by Judith Curry
How can the fundamental disagreement about the causes of climate change be most effectively communicated?
I have made numerous posts related to this topic, see especially
My specific motivation for this post is to encapsulate this disagreement in a single .ppt slide.
My first crack at this is provided below:
I am soliciting your input on how to convey this to the public on a single slide.
Thanks in advance for your constructive comments.
The important fundamental disagreement – i.e. the disagreement that is impacts justification for policy – is the disagreement about the impacts of ‘climate change’ (actually global warming), not the science of ‘climate change’.
Evidence that global warming is beneficial
The global climate change industry is estimated at US$1.405 trillion in 2013 (about 1.9% of global GDP) https://ebionline.org/product/report-4000-the-climate-change-industry/ ; and the cost is increasing much faster than economic growth https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/07/30/377086.htm .
This is an estimate of the cost. Some of the evidence of the benefits of global warming are:
Life struggles when colder than now; thrives when warmer (paleontological record of the Cenozoic Era). One line of evidence is there is more carbon tied up in the biosphere and less continental aridity during warm times (IPCC AR4 WG1); e.g.:
• “Lower continental aridity during the Mid-Pliocene” https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch6s6-3-2.html
• “10% – 33% less terrestrial carbon storage at the LGM compared to today (300-1000 GtC less C in biosphere at GCM compared with preindustrial 3000 GtC)” https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch6s6-4-1-4.html
No evidence that rapid warming towards average Phanerozoic temperatures would cause net negative impacts for life on Earth, or for the global economy.
Life thrived during rapid warming events in the past (see Figure 15:21 in Coxon and McCarron (2009), Cenozoic: Tertiary and Quaternary (until 11,700 years before 2000) http://eprints.maynoothuniversity.ie/1983/1/McCarron.pdfhttp:/eprints.maynoothuniversity.ie/1983/1/McCarron.pdf
Earth’s surface temperature averaged about 7C warmer than now over the past 540 Ma. Life thrived for most of this time. Arguably, 7C warmer than now is the optimum temperature for life on Earth.
• Scotese (2016). ‘Some Thoughts on Global Climate Change: The Transition from Icehouse to Hothouse Conditions’ https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275277369_Some_Thoughts_on_Global_Climate_Change_The_Transition_for_Icehouse_to_Hothouse_Conditions
https://html2-f.scribdassets.com/9mhexie60w4ho2f2/images/1-9fa3d55a6c.jpg
Earth is currently experiencing about the severest glacial period since complex life began.
• Scotese (2016). ‘Some Thoughts on Global Climate Change: The Transition from Icehouse to Hothouse Conditions’: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275277369_Some_Thoughts_on_Global_Climate_Change_The_Transition_for_Icehouse_to_Hothouse_Conditions Figure 15 and text.
• Scotese (2018). An Estimate of the Volume of Phanerozoic Ice. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325094158_An_Estimate_of_the_Volume_of_Phanerozoic_Ice/comments
We have the science issue and the policy issue, and I have argued that policy responses have been very damaging irrespective whether or not the dangerous warming hypothesis proves valid. So far the damage from policy in many countries (and in first-world countries requirements of third-world countries) has been disproportionate to any likely long-term damage from warming (and it might prove to be net beneficial). I’ve flagged this thread in a discussion at The Times.
(and it might prove to be net beneficial)
WHAT might prove to be beneficial? CO2, warming, policy responses, WHAT? Please do not use IT, spell it out. Anyone cam define IT and use it to promote their cause.
popesclimatetheory,
Global warming may be beneficial. I’d say global warming from the severe coldhouse temperatures Earth is currently experiencing would very probably be beneficial (see my comment above).
Alex, I think that “it” in my post clearly refers to warming, I don’t see how it could be construed otherwise. If I did, I would have expressed myself differently.
That warming is beneficial brings you in the good company of Fourier, Tyndall, Arrhenius an Callander.
Reblogged this on Utopia – you are standing in it!.
It would be interesting to hear what Tim Palmer would say about this. I suspect he highly critical of the way chaos theory is being discussed here.
The wedge is preciusely what Tim Palmer said.
Needs to be simplified down by several steps. I think your two columns should be titled “Climate change primarily is due to human added carbon dioxide” versus “Climate change due to other factor”. leave the first two points in climate forcing as they are. “Climate driven by solar – thermal energy balance top of the atmosphere” comes across as contradicting the premise that carbon dioxide is important because now you are saying climate is driven by solar (as in sun) thermal energy balance. So that should be changed to something like “carbon dioxide changes the thermal energy balance of solar input”. Then you have climate chaos being averaged out. That sounds like a good thing, i.e. no change at all so why are we concerned? The other side is fin except for your final “small wedge”. My response is huh? Is carbon dioxide important or not? If it isn’t how can it be a wedge? Have I misunderstood what are you are trying to say? If I have perhaps my misunderstanding will help you refine it.
• Forcing is amplified by positive feedbacks (water vapor, clouds)
Not to distract, but isn’t the fundamental disagreement about whether or not forcing is amplified by positive feedbacks as opposed to dampened by negative feedbacks?
Cooling has been dampened by feedback since the water cycle started, with a little more Co2 it just doesn’t have to dampen quite as much.
I don’t think so. If warming/cooling is dampened by negative feedbacks, there’s no plausible mechanism for glacial-interglacial transitions. That temperature shift is just too large to be explainable without feedbacks.
The idea that CO2 sensitivity is less than 1.2C/doubling is not a serious position within the scientific community. Too much evidence contradicts it.
Too much evidence contradicts it.
No actual evidence, only opinion and models.
That’s because they mistakenly include the effects of WV on the cooling rates, so it looks larger than it is.
And the mechanism is a variation in incoming energy, we see it happen every year as half the planet cools for winter.
My last reply was to Windchaser.
That’s because they mistakenly include the effects of WV on the cooling rates, so it looks larger than it is. No one bothered to understand cooling at night.
And the mechanism is a variation in incoming energy, we see it happen every year as half the planet cools for winter.
WC, That assumes feedbacks are constant.
Dr. Curry ==> The claim that “chaos averages out” has been thoroughly refuted by mathematicians specialized in Chaos Theory. The image of a three-dimensional chaotic attractor might be labelled “What is the “average” of a system like this?”
There is an ‘apparent’ attractor for the Earth Climate (actually two of them) which we know as Glacial Periods and Inter-Glacials — Ice Ages and Interglacial warm Periods.
In each, the weather/climate system is still chaotic but “averages” to either an Ice Age of an Interglacial.
Inside those attractors, the climate system can be at any point in some lobe of the attractor and which point is “next” is the part that is unpredictable.
An image like this might do:
http://fractalfoundation.org/OFCA/lorenz.jpg
“but “averages” to either an Ice Age OR an Interglacial.
In each, the weather/climate system is still chaotic but “averages” to either an Ice Age of an Interglacial.
Chaotic means you don’t understand what is happening. When there is more ice extent it is an ice age. When there is less ice extent it is an interglacial. Nothing more, nothing less. I really do not need to say more about this.
“What is the “average” of a system like this?”
Silly question. You might as well ask what is the average location of the Earth in its orbit. The answer is, somewhere very hot. Ha ha ha! That doesn’t mean we don’t know anything about the Earth’s orbit.
There is nothing particularly mysterious about the butterfly, either. You can find out more about it here and in linked posts. It doesn’t even look particularly chaotic.
Nick ==> You might spend a few hours actually trying to understand the basics of Chaos.
