Open thread weekend

Posted on November 25, 2012 by | 943 Comments

Its your turn to introduce some new topics for discussion.

I have a busy two weeks coming up with several trips, so I welcome your ideas for new posts.

This entry was posted in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink.

943 responses to “Open thread weekend”

  1. David Wojick | November 25, 2012 at 6:37 am |

    http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/23/opinion/krugman-grand-old-planet.html
    Krugman plays the earth creationist card, but Rubio is not a typical republican. Reps are roughly half the population with belief demographics to match that distribution. As an economist Krugman should know this. I find his writing to be mildly insane.

    • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 8:19 am |

      David –

      ?? Are you saying that Repubs are not disproportionately represented among creationists?

      Creationism is correlated with being Republican, and negatively correlated with levels of education. Do you doubt that?

      • David Wojick | November 25, 2012 at 8:39 am |

        No I do not Joshua (I assume you mean earth creationism. But Krug is making a claim about republicans not earth creationists. Very few Reps are earth creationists.

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 9:25 am |

        David –

        Very few Reps are earth creationists.

        http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/hold-creationist-view-human-origins.aspx

        According to that poll, 58% of Republicans think that God created humans in present form within the last 10,000 years.

        Is your point that while the majority of Repubs think that humans are less than 10,000 years old, but “very few” question scientific “consensus” about the age of the Earth?

        Seems dubious to me – rejection of evidence about evolution seems to go fairly hand-in-hand with belief in a young earth.

        Do you have any actual evidence for your claim?

      • lolwot | November 25, 2012 at 9:29 am |

        Creationism is is clearly a powerful enough influence for Ruban to deny the science.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 25, 2012 at 9:54 am |

        According to that poll, 25% of postgrads believe in a Young Earth. Realize that postgraduate means a degree beyond a bachelor’s. So after an average of perhaps 20 years of schooling, if a quarter of that group hasn’t figured it out yet, something is out of whack.

        Possibilities include:
        People game the polls, providing misleading responses.
        They are deeply religious which precludes skepticism
        Various reasons for “Why people believe weird things”

        That Wojick believes that there is a distinction between creationism and earth creationism is mildly insane.
        Wojick believes weird things.

      • gbaikie | November 25, 2012 at 9:56 am |

        “While 58% of Republicans believe that God created humans in their present form within the last 10,000 years, 39% of independents and 41% of Democrats agree.”

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 11:08 am |

        webhubcolonoscope

        Belief in God appears to be totally lacking in any animal species except for humans. Given that humans are the most intellectually evolved species on the planet perhaps the minority of humans who don’t hold any religious convictions are thinking more like animals and less like people?

        Just sayin’

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 11:21 am |

        My response to young earth creationists, after dealing with them for years, is:

        If God created the earth less than 10,000 years ago He did what appears to be a perfect job of making it appear to be billions of years old.

        Of course time itself is simply an artifact of entropy. Entropy is looking less likely to be the winner in the long run. Several hypotheses generally called “The Big Crunch” are gaining acceptance. The Big Crunch is basically a gravitational reversal of the expansion of the universe which causes it to contract back into singularity. A subset of The Big Crunch thinking is The Big Bounce which speculates that contraction and expansion to and from a singularity is cyclical and infinite. If the universe is deterministic and quantum mechanics is indeed unitary then history literally repeats itself on every cycle.

        No one knows. Those who think they know amuse me up to the point where they want to force their beliefs onto others.

      • Don Monfort | November 25, 2012 at 11:46 am |

        Little josh is at it again. He has said he hasn’t seen enough evidence to decide whether or not God exists, but he never misses an opportunity to brand Republican/Christian believers as ignorant, anti-science clowns. Civilized, tolerant people recognize that as hypocritical, condescending bigotry.

        According to the Gallup poll our little friend linked to, 67% of postgrads and 73% of Democrats believe that God had some hand in human evolution. And little josh hasn’t made up his mind yet, because he is still waiting for the evidence on God’s existence or non-existence to come in.

        So who the f is he to demean Republicans for having faith in something? I bet a higher percentage of Republicans have jobs and pay taxes than those highly scientifically literate Demos.

      • mike | November 25, 2012 at 12:25 pm |

        David,

        Your last comment jogged a distant memory.

        Although not a biblical literalist, myself, my thoughts did, once upon a time, wander into the “Young Earth” thicket and it struck me, at that time, that I could formulate a somewhat “respectable” version of the “Young Earth” theory. At least, so it seemed to me. But maybe not. Let me lay out my thoughts and if anyone would be so kind as to shoot my idea down (it may not be original, but I’ve not run into it before, and independently made it up), please fire away!

        Issue: Bishop Ussher, using Biblical genealogies, concluded the earth was created in 4004 B. C. Problem: How can this analysis (assuming the Bishop’s calculations to be accurate) be squared with the appearance of age in the geological record greater than Bishop Ussher’s date of creation?

        Solution: The earth is both a “Young Earth” and an “Old Earth” at the same time:

        Divine revelation (with an assist from the good Bishop) establishes as absolute Biblical truth a date of creation of 4004 B. C. But Bishop Ussher’s analysis only establishes that date as the point on the time-space continuum when the materiel world first appeared. However, Bishop Ussher’s analysis does not exclude a further creative effort by the Good Lord in which He might then bring into being a past relative to 4004 B. C. and, possibly even, the whole of the universe’s future (apparently some academic cosmologists entertain the view that past, present, and future are mere human constructs and the future along with the present and past already exists, albeit beyond our limited, human ken). Squared the circle?

        Incidentally, the above “Young/Old Earth” idea, it seems to me, then relegates creation’s exact start-date to a matter with no more interest to it than the location of the first brush stroke in a Sistine Chapel fresco.

        Please, no misunderstanding. I am not offering up my “Old/Young Earth” idea as a “scientific” hypothesis. Just as an intellectual exercise–an attempt to devise a reasonable way to hold simultaneously the literal Biblical account of creation (in terms of timing) and the scientific theories of geology. Still working on Noah’s Ark, though–That’s the tough one.

      • David Wojick | November 25, 2012 at 1:16 pm |

        I think it likely that many more people believe in human creation than in young earth creation, but I have no data on the population of young earth creationists, do you?.

        Interestingly according to this Gallup version the Rep/Dem ratio of strict human creationists is roughly 5 to 3 which means it is far from being a Rep only belief, as Krugman seems to claim.
        See http://www.gallup.com/poll/145286/Four-Americans-Believe-Strict-Creationism.aspx. When it comes to guided evolution Dems actually outnumber Reps. In any case playing the creation card to attack Republicans as Krugman does is stupid. That is my primary point.

        Also interesting, the 10,000 years is about right if “present form” means modern man, as opposed to caveman. The choices are very odd in some ways. For example “less advanced forms of life” sounds like fish or something and humans did not evolve from them in millions of years.

        I have always wanted to study this issue but never had time, to try to figure out what people actually believe. This poll does not do that.

      • David Wojick | November 25, 2012 at 1:20 pm |

        Web, it is much easier to believe that God created the modern human mind than that he created the earth 10kyr ago. Especially as we cannot presently explain the human mind.

      • GaryM | November 25, 2012 at 2:33 pm |

        “…it is much easier to believe that God created the modern human mind than that he created the earth 10kyr ago. Especially as we cannot presently explain the human mind.”

        Well, in order to believe that God created the human mind, one first has to believe that God exists. Once you accept that, I find it fascinating to think that one has trouble believing he created anything. That kind of goes contrary to the whole concept of God.

        Me, I’m ambivalent on the whole method of creation thing. If there is a God, could he have simply set things in motion with one big bang, and let the rest take care of itself, how ever long it took? Who am I to say. On the other extreme, could he have created the world some arbitrary number of years ago and made it look like it had “slowly” (time being a relative thing) evolved over billions of years? Why not?

        Shoot, he could have created it yesterday and made us all think we have been here our individual life times, or we could all just be characters in a virtual dream of some creator (like your typical modern video game). Once you accept the existence of a God/creator, it strikes me as a bit silly to talk about what he could or couldn’t do.

        The reality is that the logistics of the whole thing aren’t terribly relevant in the context of how we live our lives. Whether there is a God/creator is a fundamentally more important question than how he went about creating.

        It is the moral ethic that derives from God/religion that civilizes us and makes a world worth living in. History is fairly conclusive on where a society ungrounded in faith and morality ends up.

        On the issue of this sub-thread, anyone who thinks that science does or does not prove the existence of God, does not understand the concept of either.

      • Robert Austin | November 25, 2012 at 5:31 pm |

        GaryM | November 25, 2012 at 2:33 pm |

        Tangential to your post but picking up on your God’s assumed gender. It always amuses me when the Hebrew god is referred to as “he”. It is obvious that the origin is in the patriarchal societies of the Abrahamic religions. Literally, does God have “junk” like us guys but on a cosmic scale? And if so, what does he do with it?

      • mike | November 25, 2012 at 9:09 am |

        Josh,

        The only Gallup poll on creationism I can find that analyzes beliefs by gender and race was from 1991.

        Those subscribing to the “Creationist View”, “God created man pretty much in his present form within the last 10,000 years”–47%

        African-Americans and Women, both at 53% of the sample, had the highest agreement with the “Creationist View”.

        Perhaps Krugman might want to explore the “Anti-creationists’ war on women and African-Americans” angle in another column. Or maybe not.

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 9:46 am |

        mike –

        I don’t get your point. Do you doubt that being Republican correlates with rejection of the scientific evidence on the age of the earth/evolution of humans?

        Do you doubt a correlation between belief in evolution and education levels?

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 9:59 am |

        And mike –

        I think the Moony stuff about “Republican brains” to be interesting in a speculative kind of way, but on the whole unconvincing (the main problem I have with what I’ve seen relates to problems with direction of causality). I’m not defending Krugman’s basic thesis of an “asymmetry” – but there are some validly concerning issues w/r/t how partisanship affects reasoning and analysis. Indeed, the evidence of correlation between political identification and views on evolution, the age of the Earth, and the hilarious “analysis” offered by Republicans about the 2012 presidential election polls (check out some of GaryM’s posts on the topic) are all instructive about the prevalence of phenomena related to motivated reasoning.

      • mike | November 25, 2012 at 10:59 am |

        Josh,

        You’re too bright a guy to successfully play “dumb” with me. You get my point. I just know.

        Josh, when you worked as a carpenter did you learn anything? Was that an education? What correlations were there with your “education” working in the trades and your “scientific beliefs”? What difference does it make?

        But we know the answer, right Josh? It’s part of the hive’s agit-prop “narrative” to make out that people who left high-school to engage in wholesome, productive, life-long, honest labor rather than waste their time and money on a four-year, party-time, goof-off brainwashing at some rip-off “institution of higher learning” are stupid and contemptible–especially if they are “white”–and therefore the “smarty-pants” hive-bozos on the academic gravy-train deserve to “boss” us all around as our Philosopher Kings. Sorry, talkin’ to the wrong guy with that little line of nasty crapola, Josh.

        So many arrogant whiteboys trying to tell African-Americans what they should believe and what their children should learn–one of your themes, I believe, Josh?

        No Bible literalist, moi. Intelligent design? Never seen a more convincing interpretation of consistent, real-world observations (the apparent ubiquity of cause-and-effect in nature and the apparent fine-tuned nature of the universe) than the “Intelligent Design” hypothesis derived from the Cosmological Argument and its related watchmaker analogy (a pocket-watch implies a watchmaker) consideration of those observations. But “Intelligent Design” is anathema to the Krugman-approved, Lysenkoist hive that controls academia (Google: Richard Sternberg Smithsonian). But I could be wrong–show me! Anyone?

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 11:48 am |

        mike | November 25, 2012 at 9:09 am | Reply

        “Or maybe not.”

        Classic.

        You may need to explicitely label the sarcasm for leftwing dolts like Joshua.

      • Don Monfort | November 25, 2012 at 12:01 pm |

        mike,
        Little josh is upset at the ignorant Republican Creationists, because they are the root of most of our social and economic problems. Have you seen the stats on illegitimacy , the dropout epidemic and the resulting chronic unemployment and dependency among Creationists? How about the roving bands of Creationist youth who are committing all those flash mob robberies and random attacks on hapless non-Creationist strollers?

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 12:59 pm |

        mike –

        When I was a carpenter (which I was for some 9 years before going on to get my undergraduate degree – which I obtained in a self-designed independent study), I learned a great deal about the importance(for me, at least) of putting one foot on either side the line between theory and practice in order to develop deep understanding. There was a strong connection between my experiences as a tradesman and my approach to and understanding of pedagogy and epistemology.

        But we know the answer, right Josh? It’s part of the hive’s agit-prop “narrative” to make out that people who left high-school to engage in wholesome, productive, life-long, honest labor rather than waste their time and money on a four-year, party-time, goof-off brainwashing at some rip-off “institution of higher learning” are stupid and contemptible–especially if they are “white”–and therefore the “smarty-pants” hive-bozos on the academic gravy-train deserve to “boss” us all around as our Philosopher Kings.

        Based on my experiences, this is a gross exaggeration of academe – but certainly you are touching on some important issues and prejudices. The existence of those prejudices are however, IMO, not sufficient to support your conclusions. Just as their are biases amongst the theoriticians, so there are prejudices amongst the practioners. Take construction. The carpenters think that the architects are idiots who don’t know what it takes to actually build what the design, and often they are right. But so are the architects right when they talk of the benefits of understanding theoretical elements of design.

        Sorry, talkin’ to the wrong guy with that little line of nasty crapola, Josh

        Now I don’t need to play dumb, mike – it comes naturally. As such, again, I don’t understand your point. You seem to think that I’m talking some nasty crapola: I don’t know what you’re referring to. I’m focusing on the existence of certain correlations, and talking about how drawing generalizations from those correlations is very problematic. Some folks at least try to do so in a scientific manner. I’m dubious about their conclusions – but that doesn’t make the correlations go away.

        No Bible literalist, moi. Intelligent design? Never seen a more convincing interpretation of consistent, real-world observations…

        My views on ID are as follows: (1) I have no problem with the logical consistency of the belief or the intelligence or integrity of those who hold the beliefs. My problem is with the underlying premises (that only a supernatural entity could explain the universe) and the approach to acquiring and validating evidence. Now I don’t think that everything in the world can be explained by a scientific process of acquiring evidence, but beliefs based on different methodology are not beliefs based on a process of science; (2) The selectivity in how the premises are applied. IOW, if only a supernatural entity could explain the existence of the universe, then only a supernatural entity could explain why millions of children die in the agony of starvation on a yearly basis?

        BTW – here’s a suggestion going forward. I’ll leave the term “motivated reasoning” out of my comments to you if you’ll leave the term “agit-prop” out of your comments to me?

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 1:00 pm |

        Hey Don –

        How’s it going, buddy? Where ya’ been?

      • mike | November 25, 2012 at 1:13 pm |

        Josh,

        Yr: November 25, 12:59 pm

        Great response! You asked me not to use the term “agit-prop” with you, Josh? You got it! You’ve earned it! But that only goes for you, Josh, and not the rest of the “crusher crew” creep-outs on this blog unless and until those hive-bozo weener-heads work their game up to your level.

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 9:40 am |

        Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 8:19 am | Reply

        “Creationism is correlated with being Republican, and negatively correlated with levels of education. Do you doubt that?”

        You’re not ready to objectively and honestly discuss demographic groups and education levels. Low income evangelical Christians are the politically correct whipping boys among your sorry ilk. Do you doubt The Bell Curve, for instance?

      • WebHubTelescope | November 25, 2012 at 10:09 am |

        David Springer is the attack dog in favor of Intelligent Design. Or at least he was at one time.

        Intelligent design is considered a political gaming strategy intended to make religious belief systems more palatable to the scientific community. The I’D people only partially succeed, and it is mostly due to a highly evolved rhetorical argument strategy, full of fallacious debating tactics and a bull-rushing Gish gallop assault style.

        Springer has learned well, and I believe he is trying to apply these techniques to marginalize climate science.

        That’s why I place little credence to whatever he says.

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 10:11 am |

        Springer –

        Do you doubt The Bell Curve, for instance?

        If you believe that blacks are less intelligent than whites, I see no reason to dispel that belief. It would be rather like talking to a creationist YEC about the age of the Earth, or trying to get you to address some of the many theories that you advance based on a poor approach to analysis.

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 11:54 am |

        So the differences between races of man are only skin deep. All modern genetics of evolution are excepted in the case of humans where allele frequencies in various populations are no more than cosmetic.

        Gotcha.

        Like I said, you’re not ready for an objective look at demographics and education. You’re not ready for much of anything in fact. If I had to guess I’d say you’re a K-12 teacher and not math or science. Am I close?

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 11:57 am |

        Webhubcolonoscope holding preconceived beliefs rather than reasoned conclusions is not news to most of us. Tell me something I don’t know.

      • Bad Andrew | November 25, 2012 at 12:06 pm |

        “Intelligent design is considered a political gaming strategy intended to make religious belief systems more palatable to the scientific community.”

        Actually, it’s not. It’s pretty much just pattern detection.

        Andrew

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 12:27 pm |

        Springer –

        It seems that although you responded to my post, you may well not have read it. At least that would be the logical explanation for the content of your response. Given that, I’ll repeat what I said:

        If you believe that blacks are less intelligent than whites, I see no reason to dispel that belief. It would be rather like talking to a YEC about the age of the Earth, or trying to get you to address some of the many theories that you advance based on a poor approach to analysis.

      • rob starkey | November 25, 2012 at 10:01 am |

        Joshua

        The data appears to show little difference between the perspective between republicans and democrats. 31% of democrats had the same silly notion.

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 10:18 am |

        Rob –

        That isn’t true. The data show a significant difference between Repubs and Dems, and virtually no difference between Dems and Indies.

        In one sense, I think the entire argument is rather bogus. I don’t think that the difference tells us much of anything significant about differences between Repubs and Dems (although I do think that some of the analysis of the evidence is interesting).

        But in another sense, the evidence is useful for understanding how social, political, cultural, and personal identifications affects how people evaluate evidence and reason.

        What is more important than polls of individuals’ beliefs, IMO, is the huge difference between how Repub and Dem politicians pander to extremism. Of course, Dems also exploit religion (I cringe when Obama signs off with a “god-bless America” irrespective of his party affiliation), but the really significant difference is w/r/t that aspect of the mix between religion and politics. Consider, for example, the extremist views about mixing politics and religion of people like Rand and Ron Paul, Santorum, etc.

      • rob starkey | November 25, 2012 at 10:27 am |

        Joshua

        Imo, you seem to see things as significant because it reinforces your perspective.

        You write- “the huge difference between how Repub and Dem politicians pander to extremism.”

        My perspective- there is not really a huge difference between “HOW” Rep & Dem politicians pander to extremism, there is a difference in their target audience on specific points. Both try to create an “us” vs. “them” mentality and frequently do not communicate the specifics of their ultimate goal and their plans to achieve their goal.

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 10:43 am |

        Rob –

        There is a significant and quantifiable difference in the extent to which Republican and Democratic politicians orient to religious fundamentalism.

        Now maybe not all Republicans who do that can fairly be characterized as “pandering,” in that they themselves might hold extreme religious beliefs and so their alignment politically is not merely cynically exploitative. But I’d say that a lot of Republicans can accurately be described as pandering on this issue.

        You might fairly argue that Democrats also “pander” – in the sense of promoting political ideology merely for political expediency and not because of actual beliefs – but on this issue there is no comparison.

        This is well-documented. The relatively-uniform embrace among Republican politicians for fundamentalist Christian-oriented views evolution, the age of the Earth, stem cell research, and even issues like rape, is clear – and the difference in comparison to Dems on these issues is unarguable.

        The question of how that phenomenon relates to the climate debate is interesting. Personally, although I think it is an interesting question, I don’t see a direct link in the sense of there being some common mediator along the lines of attributes of intelligence or being “anti-science.” IMO, the correlation between political ideology and beliefs about the climate is grounded in the same kind of cognitive and psychological biases that mediate the correlation between political ideology and views of evolution.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 25, 2012 at 10:32 am |

        Joshua, This is a great topic. Which party has the highest percentage of hypocrites?

        The US has a tradition of using organized religion to organize political change. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Church_of_Christ in one office and a heart beat away, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic

        Actually, the 313a.d. nationalization of Christianity by Constaintine was a political coup. Created quite a consensus :)

      • Joshua | November 25, 2012 at 10:51 am |

        Cap’t –

        Like others, you seem to me to be wanting to steer this discussion in a direction different than the one I’m discussing. Now the other discussions would be interesting, but we need to first be clear how the discussions are different.

        I don’t believe that Republicans or Democrats are more or less “hypocritical.” I think that to find such a broad correlation – let alone to attribute some causality there – reflects motivated reasoning. In particular, I think that dynamic is true if someone tries pointing to some correlation (with a suggestion of causality) without offering a scientifically validated theory behind the correlation or causation (as at least Mooney does – even if I’m not convinced by his theories – at least he’s not making a facile argument). I am not saying that Republicans hold views on evolution because they are stupid, or because they are anti-science, or because they are hypocritical. I would find any broad implications of causality to most likely be facile and only confirming biases.

        What I have seen is a series of responses now that seem to be presenting an unrelated issue as if it somehow “balances” the correlation between party ID, views of creationism, and education levels. No other correlations make that correlation any less real.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 25, 2012 at 11:42 am |

        Joshua, “?? Are you saying that Repubs are not disproportionately represented among creationists?” There is no capital C in front of creationists. Since God is the creator, anyone professing to be a member of a religious organization would a a lower case creationist. I think that leads nicely into showing that Roman Catholics, a pretty liberal group, not your stereotype Repub, might be considered and even consider themselves to be Christian which could make them either creationists or hypocrits.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 5:21 am |

        Joshua and Mike

        Those subscribing to the “Creationist View”, “God created man pretty much in his present form within the last 10,000 years”–47%

        African-Americans and Women, both at 53% of the sample, had the highest agreement with the “Creationist View”.

        and

        Creationism is correlated with being Republican

        But didn’t African-Americans and Women both vote strongly Democrat – not Republican in the last presidential election?

        How then is is that Republicans represent the “Creationist View” more than Democrats?

        Goes to show how you can demonstrate almost any silly notion with poll results.

        Max

      • Derek | November 26, 2012 at 4:22 pm |

        .. and Democrats are disproporationately represented among Gaia-ists. So what? The last time I checked the rules of debate, ad hominem attacks were considered poor form and a sign of evidentiary and logical weakness. That has nothing to do with Krugman’s demented and blatantly ideological “reporting”.

      • thisisnotgoodtogo | November 28, 2012 at 12:31 am |

        WHT said

        “Intelligent design is considered a political gaming strategy intended to make religious belief systems more palatable to the scientific community.”

        I think you are begin a bit narrow minded. The realizations must proceed in a saltatory way. Acceptance of more and more pieces must precede abandonment of old belief. To cast the halfway crowd in with unchanging religionists is a mistake. Usually Evolutionists need to hear a complete recantation before they are satisfied that real movement is taking place..

      • timg56 | November 28, 2012 at 1:04 pm |

        Josh,

        I am highly educated and have no problem believing that God created mankind in his image or is responsible for the creation of the heavens and the earth.

        One doesn’t have to take as literal the timelines and process descriptions protrayed in scripture.

    • Max_OK | November 25, 2012 at 8:21 am |

      “Reps are roughly half the population with belief demographics to match that distribution.”
      ____
      I’m not sure what that means. If you are saying Republicans have the same beliefs as the population as a whole, I wouldn’t agree. The belief demographics of Republicans are not the same as the those of Democrats, so neither group has belief demographics that match those of both groups put together.

      • David Wojick | November 25, 2012 at 8:42 am |

        That is obviously not my claim. Just that Reps have a lot of different beliefs, few of which include earth creationism.

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 10:02 am |

        Young Earth Creationists are overwhelmingly Republican in my experience. And I have a lot of experience with them much of which is an open book at http://www.uncommondescent.com Atheists are overwhelmingly Democrats. Academics are overwhelmingly Democrat and overwhelmingly atheist at the highest levels as evidenced by surveys of NAS members who are 70% positive atheist (convinced there’s no God), 20% agnostic (skeptical of claims either way) and 10% with a belief in God. This is just about the polar opposite of the population in general.

        I’m pretty firmly in the agnostic category with regard to major religions but with Einstein in the creation category – we know something that was designed when we see it. Who or what designed it is a separate question.

        http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/news/file002.html

        Leading scientists still reject God
        Nature, Vol. 394, No. 6691, p. 313 (1998) © Macmillan Publishers Ltd.

        Sir — The question of religious belief among US scientists has been debated since early in the century. Our latest survey finds that, among the top natural scientists, disbelief is greater than ever — almost total.

        Research on this topic began with the eminent US psychologist James H. Leuba and his landmark survey of 1914. He found that 58% of 1,000 randomly selected US scientists expressed disbelief or doubt in the existence of God, and that this figure rose to near 70% among the 400 “greater” scientists within his sample [1]. Leuba repeated his survey in somewhat different form 20 years later, and found that these percentages had increased to 67 and 85, respectively [2].

        In 1996, we repeated Leuba’s 1914 survey and reported our results in Nature [3]. We found little change from 1914 for American scientists generally, with 60.7% expressing disbelief or doubt. This year, we closely imitated the second phase of Leuba’s 1914 survey to gauge belief among “greater” scientists, and find the rate of belief lower than ever — a mere 7% of respondents.

        Leuba attributed the higher level of disbelief and doubt among “greater” scientists to their “superior knowledge, understanding, and experience” [3]. Similarly, Oxford University scientist Peter Atkins commented on our 1996 survey, “You clearly can be a scientist and have religious beliefs. But I don’t think you can be a real scientist in the deepest sense of the word because they are such alien categories of knowledge.” [4] Such comments led us to repeat the second phase of Leuba’s study for an up-to-date comparison of the religious beliefs of “greater” and “lesser” scientists.

        Our chosen group of “greater” scientists were members of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). Our survey found near universal rejection of the transcendent by NAS natural scientists. Disbelief in God and immortality among NAS biological scientists was 65.2% and 69.0%, respectively, and among NAS physical scientists it was 79.0% and 76.3%. Most of the rest were agnostics on both issues, with few believers. We found the highest percentage of belief among NAS mathematicians (14.3% in God, 15.0% in immortality). Biological scientists had the lowest rate of belief (5.5% in God, 7.1% in immortality), with physicists and astronomers slightly higher (7.5% in God, 7.5% in immortality). Overall comparison figures for the 1914, 1933 and 1998 surveys appear in Table 1.

        More at link above.

      • David Springer | November 26, 2012 at 7:48 am |

        I should amend my statement about my experience with YEC (young earth creationists). Those I have experience with are men, mostly in academia, at places like Liberty University. Someone pointed out that YEC is embraced by majorities of blacks and women. I’m not surprised but I have no experience with the average member of the Southern Baptist church only its leaders and the leadership is most definitely Republican to the core.

    • dennis adams | November 25, 2012 at 10:36 am |

      David- Krugman et al and their worn out line is tedious and boring. They pigeon hole themselves with this worn out rhetoric and having used it for decades it dates them to mid 20th century thinkers. Libs and Conservatives both have their world view shaped by the 60s. The problem is that Libs look to the 1960s for their guiding light and Conservatives are into the 2060s thinking of real solutions instead of relying on the failed ideas of a half century ago. When someone teaches a gerbil to speak and say “more Federal interventionism”, will there really be a need for the Democratic Party?

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 25, 2012 at 12:24 pm |

        “Conservatives are into the 2060s thinking of real solutions…”

        By definition and tradition, to be conservative means to want to hold on to the past– traditional values and customs. The Republicans, as keepers of the conservative flame here in the U.S. have been naturally made up of primarily white people with strong traditional (i.e. Christian) values. As this is a declining demographic in the U.S., the Republicans will need to really look to the future and diversify their base or they will go the way of the Dodo bird as a party.

      • dennis adams | November 25, 2012 at 1:38 pm |

        That has been the Liberal mantra but with the Dem support of the ideology of the mid 60s and all that implies with its failed solutions, Conservative are at the vanguard of what will be a new public policy proscription which is generations ahead of Liberal ideology. Conservatives understand the value of culture and normative behavior and society’s role in shaping individual attitudes and the role in those attitudes in shaping a vibrant economy. You are using the old view of Conservative and I am using the new view which turns the tables upside down on all the usual politics. Progressives are really today’s regressives since they have nothing to offer but tired worn out 80 year old solutions.

      • GaryM | November 25, 2012 at 2:43 pm |

        So whites, by virtue of their skin tone, are more likely to have “strong traditional (ie. Christian) values.” The necessary implication being that non-whites are less likely to have strong Christian values.

        Nope, no racism there folks.

      • Louise | November 25, 2012 at 2:49 pm |

        GaryM – R Gates clearly says that Rebublicans (and conservatives) are more likely to be white people with strong Christian values. That says nothing about non-whites with strong Christian values.

      • GaryM | November 25, 2012 at 2:54 pm |

        Louise,

        Yes, if you ignore the rest of his paragraph in it’s entirety.

      • Louise | November 25, 2012 at 2:57 pm |

        GaryM – Nowhere in RGates’ comment did he imply non-whites are less likely to have strong Christian values. You have made a mistake. The correct thing to do would be to acknowledge this and apologise.

      • GaryM | November 25, 2012 at 3:06 pm |

        Louise,

        I recognize racism when I see it. Why any discussion of “conservative” and “Christian” principles if is was irrelevant to the comment?

        What precvisely is it that Republicans have to change, other than their conservative/Christian principles, to appeal to nnon-whites, according to that comment?

        You progressives are so oblivious to the reality of the inherent racism of your own opinions.

        What precisely do you think permanent affirmative action is other than an expression of progressives’ belief that minorities are intellectually inferior, and will NEVER be able to compete on an equal footing with superior (progressive) whites?

      • Louise | November 25, 2012 at 3:10 pm |

        GaryM – I am non-white and believe me I recognise racism when I see it. You are mistaken with regards to RGates’ post. That the Republican party has more support from whites than non-whites is a statement of fact.

        RGates did not imply that non-whites are less likely to have traditional Christian values but that non-whites that do have traditional Christian values are less likely to be supporters of the Republican party. Do you see the difference?

      • GaryM | November 25, 2012 at 3:18 pm |

        Louise,

        He said nothing of the kind.

        “The Republicans, as keepers of the conservative flame here in the U.S. have been naturally made up of primarily white people with strong traditional (i.e. Christian) values.”

        If Republicans represent conservatism, and skin color has nothing to do with such conservative/Christian values, then why is it that the Republican Party is then “naturally” made up of white people?

        The only characteristic of conservatism and the Republican Party mentioned it Christian values. The sentence then says that the party is therefore “naturally” made up of white people with those values. Why naturally white? Why are conservatives of all colors not “naturally” members of the conservative party?

        Without the inherent racism, the comment is gibberish.

        (The comment is historically illiterate as well, but that is an issue for another day.)

      • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 3:29 pm |

        “Christian values” is frequently used as code for non-tolerance. Not all Christians are non-tolerant, but the Republicans, in their platform, embrace the idea of imposition of their values on others.

      • dennis adams | November 25, 2012 at 5:14 pm |

        Jim D And you actually think that the Liberals with their thought police politically correct value purge do not try to impose their values and views on others. Come on, no one can possibly believe that. It is rampant in our society. If one does not believe exactly as Liberals on any number of issues then the ad hominem attacks come forth. It cuts both ways. I find Liberals to be over the top intolerant of values and views, other than theirs.

      • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 5:51 pm |

        By definition, liberals give people more freedom as long as they are not a danger to others.

      • GaryM | November 25, 2012 at 6:25 pm |

        Yes, the death toll from Big Gulps in NYC is a tragedy. Remedied by the beneficence of the latest in a series of “elite” rulers to grace the citizenry with their superior wisdom.

        God save us from our liberal betters.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 9:34 pm |

        Gary M writes:

        “What precvisely is it that Republicans have to change, other than their conservative/Christian principles, to appeal to nnon-whites, according to that comment?”

        _____
        Duh, to diversify their base so as to include positions on issues that in tune with a greater variety of people. The typical Republican base is shrinking. Either they embrace diversity or embrace being irrelevant. Pretty simple.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 9:38 pm |

        Gary M asks:

        ” then why is it that the Republican Party is then “naturally” made up of white people?”

        —-
        Conservatism in principle is based on “holding on to the past”. Whites have enjoyed the power and the money in this country for a long time, as that has been the “past”. Thus the conservative Republican party has been based on whites trying to hold on to the power they enjoyed in the past. But the times they are a changin’ and by 2050, the Latino population will be the largest. Expect the Republicans to begin to court this group…or go extinct. No other choice.

        Personal aside: I’m a white middle-class person.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 25, 2012 at 11:14 pm |

        R. Gates offers his ever baffling insight:

        Thus the conservative Republican party has been based on whites trying to hold on to the power they enjoyed in the past.

        At a certain point, don’t we have to admit this is racist?

      • R. Gates | November 26, 2012 at 1:03 am |

        No Brandon we don’t because it is not. You might want to look up really understand what racism really is. Stating the demographic facts of who makes up the majority of the Republican party is not racist, though it frightens me a bit to think the educational system has so failed us that there are people who think that speaking about demographics is “racist”. Very sad, but very convenient for certain groups to cry “racism” when the demographic make-up of a party is discussed. Why so is it so uncomfortable to speak of these facts?

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 2:31 am |

        R. Gates claims this is “[s]tating the demographic facts of” a party:

        Thus the conservative Republican party has been based on whites trying to hold on to the power they enjoyed in the past.

        He even bemoans the idea anyone could possibly take this as a racist remark. Because comments like, “Republicans are whites trying to hold onto power” are clearly just statements of demographics.

        I think this means I can safely say the Democrat party is based on minorities trying to take power from the whites. Because that’s just a statement of demographics. Nobody would ever say that sounds racist. Right?

        Very sad, but very convenient for certain groups to cry “racism” when the demographic make-up of a party is discussed. Why so is it so uncomfortable to speak of these facts?

        It takes gumption for a critic of the Republican party to accuse the Republican party of using the racism card. I mean, if Republicans criticize a Democrat who happens to be black, they get called racists. But if racist remarks are made about them, they’re just trying to use race as a ploy.

        Then again, I guess it makes a certain sort of sense. The Democrat party promotes racists so of course they can’t behave reasonably in regards to racism.

      • GaryM | November 26, 2012 at 3:26 am |

        R. Gates (aka The Racist Warmist)

        Nice try in attempting to re-write what you wrote, but no cigar.

        It is no surprise that progressives are racist. It is just another form of elitism. The Republican party represents conservative/Christian values, and thus is primarily made up of whites. But no, that isn’t racist. It is “demographic.” Talk about code words.

        In fact, African Americans were consistently Republican voters historically. Though I would never expect a progressive product of a progressive education to know that. It was precisely because of their conservative values that they voted Republican.

        Once progressives were prevented from outright owning African Americans by the Republican led Civil War, progressives then tried to use Jim Crow and the KKK to keep Blacks from voting.

        Progressives fought the Civil Rights Acts first under Eisenhower, then under Johnson. But Republicans led the effort to break their filibuster.

        Progressives then used welfare laws to break the very conservative family and social structure that led Blacks to vote Republican for decades. Starting in the 60s, to qualify for welfare benefits during times of great hardship, Black husbands/fathers had to move out of their homes so their wives and children could qualify under the progressive designed welfare state.

        Progressives also implemented the Davis-Bacon Act, to prevent Blacks from competing with White unionized construction workers. A law they still support today.

        Progressives, after being defeated again and again in their attempts to prevent Blacks from voting, changed tactics. Now, they decided to make Blacks, and later Hispanics, dependent on government. After decimating the Black family with their welfare policies, the progressives then ran the public school systems throughout the country into the ground. Keeping their union supporters fully funded, while insuring that most Blacks in the inner city could never get a decent education.

        They could no longer keep Blacks out of the schools by legislation or by standing in the school house doors, so now they simply render the schools useless.

        The racism of progressives is just another natural aspect of their elitism. It is the ugliest manifestation, but just one of many.

        And the reflexiveness with which progressives like you make racist comments like the one above, is breath taking. And as I noted above, you are all oblivious to your own racist views. After all, you are all for “fairness” and “for the children,” it’s just a happy coincidence that since progressives destroyed the Black family and inner city schools, they have been able to count on the votes of 95-98% of the African Americans they have rendered dependent on government. Some areas of major cities in Ohio voted 100% for progressivism under Obama.

        But hey, don’t worry, this is all just “demographics.”

      • David Springer | November 26, 2012 at 8:15 am |

        R.Gates

        The “Latino” population in the United States won’t last until 2060. After the second generation born in the United States they tend to intermarry with whites more often than not and without elders whose first language was Spanish the language doesn’t endure either. The situation is not really any different from Italian-Americans. Take a quick poll to see how many Americans with Italian last names today are fluent in Italian or have pure Italian bloodlines.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 11:02 am |

        Funny that me, being white, stand accused of racism against whites because I point out the fact that the Republican Party is going to need to change the groups it appeals to, moving from having a primarily white appeal to a more diverse group. Diversity is the key to the American future, and those who don’t get this will be left behind.

      • oneuniverse | November 26, 2012 at 12:01 pm |

        GaryM: “Once progressives were prevented from outright owning African Americans by the Republican led Civil War, progressives then tried to use Jim Crow and the KKK to keep Blacks from voting.”

        For some reason, you’re equating the old pro-slavery Democratic party of the 19th century with the modern social liberal / progressive Democratic party. The Democratic party of the Civil War (and pre-Civil War) era was pro-slavery. They weren’t progressives (by which I mean, concerned with civil liberties, labour rights, human rights etc).

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 5:11 pm |

        R. Gates apparently ignores my comment while responding to GaryM:

        Funny that me, being white, stand accused of racism against whites

        I’ve never accused him of being racist. Making a racist remark does not inherently indicate racism. Everyone knows a person can inadvertently make a remark that does not reflect their actual views.

        because I point out the fact that the Republican Party is going to need to change the groups it appeals to

        This is nothing like what the comment I responded to actually said. The comment I was discussing specifically called Republicans “whites trying to hold on to… power.” There is no connection between that and what R. Gates now says.

        What GaryM may have said has no bearing on what I said. I pointed out R. Gates made a derogatory remark based on race. His only response has been to misrepresent what has been said. He has never addressed the fact he specifically associated a racial group* with a derogatory remark.

        *Interestingly, “whites” are the dominant racial group within the Democrat party as well as the Republican party. As such, it would be equally (un)fair to say what R. Gates said about either party. Despite this, R. Gates insists he was merely discussing “demographics” when he singled out the Republican party like this.

    • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 1:22 pm |

      This is typical of politicians not wanting to turn off their potential base in a future presidential run. In answer to a press question about what he thinks the age of the earth is (an easy trap to set for Republican candidates), he says he is not a scientist, so he doesn’t know for sure. He could have said what he probably knows, which is billions of years, but didn’t. Similar things happen with revenue versus expenditure and AGW. The answers are designed to attract a base rather than honestly reflect their view.

      • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 1:30 pm |

        It occurs to me that while such trap questions are easy to set for Republicans, Democrats would more honestly answer this and about AGW in terms of scientific consensus. I can’t think of an equivalent trap question where a Democrat would have to go against of soften scientific consensus to appeal to their base.

      • gbaikie | December 1, 2012 at 5:19 am |

        “It occurs to me that while such trap questions are easy to set for Republicans, Democrats would more honestly answer this and about AGW in terms of scientific consensus.”

        That can be only speculation, because Democrats are never asked such a questions.
        For instance, who ever asked Harry Reid about his Mormon faith?
        At best, it’s background stuff, not headlines, which really have no significance. Making mountains out moles is what democrat dominated media does for it’s bread and butter.

    • RobertInAz | November 25, 2012 at 4:56 pm |

      Dr. Hugh Ross has an excellent analysis in his book Creation and Time.
      http://www.amazon.com/Creation-Time-Perspective-Creation-Date-Controversy/dp/0891097767

      He points out that God exists out side of our space-time universe and thus the notion of a 7 day creation narrative is meaningless from God’s perspective.

      It has been almost 20 years since I looked at this and I got rid of my material in one of the moves. There was an interesting quote from an astronomer as the big bang theory replaced the steady state universe theory. Very loosely as this is completely from memory “..as science has embraced the big bang theory, it arrives at a place where Christians have always been.” Indeed, part of the resistance to the big bang was that it implies a creation event.

      The hard core Christians, refusing to take yes for an answer, then settled an a non-scientific young earth creation belief as the test of “true” Christians.

    • Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 5:37 pm |

      Amazing,

      Half the comments so far are on religion, political beliefs and ideology. Most are by extremists and zealots. No wonder many good contributors have stopped contributing

    • Peter Lang | December 1, 2012 at 3:23 am |

      David Wojick

      O/T. but was it you that was suggesting we try using structured argument mapping methods (or some term like that), to try to improve the quality of the debate on CAGW, mitigation policies, etc.? If not, can you say who it was?

      If it was you, could you give me some advice. I’ve been playing with a tool I downloaded for a 6 day free trial http://rationale.austhink.com/learn/argument-mapping. I’ve been adding ‘Contentions’ and ‘Reasons’ but no ‘Rebuttals’. My first problem is to define a top level ‘assertion’ to start the whole thing off. I’ve tried many, but have now focused on trying to build down from this one:
      High-cost GHG mitigation polices are not justified

      Can you suggest if this is an OK top level ‘assertion’ to begin the rational argument structure? If not, can you please say why?

      Other’s I considered, and/or tried a little, were:

      – Only ‘No Regrets’ GHG mitigation polices are justified
      – Global ACO2 emissions will cause catastrophic climate change
      – Mitigation of global ACO2 emissions is essential
      – Australia’s carbon tax is not justified.
      – Carbon price and renewable energy are the best way to prevent catastrophic climate change
      – Carbon price is best way to control the climate
      – Carbon price is the best way to prevent catastrophic climate change
      – Carbon price is the necessary to prevent catastrophic climate change
      – Carbon price and renewable energy are the best way to prevent catastrophic climate change.

  2. A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 25, 2012 at 7:01 am |

    With regard to uncut brush, that in building-up year-on-year, creates catastrophic crown fires, Dave Springer has made some points that are directly relevant to climate-change discourse:

    David Springer comments [additions by FOMD] “ Lack of fires  Cheap carbon energy allowed  dry fuel  anthropogenic CO2 to build up decade after decade so when  fires  climate changes finally did happen THEY’D BE BIBLICAL/a>.”

    FOMD responded  “David Springer, you sure called that right!”

    “Everyone recognizes the bad decision-making of short-sighted ideologues, election-minded politicians, quick-profit business folks, and improvident neighbors.”

    “These short-sighted decisions can seem tolerable to us for awhile … until the inevitable day arrives when the catastrophic crown-fires rage, eh David Springer?”

    Common-Sense Questions

    • When should you ask your neighbor to cut brush?

    • When should you go to court, to compel your neighbor to cut brush?

    • When should you go to court, to sue your neighbor for crown-fire damages?

    • What is your recourse, if (a) your neighbor never cuts brush, and yet (b) cannot pay for resulting catastrophic crown-fire harms?

    • When should you elect officials, who will enforce brush-cutting regulations?

    • What sanctions are appropriate, for neighbors to adamantly deny the risk of catastrophic crown fires, and upon this basis, refuse to cut brush?

    These are tough questions, eh? Particularly because recent studies like Lethally Hot Temperatures During the Early Triassic Greenhouse provide a vivid, detailed, scientifically credible description of what “crown-fire” climate-change catastrophes look like.

    Yikes, eh? \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\frown}\,\text{\large\bfseries!!!}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\frown}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

    • Max_OK | November 25, 2012 at 8:04 am |

      I thought crown fires were related to droughts caused by climate cycles. If global warming causes longer and more severe droughts in some parts of the world (e.g., the American West), catastrophic fires would result in deforestation, and with less wood to catch fire, crown fires should be less of a problem. Of course, deforestation could cause other problems.

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 10:15 am |

        You’re trying to talk sense to a left coast imbecile convinced of his own infallibility. It won’t lead to anything constructive.

        \mathbb{IDIOT}\bowtie\mathbb{IDIOT}

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 10:21 am |

        Smoke from fires causes cooling. Global fires cause global cooling.

        There’re negative feedbacks everywhere you look. But you can’t see them wearing standard issue left coast politically correct blinders.

        \mathbb{BLIND}\bowtie\mathbb{BLIND}

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 25, 2012 at 11:48 am |

        Smoke from fires causes short term cooling but longer term warming from the additiinal carbon dioxide in the air. This is a good thing as the young trees that often quickly replace the burnt ones need that warmth and carbon to grow faster, but they also can get a boost from the extra nutrients released by fire. This cycle of fire and rebirth is a natural rhythm for forests going back tens of millions of years at least. Natural climate change certainly alters this rhythm, as forests move poleward during warmer climates and retreat during cool ones. What is unknown is how anthropogenic climate change will alter this pattern. Forest Management is actually one of the earliest forms of geoengineering.

      • timg56 | November 28, 2012 at 1:18 pm |

        Max,

        RE this sentence “If global warming causes longer and more severe droughts …” The operative word is “If”. To date the data is showing that it doesn’t.

        But no fear. The people warming of the dangers of a warming climate don’t allow something as silly as data to derail them from making what ever claims and likes they think up.

    • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 10:27 am |

      You put firebreaks on your own property and whatever protections you deem necessary for your own property. Or you move somewhere else. Or you join a gang of thugs with the power to force your neighbor to do what you want. Personally I don’t care much for the gangs which includes gangs of goverment thugs. But that’s just me. I’m a man. I’m not sure what you are, Sidles.

      • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 25, 2012 at 11:05 am |

        LOL …

        Dave Springer  (vents & rants awhile, and then asserts “I am a man”.)

        Dave Springer, you sound like the kind of hard-boiled Tree Country hombre who might like a book called That Old Ace in the Hole.

        “Ace” is largely about the Panhandle Country, kind of about markets (and what markets can and cannot do for us), kind of about nature (and what nature can and cannot do to us) … and mainly about the Panhandle Country’s people and their ways.

        Be warned though … “Ace” was writ by a woman … name of Annie Proulx.

        Still, most folks find Annie’s writings to be more than tough-minded enough, for everyday use.

        Happy holidays to yah, David Springer!  \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\heartsuit\heartsuit\heartsuit}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 12:03 pm |

        \mathbb{ADDLED}\bowtie\mathbb{ADDLED}

    • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 12:45 pm |

      Fan

      Cheap carbon energy? The same offer I made to R Gates is open to you;

      http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-271067

      Why not live with the reality of expensive carbon instead of just theorising about it?
      tonyb

    • Curious George | November 25, 2012 at 5:52 pm |

      You equate CO2 buildup with a dry fuel buildup. You are entitled to that point of view, but it is only supported by extremely questionable “climate models”. To quote Dr. Kevin Trenberth, “The climate model is just that: a model: it is a tool for use in various ways. It is not nor ever will be an exact replica of the real world. Approximations are required to make computations viable given the computer resource. You have stumbled on but one of them.”

  3. mike | November 25, 2012 at 7:23 am |

    Old poem, updated and improved, I hope. For what it’s worth.

    Now ol’ Al Gore
    He had a farm
    ‘Cuz he perceived
    A global warm

    And on that farm
    Did Gleick-bird fly
    A magpie sort
    Of manque spy

    And on that farm
    Did shewonk buzz
    A wannabee
    Who never wuzz

    And on that farm
    Did Rabett run
    With hare-brained romps
    In third person

    And on that farm
    Did bray Deltoids
    An ass-hole bunch
    Of Thermorrhoids

    And on that farm
    Hopped “Crusher ‘Roo”
    The love-joey
    Of Comrade Lew

    And on that farm
    High carbon troughs
    Gave tenured suck
    To sell-out profs

    And on that farm
    Reigned this world view
    Do as I say
    Not as I do

  4. Jim Cripwell | November 25, 2012 at 8:04 am |

    I wonder if some people from the UK would like to comment on the new UK Energy Policy. From here in Canada, it is difficult to get a balanced view of what is happening. Here we are blessed with an abundance of all sorts of energy, including natural gas, which seems to be a fraction of the cost in the UK. I hear of “fuel policy”, where households are spending more than 10% of their income on household fuel. Here in Ottawa, the weather gets quite cold, -30 C is not unheard of, and there can be days when the temperature struggles to get to -20 C as a high. But my energy bill is somewhere around 2% of my income, and I keep my whole house at a comfortable 20 C. I cannot imagine anyone having an energy bill of 10% of income.

    There seems to be a fight going on between Cameron, Osborne, Davey and Harvey, if I have got the names right. There is a battle that seems to be going on over whether or not to build more wind farms. And the Energy Policy seems to me to be a compromise between getting enough energy for the country to function, while appearing to “go green”. It seems to be the worst of both worlds. Tata Steel has already announced a loss of 1500 jobs, and closing 12 plants. I suspect the UK is committing economic suicide as a result of the Climate Change Act.

    Would someone like to comment from inside the UK as to what is really going on.

    • WebHubTelescope | November 25, 2012 at 8:46 am |

      The UK is seeing their once plentiful North Sea oil reserves plummeting. The price of fuel is sky-rocketing as they scramble to find alternatives. Some think there are natural gas reserves near Blackpool that may provide relief. Their coal has long been on decline.

      As with many parts of the world, this has less to do with climate change and more to do with expensive liquid fuel.

      I know that this scenario pains the one-note climate skeptics out there, but bean-counting of finite natural resources is not rocket science.

    • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 10:03 am |

      Jim

      I think you mean ‘fuel poverty’ rather than ‘fuel policy’. It must be the former as we don’t have the latter in any recognisable form.

      Could you tell us what you pay for electricity and gas (for heating) plus petrol (gas!) for your vehicle. Preferably so we can directly compare like for like on energy costs.

      As a result of our costs we are becoming uncompetitive as regards businesses that use large amounts of energy and certainly much of the population is finding it very hard to keep warm without spending absurd amounts of money.

      A particular problem with wind farms-apart from that they are ugly inudstrial complexes that tend to be sited in our most beautiful upland landscapes-is that the coldest weather in Britain during the winter invariably comes from an Arctic low sitting over the country, in which case there can be many weeks of no wind whatsoever.

      Here in our part of the UK (the mildest part along the southwest coast) the temperature will range up to 25C in summer, often be around 9 or 10C on a mild winter day and on cold nights in winter it might just dip below 0C, with some exceptionally cold nights being -5C. Inland parts of the country will be somewat higher in summer and could be up to another 5 degrees colder during winter.

      tonyb

      • Jim Cripwell | November 25, 2012 at 10:46 am |

        Thanks, Tony. Yes, I meant “fuel poverty”. For the record I have compared my energy costs with my brother-in-law, who lives in Bridgwater, Somerset, and by any measure I use less, and pay less for energy than he does. I heat my house with oil, and a fill up of around 700 litres is somewhere around $700. I typically need 1 1/2 fillups per year. So say oil $1000+. Electricity is around $180 per quarter, so around $700 for electricity. $2000 total.

        My car is hardly a fair comparison. I have a Toyota Echo, 9005, and hardly use it at all in the winter. It has around 57,000 kms on the clock. The main driving is in the summer, when I go to and from the cottage. I no longer make any long trips. (I am a widower, aged 87). So, 8000 kms per year, 6 litres per 100 km, 500 litres per year at $1.25 per litre; $700 for gas.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 25, 2012 at 11:59 am |

        Here in Colorado we have an increasingly broad array of energy to heat our homes and provide power. My total energy cost for gas forced air heat and electrical power is about $140 mo. for my 2500 sq. ft. home averaged over the year. Certainly fracking is providing a new energy dynamic here in the U.S. and even around the world. Cheaper energy is the upside, and we will see if there is a downside.

      • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 12:18 pm |

        Jim

        What are the relative sizes of your house compared to your brother in Law? Oil would be prohibitively expensive here and would tend to be used in rural areas. Most houses would have access to gas.

        Older British houses are notoriously poorly insulated so not surprised if we use more energy. Its very difficult and expensive to upgrade them to modern standards.

        Our petrol is around $10 a gallon so very appreciably more than yours. Average mileage is some 10000 miles per annum so this is a significant cost to the average family
        tonyb

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 12:37 pm |

        Wow. I have an 800sq’ft’ experimental structure that takes an average of $20/mo. in electricity to heat and cool it. I heat to 65F in the winter and cool to 80F in the summer. In the spring and fall it stays within that range without heating or cooling. I haven’t had air conditioning or heating on in it since September. It’s currently 68F and it doesn’t vary by more than a degree or two at most from day to night. I’m very pleased with it.

        Not surprisingly the inside temperature without assistance pretty closely tracks the temperature of the water in the lake that occupies the valley floor at the base of the hillside. Without heating or air conditioning it reaches almost 90F in the summer and almost 50F in the winter. The mean annual air temperature here is 72F which also happens to be the constant temperature of the dirt beginning about 3 feet down and the mean annual temperature of the lake as well which ranges from 50F-90F in the near surface layer.

        I built it entirely myself with the exception of an excavator to dig out the hillside and foundation sub-contractor to pour the floor and inner walls. I used the material removed from the cut in the hillside for road-base underlying a 500′ cement driveway from the top of the hill to the lake shore. Waste not want not.

      • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 12:38 pm |

        R Gates

        My offer remains open to you -or any American- who has not yet lived with the cosequences of the green agenda they are promoting, which will put them on a par with us happy bunnies here in the Uk.

        The offer? I will swap my energy bills-house and car- for yours. As far as I can see if my house was the same size as yours you would have a bill some 250% larger than you currently do.The fuel bill for my car would be at least double yours.

        The green joy doesnt end there. When I come to see you in Colorado and claim my free dinner (dessert included presumably?) I will have to pay a green tax for the privilege of flying amounting to some $100 dollars per person. It has risen some 360% in seven years.

        Mind you we’ve always got the expensive power from our headlong rush to wind farms to enjoy. The energy source that wont work when its at its coldest here in the UK as a high pressure settles over us in the winter and we have weeks without any wind….

        I’m afraid the green reality is nowhere near as good as the theory.

        Your cold British friend
        tonyb

      • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 12:40 pm |

        David Springer

        Do YOU want to swap energy bills with a Brit (me) as per the scheme I have outlined to R Gates?

        Tonyb

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 1:21 pm |

        climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 12:40 pm |

        “Do YOU want to swap energy bills with a Brit (me) as per the scheme I have outlined to R Gates?”

        I sure wouldn’t want to swap latitudes with you which is your biggest problem. Mean annual temperature where I live is 72F. If you play your cards right in a place like that heating/cooling bills are almost nothing. I use about one gallon of gasoline per week these days by careful planning of shopping trips to the nearest store which is 10 miles distant.

        I miss no snow in the winter though because of the stark beauty of nature in the winter in the north. I grew up a thousand miles north of here.

        I have all the windows open today and am comfortable in short sleeved t-shirt. Sunny and 75F at noon as I write this. My trees are all ablaze with fall colors. I talked to my 82 yr-old mom this morning who still lives in the house I was born in a thousand miles north. They have almost a foot of snow on the ground right now. Not only are her windows closed her furnace is running. It’s supposed to get down to 16F at night this week up there. In almost 20 years in south central Texas the lowest temperature I’ve observed at anytime is 17F. I can go a whole winter without seeing the temperature go below 25F. Quite the contrast.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 1:46 pm |

        Tony,

        We are lucky to have a pretty broad energy mix in the area I live in. My sister who lives in Maine is stuck with that nasty fuel oil as the only way to heat her house and they struggle every winter. This “one-trick pony” kind of energy mix quite unnecessary. I would like to see a break down of Britain’s energy mix and costs, including green fees and surcharges. Here in Colorado, we do have both wind and solar energy and pay a surcharge on our bill for the development of these, but it is relatively minor, and Colorado is a great state for both these renewable energy sources.

        As we’ve talked about before, the way to reduce overall energy costs is to diversify the sources, break the stranglehold that big energy companies have, increase energy efficiency as much as possible and go local and go renewable when practical. Fracking is going to help out the U.S. energy picture big time over the coming decades and it remains to be seen what kind of long-term environmental and health issues might come from fracking. Some suggestions have been made that America could even see a bit of a new “golden age” because of fracking. I don’t know if I’d be that optimistic, but over the short-run, fracking is making a difference for sure.

        Of course Britain is trying to do what many nations seemed committed to doing– and that’s controlling greenhouse gas emissions. America has not yet adopted such a strong formal policy. though we have reduced our greenhouse gas emissions here in the U.S. just by not burning coal (again, thanks to fracking and cheap natural gas).

        Of course, if you ever come to Colorado, dessert will be included in dinner, and drink or two before and after if you’re so inclined. We’ll also take a run up the highway a bit to visit NCAR (http://ncar.ucar.edu/) if you have the time, and you can take a first hand look at all those massively paralleled super-computers that work on those GCM’s night and day…

      • vukcevic | November 25, 2012 at 2:31 pm |

        Hi Gates
        Now you mentioned NCAR, about 18 months ago I got emailed the monthly data file for the atmospheric pressure at Stykkisholmur/Reykjavik by Dr. Hurrell, I would appreciate an update, but can not find link anywhere.
        Do you know of one?

      • Max_OK | November 25, 2012 at 3:37 pm |

        Jim Cripwell says ” am a widower, aged 87″
        _____
        Holy Cow , Jim!

        You are the Super Geezer, King of the Coots.

        Just kidding. Hope I last that long.

        To what do you attribute your longevity?

      • Jim Cripwell | November 25, 2012 at 3:38 pm |

        Tony, you write “What are the relative sizes of your house compared to your brother in Law?”

        That is an awfully difficult question to answer. My house is a bungalow of around 1200 sq ft, with an equal size of basement. I have an addition on the house, no basement, of around 300 sq ft which is heated by electricity. My b-i-l has a two story house, no basement; I would guess around 1000 sq ft on each floor. My sister has an Arga cooker, which is, of course, oil fired. They have oil fired central heating.

        You also write “Its very difficult and expensive to upgrade them to modern standards.”
        Are new houses being built with the same degree of insulation as ours? I have around 6″ in all walls, 16″ in the roof, and double glazing. The key is the insulation in the roof. I dont know why it is so difficult to put insulation in the roof of an older British home. Of course, our rooves are completley different. Yours tend to be open ceramic brick; ours are solid plywood, with weatherproof shingles on top.

      • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 4:21 pm |

        Kim

        I would tentatively say that our power costs are at least double yours and we Also use more power to get the same comfort level due to our poorer insulation standards on older properties, but direct comparison is difficult.

        It is said that 50% of the houses that will be around in 2050 in the UK already exist today. We tend to have an old housing stock and this means that many will have solid walls so can not have insulation in the walls, my own house faces the sea and I won’t install the stuff because of damp concerns. Double glazing is very expensive and by itself is unlikely to be cost effective. That is not to say that very many houses won’t have been upgraded over the years with the single biggest measure being insulation in the loft. I have about fifteen inches of loft insulation but many people will have less than this as six inches was considered normal until a few years ago. Us Brits tend to use our lofts for storage and if you have a lot of junk up there it’s less likely to be insulated.
        Tonyb

      • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 4:23 pm |

        Jim cripwell

        Sorry, my iPad changed your name to Kim without my noticing.

        Tonyb

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 4:27 pm |

        Vukcevic,

        Jim is a busy guy with new responsibilities, but you might see if the data is you need can be found here:

        https://climatedataguide.ucar.edu/es/category/data-set-formats/ascii

        or if not, try emailing jim here:

        jhurrell@ucar.edu

        I’m sure he’d be glad to get you what you need.

      • Jim Cripwell | November 25, 2012 at 5:29 pm |

        Max Ok, you write “To what do you attribute your longevity?”

        I am not sure I am that old. But I suspect the reason is good genes. Mt whole family tends to live into their 90’s. Maybe I should add the most wonderful wife in the world, who, unfortunaltely, died from Parkinson’s in 1998.

      • Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 6:12 pm |

        Max_OK asked

        To what do you attribute your longevity?

        Answer: Fossil fuel!. That’s the most important input to longer life!

      • David Springer | November 26, 2012 at 9:44 am |

        Everything is sparkly new in the United States compared to England. Except all those windmills. I bet those really sex up the otherwise 16th century decor. ;-)

    • vukcevic | November 25, 2012 at 10:22 am |

      Would someone like to comment from inside the UK as to what is really going on.
      Omnishambles !

      “Omnishambles” has been named word of the year by the Oxford English Dictionary. The word – meaning a situation which is shambolic from every possible angle.

      ‘Plebs’ are always complaining.

    • Steve Milesworthy | November 28, 2012 at 7:05 am |

      Jim,

      But my energy bill is somewhere around 2% of my income, and I keep my whole house at a comfortable 20 C. I cannot imagine anyone having an energy bill of 10% of income.

      $2000 per year is roughly comparable with examples in the UK. I pay quite a bit less than this in a modern 1300 sq foot house. I have tenants in a Victorian house and they probably pay similar to you (despite doing my best to fit insulation where I can).

      Your income, however, is quite good. Someone on minimum wage in the UK is on about £13,000 (about $21,000 dollars). Hence the 10% numbers.

      Domestic gas costs about 4.3p per kW/hour here (and going up). Oil is quite dependent on location, I believe, as typically it is used a lot in remote or difficult to access locations (farm tracks etc.).

      There is a battle that seems to be going on over whether or not to build more wind farms.

      The battle over *onshore* windfarms seems to be a skirmish with the focus on PR in rural Tory heartlands for the next election. The more significant battle seems to be the avoidance of a 2030 target for CO2 and avoidance of the issue of gas use for generating electricity (which may undermine investment in renewables).

      • Particular Physicist | November 29, 2012 at 1:24 am |

        The main objection to battle over windfarms is the ridiculous cost, rather than environmental spoilage, especially as they need standby conventional units to start up each time the win drops which almost entirely negates any CO2 saving into the bargain. In practical terms they are nonsense, there only for political correctmess.

  5. Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 8:06 am |

    Impacts – what are they?

    On a previous thread Steven Mosher said:

    The battlefield will now be impacts.

    So, what are they? What are the impacts of ACO2?

    Australian Treasury says the global average temperature will increase 7C by 2100.

    Australian Climate Institute and many other extremist organisations are saying the planet will warm 4C by 2100

    William Nordhaus’s DICE (2007) model was calibrated to the main GCM models and uses a central estimate of 3C by 2100. (Table 5-8, http://nordhaus.econ.yale.edu/Balance_2nd_proofs.pdf )

    So, what should we believe? I’ll use Nordhaus in this comment because, although the results are 5 years old, I believe he is the most balanced and sensible of those inside the CAGW Alarmist camp.

    What are the impacts of 3C warming? Are they serious or are they inconsequential? How do we know?

    I would really like to know, but the subject seems to be largely avoided.

    To try to coax some constructive comments out of the alarmists, I’ll summarise some key points from Nordhaus (2007)

    Nordhaus used estimates available up to 2007 to estimate the damage cost of 3.06C warming (from 1900) would be $22.55 trillion (in 2005 US $) (Table 5-1). But…. wait for it ….

    The damages with the ‘Optimal’ carbon price policy would be $17.31 trillion. (Temperature change from 1900 = 2.61C, a saving of just 0.47C)

    Importantly, he estimated that the abatement cost with the ‘Optimal’ carbon price policy would be $2.2 trillion.

    So, Nordhaus estimated the cost at $2.2 trillion to avoid 0.47C of warming. But …. wait for it …

    Nordhaus also makes statements in the text that, when put together, show that carbon pricing cannot work in the real world. (I summarised them here: http://judithcurry.com/2012/09/12/the-costs-of-tackling-or-not-tackling-anthropogenic-global-warming/#comment-239089. Therefore, carbon pricing would set the world back $2.2 trillion (2005 US$) for no benefit.

    This is an important issue. No work has been done to show that carbon pricing can achieve the benefits that Nordhaus and the other carbon price advocates assume. They are making an unsupported assumption. Richard Tol acknowledged it in his reply to my question here: http://judithcurry.com/2012/09/12/the-costs-of-tackling-or-not-tackling-anthropogenic-global-warming/#comment-239101

    As an aside, Nordhaus also shows the damage costs, abatement costs and Temperature change (from 1900) for other policies. Here is an extract from three of the sixteen polices listed (Table 5-1)

    Damage cost (2005 US$ trillion):
    None (delay 250 years) 22.6
    Optimal 17.3
    Stern Review (discounting) 9.0
    Low-cost backstop 4.9

    Abatement cost (2005 US$ trillion):
    None (delay 250 years) 0.0
    Optimal 2.2
    Stern Review (discounting) 27.7
    Low-cost backstop 0.5

    Global Temp change (°C from 1900):
    None (delay 250 years) 3.1
    Optimal 2.6
    Stern Review (discounting) 1.5
    Low-cost backstop 0.9

    Low cost back stop policy is by far the cheapest, by far the least damaging and by far the small best temp increase.

    • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 10:46 am |

      Ya think Minnesota would be damaged at all by 3C warming or would they be improved by it especially if the agricultural upside of 600ppm CO2 comes with it i.e. lower water requirements and faster growth.

      I have yet to see any objectivity from the usual suspects in regard to economic consequences of anthropogenic CO2. They hugely inflate the possible downsides, ignore the upsides, and generally ignore the secondary benefits of fossil fuels. All of industrial civilization and all of the increased lifespan that comes along with is made possible by fossil fuel consumption. Where is any of that factored into the analysis?

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 1:31 pm |

        NPK in the soil in modern agriculture is kept at optimal levels by supplementation or crop rotation. The extra CO2 won’t go to waste because of soil nutrients. That leaves sunlight and water starvation as limiting factors. Extra CO2 reduces the amount of water required so that’s still an improvement over less CO2 regardless of any other factors. That leaves sunlight as a limiting factor. And of course warmth. Agriculture needs unfrozen soil as a prerequisite and late spring early fall frosts can be quite destructive. Given that CO2 warms the most when and where the air is the coldest and dryest any modest warming effect is also an improvement.

        If you didn’t know these things blame a liberal school teacher.

      • Max_OK | November 25, 2012 at 3:43 pm |

        Well, if those Golden Gophers are clever enough to control everything else about their climate in addition to that “3C of warming,” they should get some increases in yields. But the additional fertilizer wouldn’t be free, and it also would have environmental costs.

        It’s hard to get something for nothing.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 6:40 am |

        Max_OK

        “Something for nothing” may not be easy.

        But if Nature (plus human CO2) is going to give the northern USA, Canada, parts of Scandinavia, Russia and China a longer growing season, an increase in arable land and higher crop yields, then let’s celebrate!

        We’ll be able to better feed a growing world population and reduce starvation – just as we did since 1970.

        Over the period 1970-2010 we had the following observed changes:

        1970
        Population: 3.7 billion
        Global temperature (HadCRUT3 anomaly, 10-year average): -0.12 °C
        Atmospheric CO2: 324 ppmv
        Global yields of major crops (million tons corn/wheat/rice): 788

        2010
        Population: 7.0 billion (up 1.9x)
        Global temperature: +0.42 °C (up 0.54 °C)
        Atmospheric CO2: 390 ppmv (up 66 ppmv or 20%)
        Global yields of major crops (million tons): 1912 (up 1124 Mt or 2.4x)
        In addition, global starvation rates were down significantly and (despite HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa) world average life expectancy increased from ~55 years to ~68 years up by 13 years.

        So I’d say this was a “win-win” situation for humanity (which theoretical analysts, like Stern or Nordhaus are just unable to visualize in their projections).

        Let’s have some more of the same!

        Max (not from OK)

      • Max_OK | November 26, 2012 at 4:45 pm |

        Referring to rising levels of temperature and CO2, manacker on Nov. 26, 2012 at 6:40 am said: |

        “Let’s have some more of the same!”
        ________

        Experience has taught me more of the same can be a bad thing. I’ll give some examples.

        Raising the temperature of my shower water from 70F to 110F was good, but raising it farther to 150 F was not good. Indeed, it was a dumb idea.

        Drinking 1 beer was good, drinking 2 was better, drinking 3 was even better, but drinking 8 beers was another dumb idea.

        So when you tell me more CO2 and more warming will be better, common sense and experience tells me you may be as dumb as I used to be.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 5:02 pm |

        Max_OK

        When I wrote of the positive effect of increased global crop yields from higher CO2 levels and slightly warmer global temperatures (presumably resulting from these higher CO2 levels), and the decrease in human starvation plus increase in human life expectancy that occurred, you shifted the subject to raising the temperature in your shower and drinking beer.

        Then you added that “common sense and experience tells” you that I “may be as dumb as” you “used to be”.

        Duh!

        I never was so dumb as to turn my shower up to 150 F or to drink 8 beers, so I never was as dumb as you used to be. Whether you’ve gotten any less dumb since then is an open question.

        But, back to the subject at hand, you can’t deny that life is better for us humans today than it was in 1970.

        And, if “global warming caused by human CO2” had anything to do with this, I say “bring it on”

        Max_definitely NOT from OK

      • Max_OK | November 26, 2012 at 7:04 pm |

        manacker said on November 26, 2012 at 5:02 pm |
        ” you can’t deny that life is better for us humans today than it was in 1970.”

        And, if “global warming caused by human CO2″ had anything to do with this, I say “bring it on”
        _______
        You are wrong. I can deny life is better for me now than it was in 1970. Life was MUCH better for me in 1970 because I was younger. Back then some pretty hot chicks found me appealing. Now days, young women are not interested in me. I get the feeling they find me disgusting. If global warming caused by human CO2 has anything to do with this, I say damn that stuff.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 7:37 pm |

        Max_OK

        Old relics, like you and me, may have had a more exciting life in 1970 than today (as you write), but that doesn’t change the fact that humanity as a whole (at 1.9X the number) is better off and living longer than in 1970.

        Whether the added CO2 or slightly warmer temperature had much to do with it is a moot point – but at least it did not cause an overall negative impact, and that’s the good news.

