockey Stick and make-believe ‘corruption’ of science for another ten years. They would love that.
BBD:
The term “climate science” is an equivocation that is constructed for the purpose of making logically improper inferences. As it has no legitimate purpose, you must not use it. The term “climate dogma” is logically and semantically acceptable.
BBD,
One of the largest errors is overemphasizing the role of organized attack. The skepticism is far more widespread and the reasons for being skeptic are far from uniform. Reacting as if all skeptics would be agents of an evil organization only reinforces the skepticism.
Scientists may feel that they are demanded to fight with one hand behind their back while the opposition is free to use both hands, but then the scientists wish to be considered as better informed and more objective. They cannot maintain such trust if they use their both hands in the fight.
The only way the science prevails in long run is by keeping to the standards of science and the only way scientists can be seen as presenting such science is that they stick to the facts even when that seems too ineffective. Furthermore it’s damaging to the science to have non-scientist proponents who claim to represent science while they “use their both hands” without protests from the scientists.
If the response cannot be made fast enough by proper means in a democratic society then trying to force a more rapid change will only backfire. That will happen both through the waste of resources in futile attempts to change world and in the buildup of even stronger political opposition that stops such activities.
Yes, the endemic alarmist corruption and statist bias in climate science is indeed of interest to only those who think the scientific method matters. Such people are known as “contrarians” in BBD’s terms.
The mainstream, by contrast, is quite happy to minimise and pass over the fiddling and hiding of data etc etc in silence, as evidenced by the scramble to try and have Climategate at al forgotten about. So whatever the Consensus view on something, we need to always remember the attitude and motivation of those who created it.
Pekka
Mann has been criticised for this unfairly. Oreskes and Conway’s Merchants of Doubt provides the essential background. First, the existence and nature of organised, politicised climate ‘scepticsm’ is examined and the phenomenon placed in the proper historical context. Second, the degree to which the original misinformation campaigns provided the template for all ‘scepticism’ is made very evident. Third, the essentially homogenous political nature of the ‘sceptics’ is clearly demonstrated.
Where organised attack by vested interest and its political proxies stops and the blaring nonsense of the libertarian evangelists begins is perhaps of less importance than you think. It is the combined effect that matters when it comes to influencing policy.
I have no idea why my caution that you are dangerously close to being played by shrewder players than yourself prompts you to say this.
Pekka –
I am not at all unsympathetic to your cautions about best practices and concerns about the lack thereof…
But I am curious as to how you respond to the pervasiveness of the kinds of comments I quote below:
Now have no reason to assume that our Physicist friend is in the employ of big oil – but surely you see a reasonably uniform political orientation amongst “skeptics?” Not completely uniform, for sure, and I’m not attributing a causality or direction of causality – but surely you see more in play than simply a reaction to what climate scientists have or haven’t done?
It seems to me that you are making assumptions about causality that may well be true for some individuals, but are not well supported by the evidence we have. For example, we have evidence from research that suggests that the more information people have on these types of issues the more likely they are to confirm biases. Research suggests that political orientation is strongly influential among those who say that Climategate strongly affects their views on climate change – in both directions (which in itself is only a minority). And we have research that suggest that opinions on climate change are strongly affected by short-term weather phenomena and the state of the economy.
While the effect you are describing is certainly intuitive and logical, and no doubt is true for some people, the evidence supporting your intuition seems to me to be lacking.
Joshua,
I wrote an answer to Particular Physicist below. That gives a response to your message as well.
I have been following during my lifetime many cases where scientists or other specialists try to get their message trough, and I refer only to cases where they genuinely believe that they are right. Those who disagree are always a diverse set. Their counterarguments vary and their reasons to doubt the specialists vary. The rule is that attempts to get the conclusions accepted with simplified strong argumentation fail invariably.
The most promising way is usually to proceed step-by-step slowly and persistently presenting only information that’s true without need to explain how it’s basically true although that and that detail was not expressed fully. Even this approach may fail but its changes to succeed are better than that of declaring simplified conclusions as the best that general public can understand.
BBD,
What to do when the other side of of the argumentation presents in public falsehoods on an issue that’s too complex for most to judge personally?
1. Do the same presenting contrary falsehoods hoping that the balance shifts to own favor.
2. Claim that the opponents are agents of an evil organization although only a few are agents of any organization and although even that isn’t outright evil.
3. Try to stick to the truth and apparently lose many battles in hope that the truth will ultimately win?
If these are the only alternatives, I pick the last.
It’s clear that Mann has been condemned often for wrong reasons but then reading his book it’s clear to me that he is also too eager to condemn others based to a significant part on prejudices rather than facts.
We have other books whose main content is to condemn the other party. We have those from both sides. Again some of them may be closer to the truth than others but I don’t trust any of them, not Oreskes, not LaFramboise, nor any of the others. They all do their cherry picking and their misleading interpretations even if some are much worse than others.
Thank you Pekka. Perfect.
BBD.
Yes one might forgive Mann for thinking that Mcintyre, the liberal, was part of a vast right ring conspiracy. However, Mcintyre’s tactics were not anything like the standard skeptical tactics: he asked for data.
Still, lets forgive Mann. For years he fought Mcintyre. Those fight showed up on the editorial pages of major papers. It didnt look good. It wasnt working.
In early 2005, Briffa sent Jones a giant pile of these clippings and noted that the “skeptics” seemed to be gaining ground. Data refusal wasnt working. Briffa could see that. Up until this point in time jones had been a data sharer. What was Jones reaction to Briffa pointing out that Mann’s data hiding wasnt working
Keenans an ass, lets see if you can do better
pekka
Have you read Oreskes and Conway? I find it hard to believe that anyone who has could make the this invidious comparison with Laframboise:
What possible good can come of invidious comparison like this. You sound like Mosher.
Who cares steven? Except people trying to focus on old problems instead of on THE problem.
Tactical hyper-focus is a cheap trick and you have played it to death.
Although you could enlighten me about McKitrick’s involvement with the Cornwall Alliance and his being a signatory to this Evangelical Declaration on Global Warming – along with Roy Spencer:
Anti-science activism, religious fundamentalism and the Republican base… discuss.
Sorry – the previous comment should have begun with this quote:
As usual, BBD out in cloud-cuckoo land. The initial injection of political motive into climate science obviosuly came from totalitarian/socialist evangelists, since CAGW means more excuses to crank up taxes and regulators. Plus the professionis state-run, which means everyone involved is a type of state-worshipper relative to the general population.
The only ‘tactical hyper-focus cheap trick’ around here here is the attempt to suggest that climate science is above board, and that we should look only at its answers, not at its underhand methods of arriving at them.
Gallup poll has results far different than Yale study.
I’d pay attention to Gallup if I were you.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/1615/environment.aspx
Your camp is losing the war for hearts and minds in the US. Denial is more than just a river in Egypt.
The attack on climate science is indeed unique, because the politicization of climate science by the environmental movement is unique. Watch Gore’s latest telethon. If it were not for this politicization none of us would be here. But skeptics did not create this situation. We are just reacting to it, defending humanity as it were, from a dangerous political movement that relies on scares loosly based on shaky science. The Greens sowed this wind.
If you want to see the depth of politicization just read the USGCRP reports which are even more proCAGW than the IPCC. And these are the folks that control the $2 billion a year US climate research budget, unlike the IPCC which controls nothing, and which is estimated to be half the global climate research budget.
But skeptics did not create this situation. We are just reacting to it,…
Yes – it’s all “them” and let’s characterize “skeptics” as if they are monolithic.
‘Tis a noble cause indeed.
See http://climaterealityproject.org/ for Gore’s telethon, this year featuring dirty weather! Advocacy personified.
David –
Have you not described yourself as an advocate?
Of course I am an advocate, defending humanity from the Greens. Most skeptics are. That is what I just said.
manaker.
you realize the anniversary approaches. A promise was made. In writing.
we will see if RC is a man of his word or if he made a deal.
bbd, you could likely be correct, but only once you guys right the wrongs. That has not been done. Corruption is funny like that
Yes indeed Mr E. Some public admission of corruption and bias, and a public attempt to root it out, would go a very long way to rehabilitating Climate Science. Continual denial just steadily blackens the profession more and more.
BBD |
re: … being an example of the endemic, unrepentant dishonesty that characterizes climate science …
No proof whatsoever
Overwhelming proof to anyone not laboring to overlook it.
just the same old paranoid conspiracy mindset
The only conspiracists around are those like you and CC who suggest government climate scientist have a secret plan to be honest and open, as opposed to serving their paymaster (hiding data, screwing over peer-review, etc).
Taking your word for it, for the sake of the argument, the public believes in CAGW, what do imagine that would prove about “reality”? That it plays to their desire for a more totaltarian society – CAGW of course providing the perfect pretext for more taxes and a Bigger Brother ?
Put your loony-left behind and start looking at the real world.
No comment on the demographics Tomcat? Nothing to say about the implosion of your ’cause’? You surprise me.
This bears repeating:
Despite a decade of frothing and foaming about MBH98/99 (which nobody else cares about) and the non-scandal of ‘Climategate’ and all the rest of the fake ‘controversy’, the peddlers of doubt are losing ground. Just read the quote.
The point to note here is that the fake sceptics have nothing else, demonstrable by the fact that *even now* they bang on endlessly about the Hockey Stick as if it mattered. And it doesn’t.
There is no published, coherent, widely-supported scientific case challenging the scientific consensus on AGW. You have *nothing*. Hence the absolute reliance on manufactured ‘controversy’, misrepresentation and downright nonsense.
It can only get you so far.
Only a right-wing ideologue could possibly describe me as of the left. What an idiotic, but revealing, remark. In the real world, the Republicans imploded and the American people aren’t being fooled by climate misinformation any more.
You should take note.
Webster, “What a fallacious liar you are Cappy Dick. You know that your own work on this topic is purely crackpot theorizing, intended purely to create an aura of FUD around the conventional science. You construct your arguments with such galloping gish word salad because you realize that you will suck in gullible fools that are impressed by that kind of talk.”
As usual you don’t have anything to offer but feel compelled to show you are an Ad Hom among Ad Homs anyway.
The debate for many, if not most, Webster, is over the degree of warming due to CO2 doubling alone that may be expected at the real surface of the Earth and over what time period. The Fat Tails that you and BBD use to create alarm and tend to be in love with, doncha know.
You do a Fickian analysis of Ocean Heat Uptake without knowing what the actual initial value of the ocean surface temperature is and amazingly find that outdated data still produces outdated results and you somehow think that is cutting edge proof of something relevant to the real world. It’s not Webster. The world has changed since 1995. We have these things called satellites.
Can we say: put a sock in it capn?
Blah Blah Duh, Not really :)
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2012/tuning-climate-models-a-group-discusses-how-its-done/#comment-106397
Since you constantly use model “experiments” as evidence and ignore observation, you should read more about models. Gerald Browning may be a name for you to remember. Buzz words, initial conditions, absolute temperatures, N-S and hyperviscosity.
BBD:
The phrase “scientific consensus” is an oxymoron.
BBD | November 14, 2012 at 5:22 am | Reply
No comment on the demographics Tomcat? Nothing to say about the implosion of your ’cause’? You surprise me.
Yes unlike you I am more concerned with the actual issues, not how many or few share my view. (I happen to think your demographics are wishful thinking, fwiw. But I’m on my guard for wishful thinking of my own).
And the only people who say they don’t care about the rot in climate science revealed by Climategate, are those like yourself scrambling to hide it.
The point to note here is that the fake sceptics have nothing else
You don’t need “something else” to be a skeptic, you just need to question what is being said.
*even now* they bang on endlessly about the Hockey Stick as if it mattered. And it doesn’t.
The only people saying it doesn’t matter, are those like yourself scrambling to have this debacle in the alarmist camp forgotten.
And it does matter, since if present temperatures are unexceptional, there is no need to panic.
There is no published, coherent, widely-supported scientific case challenging the scientific consensus on AGW.
There are many – esp as regards levels of certainty. There consensus is just a vague hypothesis at this stage, with no clear measurements to quantify attribution of CO2-induced warming.
And you must indeed be loony left – not unusual in the EU – as only such a person could place such blind hope and faith in a structure quite obviously addled with political money and overtones.
You need to build a scientific case to challenge a scientific consensus, and the ‘sceptics’ simply cannot do this. Therefore the ‘sceptics’ – as you helpfully concede – are reduced to mere contrarian rhetoric.
Yap! Yap! Yap!
BBD, “You need to build a scientific case to challenge a scientific consensus, and the ‘sceptics’ simply cannot do this.”
If legitimate science is dismissed as “merchant of doubt” tactics, you are right, since most of the real debate is over the significance of the impacts or results.
The average range of transient climate “sensitivity” using the most modern data is 1.5 C per doubling with newer studies tending towards lower values. When more information indicates less impact, that would tend to indicate that the understanding is not what it was cracked up to be.
You insist that the new data be ignored and that the original estimates are the “standard”.
So true on requiring a scientific case to challenge a consensus. There are about 45 alternate theories to consensus AGW promulgated by commenters to this site.
http://tinyurl.com/ClimateClowns
The fact that all of these theories are equally loony, and that there are even more by others (Archibald, Salby, etc) tells me the skeptical case is not there.
The fake skeptics don’t have a case and can’t rally around an alternate theory because they realize they will be crushed. So they resort to playing games with fallacious and rhetorical arguments.
This also explains why the real skeptics, the Michael Shermers and James Randis, do not address this topic. All they have is their credibility, and they realize the counter-science is just not there.
If there was a solid case against AGW, the tide would change so fast it would make your head spin. That is the way that science works, ha ha.
What a fallacious liar you are Cappy Dick. You know that your own work on this topic is purely crackpot theorizing, intended purely to create an aura of FUD around the conventional science. You construct your arguments with such galloping gish word salad because you realize that you will suck in gullible fools that are impressed by that kind of talk.
Web
You list what in your mind are “loony cases”, but you miss the key one:
the fact that the “consensus” case of CAGW, as promoted by IPCC (2xCO2 mean climate sensitivity of 3.2C, “most” of late 20thC warming caused by AGW), is not substantiated by empirical scientific evidence, but only by computer simulations.
This is NOT a “loony” case. It is simply the premise that the “CAGW case” lacks empirical scientific support.
Then you have omitted solar cases, such as Svensmark’s GCR cloud nucleation hypothesis, which is not “loony” at all and is being tested experimentally at CERN, after having validated the basic nucleation mechanism.
I am not saying the “CAGW case” is impossible. I’m just reminding you that it has not been substantiated by empirical evidence and that there are other cases out there, which are just as viable.
Max
Max, I didn’t mention Svensmark because he doesn’t write comments to Climate Etc. If I were to widen my acceptance standards and start fishing around for crackpot theories on other sites such as WUWT, I am certain the count of loony theories would rise to the hundreds.
I will amend Max’s entry to indicate that his crackpot theory is to accept the dogma of Svensmark without any critical analysis.
Web
You write:
There will never be a “solid case against AGW” IMO, because it is impossible to falsify.
However, there may well be enough evidence of an alternate mechanism governing our planet’s climate (before and after industrialization) so that AGW is relegated to being only a very small player in the overall picture.
I think this is a distinct possibility.
Svensmark’s hypothesis is just one candidate. “Clouds remain the largest uncertainty”, as IPCC concedes, and it also states that its “level of scientific understanding of solar forcing is low”.
Some of the stuff the Chief has written about on sudden changes in ocean currents may be another.
I can’t vouch for some of the other mechanisms that have been proposed (which you have called “loony”), but who knows whether or not they may have some merit?.
Others may be out there, which are not yet even formulated.
So I think that the IPCC version of “CAGW” will eventually be refuted – not by direct falsification, but by replacement with something else that is supported by empirical evidence in addition to a viable theoretical mechanism.
And, I agree with you – if and when it happens, it will happen fast (despite the billions of dollars invested in the CAGW big business to date).
Poof!
Max
Web
You have misunderstood again when you say I accept the Svensmark theory.
Try to clear your mind of clutter. Then try to read what is written below. Read it again (a few times if necessary). See if it soaks in. If not, repeat from step 1.
– I do not support Svensmark’s GCR cloud hypothesis as the primary driver of our planet’s climate anymore than I support the. AGW hypothesis as the primary driver of our planet’s climate.
– Neither hypothesis has been validated by empirical scientific evidence.
– The AGW hypothesis, itself, has a hundred year “head start” and there is a well-established theoretical mechanism. GHG levels have increased as temperature has done the same, although the correlation is not too robust.
– The GCR hypothesis is relatively new. A good long-term correlation between solar activity and climate exists. Lab tests made by Svensmark showed some nucleation, but were too rudimentary to be conclusive; recent tests of the CLOUD experiment at CERN have demonstrated the cosmic ray nucleation mechanism when certain naturally occurring aerosols are present, but more experimental work is needed to demonstrate a clear cloud nucleation by cosmic rays
– I believe that IPCC made a mistake by simply writing off Svensmark’s hypothesis as “controversial” in AR4.
– It would have been more correct, scientifically if not politically, to state that “there is an alternate hypothesis involving cosmic rays and clouds, which has not yet been tested, but which might account for some of the past warming, especially during periods prior to industrialization.”
So that’s my stand on the Svensmark hypothesis.
Got it?
If not, re-read the above, starting at the top.
Max
Max, “Some of the stuff the Chief has written about on sudden changes in ocean currents may be another.”
Actually, the oceans are the thing to watch. While there are dozens or more smaller probability influences, the heat capacity of the oceans are the key.
BBD, is in serious denial of southern hemisphere drivers. Changes in the average surface wind velocity in the Antarctic convergence region, where those winds are causing more Antarctic sea ice growth, can have a major impact on the THC 60 years and longer down the road. If fact, there has been a shift in the heat distribution of the oceans between the SH and NH plus the Pacific and Atlantic, something not in the CO2 playbook.
When Mosher and Hausfather posted on BEST, they noted that the
Diurnal Temperature Range reversed from decreasing from the start of the record to increasing around 1985. That reversal doesn’t fit with any of the climate “shifts” or oscillations and I don’t think one of the “signatures” of CO2 is increasing the diurnal temperature range.
Which way the tide flows depends crucially on the interests of who is funding it. Especially if as here there is a monopoly funder with a monumental vested interest. That is the way that science works.
Webster, since you enjoy thinking you are contributing science. BEST has a novel feature, approximate absolute temperatures. If you check you will find that BEST estimates “global” land temperature Tmax at 15.2C and Tmin at 3.3 C. The Stephens budget indicated that “global” surface temperature is about 16.3 C. What would be the approximate “global” SST?
Since the MODIS/AQUA data indicates that there is a rather large skin temperature gradient that is larger during calm and smaller during windy conditions, what impact would a shift of “average” surface wind velocity have on “global” average temperature?
Phew, what a powerful case BBD makes for believing the ‘Consensus’ : the American public believe it (or so he says).
Perhaps this is how other thorny issues can be ‘resolved’ – just ask the public what they think. We can even ask them to put a figure to the 2xCO2 sensitivity, that’ll really get things moving.
Oh no, did some beastly blogger really call him a loony? Hey you – stop it! Now!
Misrepresentation. Scientific consensus emerges from science. The increasing acceptance of the scientific consensus by the American people doesn’t validate it nor do I argue this.
I argue that it demonstrates that the misrepresenters are failing to keep the American people confused and misled. Did you misunderstand this on purpose? ;-)
The increasing acceptance of the scientific consensus by the American people doesn’t validate it nor do I argue this.
Of course you did. But wriggle away … And if true, what your argument really says, is that it demonstrates that the misrepresenters have succeeded in keeping the American people misled and falsely certain.
“You need to build a scientific case to challenge a scientific consensus, and the ‘sceptics’ simply cannot do this.
Except for Curry, Lindzen … ?
You are simply yap yap yap defending a fake consensus built on fraud and politics.
Our host has not published anything on climate sensitivity that I am aware of. Lindzen’s work has not withstood scrutiny. You can easily establish this for yourself.
I repeat: there is no widely accepted body of work challenging the scientific consensus on AGW.
Fake?
Fraud?
Politics?
Now, what did I just say? Oh yes: ‘sceptics’ are reduced to mere contrarian rhetoric.
Thank you for the confirmation.
Yeah, Curry is a lot smarter than your run-of-the-mill fake skeptic around these parts, and hasn’t published anything that would make it to the loony bin.
That is not debunking consensus but establishing criteria for quantifying uncertainty, which is a scientific topic in its own right.
BBD
“Lindzen’s work has not withstood scrutiny”
Pure unadulterated BS on your part BBD!
Lindzen has written or co-authored hundreds of papers.
I have not seen hundreds of well-substantiated rebuttals of all these papers; have you?
(Of course you haven’t, you were just tossing out some BS in your usual manner.)
More recently, L+C 2009 was found to have errors in the calculation method (Roy Spencer was the first to point to this but others followed). These were corrected in L+C 2011.
Grow up and don’t just toss out BS – it backfires every time.
Max
BBD
In addition to the false BS you tossed out on Lindzen, you write that there is no “consensus” position against the “consensus” position.
Duh!
What a totally stupid thing to write.
Of course there is no “consensus” against the “consensus”.
IPCC invented the forced “consensus” process to create a “consensus”., thereby leading to the corruption of climate science as Climategate showed.
No one has done this on the “skeptic” side.
Max
I repeat: there is no widely accepted body of work challenging the scientific consensus on AGW.
Only not accepted by the fake consensus. As I said, you are reduced to yap yap yap regurgitation of what you so badly want to be true, and can’t bear having questioned.
Web
I agree with you fully on the point you just made about our hostess:
Nothing she has said or written about the ongoing scientific and political debate on AGW is “loony bin” material.
She summarized her position on this debate very succinctly in testimony before a US congressional committee in the fall of 2010, key excerpts of which I will quote here:
This all makes very good sense to me. How about you?
Max
Web > Yeah, Curry … is not debunking consensus but establishing criteria for quantifying uncertainty, which is a scientific topic in its own right.
That’s just fancy footwork. Curry is debunking the fake certainty of the fake consensus.
manacker
Oh come on. Of course I meant Lindzen’s *wholly rebutted* papers attempting to demonstrate a low climate sensitivity. Not his entire life’s output. What a ridiculously cheap shot.
Childish attempts at point-scoring like this only emphasise the fact that ‘sceptics’ have no robust scientific case.
Rubbish. And another calculated and childishly transparent misrepresentation.
I actually wrote this, which is quite different:
There’s no body of work challenging the scientific consensus because it is almost certainly correct. But what do you do? Invoke a conspiracy theory surrounding the IPCC.
This is paranoid nonsense that belongs with faked moon landings and the rest.
BBD
Glad you corrected your statement on Lindzen from the way it was written.
But it may have escaped your attention that L+C 2011 issued a correction to L+C 2009, to which (I assume) you refer.
Others (Spencer was actually the first) found the error in L+C 2009 and wrote a paper on it and L+C subsequently corrected their paper.
The estimated CS based on the ERBE observations is still lower than the IPCC computer-generated range, but it is a bit higher than in L+C 2009 (and close to the figure estimated by Spencer using the same raw ERBE data).
For a graphical depiction of L+C 2009, L+C 2011 and the Spencer correction see:
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7109/7480026642_b9249ae4db_b.jpg
Case closed.
Max
BBD
Your hyperbole about “fake moon landings”, etc. makes you look foolish and childish.
I assume that, in fact, you are neither – so why post garbage that makes you look that way?
Address the specific issues on the “manufactured consensus” (the topic here), instead.
Max
Your conspiracy theory about the IPCC is foolish, Max. As all conspiracy theories are.
Claiming that climate sensitivity is down around the 1C range is even more foolish. What irritates me is that I’ve now explained this to you *repeatedly* and you are simply ignoring the facts.
A CS of ~1C would flatten out interannual and interdecadal and centennial and millennial variability. It is incompatible with all known climate behaviour from interannual wiggles to C2Oth variation under slight forcing changes to the MWP/LIA also under slight forcing changes, to *deglaciation* under… slight orbital forcing change.
On the other hand, climate sensitivity of ~3C fits very well with known climate behaviour. Time for parsimonious reasoning again… Although I know ‘sceptics’ are incapable of this.
Blah Blah Duh, “Claiming that climate sensitivity is down around the 1C range is even more foolish.” Now why would that be Blah Blah? The no feedback climate sensitivity is approximately 1 to 1.5 “all things remaining equal” That is all the parsimonious reasoning there is Blah Blah. Any sensitivity outside of that range requires assumptions of feedbacks based on assumptions of initial conditions and assumptions of the location of the no feedback sensitivity. That adds up to more assumptions than 1 to 1.5. Partner Parsimonious.
BBD
I have not argued for a CS of below 1.
I have simply shown you what L+C 2009, the correction to L+C 2009 by Spencer and L+C 2011have concluded on climate sensitivity based on ERBE satellite observations, and have plotted this along with the Myhre et al. “no feedback” figure and IPCC’s computer-generated range with all feedbacks.
But let me state why I have concluded that the IPCC CS range of 2C to 4.5C is exaggerated:
As you know full well, there are serious reservations about the magnitude of he computer-generated water vapor feedback (based on assumed constant relative humidity). There are satellite observations (Minschwaner + Dessler 2004) which show a much lower WV feedback with warming than constant RH.
Then there are the pesky NOAA data from weather b alloons that go back to 1948, which show a reduction of tropospheric water vapor content with warming temperature over time, that have yet to be explained by IPCC.
In addition there have been satellite observations (Spencer + Braswell 2007), which demonstrate a strongly negative net overall feedback from clouds with warming.
IOW, the feedback assumptions of the IPCC climate models with regard to WV and clouds do not correspond with observed reality, and the model-estimated 2xCO2 climate sensitivity is therefore likely to be grossly exaggerated.
Any comments? (Try to keep them related to the facts and specific, rather than general and polemic.)
Max
BBD, since you are making a very strong empirical claim perhaps you can clarify it a bit. Science is after all about precision. First, by “consensus on AGW” do you mean by AGW that humans have some influence on climate (which few deny), that humans have had more influence in the last 50 years than natural factors (the IPCC claim), or that humans have a dangerous influence (CAGW)? Or what?
Second by “widely accepted body of work” do you mean there are no articles in the published literature suggesting that whatever you mean by a consensus on AGW may be incorrect? If not then what do you mean by this extremely vague descriptor? Does widely accepted differ from published and if so how? Are you talking about citation rates or what? Accepted by whom and how widely?
If you cannot be precise then you are simply playing the usual vague scare game.
manacker
You are incapable of playing a straight game. I did NOT SAY that you were doing this. My exact words were:
Get that? About, approximately, ‘~’ [tilde]. Got that?
Just cease and desist with the crap, eh?
Certainly. My comment is that you are totally wrong. Specific references:
Soden BJ et al. (2005) “The radiative signature of upper tropospheric moistening” Science 310, 841-844.
Abstract: “Climate models predict that the concentration of water vapor in the upper troposphere could double by the end of the century as a result of increases in greenhouse gases. Such moistening plays a key role in amplifying the rate at which the climate warms in response to anthropogenic activities, but has been difficult to detect because of deficiencies in conventional observing systems. We use satellite measurements to highlight a distinct radiative signature of upper tropospheric moistening over the period 1982 to 2004. The observed moistening is accurately captured by climate model simulations and lends further credence to model projections of future global warming.”
Santer BD et al (2007) “Identification of human-induced changes in atmospheric moisture content” Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 104 15248-15253.
Abstract: “Data from the satellite-based Special Sensor Microwave Imager (SSM/I) show that the total atmospheric moisture content over oceans has increased by 0.41 kg/m(2) per decade since 1988. Results from current climate models indicate that water vapor increases of this magnitude cannot be explained by climate noise alone. In a formal detection and attribution analysis using the pooled results from 22 different climate models, the simulated “fingerprint” pattern of anthropogenically caused changes in water vapor is identifiable with high statistical confidence in the SSM/I data. Experiments in which forcing factors are varied individually suggest that this fingerprint “match” is primarily due to human caused increases in greenhouse gases and not to solar forcing or recovery from the eruption of Mount Pinatubo. Our findings provide preliminary evidence of an emerging anthropogenic signal in the moisture content of earth’s atmosphere.”
Rind D et al (1991) “Positive Water-Vapor Feedback In Climate Models Confirmed By Satellite Data” Nature 349, 500-503.
Abstract: “Chief among the mechanisms thought to amplify the global climate response to increased concentrations of trace gases is the atmospheric water vapour feedback. As the oceans and atmosphere warm, there is increased evaporation, and it has been generally thought that the additional moisture then adds to the greenhouse effect by trapping more infrared radiation. Recently, it has been suggested that general circulation models used for evaluating climate change overestimate this response, and that increased convection in a warmer climate would actually dry the middle and upper troposphere by means of associated compensatory subsidence1. We use some new satellite-generated water vapour data to investigate this question. From a comparison of summer and winter moisture values in regions of the middle and upper troposphere that have previously been difficult to observe with confidence, we find that, as the hemispheres warm, increased convection leads to increased water vapour above 500 mbar in approximate quantitative agreement with the results from current climate models. The same conclusion is reached by comparing the tropical western and eastern Pacific regions. Thus, we conclude that the water vapour feedback is not overestimated in models and should amplify the climate response to increased trace-gas concentrations.”
Zhang XB (2007) “Detection of human influence on twentieth-century precipitation trends” Nature 448, 461-465.
Abstract: “Human influence on climate has been detected in surface air temperature(1-5), sea level pressure(6), free atmospheric temperature(7), tropopause height(8) and ocean heat content(9). Human-induced changes have not, however, previously been detected in precipitation at the global scale(10-12), partly because changes in precipitation in different regions cancel each other out and thereby reduce the strength of the global average signal(13-19). Models suggest that anthropogenic forcing should have caused a small increase in global mean precipitation and a latitudinal redistribution of precipitation, increasing precipitation at high latitudes, decreasing precipitation at sub-tropical latitudes(15,18,19), and possibly changing the distribution of precipitation within the tropics by shifting the position of the Intertropical Convergence Zone(20). Here we compare observed changes in land precipitation during the twentieth century averaged over latitudinal bands with changes simulated by fourteen climate models. We show that anthropogenic forcing has had a detectable influence on observed changes in average precipitation within latitudinal bands, and that these changes cannot be explained by internal climate variability or natural forcing. We estimate that anthropogenic forcing contributed significantly to observed increases in precipitation in the Northern Hemisphere mid-latitudes, drying in the Northern Hemisphere subtropics and tropics, and moistening in the Southern Hemisphere subtropics and deep tropics. The observed changes, which are larger than estimated from model simulations, may have already had significant effects on ecosystems, agriculture and human health in regions that are sensitive to changes in precipitation, such as the Sahel.”
Allan, R P & Soden, B J (2008) Atmospheric warming and the amplification of precipitation extremes” Science 321, 1481-1484.
Abstract: “Climate models suggest that extreme precipitation events will become more common in an anthropogenically warmed climate. However, observational limitations have hindered a direct evaluation of model- projected changes in extreme precipitation. We used satellite observations and model simulations to examine the response of tropical precipitation events to naturally driven changes in surface temperature and atmospheric moisture content. These observations reveal a distinct link between rainfall extremes and temperature, with heavy rain events increasing during warm periods and decreasing during cold periods. Furthermore, the observed amplification of rainfall extremes is found to be larger than that predicted by models, implying that projections of future changes in rainfall extremes in response to anthropogenic global warming may be underestimated.”
Gettelman A and Fu Q (2008) “Observed and simulated upper-tropospheric water vapor feedback” J. Climate 21, 3282-3289.
Abstract: “Satellite measurements from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) in the upper troposphere over 4.5 yr are used to assess the covariation of upper-tropospheric humidity and temperature with surface temperatures, which can be used to constrain the upper-tropospheric moistening due to the water vapor feedback. Results are compared to simulations from a general circulation model, the NCAR Community Atmosphere Model (CAM), to see if the model can reproduce the variations. Results indicate that the upper troposphere maintains nearly constant relative humidity for observed perturbations to ocean surface temperatures over the observed period, with increases in temperature similar to 1.5 times the changes at the surface, and corresponding increases in water vapor ( specific humidity) of 10% -25% degrees C-1. Increases in water vapor are largest at pressures below 400 hPa, but they have a double peak structure. Simulations reproduce these changes quantitatively and qualitatively. Agreement is best when the model is sorted for satellite sampling thresholds. This indicates that the model reproduces the moistening associated with the observed upper-tropospheric water vapor feedback. The results are not qualitatively sensitive to model resolution or model physics.”
Brogniez H and Pierrehumbert RT (2007) “Intercomparison of tropical tropospheric humidity in GCMs with AMSU-B water vapor data” Geophys. Res. Lett. 34, Article Number: L17812
Abstract: “We make use of microwave measurements of the tropical free tropospheric relative humidity (FTH) to evaluate the extent to which the water vapor distribution in four general circulation models is faithful to reality. The comparison is performed in the tropics by sorting the FTH in dynamical regimes defined upon the 500 hPa vertical velocity. Because microwave radiation penetrates non-rainy and warm clouds, we are able to estimate the FTH over most of the dynamical regimes that characterize the tropics. The comparisons reveal that two models simulate a free troposphere drier than observed (< 10%), while the others agree with the observations. Despite some differences, the level of agreement is good enough to lend confidence in the representation of atmospheric moistening processes. A climate change scenario, tested on two models, shows a tendency to maintain the FTH to an almost fixed value be it an ascending or a subsiding regime”
Now explain to me how a CS much below ~3C could fit with known climate behaviour:
A CS of ~1C [about, approximately 1C] would flatten out interannual and interdecadal and centennial and millennial variability. It is incompatible with all known climate behaviour from interannual wiggles to C2Oth variation under slight forcing changes to the MWP/LIA also under slight forcing changes, to *deglaciation* under… slight orbital forcing change.
On the other hand, climate sensitivity of ~3C fits very well with known climate behaviour.
How do you *explain* this Max?
Blah Blah Duh, “Now explain to me how a CS much below ~3C could fit with known climate behaviour:”
Can you say HYPERVISCOSITY? The weakly damped recurrent patterns in paleo climate are not examples of HYPERVISCOSITY, they are examples of a huge system with unbelivably large amounts of thermal inertia. Climate models use HYPERVISCOSITY to OVERLY DAMPEN this natural behavior. Imagine that?
Those who will not read Levitus et al. (2012) continue to spout nonsense about what is and is not relevant to the real world.
BBD, you continue to make ignorant comments? There has been increasing OH uptake, the questions my ill-informed friend is how much is due to CO2, how much is natural and whether the shift in the rate of uptake is an indication of a natural capacity limit. The oceans are like batteries. The have charge and discharge rates with limits on the rate of each.
capn
Blah blah blah. Upside down d18O curves and no permanent Antarctic ice before 800ka. You do not have any basis for calling me ‘ignorant’ or ‘ill informed’. I suggest you keep this fact at the forefront of what passes for your mind.
BBD, I was wondering what the BBD stood for :) Blah Blah Doh!
TOTALITARIAN
Actually both the US and the EU are at historically high levels of state control. So _both_ are pretty totalitarian, by their own standards. And getting slowly but steadily worse. EU probably worse in absolute terms though.
Agree.
Max
http://www.gallup.com/poll/1615/environment.aspx
What Americans really think about global warming and how attitudes have changed since 2000 from the preeminent US polling organization, Gallup, Inc.
It’s not good news for the AGW crew. Larger percentage of people believe global warming is exaggerated. Smaller percentages are in favor of CO2 emission controls, solar and wind power, etc.
Just for good measure:
http://www.gallup.com/poll/153875/Worry-Water-Air-Pollution-Historical-Lows.aspx
Pekka >> The only way the science prevails in long run is by keeping to the standards of science and the only way scientists can be seen as presenting such science is that they stick to the facts even when that seems too ineffective.
They also need to discipline those who stray, and disassociate themselves loudly from them and their fake conclusions. This to me is why the whole profession is being tarred by the actions of the IPCC cadre – they just can’t being themselves to send the rascals packing.
PP, not correcting some and over correcting others in the Climate Science community is interesting. Trenberth commented on the Steig and Mann Antarctic paper with, “it is hard creating data where there is none.” Then in his most recent budget, finding a 20 Wm-2 error that has been pointed out for years, is a “minor adjustment”. Of course Trenberth goes ballistic and has editors resign when a “skeptic” publishes a rebuttal of a rebuttal. It is a farce.
Feudal wars are not the correct solution for science.
The most important single thing to understand about scientific knowledge is that it’s built gradually. Only few discoveries are clear enough to get accepted immediately, almost all of the scientific knowledge has reached that status through multiple independent confirmation. Individual studies should never be taken so seriously that fighting on them would become as important as has been the case over hockey stick.
Neither should individual scientists have such a stature that dissociating from them (or associating with them) would be an issue.
My view is that Mann erred in his paper but I don’t believe that scientific fraud was involved. Wise scientists should accept promptly that they have erred when their work has been shown to lack the supposed merit, but dissociating explicitly by other scientists is needed only in case of outright fraud. Writing papers that correct the error is the best response but sometimes it’s difficult to get enough novelty value in such a paper to warrant publication.
It was a serious misjudgment to pick a recent result of the type of the hockey stick as the symbol of climate science. Such decisions carry too much risk of error and erring on a symbol got a major issue that the skeptics have been using for their advantage.
I criticize what some climate scientists have been doing and the way they have reacted to the criticism from the skeptics. The skeptical side has produces infinitely more nonsense both on the climate and on the scientists – they are using both hands (or all hands of many different people). Scientists must, however, behave differently if they wish to have more trustworthiness.
We have posted back and forth from both sides of the debate, with occasional OT diversions and detours, but our hostess covered the topic here best of all with her opening sentence:
“The manufactured consensus of the IPCC has had the unintended consequences of distorting the science, elevating the voices of scientists that dispute the consensus, and motivating actions by the consensus scientists and their supporters that have diminished the public’s trust in the IPCC.”
Pretty much tells it all IMO.
Max
Pekka
Up-thread you list three options for responding to “untruths” in the ongoing climate debate:
<blockquote1. Do the same presenting contrary falsehoods hoping that the balance shifts to own favor.
2. Claim that the opponents are agents of an evil organization although only a few are agents of any organization and although even that isn’t outright evil.
3. Try to stick to the truth and apparently lose many battles in hope that the truth will ultimately win?
I understand and appreciate that you endeavor to follow the 3rd course.
So do I.
The complication comes in defining what “the truth” really is.
As you know, there is a great deal of uncertainty on that.
And, to get back to our topic here, there is no “consensus” on the “consensus”.
So the debate goes on.
Max
In this case “the truth” requires that the level of uncertainty is brought up in some understandable way. Every scientists has her or his own view of “the truth”. The subjectivity of the judgment must also be expressed in some way. The right way is not necessarily to tell confidence limits. That might be a poor way of expressing it and something that concentrates on the subjectivity of judgment a better way.
The task of IPCC is different. IAC has presented good comments on that but I consider some of their proposals unrealistic. My view is that the nature of uncertainties makes in some important cases the proposed approaches impossible to complete properly.
Pekka
We agree philosophically.
Yes. An effort should be made to reduce the “uncertainty”.
“The task of IPCC is different”, I agree.
IMO itshould be to compile all scientific findings, without attempting to forge a consensus, but rather to report all opinions impartially and objectively, in order to let readers decide waht is happening based on the data provided.
It should NOT make any long-term projections based on GCM outputs. These are interpreted to be “predictions” instead of simply “projections”, thereby confusing the reader.
However, I believe IPCC has taken on the task to promote and sell the concept of disruptive and potentially catastrophic anthropogenic greenhouse warming (CAGW) to policy makers and the general public with a “manufactured consensus process” (as our hostess puts it) and frightening projections of long-range future climate.
In so doing it has ignored or rejected conflicting opinions and findings, overstated confidence and understated uncertainty.
This behavior has not gone unnoticed (and Climategate, etc. has further complicated things), so that general confidence in IPCC (once considered the “gold standard” in climate science) has plummeted to the point that surveys in the USA indicate almost 70% of the respondents believe that climate scientists are “fudging the data”.
I’m sure you will agree that this is not good for climate science.
Max
There’s no body of work challenging the scientific consensus because it is almost certainly correct.
There is plenty of work, just not accepted by the fake, fraud-ridden consensus, all of whom are in the employ of the same vested interest funder.
But what do you do? Invoke a conspiracy theory surrounding the IPCC.
This is paranoid nonsense that belongs with faked moon landings and the rest.
The conspiracy nonsense that belongs withe faked moon landings, is the idea that government stooge climate scientists who unrepentantly gave us Climategate, sabotaged peer-review etc etc, are suddenly secretly planning to be objective instead of continuing to push the fake alarmist consensus that serves their paymaster’s interests.
So it’s all a socialist plot to install a totalitarian world government via the UN using fake climate science as the trojan?
But you are definitely NOT a conspiracy theorist. Perish the thought! And may that Lewadowski burn in hell for what he said.
:-)
Yes, to suggest Laframboise is as vile, blinkered and ignorant as Oreskes is an outrage.
My views of LaFramboise’s book can be seen here
http://judithcurry.com/2011/10/19/laframboise-on-the-ipcc/#comment-124319
and in further comments of the thread.
Oreskes is certainly much more refined but similarly one-sided. I have not read the book coauthored by Conway, but I have read other material of the same nature by her (only climate science related, not on tobacco industry etc.).
In both cases the evidence is cherry picked and interpreted to strengthen the message.
You have essentially accused O&C of misrepresentation without reading the text. You fall in my estimation, Pekka.
Have I?
I think that I referred to writings of Oreskes more generally and I have read those. (No, I cannot give references because that was some time ago.)
Oh crap, Pekka. You have fallen some as yet undetermined distance in the vital esteem of “BBD”. Whoever that is. Have you considered the consequences? Think of the children, man.
Pekka
That is how I understood this:
And I objected to it here.
BBD
The thread was getting too long so am responding to your last two posts here.
You cited several studies to refute my statements on water vapor and cloud feedbacks.
I had cited examples of actual physical observations, which suggest that WV feedback is less than constant RH as estimated by the climate models cited by IPCC and that net cloud feedback is negative rather than positive.
To your response:
Soden et al. 2005 start off with:
Sure, that’s what “climate models predict”.
Soden et al. 2005 state that there has been an “observed humidity signal from 1982 to 2004”.
OK.
M+D 2004 also found an “observed humidity signal”. But it was only around one-fourth of the constant RH “signal” assumed by the climate models:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3178/2958955575_2c69450bd9_b.jpg
Santer et al. are essentially trying to tie the observed increase in total atmospheric moisture to an AGW “fingerprint”, concluding
That’s nice.
Rind et al. 1991 is pretty old stuff. Whether or not it got superseded by M+D 2004 is a moot point.
Zhang 2007 is more about AGW contributing to precipitation than about quantified WV increase over time, suggesting (among other things) that the Sahel may be benefitting from more rain as a result of AGW
Allen + Soden 2008 is also more about precipitation extremes than about atmospheric WV content.
Gettelman + Fu 2008 is about WV increase. It indicates that ”upper troposphere maintains nearly constant relative humidity for observed perturbations to ocean surface temperatures over the observed period”. This paper does indicate that upper tropospheric WV content increases roughly with constant RH, IOW four times what was found by M+D 2004. So this is the only paper you have cited that does, indeed, suggest constant RH with warming.
Brogniez + Pierrehumbert 2007 show increased WV content with warming, concluding:
So moisture increased with warming.
It looks to me like there is still a lot of uncertainty regarding the magnitude of WV increase with warming, between the extremes of less that one-fourth constant RH (M+D 2004) to essentially constant RH (G+F 2008), as also assumed by the climate models..
Who’s got it right? M+D 2004 or G+F 2008? Guess that’s what “uncertainty” is all about.
Now we come to clouds.
I noticed you did not cite any papers there to rebut S+B 2007 with physically observed data.
So, even if we ignore M+D 2004 and accept that the WV feedback is as estimated by the climate models, but accept the S+B 2007 negative cloud feedback instead of IPCC’s model-based strongly positive cloud feedback, we end up with a 2xCO2 CS of around 1C (not ~3C ).
That’s an even greater source of “uncertainty” than the WV feedback.
And a CS of ~1C is still a very distinct possibility, based on the evidence at hand.
Max
Oh stop wittering for five minutes and answer the bloody question will you.
A CS of ~1C is INCOMPATIBLE with known climate behaviour. A CS of ~3C is a very good fit. I refer to *everything* from interannual variability all the way up to deglaciation under orbital forcing, taking in the MWP and the LIA and C20th variability in between. NONE of this is correlated with large changes in forcings.
Parsimonious reasoning leads to a single answer: the climate system is dominated by positive feedbacks and is therefore moderately sensitive to changes in RF. These INCLUDE changes in RF from GHGs.
Cue more dodging, obfuscation, misrepresentation and WAFFLE…
Forcings are NOT known, not even close. SO, any sensitivity (if there’s such a thing) is compatible with known climate behavior.
Actually Max is doing some fairly detailed analysis of uncertainties, citing actual studies, while you are just shouting and making wildly general claims which cannot be true. You consistently do not respond to his arguments.
If a CS of 3C is a very good fit with everything we see why has it not warmed for over a decade? For that matter the UAH record, which is the closest thing we have to a measurement of global temps, shows no warming for the last 33 years except a single step up coincident with the big ENSO starting in 1998. Hardly a good fit with the steady CO2 increases.
The truth is that there are places and scales where there appear to be good correlations and places and scales where there clearly are not. When you add in that in most cases the data is highly uncertain then your correlation claims become speculative at best.
You claim there is no real debate but when presented with specifics you start shouting, or insulting, and change the subject. You do this consistently (a good correlation).We have seen this behavior before, many times in fact.
David Wojick
This is a quick illustration of your bad faith and misrepresentations. It’s why I won’t generally talk to you:
No demonstration of why my claims are ‘wildly general’, nor why they ‘cannot’ be true’. Delegitimisation attempt. Junk comment.
False statement. Junk comment.
The natural-variability-doesn’t-exist fallacy plus the monotonic warming fallacy rolled into one. Junk comment.
Another delegitimisation attempt. Junk comment.
Summary: junk comment. Action: ignore.
In what way is ~1C incompatible with known climate behavoir? It is at the low end of both magnitude and probability as indicated in AR4. It is not incompatible. You do not mention long term persistance phenomena http://itia.ntua.gr/en/docinfo/850/ , nor attractors, thus your parsimony statement is a deferred argument from ignorance. Mannaker gave his reasoning; you provided none and made incorrect statements if AR4 is considered a reasonable source. I find that you are the one dodging, obfuscating, and misrepresenting (AR4). But don’t waffle you just continue to ignore what the range of CS is according to AR4. We have had this discussion before.
Cue more dodging, obfuscation, misrepresentation and waffle and strawmen by the dozen…
Thanks for a perfect response. You claim there is no real debate but when presented with specifics you start shouting, or insulting, and change the subject. You do this consistently. We have seen this behavior before, many times in fact. Duck duck.
See above. You aren’t here in good faith, so don’t whine.
“You aren’t here in good faith…”
Well, well, well… Look Who’s Talkin’ ;)
Andrew
Demonstrate the bad faith, Bad Andrew.
“Demonstrate the bad faith, Bad Andrew.”
Can I go back and pull some of your Bishop Hill material in my report? ;)
Andrew
You accuse me of bad faith here. It should be easy for you to demonstrate bad faith using quotes from this thread.
Can’t you do that?
“You accuse me of bad faith here”
and there. ;)
Andrew
Then demonstrate the bad faith. Go ahead, trawl through BH or C-a-S. Demonstrate bad faith. Or get stuffed.
I’m just starting my research, but this is amusing:
“Off topic threads
Jan 25, 2012
Blogs The threads are getting out of hand again. I have imposed a timeout on BBD until Monda”y.
HAHA
Andrew
That’s not bad faith. That’s me being censored by the proprietor of a denialist blog for daring to differ with the herd. The bad faith there is arguably being demonstrated by Andrew Montford.
I hope you can do better than that.
BBD,
Well, lets take a closer look at what’s happening up so far. You’ve accused several people here of acting in bad faith, and at least one other blogger of actively attempting to “censor” you.
Methinks you may be having delusions of relevance, much like Joshua.