Chaos Theory is not a mystery to those who have put in the time and effort to understand it.
You can start by reading my series on Chaos at WUWT.
Kip your cartoon view of things is no match for Nick
https://moyhu.blogspot.com/2016/11/lorenz-attractors-fluids-chaos-and.html
Kip,
I have spent a large part of my working life with chaotic (turbulent) fluid flows. And before that, with nonlinear differential equations.
The mean and variance of climate series shift frequently – as less frequently and dramatically does Earth’s orbit.
No it means that the average tells you nothing.
More sophistry Nick. Your example literally means nothing. Some averages have meaning and are useful, some do not and are not. So what?
The question is whether this one does or not.
Nick ==> Forgot your history — but nonetheless, you then realize that the chaotic elements of the climate system mean that the statement “climate chaos is ‘noise’ that averages out” is utter nonsense.
The averaging of chaotic outputs of multiple runs of multiple models is scientifically/mathematically absurd when considering a single element of the system, such as temperature.
If things were as obvious as I state, then we wouldn’t have the the Fundamental Disagreement that Judith is talking about — and maybe knowledgeable intelligent people can disagree on the point.
Well then Nick you will have realized that the Navier Stokes equations as a set are unsolveable when applied to the atmosphere even if you could model clouds properly. Unless you have some real world experimental data to fill in some of the variables essentially you are guessing and assuming the proper turbulent properties. Climate models are a sham.
Averages of chaotic response are chaotic.
Dan Hughes: Averages of chaotic response are chaotic.
Did you make that up, or do you have a reference. The distribution of the trajectories within the attractor can be quite stable.
Dan is correct. The distribution of the trajectories my be stable, in fact they are timeless, but the averages associated with the actual path taken. either up to a given time or during any given interval length, will vary chaotically. This is part of what is called strange statistics. But the distribution of the segments of the trajectories will vary chaotically.
Likewise if you take different interval lengths, say prior to a given time on a given trajectory, the averages will all be different in varying ways. This is just what we see with rainfall for a given locale. Chaotic statistics are in some ways even more fun than chaotic physics.
David Wojick: The distribution of the trajectories my be stable, in fact they are timeless, but the averages associated with the actual path taken.
What are the “averages associated with” an actual path?
We may be writing about different things: I wrote about the distribution of the population of paths starting from the same initial conditions.
for another take on stochastic variations of chaotic dynamical systems, read the book “Stochastic Dynamics”, edited by Crauel and Gundlach, published by Springer in 1992. I particularly recommend the chapter “The Stochastic Brusselator: Parametric Noise Destroys Hopf Bifurcation” by Ludwig Arnols and others. As shown by that example and other in the book and published since, a chaotic system defined by nonlinear differential equations, and the same chaotic system with added random noise, do not possess the same properties like bifurcations and catastrophes.
This has implications for thinking about climate dynamics in light of (mathematical) chaos: will the best models turn out to be deterministic systems of differential equations, or will they be such deterministic systems with added random noise? If the latter, sudden shifts in response to tiny changes may not reasonably be expected. Given the lack of even one system of diffeqns that makes reasonably accurate predictions of climate states states, or the distributions (or functionals of distributions) of climate states, it is foolish to be doctrinaire.
The size of the image is selected to make it look more chaotic than it really is. The butterfly is in the box in your image, but the selection of the box is made to fit the butterfly. The possible values for the dimensions of the box are the set of real numbers, so it could be made larger to make the chaos look smaller. Or is could be made smaller, such that the butterfly doesn’t stay in the box.
Or it could be selected where there is no butterfly.
Thus although the solutions are chaotic, predictions can be made such as the butterfly is in the box, or the butterfly is not in the box.
The amount of chaos is dependent on the amount of zoom and also where you are looking.
bob ==> Actually, it is the initial conditions fed into a very specific formula that produces the Lorenz butterfly attractor — and the they are very narrow conditions at that. Other initial conditions do not create the attractor….other formulas (systems) also do not create the attractor.
Other climates on other planets with other oceans and atmospheres would be different than the Earth climate, I suspect.
Also, if Earth had a much different mix of land and oceans, different arrangement of land masses or oceans then our planets climate would be different.
There is no reason to believe that Earths climate is the particular system that produces the butterfly-like attractor — it is simply an example of a two-lobed chaotic attractor.
It is my opinion (which is shared by many – including the IPCC) that the Earth “climate system is a coupled non-linear chaotic system”, comprised of the ocean system and the atmosphere, both of which are non-linear/chaotic in nature. That much is agreed upon.
The disagreement is about whether or not such a system can be “predicted” far into the future and whether our current models have any ability to do so or even if they are fundamentally fit for that purpose.
I wrote about this in my Chaos series.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/10/chaos-climate-part-4-an-attractive-idea/
Kip, I think you are making a mistake when you consider glacials and glaciations to be examples of attractors in the Lorenz sense, anyway you are confused about that. Ice ages have glacials and interglacials and the movement between the two is forced by orbital variations not chaotic behavior.
The latest ice age, that we are currently in, was started when South America and North America collided.
ENSO is probably chaotic, but glaciations I would say no.
Not going to wuwt, not interested in going where things are made up.
I’d expect that near the glacial-interglacial transitions, there are two attractors.
That doesn’t mean there are always two attractors, though. Right now, there’s enough CO2 that even if we were in a glacial period, we’d drop out of it. And at other times, with much much lower CO2, we’d enter a glacial period even if we started in an interglacial.
Sometimes there are two attractors. Right now, there’s no evidence for that. And climate has been pretty stable over the last few thousand years, up until the last century.
‘Synchronization of polar climate variability over the last ice age: in search of simple rules at the heart of climate’s complexity’
J. A. Rial
http://www.ajsonline.org/content/312/4/417.short
The difference between temporal and spatio-temporal chaos “comes from the fact that we lost this convenient finite dimensional phase space. That’s why almost nothing transports from temporal chaos to spatio-temporal chaos. There are no attractors, bifurcations and such. The whole mathematical apparatus has to be invented from scratch and it will take decades. To know the state of the system, we must know all the fields at all points – this is an uncountable infinity of dimensions. As the fields are coupled, the system produces quasi standing waves all the time. A quasi standing wave is a spatial pattern that oscillates at the same place repeating the same spatial structures in time. However in spatio-temporal chaos these quasi standing waves are not invariants of the system on the contrary to the attractors which are the invariants of the temporal chaos. They live for a certain time and then change or disappear altogether.” https://judithcurry.com/2011/02/10/spatio-temporal-chaos/
Glacials and interglacials – large internal responses to small changes in external conditions – are ‘quasi standing waves’ in this sense.
this is a really interesting paper
I thought so. Here’s an open version if anyone is interested.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275796089_Synchronization_of_polar_climate_variability_over_the_last_ice_age_In_search_of_simple_rules_at_the_heart_of_climate's_complexity
At Robert Ellison:
Synchronization of polar climate variability over the last ice age
When oceans are warm and deep and thawed, it snows more in both hemispheres. When oceans are cold and shallow and frozen, it snows less in both hemispheres. This causes both hemispheres to gain ice and get cold at about the same time and this causes both hemispheres to deplete ice and get warm at about the same time. There is no chaos in this. Ice ages are caused by ice. Ice comes from snowfall. Snowfall comes from moisture that evaporated from oceans that are warm enough to be thawed. This synchronization is based on the basic laws of physics. Solar due to orbit cycles alternate hemispheres. Major ice age and warming cycles do not alternate hemispheres.
Your certainty in this simple narrative prevents actual learning.