        Max_CH

      • Max_OK | November 26, 2012 at 11:54 pm |

        manacker said on November 26, 2012 at 7:37 pm |

        “humanity as a whole (at 1.9X the number) is better off and living longer than in 1970”

        “Whether the added CO2 or slightly warmer temperature had much to do with it is a moot point – but at least it did not cause an overall negative impact, and that’s the good news.”
        ______

        Max, perhaps you haven’t thought about the growing obesity problem. At the same time levels of atmospheric CO2 and global temperature were rising, global obesity was growing. I suspect there a connection between the availability of inexpensive fossil fuels and people getting fatter, although I recognize other factors can contribute to obesity. The rise in obesity rates since 1970 is shocking (see chart in linked article).

        http://www.oecd.org/els/healthpoliciesanddata/49712071.pdf

        The World Health Organization and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine report that about 3.5 million tons of global human biomass is due to obesity. One- third of that excess blubber is in North America, which has only 6 percent of the world’s population.

        http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/18/the-couch-potato-goes-global/

        I wonder how much fossil fuel is consumed in producing 3.5 million tons of unhealthy fat in humans, and how much is consumed in moving that unhealthy fat around?

    • David L Hagen | November 25, 2012 at 3:47 pm |

      For a bit of levity, a different perspective, and reality see: Minnesotans for Global Warming and their videos.

    • Ammonite | November 25, 2012 at 8:28 pm |

      Hi Peter. Your question on impacts is very well placed. It seems that many people have strong opinions on AGW without having investigated this crticial issue. I recommend Mark Lynas “Six Degrees”. He lists possible effects for global/local rises of 1C, 2C, 3C etc. The book is easily digestible and well researched with many references. (Feel free to ignore the loosely supported and speculative nature of most effects beyond +4C.)

      Short summary: +3C presents many potentially intractable problems for large swathes of the planet (+3C is also the median climate sensitivity estimate according to Knutti and Hegerl 2008).

      • Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 9:03 pm |

        Ammonite,

        Thank you for that suggestion. Is Mark Lynas considered to be qualified, objective and impartial?

      • Ammonite | November 25, 2012 at 9:19 pm |

        I would not assume impartiality. From Wikipedia: “Mark Lynas (born 1973) is a British author, journalist and environmental activist who focuses on climate change”… However Six Degrees references primary literature extensively. This provides somewhat of an independent gauge that you can use to judge for yourself. Ignore the publisher’s front cover hype and stick to the early chapters. It is well worth the read. My sense (gained directly from his book) is that Lynas does not think the +5/+6C scenarios likely at all.

      • Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 10:25 pm |

        Hi Ammonite,

        Thank you for your comment. You confirmed what I believe is the case – Lyna is an activist and, therefore, has a credibility issue.

        I’ve read a lot of this sort of material. I’ve been following it closely for over two decades and was involved in policy advice to government on energy and CO2 emissions in the 1990s. I’ve seen a lot of the sort of material Lynas has written (although I haven’t read his book). I don’t find this sort of alarmist material credible. When I first read the IPCC AR4 “Summary for Policy Makers” and then WG2, my reaction was that it was clearly alarmists, scaremongering, cherry picking, exaggerating the downside consequences.

        Some reasons I don’t find alarmist material (as indicated by exaggerations, selection bias the adjectives they use) persuasive are:

        1. Australia’s Climate Commissioner, Tim Flannery, is continually exaggerating (e.g. the dams will never fill again, and many other such ridiculous exaggerations)

        2. The top Australian climate scientists are continually scaremongering: https://theconversation.edu.au/climate-change-is-real-an-open-letter-from-the-scientific-community-1808

        3. The Australian Climate Commission is continually scaremongering

        4. The Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency is continually scaremongering.

        5. The Australian Treasury – who does the modelling to justify the carbon tax and ETS – is scaremongering (e.g. CO2 concentrations will be 1500 ppm by 2100, global temperatures will be 7C higher, sea levels will rise 1.1m, and this: “Cost of inaction”. http://archive.treasury.gov.au/carbonpricemodelling/content/overview/page16.asp

        Given the above, we have a reason to be sceptical. Lynas paints a scary picture of what will happen: deserts and sand dunes across the US grain growing areas, Amazon forests burn down, etc. Why should we believe such writings given that:

        1. the world is better off and more productive after 0.8C of warming in past two centuries. Why won’t this continue?

        2. Life thrived when the planet was warmer and struggled when colder. AR4, Chapter 6 says the area of deserts expnds when colder and shrinks when warmer. Chapter 6 also says more carbon was tied up in the biosphere when the planet was warmer. All this suggests warmer is better for life on Earth.

        3. It seems rising sea levels are a trivial cost item (e.g. 0.03% of GDP cumulative to 2100).

        4. We do not seem to have any relable cost estimates on the effect to global food production. However, the real issue with food productivity is governance and infrastructure. The world can feed far more than the 9 billion projected peak population if we don’t slow development. It is the bad policies that slow wealth creation for the world that threaten the world’s ability to feed itself.

        Every way I look at this it seems to me that the problem is with the economically irrational policies being advocated – e.g. carbon pricing and renewable energy.

        How can we get reliable, impartial, quality advice to base policy on? It seems to be impossible. Nordhaus’s is good, but even his analyses are based on studies that seem to tend towards being exaggerations towards worst cases. There seems to be little if any information available that is clearly credible.

      • Ammonite | November 26, 2012 at 2:17 am |

        Hi Peter. You raise many interesting points. I’ll pick a few. I believe you could find plenty of evidence available to support a sceptical stance regarding climate statements made by politicians of any stripe. Such statements say little about the state of the science one way or another. As for “top Australian climate scientists”, I choose to listen to what they have to say under the assumption that they believe it to be true.

        Agricultural productivity is a complex mix of innovation, energy availability (a key point often missed entirely by green activists) and favourable climate. The first two points support your case regarding the need for a sensible economic approach. A challenge occurs however if climate crosses non-linear thresholds for crop-growth/domesticated-animal-survivability such as too much/little rainfall, heat/cold, wrong season delivery, preferential pest selection etc. Consider the failure of this year’s US corn crop… It is not convincing to me to say that life thrived x-100 million years ago under warmer conditions therefore we’ll be ok. There wasn’t one human alive then let alone 9 billion of us and the life of the time evolved across eons instead of having to adjust over a period of a hundred years or so. Rate of change is the threat here.

        The “why should we believe such writings” point might be best served by reading Lynas’ offering. For example, excavation reveals that the Amazon has two stable states: rainforest and savannah. What threshold behaviour causes the shift? Can anyone be certain the risk is minimal if they haven’t reviewed the evidence? Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying the Amazon must burn or that any other particular disaster scenario must happen. I am arguing for more awareness in discussions. Too many posters blithely declare with utter certainty that no harm can come from increasing temperature/sea-level/ocean-acidification when substantial amounts of evidence suggest otherwise.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 5:46 am |

        Lynas ~ lyin’ ass?

      • Peter Lang | November 26, 2012 at 6:11 pm |

        Hi Ammonite,

        Thank you for your reply. I’ll respond to your first point in this comment.

        As for “top Australian climate scientists”, I choose to listen to what they have to say under the assumption that they believe it to be true.

        That shows a fundamental difference between us. You accept what scientists say because they are scientists. However, from my perspective, climate science has been corrupted. It is policy-driven science. I agree that the scientists believe what they say. But I see that as an expression of group think caused by the corruption of government funding to get the answers government wants. There are career advantages in supporting the orthodoxy. I am not saying that scientists are lying. I am saying they are caught up in a situation of group think and orthodoxy.

        If you look at what the top Australian climate scientists are saying, I think you’d have to agree it is extreme scaremongering. IMO, they have no credibility whatsoever. What is happening with climate scientists in Australia is also happening throughout the other rich countries. Could I urge you to consider the following for example:

        The thirteen part Clearing up the climate debate written by Australia’s top climate scientists, demonstrates they are up to their necks in activism.

        ‘Part One’ provides links to the thirteen Parts (scroll to the end of the article). And a list of the signatories that endorsed this compendium. It’s a list of who’s who of Australia’s top climate scientists.
        https://theconversation.edu.au/climate-change-is-real-an-open-letter-from-the-scientific-community-1808

        It is clear from the contributions written by these top climate scientists they are activists and extremists.

        I went first to ‘Part Four’ (written by Mike Sandiford) to try to find out what they say about the consequences of AGW. Why are the scientists saying it is catastrophic?
        https://theconversation.edu.au/our-effect-on-the-earth-is-real-how-were-geo-engineering-the-planet-1544
        It’s about the evilness of humans, the damage plastic bags are doing and the like.

        Nowhere in the thirteen Parts, written by Australia’s top climate scientists, could I find any persuasive case for dangerous or catastrophic climate change.

        Don’t miss ‘Part 13’ the wrap up by a well known climate activist!
        https://theconversation.edu.au/the-false-the-confused-and-the-mendacious-how-the-media-gets-it-wrong-on-climate-change-1558

        Given this clear advocacy, scaremongering, alarmism and extremism I do not simply trust what the climate scientists tell us. I question it. Even more so because they strongly advocate economically irrational policies like carbon pricing and renewable energy and (mostly) oppose nuclear power which is by far the least cost way to reduce global emissions.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 7:01 pm |

        Ammonite and Peter Lang

        Regarding agriculture and higher CO2 levels plus warmer temperatures:

        As I pointed out to Max_OK above
        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-271327

        We have had a major increase in crop productivity since 1970, at the same time as atmospheric CO2 increased by ~20% and temperature increased by ~0.5C.

        The net result was less human starvation and a longer average human life expectancy (despite the HIV/AIDS scourge in sub-Saharan Africa).

        So it is most likely that even higher CO2 levels plus slightly higher temperatures will bring even higher global crop productivity as more land becomes arable in Canada, northern USA, Scandinavia, Russia and China.

        As Peter points out, warmer is generally better while colder is worse.

        Gradual sea level rise is something humanity has lived with for well over 150 years at least (as we have come out of the Little Ice Age); there is no reason to believe that this will present any real emergency – we are talking about millimeters per year and people will adapt where necessary (as the Dutch have been doing for centuries).

        The rest of the “extreme weather effects from AGW” are “not based on formal attribution studies” as IPCC concedes, but rather on “expert judgment” (translation: wild-ass-guess or WAG).

        But how much arming are we really talking about (let’s forget the doomsday predictions of guys like Lynas and look at the data).

        There are only so much fossil fuel resources left on our planet. A WEC 2010 report tells us we still have around 85% of all the fossil fuel reserves that were ever on our planet (other estimates put this percentage lower), but let’s use this rather optimistic estimate on inferred remaining resources. These should last around 300 years at current use levels or 150-200 years at expected increasing use levels.

        The first 15% got us from 280 ppmv to 392 ppmv, or an increase of 112 ppmv.

        The remaining 85% would theoretically get us to::

        392 + 0.85*112/0.15 = 1027 ppmv

        It is extremely unlikely that we would ever reach this level, since a cost effective substitute for fossil fuels will undoubtedly be developed long before they are all used up (as Peter argues, nuclear power is already competitive in most locations – however, that’s another argument). But this gives us an absolute asymptotic upper CO2 level that could theoretically result from human combustion of fossil fuels.

        We have seen around 0.8C warming since the start of industrialization..

        Depending on whose estimate of natural forcing one uses (IPCC or that of several independent solar studies), between 50% and 93% of past warming was caused by “anthropogenic forcing”, which IPCC tells us is equal to forcing from CO2, since other anthropogenic forcings (other GHGs, aerosols, etc) cancelled one another out.

        So CO2 caused between 0.4C and 0.74C warming to date. This equals 0.57C+/-0.17C

        The CO2/temperature relation is logarithmic according to IPCC (and GH theory), so future warming from CO2 could be:

        IPCC basis:
        ln(1027/392)*0.74 / ln(392/280) =
        0.9631*0.74 / 0.3365 = 2.1C

        Solar studies basis:
        ln(1027/392)*0.40 / ln(392/280) =
        0.9631*0.40 / 0.3365 = 1.1C

        or 1.6C+/-0.5C

        That’s it, folks. The maximum warming we could ever theoretically see from burning all the remaining fossil fuels on our planet, based on actually observed warming, CO2 change to date and all the optimistically inferred remaining fossil fuel resources on our planet.

        This is no big deal.

        And, based on the past CO2 increase plus warming we have seen, this will most likely have a slight beneficial impact on overall crop yields worldwide.

        Bring it on!

        Max

      • Peter Lang | November 26, 2012 at 7:07 pm |

        excavation reveals that the Amazon has two stable states: rainforest and savannah.

        Picking out bits and pieces of evidence I see as cherry picking. For every one you pick, someone else can pick something to refute it. So I want to stay big picture for the start. Regarding the Amazon, we can also see that parts of the Saraha desert that are now sand dunes were grasslands in warmer times, in fact some of it was grassland during the Holocene. The area of desert shrinks when warmer. That’s good.

        What threshold behaviour causes the shift? Can anyone be certain the risk is minimal if they haven’t reviewed the evidence?

        We don’t know what causes the shifts. But, if warmer is better overall, does it really matter? More importantly, if we spend all this money to truy to control the climagte, what is the probability that the money spent will produce a successful result. I’d suggest the probability is near 0%

        It would be great to be able to hold the climate at some desired level, but is this realistic, or are we just fooling ourselves. Isn’t it better to continually develop our ability to adapt rather than waste our resources on schemes that have a very low probability of achieving the desired objective. The real objective is not to reduce CO2 emissions. The real objective is to control the climate. But we have virtually no evidence that carbon pricing and renewable energy will have any beneficial effect whatsoever. However, it is almost certain that the waste of money these policies will do significant harm to many people.

        Given these probabilities I am persuaded that the mitigation policies advocated so far – carbon pricing and renewable energy – will do far more harm than good. I’d say I am 90% confident of that. And I recvkon that estimates is just as valid as the IPCC’s unscientific estimates of 90% certainty which are based on opinion from experts who are part of the orthodoxy.

        I support ‘No Regrets’ policies. But I am opposed to the economically irrational policies proposed by climate activists and renewable energy advocates.

      • Ammonite | November 27, 2012 at 5:44 am |

        Hi Peter. Unfortunately I am out of time to do your points justice. Please note that choosing to listen is not the same as agreeing without investigation. As for the big picture, the earth is retaining progressively more of the suns energy and it has to go somewhere. Unfortunately I fear that adequate regional forecasts will prove problematic making preventative planning very difficult. (Consider the latest RealClimate post on regional behaviour in climate models.) If climate sensitivity is anywhere near 3C we are in for a rough ride. As an example, the warmer air becomes the greater its saturation potential. Consider the recent Queenland floods and the damage caused to that economy. If a flood stays 2cm below a levee it is nothing, 2cm above and it is a catastrophe. Damage functions are highly non-linear. Even “small” shifts can count.

      • Ammonite | November 27, 2012 at 5:56 am |

        Hi Manacker. On a quick reading of your senstivity estimate is it fair to say that you are assuming that the full effect of CO2 already omitted has taken effect? If so (and ignoring all other influences such as aerosol load) your calculation at best might establish a lower bound.

      • Peter Lang | November 27, 2012 at 7:00 am |

        Ammonite,

        Together with the Brisbane floods Australia received widespread rain over nearly all the continent. The floods can be handled by improved infrastructure. But the benefits of greater and more frequent rainfall over the whole country far exceed the flood damages with improved infrastructure.

        You have not addressed the important question about what is the probability that mitigation policies, like carbon tax and renewable energy, would prevent the floods. Money spent on improving infrastructure would be effective within years. But irrational policies like carbon pricing and renewable energy, will probably be a total failure. http://skepticalscience.com//news.php?f=nordhaus-sets-the-record-straight-climate-mitigation-saves-money#82373.

      • Ammonite | November 27, 2012 at 5:56 pm |

        You are correct Peter, my focus in this discussion is to try to highlight potential effects of warming, not propose solutions. In the case of Australia the carbon tax appears to have been motivated solely to gain the Green vote and allow Labour to cling to power. As an example of how poorly this has been thought through, brown-coal fired power stations in Victoria have been compensated by tax payers to the tune of ~1Bn dollars AND allowed to stay operational without change! It beggars belief.

        Try Lynas. It’s interesting and not nearly as bad as you fear (I hope). Comparing the benefits/drawbacks of mitigation vs adaptation is impossible if the consequences of BAU are not adequately considered.

      • Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 6:28 am |

        Ammonite,

        Comparing the benefits/drawbacks of mitigation vs adaptation is impossible if the consequences of BAU are not adequately considered.

        They are considered. That is what the Nordhaus “Delay 250 years” policy is http://nordhaus.econ.yale.edu/Balance_2nd_proofs.pdf. It means no mitigation, adaptation only. My comments and links provided above show why I suspect the damage costs are overstated, the mitigation costs understated, and the probability that the proposed mitigation policies would have any significant effect on the climate or sea levels not investigated.

        Nordhaus says that the uncertainty on the damage function is high. And he says:

        The major issue at this stage is that the database for impact studies continues to be relatively small.

        (p24: http://nordhaus.econ.yale.edu/Accom_Notes_100507.pdf)

        That is why I’ve been asking about the impacts of ACO2 emissions and the damage function (quantitative, not just descriptions of scary scenarios loaded with hyperbole, exaggeration, scaremongering).

    • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 5:59 am |

      Peter Lang

      Nordhaus used estimates available up to 2007 to estimate the damage cost of 3.06C warming (from 1900) would be $22.55 trillion (in 2005 US $) (Table 5-1). But…. wait for it ….

      The damages with the ‘Optimal’ carbon price policy would be $17.31 trillion. (Temperature change from 1900 = 2.61C, a saving of just 0.47C)

      IOW a difference in warming of 3.06-2.61 = 0.47C represents a difference in “damage cost” of $22.55-17.31 trillion = $5.24 trillion?

      How absurd!

      While Nordhaus is the least goofy of the analysts you cited, his conclusions are still totally ridiculous.

      The “optimum policy” is obviously to adapt to any climate change Nature throws at us IF and WHEN it appears that this change is imminent (but Nordhaus has not been able to show any “damage cost” for this case, because there is none).

      Max

      • Peter Lang | November 26, 2012 at 6:45 am |

        Manacker,

        Yes. And ‘no regrets’ policies. Since many people are not going to be satisfied, or even listen, unless mitigation is offered, I suggest we should also point out that they can have our cake and eat it. ‘No Regrets’ policies are possible. We just have to break through the closed minds (some how) to get some focus on the options.

        Nordhaus’s figures that I summarised above for three policy options – no mitigation, ‘Optimal’ carbon price, and ‘Low-cost backstop’ – show that the ‘Low-cost backstop’ is by far the best option in all ways. This is the point Bjorn Lomborg has been trying to get through to people for years.

        Nuclear power could be a ‘low cost backstop’ technology that could make a very significant contribution to reducing emissions at low cost. In fact, It could be ‘No Regrets’. That is, we could cut emissions at no cost or negative cost. Everyone happy. We just need to get people allow it to happen. To support it.

        This week, President Obama announced $500 million for the $180 MWe mPower small nuclear power plant program http://www.uxc.com/smr/Library/Design%20Specific/mPower/Presentations/2012%20-%20Reactor%20Design%20Overview.pdf
        That’s a start. This gives details of 43 small nuclear power plants in various stages of concept through to operating http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf33.html. We need to allow competition to proceed. Let the market improve the breed and get the price down through competition.

        Once the world gets going, the cost of electricity from small nuclear power plants would fall to well below fossil fuels in fairly short order.

  6. Paul Vaughan | November 25, 2012 at 8:46 am |

    Chao, B.F. (2006). Earth’s oblateness and its temporal variations Comptes Rendus Geoscience 338, 1123-1129. doi:10.1016/j.crte.2006.09.014.
    http://www.earth.sinica.edu.tw/~bfchao/publication/eng/2006-Earth%E2%80%99s%20oblateness%20and%20its%20temporal%20variations.pdf

  7. Don B | November 25, 2012 at 9:17 am |

    From this morning’s NYT, Is This the End?…

    “Last month’s “weather event” [Sandy] should have taught us that. Whether in 50 or 100 or 200 years, there’s a good chance that New York City will sink beneath the sea.”

    http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/25/opinion/sunday/is-this-the-end.html?_r=0

    Do climate alarmists really have no idea how powerful NY striking hurricanes have been in the 1800s, and in the 1900s before CO2 could have had any possible effect on the weather and climate?

    • Don B | November 25, 2012 at 9:53 am |

      New York’s 1821 hurricane:

      “New York’s second vulnerability is demographic. During the decades of calm between major hurricanes, the city grows and forgets. During the great hurricane of 1821, only 152,000 people lived in New York City. When the next major, direct hit came in 1893, the city’s population was 2.5 million. At the time of the 1938 storm, Long Island wasn’t a densely populated suburban sprawl; it was a rural home for oyster fishermen, potato farmers and wealthy industrialists. The same storm today would wreak incredible havoc. AIR Worldwide Corporation estimates $11.6 billion in New York losses alone. ”

      and
      “In 1821, stunned colonial New Yorkers recorded sea levels rising as fast as 13 feet in a single hour at the Battery. The East River and Hudson Rivers merged over Lower Manhattan all the way to Canal Street. According to Coch, the fact that the 1821 storm struck at low tide “is the only thing that saved the city.”

      http://web.archive.org/web/20071230031244/http://www.nypress.com/18/29/news&columns/aaronnaparstek.cfm

    • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 25, 2012 at 10:04 am |

      Don B asks [tuning by FOMD]  Do climate  alarmists  denialists really have no idea  how powerful NY striking hurricanes have been in the 1800s  how powerful climate-change can be?

      Asking the right questions is essential to scientific understanding, eh Don B?

      That is the common-sense reason why ideologically committed climate-change denialists insist upon cherry-picking both wrong answers and marginally relevant questions. Doh!

      Fortunately it’s pretty darn easy to point folks toward common-sense, politically tough, centrally important, science-driven questions, eh Don B?  \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\heartsuit\heartsuit\heartsuit}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • rob starkey | November 25, 2012 at 10:13 am |

        Fan writes- “Fortunately it’s pretty darn easy to point folks toward common-sense, politically tough, centrally important, science-driven questions, eh?”

        My reply
        Please- point out these easy science driven questions.

        Do you claim to know that something can be done and what it is to ensure better overall weather for humans the planet?

      • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 25, 2012 at 11:10 am |

        Read it agin, Rob. The post never says the questions are easy — it says they’re “common-sense, politically tough, centrally important, science-driven”.

        You like irrelevant questions that have easy answers? Heck, there’s no shortage of climate-change “denialist-in-the-bubble” forums that specialize in providing easy cherry-picked questions-and-answers, eh?  \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\heartsuit\heartsuit\heartsuit}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 12:03 pm |

        Fan

        You link to a pay walled article on the Triassic. During that period the continents were stuck together-not separated- and the conditions were described like this’

        “The Triassic climate was generally hot and dry, forming typical red bed sandstones and evaporites. There is no evidence of glaciation at or near either pole; in fact, the polar regions were apparently moist and temperate, a climate suitable for reptile-like creatures. Pangaea’s large size limited the moderating effect of the global ocean; its continental climate was highly seasonal, with very hot summers and cold winters.”

        So surely Don was correct in trying to compare events that happened during the Holcene with modern events, rather than attempting to compare apples and oranges as you have done.

        As I remarked recently on another threadlooking at observational evidence the modern era appears rather benign compared to the huge and devastating weather events that typified much of the past 1000 years.

        (like your new emoticoms-they would look good on a T shirt)
        tonyb

    • Don B | November 25, 2012 at 10:48 am |

      New York’s 1893 hurricane:

      “It turns out there was once a small, sandy spit of an island off the southern coast of Rockaway. In the years after the Civil War, developers built saloons and bathhouses, and Hog Island became a sort of 1890s version of the Hamptons. During the summers, the city’s Democratic bosses used Hog Island as a kind of outdoor annex of Tammany Hall. That all ended on the night of August 23, 1893, when a terrifying category-2 hurricane rolled up from Norfolk, Virginia, and made landfall on what is now JFK airport.

      The storm was a major event. All six front-page columns of the August 25, 1893 New York Times were dedicated to the “unexampled fury” of the “West Indian monster” and the damage it wrought throughout the region. Dozens of boats were sunk, and scores of sailors perished. In Central Park “more than a hundred noble trees were torn up by the roots,” and thousands of sparrows lay dead on the ground. “Gangs of small boys roamed through the Park in the early hours of the morning collecting the dead sparrows and picking their feathers.”

      At the brand-new Met Life building at Madison Avenue and 23rd Street, a heavy-iron fence was torn away by the wind, plunging 10 stories and crashing through a stained-glass dome before landing on a mosaic “including quantities of costly Mexican onyx.” In Brooklyn, at Wyckoff and Myrtle Avenues, “the water in the street was up to a man’s waist,” and residents used ladders to get in and out of their houses. Most of the boats moored at the Williamsburg Yacht Club were “sunk, driven ashore or demolished.” The East River rose “until it swept over the sea wall in the Astoria district and submerged the Boulevard.” At Coney Island, 30-foot waves swept 200 yards inland, destroying nearly every man-made structure in its path and wrecking the elevated railroad.

      Hog Island largely disappeared that night,” Coch says. “As far as I know, it is the only incidence of the removal of an entire island by a hurricane.”

      http://web.archive.org/web/20071230031244/http://www.nypress.com/18/29/news&columns/aaronnaparstek.cfm

    • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 10:52 am |

      One can only hope it’s sooner rather than later. Metropolitan life isn’t what evolution designed humans for (pardon the dangling participle). The larger the metropolis the more unnatural and depraved it becomes. Concrete jungles are a blight on the planet and a cancer on the body of humanity.

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 10:55 am |

        ‘Scuse me. That’s a dangling preposition.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 25, 2012 at 12:13 pm |

        David Springer said:
        “Metropolitan life isn’t what evolution designed humans for…”

        A most interesting twist of quasi-science and religious philosophy. The notion that evolution is “thing” that can design as opposed to a process of adaptation combined with the general notion that humans were designed at all as opposed to constantly evolv-ing organisms that change and adapt over time to the environment in which we find ourselves.

      • David Springer | November 25, 2012 at 2:28 pm |

        There are limits to what evolution can reasonably accomplish given a finite universe, law, and chance. I suggest reading biochemistry professor Michael Behe’s most recent tome “The Edge of Evolution”, Cornell U geneticist professor John Sanford’s “Genetic Entropy”, and Mike Gene’s (pen name, anonymous engineer) “The Design Matrix” for a broad overview of the gamut of Intelligent Design concepts. Behe is a Catholic and is an old earth creationist. Sanford is an evangelical Christian and is a young earth creationist. Gene is a engineer with no particular religious beliefs and looks at things from an engineering perspecitve which is highly skeptical of there being sufficient data to reach any real conclusions about how life and universe came to exist.

        Contrary to leftwing urban legend the upper echelons of fundamental Christianity reject Intelligent Design because ID (the math not the movement) has no dispute with an old earth and the dead God of Einstein and Spinoza. In fact there are two discrete branches of strictly scientific ID, biologic and cosmologic. No doubt the Discovery Institute is a Christian apologist front organization and I can say that through years of being on the inside of it as the token agnostic. They use the forensics of strict ID as a wedge to further fundamentalist Christian political change. Exactly as someone else said, by casting doubt on the universe and life within it being the result of law and chance alone, they can accomplish a lot. By the same token the National Center for Science Education is a front organization for the atheist agenda. I don’t have much time for either of them. I’m interested in following the evidence wherever it leads. ID leads me to Spinoza and Einstein’s beliefs but no further. I don’t feel like I’m in shabby company there.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 3:43 pm |

        David Springer said:

        “There are limits to what evolution can reasonably accomplish given a finite universe, law, and chance.”
        _____
        Understanding only a fraction of this universe (i.e. we still don’t know what dark energy and dark matter are and they make up the majority of this universe), it seems that we are a very long way from knowing what evolution “reasonably” can accomplish. Also, with the strong possibility that there could be some 10^500 universes existing at any given time, it seem much more plausible to suggest something closer to “anything that can happen will happen”. In short, whether we like it or not, we are faced with looking at a universe that behaves more like a ‘seed’ that is, through the inevitable progress and one-way arrow of time, prone to both evolve intelligent life as a localized negentropic process as it heads towards its eventual heat death in its overall arrow-of-time entropic process. LIke bubbles foaming out of a bubble pipe, if one were to believe the multi-universe theory, then our universe is just one bubble that was destined to form, expand, and eventually die, to be replaced by another and another and another for all eternity.

        From this perspective, the notion of a finite universe with limitations on what evolution can accomplish seem quaint at best.

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 25, 2012 at 3:59 pm |

        indeed, if we accept the hypothesis that the what we see is the result of natural selection then we are surely witnesses of the mother of all confirmatory biases.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 4:06 pm |

        David Springer said:

        “ID leads me to Spinoza and Einstein’s beliefs but no further. I don’t feel like I’m in shabby company there.”

        ____

        1.) Respectfully, you’re no Spinoza or Einstein.
        2.) That seriously misrepresents what Einstein actually thought
        3) Nothing guides the formation of an intricate snowflake but the laws of physics…i.e. given the right conditions, a snowflake forms. So too for intelligent civilizations. Thus, there is no intelligent “design” just, as the Chinese call it…the Tao…the Way things are.

        “The Tao is like a well:
        used but never used up.
        It is like the eternal void:
        filled with infinite possibilities.”

        Amazingly on even though thousands of years old and long before we knew about dark matter, dark energy, black holes and the like. With 10^500 universes at any given time, and an infinite number before and after, intelligent design not required.

      • vukcevic | November 25, 2012 at 5:53 pm |

        Gates
        Thanks, I am familiar with the website, I’ll try Adam Philips first.

      • mike | November 25, 2012 at 9:11 pm |

        Gates,

        Yr: “…the strong possibility there could be 10^500 universes existing at any one time…”

        And Yr: “…with 10^500 universes existing at any one time, and an infinite number before and after, intelligent design not required.

        And Yr: “…If one were to believe in the multi universe theory…”

        Gates,

        Have you ever, even once in your life, had a thought that was not hive-supplied and pre-digested for you?

        In no particular order:

        -If you or anyone else “believed” in the multi universe theory, then they would be indulging in a pseudo-religious mode of thinking, not science. Science is not a system of dogmatic “beliefs”. It is a rational, empirically based method for arriving at estimates of the nature of the universe, but such estimates are always corrigible and never involve “belief”. Curious how the hive, though, chases conventional religion out of the academy and then sneaks a bunch of booger-brain, pseudo-religious nonsense through the ivory tower’s back-door in its place–pseudo-religious dogma that always just happens to lend aid and comfort to our Philosopher King’s and Queen’s latest, make-a-buck/make-a-gulag, brave-new-Tao, lefty social-engineering schemes. Funny thing that.

        A strong possibility that 10^500 universes exist simultaneously at any one time. Bold claim. What “science” supports that, Gates?

        -And that gets us to the real point of your “Taoist” theorizing, I would estimate, Gates. You and your hive-buddies are real anxious to get Intelligent Design (ID) off the table. Religion, especially the Christian faith, imposes on individual believers duties and obligations that take moral precedence over the potential dictates of our Platonic betters. And that’s real bad for the hive’s totalitarian agenda, right Gates? And ID gives support to those of faith. So ID must be branded non-science and replaced with off-the-wall pseudo-science adorned with goof-ball “Taoist” sloganeering seemingly ripped-off an especially saccharine, touchy-feely, Peter Max poster.

        And, oh by the way, Gates the multi-universe idea, even if confirmed through science, only gets the hive out of the “fine-tuned” universe bind and still does not solve the problem of how the whole she-bang got started–see the wiki discussion of the “Cosmological Argument.”

        Gates, your passive-agressive, way-of-the-Tao, head-trip, guru-flake pursuit of your anti-religious bigotry–to which you seem determined to also attach your distaste for white people, as we’ve previously discussed, is a nasty business. So, Gates, do you use the authority of your position in the classroom to brainwash susceptible, captive-audience kids with all this clap-trap? Just curious.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 10:43 pm |

        Hey Mike,

        Many things you’ve said indicate you lack vision of the kind that it takes to make that next big discovery by science…but this is really comical to me. You said:

        “And, oh by the way, Gates the multi-universe idea, even if confirmed through science, only gets the hive out of the “fine-tuned” universe bind and still does not solve the problem of how the whole she-bang got started.”

        ____
        You don’t get it do you. There is no beginning or end to a multiverse. Such linear thinking in a multiverse that is infinite in time and space is akin to thinking the world is flat or the Earth at the center of the solar system. Our particular universe certainly has a beginning and end, but as part of the overall multiverse, it is just one chapter of many…of an infinite many. Hard for our limited human biocomputers (aka brains) to grasp this, but if you try real hard you can just see over the horizon to a multiverse without beginning or end.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 25, 2012 at 10:58 pm |

        R. Gates proves he doesn’t understand what he’s talking about:

        You don’t get it do you. There is no beginning or end to a multiverse. Such linear thinking in a multiverse that is infinite in time and space is akin to thinking the world is flat or the Earth at the center of the solar system. Our particular universe certainly has a beginning and end, but as part of the overall multiverse, it is just one chapter of many…of an infinite many. Hard for our limited human biocomputers (aka brains) to grasp this, but if you try real hard you can just see over the horizon to a multiverse without beginning or end.

        mike pointed out a multiverse, as a closed system, has no explanation for it’s origin/existence. R. Gates responds by saying there is no beginning or end to a temporal dimension within the closed system, thus there is no problem. As anyone who has any idea of what they’re talking about on this topic would know, that’s completely non-responsive.

        In other words, his response is a non-sequitur, a red herring, a straw man, and many other things, but it is not an actual response.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 25, 2012 at 11:01 pm |

        To demonstrate the silliness of that comment by R. Gates, imagine this exchange:

        A: Hey! Who drew a graph in permanent marker on my wall?
        B: Nobody.
        A: Somebody had to, otherwise why would it be there?
        B: Nobody had to have drawn it. The x dimension in the graph has no beginning or end.
        A: That… makes no sense.
        B: I see you are not up on the latest thoughts of graphology.

        Popsci, for the win!

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 25, 2012 at 11:20 pm |

        That it is a particle is a fundamental precept of quantum mechanics – a photon – literally a packet of energy whose energy is related to wavelength. Which is a property of waves. The position of this photon is defined in space as a probability distribution function – x probability of occupying a finite volume of space dV and so on. The PDF is projected through time with the evolving Schrödinger equation. When the particle is ultimately observed the pdf collapses into only one of many possibilities.

        The many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is that all of the probabilities are realised in one of many universes in the collapse of the probability function. The Copenhagen interpretation – perhaps the ‘consensus’ amongst physicists – is that this is mere mathematics and that the collapse of the function is not material.

        Wave/particle duality is a mystery – but I think that relativity (specifically time dilation) is more germane to God and evolution.

        ‘Since there exists in this four dimensional structure [space-time] no longer any sections which represent “now” objectively, the concepts of happening and becoming are indeed not completely suspended, but yet complicated. It appears therefore more natural to think of physical reality as a four dimensional existence, instead of, as hitherto, the evolution of a three dimensional existence.’ Albert Einstein

        It has been said that evolution doesn’t need God. But perhaps it is more true to say that relativity doesn’t need evolution.

      • mike | November 25, 2012 at 11:22 pm |

        Gates,

        Yr: “You don’t get it do you. There is no beginning or end to a multiverse. Such linear thinking…”

        No beginning or end? Heavy, man! Like far out! Like blows my mind!

        You’ve complete re-oriented my whole way of thinking, Gates! The scale from my third-eye has fallen! I understand it all now! Who needs that stinkin’ “linear thinkin'” Western science crapola when all you really have to do is just, you know, like, break out your Iron Butterfly album, select the “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” track, assume the lotus position, grove on the ensuing cosmic vibes (maybe also drop a tab or two of Mr. Sunshine’s, Tao-special best?–what do you think there, Gates?) and just “GET IT”–you just have TO BELIEVE! WOW! IT JUST HAPPENED, GATES! I JUST GOT IT GATES, I’VE JUST SEEN GOD!!!! I MEAN, LIKE, I’VE JUST SEEN THE MULTIVERSE!!!!

        Good Lord, Gates. Dont’ you know your low-rent, store-front ashram, stoned-freak shaman act went out with love-beads, bell-bottom trousers, and the counter-culture’s soap-and-water phobic infatuation with B. O. (though that last remains a hive core value, I know). I mean, like, you’re so behind the times, Gates, that I bet you haven’t even made the move to hive’s latest fad yet–vegan flatulence. What a retro-dork weirdo you are, Gates!

        The amazing thing, though, is I suspect that you’ve managed to figure out how to make a buck out of your schtick, Gates. Let me guess, the source of funding for your gravy-train, boondoggle, life’s work is all taxypayer rip-off in origin. Am I right or am I right?

        Uh-oh! Music ended, no more vibes–You’re right, Gates, I guess I just “don’t get it” after all–at least not how you mean it.

  8. al in kansas | November 25, 2012 at 10:45 am |

    http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/articles/ocean.html
    Older article I ran across, I think is good and to the point. Its the sun and the oceans, everything else is irrelevant small change.

    • Wagathon | November 25, 2012 at 12:17 pm |

      He is right about Trenberth being full of it but his description of process does not capture role of convection, the mechanics of a swirling vortex, and the simple fact that it is the existence of cold water atop warming water that causes the water to sink.

    • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 2:10 pm |

      al in kansas,

      What do you know about thermodynamic theory? That the oceans would gain heat energy (as they have over the past 50+ years), is not because they are getting more solar energy falling upon them as the net amount of short-wave solar reaching the ocean surface has been static to slightly lower over this period. Rather, it can only mean that they are losing less net heat to the atmosphere and thus the ocean energy content goes up. Now, some are confused when it is stated that greenhouse gases warm the ocean, for this is really not the true thermodynamic situation. The net energy flow is always from oceans to atmosphere to space. Greenhouse gases (being in the middle) alter the thermal gradient between ocean (the source) and space (the drain) of the stored heat in the oceans. Just like when putting a jacket on– the jacket is not actually warming the body, but merely altering the thermal gradient between the stored energy of the body and the colder outside air.

      Warming oceans are one of the strongest signals that greenhouse gases are altering Earth’s energy mix. As the sun has been actually declining slightly in output over the past 50 years, the warming oceans cannot be due to more sunlight, but a less steep thermal gradient between ocean and space caused by increasing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. This “warming oceans yet slightly less energetic sun” is a paradox that skeptics (and deniers) explain through a variety of very awkward and convoluted reasoning (ENSO, clouds, etc etc) or they just flat out claim the ocean data is “too corrupt” or “has too much uncertainty”. Convoluted alternative explanations that don’t meet scientific rigor or outright denialism seems a poor choice to acceptance of the elegant and scientifically sound concept of greenhouse gas alternation of the thermal gradient between ocean and space.

      • J Martin | November 25, 2012 at 3:25 pm |

        As the sun has been actually declining slightly in output over the past 50 years.

        That would be why the last few solar cycles have been so high then.

        Sounds to me like you should pull the plug on those massively paralleled super-computers that work on those GCM’s night and day…

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 3:52 pm |

        J Martin said:

        “That would be why the last few solar cycles have been so high then…”

        _____
        Have you been asleep? If anything we are at the doorsteps of a potential Dalton or Maunder minimum with the sun really quieting down this past decade. Solar activity has been declining during a period in which ocean heat content continues to rise. The two are obviously not directly associated as the heat content of the ocean should be declining slightly during this period whereas it has almost doubled in the past 7 years alone, and over the past 50 years has added somewhere around 25 x 10^22 Joules of energy. What must be happening with the ocean is not that more short-wave solar is reaching the surface, but less net heat is being transported from ocean to space, which are the ultimate source and sink of stored solar energy for our planet.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 3:57 pm |

        J Martin said:

        “Sounds to me like you should pull the plug on those massively paralleled super-computers that work on those GCM’s night and day…”

        _____
        Certain reactionary denialists would probably love to see NCAR shut down, and probably many other scientific institutions. In their place, we could all be given passes to the Creation Musuem! http://creationmuseum.org/

      • J Martin | November 25, 2012 at 4:54 pm |

        If anything we are at the doorsteps of a potential Dalton or Maunder minimum with the sun really quieting down this past decade.

        This I agree with.

        The previous solar cycle was decidedly healthy, the current cycle is indeed very quiet at about half the peak value, with the next one or more cycles possibly quieter or even much quieter still.

        Though as for measuring and modelling ocean heat content and taking other oceanic factors into consideration such as currents, and buffering (time delay) effects. I think science is some way from being able to state anything about what ‘should’ be happening with respect to oceans with any degree of certainty.

        It is usually considered that there are three categories of Climateer. Sceptic, Lukewarmer, and Warmist. To this we need to add a fourth category, which I shall name in your honour- RGatesist.

        This unique and highly unusual category is reserved for those that admit to the reality that the Sun is the source of warmth for planet Earth, and which exercises a not inconsiderable degree of influence over matters ‘climate’ here on planet Earth, yet steadfastly cling to the belief in the near magical effects of co2 which shall arise from the ashes (ice) of the forthcoming Landscheidt minimum.

        ist, er, esque, or some other ending of your choice.

        Landscheidt not Eddy, because although Eddy identified the sun as a variable star, he didn’t predict the timing and extent of the forthcoming minimum whereas Landscheidt did, in 1983.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 6:00 pm |

        J Martin,

        Thank you for the honor of a category in my name, but really, since it will use my moniker, perhaps to get this definition just right, from the “horses mouth” so to speak would be important. Here’s the essence;

        1) Of course the sun is the source of the majority of energy used in ongoing dynamical processes observed in the atmosphere, biosphere, and hydrosphere of Earth
        2) Over longer periods, Milankovitch cycles serve to modulate the amount of sunlight falling on the Earth at certain seasons and locations on the planet. These Milankovitch cycles cause the coming and goings of the glacial and interglacial periods.
        3) Coupled with Milankovitch cycles are greenhouse gas concentrations. These also fluctuate with the comings and goings of the glacial and interglacial periods, and can serve as positive or negative feedback depending on the point in the Milankovitch glacial retreat/advance cycle the planet is in.
        4) The sun also has it’s own internal cycles that can be long or short and can cause the amount of solar energy striking the Earth to vary over time, but this variation is less than seen from Milankovtich cycles.
        5) The oceans also have their own internal cycles, of shorter and longer term duration, as reflected in shorter term events such as ENSO and longer-term events such as alterations in the THC.
        6) It is possible that Earth also goes through geomagnetic cycles and the path of the solar system through the Galaxy could go through cycles whereby the amount of cosmic radiation striking the Earth could affect weather, cloud formation, etc.
        7) In addition to the normal rhythms of natural cycles as described above, there are “dragon king” events– events that are unpredictable and extreme, and can cause a sudden “shock” to the Earth system, such that it can be kicked suddenly into a whole new regime. One only needs to think of the eruption of Mt. Toba 74K years ago, or the sudden onset of cold during the Younger Dryas glacial period about 12K years ago to see how sudden these events can be and how they can suddenly shift the climate. Both of these events had big impacts on humanity (as well as other living creatures) and we ought to pay attention!
        8) The sudden release of billions of tons of CO2, methane, and N2O by human activity may be (yes may be) seen as another potential sudden shock to the Earth system which naturally takes tens of thousands of years to use the rock-carbon cycle to sequester carbon.
        9) It would be my position that it is highly likely that humans are altering the Earth’s climate, but whether this leads to a sudden regime change, one way or another, remains to be seen, but certainly, given Earth’s history, and the huge amount of carbon released by humans and continuing to be released and the spikes we’ve seen in CO2, methane, and N2O, the potential for significant climate change remains to be seen.
        10) Humans are a very adaptable species and even if major climate change does occur over the coming decades and centuries, there is a good chance that at least some of us will adapt and survive. Whether or not we’ll be able to carry on our civilization in a “business as usual” manner and continue to feed the billions of us is an entirely different question. Thus, climate change could be “catastrophic” for human civilization in its current form without necessarily being so for humans as a species going forward.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 25, 2012 at 11:25 pm |

        What do you know about thermodynamic theory? That the oceans would gain heat energy (as they have over the past 50+ years), is not because they are getting more solar energy falling upon them as the net amount of short-wave solar reaching the ocean surface has been static to slightly lower over this period.

        BS.

        It changes all the time with cloud changes and ocean heat content tracks this closely.

      • R. Gates | November 26, 2012 at 1:11 am |

        Chief said:

        “It changes all the time with cloud changes and ocean heat content tracks this closely.”
        ____
        Nice try Chief, but wrong once more. I know this is our old battleground and shall no doubt be forever, but cloud cover has not decreased in lock step with increasing ocean heat content. More SW is not reaching the ocean in lock step with increasing ocean heat content. The oceans are giving up less energy to the atmosphere on its way to space. Why? Because of increasing greenhouse gases in that atmosphere that alter the thermal gradient between ocean and space. The evidence is so overwhelming that it (along with declining Arctic sea ice, which is also related to increasing ocean heat content) is one of the strongest pieces of evidence we have for anthropogenic alteration of the Earth’s energy system.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 9:09 pm |

        Bllah blah duh – you are a cruddy little fool with no crebilbility at all.

        If you continue to think that you ‘nailed me’ on S&T09 – that simply goes to your idiot misunderstanding of the paper and perverse insisitence on something that is clearly not the case.

        ‘If the role of internal variability in the climate system is as large as this analysis would seem to suggest, warming over the 21st century may well be larger than that predicted by the current generation of models, given the propensity of those models to underestimate climate internal variability…’

        Is not a prediction of warming as is abundantly clear to any but idiots in the preceding paragraph.

        ‘…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.’

        The meaning is clear in a context of a chaotic environment. It is in plain English regardless of whether or not you can understand. So take your lies, deceit and abuse and play somewhere else.

    • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 4:14 am |

      You still have no evidence at all Gatesy. Just arm waving with an invalid attempt to invoke XBT data for looking at ENSO. It case you don’t recall.

      ‘Previous ocean heat storage datasets required 5- to 10-yr averages to reduce sampling errors. The Willis et al. (2004) analysis demonstrated
      a sampling error of 0.4 W m2 (1) for global annual ocean heat storage.’

      We see rapid warming of the ocean during the 1997/98 El Nino and subsequent cooling in the La Nina that followed (Wong et al 2006)

      http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=Wong2006figure7.gif

      Both ERBS and ISCCP-FD show all of the recent warming in the SW – with cooling in the long wave. It is simply a fact that this is what the satellites say – like it or not.

      We know that ocean heat has changed in this century – http://www.ocean-sci-discuss.net/8/999/2011/osd-8-999-2011.pdf –

      We know that the CERES toa flux has changed as well – http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo1375.html

      Unfortunately for your case it is all in the SW – and linked through cloud feedbacks with ENSO.

      http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=CERES_MODIS.gif

      So sad – too bad you’re wrong.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 8:28 am |

        Chief said:

        “We see rapid warming of the ocean during the 1997/98 El Nino and subsequent cooling in the La Nina that followed (Wong et al 2006)”

        —-
        Again, a complete mischaracterization of what was happening there. Why the attempt to mislead? Pacific Ocean basin heat content had a short-term peak in 1996 and then fell during the 97-98 El Niño and then rose again as the heat content rebuilt during the 99-2000 La Niña as clearly shown by the data:

        http://data.nodc.noaa.gov/woa/DATA_ANALYSIS/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/DATA/basin/yearly/h22-p0-700m.dat

        Did you not know this or are you just intentionally try to be obtuse?

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 2:34 pm |

        Your data is unusable for this. Which is why Wong used the sea level constrained data from Willis. Simply because you don’t understand this is no reason to be rude. This seems to be a blind spot gatesy,

        ‘For this purpose we use the monthly climatological fields of temperature from Locarnini et al. [2010]. Then we composite all anomaly values in each one-degree square by five-year running compositing periods.’ Levitus 2010

        ‘On a global annual scale, the change in TOA net radiation and ocean heat storage should be in phase and of the same magnitude. This is due to the fact that all other forms of heat storage in the earth system are factors of 10 or more smaller than ocean heat storage (Levitus et al. 2001). Previous ocean heat storage datasets required 5- to 10-yr averages to reduce sampling errors. The Willis et al. (2004) analysis demonstrated a sampling error of 0.4 W m_2 (1_) for global annual ocean heat storage. Figure 7 gives a direct interannual comparison of these new ocean heat storage data from 1993 to 2003 against those from the 12-month running mean ERBE/ ERBS Nonscanner WFOV edition3_Rev1 and CERES/Terra Scanner ES4 Edition2_Rev1 net flux anomalies. The CERES/Terra Scanner results are global and the ERBE/ERBS Nonscanner WFOV results cover 60°N to 60°S (or _87% of the earth’s surface). The net flux anomalies are calculated with respect to the 1985–89 period. They are basically deseasonalized anomalies similar to those shown in previous figures. A 12-month running mean filter has been applied to the TOA radiation data to reduce the temporal sampling noise and to match up directly with the corresponding time scale of the ocean storage data. The ocean heat storage data (Willis et al. 2004) is available only in annually smoothed seasonal data. The drop in the global ocean heat storage in the later part of 1998 is associated with cooling of the global ocean after the rapid warming of the ocean during the 1997–98 El Niño event (Willis et al. 2004). While spatial sampling error is the dominant source of uncertainty in the ocean data, absolute calibration uncertainties dominate the radiation budget data. For a comparison of interannual variations, however, we can remove the mean calibration uncertainty by requiring agreement for the average of all overlapping data for each instrument time series (e.g., 1993–99 average for ERBS and ocean heat storage). Note that Willis et al. (2004) estimate the 10-yr average uncertainty in ocean heat storage from 1992 to 2002 as _0.2W m_2. The interannual variability of the net flux anomalies in Fig. 7 from the ERBS Nonscanner WFOV and CERES Scanner agree very well with the interannual variability of the ocean heat storage data. The agreement is within the ocean heat storage sampling uncertainties, with 1-sigma difference in the anomalies of 0.4 W m_2. The two times series are in phase with each other, consistent with the constraint of planetary energy balance.’ Wong et al 2006

        In a study that was widely interpreted as a demonstration of a positive global warming cloud feedback, Amy Clement and colleagues (2009) presented observational evidence of decadal change in cloud cover in surface observation of clouds from the Comprehensive Ocean Atmosphere Data Set (COADS). ‘Both COADS and adjusted ISCCP data sets show a shift toward more total cloud cover in the late 1990s, and the shift is dominated by low- level cloud cover in the adjusted ISCCP data. The longer COADS total cloud time series indicates that a similar magnitude shift toward reduced cloud cover occurred in the mid-1970s, and this earlier shift was also dominated by marine stratiform clouds. . . Our observational analysis indicates that increased SST and weaker subtropical highs will act to reduce NE Pacific cloud cover.’ As was clearly stated in the paper, the evidence was for a decadal cloud feedback. The feedbacks correspond exactly to changes in the Pacific multi-decadal pattern.
        A number of studies have demonstrated the connection of ENSO to radiative flux and therefore to cloud. In an analysis of global warming cloud feedbacks, Dessler (2010) used short term variations in surface temperature and CERES data to determine that cloud cover was negatively correlated with temperature. Dessler also plotted ENSO against surface temperature leaving no doubt that ENSO was the primary cause of the short term temperature variations. Leaving aside anthropogenic global warming – the finding of a positive feedback here is in the first instance an ENSO feedback. As was reported, ‘the climate variations being analysed here are primarily driven by ENSO, and there has been no suggestion that ENSO is caused by cloud variations.’ The study takes a statistical approach that may gloss over the difference in processes in play in ENSO and from global warming.
        Zhu et al (2007) found that cloud formation for ENSO and for global warming have different characteristics and are the result of different physical mechanisms. The change in low cloud cover in the 1997-1998 El Niño came mainly as a decrease in optically thick stratocumulus and stratus cloud. The decrease is negatively correlated to local SST anomalies, especially in the eastern tropical Pacific, and is associated with a change in convective activity. ‘During the 1997–1998 El Niño, observations indicate that the SST increase in the eastern tropical Pacific enhances the atmospheric convection, which shifts the upward motion to further south and breaks down low stratiform clouds, leading to a decrease in low cloud amount in this region. Taking into account the obscuring effects of high cloud, it was found that thick low clouds decreased by more than 20% in the eastern tropical Pacific… In contrast, most increase in low cloud amount due to doubled CO2 simulated by the NCAR and GFDL models occurs in the subtropical subsidence regimes associated with a strong atmospheric stability.’
        The surface observed decadal atmospheric changes have quantified support in satellite measurements of top of atmosphere radiative flux. This is what NASA/GISS says about the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project data. The ‘slow increase of global upwelling LW (infrared or heat) flux at TOA from the 1980′s to the 1990′s, which is found mostly in lower latitudes, is confirmed by the ERBS records.’ ‘The overall slow decrease of upwelling SW (visible light) flux from the mid-1980′s until the end of the 1990′s and subsequent increase from 2000 onwards appears to be caused, primarily, by changes in global cloud cover (although there is a small increase of cloud optical thickness after 2000) and is confirmed by the ERBS measurements.’
        Wong et al (2006) find that ‘comparison of decadal changes in ERB with existing satellite-based decadal radiation datasets shows very good agreement among ERBS Nonscanner WFOV Edition3_Rev1, HIRS Pathfinder OLR, and ISCCP FD datasets.’ They estimate the 15 year stability uncertainty of the radiative flux anomaly data (for all three datasets) at 0.3W/m2 to 0.4W/m2.
        All global warming in the past 50 years, the period in which the IPCC say most warming occurred because of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, happened between 1977 and 1998. This is exactly the same period as the last warm El Niño dominated Pacific decadal mode. In the instrumental record, the trajectory of global surface temperature mirrors the Pacific Ocean states. Cool to the late 1970’s, warm to 1998 and cool since. Sea surface temperature is negatively correlated to marine stratiform cloud. Multiple satellite data sources show that over most of the period of warming there was planetary cooling in the infrared band where greenhouse gases were expected to result in warming – and strong planetary warming as a result of less cloud reflecting less sunlight back into space. As a testable hypothesis, the current cool La Niña mode of the Pacific decadal pattern will lead to increased cloud cover and global cooling over another decade or three. After that, in a chaotic climate, it is anyone’s guess.

      • R. Gates | November 26, 2012 at 2:59 pm |

        Chief,

        Do you think that cut and pasting massive amounts of information will make the basic data change or go away? This little bit is really funny though:

        “The drop in the global ocean heat storage in the later part of 1998 is associated with cooling of the global ocean after the rapid warming of the ocean during the 1997–98 El Niño event (Willis et al. 2004).”
        ___
        What is this supposed to prove as it is a basic tautolgy A=A. The ocean heat content fell because the oceans cooled? Duh. A=A. What we care about is WHY did the heat content fall, and where did the heat come from the found it’s happy little way into the troposphere during the 97-98 El Nino? The only place that a heat spike in the troposphere can come from…a huge release from the oceans– mainly the Pacific Basin as the data clearly shows. Data which you of course want to conveniently discount. The raw numbers may have margins of error in the data but the direction of movement in the heat content exceeds that margin, so we can be quite clear about the direction of change. There is a short-term peak in 1996 in Pacific Basin ocean heat content…then it falls off during the 97-98 El Nino, as energy flows to troposphere (and tropospheric temperatures then spike for a few months after the peak of the El Nino), and then ocean heat content starts to climb again during the 99-2000 La Nina. The thermodynamics are so basic on this and the data so clear it doesn’t take a the lengthy post to make this simple point.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 3:27 pm |

        “Rapid ocean warming during the 1997-98 El Niño’. It can’t get any clearer than that. The ocean heat content follows the ERBE net radiative flux closely as Wong et al says. Really the data you show is discounted for this purpose by Wong et al and I quoted the reason why from Levitus et al 2010 as the 5 year compositing technique that compensates for sparse data.

        It is quite obvious that cloud changes in ENSO – a number of references are provided which you seem to want to dismiss out of hand to concentrate on data that can’t possibly be used in this way. Embarrassed by a wealth of references?

        You are rapidly descending into the incoherent and the disingenuous

        So sad too bad.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 4:00 pm |

        Chief,

        Let’s pull back from this for a day or so. I’m actually in communication directly with Sydney Levitus on this. The timing of the sequence of events is extremely important as the spike in SST’s in the eastern Pacific that of course accompany the El Nino can appear to some to be a spike in ocean heat content, but this is actually heat flux from ocean to atmosphere and thus does not represent actual heat being gained by the ocean but energy leaving the ocean showing up as a spike in ocean SST’s. The way I read the sequence of XBT corrected ocean heat content anomaly data (down to 700 meters) on this period is currently as follows:

        Mid 1996: Pacific Basin ocean heat content anomaly hits approximately 2.8 x 10 ^22 Joules
        MId 1997: El Nino has begun, Pacific Basin ocean heat content anomaly falls to approximately 1.91 x 10^22 Joules
        Mid 1998: El Nino over, Pacific Basin ocean heat content anomaly falls to low point of 1.02 x 10^22 Joules
        Mid 1999: La Nina is well underway, Pacific Basin ocean heat content has risen back to 2.23 x 10^22 Joules…

        and just for good measure:

        I will share what I hear from Dr. Levitus on this.

        For now, rather than get too testy with each other, let’s just agree to disagree and move on. We’ll have lot’s of time to return to this later…

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 4:29 pm |

        The statement is quite clear. Rapid warming of the oceans in the 1997/98 El Nino from altimetry constrained data. We might note that satellite altimetry does not confuse surface warmth and deep ocean heat content.

        Zhu et al (2007) found that cloud formation for ENSO and for global warming have different characteristics and are the result of different physical mechanisms. The change in low cloud cover in the 1997-1998 El Niño came mainly as a decrease in optically thick stratocumulus and stratus cloud. The decrease is negatively correlated to local SST anomalies, especially in the eastern tropical Pacific, and is associated with a change in convective activity. ‘During the 1997–1998 El Niño, observations indicate that the SST increase in the eastern tropical Pacific enhances the atmospheric convection, which shifts the upward motion to further south and breaks down low stratiform clouds, leading to a decrease in low cloud amount in this region. Taking into account the obscuring effects of high cloud, it was found that thick low clouds decreased by more than 20% in the eastern tropical Pacific… In contrast, most increase in low cloud amount due to doubled CO2 simulated by the NCAR and GFDL models occurs in the subtropical subsidence regimes associated with a strong atmospheric stability.’

        Ocean heat content follows toa radiative flux closely – which is modulated by ENSO. The thermodynamics are obvious and it is quite clear in CERES what the cause of ocean heat content change this century is. It is clear also in ERBS and ISCCP-FD data. Although the latter are of course less reliable – much as the XPT data is far less reliable than ARGO. But nontheless – multiple strands of evidence.

        Opposed to this you have 5 year composited xpt data that you attempt to apply to annual values. I quoted from Levitus 2010 on this. By all means contact whomever you like.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 5:54 pm |

        Again Chief, I will look forward to Dr. Levitus responding to this issue. Right now I think we just view this from vastly different perspectives…you see El Nino as a period of ocean heat content increase and I see the opposite. I don’t confuse SST’s with ocean heat content. I go by posted data from NOAA, and you tell me this data is not reliable, even though NOAA has gone to great lengths to make it as accurate as possible so at least the trends are greater than the uncertainty. Thus, we are at an impasse and I really need to hear from the Levitus directly. If he agrees with your viewpoint I’ll gladly concede and reconsider much of what I’ve posted.

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 6:07 pm |

        You are going to get nailed *yet again* for misrepresentation. Couldn’t happen to a nicer blog crank.

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 6:08 pm |

        I imagine it’s fairly obvious that the above billet doux is for CH, not R. Gates.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 9:10 pm |

        Blah blah duh – you are a cruddy little fool with no crebilbility at all.

        If you continue to think that you ‘nailed me’ on S&T09 – that simply goes to your idiot misunderstanding of the paper and perverse insisitence on something that is clearly not the case.

        ‘If the role of internal variability in the climate system is as large as this analysis would seem to suggest, warming over the 21st century may well be larger than that predicted by the current generation of models, given the propensity of those models to underestimate climate internal variability…’

        Is not a prediction of warming as is abundantly clear to any but idiots in the preceding paragraph.

        ‘…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.’

        The meaning is clear in a context of a chaotic environment. It is in plain English regardless of whether or not you can understand. So take your lies, deceit and abuse and play somewhere else because really the adults are talking now.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 9:26 pm |

        You are incorrect on a number of counts Gatesy.

        Josh Willis and Tamkeng Wong are the ones who say that the oceans warmed strongly in the 1997/98 El Nino. I just read the peer reviewed science.

        Here again is the data presented by Wong – http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=Wong2006figure7.gif

        I don’t confuse surface temperature with deep ocean heat. Indeed as I said the satellite altimetry data used by Willis can’t be fooled that way.

        I don’t say that the Levitus data is unreliable. Merely that it is composited over 5 years and therefore cannot be used for annual attribution. Read the Wong paper.

        I don’t even say that the ocean/atmosphere interaction is wrong. I said the same here – http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/11/enso_variation_and_global_warm.html – in 2007.

        ‘A simple process of heat transfer from the ocean to the atmosphere occurs. The heat transfer is enhanced in the El Niño state by the enormous area of warm water.

        Conversely, heat is gained by the Pacific Ocean during cooler La Niña conditions and global surface temperatures dip. This is reflected in the CRU surface temperature anomalies shown below for the period 1990 to 2006. 1997 and 1998 are hot. By contrast, 2000 was relatively cool.’

        I was wrong then and you are now. The more fundamental processs is the change in T0A radiative flux which is modulated by, inter alia, ENSO.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 5:44 am |

        CH

        From S&T09:

        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.

        Let me help you here. *That* bit of S&T is about short term phenomena, which – by the way – is all S&T are proposing that these hypothesised shifts are. These may ‘lie outside the envelope’ of the forced trend. But knowing that there are some extremely stupid people out there, S&T are careful to distinguish between short-term ‘climate shifts’ and the centennial forced trend. This is really important, so strive to hold the distinction clearly in the forefront of your mind.

        When considering the relationship between the two, S&T explicitly caution that since the climate system is:

        – sensitive

        – subject to sustained and increasing GHG forcing

        – the short-term shifts are going to be skewed towards warming events

        – the net effect *over a century* is that warming may be greater than predicted

        – this can happen despite the occasional hiatus or even period of cooling

        Here – again – are the actual words they wrote:

        If the role of internal variability in the climate system is as large as this analysis would seem to suggest, warming over the 21st century may well be larger than that predicted by the current generation of models.

        S&T predicts that warming may be greater than predicted! In plain English!

        Only a true crank could have denied this so absolutely and for so long in the face of such evidence. Either that or you do not understand this paper.

        Which is why you are not in a position to talk to me like this:

        Blah blah duh – you are a cruddy little fool with no crebilbility [sic] at all.

        If you continue to think that you ‘nailed me’ on S&T09 – that simply goes to your idiot misunderstanding of the paper and perverse insisitence [sic] on something that is clearly not the case.

        […]

        The meaning is clear in a context of a chaotic environment. It is in plain English regardless of whether or not you can understand. So take your lies, deceit and abuse and play somewhere else because really the adults are talking now.

        As long as you do, I will make mock of you. You richly deserve it.

      • Palindrone | November 27, 2012 at 6:11 am |

        You “make mock” only of yourself BBD. Because richly deserve it ?

        Timeout. How about less militancy and less more search for truth all round ?

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 7:15 am |

        As long as you continue to be an abusive and repulsive troll I will continue to talk to you like that. You certainly ask for it from everyone. You are both a crank and a fool.

        ‘The above observational and modeling results suggest the following intrinsic mechanism of the climate
        system leading to major climate shifts. First, the major climate modes tend to synchronize at some coupling
        strength. When this synchronous state is followed by an increase in the coupling strength, the network’s synchronous state is destroyed and after that climate emerges in a new state. The whole event marks a significant shift in climate. It is interesting to speculate on the climate shift after the 1970s event. The standard explanation for the post 1970s warming is that the radiative effect of greenhouse gases overcame shortwave reflection effects due to aerosols [Mann and Emanuel, 2006]. However, comparison of the 2035 event in the 21st century simulation and the 1910s event in the observations with this event, suggests an alternative
        hypothesis, namely that the climate shifted after the 1970s event to a different state of a warmer climate, which may be superimposed on an anthropogenic warming trend.’ Tsonis et al 2007 – A new mechanism for major climate shifts

        The shifts are certainly multidecadal – but I have already linked elsewhere to Slingo and Palmer 2011 who make the obvious point that there are longer term variations in this largely Pacific phenomenon. I have linked to Vance 2012 and Moys 2002 who develop ENSO proxies for 1,000 year and 11,000 years respectively.

        ‘So how much will uncertainties in climate-change predictions of the large-scale reduce if models are run at 20, 2 or even 0.2 km resolution rather than say 100 km resolution? Equally, we may ask whether there is a certain resolution (e.g. 20 km), where it might be feasible to represent small-scale motions using stochastic equations, rather than trying to resolve them? These questions urgently need answering as the pressures grow on the climate science community to estimate, and if possible reduce uncertainties, and provide more reliable and confident predictions of regional climate change, hazardous weather and extremes.

        Nevertheless, however much models improve, there will always be an irreducible level of uncertainty—‘flap of the seagull’s wings’—because of the chaotic nature of the system. Even the climate we have observed over the past century or so is only one realization of what the real system might produce.

        Figure 12 shows 2000 years of El Nino behaviour simulated by a state-of-the-art climate model forced with present day solar irradiance and greenhouse gas concentrations. The richness of the El Nino behaviour, decade by decade and century by century, testifies to the fundamentally chaotic nature of the system that we are attempting to predict. It challenges the way in which we evaluate models and emphasizes the importance of continuing to focus on observing and understanding processes and phenomena in the climate system. It is also a classic demonstration of the need for ensemble prediction systems on all time scales in order to sample the range of possible outcomes that even the real world could produce. Nothing is certain.’ Slingo and Palmer 2011

        In response we have a facile play of words interpreting physics – complex systems theory – for which you have not the vaguest notion. Despite my links to very many scientific sources – you make no effort to understand that really truly nothing is certain. Sensitivity may be negative or positive – and may lead to catastrophic change within a decade or less. Certainly this is well outside of the limits of ordered forcing. The mechanisms are multiple but ill defined.

        This is the new climate paradigm that you seem incapable of grasping – so sad too bad. I don’t really give a rat’s arse – simply that you are so repulsive that I am under no compunction to be nice about it as I would if you were anything like a reasonable person. And I am certainly under no obligation to dance to your stupid tune.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 8:32 am |

        CH

        Not still on about Palmer and the 2ka of simulated ENSO *not exhibiting a trend*? It doesn’t help – it actually makes the case against you.

        Do you not understand what is being said here? It’s not complicated: short term variations don’t drive long term trends. It’s the other way around. Much of your misrepresentation depends on misrepresenting short term variability as the driver of long term climate trends. This is rubbish.

        Screeds of irrelevant or misrepresented cut’n’paste to cover up the non-response, as per. More abuse, as per.

        The ‘new climate paradigm’ that doesn’t actually change anything that matters. Look at the repetitive, predictable behaviour of the climate system during the most extreme changes it has experienced during Pliocene/Pleistocene which *disprove* the mad notion that climate is so chaotic as to be inherently unpredictable…

        This isn’t a ‘facile play of words’. This is you getting roundly debunked and going into your standard denial-loop pathology.

        S&T09 is *handwaving* but you simply refuse to see it. Try again. Just read the words:

        If as suggested here, a dynamically driven climate shift has occurred, the duration of similar shifts during the 20th century suggests the new global mean temperature trend may persist for several decades. Of course, it is purely speculative to presume that the global mean temperature will remain near current levels for such an extended period of time. Moreover, we caution that the shifts described here are presumably superimposed upon a long term warming trend due to anthropogenic forcing. However, the nature of these past shifts in climate state suggests the possibility of near constant temperature lasting a decade or more into the future must at least be entertained.

        I’ve entertained the possibility. You have misrepresented it as a fact.

        Do you know what purely speculative means?

        Do you understand what we caution that the shifts described here are presumably superimposed upon a long term warming trend due to anthropogenic forcing

        Apparently not, which is why you cannot parse this:

        If the role of internal variability in the climate system is as large as this analysis would seem to suggest, warming over the 21st century may well be larger than that predicted by the current generation of models.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 2:10 pm |

        Not still on about eyeballing an ENSO graph. There certainly is variation at all scales. ENSO is a long term driver of climate from the drying of the Sahel 5,000 years ago to the present.

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=ENSO11000.gif

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=Vance2012-AntarticaLawDomeicecoresaltcontent.jpg

        ‘ENSO causes climate extremes across and beyond the Pacific Basin, however evidence of ENSO at high southern latitudes is generally restricted to the South Pacific and West Antarctica. Here we report a statistically significant link between ENSO and sea salt deposition during summer from the Law Dome (LD) ice core in East Antarctica. ENSO-related atmospheric anomalies from the central-western Equatorial Pacific (CWEP) propagate to the South Pacific and the circumpolar high latitudes. These anomalies modulate high latitude zonal winds, with El Niño (La Niña) conditions causing reduced (enhanced) zonal wind speeds and subsequently, reduced (enhanced) summer sea salt deposition at LD. Over the last 1010 years, the LD summer sea salt (LDSSS) record has exhibited two below average (El Niño-like) epochs, 1000-1260 AD and 1920-2009 AD, and a longer above average (La Niña-like) epoch from 1260-1860 AD. Spectral analysis shows the below average epochs are associated with enhanced ENSO-like variability around 2-5 years, while the above average epoch is associated more with variability around 6-7 years. The LDSSS record is also significantly correlated with annual rainfall in eastern mainland Australia. While the correlation displays decadal-scale variability similar to changes in the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO), the LDSSS record suggests rainfall in the modern instrumental era (1910-2009 AD) is below the long-term average. In addition, recent rainfall declines in some regions of eastern and south-eastern Australia appear to be mirrored by a downward trend in the LDSSS record, suggesting current rainfall regimes are unusual though not unknown over the last millennium.’ Vance et al 2012

        See if you can eyeball in a trend there – dumbo.

        Here is another Tsonis study for you not to understand – http://www.clim-past-discuss.net/6/C403/2010/cpd-6-C403-2010.pdf

        Let’s look at the Swanson RC – http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/07/warminginterrupted-much-ado-about-natural-variability/ – post. What Swanson does is exclude the extreme ENSO events at the climate shifts of 1976/77 and the 1997/98 from the ‘true global warming signal’ to get warming of about 0.1 degrees C/decade. But you can’t really cope with that either.