Andrew
Let’s have a look at what’s happened so far. You have accused me of bad faith and failed to demonstrate it despite being repeatedly challenged and offered a choice of blogs from which to draw your examples.
Projection, BA. Projection.
BBD | November 14, 2012 at 1:06 pm | Reply
“A CS of ~1C is INCOMPATIBLE with known climate behaviour”
It’s quite compatible. Pretty much the no-feedback scenario. Cloud feedback is negative. You should start getting used to the idea.
Somebody else who doesn’t understand that if cloud feedback nets negative, known climate behaviour would be impossible.
So much talk, so little understanding of the basics.
I feel the same way about anyone who believes cloud feedbacks are positive. What is it that you think limits cloud cover to about 70% if feedback is positive? Why isn’t cloud cover 100%? Only negative feedback explains it. Pretty simple stuff. Observations are completely supportive.
Oh for goodness sake THINK Springer.
What does ‘negative feedback’ actually mean?
It means that the effects of forcing are damped down, diminished, reduced, weakened.
If the climate system is dominated by negative feedbacks it cannot respond to changes in forcing. Nothing much can happen. Internally and externally forced variability is suppressed, flattened, damped, smoothed out of existence. This is very obviously *not* our climate system.
Our climate system is noisy with interannual variability, itself a clear indication that the climate system is moderately sensitive. Otherwise – flatline.
Ditto interdecadal variability. Net negative feedbacks = flatline or very slight bumpiness.
And so on all the way up to the glacial/deglacial cycles.
It is obvious to the meanest intellect that the climate system is dominated by positive feedbacks or its observed and reconstructed behaviour simply could not happen.
No MWP. No LIA. No early C20th warming. No mid-C20th cooling. No late-C20th warming. No variability.
No glacial terminations under weak orbital forcing. No Holocene. No LGM. No Eemian. No Holsteinian. No variability.
So what can we say about cloud feedback?
We can say that cloud feedback is either weakly negative, neutral or weakly positive. And that’s it.
THINK for once. It won’t kill you.
The only changes that aren’t noise in the last few million years are changes from glacial to interglacial. Our planet is on a tipping point but if history is any guide ice has the upper hand. Glacials last 10x as long as interglacials. When the ice starts to melt there’s a positive feedback from decreasing albedo. Global average temperature shoots up a few degrees in response then hits a brick f*cking ceiling. The brick f*cking ceiling is the limit imposed by negative feedback from clouds. CO2 is an effect not a cause. You got it ass backwards.
How about you explain to me why the place on the earth with the highest mean annual temperature is an equatorial desert that’s dryer than a popcorn fart. If water vapor had a net warming effect shouldn’t the highest mean annual temperature be somewhere where there’s like a lot of water vapor? Denial is more than just a river in Egypt.
But seriously, why is the highest mean annual temperature an equatorial jungle instead of an equatorial desert if the hydrologic cycle has a positive feedback in the prevailing climate?
Would you just respond to the substance of my comment for once instead of rambling on with your usual stream of consciousness.
How do we square low CS with known climate behaviour?
Every comment I’ve ever made squares it. Find one that does not.
Clouds are a negative feedback such that at approximately 70% an equilibrium is reached. Any fewer and the surface gets more sunlight which evaporates more water and makes more clouds which then shade the surface which limits evaporation. BOOYAH. An equilibrium point.
If you add more CO2 to the atmosphere it might cause more evaporation and it might not. If there’s free water to evaporate then added CO2 does nothing but make more clouds which make more shade and the net effect is zero.
However, where evaporation is limited, which it is at many times and many places, then instead of making more clouds CO2 makes the surface warmer. ALL the observations are explained by this. I challenge you to present a disconfirming observation. No hand waving an actual observation and an explanation of why the above cannot explain it.
David, please, go back and read this comment again. Perhaps you missed it? Never mind. Try again. Try to understand the words. Try to think.
Try to understand the essential problem: if CS was low, then we can’t explain known climate behaviour. It’s all explained in the comment.
Just read the words slowly. Think. Do your best. You can do this David, I know you can. Just go slowly and steadily and start back at the beginning if you find yourself getting confused. There’s no shame in that.
It’s okay if it takes all night. The rewards more than compensate for the effort. Your understanding will change; it will become richer, more complete and more *useful* to you in situations such as these.
Go for it, David. I know you can do it.
BBD
You wrote: “It is obvious to the meanest intellect that the climate system is dominated by positive feedbacks or its observed and reconstructed behaviour simply could not happen.”
So you are certain of what change in the system resulted in long term periods of cooling? Can you clarify?
Rob Starkey
A positive feedback amplifies the effect of a change in forcing. For example, ice albedo is a strong positive feedback. It enhances cooling when radiative forcing is reduced and amplifies warming when RF increases.
Positive ice albedo feedback accelerates the onset of glaciation and maintains low temperatures during glacials. It accelerates warming during deglacial phases and helps stabilise interglacial climate states.
David Springer | November 14, 2012 at 4:17 pm said: How about you explain to me why the place on the earth with the highest mean annual temperature is an equatorial desert that’s dryer than a popcorn fart. If water vapor had a net warming effect shouldn’t the highest mean annual temperature be somewhere where there’s like a lot of water vapor?”
David, David…I’ll explain to you, do you have open mind for real proofs?:::where is dry – days are warmer / nights colder than where is plenty H2O – overall, if you take the temp on both places for every minute in 24h; they both have SAME temp!!! That’s why one of the biggest stupidity is: monitoring only for the HOTTEST minute in 24h!!!!! Can you dig it?! Hotter days / colder nights V cooler days / warmer nights = those CANCEL EACH OTHER!!! So, both camps are wrong! If you want genuinely to know why they blame ”water vapor” here are the best GENUINE/ scientific proofs, why the Warmist are 100% WRONG: :http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2012/07/20/water-vapor/
BBD
I have answered Steven Mosher’s question on why I have concluded that we do not know what the 2xCO2 climate sensitivity is in fact.
It could well be below 1C, as estimated by Lindzen and Spencer and thee are several reasons to doubt that it is as high as 3C.
But read my response to Steven.
Max
We’ve been through it Max. ~1C is simply at odds with known climate behaviour. This is very, very obvious to anyone actually prepared to *think* objectively.
~3C is the result of multiple lines of investigation combining paleoclimate (Hansen & Sato 2012) with observations and modelling (Knutti & Hegerl 2008). Common sense also strongly buttresses ~3C. See my comments to Springer above, eg here. Like him, I urge you to go back and read again, carefully this time, and *think* instead of simply flipping into denial mode.
But doubtless I am wasting (yet more) of my breath.
As for Spencer and Lindzen, the blunt truth is nobody takes their sensitivity papers seriously. These studies – which neither could get published in high impact journals – have been shown to be flawed and are ignored except by desperate contrarians who have *nothing else*.
BBD
Your ranting and raving do not make any more sense this time than they did earlier.
Saying something is “very obvious” does not make it so.
I have given you plus Steven Mosher the specific reasons why I am rationally skeptical that the 2xCO2 climate sensitivity is ~3C and why I have concluded it could just as well be ~1C or even lower.
You have not been able to cite empirical evidence for a CS of ~3C.
Until you do, I will remain rationally skeptical that it is this high.
And, if it is only ~1C (or even lower as the observations of Lindzen and Spencer suggest) then AGW is a non-issue.
Poof! Another dead doomsday prediction.
I do not believe that you repeating the same BS statements and adding insult to injury is going to change my mind. The only thing that would do so is empirical evidence based on actual physical observations or reproducible experimentation. And you have been unable to cite this.
End of discussion.
Max
Even if climate sensitivity (2xCO2) is 3C, so what? Does it matter much? What’s the consequence? What’s the damage function? Whats the decarbonisation rate function? How do we know?
Importantly, what would be the real cost to humanity of implementing the policies the CAGW alarmists advocate we implement? And what is the probability those policies would be beneficial? How beneficial?
Those are the questions that must be answered, satisfactorily, before a rational person would supporting the policies the CAGW alarmists’ advocate (such as carbon pricing and renewable energy).
manacker
That’s because you aren’t very bright, Max.
Rubbish – Hansen & Sato (2012) referenced in the previous comment – the one you are responding to without having apparently read.
Either:
– you aren’t reading the comments I direct you to
Or:
– you are as thick as mince
I second David Wojick’s claim that the CS is a scientifically incoherent concept.
max,
you need to answer BBDs question. One can, of course, find individual, questionable, estimates of CS at ~1C. However, as he points out if you claim certainty about 1C, there is a whole raft of observations that make no sense. On the other hand, if you accept something in the range of
3C, many pieces of the puzzle fall into place. In other terms 3C gives you a much more coherent picture of more evidence. One can’t logically rule out 1C, but if true, much less makes sense. When we reason we reason to the best explanation. The explanation that makes more, not less, of our data make sense.
If this was any other field than climate science you would agree.
Except this picture and/or puzzle is only in your mind. Is the picture of the puzzle or the puzzle about the picture?
The picture I see rules out a CS of 3C. But of course if you insist on arguing metaphorically you can claim anything you like, because metaphors are not arguments. If you are making scientific claims about evidence then yours are unsupportable subjective impressions, as are BBD’s. If you want to say this is how you see it then fine, but do not claim that this is how it is. There is no there there.
Then you are beyond the reach of reason and shouldn’t be commenting on a blog like this.
On the contrary human reasoning, especially scientific reasoning, is my Ph.D. field. What is yours?
Then reasonably explain to me why you reject the scientific consensus on climate sensitivity. Or explain how the hell you can claim expertise in scientific reasoning when you are clearly adrift here. Explain to me what the hell you think you are doing here.
I’d really like to know. You are a Heartland tool, are you not? The one writing up the confuse-the-children syllabus. That is you, is it not?
First answer my question, what is your field?
What I do has no relevance here. You are trying to avoid answering the following questions:
Reasonably explain to me why you reject the scientific consensus on climate sensitivity. Or explain how the hell you can claim expertise in scientific reasoning when you are clearly adrift here. Explain to me what the hell you think you are doing here.
I’d really like to know. You are a Heartland tool, are you not? The one writing up the confuse-the-children syllabus. That is you, is it not?
The stink of bad faith in here is almost unbearable.
BBD: So while you have no expertise in climate science you yet claim to have mastered it entirely, or at least that is what your broad claims about the total evidence imply. Not likely. I don’t suppose you are a medical doctor? We had one of those for a while. He too claimed to have universal knowledge.
My field is the logic of complex issues, especially confusions in science and policy, and the climate debate has been my special study for 20 years, ever since Rio. I have never worked for Heartland but I admire them greatly and have given them free advice from time to time. Maybe that makes them my tool. I did propose to develop K-12 materials to help science teachers teach about the debate but there is no actual project, alas. I have however mapped all the technical concepts taught in K-12 science education.
As for sensitivity the concept is scientifically incoherent. One can ask abstractly what doubling CO2 might do if nothing else happens, like things such as feedbacks, internal variability and independent forcing, but that case is so far removed from reality that it is a worthless distraction.
Adding feedbacks has two problems. First we do not know what they all are, or how they work, not even the sign in some cases. Second given the known nonlinearities they are probably sensitive to unknowable initial conditions hence intrinsically unpredictable, so there is simply no such number. If we then add internal variability and independent forcings it is clear that there is no such thing as CO2 sensitivity in the sense that it predicts climate change. Nor therefore can it be deduced from past climate behavior, which is subject to all of the above complexities.
In short the concept of real sensitivity is based on an impossible assumption. I hope this answers your question.
I also think that the observed CO2 increase has caused no atmospheric warming, but that is a different issue.
Wojick
More self-serving misrepresentation of the usual type. Junk comment.
BBD: I went to some effort to summarize my research on the confusion around the concept of sensitivity but you provide no actual response except your usual casual dismissal. This pattern is now clear for you. You practice what in logic is called argument by assertion, which is no real argument at all just repetition of your claim. From now on I will just make fun of you as that is all you are worth as a debate opponent.
David
You must let the entire field know that it is confused about this. And has been since well before Charney et al. (1979). Remember Charney? It came up a few weeks ago.
Let’s look at a published study addressing these questions in order to arrive at an empirical estimate of climate sensitivity.
[Let’s try that again with the html straight:]
David
You must let the entire field know that it is confused about this. And has been since well before Charney et al. (1979). Remember Charney? It came up a few weeks ago.
Let’s look at a published study addressing these questions in order to arrive at an empirical estimate of climate sensitivity.
Hansen & Sato (2012).
I’ve done a quick literature search for a reply to HS12 and didn’t find anything. If I’ve missed it, please post a link.
You have raised the issue of professional expertise. With this in mind, before you (a non-expert) attempt to claim that Hansen (a globally pre-eminent expert) has his head up his backside, take a deep breath and ask yourself: ‘Who do I think I am and what do I think I am doing?’
***
Then you are an irresolute businessman and likely to remain a poor man. Heartland does not provide its services for free. It requires payment and so should you or you are simply a tool. Remember Dr Johnson’s advice:
Perhaps Dr Johnson would have exempted blogs as the legitimate offspring of coffee house conversation.
What are some of things on the raft of things that don’t make sense in light of 1C sensitivity?
Speak right up. There’s a bunch of us would like to know.
Read the thread instead of asking redundant questions.
You’re awfully niggardly when it comes to answering pointed questions.
ROFLMAO
All hat, no cattle.
Steven Mosher
I can accept the theoretical determination of no-feedback 2xCO2 climate sensitivity of ~1C (Myhre et al.). I have seen no empirical evidence of this figure, but I can accept it a priori.
But here are some reasons why I am rationally skeptical of net overall feedbacks that are so strongly positive that this figure is increased by a factor of 3 to ~3C.
I do not buy Hansen’s posit that our climate has been highly sensitive throughout history, being whip-lashed from one extreme to the other by very small changes in forcing. I rather accept other more logical hypotheses that there are natural “thermostats” that regulate our climate within bounds, and that these are related to the water cycle. There have been some studies suggesting this.
But that is just the “theory”.
The “pieces” that all add up to ~3C are not based on real-time physical observations.
IPCC assumes water vapor will increase in lockstep with warming following Clausius Clapeyron to maintain constant relative humidity, yet there are observations showing that the WV increase is less than one-fourth of this amount.
IPCC tells us in AR4 that “clouds remain the largest source of uncertainty” and concede that its “level of scientific understanding of solar forcing is low”. Every schoolchild knows that the sun and clouds are extremely important in determining the weather, so this basic lack of knowledge makes me skeptical that the IPCC models are able to replicate the climate without this scientific understanding.
Yet, despite the “large uncertainty”, IPCC models estimate that net cloud feedback is strongly positive, adding 1.3C to the 2xCO2 CS
Recent studies by Lindzen + Choi plus Spencer + Braswell based on CERES and ERBE satellite observations show a much lower CS, below !C and a strongly negative net cloud feedback.
Model studies using superparameterization to better estimate the behavior of clouds by Wyant et al. show that clouds have a net negative feedback.
The historical CO2 and temperature record result in a calculated 2xCO2 temperature response of between 0.8 and 1.5, depending on what solar forcing is assumed over the period 1750-2005. IPCC models estimate that solar forcing only contributed 7% of the historical forcing, while several solar studies estimate that solar forcing represented around 50%.
All these many factors have convinced me, Steven, that we do not know what the 2xCO2 climate sensitivity really is, and that it could quite easily be below 1C, as Lindzen and Spencer have estimated from the satellite observations.
And if it really is only ~1C, the whole CAGW premise implodes into irrelevance.
So let’s clear up the uncertainty on climate sensitivity before we get all hysterical.
That’s my point.
Max
PS And no doubt the Hockeystick, Climategate plus other fudging of data, all in the direction of making AGW look more problematic (of which there are several examples in AR4), have made me extremely skeptical. “Fool me once, shame on you – fool me twice, shame on me”.
no dave at 1c you have pale o puzzles. at 3c no puzzles
Isn’t that an indication that paleo is the puzzle?
I think the only puzzle here is why Steven Mosher pretends he knows what he’s talking about.
Andrew
Correction, Mosh knows what he is talking about technically. You can’t fake showing a facility for handling huge amounts of data and doing interesting stuff with R, to name a couple of skills that I am impressed by. The BEST analysis support is very cool stuff.
Mosher, what puzzles me is that I thought you had a background in philosophy of science, as do I. Do you not see that you are making a universal claim and a preposterous one at that? You seem to be claiming that a CS (whatever that means) of 3 solves all known climate questions (or puzzles as you put it). You say specifically that with a CS of 3 there are no puzzles. Surely not, nor can you even know what all the climate questions are, there being untold thousands of these burried in the literature. Nor do you address my CS coherence analysis.
Steven Mosher
“Paleo puzzles” will remain exactly that.
What is needed to support a SC of ~3C (and the IPCC CAGW premise) is empirical scientific evidence based on real-time physical observations or reproducible experimentation (Feynman) plus a description of how this hypothesis could be falsified (Popper).
Not subjective interpretations of dicey paleo-climate proxy data taken over cherry-picked periods of our planet’s distant geological past. This is not much better than “reading tea leaves”, because there are too many unknowns and uncertainties.
Max
Watts versus Gore. No consensus here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/11/13/counter-programming-to-al-gores-dirty-weather-report-will-be-on-wuwt-tv-live-starting-wednesday-nov-14-at-8pm-est/
Dirty weather? Too funny. But the NWS has added a banner to its local forecasts featuring the worst weather in the nation that day. For example: http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?CityName=Toms+Brook&state=VA&site=LWX&textField1=38.9471&textField2=-78.4399&e=0
Coincidence? I think not since bad weather is this year’s CAGW poster child. Unfortunately for Gore today is relatively quiet.
David Wojick
WUWT TV Live had a good program. Lots of “lean red meat” there, even though there were some technical glitches and occasional sound problems.
Monckton gave his usual pitch that may have been too “über-scientific” for many viewers (plus he appeared to have a bad cold and some sound glitches) – but there was substance there. Montford was good. (unfortunately I missed Mosher, being on CET, but I assume his presentation was up to his usual par), Maurizio (and the “secret BBC list” that Tony Newbery has been trying to get for years) was great, Donna LaFramboise listed the facts on “why one shouldn’t trust IPCC” from her book and the end of show by Watts on US weather station errors was also impressive. All-in-all, a bunch of good stuff.
I hope Judith runs a “post mortem” on the two broadcasts (I didn’t tune in to Al Gore’s “dirty weather” pitch, but can imagine what he was trying to sell).
What was your overall impression?
Max
Reading comments on this and other blogs suggests another way of understanding the lack of consensus.
Until recently, the whole idea of “climate” has been the assertion that past weather patterns are the best predictors of future weather. Today, those who promote “climate change” are actually asserting that future weather will not follow past patterns because we humans have altered the environment so much with our GHG emissions, and some would add with our other impacts, such as urban developments, land and water usage, and dispersion of chemicals. Thus, we can only guess at future weather by means of complex computer models that incorporate forcing factors and are tuned to hindcast historical weather patterns. And, it is claimed, these models are saying the future will be bad for humans and the planet if we don’t change our ways.
This is really a remarkable claim, and a total dismissal of previous meteorological principles. Many, unsurprisingly, are skeptical of the claim and nervous about trusting the “ghost in the machine.” Climate change advocates seize on any unusual weather as proof that today’s events are “unprecedented”, while skeptics refer to similar conditions in the past and fit the events into historical patterns. So which is it: “We’re not in Kansas anymore,” or “What goes around comes around, as usual.”
It would be an interesting academic debate that would be resolved eventually, except that many billions have been spent on climate change, and industries have placed huge bets on policy actions that will not wait for the decades necessary to see who is right on the fundamental premise.
All these fancy words. But, what about all these happenings?
http://climate.noaa.gov/warmingworld/
Many here believe this climate science stuff is just another one world government totalitarian thing. Have you ever considered you could be wrong? What if there really is something going on within our atmosphere and oceans and land/ice masses. What if the science, ragged edges and all, actually has learned a lot? Uncertainty does not mean not knowing!
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/index.htm
And how can you ever know if you don’t investigate with a eye toward learning. Seems like all the arm waving is about hiding from all the actual factual stuff that’s out there.
OK. Let’s put you down as “we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
Say, cc,
The hive is alive
with the buzz of confusion
With warnings they hum
Of a thousand fears…
The hives fill yer head
With the sounds of delusion,
Global warming unknown
In ten thousand years…
H/t Hive members, Erlich, Hansen*, Pauchari, Suzuki et al.
* http://www.climatedepot.com/a/11549/NASAs-James-Hansens-death-train-argument-denied-as-a-nuisance-by-Supreme-Court
BBD
Watch your manners, sonny.
Or your momma will wash out your mouth with soap
Max
You are crossing the boundary from silly to laughable ;-)
David Wojick and I have both claimed that the climate sensitivity (aka equilibrium climate sensitivity) is a scientifically incoherent concept. Would anyone like to take the opposite side of the argument?
The entire field of climatology takes the opposite side of the argument.
I take it that you are taking the opposite side. What’s your argument?
It is that you are not mounting a credible challenge to an entire field of science. You lack the means. Where are the published, peer-reviewed studies that back up your iconoclastic ideas?
Argument by assertion in blog comments is not going to take down a central tenet of climatology.
BBD (Nov. 15, 2012 at 4:18 pm)::
To state that your opponent is not mounting a credible challenge lacks the element of reason. What are your reasons, if any, for holding your opinion?
Don’t need any reasons. Ever watch a prospective engineering student argue with a professor after receiving a failing grade for completely butchering an exam? That’s what this is like; the only difference is that the fake skeptics don’t go away with their tail between their legs.
There are close to 50 crackpots on this comment area trying to get attention for their alternative theories and they can’t take a hint when told they haven’t made the grade.
Instead they think they can argue in terms of fairness and by quoting Feynman. No chance. You either come up with some substantive science or put it to rest.
BBD:
You’ve tried bluster and it hasn’t worked. Why don’t you try appealing to our intellects?
I gather, then, that you have no argument to offer.
You have read my argument and apparently not understood it. You have failed to acknowledge the extreme weakness of your position. You have failed to provide a broadly accepted and widely supported, widely referenced scientific argument that counters the consensus position on the utility of the concept of climate sensitivity.
You’ve bloviated and in the process have stated a number of premises that are false or unsupported. You have not, to my knowledge, made a reasoned argument. By “reasoned” I mean that all of the premises are stated and are true and the conclusion follows logically from these premises.
Joshua,
Your comments continually provide evidence of your motivated reasoning.
Demonstrate the errors in the argument then. This should be trivial enough. By demonstrate, I mean *demonstrate*. Not merely assert that there are errors. If you need a template, see my previous comments to you.
You’ve addressed that statement to yourself. If you meant to address it to me, I need to have your argument before I can try to take it apart. As David Wojick has pointed out to you, a bunch of unsupported assertions is not a reasoned argument.
Absurd threading nit-picks?
What you need to do, Terry, is acknowledge that your beliefs about the concept of sensitivity are unsupported nonsense. This is your only option, since you cannot proved a referenced and widely accepted scientific argument in support of your notions.
You are wasting your own time and mine with this.
BBD,
Demonstrate the argument you cite then. This should be trivial enough. By demonstrate, I mean *demonstrate*. Not merely assert it is correct. Let us know if you need a template.
Vassily, you need only read the thread.
BBD (paraphrased) to a question he struggles with : go and read the thread
Either produce the answer or admit you have none. If the answer is indeed in there, somewhere, it’s your argument, so you do the spadework of digging for it through tangled, interrupted and fragmented threads.
Of course if by chance you happen to know your own argument, might be simpler to just produce it.
Hmmm. Terry – why aren’t you under a bus? Judith doesn’t listen to anyone with your views. Time after time I have been told that most “skeptics” don’t interpret the science as you do.
When many “skeptics” are describing “skeptics” as monolithic in their beliefs (which they do in between the times that they say that “skeptics” aren’t monolithic), they make it clear to eliminate those who interpret the science as you do. They say that your beliefs are not credible, are not based on known and established properties of physics.
Do you have any reaction to how you alternately appear and reappear in the eyes of other “skeptics,” based merely on whether your views are convenient to their rhetoric and tribalism?
> When many “skeptics” are describing “skeptics” as monolithic in their beliefs
Only highly tribal “believers” like Joshua like to believe this is the case.
???
You have not seen “skeptics” describe “skeptics” as monolithic in their beliefs? Really?
Petra:
Actually, Joshua was wrong in his presumption that “Judith doesn’t listen to anyone with your views” She published my views a year and a half ago in a series of three peer reviewed articles. The referee was Dr. Curry.
Terry –
Well, apparently I was wrong. So how then would you reconcile why Judith would both publish your views and also say that she doesn’t listen to anyone who doubts that ACO2 is warming the climate.
Is there a legitimate way to both hold the views you do w/r/t “sensitivity” and still not take it as a given that ACO2 is warming the climate?
Assuming that to be true (which is the only way I can see to reconcile Judith’s actions with her statements), then do you suppose that Judith does not categorically disagree with the statement that:
Now that would also seem hard to reconcile, as if I’m not mistaken, Judith has herself extensively discussed her views on climate sensitivity. She is so invested in it as a “coherent concept” that she offers extensive opinions on how the IPCC incorrectly estimates climate sensitivity. Why would she express such extensive and definitive views on something that is scientifically incoherent? Any ideas?
Joshua:
There is a question of whether ACO2 is warming the planet and a separate question of whether the IPCC reached its 2007 conclusion via a logical and scientific process. The papers of mine that Dr. Curry has published address only the latter question.
The former question asks whether ACO2 causes the planet to warm. That condition A causes outcome B is tough to prove. Usually, the best that we can do is to show that condition A provides a degree of information about whether the outcome will be B1, B2, and so forth.
If we had enough observed events, it might be possible to produce a model that produced enough information about whether the Earth will warm or cool under various conditions for CO2 emissions to be meaningfully regulated. Currently, we have no observed events and thus we have no information on which to base regulatory policy.
Terry –
Actually, I need to change this working:
That is obviously possible. My question is better stated as: Is it possible to believe that ACO2 warming the climate is a given and still believe as you do about “climate sensitivity.” It seems to me that believing that ACO2 definitely warms the climate would necessarily imply a belief that “climate sensitivity” is a coherent concept. Am I wrong?
Joshua
Can’t CO2 be a factor that varies in importance over time?
Rob –
If true, I see no reason why that would render it a “scientifically incoherent concept.” Do you?
Either we accept the physics of radiative transfer and its implications for the climate system or we don’t.
Brave brave Sir Joshua enjoins the battle, his weapon of choice being a concerted effort to not understand any English beyond what a five-year-old would.
At issue here : Judith doesn’t “listen” to people who don’t buy AGW at all. Our substitute five-year-old seems to think this is literal, and means zero communication. Zip, nada, …
Refresh my memory, someone – at what (mental) age does metaphorical language normally enter the consciousness ?
Now this is a classic:
So for our friend Vassily, communication with someone does not require listening.
Like said – it’s all information.
Terry –
Yes, it is tough to prove. We can see that fact in that the iconic IPCC statement only estimates probabilities, rather than asserts proof.
But Watts and many other “skeptics” say that most “skeptics” don’t doubt that ACO2 warms the climate. Judith has said that:
Once again – there is a sharp distinction between your views and those of Judith. I find it odd that on the one hand she outright rejects your views on the basic issue in question, yet at other times seems to think your perspective valid. Now of course, just because she rejects some of your views, even if they are on the most fundamental of questions, she needs to reject all of your views – but it does seem that it would be better if she were more consistent in her orientation towards “skeptics.” On the one hand, she considers “extended peer review” comments from knowledgeable people such as yourself to be highly informative to the debate, but without much effort to differentiate the different comments from that same group, she also states total disagreement from the same source of input.
And off-topic but interesting nonetheless, she has also posted the following – a statement from Dr. Eric Wolff and her response:
Seems rather interesting since now she thinks that global warming has stopped.
Sorry –
Just because she rejects some of your views doesn’t mean that she needs to reject all your views…..
So for our friend Vassily, communication with someone does not require listening.
Truly astounding. Rather than retract his own idiocy, Joshua now wriggles to try and ascribe what he had said to someone else, and then criticise it!
???
You have seen “skeptics” describe “skeptics” as monolithic in their beliefs? Really? Where? An isolated case I could believe, but routinely?
Yes. Quite routinely. As an example, look at the recent thread where steven mosher, Peter Miller, mannacker, David W. (and perhaps others) exchange monolithic descriptions of what “skeptics” do and don’t believe – ironically noting the logical flaw in the thinking of those in disagreement with them but not seeing that same logical flaw in their own thinking.
Joshua
You are certainly not as stupid as you sound (at least I sincerely hope so).
There is only ONE “monolithic” conclusion “skeptics” have reached and that is that the CAGW premise of IPCC is not supported by empirical data.
Beyond that basic conclusion, there are many facets. I pointed out to Steven Mosher that his notion of what “skeptics believe” was false in my case.
Let’s take one specific example involving two posters here: myself and Jim Cripwell.
We are both rationally skeptical of the IPCC CAGW premise.
Yet he totally rejects the notion that the GH theory is supported by empirical evidence, while I am willing to accept AGW as a theory, but seriously question IPCC’s model-based conclusions on its magnitude.
Other posters here may have other reasons for their rational skepticism of the IOPCC CAGW remise.
IOW there is no “monolithic” belief on the part of skeptics, with exception of the fact that they are “monolithically skeptical” of the IPCC CAGW notion.
Got it this time?
It’s not that complicated.
You just have to clear out the clutter in your mind first.
Max
To add on what Josh is saying, the monolithic thinking is also a form of peer group pressure.
It is universally frowned upon to attack another skeptical crackpot theory. Thus we see these dozens of theories hanging around, with the intention of adding to the FUD.
Do not mention The Fight Club.
Webster, “It is universally frowned upon to attack another skeptical crackpot theory. ” Nonsense, That is a facile generalization, as Joshua would “normally” point out. Whenever a “crackpot” theory is the subject of a post, there are plenty of “attacks” from both sides.
Joshua’s nonsense is now taken to another level by Web. Just how much “frowning on” is anyone writing behind a handle going to suffer from for heaven’s sake?
And even if it did happen, still far more in the spirit of science than on any truebeliever sites like Realclimate, where only gospel-regurgitation and elaboration is allowed. Here Web and Joshua and the other devout CAGWers can say whatever they like. Good.
Manacker –
You rightly objected to mosher stating that “Skeptics believe X,” or “skeptics believe Y.” It was an inaccurate generalization.
Your inability to hold yourself and your friends who identify as “skeptics” to the same standard is evidence of selective logic, weak reasoning, etc.
You provided us with abundant evidence of your double-standard in that recent thread, as you often do.
This is very basic and simple stuff. You are certainly entitled to delude yourself into thinking otherwise.
More evidence of the phenomena I am describing:
I am labeled as a “devout” CAGWer. The sloppiness resulting from lack of specificity notwithstanding, we see here that someone has drawn a conclusion that is false. Why? Because of a willingness to draw conclusions without satisfying the need for supporting evidence.
Unfortunately, this fundamentally flawed reasoning process is ubiquitous amongst the group of people who self-describe as climate “skeptics.” In fact, such reasoning is evidence of “skepticism” and not skepticism.
And in one deft stoke of evasion, Joshua weasels out of his lunatic earlier claim that skeptics are monolithic. I guess he did it to avoid being frowned on by Webhubbub, a local alarmosphere Master.
Joshua
You accuse me of a “double standard”
Be a bit more specific.
Max
Cap’n –
I have to agree. It is not “universally” frowned upon. WHT’s statement is falsified by evidence such as Judith sometimes throwing some “skeptics” under the bus.
But it is surprising to me to lack of rigor I see when people calling themselves “rational skeptics” besmirch the entity of valid skepticism – such as we see with manacker and others so frequently. mosher’s points while invalidated by his inaccurate generalization (over-universalizing, over-generalizing, whatever you want to call it), also contained a basic truth in that they did lay out the kind of illogic, disregard for uncertainty, contradictions, tribalism, double-standards etc., that we often see in the comments of “skeptics” in these threads. The same sort of assessment applies to WHT’s overstatement.
Bated-
I have never, ever said that “skeptics” are monolithic. Not once. That is because it is easily apparent that “skeptics” are, in fact, not “monolithic.”
Again, we see that you draw conclusions w/o a basis evidence. That is “skepticism,” and not skepticism, my friend.
Here is Joshua ‘not’ saying that skeptics are monolithic :
” .. look at the recent thread where steven mosher, Peter Miller, mannacker, David W. (and perhaps others) exchange monolithic descriptions of what “skeptics” do and don’t believe ”
This is typical duplicity of a devout CAGWer like Joshua. I imagine he must have made the odd sensible and non-devious comment, but I have never seen one.
Lots of trash theories to clean up. It takes effort to keep this place from looking like one of those “garbage houses” that you see on the news.
The problem is that the longer you wait, the more unbearable the stench becomes.
You have started the cleanup work on Myrrrhh and then you go to Doug Cotton. Pretty soon you have made some headway. But then eventually you have to start eating your young, the ones that have theories but don’t comment incessantly, yet just enough to raise the level of FUD.
All you will have left is do-nothings who screech and bellow about following the advice of Popper and Feynman, but have nothing to show.
“Eating our own children” (like Myrrh!!) …. Seems Web is now falling in with Joshua’s mouthy tripe about a skeptic monolith.
Myrrh is a fellow-crackpot like yourself and Joshua. We would have no qualms whatever putting all of your on the spit together. Crackpots make good crackling I’m told.
FUD? The real problem is Complacency, False Certainty and Not Enough Doubt. CFCNED. Mmmm, be a sweetie, cook us up a better slogan and acronym will you?
There Tomcat sits festering in his garbage house. Unable to control the crackpots such as Myrrhh, Coffman, Cotton, etc that surround him, he starts to transfer his anxieties on to people like myself and Joshua.
By projecting his own inadequacies and calling us crackpots, he thinks he can reframe the mess and hang it on diligent scientific researchers, people that actually know what they are doing.
Like I have said, this place is a 3-ring circus, filled with clowns showing off their insanely comical theories, lion-tamers trying to beat down honest science, and trapeze artists and acrobats trying to show off their flexible rhetorical skills.
Yet more content-free waffle from Web. He really has gone downhill. Time was when he could marshall an idea with some identifiable form. Now he just leads the unhappy alliance of sullen wackos here.
‘Could do better’.
Monolithic skepticism?
A bizarre notion indeed. CAGW believers are inherently going to be monolithic to extent of their overall faith wrt the dogma as a whole, but skeptics are likely to question/accept any number of various combinations of the various components thereof.
Particular Physicist
Precisely!
(As I have tried to explain to Joshua.)
It is astounding that Joshua (a “believer” in the IPCC CAGW premise) is trying to tell “rational skeptics” of this premise what they think.
And, when they tell him otherwise, he tells them that’s not really what they think.
Apparently he believes that he has paranormal psychic ability.
Max
Remember these CAGW “believers” have proven beyond all reasonable doubt their ability to believe what is reasonably doubted.
So do tell us, pray, what the major points of the alleged monolith of skepticsm are.
Petra, Cheaters will never prosper.
Petra
The “monolith” of skepticism may be the motto:
“illegitemi non confide” (don’t trust the bastards)
Max
I would say most skeptics believe the current state of academic climate science is akin to the brown stuff that comes out of a cow’s butt.
“Do you have any reaction to how you alternately appear and reappear in the eyes of other “skeptics,” based merely on whether your views are convenient to their rhetoric and tribalism?”
Impressive, self-serving smokescreen. The question Joshua strains to disguise this time being how, to tribal fake believer himself, Terry’s views alternately appear and reappear, based merely on how these views are convenient to Joshua’s rhetoric and tribalism?
I refuse to join any tribe that would have ME for a member.
Similarly, I would refuse to join any tribe that would have YOU as a member.
It is fascinating how many times “skeptics” have determined that I said that “skeptics” are monolothic – even though I never said such, and in fact criticized mosher for using such an inaccurate generalization (he didn’t actually say that they are monolithic – but his statements of how “Skeptics think X, or skeptics say Y,” etc., logically imply an attribute of being monolithic.)
What is also fascinating is how “skeptics” right objected to mosher’s inaccuracy even as they employ the exact same ill-logic.
Heh!
That should read “What is also fascinating is how some“skeptics” rightly objected to mosher’s inaccuracy even as they employ the exact same ill-logic.
and still nobody gets the point of that exercise.
Mosher –
If your intent was to hoist “skeptics” on their own petard – job well done, sir!
To label me as a “skeptic” is inaccurate. I have a 13 year long background in the design and management of scientific studies. In a job such as that, avoidance of methodological errors is of paramount importance. Thus, over a period of many years I studied up on topics relating to the methodology of science. In this way learned how, in the design of a study, one could avoid methodological error. I had the good fortune of tracking down and hiring a theoretical physicist who had developed error-avoidance procedures not taught in universities and inserted these procedures into the studies I designed. That these studies were free from error was extremely unusual.
This background gives me an unusually great ability to spot errors in scientific studies designed by others. Three years ago, with no previous background in climatology, I began to poke around in climatology looking for methodological errors. Within half an hour I hit the jackpot. A scientific study needs a statistical population else this study is not scientific. The study described by the IPCC in AR4 didn’t have one!
In the interim, I’ve tried to alert people to this error and to related ones such as the incoherence of the CS as a concept. To report errors has placed me in conflict with skeptics as well as warmists. Few people, it turns out, want to hear about errors in the methodology of an ongoing study and the number who are willing to work toward the elimination of errors in the methodology of an ongoing study is vanishingly small. The motivating factor seems to be that to admit methodological error makes everyone who has ever worked in that study look like an incompetent. Thus, from the standpoint of self interest, it’s better to cover up errors than to bring them to the light of day and fix them. I’ve witnessed this pattern of behavior outside of climatology as well as within it.
Terry Oldberg | November 16, 2012 at 11:34 am said: ”The motivating factor seems to be that to admit methodological error makes everyone who has ever worked in that study look like an incompetent. Thus, from the standpoint of self interest, it’s better to cover up errors than to bring them to the light of day and fix them ”
Terry, you have hit the nail on the head! ”Probably” you suffer from that same ”ego-sickness” also – otherwise you would have acknowledged my comments.
I’m the only one with proofs beyond any shadow of a doubt: warmings / coolings are NEVER global – laws of physics don’t permit that. BUT, the ”Skeptics” got stuck into lots of past phony ”GLOBAL” warmings and GLOBAL ice ages – now are avoiding to admit that: they have being duped by Plimer and similar.
When part of the atmosphere gets warmer than normal – other part MUST get colder than normal – otherwise that extra heat is discharged in minutes = therefore: the Warmist don’t have a case!!!
the only reason Warmist are flourishing, is because; the fake Skeptics are prepared to shield the Warmist for as long as possible To quote your sentence: ”Thus, from the standpoint of self interest, it’s better to cover up errors than to bring them to the light of day and fix them ”
Terry, do you belong in that club also?!?!?!
http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2011/08/29/hello-world/
StefanTheDenier:
As in the investigation of the warmists, in your investigation the methodology is dogmatic rather than scientific. It will remain so until somebody identifies the statistical population so we can test your assertions.
Joshua
Imo- you frequently misunderstand Judith’s views.
Could be, Rob. Certainly within the realm of possibility. Do you have anything in specific that you’re thinking of – ideally w/r/t something I’ve said in this thread?
Rob,
I’d say Joshua selectively misunderstand’s everything that doesn’t support his ideological beliefs. Then he twists what been said so he can write more of his arguments derived from his ‘motivated reasoning’ (his term he applies to those who do not share his ideological beleifs)
Peter –
Actually, the evidence shows that the fundamental attributes in our cognition and psychology that lead to motivated reasoning apply to all of us, including myself (and those who agree with me on any variety of issues). It is only if we are open to that evidence that we we might be able to control for the corrupting influence of those processes of biased reasoning. I take it as a matter of faith that my reasoning is prone to biases – and as a result work hard to control for those biases. I’m quite sure I don’t do a perfect job.
Joshua said:
Clearly you are not open to evidence that does not confirm your biases. That is demonstrated by most if not all your comments.
Peter –
We all are predisposed to be closed to evidence that contradicts our biases, including me. Now despite you falsely indicating otherwise, along with other false claims that you’ve made about me, I have always acknowledged the universality of the problem. Now I may not successfully control for that problem, but at least I acknowledge that it is universal. Logically, if anyone is going to control for that problem, the first step would be to acknowledge its universality.
Joshua,
More bla bla bla. Since you say you recognised you have the problem, why don’t you make an effort to control it. Clearly you haven’t even tried. Your posts are just loaded with ideologically driven drivel. I’ve been pointing out example over the past few days. Why haven’t you made an attempt to address your problem, admit that your an ideologue and will try to open you mind and mend your ways. You could confess! And admit to all your past sins against humanity!
Joshua, Imo- you frequently misunderstand Judith’s views.
His efforts in that regard are unparallelled. Just loves straw and point-scoring .
Joshua (Nov. 16, 2012 at 4:54 pm):
The idea that there is a “climate sensitivity” is scientifically worthless and should be discarded. To convert IPCC climatology to a science, we need to replace this idea with the statistical population that presently does not exist. With the availability of a population plus a sufficiently large sampling of observed events from this population it is possible that we could build a logically and scientifically sound predictive model. Many people believe that we already possess predictive models but this is not true. Said predictive model might or might not support the contention that rises in the CO2 concentration significantly bias fluctuations in the outcomes of events toward warming.
Wear the George A. Romero Award with pride.
BBD:
Romero seems to be a film director. Is this relevant?
Zombies are fictional creatures, but arguing with the fake skeptics is similar to beating back zombies. They keep coming wave after wave. The only good thing is they are individually very easy to handle, as they are single-minded in their mental outlook. That’s the connection to Romero as I see it.
Web > arguing with the fake skeptics is similar to beating back zombies.
To this committed believer in the fake consensus gospel, every non-believer is a fake – by definition. That’s the best he can manage.
Here we go again. Terry tells again what’s the only way of doing science. That’s, however, only one of many. Doing valid science is not only making explicit hypotheses and testing them using statistics. Anybody with the slightest real life contact with science knows that Terry’s view contradicts the reality. Most of the valid scientific work is something else.
One may criticize any particular point in IPCC reports, but making blanket statements as Terry does is totally unjustified and tells of lacking understanding of what science really is.
Pekka:
I am a critic, on logical grouds, of the methodology of global warming climatology. I work by submitting proofs of my assertions for review and comment.
You have not, to my knowledge, refuted a single one of my proofs. As you are apparently incapable of doing so, it seems to me to be appropriate that you should now accept them as valid.
Proofs that are based on self-maded assumptions are worthless. That’s the whole point.
You cannot prove anything starting from solid or even generally accepted assumptions. If you wish to argue more. then, please, present your argument in full. That should make it easy to see where you use unfounded assumptions. Without that I can only conclude that a proof that leads to counterfactual results cannot be right. Your conclusions contradict clearly the reality of scientific process and are therefore necessarily counterfactual.
Pekka:
The argument that you have just given draws an inference from an equivocation on the term “scientific.” According to the academic philsopher James Hall of the University of Richmond, “Proper inferences avoid equivocation.” See lecture #13 in the series of lectures entitled “Tools of Thinking: Understanding the World through Experience and Reason” published on DVDs by The Teaching Company.
Why? There is no credible challenge. You have no scientific case but you assert that an entire field of science is in error. Now that lacks the element of reason.
Your statements that “There is no credible challenge” and “You have no scientific case..” are unsupported as well as erroneous.
BBD
The credible challenge to IPCC’s CAGW premise is simply that it is not supported by empirical scientific evidence (Feynman) and that it cannot even be falsified (Popper).
Tell me how it could be falsified and cite the specific empirical scientific evidence that supports it and you are off the hook.
Max
Then list your references. I cite the entire field of climate science.
You’ve tried bluster and it hasn’t worked. Why don’t you try appealing to our intellects? (sorry, this was originally posted under the wrong BBD comment)
OK, Terry Oldberg, take your pick on topics you want to discuss:
1. Radiative and spectral properties of greenhouse gases
2. Detailed energy balance in the context of continuity equations
3. Sequestering of thermal energy or CO2 via diffusional pathways
4. Projection of world-wide fossil fuel usage
5. Time-series analysis of noisy signals and the potential of modeling via reversion-to-the-mean random walk processes.
6.Thermal activation of CO2 and water vapor outgassing with increasing temperatures.
Those are a few of my interests that most fake skeptics are afraid to go near, so I am curious as to what you have to offer.
FYI: We’re in a thread whose topic was introduced in my post of Nov. 15, 2012 at 3:31 pm and is not a member of your list. Do you care to debate this topic? By the way, to suggest that I might be a “fake skeptic” is an example of an ad hominem argument. This type of argument is illogical.
Terry,
Your arguments are mostly empty rhetoric.
You make up definitions and find the reality in conflict with them. Then you conclude that there’s something wrong with the reality.
Think again.
Pekka,
Are you defending the idiot blowhard with the physically impossible delusions?
You are a disappointment.
Pekka
As a proper climate scientist here, I think most here would hope and rely on to you stick to your normal high-grade answers.
Petra,
I’m physicist, system analyst and energy economist, but not a climate scientist.
I have done my share in arguing with BBD, but that doesn’t mean that I would always agree with those who disagree with him. That I chose to comment on Terry is not based on this thread alone, perhaps not even to a major part on this thread. I had similar views on the long posts that he authored, and the same issue comes up most of the times he comments on anything. He invents rules and finds that others violate them. So what?
“to suggest that I might be a “fake skeptic” is an example of an ad hominem argument. ”
It’s a term identifying the user as a fake believer.
WHT
You “list of topic” are marginally interesting, but let’s cut to the chase and discuss
empirical scientific evidence (Feynman) supporting the IPCC CAGW premise and how this hypothesis could be falsified (Popper)
It’s up to you, buddy.
Max
Max, take Webster’s 3.
Cap’n
Thanks for tip.
If Webby’s “3” provides empirical scientific evidence (Feynman) supporting the IPCC CAGW premise and how this hypothesis could be falsified (Popper), I’ll take it.
If not, I’ll skip it.
Max
1. Radiative and spectral properties of greenhouse gases
The guy suggests that the imbalance at the TOA is preserved because emissions from greenhouse gases is ‘smeared across the spectrum’.
2. Detailed energy balance in the context of continuity equations
Energy is conserved in theory and practice – albeit by adjustments and not precisely in the models. But the system is nonequilibrium and the pathways too complex for back of the envelope analytics.
3. Sequestering of thermal energy or CO2 via diffusional pathways
The oceans are not warmed by the atmosphere. It is physcally unrealistic – and because of nonequilibrium processes computationlly improbable as a black box model. A two compartment CO2 function with an invented ‘effective diffusion’ for the carbon cycle is conceptually stupid.
4. Projection of world-wide fossil fuel usage
Wasting years on this obsession is very telling when anyone sensible knows that the real measure is liquif fuels availability.
5. Time-series analysis of noisy signals and the potential of modeling via reversion-to-the-mean random walk processes.
A saw tooth function is not remotely a model for galcials/interglacials. A superficial resemblance between predetermined bounds is entirely nonsense.
6.Thermal activation of CO2 and water vapor outgassing with increasing temperatures.
Error arises from not considering all the factors as I pointed out yesterday – http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/14/policy-rhetoric-and-public-bewilderment/#comment-267935
The guy is a relentless idiot.
Chief lives by the rhetorical argument. He has no understanding of the statistical mechanics behind a gray-body population of photons. Strike his criticism of #1.
He is tainted by his belief that chaotic mechanisms supercede energy balance arguments. He doesn’t seem to understand that continuity equations by their definition are non-equilibrium. Because that is what they are used to solve. Strike #2.
He has no appreciation for the utility of diffusional models to solve problems. His loss, not that of James Hansen and others that use the approach. He doesn’t seem to understand that an analytical diffusion solution is already multicompartment, and a multii-box is used to solve the numerical case. Strike 3.
He apparently doesn’t think that future usage of fossil fuel has any bearing on co2 emissions. I like to include this factor so we remember the bigger picture. He whiffed on that softball.
He doesn’t understand that highly sensitive systems
occupying a shallow energy state can follow a time series that approximates a random walk. The real signal due to a forcing function can potentially get extracted from the noise. The Chief ought to get a copy of Nate Silver’s book called The Signal and The Noise.