Robert I Ellison: I thought so. Here’s an open version if anyone is interested.
Thank you for the link.
Robert I Ellison: I thought so. Here’s an open version if anyone is interested.
One quote from the paper: In the second section of the paper, titled the
polar phase shift, time series of temperature variations from the Polar Regions are shown to transform into one another through a +/- pi/2 phase shift, which is shown to be fully consistent with polar synchronization.
Read the whole thing. I was pleased to see the authors cite the dynamic modeling in neurophysiology of Eugene Izhikevich.
At Robert Ellison:
You wrote:
Your certainty in this simple narrative prevents actual learning.
In the Abstract, the author wrote:
This, plus the fact that remarkable close simulations of the time series are obtained with a model consisting of a few nonlinear differential equations suggest the intriguing possibility that there are simple rules governing the complex behavior of global paleoclimate.
Give these words some thought. You sent me the link, yet you say considering simple rules prevents actual learning. Occam would disagree.
Go to the simple. There are ice ages when much ice is placed on land. Major ice ages happen in both hemispheres at the same time. Ice is formed from ocean water when it is warm and full of energy and deep and full of moisture. Ice ages end in both hemisphere because oceans are low and cold and cannot supply moisture and energy to keep forming ice to replace what thaws every year.
People try to pick external forcing timing to cause ice ages. Go to the simple, pick internal factors as to when it is even possible.
An ice machine requires energy to power it and it requires energy to be removed from the process and it requires water that can be changed to ice.
For earth, the energy is provided from the energy stored in the oceans, the energy out is the IR out from the tops of clouds where the ice was formed and the moisture came from the oceans.
Ice ages are cold and last a long time because the sequestered ice advanced and is thawing and reflecting to provide cooling.
In fact, this thread is about “IN SEARCH OF SIMPLE RULES”
Consider some simple rules, we don’t need math models to consider simple principles and compare with data from ice cores.
Unlike many things in climate science – spatio/temporal chaos climate science can be seen in the wild. Within the turbulent flow of the mountain river vortices form and are relatively stable both in time and space. Oder emerging out of disorder. The first rule of chaos theory. The second rule is that they operate at all scales – from micro eddies in the river to ocean and planet spanning turbulent flows in oceans and atmosphere. The simple rules of chaos are not narratives of simple mechanisms.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/river-in-mountains.jpg
“The global climate system is composed of a number of subsystems — atmosphere, biosphere,
cryosphere, hydrosphere and lithosphere — each
of which has distinct characteristic times, from
days and weeks to centuries and millennia. Each
subsystem, moreover, has its own internal variability, all other things being constant, over a
fairly broad range of time scales. These ranges
overlap between one subsystem and another.
The interactions between the subsystems thus
give rise to climate variability on all time scales.” Michael Ghil
Give me a reference that says that states emerging from interactions of physical systems are wild rather than ergodic.
The article btw discusses simple rules at the heart of climate complexity – not that climate itself is simple.
You should reread the abstract until you understand these words.
the intriguing possibility that there are simple rules governing the complex behavior of global paleoclimate.
Blind belief in chaos does blind people to anything simple.
From a layman perspective, the chaos side uses too much jargon. It’s precise, but sadly, no one outside of these domains follow. That’s the advantage of the external forcing crowd with their ‘control knob’. You need to portray the complexity as something they’re familiar with – for example an ecosystem. Of course, analogies are fraught with their own problems and can become a rabbit hole. You could be direct and maybe use an chaotic oscillating magnetic pendulum as an example? People can understand that single magnets and simple topologies are easily digestible – but that even the best physicist cannot predict the actual motion of a $5 toy.
Tim Palmer does it with a wedge.
You can’t predict the exact motion of the $5 toy, but you can predict the statistics of it pretty accurately.
Weather vs climate.
If an external force is applied to a child’s top, for example a gust of wind, I predict that the toy will move in a specific direction. Yes, it’s chaotic, and no I cannot tell you exactly where the toy will be at any given time, but I do know that the toy will be in another position relative to where it would have been without the wind.
If a balloon is tied to a fan that is directed upward and at an angle, there is no way to predict its position at any time in the future (weather.) Even this simple system is too chaotic to measure a general position after a few seconds like the toy example.
Change the angle of the fan and you can predict whether the balloon will be higher or lower (climate.) It’s still terribly chaotic, but we can know something changed and we can measure it.
Use the term chaos all you want, but CO2 most certainly is a knob.
Like most alarmists your analogy is grossly exaggerated. At 400 ppm, CO2 is more like the wind generated by the flapping wings of a fly. “A gust of wind” would be more like the impact of an asteroid the half size of the moon. You have no sense of scale.
When did simple science facts become “alarmist”? You seem to have a lot of gut feelings that you count as better than science.
You have no sense of science.
And you have no sense of the word complexity. That alone disqualifies you from much of the discussion.
cerescokid, I will type slower for you next time.
you have two sides. you ignore the natural cycles from natural causes that have nothing dependent on CO2 or Chaos. it snows more when it is warm and ice piles up and spreads out and it gets colder. it snows less when it is cold and ice depletes and retreats and it gets warmer. This keeps climate in bounds and this is totally not considered. Climate temperature has been bounded, that is not due to Chaos and that is not due to CO2. That has gone on for millions of years.
Yes, probably most people are completely unaware of any longer-term context, the public debate is generally short term.
Well Mrs Curry, I think you know this better than any of us(fake data, fake models and predictions, the history of scaremongering with global cooling, warming, climate change, overpopulations, etc). I would argue that the best thing you could do is read Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. Because this is a war, Michael Mann knows this is a war, the audience knows it’s a war and you need to go to the debate with that notion. What you posted up there (apart that most of the people wont understand it) is not a strategy plan to win a battle, it’s a plan on how to blur your loss after the battle.
Take a look at arguments that Mann presented in the past, do research and debunk them one by one as he presents them. There us no other way. If you decide to let him pursue his agenda, not challenge him on the ‘cooked books’ he is gonna end up on top. This is their corner stone
Obviously I don’t know the format of the debate, but what I do know is that you will not beat Mann by playing nice.
Anyway I would like to thank you for your efforts, I know that it wasn’t easy for you to stand up against the elites and that you paid a certain price for that.
Best of luck at the debate!
PS
Will there be a livestream?
I wish you all the luck in the debate
The “average” person does not understand what chaos means. It is often confused with randomness. CO2 is only one factor that is possibly contributing to the observed chaos. Water vapor thru the processes of evaporation/condensation, freezing/thawing is a major contributor to weather and climate chaos. Try modeling the chaos in a thunder cloud.
Suggest something really simple, like
MAN CAUSING CLIMATE PROBLEMS?
No way to tell, too complicated.
BUT DON’T PANIC!
Emissions plunge as
profit motive
makes energy use ever cleaner.
Simple statement that is absolutely accurate and avoids eye-glazing scientific mumbo-jumbo. Follow-up slides can provide more details.
I have used this from Demetris Koutsoyiannis a couple of times today.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/nile-e1527722953992.jpg
It compares randomly generated data with by far the longest instrumental record in climate. The Nile River height record starts in 632 AD. It is from a stilling chamber with an inlet from the Nile River at Cairo. Water levels varied from ‘hunger’ at 12 cubits (a cubit is approximately half a metre) through abundance at 16 cubits and to disaster at 18 cubits.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/nilometer.jpg
“H.E. Hurst spent some 60 years studying the Nile for the Egyptian government, and laid the foundation for a monumental set of hydrological records and investigations.” His 1950’s publications sank without a trace before being rediscovered by Mandelbrot. The effects that Hurst discovered involve ‘persistence’ in hydrological regimes – a product of dynamical complexity.