        ‘Using a new measure of coupling strength, this update shows that these climate modes have recently synchronized, with synchronization peaking in the year 2001/02. This synchronization has been followed by an increase in coupling. This suggests that the climate system may well have shifted again, with a consequent break in the global mean temperature trend from the post 1976/77warming to a new period (indeterminate length) of roughly constant global mean temperature.’ S&T09

        It is indeed a fact that the planet is in a cool mode – http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703 – and these modes last 20 to 40 years.

        ‘Recent scientific evidence shows that major and widespread climate changes have occurred with startling speed. For example, roughly half the north Atlantic warming since the last ice age was achieved in only a decade, and it was accompanied by significant climatic changes across most of the globe. Similar events, including local warmings as large as 16°C, occurred repeatedly during the slide into and climb out of the last ice age. Human civilizations arose after those extreme, global ice-age climate jumps. Severe droughts and other regional climate events during the current warm period have shown similar tendencies of abrupt onset and great persistence, often with adverse effects on societies.

        Abrupt climate changes were especially common when the climate system was being forced to change most rapidly. Thus, greenhouse warming and other human alterations of the earth system may increase the possibility of large, abrupt, and unwelcome regional or global climatic events. The abrupt changes of the past are not fully explained yet, and climate models typically underestimate the size, speed, and extent of those changes. Hence, future abrupt changes cannot be predicted with confidence, and climate surprises are to be expected.

        The new paradigm of an abruptly changing climatic system has been well established by research over the last decade, but this new thinking is little known and scarcely appreciated in the wider community of natural and social scientists and policy-makers.’ NAS 2002

        ‘Because they occur relatively rapidly, these sorts of climate change are called abrupt climate change. Our understanding of past abrupt climate changes and their causes is still in its infancy; most of the research on this topic has been completed since the early 1990s. Scientists have made significant progress, however, in identifying and describing various abrupt events of the past and forming hypotheses about their causes. This paleo perspective will describe the evidence for past abrupt climate change and explore some of the possible causes.’ http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/abrupt/index.html

        ‘Weather changes abruptly from day to day, and there is no basic difficulty in understanding such changes because they involve a “fast” and easily observed part of the climate system (e.g., clouds and precipitation). But mechanisms behind abrupt climate change must surmount a fundamental hurdle in that they must alter the working of a “slow” (i.e., persistent) component of the climate system (e.g., ocean fluxes) but must do so rapidly. Two key components of the climate system are oceans and land ice. In addition, the atmospheric response is a crucial ingredient in the mix of mechanisms that might lead to abrupt climate change because the atmosphere knits together the behavior of the other components. The atmosphere potentially also gives rise to threshold behavior in the system, whereby gradual changes in forcing yield nearly discontinuous changes in response.
        A mechanism that might lead to abrupt climate change would need to have the following characteristics:
        • A trigger or, alternatively, a chaotic perturbation, with either one causing a threshold crossing (something that initiates the event).
        • An amplifier and globalizer to intensify and spread the influence of small or local changes.
        • A source of persistence, allowing the altered climate state to last for up to centuries or millennia.’

        . It is bizarre that you can continue to imagine that things are ‘predictable’. I suppose in one sense we might expect abrupt transitions between glacial and interglacials and it is predictable in that minimal sense. But the details – the timing and extent of change and the precise mechanisms are little understood. There are theories it seems you do not understand the limits of knowledge here.

        Climate is certainly not predictable as both models and climate are chaotic in the sense of complex systems theory.

        Here is another study for you not to understand.

        ‘AOS models are members of the broader class of deterministic chaotic dynamical systems, which provides several expectations about their properties (Fig. 1). In the context of weather prediction, the generic property of sensitive dependence is well understood (4, 5). For a particular model, small differences in initial state (indistinguishable within the sampling uncertainty for atmospheric measurements) amplify with time at an exponential rate until saturating at a magnitude comparable to the range of intrinsic variability. Model differences are another source of sensitive dependence. Thus, a deterministic weather forecast cannot be accurate after a period of a few weeks, and the time interval for skillful modern forecasts is only somewhat shorter than the estimate for this theoretical limit. In the context of equilibrium climate dynamics, there is another generic property that is also relevant for AOS, namely structural instability (6). Small changes in model formulation, either its equation set or parameter values, induce significant differences in the long-time distribution functions for the dependent variables (i.e., the phase-space attractor). The character of the changes can be either metrical (e.g., different means or variances) or topological (different attractor shapes). Structural instability is the norm for broad classes of chaotic dynamical systems that can be so assessed.’

        ‘Sensitive dependence and structural instability are humbling twin properties for chaotic dynamical systems, indicating limits about which kinds of questions are theoretically answerable. They echo other famous limitations on scientist’s expectations, namely the undecidability of some propositions within axiomatic mathematical systems (Gödel’s theorem) and the uncomputability of some algorithms due to excessive size of the calculation.’

        http://www.pnas.org/content/104/21/8709.full

        For something that makes no difference – it seems to be raising a few issues.

        ‘‘Prediction of weather and climate are necessarily uncertain: our observations of weather and climate are uncertain, the models into which we assimilate this data and predict the future are uncertain, and external effects such as volcanoes and anthropogenic greenhouse emissions are also uncertain. Fundamentally, therefore, therefore we should think of weather and climate predictions in terms of equations whose basic prognostic variables are probability densities ρ(X,t) where X denotes some climatic variable and t denoted time. In this way, ρ(X,t)dV represents the probability that, at time t, the true value of X lies in some small volume dV of state space.’ (Predicting Weather and Climate – Palmer and Hagedorn eds – 2006)

        You accuse me of cutting and pasting science – guilty. You really have nothing but a line of abuse and insults and a lawyers interpretation of a passage or two that really just illustrates your paucity of understanding and imagination. You have a simplistic presumption that climate is predictable. It isn’t at any scale except perhaps as a probabilistic density function.

        The ‘new climate paradigm’ that doesn’t actually change anything that matters. Look at the repetitive, predictable behaviour of the climate system during the most extreme changes it has experienced during Pliocene/Pleistocene which *disprove* the mad notion that climate is so chaotic as to be inherently unpredictable…

        Idiot.

  9. Wagathon | November 25, 2012 at 11:23 am |

    For a Left vs. right issue we know we are dealing with politics not science. But with AGW theory we also have an economic issue: just as we have the legal tax on the economy and with AGW theory we have the bureaucrat tax–a diverstion of restorces into unproductive activities–which leads to a decrease in the overall wealth of a society.

  10. jim2 | November 25, 2012 at 11:42 am |

    This looks like a more appropriate thread for this previous comment:

    The loony left, non-scientists accept the preachings of Algore and the main-stream media. They are no better than creationists in this respect – anything the left-wing priests say, they take on faith. For these people, it is religion.

  11. Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 12:50 pm |

    The World Bank commissioned a report released this month.
    “Why a 4 C warmer world must be avoided”
    The Executive Summary (24 pages) is here.
    http://climatechange.worldbank.org/sites/default/files/Turn_Down_the_Heat_Executive_Summary_English.pdf

    An excerpt from the Foreword by the World Bank President
    “This report spells out what the world would be like if it warmed by 4 degrees Celsius, which is what
    scientists are nearly unanimously predicting by the end of the century, without serious policy changes.
    The 4°C scenarios are devastating: the inundation of coastal cities; increasing risks for food production
    potentially leading to higher malnutrition rates; many dry regions becoming dryer, wet regions wetter;
    unprecedented heat waves in many regions, especially in the tropics; substantially exacerbated water
    scarcity in many regions; increased frequency of high-intensity tropical cyclones; and irreversible loss of
    biodiversity, including coral reef systems.
    And most importantly, a 4°C world is so different from the current one that it comes with high uncertainty
    and new risks that threaten our ability to anticipate and plan for future adaptation needs.
    The lack of action on climate change not only risks putting prosperity out of reach of millions of people
    in the developing world, it threatens to roll back decades of sustainable development.
    It is clear that we already know a great deal about the threat before us. The science is unequivocal
    that humans are the cause of global warming, and major changes are already being observed: global mean
    warming is 0.8°C above pre industrial levels; oceans have warmed by 0.09°C since the 1950s and are acidifying;
    sea levels rose by about 20 cm since pre-industrial times and are now rising at 3.2 cm per decade;
    an exceptional number of extreme heat waves occurred in the last decade; major food crop growing areas
    are increasingly affected by drought.
    Despite the global community’s best intentions to keep global warming below a 2°C increase above
    pre-industrial climate, higher levels of warming are increasingly likely. Scientists agree that countries’ current
    United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change emission pledges and commitments would
    most likely result in 3.5 to 4°C warming. And the longer those pledges remain unmet, the more likely a
    4°C world becomes.”

    • Wagathon | November 25, 2012 at 1:26 pm |

      So now the World Bank thinks it has its fingertips on the Earth’s thermostat and its credentials is that it commissioned a report. What is that; Big Bird science?

    • J Martin | November 25, 2012 at 5:23 pm |

      He’s a ‘banker’ he doesn’t actually give a toss about whether temperatures go up or down, co2, or climate, his number one overwhelming interest is money.

      Any words such people utter are designed to increase the amount of money they and their institutions can appropriate.

    • Bill | November 25, 2012 at 6:20 pm |

      I think the “scientists are nearly unanimously predicting 4 C” is a bit of an overstatement.

      • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 11:03 pm |

        You have to consider that by 2100 it will be more than a doubling without policy changes, so 4 &degC is close to the middle of the consensus.

      • David Wojick | November 27, 2012 at 8:23 am |

        Close to the middle is far from unanimous nor is it close to the middle. As a claim about the demographics of belief this one is wildly false. This CAGW report is probably part of the usual flurry that preceeds the annual UNFCC COP meeting.

    • timg56 | November 28, 2012 at 1:39 pm |

      Jim D,

      Just because the World Bank wants to put its faith in model derived predictions of the future is no good reason for the rest of us to do so.

      The evidence supportting any of the following:

      inundation of coastal cities; increasing risks for food production
      potentially leading to higher malnutrition rates; many dry regions becoming dryer, wet regions wetter;
      unprecedented heat waves in many regions, especially in the tropics; substantially exacerbated water
      scarcity in many regions; increased frequency of high-intensity tropical cyclones; and irreversible loss of
      biodiversity, including coral reef systems.

      is simply not there. So which are you going to believe? Models trying to make predictions 100 years out or the data we currently have?

  12. Wagathon | November 25, 2012 at 1:32 pm |

    “For the past two decades at least, and possibly for the past seven decades, the Earth’s true surface air temperature has likely experienced no net change,” and by that he is talking about the entire surface of the Earth including the 3/5s that is the surface of the ocean (see link above) that he correctly sees is the other part of the global warming equation–i.e., nominally, it’s the Sun, stupid.

  13. Alexej Buergin | November 25, 2012 at 1:44 pm |

    David Springer:
    Was it you who believed that electric transmission lines should not be under ground near the coast?
    Last week I was looking at how they do it on the Palm Jumeirah, Dubai (an artificial Fort Lauderdale in the shape of a palm, buiit on a fill-in in the gulf). Not one cable to be seen. Everything under ground.
    In the vicinity are the highest sky-scraper of the world and the biggest mall of the world; some countries still have drive and energy. But nowhere a solar cell or a wind turbine.

  14. Myrrh | November 25, 2012 at 2:12 pm |

    Water’s residence time in the atmosphere is 8-10 days, the Water Cycle

    All water is carbonic acid, rain is carbonic acid. Carbon dioxide is fully part of the Water Cycle and in this has the same residence time as water in the atmosphere, 8-10 days.

    The AGWScienceFiction’s fictional Greenhouse Effect has no rain in its Carbon Cycle.

    Example: http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-residence-time.htm

    Idiocy/science fraud, whatever, this is a deliberate sleight of hand on someone’s part to create a fake basic fisics for the fake AGW by creating a fictional world and passing it off as if the real world around us.

    • Louise | November 25, 2012 at 2:27 pm |

      Are you actually saying that you do not believe that there is a constant and measurable amount of CO2 in the atmosphere and that this has risen over the last 100 plus years?

      Nobody has claimed that the same actual molecules stay in the atmosphere for years but that the proportion of CO2 in the atmosphere is greater now than it was before the industrial revolution.

      You do understand the difference don’t you?

      • Myrrh | November 25, 2012 at 5:25 pm |

        Louise | November 25, 2012 at 2:27 pm | Are you actually saying that you do not believe that there is a constant and measurable amount of CO2 in the atmosphere and that this has risen over the last 100 plus years?

        What I am saying, if you read my post, is that in the AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect fake fisics, there is no rain the Carbon Cycle. ALL rain is CARBONIC ACID.

        Every time it rains it rains carbon dioxide. You have no real world processes in your fictional fisics, and you don’t even notice it’s missing.

        It doesn’t matter how much carbon dioxide goes up, it always comes down. It doesn’t accumulate, you don’t realise how idiotic the AGW claims!

        Like this, from my link to Skeptical Science: ” Some molecules are removed by undergoing change – methane is oxidised to CO2 for example. However, CO2 is (almost) chemically inert and so is only removed by an increase in total biomass or by dissolution in the oceans. The dissolution process has a bottleneck and it will be centuries before total CO2 in the atmosphere decreases. (Even then we will be in trouble as the oceans undergo acidification).”

        Where the rain in the Carbon Cycle? Idiotic ideas about “bottleneck” at the ocean keeping carbon dioxide in the atmosphere accumulating for centuries..? Can’t you hear yourselves?

        Nobody has claimed that the same actual molecules stay in the atmosphere for years but that the proportion of CO2 in the atmosphere is greater now than it was before the industrial revolution.

        You do understand the difference don’t you?

        Do you understand that every time it rains all carbon dioxide is cleared from the atmosphere around?

        Prove that it is greater now than before the Industrial Revolution. We’ve had measurements of Carbon Dioxide for a couple of centuries now and before Callendar and Keeling cherry picked the 280 ppm figure the standard average was around 400 ppm.

        http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1806245/posts

        And so much for Keeling’s mythical “well-mixed” background:

        http://www.greenparty.ca/blogs/169/2009-01-03/ppm-co2-altitude-and-mass-co2-atmosphere-8520-metres-beyond-which-there-practic

        By Richard Belshaw on 3 January 2009 – 7:57pm
        “Excel spreadsheet extension of CRC 85th edition 2004-2005 handbook on physics and chemistry……
        Equations worked out in Maple 12 by Maplesoft.

        The mass of CO2 in the atmosphere is approximately 1.06186E+14 x 10^14 kg

        the ppm is as listed in the attached spreadsheet…..
        altitude
        metres ppm at altitude
        10 387.00000000000000000000
        20 386.76185159877100000000
        30 385.82817078570700000000
        40 384.20383974867100000000
        50 381.89744923045400000000
        60 378.92122285673500000000
        70 375.29090921052500000000
        80 371.02564298657700000000
        90 366.14777693898100000000
        100 360.68268668780400000000
        110 354.65855077049000000000
        120 348.10610860632300000000
        130 341.05839928301200000000
        140 333.55048427047500000000
        150 325.61915731533400000000
        160 317.30264486918400000000
        170 308.64030045348600000000
        180 299.67229636420100000000
        190 290.43931607115600000000
        200 280.98225057251200000000
        210 271.34190182616800000000
        220 261.55869620114700000000
        230 251.67241067665700000000
        240 241.72191426947000000000
        250 231.74492689624000000000
        260 221.77779758182900000000
        270 211.85530361301600000000
        280 202.01047191470200000000
        290 192.27442359850200000000
        300 182.67624230670000000000
        310 173.24286665324200000000
        320 163.99900675246900000000
        330 154.96708453023400000000
        etc.”

        Carbon Dioxide is heavier than air, it will always sink displacing air unless work is done to change that direction. Life heat always flows from hotter to colder. It’s a physical fact of life.

      • lolwot | November 25, 2012 at 5:35 pm |

        NO RAIN IN CARBON CYCLE!!!

        MUSTBEFRAUD!!

      • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 5:57 pm |

        Oxygen is heavier than nitrogen. How long before they separate out? Time scales are of the essence here.

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 25, 2012 at 6:12 pm |

        The gases will never separate in a convectively mixed atmosphere. Even the stratosphere has sufficiently mixing to maintain nearly uniform mixing ratios for non-condencing gases. Going still higher up separation starts to get significant.

      • Mark B (number 2) | November 25, 2012 at 7:02 pm |

        I noticed that CO2 was heavier than air at school, because we could pour it out of a beaker onto a flame and extinguish it. So this decrease in CO2 as we get higher is to be expected.
        I have already read articles by warmists which said that the CO2 concentration at sea level makes no difference to the warming, because the atmosphere already has high concentrations of water vapour, which are absorbing as much infra red (re-radiated from the surface) as is possible. The explanation is that it is in the upper atmosphere, where the water vapour is much less, that carbon dioxide has a significant effect.
        Now, as a layman, I have looked up the explanation of the greenhouse effect in wiki. This is an extract from it:

        “The reality is more complex: the atmosphere near the surface is largely opaque to thermal radiation (with important exceptions for “window” bands), and most heat loss from the surface is by sensible heat and latent heat transport. Radiative energy losses become increasingly important higher in the atmosphere largely because of the decreasing concentration of water vapor, an important greenhouse gas. It is more realistic to think of the greenhouse effect as applying to a “surface” in the mid-troposphere, which is effectively coupled to the surface by a lapse rate.”

        But extrapolating from the figures that you have quoted, there could hardly be any CO2 in the troposphere (or the stratosphere, even). Considering that the air up there is very thin anyway, and we are talking about a few ppm of this very thin layer, I can’t see how the recent increase in carbon dioxide can have any effect.

        I am not saying that the warmist point of view is wrong, just that I don’t understand it. I just can’t get my head around it. Can any one explain it to me, addressing the contradictions that I have pointed out.

      • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 7:26 pm |

        Yes, pure CO2 is heavier than air at the same temperature, but try mixing it first and seeing how long it takes to separate. You will have a long wait.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 25, 2012 at 9:54 pm |

        MarkB doesn’t understand the idea of buoyancy within a displaced volume.

        Myrrrhhh needs to buy a vowel.

        Clown show times 10.

      • Mark B (number 2) | November 26, 2012 at 4:52 am |

        Thanks, Jim D for explaining that the CO2 would take a long time to separate and sink.
        Myrrh, having thought about what Jim D has said, I have looked at the table that you have shown above, with the ppm of CO2 for different altitudes, again. I think that this table has just been used as a tool to calculate the total mass of CO2 in the atmosphere. The ppm concentrations listed are not real measured values, but equivilant amounts (masses) of the CO2 at each level.

    • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 2:31 pm |

      Myrrh,

      You make it sound as though every CO2 molecule is going to react and associate with a water molecule over a period of 8-10 days to form carbonic acid, and this is far from the truth. A “newly emitted” CO2 molecule has a low probability of associating with a water molecule in its first 8-10 days in the atmosphere. Humidity, partial pressures, temperature, and the presence of other compounds in the atmosphere affect the rates of association.

      For those who want the basic science behind this, see:

      http://www.chemistry.wustl.edu/~edudev/LabTutorials/Water/FreshWater/acidrain.html

      http://www.elmhurst.edu/~chm/vchembook/190acidrain.html

      • Myrrh | November 25, 2012 at 5:55 pm |

        R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 2:31 pm | Reply Myrrh,

        You make it sound as though every CO2 molecule is going to react and associate with a water molecule over a period of 8-10 days to form carbonic acid, and this is far from the truth. A “newly emitted” CO2 molecule has a low probability of associating with a water molecule in its first 8-10 days in the atmosphere. Humidity, partial pressures, temperature, and the presence of other compounds in the atmosphere affect the rates of association.

        For those who want the basic science behind this, see:

        http://www.chemistry.wustl.edu/~edudev/LabTutorials/Water/FreshWater/acidrain.html

        http://www.elmhurst.edu/~chm/vchembook/190acidrain.html

        So where on these pages does it give the information you claim is “true”?

        Water and carbon dioxide are attracted to each other, that’s why all rain is carbonic acid. It doesn’t take carbon dioxide 8-10 days to associate with water, it’s love at first sight and straight into clinch, the 8-10 days is the residence time for water in the atmosphere, time spent as clouds etc. taken into consideration. Since Carbon Dioxide is FULLY part of the Water Cycle, which you don’t have either, in this it shares the same residence time.

        In other words, through the Water Cycle carbon dioxide is being cleared out of the atmosphere continously, no matter how much is being pumped in, rain takes all of it out.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 6:13 pm |

        Myrrh said:

        “In other words, through the Water Cycle carbon dioxide is being cleared out of the atmosphere continously, no matter how much is being pumped in, rain takes all of it out.”

        ___
        No Myrrh, rain does not take all the carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. If this were the case we would see CO2 levels rising and falling with long and short term cycles of increased and decreased precipitation, which is not the case– CO2 just keeps going up as more is being put into the atmosphere by humans than can be naturally sequestered in the oceans and biosphere.

      • Myrrh | November 25, 2012 at 7:39 pm |

        No Myrrh, rain does not take all the carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. If this were the case we would see CO2 levels rising and falling with long and short term cycles of increased and decreased precipitation, which is not the case– CO2 just keeps going up as more is being put into the atmosphere by humans than can be naturally sequestered in the oceans and biosphere.

        All rain is carbonic acid. Water and carbon dioxide have a great attraction for each other, if there is carbon dioxide and water around in the atmosphere together then we have carbonic acid.

        But again, my point is that AGWScienceFiction’s Greenhouse Effect does not have rain, carbonic acid, in its Carbon Cycle. The dog didn’t bark.

        But then, the whole of the Water Cycle has been excised, so it’s hardly surprising you, generic, don’t notice what’s missing..

      • Jim D | November 25, 2012 at 7:48 pm |

        Most of the CO2 going into the ocean is by direct contact in the gas phase. The rain contribution is a drop in the ocean (had to say it).

    • BBD | November 25, 2012 at 3:14 pm |

      Myrrh

      Idiocy/science fraud, whatever, this is a deliberate sleight of hand on someone’s part to create a fake basic fisics for the fake AGW by creating a fictional world and passing it off as if the real world around us.

      Woo. Conspiracy theory alert!

      Are you actually suggesting that all this CO2 data is faked?? Seriously?

      Click a station location and pick ‘carbon cycle gasses’ from the options at the left of the screen, then select ‘time series’. Are you really claiming that I am looking at faked data?

      • Myrrh | November 25, 2012 at 6:19 pm |

        Of course you’re looking at faked data, Callendar and Keeling had an agenda, they cherry picked a low base to create the scare-mongering Keeling curve, and yes, first kept in the family it’s now globally controlled faked data with a globally faked myth of “well-mixed” background, with a globally faked doom and destruction for the ridiculous science fraud that “carbon dioxide drives global warming” and a few extra parts per million will cause runaway of this. Globally faked as all the temperature measures are continually tampered with.

        Unbelievable that with all the information we have on the constant fixing of data to suit the agenda you still have this innocent trust in the its veracity..

        But, that’s not my point here. My point here is that your fake fisics has taken rain out of the Carbon Cycle, and all rain is carbonic acid.

        This is just one example of the ubiquitous idiotic fake fisics memes you regurgitate mindlessly because the AGWScienceFiction department that created your fake fisics had to take rain out of the Carbon Cycle to pretend that it “accumulates for hundreds of years forming a blanket/backradiating”, choose whichever variation they created for your arguments with each other..

        http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Carbon_dioxide#cite_note-8

        “CO2, unlike other greenhouse gases, does not break down in the atmosphere. Its natural removal depends upon the absorption and eventual sequestration in the oceans or land as part of the earth’s carbon cycle. Approximately 65% of emitted CO2 is removed from the atmosphere within a hundred years through the oceans and biosphere. The remainder stays until drawn down through much slower processes, with an additional 15-30% removed over the next 5,000 years, and the remaining ~10% after 400,000 to a million years.”

        Doesn’t break down in the atmosphere? Where’s the rain in your fake Carbon Cycle? Where’s the mention of Carbonic Acid in your fake Carbon Cycle? Haven’t any of you noticed these missing?

      • BBD | November 25, 2012 at 9:28 pm |

        Of course you’re looking at faked data,

        Conspiracy theorists are loons.

        You are a conspiracy theorist…

  15. David Wojick | November 25, 2012 at 2:51 pm |

    Let us not forget the Really Big Show this week — UNFCCC COP 18 and what may well be the last meeting of the Kyoto MOP (the world’s biggest MOP).
    http://www.iisd.ca/climate/cop18/ has good daily coverage, including of some of the hundreds of side events that enliven this grand circus.

    • Ron C. | November 27, 2012 at 12:44 pm |

      Headlines from Doha COP 18 show that the permafrost bogeyman has been trotted out. Once again alarmists are in massive denial of the facts.
      1) Permafrost has an active layer that can vary between two to three feet in a typical place like Barrow AK. That layer has melting and freezing every year.
      The methane concentration have been flat in Barrow in recent decades.

      2) Permafrost depletion in NH stopped in 2005.

      Except for warming during the 1970s and 80s, northern Eurasian temperatures appear to have remained fairly stable. And of that warming, Frauenfeld and Zhang state that “the strong decrease in seasonal freeze depths during the 1970s to “1990s was likely the result of strong atmospheric forcing from the North Atlantic Oscillation during that time period.” Thus, their work provides little to no evidence for any significant warming of this massive portion of earth’s land mass over the past two decades, and absolutely no evidence for recent CO2-induced warming.” [Oliver W Frauenfeld, Tingjun Zhang 2011: Environmental Research Letters]

      3) Researchers have discovered that when these melted areas are thawed, the explosion of new growth of vegetation becomes a positive CO2 sink that sequesters carbon dioxide in greater quantities than that released from the thaw. So instead of permafrost melting being a positive warming feedback, it actually becomes a negative feedback.
      “northern peatlands can continue to serve as carbon sinks under a warmer and wetter climate, providing a negative feedback to climate warming,” which is the exact polar-opposite of what has historically been claimed by the world’s climate alarmists.” [Shanshan Cai, Zicheng Yu 2011: Quaternary Research]

      4) Earlier warm periods, such as the Medieval and Holocene optimum, did not produce unusual amounts of CH4.
      “There appear to be no significant CH4-excursions in ice core records of Antarctica or Greenland during these time periods which otherwise might serve as evidence for a massive release of methane into the atmosphere from degrading permafrost terrains.”
      http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2007/05/24/cooling-the-permafrost-scare/

  16. IPMeng | November 25, 2012 at 2:54 pm |

    A changing climate will bring winners and losers over time irrespective of direction. What are some of the winners and losers of a warming climate?

  17. Louise | November 25, 2012 at 3:03 pm |

    A comparison too far?

    “As a global warming skeptic who never will be in a car pool van or AFV unless forced to do so by the government, it hit me that I now know what it was like to be a black citizen in the South during the height of Jim Crow laws”

    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/11/25/global-warming-skepticism-and-the-new-segregation/

  18. R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 4:33 pm |

    An interesting paper on Earth’s energy balance and sea levels worthy of a read by some of you who still believe in science:

    http://igitur-archive.library.uu.nl/phys/2012-0229-200953/2011GL048794.pdf

    For the others, something appropriate:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/scalzi/sets/72157603091357751/

  19. R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 4:39 pm |

    This is fun. Did you know that the Utah Raptor (yep, a dinosaur) lived about 4,300 years ago? Yes, about the same time that According to the Creation Museum it did:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/scalzi/1969162767/in/set-72157603091357751/lightbox/

    I would strongly suggest that if you visit Kentucky, that you check this museum out. Good to know what some of your neighbors believe…

    • climatereason | November 25, 2012 at 4:53 pm |

      R gates

      Was it my imagination or was one of the ice core experts mentioned in climate gate a creationist? He placed great emphasis on the accuracy of the ice cores for demonstrating temperature and co2 for 5000 years but then had a blind spot at what happened in the tens of thousands of years that preceded the start of creation.
      Tonyb

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 6:27 pm |

        Tony,

        Outside of Roy Spencer and John Christy being fundamentalist Christian, I have no knowledge of (and no particular interest in) other scientist’s philosophical positions on religious issues. If one of the Climategate ice core scientists is a creationist that matters not to me– unless they alter their data to justify their position– then of course, it matters very much.

    • Brandon Shollenberger | November 25, 2012 at 5:00 pm |

      R. Gates says it is “[g]ood to know what some of your neighbors believe.” I agree. And since R. Gates is a neighbor of mine in this online community, I am happy to know he believes:

      Also, with the strong possibility that there could be some 10^500 universes existing at any given time…

      As always, craziness abounds in this world.

      • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 6:22 pm |

        Brandon,

        Since I see you are not up on the latest thoughts of cosmology, I’ll forgive your ad hom on me as being out of ignorance and not malice. For those who care to see where some of the latest thinking on cosmology rest related to a potential multiverse made up of many universes, I would suggest a few resources. First, for Brandon, an overview of this concept for “Dummies” (really, no ad hom intended):

        http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/the-theory-of-parallel-universes.html

        Then some other great sources:

        http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/08/110809-other-universes-multiverse-big-bang-space-science-microwave/

        http://www.universetoday.com/85316/multiverse-theory/

        http://www.wbur.org/npr/132932268/a-physicist-explains-why-parallel-universes-may-exist

        http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/jun/10/david-deutsch-multiverse-fabric-reality

        http://www.ted.com/talks/brian_greene_why_is_our_universe_fine_tuned_for_life.html

        Quite mind expanding…really.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 25, 2012 at 10:50 pm |

        R. Gates:

        Since I see you are not up on the latest thoughts of cosmology, I’ll forgive your ad hom on me as being out of ignorance and not malice.

        I wonder which you understand less, the meaning of ad hominem or cosmology. I’m happy to say I apparently understand both far more than you, a fact made abundantly evident by this post of yours. I prefer the real world with facts and evidence, but by all means, feel free to promote pseudo-science that has absolutely no basis or justification because it sounds cool.

        Popsci, the new religion.

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 10:53 am |

        R Gates

        Thanks for the links. Fascinating. Also for the pointer to Church et al. (2011) above.

        Brandon Shollenberger

        You are being a prat. Why? What’s wrong with you?

      • mike | November 26, 2012 at 1:49 pm |

        BBD,

        Yr: “What’s wrong with you?”

        Well, BBD, let me put that same question to you. BBD, why can’t you and Gates get a real job? Why can’t you two do something useful with your lives? Why do you two spend your whole lives coasting from one scare-mongering, hive-scam, taxpayer rip-off free-lunch to another? What’s wrong with the two of you?

        And now I’ll answer the question I posed to Gates and you, BBD, at least as it pertains to the “multi-verse” business. What’s wrong is that the two of you expect a publically-funded trough to go with your little Oh-the-wonders-of-the-universe!, Tao-baiting, swami-wannabee act and it’s associated infinity-is-groovy, beginnings-and-endings-are-like-real-linear-bummer-thinking, mind-expansion-really-lights-my-fire flim-flam.

        And, BBD, the other thing that’s wrong with you two is that you also want to brainwash captive-audience, impressionable kids, entrusted to your care, with your “third-eye” science clap-trap while leaving the poor dumb tykes, when they finally graduate from your shyster “institutions of higher learning”, with decades of crushing student-loan debt to go along with their utter, youth-master nurtured, unsuitability for gainful employment in the process.

        That’s what’s wrong with you and Gates, BBD. GET IT!

      • R. Gates | November 26, 2012 at 2:25 pm |

        Mike,

        Funny how you like to go so easily to your little personal attack rants rather than face the issues and questions. In that you fail to grasp the larger significance of what it would mean if the many-worlds or multi-universe interpretation of the cosmos would prove to be true, you’d probably also have been on the side of the Inquisition demanding that Galileo recant his “crazy” thinking. God forbid if he’d start to infect the young with the notion that the Earth was not the center of it all. I do pity closed-minded individuals…not just for the vision they lack, but also for the courage they lack to step outside their neat and tidy conception of the universe. As the physicist Sir Arthur Eddington said so well:

        “Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine.”

        Which of course means you’ve got to push your imagination to the maximum to come close to what the universe is really like. You’ve got a lot of ground to make up there Mike.

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 2:34 pm |

        mike

        Well, BBD, let me put that same question to you. BBD, why can’t you and Gates get a real job? Why can’t you two do something useful with your lives? Why do you two spend your whole lives coasting from one scare-mongering, hive-scam, taxpayer rip-off free-lunch to another? What’s wrong with the two of you?

        I ran a successful business and retired earlier this year, aged 47. I don’t need a job; I have money. And I have paid a great deal of tax over the years. Almost certainly more than you.

        Anyway, what’s your excuse for having the free time to partake in these charming tête-à-têtes?

        Unemployable, by any chance?

      • mike | November 26, 2012 at 3:10 pm |

        BBD (and Gates),

        Yr: “I ran a successful business…etc.”

        A little vague there, BBD, about your purported business enterprise–though I don’t put it above you to have opportunistically and parasitically tapped into one or another of the hive’s lucrative hustles through your good comrade connections and made a crony-capitalist bundle off it.

        Otherwise, I’ll leave it to you to figure out who and what I am. Should be interesting.

        Other than that, I refuse to be baited by your incivility and your, frankly, ill-tempered hectoring, BBD (double all that for you, Gates). . What’s wrong with you (two)?

        What if they gave a food-fight and nobody came?

        Think about it!

        Peace and love, brethren. .

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 5:14 pm |

        Mike said:

        “Otherwise, I’ll leave it to you to figure out who and what I am. Should be interesting.”

        ___

        Interesting that you think we should care who or what you are. I don’t. That’s doesn’t interest me in the least.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 5:23 pm |

        BBD:

        Brandon Shollenberger

        You are being a prat. Why? What’s wrong with you?

        I’m neither an idiot nor a fool. That’s apparently enough to do “wrong” by you and R. Gates.

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 5:38 pm |

        mike

        A little vague there, BBD, about your purported business enterprise

        Nothing whatsoever to do with the bozo hive-mind, I assure you.

        Otherwise, I’ll leave it to you to figure out who and what I am. Should be interesting.

        Obviously you are a loon.

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 5:38 pm |

        Brandon S

        I’m neither an idiot nor a fool.

        You are idiotic enough to reject the scientific consensus on climate change and believe in a lot of ‘sceptic’ twaddle. That’s more than enough for me.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 5:50 pm |

        BBD:

        You are idiotic enough to reject the scientific consensus on climate change and believe in a lot of ‘sceptic’ twaddle. That’s more than enough for me.

        I criticize R. Gates for promoting pseudoscience, and you jump in to demonstrate your belief in ESP. I hate to break it to you, but you suck at mind-reading. You have no idea what I believe.

        Or maybe you do. Tell you what; I picked a card. Can you tell me which one it is?

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 5:53 pm |

        Brandon, I’ve read a few of your comments. Are you one of these tiresome deniers who denies being a denier? They’re the worst. I prefer the obviously insane types like mike to be honest.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 6:15 pm |

        BBD:

        Brandon, I’ve read a few of your comments. Are you one of these tiresome deniers who denies being a denier? They’re the worst. I prefer the obviously insane types like mike to be honest.

        You’ve put no effort into figuring out what my views on global warming are. I’ve never hidden them. In fact, I’ve discussed them on this blog multiple times. Why would you assume you know what they are when it would be so easy to actually find out? Heck, you could have just asked me at any point. Instead, you’ve just assumed you know every time you’ve responded to me.

        I’ll give you a hint. My beliefs aren’t what you say they are. Anyone who knows me at all could tell you that.

      • mike | November 26, 2012 at 7:55 pm |

        Hey BBD,

        O. K., guy, you still shootin’ off your little, geek-ball smart-mouth?

        So, BBD, see this milk-carton? Some milk in it, but not a whole lot. Mostly it’s all stuffed with all that creep-out, good-for-you, booger-food that the cafeteria serves here and that no self-respecting kid would touch in a jillion years–you know, that sort of crapola you chow down on, BBD, and then ask for seconds. And everything’s like all shook-up, sorta like a milk-shake. And Mary Fischer, who, as you may have heard, can always be counted on, in that sweet, luscious, feminine way of hers, to hack up a really gross “lugie” when appropriate to the occasion?–her contribution is in here too, It’s part of the milk-shake, BBD. And Robbie Snodgrass?–after you the biggest dork in the school–well ol’ Robbie groped up for us one of his really choice, dripping goobers (we restrained him before he had a chance to eat it) and that little bit of Robbie’s precious bodily fluids is in the milk-shake too, BBD. Again, BBD, yah see this milk-carton?–WHOOOOOSH! Screw the peace and love stuff!

        Do you realize, BBD, just what a freak-show spectacle you and Gates make trading mash notes and trippin’ over that ridiculous, infinity-that-has-no-beggining-or-ending cult-object that is obviously the big-deal fetish in that even more ridiculous Tao-Mao, academic-parasite crypto-religion that had seized both of your rudimentary, pea-sized, greenwashed hive-brains? Do you, BBD? You’re both just a big, fat, barf-bag joke!

        And, oh by the way, BBD, you don’t really expect anyone to believe you’re a 47 year old retired businessman do you? I mean, like, do you act like a 47 year old retired businessman, BBD? Not a hard question, that last, BBD–and, oh by the way, the answer is “NO!” I got you spotted, BBD–you’re really just some pimply-face, can’t-get-a-date, weirdo, nerd kid. Grow up!

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 5:53 am |

        mike

        This is wonderful stuff. Thank you for taking the time to prepare it. I may print and frame if that’s okay?

        And, oh by the way, BBD, you don’t really expect anyone to believe you’re a 47 year old retired businessman do you? I mean, like, do you act like a 47 year old retired businessman, BBD?

        What does a 47 year old retired businessman behave like? It there only one single, instantly identifiable type? Or are you spouting the most astonishing bollocks?

        ;-)

        There is more. I’ve been married for two decades (to an intelligent and beautiful woman) and have a five-year old son… not bad for ‘some pimply-face, can’t-get-a-date, weirdo, nerd kid.’

        I think you’re just jealous ;-)

      • mike | November 27, 2012 at 6:13 am |

        Hey BBD,

        Give me a break, will yah?–quit with all the hyped-up, hopped-up B. S. Pretty please!

        Methinks the pimply-faced, can’t-get-a-date, weirdo, nerd kid protests too much. Yep, BBD–I got you pegged all right–right zit-boy?!

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 6:53 am |

        mike

        Since when do you get anywhere in this world by giving abusive, bullying nutters a break?

        You picked on the wrong retired businessman. GFY.

      • BatedBreath | November 27, 2012 at 7:04 am |

        BBD | Since when do you get anywhere in this world by giving abusive, bullying nutters a break?

        There’s always a chance you might know something useful …

      • mike | November 27, 2012 at 7:34 am |

        Hey BBD!

        IRT: “…GFY.”

        “YO MOMMA!”

  20. David L. Hagen | November 25, 2012 at 4:39 pm |

    Declining Available Net Oil Exports – After China+India, while 1 billion live in extreme poverty

    What will be the likely near term impacts declining Available Net Oil Exports to oil importing countries (other than China and India) compared to that of rising CO2?
    See Jeffrey Brown (aka westexas):

    Available Net Exports (GNE Less Chindia’s Net Imports), 17 mbpd Gap:
    (2002-2005 rate of change: +4.4%/year; 2005-2011 rate of change: -2.2%year)

    In the context of Oil Watch – World Total Liquids Production.

    Put that in the context of Actuary Gail Tverberg’s observations:
    Climate Change: The Standard Fixes Don’t Work
    Tverberg shows how the rate of increase in Global oil production has declined from +7.9%/year prior to 1973 to +0.1%/year since 2005.

    Adding a carbon tax tends to add to the Asian competitive edge. This tends to shift production offshore, and with it, jobs. . . .
    the CO2 solutions act as yet another way to encourage more international trade, and with it more “growth”, and more CO2.

    In the near term, see: The Close Tie Between Energy Consumption, Employment, and Recession

    A Strange Relationship – A Close Tie Between the Amount of Energy Consumed and the Number of People Employed

    Since 1982, the number of people employed in the United States has tended to move in a similar pattern to the amount of energy consumed. When one increases (or decreases), the other tends to increase (or decrease). In numerical terms, R2 = .98.

    So the “political” solutions of carbon tax will reduce US employment, shift jobs to China, worsen US balance of trade, and increase global CO2, since China has lower energy efficiency and uses more coal! Way to go!

    At the same time we have 3 billion people living in poverty, including 1 billion in extreme poverty of < $1.25/day. To rise out of poverty, they need jobs which requires competitive energy. Current climate “solutions” condemn them to eternal poverty.

    The Cornwall Alliance observes:

    proposed policies would destroy jobs and impose trillions of dollars in costs to achieve no net benefits. They could be implemented only by enormous and dangerous expansion of government control over private life. Worst of all, by raising energy prices and hindering economic development, they would slow or stop the rise of the world’s poor out of poverty and so condemn millions to premature death. . . .

    Instead:

    3.We call on political leaders to adopt policies that protect human liberty, make energy more affordable, and free the poor to rise out of poverty, while abandoning fruitless, indeed harmful policies to control global temperature.

    • David L. Hagen | November 25, 2012 at 7:03 pm |

      Consider too the consequencees of “green” policies especially on the poorest in developing countries. e.g.,

      Could Biofuel Policies Increase Death and Disease in Developing Countries?
      Idur Goklany finds:

      estimates of the increase in poverty owing to growth in biofuels production over 2004 levels leads to the conclusion that additional biofuel production may have resulted in at least 192,000 excess deaths and 6.7 million additional lost DALYs in 2010. These exceed WHO’s estimated annual toll of 141,000 deaths and 5.4 million lost DALYs attributable to global warming. Thus, policies intended to mitigate global warming may actually have increased deathanddisease indeveloping countries.

      Goklany, I.M. 2011. Could Biofuel Policies Increase Death and Disease in Developing Countries? Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons 16: 9-13.

      The Cost of Good Intentions: The Ethics and Economics of the War on Conventional Energy, by Timothy D. Terrell, Ph.D., the Cornwall Alliance

      concludes with a call to honesty in place of the exaggeration of environmental hazards, and a call to caution in the use of coercive, regulatory means rather than more productive voluntary, market based means, supplemented by tort action, to care for people and the planet on which we live. . . .
      In our comfortable, air conditioned homes, we in the developed nations of the world forget that the hazards of coal-fired power plants are far smaller than the hazards of the current energy sources of much of the world. About two billion people in the world cook and heat their homes with dirty fuels like wood and dung. Developing nations may benefit greatly by moving toward electrification provided by cheap, available coal supplies, which would allow cleaner households and more productive industry. Yet they are pushed toward international agreements that would limit growth and prolong the period of time the populations of these nations inhale the smoke of their dung fires. Use of intermediate technologies should not be restricted simply because developed nations have already moved past them and regard them as dirty. Doing so could force death and suffering on the poorest and weakest of the world’s population. Such restrictions force these nations to linger in poverty, with all that tends to accompany low incomes: shorter life expectancies, higher rates of infant mortality, low literacy rates, and hunger.

  21. Doug Cotton | November 25, 2012 at 4:54 pm |

    Those who have difficulty understanding how a natural adiabatic lapse rate develops in any atmosphere may wish to refer to this comment which I have just written on Roy Spencer’s blog. It needs to be read in conjunction with several posts I have also written just above on that thread.

    The temperature of the Venus surface could not possibly have been raised about 500 degrees above the planet’s radiating temperature by any greenhouse effect, especially when you consider that the insolation it receives from the Sun is only about 10% of that received by Earth’s surface. It is that hot for no other reason than that a natural adiabatic lapse rate caused the temperature gradient in the thick carbon dioxide Venus atmosphere (94 times the mass of Earth’s atmosphere) when the planet first formed.

    Read this page and the reference in the footnote thereon.
     

    • gbaikie | November 25, 2012 at 7:45 pm |

      Lapse rate is directly related gravity and it’s why Venus is hot.
      In the atmosphere of Venus where the air pressure is equal to Earth’s at sea level, Venus air temperature is fairly warm, but Earth does conditions with higher air temperature in the warmest places on Earth.

      And it seems that if Venus was at Earth distance, the part of Venus atmosphere at 1 atm would much colder. And this would translates to a cooler Venus surface temperature. If you temperature at 1 atm at 30 C
      and going lower until the pressure is 2 atm it will be warmer- it’s just gas laws. If on Earth you at 1/2 sea level pressure, the air will much cooler.

      So the question why is Venus have such warm conditions at the elevation
      which has same atmospheric pressure as Earth? If warm, the rest of pressure of atmosphere will give you hot temperatures in these lower elevations.
      So if you in a balloon on Venus and at Earth’s pressure in it’s atmosphere, and one on the day lite side of planet, what is it like?
      Well, since you have enough pressure, you don’t need a spacesuit [which are mostly pressure suits] but you will need an oxygen mask. And in the shade it’s hot, like desert conditions in the day and the air would be very dry. So with such dry conditions one lose a lot water but keep fairly cool- it would seem cooler than it is. But things in sunlight are going to get very hot, more than twice the sunlight as one have on Earth. At Venus distance from the sun, there is 2,647 – 2,576 watts per square meter:
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunlight
      And at this elevation on Venus, unless Venus clouds are blocking the Sun,
      one going get a high percentage of this sunlight. One is going get about twice the sunlight as on the Moon, and on the Moon, stuff can heat up to 120 C. Sun bathing could be an exciting adventure- probably measured in minutes rather than an hour and UV could be brutal. So something like intense sun bathing sauna, probably more intense than tanning booths.
      So clothes are just going to get hot in the sunlight, desert attire used on Earth probably would not work. Perhaps you could something reflective, or perhaps bathing suit, sun screen, and a shiny hat, would work if you want to be in direct sunlight. Of course inside an structure with air conditioning one could be comfortable. So 450 K is 2325 watts per square meter,
      so Moon has bit less than 400 K surface temp, and Venus at 1 atm would have surface temperature reach around 450 K [176 C or 348 F]. Or an iron frying pan left in the sun, works fine to cook bacon and eggs. But compared to sea level Venus, it’s no comparison.
      So as far human go, air temperature is ok, but things in the sun get a lot hotter. A pan of water without a lid would not boil, but water in black garbage bag should.
      So anything which is liquid or solid will get much warmer than the air temperature- which same as on Earth [except water evaporates].
      So the clouds of drops of acid should get hot and the air will be warmed by these warm droplets of acid:
      “Acid clouds and lightning

      At around 60 kilometres altitude is a very thick cloud layer – a 20 kilometre-deep blanket surrounding the planet. It marks the limit between Venus’s lower and middle atmospheric layers. It is this yellowish layer that prevented for a long time Earth-based observatories and previous orbiter missions to see through.

      It is known today that the upper part of this layer is mostly composed of tiny droplets of sulphuric acid, but what is happening chemically in the lower clouds is still unknown. For instance, what is the origin of the large solid particles floating in the lower clouds observed by Pioneer-Venus?”
      http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Venus_Express/SEMANY808BE_0.html

      So it’s the liquids and solids high in the atmosphere that warms the air, and lapse rate accounts for high temperature in the denser atmosphere near surface.

  22. Jim Cripwell | November 25, 2012 at 5:38 pm |

    I wonder how many others are watching http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/execute.csh?amsutemps+002 and trying to guess what is going to happen to the satellite temperature dsata over the next week or so.

    • R. Gates | November 25, 2012 at 6:32 pm |

      Do you think it has some significance that we should be watching it so closely? Are you expecting some big change, other than downward as is typical in a NH winter? The NH dominates this metric and we will be reaching our annual point of minimum solar insulation in less than 4 weeks now. What did you expect it to do but go down? As El Nino has been an El No-show, we’ve not had a great amount of heat moving from ocean to atmosphere that would cause a large spike.

      • JCH | November 25, 2012 at 7:00 pm |

        Redraw it with 2010 and 2009.

      • Jim Cripwell | November 26, 2012 at 6:49 am |

        R.Gates writes “Do you think it has some significance that we should be watching it so closely?”

        Yes, I do. I am watching the relative values of daily/monthly temperatures for the 21st century. Earlier this month, 2012 was showing it was the warmest month since 2002. Now the value is less that some years. The warmists claim that, sooner or later, global temperatures must start rising at a rate significantly greater than 0.06 C per decade. What I am looking for is signs that this is happening. I can see none. But the first place that this trend will show up is in the daily tempertaure readings.

      • BillC | November 26, 2012 at 2:52 pm |

        JCH – not sure your point. I do this when i visit Aqua. If your point is the temperatures near the winter solstice (NH) don’t change much with the ENSO patterns – sure. Also don’t forget according to Spencer the Aqua data need to be adjusted down (which leaves it still hotter than the RSS mean, which helps against the accusations of manipulation). No badass El Ni~o this cycle anyway, it’s fun to be a lukewarmer.

      • JCH | November 26, 2012 at 3:36 pm |

        BillC – if ENSO neutral is hot enough to pin records on the wall, maybe it can pin a year.

    • Bill | November 25, 2012 at 7:20 pm |

      Does it matter?

  23. newclimatechangetheory | November 25, 2012 at 5:55 pm |

    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 or water constant when its pressure is changed in an adiabatic and isohaline manner.

    Gravity alone determines the change in pressure for a given atmospheric mass.

    It seems Roy Spencer and many 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 (described in my earlier posts above) demonstrates the validity of the above explanation (using the adiabatic lapse rate) and thus the fiction of the GHE conjecture.

    Refer Section 8 of this paper for more detail on Venus.

  24. Alexander Biggs | November 25, 2012 at 6:48 pm |

    One of the interesting things about an open thread is the choice of subjects it throws up. It exposes differences between cultures that go way back to our origins and can even negate our scientific beliefs. One such difference is that between US and Australian attitudes to religion. Australians tend to regard religion as a private matter. Your religion or lack of it is a matter between you and your god if you have one. So that would cover creationism as well. At present the only religious matter occupying our attention iis sme Catholic institution’s ill-tratment of children. although female genital mutilation is receiving some attention.

    As for a suitable topic for an open thread, How about the errors of the UN,s IPCC? I’ll list three:
    (1) The failure of the IPCC to explain in any convincing fashion climate between 1910 and 1940.
    (2) The failure of the IPCC to explain in convincing fashion the fall in global average temperature between 1940 and 1970.
    (3) The failure of the IPCC to explain the constant average global temperature between 2000 and the present..

    • bwdave | November 25, 2012 at 7:09 pm |

      (4) The failure of the IPCC to provide a plausible theory or measurable empirical relationship that supports their claimed CO2 effects.

    • Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 7:55 pm |

      More questions:

      (4) The failure of the IPCC to explain in convincing fashion the consequences of ACO2

      (5) The failure of the IPCC to explain in convincing fashion the consequences of the mitigation policies they advocate (that is the real consequences to the economies of the countries that might participate, and therefore the consequences for human well being)

      (6) The failure of the IPCC to explain in convincing fashion the likelihood that the mitigation policies they will advocate with actually fix the climate, sea levels, etc.

    • lolwot | November 26, 2012 at 4:14 pm |

      (1) the failure of climate skeptics to understand the science

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 4:32 pm |

        You must mean the failure of space cadets to move beyond a simplistic narrative in superficialy scientific language.

      • timg56 | November 28, 2012 at 1:50 pm |

        lolwot,

        Several valid points of discussion are provided and all you can do is throw out a vague claim about who can or can’t understand the science.

        Showing us once again that global warming is a faith based religion.

  25. Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 7:00 pm |

    Causes, Risks and Effects

    Causes: these are definite events or sets of circumstances that exist which give rise to uncertainty.

    Risks: these are uncertain events or sets of conditions that, if they occur, would positive or negative effects

    Effect: these are unplanned / unexpected variations from expected outcomes.

    It is important to keep a clear separation between causes, risks and effect during risk identification.

    Using meta language to distinguish risks

    “A a result of <definite cause>, <uncertain event> may occur, which would lead to <effect>”

    “A a result of ACO2 emissions, significant climate changes may occur, which would lead to ????”

    Most of the focus is on the causes and risk, but very little focus on the effects (or impacts or consequences).

    Why is this the case?

  26. Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 7:48 pm |

    David L Hagen,

    Consider too the consequencees of “green” policies especially on the poorest in developing countries.

    Absolutely. That is what is often forgotten when we look at only one issue and don’t consider all risks in a properly balanced way. that is the real beauty of risk management when done rigorously. All causes, risks and effects are considered. One of the beauties of the risk management process used in project management is that it applies the processes to positive and negative risks – i.e. costs and benefits. project management does that because opportunities to improve the project outcomes are just as important as the threats to project objectives.

    Expanding on your point, I’d suggest the following should be done:

    – risk analysis should consider the ACO2 as just one of many causes of risks that threaten us It should be considered in proper perspective

    – the probability that the advocated mitigation strategies (like CO2 pricing and renewable energy) will achieve the objective of fixing the climate and sea levels should be properly analysed

    – The other consequences of the advocated mitigation policies must be properly analysed. This is the really important one that is missing. Perhaps it is being intentionally avoided. The consequences of reducing the global GDP growth rate are very significant for human wellbeing. It is pretty clear there is a real reluctance to discuss this issue.

    The fact it is (apparently) being avoided is sends the message that those most concerned about CAGW have not really considered the effects – the most important part of the risk management process – very thoroughly.

  27. Beth Cooper | November 25, 2012 at 7:55 pm |

    A Book of Feathers.

    The Evolution of Birds.

    Making do with what’s at hand.
    In this case, ‘hands’ –
    Used to be ‘legs’ but they became
    Useless little arms
    With claw appendage. the kind
    You find on odd marsupials like kangaroos,
    And on that two-legged oddity
    Of the Jurassic, Dinosaur Theropod.
    By God! There’s a black swan development
    If ever there was one.

    Fossils unearthed in limestone quarries
    By homo sapien with evolutionary tools –
    Stone axes won’t do it, record
    The evolution of the therapod hand
    From flexing wrist of Velociraptor to
    Unenlagla’s wing-like flaps and
    Primitive feathers of Caudpteryx,
    Say, there’s a giant step for birds!
    Then the momentous uncovering of
    Flight feathers on fossil Archaeopterix,
    And we have lift off!

    While precisely ‘how’ or ‘why’ the wings
    Of birds evolve remains a mystery,
    Just when some homo sapiens think
    They – may – have -some kind of handle
    On the evolution of birds, tricky Nature
    Calls up another black swan, or cygnet, maybe,
    Seems some new – and – up – to – now – unknown
    Phenomenon has been at work in the evolution
    of birds.* For yet another evolutionary technology,
    X – ray CT scanning of bird skulls
    Throws new light on bird progression or
    Paradoxically, – regression. ‘Progenesis’
    They call it, seems, birds are really baby
    Dinosaurs. Precocious maturation of birds
    In just a few weeks, a portion of the life span
    Of therapods becomes the whole life span
    Of a new successful species.

    Praise be to tricky Nature for the evolution
    Of birds! Lords of the air, of updraft
    And perilous tumblings, of
    Uttereances of sweet song, of joy
    To the world and tremulous longing,
    Of feathers rivalling in pattern and profusion
    The spangled Universe, touchinging the imagination
    Of homo sapien, inspiring the visionary words
    Of poets, expressive of the delight and lamentation
    Of mature lovers, and the yearning dreams of adolescents.

    BC

    * (Study by A Abzhanov &B Bhullar, Harvard University.)

  28. Girma | November 25, 2012 at 8:28 pm |

    Remarkable correlation between CO2 concentration in the atmosphere and El Nino and La Nina:

    http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/compress:12/derivative/derivative/from:1979.3/normalise/plot/rss/compress:12/derivative/normalise

    Magic!

    This result demonstrates GMT and CO2 concentration in the atmosphere are genuine metrics of the climate.

    • Girma | November 25, 2012 at 11:11 pm |

      Correlation between CO2 concentration in the atmopshere and GMT => http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/compress:12/normalise/plot/esrl-co2/compress:12/derivative/normalise/from:1979.3/plot/rss/normalise/trend

      The Real History of Carbon Dioxide Levels
      Greenie Watch ^ | March 23, 2007 | Dr. John Ray
      Posted on Sun Mar 25 2007 07:45:59 GMT+0800 (W. Australia Standard Time) by WayneLusvardi

      The Real History of C02 Levels

      Prof. Beck’s paper “180 YEARS OF ATMOSPHERIC CO2 GAS ANALYSIS BY CHEMICAL METHODS” has now been published in the journal Energy and Environment.

      A PDF copy of the full paper can be obtained from the author: egbeck@biokurs.de.

      The short version of Beck’s paper can be found here: http://www.anenglishmanscastle.com/180_years_accurate_Co2_Chemical_Methods.pdf

      (Note: Chart could not be cut and pasted. Go to http://antigreen.blogspot.com/ to see chart)

      Excerpt below. It shows that actual past measurements of atmospheric CO2 have undergone great variation in levels from time to time in the period surveyed. Levels were not “flat” before the 20th century, as is usually asserted. There is a discussion of the paper here. I mentioned this matter previously on March 9th. — where there is also a link to an early version of the full paper.

      ABSTRACT

      More than 90,000 accurate chemical analyses of CO2 in air since 1812 are summarised. The historic chemical data reveal that changes in CO2 track changes in temperature, and therefore climate in contrast to the simple, monotonically increasing CO2 trend depicted in the post-1990 literature on climate-change.

      Since 1812, the CO2 concentration in northern hemispheric air has fluctuated exhibiting three high level maxima around 1825, 1857 and 1942 the latter showing more than 400 ppm. Between 1857 and 1958, the Pettenkofer process was the standard analytical method for determining atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, and usually achieved an accuracy better than 3%. These determinations were made by several scientists of Nobel Prize level distinction.

      Following Callendar (1938), modern climatologists have generally ignored the historic determinations of CO2, despite the techniques being standard text book procedures in several different disciplines. Chemical methods were discredited as unreliable, choosing only few which fit the assumption of a climate CO2 connection.

      THE CURRENT VIEWS ON CO2 AND CLIMATE CHANGE

      The causes, development and future projection of climate change are summarized in the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a United Nations body that is responsible for advising governments. The four consecutive Assessment Reports of the IPCC – issued in 1992, 1995, 2001 and 2007 – follow closely the views of three influential scientists, Arrhenius, Callendar and Keeling on the importance of CO2 as a control on climate change.

      Quote from Keeling (1978, p. 1 [1]). “The idea that CO2 from fossil fuel burning might accumulate in air and cause a warming of the lower atmosphere was speculated upon as early as the latter half of the nineteenth century (Arrhenius, 1903). At that time the use of fossil fuel was too slight to expect a rise in atmospheric CO2 to be detectable. The idea was again convincingly expressed by Callendar (1938, 1940) but still without solid evidence of a rise in CO2.”

      Following this line of argument, the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report (IPCC, 2001, chapter 3.1 [2]) contained the further explanation which makes it entirely explicit that direct measurements can only be relied on post 1957 and prior direct measurements can be disregarded in favour of indirect measurements made of air trapped in ice: “The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has risen from close to 280 parts per million (ppm) in 1800, at first slowly and then progressively faster to a value of 367 ppm in 1999, echoing the increasing pace of global agricultural and industrial development. This is known from numerous, well-replicated measurements of the composition of air bubbles trapped in Antarctic ice. Atmospheric CO2 concentration have been measured directly with high precision since 1957; these measurements agree with ice-core measurements, and show a continuation of the increasing trend up to the present.”

      In 1958 C.D. Keeling, University of California, San Diego, USA, introduced a new technique for the accurate measurement of atmospheric CO2. Keeling used cryogenic condensation of air samples followed by NDIR spectroscopic analysis against a reference gas, using manometric calibration. Subsequently, this technique was adopted as an analytical standard for CO2 determination throughout the world, including by the World Meteorological Association (WMO) [3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13].

      CO2 measuring stations are distributed across the globe. Most, however, are located in coastal or island areas in order to obtain air without contamination from vegetation, organisms and industrial activity, i.e. to establish the so-called background level of CO2. In considering such measurements, account should be taken of the established fact that land-derived air flowing seawards loses about 10 ppm of its carbon dioxide to dissolution in the oceans, and even more in colder waters (Henrys Law).

      THE ESTABLISHED CRITICAL VIEW ON HISTORICAL CO2 DATA

      A major issue regarding the IPCC approach to linking climate and CO2 is the assumption that prior to the industrial revolution the level of atmospheric CO2 was in an equilibrium state of about 280 ppm, around which little or no variation occurred. This presumption of constancy and equilibrium is based upon a critical review of the older literature on atmospheric CO2 content by Callendar and Keeling. (See Table 1). Between 1800 and 1961, more than 380 technical papers that were published on air gas analysis contained data on atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Callendar [16, 20, 24] Keeling and the IPCC did not provide a thorough evaluation of these papers and the standard chemical methods that they deployed. Rather, they discredited these techniques and data, and rejected most as faulty or highly inaccurate [20, 22, 23, 25, 26, 27]. Though they acknowledge the concept of an ‘unpolluted background level’ for CO2, these authors only examined about 10% of the available literature, asserting from that that only 1% of all previous data could be viewed as accurate (Muentz [28, 29, 30], Reiset [31], Buch [32]).

      THE CHALLENGE OF THE MAIN STREAM VIEW ON THE HISTORICAL DATA

      During my own review of the literature, I observed that the evaluation of Reiset’s and Muentz’s work by Callendar and Keeling was erroneous. This made me investigate carefully the criteria that were used by these and other authors to accept or to reject such historical data. The data accepted by Callendar and Keeling had to be sufficiently low to be consistent with the greenhouse hypothesis of climate change controlled by rising CO2 emissions from fossil fuel burning. Callendar rejected nearly all data before 1870 because of “relatively crude instrumentation” and reported only twelve suitable data sets in 20th century as known to him [20] out of 99 made available by Stepanova 1952 [18].

      The intent of these authors was to identify CO2 determinations that were made using pure unpolluted air, in order to assess the true background level of CO2. Callendar set out the criteria that he used to judge whether older determinations were “allowable” in his 1958 paper [20] which presents only data that fell within 10% of a longer yearly average estimated for the region, and also rejected all measurements, however accurate, that were “measurements intended for special purposes, such as biological, soil air, atmospheric pollution”.

      Next I cite the conclusion of the analysis of 19th centuries CO2 data by Keeling back in 1986 (From/Keeling 1986, pp. 101-103 [23]): “Our original goal was to find, if possible, a seasonal cycle in the nineteenth century atmospheric CO2 data in agreement with modern observations by applying the air mass criteria of Callendar (1940a) to screen out contaminated data. This goal we have demonstrated to be unachievable. We find, after screening out suspicious data on the basis of air mass, that none of the five data sets of Callendar show the seasonal cycle which Callendar found in combination. Brown and Escombe (1905b) investigated atmospheric carbon dioxide only as a sideline to botanical studies. They provide minimal information on methodology and weather conditions. A few of their data seem abnormally low. Their sampling was sporadic over a four year period at a site poorly chosen to study CO2, albeit convenient to their botanical laboratory. Their results are of interest mainly because they used an apparatus similar to Reiset’s which had been carefully tested by an independent method.” “In conclusion, the measurements of atmospheric carbon dioxide carried out by Reiset (1882) from 1872 to 1880 on the coast of northern France appear to be valid. They indicate a mean annual concentration, with respect to dry air, of 292.4 ~ 1.2 ppm. Comparisons with other possibly valid contemporary data suggest that these data are not biased by more than 10 ppm. It is thus unlikely that the CO2 concentration was less than 282 ppm in the late nineteenth century, and was probably close to 292 ppm.”

      There was no verification or falsification of results and methods used by other authors, especially those published in the 20th century (e.g. Lundegardh [35, 36], Duerst [37], Kreutz[38], Misra [39], Scholander [40]), with exception of Buch 1935 [32], lying on the “fuel line” (Callendar 1958 [20]). According to Callendar, Keeling and the IPCC, CO2 variations to be observed in air were due diurnal, and seasonal cycles, or to glacial/ interglacial fluctuations. Natural concentrations are assumed to have been in equilibrium until mankind disturbed the natural situation. In this way, any long term observations that might display decadal to centennial natural variations in atmospheric CO2 are ruled out a priori by Callendar and Keeling. As I discuss further below, these criticisms by Callendar and Keeling, and the selective way in which they discarded previous data, are not able to be justified. Their most egregious error was perhaps the dismissal of all data which showed variations from their presupposed average. That said, it is of course the case that some of the older data has to be viewed as less reliable for technical, analytical reasons, as also indicated below.

      […]

      DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

      During the late 20th century, the hypothesis that the ongoing rise of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is a result of fossil fuel burning became the dominant paradigm. To establish this paradigm, and increasingly since then, historical measurements indicating fluctuating CO2 levels between 300 and more than 400 ppmv have been neglected. A re-evaluation has been undertaken of the historical literature on atmospheric CO2 levels since the introduction of reliable chemical measuring techniques in the early to middle 19th century. More than 90,000 individual determinations of CO2 levels are reported between 1812 and 1961. The great majority of these determinations were made by skilled investigators using well established laboratory analytical techniques. Data from 138 sources and locations have been combined to produce a yearly average atmospheric CO2 curve for the northern hemisphere.

      The historical data that I have considered to be reliable can, of course, be challenged on the grounds that they represent local measurements only, and are therefore not representative on a global scale. Strong evidence that this is not the case, and that the composite historical CO2 curve is globally meaningful, comes from the correspondence between the curve and other global phenomena, including both sunspot cycles and the moon phases, the latter presented here probably for the first time in the literature, and the average global temperature statistic. Furthermore, that the historical data are reliable in themselves is supported by the credible seasonal, monthly and daily variations that they display, the pattern of which corresponds with modern measurements.

      It is indeed surprising that the quality and accuracy of these historic CO2 measurements has escaped the attention of other researchers. How to interpret the monthly variation of CO2 (see Fig. 5, 7, 9 and modern measurements e.g. Mauna Loa), which indicates a coincidence with the lunar phases, is another question to be dealt within a paper in preparation.

      Modern greenhouse hypothesis is based on the work of G.S. Callendar and C.D. Keeling, following S. Arrhenius, as latterly popularized by the IPCC. Review of available literature raise the question if these authors have systematically discarded a large number of valid technical papers and older atmospheric CO2 determinations because they did not fit their hypothesis? Obviously they use only a few carefully selected values from the older literature, invariably choosing results that are consistent with the hypothesis of an induced rise of CO2 in air caused by the burning of fossil fuel. Evidence for lacking evaluation of methods results from the finding that as accurate selected results show systematic errors in the order of at least 20 ppm. Most authors and sources have summarised the historical CO2 determinations by chemical methods incorrectly and promulgated the unjustifiable view that historical methods of analysis were unreliable and produced poor quality results

  29. Peter Lang | November 25, 2012 at 11:36 pm |

    The way forward – how to cut global ACO2

    Technology options:

    1. renewable energy –high cost, CO2 abatement cost ~ $300/tonne CO2

    2. biofuels – limited capacity and high cost. Can’t do much

    3. nuclear energy – with existing technology CO2 abatement cost would be about $65/tonne CO2 (in Australia based on current prices). However, the abatement cost could, eventually, be less than $0/tonne CO2 if the impediments to low cost nuclear power were removed and nuclear power was allowed to develop in a competitive market like all other technologies.

    US DOE has just announced a program to develop small modular reactors:
    http://energy.gov/articles/energy-department-announces-new-investment-us-small-modular-reactor-design-and

    But I wonder if this is the best approach to getting cheap clean energy to replace fossil fuels world wide. My concern is that the same massive bureaucracies are involved. And the same old, large, enormously bureaucratic organisations are involved: Babcock and Wilcox, TVA and Bechtel. They are good companies, but they are enormous. IMO, this is not the way to develop a competitive market of small modular reactors, and, therefore, all the benefits that competition brings.

    I’d prefer to see President Obama make an announcement:

    “Today I announce I will establish a new nuclear regulatory commission. Its purpose will be to identify and remove the impediments to low cost nuclear power so that all the world can benefit from it. The new body will advise government as to what impediments will require legislation to remove them. I’ve instructed all departments to facilitate the process.

    • gbaikie | November 26, 2012 at 12:07 am |

      “But I wonder if this is the best approach to getting cheap clean energy to replace fossil fuels world wide. My concern is that the same massive bureaucracies are involved. And the same old, large, enormously bureaucratic organisations are involved: Babcock and Wilcox, TVA and Bechtel. They are good companies, but they are enormous. IMO, this is not the way to develop a competitive market of small modular reactors, and, therefore, all the benefits that competition brings.”

      IBM made a PC, and did it to compete against Apple PC, but it helped make PC more universal. So probably biggest factor is these large companies will get quite of few patents. But despite people think large companies tend not to be competitive unless doing a lot right- or government is interfering. But even if US government intereferes, there is fortuately many other governments not so disposed to do so.
      So even if a small company was doing the same thing, having big corporations involved, it doesn’t mean it’s would problem. In fact many jump in now, maybe part of their business plan is to be bought up- or take over:)

  30. Peter Davies | November 26, 2012 at 12:05 am |

    I have always considered the attached link to be a useful intro to how and why quantum physics can be used to better explain observed pnenomena.

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 26, 2012 at 5:54 am |

        Peter,

        That article presents questionable views, or perhaps I should say, it’s erroneous and misleading.

        It tells correctly that Hamiltonian formulation of mechanics has clear similarities with QM but it’s false to claim that the two-slit experiment with electrons can be explained by any formulation of classical mechanics. A posteriori we can, of course, cherry pick parts of the classical mechanics leaving out other parts and then find that what’s left is consistent with this result, but that’s not at all the same thing.

        There are other similar faults in description of the consequences of the collapse of state in measurement. More complex issues are involved in that than Paul Quincey admits.

        ====

        A few words also on the many worlds interpretations of QM. As Brian Greene explains in his book The Hidden Reality there are actually many largely unrelated hypotheses that contain in one way or another multiple universes. Some of them have been built as answers to the problems in interpreting QM, other are related to the strange conclusions that we get if we assume that the universe is infinite.

        There are some proposals that the other universes would somehow affect our world. That would make them real but then we might also ask are they really other universes or rather extensions of that of ours. Most of the proposals are, however, purely metaphysical. They don’t change anything in what we may ever observe, they are just an alternative way of talking about the same physics. Whether they are a better or worse way than some other proposals is then purely a matter of taste and discussing them belongs to that part of philosophy that does not lead anywhere (except that any discussion may lead to genuinely new ideas).

        I think that I have understood all the ideas that Brian Greene tells about and some more but I’m not convinced that the ideas are of any real value.

      • Peter Davies | November 26, 2012 at 5:58 am |

        Doug. Soory about the typo :)

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 5:35 pm |

        Pekka Pirilä:

        That article presents questionable views, or perhaps I should say, it’s erroneous and misleading.