The last thing on outgassing completes Chiefs 0-for-everything because he cannot bear the thought that his Aussie buddies Girma and Salby are wrong.
Lot of interesting physics to consider as long as you dont suffer from the combination myopia and Tourettes syndrome that afflicts the Chief.
‘Chief lives by the rhetorical argument. He has no understanding of the statistical mechanics behind a gray-body population of photons. Strike his criticism of #1.’
Absolutely not. Smearing of energy across the spectrum in emissions was simply error on your part – which if you had any honesty you would simply acknowledge. Nor is it statistical at all but governed by quantum considerations at the atomic level.
He is tainted by his belief that chaotic mechanisms supercede energy balance arguments. He doesn’t seem to understand that continuity equations by their definition are non-equilibrium. Because that is what they are used to solve. Strike #2.
Chaos in climate results in emergent behaviour that influences the energy balance at TOA. The evidence is quite clear. The nonequilbrium system means that simplifying concepts such as maximum entropy don’t apply. There are no simple solutions only unwarranted simplifying assumptions.
He has no appreciation for the utility of diffusional models to solve problems. His loss, not that of James Hansen and others that use the approach. He doesn’t seem to understand that an analytical diffusion solution is already multicompartment, and a multii-box is used to solve the numerical case. Strike 3.
He diffuses heat from the atmosphere to the oceans using an ‘effective diffusion’. Physically incorrect and impossible to derive and validate an ‘effective diffusion’ for a black box model. It is delusional.
The CO2 function has the atmosphere and the ocean – two compartments. There are many more compartments than this. It is akin to heat diffusion. Simply because heat diffusion conceptually has layers as heat progressively moves into a substance is quite irrelevant to the many different sources and sinks of carbon in the environment.
It produces error in that even essential processes such as the interaction of vapour pressure and temperature are not considered leading to outgassing with higher temperature. Not true as shown at the NOAA site linked to. All he has is imaginary numbers (in the sense of pure fantasy) – and seems incapable of cross checking against what is understood of how things really work.
He apparently doesn’t think that future usage of fossil fuel has any bearing on co2 emissions. I like to include this factor so we remember the bigger picture. He whiffed on that softball.
No simply that your obsession with peak oil is idiotic and you have wasted your life on this stupid idea.
He doesn’t understand that highly sensitive systems
occupying a shallow energy state can follow a time series that approximates a random walk. The real signal due to a forcing function can potentially get extracted from the noise. The Chief ought to get a copy of Nate Silver’s book called The Signal and The Noise.
Again – to conceive of glacial/interglacials as an Ornstein–Uhlenbeck process – to produce a saw tooth graph that in no sense is a representation of reality – is a metaphor for your own poor grasp of reality.
The last thing on outgassing completes Chiefs 0-for-everything because he cannot bear the thought that his Aussie buddies Girma and Salby are wrong.
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/sabi2854/images/fig03.3.gif
‘Figure 3.3 shows the distribution of total net sea–air CO2 fluxes. The darker shades indicate oceanic areas where there is a net source of CO2 to the atmosphere and the lighter shades indicate regions where there is a net sink of CO2. The equatorial Pacific is a strong source of CO2 to the atmosphere throughout the year as a result of upwelling that brings deep, high CO2 waters to the surface in the central and eastern regions. This upwelling, and thus the CO2 flux to the atmosphere, is heavily modulated by the El Niño–southern oscillation (ENSO) cycle. During strong El Niño years the equatorial Pacific CO2 source can drop to zero. During La Niña the CO2 source to the atmosphere is enhanced. High CO2 outgassing fluxes are also observed in the tropical Atlantic and Indian oceans throughout the year. The Arabian Sea becomes a significant source of CO2 to the atmosphere in the late summer and early fall months as the south-east monsoon generates intense upwelling off the Arabian peninsula.’
You are wrong about outgassing because you have not taken into account complexities that are easily discoverable. Girma is equally wrong – as I think I suggested. Salby did not address outgassing to my knowledge.
You are just a worthless fool who wallows in ignorance, dishonesty and abuse.
CH
Who argues that the oceans are warmed by the atmosphere? Where? I thought the mainstream position was that tropospheric temperature determines the rate at which the ocean cools.
BBD: citing the entire field exemplifies your only claim which is that all of climate science is behind you, which is of course nonsense. It is amusing though that your citation includes those well known journal articles that question the existence of the basic greenhouse effect. This is a bit like citing the expert reviewers as supporting the IPCC SPM conclusion even though many are skeptics, including me. But hey I got the Nobel prize right, same as Mann.
Not on the utility of the concept of climate sensitivity it isn’t. Again, this is more tactical misrepresentation. If you wish to be taken seriously you need to stop behaving like this. It makes you look like an unscrupulous and dishonest player operating in bad faith.
Wojick > citing the entire field exemplifies your only claim which is that all of climate science is behind you, which is of course nonsense.
BBD > Not on the utility of the concept of climate sensitivity it isn’t. Again, this is more tactical misrepresentation. If you wish to be taken seriously you need to stop behaving like this. It makes you look like an unscrupulous and dishonest player operating in bad faith.
—
The specifics of what the comment was on are of course irrelevant (and were in addition not about the concept of climate sensitivity).
Again, this is more tactical misrepresentation. If you wish to be taken seriously you need to stop behaving like this. It makes you look like an unscrupulous and dishonest player operating in bad faith.
BBD
Baloney!
Does this include Lindzen, Spencer and others who are rationally skeptical of the IPCC GAGW premise?
Get specific, BBD. Cite empirical evidence based on actual physical observations or reproducible experimentation, which supports the IPCC CAGW premise if you can.
Max
Manacker
If you were paying attention, you would know that this argument between TO, DW and myself is about whether the concept of climate sensitivity is nonsensical.
Lindzen and Spencer *totally* accept the utility of the concept and variously attempt to quantify it in the studies which you reference but apparently have not read.
As for the claptrap about empirical evidence, you need to improve your understanding of the way in which science operates with available evidence and read Hansen & Sato (2012) which is linked upthread.
BBD is right about one thing – it is indeed the case that the means to being down the official climate dogma are scarce – since the climate church effectively selectively invests our taxes it lives off, mainly in arguments proving CAGW, rarely if ever in those that question it.
The single ‘consensus’ conclusion stems from the single source of funding – the state* (politics). And that single conclusion just so happens to massively support the vested interests of the said funder (by justifying increases in taxes and political interference generally), and hence also the careers of those who minister the state-boosting dogma.
Like any organization, the state is simply trying to advance its interests. The very opposite of a conspiracy or secret plot, it is just acting normally.
—
* “State” above used in the general sense, not the specific and narrower sense of a US state such as Kansas..
Back ter the fray …exhilarating ain’t it, lol?
Though, ‘It’s cooling, folks,’ things are hotting up in
Le Grand Debate chez le salon Judith Curry. ..
say, mes braves, where is Kim?
Is this BBD here related to the one eventually tossed off Bishop Hill for a record-breakingly high vaccuous_abuse-to-content ratio ?
Petra,
Yep. That would be the same one. A real dingbat.
Yet BBD’s type is worth studying. He practices what is called “argument by assertion” in logic. This means he does not respond to substantive counter arguments with substantive counter arguments. He typically dismisses them with cursory abuse, a move into the meta level. Or he repeats his claim in different language. Or he claims that all of climate science is on his side, the familiar science versus skeptics fallacy. This dance is interesting to watch, and efficient in its way, but do not waste time formulating technical responses unless he (or she) actually engages.
Yes there’s a large element of ‘The consensus is that the consensus is right’ to his drift.
> ( Myrrh’s) position is that near infrared from the sun is what heats things. There is a lot of near infrared from the sun and it does heat things. By arguing that visible light does not heat things he nullifies the greenhouse effect because that is based on the atmosphere being transparent to visible light and opaque to far infrared.
But not near infrared.
So already end of argument, even without his later implicit assumption claim that the energy from visible light just disappears.
BatedBreath | November 16, 2012 at 11:28 am | ( Myrrh’s) position is that near infrared from the sun is what heats things. There is a lot of near infrared from the sun and it does heat things. By arguing that visible light does not heat things he nullifies the greenhouse effect because that is based on the atmosphere being transparent to visible light and opaque to far infrared.
But not near infrared.
So already end of argument, even without his later implicit assumption claim that the energy from visible light just disappears.
Near infrared is classed with Light not Heat, classed Reflective not Thermal. There are real physical reasons in real world physics for these classifications.
Light cannot move molecules of matter into vibration which is what it takes to heat matter.
It is the Sun’s thermal energy on the move to us which can and does heat matter, because it is capable of moving molecules of matter into vibration which is what it takes to heat matter.
This is bog standard real world physics.
You claim not only “that Light from the Sun can and does heat matter, but that Heat from the Sun doesn’t get through the atmosphere/is not produced by the Sun and so doesn’t heat Earth’s land and water”.
This is complete nonsense reversal, giving the property of the thermal infrared waves/photons to shortwave which doesn’t have this property.
What does it take for you to get a grip on what I’m saying?
Since your claim overturns standard physics it is up to you to prove that what you claim is real world.
Myrrh
Since you flatly contradict bog standard physics by claiming that visible light and near infra-red cannot heat anything, you will need to provide some evidence.
@Myrrh
Even if for the sake of the argument, we say visible light cannot warm anything, this still makes no difference to the overall AGW argument.
The facts remain that the earth is indeed warned by the sun one way or another, resulting in outgoing IR, which warms greenhouse gasses.
So even if true, your claim make zero real difference here.
David Wojick
BBD uses “argument by assertion”, as you write.
He also uses “argument by obfuscation”, “argument ad hominem”, “argument by distraction” and “argument by polemic”.
He masterfully avoids “argument from evidence”.
And, yes, his type is “worth studying”, because he is not a lone operator. Several other “CAGW believers” here use the same approach.
This tells me something about the scientific (in)validity of their argument.
Max
Not very masterful. What you need to do is simply single out one question he refuses to answer and at every encounter ask him to answer it.
With Myrhh, who continually posits that visible light can’t raise the temperature of anything, many people (me included) have pointed out that visible light lasers can burn things. His response “the sun isn’t a laser”. So the only interaction I have with him anymore is to ask him to describe the difference between a blue photon from the sun and a blue photon from a laser. He never answers. He just ignores it. I win by default.
With BBD I’ve settled on asking ‘Why is the amount of cloud cover on the earth about 70% and not 50% or 90%?’
A negative feedback must be admitted to explain any limit below 100%.
> Myrhh, who continually posits that visible light can’t raise the temperature of anything
Which explains why night temperatures are no lower than daytime ones, no doubt.
His position is that near infrared from the sun is what heats things. There is a lot of near infrared from the sun and it does heat things. By arguing that visible light does not heat things he nullifies the greenhouse effect because that is based on the atmosphere being transparent to visible light and opaque to far infrared. Take away the ability of visible light to heat the surface and the greenhouse effect is gone with it.
The fatal flaw in his thesis is the inability to explain what happens to the energy in the visible light photon when it is absorbed by matter. In his mind the energy just ceases to exist which of course violates the law of conservation of energy. He asks for proof that visible light can heat things and I provided youtube videos of visible red, green, and blue lasers setting stuff on fire. Then he says the sun is not a laser. Then I ask for the physical difference between a visible photon from the sun and a visible photon from a laser. He doesn’t attempt to answer it.
Springer
It would help *enormously* if you actually read my responses. Try this one, which I have now re-linked for the third time.
Follow the advice given here.
When you eventually reach the end of the comment you need to read and inwardly digest, you will find this:
I’ve added the bold to aid comprehension.
The point, again, is that it is *obvious* that the climate system is *not* dominated by negative feedbacks because if it was, it would not exhibit known variability. It could not exhibit such variability. That would be physically impossible.
Think, Springer, think.
manacker
Follow the links and advice given to Springer above. It applies just as much to you.
Think, max, think.
Springer > With BBD I’ve settled on asking ‘Why is the amount of cloud cover on the earth about 70% and not 50% or 90%?’
A negative feedback must be admitted to explain any limit below 100%.
BBD> It would help *enormously* if you actually read my responses. Try this one, which I have now re-linked for the third time.
—
BBD it would help ‘enormously’ if ou actually started addressing the question. For once, look at the actual question put to you rather than some other topic on your mind. (Boldness added to aid comprehension). Ask your class teacher if your don’t know what I mean.
Now if you do ever decide to read the question, you’ll see it’s quite *obvious* that it’s *not* about whether the system is *dominated* by negative feedbacks.
Think, BBD, think. It’ll also help you lose the comical feigned air of superiority
BBD
IPCC AR4 WG1 models estimated that the net overall feedback from clouds with warming (over the tropics) was strongly positive, conceding, however, that “cloud feedbacks remain the largest source of uncertainty”
Subsequently, physical observations from CERES satellites by Spencer + Braswell 2006 showed that the net overall feedback from clouds with warming (over the tropics) was strongly negative, thereby clearing up this “uncertainty”.
What does this mean?
Prior to this new knowledge, IPCC models had estimated that the net overall cloud feedback was strong enough to increase the 2xCO2 climate sensitivity by 1.3C (from 1.9C to 3.2C). [IPCC AR4 WG1 Ch.8, p.633]
IOW, if the cloud feedback were neutral, CS would be 1.9C, according to IPCC.
So, if we now have an observed net negative cloud feedback, this would reduce the climate sensitivity to around 1.0C.
——————————————————————————–
So much for physical observations.
One of the reasons for the “large uncertainty on cloud feedbacks” is the poor parameterization of clouds in the climate models cited by IPCC.
A 2006 study by Wyant et al. attempts to reduce this uncertainty by using superparameterization to better capture the behavior of clouds in the models, covering not only the tropics, but also higher latitudes.
These independent study also shows that the net overall feedback from clouds is strongly negative.
IOW there are two bits of data that have been published after the AR4 WG1 cutoff, which both show that the IPCC model assumption of strongly net positive cloud feedback is incorrect, and that this is most likely strongly negative instead, thereby reducing 2xCO2 climate sensitivity to around 1C.
———————————————————————-
The key finding in both cases is simply that the increased reflection of incoming SW radiation from increased low altitude clouds is greater than the increased absorption of outgoing LW, primarily from higher altitude clouds.
Kevin Trenberth had suggested that this might be happening, with “clouds acting as a natural thermostat”, when asked where the “missing energy” of the current warming pause was going.
Rejoice!
We will not be fried – but rather will be “saved” by the clouds!
Max
Manacker:
Note, however, that the methodology of the study of Spencer and Braswell, is necessarily unscientific in view of the absense of the underlying statistical population
Max
I can’t believe you *still* don’t understand this. Must be denial ;-) Nobody’s that stupid.
I also mentioned upthread that S&B11 has been thoroughly rebutted (Trenberth, Fasullo & Abraham 2011). Did you not check this out? Why not? Are you afraid that you will find out that I am correct and your pet study is junk?
David Springer | November 16, 2012 at 9:31 am | With Myrhh, who continually posits that visible light can’t raise the temperature of anything, many people (me included) have pointed out that visible light lasers can burn things. His response “the sun isn’t a laser”. So the only interaction I have with him anymore is to ask him to describe the difference between a blue photon from the sun and a blue photon from a laser. He never answers. He just ignores it. I win by default.
You lose by avoiding my question.
I asked specifically, How does visible light from the Sun heat the land and water at the equator to the intensity it is heated which gives us our huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems?
That is a package. Read it until you grasp what I am asking for. Return with proof that visible light from the Sun does what the fictional Greenhouse Effect energy budget claims and you keep repeating without providing any physical proof..
Idiotic responses are not worth replying to when they keep being repeated.
If you insist on claiming that this is possible, then it is for you to provide conclusive empirical and real physics data. You, and all here, continue to avoid this.
Myrrh
If and when you can explain how the energy from visible light simply vanishes, you can then move to the next stage of your argument. But until then you’re falling at the first hurdle. Over and over and over.
BatedBreath | November 20, 2012 at 1:39 am | Myrrh
If and when you can explain how the energy from visible light simply vanishes, you can then move to the next stage of your argument. But until then you’re falling at the first hurdle. Over and over and over.
I don’t have to explain it.. ( I already have several times in discussions here), it’s for you to work out what happens.
Why do you, generic, have such a difficult time understanding what is meant by “science challenge”?
I’m the one challenging, you are ones being challenged. I am challenging you to provide proof of your claim that “shortwave from the Sun heats land and water” in your claimed “Greenhouse Effect science of shortwave in longwave out”.
To this end I have written a challenge to your science claim, I ask you to: Prove that Visible light from the Sun heats the land and water at the equator to the intensity this is heated (in the real world) which gives us the huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems we have.
This is carefully worded. If you’re not up for the challenge, fine, I can understand that. I know you can’t find it because it doesn’t exist, so is this why you’re introducing distractions, because you’ve looked for it and can’t find it either?
Shrug, if you really want to understand what happens to visible light I suggest you first take on board what I am going to tell you now. That AGWScienceFiction fisics has obliterated all the differences between wavelengths/photons which are packets of particles, to pretend that all “electromagnetic energy is the same and all create heat on being absorbed”. This is sleight of hand in order to con you that shortwave from the Sun is capable of heating land and water.
Look up electronic transitions, this is the level on which the tiny shortwaves operate. This is not the level on which the whole molecules of matter are set into vibration, which is what it takes to heat up matter.
Look up photosynthesis, this is plant life using the visible light energies from the Sun to convert to chemical energy, not heat energy. AGWSF doesn’t want you to understand that not all “absorption” creates heat..
When visible light is absorbed by our eyes it converts to a nerve impulse. This isn’t the creation of heat, visible light is not heating our eyes. This is conservation of energy, to a different energy. Just as in photosynthesis the conversion is into a chemical energy in the creation of sugars.
So, there is “absorption” and “absorption”. Not all absorption creates heat, as I’ve just explained, but AGWSF also produces another sleight of hand in deliberately creating confusion re visible light absorption in the ocean, by using the general meaning of absorption, meaning attentuation, to suggest that all attenuation creates heat. But, absorption is just one possible reason for attenuation, for example, in water visible light is not absorbed at all, it is transmitted through unchanged, so it is not being absorbed even on the electronic transition level. It takes the actual direct heating of water at the equator to give us our huge winds and weather remember..
Another example of electronic transition absorption of visible light is in our atmosphere. Here, the electrons of the molecules of nitrogen and oxygen which comprise practically all of our atmosphere absorb visible light. This causes the electron to be energised and because all electrons prefer being in their ground state the electron returns to this and as it does so it releases the same energy as it took in. This is what happens in reflection/scattering and which is what gives us our blue sky, because blue visible is more energetic than the other colours it gets bounced around the atmosphere more, has more encounters with the electrons in the atmosphere. Blue light in and blue light out, and blue light is not a thermal energy, this is not heat being bounced around..
Shortwave uv is even more energetic than visible light and is divided into the categories ionising and non-ionising. Ionising is when the more energetic uv is absorbed by electrons and bounces them out of their orbit altogether.
Anyway, I specify visible light from the Sun in my direct science challenge not only because it is claimed to be the “major energy heating land and water”, but also because there is much more available on visible light, the science of Optics is well established. If you look and can find how visible light from the Sun heats matter of land and water in any of its pages, do let me know.
If this challenge is too difficult, it can be very hard to find pages on the internet which haven’t been corrupted by the AGWSF false fisics memes and might thus entail you going to science libraries and so on, then give some thought to what I have said in another post here:
Myrrh | November 19, 2012 at 1:01 pm
http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-269255
From which:
“I am giving the TRADITIONAL physics teaching that it is THERMAL INFRARED HEAT from the Sun that we feel as heat from the Sun and which is what heats up matter.
..
“You give two different versions of why the real direct heat from the Sun doesn’t play any part in heating the Earth’s land and oceans.
“The first is that “there is an invisible barrier like the glass of a greenhouse which prevents the heat from the Sun, thermal infrared, aka longwave, getting through from TOA”, and the second, “that the Sun produces very little heat and we get only a tiny bit of that and it’s insignificant”
..
“You can continue to ignore my saying this, but if you are really scientists then you cannot ignore that this NASA page is giving traditional physics in saying that the HEAT WE FEEL FROM THE SUN IS THERMAL INFRARED, LONGWAVE.
http://science.hq.nasa.gov/kids/imagers/ems/infrared.html
“Far infrared waves are thermal. In other words, we experience this type of infrared radiation every day in the form of heat! The heat that we feel from sunlight, a fire, a radiator or a warm sidewalk is infrared.”
“Shorter, near infrared waves are not hot at all – in fact you cannot even feel them.”
IT CONTRADICTS YOU.
DEAL WITH IT.”
As before, you will need to provide physical proof of either/both the AGWSF claims which have changed traditional physics teaching, which is still being taught in traditional physics, that it is the Sun’s thermal energy in transit via radiation we get on Earth, that is, the Sun’s HEAT which we feel on the Earth’s surface, which is thermal infrared, longwave infrared, also known as radiant heat. We cannot feel shortwave.
This is an astonishing thing for anyone to claim..
> If and when you can explain how the energy from visible light simply vanishes, you can then move to the next stage of your argument. But until then you’re falling at the first hurdle. Over and over and over.
Myrrh > I don’t have to explain it.
What you don’t seem to understand, is that do have to explain it. It is your challenge. You can’t just assume it and move on.
So, where does this energy vanish to ?
Which particular wavelength from the sun heats the earth is irrelevant to the basic agw argument. So why all the fuss?
Does visible light cause warming?
Can this not be tested with some sort of filter that only lets through visible light but not the near-IR ?
David
Didn’t realize that you were (like Michael Mann) a Nobel Laureate.
(Do I have to call you “Sir David” now?)
Max
Yet more self-serving nonsense from David, who is rapidly emerging as a real character. And neither an honest nor a pleasant one.
BBD > Yet more self-serving nonsense from David, who is rapidly emerging as a real character. And neither an honest nor a pleasant one.
All this bare BS is , of course, is yet more more self-serving nonsense from BBD, who is rapidly emerging as a real character. And neither an honest nor a pleasant one.
To be clear, that was addressed to Wojick, who only needs to look up to see that what he writes here is junk commentary.
Constantly smearing your opponent with untruths is a very short-term tactic. Every other *honest* player quickly realises that you are operating in bad faith (even if they cannot bring themselves to censure you for it publicly). Same tribe, and all that. Only other dishonest players will let this pass, thus confirming their dishonesty.
Petra
There is a regrettable tendency among several commenters here to simply make up derrogatory falsehoods about me and post them.
You have joined in, so I make the same challenge to you that I made to Bad Andrew upthread: let’s see some examples that demonstrate the alleged ‘record-breakingly high vaccuous_abuse-to-content ratio’.
When you fail to provide any it will be evident that none exist and you are making up falsehoods.
Over to you.
Sorry, that should be ‘derogatory’.
BBD
All you have done is display further bad faith by again ducking the question.
Which simply strengthens the suggestion that it it was indeed you who was banned from Bishop Hill for heavy reliance on abuse ( must have been really impressive to upset even the Bishop, a genuine badge of dishonour, awarded to only the very worst ). But from your style here, can’t say I’m hugely surprised.
Still with you then. Was it or was it not you?
Oh, and what I forgot to mention, is that you show further bad faith here:
> … I will assume the answer you seek to conceal is Yes – ie you did indeed make history by being tossed off Bishop Hill for abuse above and beyond.
which you misquote as an apparent claim
> … [sneaky snip] you did indeed make history by being tossed off Bishop Hill for abuse above and beyond.
A strawman you then seek to defend, thereby continuing your concealment exercise.
I’ve been banned by Montford for upsetting the loons at BH. Of course I’m not denying this. The problem here is your dishonest characterisation of the reason for that ban. A characterisation that you are consistently refusing to back up with quotes and context. Because you are of course *lying*.
And now you are a bit stuck, hence the silly dance you are doing. It’s rather pitiful and if I were you, I would stop.
To *prove* that I am not concealing anything is trivial. See for yourself.
Click the link to that BH thread while you are at it. Find me some evidence for this ‘record-breakingly high vaccuous_abuse-to-content ratio’.
Off you go. Take your alter ego Erica with you ;-)
I’ve been banned by Montford for upsetting the loons at BH
Sure, you were no doubt very civil there. It’s only here you degenerated into rampant abuse in attempts to shore up your position. Naughty naughty Climate ETC for sewerizing BBD.
BBD, Your record here as a bottom-feeder unavoidably speaks volumes.
If you seriously expect anyone to believe this wasn’t why you got banned at BH, you’ll need to do more than try and offload the effort of establishing this, onto your detractors.
BBD
Since you here exhibit the bad faith of ducking the question, I will assume the answer you seek to conceal is Yes – ie you did indeed make history by being tossed off Bishop Hill for abuse above and beyond.
Let’s see some quotes with linked context demonstrating this. I say you are lying and I am going to challenge all such defamation from now on until it stops.
Over to you.
Petra
When you’ve finished the dance of the seven evasions, your response is required *here* – not upthread.
Here.
Over to you…
You are the only dancer of seven evasions BBD.
Still waiting for you to produce the alleged polite yet penetrating quotes that got you banned. The longer you evade, the more sure we become you have none.
So still with you. You could just fess up and we could all get on with other stuff.
‘Monolithic’, Joshua, as in ‘monumentally solid?’ Surely that
suggests ‘consensus,’ Joshua, as in consensus science, as in
‘the science is settled.’ Ahemm …now who says that?
…empirical climate sensitivity incorporates all fast response feedbacks in the real-world climate system … In contrast to climate models, which can only approximate the physical processes and may exclude important processes, the empirical result includes all processes that exist in the real world – and the physics is exact.
What, really, is an ’empirical climate sensitivity’ rating? Like a very simple model with some real values plugged in ? Temp went up X, CO2 went up Y…
And the physics being ‘exact’ ? ALL the physics needed to predict climate ? If Yes, who needs models ?
For transient climate response (TCR) on a timescale of a few years a simple analysis based on empirical data on solar cycles and related temperature variability and basic physics tells the value of approx 2 K (or a little higher). Adding some further analysis based on regional data Tung et al raise that estimate to the range 2.5 – 3.6 K. (GRL Vol 35, 2008)
I like the simplicity of the approach that gives the value of 2+. The correlation between variations in solar irradiance and temperature has been determined by Lean and Rind, Stefan-Boltzmann law applied to TOA is another component and then we need only the value 3.7 W/m^2 for forcing to reach that result.
A completely different issue is the ratio of TCR to longer term responses up to the virtual equilibrium.
Pekka:
TCR (transient climate response) has the merit of being observable and the shortcoming of not being constant. ECS (equilibrium climate sensitivity) has the merit of being constant and the shortcoming of not being observable. In view of the shortcomings of both parameters, one cannot make a falsifiable claim about the numerical value of either parameter. This is my reason for claiming the concept of a “climate sensitivity” to be scientifically incoherent.
Terry,
This is a typical statement from you. You play with words and concepts to make a normal difficulty to appear total obstacle.
The points that you raise are not insignificant but they are not at all as decisive as you tell. That’s your trick to belittle valid science when you don’t like the results.
Pekka:
That’s an ad hominem argument. For the future, please refrain from distracting us and wasting our time through ad hominem arguments.
I do not believe I have played a logically or ethically unacceptable trick on the audience for this debate. If you feel that I have done so, it is incumbent on you to expose this specific trick by identifying the principles of logic or ethics that are violated by it. To spout unsupported or inaccurate generalities such as “This is a typical statement from you,” “You play with words and concepts to make a normal difficulty to appear total obstacle” and “That’s your trick to belittle valid science when you don’t like the results” is distracting, unethical, unfair and time wasting.
Terry,
Noting that you use specific type of arguments time after time is not ad hominem.
The issue is related to what scientific knowledge is and how it gets augmented. You set requirements for science which contradict the experience. Very much of what we now know presently based on science had not been learned if you were correct. Science is not restricted by such rules, it’s restricted only by very general principles like pursuit for truth – which again cannot be defined formally but is understood similarly by most. The whole field of philosophy of science has not led to any single conclusion because science is too multifaceted for that.
Your have stated essentially that you can show that climate science is not science at all, and you have made many equally nonsensical statements. I have not considered it worthwhile to comment every time but I feel that it’s necessary to bring this up every now and then.
Pekka:
I’ve stated my argument.The valdity or invalidity of this argument is unrelated to my personal characteristics. If you wish to try to refute my argument, you must address the details of this argument. To disparage me in attempting to refute my argument is illogical, obnoxious, time-wasting and an example of an ad hominem argument..
Lets discuss TCR and ECS .As you say they have their strengths and weaknesses. Every other single indicator (and every set of indicators) has also their strengths and weaknesses. Indicators are tools for passing information. The recipient of information should understand what is the basis of that piece of information. As long as this is true for an indicator it has it’s justification. Only indicators that are redundant (taking into account their uncertainties) don’t add anything and should be dropped (unless it’s better to drop some other indicator).
TCR allows rather direct determination from empirical data and summarizes a part of it neatly. That makes it a useful indicator.
ECS is certainly more difficult to estimate, and even to define precisely. On the other hand it’s more closely related to long term considerations. It makes perfect sense to study what can be concluded about ECS and to discuss arguments used in reaching these conclusions. That’s perfectly valid activity for scientists. They may very well be doing science in that activity.
There’s no doubt that climate science is science, and a physical science. It’s studying difficult issues and reaches conclusive results slowly. Describing it’s status to outsiders is difficult – and judging properly the status of understanding is difficult for the scientists themselves. But science doesn’t have to be easy or it’s status easy to describe.
Sullivan, you write “What, really, is an ‘empirical climate sensitivity’ rating? Like a very simple model with some real values plugged in ? Temp went up X, CO2 went up Y…”
Not quite. I dont know where your origianl quote comes from. We know global temperatures have been rising at an approximate linear rate of around 0.06 C per decade since the end of the LIA. See http://bit.ly/V19Im8 and http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/MidSummer-MidWinter.htm. There is noise which causes the rise to stay within limits of around +/- 0.25 C. What there is no sign of, is that there has been any cha ge in the rate of rise of temperatures since CO2 started rising at an abnormal rate around 1970.
Now this is not positive evidence; it is negative evidence. I cannot prove that the rate of rise of temperature will not suddenly rise and demonstrate that CAGW is real. But it has not happened yet. So we can conclude from this negative evidence that there is no sign that adding CO2 to the atmosphere has any effect on the rate of rise of global temperatures, from which it follows that there are indications that the total climate sensitivity of CO2 is indistinguishable from zero.
The quote is from Hansen & Sato (2012).
Thanks, BBD.
Your argument incorporates the claim that “global tempertures have been rising at an APPROXIMATE linear rate of around 0.6 C per decade…” The insertion of “approximate” renders your claim irrefutable and thus your argument is unscientific.
Terry, you write “The insertion of “approximate” renders your claim irrefutable and thus your argument is unscientific.”
Pedantically, you are absolutely correct. I ought ot have stated something like “the rate of rise of tmeperature is observed to be 0.06 C +/- something or other”. I did not produce the graph; Girma did. Whether he has the right figures to insert, I have no idea. I dont knows the numbers.
But you are being much too pedantic, IMHO. For the purpose of discussion on this sort of blog, saying that some figure is about something or other, I consider to be acceptable. It conveys what I mean, that the slope is somewhere around 0.06 C per decade, and that is all I care about.
Terry Oldberg | November 16, 2012 at 4:30 pm said: ”The insertion of “approximate” renders your claim irrefutable and thus your argument is unscientific”
Terry, the sin is much bigger than the: ”approximate – can happen -probably – it’s possible – many scientist say – if it happen” and so on, but, you cannot see the sin in the ”precision”, because you are ”probably” part of it: here it’s: .
Saying: ”by 0,06C” and similar con is much more sick, than their ”maybies”. It means: they know that is NOT 0,07C, or 0,05C, BUT is 0,06C…Precision in one hundredth of a degree. (similar as when bureaucrats say: ”the bridge will cost 45 million$ and 376,342, and 23cents, to be built – when is built, the cost is more than double than they predicted; but it was convincing of their understanding / expertise, when they stated dollars and cents
Terry, compare it with the reality: ””They made it official that: ‘’during the northern summer; the planet is WARMER BY up to 3,8C than during the southern summer.’’ WOW, what a science!…
I believe that: their data shows even bigger difference; but they are not heroic enough, to admit -> ‘’smoothening follows’’
The TRUTH: not enough EXTRA WARMTH is in the atmosphere during the northern summer than during southern, to boil one chicken egg with it!!! BUT, it shows that ‘’their modelling’’ is complete crap! It shows warmer, for two unscientific reasons::
#1: because 75% of the monitoring places are on the N/H, 25% only on the southern. Example: if 75 workers get pay increase by 10% for 6 months and 25 workers get pay decrease by 10% = overall together they will be getting more money; than for the next 6 months – when 75 workers get salary decreased by 10% and the other 25 workers get increased their salary by that much. What a con science is used; by not having monitoring places spaced equally!!!… Reason everybody is scared from the truth, and are trying to silence my proofs / science!!!
Reason #2: on the S/H is much more water, than on the northern hemisphere. Where is ‘’more water’’ DAYS ARE COOLER / NIGHTS WARMER!!! It proves that: monitoring only for the ‘’HOTTEST MINUTE’’ in 24h, and ignoring the other 1439 minutes – is the mother of all con and misleading science!!! BY BOTH CAMPS!!! Warmth in every minute in 24h has SAME value; but doesn’t go up / down equally as the hottest minute!!!
That’s admission that they are wrong by 3,8C in 6 months – then look at their ”GLOBAL” temperature charts for the last 150y, 1000y, 6000 years – they ”pretend” to be correct in one hundredth of a degree and occasionally in one thousandth of a degree, for every year. That’s what kind of people FROM BOTH CAMPS are talking about their ”scientific proofs”… where is their credibility, what kind of ”computer models” can be wrong by 3,8C for 6 months non-existent difference in temp – but are talking ”with precision” about 1920’s, 1850’s, 5BC…?
150y ago, there were only few unreliable thermometers; data collected by unreliable people. But that data is used as correct – sometime, by some, is stated as: unreliable; but was / IS used as reliable anyway, by those same people. 400-500-700 years ago.. well the correct GLOBAL temperature ”BY THEIR PROXY” was discovered from: if there were 12 bushels of grain per acre in Devon-shire, England; then next year was only 11,5 bushels -> that means that: in all of Oceania, south America and the other 90% of the planet – the temperature following year was ”COLDER BY 0,04C, on the WHOLE planet…. WOW! What a science – precision in one hundredth of a degree. Look at their GLOBAL temp charts = it looks as seismographs / the planet has a hi-fever…?
Their GLOBAL temp cycles are even more sick. They found in Colorado Canyon erosion that: certain deposits repeat themselves -> instantly they name them as ”factual cycles” in other country, or other continent, alluvial deposits don’t mach the ones in Colorado – instead of admitting that: THOSE CYCLES were not GLOBAL – canyon’s alluvial deposits tell about the past climate ONLY AROUND Colorado- they just ad more and more different cycles. Blame the sun, solar dust; blame everything that cannot take them to court for defamation. Instead of starting to analyse: how the deterioration of vegetation / climate was gradually affected by human inventing the ARTIFICIALLY CREATION OF FIRE. In Eurasia + North Africa 50000-60000 years ago – north America 15000y ago – in Australia maybe 30000y ago. After 20-30 intensive bushfires, the vegetation gives up -> without vegetation -> rainfall decreases = become hotter days / colder nights / more extreme climate. Unfortunately, admitting the truth – so that the climate can be improved – which would bring money to the engineers and working people; but not to the Organized Crime
Before the invention of artificial fires by human – the only fires the earth did know was from volcanoes and lightening storms. Volcanoes aren’t very often – electric storm is associated with rain = because of wet; fire doesn’t go far. Artificial fires first started, when was mulch everywhere – after many generation; the mongrels were turning the best lands into desert… now the Fakes are ”SKEPTICAL” if human can change the climate… self destructive idiots… born losers! Terry, do you belong in that club / cult?
Terry, unless the two unavoidable hurdles are crossed = NOTHING is scientific about ”climate science” here are the two hurdles: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/unavoidable-two-hurdles-to-cross/
Jim – may I suggest that “it is negative evidence” might profitably be replaced with “it is disconfirmation”, or “it is disconfirmatory evidence.”?
“empirical climate sensitivity”
So what I’m hearing then regarding the meaning of this term, is :
Facts: CO2 went up X, temperature went up Y.
Therefore, “empirical climate sensitivity” = Y / X
which carries an assumed (rather than proven) dependence of Y on X, neatly doing away with the need for the complexities of physics and models.
That’s ‘climate science’ in a nutshell.
In addition to doing away with the complexity, the assumption that Y / X is a constant fabricates information. When they knowt X, governmental policy makers naively conclude think they have perfect information about Y when (it can be shown) they have no information. 100% of the information policy makers think they have is fabricated by climatologists.
Jim Cripwell (Nov. 16, 2012 at 5:03 pm):
If you were to avoid equivocations using terms such as “approximate,” “about” and “somewhere around,” I think you’ll find it impossible to prove what you’d like to prove. If the inferred rate of temperature rise is “about 0.6” and the observed rate is “about 0.7” is this inference right or wrong? It can’t logically be said.
Equivocations mask improper inferences. Hence, to get rid of whatever improper inferences are being made via climatological arguments we need to get rid of the equivocations in them. The purpose for this is quality control not, as you imply, pedantic.
Re: climate sensitivity is scientifically incoherent.
What is the rationale behind this claim?
The concept seems coherent enough to me, though that alone doesn’t make it true of course. Can we get a run-down from the advocates of this view?
Vassily:
I offer my argument in a post made on November 16, 2012 at 2:20 pm (see above).
Terry,
We miss only the relationship between your requirements for scientific coherence and those understood (explicitly or implicitly) by most others including active scientists. My estimate is that few if any of working scientists agree with your unrealistic requirements (by scientists I refer here to those studying natural sciences).
Pekka:
You’ve mischaracterised them as my requirements. They are requirements of logic. The methodology of climatological research is illogical.
Terry,
That they are required by logic is only your subjective view. Logic by itself cannot say anything like that. That’s the whole point that I consider fundamentally wrong in very many comments by you. You invent something and then derive from that related statements that are not any more true that the subjective starting point.
Pekka;
It doesn’t sound as though willb is biting on your equivocations..
Pekka, you are being purposely obtuse. Terry has already told you what his requirements are:
– He has defined in detail what he means by science. I think I’m safe in summarizing it as “Science is what happens when the scientific method is applied”.
– As far as I can tell, the definition for the scientific method that he has described is well-established, by Karl Popper and others.
– At this point in time, consensus climate scientists are claiming they have a working hypothesis for how the real-world climate works.
– According to Terry, this hypothesis about the real world is not falsifiable, can’t be tested, and doesn’t let us see if the real world behaves as the hypothesis predicts. I think most scientists would agree that this puts the hypothesis on pretty shaky ground with respect to the scientific method.
I think Terry has made a pretty good case that the hypothesis is unscientific (i.e. scientifically incoherent).
Willb,
Your message is empty. Transferring the point where the assumption from science to scientific method does not make it any more objective. If scientific method is defined narrowly, it’s not true that science is restricted to what using such methods means.
Popper’s views are not uniformly accepted, rather the opposite. In addition there’s some disagreement on what he really meant.
The whole idea that this kind of questions can be answered by logic is absurd.
Pekka:
In your reply to Willb, you trot out a well worn strawman argument in which Popper plays the strawman. Independent of Popper, the difference between a scientific and a dogmatic methodology is and always has been that hypotheses are testable in the former type of methodology but not the latter.
In science all conclusions must be supported by something objectively evaluable. What that really means can be seen checking how scientific knowledge has been developing in practice. It’s seen that very many different approaches have been used. Most important steps have often been made before it has been possible to really test them. All kind of concepts have been of great value in those processes and stating that some particular concept cannot be valuable for science is non-sense.
One thing that we have learned from the extensive literature on philosophy of science is that defining exactly what is science or what is scientific work has not been possible (and probably never will be possible). By that I don’t condone relativism. Case bay case it’s mostly possible to agree whether some particular activity falls within the limits of science even when we lack formal definitions.
Every specific conclusion can of course be criticized and that may involve noting that concepts have not been defined well enough for the particular use they are put in. That doesn’t, however, mean automatically that the concept cannot be used in some other connection. Specifically I do agree that climate sensitivity is a problematic concept but I do not agree that it has to be unsuitable for being used in science.
The stronger statement that the whole climate science is not science is just false. Climate scientists are widely doing work that has clearly the nature of scientific work. They are doing climate science.
I react strongly on all kind of claims of proof that I consider to be without any merit and presented to support very subjective views. We have seen all too many skeptics take that approach. They claim to know or prove issues that are at best unprovable and at worst outright false.
Pekka:
Where to you stand on the morality of basing arguments meant for public consumpation on equivocations, strawman arguments or fallacies of other types?
Pekka,
I agree with you that climate science is science. I also agree with much of what you say in your characterization of science in general. From my perspective science is much more than just presenting hypotheses. It also includes asking questions about the real world, gathering data and making conjectures to answer the questions that were asked. I would consider all of these activities to be science. In my view they all fall under the umbrella of the scientific method.
To me the question is: Are the consensus scientists presenting us with a working hypothesis about the real world that is not falsifiable, can’t be tested, and doesn’t let us see if the real world behaves as the hypothesis predicts? If they are, then I have to say that this part of it falls outside my definition of science.
Willb,
My view on the nature of empirical evidence in support of some skill in making climate projections is that the evidence is scattered. There is quite a lot of such scattered evidence but judging, how well it can verify the predictive skill of climate science is very difficult. The scattered nature of the evidence means that a stepwise approach for using the evidence does not work. We cannot proceed effectively noting that each step is strongly supported by evidence and taking its results as input to the next step, because such an approach is inefficient in using scattered evidence.
When we have a considerable amount of evidence but not in a form that can be used in a stepwise fashion it’s very difficult to tell, how much it really proves. Using models that describe the behavior of the system in many ways, we can make tests using simultaneously many aspects of the data. If the models would be on a really solid theoretical foundations and well defined, that might allow for strong testing that excludes most alternatives and leaves only a very limited set compatible with data. Unfortunately the climate science has not reached that level. Many modelers do, however, claim that the data sets rather stringent limits on the models.
The climate science is still in the learning phase. The data is used to build better models and cannot be used cleanly for testing. Calculating in a formally correct way confidence limits and likelihoods is not possible. A lot has been learned and further learning is going on. This is scientific work and adds to the knowledge base, but as I have tried to say, we cannot really estimate the reliability and accuracy of the conclusions.
Stated in another way, the uncertainties remain large and they are to a significant degree of the nature of lack of knowledge, which means that it’s not possible to justify properly uncertainty ranges or pdf’s. A good example is the set of estimates for the equilibrium climate sensitivity. From empirical data directly and from model analyses that use empirical data as input various groups have reached pdf-type distributions, but they are not really pdf’s but rather at best conditional probabilities that should be used in combination with prior distributions following Bayesian rules. Furthermore the conditional probabilities themselves are obtained making some assumptions that cannot be verified. There’s subjective input in the process at two levels (at least).
From the above one could be led to conclude that I’m a climate change skeptic but I’m not. I put much weight on the basic understanding of the greenhouse effect and I accept the basic idea of the precautionary principle. From this basis I do consider the evidence sufficient for great concern, and I accept that trying to reduce CO2 emissions rather strongly is warranted. Where I’m more a skeptic is in our ability to choose and implement solutions that are both effective enough and certain enough to have a net positive impact.
Terry,
I have no idea of where you see those.
My own view is that all that I have done is to fight your logical fallacy that is created when you claim that you can use logic to tell something that logic cannot tell at all.
Pekka:
To get an idea of where I see those,please read my previous posts.
Terry,
As far as I can judge, all boils back to the fundamental disagreement on formally defining what is science and which concepts belong to science.
Your view seems to be that it’s possible to define formally what’s science and that you know that definition, while I believe that your views on defining science are false. Furthermore I don’t think only that you are not the guardian of the definition of science I but also that formally defining science is not possible at all. My views are not exceptional but based on literature they are shared by a great majority of current philosophers of science and most certainly by the scientists themselves (considering those scientists who have enough interest in this kind of matters to form a real view. Very many scientists don’t care about this kind of meta issues).
“The scientific method” is either based on an excessively narrowly defined caricature of science, or it’s interpreted more widely to include what’s done in valid science. If you feel that the second alternative is vague, you are right. It’s vague because the alternatives are vagueness and logical fallacy, from these a choose vagueness.
Pekka:
You misrepresent my position. This position is based, in part, upon the fact that many terms in the language of climatology are ambigous in their reference to the meanings of these words. In other words, each term possesses multiple meanings. For example, the term “science” possesses the meaning “demonstrable knowledge” and the meaning “the process that is operated by people calling themselves ‘scientists’.”
Ambiguity of reference to the associated meaning is a feature of many of the words in the natural languages. Sometimes this ambiguity does not cause trouble. It does cause trouble in attempts at logical discourse, for it supports the fallacy that is called “equivocation.” The logician James Hall summarizes the logical impact of equivocation by stating that “Proper inferences avoid equivocation.”
In climatology, equivocation could be avoided through a disambiguation that resulted in a one-to-one relationship between terms and meanings. Climatologists have not done this. Instead, they have made extensive use of the equivocation fallacy in pinning the blame for global warming on CO2 emissions. For details, see my article at http://judithcurry.com/2011/02/15/the-principles-of-reasoning-part-iii-logic-and-climatology/ and Vincent Gray’s article “The Triumph of Doublespeak.”
The equivocation fallacy plays a role in the argument that you make in this thread for calling climatology a “science.” It is a “science” in the sense of ” the process that is operated by people calling themselves ‘scientists’.” It is not a “science” in the sense of “demonstrable knowledge” in light of the absense of a statistical population.
To call climatology a “science” then, is deceptive. You have been guilty of this deception in this thread.
Terry,
I think the last couple messages from both sides tell clearly where we disgree fundamentally.
I agree. The conflict is fundamentally over your preference for a deceptive mode of argumentation and my abhorence of it.
Terry,
If you choose to end with such words, I can only say that I don’t think any better about your judgment.
Pekka Pirilä, thank you for taking the time share your thoughts, it’s a nice counterbalance to the misdirection and confusion some try to inject with their disingenuous attacks on the validity of Climate Science.
Recently, I came across an essay Chris Colose wrote a couple years back that’s an excellent review of the flaws in Curry, and pal’s, approach to the IPCC and their portrayal of climatology in general.
Judith Curry on ‘dogma’ and ideology
http://chriscolose.wordpress.com/2010/11/09/934/
You may have, however, noticed that I end sometimes in argument also with the other side. I dislike badly justified arguments whenever I see such. I believe that the only right way for using science is to take care of not overstating its conclusions, That happens too much for my liking and I believe that that will ultimately backfire.
It’s also important to stick to the right procedures. While I think that the findings of Climategate have been greatly exaggerated, the emails do definitely tell about failures to follow the right procedures. Here we need not to see, how false procedures have backfired.
When I read how Stephen Schneider discussed the difficulty in being both fully honest and effective, I don’t think that he was to least unethical, but I do think that he erred. In the long term being effective is not at all contradictory with being fully honest and open, rather a scientist must be fully honest and open to remain effective. Deviating from that is not bad only for his personal effectiveness but also on that of his colleagues. Presenting these views has to my surprise been too much for some supporters of main stream science. (The counterarguments got immediately aggressive and personal.)
There’s one additional point. Countering false arguments can be done only when they have been presented. Whatever you think otherwise of this site there are few other sites where such an argumentation can foster. In practically all other sites with significant following one side is silenced by the majority even when the host doesn’t do that. Here we have a lot of empty noise but we have also unrestricted argumentation.
.. Here we need not wait to see, how false ..
Did you counter a false argument? Please cite this argument and your counter-argument so readers can examine your claim.
CitizensChallenge Pekka Pirilä, thank you for taking the time share your thoughts, it’s a nice counterbalance to the misdirection and confusion some try to inject with their disingenuous attacks on the validity of Climate Science.
What do you find confusing about traditional physics which works in the real world?
There’s nothing disingenuous about my objections to ‘climate science’, it is fake fisics basics which premise all the AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect.