“Hurst’s environmetric observations in the 1950s first sparked interest in the natural phenomenon of anomalously fast growth of rescaled range in hydrological time series, most famously from the Nile river1,2. Rescaled range is a measure of the variability of a time series and is calculated by dividing the range of the values by the standard deviation. This is done for increasing window sizes which are than averaged2,3.” https://www.nature.com/articles/srep09068
The implications of such intrinsic variability for the US are megadroughts and megafloods – such as has not been seen in the 20th century – that won’t be solved by wind turbines and solar panels.
https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/28/the-debate/#comment-872953
“The implications of such intrinsic variability for the US are megadroughts and megafloods – such as has not been seen in the 20th century”
–
“The implications of such intrinsic variability for the US could have been megadroughts and megafloods – such were actually not seen in the 20th century”
–
More to the point, while your comments are correct the likelihood which you did not mention on a human time frame is extremely low, and if either occurred we would not really be bothered about it anymore. Best to confine considerations to more likely changes and implications which would be more of the usual variability and more pertinent to our hopes and needs.
Both of the studies I linked to here discuss extremes in the deeper past than the last 50 years. They define more nearly the limits of natural variability.
“The implications of such intrinsic variability for the US could have been megadroughts and megafloods…”
I don’t understand what is meant by this – these are events that happened in the last millennia. They are likely to happen again with the right sea state.
https://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~jsmerdon/papers/2016_wirescc_cooketal.pdf
http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/11/7/074025
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/10.1175/2008JCLI2170.1
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00247.1
They complain that there is not enough historical perspective and then that there is too much.
Key point.
ie. The climate has been rather benign during living memory. It is especially variable and extreme in the NH and NA and Asia. Most of modern society grew during ideal circumstances. We should be worried about reversion to the mean, not a slight drift in mean and reduction in variance.
The certainty of hydrological extremes greater than those seen in the modern era is a natural risk that that cannot be reduced by installing wind turbines and solar panels.
Robert I. Ellison | May 31, 2018 at 4:43 am |
Both of the studies I linked to here discuss extremes in the deeper past than the last 50 years. They define more nearly the limits of natural variability.
“The implications of such intrinsic variability for the US could have been megadroughts and megafloods…”
–
I don’t understand what is meant by this – these are events that happened in the last millennia.
–
Yes but they definitely did not happen in the 20th century did they?
–
The implications you refer to are most likely remote, even if not the same range as all the ice caps melting completely.
Yes we could have mega droughts and floods at any time but they are not likely to be a problem solving in or by the wind turbine and solar panel era we are entering.
That they didn’t happen in the 20th century is the point. But they may happen at any time. And no – wind turbines and solar panels won’t stop natural variability as I said.
The certainty of hydrological extremes greater than those seen in the modern era is a natural risk that that cannot be reduced by installing wind turbines and solar panels.
That is right, depending on wind turbines and solar panels increase risk. They are spread out and impossible to protect and harder to fix.
A misguided assumption of certainty undermines ongoing intellectual progress.
No, depending on NG for base load is a risk. For the U.S. we should be using a small amount of coal, some wind and solar to extend our NG supply. Ideally, we should be shifting to nuclear and then fusion. Nuclear we know works, fusion will take time and cannot be counted on.
Thanks for engaging. Hope you get some telling insights, I will try mine. Whatever works for you. I prefer the approach of what is natural fact we can and have measured, versus what hypothetical models suggest based on guesses that don’t forecast reality.. Also a clear statement of the factual scale of change in amplitude and time, so that its is clear no significant change can or has happened in human time scales, within or without industrialisation, so any real change can be responded to as it occurs. In particular, the tipping point is an artificial construct that has not occured while records have been possible, on geological or hom sap time scale, even the interglacials are slow enough to relocate over 7,000 years, and terminate themselves at close to our current temperatures, even with strongly rising CO2..NO tipping point due to CO2. More to come.
Would it be fair to say that what you’ve presented here is the position of the 97% (warmers & luke warmers) in the left panel verses that of the right panel which represents the 3%?
Judith
I am a layman, and not well educated at that. What I have in common with politicians is that no one needs a single qualification to be one.
You are therefore operating at the bottom of the gene pool, i.e. at my level.
What persuaded me that AGW was nonsense?
Well, I have lived for 61 years and in that time seen nothing more than a gentle warming of my environment i.e. the UK. Nothing calamitous, despite the hysterical claims of my memory, veering from global cooling to CAGW, all predicted within less than a decade. So far, nothing. Well not quite, but I’ll get to that.
As I slowly progressed in the subject, the other thing that caught my eye was that observed temperatures from a variety of sources have not come close to the predicted models of contributors to the IPCC. As bad as I am at interpreting graphs, that one is pretty obvious.
And it was Patrick Moore who put me onto one of the most compelling arguments for me. There is not a single paper that I can find which demonstrates CO2 causes the planet to warm significantly. I’ll qualify that by stating that David Middleton assures me there is one. But after 40 years of research, is that enough? Nor can I find it.
I said I would get back to it; It’s my understanding that the only empirical manifestation of increased atmospheric CO2 is that the planet has greened by 14% over the last 30 years or so of satellite observation according to NASA. It wasn’t widely anticipated by the alarmists and nothing they can produce as evidence, even their computer models, comes close to a 14% increase in anything. It represents two continents the size of mainland America of increased vegetation, according to one of the reports authors.
Whilst I admire your skill in the science, we laymen don’t understand it. We understand practical illustrations on the debate.
Like the 97% fallacy, it’s the low hanging fruit you need to harvest. Everyone has a single vote, even scientists. So don’t try to persuade the elite, of whom there are few, try to persuade us dummies, of whom there are many.
Like it or not, Trump did it.
Well said, the vast majority of the population have no grasp of the science or issues and have been persuaded by warmist propaganda, which the great bulk of the media supports. My main argument is that, whatever the future holds, we are better off by increasing our capacity to deal with the unexpected, which will also make us better placed if dangerous warming does occur than if we damage our economies through absurd anti-emissions policies which will have a negligible effect on the amount of warming. In the first four months of this year, Chinese GHG emissions rose by almost as much as Australia’s annual emissions; yet many mad politicians in Oz want a 50-60% reduction in emissions in a very short time in a country with rapid (immigration-driven) population growth. That includes the Labor opposition who seem likely to form the next government.
I agree with HotScot’s view. I think the “chaos” business is overly wonkish and, on the face of it, doesn’t really deal with basics which agw activists have effectively exploited. For example, the world has warmed visibly since 1850 +/-, “visibly” meaning things like the shrinking of the glaciers and the arctic icepack. “Visibly” also includes the temperature time series – particularly when graphically presented.. One could also say it includes the perception that extreme weather events like hurricanes and floods have increased in frequency – the msm has latched onto these things because their mentality squares with that of the lowest common denominator, intentionally or not.
Let’s face it, the gw meme has a very seductive quality. Bright people like my older brother have bought it without a skeptical thought. They know cliamte change is complicated but the “qualified scientists accept it as the truth”. So their lives are made simpler.
To me, skepticism is a defensive mindset. It seeks to rebut conventional wisdom, of which the anthropogenic climate change mindset is a perfect example. The most successful discussions with my older brother revolve around pointing out the rather modest increase in temperatures – about 1deg. C since 1850 – a factoid that challenges his view that temperatures have increased dramatically. He also understands graphs that shows natural variation over time, particularly the evidence that temperature spikes like this one have occurred before, even in the 20th century.