        While it does fine for some things which it gets right, I think that article does more harm than good because of what it gets wrong.

        Most of the proposals are, however, purely metaphysical. They don’t change anything in what we may ever observe, they are just an alternative way of talking about the same physics. Whether they are a better or worse way than some other proposals is then purely a matter of taste and discussing them belongs to that part of philosophy that does not lead anywhere (except that any discussion may lead to genuinely new ideas).

        Definitely. There’d be nothing wrong if they were restricted to philosophical discussions. The problem is lots of people promote them as serious, scientific ideas. As metaphysical views, they’re akin to religions. They’re purely a matter of faith. Promoting them as science is incredibly offensive.

        What I find especially mind-boggling is many people who promote those views as science are the same people condemning religious people as irrational. It’s crazy.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 5:47 pm |

        Oh, Pekka Pirilä reminded me of a point I find peculiar:

        other are related to the strange conclusions that we get if we assume that the universe is infinite.

        I always found this idea annoying. The idea assumes the universe is infinite in size (but we can’t see beyond a certain point because of distances and the acceleration of space). The idea is if the universe is infinite in size, there must be other universes just like ours within it. After all, anything that can happen will happen if you have an infinite number of chances.

        The logic is fine, even if it is based on an untestable assumption. My problem is why do people call it an example of multiple universes? There cannot be an infinite number of universes within our universe. Shouldn’t there be some other term used for these “universes”?

        It may just sound like semantics, but we’re (supposed to be) talking about science here. It’s supposed to be explicit, yet nobody promoting this idea ever is. Not only is it pseudoscience, it’s shoddy pseudoscience.

    • newclimatechangetheory | November 26, 2012 at 4:52 am |

      Yes, unless it’s used correctly and when applicable, about all it might do is better explain observed pneumonia – well you almost wrote that.

    • Peter Davies | November 26, 2012 at 6:07 am |

      Pekka, the main point of this paper IMO is that real world phenomena is better explained by reference to quantum physics/mechanics. The behaviour of weather and climate seems more consistent with quantum mechanics than with anything that classical physics can offer.

      Cant you visualise anything at all where quantum theory, as applied to macro events, might be a worthwhile avenue of investigation?

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 26, 2012 at 6:25 am |

        Peter,

        Quantum mechanics is certainly involved in understanding atmosphere. That’s most obvious in discussion of radiative energy transfer, i.e. in the absorption and emission of radiation at all wavelengths from UV to microwaves. The HITRAN database of the spectroscopic parameters is built combining empirical data and quantum mechanical models of the molecules. The theories of line broadening are also based on QM.

        That’s the only area that comes immediately to my mind where QM is explicitly used in understanding major effects related to atmospheric physics. Many devices used in empirical measurements have been developed using explicitly QM but that’s a little different issue.

        Digging deeper in any of the processes is likely to involve QM in one way or another, but most of the research is not likely to take explicit advantage of QM methods. I have probably overlooked some clear examples but I think that the general picture is as described above.

      • Peter Davies | November 26, 2012 at 7:53 am |

        Thanks for your thoughtful response Pekka. Your scientific background and positive contributions to this blog have been very much appreciated by me, notwithstanding that I disagree with your professed support for AGW.

        A considerable number of contributors to this blog negate and belittle their posts through unnecessary spite and abuse which switches me and many others off straight away.

  31. Mongoose | November 26, 2012 at 2:55 am |

    Here’s a real Conspiracy Theory: Maurice Strong set up the UN Environment Programme which set up the IPCC. Strong felt it was/is his responsibility to destroy Western industrial civilisation. The founding mandate of the IPCC is to prove that ‘climate change’ is ‘human-induced’ due to human CO2 emissions. Conclusion: fund scientists to ‘prove’ it, fund NGOs to campaign for human CO2 emissions reductions, get the media to hype up the ‘dangers’ and governments (especially in the UK and Europe) to legislate, fine and tax CO2 and enable some to make money out of it – and, hey presto, we have the destruction of Western industrial civilisation.

    • David Wojick | November 26, 2012 at 6:50 am |

      Mongoose, your conspiracy model misses the fact that CAGW is part of a green mass movement. Strong has played a role but so have many others, especially in national governments. The members of UNEP are over 100 governments, some quite active. Every member country of UNEP is a member of IPCC, as are all member countries of WMO which jointly owns IPCC. Climate research supporting CAGW is funded by national governments, especially the US, not IPCC. So are a lot of the so-called communication efforts. These countries are responding to popular pressure not Strong. CAGW is a political movement not a conspiracy.

      • Herman Alexander Pope | November 26, 2012 at 11:12 am |

        political movement not a conspiracy

        political movement and conspiracy are very often the same thing

      • David Wojick | November 26, 2012 at 11:58 am |

        Pope: do you have an example of a political movement that is identical to a conspiracy? Political movements may spawn local conspiracies, such as the Russian coup or the US Declaration of Independence. But a political movement involves large numbers of people who do not know one another, while a conspiracy is a highly organized effort. They are almost opposites as far as network theory is concerned.

      • Mongoose | November 28, 2012 at 2:49 am |

        Most Greens and Leftists have been hoodwinked by the Malthusian anti-masses ideology into believing that CO2 is harming the planet, poor etc. Being hoodwinked means that they have not understood the implications of that nefarious ideology – these implications being the destruction of industrialised civilisation. Such destruction, if it happens, would worsen conditions for ordinary folk – which many Greens and most Leftists would not want. You are right that this nefarious ideology has (by hoodwinking so many) become a hugely powerful movement.

    • omanuel | November 26, 2012 at 7:26 am |

      There may be merit in your analysis. It fits empirical facts.

  32. Beth Cooper | November 26, 2012 at 3:54 am |

    Mongoose, luv yer name and agree with yer message and
    herewith award Maurice Stong the 2012 HUBRIS Award.

  33. Beth Cooper | November 26, 2012 at 4:22 am |

    Lol .. Maurice ‘Stong’ should have written ‘Sting.’

  34. Doug Cotton | November 26, 2012 at 4:37 am |

    Sorry, gbaikie, but you are forgetting the the Venus atmosphere is nearly all carbon dioxide, and is about 92 to 94 times the mass of Earth’s atmosphere. The result of this is that the insolation reaching the Venus surface is reduced so much by the dense atmosphere that it ends up being only about 10% of the insolation received from the Sun at Earth’s surface. Yet the Venus surface is about 500 degrees hotter.

    What happens is that the adiabatic lapse rate, determined by the planet’s acceleration due to gravity, sets the gradient of the temperature plot. Most incoming Solar radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere, and, quite independently of any of the radiation from the surface, the base of the atmosphere ends up being about 500 degrees above the mean radiating temperature. It is a simple matter for the hot base of the atmosphere to then heat the surface to almost the same temperature, mostly by conduction as molecules collide with the surface.

    Please read this article for more detail.

    Doug Cotton
    Science Researcher and Author for PSI

    • gbaikie | November 26, 2012 at 8:59 am |

      “Sorry, gbaikie, but you are forgetting the the Venus atmosphere is nearly all carbon dioxide, and is about 92 to 94 times the mass of Earth’s atmosphere.”
      Not forgetting.
      But one can talk about the surface of Earth ocean, which is very small part of the Earth’s ocean.
      Venus vs Earth
      Earth’s atmospheric mass is 5.1 x 10^18 kg and Venus: ~4.8 x 10^20 kg
      and 96.5% Carbon Dioxide (CO2), 3.5% Nitrogen (N2)
      http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/factsheet/venusfact.html
      So, probably closer to 94 times the mass and Venus has more atmosphere
      of N2 and probably a lot more tiny droplets of sulphuric acid than earth.
      “Sulfur Dioxide (SO2) – 150 ppm”
      With H2O being around 20 ppm, it’s very dry atmosphere but because there so much atmosphere the total amount of H2O in Venus atmosphere more than one might imagine- and there is about 7 times more SO2.

      “Sulphur dioxide (SO2) is a colourless gas with a characteristic and irritating smell. This odour is perceptible at different levels depending on the individual’s sensitivity, but is generally perceived between 0.3-1.4 ppm and is easily noticeable at 3 ppm (Baxter, 2000; Wellburn, 1994). SO2 is non-flammable, not explosive and relatively stable. It is more than twice as dense as ambient air (2.62 g L-1 at 25°C and 1 atm (Lide, 2003)) and is highly soluble in water (85 g L-1 at 25°C (Gangolli, 1999)). On contact with moist membranes, SO2 forms sulphuric acid (H2SO4), which is responsible for its severe irritant effects on the eyes, mucous membranes and skin (Komarnisky et al., 2003).

      Typically, the concentration of SO2 in dilute volcanic plumes is <10 ppm, as little as 10 km downwind of the source, compared to the tropospheric background of 0.00001-0.07 ppm "
      http://www.ivhhn.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=82

      The quantity of H2SO4 as droplets in Venus clouds is similar to droplet of water in Earth's clouds. And main difference seems that Venus is [or can be] more cloudy than Earth.

    • gbaikie | November 26, 2012 at 9:17 am |

      “The result of this is that the insolation reaching the Venus surface is reduced so much by the dense atmosphere that it ends up being only about 10% of the insolation received from the Sun at Earth’s surface. Yet the Venus surface is about 500 degrees hotter.”

      I am not sure of amount, but it could be 10% of Earth.
      Wiki says:
      “The actual brightness of sunlight that would be observed at the surface depends also on the presence and composition of an atmosphere. For example Venus’ thick atmosphere reflects more than 60% of the solar light it receives. The actual illumination of the surface is about 14,000 lux, comparable to that on Earth “in the daytime with overcast clouds” ”
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunlight

      But it seem to depend where one was on the surface in various location
      on the sun lit side of Venus- and perhaps how cloudy it was at the moment.
      But we can agree that probably in no place [including highest peaks] and at no time, does the surface have as much sunlight as surface of Earth.
      Perhaps that is wrong, but it’s seems to me to be a good assumption.
      On the other side of it, it normally get pretty dark in places and times on the sun lit side of Venus at the surface.

    • bob droege | November 26, 2012 at 2:34 pm |

      How did Venus get so much CO2 in the atmosphere in the first place?
      Do you know that the adiabatic lapse rate is caused by the greenhouse effect?

      • gbaikie | November 26, 2012 at 8:49 pm |

        “How did Venus get so much CO2 in the atmosphere in the first place?”

        It’s an interesting question- not sure there is answer. Except the CO2 is fairly commonly in solar system/universe.
        Why does Earth have so much water? Why does Mercury have no atmosphere?
        One way to look at Venus is why does it have so much carbon. It could started out with a lot more Methane, as the source of carbon.

        “Saturn’s orange moon Titan has hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all the known oil and natural gas reserves on Earth, according to new data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft. The hydrocarbons rain from the sky, collecting in vast deposits that form lakes and dunes. ”
        …
        Cassini has mapped about 20 percent of Titan’s surface with radar. Several hundred lakes and seas have been observed, with each of several dozen estimated to contain more hydrocarbon liquid than Earth’s oil and gas reserves. The dark dunes that run along the equator contain a volume of organics several hundred times larger than Earth’s coal reserves.
        http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/media/cassini-20080213.html

        Perhaps Venus had a much more massive atmosphere than it does now, something like a small gas giant.

        “Do you know that the adiabatic lapse rate is caused by the greenhouse effect?”

        Suppose you had long pipe, say 2 km long and 10 meter diameter; and placed vertical on the Moon, and put some nitrogen in it.
        Would expect denser air at the bottom of pipe.
        And would expect warmer air to rise?
        If the warmer air is less dense at the top of pipe, doesn’t the lower density of it make it less warm?

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 27, 2012 at 4:14 am |

        Adiabatic lapse rate is maintained by vertical convection that’s nearly adiabatic.

        No real convection is totally adiabatic but some dissipation is always present. To maintain convection in presence of dissipation work is required.

        The only significant source of work is an atmospheric heat engine. An atmospheric heat engine requires that heat enters atmosphere at a higher temperature and leaves at a lower one. When the source of energy is solar radiation we need a situation where the solar energy reaches the point of absorption more easily than radiation from that point can exit the atmosphere. The greenhouse effect is by definition the mechanism that leads to this situation.

        Without greenhouse effect the average temperatures would not depend strongly on the altitude in the atmosphere. The adiabatic lapse rate would not be seen as there would not be convection to maintain it.

        Less obvious is the altitude range where the atmospheric heat engine operates on Venus. The cold side of the engine is certainly at the top of the atmosphere but the hot side could be both on the surface and somewhere in the atmosphere, perhaps at the top of the sulphuric acid clouds. A heat engine operating high up in the atmosphere may drive convection also at lower altitudes.

        The heat from the interior of the planet can also contribute to the heat engine but the energy flux related to that is also on Venus very small in comparison with the radiation from Sun.

      • gbaikie | November 27, 2012 at 6:30 pm |

        “Adiabatic lapse rate is maintained by vertical convection that’s nearly adiabatic. ”
        yeah.

        “No real convection is totally adiabatic but some dissipation is always present. To maintain convection in presence of dissipation work is required.”
        Ok. Moon is not absolute zero, and so work is done.

        No upward convection due to buoyancy occurs when one isn’t in a gravity well. So, zero gravity and gas, there is no lapse rate.
        Though one heated side of something and gas temperature would slowly spread [so difference in temperature]. So box in space with no gravity, heat one wall, and it tends to hotter nearer the wall. And since air is lousy conductor or convector of heat without buoyancy, one could have extreme difference in temperature as one went further from a hot wall. And higher density of gas in box should have larger temperature differences.

        Or upward convection is ceases when gas achieves Adiabatic lapse rate in a gravity well. Which on earth with it’s day and night differences one should have changing amounts of upward convection, rather ever reaching zero convection due to buoyancy.

        “The only significant source of work is an atmospheric heat engine. An atmospheric heat engine requires that heat enters atmosphere at a higher temperature and leaves at a lower one. When the source of energy is solar radiation we need a situation where the solar energy reaches the point of absorption more easily than radiation from that point can exit the atmosphere. The greenhouse effect is by definition the mechanism that leads to this situation.

        Without greenhouse effect the average temperatures would not depend strongly on the altitude in the atmosphere. The adiabatic lapse rate would not be seen as there would not be convection to maintain it.”

        A major effect upon lapse rate, is water content:
        Dry and wet adiabatic lapse rate. Humidity in the air reduces the lapse rate, so very humid can get around 3 C per 1000 meter, instead around 6 C per 1000 meters of elevation.
        I would guess a wet adiabatic lapse rate increases convection- or water vapor is more sensitive/responsive to warming or cooling conditions.
        I see no reason a greenhouse gas other than water, would have much or any effect.

    • David Springer | November 26, 2012 at 5:40 pm |

      Nonsense.

      Can you spell internal heat? I knew you could.

      Venus’ atmosphere at 90+ bar CO2 insulates the molten core just like the earth’s crustal rocks insulate the earth’s molten core. If you dig down a few miles into the earth’s crust you reach temperatures as high as the surface on Venus. Digging down through 90 bar CO2 is like digging down into the rocks on the earth. Very little solar energy penetrates the thick cloud layer on Venus. Amost all the solar energy is absorbed and radiated back out to space in the cloud layer.

      This has been known since it was discovered in the 1960’s that Venus’ surface is isothermal. It’s the same temperature day/night equator/pole. What makes that such a good trick is that it’s day is some 200 earth days long and that STILL isn’t enough to make the dayside surface hotter than the nightside surface. The surface winds are slow as molasses which was also discovered 50+ years ago by Russian radar. You see the surface is all kinds of bumpy. With a 90 bar atmosphere any slight breeze will pick up rocks and sandblast the surface smooth as a billiard ball.

      • bob droege | November 26, 2012 at 7:11 pm |

        There is no insulator that can keep something that hot for millions of years.
        Tell me again, how did Venus get such a thick atmosphere?
        I know you can’t, but you might as well try.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 7:29 pm |

        bob droege

        You can’t tell us how Venus got the atmosphere it got, but I can tell you definitely how it did NOT get the climate it got: from piddling human emissions of CO2.

        Hansen’s “Venus runaway” on Earth is totally absurd.

        But, then again, so are most of his pronouncements.

        Max

      • bob droege | November 26, 2012 at 8:22 pm |

        Hi Max,
        Some scientists try to explain the facts that they discover.
        The facts are that Venus has an unusual amount of CO2 in its atmosphere and an unusually high percentage of dueterium in the hydrogen that is present.
        It is hard to explain how a planet smaller than earth could capture almost 100 times the amount of gas during the condensation of the terrestrial bodies in the solar sysem. Especially considering carbon dioxide is not a very common gas in the kind of gas clouds that condensed to form the solar sysem.
        Max, do you care to take a stab at explaining the dueterium anomaly?

      • gbaikie | November 26, 2012 at 9:06 pm |

        “Some scientists try to explain the facts that they discover.
        The facts are that Venus has an unusual amount of CO2 in its atmosphere and an unusually high percentage of dueterium in the hydrogen that is present.”

        Hydrogen [gas] is the most common element in the universe.
        One has few possibility.
        That Venus was in orbit around the sun, before the sun was bright [or began on it’s main sequence].
        Or did a major amount of Venus’ planetary formation occur after the Sun started to shine- in terms of Earth it’s thought this is the case.
        Or did most Venus formation occur in different location then it is now.
        Or one or more of the above.

  35. Edim | November 26, 2012 at 8:51 am |

    Alarmism as usual.
    Animals are already dissolving in Southern Ocean acid
    http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn22531-animals-are-already-dissolving-in-southern-ocean-acid.html

  36. Tomas Milanovic | November 26, 2012 at 9:34 am |

    Peter Davies

    The behaviour of weather and climate seems more consistent with quantum mechanics than with anything that classical physics can offer.

    You are absolutely right and in more ways than one.
    You have on one side the obvious use for radiative physics. For instance a system which is not in LTE (e.g high altitude low pressure gas) can only be described by QM. If you want to describe the absorption/emission process with any degree of accuracy, you must use QM too.
    This whole technical kitchen is already used.
    But there is also another more paradigmatic level which is probably what you had in mind.
    For what is QM?
    It is a linear, probabilistic, field theory where every word has a huge importance.
    It is linear and thus it obeys the superposition principle (a linear combination of solutions is solution). Many of its properties (f.ex interference) are due to the fundamental linearity.
    It is probabilistic because it is impossible to predict an outcome of an experiment. Only probabilities can be predicted and the outcome of an experiment is necessarily an Eigenvalue of an operator with associated probability. This property is paramount because it falsifies all local, realistic theories. In other words the system is in no defined state before observation. The process which leads from the probabilities to the actual observation of an Eigenvalue which has been considered mysterious for a long time is now well described as decoherence.
    And it is a field theory because the fundamental reality are fields , e.g functions F(x,y,z,t). The (linear) field equation is the Schrödinger equations gives for solution the probability fields for all observables. The relevant mathematical tools for field theories, the Hilbert space with the associated measure which gives the phase space are well developed too.
    Now what is weather/climate ?
    A non linear, probabilistic, field theory. And clearly there are more similarities with QM than differences.
    The obvious difference is the non linearity. The superposition principle doesn’t work what makes interactions among fields much more complicated.
    But it is also probabilistic. The reason for that is that as the system is chaotic, no unique deterministic prediction is possible. Only probabilities for future states could be predicted in the best case. Unfortunately we have not an equivalent of Schrödinger equation which would give these probabilities explicitly. This field of study – looking for equations governing the probability distributions is virginal. No climate scientist has the skill or interest to look for the only relevant parameter – the probability distribution density.
    And it is obviously a field theory. All relevant variables are fields (temperatures, pressures, densities, concentrations …) e.g functions T(x,y,z,t) etc. Because it is a field theory, the correct formalism developed for QM should be used too. The phase space is an infinite dimensional Hilbert space etc. Even if this formalism is routinely used in fluid mechanics which deals with Navier Stokes field equations, it is not used in climate science. Sure, the field interactions are more complicated and not all field equations are known but using mathematical tools which already made their proofs always allows better understanding than using inadequate tools.
    So yes, I agree with you, weather/climate studies have much to win by looking for inspiration to the methods and tools of QM or to non linear dynamics. If they don’t do so, it is probably because climate scientists are not trained in these disciplines.

    • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 26, 2012 at 9:59 am |

      Tomas, while that is basically true, there is more than one way to skin a catfish. I don’t need to determine every potential eddy or whirl in a pipe to pretty accurately size one to deliver a flow with available head pressure. I can size the pipe and use a valve to make adjustments if required.

      So in climate, given the less than stellar accuracy of the data, you can use a simple coarse model and look for the anomalies. A learn as you go method to figure out what else you need to know to solve the problem for a specific purpose, like estimating time constants and rough impact ranges.

      The problem with climate science is they are trying to figure out all the whirls and eddies without considering the anomalies, asymmetry and general uncertainties which would build the PDF. In other words, they believe their models instead of learn from them.

      • Spence_UK | November 27, 2012 at 3:15 am |

        Tomas, while that is basically true, there is more than one way to skin a catfish. I don’t need to determine every potential eddy or whirl in a pipe to pretty accurately size one to deliver a flow with available head pressure.

        But you do when the magnitude of the changes are of the same order as the magnitude of the variability due to the eddies. Which appears to be the case for the current dose of climate change (e.g. Cohn and Lins)

    • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 26, 2012 at 10:02 am |

      Tomas Milanovic, you will be glad to learn that the climate-change research that your post asserts does not exist has been thoroughly reviewed by Martyushev and Seleznev!

      @article{
      Author = {Martyushev, L. M. and Seleznev, V. D.},
      Journal = {Physics Reports},
      Number = {1},
      Pages = {1--45},
      Title = {Maximum entropy production principle
      in physics, chemistry and biology},
      Volume = {426},
      Year = {2006}
      }

      See in particular Section 3.1 “Transfer in the atmosphere and oceans” for an extensive survey of this very active and rapidly evolving area of climate-change research.

      It is a pleasure to help update your understanding, Tomas Milanovic! \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\heartsuit\heartsuit\heartsuit}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 5:24 am |

        There is no fundamental theory defining entropy production in a nonequilibrium system comparable to the 2nd law of thermodynamics in an equilibrium system. http://rd.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00114-009-0509-x#

        So while linking these concepts in a statistical thermodynamics of nonequilibrium systems might be a worthy goal it is far from a complete project.

        Don’t we often find that fan has no fundamental appreciation of the things he cites? Worthless distraction from a sensible scientific discussion from Tomas in my opinion.

        Does anyone believe anything this person says? Incredible.

      • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 27, 2012 at 1:58 pm |

        Thank you for an outstanding literature reference, Chief Hydrologist!

        It’s particularly striking that the Axel Kleidon article that you posted, namely Nonequilibrium thermodynamics and maximum entropy production in the Earth system (2009) reaches the same conclusions [and in fact references and praises highly in its concluding section!] the same article that I posted, namely Martyushev and Seleznev’s Maximum entropy production principle in physics, chemistry and biology (2006).

        And it’s terrific that both of these fine articles help us appreciate why Hansen’s simple thermodynamical reasoning yields such a strikingly accurate picture of anthropogenic climate change, eh? \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries!!!}}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

        It’s a good thing — essential in fact to the long-term survival of republican democracy — that climate-change science helps us appreciate the long-term consequences of our actions!

        That’s why every rational conservative rejoices in stronger climate-change science, eh Chief Hydrologist? \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries!!!}}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 2:33 pm |

        The progress of science depends depends on going down many paths that might not bear fruit. This is certainly the case with a statistical thermodynamics of nonequilibrium systems at the moment. There is a an approach and there have been for decades but there are no practical applications in climate. No solutions to the pertinent statisitcal properties of the system. To pretend that it is otherwise is foolish.

        ‘Atmospheric and oceanic forcings are strongest at global equilibrium scales of 10^7 m and seasons to millennia. Fluid mixing and dissipation occur at microscales of 10^−3 m and 10^−3 s, and cloud particulate transformations happen at 10^−6 m or smaller. Observed intrinsic variability is spectrally broad band across all intermediate scales. A full representation for all dynamical degrees of freedom in different quantities and scales is uncomputable even with optimistically foreseeable computer technology. No fundamentally reliable reduction of the size of the AOS dynamical system (i.e., a statistical mechanics analogous to the transition between molecular kinetics and fluid dynamics) is yet envisioned. ‘ http://www.pnas.org/content/104/21/8709.full

        ‘Finally, Lorenz’s theory of the atmosphere (and ocean) as a chaotic system raises fundamental, but unanswered questions about how much the uncertainties in climate-change projections can be reduced. In 1969, Lorenz [30] wrote: ‘Perhaps we can visualize the day when all of the relevant physical principles will be perfectly known. It may then still not be possible to express these principles as mathematical equations which can be solved by digital computers. We may believe, for example, that the motion of the unsaturated portion of the atmosphere is governed by the Navier–Stokes equations, but to use these equations properly we should have to describe each turbulent eddy—a task far beyond the capacity of the largest computer. We must therefore express the pertinent statistical properties of turbulent eddies as functions of the larger-scale motions. We do not yet know how to do this, nor have we proven that the desired functions exist’. Thirty years later, this problem remains unsolved, and may possibly be unsolvable.’ http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1956/4751.full

        So sad – too bad you have a very unreal argument in scientific terms. But I am used to that from you. The world is not warming for a decade or three more at least – for progress to be made this is front and centre. Reality rather than unreality. The question is how you progress to incorporating that in a sensible political strategy.

        http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 2:43 pm |

        Chief Hydro said:

        ” The world is not warming for a decade or three more at least…”

        And by “world” he means to exclude the oceans apparently, which conveniently would be the “worlds” largest storage of any excess energy caused by greenhouse gas concentration increases. Again, how convenient to exclude this.

        Chief, do you mean to insinuate that the oceans too will be cooling for your “decade or three”? As there is no evidence of that as of yet…

      • Handel | November 27, 2012 at 3:05 pm |

        @gates
        ……. the oceans … which … would be the “worlds” largest storage of any excess energy caused by greenhouse gas concentration increases.

        For greenhouse warming to be the cause of increased ocean temperatures, it must first warm the atmosphere, so that the resultant reduced ocean-atmosphere temperature gradient causes a lower rate of ocean cooling to the atmosphere.

        But since atmospheric temperatures have not been rising some some decade and a half, the greenhouse effect cannot be behind any rising ocean temperatures. Something else must be. Any ideas?

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 3:05 pm |

        I think you are descending into dishonesty and inability to process anomalous information. Cult of AGW millennialist groupthink. Odd that the link I provided to NASA shows a pretty picture of a thermally enhanced Pacific. How is the discussion with Sydney Levitus going btw?

        I have consistently cited ARGO – http://www.ocean-sci-discuss.net/8/999/2011/osd-8-999-2011.pdf – and CERES – http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo1375.html

        Mind you the net CERES change is all SW – which can’t be right.

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=CERES_MODIS.gif

        Before that there was a ‘climatologically significant change before CERES followed by a long period of insignificant change.’

        http://www.bbso.njit.edu/Research/EarthShine/

        Changes in cloud as well associated with the PDO in surface and satellite observations.

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=Clementetal2009.png

        We are in a cool Pacific mode – and these last 20 to 40 years. The discussion has achieved epic bizzarre status. Not quite up to the standard of blah blah, webby or fan – but pretty good.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 27, 2012 at 6:47 pm |

        Handel said:

        “For greenhouse warming to be the cause of increased ocean temperatures, it must first warm the atmosphere…”
        _____
        This is true, and have you noticed that our current temperatures are at their highest in many centuries?

        But remember that net planetary heat flow is from ocean to atmosphere. Say that to yourself until it sinks in:

        NET PLANETARY HEAT FLOW IS FROM OCEAN TO ATMOSPHERE.

        So, yes, for the oceans to warm, the atmosphere must warm slightly, but not in equal measure to the kinds of energy that the oceans store. The atmosphere only serves as the thermal gradient between the stored solar energy sink of the planet (the ocean) the the final stored solar energy drain for the planet (space). When you alter the thermal gradient of the atmosphere by making it less steep through GH gases, the oceans store more heat stays in the ocean. Say this to yourself until is sinks in…

        THE ATMOSPHERE IS THE THERMAL GRADIENT BETWEEN OCEAN AND SPACE.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 7:26 pm |

        And still the satellites show the change in toa energy flows are almost entirely in the SW. And the ocean heat content closely follows the net flux.

        ‘In summary, although there is independent evidence for decadal changes in TOA radiative fluxes over the last two decades, the evidence is equivocal. Changes in the planetary and tropical TOA radiative fluxes are consistent with independent global ocean heat-storage data, and are expected to be dominated by changes in cloud radiative forcing. To the extent that they are real, they may simply reflect natural low-frequency variability of the climate system.’ IPCC 3.4.4.1

        If low frequency climate variability is real? Yeah right.

        http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703

      • Handel | November 28, 2012 at 2:09 am |

        @Gates
        You are singing to the choir here – the points you ask me to note, are some of the very points I was making to you. To wit :

        (1) Net planetary heat flow is from ocean to atmosphere
        (2) The atmosphere is the thermal gradient between ocean and space
        (3) If atmospheric temperature rises, this thermal gradient becomes less steep, and so more heat stays in the ocean.

        To these I added merely that

        (4) Since the atmosphere has not being warming for 15+ years, any increase in OHC during that period that may have occurred, can only be due to some factor/s other than atmospheric warming.
        (5) And since greenhouse warming is obviously an atmospheric phenomenon, greenhouse warming too cannot be behind any ocean warming that may have occurred during the these 15+ years.

        Which leaves us with a question : since greenhouse warming is not behind OHC increases, what factors are behind it ?

      • Handel | November 28, 2012 at 2:20 am |

        @Chief
        And still the satellites show the change in toa energy flows are almost entirely in the SW. And the ocean heat content closely follows the net flux

        Which also suggests that greenhouse warming is not what is behind OHC increases, since this would require that toa energy flow changes would need to be in LW.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 2:29 am |

        Gates, In practice, what we observe are two thermal gradients operating in parallel. The “hotter” more-steep thermal gradient is between the land and the radiating atmosphere, and the “cooler” less-steep thermal gradient is between the ocean and the atmosphere. The ocean picks up and locks in more of the incoming radiation as it travels down through the atmosphere. The ocean can obviously store more thermal energy as it has a much higher heat capacity than the land does.

        Bottom-line is that the land is closer to the eventual equilibrium climate sensitivity while the ocean is tracking closer to the transient climate sensitivity,
        FWIW, James Hansen was describing this thermal transient behavior nearly 30 years ago. In the paper Hansen calls it “unrealized warming”, which is heat entering into the ocean without raising the climate temperature substantially.
        http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/1985/1985_Hansen_etal.pdf

        Who has debunked this? The physical reasoning behind the behavior is solid.

    • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 26, 2012 at 10:12 am |

      Actually here is a good example,
      http://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/blog/isaac-held/2011/03/19/time-dependent-climate-sensitivity/

      Held is a smart guy. He and are few others are curious why their models produce non-linear responses to forcing instead of trying to figure out why they would expect a linear response to forcing. A simple model pretty much indicates that response should be non-linear and the data indicates that the time constants are pretty long.

    • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 26, 2012 at 10:29 am |

      CaptDallas2, thank you for that fine link to to Isaac Held’s research on long-term CO2 sensitivity.

      When Held’s common-sense analysis and explanation of CO2 sensitivity is combined with recent advances in our understanding of lethally hot equatorial temperatures associated to climate change, then it scarcely seems possible for any rational, scientifically-informed person to remain a climate-change skeptic, eh? \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\frown}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries?!?}}\ \overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\frown}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 7:31 pm |

        fan said:

        “scarcely seems possible for any rational, scientifically-informed person to remain a climate-change skeptic…”
        _____
        That’s because the bulk of them are not true skeptics but simply deniers wearing a skeptic’s skin (and most don’t even realize it). Even if the CO2 goes to 2000 ppm and the ice caps are long gone and every glacier is gone and the oceans have risen dozen of meters and the food chain is disrupted and we have a climate like the Miocene, there would be those who would claim it was all natural variability…assuming of course humans were still around to make such claims. I’m not suggesting, BTW, any of the above will happen, but simply show how steadfast they are in their beliefs…and that’s the whole point…they are beliefs and not rational thought or logic.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 5:55 am |

        ‘However, the nature of these past shifts in climate state suggests the possibility of near constant temperature lasting a decade or more into the future must at least be entertained. The apparent lack of a proximate cause behind the halt in warming post 2001/02 challenges our understanding of the climate system, specifically the physical reasoning and causal links between longer time-scale modes of internal climate variability and the impact of such modes upon global temperature.

        Fortunately, climate science is rapidly developing the tools to meet this challenge, as in the near future it will be possible to attribute cause and effect in decadal-scale climate variability within the context of a seamless climate forecast system [Palmer et al., 2008]. Doing so is vital, 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

        Palmer in fact – as any sensible modeller does – recognises the probabilistic nature of ‘seamless’ forecasting die to the chaotic nature of both models and climate.

        ‘Prediction of weather and climate are necessarily uncertain: our observations of weather and climate are uncertain, the models into which we assimilate this data and predict the future are uncertain, and external effects such as volcanoes and anthropogenic greenhouse emissions are also uncertain. Fundamentally, therefore, therefore we should think of weather and climate predictions in terms of equations whose basic prognostic variables are probability densities ρ(X,t) where X denotes some climatic variable and t denoted time. In this way, ρ(X,t)dV represents the probability that, at time t, the true value of X lies in some small volume dV of state space.’ (Predicting Weather and Climate – Palmer and Hagedorn eds – 2006)

        Regardless – there are 2 immediate concerns that arise from S&T09. The first is that climate sensitivity can be negative or positive and is unknowable. At least until we get some seriously interesting probabilistic forecasts. The other is the lack of warming for another decade or three.

        These 2 things seem almost a tragedy unfolding. The lack of warming creating a social environment in which climate change is a lost cause and the risk of catastrophic climate change in a decade or less.

        It is astonishing to me that this is not regarded as at least a possibility by the cult of AGW groupthink space cadets. They are so unutterably convinced of their rightness and moral goodness that no doubt can be considered. This is of course a symptom of millennialist groupthink.

        Science has spoken – and though I suggest it does seem to have a more nuanced view – it is enough to make me the enemy. It is funny in a way – they have such a conviction of peril and a magical solution but are utterly clueless. I predict it will all end badly.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 3:05 pm |

        Regardless – there are 2 immediate concerns that arise from S&T09. The first is that climate sensitivity can be negative or positive and is unknowable.

        Still utterly incapable from sorting the short-term transient events from the long term trends I see.

        Also, before things get any worse, I’d check the formal definitions of TCR and ECS again if I were you.

        It’s a sort of mental illness, isn’t it old chap?

        So sad, too bad.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 3:07 pm |

        Oops – nearly forgot the essential we-are-handwaving quote from dear old S&T:

        If as suggested here, a dynamically driven climate shift has occurred, the duration of similar shifts during the 20th century suggests the new global mean temperature trend may persist for several decades. Of course, it is purely speculative to presume that the global mean temperature will remain near current levels for such an extended period of time. Moreover, we caution that the shifts described here are presumably superimposed upon a long term warming trend due to anthropogenic forcing. However, the nature of these past shifts in climate state suggests the possibility of near constant temperature lasting a decade or more into the future must at least be entertained.

        Did you spot the tell-tale mention-ette of short term shifts vs long term trends in there CH?

        ;-)

      • Steady Eddie | November 27, 2012 at 3:17 pm |

        You really are trying to get blood out of a stone here BBD.
        They observe the actual short term non-warming, and then blithely just regurgitate the ‘consensus’ presumption that this is over a long-term trend.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 3:18 pm |

        BBD

        Sounds to me like a classical “cop-out” clause.

        “It’s warming, but it may look like it’s cooling for a decade or more but, believe us, folks, it’s warming.”

        Duh!

        What if it isn’t really warming?

        Oops!

        At some point in the not too distant future, BBD, the jig will be up. If it hasn’t warmed for another couple of years,the IPCC CAGW premise will have been falsified by the facts on the ground.

        Poof!

        Max

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 3:26 pm |

        At some point in the not too distant future, BBD, the jig will be up.

        You what? That’s denialist claptrap Max.

        OHC, remember?

        You lot really are a joke. I genuinely expected better from Dr Curry’s denizens. I’m actually f*****g appalled.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 4:02 pm |

        Sensitivity in a chaotic system is defined both away from points of bifurcation and at saddle points. Near a chaotic bifurcation a small change will initiate a transition to a new climate state and the transition may theoretically be to a warmer or cooler state. Surprise – http://chaos.aip.org/resource/1/chaoeh/v22/i2/p023110_s1?bypassSSO=1

        So TCS and ECS become – in a chaotic environment – concepts that are not applicable. In so far as they are derived by models – they are incorrect as models are themselves chaotic and can forecast only in probabilistic terms. This pdf is undefined as yet as there are no probabilistic forecasts of some rigour. Each probability has an associated and different sensitivity of course and the probabilities are the product of chaos.

        It is the difference between a chaotic – a dynamically complex – system and ordered forcing.

        I wouldn’t mind blah blah being stupid – but he is so obsessively idiotic and abusive that I have no qualms about saying so.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 4:16 pm |

        CH

        Sensitivity in a chaotic system [blah, blah, blah, blah]

        Doesn’t look all that chaotic from the 800ka of ice core data. All those self-similar, essentially *predictable* responses to orbital forcing…

        And not a probabilistic model in sight…

        You are so screwed here. Give it up. Find another crank idea to peddle eh? This beyond tedious now.

        (Cue the standard denial-loop pathology and eruption of bile and abuse…)

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 4:26 pm |

        Odd how no scientist agrees with you blah blah.

        ‘Look we have had have many glacials/integalcials in the Quaternary, many abrupt climate shifts, many sudden changes in hydrology, surface temperature and biology. It is all predictable form orbital eccentricity. You will either be reasonably comfortable or freeze you balls off.’

        Cue the nonsense and insults…

        Mind you we don’t deny ergodicity.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 4:34 pm |

        CH

        And now you are well and truly scuppered, you retreat into nonsense. No scientists agree that deglaciations are self-similar and essentially predictable responses to orbital forcing? Really?

        This type of repetitive climate response doesn’t disprove the balls about climate being chaotic to the extent of complete unpredictability? Really?

        You are *stuffed* on this one. It’s over.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 4:47 pm |

        And by scientists I mean the NOAA, the WHOI, the NAS Committee on Abrupt Climate Change, The Royal Society, James McWiiliams, Tim Palmer, Julia Slingo, Anastasios Tsonis, Bodall and Tei, JOSÉ A. RIAL, ROGER A. PIELKE SR., MARTIN BENISTON, MARTIN CLAUSSEN4, JOSEP CANADELL, PETER COX, HERMANN HELD, NATHALIE DE NOBLET-DUCOUDRÉ, RONALD PRINN, JAMES F. REYNOLDS and JOSÉ D. SALAS, etc. Not to mention Rene Thom and Didier Sornette.

        ‘Evidence for abrupt climate change is readily apparent in ice cores taken from Greenland and Antarctica. One sees clear indications of long-term changes discussed above, with CO² and proxy temperature changes associated with the last ice age and its transition into our present interglacial period of warmth. But, in addition, there is a strong chaotic variation of properties with a quasi-period of around 1500 years. We say chaotic because these millennial shifts look like anything but regular oscillations. Rather, they look like rapid, decade-long transitions between cold and warm climates followed by long interludes in one of the two states.

        The best known example of these events is the Younger Dryas cooling of about 12,000 years ago, named for arctic wildflower remains identified in northern European sediments. This event began and ended within a decade and for its 1000 year duration the North Atlantic region was about 5°C colder.

        The lack of periodicity and the present failure to isolate a stable forcing mechanism À la Milankovitch, has prompted much scientific debate about the cause of the Younger Dryas and other millennial scale events. Indeed, the Younger Dryas occurred at a time when orbital forcing should have continued to drive climate to the present warm state.’ WHOI

        Yet your response to this is that we know what caused the Younger Dryas. You are right about one thing – this is beyond tedious.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 4:52 pm |

        BBD

        You can attempt to rationalize away the current “lack of warming” (Trenberth’s “travesty”) with statements like the one made by Met Office (“natural variability is masking the greenhouse warming signal”) or Trenberth himself (“clouds acting as a natural thermostat, reflecting the missing heat out to space”), but it doesn’t change the fact that it has stopped warming for well over a decade despite unabated GHG emissions and concentrations reaching record levels.

        Ben Santer has concluded that a “pause” of 17 years or more would be statistically significant and, by extension, begin to raise serious questions regarding the IPCC climate sensitivity estimates (or assumptions).

        That will happen in 2 years if the global temperature continues as it has for the past decade.

        Will this (if it happens) be a milestone in the CAGW saga with IPCC recalculating the assumed climate sensitivity, will the goalposts simply be moved or will the “pause” in warming be rationalized away (with Chinese aerosols, deep ocean warming, blah blah)?

        We’ll have to wait and see, BBD, since none of us knows what the future climate will be.

        My conclusion is that it will most likely continue warming, as it has in the past, in 30-year fits and spurts with an overall warming trend of around 0.6C per century.

        And this will place a lot of stress on the model-derived mean 2xCO2 climate sensitivity estimate of IPCC of 3.2C; I would imagine that this will have to be reduced by a factor of at least 2.

        But that’s just my guess.

        What’s your guess?

        Max

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 5:04 pm |

        CH

        He who knows nothing about paleoclimate can be relied upon to spout crap on paleoclimate. See here. Learn somewhat. Do us all a favour. Your attempts to link paleo abrupt change to your crackpottery are painful nonsense.

        Part of your problem is that you dodge around all over the place whenever you come upon a comment you can’t respond to, and then we have to go through the whole tiresome denialist two-step again. As here.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 5:16 pm |

        Since Max is here too, I will just repeat the comment he *and* CH dodged elsewhere. It’s the only way to deal with this sort of behaviour:

        manacker

        CH is leading you up the garden path. The NAS report’s discussion of abrupt paleoclimate change was in some ways alarmist! Yes, I did say that ;-)

        What you and CH would greatly benefit from is a more carefully considered view of the types and mechanisms of abrupt paleoclimate change and their *non-applicability* to late Holocene climate conditions.

        A splendid place to start would be Wunsch (2006), which discusses the nature and origin of Dansgaard-Oeschger events.

        As ever, we must pay very close attention to the actual words used or we will make colossal prats out of ourselves à la CH:

        Hypotheses and inferences concerning the nature of abrupt climate change, exemplified by the Dansgaard–Oeschger (D–O) events, are reviewed. There is little concrete evidence that these events are more than a regional Greenland phenomenon.

        […]

        Connection of D–O events to the possibility of modern abrupt climate change rests on a very weak chain of assumptions.

        Now, even if we disagree with Wunsch about the spatial extent of D-O events there is no getting around his argument that they disappeared during the Holocene and their existence is therefore a glacial climate phenomenon (whatever the exact causative mechanism; again we don’t need to determine this here). Now, read the last line of the abstract in bold above again.

        D-O oscillations and Heinrich events (collectively termed the glacial Bond Cycle) and AMOC shutdowns like the Younger Dryas are all confined to glacial or deglacial climate conditions. They do not occur in interglacials. See Clement & Peterson (2008) for a comprehensive overview.

        Here, 11.5ka into the Holocene, there *is* no plausible mechanism for a significant and sustained cooling as the climate system undergoes sustained and increasing GHG forcing. Swiftly overwhelmed wibbles are all you are going to get and the forced trend will dominate on the centennial scale.

        Contrary to CH’s imaginings, climate system behaviour under forcing is *not* so chaotic as to be unpredictable. We can easily see this by looking at the repetitive, self-similar, essentially *predictable* deglaciations under orbital forcing revealed in the ice core and ocean sediment data.

        CH will fulminate himself into an advanced state of absurdity before admitting that this puts paid to his ‘new climate paradigm’ that climate is so chaotic as to be inherently unpredictable but it does, and that’s the end of that.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 5:25 pm |

        Climate is unpredictable other than as a probability density function. This is because both models and climate are chaotic. And I have quoted sufficiently on that. It is something that is well understood by modellers. Tim Palmer as the head of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts must be accounted as a leading leading practitioner as is James McWilliams.

        But also the point at which transitions occur – and the speed and extent of transitions are unpredictable. They may be approached by for instance – http://www.pnas.org/content/105/38/14308.full –

        ‘In the Earth’s history, periods of relatively stable climate have often been interrupted by sharp transitions to a contrasting state. One explanation for such events of abrupt change is that they happened when the earth system reached a critical tipping point. However, this remains hard to prove for events in the remote past, and it is even more difficult to predict if and when we might reach a tipping point for abrupt climate change in the future. Here, we analyze eight ancient abrupt climate shifts and show that they were all preceded by a characteristic slowing down of the fluctuations starting well before the actual shift. Such slowing down, measured as increased autocorrelation, can be mathematically shown to be a hallmark of tipping points. Therefore, our results imply independent empirical evidence for the idea that past abrupt shifts were associated with the passing of critical thresholds. Because the mechanism causing slowing down is fundamentally inherent to tipping points, it follows that our way to detect slowing down might be used as a universal early warning signal for upcoming catastrophic change. Because tipping points in ecosystems and other complex systems are notoriously hard to predict in other ways, this is a promising perspective.’

        Chaos in the sense of complex systems theory is not random but is entirely deterministic. The outcomes are constrained by the topology of the phase space. So the mere fact that glacials and interglacials have alternated in the Quaternary do not change the underlying dynamical mechanisms – ice, snow, cloud, biology, dust – that change dramatically in response to the presumably orbital trigger in the way described by the NAS.

        ‘Weather changes abruptly from day to day, and there is no basic difficulty in understanding such changes because they involve a “fast” and easily observed part of the climate system (e.g., clouds and precipitation). But mechanisms behind abrupt climate change must surmount a fundamental hurdle in that they must alter the working of a “slow” (i.e., persistent) component of the climate system (e.g., ocean fluxes) but must do so rapidly. Two key components of the climate system are oceans and land ice. In addition, the atmospheric response is a crucial ingredient in the mix of mechanisms that might lead to abrupt climate change because the atmosphere knits together the behavior of the other components. The atmosphere potentially also gives rise to threshold behavior in the system, whereby gradual changes in forcing yield nearly discontinuous changes in response.

        – A mechanism that might lead to abrupt climate change would need to have the following characteristics:

        – A trigger or, alternatively, a chaotic perturbation, with either one causing a threshold crossing (something that initiates the event).

        – An amplifier and globalizer to intensify and spread the influence of small or local changes.

        A source of persistence, allowing the altered climate state to last for up to centuries or millennia.’

        You comenced with nonsense and insults – and continued in the same vein. You can give me not one reference that supports your armwaving. This is simply how climate works. If you cannot or will not understand it is not my problem.

      • Tomcat | November 27, 2012 at 5:46 pm |

        BBD …..

        You are so screwed here. Give it up. Find another crank idea to peddle eh? This beyond tedious now.

        Desperation. Classic fake bravado of someone who knows his own argument is screwed.

        (Cue the standard denial-loop pathology and eruption of bile and abuse…)

        And projecting the very vices he excels in, onto others.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 5:58 pm |

        BBD

        In your apparent confusion you wrote of a ” comment he *and* CH dodged elsewhere”.

        But you failed to mention the “comment” I allegedly “dodged elsewhere”.

        Please do so and I will respond.

        In the meantime, I’ll remind you of a question I asked you about the current “lack of warming”.

        Do you think it will continue for a couple more years and become “statistically relevant” (according to Santer this takes 17 years)?

        If it continues for several years beyond this, will IPCC re-evaluate its model-derived 2xCO2 mean climate sensitivuty estimate of 3.2C accordingly?

        Or will there be all sorts of rationalizations, such as “hidden” in the deep ocean, Chinese aerosols, etc. etc., all to defend the CAGW hypothesis against the observed evidence?

        What do you think?

        Max

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 6:09 pm |

        Bond et al (1993) documented correlations between Greenland ice cores and Heinrich events. Specifically Bond et al (1993) demonstrated that Heinrich events occurred at the termination of bundled cooling cycles (Dansgaard-Oeschger cycles) that were documented in Greenland ice cores, and confirmed that the cooling cycles and Heinrich events were followed by abrupt periods of significant warming. Research such as this investigates the formerly unrecognized relationships between ice sheet behavior and ocean-atmosphere temperature changes.
        http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/slides/slideset/index19.htm

        ‘Bond events are North Atlantic climate fluctuations occurring every ≈1,470 ± 500 years throughout the Holocene. Eight such events have been identified, primarily from fluctuations in ice-rafted debris. Bond events may be the interglacial relatives of the glacial Dansgaard–Oeschger events,[1] with a magnitude of perhaps 15–20% of the glacial-interglacial temperature change.’ Wikipedia

        Our review of the paleoclimatic evidence suggests that despite large spatial gaps in the data and limitations
        related to the age control for different proxies, there is considerable evidence that abrupt, millennial-time scale
        climate events in Greenland coincide with changes in many other parts of the world. Climate signals in the tropical Atlantic appear to be consistent with changes in the hydrological cycle and, in particular, a southward shift in the latitude of the ITCZ coinciding with cooling in Greenland. In records with sufficient resolution, these changes do appear to show the same abrupt character as those in Greenland. While data are sparse across most of the Pacific, there are several records from the Asian monsoon region that indicate that changes there coincide both in timing and abrupt character with events in Greenland as well. Because many of these proxies are likely related to local hydrological quantities that have strong small-scale spatial variability, it is difficult to distinguish between a change that is abrupt in time and a spatial shift. Nevertheless, the fact that abrupt events can be identified in different proxies and in different areas affected by the monsoon is suggestive that there is a large-scale change coinciding roughly in time with D-O events in Greenland. The Southern Hemisphere evidence for abrupt change remains quite unclear. There do appear to be millennial-time scale events in Antarctic ice cores that coincide roughly in time with the Greenland events, but they are not abrupt. Land and ocean records from the rest of the Southern Hemisphere are few and far between and generally do not have the appropriate resolution to characterize whether changes are abrupt. What are the mechanisms that can give rise to these features of the paleoclimate record? There is certainly support for a major role for the THC in abrupt climate change. There is paleoclimatic evidence for meltwater events flooding into the North Atlantic, and models suggest that realistic values of freshwater input could change the THC, even shutting it down completely. The spatial response to a THC shutdown simulated by models appears to be consistent with paleoclimate evidence for temperature and hydrologic changes in the tropical and North Atlantic, and models predict a weakening of the Asian monsoon, which is also generally consistent with observations.’

        ‘The strength of the arguments for a role for tropical processes in abrupt climate change is their ability to
        influence the global climate. Small changes in the tropics can potentially alter the radiation budget of the planet, the hydrological cycle, the atmospheric circulation, and even possibly the THC. While there are some mechanisms that could produce abrupt changes in the tropical climate, they have only been demonstrated in response to some forcing (e.g., orbital changes or CO2). One example for generation of millennial-time scale variability by tropical processes was given [Clement and Cane, 1999], but it was demonstrated with a highly idealized model. It is as yet unclear whether this would occur in a more complete model. Nevertheless, given the paleoclimate evidence from the Indo-Pacific region, any mechanism to explain abrupt change must account not only for what processes may influence the monsoon but also what the impact of a change in the monsoon would have on the rest of the globe. Furthermore, the absence of high-resolution records from the tropical Pacific Ocean leaves open questions about the role of coupled interactions (akin to ENSO) in abrupt change. Given the importance of this region in generating modern variability, it seems clear that this region should not be overlooked. Finally, given the potential role for processes occurring in both low and high latitudes, we suggest that a global approach is necessary for understanding the problem of abrupt change. Coupled GCMs certainly offer this kind of perspective, but they have been used only in limited applications to this problem, primarily in studies of the climate response to freshwater forcing in the Atlantic. While this has been useful, there are other ways to perturb the climate (e.g., different initial conditions or forcing persistent changes in particular phenomena) that may help to reveal the global-scale coupled feedbacks that can cause the climate to change abruptly around the globe.’ I quite like Amy Clements – I have saved the paper for quiet contemplation thanks.

        The coupled feedback mechanisms are the same as they always were – cloud, ice, snow, biology, hydrology and ocean circulation for which are understanding especially of coupled global processes are in their infancy.

        The NAS Committee on Abrupt Climate Change is alarmist and there is definitely no way that climate can change abruptly in the Holocene?

        The guy is abusive and repulsive – so I have no compunction in calling him a moron.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 7:46 pm |

        ‘Prediction of weather and climate are necessarily uncertain: our observations of weather and climate are uncertain, the models into which we assimilate this data and predict the future are uncertain, and external effects such as volcanoes and anthropogenic greenhouse emissions are also uncertain. Fundamentally, therefore, therefore we should think of weather and climate predictions in terms of equations whose basic prognostic variables are probability densities ρ(X,t) where X denotes some climatic variable and t denoted time. In this way, ρ(X,t)dV represents the probability that, at time t, the true value of X lies in some small volume dV of state space.’ (Predicting Weather and Climate – Palmer and Hagedorn eds – 2006)

        What do you assume my Palmer is? Have you not noticed the above that I keep quoting as my own little joke? I keep talking about probabilisitc forecasting as opposed to the ‘durian’ that emerges from the ‘fruit bowl of opportunity.’ that we have now.

        Do you remotely understand the math at the core of these problems?

        ‘Nevertheless, however much models improve, there will always be an irreducible level of uncertainty—‘flap of the seagull’s wings’—because of the chaotic nature of the system. Even the climate we have observed over the past century or so is only one realization of what the real system might produce.’ http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1956/4751.full

        I have of course seen those presentations you link to – you might have simply left it at that. But no – your had to add a snide and stupid comment that was most unwelcome.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:15 am |

        CH

        You comenced with nonsense and insults – and continued in the same vein. You can give me not one reference that supports your armwaving. This is simply how climate works. If you cannot or will not understand it is not my problem.

        You are a liar. You’ve had references aplenty. Here repeated for the third time:

        First time

        Second time

        ***

        Since Max is here too, I will just repeat the comment he *and* CH dodged elsewhere

        manacker

        CH is leading you up the garden path. The NAS report’s discussion of abrupt paleoclimate change was in some ways alarmist! Yes, I did say that ;-)

        What you and CH would greatly benefit from is a more carefully considered view of the types and mechanisms of abrupt paleoclimate change and their *non-applicability* to late Holocene climate conditions.

        A splendid place to start would be Wunsch (2006), which discusses the nature and origin of Dansgaard-Oeschger events.

        As ever, we must pay very close attention to the actual words used or we will make colossal prats out of ourselves à la CH:

        Hypotheses and inferences concerning the nature of abrupt climate change, exemplified by the Dansgaard–Oeschger (D–O) events, are reviewed. There is little concrete evidence that these events are more than a regional Greenland phenomenon.

        […]

        Connection of D–O events to the possibility of modern abrupt climate change rests on a very weak chain of assumptions.

        Now, even if we disagree with Wunsch about the spatial extent of D-O events there is no getting around his argument that they disappeared during the Holocene and their existence is therefore a glacial climate phenomenon (whatever the exact causative mechanism; again we don’t need to determine this here). Now, read the last line of the abstract in bold above again.

        D-O oscillations and Heinrich events (collectively termed the glacial Bond Cycle) and AMOC shutdowns like the Younger Dryas are all confined to glacial or deglacial climate conditions. They do not occur in interglacials. See Clement & Peterson (2008) for a comprehensive overview.

        Here, 11.5ka into the Holocene, there *is* no plausible mechanism for a significant and sustained cooling as the climate system undergoes sustained and increasing GHG forcing. Swiftly overwhelmed wibbles are all you are going to get and the forced trend will dominate on the centennial scale.

        Contrary to CH’s imaginings, climate system behaviour under forcing is *not* so chaotic as to be unpredictable. We can easily see this by looking at the repetitive, self-similar, essentially *predictable* deglaciations under orbital forcing revealed in the ice core and ocean sediment data.

        CH will fulminate himself into an advanced state of absurdity before admitting that this puts paid to his ‘new climate paradigm’ that climate is so chaotic as to be inherently unpredictable but it does, and that’s the end of that.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:20 am |

        Now that’s out of the way, why are you quoting endless screeds at me again? I know what the glacial Bond Cycle is (read my comments and references instead of claiming they do not exist – liar). Read Wunsch 06 on D-O causation and spatial influence instead of quoting obsolete studies at me by the yard.

        I know why you hide behind screeds of irrelevance. It is to create the impression of knowledge where there is none. It is to conceal the central failure of your argument.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 5:39 am |

        The Bond events or cycles are the Holocene equivalant of the glacial D-O events. They did not stop in the Holocene as you claimed. Caught out in a lie again?

        The central argument is complex systems theory as applied to climate – and I even quote Clements back to you about the nature of abrupt change.

        Can’t help it if you don’t understand but the 20 or 30 references I gave might give some rational person pause.

        You however are an appalling, abusive and repulsive idiot. Feel free to come back again any time. I very much enjoy making it clear just what a fool you are.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 5:46 am |

        You on the other are trying to assert – and that is all if is – that climate doesn’t change abruptly. There is no science that suggests that abrupt change is not a constant factor in Earth’s climate.

        It takes a special kind of idiot to persist in the light of everwhelming absurdity. Congratualtions.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 6:06 am |

        CH

        The Bond events or cycles are the Holocene equivalant of the glacial D-O events. They did not stop in the Holocene as you claimed. Caught out in a lie again?

        No, because unlike you, I have done the necessary background reading:

        Bond himself called them ‘enigmatic’ and ‘at best quasi-periodic’. If there really is a Holocene Bond cycle it is hypothesised to be a response to low frequency solar variability.

        See Bond et al. (1997, 1999, 2001).

        The claim that D-O events ‘are the equivalent’ of the Holocene Bond Cycle is a very long stretch that teeters on the brink of misrepresentation. You really need to read Wunsch (2006).

        I very much enjoy making it clear just what a fool you are.

        Do you now?

        You on the other are trying to assert – and that is all if is – that climate doesn’t change abruptly. There is no science that suggests that abrupt change is not a constant factor in Earth’s climate.

        This is yet another lie.

        Constant lies and misrepresentation are not exactly helping your credibility.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 6:50 am |

        The Bond events have the same periodicity as D-O events – but with 15 to 20% of the D-O range as was made clear if you would bother to read anything I wrote. Both are most certainly ‘quasi-periodic’. And the claim was with NOA in the link I provided.

        The Bond events occur in the Holocene and D-O in the glacial. Not sure what your point is – pointless as usual it seems.

        You have spent hours denying abrupt change – dynamical complexity – in climate. Making absurd claims about predictability of abrupt change – armwaving. Yes – I have no compunction in revealing the disingenuous, the lies, the dishonesty and the bad faith and your simplistic climate narrative. You have no credibility at all and never had.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 9:16 am |

        You have spent hours denying abrupt change – dynamical complexity – in climate. Making absurd claims about predictability of abrupt change – armwaving.

        More lies and misrepresentations. I did no such thing. I pointed out that you (deliberately?) confuse short term variability with long term forced trend. That you do so to assert the dominance of chaotic behaviour over long term forced trends. That you do this because you are a denier of the climatologically significant effects of GHG forcing. That you use the over-emphasis on short-term variability to make easily disprovable claims that the climate system is fundamentally unpredictable under sustained forcing (see orbitally forced deglaciation).

        You are a debunked liar and misrepresenter who simply goes into denial-loop when confronted with your errors and repeats the same old junk endlessly.

        As for your insistence that the Holocene Bond Cycle is a continuation of D-O events I repeat, it borders on misrepresentation and demonstrates poor topic knowledge. Most of your references are obsolete.

        I repeat, there are no mechanisms in the late Holocene that will produce abrupt, significant cooling events such as are found in glacial and deglacial climates (D-O, Heinrich, YD). It’s just another misrepresentation in service of your argumentative goal: to deny the efficacy of GHGs as a forcing.

        You are without doubt a politically motivated fake sceptic.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 1:52 pm |

        Let’s try this again – I like definitions.

        ‘Bond events are North Atlantic climate fluctuations occurring every ≈1,470 ± 500 years throughout the Holocene. Eight such events have been identified, primarily from fluctuations in ice-rafted debris. Bond events may be the interglacial relatives of the glacial Dansgaard–Oeschger events,[1] with a magnitude of perhaps 15–20% of the glacial-interglacial temperature change.’ Wikipedia

        Here’s the whole comment.

        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-271770

        You berate me about galacials/interglacials being entirely predictable, about there being no evidence for abrupt change in the Holocene, no mechanisms for abrupt change, etc, etc.

        Then you deny it and invent some nonsense with the denial word. It is all to do with your insistence that it is all predictable. It isn’t because there are no means to predict because both climate and models are chaotic. The models are chaotic and thus cannot be used for anything other than probabilisitc forecasting. Climate shifts happen at multi-decadal scales. Tthese have beens from warmer to cooler – but it is more likely to not to repeat that pattern. Climate shifts happen on longer time scales for reasons that are poorly understood. Read the passage I quoted from the Clements and Peterson paper.

        You don’t like this and flail around denying this even as a potential. certanty rules but you are a scmuck who insists that everything is understood and predictable – and is moronic, abusive, repulsive and dishonest to boot.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 3:36 pm |

        I suggest you read your own reference.

        ‘Finally, given the potential role for processes occurring in both low and high latitudes, we suggest that a global approach is necessary for understanding the problem of abrupt change. Coupled GCMs certainly offer this kind of perspective, but they have been used only in limited applications to this problem, primarily in studies of the climate response to freshwater forcing in the Atlantic. While this has been useful, there are other ways to perturb the climate (e.g., different initial conditions or forcing persistent changes in particular phenomena) that may help to reveal the global-scale coupled feedbacks that can cause the climate to change abruptly around the globe.’

        As for political motivation – I suggest that the defense of democracy is a duty for all generations and that there are modern day challenges

        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-271789

        You are mistaknen on both counts. So sad too bad. You are moreover abusive, noxious and repulsive. A shing example of the millenialist cult of AGW groupthink space cadets. Congratualtions.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 28, 2012 at 3:42 pm |

        Chief Hydro said:

        “Ocean heat content follows closely the radiative imbalance at TOA.

        That is after all the source of all these things – is it not gatesy?”

        Yes they track with a lag and you’ve got sequence wrong.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 4:31 pm |

        CH

        Bond events may be the interglacial relatives of the glacial Dansgaard–Oeschger events,[1] with a magnitude of perhaps 15–20% of the glacial-interglacial temperature change.’ Wikipedia

        Or they *may not*. See Wunsch (2006). Not Wikipedia. And even if they are some sort of faint echo of D-O events, they are tiny little stumps of an effect without the major NH ice sheet in place. So my original point is correct: along with Heinrich events and the YD, these are essentially glacial/deglacial climate effects. Why does this matter? Because there are no analogous mechanisms in place for abrupt, sustained and significant global *cooling* in the C21st.

        Who would argue otherwise in the face of the evidence? Only motivated AGW deniers like you, for example.

        You berate me about galacials/interglacials being entirely predictable, about there being no evidence for abrupt change in the Holocene, no mechanisms for abrupt change, etc, etc.

        Again and again and again, deliberate misrepresentation. I am sick to death of you doing this. What I have said *repeatedly* is that glacial terminations under orbital forcing disprove your contention that long-term climate change is unpredictably chaotic under sustained forcing. The data show the exact opposite. Never mind the verbiage about models and all the rest of it. Just look at the wall of paleoclimate data. How many times do I have to repeat this before you stop lying about what I actually said? How many times?

        As for quoting bits of C&P at me… why? The paper is about abrupt climate change during the last glacial. My whole point, restated for what feels like the 125th here, is that such mechanisms DO NOT EXIST 11.5ka into the Holocene. They *all* require major NH ice sheets. How many times do I have to say this?

        Have you forgotten that this entire argument stems from your frankly mad assertion that short-term chaotic shifts in C21st climate under steadily increasing forcing will affect the centennial *global* warming trend enough to matter? All you are doing is over-emphasising the role of short-term chaos in order to undermine the role of long-term forcing. No prizes for guessing why.

        Anyway, sod this. I’ve had enough. You are simply too crazy and too dishonest to talk to. God knows I’ve tried but *everything* just bounces off the carapace of crank. Either you don’t understand what is being said to you, or you are too locked into your madness to reach. Not that it makes any practical difference.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 4:32 pm |

        What little evidence there is suggests close correlation.

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=Wong2006figure7.gif

        This is not surprising – or shouldn’t be – the accumulation of heat or otherwise is caused directly and immediatley by the change in toa flux.
        There is no lag in the energy hitting the oceans.

        In the graph above we see stong ocean warming in the 1997/99 El Nino and cooling in the 1999 La Nina. This is based on annual ocean heat content values constrained by satellite altimetry rather than the 5 year average of the XBT date.

        You continue to deny the peer reviewed evidence. Why do you think that is gatesy?

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 5:20 pm |

        ‘But all that aside, BBD, I think we can both agree that you’re a total weirdo, hyper up-tight control-freak. And in that regard, your frantic, mono-maniac efforts to impose ORDER AND CONTROL AND DISCIPLINED PC HIVE-THINK on this blog are a constant source of entertainment. I mean, like, I’m sure even you’ve noted, BBD, that every time you pull one of your imperious demand, impatient out-burst, frustrated melt-down, I’m-the-little-smarty-pants-and-you’re-not, YOU’RE-A-LIAR!, whip-cracking, ram-rod tricks to GET EVERYONE ON THIS BLOG IN LINE, it fails–blows up in your face even.’ Mike

        Oh my God you are a maniac. All of the mechanisms that feed into abrupt change are operational in the world today. We have such a weak grasp on the reasons these change or even their source which was the point of the Clements and Peterson quote.
        We have climate shifts that are fairly obviously resulting in no warming for a decade or three more. Beyond that are shifts at all scales from interannual to millennial. There is no predicting this. The models are chaotic and there is no guarantee that the 20th pattern will be repeated. Indeed it seems unlikely. ‘Nevertheless, however much models improve, there will always be an irreducible level of uncertainty—‘flap of the seagull’s wings’—because of the chaotic nature of the system. Even the climate we have observed over the past century or so is only one realization of what the real system might produce.’ S&P2011

        There is a great deal of difference in uncertainty in a chaotic system and an absurd certainty. That latter is the truly mad claim. As Swanson and Tsonis say – and which you perversely misunderstah – at these shifts there may be surprises at both the warming and cooling ends of the sprectrum that are well outside of any simple minded expectation of global warming. This you resolutely fail to understand because it contradicts your groupthink meme of ordered forcing and predictable warming. You are wrong – and cannot face it. So sad – too bad.

        Abrupt climate change happened around 1910, the mid 1940’s the late 1970’s and 1998/2001. It is no coincidence that shifts in ocean and atmospheric indices occur at the same time as changes in the trajectory of global surface temperature. Our ‘interest is to understand – first the natural variability of climate – and then take it from there. So we were very excited when we realized a lot of changes in the past century from warmer to cooler and then back to warmer were all natural,’ Tsonis said.

        Do you think about your facile handwaving about there being absolutely no chance of abrupt climate in the modern world? You are a gargantuan idiot with no redeeming features at all.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:25 pm |

        One final question: how old are you, CH?

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:32 pm |

        Actually, there was one other thing.

        Do you think about your facile handwaving about there being absolutely no chance of abrupt climate in the modern world?

        Please show me where I ever said – ever – that there was ‘absolutely no chance of abrupt climate change in the modern world’. You see, I have said repeatedly that you are a liar and a misrepresenter. I say you are lying here.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 5:51 pm |

        I am a practising hydrologist and environmental scientist in the prime of my life and career. I should be working to a deadline instead of wasting time here. What the hell – I do my best work under pressure. My motto since university has been if it weren’t for the last minute rush nothing would get done. I am afraid that is consistent with the personality test we did some time ago. Can someone reference it for blah blah. I think he needs some insight into his personality – or lack of it.

        I have a question. What kind of malcontent dickwad retires at 47? Careers and intellect don’t start peaking until 50 at least. That is when you have sufficient knowledge, experience and confidence for peak achievement. Frankly I regard a 47 year old retiree as an unemployable loser. How’s that working out for you?

        You keep telling me that there are no mechanisms for abrupt change in the last 11,000 years and then you deny it and call me a liar. I keep saying that you are a clueless and dishonest troll.

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/#!cpZZ3QQtppZZ28

        How’s that for abrupt change in the last 11,000 years. I could talk about the drying of the Sahel some 5,000 years ago or the demise of the Minoan civilisation. But frankly you are too much of a dickwad to bother.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 6:02 pm |

        Answer the question, liar:

        Please show me where I ever said – ever – that there was ‘absolutely no chance of abrupt climate change in the modern world’. You see, I have said repeatedly that you are a liar and a misrepresenter. I say you are lying here.

        Now.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 6:45 pm |

        Stamping your feet and snarling – now – just makes me laugh at you.

        You haven’t answered my question – (what sort of a dickwad are you?) – but OK

        Your question – Please show me where I ever said – ever – that there was ‘absolutely no chance of abrupt climate change in the modern world’. You see, I have said repeatedly that you are a liar and a misrepresenter. I say you are lying here.

        ‘As for quoting bits of C&P at me… why? The paper is about abrupt climate change during the last glacial. My whole point, restated for what feels like the 125th here, is that such mechanisms DO NOT EXIST 11.5ka into the Holocene. They *all* require major NH ice sheets. How many times do I have to say this?’

        And so the descent into farce and pretence continues. I don’t mind people reinventing themselves on the run. The recognition of error is a sign of a true and noble natural philosopher. However, to change his mind and then call me a liar seems a bit rich. Oh – that sort of a dickwad.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 7:04 pm |

        Of course the liar is reduced to taking a paragraph out of context. Of course what I have consistently maintained is that there is no mechanism for abrupt, sustained and significant global *cooling* in the C21st. The entire context of our argument is based on this. I point out the insistent attempts by the liar to warp this repeatedly above. The liar has now done it again.

        Here is the first paragraph from the comment you quote out of context.

        Or they *may not*. See Wunsch (2006). Not Wikipedia. And even if they are some sort of faint echo of D-O events, they are tiny little stumps of an effect without the major NH ice sheet in place. So my original point is correct: along with Heinrich events and the YD, these are essentially glacial/deglacial climate effects. Why does this matter? Because there are no analogous mechanisms in place for abrupt, sustained and significant global *cooling* in the C21st.