If you disagree then tough it out, prove you’re right and I’m wrong – see my post above: http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-269255
Pekka’s reason for the absence of radiant heat from the Sun, which traditional physics still teaches is thermal infrared, longwave, and is what we feel as heat from the Sun so does reach us, is that “the Sun gives off very little heat”, the second of the silly reasons which AGWSF followers give for the nonsensical claim that shortwave from the Sun heats the Earth’s land and oceans and the heat from the Sun doesn’t reach us.
Read my explanation and the quote I give from a NASA page still teaching traditional physics which says that the heat we feel from the Sun is longwave infrared, thermal infrared,
THIS CONTRADICTS YOUR AGWSF CLAIM OF “SHORTWAVE IN LONGWAVE OUT”.
You can’t just ignore this and carry on regurgitating your daft unproven memes! If you have any view of yourselves as real scientists you must deal with this.
citizenschallenge |
Your attempts to misdirect, confuse and shoot the messenger are to avail. The only enemy of the climatology is the ‘profession’ supposedly practicing it, that simply would not and still will not take action against members that determinedly sabotage science by pal-review, hiding the decline, and so on, and the unrepentant response to the malpractices revealed in Climategate.
If instead of immediately circling the wagons and refusing to budge or call out the wrongdoers, they had instead disciplined them (fines, demotions, sackings, whatever), the public would have the view that this was all an aberration. But by digging in as they have, they very clearly convey their inner systemic corruption.
I’m still waiting for that objective list of their actual wrong doings. I get vague pointers, but every time I look deeper and read ClimateGate emails, I find nothing that hints at “systemic corruption”… perhaps some pissed off scientists who feel like they are being attacked with dirty tricks, and of course the usual back and forth bickering you’ll find anywhere – but “systemic corruption” not even close.
Yes that’s right CC, years and tears of hiding data, hiding the decline, “redefining” peer-review, arranging to have evidence of the above destroyed, and not a peep from virtually the entire profession over all this, doesn’t show systemic rot at all.
batedbreath:
To your list of offenses, I would add drawing inferences from equivocations.
BBD
Max I can’t believe you *still* don’t understand this. Must be denial ;-) Nobody’s that stupid.
Another helpful post from the BBD that wasn’t thrown off Bishop Hill for habitual conceited abuse. Honest.
This is from 2009:
Japan’s boffins: Global warming isn’t man-made
Climate science is ‘ancient astrology’, claims report
By Andrew Orlowski
Posted in Science, 25th February 2009 12:23 GMT
Exclusive “Japanese scientists have made a dramatic break with the UN and Western-backed hypothesis of climate change in a new report from its Energy Commission.
Three of the five researchers disagree with the UN’s IPCC view that recent warming is primarily the consequence of man-made industrial emissions of greenhouse gases. Remarkably, the subtle and nuanced language typical in such reports has been set aside.
One of the five contributors compares computer climate modelling to ancient astrology. Others castigate the paucity of the US ground temperature data set used to support the hypothesis, and declare that the unambiguous warming trend from the mid-part of the 20th Century has ceased.
The report by Japan Society of Energy and Resources (JSER) is astonishing rebuke to international pressure, and a vote of confidence in Japan’s native marine and astronomical research. Publicly-funded science in the West uniformly backs the hypothesis that industrial influence is primarily responsible for climate change, although fissures have appeared recently. Only one of the five top Japanese scientists commissioned here concurs with the man-made global warming hypothesis.
JSER is the academic society representing scientists from the energy and resource fields, and acts as a government advisory panel. The report appeared last month but has received curiously little attention. So The Register commissioned a translation of the document – the first to appear in the West in any form. Below you’ll find some of the key findings – but first, a summary.”
continued on:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/25/jstor_climate_report_translation/
The scientist who likened climate science to astrology: Dr. Kanya Kusano Program Director and Group Leader Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science & Technology
More from 2009: http://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=10fe77b0-802a-23ad-4df1-fc38ed4f85e3
Posted By Marc Morano – 4:09 PM ET – Marc_Morano@EPW.Senate.Gov
“Update: More Than 700 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims
Outpouring of Skeptical Scientists Continues as 59 Scientists Added to Senate Report
‘The science has, quite simply, gone awry’
Washington, DC: Fifty-nine additional scientists from around the world have been added to the U.S. Senate Minority Report of dissenting scientists, pushing the total to over 700 skeptical international scientists – a dramatic increase from the original 650 scientists featured in the initial December 11, 2008 release. The 59 additional scientists added to the 255-page Senate Minority report since the initial release 13 ½ weeks ago represents an average of over four skeptical scientists a week. This updated report – which includes yet another former UN IPCC scientist – represents an additional 300 (and growing) scientists and climate researchers since the initial report’s release in December 2007.
The over 700 dissenting scientists are now more than 13 times the number of UN scientists (52) who authored the media-hyped IPCC 2007 Summary for Policymakers. The 59 additional scientists hail from all over the world, including Japan, Italy, UK, Czech Republic, Canada, Netherlands, the U.S. and many are affiliated with prestigious institutions including, NASA, U.S. Navy, U.S. Defense Department, Energy Department, U.S. Air Force, the Philosophical Society of Washington (the oldest scientific society in Washington), Princeton University, Tulane University, American University, Oregon State University, U.S. Naval Academy and EPA.
The explosion of skeptical scientific voices is accelerating unabated in 2009. A March 14, 2009 article in the Australian revealed that Japanese scientists are now at the forefront of rejecting man-made climate fears prompted by the UN IPCC.
Prominent Japanese Geologist Dr. Shigenori Maruyama, a professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences who has authored more than 125 scientific publications, said in March 2009 that “there was widespread skepticism among his colleagues about the IPCC’s fourth and latest assessment report that most of the observed global temperature increase since the mid-20th century ‘is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations.” Maruyama noted that when this question was raised at a Japan Geoscience Union symposium last year, ‘the result showed 90 per cent of the participants do not believe the IPCC report.” “
Hmmm, The Register and the political operative Marc Morano… one sided agenda driven sources if there ever were any. Why should we trust anything Marc (ex-Rush Limbaugh Show producer – Mr. Swift Boat – not climate researcher, nor physicist) tells us?
March 2009, hmmm, 3 1/2 years and still no traction. Well, doing an internet search reveals pages worth of copy-cat repetition of the same article and good ‘ol Morano’s spin. But, I’ve yet to find any half way objective review of JSER’s claims. Can you offer any?
One last thought. I’m no physicist for sure, so I’m in no position to judge the more educated discussions regarding the laws of thermodynamics, such as the Gerlich and Tscheuschner 2009 paper So I’m left looking at a world where these laws have been defined for a very long time. Incredible gadgets have been built around these laws, such as heat seeking air to air missiles. Things that would be impossible without a thorough understanding of greenhouse gases. But, I am supposed to believe all that is baloney because some folks have “discovered” an alternative interpretation? And the reason the entire establishment community is stonewalling this discovery is because it would ruin them, thus a huge conspiracy to keep science a secret… and so on and so forth.
I’ve be reading a discussion about at climatephysicsforums.com and thought these comments interesting and worth injecting here {Terry O. this should be a blast from the past for you ;-)}
=================================
http://climatephysicsforums.com/topic/3292392/2/index.html
post #13
logicman wrote:
“As to the papers under discussion, I think we have a straw man argument:
“a fictitious mechanism, in which a planetary atmosphere acts as a heat pump driven by an environment”
Firstly, an atmosphere is an integral part of a planetary surface environment.
Secondly, a planetary atmosphere is a heat engine driven by a sun.
The second law of thermodynamics is often stated to demand that heat can only flow from a hot to a cold body. If that is the stance taken by the authors as a founding argument then their conclusions must inevitably be wrong.
The notion that heat can only flow from a hot to a cold body is a basic principle of the caloric theory of heat. Whilst being a very useful fiction in the case of conductive heat transfer it completely fails to describe reality in the case of radiative heat transfer.
Caloric heat flow is unidirectional. Radiative heat transfer is bidirectional.
The temperature of a body is determined by the net radiative transfer.
When two radiating bodies are in proximity there will be a flow of radiated energy from each to the other. If they are of different temperatures then there will be a net flow of energy from the hotter to the colder body.
Unlike caloric theory, the law of net radiative transfer does not completely prohibit the transfer of heat energy from a colder to a hotter body. It prohibits a net positive transfer from cold to hot.
If you consider CO2 and radiative transfer then you must not treat the atmosphere as a single homogenous body. For the purpose of discussion it is a support matrix of Nitrogen with embedded radiating bodies – CO2 molecules.
A CO2 molecule can emit a photon in any direction. In atmosphere, that photon can be directed towards the ground or towards space.”
===================================================
Sky Hunter at #17 The claim that back radiation violates the second law of thermodynamics (the premise of G&T’s paper) is utterly absurd. They use a literal, parsed definition of the Second Law to make their specious claim. It is not an ad hominem to point out the fact that the journal’s reviewers should never have allowed it past the review process with such an absurd claim.
===============================================
citizenschallenge:
The conflict that flared in the blogosphere after publication of the G&T paper resulted from the practice by certain climatologists of describing the back radiation as a kind of “heat flux.” It isn’t. The back radiation is a kind of “vector irradiance.” The vector irradiance is in no way bound by the second law of thermodynamics.
What exactly have greenhouse gases got to do with heat-seeking missiles?
And why exactly are you trying to teach people how to suck (radiative transfer) eggs?
citizenschallenge | November 20, 2012 at 4:28 pm | One last thought. I’m no physicist for sure, so I’m in no position to judge the more educated discussions regarding the laws of thermodynamics, such as the Gerlich and Tscheuschner 2009 paper So I’m left looking at a world where these laws have been defined for a very long time.
Defined for a long time in traditional real world tried and tested and well understood in use in countless applications..
Which teaches that heat always flows from hotter to colder. This is simply a fact of the physical reality around us, like water always flows downhill.
It takes work to change this. The key word stated and implicit in the 2nd Law is spontaneously. Anyone can see that water always flows downhill..
Because you don’t know enough about this you can’t see the sleights of hand AGWSF uses, tweaking real physics by missing out words and even whole concepts, giving the properties of one thing to another, taking laws out of context, and much more.
The AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect has created a fake fisics to confuse those like you who don’t understand any of the parts well enough.. Unfortunately, those like you don’t understand it well enough to be able to understand arguments from traditional science so you continue to be confused by this con, and continue to regurgitate its fiction fisics as if real.
AGWSF has created a fictional world for its Greenhouse Effect by creating a fictional fisics basics package. In the real world for example, it would mean there is no sound in your world. But you have to understand the difference between ideal and real gas to be able to follow the reasoning behind my saying this. There is no Water Cycle in the fake AGW Greenhouse Effect, there is no rain in its Carbon Cycle, and so on. These can get very complicated to explain, but here I have whittled it down to a key concept which is basic to the fake Greenhouse Effect and which is not beyond the grasp of anyone of general intelligence to understand is fake, if he takes the time to think about it.
The very first thing you have to understand is the AGWSF fake fisics meme “all electromagnetic energy is the same and all create heat on being absorbed”, is not traditional well known well understood real world physics. It is gobbledegook. It only becomes apparent that it is gobbledegook if you know real physics about this. Real physics about this is not difficult to grasp, it is logical, rational, and all the parts fit together coherently. AGWSF fake fisics doesn’t make sense.
The second thing you have to understand from this is that Heat and Light are different, they have different properties, such as size, they act differently on meeting matter. Real physics understands the differences. Real physics knows what these different wavelengths/photons/particles can and cannot do. Real physics describes these differences and names and categorises them. Real physics is the wonder of discovery of the actual properties and processes of the real world around us.
That is the biggest loss to us all in this, a generation deliberately confused and unable to appreciate the great understanding of the physical world we have acquired very recently in our history – it is a marvellous thing to know that the heat we receive from the Sun is invisible and we have Herschel to thank for this discovery.
We’ve become better at measuring since Herschel physically moved his prism by hand at the edge of the table and have a detailed knowledge of the differences between the different wavelengths. We now know that these electromagnetic energies are different in size and that the invisible heat energy does not include near infrared, that is why the radiant heat energy is called thermal; it is the thermal energy meaning of heat of the electromagnetic spectrum as a whole and of the invisible infrared. We know that shortwave infrared is not hot, that it is not thermal. It is categorised together with Light, not Heat, Refective not Thermal.
This used to be the basic physics taught even to junior children because it was easy to understand, but since AGWSF has infiltrated the general education system it has been lost to the majority. It is still being taught by teachers of traditional physics, so it is not yet entirely lost.
But, if this majority present generation continue teaching the fake fisics then real physics will become like magic to them. They will not themselves be able to design photovoltaic solar panels and thermal panels to capture these different energies from the Sun, because they now have lost traditional teaching and can’t pass this on with comprehension of the differences. This is just one example.
Please see my post above: Myrrh | November 19, 2012 at 1:01 pm
http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-269255
It is not easy to find traditional physics teaching of the basics now, I have also posted something about this to BatedBreath on:
Myrrh | November 20, 2012 at 2:26 pm
http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-269609
Sorry for the missing close italics after “heat” in the last one.
“Look up photosynthesis, this is plant life using the visible light energies from the Sun to convert to chemical energy, not heat energy. AGWSF doesn’t want you to understand that not all “absorption” creates heat..
When visible light is absorbed by our eyes it converts to a nerve impulse. This isn’t the creation of heat, visible light is not heating our eyes. This is conservation of energy, to a different energy. Just as in photosynthesis the conversion is into a chemical energy in the creation of sugars.”
So, the problem here, which doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand, is that I have given an example from NASA of the traditional teaching on this, as I have explained. It is clear therefore that this contradicts the AGWSF Greenhouse Effect claim that longwave infrared, heat, from the Sun doesn’t reach us.
You cannot ignore this because I have given NASA as confirming what I am saying…
If you take the time to think this through you will I’m sure see that AGWSF has corrupted traditional teaching. Bear in mind that all this corrupted fisics it produces is to promote the fake Greenhouse Effect, so there are reasons for it.
Here, it is so that measurements, real world, of heat from the Sun can be passed off as “from the atmosphere from greenhouse gases because it can’t be anything else because either the Sun doesn’t produce very much longwave infrared/there is some invisible unexplained barrier like the glass of a greenhouse which prevents longwave infrared from reaching us”.
Do you see the sleight of hand?
The Second law was originally formulated as a postulate that was needed to explain observations. It is one basic postulate in the formal mathematical theory of Classical Thermodynamics. At that time it was not possible to explain this theory from anything more detailed or more fundamental.
During the 19th century scientists like Maxwell and Boltzmann developed a theory that goes deeper in the questions of thermodynamics. They realized that classical thermodynamics can be derived from some simple assumptions on the micro-physics and the mathematical theory of statistics. The theory of statistical thermodynamics is a more powerful theory than classical thermodynamics as the latter can be derived from the former and as statistical thermodynamics can explain additional phenomena.
The state of statistical thermodynamics was not entirely satisfactory in the 19th century as there were some serious problems in the theory. Most notably the ultraviolet catastrophe could not resolved. What was needed to make the theory consistent was Quantum Mechanics. The Quantum Statistical Thermodynamics is a theory that is free of serious internal contradictions and can be used to derive the Classical Thermodynamics wherever this is applicable.
In Classical Td heat is defined as that energy flux that’s needed to balance conservation of energy when work is handled separately. The mathematical abstract theory could not express anything more about heat. Concerning a single body (or any bounded volume) it was possible to tell, how much heat was flowing in or out, but not to define in absolute terms, how much heat was in the body at any moment. The definition of heat was made to correspond to this state of matter. Later it has become possible to define the energy content of a body in absolute terms. Now it makes also sense to tell which part of this energy is heat. Presently we have some confusion and a lot of empty rhetoric that originates from the presence of two alternative ways of defining heat, the classical one, and the “modern” one. The modern approach has the advantage that it agrees better with everyday use of the word. In climate discussion we meet the controversy only when skeptics try to use the classical definition to confuse or to “prove” their false “theorems”.
It’s misleading to present downhill flow of water as an analog for the flow of heat from hot to cold. It’s misleading because the flow of water is a collective flow where every molecule is forced to move with the flow. The transfer of heat by conduction or radiation is a statistical phenomenon. In conduction the micro level energy transfer goes always in both directions and the overall flow of heat is due the larger number (and average energy) of micro level movements in one direction than in the other. In this respect conduction is not any different from radiative energy transfer where the same is true. The difference between conduction and radiative energy transfer is that the distance covered by a single micro level event is extremely short in conduction while its often rather long in radiative energy transfer. For this reason it’s rather easy to intercept the radiative energy transfer and measure radiation from each direction while intercepting conduction is either impossible or much more difficult.
Did you see the sleight of hand?
Pekka Pirilä | November 21, 2012 at 4:25 am | The Second law was originally formulated as a postulate that was needed to explain observations. It is one basic postulate in the formal mathematical theory of Classical Thermodynamics. At that time it was not possible to explain this theory from anything more detailed or more fundamental.
The 2nd Law was brought in to ‘correct’ the 1st which doesn’t care which way anything travels as long as energy is conserved, it would be quite happy with heat flowing from colder to hotter, corrected by the observation that heat always travels from hotter to colder and never the other way around.
There is nothing more fundamental in heat transfer than the 2nd Law – that heat always flows spontaneously from hotter to colder, it’s a fact, an observable fact. It takes work to change that. Your fridge works because we know this. If it was not a fact we would end up with perpetual motion and unless you have something to prove perpetual motion is physically possible then I suggest you stick with the 2nd Law as it is writ.
During the 19th century scientists like Maxwell and Boltzmann developed a theory that goes deeper in the questions of thermodynamics. They realized that classical thermodynamics can be derived from some simple assumptions on the micro-physics and the mathematical theory of statistics. The theory of statistical thermodynamics is a more powerful theory than classical thermodynamics as the latter can be derived from the former and as statistical thermodynamics can explain additional phenomena.
Throwing “quantum” around to confuse the subject, and “statistical” is another AGWSF meme rebuttal, doesn’t mean anything unless you can prove that heat flows from colder to hotter, you will just have to grin and bear it.
You cannot pretend that this breaks down on your imagined quantum level when you can offer no proof that it doesn’t obey the 2nd Law at this level, but which level is anyway totally and utterly irrelevant to this subject, and you can pretend that “photons travel in all directions therefore ..”, or pretend that there is some magical spontaneous statistical “net” created out of “heat also flows from colder to hotter” when it breaks the 2nd Law of heat flow which requires work to be done to achieve such a thing, and when the real statistical net is still as Boltzmann’s probabilities that atoms would be travelling at certain speeds and in certain directions – you still have to show that radiant heat photons travel spontaneously from colder to hotter and all, all, empirical evidence from countless real world applications have NEVER observed this. The Real Science Discipline of Thermodynamics has studied this in depth. It understands heat and work.
The state of statistical thermodynamics was not entirely satisfactory in the 19th century as there were some serious problems in the theory. Most notably the ultraviolet catastrophe could not resolved. What was needed to make the theory consistent was Quantum Mechanics. The Quantum Statistical Thermodynamics is a theory that is free of serious internal contradictions and can be used to derive the Classical Thermodynamics wherever this is applicable.
There was no ultra-violet catastrophe, it violated conservation of energy. The catastrophe was only in the minds of some who imagined infinite runaway global ultraviolet being produced from a finite source…
..and Planck didn’t have this in mind anyway when he came up with quantum, it appears, that this “quantum” explanation has just been tagged onto the ultra-violet catastrophe as “having solved it”, when it does no such thing since it wasn’t an observable phenomenon anyway. If you say it does, then please, explain exactly how.
Hmm, find this all the time in the AGWSF world, here’s an example: http://damnedhippie.wordpress.com/2011/10/09/the-ultraviolet-catastrophe/
“If the rock follows the old laws of physics, it would radiate an infinite amount of high-energy ultraviolet radiation.”
You, generic, can claim that this imagined catastrophe comes from “the old laws of physics and only quantum saved this”, but it clearly doesn’t since it ultra-violates the “old laws of physics of conservation of energy”.
But the next bit is funny, “So, in exchange for a finite amount of electrical energy, our scientist would get an infinite amount of light energy. Set in front of it a solar-powered mechanical device that generates electricity to run the hot plate, and you have a perpetual motion machine.”
Which is exactly what your “backradiation” is when further heating the warmer surface as it radiates heat from the colder atmosphere.
What we have from AGWScienceFiction extrapolation is the ludicrous scenario I was told a while back, that a hunter could leave a chunk of raw meat in his igloo while he went out for a few hours and on his return that chunk of raw meat would be his dinner cooked by “backradiation” from the ice..
As I’ve said, AGWSF is internally incoherent and makes nonsense of the real world. None of its explanations make sense because they are not meant to, the Greenhouse Effect fisics was designed to confuse. And to that end they’ll play every trick in the book to hide that its Greenhouse Effect fisics is fake.
Presently we have some confusion and a lot of empty rhetoric that originates from the presence of two alternative ways of defining heat, the classical one, and the “modern” one. The modern approach has the advantage that it agrees better with everyday use of the word. In climate discussion we meet the controversy only when skeptics try to use the classical definition to confuse or to “prove” their false “theorems”.
There’s nothing wrong with the classical definitions of heat. The only confusion here is that you are trying to change it to mean something entirely imagined from the idiotic meme “all electromagnetic energy is the same and all creates heat” because you want to pretend that “visible light can heat matter and no longwave infrared reaches us from the Sun”. It is idiotic because it is gobbledgook, as I have explained above.
You can pretend all you like that that your “quantum” and your “statistics” give you a “modern” explanation, but since you still end up with runaway global warming from a cold atmosphere heating a hotter surface/no means of stopping heat flowing from colder to hotter, you’re clearly talking outside of the realm of our real physical reality. So your “modern heat” is as it appears here, mangling real physics and the history of it to pretend that it exists.
But back to my point, I’m not interested in “backradiation” arguments here, they’re irrelvant:
You’re the one confused by this deliberate manipulation of fake fisics. That’s why you don’t realise your claim that “the Sun gives off very little longwave infrared” doesn’t make sense.
Because you don’t understand what you’re really saying is that “the Sun gives off very little heat”.
Longwave infrared is the thermal energy in the electromagnetic spectrum, it is invisible, it is what we feel as heat because it is heat, it heats us up because it is capable of doing so, it causes our whole molecules of matter to vibrate, which is kinetic energy which is heat. It is what we feel as heat from the Sun, read the NASA quote. You claim the Sun gives off no heat!
You don’t understand what you’re saying because you have been convinced that heat is something different and convinced that visible light can heat matter so you don’t notice the real heat from the Sun is missing in your world.
I can only suggest that you take up the direct science challege I gave earlier, show that visible light from the Sun can heat the matter of land and water at the equator to the intensity this is heated in the real world which is what gives us our huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems.
Or, get to grips with what I am saying here about the real missing heat from the AGWSF Greenhouse Effect energy budget..
We cannot feel shortwave from the Sun.
This is a physical fact of our reality.
The heat you feel from the Sun is THERMAL INFRARED, LONGWAVE INFRARED. As traditional physics still teaches.
Please, think about what I have just said. Traditional physics contradicts you.
You cannot make such claims against traditional physics teaching without offering some physical proof..
It’s misleading to present downhill flow of water as an analog for the flow of heat from hot to cold. It’s misleading because the flow of water is a collective flow where every molecule is forced to move with the flow. The transfer of heat by conduction or radiation is a statistical phenomenon. In conduction the micro level energy transfer goes always in both directions and the overall flow of heat is due the larger number (and average energy) of micro level movements in one direction than in the other. In this respect conduction is not any different from radiative energy transfer where the same is true. The difference between conduction and radiative energy transfer is that the distance covered by a single micro level event is extremely short in conduction while its often rather long in radiative energy transfer. For this reason it’s rather easy to intercept the radiative energy transfer and measure radiation from each direction while intercepting conduction is either impossible or much more difficult.
As heat flow from hotter to colder is forced.., by the temperature difference. That is what is meant by “spontaneous” in the 2nd Law. It takes work to change this direction.
http://www.phys.unm.edu/~gbtaylor/phys102/lectures/9_temperature.pdf
“2nd Law of Thermodynamics
● Imagine two bricks at different temperatures in
thermal contact
– If the hot brick were able to extract heat from the cold
brick, would this violate the 1st law of
thermodynamics?
● No. Not if the cold brick becomes even colder so that the
total amount of energy is conserved.
– This sort of behavior is prohibited by the 2nd law of
thermodynamics:
● Heat never spontaneously flows from a cold object to a
hotter object.
– Heat can be made to flow in the opposite direction, but only by
doing work on the system or by adding energy from another
source.”
You can pretend the 2nd Law doesn’t exist, you can pretend that it means something entirely different ‘to your modern understanding’, by inserting “net” where none is required, from taking statistics out of context, and so on, but until you can show and tell you’re just creating imaginary scenarios.
The 2nd Law limited the 1st to observation. Water always flows downhill. It takes work to change that direction, just as it takes work to change the spontaneous flow of heat from hotter to colder.
It’s time AGWSF supporters opened their eyes and looked at the real world around them..
..and felt the real world around them. The heat we feel from the Sun is longwave infrared, thermal infrared, the Sun’s thermal energy on the move to us transferred by radiation.
Your Greenhouse Effect world doesn’t have this.
And since shortwave from the Sun isn’t thermal and can’t heat matter then your world has no heat from the Sun at all.
Think about this, please.
You’re right in stating that heat does not flow from colder to hotter matter without a heat pump. This is irrelevant, however,as the back radiation is not a heat flux.
Also, as the “heat” is the energy that crosses the specified boundary, that electromagnetic energy is “heat” is independent of its wavelength.
Terry Oldberg | November 21, 2012 at 8:56 pm | You’re right in stating that heat does not flow from colder to hotter matter without a heat pump. This is irrelevant, however,as the back radiation is not a heat flux.
Also, as the “heat” is the energy that crosses the specified boundary, that electromagnetic energy is “heat” is independent of its wavelength.
If you’re claiming that “backradiation is longwave infrared radiating back from greenhouse gases in the atmosphere” then you are talking about heat flow and that is always from hotter to colder.
Longwave infrared is heat. That’s why it is called thermal, thermal comes from the Greek meaning “of heat”. It is what we feel as heat because we are capable of feeling it and know that it is heat, it is what we feel heating us up. We have to assume for the moment that rocks don’t feel it, but a rock absorbing this heat and heating up is not not absorbing heat just because it doesn’t feel it. In other words, heat is the intrinsic property of longwave infrared, please see the NASA quote I give, it is the intrinsic property of that wavelength and it does things specific to that wavelength which non-thermal energies cannot do. It is much bigger than visible light, so it moves whole molecules into vibration when it is absorbed, this is kinetic energy, which is also heat. Heat heats because it has the power to heat. This is bog standard traditional physics.
Just as the colour blue of visible light is an intrinsic property of that wavelength – if some see it to be a different colour it is because of differences in their receptors to it. That’s how we know some people are colour blind. Some fauna see in infrared, snakes, some in ultra-violet, butterflies, this is a function of their receptors.
[Which is how Einstein came to confuse his subjective perception of time slowing when he was lost in the moment while in the company of a woman with changes in objective reality. The objective world doesn’t slow down when we’re bored waiting for hours for a delayed flight, someone running down the corridor of a train doesn’t get to the next station later than someone sitting still in a carriage who gets there faster..]
AGWScienceFiction has deliberately taken out all differences of intrinsic properties of the wavelengths in the objective world in order to create confusion between light and heat from the Sun, in order to pretend that all real world measurements of downwelling longwave infrared are from “backradiation from greenhouse gases”. It is important to understand that there is a difference between heat and light, as categorised in traditional physics.
A gamma ray is not a radio wave. These are different in size for a start and size matters, the one cannot do what the other can do on meeting matter because they are different from each other, a radio wave cannot scramble your DNA but it can travel through a brick wall where visible light can’t… An ionising UV ray can do what a non-ionising UV can’t, it can cause an electron to shoot out of its orbit altogether. Visible light is non-ionising, it can’t do this.
Visible light can move the electron in its encounter with the matter of oxygen and nitrogen in the atmosphere, but it doesn’t have enough energy to move it out of its orbit around the nucleus, instead, the electron absorbs the visible light briefly and is energised but always wanting to return to its ground state it does so and when it does it gives off the same energy it took in, blue light in blue light out is how we get reflection/scattering in our atmosphere, our blue sky. There is no creation of heat in this, because the energy is conserved in the extra energy of movement through space of the electron against the slowing down of the visible light. Visible light is slowed down when passing through matter, a diamond will slow it down to half the speed it travels through the ‘vacuum’.
A diamond is transparent to visible light, it does not slow it down because its electrons absorb it in reflection/scattering, but because they don’t absorb it at all, not even on the electronic transition level. This travel through transparent matter is called transmitted and there is no change in the visible light except again delay in the conservation of energy. The different sizes of the visible light are slowed down differently. That is how we get white light separating out into its colours in a transparent glass prism, and the sparkle of colours in a multi-faceted diamond, from the molecules wanting to absorb and the different colours of light wanting to be absorbed, but not able to be so passed on through unchanged with the diamond delaying this considerably, to our delight. Visible light is transmitted through water..
Which means, that the water of the ocean and on land is a transparent medium for visible light, which means, that visible light is not absorbed by water neither on the bigger molecular vibrational level which is what it takes to heat water, nor on the tiny electronic transition level which is how we get reflection/scattering in the atmosphere.
This falsifies the AGWSF claim that “visible light from the Sun is absorbed by water heating the ocean”.
Myrrh:
You seem to be laboring under some misconceptions. I correct these seeming misconceptions below.
1) As you say, a heat flux is bound by the second law of thermodynamics. A heat flux may be represented by a vector and this vector may be decomposed into sub-vectors of various kinds such that the heat flux vector is the vector sum of the various sub-vectors. Though the heat flux vector is bound by the second law, its sub-vectors are not. Thus, it is possible for one or more subvectors to point up a temperature gradient without violation of the second law. In this picture, the back radiation is a kind of subvector.
2) Electromagnetic waves of all wavelengths are capable of carrying energy. Thus, waves of wavelengths that are not “long” are capable of carrying energy. The electromagnetic energy that crosses a boundary is by definition a kind of “heat.” Thus, shortwave radiation from the sun that crosses a boundary conveys heat.
Myrrh | November 21, 2012 at 8:03 pm said: ”Greenhouse Effect fisics was designed to confuse. And to that end they’ll play every trick in the book to hide that its Greenhouse Effect fisics is fake”
Myrrh, those two sentences of yours – should be on every billboard, off the roads. 2] You have the dedication, but closet parashoot brains are not interested in reality; it’s time for you to realize that.
BUT, I have to point an anomaly in your text; obviously because you are forced to bark up their wrong tree occasionally…to bring you all back to reality:
#1: your example of heat flowing only from ”hotter brick to the colder” That is 100% correct. BUT:
The example is NOT appropriate for the subject. Bricks is reference to conduction – from one to the other. == in nature, if extra heat is intercepted by CO2&H2O molecules high up === between that place and the ground conduction of heat doesn’t even apply – because in-between is few kilometers of O&N as perfect INSULATORS!(which is not the case between two bricks) B] by the unwritten rule: heat always goes up – coldness downwards. Reason for it is:
heat is exclusively ”transported” from the ground up; by O&N =nothing to do with CO2= O&N collect heat from the ground (that’s why cooling of the ground is much more efficient, when is windy} when warmed those gases close to the ground -> expand and go up, similar as released tennis ball from the bottom of the swimming-pool. Those O&N atoms are NOT conducting that heat = BUT; ”personally” are taking the extra heat high up, to waste it CO2 up, is not stopping them, because CO2 is creating ”SHADE-CLOTH EFFECT” not greenhouse effect!!! That’s where they are COMPLETELY wrong with their phony GLOBAL warming, and for same reason they were wrong in 70’s prediction of: Nuclear Winter Effect for year 2000, because of dimming effect
#2: your example about the ”water flow in the creek is in ”one direction”
That subject should be broadened; because of the importance in the reaction of heat movement in the troposphere: a] depends the speed of flow on the creek if is on flat ground, or steep; even cascading water -very important for what I have being preaching PLUS, very important for people to understand the difference between clear sky = extreme between day / night (warming during the day / cooling during the night is as WATER FLOW IN RAPIDS = fast warming during the day / fast cooling during the night = as in Sahara!!!!
b] when is water vapor &CO2 in the atmosphere – because they take some of the brunt from the sun -> days are cooler on the ground / upper atmosphere warmer (Brazil) — nights are warmer ==== reason is: because the proportion in difference of temp between upper atmosphere and the ground is LESS, at nights ”SLOWS COOLING” as in flat creek-bed – water flows much slower = slower warming during the day / slower cooling during the night = the best climate!!! ironically, they blame CO2 & water vapor, as bad for climate = mother of all stupidity and receipt for destruction of the environment and climate – reason the nutters from both camps CON that the real climatic changes and the phony GLOBAL warmings are one and the same thing.
Myrrh, if you can explain those two factors above, in your perfect English – everybody with open mind can understand and get on board. Well, regarding the fanatics from both camps.. you can take a skunk to water, but can’t make him to drink – don’t have sleepless nights because of them; they are the born losers. cheers!!!…
stephan & myrrh
Do you deny that CO2 absorbs IR ? If so, what support can you provide for this?
stefanthedenier | November 21, 2012 at 10:11 pm | Myrrh, those two sentences of yours – should be on every billboard, off the roads. 2] You have the dedication, but closet parashoot brains are not interested in reality; it’s time for you to realize that.
Well, this is a very clever and very complex con, it’s not easy to spot because it was introduced into the general education system, this is now to university/PhD levels.. Real physics is so tweaked in all its parts that it creates layers of confusion because few, I imagine, have empirical knowledge of all the different science fields this touches on. Perhaps that’s why it is so difficult to get across, how easy is it for someone educated to these levels to change his mind when he considers himself intelligent and rational and surrounded by a majority in agreement that the Greenhouse Effect exists, apart from the doctrinal squabbles about nuances between the CAGW and AGW sects, and some oik comes along and says he’s basing all his arguments on faked fisics?
It was just by chance I began to look at the basic claims, because I was getting bored with the interminable “backradiation” arguments.., and I was really puzzled by what they were claiming for carbon dioxide and I couldn’t find any discussions about it. All of which has taken quite a lot of time as I could only discover what they were being taught in these kinds of discussions, because my education was traditional and I didn’t know any of this AGW fisics. I had a lot of reading to do.. And, the whole thing is further complicated when some grounded in traditional physics in their own field take on trust some other faked fisics meme not in their own field, as if ‘well-known so must be right’. None of this is easy to deconstruct, it is a very clever manipulation by very subtle changes.
BUT, I have to point an anomaly in your text; obviously because you are forced to bark up their wrong tree occasionally…to bring you all back to reality:
#1: your example of heat flowing only from ”hotter brick to the colder” That is 100% correct. BUT:
The example is NOT appropriate for the subject. Bricks is reference to conduction – from one to the other. == in nature, if extra heat is intercepted by CO2&H2O molecules high up === between that place and the ground conduction of heat doesn’t even apply – because in-between is few kilometers of O&N as perfect INSULATORS!(which is not the case between two bricks) B] by the unwritten rule: heat always goes up – coldness downwards. Reason for it is:
heat is exclusively ”transported” from the ground up; by O&N =nothing to do with CO2= O&N collect heat from the ground (that’s why cooling of the ground is much more efficient, when is windy} when warmed those gases close to the ground -> expand and go up, similar as released tennis ball from the bottom of the swimming-pool. Those O&N atoms are NOT conducting that heat = BUT; ”personally” are taking the extra heat high up, to waste it CO2 up, is not stopping them, because CO2 is creating ”SHADE-CLOTH EFFECT” not greenhouse effect!!! That’s where they are COMPLETELY wrong with their phony GLOBAL warming, and for same reason they were wrong in 70′s prediction of: Nuclear Winter Effect for year 2000, because of dimming effect
I’m not sure what you mean by “insulators”, and I don’t know how you understand oxygen and nitrogen to be moving heat up, because it appears you’re missing out convection and the Water Cycle.
It might be easier if I just told you what I’ve found here. The AGWScience Fiction’s Greenhouse Effect has no atmosphere at all..
It goes straight from the surface to empty space, hence all the radiation arguments. The reason it has no atmosphere is because it is created out of an idea based on “ideal” gases, it claims that oxygen and nitrogen and carbon dioxide are ideal gases, not real gases. Now, most never get to learn there is a difference, these are two technical terms in gas science so why should the majority know? But this is where I came in so to speak. I found out that AGW fisics was based on ideal gas and not real when I began questioning the claim “carbon dioxide accumulates for hundreds and even thousands of years in the atmosphere”.
The man I was questioning was a PhD in physics and teaching at university level, he was totally committed to AGW and had introduced me to the subject, it didn’t us long to begin disagreeing with each other.. Anyway, a while later, it was a general discussion forum, the subject came up again and I asked about carbon dioxide, I said it was heavier than air so couldn’t accumulate in the atmosphere at all, it would always sink to the ground displacing air. He said that was nonsense ‘because it was so well-mixed that it couldn’t separate out’. He was a bit more blunt than that conveys and the peanut gallery got settled in, fingers to the ready at keyboards.. :)
So, I fetched real world examples of carbon dioxide separating out and sinking because being heavier than air that’s what it does; mining, volcanic venting, breweries. I thought this was well-known…, certainly I thought it should have been very well known to someone with a physics PhD teaching others about carbon dioxide. I think he was genuinely shocked, that he’d never heard of this before. He admitted that carbon dioxide could sink, well, he had to, the real world examples are numerous, but he came up with some idea that it ‘took the package of air it was in with it’ and, he was also a moderator on the forum, he quickly removed his post denying it could sink in air, but I was interested in finding out why he’d said this and he was still interested in educating me, so we continued the discussion.
So, I discovered that AGWSF fisics teaches that the atmosphere is composed of ideal gas and this is where the “well-mixed” concept for carbon dioxide originates. An ideal gas has no properties, no processes, is not subject to gravity, because, it doesn’t exist, it’s purely an imaginary construct in an imaginary container drawn on an imaginary sheet of paper in an imaginary lab; useful as a start point in gas calculations, but no real gas obeys ideal gas law so it takes many more equations having to be added in for all the missing properties and processes to get anywhere near real gas numbers. AGWSF had created a whole atmosphere of this and claims it is our real world’s atmosphere.
The ideal gas is a hard dot of nothing zipping at great speeds through empty space under its own molecular momentum, it bounces off other ideal gas molecules it meets in elastic collisions and so, the AGWSF meme goes, that’s how carbon dioxide becomes thoroughly, and very quickly, well-mixed to the point where it cannot be unmixed without a huge amount of work being done, for example as in separating out again ink that had been poured into a glass of water. So, ‘”thoroughly mixed and everywhere spread out in its proportion of the atmosphere”.
I couldn’t quite believe what I was hearing, it was a shock, so I suggested a scenario to make sure I understood what he was saying. Since he’d admitted carbon dioxide could sink I suggested the following:
there is a room where carbon dioxide has pooled on the floor and nothing is done to alter the conditions in which it pooled, no windows opened, no fan put on, no work done.
I said the carbon dioxide pooled on the ground would stay pooled on the ground because heavier than air. He said the carbon dioxide would immediately begin to diffuse through the room and quickly become thoroughly mixed as per ideal gas and could not be for all practical purposed un-mixed again.
He taught this at university level, set exams in ideal gas calculation, said he’d fail me for my ‘strange views’ if I’d been in any of his classes.., was completely oblivious to the existence of the concepts I was giving, which were from traditional physics.
I realised then we were talking about two different worlds. What it did do for me was to make sense of the arguments I been working through reading discussions, I could understand for example why applied scientists arguing against AGW would get frustrated because there was no convection in the Greenhouse Effect, no gravity. A while later I found the AGW teaching about light..
Now, the ideal gas has no properties and processes of real gases, it has no weight or volume because it just an imaginary hard dot of nothing, it has no attraction so all it does is collide with other ideal gas molecules at great speed and bounce off into the vast empty space distances between them. The repercussions of beginning from this imaginary base are not easy to deconstruct for others because its affects are spread through the AGW world and only someone who is familiar with the differences between real and ideal will pick it up from my shorthand as I’ve given in this paragraph. Which is why I have come to concentrate on the one point I’ve been making here, which is complicated enough, but not nearly so much as trying to explain the concepts of volume and weight of gases and what this means between the two different worlds described by them when to explain these I have to bring in yet more terms that would be unfamiliar, such as gases are fluids.
In the real world of real gases our whole atmosphere is a volume of fluid, gases and liquids are fluids. It is not ideal gas empty space around us, it is full of fluid gas. If it were ideal gas empty space we would have no sound, but we do have sound, because our real molecules are not flying off into empty space bouncing off other gases, but are squashed together, their volumes restricting the movement of the other molecules around them. Think of our atmosphere as a heavy ocean of gas around us, pressing down on us around a ton on our shoulders, (a stone or 14lbs per square inch). This is a very heavy amount of fluid, not as dense as a liquid fluid, but still a distinct volume of gas. If you were standing on the bottom of a swimming pool with ten feet of water above you and then went out to stand in an open field, the weight of water you had above you and the weight of the atmosphere above you in the open would be roughly the same. This isn’t empty space weighing down on you, it is a physical material entity, a huge heavy volume of gas. Mostly oxygen and nitrogen, but with around 1-5% water, a bit of argon (1% of dry air), and then trace amounts of other gases.
It is not just the oxygen and nitrogen at the surface taking in heat by conduction, all the gases in the atmosphere do and especially important is water evaporating with its much greater heat capacity because it takes much more heat away from the surface.
The most important point here are that as gases are heated they rise taking their heat with them and this is what gives us our great wind and weather systems as volumes of the gas air are differentially heated. When volumes of the fluid air rise becoming less dense and lighter than the air around them, the colder heavier volumes of air around them will flow beneath, displacing the lighter hotter air. Hot air rises, cold air sinks. These volumes of fluid gas on the move are called winds, they are convection currents. Just like currents in the ocean created by volumes of water differentially heated, the hotter water rising and the the colder flowing beneath.
It is this process from the behaviour of real gases which gives us our great winds from the intense heating of land and water at the equator. As this volume of hot air rises it flows to the poles and the denser colder air at the poles sinks beneath and flows towards the equator – this is our basic wind system, these stay in their own hemispheres. Add the Earth’s rotation for what happens next, a good weather site will explain this, and, look up inshore/offshore winds which is a good example of differential heating. This is how heat is transferred in a fluid medium, convection. Volumes of air on the move in the atmosphere, volumes of water in the ocean.
Add to that the Water Cycle which is volumes of water vapour rising and taking away heat from the surface which it releases when it reaches the colder heights and condenses back to fluid liquid water or ice, and then cooled sinking back to the surface, as in rain. All pure clean rain is carbonic acid, because real gases have attraction and water and carbon dioxide are greatly attracted to each other. Carbon dioxide shares waters residence time in the atmosphere, 8-10 days.
All this is missing from the AGWSF Greenhouse Effect world, because it has empty space with hard dots of nothing bouncing off each other instead..
..it’s been quite depressing at times reading descriptions of the “Carbon Cycle”, without any mention of rain.. Instead they talk about “sinks”. There’s is no Life in their Carbon Cycle.
The missing Water Cycle is interesting also because of the sleight of hand used in disappearing it. But I’m going to have to leave it at that for today, I’ll try and come back to answer the rest of your post tomorrow.
Myrrh
Please just address the simple question put to you :
Do you deny that CO2 absorbs IR ? If so, what support can you provide for this?
PS
Note the correct spelling of “physics”.
Tomcat | November 23, 2012 at 12:08 am |
Myrrh
Please just address the simple question put to you :
Do you deny that CO2 absorbs IR ? If so, what support can you provide for this?
PS
Note the correct spelling of “physics”.
I was going to write that I didn’t know why you have such a fixation with this, but then I recalled, that’s how it’s presented to you by AGWScienceFiction’s meme producing department and so they create the sleight of hand ‘experiment’ to “prove carbon dioxide heats the earth by backradiation”, by showing nothing of the kind. You can find them online, the Beeb’s is worth watching if you want to see how magic tricks are done.
A jar full of carbon dioxide against a jar of “air”. The constituent parts of the air unspecified. Bear in mind also when, if, you watch or remember such an experiment, the different heat capacities of water and carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide has no practical capacity to store heat, so will heat up quickly and just as quickly release any heat, practically instantly. Water has an immense heat capacity, which means it takes longer to heat up and so longer to cools down. In the Beeb trick the jar of “air” took longer to show any increase in temperature so it is obvious that a considerable amount of water was in that sample. As soon as the jar full of carbon dioxide had shown a ‘dramatic’ increase against the jar of “air”, they stopped the experiment. And then turned to their pretend sceptics in the ‘audience’ and asked if they had changed their minds about carbon dioxide causing global warming, gosh, they all changed their minds, more converts!
So, an experiment which showed nothing about backradiation nor did it show anything about the AGW fake fisics claim that “carbon dioxide traps heat”, because they shut down the ‘experiment’ before timing how long it took to cool down.
And so what? Is that the best meme the puppet masters can come with in science arguments about this? Why should I deny it? Science isn’t a religious belief system.
The facts about carbon dioxide are well known to science. As I have described, its low heat capacity means it is physically incapable of trapping heat. Oxygen and nitrogen slightly higher but for all practical purposes these too heat up quickly and as quickly release the heat.
I have chosen to spell AGWScienceFiction’s fisics as fisics because it is fake, it makes it less confusing when I am comparing it with real world physics.
The Greenhouse Effect is a fictional world, all its fisics basics are gobbledegook.
Prove they are not and I’ll spell it physics..
For the Nth time of asking : Please just address the simple question put to you :
Do you deny that CO2 absorbs IR ? If so, what support can you provide for this?
Myrrh : [Long pompous ramble, once again completely ignoring the question]
Conclusion : he does indeed deny standard physics regarding absorption spectra. But is loathe to admit it.
—
The Greenhouse Effect is a fictional world, all its fisics basics are gobbledegook … [it claims that] carbon dioxide heats the earth by backradiation
You are completely out of touch with the the subject you criticise.. While some backradition exists at the BOA, the basics of the AGW mechanism is actually that the GHG-laden atmosphere warms, thereby slowing the cooling of the earth into the atmosphere.
Prove [The Greenhouse Effect] and I’ll spell it “physics”
Most revealing. Despite not being a native English speaker, you deny common English usage then. A clear pattern is emerging.
So Myrrh denies the English language too?!
Wonderful. Perhaps like Descartes he has set out to deny everything. And perhaps like Descartes too, he stays in bed till noon, which explains why he has enough time to produce so many long-winded posts.
Tomcat | November 24, 2012 at 1:07 am
“The Greenhouse Effect is a fictional world, all its fisics basics are gobbledegook … [it claims that] carbon dioxide heats the earth by backradiation”
You are completely out of touch with the the subject you criticise.. While some backradition exists at the BOA, the basics of the AGW mechanism is actually that the GHG-laden atmosphere warms, thereby slowing the cooling of the earth into the atmosphere.
Ah the doctrinal nuance arguments.. Between CAGW and AGW is it? As Pekka told me, rather disdainfully, ‘that only CAGW’s believe that there is an invisible barrier around the Earth preventing longwave infrared from entering’ and that ‘the real scientist who are AGW’s say that the Sun gives off very little longwave infrared so there’s nothing to get here’.
Grin. Like two groups in the crowd admiring the Emperor’s New Clothes from a great distance and arguing about the stitching and buttons.
Please see my post today to Stefan, the real blanket of greenhouse gases keeping the Earth warm are nitrogen and oxygen. Without which the temperature of the Earth would be -18°C, and with which, but without water, the temperature would be 67°C. Think desert.
So, another example of sleight of hand from the fraudulent AGWSF meme producing department, it correctly says this minus18°C is the temperature without greenhouse gases, but only in real physics which includes oxygen and nitrogen in the warming and cooling of our atmosphere which was likened to a real greenhouse which both warms and cools to get optimum temps for its plants.
The AGW/CAGW greenhouse is a fake, it only warms and misattributes this effect to the greenhouse gases which cool, water and carbon dioxide.