I think most warmists on my brother’s level are impressed by these simple illustrations. Bright peoples’, if they’re not scientists or mathematicians, eyes will glaze over if you throw chaos theory at them. They don’t understand the science of climate change – I really don’t either. But they will listen to simple rebuttals like the temp increase example. This is the stuff that appeals to my innate sense of skepticism – simple examples of how warming has been exaggerated.
I agree with Faustino and scraft 1.
The world should do all it can to increase economic growth and improve human well-being, especially the poorer countries. Blocking fossil fuels is bad policy, as is incentivizing renewable energy.
Bjorn Lomborg says: :Why we need to stop aiming for the 2°C target, which is both impossible and a hindrance to better policies” which he quotes from Ted Nordhaus: “The Two-Degree Delusion” http://ow.ly/H5kF30j79X9
The cost of climate policies is substantial and is in addition to the economic impact of reduced global warming. Climate Change Business Journal estimates put the climate change industry at $1,405 billion in 2013 [33]; this was about 1.9% of world GDP. Insurance Journal (2015) states “according to Climate Change Business Journal the ‘climate change industry’ grew at between 17 and 24 percent annually from 2005-2008, slowing to between 4 and 6 percent following the recession with the exception of 2011’s inexplicable 15 percent growth” [36].
Furthermore, any reductions in temperature would be minimal but at high cost. Lomborg (2015) [37] says “the only peer-reviewed estimate shows that the climate impact of all Paris promises 2016-2030 will reduce global temperatures by just 0.05C in 2100; if they continue to 2100 they would reduce temperatures by 0.17C”. And, using the “the best available climate economic model ensembles from the Stanford Energy Modeling Forum, the Asia Modeling Exercise and the EU/EPA CLIMACAP-LAMP project” the most likely cost would be $1,848 billion per year in 2030. This is about 2% of projected world GDP in 2030, but does not include all costs of the climate industry.
[33] Ferrier, G. The Climate Change Industry; EBI Report 4000; Climate Change Business Journal: San Diego, CA, US, 2015. https://ebionline.org/product/report-4000-the-climate-change-industry/
[36] Jergler, D. Is Climate Change Now Its Own Industry? https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/07/30/377086.htm
[37] Lomborg, B. The impact and cost of the 2015 Paris Climate Summit, with special focus on US policies. In The House of Representatives Committee on Science, Space and Technology, 114th Congress, First Session ed.; U.S. Government Publishing Office: Washington, US, 2015; pp 98-118. https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-114hhrg97771/pdf/CHRG-114hhrg97771.pdf
We are hoping too, Judith
“I’m hoping that at some point soon, climate scientists will get fed up with trying to play politics with their science and get back to researching and debating these fundamentally interesting and unsolved issues in the science of climate dynamics, rather than attacking their colleagues for suggesting that there are other ways of thinking about climate change.”
https://judithcurry.com/2014/05/26/the-heart-of-the-climate-dynamics-debate/
Robert L. Bradley, Jr.
robbradley58@gmail.com
713-304-8942
Add Mathematicians and Computer Modelers to the list of global warming proponents in the bottom left quadrant.
Hi Judith,
Please include the Naval Architects in the Climate Chaos side of the equation. The main reason is due to the fact that if we didn’t had turbulent flow in the atmosphere all the CO2 would be stuck to the ground, with O2 on top, N2 floating over it and finally the amazing H2O that would be flying high in the sky. Nevertheless a mixture occurs due the turbulent nature of the atmospheric boundary layer (basically at day time) and so we can expect and measure some dispersion into the air column for their main components. Nevertheless, CO2 when at the ground level, as very few chance to escape because is basically captured by the plants or is mixed by the Ocean free surface.
All the best from
Cascais, Portugal
Judy
With “To highly complex system” suggest adding “nonlinear”.
That may be more important than “global”.
Suggest rephrasing to “globally resonant”.
If room, add “weakly” before “coupled”.
Suggest:
“Climate change occurs as natural shifts in noisy states”
“Equilibrium is fleeting between noisy natural variations”
Clearly the view on the left panel is one that traces back to Milankovitch cycles, understanding paleoclimate through geologically induced atmospheric changes, and back further to Arrhenius and Tyndall’s understanding of the current atmosphere and the importance of greenhouse gases to it. This has all been quantified with the benefit of more recent science of radiative transfer and the effects of various processes on climate is quantified well without having to invent new physics.
The view on the right panel is much more recent and has sprung up in response to the idea that GHGs have a strong effect on climate. It doesn’t have any roots in physics or even any explanatory or predictive power making it unpublishable as science. Double CO2 – who knows? Increase solar strength by 1% – who knows? Orbital effects – who knows? Have more volcanoes – who knows? Forcing doesn’t count for much compared to the unknown void in their minds. Having that panel equal size is not representative of its impact in scientific thought.
Jim a very simple question where do you think the CO2 you exhale at night in concentrated in your bed room in the morning? At the ceiling or at the floor? Please take a deep breath before your answer!!! ;););) Al
The right-panel people would have no answer for that because somewhere along the way they lost physics as an explanation for anything related to the atmosphere.
Jim,
I want your answer about the CO2 in your bedroom and please do it using plain physics and some general chemistry. Its plain simple CO2 does not float over the other gases and when at the same temperature of the surrounding atmosphere starts to fall almost vertically at a steady pace into the ground. And that is fundamental physics though to us by the genius Arquimedes more than 3000 years ago.
Cheers, Al
CO2 is a well mixed gas. What else can I help you with?
It’s well mixed below the turbopause, and since Jim wakes up in the morning, I’m assuming he lives below the turbopause.
So no, it not concentrated at the floor or at the ceiling.
And you have your dates wrong on Archimedes or Arquimedes, I’m thinking they are the same dude.
(yeah, jim, maybe she should just shrink it down to 3% of its size… ☺)
Probably less, because even those 3% use it as a what-if and not an outright denial.
And clearly the right hand panel traces back to Poincaré.
Chaos has been described as the 3rd great idea in 20th century physics – with relativity and quantum mechanics.
As for chaos and climate – let me google that for you Jimmy.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=climate+and+dynamical+complexity
The work in that area uses GCMs from the left panel that show global warming in response to forcing, so they should be on the left side. Yes, it’s complex, but that doesn’t stop warming from forcing changes, and they agree with that part because they are using those GCMs to make their point. If someone could come up with a GCM that was too chaotic to respond to forcing that would go on the right panel.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2007GL030288
“What defines a climate change as abrupt? Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause. Chaotic processes in the climate system may allow the cause of such an abrupt climate change to be undetectably small.”
https://www.nap.edu/read/10136/chapter/1
Climate models are of course chaotic dynamical systems.
“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 (see ref. 26).” http://www.pnas.org/content/104/21/8709
Jimmy is an ideological dinosaur who is getting bizarrely far fetched.
The most obvious abrupt changes have been related to melting ice sheets. Hansen has a paper on these possibly happening by 2100. Do you put him in the right panel? Of course not. He is an example of someone who wants action fast to keep the climate from going over these tipping points.
Climate shifts will happen 3 or 4 times this century. And likely involve very significant impacts on temperature and hydrology – that wind turbines and solar panels will not prevent.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/moys-2002-2.png
“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.” https://www.nap.edu/read/10136/chapter/2
But I would put Hanen’s pointless speculation about future low probability events in the garbage bin.