        Funny what a difference the context makes.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 7:58 pm |

        The context is quite clear – and you repeat it – there is no chance of abrupt climate change in the Holocene. Although that sometimes by extension morphs into the 21st century. Either way it is far from true. Interglacials terminate through runaway feedbacks to small changes in summer insolation. The billion dollar question is how, why and when will the current interglacial end? And believe me the question is rhetorical. I am not remotely interested in your answer to this question.

        As we have seen – smaller and less persistent climate shifts are everywhere evident – decadal, centennial and millennial abrupt variability in hydrology, biology and surface temperature – in the records. Here – for instance – is a 1000 year ENSO proxy. More salt = La Niña

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=Vance2012-AntarticaLawDomeicecoresaltcontent.jpg

        If your claim to not have D-O events in the Holocene is your claim to fame – it is laughable as these are confined by definition to glacials. But these ‘nubs’ of D-O events – the Bond cycles – have significant climatological clout.

        Could this be Bond Event Zero? If so – how significant and how rapid will be the decline of temperature? These are pertinent questions but not ones that can be answered with any certainty.

        http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/04/06/bond-event-zero/

        This discussion must by now be terminal. You have embarrassed yourself enough by your overblown certainty and quite simplistic and often contradictory claims, your odd admissions that there are no mechanisms for abrupt change in the Holocene and simultaneous denial of saying that, your emotionally charged and abusive and repulsive rhetoric and your egregiously limited scholarship and imagination.

        I think you have proven to everyone here your worth as a contributor to rational and collegial discussion on science from your very first comment. It is precisely zero.

      • Vassily | November 29, 2012 at 2:48 am |

        BBD,

        Since you have so firmly staked out your position as a politics-motivated fake alarmist devoutly wedded to climatologically significant effects of GHG forcing no matter what, your claims of misrepresentions by other are laughable.

        But anyone can change, or at least change tack. Why not try some open-mindedness? And decorum?

      • BBD | November 29, 2012 at 3:36 am |

        CH

        You have tried very hard to bury what this entire argument was all about.

        It arose from your leitmotif assertion that short-term chaotic COOLING shifts in C21st climate under steadily increasing forcing will reduce the centennial *global* warming trend enough to matter. You wave at glacial/deglacial abrupt cooling events as support for your claim.

        I pointed out that this was nonsense because the forced trend will dominate on the centennial scale. This will happen because the abrupt and strong *cooling events* characteristic of glacial/deglacial climates cannot happen 11.5ka into the Holocene as the mechanisms which caused them disappeared with the ice.

        Having lost this argument, you invented a strawman and started lying about what I had actually said. I find this sort of thing irritating beyond measure.

        Your lie was to insist that I have claimed that Holocene climate does not change abruptly. What I really said was: it won’t cool abruptly or enough to offset GHG forcing on the centennial scale because it can’t. The major NH ice sheets are gone. The climate is under constant and increasing forcing from GHGs. No YD events in the C21st etc.

        Let’s review the history of the lie and my ongoing attempts to keep the focus on what this argument was once about, before you started pretending that it was about something else entirely:

        1/
        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-271881

        The NAS Committee on Abrupt Climate Change is alarmist and there is definitely no way that climate can change abruptly in the Holocene?

        The guy is abusive and repulsive – so I have no compunction in calling him a moron.

        [Response:] Here, 11.5ka into the Holocene, there *is* no plausible mechanism for a significant and sustained cooling as the climate system undergoes sustained and increasing GHG forcing. Swiftly overwhelmed wibbles are all you are going to get and the forced trend will dominate on the centennial scale.

        2/
        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-271894

        You on the other are trying to assert – and that is all if is – that climate doesn’t change abruptly. There is no science that suggests that abrupt change is not a constant factor in Earth’s climate.

        [Response:] This is yet another lie.

        Constant lies and misrepresentation are not exactly helping your credibility.

        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-271938

        3/

        You have spent hours denying abrupt change – dynamical complexity – in climate. Making absurd claims about predictability of abrupt change – armwaving.

        [Response:] I repeat, there are no mechanisms in the late Holocene that will produce abrupt, significant cooling events such as are found in glacial and deglacial climates (D-O, Heinrich, YD). It’s just another misrepresentation in service of your argumentative goal: to deny the efficacy of GHGs as a forcing.

        4/
        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-272028

        You berate me about galacials/interglacials being entirely predictable, about there being no evidence for abrupt change in the Holocene, no mechanisms for abrupt change, etc, etc.

        [Response:] So my original point is correct: along with Heinrich events and the YD, these are essentially glacial/deglacial climate effects. Why does this matter? Because there are no analogous mechanisms in place for abrupt, sustained and significant global *cooling* in the C21st.

        ***

        I think that gives a pretty good flavour of what you have been doing here.

        Lying doesn’t win arguments CH. You need to learn this. And you will.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 29, 2012 at 4:35 am |

        You are such a pompous, opinionated twit. You keep pontificating on the lack of mechanisms for abrupt change in the 21st century.

        Not true – http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10136&page=73 – the potential exists for surprises at both the colder and warmer end of the sprectrum.

        The world has moved on. So am I.

      • BBD | November 29, 2012 at 4:48 am |

        What about the lies?

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 29, 2012 at 4:54 am |

        I was coming back to add just one more thing. But I do not lie ever. I do not show bad faith. I have provided you with dozens of references which you straight jacket into the limits of your ideology.

        http://www.pik-potsdam.de/~stefan/Publications/Book_chapters/zew.html

        I am not a sceptic but you I am afraid are still a pompous twit and a moron. So sad – too bad.

      • BBD | November 29, 2012 at 5:13 am |

        But I do not lie ever. I do not show bad faith.

        Another lie. More evidence of bad faith. And comedy gold.

        Now what about the rest of your lies?

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 29, 2012 at 5:20 am |

        Yeah – what about being a pompous twit?

      • BBD | November 29, 2012 at 5:25 am |

        How interesting. You have become extremely evasive all of a sudden.

        Let’s once again share a giggle over the depth of your hypocrisy:

        But I do not lie ever. I do not show bad faith.

        Now I know you aren’t going to talk to me about your failed attempt to lie your way out of a lost argument. That doesn’t really matter.

        I’m just making a point. Doubtless we will revisit this point again in future.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 29, 2012 at 6:17 am |

        No really I want to know. Why do you think that you being a pompous twit will succeed in getting me to answer any more of your silly accusations?

        http://www.whoi.edu/science/GG/…/Shuman%20et%20al%202009.pdf

        Idiot.

      • BBD | November 29, 2012 at 8:22 am |

        Oh, I know you aren’t going to admit what you’ve done. I just wanted it summarised for the record. For reference. And now it is.

        You need to keep up with your reading you know.

        You invest far too much in obsolete references. And you *seriously* need to brush up on your paleoclimate before trying to bull***t me again.

    • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 26, 2012 at 11:05 am |

      Fan, I guess that would depend on your background. Lethally hot equatorial temperature would be the result of slow internal heat transfer. The poles are the heat sinks, not the oceans. The oceans just transfer energy along with the atmosphere. With the opening of the Drake Passage, internal transfer and mixing is more efficient. It is a thermodynamics thing, not a faith thing.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 11:37 am |

        Captn.

        As you point out, the poles are heat sinks, with the North Pole more so than the South. Do you accept the possibility then that the reduction of Arctic sea ice could be at least partially as a result of increased advection of heat toward the Arctic Ocean from lower latitudes?

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 26, 2012 at 11:42 am |

        Gates, ” Do you accept the possibility then that the reduction of Arctic sea ice could be at least partially as a result of increased advection of heat toward the Arctic Ocean from lower latitudes?” I am positive of it. The question is really the time constants so you can get a reasonable estimate of what may have caused what.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 2:03 pm |

        Captn.,

        You may be “positive” of it, but I’m only “fairly convinced” as I always look for alternative explanations. But your point about time constraints is a good one, and of course there are then a few options for where this heat is coming from:

        1) Increased GHG’s keeping more heat in the oceans
        2) A more active sun during the the later part of the 20th Century adding a bit more energy to the oceans
        3) Natural ocean cycles bringing up more heat form lower depths as the THC goes through a long-period cycle.
        4) Some combination thereof

        In that it appears that the ocean is gaining heat from the upper layers down to abyssal levels, I would discount #3. In that heat has continued to build since 2000 while the sun as grown more quiet I would be more skeptical of #2, though the length of the solar cycles prior to 2000 could certainly play a role. #1 and or a combination of #1 and #2 seems most plausible. As I’ve pointed out to your good friend Chief Hydro, the period of 1976-2000, which saw significant increases in ocean heat content overall, was dominated by El Nino or a positive PDO, which would tend to favor a warmer troposphere but a slow reduction in ocean heat content. It seems whatever has been the main driver of increasing ocean heat content has been fairly steady in effect over at least the past 50+ years. Increasing GHG’s therefore seem the top most likely candidate.

      • climatereason | November 26, 2012 at 2:38 pm |

        R Gates

        As far as warm water inflow into the Arctc goes I read a number of contemporary books on the subject when researchingthe arctic warming that ocurred from arround 1816.

        A Royal Navy scientific expedition sponsored by the Royal Society was sent to investigate and amongst other things they commented on the warmth of the water flowing into the arctic from the gulf stream and its branches. They also commented on its power-one place in greenland was called coconut bay because of the number of the coconuts that washed up there that seemed to have their orgins in the West Indies. The heat from the sun was also a surprise to them. (Bear in mind that whalers had been in the area for centuries so this was not some naive comment from a society that knew nothing of the arctic)

        Also of especial interest were their comments on the sootiness of the snow/glaciers which they attributed to industrial activity in the US and which they believed had an effect on snow /ice melt.

        This is eerily similar to a recent BBC documemtary where I was very struck by the sootiness of the landscape which extended into the various snow and ice levels and deep into the glacial caves into which they dived

        tonyb.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 26, 2012 at 2:46 pm |

        Gates,
        1) Increased GHG’s keeping more heat in the oceans
        How much? With no convincing evidence of water vapor feedback, in fact more evidence of a lack of water vapor positive feedback, the majority of warming over NH land area at higher altitude, significant SSW events with an unusual cyclic nature and more recent TCR estimates below 2C, the “most” due to GHG is questionable.
        2) A more active sun during the the later part of the 20th Century adding a bit more energy to the oceans. There is an interesting range of solar impact lags and changes in cloud conditions. During the “aerosol” cooling of the late 40s and early 50s, the first signs of cooling in the oceans is in the southern hemisphere. If you compare GISS LOTI, normalized, and subtract the SH bands from the NH bands you will see interesting hemispheric variability on longer time scales.

        https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-nrXTZdEiPd4/ULJWRYyyuRI/AAAAAAAAFu8/mB60pWAqBl0/s800/giss%2520loti%2520N%2520S%2520normalized.png

        A build your own index. Since the N high latitudes have different heat sink properties than the S high latitudes, changes in the distribution of heat capacity, THC, PDO, AMO etc. can change surface temperature without “forcing” required.
        3) Natural ocean cycles bringing up more heat form lower depths as the THC goes through a long-period cycle.
        A change in the average surface wind velocity in the ACC can produce an 10 Sverdrup change in the THC in the Atlantic (Tuggweilder also Manabe) causing ~ 30 to 150 year variations in heat transfer. Currently, the NH (30-90 lat.) average surface temperature is 2C greater than the SH (30-90 latitude band). If the hemispheres where in true equilibrium, the NH (30-90) would be ~ 7C warmer than the SH. If you compare the Greenland and Antarctic ice cores you will note the large variance.

        The GISS LOTI 44-64S is highlighted here,
        https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-bcbV00zTNBg/UKqOo-dkJQI/AAAAAAAAFuA/CAEJI-fHw8c/s912/giss%2520regional%2520with%2520trend%25201980.png

        Using the 1980 to 2011 baseline provides a different perspective. Zero is about a flat as a regression gets.

        For the whole series, https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-A-zUL62VR7g/UKqOo6Hq3LI/AAAAAAAAFuE/zce_hbJuEnQ/s883/giss%2520regional%2520with%2520trend%25201904.png

        Because of the difference in variance, normalizing improves the build your own index look. There is a good deal more natural variability in the system than most appreciate. Also you should note that Diurnal Temperature Range trends did a reversal around 1985. There was a 2C increase in Tmin in Iceland that stands out.

        4) Some combination thereof. Definitely a combination, that makes it a fun puzzle. Try looking at more models with absolute temperatures. Anomalies are limited when the initial conditions are uncertain.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 26, 2012 at 3:07 pm |

        Why do you insist in going around in circles getting more and more angry? It that a metaphor this blog? The hamster wheel? I have been trying to think of something entirely new for this thread – but it is all the same rehashed argument. It is impossible to move forward against entrenched space cadet beliefs.

        We know that ocean heat has changed in this century – http://www.ocean-sci-discuss.net/8/999/2011/osd-8-999-2011.pdf –

        We know that the CERES toa flux has changed as well – http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo1375.html

        Unfortunately for your case it is all in the SW – and linked through cloud feedbacks with PDO and ENSO in the Pacific.

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=CERES_MODIS.gif

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=Clementetal2009.png

        ‘The overall slight rise (relative heating) of global total net flux at TOA between the 1980’s and 1990’s is confirmed in the tropics by the ERBS measurements and exceeds the estimated climate forcing changes (greenhouse gases and aerosols) for this period. The most obvious explanation is the associated changes in cloudiness during this period.’ http://isccp.giss.nasa.gov/projects/browse_fc.html

        ‘In summary, although there is independent evidence for decadal changes in TOA radiative fluxes over the last two decades, the evidence is equivocal. Changes in the planetary and tropical TOA radiative fluxes are consistent with independent global ocean heat-storage data, and are expected to be dominated by changes in cloud radiative forcing. To the extent that they are real, they may simply reflect natural low-frequency variability of the climate system.’ IPCC 3.4.4.1

        But the reality is more frequent and intense La Nina over the next decade or three. http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703

        ‘One’ is not a climate change sceptic. The reality of climate is dynamical complexity with a finite risk of catastrophic change. The antidote to that would seem to be pragmatic ways forward. e.g. -http://thebreakthrough.org/archive/climate_pragmatism_innovation – That and conservation farming.

        Blah blah quotes this to me as ‘proof’ that S&T09 ‘predicted’ greater warming. ‘If the role of internal variability in the climate system is as large as this analysis would seem to suggest, warming over the 21st century may well be larger than that predicted by the current generation of models, given the propensity of those models to underestimate climate internal variability…’

        In reality – and from the previous paragraph – ‘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.’

        The reality encompasses no warming for a decade or three more at least. The question I keep asking space cadets is what this does to the politics of carbon emission reduction but they seem incapable of changing course despite the quite evident advances in the science.

        Merely arm waving will not work – Gatesy. If you have any evidence other than composited gridded ocean heat that is useless for annual attribution for God’s sake tell someone. Otherwise sit down and shut up. So sad – too bad you’re wrong.

      • vukcevic | November 26, 2012 at 4:08 pm |

        Captain
        To demonstrate the shorter term variability you need 2 variables: solar and the Earth’s magnetic fields oscillations, they go in and out of phase
        http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/EarthNV.htm
        for longer term same again
        http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SST-NAP.htm
        and how is this done?
        The oceans’ currents.
        I suggest to Mr. Gates to plot two sets of data from the NOAA’s files as shown here:
        http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/NoaaD.htm
        If it is in the data take a note.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 26, 2012 at 4:41 pm |

        Vuc, There are some other interesting things going on as well. For the small change in solar forcing variability to have longer term stronger impacts, the internal heat transfer has to have its own time constants and frequencies, ala Selvam to produce self organized criticality. The response to Milanchovitch cycles has changed with time where for the past 800ka or so, procession has taken a stronger role, the switch from 41ka to ~100ka cycles which appear to be shifting to 21.75ka periods, approximately :)

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 5:27 pm |

        Tony said:

        “where I was very struck by the sootiness of the landscape which extended into the various snow and ice levels and deep into the glacial caves into which they dived…”

        _____
        Interesting, as usual. This time, around 1816 is especially unique as of course we had the “Year without a Summer” that year, when it was unseasonably cold in Europe and along the East Coast of the U.S. because of the eruption of Mt. Tambora in 1815. 1816 saw not just the cold but crop failures etc. Tough year. Odd if it is true that it was warm in Greenland, but a blocking high over Greenland, with a very negative AO cold have been part of the culprit for this. Either way, 1816 is known as the “Year without a Summer”.

      • vukcevic | November 26, 2012 at 5:54 pm |

        Cap’n
        Agree on Milankovic.
        I should made it clear that I refer to instrumental data periods:
        shorter term –decadal change
        longer term multidecadal variability.
        I only occasionally, but not often stray into the ‘big-unknown’ of the proxy data.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 27, 2012 at 6:35 pm |

        Vuc, “I only occasionally, but not often stray into the ‘big-unknown’ of the proxy data.”

        You should look at some of the ocean paleo data. Interesting, a little coarse, but interesting. The timing of geomagnetic reversals and climate change for example. Richard Muller has a paper where he figures that impact events triggered climate change and the reversals. That is a pretty reasonable observation. However, not all of the events match perfectly and the Milankovitch cycles trend to be a better match with climate.

        It would be odd for climate change due to Milankovitch cycles to stimulate impact events, but climate change could stimulate internal events that could lead to geomagnetic reversals. One of those chicken and egg kinda puzzles.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 27, 2012 at 11:05 pm |

        Gates,
        Interesting presentations that you linked to

        “Global ocean heat content changes in sfc-100m layer are anti-correlated with those from 100-700m; however, great observational uncertainties are present in net 0-700m changes in historical record.
        •Roemmish and Gilson (2011) show that using only corrected Argo float data, net heat variations are 3-5x smaller than for either layer  upper ocean restratification dominates TOA flux forcing.”

        I looked at a scant fraction of the float data and one can readily pick up the correlations and anti-correlations in temperature between the layers.

        The ocean is a great thermal mixing machine down to a certain level, which means it can continue to act as an effective heat sink.

        With the plethora of data and instrumentation sources, it’s just a matter of time before all the pieces start coming together. Very interesting to follow this.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 11:48 pm |

        So your take home message is that the oceans are ‘a great thermal mixing machine’?

        Idiot.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 1:56 am |

        Little baby Chief Wiggles can’t control the debate so he does what comes naturally.

        ” Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 11:48 pm |

        So your take home message is that the oceans are ‘a great thermal mixing machine’?
        Idiot.”

        Some of us cats will actually get their hands dirty and do some analysis.
        http://theoilconundrum.blogspot.com/2011/10/sea-temperature-correlation.html

        You know, its really not that hard. You can even try to emulate your pseudo-military buddy Captain and dig in to the data and make up some stuff. I guess it’s easier skipping that step and go directly to the copy-and-paste fiction writing.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 28, 2012 at 2:14 am |

        WHT,

        That’s a nice analogy about the ocean– “great thermal mixing machine”. Really a mixing and storage machine, that responds in specific ways to external forcing versus natural variability. Chief Hydro is banking that it was changes in cloud cover that were causing more SW to enter the ocean and that’s what has been causing their slowly and steady rise in heat content. Actually, what newer studies coming out, like this one:

        http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2012/2012GL053262.shtml

        Are showing is that the warming pattern seen in the ocean and atmosphere must be caused by an external forcing on the climate, an external forcing on the oceans, and not internal variability such as we might see from simply changes in the PDO or ENSO.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 2:42 am |

        Gates,
        I am going directly to the source on some of these analogies, especially the Hansen and Lacis paper here:
        http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/1985/1985_Hansen_etal.pdf
        They talk quite a bit about mixing in the layers as a diffusional process.

        I have been working out an analysis for thermal diffusivity that assumes aleatory uncertainty in both the diffusion coefficient and the mixing interface. As it turns out, the analytical result is much simpler to deal with, while it captures the expected Fickian-shaped response curve. My goal is always to see if we can come up with some nice first-order physics to help explain what is happening. As more data comes in, this should be interesting to watch the evolution in the response curves.

      • Steady Eddie | November 28, 2012 at 2:46 am |

        Gates
        [recent studies] are showing is that the warming pattern seen in the ocean and atmosphere must be caused by an external forcing on the climate, an external forcing on the oceans, and not internal variability such as we might see from simply changes in the PDO or ENSO.

        How ‘recent’ is their data exactly ? Pre-1998 ?

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 5:21 am |

        The guy works with power rules. He has a power rule for diffusion of heat from the atmosphere to the ocean. I kid you not. All based on ‘aleatory uncertainty’. That’s right – he pulls it out of his arse.

        He has a power rule for diffusion of carbon from the atmoshere to the oceans. OK – but there are quite a lot of factors in the carbon cycle. All based on ‘aleatory uncertainty’. That’s right.

        He is just a self aggrandising wack job – as crazy as anyone on the web.

        What’s wrong with you gatesy. Feeling a bit outgunned? Lost the debate on the data? How that discussion with Levitus going? Found out yet that the data is composited over 5 years as discussed in his 2010 paper? And so can’t be used for annual change? Don’t like the Wong data? Doesn’t suit the narrative?

        Idiots.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 5:28 am |

        Eddie – It is space cadet nonsense. They make the assumption that toa radiative flux doesn’t change as a result of cloud changes in particular.

        I like to quote the IPCC ‘In summary, although there is independent evidence for decadal changes in TOA radiative fluxes over the last two decades, the evidence is equivocal. Changes in the planetary and tropical TOA radiative fluxes are consistent with independent global ocean heat-storage data, and are expected to be dominated by changes in cloud radiative forcing. To the extent that they are real, they may simply reflect natural low-frequency variability of the climate system.’ AR4 3.4.4.1

        There is lots of evidence for low frequency climate variability – and indeed for cloud modulated by Pacific SST.

        It is all very bizarre.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:49 am |

        CH asks:

        Don’t like the Wong data? Doesn’t suit the narrative?

        But Wong06 is quite clear on OHC:

        The ocean heat storage and net radiation data, while showing relatively large interannual variability, are consistent with heating predicted from current state of-the-art coupled ocean–atmosphere climate models (Barnett et al. 2001). The anticipated change in anthropogenic radiative forcing over the next few decades is estimated as ~0.6 W m^2 (decade)^1 (Houghton et al. 2001). The interannual variability in net radiation is of similar magnitude (+/-0.7 W m2). Note that the ocean heat storage dataset for single annual-mean values has a sampling uncertainty of 0.4 W m^2 (1o) so that the larger range of variation in ocean heat storage is more likely due to its larger sampling noise. The radiation dataset has a larger mean bias uncertainty (absolute calibration) but smaller sampling error than the ocean heat storage data. The 10-yr average of ocean heat storage is about 0.6 W m^2, similar to the levels predicted by current climate models for anthropogenic global warming scenarios (Houghton et al. 2001; Hansen et al. 2005).

        This has now been pointed out several times.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:53 am |

        The climate system is not a perpetual motion machine. It cools down when it heats up ;-)

        The increase in OHC since the mid-C20th requires an external forcing. CH is in denial about the *most likely* cause: increasing RF from GHGs.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 6:09 am |

        The 10-yr average of ocean heat storage is about 0.6 W m^2, similar to the levels predicted by current climate models for anthropogenic global warming scenarios (Houghton et al. 2001; Hansen et al. 2005).

        Here is the data as reported by the IPCC. http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/figure-3-23.html

        And just in case you need help interpreting.

        ‘In summary, although there is independent evidence for decadal changes in TOA radiative fluxes over the last two decades, the evidence is equivocal. Changes in the planetary and tropical TOA radiative fluxes are consistent with independent global ocean heat-storage data, and are expected to be dominated by changes in cloud radiative forcing. To the extent that they are real, they may simply reflect natural low-frequency variability of the climate system.’ AR4 3.4.4.1

        For good measure here is the ISCCP-FD SW record – http://isccp.giss.nasa.gov/zFD/an9090_SWup_toa.gif

        ‘The overall slight rise (relative heating) of global total net flux at TOA between the 1980’s and 1990’s is confirmed in the tropics by the ERBS measurements and exceeds the estimated climate forcing changes (greenhouse gases and aerosols) for this period. The most obvious explanation is the associated changes in cloudiness during this period. ‘

        The increase in net in both cases was all SW – with cooling in the LW.
        It might be ‘similar’ to AGW but the cause in the satellite records is entirely different. This has now been pointed out to you several times but you persist in the idiotic quest to deny it. I wonder why that is – space cadet.

        But by all keep making your stupid lawyer points based entirely on interpreting words like some magical incantation. It amuses me to point out how silly you are.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 6:35 am |

        The climate system is not a perpetual motion machine. It cools down when it heats up ;-)

        The increase in OHC since the mid-C20th requires an external forcing. CH is in denial about the *most likely* cause: increasing RF from GHGs.

        Now you have me worried. It cools down when it warms up? Novel theory you have there. It is probably better to say the oceans warmed from the 1970’s. Now we know there are low frequency climate modes. The shift to more frequent and intense El Nino in the 1970’s for instance, we know that these Pacific modes influence low level marine stratocumulous – http://judithcurry.com/2011/02/09/decadal-variability-of-clouds/ – and therefore the energy budget of the planet, we presume that the Pacific mode contributed to ocean and atmosphere warming in the period to 1998. There is actually some quite respectable science in this presumption.

        Lo and behold – what do the satellite records say? What was that again? Now it is not warming for a decade ot three more. What’s ya gunna do?

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 6:57 am |

        These slides

        http://www.atmos.umd.edu/~seminar/data/y12fall/umd_aosc_121115_levitus.pdf

        tell more about the recent results of Levitus et al.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 7:04 am |

        CH

        It is probably better to say the oceans warmed from the 1970′s. Now we know there are low frequency climate modes. The shift to more frequent and intense El Nino in the 1970′s for instance, we know that these Pacific modes influence low level marine stratocumulous [etc]

        So much hingest on this innocent-sounding misdirection doesn’t it? Actually, that’s about 45 years of rising OHC which is not attributable to any ‘low frequency variation’ I’ve ever heard of. Nor is any Pacific mode capable of causing OHC to increase in all major ocean basins (Levitus et al. 2012).

        OHC does *not* fit with your perpetual motion machine depiction of how the climate system works. It is compelling evidence for a sustained energetic imbalance. And we* all know why that’s happening.

        *’we’ excludes deniers

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 7:08 am |

        Thank you Pekka

        Very useful. Now all we have to do is get certain obstinate rejectionists and misrepresenters to LOOK at the pretty pictures.

      • Handel | November 28, 2012 at 10:23 am |

        The increase in OHC since the mid-C20th requires an external forcing. CH is in denial about the *most likely* cause: increasing RF from GHGs

        Only if/while RF from GHGs increases atmospheric temperatures, thereby reducing the ocean-atmosphere temperature gradient.
        Those who maintain an OHC increase over the last 16 years has *most likely* been due to RF from GHGs, are in denial about the atmospheric temperature plateau for this period.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 11:11 am |

        How strange. Somebody with a different screen name made exactly the same comment recently on another thread. I suggested that their perspective was incomplete and that they needed to have a look at Meehl et al. (2011).

        In the brief following exchange, JCH offered another perspective…

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 2:04 pm |

        So – you get the nature of the radiative flux wrong at TOA and continue with your nonsense on a different tack. You accuse me of misdirection and then say exactly the same thing.

        You are an impossible idiot.

      • R. Gates | November 28, 2012 at 2:32 pm |

        Handel said:

        “Only if/while RF from GHGs increases atmospheric temperatures, thereby reducing the ocean-atmosphere temperature gradient.
        Those who maintain an OHC increase over the last 16 years has *most likely* been due to RF from GHGs, are in denial about the atmospheric temperature plateau for this period”

        ______
        This notion that atmospheric temperatures must continue to increase for ocean heat content to continue to increase is often repeated by those who fail to grasp the basic concept of the “control nob” function that GHG’s fulfill in regulating the heat flow from ocean to space. The control nob, or thermal gradient function of GHG’s- modulating the rate of energy flow from ocean (source) to space (sink) are like any other control knob. Their levels determine the rate of flow. Remember, net heat flows from ocean to atmosphere and then to space. The atmospheric temperatures have been flat over the past decade BUT FLAT AT THE HIGHEST LEVELS IN CENTURIES. The control knob has been set to “accumulate”, as these higher atmospheric temperatures mean that even during this period of flat HIGHER temperatures, the rate of flow of energy from ocean to space is slowed, and thus the oceans are still accumulating energy. Down to 2000m, the oceans have nearly doubled their heat content over the past decade alone. Changes in clouds (allowing more SW to strike the ocean) are insufficient to explain this accumulation. The PDO is insufficient to explain this accumulation. This nature of this heating of the ocean, combined with higher atmospheric temperatures (yes, flat for ten years, but at record high levels) can only be caused by an external forcing on the climate, exactly in line with what is expected from the continued and rapid increase of anthropogenic greenhouse gases.

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 2:40 pm |

        Gates,

        Down to 2000m, the oceans have nearly doubled their heat content over the past decade alone.

        What is that supposed to mean? The only meaning for that sentence that I understand would require something of the order of doubling the absolute temperature. I really don’t understand, what you mean by that.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 2:51 pm |

        Ocean heat content follows closely the radiative imbalance at TOA.

        That is after all the source of all these things – is it not gatesy?

        Ocean heat content has continued to rise moderately with a dip in the last couple of years. Although it is hard to see in CERES a justification of the large jump at the XBT/ARGO splice.

        http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=CERES_MODIS-1.gif

        Beyond that we are in a cool mode – http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703 – as TOA radiative flux is modulated by ENSO and the PDO. So little warming – or sea level rise – for a decade or three more.

        I guess the millenialist cult of AGW groupthink space cadets don’t want to know. Just a handwaving, blanket denial. So sad – too bad.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 28, 2012 at 3:12 pm |

        I believe he is taking an arbitrary baseline then comparing two period. In other words, he’s conflating “doubling over a certain value” with “doubling.” It’s silly and misleading.

        It’d be like saying the increase from 100 to 101 is “infinite” because if you take your baseline as 100, the increase is 1/0.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 28, 2012 at 6:55 pm |

        Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 2:40 pm |
        Gates,

        Down to 2000m, the oceans have nearly doubled their heat content over the past decade alone.

        What is that supposed to mean? The only meaning for that sentence that I understand would require something of the order of doubling the absolute temperature. I really don’t understand, what you mean by that.

        _______
        Pekka,

        Should be heat content “anomaly” of course, though none of the standard graphs include this nomenclature. Thus, the variance from their standard reference period, based on Levitus et. al, has doubled in the world oceans over the past 10 years, as this period has seen faster rising heat content than the average over the past 50+ years. The average over the past 50+ years is somewhere around 0.5 x 10^22 Joules per year added to the global ocean down to 2000m, whereas over the past 10 years, we’ve seen somewhere around 1.0 x 10^22 Joules per year added. Thus, in the past 10 years, the heat content anomaly has gone from somewhere around 7 x 10 ^22 Joules to around 14.5 x 10^22 Joules and it is here that the term “doubled” heat content came from, though it should be a doubled heat content anomaly, for certainly the oceans down to 2000m have not doubled in temperature over the past 10 years!

      • Handel | November 29, 2012 at 11:27 am |

        Ocean heat content follows closely the radiative imbalance at TOA.

        But does the TOA radiative imbalance closely follow CO2 levels ?

        Surely that is what AGW stands or falls on ?

    • WebHubTelescope | November 27, 2012 at 9:19 am |

      Don’t forget that Tomas is blowing smoke. At the macro scale, quantum effects are thoroughly mixed. Unless the earth acts like a large resonant cavity, which is totally preposterous when you think about it.

      Yet as Pekka says, the quantum effects are obvious at scales that are reasonable, such as for the radiative spectrum and where statistical mechanics rules.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 4:16 pm |

        Quantum effects are thoroughtly mixed? Just what could that possibly mean? We have 3 great ideas in 20th century physics. The very small, the very large and the very complex.

        Tomas mixed the very small with the very complex – unwise in my opinion. QM has absolutely nothing to do with complex systems theory.

        Satistical mechanics doesn’t work with nonequilibrium systems.

        ‘Non-equilibrium systems are much more complex and they may undergo fluctuations of more extensive quantities. The boundary conditions impose on them particular intensive variables, like temperature gradients or distorted collective motions (shear motions, vortices, etc.), often called thermodynamic forces. If free energies are very useful in equilibrium thermodynamics, it must be stressed that there is no general law defining stationary non-equilibrium properties of the energy as is the second law of thermodynamics for the entropy in equilibrium thermodynamics.’ wikepedia

        At the macro scale we have complex systems – that are susceptible only to the ideas of complex systems thoery as Tomas says.

        Webby is an idiot whose words and concepts have very little fundamental physical meaning.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 27, 2012 at 10:42 pm |

        Chief Astrologist Wiggles does not seem to be able to comprehend that the continuity equations used to solve all sorts of problems are based on non-equilibrium dynamics. Chief Astrologist Wiggles hates anyone with a solid state physics background because he can’t comprehend that the reason his computer works at all is due to the harnessing of non-equilibrium perturbations to the statistical mechanics of electrical carriers.

        We are scientists because we actually make progress. Chief is one of the fake skeptics that gets angry because he can’t seem to understand fundamental concepts.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 11:24 pm |

        That’s funny. I thought it had to do with transistors, logic gates, machine languages, ptotaming languges and ever upward on increasing abstraction.

        But please do tell. What is quantum mixing? What is harnessing of non-equilibrium perturbations to the statistical mechanics of electrical carriers? You are an idiot who puts words together in ways that sound like they should mean something but do not.

        ‘Finally, Lorenz’s theory of the atmosphere (and ocean) as a chaotic system raises fundamental, but unanswered questions about how much the uncertainties in climate-change projections can be reduced. In 1969, Lorenz [30] wrote: ‘Perhaps we can visualize the day when all of the relevant physical principles will be perfectly known. It may then still not be possible to express these principles as mathematical equations which can be solved by digital computers. We may believe, for example, that the motion of the unsaturated portion of the atmosphere is governed by the Navier–Stokes equations, but to use these equations properly we should have to describe each turbulent eddy—a task far beyond the capacity of the largest computer. We must therefore express the pertinent statistical properties of turbulent eddies as functions of the larger-scale motions. We do not yet know how to do this, nor have we proven that the desired functions exist’. Thirty years later, this problem remains unsolved, and may possibly be unsolvable.’ Slingo and Palmer 2011

        So here is the Navier-Stokes continuity equation – by all means solve it.
        You are instead an utterly worhtless moron.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 11:53 pm |

        ah…programming languges..? Still the guy is an absurdity on legs.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 1:38 am |

        Everyone understands that quantum effects rule on the scale of the wavelength corresponding to the energy of the particle. At macro scales, statistical mechanics starts to take over and that’s where the state space of particles becomes thoroughly mixed.
        For bosons such as photons you have your Bose-Einstein statistics.
        For fermions such as electrons you have your Fermi-Dirac statistics.
        Either of these can reduce to Maxwell-Boltzmann statistics for the appropriate regime, which simplifies much of the math.

        A transistor works by slight modifications or perturbations to the carrier densities which follow F-D statistics. This is obviously non-equilibrium as we are placing a voltage across the material, and the electrical carriers will start to move. The charged carriers could be doing all sorts of odd things like scattering and emitting photons, yet we look at the statistics and realize that the forcing function we apply is really all that matters.

        Same thing with the Bose statistics that will feed into the derivation of Planck’s response curve for black-body radiation. We can perturb the statistics and understand which way the thermal response will trend.

        Same goes for heat response by applying forcing functions to the system and accounting for where the heat goes. Nothing will go out-of-whack the way you think it will without some external stimulation

        It is in fact pretty simple — we have forcing functions which cause perturbations. On the relative scale, these perturbations aren’t large and we should be able to get a handle on them. Whether these are micro or macro, it really doesn’t matter. Technology has brought us many instrumented sources of data and volumes of data to work with. It’s just a matter of time before we will figure out the rest of the pieces.

        I think the the problem with Chief Astrologist Wiggles is that he has some stupid agenda that he has going on and he just can’t deal with the basic physics. Like the other pseudo-authoritarian types such as Captain and the sarge, the Chief has only studied the redneck-filtered version of physics and they continue to make bone-headed assumptions. It’s totally predictable that they get mad when they are challenged because that’s why they picked the monikers of Chief and Captain in the first place. They think that all the sheeple will follow their orders when they start to bark. Yea, sure. The entertainment value is in terms of witnessing these blowhards getting more and more riled up when they get called on their fabrications.

      • Steady Eddie | November 28, 2012 at 2:39 am |

        Web, You seem much better at producing impressive but bald lists of facts, rather than argumentation. Seems a waste.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 3:02 am |

        No Edie, Like in everything I do, I do a mix of math analysis, physical theory, and data crunching. Just because you don’t see this doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.
        http://theoilconundrum.blogspot.com
        http://mobjectivist.blogspot.com

        Mosh and Nick Stokes and Tamino and a few others do this, which means that they can interpret what they find.
        This is in contrast to you, Edie, a run-of-the-mill fake skeptic who has nothing to add to the debate.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 3:11 am |

        Steady Eddie | November 28, 2012 at 2:39 am |

        “Web, You seem much better at producing impressive but bald lists of facts, rather than argumentation. Seems a waste.”

        You seem too easily impressed.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 3:30 am |

        WebHubTelescope | November 27, 2012 at 10:42 pm |

        “the reason his computer works at all is due to the harnessing of non-equilibrium perturbations to the statistical mechanics of electrical carriers”

        Funny thing, Konrad Zuse built the first programmable computer without tubes or transisters. The Z2 was built from 600 electro-mechanical relays. Brits called the vacuum tube a “valve”. This is a very accurate description and it applies to transisters as well. Logic elements can be constructed mechanically or electrically. Your computer works because of boolean logic not because of any particular physical implementation of that logic.

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boolean_algebra_(logic)

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_tube

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konrad_Zuse

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 3:39 am |

        webnutcolonoscope makes no sense at all as usual. To go back to definitions – and wonder what practical import these concepts have for the climate system.
        ‘In quantum statistics, Bose–Einstein statistics (or more colloquially B–E statistics) is one of two possible ways in which a collection of indistinguishable particles may occupy a set of available discrete energy states. The aggregation of particles in the same state, which is characteristic of particles obeying Bose-Einstein statistics, accounts for the cohesive streaming of laser light and the frictionless creeping of superfluid helium. The theory of this behaviour was developed (1924–25) by Albert Einstein and Satyendra Nath Bose, who recognized that a collection of identical and indistinguishable particles can be distributed in this way.
        The Bose-Einstein statistics apply only to those particles not limited to single occupancy of the same state—that is, particles that do not obey the Pauli exclusion principle restrictions. Such particles have integer values of spin and are named bosons, after the statistics that correctly describe their behaviour.’ wikepedia

        ‘Fermi–Dirac statistics is a part of the science of physics that describes the energies of single particles in a system comprising many identical particles that obey the Pauli exclusion principle. It is named after Enrico Fermi and Paul Dirac, who each discovered it independently, although Enrico Fermi defined the statistics earlier than Paul Dirac.[1][2]

        Fermi–Dirac (F–D) statistics applies to identical particles with half-odd-integer spin in a system in thermal equilibrium. Additionally, the particles in this system are assumed to have negligible mutual interaction. This allows the many-particle system to be described in terms of single-particle energy states. The result is the F–D distribution of particles over these states and includes the condition that no two particles can occupy the same state, which has a considerable effect on the properties of the system. Since F–D statistics applies to particles with half-integer spin, these particles have come to be called fermions. It is most commonly applied to electrons, which are fermions with spin 1/2. Fermi–Dirac statistics is a part of the more general field of statistical mechanics and uses the principles of quantum mechanics.’ wikepedia

        He is saying that the particles may occupy any of the number of available energy states – and that there is a statistical distribution for this. This is simply a truism that says nothing about the available energy or the pathways those energies take.

        Yesterday he confused open and closed systems. The Earth system is closed. Today he confuses equilibrium and non-equilibrium thermodynamics. ‘Equilibrium Thermodynamics is the systematic study of transformations of matter and energy in systems as they approach equilibrium. The word equilibrium implies a state of balance. Equilibrium thermodynamics, in origins, derives from analysis of the Carnot cycle. Here, typically a system, as cylinder of gas, is set out of balance via heat input from a combustion reaction. Then, through a series of steps, as the system settles into its final equilibrium state, work is extracted.’ wikepedia

        The heat diffusion and other things he mentions are studies of energies in systems as they approach equilibrium. He appeals to high sounding but ultimately barely relevant concepts and gets basic concepts so wrong.

        ‘Non-equilibrium thermodynamics is a branch of thermodynamics that deals with thermodynamic systems that are not in thermodynamic equilibrium. Most systems found in nature are not in thermodynamic equilibrium; for they are changing or can be triggered to change over time, and are continuously and discontinuously subject to flux of matter and energy to and from other systems and to chemical reactions. Non-equilibrium thermodynamics is concerned with transport processes and with the rates of chemical reactions’

        It is the transport processes and reaction rates that are important in the immensely complex, nonequilibrium system that is Earth’s climate.

        I invited him to solve Navier-Stokes – which is the ‘continuity’ equation applicable to climate. There is in fact a million dollar prize for this – http://www.claymath.org/millennium/Navier-Stokes_Equations/

        ‘Waves follow our boat as we meander across the lake, and turbulent air currents follow our flight in a modern jet. Mathematicians and physicists believe that an explanation for and the prediction of both the breeze and the turbulence can be found through an understanding of solutions to the Navier-Stokes equations. Although these equations were written down in the 19th Century, our understanding of them remains minimal. The challenge is to make substantial progress toward a mathematical theory which will unlock the secrets hidden in the Navier-Stokes equations.’

        As for Chief Hydrologist – everyone knows my name – Robert I Ellison. I have the IQ of Lisa Simpson, degrees in engineering and science and wide ranging interests in art, music, literature, economics and physics. I am a bit of a dilettante and regard myself as a natural philosopher of some renown.

        That’s not the reason for the moniker however – and he knows this perfectly well because it is described with some perplexity in his list of ‘climate clowns’.

        The moniker in fact derives from Cecil Terwilliger – Springfields Chief Hydrological and Hydraulical Engineer. Hydrology is you see a sacred vocation in some cultures.

        The guy has absolutely no sense of humour, doesn’t get literature and it shows in his writing, is just utterly clueless about the breadth of things that matter in climate science, has so little ability to read and research and make valid connections, imagines that whatever he imagines is true and essentially makes it up as he goes along by a process of ‘intuitive physics’, seems socially and culturally awkward and at the end of the day get’s everything wrong and is abusive and repulsive to go with it.

      • Steady Eddie | November 28, 2012 at 9:27 am |

        Yes Web, you do indulge in some apparent attempts at science, the sincerity of which is open to debate. But like the run-of-the-mill fake alarmist that you are, you also blow a lot of smoke with some fancy terms, quite evident from your phony smartass air of authority. Just because you think you add value to the debate, doesn’t mean you do. Your comically overblown ego is a clear signal anyone can read, not just science grads.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 29, 2012 at 2:18 am |

        I do dig the projection. Throwing up wild shot after wild shot.

        What gets me is that Chef Wiggles seems to believe that art and culture are important ingredients to working climate science.

      • Peter Davies | November 29, 2012 at 2:35 am |

        You have a healthy ego Chief but I don’t find it offensive. Thanks to your tireless restating of the facts of climate physics along with your interpretation of what is going on has been most helpful to me and many others as well.

        Tomas has written about complexity, chaos, ergodicity and quantum mechanics in respect of weather and climate systems with which I feel in agreement but not in any educated sense. You and a couple of others have at least helped me to understand the gist of what he has been talking about.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 29, 2012 at 3:20 am |

        Why thank you Peter. I am a little embarassed now at claiming to be as smart as Lisa Simpson. In truth I would rather be more like Bart or Homer – but not to be.

        Webby you keep referring to things like Bose-Einstein statistics – things that have no great significance in climate science – but get the basics wrong. Diffusion of heat from the atmosphere to the oceans for instance. Something that is fundamentally unphysical. And you imagine that what you do is climate science. I think it is fundamentally misusing power rules in both epistemic and aleatory uncertainty. The parameters for the power rules – in other words – you pull out of your arse.

        You make no admissions of your errors – but just popup again and again like a bop bag with silly and offensive comment. So sad – too bad.

  37. A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 26, 2012 at 9:38 am |

    Pekka Pirilä notes “Indeed, if we accept the hypothesis that the what we see is the result of natural selection then we are surely witnesses of the mother of all confirmatory biases.”

    Pekka makes a good point. Indeed it is deplorable how few citizens nowadays — scientists and skeptics alike — are even vaguely aware of (physicist) Brandon Carter’s two-part rational resolution of Fermi’s Paradox:

    (1) Enrico Fermi’s Question: Where is Everyone?  Brandon Carter’s hypothesis asserts that Earth is not visited by space-faring galactic civilizations because catastropic climate-instabilities have killed all evolving intelligent species in the entire galaxy, except on the planet Earth.

    (2) Why Has Earth Been Spared?  Brandon Carter’s hypothesis asserts that planet Earth avoided climate-change catastrophes in the past for a wholly anthropic reason: (a) some planet had to be the luckiest planet, and (b) by chance, that luckiest-of-all planet was our planet Earth (as we know because, hey, we’re still alive!).

    Climate Etc regulars can learn all about general Carter-style arguments on the Wikipedia page Doomsday Arguments; for an in-depth discussion of Doomsday Arguments relating specifically to climate-change physics, consult (for example) Barrow and Tipler’s The Anthropic Cosmological Principle. (Section 8.7) \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries!!!}}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

    Do I personally believe these Doomsday Arguments (climate-change and otherwise)? Hmmm … I’m not a believer, yet on the other hand, this general class of arguments is surprisingly difficult to rationally refute.

    One useful lesson is that Hansen and colleagues’ recent articles are by no means the first to advance catastrophic climate-change scenarios … the literature of climate-change scenarios is much older and richer than that, eh? \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries!!!}}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

    • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 10:14 am |

      Fanny

      You are right on one point: the literature on human-caused climate doomsday scenarios is older than the latest prophet of doom (Hansen).

      The “Great Flood” goes back way before Noah to the ancient Babylonians (the story of Gilgamesh is one of the oldest written documents on Earth).

      The “gods”, “Jehova” or “Gaia” are “angered” by man’s transgressions (latest sin: burning fossil fuels to live a better life), and respond with a catastrophic (or cataclysmic) climate event. As “Genesis” (and James E. Hansen) warn us: “it won’t be water but fire next time” (i.e. “Venus runaway”).

      Good scary stuff. But basically BS each time.

      I’m sorry for you that you’ve fallen for the latest doomsday prophet and apparently live in constant fear.

      Sad.

      Max

    • gbaikie | November 26, 2012 at 10:39 am |

      ” Indeed it is deplorable how few citizens nowadays — scientists and skeptics alike — are even vaguely aware of (physicist) Brandon Carter’s two-part rational resolution of Fermi’s Paradox:

      (1) Enrico Fermi’s Question: Where is Everyone? Brandon Carter’s hypothesis asserts that Earth is not visited by space-faring galactic civilizations because catastropic climate-instabilities have killed all evolving intelligent species in the entire galaxy, except on the planet Earth.

      (2) Why Has Earth Been Spared? Brandon Carter’s hypothesis asserts that planet Earth avoided climate-change catastrophes in the past for a wholly anthropic reason: (a) some planet had to be the luckiest planet, and (b) by chance, that luckiest-of-all planet was our planet Earth (as we know because, hey, we’re still alive!).”

      It is impossible for climate change to end human civilization.

      One space rock can do this.
      It seems the reason human civilization could fail, is: 1] there is a lot of idiots.
      2] Earth is probably harder to leave than most planets which have ever developed a civilization.

      If Earthlings ever leave their cradle, there other problems which inhibit star travel and likewise other civilizations from other stars coming to Earth.
      And most problems have little to do the technological capability to make starships.
      A clue to this problem, lies in the question, why are we still on Earth?
      The answer to that question has nothing to do with the technological capability for humans to leave Earth. Herds of space nerds will tell you different story, but they are wrong.

      The baseline reason of Fermi’s paradox is chance developing life beyond bacteria, coupled with the Universe is a dangerous place. It’s dangerous, if just consider the amount of supernovas which occur, which probably limit civilization occurring near the hub of galaxies.
      Next, for rocky planets to form, you need rocks. And rocks can fall on your head, later [see, space rocks].
      These and other factors are going thin the herd.
      We could have as much as 1 civilization per 100 stars system [I think it’s less than 1 per 1000]. But with hundreds of billions of star systems in your galaxy, even 1 per million means there is a lot of them.
      But even if there is 1 per 100, it can explain Fermi’s paradox.
      Because any civilization may want to go to another star system, and if they do, they may only go to a few of them.
      And then as odds, if as much as 1 in 100, what chance of being near another civilization at the same time.
      Other things are why go to another star system, especially if you know if it has intelligent life in the system?
      Some people don’t want go to Mars, because there might be alien microbial life on the planet.
      Would any government actually want anyone going to star system if they knew there is intelligence life there?
      Probably most dangerous you do is make contact with alien civilization- one would at least want to study it, first. And if you do, that, then, they going to be strange people.
      Leaving aside the idea, that one doesn’t want annoy a possibility dangerous predator- which could easily *appear* cute and fuzzy, do you actually want to go to planets of any kind.
      The reason to go to other star systems is for adventure. Almost any star system has all any civilization could want- unlimited energy and unlimited resources for trillions of people.
      So if limited the type creature which goes to other star system to creatures desiring adventure- they might tend to want too much fun.

      • Peter Davies | November 26, 2012 at 4:06 pm |

        Interesting post gbaike. The main thing that prevents people on Earth from visiting star systems with any potential for intelligent life is simply that of time, because if we are counting thousands of light years then there is an awful lot of travelling to do!

        The universe that we can see is really a hologram isn’t it? Its made up of objects that reflect light that has taken an enormous range of light years to reach us. In fact some of the stars we can see ow have ceased to exist many light years previously but their reflected light is still to wink out.

      • gbaikie | November 26, 2012 at 4:52 pm |

        “The main thing that prevents people on Earth from visiting star systems with any potential for intelligent life is simply that of time, because if we are counting thousands of light years then there is an awful lot of travelling to do! ”

        Time is certainly one element. But there are 33 stars [systems] within 12.5 light years:
        http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/12lys.html
        But even 4 light year time delay on communications is a problem- though faster than light communication may be possible.

      • lolwot | November 26, 2012 at 5:34 pm |

        “Because any civilization may want to go to another star system, and if they do, they may only go to a few of them.”

        I think the heart of Fermi’s paradox is that if just one civilization in this galaxy ever had the technology to travel to another star system they would have inevitably colonized the entire galaxy within something like one million years.

        Humans didn’t stick to one continent for example, we swept across them all. It doesn’t require planning, groups of people will always splinter off to found their own independent states in unclaimed lands. Once the technology is available to average joes there will always be a constant trickle of colony ships heading out in all directions. The first star systems colonized will then become the seeds from which more colony ships embark under the same process and so on.

        The genie is out of the bottle then. There is no conceivable way that this exponential wave of colony ships could be stopped. There is no centralized control or planning that can be taken out and even a war couldn’t wipe them all out. The galaxy would be colonized by this exponential process in under 1 million years and that’s assuming much-slower-than-light travel. There’s been far longer than 1 million years for this irreversible process to happen.

        IMO either a) they exist but are hiding, b) we are alone, or c) every intelligent civilization is wiped out before it gets the chance to spread.

        I think b) is most likely. a) has problems. c) now seems increasingly unlikely. For c) I was wagering on some hidden flaw in the laws of physics inevitably leading intelligent species to obliterate their planet when they play with it. Kind of similar to all that hoohah about the CERN experiment generating a black hole kind of thing.

      • lolwot | November 26, 2012 at 5:56 pm |

        “The main thing that prevents people on Earth from visiting star systems with any potential for intelligent life is simply that of time, because if we are counting thousands of light years then there is an awful lot of travelling to do!”

        Once people are living their entire lives in space the concept of travelling in space will lose a lot of the significance it has today. Whether people live out their 300 year lifetimes on a ship circling the Sun or on a ship moving slowly towards a distant star might not matter as much.

    • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 5:18 pm |

      Dear lord. Are there any people* here not considered skeptics who will speak against the stupid popsci craze? How can people say they believe in science while promoting pseudo scientific gibberish at not only acceptable, but desirable?

      *Pekka Pirilä deserves an honorable mention here. I think he’s the only one who has spoken up.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 7:36 pm |

        You need to get out more there Brandon, and perhaps even do a bit of reading on the history of science-fiction. The realties of today have exceeded some of the most outrageous science fiction of a century ago. The realities of tomorrow are at the very fringes and even beyond of what is thought possible today. This, by the way, cuts both ways, both negative and positive, as Dark ages can happen to any civilization.

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 8:10 pm |

        R. Gates:

        You need to get out more there Brandon, and perhaps even do a bit of reading on the history of science-fiction. The realties of today have exceeded some of the most outrageous science fiction of a century ago. The realities of tomorrow are at the very fringes and even beyond of what is thought possible today.

        This is about the stupidest form of hand-waving imaginable. You’re saying a failure of imaginations in the past suggests crazy things are plausible. Of course we can’t imagine everything that will happen in the future, but that doesn’t mean we can’t figure out what is and is not plausible. For example, it takes no imagination to understand:

        Perhaps [aliens] are still here and wish to remain hidden.

        Is crazy. You’re seriously suggesting aliens may be walking amongst us, without any basis or justification other than… we can’t predict things. Where does it end? Should I lend credence to the idea my neighbor is from outer space? Perhaps I should believe shapeshifting lizardmen are manipulating human history.

        No! People have believed in a multiverse for thousands of years. It’s part of many religions. And that’s fine. It’s religion. Faith in unknowable things is not a problem. It only becomes a problem when you start calling it science. Science doesn’t support a single one of these crazy ideas, and you insult every scientist in the world by saying it does. You’re worse than Young Earth Creationists.

        By the way, are you Michio Kaku? I swear, you sound like a bitter, arrogant version of him. I could almost see you as him while he’s drinking.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 8:19 pm |

        Brandon,

        You seem to enjoy taking my quotes out of context or otherwise misrepresenting what I said. In answer to the Fermi Paradox I simply presented the possibility that aliens were here but wish to remain hidden for whatever reason as one possible solution to this paradox among many that I offered. I never said what form they were in or how they could remain hidden or any such thing. Though it is not impossible (even more so given our own recent advances in cloaking technology) that aliens could be near Earth and remain hidden, I never said I believed this was the case or even likely. Don’t misrepresent what I say or you’ll really piss me off…

      • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 9:19 pm |

        R. Gates:

        Don’t misrepresent what I say or you’ll really piss me off…

        You constantly misrepresent what you say, yet you’ll get mad if I do the same? That’s fascinating.

        Please tell me how I misrepresented anything:

        Though it is not impossible (even more so given our own recent advances in cloaking technology) that aliens could be near Earth and remain hidden, I never said I believed this was the case or even likely.

        You specifically suggested aliens may be “here” and “hidden.” I said you’re “seriously suggesting aliens may be walking amongst us.” In what way did I misrepresent you?

        If I have ever misrepresented you, quote what I said and show how it is inaccurate. Otherwise, you’re just making things up to hide from criticisms.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 3:36 am |

        The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 8:19 pm |

        “Don’t misrepresent what I say or you’ll really piss me off…”

        Oh my. A pissed off R. Gates. What will the consequence of that be? A stern admonishment?

        ROFLMOA

        \mathbb{IMBECILE}

    • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 7:11 pm |

      In regards to the Fermi Paradox, while it is possible that some kind of catastrophic climate change limits the evolution of intelligent civilizations beyond a certain point, there are also many other catastrophe which probability would lend themselves to bringing about the end of a civilization before it could extend too far beyond its local solar system. But I tend to favor a more simplified view. The period of communications via standard radio broadcast is relatively small, perhaps just a few hundred years, and that other forms of communications that are far more effective via technology that we haven’t developed yet might be more common among advanced civilizations. Once civilizations develop these, they leave behind the kinds of radio and television we know just like smoke signals and the pony express were left behind. Who knows where these advanced communications technologies rest, but you can be sure that we will leave our current system behind eventually.

      So why are they not zipping around our world? Perhaps some have been here and found us for the most part, uninteresting. Perhaps they are still here and wish to remain hidden. Perhaps they really don’t need to travel here physically as they have the ability to observe us from quite some distance, much like we are now just beginning to observe distant planets around distant stars very crudely. In 100 or 200 years how much better will our ability be to observe these distant worlds? Why travel there physically if you can watch it all from your home planet? If (as is likely) they mastered the fusion process, then they really don’t need our resources or anything else we might offer. They pretty much have unlimited power to do what they wish, and zipping to the furthest reaches of the galaxy might not be all that appealing to them, especially, if they already know what’s here anyway, and it’s not all that interesting to a race that would view us much the way we view apes or pigs or dolphins in term of intelligence.

  38. RiHo08 | November 26, 2012 at 11:06 am |

    From the BBC today a quote worth noting re: European Adaption Strategy reports:

    Climate Change Impacts and Vulnerabilities in Europe 2012

    “One of the report’s authors, Andre Jol, head of the EEA’s (European Environment Agency) vulnerability and adaptation group, added: “We know that the main increase in damage costs from natural disasters has not been from climate change, as such, but more as a result of an increase in wealth, people and infrastructure in risk areas.One of the report’s authors, Andre Jol, head of the EEA’s vulnerability and adaptation group, added: “We know that the main increase in damage costs from natural disasters has not been from climate change, as such, but more as a result of an increase in wealth, people and infrastructure in risk areas.”

    The report’s conclusion has relevance to USA and new policy regarding flood plain and coastal regions.

    It is refreshing that BBC did include this quote, although the quote is buried and discounted by opinions later on. Still, adaptation; there is good news that wealth plays an important role as well as people and infrastructure in risk areas. Now all we need is for FEMA to price insurance according to risk, not subsidize insurance, and voila, a rationale adaption policy.

    • MrE | November 26, 2012 at 11:29 am |

      =1

    • MrE | November 26, 2012 at 11:30 am |

      +1 :P

    • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 26, 2012 at 12:00 pm |

      RiHo08 embraces climate-change rationality:  “Now all we need is for  FEMA  energy economies to price  insurance  carbon-burning according to  risk  long-term harms, not subsidize  insurance  short-term cheap energy, and voila, a rationale climate-change adaption policy.”

      RiHo08, please let me say that your post’s reasoning amounts to an admirably rational case for foresighted, scientifically grounded, conservatively justified, carbon-taxing, climate-change policies, eh? \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries!!!}}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • RiHo08 | November 26, 2012 at 1:09 pm |

        A fan of MORE discourse.

        Adaptation is what is natural.

        Believing a carbon-taxing policy will change climate is hubris.

        Rationality is the belief that a choice becomes a necessity.

        My choice is to adapt and understand the weather.

      • climatereason | November 26, 2012 at 3:12 pm |

        Fan

        How do we know that the ozone hole wasn’t always there prior to our ability to start recording it during the 1950’s?

        Tonyb

      • A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 26, 2012 at 4:17 pm |

        climatereason asks:  “How do we know that the ozone hole wasn’t always there prior to our ability to start recording it during the 1950′s?”

        Most folks rely upon chemistry, physics, and mathematics. What do you rely upon, climatereason? \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries!!!}}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

      • climatereason | November 26, 2012 at 4:21 pm |

        Fan

        I rely on the reply from the greatest experts in the field
        at Cambridge university and the Max Planck institute who I posed this question to. They said they didn’t know whether a hole existed or not. Perhaps they know more about it than even you do fan?
        Tonyb

      • RiHo08 | November 26, 2012 at 4:54 pm |

        A fan of MORE discourse

        The Montreal Protocol formed the template for the Kyoto Protocol in the naive belief that the two issues were similar. For CFC abatement DuPont had HFC as lady-in-waiting. The Montreal Protocol wouldn’t have occurred without a viable (read: economically feasible) substitute.

        Where Kyoto goes off the rails is that the substitute for fossil fuels is the non-polluting Nuclear which elicited a firestorm of protest. The situation is easy: no economically feasible substitute, no protocol. The situation today remains the same as yesteryear. Until and unless Nuclear becomes the substitute for coal/oil/gas there is no base load generation alternative for the next 50+ years.

        Environmentalists shot themselves in the foot with Kyoto and no viable substitute so we have a goofy carbon tax proposal. “Renewables” became the nonexistent alternative requiring subsidies, and a slow technological growth leading us to an intermittent power proposal. My God, what a catastrophe.

        Not only did the environmentalists mess with the politics but they had to mess with the science which led to our present circumstance; that is, these delays gave time for a skeptical opposition to form who exposed the Mad Hatter CAGW scientists for the running around fools they have become. Their late, their late, for a very important date. No time to say hello goodbye, their late, their late, their late.

      • David Springer | November 26, 2012 at 4:59 pm |

        \mathbb{DOPEY}\bowtie\mathbb{DOPEY}

      • David Springer | November 26, 2012 at 5:01 pm |

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}
        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

        \mathbb{DORKY}\bowtie\mathbb{DORKY}

      • Peter Lang | November 26, 2012 at 8:11 pm |

        RiHo08
        @ November 26, 2012 at 4:54 pm

        +1 Spot on.

        I find it difficult to understand why the people who would like us to believe they think rationally don’t get what you said. It seems so obvious.

        Actually, I am sure it has little to do with not getting it. I’d say they don’t want to admit to it. And the fact they don’t discredits them and the rest of what they believe and advocate. It shows they are irrational and are more interested in pursuing other agendas.

      • timg56 | November 28, 2012 at 2:14 pm |

        fan,

        It is a mistake on your part to refer to the “ozone hole”.

        1) As far as scientist know, the “hole” may have always existed.

        2) Scientists still have trouble explaining why the “hole” was not where they predicted it to be.

        3) The size of the “hole” has not diminished since the Montreal Accord, perhaps an indication that the anthropogenic component is not as great a factor as some claim.

        4) As with global warming, the “threat” from the ozone hole was extremely overblown. Try to identify one negative impact that has been confirmed since the hole was discovered.

        In other words, what a referal to the ozone hole story tells us is that the science is far less understood than what some might want to think and that scepticism, particularly with regard to any threat mankind faces, should be the order of the day.

  39. MrE | November 26, 2012 at 11:29 am |

    +1

  40. Bad Andrew | November 26, 2012 at 12:30 pm |

    Warmers and Multiversers = SciFi Fans who don’t know when the movie begins or ends. It’s all the same.

    Andrew

  41. Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 1:33 pm |

    Water is of course already very highly taxed so there’s no revenue game in that for the government machine but still– just a small amount can kill a person quickly and does every year and that makes water more dangerous than CO2. And, water is the only thing other than CO2 that is emitted by modern US coal fired power plants. Too bad the same thing cannot be said for the coal-fired power plants being built everyday in China, Brazil, India, etc. These are the beneficiaries of the Left’s failed secular, socialist agenda of the Government/EPA/Education Complex that kills US companies and jobs.

    • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 1:51 pm |

      Waggy said:

      “Left’s failed secular, socialist agenda of the Government/EPA/Education Complex that kills…”

      ____
      Don’t you mean: “Left’s failed secular, socialist agenda of the Government/EPA/Education Complex/Grassy Knoll/Elvis is not Dead/Aliens in the White House/Where’s the Birth Certificate/UN World Police/Iluminati/Trilateral/Area 51/They want my guns & Precious Bodily Fluids/Flouride in the water/Communist/Fascist/Pinko/Anti-American…etc. etc. etc. Complex that kills.”?

      Why not just lump all the paranoid conspiracy nutty thinking into one big happy ball of lunacy, eh?

      • mike | November 26, 2012 at 2:19 pm |

        Gates,

        I’m shocked at the utter lack of fair-minded civility in your reply to Wagathon. What’s wrong with you?

      • Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 4:37 pm |

        Does the Left now wish to deny it has a secular, socialist agenda? What’s next, pigs fly?

      • blueice2hotsea | November 26, 2012 at 5:11 pm |

        Gates –

        Something flipped you out. Is this is the correction you are looking for?

        These are the beneficiaries of the Left’s failed successful secular, socialist agenda of the Government/EPA/Education Complex that kills US companies and jobs.

        Perchance thou protesteth Waggy too loudly…

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 5:42 pm |

        Really? A Government/EPA/Education Complex? Is this the nuttiest conspiracy complex ever? You can barely get one of this groups to work by itself, but all three as a “complex”. Might as well through Elvis and Aliens into the mix. Makes just as much sense…

      • Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 6:02 pm |

        Haven’t you heard?

        “Aliens Cause Global Warming”

        A lecture by Michael Crichton
        Caltech Michelin Lecture
        January 17, 2003

        My topic today sounds humorous but unfortunately I am serious. I am going to argue that extraterrestrials lie behind global warming. Or to speak more precisely, I will argue that a belief in extraterrestrials has paved the way, in a progression of steps, to a belief in global warming.

        Charting this progression of belief will be my task today.

        Let me say at once that I have no desire to discourage anyone from believing in either extraterrestrials or global warming. That would be quite impossible to do. Rather, I want to discuss the history of several widely-publicized beliefs and to point to what I consider an emerging crisis in the whole enterprise of science—namely the increasingly uneasy relationship between hard science and public policy…

      • BBD | November 26, 2012 at 6:05 pm |

        R. Gates

        Why not just lump all the paranoid conspiracy nutty thinking into one big happy ball of lunacy, eh?

        That’s the spirit!

      • blueice2hotsea | November 26, 2012 at 6:22 pm |

        Gates –

        Well I certainly agree that there are some nutty conspiracy complexes. But OTOH, it is sometimes rather difficult to know a priori which are truly nutty and which are not.

        I make this claim after having absorbed some 80,000 pages of Leftist materials straight from the I’d-rather-not-say-what. As a result, my perspective is that it is equally (if not more so) nutty to claim no Leftist conspiracies.

        Only time will tell.

        bi2hs

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 7:21 pm |

        blueice said:

        “80,000 pages of Leftist materials straight from the I’d-rather-not-say-what.”

        ___
        Ah, the old source-which-must-not-be-named, eh? Sort of a Leftist Voldemort eh? Watch your back, dude. That’s some powerful black magic your dabbling in…

      • blueice2hotsea | November 26, 2012 at 7:39 pm |

        Gates –

        OK. I was going to say “straight from the hoses ass”, but I thought that would be injecting unnecessary editorial comment.

        The sources were direct Leftist literature, autobiographies, authorized biographies, history, etc. – all unedited and uncommented upon by opposing uncharitable interpretations.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 7:46 pm |

        Please blueice, don’t hold back now. Tell us specifically which passages of the “80,000 pages” that you’ve absorbed from this “Leftist” material indicates a Leftist conspiracy. We’ll all big boys and girls here…we can take it. Please do tell!

      • blueice2hotsea | November 26, 2012 at 9:18 pm |

        R. Gates –

        My intent is not to insult you or to denigrate Leftist ideals and issues in general. It’s just that it is delusional to define “conspiracy” as a Right-wing only activity. And that is what I thought you were doing.

        If I misinterpreted your comments, I apologize.

        Now as to your interest in what passages written by Leftists might reveal a conspiracy to commit crimes. You are obviously an innocent, naive child. If you wish to be deflowered, it won’t be by me. Sorry. However, you can investigate this for yourself. All that you need is an apolitical definition of crime and conspiracy and a stack of Left-wing autobiographies.

        Good luck,

        bi2hs

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 9:50 am |

        R. Gates

        Your “book burning” sidetrack is a different debate.

        It is one of controlling thought by squashing dissenting view.

        IPCC calls it the “consensus process”

        Max

    • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 6:07 am |

      There is an open conspiracy to abolish democracy and the rule of law, economic growth and capitalism. It is everywhere on the net. It is absurd to deny its existence.

      Pick a definition – all fit the case.

      •A combination of men for an evil purpose; an agreement, between two or more persons, to commit a crime in concert, as treason; a plot.
      •A concurence or general tendency, as of circumstances, to one event, as if by agreement.
      •An agreement, manifesting itself in words or deeds, by which two or more persons confederate to do an unlawful act, or to use unlawful to do an act which is lawful; confederacy.

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 10:20 am |

        I’ll take Cubafornia twinkies sliding into fiscal Hostess holes for $200 Chief.

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 2:50 pm |

        Please Chief, be more specific in this or otherwise I’ll have to lump you in with the other conspiracy whackos here…

      • BFJ Cricklewood | November 27, 2012 at 3:10 pm |

        gates you’d need to be pretty blind to not notice the world is steadily moving to more and more soft totalitarianism. everywhere there is more, and more centralised, government.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 3:25 pm |

        Which bit of everywhere on the web and absurd to deny it’s existence didn’t you understand gatesy?

        Guess i will have to lump you in with the millennialist cult of AGW groupthink space cadets.

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 3:33 pm |

        There is an open conspiracy to abolish democracy and the rule of law, economic growth and capitalism. It is everywhere on the net.

        Ah. I was wondering how long it would take to get down to motivations behind the crankery. Because there’s always something going on behind the grubby curtains and peeling paint. Always.

        And you, it turns out, are a conspiracy theorist! You even *admit it*, which is most refreshing.

        All is explained. Thank you.

      • Tomcat | November 27, 2012 at 5:35 pm |

        Sooner or later, the not-too-bright devout alarmist will feel the need to wheel out the tired old “conspiracy” strawman. And here BBD self-identifies. But with the added stupidity of trying to equate “open conspiracy” with “conspiracy”.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 27, 2012 at 6:25 pm |

        I didn’t think you had anything tangible Chief. I guess I was hopeful that you’d surprise me. Oh well.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 7:19 pm |

        ‘The vexing thought that democracy as we now know it in all its geographic and historical variations might not survive indefinitely, that it could slit its own throat or quietly take its own life in an act of ‘democide’, even that it could be overpowered and killed off by outside forces that escape its attention, runs counter, of course, to much recent optimism about the global triumph of democracy. This book’s strategy of challenging humbug is deliberately strident. For in weighing up the probable long-term effects of a wide range of deep-rooted problems, The Life and Death of Democracy gives voice to what growing numbers of people quietly think: that despite all the huffing and puffing, the so-called global triumph of democracy may well turn out to be a campfire on ice. The book explains why the great democratic renewal that first began in India now breeds worldwide anxieties about whether democracy itself can cope with its own problems, let alone its adversaries. In probing these anxieties, the book does not draw easy conclusions. It does not favour simple-minded partisanship. It most certainly stands on the side of democracy, with new arguments. But it is not apologetic for its illusions, follies and weaknesses. In supposing that the most obscure phase in the history of democracy is now, the book argues the need to rethink its fundamental features, including present-day trends and definitions of the term. With an even hand, and one eye constantly on the past, the book tries to expose the worrying lack of clarity about what democracy means today, and why, if they are lucky, future generations will enjoy its fruits and find it indispensable. The book also comes up with a new set of reasons for thinking that democracy is a superior method of government – a good way of life that in principle can be embraced and applied by our entire planet.