Prove [The Greenhouse Effect] and I’ll spell it “physics”
Most revealing. Despite not being a native English speaker, you deny common English usage then. A clear pattern is emerging.
The pattern is the AGW/CAGWScience Fiction’s fisics is fake in all its parts, is all I’ve been saying. This fake fisics is used to create a fictional imaginary world so must not be confused with real world physics which describes real world properties and processes, to that end giving it a different spelling helps greatly in showing which I’m describing.
Simple questions ducked by Myrrh for the (N+1)th time now:
Do you deny that, as per standard physics, CO2 absorbs IR ?
If so, what support can you provide for this?
CC on greenhouse theory …. the reason the entire establishment community is stonewalling [] is because it would ruin them, thus a huge conspiracy to keep science a secret…
No need to invoke a conspiracy strawman to explain why people would act so as to advance their own interests.
phatboy | November 20, 2012 at 5:21 pm | Reply
What exactly have greenhouse gases got to do with heat-seeking missiles? And why exactly are you trying to teach people how to suck (radiative transfer) eggs?
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Heat seeking missiles work by zeroing in on a heat target many miles distance and tracking down that signature to a specific place and time within a spilt second time frames. That targeted heat signature is traveling through and interacting with many miles worth of atmosphere and GHGs. In order for that gadget to function, scientists needed a thorough understanding, heck a mastery, of GHG spectrums and dynamics within our atmosphere.
pb, people have been taught and worked with radiative transfer issues for many many decades in many varied fields. You who thinks all that experience sucks eggs?
I did a Google Scholar search on G&T 2009, then looked at “cited by” and it’s a motley crew for sure and I couldn’t find a serious physicist among them.
It seems to me something as revolutionary G&T’s suppositions would have physicists humming – there are always young scientists looking for revolutionary ideas to flesh out. But, there’s nothing. Not a peep of interest among physicists… why is that?
And then we have folk’s of Monk’s frame of mind who have figured it out:
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Monk | November 21, 2012 at 6:19 am | Reply
CC on greenhouse theory …. the reason the entire establishment community is stonewalling [] is because it would ruin them, thus a huge conspiracy to keep science a secret…
No need to invoke a conspiracy strawman to explain why people would act so as to advance their own interests.
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Within the scientific and engineering profession – having it accurate and work right matters – and being proven wrong is part of growing up. One learns one’s lessons and moves along – stonewalling to shore up a failed notion does not work the way you’d like to believe it does. Not in this world at least.
Your faith that the scientific world is in on such a massive conspiracy makes about as much sense as claiming NASA staged the moon landing in a desert outside Hollywood.
Speaking of which I think Monk may be watching way too many Hollywood movies.
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Myrrh response was interesting.
Highlights:
“The AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect has created a fake fisics to confuse those like you who don’t understand any of the parts well enough…” >{it seems pretty extreme labeling something as SciFi when it has served science and industry quite well for quite a number of years.}
~ ~ ~
“There is no Water Cycle in the fake AGW Greenhouse Effect, there is no rain in its Carbon Cycle, and so on…” > {shouldn’t you have some sources and explanations with a claim like that?}
~ ~ ~
“It is gobbledegook. It only becomes apparent that it is gobbledegook if you know real physics about this. Real physics about this is not difficult to grasp, it is logical, rational, and all the parts fit together coherently. AGWSF fake fisics doesn’t make sense..” >{Well if it’s not difficult to grasp, I would think real experts would get it. That they don’t indicates that perhaps you are the missing some physics details}
~ ~ ~
“This used to be the basic physics taught even to junior children because it was easy to understand, but since AGWSF has infiltrated the general education system it has been lost to the majority…” >{oh boy – and the UN with their black helicopters are ready to steal our freedoms.}
~ ~ ~
“Bear in mind that all this corrupted fisics it produces is to promote the fake Greenhouse Effect, so there are reasons for it…”
I read it all but it don’t make sense and your claim NASA proves you right is rather thin.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Thanks be Pekka Pirilä joined in. It’s is quite the juxtaposition. Pekka explains his topic from one end to the other. He doesn’t have to resort to made up words or conspiracy theories or condescension. And he clearly points out flaws, again not resorting to rhetoric, but clear explanations:
Pekka writes: “It’s misleading to present downhill flow of water as an analog for the flow of heat from hot to cold. It’s misleading because the flow of water is a collective flow where every molecule is forced to move with the flow. The transfer of heat by conduction or radiation is a statistical phenomenon. In conduction the micro level energy transfer goes always in both directions and the overall flow of heat is due the larger number (and average energy) of micro level movements in one direction than in the other. In this respect conduction is not any different from radiative energy transfer where the same is true… (and so on)”
CC > . the reason the entire establishment community is stonewalling [] is because it would ruin them, thus a huge conspiracy to keep science a secret…,
Monk > No need to invoke the old conspiracy strawman to explain why people would act so as to advance their own interests.
With no answer to this obvious point, CC simply reruns the same old discredited strawman – the childish drivel that acting in one’s interest requires a “conspiracy”. It’s as if he actually believes that the state, with a very obvious and very large vested interest in selling CAGW, and which is essentially the sole funder of climate science, will have no influence on which scientists and theories will be sponsored, and which not. All they really care about is whether they can raise more taxes or not, and this requires that CAGW is believed by the public, regardless of whether it turns out to be true or not.
citizenschallenge:
it seems pretty extreme labeling something as SciFi when it has served science and industry quite well for quite a number of years.
It’s real physics which serves us, real physics knows the difference between light and heat, that’s why they real scientists can design photovoltaic panels to capture light to convert to electricity, and thermal panels to capture the Sun’s direct heat, heating water – your ‘scientists’ couldn’t find their way out of a paper bag.
“There is no Water Cycle in the fake AGW Greenhouse Effect, there is no rain in its Carbon Cycle, and so on…” shouldn’t you have some sources and explanations with a claim like that?
Show me you have the Water Cycle and rain in the Carbon Cycle in the Greenhouse Effect fake fisics.
“Bear in mind that all this corrupted fisics it produces is to promote the fake Greenhouse Effect, so there are reasons for it…”
I read it all but it don’t make sense and your claim NASA proves you right is rather thin.
Well, it is very difficult to explain to someone who doesn’t have traditional science on the different points I’ve made, that’s the point I’m trying to get across. That traditional science doesn’t teach AGWSF fisics. And I’m doing my best to give real world physics and explanations why the fake fisics doesn’t work in the real world.
I have given the NASA quote as an example of traditional science teaching on this, that the heat we feel from the Sun is longwave infrared, thermal infrared, and that we can’t feel Light. Near infrared is classed with light and we can’t feel it, we can’t feel shortwave as heat because these energies do not heat us up.
I haven’t given the quote to “prove I am right”, I have said that because NASA agrees with me here – you cannot ignore what I am saying, because it is saying exactly what I am saying.
It’s up to you to decide if NASA, as here in my quote, and I are telling you real physical facts about thermal and near infrared. I have given them as a ‘respected science source’, its name carries weight. I have told you that it is here, as in the quote, giving the same traditional physics I am giving.
In traditional physics we have known since Herschel that the heat we feel from the Sun is invisible. He, at the time, called it “dark light”, we now call it thermal infrared, the wavelength/photon/particle of heat.
Herschel’s experiment was a tremendous breakthrough for science, which until then associated the visible light from the the Sun with heat. When Tyndall tested Herschel’s finding for himself he was so astonished at the great temperature he got from invisible infrared that he made the comment, I paraphrase, ‘visible light then, is only of use to us for seeing’. He was wrong about this of course, scientists later discovered the amazing power of plants to convert visible light into chemical energy, the creation of sugars, in photosynthesis. But at the time the separation of the Sun’s rays into visible and invisible was a great wonder. It still is, if you think about it..
Herschel’s experiments consisted of moving a glass prism by hand at the edge of a table, not very accurate, but accurate enough to establish that there was great heat in the invisible rays. Since then the accuracy of measuring has improved greatly, both Herchel and Tyndall would be astonished now by how many more rays from the Sun we know about, and particularly the differences between them of properties and processes.
What isn’t clear as a visual on spectrum graphics is the difference in size between these distinct wavelengths, the difference between a gamma and a radio wave is rather large… On the NASA page I quoted from, it says the difference between near infrared and longwave, thermal, is between microscopic and the size of a pin head. Well, think of Herschel’s measurements by hand, he had no way of knowing this at the time and so would not know that the Sun’s bigger thermal energy would be overlapping his measurements of tinier near infrared, and visible. Since then Science has not only given it a change of name, infrared, but divided that into thermal and reflective, we now know near infrared is not thermal. We know it is not hot, we can’t feel it. We can’t feel visible light or uv. We feel heat and that heat from the Sun is longwave infrared, thermal infrared.
We now know so much more about this, we know that Light, the shortwaves of visible and the two either side, work on the electronic transition level. This is a tiny level, affecting only the electons of molecules, because they are too tiny to make a bigger impact. UV is split into ionising and non-ionising, its more energetic ionising rays can send the electrons it meets out of their orbits. And so on.
I’ve already given the fact, several times, that water is a transparent medium for visible light, not even its electrons absorb visible, but this level of encounter isn’t powerful enough to heat molecules of matter anyway. It takes the bigger more powerful heat energy from the Sun, aka radiant heat, thermal infrared, longwave infrared, to do this. Longwave infrared from the Sun moves the whole molecule into vibration, this is what it takes to heat up matter. To make matter hot the whole molecule must be vibrated. You can use mechanical energy to do the same to your skin, rub your hands together and set the molecules of your skin into vibration. The best visible light can do here is get bounced around the sky by the electrons of the molecules of nitrogen and oxygen..
What I meant by AGWSF having a reason for all its fake fisics, is that whenever a basic claim is examined and seen to be fake, it is because it has to twist real physics to make the claims it does for the Greenhouse Effect.
The Greenhouse Effect claims “backradiation of heat from greenhouses gases in the atmosphere”, by taking out the Sun’s real direct heat it can pretend that whatever measurements made of real world heat from the Sun are attributed to their “backradiation from greenhouse gases”, and of course, it never provides any real science to show that there is such a thing as “backradiation of heat from the colder atmosphere to the hotter Earth’s surface”.
Is that clearer? It really isn’t easy to explain because its such a simple trick like all the best cons are, enough real information with the fake slipped in quietly so that it isn’t noticed. And of course as I’ve said, it’s now in the education system “shortwave in longwave out”, so no one bothers to question it who has learned this. I was never taught this fake fisics, so I spotted immediately that it was contradicting real physics. Which, if you read old textbooks and papers and traditional science now, simply uses the two category names light and heat to describe these; heat from the Sun would never be confused with light from the Sun!
AGWSF has had to create this “shortwave” and “longwave” category. It doesn’t dare call the longwave thermal infrared because it doesn’t want anything to jar its memes.
Anyway, I think this is the easiest of the fake fisics to show how AGWSF uses fake fisics, because now we have whole industries creating visible light bulbs with the minimum of heat.. To ‘improve’ on the incandescent lighbulb which produces only 5% light and 95% heat.. You could look up grow lights used in greenhouses which want to optimise visible light for photosynthesis but don’t want that 95% heat cooking their plants.
Heat cooks our dinner, the Sun’s radiant heat cooks, we can feel it cooking us. Visible light can’t do that. Simple as that. You won’t find anyone, well real applied scientist, designing a visible light heating system for heating buildings, or designing a visible light sauna..
As for Pekka’s water flow, the reason water flows downhill is because of gravity pulling down real molecules which have volume, weight, mass and are not the imaginary hard dots of nothing ideal gas of the empty space AGW world, and not because ‘lots of water forcing it in one direction’ – why not forcing it up then?
Surely then if a stream of water bounces off a rock the bits flying off will also fly up and keep going…
Further issues repeatedly dodged by Myrrh.
(1) Where is the alleged standard science that says visible light cannot heat anything ?
(2) And even assuming it can’t, how does that negate the idea of GHGs ? Unless you also deny the the earth is being warmed by the sun (causing it to radiate), it makes no difference which of the sun’s wavelengths are warming the earth.
Tomcat | November 24, 2012 at 1:31 am | Reply Further issues repeatedly dodged by Myrrh.
(1) Where is the alleged standard science that says visible light cannot heat anything ?
(2) And even assuming it can’t, how does that negate the idea of GHGs ? Unless you also deny the the earth is being warmed by the sun (causing it to radiate), it makes no difference which of the sun’s wavelengths are warming the earth.
Tomcat, it appears you haven’t bothered reading my posts or you wouldn’t have asked these questions.
If there is anything in any of my posts which you’d like me to clarify or with which you disagree, please quote exactly what I have said together with your question or together with a specific argument detailing why you disagree.
Oh it’s easy, Tomcat.
If like Myrrh you also deny that CO2 cannot absorb heat from IR (or any wavelength, actually), then there is no trapping of heat by the atmosphere. No such thing as a GHG.
What happens by this account is:-
– Incoming visible light passes straight through the atmosphere, ie does not warm it. It also does not warm the earth’s land or water.
– Incoming IR also passes straight through the atmosphere without warming it.
– But unlike the visible light, this incoming IR does warm the earth
– The earth then radiates this heat back out as IR
– This outgoing IR similarly passes straight through the atmosphere without warming it
So IR comes in, and goes back out again, having no effect on the CO2 in the atmosphere in either direction. Thus it makes no difference to the temperature of earth how much or how little CO2 there is in the atmosphere, or whether the CO2 content is constant or changes.
That’s his theory, anyway ….
“Oh it’s easy, Tomcat.
If like Myrrh you also deny that CO2 cannot absorb heat from IR (or any wavelength, actually), then there is no trapping of heat by the atmosphere. No such thing as a GHG.”
CO2 could perhaps reflect or re-radiate long wave IR.
And that can be a Greenhouse Effect.
But in any case, no matter what CO2 is doing, it seem like it
can not have much effect.
And strangely, everyone agrees with this.
And so the debate is really about can a small effect have a dramatic
consequence- unless you fanatical CAGWer who believe that Earth and enough CO2 can become like Venus.
But I think small effects causing big effects is also a bit foolish.
“What happens by this account is:-
– Incoming visible light passes straight through the atmosphere, ie does not warm it. It also does not warm the earth’s land or water.
– Incoming IR also passes straight through the atmosphere without warming it.
– But unlike the visible light, this incoming IR does warm the earth
– The earth then radiates this heat back out as IR
– This outgoing IR similarly passes straight through the atmosphere without warming it”
One problem I see, is IR is huge spectrum [unlike the visible spectrum]
So what part of IR spectrum is being discussed?
Once that is clarified, it’s possible to have a discussion which could
be within the realm of science.
Tomcat | November 24
Further issues repeatedly dodged by Myrrh.
(1) Where is the alleged standard science that says visible light cannot heat anything ?
(2) And even assuming it can’t, how does that negate the idea of GHGs ? Unless you also deny the the earth is being warmed by the sun (causing it to radiate), it makes no difference which of the sun’s wavelengths are warming the earth.
Myrrh, later the same day : [dodges yet again]
Terry Oldberg | November 18, 2012 at 11:06 am said: ”StefanTheDenier: As in the investigation of the warmists, in your investigation the methodology is dogmatic rather than scientific. It will remain so until somebody identifies the statistical population so we can test your assertions”
Terryyy!!!.I have being against ”dogmatic /fanatic cult’ attitudes”, from day one!!! You probably are confusing me with somebody else; or you are talking from the top of your head / prejudicial as a ”runner / truth-phobia”.
2] everything I say, can be replicated in controlled environment / laboratory – no need to wait 100y, to prove that both camps are wrong. As a challenge; you. should pick any important subject on my blog – point something that is wrong, or insufficient proofs / evidences – you will get truckloads of it, extra.
3] ”statistical population” === that’s a good one… Terry, a] if ANYBODY approves the data of temp collected; as sufficient, he / she is not a statistician, but a con, or collateral damage: Monitoring on few places, NOT EVENLY distributed places – only for the ”hottest minute in 24h, – only on 6feet from the ground… is the Genesis of the whole con. The trillions of variations in temp + changing every few minutes === is same as: giving a bucketful of gravel to a statistician – to multiply and come up with the number of grains of sand in Sahara. Yes, there are many bucketfuls of gravel in Sahara – but no honest statistician would have attempted – before they give him all the sizes of the specks of sand + the thickness of the dunes . density, and much more. I’ve repeated 1000 times, that: temp in the troposphere isn’t as in human body I.e. if under the armpit gets a degree warmer = the whole body is warmer by a degree. In the troposphere is COMPLETELY the opposite:
if cloudy – upper atmosphere warmer / on the ground cooler – that’s NOT cooler planet. b] if between two monitoring places is 100km and temp goes up by 2C, BUT between next 2 monitoring places is 1456km, and gets cooler by 0,5C (which is the case on many places) but is not given that info to the ”statistician” …. and even between the two closest monitoring places is not same temp, but million variations and keeps changing every 10minutes… c] taking for the hottest minute, but ignoring the other 1439 minutes in 24h – they don’t go up, or down as much as the hottest minutes …. one against 1439.. com-on Terry, any half honest statistician would have instantly declared the lot as ” criminal’s crap”
I challenge:you, to find at-least a half honest statistician in the blogosphere
I challenge you: to compare my proofs that are on my blog; against the Warmist’ and against the Fake’s manipulations. I’ve challenged others – realizing that they cannot argue against real proofs -> become deaf, mute, or give some remark, smelly remark, as you did; referring it as ”dogmatic” — it’s same as referring to Rabbi as Hitler. Terry, the challenge stands – don’t pas the buck to others – point the subject – will give you lots of extra informations, to your satisfaction. Don’t be a part of the ”Honesty Famine sufferers”. You can run, but be still be on this planet. Or, get on the planet;”albedo, positive / negative forcing, equilibrium, LIA, galactic dust, eocene” zodiac..
stefanthedenier:
You seem to be under the impression that if the population were to be identified its elements would be temperatures but this is not the case. Instead, it would be comprised of statistically independent events. Each such event would be describable by an observed state and an inferred but observable state. Conventionally, the former state is called the “condition” of the event and the latter state is called the “outcome.”
A “condition” is a proper subset of the tuples in the Cartesian product of the values that are taken on by the model’s independent variables. An “outcome” is a proper subset of the tuples in the Cartesian product of the values that are taken on by the model’s dependent variables. If a model’s conditions provide information about this model’s outcomes then the associated system can be controlled by arranging for conditions to be met that produce the desired outcomes with a degree of reliability. Otherwise, this system is uncontrollable.
Currently the climate is uncontrollable, for a model matching the above description has not yet been created. Step 1 in the creation of such a model would be to describe the underlying population.
It is apt to call a model of the type I have described a “predictive model.” The IPCC climate models are not predictive models. They make “projections” rather than predictions and are useless for the purpose of controlling the climate as they provide no information about the outcomes of events.
That we lack the basis for controlling the climate yet are attempting to control the climate through curbs on CO2 emissions is obscured by fallacious reasoning on the part of a group of people that includes deniers and skeptics as well as warmists. Trying to turn this situation around gets me into battles with deniers and skeptics as well as warmists.
Terry Oldberg | November 22, 2012 at 11:33 am said: ”stefanthedenier: You seem to be under the impression that if the population were to be identified its elements would be temperatures but this is not the case”
#1 a: do not understand this comment.
c#2: ”Instead, it would be comprised of statistically independent events’
a#2: Terry, one event increases / decreases other event / events = you are sh/tlless .scared from my proofs / formulas about the ”SELF-ADJUSTING” why? == I have stated everywhere: ” if the temp increases for ANY reason -> troposphere increases volume INSTANTLY, plus vertical winds increase and wastes that extra heat in minutes, not in 100years!!! only reason part of the troposphere can get warmer than normal, for prolong period – is: if other part gets colder than normal – to accommodate the extra volume of air from the extra warmed side! ”that’s the outcome”
#3: ”A “condition” is a proper subset of the tuples in the Cartesian product of the values that are taken on by the model’s independent variables. ”
a#3: a: you are laboring in ”empty talk philosophy b: things in nature don’t function ”independently”!!! can you dig-it?! Like children’s ”see-saw plank” ==the more one side goes up -> the more the other side goes down === which means::: ”during the big ice age in the N/H – the S/H had much hotter days; it wasn’t colder on both hemispheres simultaneously!!! The laws of physics don’t permit that!!! SAME laws of physics were 15000y ago as today – unless you guys abolish the laws of physics = all of you are dead wrong! B] creating a model, in which; my formulas and the laws of physics are completely disregarded; is the precursor of all evil!
#4: ”It is apt to call a model of the type I have described a “predictive model.”
a#4: ”model” in which is disregarded that: H2O controls the climate – is self-fulfilling prophecy for worse climate! b] in ”model” where CO2&water vapor is badmouthed as greenhouse / GLOBAL warming gases = is not a model; but the mother of all con jobs. I can, and did predict things that already happened, and things that will happen – because I take in consideration, the real facts = I’m dogma free. There are sufficient factors known – no need to guess scary / spooky crap for cash and ideology
#5: ”The IPCC climate models are not predictive models. They make “projections” rather than predictions and are useless”
a#5: the IPCC models are not meant to ”project / predict” but to panic / control and fleece the people. Putting the phony GLOBAL warmings with the real climatic changes in the same basket is same as: because the moon is spinning around the earth – to incorporate that Saturn and Neptune are spinning around the earth also = wrong starting point for the Warmist & fake Skeptics. Terry, you are obviously lost into their smokescreen. Terry, I’ll answer on every question of yours, in details; can you answer this question for me: ”- why are you scared to read the few posts on my homepage?!?!?!”
#6: ”That we lack the basis for controlling the climate yet are attempting to control the climate through curbs on CO2 emissions”’
a#6: wrong! we can control the climate, to a degree; if the bigots admit that: H2O is controlling the climate. Therefore: human is capable to produce worse climate = did it by inventing artificial fire. Human can also ”IMPROVE” the climate; by building new dams – to attract extra clouds from the sea. BUT, HUMAN CANNOT PRODUCE GLOBAL WARMING!!!
#7: ” Trying to turn this situation around gets me into battles with deniers and skeptics”
a#7: welcome to my club, Terry. The truth is a lonely place for long periods, in a company of nutters. Can you feel what Galileo felt? you are lucky, because in your search of the truth; you are prepared to consume lots of their crap, also… But I stand 100% for the solid truth / proofs… If you read all the 11 posts I have on my blog; we will have a lot to discus. For now, you are running with one leg of each side of a barbwire fence.. most probably is painful for you. That’s why you are in doubt about climate / and the phony GLOBAL warmings. Stop confusing those two, mate!!! go to my blog and learn about your missing links – I’ve connected all the dots, for everybody with open mind. Terry, stop seating on the truth / constipating – the more you hold-back = the more it stinks… after. ”Truth-phobia” is curable
I’m glad to hear you say that you “…stand 100% for the solid truth / proofs.” However, on the evidence of arguments that you have made in this thread I have to conclude that you lack the skills that are required for the composition of a proof.
Terry Oldberg | November 22, 2012 at 11:33 pm said: ”I’m glad to hear you say that you “…stand 100% for the solid truth / proofs.” However, on the evidence of arguments that you have made in this thread I have to conclude that you lack the skills that are required for the composition of a proof”
Terry, instead of pointing what you don’t understand ”your evidences” for more details == you decided to play a bigot. b] yes, my English vocabulary is limited, but; what I have – if it was known on the street / in public = would have being the end of the propaganda! If you prefer lies, on perfect Oxford English… there are plenty of those around, not from me, if that makes you happy. Only honest person respect honesty / truth
Tomcat | November 22, 2012 at 5:23 crapet: ”stephan & myrrh Do you deny that CO2 absorbs IR ? If so, what support can you provide for this?”
1] Tomcat, not that I just DON’T deny it, but I promote it, so listen and learn: in the morning, the carbon atom in the CO2 molecule absorbs IR &UV ”radiation” and warms up -> that warms the two oxygen atoms in the molecule -> they become warmer than surrounding free O&N atoms -> they expand and on the way up! (similar as fog from H2O)
2]They stay all day up, because the ”carbon atom” in the molecule keeps absorbing IR&UV (much better than ozone can do -remember the fuss about ozone?) Therefore: they absorb part of the ”radiation” high up; where cooling is much more efficient; = which means: more CO2 &H2O up there = LESS radiation comes to the ground = cooler days on the ground!!!
3]At night, the carbon atom loses the benefit of the sunlight -> cools -> CO2 molecule becomes heavier per volume than the O&N below -> falls down, to feed the trees, crops. b] when is more CO2 &H2O up = upper atmosphere warmer during the day / cooler on the ground. Then at night: because the proportion in difference of heat in upper atmosphere and on the ground is LESS -> slows cooling at night = warmer nights. What do you clowns have against cooler days / warmer nights?!
4] therefore: I never ever said that CO2 &H2O don’t absorb IR&UV radiation! b] Less sucking on the weed, listen and try to understand what was / is said – instead of hallucinating! ‘Sunlight comes from the other side of the water cloud & dirty clouds!!!”
5] I said to you before: need to repeat same advice for your sick attitude, ”where to shove it up”; you will be given, only if you buy me a 6pack of beer for the advise; or for you to donate equal amount of $$$ to this blog first. Therefore: the explanation I’ve given you now, is on credit. Otherwise, you Tomcat will be taken to a Vet, for snip-snip. For now; you should apologize for insinuating that I say that CO2 doesn’t absorb IR&UV radiation. Have a bit of honesty and apologize! By displaying that ignorance, that you are so dumb that cannot understand – it will cost you. Less $$ you have left for dopamine, will increase your understanding = double benefit
Stefan
OK, so you accept the standard physics that GHGs absorb IR. Your own claims though, is that the IR-heated CO2 molecules rise up in the atmosphere during the day; and then at night, when there is less IR from the earth, they cool and come back down to earth as it were. So the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere at various altitudes is changing on a diurnal cycle.
Q1 : Is this just speculation, or do you have actual measurements that confirm this?
Q2: I can see why CO2 might rise relative to the O & N due to absorbing IR whereas as the O & N do not; but why would CO2 cool more than the O & N at any given altitude?
Tomcat | November 23, 2012 at 12:01 am said: ”Stefan
OK, so you accept the standard physics that GHGs absorb IR”
A: CO2 & H2O are NOT a greenhouse gases!!!! They create ”Shade-cloth Effect” you D/H!!! Greenhouse has a SOLID glass roof! Have enough brains, not to be brainwashed by AGW -CAGW .crap! Even where those gases lift, there is still much more O&N, than CO2!!! RADIATION COMES FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE co2&h2o clouds – forget radiation from the ground!!! exception: secondary radiation / radiation from the sea-surface keep the cloud up – until they go over land; where reflection diminishes – apart from the desert; reason clouds don’t get there
Q1 : ”Is this just speculation, or do you have actual measurements that confirm this?”
A#1: I don’t work on ”speculation / guessing” what I say, are ALL solid proofs, beyond a shadow of a doubt!! b] because CO2 distribution is not even;/ same everywhere ”correct measurements” would be speculation – stick to the facts!’
Q2: ”I can see why CO2 might rise relative to the O & N due to absorbing IR whereas as the O & N do not; but why would CO2 cool more than the O & N at any given altitude?”
CO2 cools more, only during the night!!! Reason is: carbon is a good heat conductor.. B] you can’t go up 7km to experiment – BUT: swap the carbon for a peas of metal pipe — and O&N swap for two lumps of wood -> put all 3 object exposed to the sunlight – monitor the DIFFERENCE in their temp === metal / carbon would be much hotter than wood / O&N. Then leave them at night, after sundown – monitor: metal / carbon will be much ”COLDER”, than wood / O&N.
CO2 absorbs much extra coldness; which increases CONDENSATION + CARBON absorbs electricity (reason is graphite in the batteries) absorbs electrically charged water vapor = CO2 is rainmaker!!! Stop badmouthing CO2; makes you look stupid, selfish and ignorant = because: you are exhaling CO2 to use it by your vocal cords -> to badmouth CO2…
Tomcat > OK, so you accept the standard physics that GHGs absorb IR
Stefan > CO2 & H2O are NOT a greenhouse gases!!!!
So that’s a NO then, you deny the standard physics.
Tomcat > Regarding your own claim that that the IR-heated CO2 molecules rise up in the atmosphere during the day; and then at night come down again…
Q1 : Is this just speculation, or do you have actual measurements that confirm this?
Stefan > …
No measurements supplied, so just more assertion.
=> end of this discussion
Myrrh | November 22, 2012 at 8:56 pm said: ”Well, this is a very clever and very complex con, it’s not easy to spot because it was introduced into the general education system, this is now to university/PhD levels”
#1: Myrrh, they have learned it, by ”memorizing” it, as a song / gospel, not by understanding how the things function – reason they have closet minds; if something is different; no space in their lyrics = ” give us our daily bread ”and salad” doesn’t fit in. They have being denied to reason, common sense, to incorporate. That’s why is more productive to explain to people that are not fanatics, as Tomcat, Springer, Chief. On the other hand: people as lolwot, gbaikie, WebTheCrackpot, Gates; no point to explain – because they know that THEY are lying = truth irritates them
#2: ”I’m not sure what you mean by “insulators”, and I don’t know how you understand oxygen and nitrogen to be moving heat up, because it appears you’re missing out convection and the Water Cycle”
A#2: proof that you suffer from similar sickness; only: you have your nose into ”your microscope” – .cannot notice that: other factors outside your microscope react,simultaneously!!! a] CO2 &H2O intercept radiation and get warmer high up / on the expense of the heat creation on the ground. b] the heat created high up – is insulated by 6-7km of O&N below – if you don’t know that: O&N are not heat conductors, but perfect insulators.. nobody can help you in that department
B] O&N don’t conduct heat, BUT, they transport heat upwards!!! That’s the ”convection, mate! Forget about ”water cycle” that’s separate subject, don’t mix those two!
#3: ”It might be easier if I just told you what I’ve found here. The AGWScience Fiction’s Greenhouse Effect has no atmosphere at all”
a#3: that’s where both camps are completely wrong, including you! .. O&N are 998999ppm, they regulate the ”OVERALL’ temp in the troposphere to be always the same – reason you cannot understand the example of ”tennis ball” here:
water in the pool is heavier per volume than the tennis ball – reason the ball goes to the top instantly, and jumps a foot above the water ==== when O&N close to the ground collect heat -> double in volume than the rest of the O&N above – go up (that’s the force that lifts the hot air balloon up) create ”vertical wind / heat convayer” -> then when they jump a foot into the stratosphere -> they cool more than the rest of the O&N below and drop down as very heavy / cold, and push others up. (they cool up there, because is cold / but they are transparent to the sunlight) proof that you have memorized things also, without understanding the complete function
B] yes, the sun produces lots of heat on the ground + heat from volcanoes + from burning fossil fuel = it’s all wasted, same day. Today the sun will produce tremendous heat on the earth – but tomorrow will have exactly the same amount of heat as yesterday! Because of: sensitivity of O&N in expanding / shrinking in change of temp. b] how sensitive? : ”burn a matchstick – the amount of heat you produced by burning it – that much EXTRA heat the troposphere will release today; than if you didn’t burn it. Because: for the duration when you were burning it -> the 10cm3 around the flame doubled in volume = the troposphere was by 10cm3 ,larger. P.s. those 10cm3 didn’t go into the stratosphere; but pushed the the air above to go up into the stratosphere by that much.
#4:”I began questioning the claim “carbon dioxide accumulates for hundreds and even thousands of years in the atmosphere”.
a#4: they are sending you on a wild goose chase – you are obeying, as a hunting dog. Instead of knowing things, ”by understanding” == truth: the more CO2 goes up = the more of it falls down. CO2 increases condensation and falls down extra with dew and rain. CO2 has nothing to do with the temp; but by you debating it = you are dignifying their lies. Blame yourself, for not reading everything i have on my blog.
#5: ”I said it was heavier than air so couldn’t accumulate in the atmosphere at all, it would always sink to the ground displacing air. He said that was nonsense ‘because it was so well-mixed that it couldn’t separate out’”
a#5: CO2 goes up every morning – falls down every evening (reason why; I’ve explained to Tomcat, in the reply on his comment}.
#6: ”Now, the ideal gas has no properties and processes of real gases, it has no weight or volume because it just an imaginary hard dot of nothing’
a#6: if you have being reading my 11 posts ,== you would have known to point to him: where the force comes from, to lift 500kg hot air baloon; which after 20-30 minutes accumulates inside over 150000ppm of CO2, but still keep pushing up with all that weight. BLAME YOURSELF!!! Leave the ”water influence” for after (there is a page on that also, on my homepage; read the lot what’s there; you will be glad you did, So-far; you have being operating on the kidneys, and ignored that: what you are talking about works in coordination of other organs – by itself is meaningless – reason they are ridiculing you. Learn how the whole system functions, in coordination; with understanding – not as lyric!
“That’s why is more productive to explain to people that are not fanatics, as Tomcat, Springer, Chief. On the other hand: people as lolwot, gbaikie, WebTheCrackpot, Gates; no point to explain – because they know that THEY are lying = truth irritates them.”
I am not aware of a single thing that I am lying about.
And so, I would be happy if you pointed one one thing you think I am lying about.
Not only I am not aware of anything which you might think I am lying about, I don’t know what you disagree with that I have ever said. I don’t even feel sufficiently confident to attempt a guess.
gbaikie | November 24, 2012 at 2:31 am said: ”I am not aware of a single thing that I am lying about”
gbaikie, my friend; pull the other one!
b] you and Tony are imitating ”sergeant Schulz, perfectly – I know noooothing”’
A] on my comment to Myrrh you are commenting on; there is an example of” burning a matchstick” By the laws of physics, that example is correct. so-far, ALL your propaganda LIES are million light years away from the truth – Same laws of physics will be in 100years (by the way: Tony doesn’t want to acknowledge that: same laws of physics were in the past) ALL of you have abolished those laws of physics; without legislation in parliament and in UN…?…?!
c#2: ” I don’t even feel sufficiently confident to attempt a guess”
A#2: mate, lets hope you intend to get straight / honest. B] I’m not going to ”attempt” to point all of your past lies – they were toooo many. c] if I try to attempt to explain all the damages done / and in progress, because of the sick propaganda – would take me two life-spans. We will leave that to the criminologist, judges and the jury
If you decided to jump ship; you can explain what that example about ”burning a matchstick” means. You are intelligent, now lets get clever also. It’s not prudent for you, to stick to the sinking Titanic!.
stefanthedenier | November 23, 2012 at 12:27 am
B] O&N don’t conduct heat, BUT, they transport heat upwards!!! That’s the ”convection, mate!
Volumes of oxygen and nitrogen, air, on the move are called winds, these are convection currents created when volumes of air gets heated at the surface and expand becoming lighter and less dense than the colder air around them, which being colder and heavier sinks flowing beneath. Gases are compressible they expand when heated and contract when cooled down. The hot air balloon rises because the heated gases have become less dense and lighter than than the air around them, they rise taking the balloon enclosing them up and away. If you’ve never been up in a hot air balloon, it’s a great experience.
Forget about ”water cycle” that’s separate subject, don’t mix those two!
Not at all a separate subject.. Firstly because water has a very high heat capacity, very good at trapping heat… In evaporation when heated at the surface it rises taking that heat with it, when it reaches the colder heights it, the hot water vapour, condenses back into liquid water or ice, forming clouds and coming down as rain and so on. Rain is carbonic acid.
Carbonic Acid is Water and Carbon Dioxide. Every time it rains all the carbon dioxide around in the atmosphere is cleared up and returns to the ground, where the cycle begins again. That’s why it’s called a cycle. It could just as well be called the Carbonic Acid Cycle.
Carbon dioxide in this has the same residence time in the atmosphere as water, 8-10 days. So, carbon dioxide will always sink back to the surface one way or the other, through the Water Cycle or being heavier than air when not being moved by work, such as heat or in convection currents, winds, which could also take it sideways.
This Water Cycle is missing from from the AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect because with the Water Cycle there is no such thing as the claimed “33°C/33K warming by greenhouse gases from minus18°C to 15°C”.
What AGWSF pretends, to achieve this sleight of hand, is that the “minus18°C figure is the temperature of the Earth with oxygen and nitrogen but without greenhouse gases”, but that is the standard figure for the Earth without any atmosphere at all.
The AGWSF “33°C warming” is an imaginary figure created by first faking the base line.
The second part of this science fraud is taking out the Water Cycle, without water the Earth with its atmosphere of mainly oxygen and nitrogen would be 67°C,
It is clear therefore, it is our real gas atmosphere of mainly oxygen and nitrogen which are also our basic greenhouse gases acting as a blanket around the Earth stopping the heat from escaping.
Traditionally the whole of our atmosphere was likened to a greenhouse, but a real greenhouse, where optimum temperatures for plants could be regulated by heating and cooling, so traditionally, ALL the gases in our atmosphere are greenhouse gases because all gases rise when heated and sink when cooled, but particularly water in the cooling because it includes the great Water Cycle without which the Earth would be 67°C not 15°C.
Without the Water Cycle, but with our heavy fluid gas blanket atmosphere of mainly nitrogen and oxygen, the Earth would be a desert, so, without the “greenhouse gases as AGWSF defines them”, the Earth would be 52°C hotter, not 33°C colder…
Notice there are several sleights of hand used in this; changing the base line temperature by claiming it is something it isn’t, changing the concept of a real greenhouse having both heating and cooling to being a greenhouse which just heats.., changing the concept of greenhouse from being our whole atmosphere of gases and changing that our most important greenhouse gases are oxygen, nitrogen and water – the bulk nitrogen and oxygen blanket warming and the water cooling in its cycle.
It is our extraordinary atmosphere of gases surrounding our world at just the right distance from the Sun and right size to give us the gravity we have, which gives us the abundant life we have from the amazing real properties and processes of our real voluminous gases.
AGWScienceFiction Greenhouse Effect is a nasty piece of work.
#3: ”It might be easier if I just told you what I’ve found here. The AGWScience Fiction’s Greenhouse Effect has no atmosphere at all”
a#3: that’s where both camps are completely wrong, including you! .. O&N are 998999ppm, they regulate the ”OVERALL’ temp in the troposphere to be always the same – reason you cannot understand the example of ”tennis ball” here:
water in the pool is heavier per volume than the tennis ball – reason the ball goes to the top instantly, and jumps a foot above the water ==== when O&N close to the ground collect heat -> double in volume than the rest of the O&N above – go up (that’s the force that lifts the hot air balloon up) create ”vertical wind / heat convayer” -> then when they jump a foot into the stratosphere -> they cool more than the rest of the O&N below and drop down as very heavy / cold, and push others up. (they cool up there, because is cold / but they are transparent to the sunlight) proof that you have memorized things also, without understanding the complete function
What I mean is specifically related to the AGWSF’s creation of a fictional atmosphere out of ideal gases, not real gases which have properties and processes. They have no way to get their clouds. Their carbon dioxide doesn’t defy gravity, because they don’t have gravity. They don’t have convection because they have nothing to convect. They have empty space, they do not have our heavy, voluminous fluid gas ocean subject to gravity, they go straight from the surface to empty space hence their “radiation” arguments. They do not have any atmosphere at all. They have no sound in their world. You have to know the difference between ideal and real gases to appreciate what I’m saying here.
#4:”I began questioning the claim “carbon dioxide accumulates for hundreds and even thousands of years in the atmosphere”.
a#4: they are sending you on a wild goose chase – you are obeying, as a hunting dog. Instead of knowing things, ”by understanding” == truth: the more CO2 goes up = the more of it falls down. CO2 increases condensation and falls down extra with dew and rain. CO2 has nothing to do with the temp; but by you debating it = you are dignifying their lies. Blame yourself, for not reading everything i have on my blog.
Hmm, I am pointing out the con that exists in the whole of their concept of the Greenhouse Effect and its comic cartoon energy budget. Because I have noticed it. Because I have spotted where their claims contradict real physics, as still taught traditionally.
They don’t have any heat from the Sun in their fake fisics world.., why are you bothering to argue with them about temperature..?
In the past people or experts believed in what called Celestial spheres:
“The celestial spheres, or celestial orbs, were the fundamental entities of the cosmological models developed by Plato, Eudoxus, Aristotle, Ptolemy, Copernicus and others. In these celestial models the stars and planets are carried around by being embedded in rotating spheres made of an aetherial transparent fifth element (quintessence), like jewels set in orbs. Since the fixed stars did not change their positions relative to each other, it was argued that they must be on the surface of a single starry sphere.”
Do you think the people who believed this were con men?
Or people engaged in fraud?
Or mostly just dim witted?
gbaikie | November 24, 2012 at 6:29 pm said: ”In the past people or experts believed in what called Celestial spheres”
BUT, when people discovered the truth – they stopped believing! On the other hand: when X number of times I’ve proven that: warmings cannot be GLOBAL — water controls the climate – climatic changes have nothing to do with any phony ”GLOBAL warmings” === you continue with your fanaticism.
Ignorance is not a crime — but ignoring the truth, to commit damages; is a cardinal crime!!! think about it: Don’t wash your hands with those great thinkers!
gbaikie | November 24, 2012 at 6:29 pm |
P.S. gbaikie, I forgot to comment on your ”fishnet”’ suggestion…. sorry.
You cannot imagine how correct you are! spot on! it’s more to the point ”fishnet” than ”shade-cloth effect” BUT, is it appropriate, you should know better, English is your lingo.
2] 4-5 years ago, when I was writing my book; a friend suggested to me the ”fishnet effect” and I changed it to that. BUT, after I realized that: fishnet is assisted with pro’s stockings. – so I changed every reference back to ”shade-cloth effect”. Was i correct in changing it, or should have listened to the friend…. you think, you have problems…
Because Warmist are always trying to muddy the water / smokescreen – I constantly am trying to simplify / to eliminate confusion / rot. Now I’m writing the second book; asking for your advice: should I stick to the same; or change it to ‘fishnet effect” because is more to the point of reality. please help!
Myrrh | November 24, 2012 at 4:28 pm said: ”Volumes of oxygen and nitrogen, air, on the move are called wind”
Myrrh… in the whole of your comment above; you sound as: ”you teaching your father: how to make children” == plus, in half of your remarks – you are mentioning ”the stork” Is it a proof that: you have being for too long too close, to the Tomcat’s bong – as a ”passive smoker”?! Looks like your mind is ”one way street” I respect you for trying to present the truth, BUT: your father gave you two ears and only one mouth! I.e. to listen twice as much, than you talk!!! It shows that: you have being avoiding to read what is on my blog = now you are superficially presenting / what is there, in DETAILS – PLUS, as I said: you are: in-between inserting some ”stork jobs” GO TO MY BLOG!!!
I’ll now point only few of your ”storks” ::::
stork#1 ”If you’ve never been up in a hot air balloon, it’s a great experience”
A#1: if you have being reading what i have – wouldn’t be educating your father how to make children!!! (I had a hang-glider + did fly personalty hot air balloon, not as pasanger)
.stork#2: ”Firstly because water has a very high heat capacity, very good at trapping heat…”
A#2: Myrrh, I told you to keep water as separate issue; because: on water you are half correct / half wrong. As ”separate” is easier corrected. Don’t bait more than you can chew… start simplifying – creating confusion is Warmist job, stop helping them! Here is on water, if you don’t have patients, but go and read it; so you get a complete picture – instead of tangling yourself with parts of the puzzle: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2012/07/20/water-vapor/
stork #3: ”Carbonic Acid is Water and Carbon Dioxide”
A#3: that’s how parrot is teaching people, how to say: ”cocky wants a cracker” (Mirrh, next time when close to Tomcat’s bong, put a washing-peg on your nose – otherwise, you might become a collateral damage)
stork #4:”They have no sound in their world. You have to know the difference between ideal and real gases to appreciate what I’m saying here”
A#4: Myrrh, most of them know, for me repeating thousand times that: O&N are 998999ppm, but they are scared from the truth and avoid.== you have noticed that: O&N exist, full stop. Full function of them – you still need to learn that: ”no matter how much extra heat is produced – O&N are capable of getting read of it… -if you get out of your trans; you can help me present the truth, stop using Tomcat’s attitude!!!
stork #5:”I began questioning the claim “carbon dioxide accumulates for hundreds and even thousands of years in the atmosphere”
A#5: well, I didn’t have to ”begin questioning” I did know it as soon as was presented; that they are wrong; as soon as they said their lies! Reason I wrote my book!!! I’m on your site, wake up!!!
stork #6:”Hmm, I am pointing out the con that exists in the whole of their concept of the Greenhouse Effect and its comic cartoon energy budget. Because I have noticed it. Because I have spotted where their claims contradict real physics”
A#6: that’s good. BUT, instead of ”half cocked” read every sentence on my homepage, those few posts – so you have complete picture and real ammunition – instead of using 60% blanks!!!
A#7:”They don’t have any heat from the Sun in their fake fisics world.., why are you bothering to argue with them about temperature..?”
A#7: Yes they do; you sound again as Tomcat (closed parashoot mind)
the only thing is: they are back to front on everything – because they benefit from confusion; don’t underestimate them! You have to clear the WHOLE of your deck, instead off only half!!! The only way you can do that, is: to read all 11posts / pages on my blog. So-far, you are mixing some truth, some crap; and disregarding the real proofs; there can help you to have complete picture – then they will hate you even more – but at-least cannot ridicule you. You have to understand that: warming of the planet exist / COOLING of the planet exist!!! Reason I gave you the example of complete sensitivity in regulation for the heat ”OVERALL” in the troposphere to be ALWAYS the same! … Can you remember the example: of you ”burning a matchstick” or are you suffering from Tomcat’s attitude, and already forgot? If you did have correct understanding of the WHOLE phony GLOBAL warming agenda – that example would have meant a lot to you. remember: ”two ears / one mouth” the only way to have open mind and enlarge knowledge! Stop teaching your farther, that: the stork can bring babies also…
stefanthedenier | November 24, 2012 at 9:54 pm | Reply
Myrrh | November 24, 2012 at 4:28 pm said: ”Volumes of oxygen and nitrogen, air, on the move are called wind”
Myrrh… in the whole of your comment above; you sound as: ”you teaching your father: how to make children” == plus, in half of your remarks – you are mentioning ”the stork” Is it a proof that: you have being for too long too close, to the Tomcat’s bong – as a ”passive smoker”?! Looks like your mind is ”one way street” I respect you for trying to present the truth, BUT: your father gave you two ears and only one mouth! I.e. to listen twice as much, than you talk!!! It shows that: you have being avoiding to read what is on my blog = now you are superficially presenting / what is there, in DETAILS – PLUS, as I said: you are: in-between inserting some ”stork jobs” GO TO MY BLOG!!!
Stefan, perhaps if you stopped shouting long enough to give yourself time to comprehend what I am trying to say here.. You are not following my arguments which are also to inform any others reading this who might not know the basics.
I’ve been to your blog. There, as here, you are using a confused mix of real physics and the fake fisics memes of the AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect, a common problem as I’ve noted elsewhere. “Climate science” touches on many different science disciplines and while experts in one field of real science will be able to pick out where AGW fake fisics contradicts the physics in their own field, they mostly take for granted fake fisics memes in disciplines they know little if anything about.
These fake fisics memes are ubiquitous, they were deliberately introduced into the education system with the result that we have all these arguments where people don’t realise which is fake and which real in the views they hold. You are an example of this.
Hence you thinking I’m giving elementary information, but my point is they don’t have this elementary information. They don’t know what wind is. I give basic information which is important for my argument bearing in mind that others might be reading my posts to you who don’t these basics.
However, you are also disagreeing with me on some points because you don’t understand the points I’m making because you’re simply repeating a fake fisics meme about the basics.
I will make one more effort to clarify my points for you.
A#1: if you have being reading what i have – wouldn’t be educating your father how to make children!!! (I had a hang-glider + did fly personalty hot air balloon, not as pasanger)
My point was that your “carbon dioxide goes up”, is because a) gases are compressible, which means they can expand and contract, and b) gases have weight relative to each other. They expand when hot, which means they become less dense, which means they become lighter than the surrounding air, which is why the balloon lifts up. And since you’ve even flown them, you will know that to get movement downwards you have to switch off the burner, why? Because it allows the gases to cool down again, and when gases cool down they contract, which means they get denser, which means they get heavier than the air around them, which means they will sink. As we both know: hot air rises, cold air sinks. They don’t have hot air that rises and sinks, because they don’t have real gases. They don’t have convection because their gases are not real.