Pragmatic responses I have discussed endlessly.
https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/28/the-debate/#comment-872937
Which part do you not get? You are an ideological dinosaur. Nothing challenges your agnotology. Stop wasting our time with far too frequent repetition of these memes of yours.
If you count things the size of an ENSO as a climate shift, then it occurs a lot more often than you say. Most people would not. Usually the clue is with sea level. Real tipping points will affect that by meters. If you’re invoking chaos, go the full way like Hansen, not teeny self-canceling fluctuations.
If he read anything I cited he would be under the delusion that the literature does not exist.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/swanson-et-al-2009-e1525230834922.png
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2008GL037022
Or that it is small and sums to zero.
In 2009 they were predicting a steady temperature for the next decade based on this. Turned out wrong.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/best/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.25
… would not be under the delusion…
“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.”
They are not wrong at all.
“They are not wrong at all.”
Well, here is how their 2002 climate shift is looking now – cf your graph above. I’ve enhanced the WFT lines in Paint; original is here. Not much of a shift.
https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/www.moyhu.org/2018/05/tsonis.png
As I replied to a reposting of this below – a wood for dimwits graph is hardly definitive.
Why would you use northern hemisphere HadCRUT?
https://i.imgur.com/2Bi6VKk.png
Looks to me that El Niño doesn’t count as global warming.
They did the usual trick of starting their flat trend with the 1998 El Nino, so also ending in a large El Nino is better than not, otherwise you can just fool yourself about the trend.
“Why would you use northern hemisphere HadCRUT?”
Because I thought that is what Swanson and Tsonis used. Their paper talks a lot about NH, and the plot doesn’t say. But it seems I was wrong.
Here is the same plot, with similar trend intervals, using global rather than NH. Still no real shift around 2001.
https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/www.moyhu.org/2018/05/tsonisg.png
Ever hear of consilience Nick? Jimmy assuredly hasn’t.
https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/30/fundamental-disagreement-about-climate-change/#comment-873123
The shift is real. It just happens to have a spike at the end that is confounding the trend. The evidence is that temperatures are now very close to the 2001-2013 average and decreasing. What kind of trend gets from a certain temperature to the same temperature 17 years later? A flat trend.
We know that spike was caused by El Niño, not global warming, ergo there has been no global warming since 2001. That’s the real answer regardless of what the numbers say.
The analog is the 1878 El Niño. You get a fake positive trend due to it, despite temperatures being flat and then decreasing.
https://i.imgur.com/gkwh92v.png
Trends are very sensitive to initial and final conditions. That is why you have to use your head instead of a calculator.
The Pause lives. Long live the Pause!
Temp series
https://micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2017/04/1940to2015.png
Anomaly
https://micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/global.png
For climate there is too much short-term variability to count as climate change which is why 30-year temperatures are usually considered. So let’s look at the 30-year temperature.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/best/mean:240/mean:120/plot/best/from:1987/trend
What happened to the pause you ask? Well, the 15 years before the “pause” had changes almost twice as fast as the 30-year average, so overall this internal variability canceled itself in a 30-year timeframe. Thirty year trends are robust, but 15-year trends are all over the place. These are the decadal trends of 30-year and 15-year temperatures.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/best/mean:60/mean:120/derivative/scale:120/plot/best/mean:240/mean:120/derivative/scale:120
When you are reacting to 15-year temperatures, just wait 5 years because it is going to change. The 30-year temperature is more reliable for long-term extrapolation.
The problem warmists have is that they are so sure of their hypothesis that they only contemplate a possible continuation, which is more warming. However, Nature has taught us to be humble. A possible continuation of the present situation is a decrease in temperature, because it has already happened before:
https://i.imgur.com/b3D6nwK.png
Big shifts happen when there is lots of ice at low latitudes.
Javier, GAT shifts following big el Ninos are a possible result of the GHE. They seems to be more likely due to SW radiation changes, but it is not impossible that the GHE is contributing to heat build up in the IPWP.
The great and powerful back-to-back La Nina events started in August 2016. At that point the 30-year warming trend was .173 ℃ per decade. The current 30-year trend to date, which includes the great post El Niño cooling caused by the great and powerful back-to-back La Niña events since August of 2016, is .187 ℃ per decade:
https://i.imgur.com/iLtacGd.png
Now that’s chaos for you.
Professor Curry is forecasting an El Niño is possible late 2018/early 2019. OHC is now at the highest level since ARGO commenced. It could possible start slow, hand around for a year, then fire up and bake.
What do you mean by:
The two La Niña events after the big El Niño of 2015-16 barely qualified for a La Niña and had been among the weakest Niñas ever. Temperature just scratched outside the neutral value of –0.5°C anomaly:
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/monitoring/nino3_4.png
Weak, weak, Las Niñas. That’s why the cooling has been so slow.
Link to BoM El Niño figure.
LMAO.
You are really not interesting enough for anyone to care.
https://i.imgur.com/T8RXxhT.png
It can be customized.
John von Neumann famously said: “With four parameters I can fit an elephant, and with five I can make him wiggle his trunk.”
Javier, thanks for correcting JCH.
He does have a tendency to use data discriminately.
“PIOMAS gridded thickness data updated up to 31st May. I calculate a volume on that day of 20.01 [1000 km3 ], 5th lowest for the day.”
Global temps dropping ? Ice melting slowly.
What’s not to like.
The global cooling priests are once again leading with their jaws. As always, warming up the old haymaker.
https://i.imgur.com/kn2ptyR.png
I suppose it’s a nice use of colors, even if what it’s showing is made up nonsense.
According to the actual measurements from weather stations in the 50’s, it was just as warm then as it is now.
Global Anomaly, just incase you wanted to see what the actual temp series really looks like.
https://i2.wp.com/micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/global.png
March 15, 2008, in the cold throes of the Ides of March, with 11 hours, 43 minutes of sunlight at the North Pole, and the fat and healthy Polar Bears plying their trade in the Arctic Sea Ice.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/CICE_combine_thick_SM_EN_20080315-1.png
June 2, 2018, with 20 hours and 50 minutes of sunlight at the North Pole, and even fatter and healthier sunglassed Polar Bears sunbathing in even thicker Arctic Sea Ice.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/FullSize_CICE_combine_thick_SM_EN_20180602_shadow.png
My one slide would say:
Mainstream climate science misappropriates causes for its own ends. It is therefore a pseudoscience.
Interesting how Dr C has the differing professions pegged to each of the two panels. It’s almost as though you can predict a scientist’s stance by his discipline. (that right panel eerily fits svalgaard the solar physicist to the t) It would be nice to get an insightful sociological perspective on this…
It always helps to have -ologists of various kinds. Adds an air of legitimacy that it doesn’t really have when there’s actually no publications for them to read and sign up to.
Jim, that’s why i threw in the word insightful there. It would be nice to get an objective overview of what’s going on in this regard (even if such an overview doesn’t or can’t even possibly exist)…
The key word there is sociological. It is not a scientific divide.
(actually, jimmy, what i’d really like to know is why svalgaard is such a bone head)…
Jim,
Surely you can agree on these two points:
#1 Consensus is not part of the scientific method
#2 Advocacy is not the job of a scientist
Consensus is at the science/policy interface. People aren’t going to make policy on less-than-likely science. They look for the level of consensus first.
Advocacy is not part of the job, but it is also not restricted as long as the scientist speaks for themself rather than for their lab. Also professional organizations and industries, some of which contain scientists, advocate through their policy statements. I have no problem with that.