        The whole approach owes a debt to the great nineteenth-century American poet and writer Walt Whitman. He famously noted that the history of democracy could not be written because democracy as he and others knew it was not yet properly built. Time proved him right. And so from the standpoint of the early twenty-first century, and the possible survival or destruction of a brand-new type of democracy, the same point can be put differently: we do not know what will become of monitory democracy because its fate has not yet been determined.’

        © John Keane 2009

        Here is a debate – after which 40% supported the view that democracy has failed the planet. There are much more radical positions that can be found across the web. Why don’t you go looking for it rather than making up stories about consiracy theorist. But I suggest that is simply a distraction.

        http://www.opendemocracy.net/andrew-dobson/james-lovelock-greenery-vs-democracy

      • RiHo08 | November 27, 2012 at 10:30 pm |

        Chief

        Democracy is in the streets of Cairo, in voices strong and weak, protesting an abstraction of absolute power. Democracy rises because people rise above themselves, impassionatedly seeing beyond themselves. Democracy is spontaneous, guided, manipulated, and eventually imprisoned, for excesses imposed upon the rights of others. And yet it survives in hearts and minds once enamored by simplistic direct solutions. For democracy reflects the nuances of life itself. I do not fear for democracy. I fear for those whose souls blinded by their passion and self righteousness. Dante’s lost souls.

      • blueice2hotsea | November 28, 2012 at 4:09 pm |

        I bet those “conspiracy whackos” are all paid agents of Big Oil, too.

        Wait, I know. Some of them probably conspired to violate FOIA laws and pin the blame on left-wing activists. That’s the ticket…

  42. Doug Cotton | November 26, 2012 at 4:27 pm |

    Latest News re court case against Mann, and more

    Click here.

    • Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 5:09 pm |

      Shining a light on the corruption of deeply dispicable global warmingism:

      “In his now defeated writ Weaver tried and failed to get the court to punish Ball for declaring Weaver was part of the ‘corruption of climate science.’ Ball further stated that Weaver was ‘unqualified’ about climate and was dishonestly passing himself off as a climate expert when he wasn’t. Hilariously, it seems the court agrees with Ball and Weaver has removed the claim from his website. Also now given legal validity is Ball’s other claim that Weaver had his students heckle and interrupt Ball during a presentation at the University of Victoria in April, 2010.”

      But… the cause of truth and justice owes much to:

      “Dr. Vincent Gray, author of the NZCSC newsletter wrote, ‘In several recent newsletters I have attacked the plausibility of the basic climate model promoted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.’ In particular Dr. Gray condemned the practice of IPCC junk science in stubbornly modelling Earth as is if were flat. As Postma’s calculations have shown, it is by crassly choosing to stick with this ‘flat earth physics’ that climatologists have gotten away for decades in duping policymakers that any such greenhouse effect exists.”

    • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 5:34 pm |

      Yes, what Earth-shattering news Doug.

      Another commercial brought to you by Principia Scientific International…

      • Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 5:55 pm |

        More breaking news: MBH98/99/08 (aka, the ‘hockey stick’) is a proven scientific fraud and Western schoolteachers won’t tell the children.

      • manacker | November 26, 2012 at 7:22 pm |

        R. Gates

        The “commercial brought to you by Principia Scientific International” (as you put it) is no different than “the commercial [for CAGW] brought to you by IPCC”, is it?

        But the latter was ballyhooed as the “gold standard” for climate science (until pieces became unraveled, e.g. hockey shtick, Climategate, Glaciergate, etc.).

        What a joke!

        [If you were REALLY a “skeptical warmist”, you would have long tossed all 1000+ pages of AR4 WG1-3 on the fire.]

        Max

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 26, 2012 at 7:51 pm |

        Max,

        The burning of books is (no matter my own personal view of them) is not something I ascribe to. It was tried at another time in history as a way to control free thought…and the results were very negative overall I’d say.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 9:54 am |

        R. Gates

        [This reply to your post ended up in the wrong place, so am reposting]

        Your “book burning” sidetrack is a different debate.

        It is one of controlling thought by squashing dissenting view.

        IPCC calls it the “consensus process”

        Max

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 9:57 am |

        R. Gates

        PS And, yes, I’d agree with you that the result of IPCC squashing dissenting view by a forced consensus process “were very negative overall”

  43. Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 4:48 pm |

    So now… The Left wants to deny it has a secular socialist agenda. If not that then it must be a corrupt agenda. They always hurt the one they claim to love…

    “They conned governments with one deception after another and precluded any chance of a logical and reasonable approach. Beyond the fact that doing nothing is the best policy, if you want to prepare you prepare for cooling because if you are wrong the adjustment to a warmer world is so much easier. Meanwhile the record colds continue. Hans Jelbring brought the following to my attention. The December 26, 2010 Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter the headlne reads Kallaste vintern sedan 1700-talet (Coldest winter since the 18th century). Atlanta, Georgia had the first white Christmas since 1882.

    “The denials and deceptions also continue. Included is corruption of the global temperature record to prove 2010 was the warmest on record. The Obama administration compounds the problems by not challenging the falsehoods and corruption but continues his plan to bankrupt the coal industry by imposing heavy restrictions on energy through the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

    “By his word this guarantees skyrocketing energy costs, which will impact the poor and middle class most as heating bills soar. It’s the political version of the song, ‘You always hurt the one you claim to love.’” ~Tim Ball, 28-Dec-2010

  44. Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 5:14 pm |

    Global Warmzilla meets Tim Ball:

    Specialist Canadian libel firm, Pearlman Lindholm are to announce the filing of separate counterclaims on behalf of Dr. Ball and against discredited climate professors Michael Mann and Andrew Weaver. Recently the Nobel Committee affirmed that both professors lied when each claimed to be co-winners of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.

    (See lLatest News’ link above)

    • Brandon Shollenberger | November 26, 2012 at 9:52 pm |

      You do yourself a disservice by associating yourself with such a terrible source. Even if you ignore the absurdity of denying the greenhouse effect, something that source promotes, the source is simply wrong on point. There is no way to know those two lied. They may have held a stupid belief, but believing in a stupid idea doesn’t make you a liar.

      If it did, that source would be full of liars.

      • Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 9:56 pm |

        Yeah, yeah… y9u are no Tim Ball. I get it. Believe me… I beleive it.

      • Vague Genie | November 26, 2012 at 10:03 pm |

        I beleive y9u. I really do.

      • blueice2hotsea | November 28, 2012 at 5:34 pm |

        Wagathon –

        Don’t sulk. Just admit that Brandon Shollenberger has a point.

        The news flash was penned (or at the very least posted w/o attribution) by Tim Ball’s co-founder of PSI – where Dr. Ball happens to be “the appointed Chair”.

  45. David Springer | November 26, 2012 at 5:56 pm |

    Doug Cotton, the dry adiabatic lapse rate measured by thermometer in an isothermal (non-convecting) atmosphere is caused by gravity. As you increase in altitude some of the kinetic energy in each isothermal layer is replaced by an equal amount of gravitational potential energy. Thus a pound of air at sea level has the same thermal energy as a pound of air at 10,000’msl. The air at sea level is 100% kinetic 0% gravitational potential. Moving that pound of air up in altitude gives it gravitational potential energy at the expense of kinetic energy. Where you dragon slayers go off the reservation is in thinking that the air at the surface is hotter than it would be without gravity. That is false. The air at altitude would be hotter because there wouldn’t be any rise in gravitational potential energy. The main conceptual problem for most people is they forget that thermometers do not measure total thermal energy they only measure kinetic energy. Thermal energy is the sum of kinetic and gravitational potential energy. So isothermal only means “same temperature” when there’s no gravitational potential energy gradient to account for.

  46. Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 6:19 pm |

    There is example after example of the sacrifice of credibility Western academia on the alter of Leftist secular, socialism and liberal Utopia–e.g.:

    A final media embarrassment came in 1991, when Carl Sagan predicted on Nightline that Kuwaiti oil fires would produce a nuclear winter effect, causing a “year without a summer,” and endangering crops around the world. Sagan stressed this outcome was so likely that “it should affect the war plans.” None of it happened. (Chrichton)

  47. Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 9:53 pm |

    Everthing is a frenzy nowadays. It is an obvious and admitted political maneuver to “take advantage of a crisis” but the Democrat party has taken it to a new level by inventing the global warming crisis. It says a lot about a society that can be gamed in this way. 20 years from now the 47%’rs who are giving away our rights today will be wiser but it may be too late. That is why good things never last that long. In the long run, idiots rule.

  48. Wagathon | November 26, 2012 at 10:12 pm |

    Anyone who has ever taken a intro-level economics class has known since the ’70s that the social security system is unsustainable. Anyone smart enough to get elected over the last 50 years knows this. The old saying that we get the government we deserve is true. We all deserve what is coming. All of this denial will end. And, it will end badly. Very badly.

    • Vague Genie | November 26, 2012 at 10:23 pm |

      All things end badly.

      • R. Gates | November 26, 2012 at 10:27 pm |

        Define badly.

      • Vague Genie | November 26, 2012 at 10:33 pm |

        Guilty or regretful.

      • R. Gates | November 26, 2012 at 10:39 pm |

        Snake eats rat. End of rat. No guilt, no regrets. Take a nap and enjoy the full belly.

      • Vague Genie | November 26, 2012 at 10:47 pm |

        The rat ended badly.

      • Peter Lang | November 26, 2012 at 10:51 pm |

        R. Gates,

        Is your contribution constructive?

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 12:01 am |

        Snake eating rat guarantees that both Snakes and Rats will go on as species. Nature cares not for the individual, but only the balance of all. It all ends well, as the only other option is no-thing at all.

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 12:02 am |

        Peter Lang,

        We all can ask ourselves that, eh?

      • Vague Genie | November 27, 2012 at 12:28 am |

        Would morality determined by Mother Nature support the eradication of humans as a species?

        Answer: Projection is fun!

      • Peter Lang | November 27, 2012 at 12:44 am |

        R. Gates,

        Apparently you didn’t cop on/ I asked you the question to show you how hypocritical you can be (refer to your comments of yesterday).

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 12:57 am |

        Vague Genie asks:

        “Would morality determined by Mother Nature support the eradication of humans as a species?”

        ——
        Non-duality best applied here. There is no real difference between humans and Mother Nature. It is a convenience we create. If a man jumps off a bridge it is Mother Nature killing herself, if a man pulls back at the last minute it is Mother Nature saving herself. Mother Nature gives birth and eats her young. A comet could wipe us out next year or we could go on to spread our seed across the galaxy. Terrible-wonderful ugly-beauty of this dance, but the only dance there is.

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 1:15 am |

        Mother Nature is quite Janus-faced…she might love you or eat you:

        http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/27/science/in-nature-fatal-attractions-can-be-part-of-life.html?_r=0

      • Vague Genie | November 27, 2012 at 1:27 am |

        R. Gates:

        There is no real difference between humans and Mother Nature.

        Nature cares not for the individual

      • Tom | November 27, 2012 at 3:11 am |

        Not according to this scientific study…

        http://houston.cbslocal.com/2012/11/26/study-porn-actresses-more-religious-have-higher-self-esteem-than-other-women/

        where everyone is happy, and a star too.

      • mike | November 27, 2012 at 5:10 am |

        Hey Gates!,

        You know, Gates, if I got a fortune-cookie with one of your oracular pearls-of-wisdom in it, I’d send it back. And to think that the tax-payer actually gets ripped off to pay for your little seances with Gaia.

        So, given all that snake eats rat business, Gates, would I be mistaken to think that among other subjects explored in your out-of-body-experience, mind-expanded, chit-chat hob-nobbings with the “infinite” forces of nature you’ve had occassion to touch on the need for a mass cull of humanity? Does Gaia dig eugenics? Do you?

        Let me put it this way, Gates. Is humanity the snake or the rat? Is the hive the snake or the rat? Who are you planning to eat, Gates?

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 27, 2012 at 10:55 am |

        Mike,

        Humans are of course both snake and rat. We, like nature, and part of nature, are Janus-faced. We can be both predator and prey. Life eats life– at least if you’re an animal. It’s the only way this little island of negentropy in this region of this particular universe can exist.

      • mike | November 27, 2012 at 2:13 pm |

        Gates,

        Yr: “Humans are of course both snake and rat.”

        Sorta expected your last evasive reply, Gates. You know, Gates, most would dismiss your flaky, New Age, gushing-cant, Tao-power, head-shop-guru, micro-wave bromides as nothing more than just evidence of some decidedly weirdo, but basically harmless, screw-loose, ditzy obsessions.

        And they might be right. But I prefer to judge the matter in terms of capabilities, rather than try to guess at intentions. And my estimate of the situation? Someone with your view of “nature”, Gates, and your place in it would have no problem stopping up his ears to the babe’s cry and the mother’s desperate pleas over and over again–by the tens of millions. If it were all for Gaia, that is. Just rats getting eaten by snakes.

        Again, could be wrong, but your deliberate evasiveness with regards to some questions I posed to you (your privilege, of course) prompts me to be better safe than sorry in my assessment of the reply you did provide, such as it was. After all, we live in times of great moment. Can’t afford to under-estimate anyone now-a-days.

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 2:59 pm |

        Mike,

        Sorry you didn’t quite fully understand my answer. Humanity is both snake and rat. We both eat and are eaten. We are both hunted and hunter. Every day we attacked by those who would do our bodies and lives the ultimate damage, and we take the lives of other living things in order to go on.
        Each of us, instinctually, will protect ourselves and our families first and foremost, and then, to the degree we have some altruism will protect friends, community, state and nation, etc. in expanding rings out from our own central family.
        So, we are part snake and part rat, humanity is part snake and part rat, and to the degree we feel our family is safe, we may step away from our own lives, and even sacrifice it, to protect friends, community, nation, and even humanity as a whole.

      • R. Gates | November 27, 2012 at 6:16 pm |

        Mike,

        Mike,
        I’ve been hearing more and more of this kind of thinking from different people around the Blogosphere. Where is this information getting coming from? Need to do a better job plugging up those leaks I guess…
        Or, you might consider a good hard look at the way that paranoia can allow you to believe irrational things…
        Or, just to hedge your bets, stockpile food and weapons and have a definite escape route from any major city…
        And protect your precious bodily fluids…

      • mike | November 27, 2012 at 9:05 pm |

        Gates,

        You have me at a disadvantage, Gates–your hive-dullard, trite-and-proud, micro-waved Tao-booger response to my last comment escapes comparison with the superior merits of that previous, wit-laden reply of mine. For you see, Gates, my poor, since-departed comment-rat, alas, got swallowed up whole!

        Let’s see now, Gates, you subscribe to a world view–a commonplace, hive-view, we can imagine–in which all of life is best seen as snakes eating rats and rats then morphing into snakes and then eating former snakes now, in turn, transformed into rats. A bit of a Hobbesian, dystopian view of “the world”, there Gates, for someone so contemptuous of those who might be prepared, to some degree, for the possibility “things” might suddenly go South, in one way or another.

        And your voracious snakes (for the moment a snake, Gates–I got your head-shop-guru bit about how we’re all both snake and rat) are all guilt-free as they unhinge their jaws and gulp down their rat-prey. You know, Gates, the sort of dispassionate, larger view of “things” that kept the good-comrades, in the past, impervious to the human sufferings around them and focused on their job as they went about their lethal, cold-blooded, reptilian, mass-extermination business–The Holomodor, The Great Leap Forward, and the Killing Fields of Cambodia, to name only a few snake-pit hells you lefties visited on humanity, within living memory in the last century.

        And, oh by the way, Gates, your betters all have bug-out plans and well-stocked hidey-holes, for themselves, you know. Some ridicule you might want to toss their way, or do you know your hive-place too well and value hive-discipline too highly for impertinence like that?

        So, yes, Gates, I’m a little cautious–paranoid you might say–about just what it is the hive is up to lately behind our backs, behind its veil of, oh say, its tenure-trough, climategate-style duplicities and its high-carbon, blow-out, party-time, greenshirt-hypocrite eco-confabs, for example.

        And if you think about it, Gates, stock-piling food and other precautions, makes a certain sense, you might finally agree, for those of us not fortunate enough, like you, to have a secure place aboard the Ivory Tower’s taxpayer rip-off, sloth-bucket, CO2-spew, viper-express gravy-train.

        Curious, isn’t it, Gates, how your intended taunts so easily become “badges of honor.”

      • timg56 | November 28, 2012 at 2:23 pm |

        VG,

        Congrats. Only 4 words, yet you manage both unsupportable and idiotic with the same sentence.

  49. Mann2Mann | November 27, 2012 at 12:36 am |

    Someone needs to seriously investigate the link between George Soros (the hedge fund manager aka currency manipulator) and Michael Mann (data manipulator). Soros’ billions are (1) currently heavily invested in green energy companies and (2) the source of Mann’s legal defense fund. Soros’ green hedge fund even has Cathy Zoi, an ex-undersecretary of Energy under Obama, on staff. Conflict of interest, much? Please, investigative journalists need to look into this. Soros is like an octopus with tentacles up every skirt.

  50. Erica | November 27, 2012 at 12:59 am |

    Have you seen the stats on illegitimacy , the dropout epidemic and the resulting chronic unemployment and dependency among Creationists?

    Yes creationism is wacky, but I’d still rather have creationists next door than someone with an entitlement complex who likes to feed off the taxes of others.

    • David Springer | November 27, 2012 at 10:44 am |

      The best next door neighbors I ever had in a city was a 20 acre graveyard. They’re very quiet (except for an occasional 21-gun salute) and keep their yard in excellent shape along with a nice 5mph speed limit winding road perfect for dog walking. And talk about a low carbon footprint!

  51. follow | November 27, 2012 at 1:02 am |

    A lot has been said about climate deniers, skeptics, realists, etc. I would like to add a couple new definitions to the discussion:

    Climate Hypocrite = media-savvy person who publicly demands everyone reduce their carbon footprint while increasing his/hers e.g. Al Gore tells people sea level is rising because of global warming but continues to buy expensive beachfront properties. Al Gore lectures university students on reducing their CO2 usage while leaving his car engine running outside the university for more than an hour. Fanny Armstrong, responsible for the famous 10:10 video where eco-fascists blow up children for not believing in global warming, flies around the world in CO2 spewing airplanes telling the world that CO2 is bad for the environment. Obama tells government workers to cycle to work to reduce CO2 while he goes to work in a gas-guzzling luxury vehicle surrounded by an army of secret servicemen driving gas-guzzling vehicles.

    Do as I say, not as I do? Wake up ye willing and foolish sheep.

    By the way, the scientific data shows that there hasn’t been any global warming for the past 12 years. When people in positions of power and responsibility start acting like there really IS global warming, that is the only time we should start taking notice.

  52. Petra | November 27, 2012 at 1:13 am |

    Does visible light warm the earth?

    Can this not be established with a simple experiment involving an infrared filter?

    • Vague Genie | November 27, 2012 at 1:31 am |

      Visible light’s energy is absorbed by matter at the Earth’s surface. That energy must do something.

    • Petra | November 27, 2012 at 1:37 am |

      Yes, but how much compared to IR?

    • Memphis | November 27, 2012 at 2:01 am |

      While interesting, the question has little or no bearing on the general theory of agw.

      Even if visible light has absolutely no warming effect on earth (land and oceans), the fact remains the earth is still being warmed by the sun, if only by infrared. And this heat is still being radiated back out as infrared, where it is still being trapped by inter alia CO2, the levels of which are still being added to by humankind.

      (Just how much warming this causes is quite another question though).

      • David Springer | November 27, 2012 at 9:42 am |

        Memphis | November 27, 2012 at 2:01 am | Reply

        “the fact remains the earth is still being warmed by the sun, if only by infrared. And this heat is still being radiated back out as infrared”

        Actually, no, for the bolded part. Most of the solar radiation absorbed by the earth goes into evaporating water. You have much to learn, grasshopper.

        A god-awful amount of confusion is generated by thinking surface cooling is largely radiative. It ain’t. The upper atmosphere cools by radiation. In the lower troposphere the hydrologic cycle dominates the energy flux. Thus the major malfunction with coupled ocean-atmosphere global circulation models – cloud modeling. The models don’t represent clouds well and that means the hydrologic cycle isn’t represented well and that means the major means of energy flux movement where we live and work and breathe isn’t modeled well.

        The atmosphere is heated by rain. Write that down.

        http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/ocng_textbook/chapter05/chapter05_06.htm

        Here’s what happens. Sunlight warms the tropical oceans which must evaporate water to keep from warming up. The ocean also radiates heat to the atmosphere, but the net radiation term is smaller than the evaporative term. Trade-winds carry the heat in the form of water vapor to the tropical convergence zone where it falls as rain. Rain releases the latent heat evaporated from the sea, and it heats the air in cumulus rain clouds by as much as 500 W/m2 averaged over a year (See Figure 14.1).

        At first it may seem strange that rain heats the air. After all, we are familiar with summertime thunderstorms cooling the air at ground level. The cool air from thunderstorms is due to downdrafts. Higher in the cumulus cloud, heat released by rain warms the mid-levels of the atmosphere causing air to rise rapidly in the storm. Thunderstorms are large heat engines converting the energy of latent heat into kinetic energy of winds.

      • Memphis | November 27, 2012 at 9:52 am |

        Dave Springer
        OK points taken, with thanks. In mitigation of sentence, in my mind I didn’t actually intend to suggest that all earth cooling is radiative; but in truth I hadn’t really thought about it.
        It’s amazing what you can learn if you are prepared to make a fool of yourself.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 10:31 am |

        Memphis

        The heat leaving Earth’s climate system is all being radiated out to space, presumably as LW radiation (or IR).

        GH theory tells us that a portion of the outgoing LW radiation is stopped on the way out (absorbed by high altitude clouds, water vapor and trace GH gases, such as CO2 – and then re-radiated in all directions). Increases in this GH effect theoretically result in a reduction of outgoing radiation.

        In a balanced system at equilibrium heat in = heat out. The AGW premise is that human-caused increases in trace GH gases cause heat out to be smaller than heat in, thereby raising temperature slightly. At a slightly higher temperature Earth radiates slightly more out to space, thereby restoring balance or equilibrium.

        That’s simplified – but it’s how I understand the GH theory works.

        What is not included in the above is the effect of lower altitude clouds. These reflect a significant portion (~23%) of the incoming radiation back out to space.

        This is actually the “wild card” in the whole system (Chief would explain this more scientifically). A small change in cloud cover cancels out the GH effect of a large change in trace GH gases, such as CO2. Example: an 8% change in cloud cover is equal to a doubling of CO2. But IPCC does not understand how clouds work (they even concede that clouds represent the “largest uncertainty”).

        Recent measurements (Pale et al.) showed that cloud cover decreased by 4.5% from 1985 to 2000 (during the late-20th century warming period) and then increased by 2.5% after 2000 (during the period of slight cooling called the “pause”).

        Most recently, Kevin Trenberth (co-creator of the energy balance “cartoon”) was asked where the “missing energy” of the past 12 years “pause” in warming (despite unabated GH gas emissions) was going. He suggested it may be reflected “out to space”, with “clouds acting as a natural thermostat” (a hypothesis also suggested by Roy Spencer, who has done a lot of research on clouds).

        IMO it is a pity that IPCC got itself sidetracked onto the GH effect (and human GHG emissions), rather than getting some real research done to clear up the “large uncertainty on clouds”. Until this “large uncertainty” is cleared up, we really don’t know how large the overall warming effect of AGW really is.

        That’s part of the large “uncertainty” which our hostess here has written about.

        Max

      • Memphis | November 30, 2012 at 4:06 am |

        Max,
        Yes, in focussing the greenhouse effect, I’m not (like some) trying to sideline feedbacks and their uncertainties in the bigger picture. This is just to address narrow greenhouse denial.

    • Palindrone | November 27, 2012 at 2:15 am |

      You might say the whole thing is an infrared herring.

    • Pekka Pirilä | November 27, 2012 at 7:29 am |

      From visible light that reaches the surface a fraction (perhaps 15%) gets reflected, the rest is absorbed. From the absorbed energy of visible light about 98% goes immediately to heat while some 2% is used by plants to produce organic material. Even that part will mostly produce heat at a later stage.

      Roughly one half of the radiation absorbed by the surface is visible light, a few percent UV and the rest near IR. The share of LWIR (using 3µm as cutoff) is very small because the share of that is less than 3% in the emission spectrum of the sun and the absorption in the atmosphere reduces it further.

      • Montalbano | November 27, 2012 at 9:21 am |

        Pekka, not that I doubt you, but is this information available together on some reputable science site somewhere? ( Something definitely beyond the wikipedia site mentioned below ). I have looked before for this, to no avail. Thanks.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 9:38 am |

        Pekka

        You wrote that ~15% of the incoming radiation gets reflected back to space.

        K+T estimates that ~23% of the incoming radiation gets reflected by clouds (77 Wm-2 out of 342 Wm-2) and another ~9% (30 Wm-2) gets reflected by the surface.

        Is there a discrepancy here?

        Thanks for a reply.

        Max

      • Montalbano | November 27, 2012 at 9:41 am |

        Max, he said : From visible light that reaches the surface a fraction (perhaps 15%) gets reflected,

      • MattStat/MatthewRMarler | November 27, 2012 at 10:04 am |

        montalbano: Pekka, not that I doubt you, but is this information available together on some reputable science site somewhere?

        This and other energy flows were discussed recently at Climate Etc.

      • MattStat/MatthewRMarler | November 27, 2012 at 10:10 am |

        Pekka Pirila: some 2% is used by plants to produce organic material. Even that part will mostly produce heat at a later stage.

        On that part, do you have a reference? My impression is that most is retained as biomass, but I don’t have a good reference.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 10:37 am |

        Montalbano

        Thanks for that.

        Max

    • andrew adams | November 27, 2012 at 8:06 am |

      Petra,

      I don’t pretend to be an expert but my answer would be that rather than making the distinction between visible light and IR it is more meaningful to distinguish between SW and LW radiation. The radiation received directly from the sun is almost entirely SW (<4μm), and this includes visible light and some IR radiation (IR includes anything >0.75μm). “Back radiation” received from the atmosphere is almost entirely LW (>4μm).

      According to Kiehl & Trenberth’s energy balance diagram incoming solar radiation absorbed at the surface is about 168 W/m2 and the amount of “back-radiation” absorbed by the surface about 324 W/m2.

      You might find the below link interesting.

      http://scienceofdoom.com/2009/11/28/co2-an-insignificant-trace-gas-part-one/

      • andrew adams | November 27, 2012 at 8:07 am |

        Sorry, the link to Kiehl & Trenberth’s energy balance diagram is

        http://scienceofdoom.files.wordpress.com/2010/06/energy-budget-trenberth-kiehl-1997.png

      • David Springer | November 27, 2012 at 9:19 am |

        Use this link to K&T cartoon instead. The reader might learn more while he’s there. It’s at the top of a sub-chapter in a post-grad univerisity textbook “Physical Oceanography”. Greatly detailed breakdown by region and flux type follow.

        http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/ocng_textbook/chapter05/chapter05_06.htm

      • andrew adams | November 27, 2012 at 10:03 am |

        David,

        Thanks, that looks interesting.

      • Ken Coffman | November 27, 2012 at 10:52 am |

        It’s interesting to me…there is a type of person who will believe theory over evidence before their very eyes. For example, on my walk yesterday, I noticed ice on the boardwalk…melted where the sun directly heated the wood and still frozen in the shadows. Interesting how that could happen when, according to Trenberth/Kiehl/Fusillo, the “back radiation” power from the atmosphere is roughly 2X the average power from insolation. Sure, the insolation is “peaky” and heats during less than half the 24-hour period, but how can the integrated effect of the back radiating atmosphere contribute 2X the heating power of the sun? That in a nutshell is post-modern science, my friends.

      • andrew adams | November 27, 2012 at 11:44 am |

        That just seems to me like argument from incredulity. The conclusion I would draw from your observation is that solar radiation + “back radiation” is sufficient to melt ice but “back radiation” alone is not, that doesn’t seem to me to be inherently implausible.

        And the energy flows in the K+T diagram seem clear enough, even to a layman like me, and contain the answer to your question. What part of it do you have a problem with?

      • kencoffman | November 27, 2012 at 12:20 pm |

        All energy to drive our system comes from the sun, so how can “back radiation” from the atmosphere deliver 2X the insolation W/m^2?

      • andrew adams | November 28, 2012 at 3:37 am |

        Ken,

        Some incoming solar radiation is either reflected or absorbed by the atmosphere, so the amount absorbed at the surface is only about 1/2 of that received at the TOA. The atmosphere radiates according to its temperature and this radiation received at the surface constitutes what we call “back radiation”, this happens to be 2 x the amount of solar radiation at the surface but I don’t think that this is particularly significant – we still need that incoming solar radiation in order for the earth to maintain its current temperature, without it the planet would become too cold to be habitable.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 3:53 am |

        It’s more than just interesting. Understanding the distribution of energy fluxes by location and flux type is prerequisite to basic understanding of the earth’s climate. Paramount in that is that shortwave radiation from the sun is the dominant flux that warms the surface while latent heat of vaporization is the dominant flux that cools the surface. Radiation becomes dominant in the stratosphere not the troposphere. Most of us live on the surface. A large fraction of climate boffins and sycophants do appear to live with their heads above the clouds however. Or up their arses – samo samo.

    • Monk | November 27, 2012 at 9:00 am |

      From wikipedia on infrared :

      [For each 1 kilowatt of energy from sunlight per square metre] … 527 watts is infrared radiation, 445 watts is visible light, and 32 watts is ultraviolet radiation.

      If not heat, what else could happen to those 445 watts ?

      • David Springer | November 27, 2012 at 11:21 am |

        As with visible light water is practically transparent to near infrared from 700nm to 1250nm

        http://www.npsg.uwaterloo.ca/data/water.php

        That range accounts for most of the IR energy in sunlight.

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Solar_Spectrum.png

        So to answer your question most of the IR from the sun falls upon the ocean where it penetrates as deep as visible light until impurities in the water absorb it, transform the energy to kinetic in the impurities, which then thermalize the surrouding water molecules by bumping into them evening the distribution of kinetic energy.

        Less than 10% is reflected. Over land less than 20% is reflected. Clouds account for the lion’s share of reflected sunlight.

        The interesting thing happens when we move into the far infrared emitted by stuff in the general temperature range on the earth of dirt and ocean surface. Instead of being almost perfectly transparent it’s perfectly opaque. So the energy in sunlight converted to warm water below the surface must be mechanically (not radiatively) moved to the surface where it then leaves largely by evaporation. Far infrared coming in from above cannot penetrate the ocean surface to warm the water below so it only serves to raise the evaporation rate rather than warm the water. The sun warms the ocean. It cools mostly by evaporation not radiation.

        Things change over land (or ice) where evaporation may be greatly limited by lack of liquid water. Over land is where non-condensing greenhouse gases become more interesting. Land temperature will rise from increased far infrared coming down from above if evaporation is restricted.

        Thus we should find that so-called greenhouse warming is greater over land than water, greater when the surface temperature is below 0C than above it, and greater over dry regions than rainy regions.

    • Petra | November 27, 2012 at 9:14 am |

      AA,
      At this (lay) level, ‘visible’ and ‘SW’ seem to be used interchangeably, and likewise ‘IR’ and ‘LW’. Real scientists probably shudder …
      Yes, been meaning to check out ScienceOfDoom. I have though previously formed the impression that backradiation is not the significant mechanism of agw – rather it is that the CO2-warmed atmosphere slows the cooling of the earth into itself.

      • Edim | November 27, 2012 at 9:21 am |

        Agree Petra. I shudder…

      • andrew adams | November 27, 2012 at 12:00 pm |

        Petra,

        I agree that the confusion of IR and LW can cause confusion – all LW radiation is IR but not all IR radiation is LW.

        I think your impression is correct – increasing the level of GHGs in the atmosphere reduces the amount of radiation emitted at the top of the atmosphere because it causes the atmosphere to radiate to space from a higher, colder, level. Any increase in downward radiation at the surface would be a consequence of this rather than the driving mechanism.

        I would certainly recommend SoD, particularly the “CO2 – An Insignificant Trace Gas?” and “Earth’s Energy Budget” series. he certainly knows much more about this stuff than I do ;)

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 12:17 pm |

        SoD is an excellent resource.

        Here’s the ‘back radiation’ index page.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 3:59 am |

        SoD is a f*cking warmist blog. Everything in it must be taken with a grain of salt and independently verified. At least use an encyclopedia for a reference you sorry POS.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 4:16 am |

        andrew adams | November 27, 2012 at 12:00 pm |

        “I think your impression is correct – increasing the level of GHGs in the atmosphere reduces the amount of radiation emitted at the top of the atmosphere because it causes the atmosphere to radiate to space from a higher, colder, level. Any increase in downward radiation at the surface would be a consequence of this rather than the driving mechanism. ”

        You thought wrong. A higher level, yes. A colder level, not necessarily. The dry adiabatic lapse rate is 1C per 100 meters. Water vapor lowers the lapse rate and water vapor is virtually everywhere in the troposphere to some degree. So if the response to CO2 is more water vapor, which it most certainly is over the ocean, then the lapse rate is lowered and the emission altitude rises but the temperature of the emission altitude remains the same.

        A doubling of CO2 will result in cloud tops being 100 meters higher, on average, than before. The cloud tops will be at the same temperature as before. Observation of global average cloud height has only recently become available and it supports my thesis. ALL observations support my thesis except for the lack of warming in Antarctica. I have no confident explanation for that. I think the Antarctic vortex and ozone hole has a lot to do with the anomaly but that’s just conjecture. In a well mixed atmosphere, in the dryest place on the earth, increased CO2 should be warming the Antarctic interior more than anywhere else on the planet and it ain’t.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:27 am |

        Springer

        SoD is a f*cking warmist blog.

        SoD is a f*cking science blog.

      • andrew adams | November 28, 2012 at 7:46 am |

        David,

        I linked to Science of Doom because it is easily accessible, he is concerned with explaining the basic physics, not proving (or disproving) “CAGW”, uses references to textbooks and published papers to back up his argments, and is generally a trusted source (obviously not by you). I certainly don’t consider it to be a “warmist” site, unless you define “warmist” as anyone who considers that the GHE exists and that adding additional GHGs to the atmosphere will, all things being equal, result in a rise in temperature, which would include the likes of Spencer, Lindzen and indeed Dr Curry. I notice that you didn’t cite any sources at all for your claims.

        Regarding your point about the lapse rate, my understanding is that there will be a slight decrease in the lapse rate and that this will be a negative feedback but it will not be sufficient to cancel out the warming effect of the increase in effective radiating height.

        But as I say, I’m no expert – perhaps someone who knows more about this stuff than me would like to weigh in.

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 8:06 am |

        Andrew,

        To the extent I have read and followed SoD (I have done that recently but I haven’t looked trough all the earlier material) the site is about the well understood atmospheric science, not about the more controversial issues. As an example GCM climate models have (as far as i know) been discussed only superficially essentially telling what they are without strong implications on their suitability for any particular task.

        I like the site but it cannot tell on all issues that are important for making conclusions about wise climate policy.

        To the extent I can verify the posts are in general correct. Outright errors that have got in are corrected when pointed out – and they are pointed out by the contributors. The remaining disagreements are more about style or about the best way of explaining some particular difficult issue. In some cases the discussion adds essentially to the original post.

      • andrew adams | November 28, 2012 at 8:35 am |

        Pekka,

        I agree, SoD does not get involved in controversies and is not (nor is it intended to be) a resource for those seeking answers about whether we need to develop policy responses to AGW. The idea is to help people who want to get an understanding of the basic physical principles behind climate science and as a layman I have found it very useful in that respect. I guess the extent to which it has been successful depends on what you think of my comments in this thread ; )

  53. Beth Cooper | November 27, 2012 at 3:42 am |

    Infrared herring at the lobster quadrille , lol, …
    ‘Will you, won’t you , will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?

  54. Beth Cooper | November 27, 2012 at 5:44 am |

    Mike 25/11 7.23

    ‘And on that farm
    Reigned this world view,
    Do as i say …’

    Say, Mike, why i have trouble with Haku.

    I like the elegance of ‘git ter the nub,’
    Trouble is, something there is in me
    resists, ‘say it in three lines of
    specified syllables, no more.
    Like a delinquent teenage
    I feel compelled to add
    an extra line.of qualiication,
    querie, or, whatever …

    • mike | November 27, 2012 at 6:07 am |

      Beth,

      You’re a real poet–don’t change a thing. And, Beth, your comments and verse are always such a welcome refuge of humane sanity–an especially wholesome contrast with that Gates guru-dude-wannabe and that BBD cretin and their mud-wrestling, creep-out antics. Thank you, Beth.

    • Tomcat | November 27, 2012 at 6:50 am |

      > wholesome contrast with that Gates guru-dude-wannabe and that BBD cretin

      C’mon! Gates is pretty measured. OK BBD has high-horse syndrome, but could probably be an asset if he took a valium or two before blogging.

      • mike | November 27, 2012 at 7:54 am |

        Tomcat,

        You have a point, maybe. I’ve probably lost perspective on Gates and BBD. Especially Gates, when he’s not going all nature-boy-flake on us. I mean, like I do enjoy their commentary, after a fashion, and would not want them to take even their booger-brain weirdness elsewhere.

    • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 10:48 am |

      Beth

      Agree with Mike.

      You’re on a roll – keep on truckin’.

      Max

    • mwgrant | November 27, 2012 at 11:08 am |

      Beth, I guess it is an official 3M hat trick. I concur with Mike and Manacker.

    • mwgrant | November 27, 2012 at 5:14 pm |

      Beth-

      Haiku offers both discipline and control:

      With five seven five
      discipline reins in excess,
      one ‘nub’ at a time.

      while giving quick almost instant relief. Consider other parts of this thread:

      Psigh for poor quantum,
      climate ills’ wrapping paper?
      lost in Hilbert space.

  55. Julian Flood | November 27, 2012 at 7:12 am |

    Alex Wolfe, of the Wolfe Lab, Alberta, was on the BBC recently talking about detection of the Anthropocene by future scientists. His contention was that nitrogen fixing from the Haber Process and fossil fuel combustion has hugely increased fixation to such an extent that it will show in the fossil record.

    What effect has this had on Arctic tree rings? My understanding of boggy areas is that they are generally deficient in N, so much so that some small bog plants have evolved insect traps to use the nitrogen from their rotting bodies, and I know much of the tundra is saturated when thawed. If the area where the trees grow is well drained then the soils will be very light and once again deficient in nutrients.

    Does nitrogen fertilisation play a part in increased tree ring size of trees at the limits of growth?

    A supplementary question: when a soil is enriched with fixed N, what happens to its respiration? Does the soil biota change? Does the new biota fix C in the same way and by the same pathways? Has soil respiration and C fixation been studied and, in particular, do we know what isotope sorting is carried out under the different regimes?

    JF.

    • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 11:01 am |

      Does nitrogen fertilisation play a part in increased tree ring size of trees at the limits of growth?

      In the case of the bristlecone pines used to create the hockey shtick, the question might modified to:

      Does nitrogenBS fertilisation play a part in increased tree ring size of trees at the limits of growthdeduced acceleration in temperature rise rather than decline over the most recent period?

      It appears this was the case.

      Max

  56. Girma | November 27, 2012 at 8:34 am |

    Increase in CO2 concentration in the atmosphere explained:

    1) During warm PDO phase, the global warming due to El Nino is general greater than the global cooling due to La Nina. As a result, there is a global warming trend during the warm PDO phase as shown in the following graph.

    http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/compress:12/normalise/plot/esrl-co2/compress:12/derivative/normalise/from:1979.3/plot/rss/normalise/trend

    2) From this graph, during El Nino, the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere increases.

    3) During La Nina, the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere decreases.

    4) During the warm PDO phase, due to the global warming trend, the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere increases.

    CONCLUSION

    5) During the cool PDO phase, due to the global cooling trend, the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere decrease.

    6) During the slight cooling during 1940-1970, the CO2 concentration must have decreased.

    • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 10:59 am |

      This would be an example of the mechanisms comprising coupled oscillators that Nikola Scafetta is talking about that acting in concert, collectively and in synchronization, explain the global warming, a stabilized climate or a period of global cooling Scafetta believes could take us to about 2030–2040.

    • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 27, 2012 at 11:03 am |

      So Girma, this whole PDO thing is at some kind of an 800,000+ year high right now, eh? Wow. And it just happened to coincide with Homo sapiens releasing all that extra carbon from fossil fuels. Amazing coincidence!

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 11:11 am |

        The Earth has been in a cooling trend for the last 10,000 years. What Girma is talking about is what Habibullo Abdussamatov refers to as the influence of the consecutive chain of such changes
        caused by secondary feedback effects [that] can result in additional amplification of the climatic changes.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 27, 2012 at 11:21 am |

        Sounds, uh…what’s the word…uh…crazy!

        Newsflash….Earth to deniers…human activity has caused the vast majority, directly or indirectly, of the rise in CO2, methane, and N2O levels beyond what would have been occurring during this interglacial without humans present. Move on people!

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 11:38 am |

        Based on concentrations
        (ppb) adjusted for heat
        retention characteristics……..% of All……% Natural….% Man-made
        Methane (CH4)…………………….0.360%……..0.294%……0.066%

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 27, 2012 at 11:48 am |

        Waggy,

        Your numbers make no sense at all. One must look at the increase in GHG’s beyond the level they’d be at if humans were absent from the planet. These increases are both direct and indirect, meaning also that there are feedbacks that get involved such the one increase can lead to another. CO2 Alone is some 40% higher than it would be without human activity. Your denial of the human attribution for even the rise in GHG’s puts you squarely in the denier camp. Seems you’re there to stay, so I hope you brought a tent and lot’s of provisions.

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 11:48 am |

        R. Gates

        You are entering a slippery slope with your put-down of Girma’s PDO hypothesis.

        Let me explain:

        We have had a prolonged period of slight cooling (the “pause”), despite unabated human GHG emissions and concentrations reaching record levels.

        MetOffice has told us this was due to “natural variability” which has temporarily overwhelmed and masked the GH warming from the added GHG concentrations.

        Girma is simply carrying the MetOffice rationalization a step further by suggesting a specific mechanism (PDO).

        If you pooh-pooh Girma’s suggestion that past warming may have been partly caused by natural factors, such as PDO/ENSO, then you are also pooh-poohing the MetOffice rationalization for why the GH warming was masked – leading to the question: was there a GH forcing from the end of 2000 to today (when CO2 rose from 369 to 393 ppmv, or by 6.5%)?

        According to IPCC’s model-derived 2xCO2 mean climate sensitivity of 3.2C, temperature should have risen by 0.3C since 2000.

        Yet, in actual fact, it cooled slightly instead.

        A dilemma.

        Maybe Girma has the explanation.

        Otherwise, IPCC’s model-derived 2xCO2 climate sensitivity may be exaggerated.

        Max

      • Bad Andrew | November 27, 2012 at 11:48 am |

        “human activity has caused the vast majority, directly or indirectly, of the rise in CO2”

        Not in an infinite number of multiverses, it hasn’t. Find a clue, Sherlock. ;)

        Andrew

      • Tom | November 27, 2012 at 12:26 pm |

        “The new observation suggests the collisions may have produced a new type of matter known as color-glass condensate.”

        http://phys.org/news/2012-11-unexpected-large-hadron-collider-collisions.html

        How do they know for sure, it’s not just evolution for that matter?

    • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 11:20 am |

      Girma

      To your hypothesis.

      We have no real CO2 measurements prior to Mauna Loa in 1959

      The data by Ernst Beck show fluctuations in various analyses prior to Mauna Loa, but nothing conclusive, and IPCC have written this off, prefering the story of a gradually increasing CO2 level from 280 ppmv since industrialization started (based on ice core data).

      We also do not know how representative the Mauna Loa readings are of “globally averaged CO2 concentration”.

      CO2 is supposed to be a “well-mixed greenhouse gas”, but local measurements near corn fields, for example, have shown that these “gobble up” a lot of CO2, lowering the local concentration significantly.

      Then we have absorption/outgassing of CO2 in the oceans, which – as you say- is temperature dependent, and certainly must result in some local differences in concentration as ocean temperature changes. Prof. Salby seems to think most of the change in atmospheric CO2 comes from natural variations – largely from the ocean.

      There is also the unsolved dilemma of the “missing CO2”. Only ~half of the amount emitted by humans ends up “remaining in the atmosphere”, and this portion is decreasing steadily at ~1% per decade (by over 5 %age points since Mauna Loa started)

      With all these caveats, Mauna Loa has shown a steady increase of atmospheric CO2 concentration since 1959, when it was measured at 315 ppmv. So, according to Mauna Loa, there was no decrease in CO2 from 1959 to 1970.

      Are you saying that Mauna Loa is not representative of the “global average”?

      Or have I misunderstood your post?

      Max

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 11:42 am |

        “Elimination of data occurs with the Mauna Loa readings, which can vary up to 600 ppm in the course of a day. Beck explains how Charles Keeling established the Mauna Loa readings by using the lowest readings of the afternoon. He ignored natural sources, a practice that continues. Beck presumes Keeling decided to avoid these low level natural sources by establishing the station at 4000 meters up the volcano. As Beck notes “Mauna Loa does not represent the typical atmospheric CO2 on different global locations but is typical only for this volcano at a maritime location in about 4000 m altitude at that latitude.” (Beck, 2008, “50 Years of Continuous Measurement of CO2 on Mauna Loa” Energy and Environment, Vol 19, No.7.) Keeling’s son continues to operate the Mauna Loa facility and as Beck notes, “owns the global monopoly of calibration of all CO2 measurements.” Since Keeling is a co-author of the IPCC reports they accept Mauna Loa without question.”

        (Time to Revisit Falsified Science of CO2, December 28, 2009)

      • manacker | November 27, 2012 at 11:58 am |

        Wagathon

        Thanks for link to Dr. Tim Ball’s article on CO2.

        Wow!

        If this is correct, the whole IPCC house of cards is in danger of falling.

        Max

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 12:30 pm |

        Oh you utter loons. Only the very craziest deniers deny the validity of the Keeling curve.

        Do you want to be lumped in with them? You are 95% of the way, some of you…

        Here’s the global CO2 measuring station data.

        Click a station then pick ‘carbon cycle gasses’ from the options at the left, then ‘time series’ to view same.

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 27, 2012 at 1:38 pm |

        BBD,

        They quite clearly draw the line in the sand between true skeptics and denialists. For those who say the term denier is never appropriate…well, here’s the perfect proof that it is in some cases…

      • Memphis | November 27, 2012 at 2:24 pm |

        R Gates – For those who say the term denier is never appropriate

        Never? Strawman alert.

      • Girma | November 27, 2012 at 2:42 pm |

        Max

        In the recent warming from 1970 to 2000, the correlation between GMT and CO2 concentration is shown below:

        http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/compress:12/normalise/plot/esrl-co2/compress:12/derivative/normalise/from:1979.3/plot/rss/normalise/trend

        Is it not reasonable to assume the same correlation applied in the previous warming from 1910 to 1940?

        Does not that mean that CO2 concentration was greater in 1940’s than in 1910’s?

        There is observed data that shows CO2 concentration was about 400 ppm in the 1940’s

        http://www.biomind.de/realCO2/

        Does not this challenge IPCC’s claim of flat CO2 concentration profile before mid-20th century?

      • BBD | November 27, 2012 at 3:43 pm |

        Girma

        Beck was a crank. His work was a mess. Read Keeling’s response to Beck.

        Keeling was not a crank. His results still stand.

        This really should tell us something.

      • Eli Rabett | November 27, 2012 at 10:00 pm |

        “We also do not know how representative the Mauna Loa readings are of “globally averaged CO2 concentration”.

        Of course we do and yes the ML readings are representative. Of course there are some interesting additional information, such as an increased annual cycle at high latitudes in the NH, less variability in the SH, a lag in the mixing ratio in the SH as CO2 generated in the NH diffuses south, etc.

        Just about every word Girma and Waggy write on CO2 are fabrications.

    • Lauri Heimonen | November 27, 2012 at 11:57 am |

      Girma!

      ”4) During the warm PDO phase, due to the global warming trend, the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere increases.

      CONCLUSION

      5) During the cool PDO phase, due to the global cooling trend, the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere decrease.

      6) During the slight cooling during 1940-1970, the CO2 concentration must have decreased.”

      Congratulations!

      You have understood what Nir Shaviv means: ”Don’t believe a word I write. If you are a genuine scientist, or wish to think like one, you should base your beliefs on facts you see and scrutinize for yourself.”

      P.S. See Beck’s link linkki http://www.biomind.de/realCO2/ , too!

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 12:14 pm |

        “There is also nothing to indicate that pre-industrial CO2 levels were optimal — and good evidence that, throughout most of the history of life on Earth, CO2 was higher than current levels, yet life flourished.” ~Walter Starck

  57. Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 11:51 am |

    “Carbon dioxide is 0.000383 of our atmosphere by volume (0.038 percent) … Only 2.75 percent of atmospheric CO2 is anthropogenic in origin … If the atmosphere was a 100-story building, our anthropogenic CO2 contribution today would be equivalent to the linoleum on the first floor.” ~Reid Bryson

    • Steveta_uk | November 27, 2012 at 12:56 pm |

      Wagathon, CO2 makes up 383,000 parts per billion of the atmosphere.

      Antropogenic CO2 makes up 10532.5 parts per billion of the atmosphere.

      I assume your point is that these tiny amounts cannot have a significant impact.

      In which case, please explain how digoxin can be lethal within a human body when present by weight at 3 parts per billion?

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 1:42 pm |

        Second to global warming itself, defining CO2 as a pollutant by Leftist econoenvirowackpots is the second greatest hoax to have been perpetrated upon a sleepy Western society. What in the disinformation age will be added next to the politically correct government list of environmental toxic and noxious substances: dihydrogen monoxide?

    • Eli Rabett | November 27, 2012 at 9:38 pm |

      Given that the mixing ratio went from 280 to 400 ppm in about 100 years, and that change was and is directly attributed to burning shit, perhaps Reid might want a mulligan.

    • Eli Rabett | November 27, 2012 at 9:45 pm |

      That hotbed of libral Kenyan socialism the US Supreme Court agreed that CO2 is a pollutant when generated by people. Next

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 10:15 pm |

        Great we won’t need to mutilate lab rabbits.

      • Max_OK | November 27, 2012 at 10:27 pm |

        It’s stuck in the craws of pollution advocates, and they can’t stop whining about it. I laugh when they bring it up.

      • Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 10:52 pm |

        Your ecocondria is at the expense of the developing world. Good job.

      • Max_OK | November 27, 2012 at 11:49 pm |

        I got rid of that with penicillin. And I didn’t spread it around, so it wasn’t at the expense of anyone.

      • Wagathon | November 28, 2012 at 12:19 am |

        That’s a bit hypocritical for a Westerner, isn’t it?

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 1:32 am |

        No, the Supreme Court did not agree that CO2 is a pollutant you dumb bunny. They agreed that the EPA has the power to regulate CO2.

        Surely you’re bright enough to know that. That means you’re not a dumb bunny just a lying through his teeth bunny.

      • Punksta | November 28, 2012 at 2:26 am |

        US Supreme Court agreed that CO2 is a pollutant when generated by people. Next

        Climate science being decided by lawyers now. Just great. What bigger insult could there be, what more desperate blinkered devotion to ulterior political motive ?

      • Eli Rabett | November 28, 2012 at 7:39 pm |

        Anybunny wanna bet that the US Supreme Court decision ruled that CO2 is a pollutant??

    • Eli Rabett | November 27, 2012 at 9:48 pm |

      Oh yeah, real fond of that, Waggy. Care to defend it or point to the original?

  58. Girma | November 27, 2012 at 2:45 pm |

    Max (Thanks)

    In the recent warming from 1970 to 2000, the correlation between GMT and CO2 concentration is shown below:

    http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/compress:12/normalise/plot/esrl-co2/compress:12/derivative/normalise/from:1979.3/plot/rss/normalise/trend

    Is it not reasonable to assume the same correlation applied in the previous warming from 1910 to 1940?

    Does not that mean that CO2 concentration was greater in 1940′s than in 1910′s?

    There is observed data that shows CO2 concentration was about 400 ppm in the 1940′s

    http://www.biomind.de/realCO2/

    Does not this challenge IPCC’s claim of flat CO2 concentration profile before mid-20th century?

    • Eli Rabett | November 27, 2012 at 9:44 pm |

      oh Beckies! Quite tasty. Yeah it was 400 ppm inside a house or two or in the middle of a traffic jam. The problem with that nonsense is that if you believe it you are left with a small problem:

      “It should be added that Beck’s analysis also runs afoul of a basic accounting problem. Beck’s 11–year averages show large swings, including an increase from 310 to 420 ppm between 1920 and 1945 (Beck’s Figure 11). To drive an increase of this magnitude globally requires the release of 233 billion metric tons of C to the atmosphere. The amount is equivalent to more than a third of all the carbon contained in land plants globally. Other CO2 swings noted by Beck require similarly large releases or uptakes. To make a credible case, Beck would have needed to offer evidence for losses or gains of carbon of this magnitude from somewhere. He offered none.”

      So dear Girma, it does not trouble the IPCC at all.

      Frankly Eli thinks your trolling for innocents is about a step higher than going after kids.

  59. Barry Woods | November 27, 2012 at 5:01 pm |

    Safety in numbers?

    Ie why 23 scientists co-authored a paper to criticise Mann’s paper.

    When 1 author should be enough ;-)

  60. Beth Cooper | November 27, 2012 at 5:47 pm |

    Here on Climate Etc.

    Climate discourse on
    whither weather, whether free
    world. Warm air, wild words.

    ( Especially wild, October winds
    from the east, ‘capitalist swine!’ )

  61. Beth Cooper | November 27, 2012 at 5:53 pm |

    m w g , you’re
    master of the haku
    nub. What’s ‘hilbert’ space?
    :(

  62. Beth Cooper | November 27, 2012 at 5:56 pm |

    tsk syllables!

    mgw, you’re
    master of the haku nub,
    say, what’s ‘hilbert’ space?

    • mwgrant | November 27, 2012 at 6:45 pm |

      o lordie! lordie! I know ’bout them syllables…

      Nutshell: Hilbert spaces are the abstract working playgrounds of much of applied quantum mechanics.

      Very, very roughly a Hilbert space is an abstraction and generalization of our Euclidean space–including concepts such distance, vectors, etc.–into ‘spaces’ having more dimensions (finite or infinite in number). However, in the case of QM the interpretation and significance of the various mathematical entities are quite different. For example, the vectors in a QM Hilbert space represent states of the system and are not the {x,y,z}’s of our everyday space. Hilbert spaces are also used in other areas of science and engineering. Hilbert space…a lot of bang for the buck.

  63. manacker | November 27, 2012 at 6:08 pm |

    Chief

    You appear to have hit a raw nerve with BBD when you mention “naturally caused abrupt climate change” or cite NOAA papers, which refer to this. .

    Why I do not know.

    Do you have any notion why he reacts so violently to the thought of “naturally caused abrupt climate change”?

    Does he see this as a “competing” hypothesis, which could threaten his CAGW paradigm?

    Is it the dreaded “black swan” for him?

    [I’m looking for logical and rational reasons, which may be the wrong approach – maybe BBD’s problem is not a logical and rational one, but rather an illogical and emotional one.]

    What do you think?

    Max

    • Chief Hydrologist | November 27, 2012 at 6:29 pm |

      It is far from rational. They have a set of simple memes around which they have constructed an architecture of group identity and a narrative of moral and intellectual superiority. This is classic groupthink written large as these things sometimes are.

      The question I asked above is what they expect a decade or three more of no warming will mean for the politics of carbon mitigation. They can’t even imagine that this is a possibility even if it is so obviously happening.

      My motivation is that they have totally stuffed it. Yet to assume that it is OK to emit 4%, 8%, 16%, 32% of natural carbon flux as economies grow is an heroic assumption. I really expect that thses abrupt changes will hide the warming and hide it some more as the centrury progresses. To expect that the patterns of the 20th century will be repeated is nonsense. We have far from tested the limits of natural variability.

      Nonetheless – mitigation is essentially simple, economically rational, worthwhile for a number of unrelated reasons and should proceed on this basis.

  64. Beth Cooper | November 27, 2012 at 7:33 pm |

    Thx mwg, I will understand more when i get copy of ‘The Einstein
    Theory of Relativity,’ by Lillian Leiber arrives. It is at present,
    travelling through time, by ship.

  65. Beth Cooper | November 27, 2012 at 8:03 pm |

    Chief, 7.19pm and BFJC, 3.10pm,on democracy:

    I ‘ve often thought that democracy carries within it the seeds
    of its own demise because the demos ferget or underestimate
    what was achieved for human dignity and well being by their
    giant step from tyranny to governmnent by the people.

    We’ve learnt to love the growth of patriarchal government, the
    ever more largess from the public purse, forgetting it comes
    from the pockets of the productive and is a tax on productivity.
    And government well understands the value of buying votes by
    promises of more social welfare even though it comes at a cost.
    It isn’t a cost to them but the chance of another term in office.
    Cui bono? Not democracy.

  66. Doug Cotton | November 27, 2012 at 10:46 pm |

     
    1. The Venus surface could never have been raised 500 degrees by the mere mean 2.1 W/m^2 of insolation that reaches its surface from the Sun.

    2. This is solid proof that adiabatic lapse rates form autonomously, and so surface temperatures are determined by such on all planets with an atmosphere.

    3. The Venus atmosphere was heated by absorbed incident radiation from the Sun. The ALR ensured the base would be hotter, quite contrary to what you might expect – why not the top? The base heated the surface – nothing else could have.

    4. Why should we worry about 1 molecule in 2,500 being carbon dioxide, when the Venus atmosphere is over 96% carbon dioxide, and yet its surface temperature can be calculated by the same formula (based on the acceleration due to gravity) as can Earth’s surface temperature?

    There will be more detail in my next paper currently going through the review process. Stop worrying about carbon dioxide – and stay tuned!
     

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 12:58 am |

      Doug, did the base of the Venus’ atmosphere heat the core of the planet past the melting point of iron? If not what did? Cannot the thing that keeps rocks molten below the surface also keep the surface pretty dang hot?

      Venus’ surface is hot because the planet’s interior is a molten cauldron just like the earth’s but unlike the earth Venus’ has a very dense layer of insulating gases that retains more of the interior heat of the planet.

      Your theory doesn’t work for all atmospheres. It breaks down like a paper doll for Titan which has a nitrogen rich atmosphere like the earth’s at 1.45 times earth pressure at sea level. The surface of Titan is -174C. According to you it should be hotter than Death Valley.

      The consensus is you’re an ass clown, Doug. I don’t hold much respect for consensus thinking but in this case they’re right. Get a clue.

      • Doug Cotton | November 28, 2012 at 2:18 am |

         
        It would be a most extraordinary coincidence if the heat flow from the core just happened to maintain an adiabatic lapse rate that just happened to coincide with virtually identical calculations for Earth. That’s what you’re betting against. And when it also works for other planets, your chance of being right is infinitesimal.

        As with Earth, the adiabatic lapse rate sets and maintains the surface temperature. Yes there will be radiation and conduction both ways at the interface because it would be next to impossible for the temperatures on either side to drift more than a few degrees apart. Maybe the combination of core heat flow and some of that 2 W/m^2 insolation contributes to the temperature at the base of the atmosphere, but I doubt that it supplies all the energy.

        It does not negate my argument even if it does supply such energy. It is still the adiabatic lapse rate which determines the equilibrium temperature at the interface, not the flow of energy from the core. You must know that such terrestrial flow on Earth is considered negligible, even though Earth’s core is also thousands of degrees hot.

        Unless you understand how the energy in an atmosphere distributes itself under the force of gravity to maintain a natural “pseudo” adiabatic lapse rate, then you will never find an explanation as to why the temperature gradient in the Venus atmosphere even slopes the way it does, let alone determine its value. Remember, it absorbs about 98% of all incident Solar radiation. And that radiation has a hard time penetrating past half way to make the base hotter – yet it is.

        But basic physics of conduction tells us that, both for Earth and Venus, the temperature plot from the core to the surface is determined by the temperatures pre-existing at each end. That’s the way conduction works. If the surface temperature had been equal to the radiating temperature of the planet, then the temperature plot from the core would get down to that temperature when it “breaks out” at the surface. That’s physics.

        Now, you tell me why, with an atmosphere that absorbs all but 2.1 W/m^2 of incoming Solar insolation, why would it not be hotter at the top?

        You have a lot to learn about atmospheric physics it would seem, so start with Hans Jelbring’s paper here,

      • newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 2:21 am |

        Provide your calculations for Titan, using its gravitational force, distance from the Sun etc. You won’t pull wool over my eyes, my friend.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 3:04 am |

        Dry adiabatic lapse rate in a non-convecting atmosphere is due to gravity, Doug. I don’t have a problem with that. Thermal energy is defined as the sum of kinetic energy and gravitational potential energy. As altitude increases so too does gravitational potential energy. In a non-convecting isothermal atmosphere a pound of air at the surface has the same thermal energy as a pound of air at 20,000 feet. Thermometers do not measure gravitational potential energy only kinetic so you will indeed observe a temperature difference with altitude but if you were to convert gravitational potential energy to kinetic then it would all be the same temperature.

        Where the dragon slayers go off the rail is in thinking that gravity determines the surface temperature. This is incorrect. The surface temperature is no hotter than it would be without gravity. Temperature at altitude is colder than it would be without gravity and the temperature difference is completely contained by the difference in gravitational potential energy.

        This isn’t rocket science but it does require some modest understanding of what a thermometer measures and abstract understanding that air, like a potted plant falling on your head from a tenth story balcony, has gravitational potential energy that must be accounted for to satisfy the first law of thermodynamics – conservation of energy.

      • newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 3:42 am |

         
        David

        You are just making assertive statements, especially when you say “the surface temperature is no hotter than it would be without gravity.

        Here is an estimate of just how little thermal energy is coming from the core heat of Venus from this paper . …

        The mass of Venus is 0.815 earth masses [-e.g., Ash et al., 1971-[, and the surface area of Venus is 4.60 x 108k m2 rPettengilel t al., 1980-]T. he earth-scalevda luesfo r global heat loss and surface heat flux for Venus are therefore 3.4 x 10 •3 W and 74 mW/m •, respectively

        Jelbring was not a “Slayer” in 2003 when he wrote that paper. (He has only just recently joined PSI along with about 150 members now) He estimated 2.5% of Solar radiation reached the surface of Venus then.

        Subsequently this year Alberto Miatello estimated a mean of 2.1 W/m^2 in Section 8 of this paper.- which I tend to think is a more accurate estimate.

        Add the above 0.074 W/m^2 to 2.1 W/m^2 from the Sun and you tell me how that is going to maintain an extra 500 degrees at the Venus surface.
         

      • newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 3:59 am |

         
        And just in case you don’t think I knew what you just “explained” here are two excerpts from my new page finished yesterday and awaiting peer-review, so I’m happy to look into any valid criticism thereof. (Note that 2nd LoT relates to entropy.)

        The big question is, how does this temperature gradient form in the first place? Would we be able to observe a naturally occurring temperature gradient caused by gravity in a laboratory experiment? What mechanism causes it, and would it violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics?

        Molecules in motion are continually exchanging potential energy (PE) with kinetic energy (KE) whenever there is any vertical component in the path of their “free flight” between collisions. This ensures that entropy does not change in an adiabatic process, that is one in which no external energy is added and no energy lost outside the system being considered. However, this exchange between PE and KE can lead to a variation in the temperature of a small region of molecules, because temperature is a measure of kinetic energy, not potential energy. Thus hot air can rise by convection and cool adiabatically as its kinetic energy is partly converted to extra potential energy.

        But can this interchange of potential energy and kinetic energy take place in a sealed cylinder of air in a laboratory? Well, Roderick Graeff [13] believes he has demonstrated that it can. What is interesting to note is that the walls of the container also exhibited a temperature gradient, so it may be that molecules in a solid also react in a similar way, thus slightly impeding upward conduction. If this did not happen, then one could argue that a wire running outside the container could conduct heat from the base to the top, thus creating perpetual motion. So it seems that such conduction would not happen, also due to the force of gravity.

        …..

        Carbon dioxide, for example, can absorb in the 2 micron band. Thus there is no doubt that enough energy could have been absorbed quite easily over the life of each planet, and probably much more quickly than that.

        As the energy is absorbed the more dense regions at the base are able to hold more molecules with more kinetic energy, and so a higher temperature is measured there. As molecules move between collisions their trajectory must be influenced by the force of gravity, just as happens with any object in flight. This creates a greater propensity for more molecules to accumulate in lower regions of the atmosphere, but numbers are also limited by pressure considerations, and so kinetic energy will propel some molecules upwards. Equilibrium is established between these upward and downward tendencies and, as a result, a uniform temperature gradient is established.
          

        [13] http://www.firstgravitymachine.com/temperaturedifference.phtml

         

      • kencoffman | November 28, 2012 at 8:22 am |

        The surface temperature is no hotter than it would be without gravity.
        — David Springer

        This is an interesting assertion. Doesn’t gravity affect (restrict) convection? There is a propulsion of heat energy toward space via convection. Enable more convection and the surface temperature stays the same? That’s a remarkable claim.

      • Tom | November 28, 2012 at 9:05 am |

        Cold Carbon Fusion? One giant step for a man, another great leap forward for mankind.

  67. Wagathon | November 27, 2012 at 11:02 pm |

    The ALR ensured the base would be hotter, quite contrary to what you might expect – why not the top? The base heated the surface – nothing else could have.

    —
    Interesting mental image–inverted thermal pyramids covering the Earth is a lot better analogy than the greenhouse analogy.

    Obviously, using the analogy of a greenhouse with respect to global warming alarmism is not objective at all. What such purposefully inept analogizing really means is obvious too: it’s Western society’s excuse for avoiding reality. What it really shows is that fear by an ever-growing secular, socialist society of global warming is a mask to hide its fear of individualism and a determined effort to limit the freedom of others through the control of factors of production such as energy.

  68. gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 1:02 am |

    “This is how the trick works: You allow temperatures to shoot up by more than 2 degrees Celsius at around the middle of the century. Then you reduce greenhouse gas emissions to such an extent that the planet’s temperature curve falls below the magic limit of 2 degrees above current levels by 2100.”
    http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/failed-co2-targets-going-through-the-motions-at-un-climate-conference-a-869294-2.html

    Who thinks there is at least a 50% that global temperatures will increase by 2 C by the year 2050.

    So 38 years rising by 2 C. That would require a very steep rise in temperature.
    It seems we have not seen any accelerating warming, and to have 50% or more chance rising 2 C in 38 years, that in 19 years one need to see 1 C rise in global temperature. And likewise, need to see about .5 C rise in global temperature within 10 years.

    Anyway the article is right about, Going Through the Motions in Doha

  69. Beth Cooper | November 28, 2012 at 1:21 am |

    RiiiHo08, 27l11 @ 10.03 pm.
    ‘I do not fear for democracy.’ (+1 and ‘Amen’ ter that.)

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 2:38 am |

      Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote. ~Benjamin Franklin

      When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic. ~ibid

      The people voted themselves all the money in the treasury circa 1971 when the U.S. ceased backing its currency with gold.

      In the 40 intervening years they’ve voted themselves fiat currency from a printing press. Every American born today is saddled with some $200,000 in his or her share of the nation’s debt. That’s a hell of a thing to do to a baby. Yet the debt burden on newborns continues to soar by popular vote amongst the adults, a majority of whom have discovered they do not have to earn an honest living but can instead just lay the burden for their existence on the young and the unborn who inherit the debt.

      • Max_OK | November 28, 2012 at 2:12 pm |

        David Springer said on Nov. 28, 2012 at 2:38 am

        ” Every American born today is saddled with some $200,000 in his or her share of the nation’s debt. That’s a hell of a thing to do to a baby.”
        ______

        That’s a hell of a math error. The correct amount is about $52,000, not $200,000.

        As of Nov. 28, 2012 the numbers for the national debt and the population are as follows:

        $16,316,921,640,983 / 313,954,710 = $51,972

        Bond buyers don’t seem worried about the ability of Americans to service the national debt, as evidenced by their willingness to buy Treasury securities paying very low interest rates. I buy these securities myself, and thumb my nose at those who predict national bankruptcy.

      • timg56 | November 28, 2012 at 2:35 pm |

        Max,

        Here is a subject I agree with you. All the handwringing and predictions of economic disaster over the down-rating of the US credit proved to be so much hot air.

        Personally, I am hoping we drive off the so called fiscal cliff. My willingness to pay more in taxes goes up with the increase in limits on what the government can spend. I am confident that whatever compromise the politicians may come to will end up being worse than just allowing the “automatic” program play out its course.

      • Max_OK | November 28, 2012 at 2:56 pm |

        YES, timg56, the government needs to curb spending and raise taxes to reduce the national debt. But with the economy still recovering, now is not a good time to do either, or not much of either. We don’t want to stall or reverse the recovery. But there should be a plan for going ahead with both measures when the economy gets better.

  70. Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 1:49 am |

    Yes it was well said. But the risk comes from well meaning fools.

    ‘We must make the building of a free society once more an intellectual adventure, a deed of courage. What we lack is a liberal Utopia, a programme which seems neither a mere defence of things as they are nor a diluted kind of socialism, but a truly liberal radicalism which does not spare the susceptibilities of the mighty (including the trade unions), which is not too severely practical and which does not confine itself to what appears today as politically possible…Those who have concerned themselves exclusively with what seemed practicable in the existing state of opinion have constantly found that even this has rapidly become politically impossible as the result of changes in a public opinion which they have done nothing to guide. Unless we can make the philosophic foundations of a free society once more a living intellectual issue, and its implementation a task which challenges the ingenuity and imagination of our liveliest minds, the prospects of freedom are indeed dark. But if we can regain that belief in power of ideas which was the mark of liberalism at its best, the battle is not lost. ‘ Hayek

    Talking of well meaning fools. Coming out of Doha? ‘It would be more intelligent for cities and industrial sectors to join forces, and for countries to form alliances to develop climate-friendly technology. This would be better for the planet than producing yet another stack of draft resolutions, Geden says.’ Amen.