You are arguing with them as if they have real gases, and they think they do.. Neither you nor they understand that they don’t even have an atmosphere – until you can understand what I am trying to tell you about the difference between ideal and real gases you will not be able to follow my arguments here.
I am simply giving the properties and processes of the effects – which explain the points I am making. My point is that AGWSF fisics does not have gases which expand and contract. You do not understand the point I am trying to make because a) you’re not listening b) you don’t know the difference between real and ideal gases. AGWSF fisics is based on ideal gases, they do not exist, they are an imaginary construct. They have excised Van der Waals as they have excised the Water Cycle.
The fake fisics gases of the Greenhouse Effect have no properties and therefore are incapable of having processes. I am trying to explain their fake fisics bases on ideal gas and why this creates an impossible world, a fictional world. In this fictional world based on their fake ideal gas they have only empty space, because their gases do not have the properties of volume, therefore, they have no sound in their world.
They don’t have real gases with real properties and processes, like, expanding and rising when hot and sinking when cold. Like being heavier or lighter than air anyway, even at the same temperature as the surrounding air – methane is lighter than air, it rises in air, and carbon dioxide is heavier than air, it sinks in air.
.stork#2: ”Firstly because water has a very high heat capacity, very good at trapping heat…”
A#2: Myrrh, I told you to keep water as separate issue;
I am not making your argument, I am making my own.
because: on water you are half correct / half wrong. As ”separate” is easier corrected. Don’t bait more than you can chew… start simplifying – creating confusion is Warmist job, stop helping them! Here is on water, if you don’t have patients, but go and read it; so you get a complete picture – instead of tangling yourself with parts of the puzzle: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2012/07/20/water-vapor/
Because CO2 increases CONDENSATION, CO2 is a rainmaker**. Condensation is for decreasing humidity / water vapor in the air and converting it into dew, rain.
How does Carbon Dioxide increase condensation?
The fluid gas water vapour condenses back into the fluid liquid water or ice when it releases its heat on meeting colder air, heat flows from hotter to colder spontaneously, this is how the hot water vapour lighter than the air surrounding it and rising into the colder heights condenses back into liquid water. This is the basic process of condensation of water vapour back into liquid water or ice.
stork #3: ”Carbonic Acid is Water and Carbon Dioxide”
A#3: that’s how parrot is teaching people, how to say: ”cocky wants a cracker” (Mirrh, next time when close to Tomcat’s bong, put a washing-peg on your nose – otherwise, you might become a collateral damage)
I am trying to explain they don’t have rain in their Carbon Cycle, they don’t know what rain is.
Their claim is that “carbon dioxide is well-mixed and accumulates in the atmosphere for hundreds and even thousands of years” – because they don’t have real gases which can be heavier or lighter than air and because they don’t have real gases which have attraction, ideal gases do not have attraction. They have no way of getting rain, because, all rain is carbonic acid and carbonic acid is formed by the attraction of water and carbon dioxide molecules.
Carbon dioxide is fully part of the Water Cycle. The residence time of water in the atmosphere in this cycle is 8-10 days. Because carbon dioxide is fully part of the Water Cycle, because all pure clean rain is carbonic acid, carbon dioxide in this has the same residence time in the atmosphere as water, that is, 8-10 days.
Which means, carbon dioxide cannot accumulate in the atmosphere “for hundreds and even thousands of years” as they claim, a) because it is heavier than air and will always sink to the ground displacing air and b) because it is fully part of the Water Cycle.
This is the reason I began questioning them about their claims, because what they were saying about carbon dioxide being “well-mixed and accumulating for hundreds and even thousands of years” was obviously stupid. Obviously to those who know basic real world tried tested and well understood traditional physics about gases being heavier and lighter than air and know the real world basics of the Water Cycle and that all rain is carbonic acid…
stork #4:”They have no sound in their world. You have to know the difference between ideal and real gases to appreciate what I’m saying here”
A#4: Myrrh, most of them know, for me repeating thousand times that: O&N are 998999ppm, but they are scared from the truth and avoid.== you have noticed that: O&N exist, full stop. Full function of them – you still need to learn that: ”no matter how much extra heat is produced – O&N are capable of getting read of it… -if you get out of your trans; you can help me present the truth, stop using Tomcat’s attitude!!!
You’re not appreciating the point I’m making here, it’s not about the atmosphere being mostly nitrogen and oxygen. It’s a joke.
They don’t realise they don’t have any sound in their world, because they don’t extrapolate logically from their “ideal gas empty space atmosphere”..
There is a difference between ideal and real gases, ideal gases are an imaginary construct, they don’t exist. At best the ideal gas is useful as beginning calculations, but all the missing properties and processes have to be put back in by other equations to get real gas figures. What AGWSF has done here is stop before Van der Waals in our science history of exploring what gases are. Van der Waals said ideal gas law was nonsense because it didn’t include volume. They have done a similar thing with Arrhenius, they take his mistakes as the basis of their fisics..
The AGWSF fisics says that the “atmosphere is empty space with ideal gases nitrogen and oxygen and carbon dioxide and as ideal gas diffusing at great speed under their own molecular momentum and bouncing off each other in elastic collisions, because ideal gases do not have attraction, and so become well mixed”.
This is an imaginary world! Our atmosphere is not empty space. Empty space is beyond our atmosphere. Our real atmosphere is a heavy ocean of real gases with volume. It takes volume to hear sound. There is no sound in empty space. There is no sound if gases are travelling at huge speeds bouncing off each other! Sound needs a medium to travel through, empty space is not a medium, it is empty space.
We hear sound because gases have volume, because they are close to each other. Gas is a fluid which has volume subject to gravity, and therefore has weight etc., we have sound when the sound causes a molecule of real gas to vibrate and because it is near another real gas it causes that molecule of real gas to vibrate, and so the sound is passed through the fluid medium real gas. When the sound passes the molecules of real gas stop vibrating and settle back to their ground state. In the microscopic molecular scale they may well be moving at great speeds, but, they are going nowhere fast because they are constrained by the weight and volume of all the heavy ocean of gas around them.
This heavy ocean of gas weighs down 14 pounds per square inch, which is a stone per square inch. That is One Ton on our shoulders. That is a huge weight of heavy gases pressing down on us and on each other, because they have VOLUME. AGWSF fake fisics does not have gases with volume! They have nothing for gravity to work on, that’s why they have no gravity.
When they can see the joke they will understand why their fisics is fake..
stork #5:”I began questioning the claim “carbon dioxide accumulates for hundreds and even thousands of years in the atmosphere”
A#5: well, I didn’t have to ”begin questioning” I did know it as soon as was presented; that they are wrong; as soon as they said their lies! Reason I wrote my book!!! I’m on your site, wake up!!!
I wanted to know WHY they said these things. That’s why I began questioning them. That’s how I found out they have created a fictional world out of the imaginary mathematical construct ideal gas (like “average” it doesn’t exist), and, taken all the non-existence of properties of ideal gas and pretended they apply to real world gases..
That’s why they think the atmosphere is empty space, their fictional fisics ideal gas has no mass, no volume, no weight, no attraction, is not subject to gravity. They pretend in their fake fisics that oxygen and nitrogen and carbon dioxide are hard dots of nothing zipping at great speeds through empty space!
So, that’s why they have no convection, because they do not have any real gases to convect. Which means, they don’t have wind, because, wind is a volume of the fluid real gas air on the the move.
Sound is the movement of energy through the volume of fluid gas, like waves travel in the ocean; it’s not the water travelling, it’s water being moved on the spot where it is creating waves, like a Mexican wave. Etc.
stork #6:”Hmm, I am pointing out the con that exists in the whole of their concept of the Greenhouse Effect and its comic cartoon energy budget. Because I have noticed it. Because I have spotted where their claims contradict real physics”
A#6: that’s good. BUT, instead of ”half cocked” read every sentence on my homepage, those few posts – so you have complete picture and real ammunition – instead of using 60% blanks!!!
As I’ve said, you’re not following my arguments..
A#7:”They don’t have any heat from the Sun in their fake fisics world.., why are you bothering to argue with them about temperature..?”
A#7: Yes they do; you sound again as Tomcat (closed parashoot mind)
the only thing is: they are back to front on everything – because they benefit from confusion; don’t underestimate them! You have to clear the WHOLE of your deck, instead off only half!!! The only way you can do that, is: to read all 11posts / pages on my blog. So-far, you are mixing some truth, some crap; and disregarding the real proofs; there can help you to have complete picture – then they will hate you even more – but at-least cannot ridicule you. You have to understand that: warming of the planet exist / COOLING of the planet exist!!! Reason I gave you the example of complete sensitivity in regulation for the heat ”OVERALL” in the troposphere to be ALWAYS the same! … Can you remember the example: of you ”burning a matchstick” or are you suffering from Tomcat’s attitude, and already forgot? If you did have correct understanding of the WHOLE phony GLOBAL warming agenda – that example would have meant a lot to you. remember: ”two ears / one mouth” the only way to have open mind and enlarge knowledge! Stop teaching your farther, that: the stork can bring babies also…
As I’ve said, you’re not following my arguments..
They do not have heat from the Sun in their world, because I know, because I questioned them about their claims.
They claim that thermal infrared either “doesn’t get through [an unexplained] invisible barrier like the glass of a greenhouse” or, “that the Sun produces very little thermal infrared so there’s nothing to get to us”. They say “shortwave from the Sun heats land and oceans”.
In the real world, the heat we feel from the Sun is the invisible thermal infrared, we cannot physically feel shortwave, and, in the real world shortwaves are incapable of heating matter, they cannot physically heat matter, because they are not big enough, not powerful enough to move the whole molecules of matter into vibration which is what it takes to heat up land and water and us.
If you would like me to explain any of this, the arguments I am making, further, I shall be happy to do so.
Myrrh
Carbonic Acid is Water and Carbon Dioxide. Every time it rains all the carbon dioxide around in the atmosphere is cleared up and returns to the ground
All of it? This would mean
* If you took a CO2 reading right after (enough) rain, the figure would be 0%. Her this ever been done?
* As long as it keeps raining from time to time, CO2 levels cannot keep rising. But we know for a fact they have risen – from 280 ppm to ~380 ppm
Sounds like Myrrh “fisicsfiction” to me.
–Myrrh
Carbonic Acid is Water and Carbon Dioxide. Every time it rains all the carbon dioxide around in the atmosphere is cleared up and returns to the ground
All of it? This would mean
* If you took a CO2 reading right after (enough) rain, the figure would be 0%. Her this ever been done?–
The rain is Carbonic Acid and CO2 in solution. How much CO2 in solution depends upon the amount CO2 in the air.
Apparently there is more CO2 in solution then as acid in the water- and the amount CO2 in solution doesn’t affect the PH of the water.
So water without CO2 in has PH of 7. Such ultra pure water will quickly absorb CO2 and become around 5.5 PH. Or rainwater is always going to have Carbonic Acid and be around 5.5 PH.
I am not sure how much CO2 is in rainwater. But my guess is around one part in thousand.
Now a big storm like like Sandy rains a lot water, and most of it isn’t on land. But on land probably more than 400 km by 400 km square area and
more the 5 cm of rain. So 160,000 sq km with 5 cm of rain. Is 50,000 tons of water per square and in total 8 billion tonnes water. And 1/1000th of that is about 8 million tons of CO2
“For the entire United States, excluding Hawaii and Alaska, the average amount of moisture falling as rain and snow is 30.21 inches (767 millimetres).”
http://www.currentresults.com/Weather/US/average-annual-state-precipitation.php
This btw has increase about 6% over a century- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_rainfall_climatology
Contiguous United States: 8,080,464.3 square km
So 76 cm is 760 kg per square meter, and 760 million kg per sq km- or 760,000 tons per square km. .76 million tons.
So 6141 billion tons of rainwater. And 1/1000th of that is about 6 billion tonnes of CO2 removed from the air per year.
Memphis | November 25, 2012 at 2:55 am | Reply
Myrrh
Carbonic Acid is Water and Carbon Dioxide. Every time it rains all the carbon dioxide around in the atmosphere is cleared up and returns to the ground
All of it? This would mean
* If you took a CO2 reading right after (enough) rain, the figure would be 0%. Her this ever been done?
Yes, for all practical purposes all of it. For all practical purposes all water is carbonic acid. You can get neutral water, but so rare it isn’t significant.
I bookmarked something the other day because I thought it was a good example of how real scientists have thought through and experimented to bring us to the understanding we have now of the world around us – I get very annoyed when being told “there are lots of experiments to prove AGW this or AGW that in the last century”, but whenever I ask for even one to be fetched, I get nothing back.., but it also says this:
“Pure Water
As used in the remainder of this report, “pure water” connotes the
lay definition; distilled water would be called “pure.” Pure water–
completely free of suspended particles–is a rarity, however, and would
be found only in a specialized chemical laboratory. Instances have been
cited in which the water remained “contaminated with motes” after having been redistilled as many as 20 times in a quartz receptable ([6], page 318). Neutral water (pH = 7) is equally scarce; normally, it is weak carbonic acid (pH = 5.8 to 6.0) if there has been any brief contact with the atmosphere, which introduces carbon dioxide gas (H20 + CO2 – HICO 3).
A manufacturer of fused-quartz distillation apparitus cites the characteristic pH value of normal distilled water as 5.5, versus 6.2 for doubledistilled water. Concerning the dissolving by water of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, Johnson [7] has stated that “… even in an unstirred liquid contained in an open beaker, the process is substantially complete in about ten minutes.”
From “Sonic Cavitation in Water” Charles L. Darner 1970, from a US Naval Research division – http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a031182.pdf
* As long as it keeps raining from time to time, CO2 levels cannot keep rising.
Exactly…
But we know for a fact they have risen – from 280 ppm to ~380 ppm
Do we know that? The base 280 ppm was cherry picked by Callander and Keeling somehow managed to establish, in less than two years of data gathering because he was such a clever scientist, from the top of the world’s highest active volcano surrounded by active volcanoes in a volcanic hot spot producing volcanoes with all the associated volcanic venting and thousands of earthquakes in warm seas.., officially designated the poster child “pristine” area for measuring his mythical concept “well-mixed background” carbon dioxide, that he had detected a definite trend of man-made CO2 rising… Which in reality can’t be told apart from volcanic production.
His son carried on co-ordinating this (debunked by AIRS) unproven well-mixed background Keeling curve rise when the programme expanded to include other stations. Now the con is fully government controlled and globally co-ordinated. Pre this agenda driven non-science manipulation the general ‘standard average’ was 400 ppm, so designated a trace gas. So they have been getting closer to it..
If you want a good laugh, read through how they ‘measure’ for this “well-mixed background pure uncontaminated by local conditions” carbon dioxide – they have an abundance of carbon dioxide to pick and choose from..
Timothy Casey looks into some of this here: http://carbon-budget.geologist-1011.net/
Summarising …
Physics tells us that the adiabatic lapse rate represents that change in temperature that is required to keep the entropy of a parcel of air constant when its pressure is changed in an adiabatic manner.
Gravity alone determines the change in pressure for a given atmospheric mass, and so gravity alone determines the adiabatic lapse rate.
It seems that most climatologists have never learnt this basic fact of physics, so they were bluffed into believing a false conjecture that an imaginary greenhouse effect caused the observed temperature gradient responsible for the surface temperature being higher than the planet’s radiating temperature.
Consideration of what happens on Venus (whose surface receives only about 10% of the insolation received by Earth’s surface) demonstrates that the adiabatic lapse rate can be the only reason for the surface temperature being hundreds of degrees hotter. Thus it also demonstrates the fiction of the GHE conjecture.
Refer Section 8 of this paper for more detail on Venus.
Memphis | November 25, 2012 at 2:55 am said: ” But we know for a fact they have risen – from 280 ppm to ~380 ppm”
Memphis, you are confusing: ”for a fact” with: ”you have being told by the Con Brigade”, your Brainwashers.
1] rain / water is made by god, to wash things – NO, it doesn’t wash ALL of it – BUT: the more CO2 in the air -> the more it washes, simple logic. After rain, the air feels different. b] farmers will tell you: from 2inches of rainfall crops grow much better, than from same amount of irrigated water – because rain brings the essential molecule for growth, CO2
2] CO2 increases condensation = rainmaker. Because CO2 becomes colder than O&N at night + carbon absorbs electrical charges from the water vapor = rainmaker. Doesn’t have to be CO2, experiment with a bottle of deep frozen water, in humid area – outside the bottle will condensate half a cup of water. Condensation is very important, because: if is too much humidity -> evaporation decreases. I hope you know why extra evaporation is much better.
3] you blindly believe in brainwashing literature; probably why you and Tomcat demand ”literature proofs” for most basic things, from especially written treads; for confusion and brainwashing. If you can’t use your own brains and logic… are you only a trumpet for the leading Brainwashers? When you &Tomcat demand: proofs from literature; WHY is 1+1=2, it tells all about you. normally, when somebody connects the dots for you; you are lacking capacity, for yourself, to judge if is correct or not. b] contemporary literature is NOT created to inform – you should have realized that by now
Myrrh > Every time it rains all the carbon dioxide around in the atmosphere is cleared up and returns to the ground
Memphis > This would mean if you took a CO2 reading right after (enough) rain, the figure would be 0%. Has this ever been done?
Since Myrrh chose to not address the question, I’ll take the working answer as : No, the CO2 content has not been seen to reduce to 0% after rain.
Memphis > [this would also mean that] as long as it keeps raining from time to time, CO2 levels cannot keep rising.
Myrrh > Exactly…
Memphis > But we know for a fact they have risen
Myrrh denies the data that says CO2 levels are rising. But produces no alternative data.
Say Tomcat, about Descartes and sleeping till noon, what finished Descartes off was having ter get up at dawn in co-o-o-ld northern
latitudes ter debate with pesky royalty. Think he may have
succumbed ter pneumonia.
I myself gladly will sleep ter noon if i get the chance, having spent
half the night burning the midnight oil…( planet destroyer as I am.)
“I sleep, therefore I am,”
Sleeping denoting the existence of a ‘Sleeper.’
Oops! Not Tomcat but Petra. Apologies ter both.
“Descartes walks into a bar.,” (way above)
Supposedly an unoriginal “joke” ? Since when are these thought of as jokes? He was of course well known to be a drunken fart.
Descartes walks into a bar.
The bar tender asks: ‘Will you have a beer?’
Descares replies : ‘I think not.’
Say, how fragile is existence!
If you ‘think not, you aren’t. :(
Is that the beth you can manage?
And was it an error bar? A cosy small one I hope.
Yeth i gueth it ith (
Myrrh | November 25, 2012 at 6:36 am
Mate, you have being debating against Warmist &Skeptics on few blogs -=> instantly see me as one of them. You say that you have being to my blog – but as soon as you read a sentence that’s different = you take a runner; that’s NOT understanding – instead off, your empty talk follows: 1] I don’t use false physics; but broader picture, by using reliable physics. 2] if I say few things: from me comes ”constructive criticism” 3] where you are 100% I skipped those; BUT, tried to correct your narrow vision on few other things – because I can understand you better / than you can understand yourself.= I’m eliminating; ”the stork’s involvement”
Because: on those few things; you haven’t being informed, that: ”in nature few things function and affect each other simultaneously – outcome is different than: when you are zooming on a simple thing”. b] I’m pointing to you that: for a car to function – doesn’t need only steering wheel, doors and tires. I’m giving you gears, engine – so you stop appearing as Mr. Fred Flintstone with his automobile.
you are saying: ”’My point is that AGWSF fisics does not have gases which expand and contract. You do not understand the point I am trying to make because a) you’re not listening b) you don’t know the difference between real and ideal gases”’
Myrrh, half of my book is on that subject – b]half of the text on my blog is on that subject – people know that: MY FORMULAS are about that = your empty talk again, Myrrh, I’m not one of them!!! I’m correcting you, where you are wrong – you are correcting my real proofs, slow down man..Be fair to yourself – read what I have, stop panicking. Here is, how ”real” correcting sounds:
1] ”rainwater is NOT only carbonic acid: but lots of other crap the rain washes down. b] rainwater is pH7, unless is sulfuric acid in +++. Carbonic acid doesn’t bring acidity in rainwater to pH6,5!!!! carbonic acid is almost not acidic!!! you have real red blood in arteries, and darker colour blood in the vines – darker, because of the carbonic acid in it! So: your ”discovered literature” is NOT 100% correct
2] referring to ”methane” as not as heavy as air – you are dignifying the Warmist crap. TRUTH: new methane is not produced in pure form. get that correctly!!! When you erupt, it goes ”up” to your nostrils – because is at 37C, as soon as it cools in a minute – drops down. Because is produced with other goodies as ammonia, CO2, SO2 and many other compounds. Therefore: methane is NOT a greenhouse gas; BUT, it’s the most important: to produce of it as much as possible -> that produces extra free oxygen (nobody cares that: we are depleting the oxygen from the air, At least you know that oxygen exist – BUT, badmouthing creation of new methane, is = depleting the free oxygen in the air: don’t be scared from real proofs http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/methane-ch4/
Your heart is on good place; but you are lacking capacity to see the whole picture = self destructive. Your very limited good knowledge, will not save your Gotham city, trust me!
4] you are saying: ”Which means, they don’t have wind, because, wind is a volume of the fluid real gas air on the the move”
A#4: the way they look silly for ”ignoring the wind” You look half as silly for not learning that: there are horizontal ”PLUS” vertical winds = horizontal are cooling the soil – ”vertical winds” are regulating the temp ”overall” to be always the same in the troposphere!!! You must open your second eye also, to stop looking half as silly as them!
C] ”VERTICAL” winds speed up / slow down – depends on extra heat. Vertical winds go through the dirty cloud; as if it’s a ”fishnet”, YES!!! BUT, they: slowdown in Brazil, at night / speed up in Sahara. Mate, ”winds” are not ”just winds” ==== arm yourself with real proofs, or, keep stumbling in the dark.
So: rain doesn’t wash all the CO2, but: the more it’s up = the more it washes down. b] rainwater is pH7, even soda-water concentration is not pH6,5 = carbonic acid is NOT acidic!!! Eno, dexal, ural medication, that are bi-carbonated – are used as: ”ANTACIDS”!!! On some languages the ”spring carbonated water” is called ”sour water” but ”carbonic acid” name is deceiving; the name was given, before chemistry evolved. Rainwater doesn’t have sufficient positive ions, to create acidity. Just relax, cool down – otherwise, you will start sending comments, only with 2-3 big letters in colour, as David Springer – what Freud would say: started producing short circuits between his ears. Cheer up!!
.
Stefan, we are talking at cross-purposes here. I am sorry that I haven’t been able to explain my point of view well enough. For example, there is very little point, from my point of view, of going into the different winds, or any other detail – because they do not have wind. I am trying to explain why they only think they have wind, because the fisics they use cannot create winds.
I am looking only at the very basic properties and processes, because, this is the level they have altered real physics in order to create a completely fictional world. What I am trying to do is show how they have done this. It is not easy to explain, because, these tweaks of basic physics are sleights of hand, like a magician’s tricks.
The bold was to highlight the specific point as an example, that they don’t have heat from the Sun. They think they do, but they have been told a load of lies about the basic physics of electromagnetic energy from the Sun. I am trying, very hard, to concentrate on this particular aspect because I think it is important, other arguments are interesting but a distraction. I think it is important because these fake fisics basics were introduced into the education system, so now, a whole generation has basic physics upside down. And this generation believing this fake fisics not only couldn’t design the different systems for gathering energy from the Sun, photovoltaic converting to electricity and thermal panels of direct heating of water by thermal infrared, they are now useless at passing on the real physics necessary to know the differences to the next generation.
This is the great dumbing down of basic science for the mass population of oiks. No one likes being conned. They don’t like seeing themselves as victims here, so of course they would rather pretend that it isn’t true. I care about this, I find it offensive enough that some have promoted themselves to thinking they should be in control of general physics knowledge, but I find it utterly disgusting that in doing so they have deliberately introduced a corruption of real physics basics to reduce the majority of the population to the state of ignorant oiks by withholding traditional physics, they have created an ignorant mass in order to control them with the AGW scare who have ended up thinking real physical processes can be created out of fictional properties.
For example, they don’t understand you when you tell them that carbon dioxide rises, because they don’t have real gases, but ideal – real and ideal are of course technical terms in this science subject but they don’t know there is a difference between them. So I have to stress the difference, that ideal gases are a purely imaginary construct without any properties or processes of real gases. That ideal gases have no mass, no volume, no attraction, no weight, are not subject to gravity, because until they understand the difference they cannot see their carbon dioxide cannot rise up into the atmosphere, because they do not have gases buoyant in air, because they have no air!
Ideal gases are physically only hard dots of nothing and can only “diffuse at great speeds under their own molecular momentum bouncing off each other in elastic collisions in the vast empty spaces between them”, extrapolating from this they think our atmosphere is empty space with these hard dots of nothing speeding around miles apart from each other!
That’s why they don’t have sound! They just don’t know they don’t have sound.
So my joke, that they can’t hear this because they have no sound in their world.
But to understand that joke means understanding the difference between ideal and real gases and that is more complicated to explain, because what I am trying to explain is what happens when they extrapolate from these fake physics concepts and how this compares with the real word physics . This is the very important point I am trying to make from my point of view. They have extrapolated a completely ficitional world from using ideal gas concepts!
They really don’t know what AIR is! They don’t have any atmosphere at all. But they don’t know they don’t have it. They don’t know they don’t have it because they don’t know that their basic fisics is made up, made up by using terms and concepts and laws from real physics, but twisting them, or missing them out altogether. That’s why there is so much confusion generated in these arguments. Magician’s tricks are hard to follow because it’s all down to the skill of distraction and whoever created this fake fisics knew what he was doing.
We can only physically be consciously aware of one thing at a time. We take in all the information of what is happening around us, as shown when someone is put under hypnosis and recalls every single detail of what happened around them when they walked down a busy street, but consciously we’re only aware of one thing at a time and one thing only. It’s like film reels, the individual pictures only appear to make a seemless whole of movement because of the speed it is being played, so we take in the world around us as movement by the speed of processing all the separate conscious snapshots we take of what is happening. Magician’s use this knowledge to distract the audience’s attention while they quietly and quickly do something – the best magicians are both very fast and very subtle so their movements do not jar to bring them to conscious attention.
And of course, there’s also the standard technique of propanganda, tell a big enough lie loud enough and long enough to all the people and everyone will come to believe that it is the truth. Goebbels understood this perfectly: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”
The truth about real physics basics is difficult to explain because they have been brainwashed into thinking something completely different, it means trying to get them to look at the very basic properties and processes to analyse if what they claim about these are true or not.
So what I’m trying to show about the changes to basic physics is that these were created by a combination of these techniques, the downright lie that “shortwave from the Sun heats land and ocean” brainwashed through the education system so everyone comes to believe it is the truth, or takes it for granted as if real basic because it’s not in their field of science, combined with the sleights of hand of the magician that make people believe they are seeing something that isn’t there, like in the Emperor’s New Clothes.
I have whittled these down to a few basic themes, ideal gas v real gas, the missing Water Cycle hidden by the magician in the downright lie “greenhouse gases warm the planet 33°C from the minus18°C it would be without them”, and, the one I am concentrating most of my attention on because I think it is less difficult to explain than the others, the lie that “shortwaves from the Sun heat the Earth’s land and oceans and longwave infrared from the Sun doesn’t play any part in this”.
Since longwave infrared from the Sun is thermal infrared, the wavelength of radiant heat from the Sun, this means they have no heat from the Sun in their Greenhouse Effect world, because shortwaves are not physically capable of moving whole molecules of matter into vibration which is what it takes to heat up matter.
So, these are the arguments I am making, the arguments you are making in the detail you are going into are a distraction to this..
With respect, I am not interested in giving the detail of your arguments with them because I am trying, very hard, to concentrate on one aspect of this only, the deliberate changes to the very basic physical properties and processes of matter and energy around us.
They think they have heat from the Sun, but like the Emperor’s New Clothes, they are being told it exists in their world by various sleights of hand magicians’ tricks. They find it very difficult to grasp that they actually don’t have any heat from the Sun in their world, because the clever tricks have successfully hidden this from them.
I have decided to concentrate more on the Goebbelesk type lie “shortwave in longwave out” to show how the trick was played on them because it is less complicated and they can prove it for themselves.
So, I wish you luck in your work, I hope you can find something I give from my point of view about the basics interesting enough to include it.
They have no atmosphere around their world and they have no heat from the Sun in their world because their world is a fictional creation from the AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect fake fisics production department…
Ah dear, more of Myrrh’s unique fictionalfisics, that is yet again unable to deal with this simple question :
Do you deny that CO2 absorbs IR ?
If so, what support can you provide for this?
How sweet. Myrrh vs Stefan. Real live, down-and-dirty denier-on-denier action, brought to skeptic viewers courtesy of King-Curry Promotions.
Palindrone November 26, 2012 at 1:53 am said: ”How sweet. Myrrh vs Stefan. Real live, down-and-dirty denier-on-denier action”
Palindrone, if theory / proof cannot stand the scrutiny = is NOT correct, is not a genuine proof! Only the real proofs can stand up, to any scrutiny = we are NOT scared from scrutiny / we don’t ”rubber-stamp” = as contemporary ”peer review”.in the Warmist camp. Can you dig it? When I was writing my book, I was my biggest critique. Now I challenge regularly: opponent views people to peer review / scrutinize what i have === after the first attempt to point something wrong -> everybody runs for cover. = difficult to ridicule the truth / real proofs, facts and formulas, with lies
Warmist doesn’t argue against other Warmist; for fear of exposing and being exposed his own lies. Same rule with the Fakes. Only the genuine truth – beyond any shadow of a doubt; has no fear. Do you want to try, or are you just another coward, as the rest of them Warmist & Fakes?
Myrrh, keep up the good work!!!
Normal people’s greenhouse has solid glass roof – conmen’s greenhouse has 2% cover – the other 98% is O&N.
IF ON NORMAL GREENHOUSE 98% OF THE ROOF IS REMOVED; = IT WOULDN’T BE A GREENHOUSE ANYMORE !!! Correct, or wrong?!?!?!
,
And still no-one has been able to explain the warming ot the Venus surface by any GH conjecture, simply because what is only about 10% of Earth’s insolation would indeed have a hard time raising the surface temperature by the observed few hundred degrees.
Go back to this comment above.
Herein lies the largest challenge to any warmist that I have ever seen.
(Sorry, but it seems I perhaps need a bit of bold type to get your attention.)
What??!!
Is that a bigger challenge than for them to produce evidence that shortwaves from the Sun can heat the Earth’s land and water to the intensity required which gives us our huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems?
Well, if we nibble away at this from all sides it will disappear the quicker..
Another fundamental question that Myrrh Fictionalfisics keeps evading, that it makes no difference to AGW theory which of the sun’s wavelengths are heating the land and the oceans (unless you also deny the sun is heating the earth).
The result is the same – outgoing IR, captured by greenhouse gasses (unless you also deny/evade the standard absorption spectrum of CO2 et al).
Ha ha, Myrrhh is one of your own Tomcat.
He is no worse or no better than your typical run-of-the-mill AGW skeptic.
It’s fun watching you try to marginalize his ideas while there are dozens more like him commenting with the same kind of tripe on this blog.
The problem is that skeptics like yourself have no alternative theory to rally around and so are left to mindlessly stomp out every cockroach theory that crawls out of the woodwork.
Good luck with that.
> Ha ha, Myrrhh is one of your own Tomcat.
Ha ha, hardly. Not every non-catholic is jewish.
Tomcat | November 26, 2012 at 7:20 am | Reply
Another fundamental question that Myrrh Fictionalfisics keeps evading, that it makes no difference to AGW theory which of the sun’s wavelengths are heating the land and the oceans (unless you also deny the sun is heating the earth).
The result is the same – outgoing IR, captured by greenhouse gasses (unless you also deny/evade the standard absorption spectrum of CO2 et al).
Gosh, you’d carry on blithely believing everything else they told you…?
And here’s me thinking the next response would be the question, “why have they done this?”
Well, it’s an interesting phenomenon, I noticed it early on in exploring this subject. Still so many would rather cling to the belief that the premise of the con is real.
It appears that regardless how many examples of manipulation of data and un-scientific practice are pointed out, so many don’t want to face the possibility that the claimed Greenhouse Effect doesn’t exist and AGW is not to blame which is what is otherwise obvious because, if they were real there would be no need for all this corrupt practice, these science frauds.
Your fixation on the absorption spectrum of thermal infrared by carbon dioxide is meaningless – so what?
How does that prove anything else in the AGW claims about carbon dioxide and AGW’s “greenhouse gases”?
Please, do have a go at explaining exactly what it means. And do show empirical work in your show and tell, this is after all, a science blog. I’ve been told there are lots of experiments to prove whatever it is this is supposed to prove, but so far no one has ever fetched any.
it makes no difference to AGW theory which of the sun’s wavelengths are heating the land and the oceans
For the record, this point again completely ducked by Myrrh. I can only conclude he clearly has no answer, but is reluctant to admit it.
.. many don’t want to face the possibility that the claimed Greenhouse Effect doesn’t exist and AGW is not to blame which is what is otherwise obvious because, if they were real there would be no need for all this corrupt practice, these science frauds.
You are a complete johnny-come-lately to this viewpoint. Most here realised this when you were still in short pants. And even if we didn’t already know this old news, it still wouldn’t justify you ducking the question above.
Your fixation on the absorption spectrum of thermal infrared by carbon dioxide is meaningless – so what? How does that prove anything else in the AGW claims about carbon dioxide and AGW’s “greenhouse gases”?
That’s like being “fixated” on gravity when discussing why we don’t all fly off our spinning planet.
The absorption spectrum is what a greenhouse age IS. Pretty fundamental, and as known to standard physics perhaps a hundred years before any AGW panic and politicking started. And as apparently denied by you..
And the basic principle is hardly rocket science – CO2 is warmed by IR, unlike non-greenhouse gasses, to which IR is transparent. The end result of which is warming.
“there are dozens more like {Myrrh} commenting with the same kind of tripe on this blog.”
Half a dozen maybe. But if they were all banned, do you think you could find another blog that would have you ?
Doug Cotton | November 26, 2012 at 2:59 am said: ”And still no-one has been able to explain the warming ot the Venus surface by any GH conjecture, simply because what is only about 10% of Earth’s insolation would indeed have a hard time raising the surface temperature by the observed few hundred degrees”
WRONG, Dough, wrong! I’ve explained before, and will again, for you::: on the earth, 12h is day / 12h night. PLUS: ONE polar cap is always in darkness ====== because Venus is closer to the sun – the larger sun makes daylight on 55% on Venus 45% night. PLUS: both polar caps are exposed to the sunlight, PERMANENTLY!!! B] In one Venus’ day.there are ”14 earth’s days” extra sunlight than at night. That’s ACCUMULATIVE from every year extra sunshine = warmer than the earth
Plus: most of the sunlight goes through the earth’s corona and comes out of the other end, because of opaque O&N; -, not on Venus!!! happy now, or are you going to say like gbaikie did, , that: ”only one minute day is longer than night, on Venus; just to contradict me?
Myrrh and Tomcat
Consider:
1. Incoming SW from the sun.
A major part is reflected back out to space, mostly by low altitude (water droplet) clouds.
The rest warms the planet.
2. Outgoing LW radiation from Earth.
A part is absorbed by GHGs (water vapor, CO2, etc.) and re-radiated in all directions.
The rest is radiated directly out to space.
Forgetting changes in solar irradiance or other as yet unknown mechanisms related to changes in solar activity, we have two theoretical mechanisms which regulate global temperature:
– The amount of cloud cover controlling incoming SW
– The level of total GHGs (mostly water vapor) controlling outgoing LW
These are both largely dependent on the water cycle.
We do not know if or how this cycle works to act as a natural thermostat.
Until we do, we are only fooling ourselves by myopically chasing the CO2/climate connection. It is only a small piece of the puzzle.
Max
manacker (quite a moniker, that)
Yes, I am not saying (or denying) CO2 is the big control knob. Just trying to get Myrh to address some basics.
You are trying to herd cats. The cats in this case represent your inability to come up with a coherent argument against the conventional physics of climate science. So you have some 40+ cat clowns running off in all directions as soon as you try to apply some logic.
And Manacker is the king of the fallacious argument style as he tries to diminish what I say by asserting it is just a “vent” on my part. No, it’s the truth and you can’t deal with it, because your side lacks skillz to come up with anything coherent.
I would be the first to cone to your defense if you had anything substantial, as I have no professional association with the climate science establishment.
Oh – the settled, measured and certain AGW you mean? You and Myrrh could be cats from the same litter, separated at birth, you know.
Webby
The “conventional physics of climate science” (as you describe the CAGW hypothesis of IPCC) has got more holes in it than a Swiss cheese.
Biggest hole: It is not supported by empirical scientific evidence (Feynman) and cannot be falsified (Popper).
Since you (or anyone else) have been unable to either provide the empirical evidence supporting the CAGW hypothesis or indicate how it could be falsified, we can write it off as just another uncorroborated hypothesis.
“E pluribus unum” – one among many.
But keep on venting anyway.
Max
Actually “E Pluribus Unum” doesn’t mean one *of* many, it means one *from* many – as in separate items being brought together into a single whole.
As used in the Seal of the United States.
Web writes:
“The cats in this case represent your inability to come up with a coherent argument against the conventional physics of climate science.”
You are most certainly wrong in your summary analysis. It is not as you have written conventional physics of climate science that are in dispute or poorly understood. What is in dispute or poorly understood is when and to what amount the variables of “conventional physics” come into play when various forcings either complement of offset one another.
What is unknown is the rate of warming and what will occur as a result to whom and when.
Good, so watch and learn how educated climate scientists get the job done.
You can continue on with your harping about Feymman and Popper, as rest assured that they know all about the philosophy of science. That’s what a PhD stands for, doncha know.
‘as the future evolution of the global mean temperature may hold surprises on both the warm and cold ends of the spectrum due entirely to internal variability that lie well outside the envelope of a steadily increasing global mean temperature.’ S&T09
I suppose it is all physics at the end of the day – but webby is a moron who gets it wrong all the time.
WebTheCrackpot | November 26, 2012 at 3:02 pm said: ”Good, so watch and learn how educated climate scientists get the job done”
Mate, meteorology is a science, NOT climatology!!! Meteorologist avoid to predict the weather / climate past next Monday; because: the further forward predictions, are less and less reliable. Climatology is a woo-doo witchcraft; used for confusing the already confused.
Was established after Darwin published his book (before that, St. Peter’s mood was deciding the weather / climate) After, some opportunist started plying god: if is discovered from some text that: year 1678 was 12 bushels of grain per acre in Devon-shire / England = it was warmer the WHOLE planet – next year was only 11,5 bushels per acre of grain = was cooler the WHOLE planet by 0,2C.
On that foundation was built, the phony Nuclear Winter for year 2000, because of CO2 dimming – Changed by same ”climatologist” in the 80’s (to avoid justice) into GLOBAL warming for year 2100, because of the essential CO2…? That’s how they ”get the job done” They will not abuse people’s ignorance forever – climate keeps changing, but not a hint of any GLOBAL warming – people on the street started realizing the difference between meteorology and ”climatology” On the street are most clever people; is not as:the ”wall to wall nutters in the blogosphere” Start thinking about the end result – don’t sink with the sinking Titanic
Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 3:11 pm said: ”as the future evolution of the global mean temperature may hold”
Chief, from now: every conman, every time uses the words: ”may happen, if happen, could happen, it’s possible, some scientist say” and similar CON tricks – for every time / for every con; must donate a dollar to this blog. because you are compulsive, chronic liar – contact your bank-manager and ask for credits, urgently!
Yes, all that is unknown in agw is what the rate of warming will be, and what will occur as a result to whom and when.
Pah … details details …
BatedBreath | November 26, 2012 at 10:26 am said: ”Yes, all that is unknown in agw is what the rate of warming will be, and what will occur as a result to whom and when”
That only applies to nutters like you – I know that will be ZERO extra GLOBAL warming, because the laws of physics say so!!! You don’t even know the difference between: ” don’t know AND don’t want to know” Why is the truth so painful, for every nutter?
SFD >> I know that will be ZERO extra GLOBAL warming, because the laws of physics say so!!!
Again, we’re going to need some actual evidence.
Let’s start at the beginning, with the well-established physics law on greenhouse gasses – that says CO2 will absorb heat radiating up from the earth, but oxygen and nitrogen will not. So if the proportion of CO2 in the atmosphere increases, we would expect the atmosphere to warm.
Can you show why this would not happen?
WebHubTelescope:
As used in climatology, the term “science” is an equivocation. You could avoid equivocating through substitution of the term “dogma” for the term “science” thus producing the phrase “climate dogma.”
Terry Oldberg | November 26, 2012 at 11:35 am said: ”WebHubTelescope:,As used in climatology, the term “science” is an equivocation. You could avoid equivocating through substitution of the term “dogma” for the term “science”
Yes, but you shouldn’t use that word, where is not appropriate, as Terry does. WebTheCrackpot, you found your mirror / reflection of yourself – Terry suffers from same ”inferiority complex” as you. Lets see; which one of you two will produce more ”empty talk” b] how much you two panic from my formulas… ”Dogma” is for fanatics, not for open-minded.
StefanTheDenier:
The English word “science” has the dual meanings of “demonstrable knowledge” and “the process that is operated by people calling themselves ‘scientists’.”. To state an argument without clairification of which meaning is meant by the word “science” is to deceive people through the fallacy of equivocation.
Deception can be avoided through a disambiguation in which one term references “demonstrable knowledge” and another references “the process that is operated by people calling themselves ‘scientists’. Do you oppose deception? If so, what disambiguation do you favor?
Particular Physicist | November 27, 2012 at 12:44 am said: ”Let’s start at the beginning, with the well-established physics law on greenhouse gasses – that says CO2 will absorb heat radiating up from the earth, but oxygen and nitrogen will not”
1] listen very, very carefully: oxygen &nitrogen are absorbing the heat from the ground, NOT CO2!!! That’s why winds are cooling the ground ->as warmed expand -> they personally take that heat to the edge of the troposphere – waste it -> cool / shrink -> drop down to shuttle more heat. Horizontal winds cool your french-fries === vertical winds cool the planet! Referring to a trace gas as greenhouse roof = tells a lot about you.
2] normal people’s greenhouse has a solid glass roof === where is the CO2 & water vapor in the clouds / is 97% of O&N. in-between!!! If you take 97% of the roof of normal people’s greenhouse = it WOULDN’T BE A GREENHOUSE ANYMORE. Greenhouse owners run to plug a small crack in the roof, made by delinquents. Otherwise heat escapes.
If you are a physicist – I must be the Pope of Rome. Anybody with little knowledge in physics; would understand me, when I say: why O&N instantly expand when warmed / shrink without delay, when cooled. Would understand my formulas.
>> Let’s start at the beginning, with the well-established physics law on greenhouse gasses – that says CO2 will absorb heat radiating up from the earth, but oxygen and nitrogen will not”
SFD >> [completely and utterly non-responsive reply].
Point thus carried by default.
Max –
Shortwave from the Sun isn’t capable of heating land and water of the Earth’s surface, it isn’t powerful enough to heat matter, to raise its temperature.
AGWSF has taken out the real heat direct from the Sun which is capable of heating matter, longwave infrared aka thermal infrared. AGWSF claims this doesn’t reach us or, that the Sun produces very little of it.
I have already shown from the NASA quote I posted that this invisible thermal infrared is what we actually feel as heat from the Sun, so it does reach us, and that shortwave infrared isn’t a thermal energy, that we can’t feel it.
This is as traditional physics still teaches.
Your claim contradicts this.
Prove that Visible Light direct from the Sun is capable of heating land and water to the intensity required to give us the huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems we have.
This is is the AGW claim, that it is mainly visible light from the Sun in its meme “shortwave in longwave out” which does this heating, if you are defending this, then prove it. Show exactly how visible light from the Sun heats land and water.
Myrrh:
Your understnainding that
“shortwave from the Sun isn’t capable of heating land and water of the Earths surface” is incorrect. This conclusion follows from the definition of “heat” as the energy that crosses the specified boundary.
Terry Oldberg | November 26, 2012 at 1:13 pm | Myrrh:
Your understnainding that
“shortwave from the Sun isn’t capable of heating land and water of the Earths surface” is incorrect. This conclusion follows from the definition of “heat” as the energy that crosses the specified boundary.
That’s not a definition of heat. From the 1st Law, energy can cross the boundaries of a system in the form of heat or work. Energy transfer across a system from temperature difference is called heat and work is as the energy required to lift a weight.
Visible light from the Sun is not a thermal energy, it isn’t hot, it isn’t heat, we can’t feel it as heat, heat always flows from hotter to colder. That’s why we can feel the direct radiant heat from the Sun, which is thermal infrared, because it is hot, it is heat.
The Sun’s thermal energy is not shortwave infrared, not visible, not uv, but, thermal infrared, aka longwave infrared. Because the Sun is very, very hot. It is millions of degrees hot..
An incandescent lightbulb produces around 5% visible light, and 95% heat, thermal infrared. It takes a lot of heat to produce visible light.
AGWSF claims, in one of its variations as Pekka gave me, that the Sun produces very little longwave infrared.. Which, extricated from the sleight of hand, is saying that the Sun produces very little heat.. They really don’t see how funny their fisics. They don’t see how funny it is because they have been brainwashed into believing that visible light from the Sun is heat..
So you’re left with work. Show how visible light from the Sun lifts the whole molecules of matter of land and water into vibration, kinetic energy, which is what it takes to heat up matter.
Rub your hands together, that is mechanical energy moving the molecules of your skin into vibration – that’s what the Sun’s thermal energy on the move to us does. Thermal infrared is heat energy, it heats up our skin and makes it hot. We absorb it readily being mostly water, water very easily absorbs a lot of heat and as we absorb thermal infrared from the Sun we are heated up internally, so we sweat if this becomes to great for us and a danger. We sweat out water which releases its heat on evaporation and so cools us. Just as water vapour in the water cycle cools the Earth, which would be 67°C if there was no water on Earth.
We can all understand how much heat energy it takes to cook our dinners, that is what the Sun’s heat energy does to us, to the Earth’s land and water. It takes powerful heat energy to heat up matter.
I’ll explain again why you can’t show how visible light from the Sun heats land and water, which is why it cannot be found, why it is never fetched. Because shortwave from the Sun is Light, not Heat, it is much tinier than heat, it is so tiny that it gets bounced around the sky by the electrons of molecules of nitrogen and oxygen – that’s how we get our blue sky. Blue visible being more energetic than the less nervy longer visibles, gets bounced around more. This level of wavelengths meeting matter is called electronic transition, and absorbed by electrons and spat back out unchanged is called reflection/scattering.
The AGWSF sleight of hand fake fisics has deliberately promoted the erroneous idea that “because visible light is more energetic than the more laid back longwave infrared, that this means it is more powerful”. Yeah right, titchy little blue light gets bounced around by electrons which absorb the blue light from the Sun and spat back out again, it isn’t moving the whole molecules of nitrogen and oxygen into vibration which it must do to heat matter – and this is supposed to be the great heating power from the Sun… It isn’t big enough, it isn’t powerful enough.
AGWSF plays around with the word “absorbed” too, it claims “all electromagnetic energy is the same and all create heat when absorbed” – so, how hot is the sky in this AGWSF world with all this claimed “powerful visible light” being absorbed by the gas Air which means it must be heating the Air according to their fake fisics meme?
Water is a transparent medium for visible light, it isn’t absorbed at all, not even by the electrons of the whole molecules of water, it is transmitted through unchanged. But even if it was absorbed by the electrons as the electrons of nitrogen and oxygen of the gas Air absorb it, it would be simply reflected/scattered. As it is, transmitted means that it can’t get into the dance of the molecule of water and is passed along.