I doubt that ecologists in general belong on the left.
http://www.pnas.org/content/112/13/E1569.full
Judy – you have encapsulated very well! I have written on this topic. See our paper in 2016 in Physics Today, the Rial et al paper on my research website, and my minority summary on the AGU Climate Change Statement, as three of our examples. Roger Sr
How about going with Burrito Science— e.g., CO2 is a single jalapeño seed in a carne asada burrito.
Water vapor is the main atmospheric ‘greenhouse’ gas (GHG), making up about 4% of the atmosphere –i.e., 40,000 parts per million (ppm). By comparison, CO2 is ~400 ppm (a hundred times smaller –i.e., 4/100ths of 1%); and, the total yearly increase in atmospheric CO2 from all sources (including all that is released into the atmosphere by all humanity) is just 1.8 ppm –e.g., like the hot sauce made from about two jalapeño seeds to spice up a burrito the size of a 32 inch English farmhouse sink.
Even if we assumed that humanity produced all of the yearly CO2 increase, meteorologist Joe Bastardi (Two Simple Questions…) says, “The EPA estimates that the U.S. contributes about 1/5th of the CO2 man emits, which would be .20 x 1.8 ppm, or .36” In other words, we’re talking about an increase of 0.36 ppm of CO2 gas that has 1/100th of the effect of water vaper that together with all GHGs has 1/1000th of the effect of the ocean on Earth’s climate.
Bastardi has two simple questions that should be asked:
“What is the perfect temperature for the planet? Do you really believe that the U.S.‘ contribution of 0.36 parts per million of CO2 has any provably measurable effect on weather/climate?”
Yah, because no one has ever explained before that it’s not the absolute temperature that matters, but the rate of change.
Ahh, an argument from incredulity, great. Works great on non-scientists, so it should be effective in DC, even if logically it’s unsound.
Can we maybe avoid the zombie arguments?
And what’s controlling the rate of cooling?
I’ll give you a hint, it’s not co2. What causes it to stop cooling in the middle of a clear night?
Oh, the Temp of the sky is nearly 100F colder than the surface all night.
https://i2.wp.com/micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/aug-13th.png
If you are going to abandon the scientific method, common sense is all we have left if we do not wish to fund climate charlatans. “Given that global warming is unequivocal, to quote the 2007 IPCC report,” says Kevin Trenberth, speaking for the Eurocommies, “the null hypothesis should now be reversed, thereby placing the burden of proof on showing that there is no human influence [on the climate].”
No, that’s not how science works! We don’t get to the truth by reversing the scientific method. “The obvious null hypothesis of AGW theory,” Eschenbach observed, “is that all global warming is natural.” Trenberth cannot blame humanity for climate change if he cannot reject the null hypothesis. And, the world’s most well known global warming heretic told us how crazy academia was even before Trenberth attempted to reverse the null scientific method when he famously opined that perhaps aliens caused global warming (see, Michael Crichton, Aliens Cause Global Warming: A Caltech Lecture)–i.e., is it now it’s up to us to prove aliens didn’t cause global warming because, anything is possible, right?
Judith Curry:
You will not like this post, but there is actually a better explanation of Climate Change than either of those shown in your two examples.
I have a post on the pre print site Osf.io.bycj4/ titled “Atmospheric SO2: Principal Control Knob Governing Earth’s Temperatures” which you should be aware of.
I see that I made a mistake in my post. The pre print site is actually at Osf.io/bycj4/
I think it is a bad idea to pin the case against on chaos. Although it seems like an ominous word, few people know what it really means here, and phrases like “spatio-temporal chaotic” don’t help. In fact, the proper definition of chaos is that solutions originally close together diverge rapidly in time, but it’s hard to convey what that really means, or why it should be bad. And in fact it isn’t; it means you can’t get a reproducible outcome from a known initial state, but we never knew the initial state anyway. Same in all turbulent fluid dynamics.
To give a picture of chaos, suppose you have a can of white paint, and you want a can of pink. So you add red dye and stir with a stick. But it isn’t that easy. You can break up red lumps, and with shearing get stripy paint. But it takes a long time to get pink. Hardware stores use a mechanical shaker, but it still takes minutes. You want patches of red, initially close, to end up far apart.
Mixing (chaos) is what you want. But there is nothing particularly chaotic or unmanageable about pink paint. Nor about the diffusion of angular momentum in turbulence.
I think the proposition that climate change occurs in shifts is not something that meteorologists, solar physicists etc would agree about.
“Equilibrium is fleeting” – well, life is a state of disequilibrium. We don’t need equilibrium to figure stuff out.
“Lorenz was able to show that even for a simple set of nonlinear equations (1.1), the evolution of the solution could be changed by minute perturbations to the initial conditions, in other words, beyond a certain forecast lead time, there is no longer a single, deterministic solution and hence all forecasts must be treated as probabilistic. The fractionally dimensioned space occupied by the trajectories of the solutions of these nonlinear equations became known as the Lorenz attractor (figure 1), which suggests that nonlinear systems, such as the atmosphere, may exhibit regime-like structures that are, although fully deterministic, subject to abrupt and seemingly random change.”
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1956/4751
Spatio-temporal chaos is used to distinguish spatial and temporal processes in Earth’s flow field from the temporal chaos of climate models.
“We construct a network of observed climate indices in
the period 1900– 2000 and investigate their collective
behavior. The results indicate that this network
synchronized several times in this period. We find that in those cases where the synchronous state was followed by a steady increase in the coupling strength between the indices, the synchronous state was destroyed, after which a new climate state emerged. These shifts are associated with significant changes in global temperature trend and in ENSO variability. The latest such event is known as the great climate shift of the 1970s. We also find the evidence for such type of behavior in two climate simulations using a state-of-the-art model. This is the first time that this mechanism, which appears consistent with the theory of synchronized chaos, is discovered in a physical system of the size and complexity of the climate system.” https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/people.uwm.edu/dist/f/255/files/2016/08/tsonis_GRL07-294wcrr.pdf
If he actually read any of what I cite.
This was not where I was going with this – distracted by Jimmy the dinosaur.
Spatio-temporal chaos is used to distinguish the spatial and temporal patterns of climate to the temporal chaos of models.
“You can see spatio-temporal chaos if you look at a fast mountain river. There will be vortexes of different sizes at different places at different times. But if you observe patiently, you will notice that there are places where there almost always are vortexes and they almost always have similar sizes – these are the quasi standing waves of the spatio-temporal chaos governing the river. If you perturb the flow, many quasi standing waves may disappear. Or very few. It depends.” https://judithcurry.com/2011/02/10/spatio-temporal-chaos/
The result in climate are quasi standing waves that can be viewed as chaotic oscillators as nodes on a network. Perturb the flow and these shift.
Anastasios Tsonis, of the Atmospheric Sciences Group at University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, and colleagues used a mathematical network approach to analyse abrupt climate change on decadal timescales. Ocean and atmospheric indices – in this case the El Niño Southern Oscillation, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the North Atlantic Oscillation and the North Pacific Oscillation – can be thought of as chaotic oscillators that capture the major modes of climate variability. Tsonis and colleagues calculated the ‘distance’ between the indices. It was found that they would synchronise at certain times and then shift into a new state.
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.
With models the problem is non-unique solutions from feasible – within the limits of data precision – starting points. It is difficult to see where Nick gets anything right on this.
“With models the problem is non-unique solutions from feasible “
It isn’t a problem with models, any more than the CFD models engineers used to design the planes you fly in, or indeed the non-uniqueness in wind tunnel results. You work out the energy in the turbulence, and this relates to the diffusivity of momentum. Otherwise, conservation of mass, of mean momentum, all work as before.