  71. Beth Cooper | November 28, 2012 at 2:23 am |

    http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/if-reality-is-ignored-or-disregarded-when-do-we-become-a-state-against-its-people/

    Aims require means and those for global change, Erlich, Holdren
    and statist ideologues have gained access to positions for imposing
    leftist political ideologies on us via education and media:

    ‘Education coupled with pedagogy, and a friendly cultivated media amenable to the desired communications to create consensus,are
    indeed perfect methods for achieving global change.’

    Say, where are climate warriors Kim and Captain Kangaroo when
    we could do with them here?

    • timg56 | November 29, 2012 at 11:58 am |

      When one sees “social science” in the same sentence or paragraph as “science”, it is a good indication of things heading to the toilet.

      Which would you rather see your kid graduate with? A degree in Sociology or a degree in one of the sciences? Our son is back in school persuing a 2nd degree, in Computer Science. The job opportunities for Sociology (or maybe it was Psychology – equally useless) majors are not that hot. His commission in the Marine Corps was a far better decision for career advancement than his degree.

    • Peter Davies | November 30, 2012 at 1:16 am |

      Kim has not been around for quite some time. So the mantle of Climate Etc’s poet laureate has fallen upon you Beth, at least for the time being.

  72. David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 2:24 am |

    I couldn’t find the link to Tim Ball on CO2 level that someone mentioned.

    Here it is.

    http://drtimball.com/2012/pre-industrial-and-current-co2-levels-deliberately-corrupted/

  73. Beth Cooper | November 28, 2012 at 3:38 am |

    David Springer, some parents who mortgage the future of their
    own children … ironic ain’t it?

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 4:52 am |

      They’re either ignorant or wicked. I would rather believe the former than the latter.

      Forgive them, for they know not what they do. ~Christ from the Cross

      Forgiving them won’t fix things. Education or eradication seem to be the only options.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 5:01 am |

        A lamb of God would go for education. Barring the success of that the well-armed lamb of God goes for eradication. Maybe that’s what Ben Franklin had in mind when he wrote “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting for what to have for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.”

        The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tryants. ~Thomas Jefferson

        Tyranny of a Majority. ~James Madison

        Connect the dots.

  74. Myrrh | November 28, 2012 at 4:02 am |

    As Steady Eddie has linked to this post, I repeat my science challenge here:
    http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-271860

    Myrrh | November 28, 2012 at 3:36 am | Reply
    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 “shortwaves from the Sun heats the land and oceans of Earth and longwave infrared 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.

    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.

    I’m not interested in regurgitated learned by rote unproven claims.

    Until you can prove your claim on which the AGW/CAGW’s Greenhouse Effect energy budget is premised, you are actually saying that Light from the Sun heats matter, which is physically impossible, and actually saying that the Sun’s radiant heat, aka Heat, aka thermal infrared, doesn’t play any part in this –

    WHICH MEANS YOU HAVE NO HEAT FROM THE SUN IN YOUR ENERGY BUDGET.

    WAKE UP.

    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.

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 4:45 am |

      It is proven by demonstration that blue photons from a laser can set things on fire.

      What is the difference between a blue photon from a laser and a blue photon from the sun?

      \mathbb{ROFLMAO}

      • Doug Cotton | November 28, 2012 at 5:19 am |

         
        Any electromagnetic radiation emitted spontaneously from a warm body will transfer some heat to a cooler body if it is not reflected or transmitted. Of course radiation in the visible spectrum is often reflected, but not all of it all the time. Less is reflected from a black surface than a similar white surface, so a black road feels hotter than the near-white gutter you soon learned to walk on in bare feet when you were a kid. So some of the “black light” has caused a heat transfer to the black road. Its energy was not reflected, so it was absorbed in the road.

        When solar radiation penetrates deep into an ocean, most of its energy in nearly all wavelengths will be converted to thermal energy. Yes some in the visible will be reflected, but not all. We know the Sun can light up the sand bed in a shallow river, but if that water were in a deep ocean, the radiation would keep on going down and even the visible part be converted to heat,

      • newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 5:45 am |

        Artificially produced radiation in a laser is nothing like spontaneous blackbody radiation with the same wavelength. You need to read about stimulated emission produced by a laser.

      • gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 7:01 am |

        Doug Cotton | November 28, 2012 at 5:19 am |

        Any electromagnetic radiation emitted spontaneously from a warm body will transfer some heat to a cooler body if it is not reflected or transmitted. Of course radiation in the visible spectrum is often reflected, but not all of it all the time. Less is reflected from a black surface than a similar white surface, so a black road feels hotter than the near-white gutter you soon learned to walk on in bare feet when you were a kid. So some of the “black light” has caused a heat transfer to the black road. Its energy was not reflected, so it was absorbed in the road.”

        Black material can warm up faster in sunlight and get to higher maximum.
        Once reaches this maximum [or a thermal equilibrium] it only absorb more of the sun’s energy if it’s conducting, convecting, or radiating heat away from the sun heated surface. Or thick asphalt or concrete would absorb more of the Sun’s energy [it conduct the heat away from surface, as compared to thinner material [if on surface which doesn’t conduct heat very well].
        It seems to me that max temperature one could achieve from sunlight at the earth’s surface is about 80 C.
        If a material resembled the fictional perfect blackbody, at 80 C or 353 K
        then it radiate 880 watts per square meters. So even though one have 1000 watts per square of sunlight, one would anything radiating as much as 880 watts per square meter.
        A typical hottest temperature of surface should about 72 C, or 345 K
        And again assuming it was perfect blackbody, would radiate 803 watts per square meter.

        “When solar radiation penetrates deep into an ocean, most of its energy in nearly all wavelengths will be converted to thermal energy. Yes some in the visible will be reflected, but not all. We know the Sun can light up the sand bed in a shallow river, but if that water were in a deep ocean, the radiation would keep on going down and even the visible part be converted to heat.”

        The problem have with idea it’s absorbing most of the energy, is you don’t have flat surface, so the energy of sunlight is similar to being smeared over large surface area. Imagine if one square meter sunlight spread over path of 100 meters. Have sun shine on area forever, what is maximum temperature the 100 meters of surface warms to?
        Also the water would diffuse/scatter the sunlight, so shine sunlight thru frosted glass, how much does it warm a surface.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:52 am |

        gbaike

        Yes of course. The way radiative energy exchange works is like you and I being on opposite sides of a tennis court each lobbing tennis balls to the other side. Let’s say you can lob them faster. Just because you can lob them faster doesn’t mean my tennis balls don’t arrive on your side. If your goal is to move all the tennis balls out of your court then me lobbing them back at you, even at a slower rate, will make your job take longer. Substitute photons for tennis balls and that’s how the exchange between radiating masses works too.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:56 am |

        There is no difference between a blue photon from a laser and a blue photon from the sun. You empty claim to the contrary does not change the fact. You are such a dense f*ckstick it is mind boggling.

      • kencoffman | November 28, 2012 at 9:03 am |

        The Sky Dragon Slayer position is that if you start with 100 tennis balls, and no other tennis balls come over the fence from outside, it does not matter which direction they’re hit over the net, you never get 101 tennis balls.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 10:12 am |

        No, the Dragon Slayer position is that if you put a bucket of 100 tennis balls into a stronger gravity field the number of tennis balls will spontaneously increase violating the first law tennisdynamics, conservation of balls.

        Got it? Write that down!

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 10:19 am |

        Seriously, gravity does not increase the kinetic energy of air at the bottom of the gravity well. It decreases the kinetic energy of air at the top of the well and replaces the lost kinetic energy with gravitational potential energy. Thermometers do not measure gravitational potential energy so it will appear like the bottom air has more energy per molecule than the topmost air and that just ain’t so.

      • kencoffman | November 28, 2012 at 11:05 am |

        That is quite interesting. I would say collisions are a great way to exchange energy and anything correlated with density, like an atmosphere in the presence of gravity…where there would be no atmosphere if not for gravity, then the two things (exchanging energy and gravity) are correlated.

      • Myrrh | November 28, 2012 at 4:18 pm |

        What is the difference between a blue photon from a laser and a blue photon from the sun?

        Well it’s obvious you don’t know, so you can’t even begin to answer my challenge – I specified visible light from the Sun. Go find the difference and come back with real physics show how visible light from the Sun can heat the land and water at the equator to the intensity required to give us our great equator to poles winds and dramatic weather systems.

        The Sun is not a laser, of any kind, not even a carbon dioxide laser.

        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.

        OOPS! This contradicts your AGWScienceFiction claim that “there’s an invisible barrier like the glass of a greenhouse preventing thermal infrared from entering/the Sun produces very little thermal infrared.

        Shorter, near infrared waves are not hot at all – in fact you cannot even feel them. These shorter wavelengths are the ones used by your TV’s remote control.

        OOPS! AGWScienceFiction meme contradicted again.

        http://science.hq.nasa.gov/kids/imagers/ems/visible.html

        Gosh, a whole page on visible light without mentioning the AGWScienceFiction fake fisics meme about its great power to heat matter…

        Shrug, you’re really not scientists, real scientists would be interested in that contradiction.

        Real scientists wouldn’t ignore it, because it comes from a NASA page.

    • Erica | November 28, 2012 at 9:40 am |

      Myrrh you have repeatedly been challenged to come up with evidence to back up your unique claim that visible light does no warming. You have provided no data on this at all, choosing instead to babble on and on just flinging big words and self-praise around.

      Cut the bs now, JUST SHOW US THE ***ACTUAL MEASUREMENTS*** OF ENERGY IN VISIBLE LIGHT COMPARED TO OTHER WAVELENGTHS that you claim is the case.

      Others have provided measurements from standard science, it’s time you faced the challenge to produce yours. Or do you think your model constitutes evidence ?

      • Myrrh | November 28, 2012 at 3:18 pm |

        Well Erica, maybe I missed it..

        Please, do provide me with all the proof behind the AGWSF claim that shortwaves from the Sun heats land and water..

        What on earth are some of you doing on a science blog when you’re incapable of understanding what a challenge means?

        The onus is on you to provide me with proof.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 28, 2012 at 3:53 pm |

        Myrrh, You could be on to something! Something BIG! Principa Scienticifa International is looking for forward thinkers just like you that understand the gravity of the situation. Since visible light cannot warm surfaces, there most be a wealth of undiscovered gravitrons causing light meters and digital cameras to work. You should publish immediately.

        Contact Doug Cotton @ PSI

      • Myrrh | November 28, 2012 at 4:26 pm |

        Near infrared cameras work because near infrared is classed with visible light, Reflective, not Thermal. It captures the invisible light bouncing back off subjects, like visible light cameras capture visible light bouncing off subjects.

        Which is how we see the world, by capturing the visible light bouncing off subjects which energy converts to nerve impulse, not to heat.

        See the NASA page I above – shortwave infrared is not hot, we cannot even feel it.

        It is classed with Light and not classed with Heat.

        NASA: “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.”

        NASA: “Shorter, near infrared waves are not hot at all – in fact you cannot even feel them. These shorter wavelengths are the ones used by your TV’s remote control.”

      • gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 6:36 pm |

        Myrrh the link you provide:
        http://science.hq.nasa.gov/kids/imagers/ems/infrared.html
        Was updated:
        “Notice – This page has been updated and moved to:
        http://missionscience.nasa.gov/ems/07_infraredwaves.html
        These original EMS pages will be available until May 31, 2011 at which point you’ll automatically be redirected to the new pages.”

        This:
        “NASA: “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.”

        NASA: “Shorter, near infrared waves are not hot at all – in fact you cannot even feel them. These shorter wavelengths are the ones used by your TV’s remote control.”

        Was written by someone at NASA, but they were simply wrong- and NASA corrected it.
        If want to get an idea of how often the bureaucrats at NASA get things wrong I suggest this site:
        http://www.nasawatch.com/
        One can’t describe Keith Cowing as harsh critic of NASA in general, but fairly harsh with PR division and/or NASA’s executives. And it’s the public relation part of NASA which are responsible for the page you linked to.
        You could find various scientist and engineers involved with NASA [they tend to have email links], and they would probably not confirm that this statement is accurate:
        “Shorter, near infrared waves are not hot at all – in fact you cannot even feel them. ”

        Now, it would reasonable to expect that whatever NASA does in regard PR regarding science is accurate. That would be completely reasonable, but it not the case.

      • Erica | November 29, 2012 at 11:43 am |

        Still no attempt my Myrrh to supply experimental data showing how visible light has so little energy. Perhaps he’s waiting for his Nobel physics prize to arrive in the post first. Because if he is right and the entire physics establishment is wrong, and he isn’t just taking a wild stab here, he will certainly merit it.

    • Erica | November 29, 2012 at 12:17 pm |

      Myrrh said that infrared waves are thermal, contradicts the standard physics claim that – and these are his own quote marks – “there’s an invisible barrier like the glass of a greenhouse preventing thermal infrared from entering/the Sun produces very little thermal infrared.”

      This comical, deliberate misrepresentation of standard physics is to be found only in the Myrrh’s FisicsFiction. Noone thinks that. Or, just maybe, he found an alarmist somewhere, cut from the same nutty cloth as himself to quote from. Myrrh himself is apparently still stuck in the elementary rut of thinking the greenhouse effect has anything to do with what happens with greenhouses. Like a kid would,

      He then points to
      http://science.hq.nasa.gov/kids/imagers/ems/visible.html
      and concludes that a whole page for kids on visible light that doesn’t mention visible light being able to heat matter, proves that it doesn’t.

  75. Beth Cooper | November 28, 2012 at 4:09 am |

    From the poet of democracy. a song of the rolling earth:

    ‘I swear the earth shall surely be complete to him or her
    who shall be complete.,
    The earth remain jagged and broken only to him or her
    who remains jagged and broken.

    I swear there is no greatness or power that does not emulate
    those of the earth.
    There can be no theory of any account unless it corroborates
    the theory of the earth,
    No politics, song, religion, behavior, or what not, is of account
    unless it compare with the amplitude of the earth,
    Unless it face the exactness, vitality, impartiality, rectitude
    of the earth.’

    • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 9:19 am |

      Beth

      Great poem.

      You should send it to James E. Hansen.

      He needs a poetic wake-up call to get him out of his doomsday funk and tuned in to the “amplitude of the earth”.

      Max

  76. David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 4:41 am |

    So called back radiation is an accounting artefact. What matters is net radiation. GHG modus operandi is restriction of the outgoing radiative flux channel. If the flow through that channel is restricted then the flow through another channel has to make up the difference else the temperature of the surface rises and more flux is forced through the radiative channel by the higher temperature differential.

    If evaporation is free to increase then the extra energy goes into LATENT heat of vaporization rather than increased surface temperature. Cloud tops get higher but not colder. So the warmer surface is at the level of cloud tops not sea level.

    • newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 4:58 am |

       
      Sorry, David, but it just doesn’t happen that way. Start by reading from where it mentions my name in the second section here

      Doug Cotton.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:47 am |

        I’ll start by watching to see if any legitimate journal publishes the trash you’ve concocted. Good luck with that, f*ckstick.

      • Tomcat | November 29, 2012 at 2:23 am |

        Good luck with that, f*ckstick

        Now now, let’s not descend to BBD’s level David.

      • newclimatechangetheory | November 30, 2012 at 12:55 am |

        You can start David with some basic physics – see my posts below and you tell me how on Earth (or Venus) you think there would be a natural entropy gradient established autonomously – because that’s what AGW bluffers are essentially depending upon. That’s thereal garbage being promulgated – and it started with Maxwell and Boltzmann who were blatantly wrong about it..

    • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 9:27 am |

      David Springer

      You are 100% correct that the “back radiation is an accounting artefact” that has no impact on the overall energy balance.

      Its physical existence is based on very questionable measurements which are inconclusive IMO.

      But, as I understand it, it is an essential piece of the justification for a high climate sensitivity, so the models need it.

      To paraphrase Descartes:

      “It is imagined (or thought); ergo it exists.”

      Max

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 9:56 am |

        Nah, they just need back radiation to make the number of Watts look huge in comparison to Watts involved in thermal and latent fluxes.

        Thermal flux leaving the surface is 24W/m2. Latent flux is 78W/m2. Radiative flux is 65W/m2 for a total of 167W/m2 which is the same amount the surface absorbs from the sun.

        Greenhouse gases work only via radiation and since radiation isn’t the major component of surface heat flux they make it seem more important by saying the surface absorbs close to 400W/m2 of radiation from the atmosphere. That’s technically true but it also technically true that my bare ass emits 500W/m2. Looking at it might make the babes hot but it won’t make anything else hot because everything including the ground and the air near the surface is emitting that much energy and it simply cancels out when one object radiation 500W/m2 is pointed at another object emitting 500W/m2. Only the net flux is of any consequence. But the Rubes don’t know that so the global warming hypsters advertise the big numbers instead of the small net.

        If you explain to the Rubes in terms of dollars they might understand. Say I agree to pay you $10,000 for mowing my lawn but you have to do it with my lawnmower which I rent to you for $9990 per day. Even the Rube knows he won’t rich that way. Similarly the earth won’t get warmed much that way either. But the numbers still sound impressive.

      • Tom | November 28, 2012 at 10:02 am |

        Now why then do you offer to pay them cash, under the table…

      • lolwot | November 28, 2012 at 3:14 pm |

        “Only the net flux is of any consequence. But the Rubes don’t know that so the global warming hypsters advertise the big numbers instead of the small net.”

        Ridiculous conspiracy theory. Individual radiative fluxes are not advertized as part of any argument. They are split out simply to detail what makes up the net.

        And you should know this very well because it’s exactly what you did yourself. If only the NET FLUX is of any consequence then why did you advertise all these big numbers:

        “Thermal flux leaving the surface is 24W/m2. Latent flux is 78W/m2. Radiative flux is 65W/m2 for a total of 167W/m2 which is the same amount the surface absorbs from the sun.”

        When as you admit the net is close to zero.

  77. newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 4:54 am |

    Further to my new comments just above (in reply to David Springer) here’s something else for all to consider … But I’m open to any valid objections from anyone, because I want to get it “right” in yesterday’s new paper awaiting publication …

    Venus rotates once in about 243 Earth days. So its day and night are each just over 120 Earth days. The Solar insolation at TOA is about twice Earth’s value because Venus is closer to the Sun. So quite a lot of energy would enter the atmosphere during the day, and a similar amount exit during the long Venus night. It is known that there is very little movement in the atmosphere because it is so dense.

    However, it is also known that the temperature at TOA only decreases about 5 degrees in the Venus night. So where does all that energy get stored during the day? We know that only about 2.1 W/m^2 reaches the surface, so the majority (over 98%) must remain in the atmosphere.

    But why doesn’t it warm the TOA far more, when we know that radiation has a hard job penetrating that atmosphere? Surely it could warm more than 5 degrees – look at the hundreds of degrees variation in Earth’s troposphere.

    Well if I’m right about the adiabatic lapse rate, then the whole temperature plot from the surface to the TOA should rise and fall by 5 degrees, including perhaps some of the outer few metres of the crust.

    Hence, the area between the two parallel temperature plots represents the variation in energy, and where is most of that? In the lower atmosphere where it is far denser – the pressure would crush a submarine.

    But radiation being absorbed from the top down would not distribute the energy that way, with far more at the bottom than at the top, now would it? So the above-described process involving gravity acting on individual molecules (whilst keeping entropy unchanged, and so not violating 2nd LoT) must be distributing the energy in accord with the (pseudo) adiabatic lapse rate. My point is that the lapse rate is autonomous.

    • gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 8:29 am |

      “Because of the retrograde rotation, the length of a solar day on Venus is significantly shorter than the sidereal day, at 116.75 Earth days.”
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus

      trivia:
      “The equator of the Venusian surface rotates at 6.5 km/h, while on Earth rotation speed at the equator is about 1,670 km/h. Venus’s rotation has slowed down by 6.5 minutes per day since the Magellan spacecraft visited it 16 years ago.”

      “So quite a lot of energy would enter the atmosphere during the day, and a similar amount exit during the long Venus night. It is known that there is very little movement in the atmosphere because it is so dense.”

      At lower elevation with dense atmosphere, winds don’t exceed something like 10 mph.

      “However, it is also known that the temperature at TOA only decreases about 5 degrees in the Venus night. So where does all that energy get stored during the day?”
      The tremendous mass [therefore heat capacity of atmosphere] and high altitude winds.

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:45 am |

      That message si so full of chit I hardly know where to begin.

      Lets begin with the hundreds of degrees change in the earth’s troposphere from day to night.

      Where on the World Wide Web did you get that bit of nonsense from and why don’t you instantly recognize it as nonsense?

  78. Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 7:17 am |

    Higher up in this thread there’s discussion on the relative warming of the atmosphere and oceans.

    The presentation of Levitus on the warming on oceans tells that the average change in the temperature of oceans at depths up to 2000 m has been 0.09 C in 50 years. The smallness of this change tells that the relationship between the warming of the oceans and warming of the atmosphere is rather weak over periods as long as several decades.

    It’s perfectly conceivable that the ocean is warming with an almost constant rate while there are major fluctuations in the warming of the atmosphere. The opposite is of course also possible. This kind of data cannot tell whether the variability in the average surface temperature is due to variability in the net energy flux to the Earth system as whole or variability in the heat transfer between the oceans and the atmosphere.

    Irrespectively of that the recent Levitus et al date indicates that the warming of the oceans (0-2000m) has been rather uniform. since 1970. There’s some variability but not at a really significant level.

    It must be taken into account that the data presented is for 5-year running averages. Thus the time resolution is rather poor and the apparent smoothness of the curves is partially an artifact of plotting running averages.

    • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 7:36 am |

      Many people that read this think that 0.09 Degrees C over 50 years is small. Yet this is considering that the heat capacity is about 1000 times that of the atmosphere. Scale that over the average of 2000 meters and we can intuitively see how if it was much bigger than a tenth of a degree, we would be in the middle of serious heating. As they say, this number as it stands is consistent with current models of AGW.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:30 am |

        It isn’t small it’s insignificant. That’s why the global warming advertisements talk about gazillions of Joules instead. It’s all about framing the debate to scare the Rubes. Rubes like webhubcolonoscope who craps his panties daily over it.

      • kencoffman | November 28, 2012 at 8:59 am |

        That’s an amazing amount of accuracy, WHT. I’m impressed. Take noisy, sloppy, inaccurate data and extract a 300PPM (.09/300K) signal to change the course of human history. That’s some fine engineering work. Very good.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 9:03 am |

        Springer — because of his rhetorical experience within Intelligent Design circles — knows how effective the strategy of exaggeration is.
        I am only looking at small differences in absolute temperature.
        He will have a hard time, here or in my blog, finding anything I have said relating to climate science that points to any scare tactics. Its only in comparison to the fake skeptics, that what I say seems extreme.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 9:28 am |

        No scare tactics?

        Great.

        Lets then agree to say the ocean has warmed one tenth of one degree since 1958 instead of saying it gained 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 more Joules of energy.

        Lets also agree to say that atmospheric CO2 has increased from 0.028% of the atmosphere to 0.039% of the atmosphere since the beginning of the industrial revolution.

        Deal?

        LOL

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 9:36 am |

        You’re right that I know the power that using big numbers has with the Rubes from my experience in the ID debate. Just throw out the number “billions of years” of evolution and it seems like anything is possible. Mud can surely reform itself into thinking machines able to fill the Library of Congress with book given billions of years, right Rube?

      • The Skeptical Warmist (aka R. Gates) | November 28, 2012 at 10:28 am |

        WHT,

        You are exactly right. One must not look at the temperature change of the oceans but the relative energy content this represents. This is somewhere around 25 x 10^22 Joules over the past 50 years just down to 2000 meters, and even more as you go deeper. What studies like this one:

        http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2012/2012GL053262.shtml

        Are indicating is that this combined pattern of ocean and atmospheric warming strongly points to is an external forcing i.e. GHG increases, not internal variability like PDO as the primary driver of this pattern of warming.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 28, 2012 at 11:13 am |

        389 years. 0.09C in 50 years with ~ 0.7C increase in air temperature from about 1900, possibly the end of a long cooler period, it would take 389 years at 0.09 C per half century to reach a new relative equilibrium. It would take a little over a 1000 years to reach a 2 C relative equilibrium. Of course the 0.09C has a tad of uncertainty. What rate would be required for say a period of 1470 +/- 500 years?

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 12:07 pm |

        What one must look at depends on the question being considered.

        I brought up the smallness of the change in average ocean temperature because that explains how the heat flux to the ocean may continue for years while surface or atmospheric temperatures do not change.

        It’s certainly also true that the smallness of that value makes accurate determination of changes in the OHC more difficult as the temperatures are the measurable variables, not the OHC. (The flux at TOA is also measurable – in principle.)

        The smallness of the average temperature change tells also that reaching the full warming that corresponds to ECS would take very long in the hypothetical situation where forcing first changes and then remains at the new level. On the other hand it does not tell whether the difference between ECS and TCR is large or small, but a small difference would be related to very slow warming at depths as a small difference would mean that the flux within the oceans is small.

        There are many interesting issues involved both related to the influence of oceans on the climate change and to the accuracy of the empirical data. For these questions the changes in temperature profile are of equal interest to the changes in OHC. Actually the temperature profiles are the only thing which we need to know as OHC can be calculated from them but not vice versa.

        The large number of joules are incomprehensible numbers with no informative value for most people while the changes in temperature are much more understandable. If they seem small then that’s not a reason to dismiss them. Rather it must be explained why such averages are bound to be small at this stage of warming.

        One interesting thing that we can see in the ocean data is that the warming is far from uniform. That adds to the complexity of drawing conclusions from the data.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 28, 2012 at 1:22 pm |

        Nice projection there Springer, using the term Rube. I would apply it to you, not as an unintelligent hick, but as a Rube Goldberg type, creating the most tenuous yet plausible sounding arguments, which ultimately fall apart when leaned on.

        The clown show must go on.

      • R. Gates | November 28, 2012 at 2:50 pm |

        captdallas said:

        ” It would take a little over a 1000 years to reach a 2 C relative equilibrium. Of course the 0.09C has a tad of uncertainty. What rate would be required for say a period of 1470 +/- 500 years?”
        ____
        Good question but pointless to figure out. GHG’s continue to rise and OHC will continue to accumulate at even faster rates as we go forward. This things a long long way from coming close to talking about equilibrium. We’re just getting started.

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 28, 2012 at 3:05 pm |

        Gates, “This things a long long way from coming close to talking about equilibrium. We’re just getting started.”

        I agree, but equilibrium climate sensitivity is what is driving policy discussions. Transient sensitivity, while I am not sure “sensitivity” as defined is very useful, appears to be lower and trending towards lower still, than estimated in the 80s and 90s. If we are beyond of a point of no return, may as well party with what we got. If a rough estimate of 2C is 389 years down the road, there are a lot of things that could happen along the way.

        Other problems might be more pressing in that time frame.

      • Sullivan | November 29, 2012 at 2:12 am |

        So although for at least this hiatus period, ocean and atmospheric warming are uncoupled, this “is consistent with current models of AGW”.

        Not hugely convincing, really.

    • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 7:48 am |

      Pekka

      The Levitus paper you cited is interesting but it raises as many questions as it answers,

      “The 0-2000 m layer of the world ocean has warmed by ~0.09°C in the 1955-2010 period.”

      The increase of ~0.09°C over 55 years is pretty much equal to 0°C – especially since the coverage is spotty prior to ARGO in 2003 and the error bars for each measurement are greater than the 55-year trend.

      30% of this warming is supposed to have occurred in the 700-2000m layer, so 70% would theoretically be in the 0-700m layer.

      Levitus does not mention that the 0-700m trend since ARGO started has been essentially flat (and even this was after some upward “corrections” to the ARGO data had to be made).

      So, as a rational skeptic, I’d say Levitus is interesting background information, but really doesn’t tell us much about actually observed ocean heat content trends.

      We now have a system that gives us this kind of info (since 2003). Let’s see what it tells us once we have a few decades of data (that hasn’t been “corrected” too much to make it “fit” the theoretical expectations).

      Max

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 8:54 am |

        manacker

        the error bars for each measurement are greater than the 55-year trend.

        Why are you repeating this falsehood? We’ve been through this already.

        OHC 0-2000m with error bars

        You do this constantly. Why? How can repeating rubbish help your supposed case as a ‘rational sceptic’?

        You are no such thing. You repeat falsehoods. You use scare quotes around “corrections” to imply scientific misconduct again and again:

        Levitus does not mention that the 0-700m trend since ARGO started has been essentially flat (and even this was after some upward “corrections” to the ARGO data had to be made).

        You are nothing more than a denier and a conspiracy theorist.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 8:58 am |

        Here you are, doing exactly the same thing on the other thread. This is just dishonest, disgraceful behaviour.

        You have *no integrity whatsoever*.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 9:03 am |

        BBD

        You are going to tell me that the spotty upper ocean temperature measurements prior to ARGO in 2003 had a greater accuracy than +/-0.045C, when extrapolated to the overall ocean?

        Duh!

        I can believe ARGO figures (if they aren’t “corrected” or “manipulated” to death), but prior to ARGO?

        Fuggidabaoudit, BBD, you’re dreaming.

        Max

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 9:08 am |

        BBD

        Some advice from a grown-up:

        Stop the emotional outbursts and accusations of spreading “falsehoods” and being a “denier and a conspiracy theorist”.

        They really just make you look juvenile and foolish (even if you aren’t so).

        Try to stick to the factual part of the ongoing debate here.

        You’ll look a lot more intelligent and mature that way.

        Max

      • JCH | November 28, 2012 at 9:14 am |

        It is ironic that Max continues to refer to the Willis “speed bump” as though it is still real.

        It has been completely withdrawn. On a place called earth there was no speed bump. Period. Willis never found ocean cooling. He made a mistake. He corrected.

        The irony is the scientist who kept telling Willis his finding of ocean cooling, the speed bump on the way to AGW, was dead wrong; as in: DEAD WRONG, was Chef Hydro’s Wong et al, 2006.

        That Wong, Chef Hysro’s hero, said Willis was “”WONG!””

        He was wrong, MAX. He corrected his mistake. You like his mistake because it grooves with your guiding light, which is politics, not Feynman. Period. Not Feynman. So you won’t let it go. Nobody knows what Feynman would think of your tactics. He’s dead. He can’t judge you. That’s why you guys picked him.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 9:17 am |

        British Bollocks Dispenser

        When Argo data indicated the ocean was cooling in 2006 it took several years of invention of “corrections” to the raw data for it to become warming instead of cooling.

        The temperature sensor precision on Argo buoys is reputedly a few thousandth’s a degree C. Yet with that great precision it requires “correcting” the readings to show warming instead of cooling.

        This is suspect in any honest broker’s assessment. You are not an honest broker. We both know that.

        In any case ocean warming is miniscule at 0.09C over a period of 58 years even if the data is accurate. But don’t despair! Your boys will surely find more “corrections”.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 9:19 am |

        manacker

        You lied. I demonstrated it. Blustering does no good.

        You are a conspiracy theorist and a denier, and you have no integrity whatsoever.

        Denying what is clearly demonstrated above only underlines my point.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 9:26 am |

        British Bollocks Dispenser

        Your co-denialist manacker should be telling *you* to grow up Springer. Or he will be guilty of double-standards ;-)

        Carry on misrepresenting ARGO all you like. It makes no difference to the actual results. And you hate that, don’t you?

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 9:45 am |

        JCH

        Don’t get all excited.

        Here’s what actually happened:

        1. ARGO found ocean cooling since 2003
        2. Willis was surprised, since this did not support his hypothesis
        3. Willis called it a “speed bump”
        4. Willis et al. started looking at the measurements and applied an upward correction.
        5. As a result there was no cooling after 2003 (but also no real warming)

        Now to “why” this happened:

        The record shows that Willis is a firm believer in ocean warming. He has co-authored a paper with Hansen where the ocean is allegedly the “pipeline” where the missing global warming is hiding.

        His dismay when ARGO showed cooling was evident (if you read the NASA blurbs at the time).

        His off the cuff characterization of the observed cooling as a “speed bump” in the overall warming shows his apparent bias on this (his paradigm tells him it’s supposed to warm, even if the data show otherwise).

        The fact that corrected ARGO figures now show no cooling is suspect to me personally – since the exact corrections that were made are not made available to the public openly and transparently.

        Now am I saying that Willis is “fudging” the data so it fits the paradigm?

        I have no proof that this is so – but I also see no evidence that it isn’t so.

        I’d say we should wait at least a couple of decades since ARGO started, when we are sure all the “bugs” in the system have been fixed and we have a statistically significant record to talk about.

        What we have now is too dicey to be of much value IMO.

        Max

        Max

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 9:51 am |

        Max,

        You are making an extremely serious accusation while you admit that you have no evidence to support that.

        Think again what you write.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 9:51 am |

        JCH

        And lo! And behold!

        OHC rises during the period 2000 – 2011.

        And kids, let’s look carefully at the size of the error bars vs the rate of trend!

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 9:54 am |

        Accusations of serious scientific misconduct are ten-a-penny amongst the denialist fraternity.

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 28, 2012 at 10:03 am |

        Max,

        The only rational that I can find in your comments is that of trying to figure out what kind of comments might support your interests when it doesn’t matter at all whether they are based on any facts or already proven wrong in several occasions.

        Is that what you mean by rational skeptic.

      • JCH | November 28, 2012 at 10:11 am |

        Bullchit, MAX. Takmeng Wong, based upon his satellite data, said Willis’s finding of ocean cooling was wrong. It became a matter of finding out which scientist had made an error, and it was Willis.

        You are a serial distorter.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 10:14 am |

        JCH

        Thanks for posting Pielke’s OHC curve.

        It shows exactly what I’ve been talking about.

        Prior to ARGO in 2003 the curve shows a fairly strong rate of increase (keeping in mind that the data were very spotty); after 2003 the warming dropped to almost zero (even after :correcting” the ARGO data upward).

        From 1993 to 2003, OHC increased by 130 zeta-joules or by 13 zeta-joules/year

        After 2003 with “corrected” ARGO data, OHC increased by 20 zeta-joules or by 2.5 zeta-joules/year, a warming rate of less than one-fifth of the earlier (more dicey) rate.

        Was the “kink” in the curve a result of poor data prior to 2003 or of a slowdown in global warming since then?

        Or both?

        Unanswered questions, until we have a couple of decades of good ARGO data to look at.

        And that was my point

        Max

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 10:18 am |

        Pekka

        Don’t you start in the name calling game.

        You’ve been above this in the past and it doesn’t make you look too good.

        Leave that up to BBD, JCH and the others here who like that approach.

        I’ve always respected your approach and thoughts, even though I may not have always agreed with your conclusions.

        Let’s keep it that way, OK?

        Max

      • JCH | November 28, 2012 at 10:30 am |

        You have not a tidbit of evidence that Josh Willis was motivated to correct his data to fit his expectations. Your accusation is baseless speculation and therefore despicable.

        Takmeng Wong had data. He had a lot of data, and his data clearly indicated Willis was wrong.

        That was not the only evidence Willis was wrong.

        Contrary to what you are saying, Willis initially defended his findings. He had a rationale for why the oceans were cooling. It did not hold up to scrutiny.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 10:41 am |

        manacker

        Don’t you start in the name calling game.

        Hey! What about Springer? What about all the names he calls everyone here *constantly*?

        I have already asked you about your double standards here. About your integrity on this issue. And now you attack Pekka?

        Leave him out of this – he didn’t ‘call you any names’. That’s a false accusation and a misdirection rolled into one. And under that cover, you have *ignored* his point, just as you previously ignored mine.

        All of this is just more evidence on the pile demonstrating that you have *no integrity*.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 10:47 am |

        manacker the integrity-free zone says:

        Prior to ARGO in 2003 the curve shows a fairly strong rate of increase (keeping in mind that the data were very spotty); after 2003 the warming dropped to almost zero (even after :correcting” the ARGO data upward).

        I’ve already pointed out that you should pay more attention to the size of the error bars and the slope of the trend. Why don’t you do so?

        Now you continue your attack on the XBT sampling density (ignoring error bars) and you REPEAT your accusation of scientific misconduct by Willis.

        You are just a disgrace.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 10:51 am |

        JCH

        I took a closer look at the Wong study you cite that supposedly corrects an error in Willis’ previous ARGO-based study.

        There’s really nothing new in Wong, except it confirms that OHC warming slowed down dramatically after 2003 (confirming Willis’ “corrected” ARGO data). It seems to have been written to support the notion that our planet is still gaining heat despite the observed slight cooling of the atmosphere.

        If I look at HadSST2 global sea surface temperature anomaly since 2003, I see a net cooling of 0.074C since 2003, or a decadal cooling rate of 0.092C/decade.
        http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadsst2gl/from:2003/trend

        So I have another data point beside that of Willis’ ARGO data that tells me the ocean is not really warming since 2003, despite the Wong analysis.

        As I said earlier: Let’s wait until we have a couple of decades of ARGO data; then we’ll know what’s really happening.

        Max

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 10:56 am |

        SST is not OHC. Basic error.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 11:06 am |

        JCH

        We have spent millions putting in a comprehensive system of several thousand ARGO buoys to measure the ocean’s temperature (and other things); this system got operative in 2003.

        These ARGO buoys replaced some expendable XBT devices, that gave very spotty coverage and were shown to introduce a warming bias.

        The ARGO devices tell us since they were installed that the ocean has not warmed. Initial results showed net cooling, the data were corrected to show no cooling (or warming)

        Wong comes along using satellites and some ocean data to “correct” what the multi-million dollar ARGO system found, concluding that there has been slight warming since 2003.

        My question: why in hell did we spend millions of dollars to install a system to specifically measure the ocean temperature comprehensively if we aren’t going to trust the data it provides?

        Forget Wong. Let’s see what ARGO tells us.

        Max

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 11:14 am |

        Sod your question. What about all your evasions? What about your repeated accusation of scientific misconduct against Willis?

        What about the fact that you don’t understand that SST is *not* OHC?

        What about your total lack of integrity?

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 11:14 am |

        BBD

        Of course “SST is not OHC”

        Duh!

        One is the temperature of the air just above the sea surface, measured as an anomaly in degrees C.

        The other is the ocean heat content reported in zeta-joules but measured by upper ocean temperature (since 2003 by ARGO).

        But, as a check on the OHC data, it is reasonable to assume if the air just above the sea surface is cooling over longer periods on average that the sea just below the surface is not warming significantly.

        Got it?

        Max
        .

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 11:17 am |

        BBD

        Don’t act like a juvenile, BBD.

        Just stick to the factual debate here.

        Max

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 11:30 am |

        Pekka

        Read what I wrote more closely.

        You will see that I am NOT (as you wrote) “making an extremely serious accusation while you admit that you have no evidence to support that.”

        I simply raised the question.

        After the Climategate revelations and when close to 70% of the polled US public think that climate scientists are “fudging” the data, I am rationally skeptical of any ex post facto “data corrections”, which end up making AGW look stronger, especially if these are not open and transparent for one and all to see.

        But I have not accused anyone of “fudging” – I have even conceded that there is no evidence of that in this case.

        So cool down and rejoin the debate, based on the data not on emotions.

        Max

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 11:53 am |

        manacker

        But, as a check on the OHC data, it is reasonable to assume if the air just above the sea surface is cooling over longer periods on average that the sea just below the surface is not warming significantly.

        No. It is not reasonable to assume this.

        What does such an assumption tell us about the rate of energy transport downward from mixed layer? Nothing. You cannot infer OHC change from brief peridos of SST data.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 12:15 pm |

        manacker

        Just stick to the factual debate here.

        Sure. You are a liar. Fact. Evidence all over this sub-thread.

        It beggars belief that you are now trying to claim that you *didn’t repeatedly* accuse Willis of scientific misconduct.

        You are a liar. Pure and simple. Not one shred of integrity.

        You abuse the rest of us with this shameless dishonesty. You rub it in our faces. Those of us with integrity cannot really compete with you. We have to stick to our arguments. We can’t just lie all the time.

        Don’t act like a juvenile, BBD.

        How low will you go? Children behave as *you* do sometimes. They lie shamelessly. You do not get to lie like this and then accuse others of being juvenile.

        I cannot believe my f*cking eyes sometimes.

      • mike | November 28, 2012 at 1:51 pm |

        Hey BBD,

        You know, BBD, you and I have had our disagreements from time to time. You, for example, subscribe to the theory that you’re a 47 year-old, retired business man, while I favor the hypothesis, supported by Occam’s razor, that has you as a can’t-get-a-date, dork kid with zits; with severe, developmental personality dysfunctions; and with braces under way too much tension–that last accounting for the induced “Horse’s Ass Syndrome” that is so prominently a part of your behavior as displayed in the comments you post to this blog.

        But all that aside, BBD, I think we can both agree that you’re a total weirdo, hyper up-tight control-freak. And in that regard, your frantic, mono-maniac efforts to impose ORDER AND CONTROL AND DISCIPLINED PC HIVE-THINK on this blog are a constant source of entertainment. I mean, like, I’m sure even you’ve noted, BBD, that every time you pull one of your imperious demand, impatient out-burst, frustrated melt-down, I’m-the-little-smarty-pants-and-you’re-not, YOU’RE-A-LIAR!, whip-cracking, ram-rod tricks to GET EVERYONE ON THIS BLOG IN LINE, it fails–blows up in your face even.

        And, BBD, do you know why you’ve had such bad luck on this blog with your little, bossy, doofus-kid-acting-like-he-thinks-a-control-freak-47-year-old-businessman-whose-“need-the-money”-employees-hate-his-tin-pot-tyrant-guts-would-act, know-it-all, Philosopher King wannabe act on this blog when it has proven such a success in more hive-friendly venues? Well, BBD, it’s because Climate etc. is a lightly-moderated blog and, therefore, a living nightmare for booger-brain, hive-bozo control-freaks like you.

        You know, BBD, I sorta see you along the lines of a real-life, cartoon character with much in common with Wile E. Coyote. And taking in your prat-fall misadventures as you tear through this blog has brought much pleasure to and greatly enriched my golden years. Thank you, BBD. Encore!

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 3:49 pm |

        mike

        You back this fool up? That makes you as dishonest and as stupid as he is.

      • mike | November 28, 2012 at 4:50 pm |

        BBD,

        Yr: “Do you back this fool up?”

        BBD, I’m just a natural-born lurker on this blog. Just scratchin’ my head, and tryin’ my best to figure out what the guys with the big-brains, like you and manacker, are talkin’ about.

        Indeed, my only real skill is in spotting lefty, hive-bozo scams and hustles and make-a-buck/make-a-gulag intrigues and callin’ ’em out. That, and I have a sort of untreatable “bouncer-reflex disorder” that tends to flare up when one of the denizens on this blog goes all disruptive dick-head in sanctuary of the e-salon.

        Otherwise, I’m just pushing your buttons, BBD, for the malicious pleasure of it because your wrapped-way-too-tight, freak-out, indignant-dork, fuss-budget, prig-bot reactions to my provocations are truly spectacular and provide one of the few good-fun entertainments remaining to me in the decrepitude of my golden years.

        At the same time, BBD, let me be a pal and say that you need to lighten up guy. You’ll live longer, if you do. I mean, like, you don’t want to end up like Max_OK and me (and WebHub) do you?

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 4:59 pm |

        mike

        Otherwise, I’m just pushing your buttons, BBD, for the malicious pleasure of it because your wrapped-way-too-tight, freak-out, indignant-dork, fuss-budget, prig-bot reactions to my provocations are truly spectacular and provide one of the few good-fun entertainments remaining to me in the decrepitude of my golden years.

        Oh I see. You are a malicious troll. Silly me for not spotting that sooner ;-)

        Why not direct your malice at liars and fools such as manacker? They make excellent targets. Why leave them alone and only attack… oh silly me. You think I’m a communist, don’t you? A hive-bozo and all that.

        Bit bloody difficult, with my background. Which I notice you refuse to accept. Would it be difficult to imagine an entrepreneur strongly in agreement with the scientific consensus on climate change? Does that strike at the very roots of your right-wing beliefs perhaps?

        Fascinating. We’ll follow up on this as time goes by.

      • Tomcat | November 29, 2012 at 3:01 am |

        Carry on misrepresenting ARGO all you like. It makes no difference to the actual results.

        The ‘actual’ results being these low-grade ‘corrected’ ones?

        Just who is doing the misrepresenting here ? Could it possibly be the establishment/profession whose still-unrepentant deafening silence at the rampant fraud and malfeasance of Mann and other Climategaters that still rings in our ears ?

      • Tomcat | November 29, 2012 at 3:11 am |

        Pekka reprimands Max for making an extremely serious accusation while admitting he has no evidence to support that.

        Since climategate, the ensuing coverups, and lack of criticism thereof by most climate scientists, there is a reasonable presumption of malfeasance on the part of government climate science. The burden of proof falls on those who claim otherwise.

      • Steady Eddie | November 29, 2012 at 3:22 am |

        BBD – It beggars belief that you are now trying to claim that you *didn’t repeatedly* accuse Willis of scientific misconduct.
        You are a liar. Pure and simple. Not one shred of integrity.

        Show us this repeated evidence BBD, or people might think it’s actually you who is the pure and simple liar with no integrity.

    • oneuniverse | November 28, 2012 at 4:47 pm |

      Dr Pirilä, thanks for the link to the Levitus presentation, and your comments.

    • Particular Physicist | November 29, 2012 at 1:31 am |

      So in a nutshell, ocean warming and atmospheric warming do not trend together, suggesting a lack of connection and causes. Which suggests ocean warming is unrelated to GHG warming.

  79. Steve Milesworthy | November 28, 2012 at 7:22 am |

    Peter Lang,

    To avoid getting in between your discussion with ammonite, I’ll post here:

    1. the world is better off and more productive after 0.8C of warming in past two centuries. Why won’t this continue?

    It’s a cheap rhetorical trick to relate the productivity of the world to the amount of warming, when the productivity of the world is due to extraction and burning of fossil/nuclear fuels, and not due to the warming.

    Given that. It won’t continue if, for example, the amount of energy from fossil/nuclear fuels goes up less than the amount that is needed to feed consumption (and if the difference cannot be met by renewables); or if the cost of upgrading the infrastructure to deal with a different climate adds to the energy costs (an “economist” was extolling the economic “benefits” of the UK floods on the TV this week).

    • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 8:54 am |

      Steve Milesworthy

      Excuse me for interjecting myself into your exchange with Peter Lang, but I think there is a basic error in your logic.

      Peter Lang stated the rather obvious fact that with the increased availability of low-cost energy over the past two centuries, per capita global productivity has increased and human life has improved; this occurred concurrent to an increase in atmospheric CO2 from 280 to 390 ppmv and an increase in global temperature of 0.8°C.

      How much of the productivity was a result of low-cost energy?

      Certainly most of the industrial productivity increase can be tied to this.

      Agricultural productivity certainly also benefited from the availability of low-cost fossil fuels (petrochemical fertilizers, diesel-driven tractors instead of mules, etc.), but it may also have been partly increased as a result of longer growing seasons and more arable land (resulting from the 0.8°C global warming) plus increased plant growth rates (resulting from higher atmospheric CO2 levels).

      Global average human life expectancy has increased immensely as a result.

      Now to look into the future.

      Will continued availability of low cost energy (along with human ingenuity) result in increased per capita industrial productivity (and quality of life), and will additional increase in CO2 plus moderate warming result in even more increase in crop yields and agricultural productivity?

      I’d say it’s logical to assume that they will, if we consider what has happened over just the past 40 years (from 1970 to today, as CO2 increased from 324 to 392 ppmv and global temperature increased by around 0.5°C):

      Population increased by 1.9 times, from 3.7 to 7.0 billion (the annual growth rate has now slowed down significantly since around 2000)

      Annual GDP in constant $ increased from $13.8 trillion to $62.6 trillion, so annual per capita GDP increased from $3,700 to $8,900 (an increase of 2.4 times)

      Agricultural yield of all major crops increased from 788 to 1912 million tons (up by 2.4 times)

      Starvation rates decreased markedly and human life expectancy increased from ~55 years to ~68 years (up by 13 years).

      So Peter has reason to be optimistic when looking into the future and all the economic “doomsday scenarios” out there (Stern, Nordhaus, etc.) are very likely to just be bad “pipe dreams”.

      Max

      • bob droege | November 28, 2012 at 10:23 am |

        Let’s play a game!

        Count the post hoc ergo propter hocs in the last post by Max!

      • Steve Milesworthy | November 28, 2012 at 10:40 am |

        manacker,

        I’d say it’s logical to assume that they will, if we consider what has happened over just the past 40 years (from 1970 to today, as CO2 increased from 324 to 392 ppmv and global temperature increased by around 0.5°C):

        You might say that. Saying it is “logical” doesn’t make it so.

        What you describe in the latter half of your post is an economic bubble. The skin of the bubble is mostly sustained by the availability of high density energy sources such as fossil and nuclear. Your statement doesn’t really challenge that point in any “logical” way. Assuming a trend will continue is not “logical”.

        “Low cost energy” is a meaningless mantra, by the way. Our utilisation of the energy from the sun outweighs all fossil fuel use by orders of magnitude (include heating, agriculture, water “pumping” etc. etc.), and is much cheaper. You should say “easily extractable” energy or somesuch.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 5:17 pm |

        Steve Milesworthy

        From your last post I have to ask, “why are you so negative?”.

        Humanity is living better and longer than we were 200+ years ago when industrialization started – a significant part of this improvement in quality of life can be attributed to the availability of reliable, low-cost energy.

        We sure as hell don’t want to go back to the life of 200+ years ago. It was cruel and short.

        If the 2010 study by WEC is to be believed we have “used up” around 15% of all the fossil fuel reserves that were ever on our planet, leaving around 85% to go; at present consumption rates, these should last us 300 years (at anticipated accelerated future use rates, they should last 150+ years)

        In addition, we have nuclear energy to cover electrical power needs; in most places of the world this is economically competitive with coal (the cheapest fossil fuel for power generation), and there is an almost unlimited supply of nuclear fuel.

        So the lights don’t have to go out anytime soon.

        Then there are many new and improved technologies in research and development, including renewable sources, biofuels, etc., any one of which could some day become a major replacement for fossil fuels, when these become increasingly difficult and costly to extract.

        As I pointed out to you with some hard facts, humanity is much better off today than we were as little as ~40 years ago (in 1970): in standard of living, quality of life and life expectancy.

        There is no earthly reason to doubt that this gradual improvement will continue: it already is in the large developing nations, such as China, India or Brazil. As these nations develop, their populations will improve their living standard and consume more energy in the process (as we did).

        The poorest nations of all do not yet have access to a reliable. low-cost source of energy today. But they will also develop, if we allow them to do so.

        There is also no doubt whatsoever that humanity is also living better than we did as little as 40 years ago, as all the indicators show.

        So why all the negative pessimism?

        The world needs “doers” – people who will make the new technologies and improvements in human life a reality, not “stoppers” who block the construction of new nuclear power plants out of fear, for example, or “doomsayers”, who fret about the future and chase unrealistic pipe dreams, but do nothing to “make it happen”.

        Max

      • Steve Milesworthy | November 29, 2012 at 3:53 am |

        I’m not negative. I’m trying to be constructive. I think you have your head in the clouds a bit in your hopes for continued “guilt-free” use of fossil fuels, which is not that constructive. Sure life is pretty good now, but future good lives for our children and their children depend on stability and sustainability of energy supplies.

        You accept that technological advance will bring other renewable energy resources. I concur and I think it is possible. I think it would be easier to move to this scenario if they were to be developed on a fairer playing field though – ie. no unequal subsidies for nuclear generation and coal extraction, and realistic costs to be applied to users of fossil fuel.

      • Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 4:28 am |

        Max,

        I just happened to notice this discussion (I must miss lots of comments I’d like to contribute to because of the nesting structure used on Climate Etc. instead of no nesting).

        You made a point I’d like to add to:

        As these nations develop, their populations will improve their living standard and consume more energy in the process (as we did).

        Yes. But it is important they develop rapidly, otherwise much of the opportunity will be missed. If they miss out, everyone suffers, including us living in the rich countries.

        Countries must develop while their population is young. Once the population grows old – as Japan is already and China is heading towards – a smaller proportion of young people have to support a larger proportion of old people. The chance to develop is largely gone. There is a relatively short window off opportunity. It is closing for many Asian countries.

        So it is really important, for the whole world, that the developing countries develop as fast as they can. The countries that haven’t yet started must also go through the development cycle as fast as they can.

        As you say, cheap energy is one of the most important inputs.

        Therefore, they need cheap energy. The developed world should be doing all it can to facilitate their development, not unwittingly thwarting it (for example, by policies such as global carbon pricing). We should do all we can to allow cheap energy, not try to thwart it – as many people in the rich countries have been doing to the best of their ability for the past 50 years.

      • Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 5:17 am |

        What you describe in the latter half of your post is an economic bubble. The skin of the bubble is mostly sustained by the availability of high density energy sources such as fossil and nuclear. Your statement doesn’t really challenge that point in any “logical” way. Assuming a trend will continue is not “logical”.

        I’d suggest, what is not logical, is assuming a trend that has continued for 200,000 years will not continue. It strains credulity to believe that, just when we are living, the trend will stop. Especially given that we have virtually unlimited amounts of nuclear fuel available.

        “Low cost energy” is a meaningless mantra, by the way. Our utilisation of the energy from the sun outweighs all fossil fuel use by orders of magnitude (include heating, agriculture, water “pumping” etc. etc.), and is much cheaper. You should say “easily extractable” energy or somesuch.

        Now who is using rhetorical tricks? “Low cost energy” is not a meaningless mantra. Far from it. It is possibly the most important input that has allowed man to develop. Society needs high density, readily available energy. Solar and wind cannot provide cheap, high quality (fit for purpose) energy.

        You might say that. Saying it is “logical” doesn’t make it so.

        That statement applies to your beliefs about renewable energy.

      • Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 5:35 am |

        Steve Milesworthy,

        Sure life is pretty good now, but future good lives for our children and their children depend on stability and sustainability of energy supplies.

        I totally agree with you on this point. But renewable energy cannot supply it; in fact its contribution is and will continue to be negligible.

        We’ve wasted 50 years blocking development of nuclear power and at least 30 years strongly advocating renewable energy instead. How long should we continue to advocate for renewables, mandate them and massively subsidise them for no return while, at the same time, continually trying to block the development of nuclear power?

        Do you realise that CO2 emissions are about 10% to 20% higher now than they would have been if nuclear power had been allowed to progress like all other technologies? Furthermore, do you realise that we’d be in a good position now to rapidly ramp up to cut global emissions by 50% in 50 years if nuclear was more developed as small, modular, factory built nuclear power plants – like this: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/26/nuclear-small-modular-reactors/1727001/ and like the 43 small nuclear power plants described here:
        http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf33.html

        no unequal subsidies for nuclear generation and coal extraction, and realistic costs to be applied to users of fossil fuel.

        This is a complete furphy. People who make the claim do not divide the subsidies by the amount of energy supplied by the technology – e.g. $/TWh. There also many other factors they choose not to mention.

      • Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 5:37 am |

        My comment @ November 29, 2012 at 5:17 am was in response to Steve Milesworthy

      • Monk | November 29, 2012 at 8:32 am |

        “Low cost energy” is a meaningless mantra, by the way. Our utilisation of the energy from the sun outweighs all fossil fuel use by orders of magnitude (include heating, agriculture, water “pumping” etc. etc.), and is much cheaper. You should say “easily extractable” energy or somesuch.

        The claim that “low cost energy” is a meaningless mantra, is symptomatic of poor economic literacy. The cost of doing X, is all the opportunities thereby forgone. If some form of energy Y is easily extractable, that means we can do it by forgoing fewer other opportunities than other forms.

        “Low cost” thus implies “easily extractable”.

    • Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 4:56 am |

      Steve Milesworthy,

      It won’t continue if, for example, the amount of energy from fossil/nuclear fuels goes up less than the amount that is needed to feed consumption (and if the difference cannot be met by renewables); or if the cost of upgrading the infrastructure to deal with a different climate adds to the energy costs

      Three enormous ‘IFs’.

      First ‘IF’ – the amount of nuclear fuel is effectively unlimited. So the first ‘IF’ is irrelevant. We need to allow nuclear power to be cheap as it inherently should be given its 20,000 to 2 million times greater energy density than fossil fuels.

      Second ‘IF’ – the difference most certainly cannot be met by renewables in the foreseeable future if ever. IMO, non-hydro renewables are unlikely to make much of a contribution to world energy supply at all. And hydro capacity is largely developed; there is little opportunity to increase it. Hydro’s proportion of global energy will continue to decline as it has been doing for several decades.

      Third ‘IF’ – “if the cost of upgrading the infrastructure to deal with a different climate adds to the energy costs”. The cost of energy has been decreasing for 200,000 years – ever since man first learnt to control fire and then to hitch a cow to a plough (i.e. a log). The big advances have been when new fuels with higher energy density have been adopted. Energy densities in MJ/kg: wood 16, coal 24, oil 43, natural gas 50, hydrogen 123, uranium 80,000.

      The reason energy has been increasing over recent decades is largely due to the imposts of regulations, constraints, impediments. Constraints on development of nuclear power, and inadviseable waste of money on subsidising and mandating renewable energy has played a large part in increasing the cost of energy.

      Eventually, the tide will turn, the population will realise how badly they’ve been conned, and then we can start moving forward again.

      UK and EU’s growing recognition of the futility of trying to make renewable energy viable is progress. Last week’s announcement by the USDOE is a welcome step: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/26/nuclear-small-modular-reactors/1727001/

    • Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 5:02 am |

      Steve Mliesworthy,

      It’s a cheap rhetorical trick to relate the productivity of the world to the amount of warming, when the productivity of the world is due to extraction and burning of fossil/nuclear fuels, and not due to the warming.

      It’s not a rhetorical trick because it is true. Life thrives when the planet is warmer and struggles when colder. There is more carbon tied up in the biosphere when warmer than when colder. There is more precipitation. the area of deserts shrinks when warmer and expands when colder (AR4 Chapter 6).

      I agree that cheap and plentiful energy was and still is the main driver, but you cannot deny that warmer climates have also been a contributing factor.

  80. A fan of *MORE* discourse | November 28, 2012 at 7:26 am |

    There’s a vigorous outbreak of “outsider” climate-change theories in-progress here on Climate Etc, and in assessing these theories, please let me commend the theoretical analysis of Chandresekar’s “old-but-good” textbook An Introduction to The Study of Stellar Structure (1939)

    “This book was the most important source for people of my generation, and it remains today an absolutely fundamental source for students. It was written in the pre-computer age, and stellar structure and evolution is nowadays a very computer-intensive subject; nevertheless no amount of computation can replace the kind of insight that emerges in every chapter of this book.”

    In particular, Chandra’s textbook discusses in-depth the challenging topics of radiative heat transport and turbulent energy transport, regarding which “outsider” climate-change theories often claim novel insights.

    Along with Spencer Weart’s masterful on-line history The Discovery of Global Warming, hosted by the American Institute of Physics (AIP), Chandra’s book is worth the close study of every student of climate change physics!

    A challenge for “outsider” climate-change theorists  Test your novel theoretical ideas regarding climate variability against the huge body of theory, computational simulation, and observational data relating to stellar variability!

    The above theoretical/history works are appreciated as being particularly significant in light of the following breaking news:

    Sea Level Estimate Coming Soon
    CU Sea-Level Research Group

    CNES recently finished reprocessing the entire Jason-2 altimeter data record to improved GDR-D standards. We are still incorporating these new data into our GMSL processing. We expect to release new GMSL estimates within the coming weeks.

    If as many scientists expect, the next tranche of sea-level rise data shows the beginnings of an acceleration of sea-level rise, then the physics of Chandra, the history of Weart, and the climate-change predictions of Hansen, all will be affirmed.

    For many skeptics, there will be only one rational explanation of this century-old, global-scale, and now-strengthening scientific accord: a vast global conspiracy!

    Prediction  If acceleration of sea-level rise is seen, then the resulting outbreaks of vehement climate-change nutjobbery will surpass all such outbreaks seen before! \scriptstyle\rule[2.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}\,\boldsymbol{\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}\ {\displaystyle\text{\bfseries!!!}}\,\overset{\scriptstyle\circ\wedge\circ}{\smile}}\ \rule[-0.25ex]{0.01pt}{0.01pt}

    • newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 7:43 am |

       
      Relax! You won’t see it. The sea surface temperature trend since the 60 year cycle passed its maximum around 1998-99 will continue slightly downwards for 30 years from then. The 1000 year cycle will ensure 500 years of cooling sooner or later, probably starting 50 to 200 years from now, when temperatures might be 0.4 to 0.8 degrees higher on average.

      See http://climate-change-theory.com and the article linked in the message to gbaike below. Turn of fthe alarm bells!

       

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:21 am |

      \mathbb{STFU}\bowtie\mathbb{STFU}

      and furthermore

      \mathbb{GFY}\bowtie\mathbb{GFY}

    • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 8:38 am |

      FOMD

      May I contrast Springer’s characteristically unhinged response here?

      Thank you for your commentary which I find consistently erudite and frequently amusing.

      Please do not think that it is unappreciated.

      On a specific note, I too am *very* interested in the forthcoming SLR update from the CU research team. I too suspect that it will be greeted by many here with the same enthusiasm that they embrace the OHC data.

      Whether your prediction will prove correct is hard to say simply because the vehement climate-change nutjobbery I have seen here, on this blog, in only a few weeks, would be difficult if not impossible to surpass.

      :-) :-) :-)

      • Steven Mosher | November 28, 2012 at 10:26 am |

        They migrate to the place where they get best argument.
        “best” however is variously defined.

        at lucias we ignore them.
        at wuwt they are agreed with.
        at CA talk about c02 is banned

        there is only one place left where they can get an “argument”

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 5:52 pm |

        Steven

        I agree you’ve got to work at it to find the “pearls of wisdom” among all the ad homs, arm waving and posturing, and – yes – some alternate hypotheses that sound rather strange…

        But there is a debate going on here.

        And the “holes” in the CAGW argument are coming to light.

        I think that is the main benefit of a debate like this: to identify where the “consensus” CAGW premise of IPCC is flawed.

        And I believe it is working.

        (Why else would the “true believers” be howling in indignation and resorting to all the silly debating side tracks they are using?)

        Max

    • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 2:34 pm |

      Ocean heat content and therefore sea levels follows closely the radiative imbalance at TOA.

      That is after all the source of all these things – is it not mosh, FOMBS, blah blah? Why stew around in your fetid pool of ambiguous misinformation – look to the sky that’s where it all becomes clear.

      Sea level will have continued to rise moderately since 2000 with a bit of a dip in the last couple of years. Some of that might be short term relocation of water from the oceans to the land.

      http://s1114.photobucket.com/albums/k538/Chief_Hydrologist/?action=view&current=CERES_MODIS-1.gif

      Beyond that we are in a cool mode – http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703 – as TOA radiative flux is modulated by ENSO and the PDO. So little warming – or sea level rise – for a decade or three more.

      I guess the millenialist cult of AGW groupthink space cadets don’t want to know. So sad – too bad.

      • R. Gates | November 28, 2012 at 2:44 pm |

        Chief Hydro said:
        “Sea level will have continued to rise moderately since 2000 with a bit of a dip in the last couple of years. Some of that might be short term relocation of water from the oceans to the land.”
        _____
        Chief, MOST of it is short term relocation of water from oceans to land. GRACE clearly shows this and you probably know this and just “forgot” to mention it.

      • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 3:02 pm |

        Delta ocean heat content is determined by the shifting balance between incoming and outgoing energy. Sea levels have other factors that are difficult to disentangle on short periods. Although the GRACE based analysis you refer to is suggestive (and well known) – it is never just one thing or the other.

        So sad – too bad.

  81. Doug Cotton | November 28, 2012 at 7:34 am |

     gbaikie

    The surface is nothing like a perfect blackbody. More than two thirds of the energy it transfers to the atmosphere is not transferred by radiation at all. And most of the radiation from the surface is not transferring energy from the surface to the atmosphere either.

    Now go and read why here

    And please stop introducing red herrings. I was just making the point that some of the visible spectrum in solar radiation is converted to thermal energy in black surfaces, and also in whatever gets down to the deep dark regions of the ocean. Was it you who thought radiation in the visible spectrum cannot transfer heat?

     
    .

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:16 am |

      Hey Doug,

      If surface temperature is determined by gravity then what causes ice ages, the force of gravity waxes and wanes, \mathbb{MORON}?

      • Doug Cotton | November 28, 2012 at 6:26 pm |

        The lapse rate only determines the gradient. The mean Solar intensity sets the level and thus the “intercept” with the surface. Like you learnt in simple co-ordinate geometry y = mx + b

    • gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 8:49 am |

      “The surface is nothing like a perfect blackbody.”
      Nor is the surface of Earth near the color of black.
      My point was in terms of the surface radiating energy, it can’t
      exceed the theoretical blackbody. So with land surface if getting 1000 watts per square meter, no material can absorb 80% of the energy of the Sun and probably instead it’s less than 1/2 of it.

      “More than two thirds of the energy it transfers to the atmosphere is not transferred by radiation at all. ”
      Yeah. Far less than 1/3.
      Even if surface was a blackbody, it should be less than 1/3.

      Was it you who thought radiation in the visible spectrum cannot transfer heat?
      No, that would be Myrrh.

      • newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 6:36 pm |

         
        gbaikie: Sorry about the confusion with Myrrh.

        My response to the rest of your comments is to suggest you study net energy diagrams such as this which shows 51% of TOA insolation absorbed by the surface and then 15% subsequently absorbed by the atmosphere. So 15/51 = ~29.4%.
         
         

      • Eli Rabett | November 28, 2012 at 7:05 pm |

        Emissivity is a function of wavelength. That means that the absorptivity in the visible is very different from the emissivity in the IR near the peak of the black body curve for surface temperatures. You can’t assume a single value for both. The IR emissivity is north of 90% for just about the entire surface including the oceans.

      • gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 7:35 pm |

        “gbaikie: Sorry about the confusion with Myrrh.

        My response to the rest of your comments is to suggest you study net energy diagrams such as this which shows 51% of TOA insolation absorbed by the surface and then 15% subsequently absorbed by the atmosphere. So 15/51 = ~29.4%.”

        Yes I am aware of this and I have disagreements with it.
        I will list my disagreement.
        First, it’s averaged. And it’s averaged wrong.
        Let’s start by looking at an unusual condition on Earth:
        The Sun directly overhead with clear skies:
        At Top Of Atmosphere [TOA] one has about 1360 watts per square meter.
        At the surface in which sun at zenith and it’s clear skies,
        one has about 1000 watts per square meter.
        So with no clouds one losing 360 watts from the TOA to to the earth’s
        surface.
        In the diagram you have it saying 6% is reflected by atmosphere and 16% absorbed by atmosphere.
        6% plus 16% is 22%. So 22% of 1360 is 299.2 watts
        And the sun can be near zenith for limited areas and limited time as compared to the entire sun lit side of the hemisphere. Or you say losing 360 watts is the least TOA solar energy you could lose due to sunlight going thru the Earth’s atmosphere.
        So it’s not accounting for more 60 watts of the 1360 watts before it reaches the earth surface.

        An clear atmosphere could reflect, diffuse/scatter, absorb, re-radiate the sun’s energy. Diagram talks about two of these possibilities: reflect and absorb.
        One could assume reflect includes diffuse/scattering and re-radiate- it’s certainly related or could put them in this one category.
        I think it could be somewhere close to 6% of the sunlight is reflected by a clear day atmosphere, but not close if one includes diffuse/scattering and re-radiating.
        But what they doing is mixing clouds with clear skies [this averaging they are doing] , and so 6% is probably due to clouds reflecting sunlight.

        I was going to try to go over all the points, but I think I will stop here.
        The main problem I have is basic idea averaging the energy of sunlight. There are so many things wrong with this approach.

    • Memphis | November 29, 2012 at 2:06 am |

      Doug Cotton |
      ” most of the radiation from the surface is not transferring energy from the surface to the atmosphere either.”

      So where then?

      “Was it [gbaikie] who thought radiation in the visible spectrum cannot transfer heat?”

      No – the one and only advocate of that view, anywhere, is Myrrh.

  82. Beth Cooper | November 28, 2012 at 10:10 am |

    Max,

    The poem by Walt Whitman reflects an heroic vision that
    is so foreign ter the ‘apocolyptic mind’ that it might as well
    be written in Swahili fer all the sense it would make to doom-
    sayer, James Hansen and his ilk. Ergo, I shan’t waste the
    cost of a postage stamp by sending it to him. :)

    Beth.

  83. Wagathon | November 28, 2012 at 10:42 am |

    The socioeconomics of global warming has eclipsed the science of it. Consider, for example, the use of the analogy of a greenhouse to connote a problem for humanity. And, with all of the shonky political science, the lies do not stop there…

  84. Bad Andrew | November 28, 2012 at 2:29 pm |

    When a gaggle of Warmer Trolls are perpetually over-commenting on your blog, you know your blog has gone into the toilet.

    Andrew

    • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:03 pm |

      When the clamour of competing cranks drowns out the voice of reason, you know something is seriously wrong somewhere.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 5:39 pm |

        Let’s play another game!BBD

        You just repeated exactly what Bad Andrew wrote in slightly different words.

        It’s true!

        Max

  85. Girma | November 28, 2012 at 3:52 pm |

    The CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is increasing mainly because of the ocean warming.

    Proof => http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/compress:12/derivative/scale:0.2/detrend:-0.45/offset:-0.4/plot/hadcrut3vgl/compress:12

    Human emission of CO2 does not appear to exist within the above relationship.

    • lolwot | November 28, 2012 at 4:49 pm |

      CO2 rise is caused by man

    • Eli Rabett | November 28, 2012 at 7:15 pm |

      Old bull. The graph takes the derivative of the CO2 concentrations. This removes the long term trend. Eli had some comments on a similar card forcing act, and skeptical science took this one apart in detail.