Which is just as well for us, because if it was absorbed by the water in the ocean we wouldn’t be here, there wouldn’t be life as we know it. It’s because visible light is not absorbed by water that its energy can be used for photosynthesis and that’s how the proto plants first began using it to convert to chemical energy, not heat energy, in the creation of food. Plants are amazing, they take the direct energy of visible light from the Sun and bit of carbon dioxide and water and create sugars and they’re self sufficient. I’ve seen different figures, but some estimate around 80% of the oxygen in the atmosphere is created by photosynthesis in the ocean, which is released when the plant is turning carbon dioxide and water into chemical energy using visible light. The biologists have their own theory of evolution, they say that plants created the fauna, including us, to improve on spreading themselves around by seed dispersal, because they like travelling.
Anyway, it takes a lot of heat energy to heat the land and water at the equator to the intensity this is actually heated which gives us our huge global equator to poles winds and dramatic weather – visible light simply doesn’t have the oomph to do this.
That’s why Light is studied in the science field of Optics, not in Thermodynamics..
Myrrh:
“Heat is the quantity of energy which crosses the boundaries of a thermodynamic system (Engel&Reid. 2006. Page 16)…” ( see http://www.biocab.org/Heat.html )
Terry Oldberg | November 26, 2012 at 10:05 pm said: ”StefanTheDenier: Do you oppose deception? If so, what disambiguation do you favor?”
Hi Terry, my formulas are the only antidote against ambiguity. All of my proofs are; right to the point == reason you people cannot stomach my real proofs. I was told by few of you, that: ”i don’t know physics” Would you believe that? Told by people that; ”don’t know why O&N expand / shrink in change of temperature”… they cannot understand what ”enlarging” troposphere means …
people using the words: ”may happen, can happen, if happens’, scientist say, it’s possible” ==every time they use any of those words – to donate a dollar to this blog, every time.
1] For example: gbaikie was telling me, that is possible, well something – so: we are supposed to presume that: if possible = definite. Therefore:
Instead I’ve challenged him: ”it’s possible for him to eat a kilo of salt in a day – when is he going to do it?”
2] ”If happens” is used constantly === is no different than saying: -”if grandpa develops those things”… Well, if he did = he would be a grandma, but he was and always will be grandpa.
3] now, I’ll start collecting money – to prevent the moon of colliding with the earth… 99% possibility, in 99years from today. Yes, both heavenly bodies have gravitational puling powers – nothing in-between… panic, BOO!!
Terry, if you want to save your planet, I”l give you discount, but not to gbaikie. Terry, if I bring ”THE COLLISION” to 10-30years from today, WOULDN’T YOU LIKE TO OWN AN INSURANCE COMPANY?
StefanTheDenier:
How do you propose that we disambiguate the term “science”?
Myrrh
The conventional wisdom is that it’s SW in and LW out, but I haven’t seen any measurements that confirm this.
Nor do I really care.
Important to me is that essentially all the energy our planet receives comes from the sun and a significant portion of the incoming energy is reflected back to space by clouds. Using the “radiative forcing” concept favored by IPCC, this is 48 Wm-2, or 30 times the 1.6 Wm-2 total RF, which the IPCC models estimate for all anthropogenic factors since 1750.
A doubling of CO2 supposedly would add 3.7 Wm-2, or a bit less than an 8% decrease in average cloud cover.
Measurements (Pallé et al.) have shown that average cloud cover decreased by ~4.5% over the period 1985-2000 (the late-20th century period of global warming) and then increased again by ~2.5% since 2000 (the period of slight global cooling referred to as the “pause”).
http://bbso.njit.edu/Research/EarthShine/literature/Palle_etal_2006_EOS.pdf
IOW observed natural changes in cloud cover are driving the observed climate changes, rather than clouds simply reacting to warming caused by human greenhouse gases, as assumed by IPCC.
IPCC concedes that its “level of scientific understanding of natural forcing is low” and that “cloud feedbacks remain the largest source of uncertainty”.
This is a basic problem of IPCC. Rather than trying to find out what natural mechanisms make clouds behave as they do, IPCC fixates myopically on human greenhouse gases as the principal driver of climate, even going so far as to assume that clouds only react to warming caused by something else, namely human greenhouse gases!
And they call that “science”?
I call it “agenda driven science”.
Max
Terry Oldberg | November 26, 2012 at 8:24 pm |
Myrrh:
“Heat is the quantity of energy which crosses the boundaries of a thermodynamic system (Engel&Reid. 2006. Page 16)…” ( see http://www.biocab.org/Heat.html )
Terry, pointing me to a page you cannot assume I have access to is counterproductive if you don’t include a quote..
Here goes..:
From:
http://sbainvent.com/thermodynamics/energy-transfer.php
“Energy Transfer
Thermodynamics studies the changes in the total energy of a system. This is directly related to energy transfer from one system to another system, or a system to its surroundings. When dealing with a closed system energy transfer occurs across the boundaries of the system. There are two types of energy transfer that can occur in a closed system, and they are energy transferred by heat and energy transferred by work. Energy transfer only occurs across the boundaries of the system, or a fluid flowing through the system. Once the energy has been transferred it becomes part of the internal energy of the system or the environment.
..
“There are three distinct forms of heat transfer. They are conduction, convection, and radiation. Conduction occurs when two particles come in contact with each other and the more energetic particle transfers energy to the least energetic particle. Convection is very similar to conduction, except the heat exchange occurs when a fluid flows over a solid. Finally, heat transfer due to radiation occurs due to the emission of electromagnetic waves from the object. A prime example of heat transfer due to radiation is the heat that comes from the sun.
“Energy Transferred by Work
Similar to heat energy, energy due to work is measured by the energy the crosses the boundaries of the system. So if you know that that there is energy crossing the boundaries of the system, and it is not heat, then that means it must be work.
“So what exactly is work? Work is the energy transferred as a force acts through a certain distance. This can be simply defined as the equation below. ”
But, when it also says that work and heat are only recognised when they cross a system’s boundaries and that the internal energy is just called energy, it is referring only to this specific use of the words heat and work in context of the system it is describing, it is not saying that the internal energy is not “heat”.. They use other words to define heat in different forms.
Nahle has taken this definition from this use of the word heat where it is used in a specific context as a name for heat in a particular form (that heat is only ever heat when it is in transfer from temperature differences at boundaries) in the particular limit this system puts on the use of the word “heat”, and misapplied it to mean that any energy not this is not heat, which is incorrect. Please read some of the other pages on that link for appreciation of context.
In saying that the internal energy is therefore neither heat nor work and simply internal energy, it’s because they are not confusing themselves in their use of the word heat for the system they are describing . It will say on other pages that the internal energy can also be kinetic energy, which they know is heat. Kinetic energy is the energy of motion of the molecules and temperature is average of this – but Thermodynamics does not call it heat to avoid confusion within their particular system which they have further subdivided. When it means particular aspects of internal energy which are also forms of heat it will use such words as kinetic, latent (see their page form-of-energy.php and, do a search on kinetic energy is heat).
The particular, very specific, use of the word heat from this context does not travel.. Which is what Nahle has done, misapplied it to a generalisation and so limited the understanding of heat, and has added to the confusion in these arguments..
AGWSF deliberately manipulates terms and properties from real physics because it pushes the meme “all electromagnetic energy is the same and all create heat when absorbed”, which is physically absurd, in order to set the scene for its misdirection in “shortwave in longwave out” to make people believe shortwave can physically heat matter. The more confusion AGWSF can create, by people tying themselves up in arguments about the meaning and terms and so on, the better it is for the con.
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet, and whatever you want to call it heat is heat..
What we feel as heat from the Sun is therefore the heat energy in transfer from a hotter to a colder flow – the Sun is very hot, millions of degrees hot and we know this is thermal infrared and not any other, but, what is flowing as heat is also the thermal energy, heat, of the Sun.
http://www.school-for-champions.com/science/thermal_energy.htm
And this which I think explains it very well:
http://thermalenergy.org/
“Thermal Energy Explained
What is thermal energy ?
Thermal Energy: A specialized term that refers to the part of the internal energy of a system which is the total present kinetic energy resulting from the random movements of atoms and molecules.
The ultimate source of thermal energy available to mankind is the sun, the huge thermo-nuclear furnace that supplies the earth with the heat and light that are essential to life. The nuclear fusion in the sun increases the sun’s thermal energy. Once the thermal energy leaves the sun (in the form of radiation) it is called heat. Heat is thermal energy in transfer. Thermal energy is part of the overall internal energy of a system.
At a more basic level, thermal energy comes form the movement of atoms and molecules in matter. It is a form of kinetic energy produced from the random movements of those molecules. Thermal energy of a system can be increased or decreased.
When you put your hand over a hot stove you can feel the heat. You are feeling thermal energy in transfer. The atoms and molecules in the metal of the burner are moving very rapidly because the electrical energy from the wall outlet has increased the thermal energy in the burner. We all know what happens when we rub our hands together. Our mechanical energy increases the thermal energy content of the atoms in our hands and skin. We then feel the consequence of this – heat. [Link]Laws of Thermodynamics”
Italics as used in the pieces.
Further:
http://thermalenergy.org/heattransfer.php
“Heat Transfer
Thermal energy and heat are often confused. Rightly so because they are physically the same thing. Heat is always the thermal energy of some system. Using the word heat helps physicists to make a distinction relative to the system they are talking about.
…
“When you put your hand over a hot stove you can feel the heat. You are feeling thermal energy in transfer. The atoms and molecules in the metal of the burner are moving very rapidly because the electrical energy from the wall outlet has increased the thermal energy in the burner. We all know what happens when we rub our hands together. Our mechanical energy increases the thermal energy content of the atoms in our hands and skin. We then feel the consequence of this – heat.”
So, “Thermal energy and heat are often confused. Rightly so because they are physically the same thing.”
It is heat of a system and heat in transfer and it is heat when that heat heats us up.
AGWScienceFiction pushes the idea that no electromagnetic wave is heat, that heat only happens when the energy is absorbed.
Nahle et al think they are correcting this, but in fact have missed that the thermal energy of a system is also heat, exactly the same heat..
“The ultimate source of thermal energy available to mankind is the sun, the huge thermo-nuclear furnace that supplies the earth with the heat and light that are essential to life. The nuclear fusion in the sun increases the sun’s thermal energy. Once the thermal energy leaves the sun (in the form of radiation) it is called heat. Heat is thermal energy in transfer.”
Radiant heat from the Sun is thermal infrared, aka longwave infrared, aka the Sun’s thermal energy which is the Sun’s heat in transfer, which is heat.
Simple really..
In an incandescent lightbulb the heat neccessary to create the visible light doesn’t disappear, that’s what keeps flowing out as the 95% thermal infrared. But this is deliberately confused by AGW, see Pekka, which says that all the heat energy of the Sun disappears and turns to visible and shortwaves. It deliberately confuses the “peak energy” of visible by separating it from the heat energy of the Sun necessary to create it! So Pekka says that the Sun produces very little heat..
AGWSF doesn’t like using the term thermal infrared, it uses longwave to avoid jarring its memes, so what it points to to show that “the Sun produces very little longwave infrared” is the Planck spectrum and the 6000°C visible ‘surface’ of the Sun. This visible ‘surface’ is only about 300 miles wide band, the next band is much much much hotter, and the final is millions of miles wide and millions of degrees C hot.
Only someone completely brainswashed by these sleights of hand could say, as they do, that our millions of degrees hot Sun is not producing any longwave infrared and this band is not hot at all and we wouldn’t feel it..
Anyway, since we cannot feel shortwaves as heat, see the NASA page, and AGW says the Sun produces very little heat and CAGW says that there’s an invisible, but unexplained, barrier like the glass of a greenhouse around the atmosphere preventing heat from the Sun getting in, then the Greenhouse Effect energy budget has no heat at all from the Sun.
Do you see how clever their sleights of hand? A mix of several real physics terms taken out of context and downright lies.
And I still think this is easier to explain than real versus ideal gas..
So, we have known since Herschel that the great heat we feel as radiant heat from the Sun (see the NASA quote I have given above), is the invisible infrared, the Sun’s thermal energy on the move to us, since then our measurements have improved. We now know that shortwave infrared is not thermal, it is not hot, we cannot feel it as heat, it is classed with Light not Heat, classed in Reflective not Thermal. Likewise, we cannot feel visible light or uv from the Sun, and as I’ve explained above, these are tiny and incapable of moving whole molecules into vibration which is kinetic energy which is thermal energy which is heat.
Myrrh:
As you point out, there are authors who state that work and heat are both forms of energy that cross the boundary which surrounds a chunk of matter. However, that work crosses this boundary implies that it flows but unlike heat, work does not flow. For this reason, I prefer the usage in which matter is said to “do work” on its boundary. The picture is then that heat “flows” while matter “does work.”
Max – I don’t understand why you don’t care.
What’s the point of calculating visible light reflecting off clouds and from that assuming it is preventing heat from reaching the surface?
If visible light was capable of heating land and water it would be heating the clouds, not reflecting off them.
Myrrh
Shortwave from the Sun isn’t capable of heating land and water of the Earth’s surface, it isn’t powerful enough to heat matter, to raise its temperature.
As previously asked on a number of occasions : since this flatly contradicts standard physics, can you supply any evidence for this assertion ? Or are you just making this up to fit your desired conclusion ?
And as also repeatedly pointed out, it makes no difference to the basic AGW theory which wavelength is warming the earth. So even if you are right it changes nothing in the climate debate.
Do you realise this, or are you ignoring it so as not to disturb your desired conclusion ?
Terry Oldberg | November 26, 2012 at 11:15 pm said: ”StefanTheDenier:
How do you propose that we disambiguate the term “science”?”
Good question… anyone confusing big / small, good / bad climatic changes with phony GLOBAL warmings – is not a genuine scientist. They should be exposed – never ever similar things to happen to humanity.
Trouble is: they are in both camps = the Fakes are shielding the Warmist; because they are even bigger liars = their past phony GLOBAL warmings were never global… We will get there. in the blogosphere are wall to wall fanatic nutters – but on the street; the 90% of the population prefer the whole truth / nothing but the truth! please help me
stefanthedenier:
Regarding disambiguation of the term “science” in the language of climatology, I propose that we align the use of “science” in this language to conform to a decision of the courts of the United States. This decision has resulted in the Daubert standard.
Under the Daubert standard, “science” is reserved as a term of reference to “demonstrable knowledge.” Under my proposal, the term of reference to “non-demonstrable knowledge” is “dogma.” This usage results in replacement of the ambiguous phrase “climate science” by the disambiguated phrase “climate dogma” for in the absence of identification of the underlying statistical population, the knowledge that is supplied to us by the climate models is non-demonstrable.
In concealing the fact that that the methodology of its inquiry is not scientific, the IPCC uses a number of additional equivocations. In one of these, the term “prediction” is conflated with the similar sounding term “projection.” In another, the term “validation” is conflated with the similar sounding word “evaluation.” Predictions, validation and a statistical population are associated with science. Projections, evaluation and a missing statistical population are associated with dogma.
Tomcat | November 26, 2012 at 5:13 pm | Reply
Myrrh
Shortwave from the Sun isn’t capable of heating land and water of the Earth’s surface, it isn’t powerful enough to heat matter, to raise its temperature.
As previously asked on a number of occasions : since this flatly contradicts standard physics, can you supply any evidence for this assertion ? Or are you just making this up to fit your desired conclusion ?
So prove it can.
Stop avoiding it. Show me the standard physics.
And as also repeatedly pointed out, it makes no difference to the basic AGW theory which wavelength is warming the earth. So even if you are right it changes nothing in the climate debate.
Yes it does, as I’ve explained. By taking out the actual thermal energy of the Sun on the move to us, the Sun’s heat, as AGWSF claims for its fake Greenhouse Effect energy budget, it is able to utilise all the real measurements of this and pretend it comes from “the atmosphere greenhouse gases trapping/backradiating/blanketing from the longwave infrared upwelling of the heated Earth”.
So, according to the fake fisics, “warming can’t be from anything else but greenhouse gases because there is no other source of longwave infrared in the atmosphere..”
In other words, excising the Sun’s direct heat, thermal infrared and no other, AGWSF can ignore whatever increases the Sun is producing and keep claiming any increase from the Sun “is from greenhouse gases in the atmosphere”. Which is why AGWSF never produces any show and tell of AGWSF’s claim that the trapping/backradiating/blanketing power of greenhouse gases is actually physically possible.
I haven’t yet seen any evidence that you have taken in any of my explanations about the difference between heat and light from the Sun.., but, anyway, there is a great deal of difference between the direct, beam, heat from the Sun and the random upwelling heat from the heated Earth – between the capability of beam heat travelling in straight lines sustaining the targetted heating processes of matter (moving the whole molecules of matter into vibration, kinetic energy, heating up matter), and any random multidirectional untargetted upwelling heat, that this has any power to heat anything by the time it is “trapped/backradiated/blanketed”, is just silly. How long would it take you to heat up your dinner if you began by heating up the kitchen?
The problem here, the very real problem, it that these sleights of hand have totally destroyed any sense of scale and sense of power, in a way, you’re worse of then we were a few hundred years ago when scientists first began exploring the physical properties and processes of the world around us, because they knew they didn’t know.
It takes intense targetted heating of land and water at the equator to give us our huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems.
Perhaps if you could work on understand that first you might get back your sense of scale and sense of power.
Myrrh >> Shortwave from the Sun isn’t capable of heating land and water of the Earth’s surface, it isn’t powerful enough to heat matter, to raise its temperature. >>
Tomcat >> As previously asked on a number of occasions : since this flatly contradicts standard physics, can you supply any evidence for this assertion ? >>
And yet again, above, Myrrh provides zero evidence for his claim totally at variance with standard physics.
(And as Myrrh keeps ignoring, various physics-literate people have commented here before on this. And as it happens there is comment on this in the latest blog article – search on “visible light” should find it. Seems visible light does about half the warming).
Tomcat >> And as also repeatedly pointed out, it makes no difference to the basic AGW theory which wavelength is warming the earth. So even if you are right it changes nothing in the climate debate. >>
And above Myrrh makes no attempt whatsoever to even address this point. The tangled prose is hard to follow, but he appears to try put a up a smokescreen by misrepresenting the basic agw argument as saying only greenhouse-induced longwave reaches the earth. A truly spectacular strawman indeed.
Myrrh
“Shortwave from the Sun isn’t capable of heating land and water of the Earth’s surface…”
_____
Astounding stupidity.
Myrrh and Tomcat
Further to my previous post, IPCC has got it all ass-backward when they consider the impact of clouds on our climate solely as a “feedback” to warming caused principally by ppm increases in anthropogenic GHG concentrations (primarily CO2).
It is basically illogical to presume that clouds only react to changes in temperature caused by some other mechanism, especially if that mechanism is assumed to be forcing from added ppm of CO2 or some other minor GHG..
Observations (Palle et el.) have shown that cloud cover decreased markedly from the 1980s to around 2000, as global temperature warmed and then increased slightly after 2000, as global temperature cooled slightly.
The real question to be answered is: what caused these observed changes in low cloud cover?.
Max
.
PS Forget Webby. He just likes to vent.
manacker | November 26, 2012 at 7:47 am said: ”Observations (Palle et el.) have shown that cloud cover decreased markedly from the 1980s to around 2000, as global temperature warmed and then increased slightly after 2000, as global temperature cooled slightly”
Most of the people are wrong; but you succeed to be twice as WRONG..
1] GLOBAL temp, didn’t warm up from 80’s – 2000. They made it to appear as WARMING, because in the 70’s they were massaging the numbers for ”Nuclear Winter for year 2000, because of CO2 dimming effect”.
2] After 2000 didn’t ”cool slightly” – but they realized that:too many people started scrutinizing + production of CO2 increased beyond anybody’s expectation – need for them to lie in opposite direction; to keep feeding crap, people like you. Truth: nobody knows what was last year’s GLOBAL temperature, to save his / her life – but you believe their crap = you get crap – why are you pushing that crap to others?!
3] when warmer on different parts of the oceans-> evaporation increases, doesn’t decrease, simple logic. Watch the pot on the stove your mom puts; the warmer = more evaporation. But NOT from the pot that’s in the fridge. Yes, not every sea / ocean warms on every part. they get warmer in areas where submarine volcanoes / hot vents get more active. Too complicated for you?
@stefanthedenier
std >> GLOBAL temp, didn’t warm up from 80′s – 2000.
What is your evidence for this ?
std>> After 2000 didn’t ”cool slightly”
What is your evidence for this ?
Particular Physicist | November 27, 2012 at 12:33 am said: ”stefanthedenier -std >> GLOBAL temp, didn’t warm up from 80′s – 2000.
What is your evidence for this ?”
here are all the evidences you need, don’t chicken out!!!:: :http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2011/08/29/hello-world/
There are two obvious problems with this ‘evidence’
1. It’s rambling and incoherent
2. Looks a lot like you wrote it yourself.
There are two obvious problems with this ‘evidence’
1. It’s rambling and incoherent
2. Looks a lot like you wrote it yourself.
SFD>> yes, the most reliable proofs!!! Proven all, beyond any shadow of a doubt.
A lot of people feel that way about their own utterances. I’m afraid we here are going to expect more.
And it’s still rambling and incoherent, and stuffed to the gills with uncorroborated claims.
-1
Particular Physicist | November 27, 2012 at 12:33 am said: ”stefanthedenier
std>> After 2000 didn’t ”cool slightly” std >> GLOBAL temp, didn’t warm up from 80′s – 2000. What is your evidence for this ?”
1: nobody knows what’s the overall GLOBAL temp, to save his life!!!
2] nobody can honestly compare: ”one unknown, with other unknowns!!!
3: here is the proof, why overall temp is ALWAYS the same:::
Do you know that: oxygen + nitrogen are 998999ppm in the troposphere, CO2 only 260-400ppm? Q: do you know that O+N expand /shrink INSTANTLY in change of temperature? Q: do you know that: where they expand upwards, on the edge of the troposphere is minus-90⁰C? Q: why O&N expand more, when warmed by 5⁰C, than when warmed by 2⁰C? A: when warmed by 5⁰C, they need to go further up, to release more heat / intercept more, extra coldness, to equalize. Q: if O&N are cooled after 10minutes to previous temperature, why they don’t stay expanded another 5 minutes extra? A: not to intercept too much extra coldness, to prevent too much cooling. A2: they stay expanded precisely as long as they are warmer – not one second more or less – that’s how they regulate to be same warmth units overall in the troposphere, every hour of every year and millennia!
Q: do you know that: if troposphere warms up by 2⁰C extra – troposphere expands up into the stratosphere by 1km, how much extra coldness is there to intercept? A: intercepts extra appropriate coldness to counteract the extra heat in 3,5 seconds -> that extra coldness falls to the ground in minutes Q: if O+N are warmed extra for 30minutes, why they don’t shrink after 15minutes, or after one day? A: if O&N after cooled to previous temperature; stayed expanded for a whole day extra -> they would have redirected enough extra coldness, to freeze all the tropical rivers / lakes.
Q: can CO2 of 260-400ppm prevent oxygen + nitrogen (998999ppm) of expanding, when they warm up? A: O&N when warmed extra – they expand through the walls of a hi-tensile hand-grenade. Q: do you believe in the laws of physics, or in IPCC and the Warmist / Fake Skeptic cults? The laws of physics say: part of the troposphere can get colder than normal – only when other part gets warmer than normal. B] if the WHOLE troposphere gets colder > air shrinks > releases LESS heat /intercepts less coldness on the edge of the troposphere > retains more heat and equalizes in a jiffy. C] both hemispheres cannot get warmer simultaneously for more than few minutes – if they doo -> troposphere expands extra >releases extra heat / intercepts extra coldness and equalizes in a jiffy. Q: do the O+N wait to warm up by 2-3⁰C, before start expanding, or expand instantly extra when they warm up by 0,000001⁰C? All those things can be experimented / replicated now; no need to wait 100y and see that: all they come up with, are lies
Reason I’ve said to you that: if you are a genuine physicist; I must be the Pope of Rome!!!
Dear Stephan
Please explain your explanation.
Yours etc
Stefen
Montalbano, if you agree with the old saying: better late than never, here it’s the explanation. I hope that you are not suffering from ”truth phobia” as the phony Physicist: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2011/08/29/hello-world/
Stephan that is just one garbled account in support of another one.
Just give us some that is CLEAR and LOGICAL, and you may make some progress. Alternatively, the attempt may lead you to an error of yours. Either way you win.
Myrrh to establish a point it is no good simply repeating your claim over and over. What you need to do is point to some actual science that proves it. Without this your whole argument immediately collapses.
Particular Physicist | November 27, 2012 at 3:46 am said: ”Looks a lot like you wrote it yourself.”
yes, the most reliable proofs!!! Proven all, beyond any shadow of a doubt. You can’t look at the truth for 2 minutes… ”real physicist” wouldn’t left my blog, before reading all 11 posts / pages = it tells about your honesty and understanding capacity of reality and real proofs.!!!
Myrrh fictionalfisics says visible light from the Sun cannot warm the earth
Some clarification of this issue now on the latest thread
try this one
Some clarification of this issue now on the latest thread</a
oh god, bedtime for unsteady eddie
Some clarification of this issue now on the latest thread
Doesn’t anyone defending CAGW/AGW have any joined up logic?
Firstly, I am the one making the challenge about your claim, whether I provide you with any information or not is irrelevant. I am challenging you.
You’re the ones pushing the claim, you’re the ones here insisting that “shortwave from the Sun heats the land and oceans of Earth and longwave from the Sun doesn’t play any part in this”.
Damn well defend that with real science, all you’re proving so far is that you are not intellectually capable understanding why and how shoe laces are tied the way they are, you merely regurgitate your claim and and doctrinal variations of reasons why you claim your claim is right, but never provide any empirical science to prove it.
You can’t even keep it straight in your heads that I am challenging you.
However, I have given sufficient explanation of why shortwave isn’t a thermal energy, if you’re incapable of understanding the difference between electronic transitions and molecular vibrations and incapable of either asking for clarification or looking it up for yourselves and incapable of understanding that I have given a reputable science source agreeing with me, read the NASA quote, there isn’t any more I can do for you. But, that still leaves the science challenge I have made.
I am challenging you. I do not have to provide any explanation about anything. You have to provide me with conclusive empirical science proving your claim that “shortwave from the Sun heats land and water on Earth and longwave infrared doesn’t play any part in this”.
Longwave infrared is thermal infrared is heat radiation from the Sun. As the NASA quote I gave agrees with me, it is this we actually feel as heat from the Sun, we cannot feel shortwave infrared because this is not a thermal energy.
It’s for you to prove it is.
If you’re incapable of the simple comprehension skills required to understand what I am saying here, you’re not capable of thinking.
I’m not interested in regurgitated learned by rote unproven claims.
I am challenging your claim:
Prove that Shortwaves from the Sun heat Earth’s land and water and prove that longwave infrared from the Sun doesn’t play any part in this
What’s the difference between a blue photon from a laser and a blue photon from the sun?
A blue laser can burn things proving that blue photons can heat things up. There is no difference between a blue photon from the laser and a blue photon from the sun.
It is thus demonstrated that visible photons can heat matter.
QED
Thanks for playing
Myrrh : you’re the ones here insisting that “shortwave from the Sun heats the land and oceans of Earth and longwave from the Sun doesn’t play any part in this”.
That is an outright lie and you know it – nobody is saying that. This is just a strawman you sucked out of your thumb in order to appear clever as you knock it over.
For the record, standard accounts in physics attribute about half each to visible and longwave.
Myrrh you need to be very clear on what you are trying to deny:
1. The sun warms the earth.
(Note that the specific wavelength is completely irrelevant)
Agree / Deny ?
If you agree,
2. The sun radiates some of this warmth back out as LW.
Agree / Deny ?
If you agree,
3. CO2 (and other greenhouse gasses) trap some of this LW heat, due to their absorption characteristics.
Agree / Deny?
Which of these obvious, uncontested facts do you deny ?
Eddie is correct if he accepts Myrrh’s definition of “longwave from the sun”. What Myrrh ignorantly calls longwave from the sun is actually shortwave that is not visible to the human eye adjoining the red end of the visible spectrum. The technical term for it is “near infrared”. The earth radiates in the far infrared.
For all intents and purposes for heating things near infrared is the same as visible light. The atmosphere and pure water is as transparent to near infrared as it is to visible light up to about 1250 nanometers wavelength. At that point water starts to become opaque but there’s very little energy in sunlight beyond 1250 nanometers.
Steady Eddie
“For the record, standard accounts in physics attribute about half each to visible and longwave.”
Visible and infrared.
And at earth surface:
“Sunlight’s composition at ground level, per square meter, with the sun at the zenith, is about 527 watts of infrared radiation, 445 watts of visible light, and 32 watts of ultraviolet radiation. ”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunlight
Most of the 527 watts of infrared is in Near infrared. Near infrared is sort of similar to visible light in terms of it’s wavelength and it is also called shortwave.
The use of such terms longwave or shortwave is similar to saying it’s a short distance to the corner store. Rather than saying it’s 312 meters to corner store.
To be more comprehensible, Myrrh should say what wavelengths he talking about.
Most of the sunlight reaching Earth’s surface is between the 250 nm and 2500 nm. And the sunlight is the most intense between 300 and 1500 nm.
Or see graph:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Solar_Spectrum.png
One could call IR at 2500 nm, shortwave or perhaps Mid-wavelength IR.
Memphis
In your list of statements for Myrrh to either “agree or disagree” there is a “typo” in statement 2. and you forgot to add one very important statement.
Statement 2 corrected
2. The
sunEarth radiates some of this warmth back out as LW.Agree / Deny ?
Statement 4 added
4. A significant amount of the incoming solar radiation is reflected back to space by clouds and other albedo.
Agree / Deny ?
Max
Well, I’ve certainly stopped thinking of you as scientists.., having a difficult time thinking of you as rational adults.
This must really scare you by the contortions you put yourselves through to deflect attention from the fact that you don’t have any proof for your claims.
So, it’s really come to this, you’re the end result of the brainwashing of a generation, dumbing down basic science for the oiks has been successful.
More of your kind in the pipeline: http://www.geography4kids.com/files/en_solarrad.html
Max,
Correction and addition agreed
David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 5:12 am | What Myrrh ignorantly calls longwave from the sun is actually shortwave that is not visible to the human eye adjoining the red end of the visible spectrum. The technical term for it is “near infrared”. The earth radiates in the far infrared.
When I say say longwave I mean longwave, which is thermal infrared, and, I mean thermal infrared, I do not mean near infrared. I have made it quite clear that near infrared is not a thermal energy, it is not hot, we cannot feel it. See the NASA quote.
AGWSF has around 1% of its shortwaves in infrared, most of the time this is ignored, most don’t even bother mentioning the shortwave uv also included; the idiotic AGWSF Greenhouse Effect claim is that it “is predominantly Visible Light from the Sun which heats the Earth’s surface, Earth’s land and water with a bit of help from the two shortwaves either side.”
The encyclopedia britannica doesn’t bother with the two shortwaves either side of Visible:
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: “Visible light from the Sun heats the Earth’s surface.”
McGraw-Hill Science & Technology Encyclopedia:
“For the greenhouse effect to work efficiently, the planet’s atmosphere must be relatively transparent to sunlight at visible wavelengths so that significant amounts of solar radiation can penetrate to the ground.”
Oxford Dictionary of Geography: “Short-wave radiation from the sun warms the earth during daylight hours, but this heat is balanced by outgoing long-wave radiation over the entire 24-hour period.”
Wiki: Solar radiation at the frequencies of visible light largely passes through the atmosphere to warm the planetary surface, which then emits this energy at the lower frequencies of infrared thermal radiation.”
So, my science challenge:
“Prove that visible light from the Sun heats the land and water at the equator to the intensity this is heated which gives us our huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems.”
AGWScienceFiction has taken out thermal infrared from the Sun, aka longwave infrared, aka radiant heat. It has taken out all of the Sun’s direct heat.
Please, make some damn effort to understand what I’m saying, your continual rude responses are as idiotic as the fictional Greenhouse Effect energy budget.
There is no heat from the Sun in the AGWSF Greenhouse Effect Energy Budget!
AGWSF has taken out the REAL HEAT from the Sun, and substituted Visible light which cannot heat matter.
You’re all living in a very, very cold world…
For all intents and purposes for heating things near infrared is the same as visible light. The atmosphere and pure water is as transparent to near infrared as it is to visible light up to about 1250 nanometers wavelength. At that point water starts to become opaque but there’s very little energy in sunlight beyond 1250 nanometers.
Grin –
As I’ve been saying, water is transparent to visible light and near infrared, so yes, they have the same power of heating, zilch. Transparent means these are transmitted through unchanged, without being absorbed by the water.
it takes intense heating of water at the equator to get us our huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems.
So, you agree these energies claimed by AGWSF to be the great heating energies of its Greenhouse Effect energy budget, actually cannot be heating the water…
Go for it, now look at visible light and land..
Particular Physicist | November 27, 2012 at 4:41 am said: ” and stuffed to the gills with uncorroborated claims”
NO claims, just ”REAL” proofs! reason you cannot stay there for more than 1,5 minutes.
if you want ”corroborated” crap.- ask Hansen, gbaikie, Robert Gates.
1] CO2 &water vapor are NOT a greenhouse gases.
2] there is NO GLOBAL warming!
3] confusing the real climatic changes with phony GLOBAL warmings, is NOT science
4] water regulates the climate, on many different ways / O&N by expanding the troposphere when warmed / shrinking INSTANTLY, when cooled; are controlling the ”OVERALL” warmth in the troposphere to be ALWAYS the same!!! If you had any knowledge of physics; would have understood that those two gases are 998999ppm and are not expanding / shrinking in change of temp; because they don’t have anything better to do, but they are doing a job, and make both camps dumb, shameless liars!!!
“1] CO2 &water vapor are NOT a greenhouse gases.”
That what they are called. But any effect similar to what
a greenhouse does, is at best minor from any “greenhouse
gases”.
The “greenhouse effect theory” which states that “greenhouse gases” are increase the average temperature of Earth by 33 C
due to these types of gases radiant properties, is incorrect.
2] there is NO GLOBAL warming!
Since the end of the Little Ice Age, there has been warming and it’s mostly a global effect [though the Antarctic hasn’t been as clear in terms of warming].
But if one considers the retreat of glaciers as a measure of global warming then at least in the Temperate Zones there has noticeable global retreat of glaciers since the end of Little Ice Age [this glacial retreat, marks the end of Little Ice Age].
“3] confusing the real climatic changes with phony GLOBAL warmings, is NOT science”
Yes. And there is boatloads of pseudoscience related to “global warming” and/or “climate change”. In terms of science, climate studies have been rather dismal. And if you were to use the term high crimes, or High crimes and misdemeanours:
“The charge of high crimes and misdemeanors covers allegations of misconduct peculiar to officials, such as perjury of oath, abuse of authority, bribery, intimidation, misuse of assets, failure to supervise, dereliction of duty, conduct unbecoming, and refusal to obey a lawful order. Offenses by officials also include ordinary crimes, but perhaps with different standards of proof and punishment than for nonofficials, on the grounds that more is expected of officials by their oaths of office. ”
We had a lot High crimes and misdemeanours related to global warming- or AGW has been significant factor causing a lot of governmental corruption.
gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 8:30 pm said: ” “1] CO2 &water vapor are NOT a greenhouse gases.” That what they are called”
That’s what they are called; by the contemporary ”Organized Crime”
gbainkie, I had to look trough the window, to see if the sky is falling down; are you really deciding to become at least semi-honest?.
#2 you are saying: ”The “greenhouse effect theory” which states that “greenhouse gases” are increase the average temperature of Earth by 33 C, due to these types of gases radiant properties, is incorrect”
A#2: the earth is warmer than what ”they say” than the moon – because of oxygen & nitrogen, not because of CO2!!!! O&N are THE greenhouse effect gases!!! They are transparent / same as glas on a greenhouse – let the sunlight trough – then, as perfect insulators are slowing cooling; by keeping the unlimited coldness 30km away from the surface of the earth / which is not the case on the moon.
#3: you say: ”’Since the end of the Little Ice Age, there has been warming and it’s mostly a global effect [though the Antarctic hasn’t been as clear in terms of warming”
A#3: LIA is Skeptic’s crap, NOT global cooling; you should read this post: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2012/08/25/skeptics-stinky-skeletons-from-their-closet/
#4: you say: “The charge of high crimes and misdemeanors covers allegations of misconduct peculiar to officials, such as perjury of oath, abuse of authority, bribery, intimidation, misuse of assets, failure to supervise, dereliction of duty, conduct unbecoming, and refusal to obey a lawful order”
A#4: I have accumulated evidences for even more of their crimes comitted / and in progress.
#5: ”But if one considers the retreat of glaciers as a measure of global warming then at least in the Temperate Zones there has noticeable global retreat of glaciers since the end of Little Ice Age”
A#5: Listen very, very carefully: ice on the polar caps AND glaciers, melt every year; from the geothermal heat, FROM BELOW!!! Need replenishing the deficit, every season. b] the ”raw material” for replenishing, is considered es ”bad for the climate’ by both camps. The more water vapor available -> better replenished – NOTHING TO DO WITH ANY PHONY global warmings / coolings!!! b] ice from the glaciers can evaporate by dry air; without even turning into liquid; Dry heat production on the planet keeps increasing, since human invented artificial fire!!!!
S/E Asian countries contributed positively, by introducing rice paddies – they are blamed for it, by the Warmist psychos. Warmist are against building new dams, to save extra storm-water on dry lands and increase water vapor = improve the climate. As long as S/E Asian countries have rice paddies – Himalayan glaciers are safe – if they drain the paddies and plant eucalyptus trees – glaciers on Himalayas will evaporate in less than 10 years!!! (Australian Warmist ”scientists” are planting eucalyptus trees in India = to exporting ”Environmental terrorism”!!!!!! (the arsenic produced by eucalyptus trees + their silvery leafs, made Australia the driest continent / surrounded by the biggest mas of water on the planet)… crimes are growing by the minute, gbaikie, get out of that criminal organization!
gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 8:30 pm |
The “greenhouse effect theory” which states that “greenhouse gases” are increase the average temperature of Earth by 33 C
due to these types of gases radiant properties, is incorrect.
Yes, it’s a clever con, they’ve done several things here.
They’ve changed the meaning of greenhouse for a start, a real greenhouse both heats and cools to give optimum growing conditions for the plants housed in them, AGWSF pushes the meme that “greenhouses only warm”.
Our real word atmosphere was likened to a greenhouse because all the gases comprising our atmosphere played their part, primarily the some 99% of the dry air nitrogen and oxygen which acts as a blanket around the Earth helping retain its heat, unlike atmospheres without this like the Moon’s with its great swings of temperatures. Being real gases with volume and so subject to gravity these real greenhouse gases of nitrogen and oxygen keep us from constant swings into freezing, without this heavy ocean of fluid gas around us the Earth would be around minus18°C.
The other major real Greenhouse Earth gas is water, which provides the cooling of our Greenhouse atmosphere as our oxygen and nitrogen blanket provide the warming. Without water our Greenhouse Earth would be a scorching 67°C, think deserts. Through the great Water Cycle around 52°C of this heat is taken away and so we arrive at the 15°C.
AGWScienceFiction has taken the Water Cycle out of our world, and, says that minus18°C is the temperature without only the gases it designates as “greenhouse”, that this is the temperature with nitrogen and oxygen.
Their claim that “greenhouse gases warm the Earth by 33°C from the -18°C it would be without them is a clever sleight of hand, it’s an illusion created by taking out whole processes and changing the meanings of the words used in traditional physics.
It would be true of the traditional real Greenhouse atmosphere where without the practically 100% greenhouse gas blanket of oxygen and nitrogen we would be that cold, but false in their version of the greenhouse which doesn’t have these as the blanket, but gives that role only to water and carbon dioxide, minor threads in the real blanket. The real blanket would be mostly holes if only these small percents were blanket..
And of course, they can never produce any real empirical science to show how “their greenhouse gases” would give an Earth -18°C without them, and never produce any real science to show how “their greenhouse gases” could ever physically move the temperature of the whole Earth 33°C from the well below freezing minus 18°C to the 15°C we have.
That 33°C chunk doesn’t exist, there’s no connecting logic.
It’s all very well for us to be so lucky to have this heavy ocean of real gas Air oxygen and nitrogen wrapped around us like a blanket to keep the heat from escaping before the Sun can warm us up again, but still far too hot for the variety of life as we know it, but somehow we’ve also ended up with so much water that every 100,000 years we get a wonderful climate for life to flourish around most of the world as the water takes away this great heat from the surface and carries it up to the heights in its lighter than Air vapour and releases it to the cold, which causes it to condense back again into liquid water to return to the surface as cooling rain to go through the whole cycle again.
PP > and stuffed to the gill
s with uncorroborated claims
STD > NO claims, just ”REAL” proofs!
1] CO2 &water vapor are NOT a greenhouse gases.
2] there is NO GLOBAL warming!
Yes, very “real”, these proofs.
Montalbano | November 29, 2012 at 7:54 am |said: ”Dear Stephan
Please explain your explanation.Yours etc”
Montalbano, if you agree with the old saying: better late than never, here it’s the explanation. I hope that you are not suffering from ”truth phobia” as the phony Physicist: http://globalwarmingdenier.wordpress.com/2011/08/29/hello-world/
Myrrh,
It doesn’t need any proof. This is the solar energy spectrum at the top of atmosphere – http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Solar_Spectrum.png – it peaks in the visible band. It is all energy – indeed it all regarded as thermal energy in thermodynamics.
At observation it is a potential – it knocks an energy carrier out of its place and along a conductor to a meter. The same thing happens in a PV – it has energy.
Between emission and observation it is a wave/particle. It is literally a photon – a ‘packet of energy’ with the quanta of energy equal to the frequency times a constant.
This energy when it hits the Earth cannot simply disappear by the 1st Law. It is simply energy that get’s transformed, passes into and out of systems, is stored, is reflected back to space. The only essential difference between IR and SW is the frequency which results in different interactions with matter.
Cheers
Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 6:19 pm |
It doesn’t need any proof. This is the solar energy spectrum at the top of atmosphere – http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Solar_Spectrum.png – it peaks in the visible band.
What letters are you having difficulty with in the following; C, O or N?
You cannot feel those wavelengths. They are not thermal energies. They are really, really, really, tiny, that’s why they work,on the electronic transition level, the electron level, not on the level of molecular vibration, it takes moving the whole molecule of matter into vibration to heat something up.
You are showing me a 300 mile band of Light around the Sun and claiming that is all we’re getting from the Sun.
The Sun is MILLIONS of DEGREES HOT.
The electrogmagnetic wave of HEAT is thermal infrared, aka longwave infrared.
How can you not know that?
You are saying there is no HEAT from the Sun at TOA.
The shortwave energies cannot be felt as heat. They cannot physically move whole molecules into vibration which is what it takes to heat up matter. They cannot be what you are feeling as heat from the Sun.
You have no Heat from the Sun.
You are living in a cold, cold, cold world.
You are saying that the MILLIONS of degrees hot Sun, that blazing Star which is some 99.9 mass of the Solar system, is not producing any heat.
Which is the radiant heat of thermodynamics, which is thermal infrared.
You are, generic who say this, all completely off your rockers.
Get a grip.
It is all energy – indeed it all regarded as thermal energy in thermodynamics.
No it isn’t regarded as thermal energy in thermodynamics, they’re not that stupid.
At observation it is a potential – it knocks an energy carrier out of its place and along a conductor to a meter. The same thing happens in a PV – it has energy.
Between emission and observation it is a wave/particle. It is literally a photon – a ‘packet of energy’ with the quanta of energy equal to the frequency times a constant.
This energy when it hits the Earth cannot simply disappear by the 1st Law. It is simply energy that get’s transformed, passes into and out of systems, is stored, is reflected back to space. The only essential difference between IR and SW is the frequency which results in different interactions with matter.
So, show me how shortwave interacts with the real matter of land and water to raise its temperature – which – is what is necessary for it to do to give the intense heating of land and water at the equator which gives us our huge equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems.
Go to photosynthesis for how visible light converts to chemical energy not heat energy in the creation of sugars, go to Optics for how visible light creates to nerve impulses for sight. Go to Thermodynamics for how powerful heat energy capable of heating up matter is transferred by conduction, convection and thermal infrared radiation.
Cheers
Please, please, read the NASA quote I have posted. IT CONTRADICTS YOU.
It says the energy we feel as heat from the Sun is Thermal Infrared, longwave and it says that shortwave infrared is not hot, that we cannot feel it. This is traditional tried and tested well-known real world physics.
If you, all generic who claim this, want to ramble on repeatedly and mindlessly regurgitating fake fisic memes instead of taking on board that THERE IS A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT TEACHING ABOUT THIS.
Then, really, there’s no point in further discussion, you, generic, do not show yourselves to be interested in science, which is the rational and logical exploration of the physical world around us.
You think this: http://www.pasco.com/prodCatalog/OS/OS-8496_color-mixer/index.cfm is capable of heating land and water, of dramatically raising their temperature and you give me some BS graphic which you claim proves it.
Prove visible light can heat land and water, I have challenged you to prove your claim.
Or, please, do us all a favour and stop thinking of yourself, generic, as scientists.
“The Sun is MILLIONS of DEGREES HOT.”
In object which 1 million degrees emits what wavelength of light?
Hint: Star with temperature of 10,000 K has peak intensity in UV:
“You can see clearly from the plot that a 10,000 K star would have its peak wavelength in the ultraviolet part of the em spectrum whilst a 3,000 K star would emit most of its radiation in the infrared part. Not only does the shape of the curve determine the relative intensity of the different components of the continuous spectrum produced by the star, it also determines the colour of the star. A 10,000 K star appears blue-white whilst a 3,000 K star appears red. ”
http://outreach.atnf.csiro.au/education/senior/astrophysics/spectroscopyhow.html
If we had star with surface temp of 10,000 K which which was same distance from us as our sun, earth would be incinerated.
The Habitable Zone would far beyond Jupiter.
http://www.montgomerycollege.edu/Departments/planet/CosmicP4/CosmicP4_9-26-2007/Chapter24Life/Habitable_Zone.htm
Hint: Star with temperature of 10,000 K has peak intensity in UV:
“You can see clearly from the plot that a 10,000 K star would have its peak wavelength in the ultraviolet part of the em spectrum whilst a 3,000 K star would emit most of its radiation in the infrared part. Not only does the shape of the curve determine the relative intensity of the different components of the continuous spectrum produced by the star, it also determines the colour of the star.
Gosh, an incandescent lightbulb emits 5% visible light, its peak emission to its temperature, which means according to the fake fisics brainwashing you’re mindlessly regurgitating which has by sleight of hand confused peak with volume, the 95% thermal infrared the incandescent lightbulb is also emitting, doesn’t exist.
Which world are living in?
I’ll tell you, through the looking glass with Al where you can think any number of impossible things before breakfast..
Read the NASA quote I’ve given, IT CONTRADICTS YOU.
That’s supposed to make you pause, and think.
“Gosh, an incandescent lightbulb emits 5% visible light, its peak emission to its temperature, which means according to the fake fisics brainwashing you’re mindlessly regurgitating which has by sleight of hand confused peak with volume, the 95% thermal infrared the incandescent lightbulb is also emitting, doesn’t exist.”
A standard incandescent light bulb is using tungsten and this metal would melt somewhere above 3200 C. If there were materials which existed which could used without melting at 6000 C, then you could have a incandescent light bulb with Planck curve, which emitted light similar to the Sun- have it’s peak emission in visible light. Such a light bulb would also emit some X-rays, as our sun also does. It would also emit significant amount UV light. Both X-rays and UV light can be harmful to living creatures..
So anyhow, you are incorrect to say “an incandescent lightbulb emits 5% visible light, its peak emission to its temperature”.
Instead you could say an incandescent lightbulb peak emission is in the shortwave portion of infrared spectrum.
So, a 10,000 K star has it it’s peak emission in UV, a star at 6000 K has peak emission in visible light, and 3000 K Sun has peak emission in shortwave portion of infrared light. And a 3000 K star, certainly emits visible light- one can see it, just as lightbulb emits visible light [or molten steel emits white visible light].
I missed your answer regarding the Planck curve of a 1 million degree object.
A 1 million degree star does not exist, but as guess it’s peak emission would be in X-rays or higher. And such a star would certainly emit Gamma rays [no star emits Gamma rays unless it is exploding- as in a supernova].
Now a million degree object is obviously hot. And it would certainly be emitting longwave IR, but the energy one would notice the most would be the Gamma and X-rays which be vaporizing anything too close to it.
-Now a million degree object is obviously hot. And it would certainly be emitting longwave IR, but the energy one would notice the most would be the Gamma and X-rays which be vaporizing anything too close to it.-
Note the word object. Atoms [or an atom] which are a million degrees, would be far less exciting.
An object going the speed light would be rather exotic and exciting, an atom going to speed of light is less rare and somewhat commonplace.
Oh, I going reference, sonoluminescence, but apparently the temperature reached is only about 10,000 K:
“Energies on the order of an electron volt are typical on an atomic basis and correspond to an effective temperature on the order of 10,000 kelvins. This is a pretty high temperature, of course, and can influence chemical reactions. Thus, sonoluminescence is often associated with ‘sound chemistry’–or ‘sonochemistry.’ The fact that a rather benign mechanical mechanism such as a propagating sound field can produce atomic reactions is a quite remarkable and has attracted considerable scientific attention ”
http://www.tahionic.com/templar/web29.html
But apparent only in the pseudoscience of cold fusion that it’s suppose to get up to a million degrees.
gbaikie | November 29, 2012 at 4:56 pm |
Re: “an incandescent lightbulb emits 5% visible light, its peak emission to its temperature”, it doesn’t get hot enough to emit anything else..
“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_radiation “..The dominant frequency (or color) range of the emitted radiation shifts to higher frequencies as the temperature of the emitter increases. For example, a red hot object radiates mainly in the long wavelengths (red and orange) of the visible band. If it is heated further, it also begins to emit discernible amounts of green and blue light, and the spread of frequencies in the entire visible range cause it to appear white to the human eye; it is white hot. However, even at a white-hot temperature of 2000 K, 99% of the energy of the radiation is still in the infrared. This is determined by Wien’s displacement law. In the diagram the peak value for each curve moves to the left as the temperature increases.”
http://m.plantengineering.com/index.php?id=2831&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=33209&cHash=db4db9479b billet of steel
“A sufficiently hot object will emit light or visible radiation, a phenomenon called incandescence. A light bulb filament, smoldering ember, and a billet of red-hot steel are examples of this phenomenon. The hotter the object, the brighter and whiter its color. It is possible to estimate the temperature of an object this way. Experienced steelworkers do this regularly.
Not as widely recognized is the fact that incandescent objects emit a tremendous amount of invisible infrared radiation. For example, the radiance of a steel billet at 1500 F is 100,000 times greater in the infrared spectrum than in the visible spectrum.”
We can tell how hot the steel has become by the peak of visible it is emitting – but 100,000 times more invisible heat is being emitted, just as in the incandescent lightbulb which produces 5% visible light to 95% invisible heat.
It is never easy to see the tricks employed in cons, in magicians tricks, distraction here in the AGWScienceFiction Greenhouse Effect is created out of a multitude of such tricks by tweaking real physics, giving the property of one thing to another, taking laws out of context, plays on meaning of words, missing out whole processes and so on, there are two basic problems here.
It has twisted real physics out of all recognition, creating an impossible world, but, one cannot see this unless one knows the real physics, and, these twists are now ubiquitous because this was introduced into the education system which has had the result of making these impossible fisics thought of as real, so people begin their thinking from impossible facts.
The basic sleight of hand to promote the fake Greenhouse Effect is simply by giving the property of heat from the Sun to visible light from the Sun.
These are two quite distinct and different forms of electromagnetic energy, they have characteristics particular to themselves, the one cannot do what the other does. A gamma ray does not act on matter in the same way that a radio wave does, not least because of the difference in size, visible light does not give us Vitamin D, it takes the particular process from uv to do this. Real science is the exploration of the real physical world around us, what stuff is, how it differs from other stuff, how stuff acts on meeting other stuff, and we know a heck of a lot about it now. That’s why different stuff is given different names, and put into different categories for ease of reference. AGWSF has totally confused this, taken a big wooden spoon and stirred it all up until it created a physics which tells you zilch about the world around us, its world is fantasy, physically impossible. Impossible. You will not be able to see how it is impossible until you work out all the differences to real physical properties and processes, and this takes in a great many science fields. All I’m giving is the ones I’ve spotted..
The AGWSF claim is that visible lights heats the Earth’s land and water, this is a specific claim, it is impossible in the real world because visible light is not physically capable of heating matter, it is too small to move whole molecules into vibration which is what it takes for matter to become hot.
That’s why I never get any proof that it can do this – because in real physics it doesn’t exist so no one can find it.
No one is making a visible light sauna in the real world – because real world applied physics knows the difference between heat and light. In the science of Optics they are creating lightbulbs to radiate light and not heat..
How can one know anything about the heat from the Sun when this has been removed from the Greenhouse Effect world? How can anyone even begin thinking of what effect radiant heat from the Sun has on the physical matter of Earth, and us, if he thinks visible light is the heat, but when he goes to explore this he can’t find anything to show how visible light can heat matter? Don’t you think if visible light was the real heat from the Sun that we would have a whole science dedicated to this by now?
You see how twisty it all gets, because there is no logical connection of cause and effect in their claims, just more twists.
Until you, generic, can get a grip on what thermal infrared actually is, the heat we feel which is physically capable of heating up matter, and light is not this, you will continue getting confused by the twists they put in.
And until then, you will not appreciate how utterly ludicrous the idea that the Sun which is a blazing millions of degrees hot Star some 98% mass of the Solar system is “only 6000°C and gives off very little longwave infrared”…
” Myrrh | December 1, 2012 at 5:28 am |
gbaikie | November 29, 2012 at 4:56 pm |
Re: “an incandescent lightbulb emits 5% visible light, its peak emission to its temperature”, it doesn’t get hot enough to emit anything else..
“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_radiation “..The dominant frequency (or color) range of the emitted radiation shifts to higher frequencies as the temperature of the emitter increases. For example, a red hot object radiates mainly in the long wavelengths (red and orange) of the visible band. If it is heated further, it also begins to emit discernible amounts of green and blue light, and the spread of frequencies in the entire visible range cause it to appear white to the human eye; it is white hot. However, even at a white-hot temperature of 2000 K, 99% of the energy of the radiation is still in the infrared. This is determined by Wien’s displacement law. In the diagram the peak value for each curve moves to the left as the temperature increases.”
http://m.plantengineering.com/index.php?id=2831&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=33209&cHash=db4db9479b billet of steel
“A sufficiently hot object will emit light or visible radiation, a phenomenon called incandescence. A light bulb filament, smoldering ember, and a billet of red-hot steel are examples of this phenomenon. The hotter the object, the brighter and whiter its color. It is possible to estimate the temperature of an object this way. Experienced steelworkers do this regularly.”
Right.
Say, 1500 C steel has dim visible light [white light] as compared to 100 watt light bulb [which has a small filament of hot tungsten at 3000 C].
And larger areas of molten steel could radiate noticeable amounts of infrared radiation at quite a distance.
Having enough light to read a book in from molten steel probably also involves an uncomfortable levels of infrared radiation. And candle light is certainly more convenient to read a book.
Melting points of some metals:
Tungsten 3400 C
Steel, Carbon 1425 – 1540 C
Iron, Wrought 1482 – 1593 C
Iron, Gray Cast 1127 – 1204 C
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/melting-temperature-metals-d_860.html
The flame temperature of a candle:
“Depending on the wax, and the concentrations of water of oxygen in the air, somewhere between 1,200 degrees and 1,700 degrees Celsius. ”
“Candle flame – 1,930 K.”
http://hypertextbook.com/facts/1999/JaneFishler.shtml
Hmm, here:
Color also tells us about the temperature of a candle flame. The inner core of the candle flame is light blue, with a temperature of around 1800 K (1500 °C). That is the hottest part of the flame. The color inside the flame becomes yellow, orange, and finally red. The further you get from the center of the flame, the lower the temperature will be. The brightest red portion is around 1070 K (800 °C).
The round blue flame is a photo of a candle burning experiment in the International Space Station. Candle flames on earth have several different temperatures within the flame due to the variations caused by convection flows. In the zero gravity of the space station the flame burns rounder, slower, hotter and more blue.”
http://maggiemaggio.com/color/2011/08/fire-ii-color-and-temperature/
http://maggiemaggio.com/color/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/candles-reg-micrograv-01-01.jpg
So in terms radiating energy- whether visible or infrared, it depends how big the area radiating and the distance from it.
A small cap fire does not radiate much infrared energy if you 20′ away from it, whereas a large bonfire can add significant warmth at that distance. Having entire standing tree light on fire can radiate significant [and and for me personally, surprising] amounts infrared radiation at more than 100 feet distance.
And of course our sun is very big, and brighter than anything you will see on earth, and it’s very far away from Earth.
gbaikie | December 1, 2012 at 6:16 am |
Having entire standing tree light on fire can radiate significant [and and for me personally, surprising] amounts infrared radiation at more than 100 feet distance.
And of course our sun is very big, and brighter than anything you will see on earth, and it’s very far away from Earth.
Until people pushing the AGWScienceFiction memes get to grips with the fact that this is a con in which the con artists have given the power of heat to visible light which doesn’t have any of that power and which we can’t feel at all, they won’t realise they’re saying “there is no heat from the Sun”. And because they’ve been brainwashed into thinking that the Sun’s temperature is related to the visible layer with the AGWSF ‘proof’ of the Planck curve they can’t see how silly they sound claiming the Sun is 6000°C. Even when they know the Corona is millions of miles wide and millions of degrees hot, they still think that 300 miles band of visible defines the Sun’s heat. AGWSF has so successfully scrambled brains in this by confusing light with heat and providing idiotic ‘reasons’ like ‘peak visible energy means it is more powerful’, that it will take a lot of unscrambling.
I’ve read several articles and papers where postmodern scientists are struggling to understand why the Sun has a cooler layer, the visible, and then layers progressively hotter to the corona, they’re even now trying to devise a new fisics to explain where the heat in the Corona comes from..
Because they don’t know the difference between heat and light, because they have no concept of what an atmosphere is or what gravity acts on, being brought up on the AGWSF empty space with propertyless ideal gases zipping around at great speed under their own molecular momentum not subject to gravity..
We get our heat and light from the Sun’s Core:
“At the core, the temperature is
about 27 million degrees Fahrenheit,
which is sufficient to sustain
thermonuclear fusion. The energy
produced in the core powers the Sun
and produces essentially all the heat
and light we receive on Earth.”
http://astroday.kasonline.org/files/sun.pdf
That’s the real temperature of the Sun.
It is heat from that which is so powerful it takes only 8 minutes to travel 93 million miles to reach us at the Earth’s surface.
When, as some have noted, [wiki page below:sunshine, a combination of bright light and radiant heat]. the real figures for heat and light from the Sun are given, the percentage infrared is greater than visible, but, in typical pushing of AGWSF memes, that infrared is taken to be near infrared by those brainwashed to believe shortwaves heat the Earth. It’s just another sleight of hand misdirection by AGWSF, a play on words because “infrared” is routinely used to mean longwave infrared, thermal infrared aka radiant heat, in context, in contrast between heat and light.
If you look up what the AGWSF says about the amount of shortwave infrared it includes, it is only 1% of total uv/visible/infrared – that 1% cannot possibly refer to the standard physics split of more than half infrared meaning longwave heat we receive on Earth…
[wiki page below: Sunlight’s composition at ground level, per square meter, with the sun at the zenith, is about 527 watts of infrared radiation, 445 watts of visible light, and 32 watts of ultraviolet radiation.]
That’s how you’ll spot the sleights of hand, there is no joined up logic in AGWSF fisics, because its an illusion created out of tweaking real physics terms and playing with words, with just enough real facts thrown in to make it appear real, and to confuse the hell out of everyone trying to get his head around it.
So, AGWSF produces two variations of why the real heat from the Sun doesn’t play any part in heating the Earth, deconstructing the temperature of the Sun sleights of hand takes care of the Pekka people who claim “the Sun gives off very little longwave infrared” as the reason we don’t get any of it here, but the second one, and the basic of the Greenhouse Effect energy budget cartoon, is that “longwave infrared can’t get through the invisible barrier at TOA which like the glass of a greenhouse stops it while letting visible light, shortwaves, in to reach the surface”.
So, what is this invisible barrier around the Earth at TOA which prevents the heat power of the Sun from getting in? The only people who could possibly believe such idiocy are those brainwashed by the meme that “shortwave physically heats the Earth’s surface”, in traditional physics and applied thermodynamics we know that the great heat energy from the Sun is the invisible thermal infrared, the longwave infrared which is the bulk of the energy we get from the Sun at the surface, the Sun’s radiant Heat. We can feel it, we know its power to heat matter. But AGWSF has brainwashed people into thinking that the heat we feel from the Sun is visible light, which tiny bits of energy we cannot feel at all and which is not a thermal energy and which isn’t physically capable of heating matter, spat out by the electrons of nitrogen and oxygen molecules of the real gas atmosphere and rejected completely by water molecules.
This wiki page is typical of the confusion created by the intermingling of AGWSF memes with real world physics: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunlight
Mentioning the correct split between light and radiant heat and that radiant heat is bulk and reaches the surface, but with deliberate editing allowing that to be confused with the near infrared of the AGWSF meme. Connolly made thousands of such tweaks in wiki to push the AGWSF memes, and he isn’t the only one.
Of course no one likes to think himself brainwashed.., but all this fake fisics is just magicians’ tricks, those who can see through the tricks are no longer brainwashed.
aghh, sorry, missed a close italics.
AGWSF has totally confused this, taken a big wooden spoon and stirred it all up until it created a physics which tells you zilch about the world around us, its world is fantasy, physically impossible. Impossible. You will not be able to see how it is impossible until you work out all the differences to real physical properties and processes, and this takes in a great many science fields. All I’m giving is the ones I’ve spotted..
The AGWSF claim is that visible lights heats the Earth’s land and water, this is a specific claim, it is impossible in the real world because visible light is not physically capable of heating matter, it is too small to move whole molecules into vibration which is what it takes for matter to become hot.
——
A p.s. – This isn’t a theory – it’s a proven fact.
And re the AGWSF plays on words in confusing “infrared” when in context meaning radiant heat, with the non-thermal shortwave infrared, as in the wiki example:
http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/cosmic_classroom/light_lessons/thermal/transfer.html
“Both conduction and convection require matter to transfer heat. Radiation is a method of heat transfer that does not rely upon any contact between the heat source and the heated object. For example, we feel heat from the sun even though we are not touching it. Heat can be transmitted though empty space by thermal radiation. Thermal radiation (often called infrared radiation) is a type electromagnetic radiation (or light). “
Myrrh
Since you appear to be the only person on the entire planet that believes visible light cannot heat anything, it would greatly help your case if you could point to some experimental data showing this. Otherwise everyone is just going to continue thinking you made this up to fit in with your prearranged conclusion.
Memphis | November 29, 2012 at 8:04 am |
Myrrh
Since you appear to be the only person on the entire planet that believes visible light cannot heat anything, it would greatly help your case if you could point to some experimental data showing this. Otherwise everyone is just going to continue thinking you made this up to fit in with your prearranged conclusion.
What letters in the word “challenge” are you having problems with ?
I am challenging your claim, it’s for you to produce proof of it. Why haven’t I ever had a response to my challenge if it is as you say – what? So many people claim it but none can ever show how physical light from the Sun can do this?
You can’t tell me how physical light from the Sun heats matter, because it can’t. You can’t find it anywhere, you can’t find any logical, physical real world explanation because there is none.
I have given you real world physics which shows it isn’t physically big enough to heat matter, it’s too tiny to affect the whole molecules of matter on meeting them. At best, it hits electrons and gets spat back out again, in water, it can’t even get into to play with the electrons, it gets transmitted through unchanged.
This is real world physics, physics that works and knows how electromagnetic energy from the Sun affect matter on meeting it, it is still taught in traditional physics which can tell the difference between Heat and Light. You’ve been had. You’ve been brainwashed by the AGWScienceFiction agenda to believe nonsense.
If you have something different from this to explain your claim that visible light from the Sun does heat land and water, then GIVE IT. Don’t hold back.
And quit pretending, all of you who claim this, that you are scientists until you can show how visible light does what you claim.
Myrrh:
Assertions made at http://science.hq.nasa.gov/kids/imagers/ems/infrared.html are inconsistent with the definition of “heat” in thermodynamics.
Terry, it’s a physical fact that the heat we feel from the Sun is the invisible thermal infrared, which AGWScienceFiction has excised from its world. We cannot feel shortwaves, they are not hot, they are not thermal energies.
But, I really don’t care whether any one here believes me or not. I’ve explained why it is physically impossible for visible light to heat land and water, but I’m only explaining it in context of pointing out how ludicrous the AGWScienceFiction claims that, take your pick you have two contradictory explanations, “the Sun produces very little longwave infrared/the Sun’s longwave infrared is stopped at TOA by some [unexplained] invisible barrier like the glass of a greenhouse”, and, the sleight of hand change they’ve made by giving the properties of longwave infrared to shortwave, which in the real world isn’t thermal and can’t heat matter.
So, what I have been doing is requesting, and have so far not received, proof of these claims.
I’m the one making the challenge, you’re the ones who have to prove your claims.
I have specifically requested proof that visible light from the Sun, which is the main energy from the Sun in the fictional Greenhouse Effect energy budget supposed to do this great heating of land and water, is capable of doing this great heating , to give me the physical proof that it can physically heat matter on being absorbed which is the claim, heating intensely which results in raising the temperature of matter.
We feel great heat from the Sun. That is a physical fact in the real world. We feel great heat from the Sun while standing on the Earth’s surface.. That is a physical fact in the real world. We know the great heat from the Sun reaches us. That is a physical fact in the real world. We can feel this great heat on our skin. That is a physical fact in the real world. We can feel this great POWERFUL HEAT direct from the Sun as we absorb it internally and become hotter and hotter inside as it COOKS US and makes us sweat.
We know the GREAT HEAT DIRECT FROM THE SUN IS POWERFUL!
You are claiming that visible light from the Sun does this!!
So prove it.
What is the problem here?
Why can’t even one of you who claim this is ‘standard physics’, tell me how visible light from the Sun heats matter?
I have explained why it can’t.
Is that what’s foxed you all?
Because you can’t find any explanations from your supposedly ‘standard physics’ which explains in detail how visible light from the Sun cooks land and water?
Why can’t you find it?
If you could find it you wouldn’t be avoiding this challenge.
Well then, damn well admit you can’t find it.
FETCH IT – I HAVE CHALLENGED YOU TO PROVE THAT VISIBLE LIGHT FROM THE SUN HEATS THE LAND AND WATER AT THE EQUATOR TO THE INTENSITY THESE ARE ACTUALLY HEATED IN THE REAL WORLD WHICH GIVES US OUR GREAT EQUATOR TO POLES WINDS AND OUR DRAMATIC WEATHER SYSTEMS.
This is your basic energy budget claim!!
Myrrh:
While you demand proof, all that the scientific method of inquiry provides for us is theory. Your contention stands in violation a scientific theory that is particularly well tested. This theory is thermodynamics.
Myrrh,
You can do the conclusive experiment yourself.
http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/cosmic_classroom/classroom_activities/herschel_experiment2.html
You will be able to find out that heating will occur at a position that corresponds to infrared but you can also find out that there’s warming at locations where you see visible light.
Terry Oldberg | November 29, 2012 at 4:40 pm |
While you demand proof, all that the scientific method of inquiry provides for us is theory. Your contention stands in violation a scientific theory that is particularly well tested. This theory is thermodynamics.
I’m hard pressed to understand what you mean here, thermodynamics grew out of physical knowledge gained in perfecting steam engines, that takes a lot of power, heat power, to do a lot of work.
I thought my specified setting for the proof I’ve requested, I’m still waiting, would be sufficient to show how much heat power was necessary for visible light to rise to challenge, to intensely heat land and water for our powerful winds and weather systems out of the equator as is claimed. I had erroneously assumed you all had some idea of heat’s power from cooking dinners..
Please, do show me from thermodynamics the marvellous power of visible light from the Sun to heat matter, as you claim.
The pertinent aspect of thermodynamics is that the definition of “heat” is independent of the wavelength of electromagnetic radiation. By the way, my training in thermodynamics includes completion of three courses in that topic.
p.s. Terry – While you look for explanations from thermodynamics of the “great power of visible light to heat matter” of the AGWScienceFiction claim, back in the real world’s thermodynamics:
http://www.exploringcreation.info/physics/thermodynamics/transfer.htm
Processes of Heat Transfer
by Todd Elder
“At the base of thermodynamic studies is the ability of heat to be moved or transferred from one place to another. There are three ways to move heat which are conduction, convection, and radiation. All three of these forms can be examined in the process of cooking food over a campfire pictured below.
..
Radiation
Radiation is heat (or energy) traveling by infrared rays which requires no medium to travel through. This allows the heat from the Sun to travel through space to the Earth.”
From wiki on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_transfer
“Heat transfer is a discipline of thermal engineering that concerns the generation, use, conversion, and exchange of thermal energy and heat between physical systems. Heat transfer is classified into various mechanisms, such as thermal conduction, thermal convection, thermal radiation,..
“Radiation is the transfer of energy through space by means of electromagnetic waves in much the same way as electromagnetic light waves transfer light. The same laws that govern the transfer of light govern the radiant transfer of heat.”
Have you got that? because they are two very distinct and different energies from each other, they cannot be interchanged.. A radio wave is not a gamma ray.
In real physics visible light and longwave infrared, thermal infrared, are in different categories, Light and Heat, because they are two very distinct and different energies from each other, they cannot be interchanged.. A radio wave is not a gamma ray. The difference doesn’t have to be stressed as I’m doing here, “heat and light from the Sun” means visible light and radiant heat, which is thermal infrared. It’s only AGWSF which has created confusion between these, this confusion is deliberate, because this is a con..
I’m really sorry so many of you are having problems getting to grips with this, but until you actually make some damn attempt to prove visible light is capable of heating matter as you claim, I don’t think this will sink in.
There’s so much pc contortion around in descriptions, so as not to offend the AGWSF bank wagon, that it’s really quite difficult to find anything on line that gives clear teaching, but this one amused me:
http://littleshop.physics.colostate.edu/tenthings/FeelTheHeat.pdf
Thermal radiation is much like visible light, but
there’s one big difference: You can’t see it.
Or can you??? …
Visible light and infrared are both kinds
of electromagnetic radiation, but they
have very different wavelengths. Visible
light has very short wavelength, about
0.0005 mm! A typical infrared source
emits electromagnetic waves with a
wavelength of 0.010 mm, 20 times
longer.
The other big difference is in the energy of the photons. A visible light photon has enough energy to cause a molecular
transition, as it does when it strikes the retina of you eye. An infrared photon
doesn’t; a typical thermal radiation photon can only wiggle molecules, it can’t cause a transition. So infrared can only warm things up.
But you can still “see” it…”
Please do read the rest of it.. But note how it appears to give the impression that visible light because it more energetic has more ‘oomph’, by calling its process on meeting matter “molecular” transition, the usual term is “electronic” because it is so tiny that’s the tiny level it impinges on matter, the electron level, and then neatly has it striking the retina of the eye.. And then the throw away line that thermal infrared doesn’t have that energy and “can only wiggle molecules, it can’t cause a transition. So infrared can only warm things up.”
Very well written.., if you read it closely, it’s telling you exactly what I have been saying here.
Thermal infrared which is radiant heat is some twenty times bigger, this is where it gets the real oomph to move whole molecules into vibration, this is what it takes to heat up matter.
Y’all really need to get a sense of scale here, and get into the kitchen and cook something..
AGWScienceFiction has deliberately confused heat and light from the Sun.
Well Terry, then what are you waiting for?
I’ve requested proof that visible light from the Sun can physically heat intensely the land and water at the equator, you claim this exists in thermodynamics, you claim you are educated in thermodynamics, so where is the proof?
Fetch it, let’s all have a look at it.
As I’ve already provided you with proof, it does not make sense to revisit this topic.
Pekka Pirilä | November 29, 2012 at 4:05 pm | Myrrh,
You can do the conclusive experiment yourself.
http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/cosmic_classroom/classroom_activities/herschel_experiment2.html
You will be able to find out that heating will occur at a position that corresponds to infrared but you can also find out that there’s warming at locations where you see visible light.
No I can’t, the conclusive experiments were made after Herschel..
As I have explained above, Herschel could only move the prism by hand using the edge of the table, and he didn’t know what we know now, that the difference in size between these wavelengths is huge.
Visible light is tiny, invisible infrared is much bigger, visible light is even smaller than near infrared which is microscopic compared with thermal infrared which is the size of a pinhead. When he was measuring visible light he was also getting thermal infrared!
We now know that infrared is divided into thermal and non-thermal. Shortwave infrared is not thermal, it is not hot. See the NASA quote. Near infrared behaves like light not heat.
Near Infrared is classed Reflective, not Thermal. Like visible light cameras, near infrared cameras capture the reflected infrared from the subject.
Heat: http://littleshop.physics.colostate.edu/tenthings/FeelTheHeat.pdf
So they didn’t teach you the difference between the different electromagnetic energies from the Sun..
..the AGWScienceFiction meme is pretty much ubiquitous now, except in real world applied thermodynamics, “All electromagnetic energy is the same and all create heat on being absorbed”.
I’m sorry you can’t see what’s wrong with that. It’s obvious you have excellent powers of logical thinking, but logical thinking in a fake paradigm only leads to the multi-layered confusion we see in these discussions.
You have’nt given me the proof I requested, I requested physical proof that visible light can heat matter.
Here, AGWSF has given the great power of heat, therme dunamis, in transfer by radiation, to the tiny visible light which can’t move whole molecules into vibration which is what it takes to heat up matter.
Visible light works on the tiny electron level on meeting matter, electronic transitions.
For example, when the electrons of the molecules of nitrogen and oxygen absorb visible light from the Sun, they get more energetic and when they return to their ground state they release this energy, exactly what they took in, blue light in blue light out. It’s called reflection/scattering. When blue visible light meets the water in the ocean it doesn’t even get in to play with the electrons, it is passed along unchanged, called transmitted.
It’s a con. A sleight of hand giving the properties of one thing to another which doesn’t have them.
“Radiation happens when heat moves as energy waves, called infrared waves, directly from its source to something else. This is how the heat from the Sun gets to Earth. In fact, all hot things radiate heat to cooler things. When the heat waves hits the cooler thing, they make the molecules of the cooler object speed up. When the molecules of that object speed up, the object becomes hotter.”
http://www.qrg.northwestern.edu/projects/vss/docs/thermal/1-how-does-heat-move.html
Real world applied thermodynamics knows the difference between heat and light from the Sun. Knows the Sun’s heat reaches us, knows this is longwave infrared, aka thermal infrared, aka radiation, aka radiant heat, aka heat. It is not light from the Sun.
So that’s settled then, still no experimental data from Myrrh to support his claim that shortwave has no energy. He obviously has no stomach for a science challenge. Guess he is just making it up to suit a prearranged conclusion.
Memphis | November 29, 2012 at 12:48 pm | So that’s settled then, still no experimental data from Myrrh to support his claim that shortwave has no energy. He obviously has no stomach for a science challenge. Guess he is just making it up to suit a prearranged conclusion.
I never made such a claim.
Myrrh | November 29, 2012 at 3:53 pm |
Terry, it’s a physical fact that the heat we feel from the Sun is the invisible thermal infrared
That does not say anything about the energy from visible light being negligible. You’ve been relying on those science sites for kids again, haven’t you?
Cut the BS at last, give us your measurements on the energies of short and longwave that your base your claims on. Others have given the standard physics answers (about 45%-55% as I recall). now it’s time for you to finally accept the science challenge to support your claim.
thermal infrared, which AGWScienceFiction has excised from its world.
A outright and laughable lie, found only in Myrrh fisicsfiction.
I’ve explained why it is physically impossible for visible light to heat land and water
You’ve “explained” absolutely nothing, All you’ve done is provide lengthy and tangled rants and assertions interspersed with some big words. if there is substance to any of it, SHOW US YOUR SUPPORTING DATA. If you don’t, we’ll know you haven’t got any, and are just lying – or at very best making this all up in a desparate attempt to support some other preconceived conclusion.
…ludicrous … claims that, take your pick you have two contradictory explanations, “the Sun produces very little longwave infrared/the Sun’s longwave infrared is stopped at TOA by some [unexplained] invisible barrier like the glass of a greenhouse”
This is the same Myrrh fisicsfiction outright lie already mentioned above. As everyone knows, standard physics position is that both short and longwave reach and effect the surface about 50-50.
Conclusion:
In general, you urgently need to stop lying over and over. Your game there is very much up.
And in particular, you need to stop ducking your physics challenge, and SHOW US YOUR DATA for the energies of the short and longwave that everyone agrees reach the surface.
Still nothing …
Outstanding point still being ducked by Myrrh:
The fact is, the sun warms the earth. Which specific wavelength/s do this – shortwave? longwave? both? – is completely irrelevant to the general greenhouse issue. All that matters here, is that as a result of this, the earth radiates some longwave, which is then trapped by CO2.
Which makes this whole fuss of yours so utterly pointless as regards AGW. Even if turns out you are right.
Your post is misleading in several respects. That the sun warms the earth is not a fact but rather is a theory. Also, that increasing the atmospheric CO2 concentration warms (increases the surface temperature of) the earth is not a fact but rather is a theory. This theory is what we call “AGM.”
The latter theory lacks the earmarks of a scientific theory as it is insusceptible to being tested. It is insusceptible because there is no underlying statistical population.
In my previous post, please strike “AGM” and replace it with “AGW.”
Memphis >> The fact is, the sun warms the earth.
Terry >> That the sun warms the earth is not a fact but rather is a theory.
In that case, are there any facts at all then? Is even the existence of the sun a fact, or just a theory?
That the sun warms the earth does seems pretty well supported though – does this not make it a fact ? And is this something you have reason to doubt?
Memphis >> All that matters here, is that as a result of [the sun warming the earth], the earth radiates some longwave, which is then trapped by CO2.
Terry >> Also, that increasing the atmospheric CO2 concentration warms (increases the surface temperature of) the earth is not a fact but rather is a theory.
You’ll have noticed that in the comment you responded too – and indeed anywhere – I don’t claim AGW to be a fact. I do consider the greenhouse effect to be a fact, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a control knob for the earth’s temperature a la AGW. It may be, it may not be, more research needed.
Terry >> AGW theory lacks the earmarks of a scientific theory as it is insusceptible to being tested. It is insusceptible because there is no underlying statistical population.
What does that mean exactly? If over a period of time, the temperature trend followed CO2 and nothing else, would that suffice ?
Memphis:
Thank you for taking the time to reply. Regarding the existence of the sun, it is instructive to address the problem of whether the sun will come up tomorrow given that it has been observed to come up in the sequence of N previous days. The astronomer-mathematician Jean Pierre Laplace happens to have addressed this problem during his lifetime.
The following description of this problem references a statistical population, each element of which is an independent event lasting 24 hours. Each such event has an outcome in which the sun comes up or does not come up. The count N of times in which the sun came up is the result of observations and is a fact by the definition of “observations.”
A model’s prediction of whether the sun will come up tomorrow is inferred. In making this inference, the model labors under the handicap of missing information about the outcome. A user of the model recovers the missing information upon observing whether the sun comes up tomorrow.
In the language of information theory, the information that is not missing is called the “mutual information.” It is the information that one obtains about whether the sun will come up tomorrow from observing the state of the sun in the period preceeding tomorrow.
Once a model of sun-existence has been built, it can be tested through observation of whether the sun comes up in a sequence of M observed events that are independent of the construction of the model. That the model is susceptible to testing yields the conclusion that the knowledge which was created through construction of the model is demonstrable. The ancient Romans, it seems, were referencing the mutual information when they wrote of the “scientia.” Scientia is the Latin word for “demonstrable knowledge” that gave rise to the English word “science.”
Unfortunately, “science” has several meanings only one of which is “scientia.” Under the Daubert standard of the U.S. courts, “science” has the single meaning of “scientia.” Going forward, I’ll adopt this disambiguation of the term “science” and the related term “scientific.”
To generalize, when a consequence of a study is a model that provides scientia this study references a statistical population. Each element of this population is an independent event. The methodology of such a study is “scientific.” Conversely, without a statistical population the methodology of a study is not “scientific.”
The study of global warming that resulted in IPCC Assessment Report 4 lacked a statistical population. Thus, the methodology of this study cannot have been scientific. As the climate models that were a consequence of this study produce no information about the outcomes of events (no “scientia”) they are worthless for the purpose of making policy on CO2 emissions. They are worthless because they provide policy makers with no mutual information about the outcomes from their policy decisions.
Terry,
Regardless of the definition of “science”, if and when the models have a long and good record in predicting future temperatures, and we have comprehensive and robust measurements of OHC, radiative flux imbalance, etc, would that then be adequate information for policy makers?
Memphis:
That’s an imprecise way of describing the situation. A more precise way of describing it is to say that policy makers currently have no information about the outcomes from their policy decisions but need some to have a chance of controlling the climate. By the way, you’ve assumed that the outcomes of the events are global temperatures but as global temperatures of infinite number are associated with every event but every event has a unique outcome, this is not an option. One option is the 30 year average of the global temperature.
“If and when” (I’m not Terry, but…) I’d say ‘Yes.’ Memphis Tennessee.
One of the problems with arguing the science is the alternative versions which pass for explanations by different sects of this religion.
I’ve been told by Pekka that the original as per the comic cartoon KT97 and kin of the “invisible barrier at TOA [unexplained] preventing longwave infrared from the Sun from entering while passing visible light through”, is held by CAGWs, Pekka says AGWs claim is “the Sun produces very little longwave infrared and so we get practically zilch of that”. Both versions of course, in real physics, complete gobbledegook, but both these versions used to explain why the direct beam heat from the Sun has been excised from the AGWScienceFiction Greenhouse Effect Energy Budget.
In effect, in real world physics, what both these versions are saying is that there is no HEAT from the Sun direct to us in transfer by radiation, which in real physics is thermal infrared aka longwave infrared. I’ve explained why they need to say this, so they can pretend that any real world measurements of downwelling thermal infrared are from “backradiation/blanketing from the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and not from the Sun. Here too is another split into alternative explanations, of blanketing/backradiating.]
The direct heat of the Sun we feel on the surface of the Earth is its heat, its thermal energy, in transfer by radiation; thermal infrared aka radiant heat aka longwave infrared aka simply heat from the Sun. It is this great heat from the great heat of our Star the Sun which heats matter on Earth, land and water and us. We feel it on our skin and we feel its effects internally as it penetrates and heats us up, this is what makes us sweat.
It is absolutely ludicrous to give the great properties of HEAT to LIGHT. It is gobbledegook. It is not real physics. It is impossible in the real physical world around us.
AGWSF creates its fake fisics by various sleights of hand manipulating real physics by swapping around properties, taking laws out of context and mangling its terms and so on, and one technique of the magician is distraction. Here it’s in two parts.
The quality of the “longwave infrared” is first marginalised to the point of non-existance, by calling it “longwave infrared”. Although that is a correct term for the thermal infrared wavelength/photon/particle, it doesn’t immediately convey the quality, which is “heat”. So, both CAGWs and AGWs can’t immediately relate this the real physical perception we all have of what heat is, and how powerful heat is, otherwise they would immediately say, “hold on, what do mean, there’s no heat from the Sun?”, because it’s obvious to us all there is a great deal of heat from the Sun..
So the flip side of this magicians sleight of hand is to put all the attention on an alternative which can distract from the trick, this they do by saying that it’s the shortwaves from the Sun, mainly visible, which are the energies which do the heating, which is impossible in real physics which knows that light from the Sun can’t heat matter.
To this end, to convince the audience that visible light is capable of being this great heat energy they’ve excised, they provide a basic fake fisics meme on which they build the rest of their sleight of hand explanations, the meme is “all electromagnetic energy is the same and all convert to heat on being absorbed”. Which again is nonsense in real physics.
[Whenever the obvious objections are raised from real physics that visible light isn’t capable of heating matter so it can’t be heating land and oceans that meme is the first out of the bag in response, it is obvously fake fisics because electromagnetic energy doesn’t convert to heat in, for example, photosynthesis and sight, that “conservation of energy” does not mean it converts to heat, it can convert to other forms of energy. visible light converts to chemical energy in photosynthesis and nerve impulses in sight, and of course, we have conversion to electricity in photovoltaic cells. Etc.]
But, before you get too distracted and go off in a tangent which takes you away from the point I’m making.. The flip side of “there is no longwave infrared direct from the Sun” is the claim that visible light does its work of heating. One rebuttal from real physics is the obvious one that water is a transparent medium for visible light, so whatever you think “absorbed” means.., water in the real world can’t physically absorb visible light, so it can’t be heating it, visible light from the Sun cannot be heating the oceans (which is what it takes to get our winds and weather). And as with the alternative variations of dogma of why there is no longwave infrared from the Sun, there are two conflicting explanations here.
The first is adamant conviction that general use of the word “absorbed” in the descriptions of visible light attenuation in the oceans means that “water must be absorbing visible light therefore it must be heating the oceans as per basic meme” and they have no answer to the physical fact that water is a transparent medium and so can’t be absorbing it, but there’s a second which begins with agreement that visible light is not absorbed because water is a transparent medium, but which then claims that visible light heats the “impurities” in the water which in turn heat the water. David Springer makes the latter claim because, as he says above, he’s in agreement with real physics that visible and near infrared do not get absorbed because water is a transparent medium for them.
The second half of David Springer’s claim, that it is the impurities in the water which absorb visible light and so warm the ocean, is dealt with by real physics in my reply to him in another discussion. I am putting in a link here to my reply to this firstly because it connects with the discussion I was having with him here about this, and secondly, for further elucidation on the sleights of hands used by AGWSF to confuse both CAGWs and AGWs.
Myrrh | December 3, 2012 at 3:36 am
http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/28/clouds-and-magic/#comment-273475
AGWScienceFiction has created an impossible world by very clever manipulation of basic science. The reason its memes are believed, and the variations it produces argued about, is that these have been introduced into the education system, now a whole generation has been taught these fake fisics as if they are real science. This has effectively dumbed down basic science for the majority population and teachers of real physics are becoming fewer. This dumbed down physics is primarily for political/corporate aims, to promote the idea of AGW for various agendas, but this is not my concern here.
What I am concerned about is that this fake fisics is being passed down to the next generation who, for example, would not be able to design even what we have now, the photovoltaic cells to capture light from the Sun for electricity and the thermal panels of water capturing heat from the Sun, because what is being lost to the general population is all sense of the difference between properties and their processes, of the differences between heat and light.
And that is the reason we have science in the first place, the study of the real world around us because of our great desire to understand what it actually is, to know what things really are and what they can do is the study of the differences.
Good magicians are skilled, but their tricks can be known. Up to you.
Sigh, more the of delusion and dishonesty known as Myrrh’s fisicsfiction … The suggestion that he is an alarmist plant looks more and more believable with each new mailing he makes.
I’ve been told by Pekka that the original as per the comic cartoon KT97 and kin of the “invisible barrier at TOA [unexplained] preventing longwave infrared from the Sun from entering while passing visible light through”, is held by CAGWs, Pekka says AGWs claim is “the Sun produces very little longwave infrared and so we get practically zilch of that”.
A claim Myrrh knows full well is a complete lie – neither Pekka nor anyone else of ant stature has said that. Lacking any real arguments, Myrrh is just making up strawmen so he can look good knocking them down.
And as regards visible light doing any heating or not, desppite frequenent requests he still has not come up with any measurements showing this.
More importantly though, nor has it dawned on him that, unless he also wants to also deny the sun heats the earth, then it makes no difference to AGW which particular wavelength is warming the earth, the result is still the same – some of this heat is radiated out a longwave, where is it trapped by greenhouse gasses including CO2.
Lacking any answer to this point, he invariably quietly ducks it, so son’t hold your breaths folks.
There is no such thing as the “Greenhouse Effect” .
As I have been explaining. It’s an illusion, created out of faking real physics. There is no “warming of 33°C by greenhouse gases”.
So – quietly and without admitting it – it seems Myrrh has now backed away from his egregious lie that standard physics (nothing to do with agw), pretends that there is no longwave from the sun. The only pretending was Myrrh’s, trying to fit his argument to a preconceived conclusion.
And, as predicted, he once again also completely avoids the point that his whole no-warming-from-visible-light claim is so utterly futile, since it makes no difference whatsoever to the agw argument.
.There is no such thing as the “Greenhouse Effect” .
Here he denies something that that has been known and well-corroborated for over 100 years. We look forward eagerly to his empirical data showing ‘alternative’ absorption spectra for CO2 etc. (Along with the ‘alternative’ empirical data showing how visible light has little or no energy).
Memphis | December 5, 2012 at 1:35 am | So – quietly and without admitting it – it seems Myrrh has now backed away from his egregious lie that standard physics (nothing to do with agw), pretends that there is no longwave from the sun. The only pretending was Myrrh’s, trying to fit his argument to a preconceived conclusion.
Gosh Memphis, you really do have comprehension problems.., are you sure you’re up to such discussions?
I am arguing from standard physics, traditional physics, which says that we receive both heat and light from the Sun, as I’ve given in the NASA quote I posted. It is AGWScienceFiction fisics which has taken out the direct heat from the Sun which is thermal infrared which is longwave infrared which is the Sun’s direct heat in transfer by radiation, and substituted visible light from the Sun (which can’t do any heating of matter because it’s not big enough to move molecules of matter into vibration, as I have explained, and it isn’t even absorbed by water..), in order to promote its fake Greenhouse Effect. This has been introduced into the education system, it is not standard physics, it is at best a religion, and not science at all.
So, you stop lying about what I have said. Although your deliberate deceitful practice does give me another opportunity to explain how the AGWSF fake fisics is no longer standard physics, how it has corrupted standard physics, it is to be expected of those like you and we can only be grateful that you don’t have moderator status on this board so you can’t physically interfere with the posts we make..
Now I do hope you understand what I’m saying.. Would you like me to repeat it? The next time, if, you make a comment about me claiming I have said something, please quote my exact words. It will be easier for both of us then to analyse why you have such problems understanding what I’ve written..
And, as predicted, he once again also completely avoids the point that his whole no-warming-from-visible-light claim is so utterly futile, since it makes no difference whatsoever to the agw argument.
On the contrary, it makes a very great difference, as I have explained several times. If it wasn’t essential to take out the real direct heat from the Sun, which is the Sun’s thermal energy in transfer which is longwave infrared which is thermal infrared which is the Sun’s radiant heat or simply the Sun’s heat, AGWSF wouldn’t have done it. Putting it back in destroys the concept of “backradiation/blanketing from greenhouse gases in the atmosphere”, as I have explained.
Would you like me to explain it again? As many times as you need to comprehend my point, happy to do so.
.There is no such thing as the “Greenhouse Effect” .
Here he denies something that that has been known and well-corroborated for over 100 years. We look forward eagerly to his empirical data showing ‘alternative’ absorption spectra for CO2 etc.
Here: http://judithcurry.com/2012/12/04/multidecadal-climate-to-within-a-millikelvin/#comment-274012
So yet again you are another example of how deceitful AGWScienceFiction is with its fake fisics and its fake claims that this is real standard physics, there is no corroboration for AGW claims because NONE ARE EVER FETCHED when requested..
Go on – prove me wrong, fetch real science proof of AGW.
You lie that there is. AGW is a con and deliberately built on science errors from people like Arrhenius, but at least he was making an honest attempt to understand the real world around us, the climategate emails showed what lengths a sad and sorry bunch of misfits will go to in order to commit science fraud, and the continuing practices of altering temperature records – and this goes back to CRU manipulating New Zealand records, it’s a long standing science fraud.
Absorption spectra for carbon dioxide is irrelevant in real traditional standard physics, we haven’t excised the whole of the real gas atmosphere from our world.., as AGWSF has done for its fake Greenhouse Effect..
..where its fictional Earth goes from the surface direct to empty space..
..Which I think might well be the reason AGW/CAGWs have such a difficult time hearing me, because there is no sound in their world..
(Along with the ‘alternative’ empirical data showing how visible light has little or no energy).
Where have I said that? As I have requested, quote my words. I’m sure that with my capacity for infinite patience we’ll manage to get your misunderstanding straightened out..
Memphis | December 5, 2012 at 5:37 am | Following on the outright laughable lie you made about longwave from the sun being being ‘excised’ from AGW theory, further evidence of your profound ignorance of the theory you purport to challenge, is your obsession with backradiation, which, in order to support some predetermined conclusion, you presumably want to pretend is a vital factor in your trademark silly fisicsfiction. It isn’t. A (CO2-)warmed atmosphere does not directly heat the earth as such, it slows down the rate at which the earth cools.
You’re the one always proving yourself to be the liar, “shortwave in longwave out” is the energy balance on which AGW is based, Visible getting through the atmosphere and longwave infrared direct from the Sun being blocked.
As in this cartoon from Georgia State University: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/thermo/grnhse.html#c1
But, what I’d like to draw your attention to particularly is in this:
“A major part of the efficiency of the heating of an actual greenhouse is the trapping of the air so that the energy is not lost by convection. Keeping the hot air from escaping out the top is part of the practical “greenhouse effect”, but it is common usage to refer to the infrared trapping as the “greenhouse effect” in atmospheric applications where the air trapping is not applicable.”
This is where AGWScienceFiction has introduced another misdirection to fool the real world physics challenged – it is applicable.
Continued here: http://judithcurry.com/2012/12/04/multidecadal-climate-to-within-a-millikelvin/#comment-274520
Which ends:
The Greenhouse Effect is an illusion, a magician’s trick, but more importantly here, it is a con, a deliberate science fraud.
But this illusion couldn’t work if so many didn’t lack sense of scale..
You don’t have any sound in your world, perhaps that’s why you can’t hear yourselves.
A trace gas ‘trapping the heat like an insulating blanket, a thick down jacket’..?
A Star, which is our Sun, ‘only 6,000°C producing very little longwave infrared’ …?
That is a good tip particularly to those new to the blogosphere.
Brief but very precise info… Many thanks for sharing
this one. A must read article! Right now the time has come to enjoy my present, an electronic cigaret from eHealth Cigarette, a reward coming from my father to quit smoking.
Cheers!
Write more, thats all I have to say. Literally, it seems as though you relied on the video
to make your point. You obviously know what youre talking about,
why waste your intelligence on just posting videos
to your weblog when you could be giving us something enlightening to read?
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I like what you guys are usually up too. Such clever work and reporting!
Keep up the fantastic works guys I’ve you guys to blogroll.
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I’m a complete bozo about this, but I know what used car and appliance salesmen sound like. Just like Oreskes.
“What We Know” AAAS footnote iv, Oreskes, (2004), Science, 306 – from abstract.
“We analyze the evolution of the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming (AGW) in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, examining 11 944 climate abstracts from 1991–2011 matching the topics ‘global climate change’ or ‘global warming’. (pre-loading our confirmation bias.) We find that 66.4% of abstracts expressed no position on AGW, 32.6% endorsed AGW, 0.7% rejected AGW and 0.3% were uncertain about the cause of global warming.”
Initial survey: 32.6% for and 67.4% no opinion/don’t care. That’s not 97%.
So let’s rephrase to get the “right answer.” “What’s the consensus among the true believers?”
“Among abstracts expressing a position (guess which one!) on AGW, 97.1% endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming. In a second phase of this study, we invited authors to rate their own papers. Compared to abstract ratings, a smaller percentage of self-rated papers expressed no position on AGW (35.5%). (Not -97%!!!) Among self-rated papers expressing a position (guess which one!) on AGW, 97.2% endorsed the consensus. For both abstract ratings and authors’ self-ratings, the percentage of endorsements among papers expressing a position on AGW marginally increased over time.”
“Our analysis indicates that the number of papers rejecting the consensus on AGW is a vanishingly (35.5% not “vanished” or “small”) small proportion of the published research.”
No, it indicates that the true believers are still true believers and those 67.4% were just conveniently marginalized, shuttled off to the side, and ignored.
There appears to be a cottage industry of maybe 100 global warming alarmists cranking out apocalyptic climate change papers and peer reviewing each other’s work. That’s not consensus, that’s non-sensus.