      This is where the previously-mentioned alert readers will be nodding their heads and saying “Yes! We knew it!” The error that Hocker makes – taking the derivative of a time series to remove its long-term trend, then correlating a second data set with this derivative, and finally claiming the second data set explains the long-term trend – is exactly the same error that was recently discovered in a prominent “skeptical” paper by McLean 2009. McLean correlated an index of the El Niño/Southern Oscillation with the first derivative of temperature, while Hocker correlates temperature with the first derivative of CO2 concentration. Perhaps if Hocker were an avid reader of Skeptical Science, he would have been familiar with this error in McLean’s analysis and would have avoided repeating it!

      In short, paying any head to Girma is intellectual suicide.

  86. David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 4:53 pm |

    Question for British Bollocks Dispenser

    Cloud cover on the earth is 70%. If you believe clouds have a positive feedback what stops it from going to 100% cloud cover?

    • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:01 pm |

      We’ve been through this. You clearly are too stupid to understand the question, never mind the answer. Go back and look.

    • skepticalmind | November 28, 2012 at 5:03 pm |

      Perhaps clouds cover 100% of the Earth, but they are invisible to the eye?

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 5:17 pm |

      I figured you’d decline to answer. I’ve certainly gone through it buy you haven’t. I have described the effect (but not the magnitude) exactly as it is described below.

      Tough luck, old bean. Maybe now’s a good time to change your name.

      Everyone see below.

      http://www.met.reading.ac.uk/~sgs02rpa/PAPERS/Allan11MA.pdf

      Consistent with previous results (Ramanathan
      et al., 1989; Su et al., 2010), the cloud radiative cooling
      effect through reflection of short wave radiation is found
      to dominate over the long wave heating effect, resulting
      in a net cooling of the climate system of −21 Wm−2.
      The short wave radiative effect of cloud is primarily
      manifest as a reduction in the solar radiation absorbed
      at the surface of −53 Wm−2 for the global multi-annual
      mean.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:37 pm |

        Now, does that make clouds a positive feedback, or a negative feedback?

        Do tell, and be quick about it.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 5:47 pm |

        Anticipating semantic nitpicking where clouds cool the climate through negative forcing, not negative feedback, I’ve gone ahead and found nine instances in the paper that refer to feedback. A 10 page paper with 9 references to cloud feedbacks. Seems like a lot of mentions for a paper about cloud forcing not cloud feedback… LOL

        1. Introduction

        The influence of cloud radiative effect on determining cloud feedbacks and changes in the water cycle are discussed.

        5. The influence of time of day on cloud radiative
        forcing

        This is of importance in assessing cloud climate feedbacks which contribute substantially to uncertainty in climate prediction (Bony et al., 2006).

        6. Interannual changes in cloud radiative forcing
        To assess cloud climate feedbacks, in addition to measuring
        cloud properties and assessing their representation by
        models, it is also informative to consider how cloud radiative
        effect changes with time (e.g. Wielicki et al., 2002;
        Clement et al., 2009; Dessler, 2010

        7. Conclusions

        In future work it
        would be informative to categorize these effects by cloud
        type further (e.g. Futyan et al., 2005) and compare with
        climate model simulations. These analyses are vital in
        constraining cloud feedback processes further and in linking
        to future changes in the water cycle (Stephens, 2005;
        Bony et al., 2006; John et al., 2009)

        Bony SR, Colman R, Kattsov VM, Allan RP, Bretherton CS, Dufresne
        J-J, Hall A, Hallegatte S, Holland MM, Ingram W, Randall DA,
        Soden BJ, Tselioudis G, Webb MJ. 2006. How well do we
        understand and evaluate climate change feedback processes? Journal
        of Climate 19: 3445–3482.

        Clement AC, Burgman R, Norris JR. 2009. Observational and model
        evidence for positive low-level cloud feedback. Science 325:
        460–464.

        Dessler AE. 2010. A determination of the cloud feedback from climate
        variations over the past decade. Science 330: 1523–1527.

        Soden BJ, Wetherald RT, Stenchikov GL, Robock A. 2002. Global
        cooling after the eruption of Mount Pinatubo: a test of climate
        feedback by water vapor. Science 296: 727–773.

        Stephens GL. 2005. Clouds feedbacks in the climate system: a critical
        review. Journal of Climate 18: 237–273.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:58 pm |

        Springer

        Cloud feedback might be negative. Please find an instance of me ever disputing this with you (warning – I am looking at the relevant previous exchange right now).

        Had you understood what was said you would have grasped a simple but vital point: I was always talking about the net of all feedbacks in the climate system. Including but not by any means dominated cloud feedbacks. None of the papers you cite claim that negative cloud feedback dominates the climate system.

        You – buffoon that you are – went off on a tangent about cloud feedbacks and completely missed the point.

        Here’s what I said about the net of all feedbacks – including cloud, of whatever sign last time you made an arse of yourself over this:

        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.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 6:05 pm |

        David Springer

        Increased clouds exerting a negative forcing or feedback are covered in:

        Spencer + Braswell 2007: physical observations from CERES satellites confirming that the net overall feedback from clouds with warming over the tropics is negative, rather than positive

        Wyant et al. 2006: model simulations using superparameterization to better simulate the behavior of clouds showing that net overall cloud feedback is negative over all latitudes (cooling effect of increased low altitude clouds is greater than warming effect of high altitude clouds with warming).

        Palle et al. 2005: observations from Earthshine project showing that decreased cloud cover 1985-2000 resulted in observed warming while increased cloud cover 2000-2004 resulted in observed slight cooling.

        There are more out there, but these 3 independent studies using different methods came to mind.

        Hope this helps.

        Max

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 6:21 pm |

        BBD

        You tell David Springer that you could accept that cloud feedbacks are negative, rather than positive (as predicted by all the models cited by IPCC), adding that the system is not “dominated by cloud feedbacks”.

        The first part of your sentence makes good sense to me, but let’s do a sanity check on the second part.

        Out of the model-derived mean 2xCO2 climate sensitivity estimate of IPCC of 3.2C, 1.3C results from the predicted strongly positive cloud feedback (according to IPCC AR4 WG1, Ch.8, p.633).

        If this were strongly negative instead, it would mean that the 2xCO2 CS would be around 1C instead of three times this high (and the CAGW “consensus” premise of IPCC would be in the trash bin..

        So the estimated 2xCO2 climate sensitivity is very much dominated by cloud feedbacks.

        Max.

      • Monk | November 29, 2012 at 12:30 pm |

        David’s quote
        http://www.met.reading.ac.uk/~sgs02rpa/PAPERS/Allan11MA.pdf

        Consistent with previous results (Ramanathan
        et al., 1989; Su et al., 2010), the cloud radiative cooling
        effect through reflection of short wave radiation is found
        to dominate over the long wave heating effect, resulting
        in a net cooling of the climate system of −21 Wm−2.
        The short wave radiative effect of cloud is primarily
        manifest as a reduction in the solar radiation absorbed
        at the surface of −53 Wm−2 for the global multi-annual
        mean.

        is accidentally also relevant to Myrrh’s solo claim that shortwave radiation does no heating. If shortwave cannot heat, why would clouds that reflect it cause any cooling ?

    • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 5:33 pm |

      You went through it with blah blah? That must have been instructive. I have been wondering just what business he was in. I have 2 frontrunners. Coffee shop owner or lawyers office.

      The problem is how and why clouds change. One way is as a response to standing oceanic systems such as PDO+ENSO. Do we get positive or negative warming feedbcaks. Bit difficult to tell – most warming was caused by cloud cover reduction in the 1976-1998 period. Chicken and egg territory. Or with blah blah – turkey heaven.

      • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 6:36 pm |

        Chief

        You are spot on.

        The problem is that the “consensus” view on clouds is that they only act as feedbacks to some other forcing (like from GHGs), rather than an independent forcing of their own, as you point out.

        The “consensus” believers are blinkered: they can’t see outside the box of this paradigm.

        The late 20th century warming resulting from reduced cloud cover is described in the Earthshine study by Palle et al., as is the reversal of this trend after 2000. Plus Spencer has also written about the role of clouds, suggesting a link to PDO (as you know).

        I hope that IPCC will “take off their blinkers” and look at the real impact of clouds on our climate in AR5 – but maybe that’s too much to hope for.

        Max

    • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 5:42 pm |

      C’mon David, even lolwot isn’t stupid enough to believe that clouds have a positive feedback.

  87. David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 6:03 pm |

    BBD | November 28, 2012 at 5:37 pm |

    “Now, does that make clouds a positive feedback, or a negative feedback?”

    Seeing that if there were no clouds there would be 21W/m2 more surface forcing that would make them a negative feedback i.e. the more clouds the less surface forcing. In answer to my question, since you couldn’t answer it I will, by the time we have 70% cloud cover an equilibrium is reached where more clouds simply shade the surface and reduce them back down again and fewer clouds let more sunlight through to evaporate more water and increase the cloud cover.

    Thanks for playing. There’s a consolation prize waiting for you as you exit stage left. It’s a copy of the Guiness Book of World Records with the record for highest mean annual temperature anywhere on the planet high lighted. That place is a salt desert in Ethiopia with no clouds and the record was set from 1960-1966 when there was 20% less CO2 in the atmosphere.

    • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 6:09 pm |

      This is not a response David. It is witter. You have made an arse of yourself again, and I have bookmarked it, again.

      See you next time!

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 6:21 pm |

        You’re projecting. You’re the one whose responses were empty.

        Here’s more of my non-reponse, dipchit. Amazing how quickly you’re at a loss for words when confronted with pointed arguments.

        http://nsidc.org/arcticmet/patterns/feedback_loops.html

        Temperature—Cloud Cover—Radiation Feedbacks

        It is thought that if climate warms, evaporation will also increase, in turn increasing cloud cover. Because clouds have high albedo, more cloud cover will increase the earth’s albedo and reduce the amount of solar radiation absorbed at the surface. Clouds should therefore inhibit further rises in temperature. This temperature—cloud cover—radiation feedback is negative as the initial temperature change is dampened.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 6:36 pm |

        Springer

        Nobody has ever demonstrated that cloud feedbacks will emerge as the dominant, controlling mechanism which will offset future forced warming. In fact the scientific position is that cloud feedback may be somewhat positive, but there’s no need to argue the sign.

        The situation is as I have already explained it several times. The net of all feedbacks must be positive or all known climate behaviour is inexplicable. See here.

        If you don’t understand this, fine, go and do some reading. Nothing you can possibly say will change this fact, so clawing away hopelessly is a waste of *your* time.

      • BBD | November 28, 2012 at 6:42 pm |

        Incidentally, you quoted selectively from your (Arctic) reference, which is very, very naughty. Here’s the bit you carefully clipped out:

        However, cloud cover also acts as a blanket to inhibit loss of longwave radiation from the earth’s atmosphere. By this process, an increase in temperature leading to an increase in cloud cover could lead to a further increase in temperature – a positive feedback.

        Knowing which process dominates is a complex issue. Cloud type plays a strong role, as do cloud water content and particle size. Another factor is whether the cloud albedo is higher or lower than that of the surface. Research indicates that the effect of this feedback in the Arctic may be different than in other latitudes. Except in summer, arctic clouds seem to have a warming effect. This is because the blanket effect of clouds tends to dominate over reductions in shortwave radiation to the surface caused by the high cloud albedo.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 6:43 pm |

        How does temperature and cloud cover relate?

        High pressure regions are generally cloud free. They are also cold. The colder air is denser. It weighs more. The heavier air is what makes the higher pressure.

        Thus cloud cover is negatively correlated with temperature and is why it is generally assumed that “global warming” will increase cloud cover. Given that clouds are a net negative forcing that means as the surface warms increasing cloud cover acts as a negative feedback.

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-pressure_area

        In general, high-pressure areas are associated with cooler, drier air as well as clear skies due to their formation within areas of atmospheric subsidence, or areas of large-scale air descent.

      • Monk | November 29, 2012 at 6:37 pm |

        @bbd
        In fact the scientific position is that cloud feedback may be somewhat positive, but there’s no need to argue the sign.

        “The” scientific position?
        And no need to argue the sign?? Surely it’s crucial?

        The net of all feedbacks must be positive or all known climate behaviour is inexplicable.

        ie it’s needed to prop up current agw theory and the models.
        But can you support this assertion in its own right?

    • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 28, 2012 at 6:22 pm |

      Closer to 70 Wm-2 more solar forcing with no clouds at the “true” surface as a global average. Clouds reflect and absorb solar energy. You should look at clouds from both sides now :)

    • manacker | November 28, 2012 at 6:53 pm |

      BBD

      1. To the role of clouds today:

      “Clouds acting as a natural thermostat to reflect incoming energy back out to space”

      A suggestion by Kevin Trenberth, when asked where the “missing energy” of the unexplainable lack of warming (the “pause”, which Trenberth called a “travesty”) had gone.

      2. To your statement regarding high sensitivity as demonstrated by past climate behavior:

      Using subjectively interpreted dicey paleo-climate proxy data from carefully selected periods of our planet’s geological past is not much better than reading tea leaves.

      Using these data to proclaim “we can only explain this if we assume a high climate sensitivity” is, in addition, an “argument from ignorance”. There are just way too many uncertainties and unknowns.

      Max

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 7:16 pm |

        re; Trenberth

        Good one. I wasn’t aware Trenberth had been so candid about it. It’s pile on British Bollocks Dispenser Day!

        Linky to Trenberth on cloud thermostat. My emphasis.

        http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/news/08archives.html

        The Mystery of Global Warming’s Missing Heat

        Some 3,000 scientific robots that are plying the ocean have sent home a puzzling message. These diving instruments suggest that the oceans have not warmed up at all over the past four or five years. That could mean global warming has taken a breather. Or it could mean scientists aren’t quite understanding what their robots are telling them…Kevin Trenberth at the National Center for Atmospheric Research says it’s probably going back out into space. The Earth has a number of natural thermostats, including clouds, which can either trap heat and turn up the temperature, or reflect sunlight and help cool the planet

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 7:27 pm |

        There is no single sensitivity number. When conditions are right for glacial growth just the very small change caused by orbital mechanics (Milankovich cycles) is enough to put a mile of ice over most of North American, Northern Europe, and Northern Asia. No change in forcing required for that. Just less forcing in the summer and more in the winter i.e. a diminishment of seasonal temperature difference in the northern hemisphere.

        On the other hand the output of the sun has increased by 30% over geologic time and for the past 4 million years we’re in an ice age to show for it. There are sensitivity regimes where in some just a nudge does a lot and others where 30% increase in TSI does nothing.

        British Bollocks Dispenser’s handwaving that it’s impossible for sensitivity to be low is utter dreck. Sensitivity is not constant.

    • Chief Hydrologist | November 28, 2012 at 6:53 pm |

      Feedback to CO2 warming may be negative – but there are other changes happening in the system at the same time.

      For instance – Zhu et al (2007) found that cloud formation for ENSO and for global warming have different characteristics and are the result of different physical mechanisms. The change in low cloud cover in the 1997-1998 El Niño came mainly as a decrease in optically thick stratocumulus and stratus cloud. The decrease is negatively correlated to local SST anomalies, especially in the eastern tropical Pacific, and is associated with a change in convective activity. ‘During the 1997–1998 El Niño, observations indicate that the SST increase in the eastern tropical Pacific enhances the atmospheric convection, which shifts the upward motion to further south and breaks down low stratiform clouds, leading to a decrease in low cloud amount in this region. Taking into account the obscuring effects of high cloud, it was found that thick low clouds decreased by more than 20% in the eastern tropical Pacific… In contrast, most increase in low cloud amount due to doubled CO2 simulated by the NCAR and GFDL models occurs in the subtropical subsidence regimes associated with a strong atmospheric stability.’

  88. Myrrh | November 28, 2012 at 6:05 pm |

    If, as according to the AGWScienceFiction fisics, visible light from the Sun heats land and water of the Earth’s surface, how much is it heating the clouds?

    • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 28, 2012 at 6:30 pm |

      About 70Wm-2 is absorbed in the atmosphere by water vapor and clouds. The total absorbed in the atmosphere by all sources is about 200 to 240 Wm-2. Pretty much all of the solar IR is absorbed in the atmosphere. It would be hot without clouds.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 6:51 pm |

        Solar IR is absorbed by the atmosphere in the same manner as visible light. Near infrared, from 700nm to 1250nm, has the same absorption profile as visible light. There’s not much power left in sunlight beyond 1250nm but clear sky does begin to become opaque to it at that point.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 6:54 pm |

        There’s a lot of misunderstanding about solar IR. It’s a little longer wavelength than visible red light and it interacts with matter in essentially the same way as visible red light. Clouds don’t absorb it they reflect it. Water vapor doesn’t absorb it is transparent to it. Same as red light. If you research the optical properties of near infrared that is what you will learn.

    • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 28, 2012 at 7:06 pm |

      According to Stephens, ~75Wm-2+/- 10 of solar is absorbed in the atmosphere. I can’t remember the link, but about 6% of that is absorbed by water vapor (near IR?). Cloud absorption of SW is of course dependent on path length and water particle size/opacity which varies with time of day. The 18 to 20 Wm-2 faux pas by Trenberth and company on the atmospheric window relates to missing part of the complex nature of clouds, especially mixed phase clouds. A man has got to know his “surface” limitations :)

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 7:42 pm |

        http://lasp.colorado.edu/~bagenal/3720/CLASS5/EarthVisAbsorption.jpg

        Mostly ozone (O3) in ultraviolet and red/near infrared.

      • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 7:50 pm |

        I take that back. Ozone with two strong narrow ultraviolet absorption bands and a wide weak band from 440-740nm which is most of the visible range.

        http://www.theozonehole.com/fact.htm

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 28, 2012 at 8:22 pm |

        If you say so, hard to tell if that first H2O notch would be considered (near ir?) or not. There is a fairly new paper I haven’t gotten access to just yet you might find interesting.

        http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2010jd015071.shtml

      • David Springer | November 29, 2012 at 8:17 am |

        Scroll down to bottom. See first absorption band for water at 1250nm in the graph.

        http://www.npsg.uwaterloo.ca/data/water.php

        And according to wikipedia that first notch is outside the near infrared band which is in fact defined by water’s transparency to it. Short-wavelength infrared from 1400-3000nm is a transition zone where water becomes less and less transparent.

        There is little power left in sunlight beyond 1400nm so the question is moot in any case for liquid H20. I’m not sure what changes when we start talking about clouds of ice crystals. They’re largely reflective but there may be significant absorption. Things start getting dicey once particle sizes and gaps get down near the wavelength of the light involved. Quantum weirdness starts in that domain. For instance a photon passing within one wavelength of a water droplet can experience quantum tunnelling through the droplet and emerge going in exactly the opposite direction i.e. refracted 180 degrees. That is not possible in classicial optics where there is a limit IIRC of 135 degrees for refraction through a water droplet. Tunnelling explains an optical phenomenon called “The Glory” where a person (or airplane’s) shadow on a cloud below them with the sun at their back is surrounded by a rainbow colored halo. The Glory can only be seen dead-on such that you can see your own Glory but not that of a person standing near you. The phenomenon was first noted by mountain climbers several centuries in the past. It was explained in just the past year. Needless to say quantum tunnelling of light through cloud droplets resulting in 180 degree reflection is not part of GCM cloud modeling. LOL

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrared#Commonly_used_sub-division_scheme

      • captdallas2 0.8 +0.2 or -0.4 | November 29, 2012 at 8:58 am |

        David, I found a site that doesn’t require a membership for that paper,

        http://www.researchgate.net/publication/230683389_Solar_spectral_absorption_by_marine_stratus_clouds_Measurements_and_modeling

        When you consider only TOA down or surface up spectra, what absorbs what where is lost in the shuffle. Stacked aircraft looking from different layers portray a different story. 724nm is the first water absorption notch. How much 724 nm is available for absorption would depend on the optical thickness of ozone between the source and clouds. With tropical ozone depletion, thanks to deep convection boosting ice particles to the stratosphere, ozone absorption changes. Aerosol particles change absorption and water droplet size. RH changes the altitude of condensation. There is a lot of stuff going on that makes the problem close to unsolvable.

        Fun puzzle.

  89. Girma | November 28, 2012 at 6:40 pm |

    The CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is increasing mainly because of ocean warming.

    Proof => http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/compress:12/derivative/scale:0.2/detrend:-0.45/offset:-0.4/plot/hadcrut3vgl/compress:12
    Human emission of CO2 does not appear to exist within the above relationship.

    The Late Professor Hal Lewis:

    …the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.

  90. David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 6:47 pm |

    BBD | November 28, 2012 at 6:36 pm |

    “The situation is as I have already explained it several times. The net of all feedbacks must be positive or all known climate behaviour is inexplicable. See here.”

    Were your explanations peer reviewed and published in a journal? I’m not reall interested in blog comment level explanations and even less interested in them when the author doesn’t have the stones to attach his real name to it.

    I’ve been very careful to make citations from the literature in this discussion. You’ve cited yourself so far. ROLFMAO

  91. newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 6:51 pm |

     
     

    The whole discussion about radiation, feedback and so on becomes irrelevant once you realise that an adiabatic lapse rate forms autonomously in the atmospheres of planets like Earth and Venus, being a function of gravity and not having anything to do with heat flows from the surface, back radiation, feedbacks or whatever. These mechanisms (including the effects of clouds) just make temporary humps or dips in the temperature plot. Then the natural tendency to “get back to the right gradient” smoothes these out. Stephen Wilde says the same as I do on this point.

    On this thread I have pasted a lengthy excerpt from my new paper, which is now being reviewed. Those who want serious discussion of this issue may wish to join Stephen Wilde and myself on that Roy Spencer thread. But no wafflers please!
     
     

    • Wagathon | November 28, 2012 at 7:20 pm |

      Nikola Scafetta described the mechanisms comprising coupled oscillators—i.e., cyclic weather patterns that act in concert–that acting collectively and in synchronization explain climate change. It is based on these recurring patterns that Scafetta predicts global cooling to about 2030–2040. Overall the Earth has been in a cooling trend for 10,000 years. Ups and downs along the way, according to Habibullo Abdussamatov, result from the influence of a consecutive chain of changes caused by secondary feedback effects. These effects may amplify normal climatic changes over time and it is for this reason that–for all we know–the present cooling may really be another “Little Ice Age” in the making.

      Greenhouse theory is dead.

      “We’ve had a Greenhouse Theory with no evidence to support it-except a moderate warming turned into a scare by computer models whose results have never been verified with real-world events. On the other hand, we have compelling evidence of a real-world climate cycle averaging 1470 years (plus or minus 500) running through the last million years of history. The climate cycle has above all been moderate, and the trees, bears, birds, and humans have quietly adapted.” S. Fred Singer

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 7:55 pm |

      The dry adiabatic lapse rate only makes air at altitude have less kinetic energy per unit mass and more gravitational potential energy. It DOES NOT make any layer hotter that it would be without gravity. The maximum temperature is at the surface where kinetic energy is 100%. The amount of kinetic energy at the surface is not related to the force of gravity. Write that down. You’d save yourself a lot of time and trouble if you could manage to understand how energy is partitioned by gravity between kinetic and potential in a non-convecting atmosphere.

    • David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:03 pm |

      You ought to pay attention to Stephen Wilde yourself. The greenhouse effect is accomplished largely by the ocean not the atmosphere. Liquid water is like a greenhouse gas on steroids. It is totally transparent to shortwave and totally opaque to longwave. Those two qualities are what differentiate greenhouse gases from non-greenhouse gases. It would be more apt to refer to greenhouse fluids. Gases and liquids are both fluids. Wilde concludes that and I independently came to the same conclusion. Wilde was first out of the gate with it by a couple of years though.

      • gbaikie | November 28, 2012 at 8:36 pm |

        The significant of the world’s ocean in terms of having a large effect upon global temperature and climate, has been well know for decades.

      • Monk | November 29, 2012 at 6:48 pm |

        David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:03 pm | Reply
        The greenhouse effect is accomplished largely by the ocean not the atmosphere. Liquid water is like a greenhouse gas on steroids. It is totally transparent to shortwave and totally opaque to longwave.

        “The” greenhouse effect? It may be “a” greenhouse effect. But that doesn’t mean there is not also the atmospheric/CO2 one too.

      • Wagathon | December 2, 2012 at 2:11 am |

        And, in addition to the ocean, lakes and streams and subsurface clays.

  92. David Springer | November 28, 2012 at 8:16 pm |

    Looks like BBD tucked tail and ran. Possibly he realized that peddling the absurd notion that sensitivity is a fixed number and feedbacks are always either net positive or net negative, regardless of whether the planet is covered in ice or whether even the icecaps are gone, was too much bollocks even for British Bollocks Dispenser to stomach once it was pointed out.

    • BBD | November 29, 2012 at 3:47 am |

      It was after midnight. I went to bed. And why not? I’d already said what needed saying here.

      You had started wittering. What you need to do is *explain* why what I say is *wrong*.

      Why not have a crack at doing that, instead of quoting screeds of references that you haven’t read and which don’t support your ‘argument’ anyway?

      Go on, demonstrate the mighty Springer intellect. Explain to me how we square a low climate sensitivity with known climate behaviour.

      And remember David, the key point here is not the sign of cloud feedback. It is whether the climate system is dominated by negative feedbacks or by positive feedbacks. In other words, whether the climate system is insensitive or sensitive.

      I know you have struggled with these concepts throughout our various discussions, so please think carefully before responding.

      And for once, try to refrain from the rabid abuse and focus on your factual argument.

      Thanks.

      • David Springer | November 29, 2012 at 7:46 am |

        I already explained why you were wrong in this thread. You simply ignore it. Sensitivity is not a fixed number. Feedbacks are not fixed at some positive or negative point. Various examples I used blow your “sensitivity must be high” thesis out of the water. It’s infinitely high when merely rearranging the deck chairs causes the beginning of an ice age. Milankovich cycles don’t increase or decrease forcing it merely reduces or increases the seasonal difference in temperature. In the northern hemisphere when winters are warmer and summers colder that’s favorable for ice and we get a positive feedback where more ice decreases planetary albedo year over year reducing surface temperature and breeding even more ice. Another example is that the sun constantly grows stronger and it’s output is some 30% more than it was 3.5 billion years ago when life first appeared. Yet with 30% more insolation today we’re in an ice age. That’s pretty much zero sensitivity.

        Thanks for playing.

      • David Springer | November 29, 2012 at 7:52 am |

        http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/25/open-thread-weekend-3/#comment-272093

        That’s the first time I explained why your high sensitivity argument was wrong. Notice there’s no response following it. I don’t expect there will be a response following this one either.

      • BBD | November 29, 2012 at 8:55 am |

        I already explained why you were wrong in this thread. You simply ignore it. Sensitivity is not a fixed number. Feedbacks are not fixed at some positive or negative point. Various examples I used blow your “sensitivity must be high” thesis out of the water. It’s infinitely high when merely rearranging the deck chairs causes the beginning of an ice age. Milankovich cycles don’t increase or decrease forcing it merely reduces or increases the seasonal difference in temperature. In the northern hemisphere when winters are warmer and summers colder that’s favorable for ice and we get a positive feedback where more ice decreases planetary albedo year over year reducing surface temperature and breeding even more ice.

        Wow. This is one of the most fundamentally confused comments I have ever seen.

        – Sensitivity is not a fixed number.

        Perhaps not over very long time-scales. But it is certainly constant over the Pleistocene and that will do for this discussion.

        – Feedbacks are not fixed at some positive or negative point

        Feedbacks are either positive or negative. The strength varies in accordance with the strength of the forcing. It does not change sign. You obviously do not understand the concept of positive and negative feedbacks at all. See here for a quick refresher.

        – Sensitivity is infinitely high at the beginning of deglaciation.

        This is absurd. If S was infinitely high at any point in the entire history of the planet, incident sunlight would have boiled the oceans. S during the Pleistocene is 3C +/-0.5C. See Hansen & Sato (2012). You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.

        – ‘In the northern hemisphere when winters are warmer and summers colder that’s favorable for ice’

        Wrong. Milankovitch forcing increases *summer* insolation at 65 degrees North latitude.

        Putting it politely, you have demonstrated complete conceptual meltdown here.

        Go back to deglaciation under orbital forcing. You need a moderately high sensitivity for a mere seasonal and spatial reorganisation of insolation to trigger a massive climate shift. You have absolutely no *concept* of what you are talking about.

        Everything I have said about the impossibility of squaring low climate sensitivity with known climate behaviour stands.

        Everything you say here apart from the role of *positive feedback* from ice albedo is complete rubbish.

        Another example is that the sun constantly grows stronger and it’s output is some 30% more than it was 3.5 billion years ago when life first appeared. Yet with 30% more insolation today we’re in an ice age. That’s pretty much zero sensitivity.

        The sun isn’t the only variable in determining surface temperature. You have ignored the changing fraction of atmospheric GHGs and changing planetary albedo. This is why you arrive at a nonsensical conclusion.

        I’m sorry David, but what you have revealed here is terrifying… it’s even worse than I thought!

        ;-)

        Additional reading: Knutti & Hegerl (2008); Annan & Hargreaves (2006)

  93. Jim Cripwell | November 28, 2012 at 10:12 pm |

    Looking at

    http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom.gif

    there seems to be some quite cold water developing off the Peruvian coast. I have no idea what this means.

  94. newclimatechangetheory | November 28, 2012 at 10:52 pm |

    Yes Wagathon. I first wrote about climate cycles in 2010 on my first website and started reading Scafetta’s papers around that time. He has produced some good stuff.

    David Springer is making assertive statements about the “warm end” of the temperature gradient established by the adiabatic lapse rate. He has no evidence to support such. He is also not up-to-date with what Stephen Wilde is now writing.such as in this comment where he refers to my comments as being correct. David has yet to explain how less than 3 W/m^2 at the surface of Venus heats the base of its atmosphere by 500 K.

    gbaikie agrees with me that the oceans have a major effect on climate. I wrote about the overall stabilising effect on this page over a year ago. But that is all it is. They did not initially warm the base of the atmosphere and set its temperature – the adiabatic lapse rate and the mean Solar insolation did that, as Stephen Wilde also explains in the above linked comment.

    • David Springer | November 29, 2012 at 7:28 am |

      You lying little sack of chit, Cotton. I’ve explained a million times that Venus’ surface temperature is due to geothermal gradient. The uber-dense atmosphere insulates the rocks so that more of the heat from the molten core of the planet is trapped near the surface. If you dig down into the rocks on the earth a few miles you reach the same temperature as the surface of Venus. The atmosphere on Venus is simply doing the same thing the first few miles of rocks do on there earth.

      FOAD.

      • gbaikie | November 29, 2012 at 8:43 am |

        “I’ve explained a million times that Venus’ surface temperature is due to geothermal gradient. The uber-dense atmosphere insulates the rocks so that more of the heat from the molten core of the planet is trapped near the surface. If you dig down into the rocks on the earth a few miles you reach the same temperature as the surface of Venus. The atmosphere on Venus is simply doing the same thing the first few miles of rocks do on there earth.”

        It’s possible, but also not simple to prove even if you had some empirical evidence.
        Suppose Earth had an average temperature of 200 C and had this temperature [or higher] for millions of years.
        In order for internal heat of earth radiate, the Earth crust must exceed the average temperature of 200 C.
        Assuming the earth interior is heated by radioactive decay, then if heat is not radiated, then interior temperature continues to rise [there is no practical limit].
        So eventually the surface temperature must exceed the atmospheric temperature of 200 C.

        But doesn’t need to exceed it by much nor over the entire surface.

        If instead the surface rock was say 10 C warmer than atmosphere- it means perhaps one measuring a hot spot. Or if uniformly 10 C warmer, then it probably means that relatively soon, Venus may erupt on planetary scale.
        But doesn’t by itself prove the atmosphere is being warmed by Venus interior heat.
        So the question is, how could this be falsified? What evidence would prove or disprove the theory?

        Perhaps, if tops of mountains were significantly warmer, as compared to valleys, this would be proof??

    • David Springer | November 29, 2012 at 7:35 am |

      Wilde agrees with as much of your malarky as I do, by the way. He is also careful to point out that insolation establishes the surface temperature. Saturn’s moon Titan has surface pressure of 1.5 bar and the atmosphere is mostly nitrogen like the earth’s. It has a surface temperature of -175C and blows a hole in your thesis big enough for the Titanic to pass through. What a putz. Go back to playing with your little friends at the phony front organization for lunatics pretending to be a legitimate publisher Principia Scientific.

  95. Particular Physicist | November 29, 2012 at 1:59 am |

    Fan >>>> For many skeptics, there will be only one rational explanation of this century-old, global-scale, and now-strengthening scientific accord: a vast global conspiracy! >>>>>>>>>>

    Many precommitted alarmists just cannot stop themselves bringing out the tired old “conspiracy” strawman just one more time.

    They just can’t seem – or don’t want – to recognise, that you don’t need a conspiracy to explain an organisation acting so as to advance its self-interest. That is normal human behaviour.

    Or perhaps they just can’t – or won’t – see the obvious connection between the facts that
    – government funds almost all climate science
    – government has a massive vested interest in CAGW being believed, since this gives it leave to expand its scope, powers and taxation

    So you really don’t need a “conspiracy”; government funding will naturally flow preferentially to alarmist science and scientists, without anyone in government having to think too much about it. Indeed you’d need a conscious conspiracy for this to NOT happen – ie to get government science as a whole to start making an effort to be objective rather than as now just advancing its paymaster’s interests ( in a case like climate where there are such huge and obvious opportunities for more politics )

  96. Monk | November 29, 2012 at 2:32 am |

    “You use scare quotes around “corrections” to imply scientific misconduct”

    You’d really have to be a naivete theorist to think it a coincidence that for decades, all/most correction always seem to strengthen cagw, never weaken it.

    • newclimatechangetheory | November 29, 2012 at 3:07 am |

      Monk: No it doesn’t – it strengthens evidence that natural cycles explain all climate change – which is why we are at the start of about 30 years of slight cooling from 1998 to 2027 – see the foot of my Home page.

      • Girma | November 29, 2012 at 3:15 am |

        Douglas

        Your results are IDENTICAL to mine regarding the global mean temperature trend patterns:

        http://orssengo.com/GlobalWarming/GmstTrend.png

      • Doug Cotton | November 29, 2012 at 6:58 pm |

        Good.

        The reason there is no greenhouse effect relates to the fact that, in an ideal gas in a sealed insulated container the diffusion between molecules always ensures that entropy is constant, not temperature. PE interchanges with KE, but PE+KE=constant for any molecule. (This can be shown with high school physics). Hence, with entropy being the same at the top and bottom, we observe a higher temperature at the bottom when measuring only the KE. That is why the base of Earth’s atmosphere (and those of Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune) are hotter at the base, and support similar temperatures at the surface.

        The stratosphere is a red herring. It is hotter basically because there is a supply of energy there which is not typical of what happens in the troposphere. I suggest you consider the mesopause to be the effective TOA, so the stratosphere is just a hump in the overall temperature plot because of an excess of energy dumped there which can’t get away fast enough to smooth out the hump.

        The troposphere of Venus is a better example of how, in an “Ideal gas” it is entropy which “evens out” both in the horizontal and vertical components. So in equilibrium PE+KE=constant for every molecule when no energy enters or leaves the “column” of the troposphere being considered.

        There’s very little movement in the atmosphere of Venus, so it provides a good example of how this diffusion process achieves the observed temperature gradient, which, in any similar atmosphere, in practice is about two-thirds of the calculated value for the dry adiabatic lapse rate.

        That’s why it’s important to compare the results of such calculations on Earth and Venus (and Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune which have “qualifying” atmospheres) and, when we see that the “formula” works everywhere, we have very compelling evidence that the hypothesis is correct.

        Furthermore, we see very clearly that all that CO2 on Venus makes absolutely no difference. If Earth’s atmosphere were also 96% CO2 the surface temperature would be no different from what it is now. The plants might thrive, but we’d have to learn to breathe the stuff.

      • newclimatechangetheory | November 29, 2012 at 7:17 pm |

        More precisely I should have said PE+KE=constant for every molecule whilst in “free flight” between collisions. When two molecules collide, the total entropyof both remains constant.

        Over the whole volume of the gas in an insulated sealed container, there is a tendency for entropy to become equal in all small regions. This necessitates a temperature gradient warmer at the base and cooler at the top.

    • Monk | November 29, 2012 at 6:53 pm |

      Monk > You’d really have to be a naivete theorist to think it a coincidence that for decades, all/most data correction always seem to strengthen cagw, never weaken it.

      newclimatechangetheory > No it doesn’t – it strengthens evidence that natural cycles explain all climate change

      Eh ??

  97. Girma | November 29, 2012 at 6:32 am |

    Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) of 0.8 to 1.4 deg C for a doubling of CO2, with a most likely value around 1.15 deg C.

    http://rankexploits.com/musings/2012/pinatubo-climate-sensitivity-revisited/#more-21308

    • Doug Cotton | November 29, 2012 at 8:25 pm |

        
      No

      As I just explained above, carbon dioxide (even 96% on Venus) has absolutely no effect or control over the basic rule of physics that entropy cannot decrease.

      In a static atmosphere there will be a tendency for entropy to be uniform in all small regions at all altitudes in the troposphere. You cannot assume that temperature will cool at the base and thus reduce entropy.

      So PE + KE = constant in the limit for every small region in the troposphere.

      Thus KE (temperature) is greater at the base than at TOA, and so there is a temperature gradient which carbon dioxide cannot affect.
       
       

    • Steven Mosher | November 29, 2012 at 9:14 pm |

      Girma, please read the comments for discussions about differences between TCR and ECR or ECS and TCS.

  98. Tomas Milanovic | November 29, 2012 at 7:50 am |

    Chief

    Tomas mixed the very small with the very complex – unwise in my opinion. QM has absolutely nothing to do with complex systems theory.

    Then I must explain better what I meant.
    My point was NOT to elaborate about the nature and interpretation of QM. I been doing QM in practice for many years so that when I have read above some terrifyingly stupid statements about “mixing”, “energy scales”, “BE statistics” and such, I understood that a discussion about QM would be not only off topic but useless.
    And no, those stupid comments I mentioned were not written by you :)

    My point was on the paradigmatic level where the similitudes are glaring.
    QM gives you an explicit equation which provides the evolution of probabilities in time and space for all observables.
    Unfortunately I can’t write the bras and kets because it would mess up the post but when you solve the Schrödinger Equation, you can obtain probability distributions for any observable.
    Is this not EXACTLY what you want for the weather/climate?
    Are you not after a probability distribution which would allow to derive the probability distribution for all fields (temperature, pressure etc) ?

    Of course that you want this because you have understood that the system being chaotic, only probabilities can be predicted.
    Unfortunately you have not the climatic equivalent of Schrödinger’s equation.
    In a way Navier Stokes is IMPLICITELY the Schrödinger’s equation of fluid dynamics but the problem is how to extract a probability distribution (the climatic Ψ ) from the deterministic field equations of Navier Stokes (and several coupled others).
    But, and that was the point of my post, I am convinced that this Ψ must be there because the climate science cannot be anything else than a non linear, probabilistic field theory.
    Obviously, what has been misunderstood by many, this doesn’t mean that weather and QM behave in a similar way – they trivially don’t because the former is non linear while the latter is linear.

    So this kind of approach is hard indeed but is that a reason to give up?
    Precisely QM has shown that this approach leads to success.

    • David Springer | November 29, 2012 at 8:26 am |

      I was under the impression that there’s an n-particle problem in QM similar to the n-body problem in celestial mechanics i.e. once there are more than 2 bodies or particles involved the math becomes intractible and only estimations through various computational shortcuts are practically obtainable.

      • Tomas Milanovic | November 30, 2012 at 4:24 am |

        David

        I was under the impression that there’s an n-particle problem in QM similar to the n-body problem in celestial mechanics i.e. once there are more than 2 bodies or particles involved the math becomes intractible and only estimations through various computational shortcuts are practically obtainable.

        Of course but this is irrelevant.
        As you have an 1/r potential in the Schrödinger equation, you run formally in exactly the same difficulties as whith the gravitational 1/r potential in the n body problem when n>2.
        But this only means that you can no more solve analytically, you need to solve numerically (or make different reasonable approximations).
        so this is just an ancillary problem.
        QM (or any field theory) doesn’t just reduce to one equation.

        For instance likeMWGrant rightly remarks, more naturally stochastic approaches via Liouville equation may be considered.
        My point was just that there is much to be learned from the 80 years of QM successes in finding the right theoretical approach for a field theory problem.
        Compared to what people like Bohr, Pauli, Dirac, Heisenberg & Co achieved in only a few decades, climate science strikes as being exceptionnally conceptually poor and primitive.

        When you try a synthesis on climate science “papers” (by using f.ex IPCC), you notice that 90%+ are the same kind of statistical data crunching. People just take some empirical data (the more the better) and then do blindly statistics, draw charts and fit curves – preferably straight lines. There is only a small core of fluid dynamics people (Judith surely knows who they are) who try to do some conceptual work but they are drowned by the subpar crowd.

        However the worst being never certain, perhaps there will be in the climate science one day someone of Heisenberg’s or Dirac’s caliber.

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 1:53 pm |

        Hi Tomas,

        However the worst being never certain, perhaps there will be in the climate science one day someone of Heisenberg’s or Dirac’s caliber.

        The formulation of modern quantum mechanics–here I mean that of the mid to late twenties–was forced by paradoxical and inexplicable but precise observations. I do not think that climate (warming) science has such a opportune set of circumstances. Maybe it needs a Moses instead of a Dirac :O)

      • Pekka Pirilä | November 30, 2012 at 3:36 pm |

        Heisenberg and Dirac contributed to the formulation of a new fundamental theory. Such a theory is concise and can be applied in limitless number of very different problems. The problems of developing QM were difficult and solving them required exceptional capabilities but there was a clear and in some sense full resolution that could be found.

        Problems that involve only a few particles or a large number of particles in a way where all can be treated uniformly may allow for concise resolution and individual great scientists may have an opportunity of solving them fully while lesser scientists fail.

        The Earth system is not a system of a few particles, neither it’s uniform. There’s complex structure at many different levels. The oceans and continents are not simple to describe, the subprocesses of the atmosphere, oceans and other connected systems don’t allow for a concise description. The Earth system is not likely to allow for a great resolution. Oceans must be described in many ways differently from the atmosphere. In the atmosphere various local phenomena interact in multiple different ways with the large scale circulation. It’s virtually certain that no new fundamental theories are needed, what’s needed are many different new or improved ways of applying the existing theories. Learning more about the Earth system is a gradual work. In that work it’s really true that science is more perspiration than inspiration.

        The best scientists are still much more productive than average ones but even they depend on the effort of the large community of scientists.

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 6:20 pm |

        Pekka

        It’s virtually certain that no new fundamental theories are needed, what’s needed are many different new or improved ways of applying the existing theories.

        I don’t think anyone is proposing the need for new theory. Rather I think the gist of the flow is that for whatever the reasons things–politicization, personalities–have become muddled or perhaps incomplete or unrefined. This naturally engenders a certain amount of restless reflection on the state of things. Part of that reflection entails ‘what are some things we might learn from?’ After all, much of our efforts involve some form of adapting, modifying, kludging…

        Heisenberg and Dirac contributed to the formulation of a new fundamental theory. The problems of developing QM were difficult and solving them required exceptional capabilities but there was a clear and in some sense full resolution that could be found.

        By coincidence I have been taking a little time to go back and look in more detail at some of the initial efforts unfolding in the mid-1920’s. (The history of these things is much more interesting as we get older and more removed.) Heisenberg’s imposed restriction to dealing only with observable quantities and Pauli’s earlier conjecture of “spin” and the exclusion principle were truly exceptional thinking. And yet even those breaks were not done in a vacuum. Those must have been interesting times.

        Yeah, doesn’t have a thing to do with climate, but just a mention of those people and one has gotta pause–a matter of awe and a matter of envy.

      • Pekka Pirilä | December 1, 2012 at 3:58 am |

        mwgrant,

        I agree that nobody is strictly proposing that new fundamental theory would be forthcoming or needed. I mentioned that because many of the arguments presented (not by you) are based on a model of science where new theories are the goal.

        People don’t always realize that Feynman, Einstein, Heisenberg, etc. were developing new fundamental theories and comparing with them or quoting them is mostly misleading. The names and quotes are not always (or even often) used to improve understanding but rather to confuse or to support claims that are little related to the activities of those scientists.

      • Montalbano | December 2, 2012 at 9:59 am |

        mwgrant > I don’t think anyone is proposing the need for new theory.

        Seems what we really need is more directly relevant empirical measurements. Like comprehensive and reliable
        – net flux at toa
        – OHC
        which can then be plotted against Co2 levels

      • mwgrant | December 2, 2012 at 11:09 am |

        Montalbano

        This ‘thread’ is scattered about, so you may have missed earlier comments regarding the need for more observation.

        “At this stage it is clear that ‘experimental’ characterization and quantification of various proposed system components (processes) is more important. Get that more in order and then models can then be modified and adapted. Pursuing the analog with QM a little further, it is notable the QM’s success in prediction has proven spectacular of the decades of its application, but even before those successes, QM explained better than any other approach, a significant number of diverse, perplexing experimental results with a high degree of numerical precision–and that was key to its initial acceptance. I just do not see that strong of experimental characterization in climate science. The science is still young and need more observation.”

        from just below, mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 1:12 am |

        However, keep in mind that the time-frame for decision-making (near-term and long-term) has a direct impact on the value of further observation and theory development.

        BTW, speaking for myself and not Peter, Tomas, or Pekka…the thread, scattered about the posting, took a pleasurable direction of speculating on what a more formal structure for theory might look like, how it might be approached. Sometimes it is fun to just discuss stuff without advocacy.

        Catarella ;O)

    • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 1:12 am |

      Tomas.

      Just some coming to mind as a result of your ‘similarities’ comments …

      Reduced density matrices might provide a more natural analogy in the QM-climate[conceptualization] comparison than the Schrödinger equation. Perhaps in one case one starts with the Heisenberg equation of motion for the density matrix (quantum Liouville eqn) and in the other case, the classical Liouville eqn. Given the deceptively simple appearance of the equations, similarities would be striking at that stage and perhaps it would quickly admit the need for approximation…e.g., I would presume things like decoupling schemes , etc. Indeed much of what you are suggesting may already be in place in a generic form, e.g., in Balescu’s stat.mech. text? Long ago lost :o(.

      In other words, you might be able to flesh out your vision a little more rigorously if you examine the rich tradition of cross-feeding between QM MBT, QFT, and Stat. Mech–Greens functions, diagrammatic approaches…. Folks were going bonkers in regard to similarities in field theories during the 60’s and 70’s. To be clear, I am not in any way on my part suggesting one would get a climate model anytime soon, but instead one may make a little progress on formulating a ‘formal’ approach more to your tastes. Then again, maybe not.

      I appreciate that what I am suggesting with the Liouville equation is a step or two back toward the more abstract relative to Navier-Stokes, but that might be necessary for the approach where distribution functions (probabilities) are paramount.

      My own bias is that while such an undertaking would be interesting it is not likely to prove to be very practical–at least in a time frame useful to policy makers. (Still it is worth doing as a matter of physics.) At this stage it is clear that ‘experimental’ characterization and quantification of various proposed system components (processes) is more important. Get that more in order and then models can then be modified and adapted. Pursuing the analog with QM a little further, it is notable the QM’s success in prediction has proven spectacular of the decades of its application, but even before those successes, QM explained better than any other approach, a significant number of diverse, perplexing experimental results with a high degree of numerical precision–and that was key to its initial acceptance. I just do not see that strong of experimental characterization in climate science. The science is still young and need more observation.

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 1:26 am |

        I just do not see that strong of experimental characterization in climate science. The science is still young and need more observation.

        This is a characterization on the state of the climate (change) science and is not intended to infer action or lack of action in regard to policy. Those folks just have to play their turn with whatever cards they have at the time.

      • Peter Davies | November 30, 2012 at 4:50 am |

        Good comment mwg, I can see that you could be an asset to this blog provided that the abuse being thrown around doesn’t put you off!

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 7:18 am |

        Peter

        Oh, This is a blog? I thought it was a prison exercise yard.

        Actually it is the sandbox Mosher brought up previously—a safe place to bring up ideas such as a ‘field paradigm’. The cost of safety is that for a variety of reasons nothing fostered here is likely to escape and flourish outside the box. For the record its hard to imagine any assets when the entire room is engaged in a food fight free-for-all — the one exception being ‘Ma Curry’ who keeps restocking the foo(d) bar.

      • Palindrone | November 30, 2012 at 7:23 am |

        And what better foo(d) than curry?

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 7:39 am |

        Wrong about assets…Beth does bring a civilizing influence.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 30, 2012 at 8:26 am |

        “Palindrone | November 30, 2012 at 7:23 am |

        And what better foo(d) than curry?”

        Go that right, this is basic foo fighting that some of us are engaged in.
        We are trying to figure out who has the goods and can walk-the-walk, and not just talk-the-talk.

        So in thus case, we have the poseur Tomas who claims that QM uncertainty levels and probabilities will re-emerge at the macro scales of climate. Why does Tomas say such gibberish? Is this all so much foo that a fake “Tomas Milanovich” is posting just to screw with our minds?

        We know that this kind of talk is happening with regularity on this site. How else to explain the nearly 50 alternate crackpot theorists that regularly comment in the Climate Etc sandbox? But then again how can it be any different than normal political discourse? Think of how much agenda-driven political talk and lying goes on elsewhere and realize that some fraction of that will spill on to a blog ostensibly devoted to talk about science. So its a matter of figuring out what is the foo and what is real.

        We should ask Dave Grohl.

      • David Springer | November 30, 2012 at 8:35 am |

        \mathbb{WEBHUBCOLONOSCOPE}

      • WebHubTelescope | November 30, 2012 at 8:59 am |

        OK, Springer, this comment is for you to ponder.
        Here is a list of some 50 characters that comment here with alternate theories to the conventional climate science. Just pick one for you to rally behind and base all your future policy decisions on.

        Joe’s World, Stefan “TheDenier”, Herman Alexander Pope, M.A.Vukcevic, Fred Haynie, Oliver Manuel, Harry Dale Huffman, Girma Orssengo, climatereason, David Postma, Arno Arrack, Nasif Nahle, Chief Hydrologist,
        Joachim Seifert, Stephen Wilde, Nicola Scafetta, Philip Haddad, Myrrh, Vukcevic, Latimer “sockpuppet” Alder, Doc Martyn, Spartacusisfree, Peter Lang, Captain Dallas, Paul Vaughan, David Springer, Alexander Biggs, Tim Curtin, Edim, Bartemis,
        sunshinehours1, SamNC, Tomas Milanovich, John Morland, Max “liar” Manacker, gbaikie, Harold Pierce, David L. Hagen, Bob Tisdale, Julian Flood, BLouis79, limitstomaths, JWR, Nabil Swedan, David Young, Jim Cripwell, David Wojick, Claes Johnson, John O’Sullivan, Doug Cotton, Ken Coffman

        Consider the list carefully. Who are the clowns? Who are the agenda-driven polemicists? Who are the agent provocateurs? Who are the devil’s advocates? Who just like to argue? Who are insane? Who are the dogmatic believers?

        As Michael Shermer has written, “Why do people believe Weird Things?”

        Plus all these other characters that don’t comment here but infest other areas of the climate science blogosphere with their whacko theories

        It a 3-ring circus inside a sandbox, that’s Climate Etc in a nutshell.

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 9:01 am |

        WebHub

        “Is this all so much foo that a fake “Tomas Milanovich” is posting just to screw with our minds?”

        This is Slickian white rabbit-hole freefall, and we are all volunteers.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 30, 2012 at 9:17 am |

        “This is Slickian white rabbit-hole freefall, and we are all volunteers.”

        As Grace Slick pondered, one pill makes you larger and one pill makes you small,

        Why is it that no “Tomas Milanovic” appears on Google Scholar?
        Apart from one reference to http://judithcurry.com. And why is this site on Google Scholar?

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 9:58 am |

        WebHub,

        “Why is it that no “Tomas Milanovic” appears on Google Scholar?”

        I concluded that ‘Tomas Milanovic’ is Waldo and then moved on.

        “And why is this site on Google Scholar?”

        The Tao of Google?

      • Palindrone | November 30, 2012 at 10:25 am |

        Hilarious. Agenda-driven-crackpot-in-chief Web, denounces agenda-driven-crackpots – whose number seem to increase by 10 every time Web posts.

      • WebHubTelescope | November 30, 2012 at 10:46 am |

        So I am encouraging the crackpot trolls by pointing them out?
        Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

        Palindrone, I have to thank you for reminding me about the foo.
        We are the foo fighters. The foo is a smorgasboard of word salad, tripe, and swill that regularly gets posted as comments here.

    • Peter Davies | November 30, 2012 at 5:01 am |

      Tomas, thank you for your comments re QM and climate science. My knowledge of science is very sketchy but even a lay person like myself can see that QM techniques are not only applicable to this but also to that of evolution. IMO both climate science and evolutionary science are in dire need of the new paradigmatic approach that QM can provide.

      • Tomas Milanovic | November 30, 2012 at 5:31 am |

        Peter Davies

        Why evolution? Do you mean Darwin & Co ? I fail to see how this would fit to field theory paradigms while it is obvious for QM and weather/climate.

      • Peter Davies | November 30, 2012 at 8:47 am |

        Tomas, evolution also reflects real world phenomena as well as weather and climate. See Johnjoe Mcfadden’s book “Quantum Evolution”, which, IMO, seems a feasible explanation for many aspects of biology that is not explained adequately by Darwinian theory.

        The following link explains my POV on evolution better than I can: http://paraschopra.com/blog/biology/quantum-mechanics-and-the-theory-of-evolution.htm

        The central meme of evolution is natural selection but this presupposes consciousness at the micro-biological level as well as at the macro level. In a strange way, I think that there is consciousness in everything around us that is not merely religious in its manifestations.

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 8:50 am |

        Peter,

        I don’t think that climate (warming) science needs a paradigm shift. It needs to be left alone, able to advance independent of external politics–from the left or the right or middle. Internal personal politics among the scientists are a different matter–any ‘science’ is a human endeavor, there are plenty of precedents for internal politics including in the development of QM, and if not interfered with, things will work out. If we do not have that faith, then we should engage in other activities.

        I comment on evolution with trepidation, but this is a sandbox. I’ll just note that molecular biology is has QM deeply ingrained, and molecular biology is a viable source of mechanisms leading to evolution, as well as other things such as radiation damage, toxicity, etc. It is notable that molecular biology is accumulating a good track record.

        Indeed it seems to me that selection of ‘paradigm’ may well depend on the level of detail where one is operating. Practical applications of science, i.e., technology, can be successfully deployed without necessarily going to a level of fine-grained detail. For example, chemistry and chemical engineering are disciplines that deal with chemicals–the former a science and the latter a technology. ChemEng is clearly is the more empirical and coarser -grained discipline but it has done quite well both from the perspective of financial success and developing as a cohesive body of knowledge. When one considers things such as the behavior of non-ideal solutions, phase separations, etc., ChemEng had produced empirical-theoretical hybrid approaches and inroads where chemistry did not…maybe could not go. Even within chemistry there are gradations–some of us see things through orbitals and wave functions, etc., but others, e.g., natural products folks, may do quite well at times just shoving bonds around like you see in intro course.

        Similarly, decisions often can be made and actions often taken with imperfect knowledge with varying degrees of risk. A key is evaluating that risk. Finally sometimes we just have make the call–this is what leaders are supposed to do/navigate/negotiate. (Unfortunately that theory often is not put into practice.)

        Oh well, regards

      • Peter Davies | November 30, 2012 at 9:01 am |

        Indeed, I recommend a good look at Paraschopra’s blog as many of the other posts on there are topical and most interesting.

      • Peter Davies | November 30, 2012 at 9:19 am |

        mwg, the last post followed my previous one, not from yours. However, thank you for your thoughts, I agree that this blog (and any other blog) is a sandbox, however, I disagree that blogs are safe places for discourse because IMO they are inhabited by some people who act like fanatics.

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 9:28 am |

        “I think that there is consciousness in everything around us that is not merely religious in its manifestations.”

        Consciousness is an unconscious act.

      • Peter Davies | November 30, 2012 at 9:32 am |

        mwg even when consciousness is said to be collective? Or is is it always an individual thing?

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 9:40 am |

        Peter,

        “I disagree that blogs are safe places for discourse because IMO they are inhabited by some people who act like fanatics.”

        It is kind-of interesting, isn’t it. I find my own views on that and related aspects continually changing over time. Anonymity is definitely double-edged and it and/or virtual remoteness do things to the psyche.

      • mwgrant | November 30, 2012 at 9:43 am |

        “mwg even when consciousness is said to be collective? Or is is it always an individual thing?”

        Collective or individual–I can’t tell, it’s unconscious!

  99. Handel | November 29, 2012 at 9:42 am |

    R. Gates,

    RE: atmospheric temperatures must continue to increase for ocean heat content to continue to increase

    The fact that atmospheric temperature may be flat at a century (or any other) high point, makes no difference whatever to the argument. The ocean does not need time to ‘catch up’ (‘down’?) and adjust down its cooling rate into the atmosphere. There is no cumulative thing going on here.

  100. Myrrh | November 29, 2012 at 11:57 am |

    Carbon Dioxide before Callendar and Keeling cherry picked to give the unrealistic 280 ppm – the industry standard was 400 ppm at the time.

    http://www.biokurs.de/treibhaus/180CO2e_%20part4-fraction.doc

  101. Petra | November 29, 2012 at 12:41 pm |

    From observing past exchanges, when BBD calls someone a liar, that is invariably itself a lie. Indeed, lying that others are lying, is his signature manoeuvre.

  102. newclimatechangetheory | November 29, 2012 at 9:49 pm |

    The Second Law of Thermodynamics relates to entropy. It says entropy cannot decrease without some change applied to the system.

    So. whenever a molecule moves between collision,s entropy cannot decrease. Likewise when two molecules collide, entropy cannot decrease. Nor can it increase.

    So, in a perfectly insulated tall sealed cylinder of air, when equilibrium is reached, diffusion processes ensure that entropy in every small region is the same.

    Hence PE + KE = constant for every region, and so KE (and thus temperature) is greater at the bottom and less at the top.

    Hence the surface gets warmed because of this temperature gradient and no other “reason” is applicable.

    As Graeff wrote Late in the 19th century J. Loschmidt believed that a vertical column of gas or a solid in an isolated system would show a temperature gradient under the influence of gravity, being cold at the top and warm at the bottom. L. Boltzmann and J. C. Maxwell disagreed.

    Loschmidt was right and Maxwell and Boltzmann were wrong.

    The greenhouse is shattered.

    • Monk | November 30, 2012 at 2:08 am |

      @newclimatechangetheory
      Hence PE + KE = constant for every region, and so KE (and thus temperature) is greater at the bottom and less at the top.
      Hence the surface [atmosphere] gets warmed because of this temperature gradient and no other “reason” is applicable ….. The greenhouse is shattered.

      That gravity induces a temperature gradient in the atmosphere, does not mean warming of greenhouse gasses does not occur. The greenhouse is undamaged.

      • Doug Cotton | November 30, 2012 at 8:31 pm |

         
        Your approach is far too simplistic.. My response is contained in the section I wrote (after my name is mentioned) in this article and the linked documents, including my peer-reviewed paper published in March 2012.

        Doug Cotton.
         
         
        .

      • Monk | December 2, 2012 at 8:17 am |

        Perhaps your approach is needlessly complicated Doug. Surely you can give us a clear overview of how you say the greenhouse effect is somehow disappeared ?

  103. Peter Lang | November 29, 2012 at 10:47 pm |

    What’s happening at Doha? There’s not much news coming out. What a contrast to Copenhagen, eh?

    This chart is interesting. http://climatechange.carboncapturereport.org/cgi-bin/topic? It shows the media interest. Doha doesn’t even show up as a blip on the declining interest since Copenhagen (expand the time scale to see the detail)

    • David Wojick | December 2, 2012 at 10:35 am |

      The big issue in Doha is Kyoto 2 which at this point will not include the USA, Canada, Russia or Japan on the paying side. But it is only half over. Money is the big issue as always, especially the mythical $100 billion a year for developing countries. Lots of talk but little money.

  104. John in France | November 30, 2012 at 2:53 am |

    Judith,
    I was surprised not to find your name on the list of signatories to the recent open letter to Ban Ki Moon: http://opinion.financialpost.com/2012/11/29/open-climate-letter-to-un-secretary-general-current-scientific-knowledge-does-not-substantiate-ban-ki-moon-assertions-on-weather-and-climate-say-125-scientists/.
    Didn’t they contact you?

  105. Monk | November 30, 2012 at 3:51 am |

    b>Myrrky and the visible light fracas

    The earlier Climate Etc blog Uncertainty in observations of the Earth’s energy balance contains both good and fatal news for our embattled and circumlocutious comrade.

    On the bright side, from his pov, none of the (comment on) papers cited mention any heating resulting from visible light. Suggests our Judy might possibly side with Murky on this one, opposing the likes of Pekka (and virtually everyone else).

    But before Myrrky moves to pop the champagne corks, what they do discuss (at length), is warming from infrared. Crucially, this discussion is merely about a recalculation of this effect, an effect already taken on board in standard agw theory – categorically not something new.

    This is a flat contradiction of Murky’s repeated claim that infrared has been “excised” from the standard account.. Indeed I have never ever heard anyone except Murky himself mention this idea. It has “strawman” written all over it.

    So, while shortwave-in, longwave-out may be out, shortwave+longwave-in, longwave-out is certainly in, and has been all along. Which everyone knew anyway, and which leaves agw theory largely undisturbed. Hoo boy, talk about storms in teacups …

    • Myrrh | December 1, 2012 at 6:48 pm |

      Monk | November 30, 2012 at 3:51 am | Myrrky and the visible light fracas
      …
      But before Myrrky moves to pop the champagne corks, what they do discuss (at length), is warming from infrared. Crucially, this discussion is merely about a recalculation of this effect, an effect already taken on board in standard agw theory – categorically not something new.

      This is a flat contradiction of Murky’s repeated claim that infrared has been “excised” from the standard account.. Indeed I have never ever heard anyone except Murky himself mention this idea. It has “strawman” written all over it.

      So, while shortwave-in, longwave-out may be out, shortwave+longwave-in, longwave-out is certainly in, and has been all along. Which everyone knew anyway, and which leaves agw theory largely undisturbed. Hoo boy, talk about storms in teacups …

      The puppets want to pretend that the decades long con of “shortwave in longwave out” never happened..?

      So, all the very many arguments, and rudeness, I’ve had from AGW/CAGWs trying to convince me that thermal infrared doesn’t play any part in heating the Earth either because “the Sun produces very little longwave infrared” or “there is some invisible [never explained] barrier like the glass of a greenhouse preventing longwave infrared from entering and only visible gets through”, and the countless claims that visible light does the heating of land and water, “it’s absorbed by the ocean and heats it”, were all from people who didn’t understand what “shortwave in longwave out” meant? You’re being ridiculous.

      Disingenuous or in confused ignorance of the subject, either way, you’re the victim here.

      See the first link at the end of this post for some encyclopaedia entries.

      You can continue to live in your George Orwell dumbed down world, but when you get to the point when the story changes every day to something different it will be too late to do anything about it, assuming you’d even be aware of this..

      The reason for taking out the real heat from the Sun and giving the properties of radiant heat to the shortwaves, predominantly visible, is so AGWScienceFiction could use real world measurements of downwelling radiant heat and pretend that it came from “backradiation/blanketing by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere”.

      As SkepticalScience uses it here: http://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-co2-enhanced-greenhouse-effect.htm I’m putting key sentences in bold:

      “How do we know more CO2 is causing warming?

      “An enhanced greenhouse effect from CO2 has been confirmed by multiple lines of empirical evidence. Satellite measurements of infrared spectra over the past 40 years observe less energy escaping to space at the wavelengths associated with CO2. Surface measurements find more downward infrared radiation warming the planet’s surface. This provides a direct, empirical causal link between CO2 and global warming.

      The greenhouse effect occurs because greenhouse gases let sunlight (shortwave radiation) pass through the atmosphere. The earth absorbs sunlight, warms then reradiates heat (infrared or longwave radiation). The outgoing longwave radiation is absorbed by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. This heats the atmosphere which in turn re-radiates longwave radiation in all directions. Some of it makes its way back to the surface of the earth. So with more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, we expect to see less longwave radiation escaping to space at the wavelengths that carbon dioxide absorb. We also expect to see more infrared radiation returning back to Earth at these same wavelengths.

      ..

      Surface measurements of downward longwave radiation
      A compilation of surface measurements of downward longwave radiation from 1973 to 2008 find an increasing trend of more longwave radiation returning to earth, attributed to increases in air temperature, humidity and atmospheric carbon dioxide (Wang 2009). More regional studies such as an examination of downward longwave radiation over the central Alps find that downward longwave radiation is increasing due to an enhanced greenhouse effect (Philipona 2004).

      Taking this a step further, an analysis of high resolution spectral data allows scientists to quantitatively attribute the increase in downward radiation to each of several greenhouse gases (Evans 2006). The results lead the authors to conclude that “this experimental data should effectively end the argument by skeptics that no experimental evidence exists for the connection between greenhouse gas increases in the atmosphere and global warming.”

      Got that?

      So, nothing to do with the Sun producing more radiant heat.., because there is none from the Sun in AGWSF Greenhouse Effect world.

      All extra downwelling heat attributed to the fake fisics of “backradiation/blanketing thermal infrared by greenhouse gases” from the atmosphere”. The Official Story Line.

      The ‘logical’ extrapolation from the paradigm of the fake fisics basics which has taken out the real heat from the Sun, do you see the sleight of hand to create this extrapolation is by simply excising the real heat from the Sun? Giving the Sun’s thermal infrared’s property of heating physical matter to visible is only to hide the fact that it has been excised. All the memes then geared to creating the idea of visible being a powerful heating energy, etc. It’s only by continual repetition through the education system that everyone taught this takes it for granted, and doesn’t bother to check such a “well-known basic”.

      This is the damned AGWScienceFiction fantasy Greenhouse Effect, created by taking out the beam heat from the Sun, magiking it away as they’ve magiked away the Water Cycle and magiked away rain from the Carbon Cycle. It’s all smoke and mirrors, make believe, an impossible fisics of a fantasy world dreamed up through the looking glass with Al.

      So what’s happening with you? Are you embarrassed by this now? Seen too much real physics from me about the difference between heat and light that you’re busy creating an excuse, gosh that ‘AGW never said this’..? Junk AGW and step through the mirror to the real world of physics, it’s far healthier for body, mind and soul..

      See the second link for some of the sleights of hand used in this to promote AGW and to dumb down basic science knowledge for the, as they perceive it, general population of oiks, by giving the properties of thermal infrared to visible.

      Myrrh | November 30, 2012 at 7:18 pm
      http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-272704

      Myrrh | December 1, 2012 at 2:22 pm
      http://judithcurry.com/2012/10/28/climate-change-no-consensus-on-consensus/#comment-272894

    • Monk | December 2, 2012 at 8:39 am |

      Myrrky and the visible light fracas

      As previously pointed out, when Myrrh speaks of “all the very many arguments … trying to convince me that thermal infrared doesn’t play any part in heating the Earth … ” etc , he is flat-out lying. Noone here has ever said anything evening remotely like that. It’s a desparate strawman of his. The only commentary he will find here was to the effect that both shortwave and longwave from the sun warm the earth.

      Furthermore it makes no difference at all to AGW theory which particular wavelength warms the earth. The earth still radiates some of this out as longwave, and greenhouse gasses still trap this. (Point repeated due to Myrrky trying to duck it again).

    • Mr B | December 2, 2012 at 8:59 am |

      The account given here from standard physics, is that about 45% of the heating from the sun is via visible light, about 53% from IR, and 2% from UV.
      In Myrrh’s private “fisics”, though, visible light has no power to heat anything. But he gives no figures, and provides to reference to any experimental data. Until he does, the impression remains that his science is as bad as his spelling.

  106. newclimatechangetheory | November 30, 2012 at 8:42 pm |

     
    Well, Monk, part of the incident Solar radiation is absorbed by carbon dioxide in the 2 micron range. Each such photon (mostly backradiated to space) contains five (5) times the energy of the 10 micron ones it may absorb on the way back up. The cooling effect of this absorption in the 2 micron range has been calculated to be far more than any warming effect. Furthermore, the cooling effect actually prevents energy striking the surface and warming it, whereas energy captured on the way back to space, still gets sent there very soon afterwards by a chain of events including diffusion, pseudo scattering from the surface (if it goes that way) and subsequent radiation mostly by water vapour or suspended water droplets. Not even the IPCC hangs their hat on a warmer atmosphere sending heat back to the surface.
     

  107. Dan Hughes | December 1, 2012 at 10:01 am |

    Application of a constructal approach to climate change has been updated in this paper: Climate change, in the framework of the Constructal Law

    The paper updates the following that have been previously discussed:

    Bejan, A. and Reis, A.H. (2005) ‘Thermodynamic optimization of global circulation and climate’, International Journal of Energy Research, Vol. 29, pp.303–316.

    Reis, A.H. and Bejan, A. (2006) ‘Constructal theory of global circulation and climate’, International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol. 49, pp.1857–1875.

  108. 'Al Lakos | December 1, 2012 at 4:29 pm |

    We interrupt this nodcast for The Oxymoron of the Year !

  109. Punksta | December 2, 2012 at 10:10 am |

    Web
    Sure there are going to be some off-the-wall theories when anyone is allowed to comment. But against that we have the politics-financed and politics-driven ‘consensus’, science crooks like Mann who we know have no shame about hiding the decline, refusing FOI requests, hiding data, etc etc.
    Cure the endemic bias, dishonesty and dogged close-miindedness of the climate science profession as a whole, and the need to hear off-the-wall ideas falls away.

  110. Doug Cotton | December 10, 2012 at 9:56 pm |

     
    Yes, that’s why Michael Mann et al lost their court case against the Chairman of Principia Scientific International, retired professor of climatology, Timothy Ball. They blew a million dollars in court costs I understand.
     ‘

     

  111. tom | February 11, 2014 at 10:40 pm |

    bye

  112. tim | February 11, 2014 at 10:42 pm |

    shut up

  113. tim | February 11, 2014 at 10:43 pm |

    f***in b****