At about this time, I usually produce the GFDL GCM model of ocean currents. The Gulf stream, Agulhas etc are all there. There are a whole lot of transient wiggles. Another run with this model, or another, would give a different lot of wiggles. No-one cares. The Gulf, Agulhas et are all still there, with the same general path and strength.
None of this is at all pertinent Nick. While short term process level modelling is possible – where there is a projection over a long period divergence is a problem.
“Atmospheric and oceanic computational simulation models often successfully depict chaotic space–time patterns, flow phenomena, dynamical balances, and equilibrium distributions that mimic nature. This success is accomplished through necessary but nonunique choices for discrete algorithms, parameterizations, and coupled contributing processes that introduce structural instability into the model. Therefore, we should expect a degree of irreducible imprecision in quantitative correspondences with nature, even with plausibly formulated models and careful calibration (tuning) to several empirical measures. Where precision is an issue (e.g., in a climate forecast), only simulation ensembles made across systematically designed model families allow an estimate of the level of relevant irreducible imprecision…
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 (see ref. 26).” http://www.pnas.org/content/104/21/8709
We have not come to terms with the intrinsic limitations of models and nor is it remotely comparable to the spatio-temporal chaos of climate.
Weather prediction is the obvious example to understand chaos as a concept.
The equilibrium is fleeting statement should be removed IMO. Equilibrium is likely non existent. There is no guarantee that any point of equilibrium exists on the attractor.
The paint analogy is inappropriate. Chaos is mixing but we don’t want to know about mixing we simply want the paint mixed. Consider the subdivided volume of the paint can and describe the state of the mixing in each dV as the paint is mixed. This is no more predictable than future climate states, and the mixing of paint in a closed volume is a far easier problem to solve.
Mixing is not chaos. Vortices formed in the paint during mixing are. If you change the frequency of vibration the size, location and number of vortices will change.
Well, It’s not a simple problem to decompose into boundary and initial conditions. The initial state does impact where you end up in many flows because of multiple solutions and bifurcations. Boundary values normally have the biggest influence. This initial condition issue is beginning to be documented in the literature with RANS simulations.
“The paint analogy is inappropriate. Chaos is mixing but we don’t want to know about mixing we simply want the paint mixed. “
No, I think it is appropriate. I’m warming to it. The thing is, we can’t predict where the dye will end up. It’s slow motion turbulence, so in fact you can track that for a while. But we actually don’t care. It doesn’t matter how you initially placed the dye. What matters is the amount of it, which is preserved and determines the pinkness.
That is the analogy with GCMs. There is a lot more things that we want to know than just amount of dye. But they are still things that don’t depend on the initial state.
And it’s true of CFD too. The typical problem is flow over a wing. In a CFD simulation, you have to start with an initial state, just as you have to place the dye somewhere in the paint. But what you want to know in the end is aggregate stuff like lift and drag. None of that depends on the initial state. The chaos in the calculation mimics the chaos of real flow. In the wind tunnel, you don’t worry about setting the initial state. You get the same results as CFD.
“What matters is the amount of it, which is preserved and determines the pinkness.”
Your simply doubling down on your inappropriate analogy.
The trajectories of model solutions do depend on initial conditions. That is the unavoidable reality. If you start a climate model from a slightly different point – you get a whole new solution.
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/roypta/369/1956/4751/F2.large.jpg
If you change the flow in a wind tunnel the patterns of turbulence change. Same with the planet.
https://earth.nullschool.net/
Nick contradicts a dozen or so of the best known names in the field – that I have cited just here – and it doesn’t seem to phase him.
“If you change the flow in a wind tunnel the patterns of turbulence change.”
If you change the initial state (if you ever tried to control it) the patterns would change. No-one cares. If you introduce objects to vary the flow, that is a boundary condition variation, not initial. Here is a paper (one of many) where we did that. Changing the boundaries will alter any flow, turbulent or not.
I have been a hydrodynamic modeler for decades and an environmental scientist for nearly as long. I have been aware of step changes in hydrology, biological populations, global temperature trajectories, lake eutrophication and the Pacific state for most of that time.
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/mei/ts.gif
You can eyeball in the “Great Pacific Climate Shift” of 1976/1997 – and the shift in 1998/2001 – easily enough. And there is analysis with network math of synchronized change in ocean and atmopheric indices. The nature of data emerging from Earth’s spatio-temporal chaos is regimes and shifts. It sums to change over a millennia at least.
e.g. https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00003.1
“What defines a climate change as abrupt? Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause. Chaotic processes in the climate system may allow the cause of such an abrupt climate change to be undetectably small.” NAS 2002
Chaos theory suggests that the system is pushed by greenhouse gas changes and warming – as well as solar intensity and Earth orbital eccentricities – past a threshold at which stage the components start to interact chaotically in multiple and changing negative and positive feedbacks – as tremendous energies cascade through powerful subsystems. Some of these changes have a regularity within broad limits and the planet responds with a broad regularity in changes of ice, cloud, Atlantic thermohaline circulation and ocean and atmospheric circulation.
This paradigm is data driven and not theoretical. As seen in the 1300 year Nilometer record I showed above. But it is the behavior of the broad class of complex dynamical systems. In the Earth flow field there are step changes in ocean and atmospheric circulation that model’s cannot hope to simulate as yet.
e.g. https://www.geomar.de/en/news/article/klimavorhersagen-ueber-mehrere-jahre-moeglich/
“Since “panta rhei” was pronounced by Heraclitus, hydrology and the objects it studies, such as rivers and lakes, have offered grounds to observe and understand change and flux. Change occurs on all time scales, from minute to geological, but our limited senses and life span, as well as the short time window of instrumental observations, restrict our perception to the most apparent daily to yearly variations. As a result, our typical modelling practices assume that natural changes are just a short-term “noise” superimposed on the daily and annual cycles in a scene that is static and invariant in the long run. According to this perception, only an exceptional and extraordinary forcing can produce a long-term change. The hydrologist H.E. Hurst, studying the long flow records of the Nile and other geophysical time series, was the first to observe a natural behaviour, named after him, related to multi-scale change, as well as its implications in engineering designs. Essentially, this behaviour manifests that long-term changes are much more frequent and intense than commonly perceived and, simultaneously, that the future states are much more uncertain and unpredictable on long time horizons than implied by standard approaches. Surprisingly, however, the implications of multi-scale change have not been assimilated in geophysical sciences. A change of perspective is thus needed, in which change and uncertainty are essential parts.” https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02626667.2013.804626
I take it from your denial of climate shifts that you are unfamiliar with these ideas?
… whoops … 1976/77 great Pacific climate shift…
“I take it from your denial of climate shifts”
I’m a sKeptic. But especially of the supposed 1999-2002 change. I responded above to your comment with Tsonis’ 2009 graph, but it is in moderation. The source is linked there, but here is the updated graph, where I have widened the slope lines:
https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/www.moyhu.org/2018/05/tsonis.png
It is of course fairly dodgy to impose a linear trend on a short record with such variability. Note the 2 sigma limits.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/hadcrut.png
The regime is not over – at least not demonstrably. The surface record at the end contains an ENSO artifact – and also a drought artifact. And if a wood for dimwits graph is all you have it’s a bit sad.
“We find that in those cases where the synchronous state was followed by a steady increase in the coupling strength between the indices, the synchronous state was destroyed, after which a new climate state emerged. These shifts are associated with significant changes in global temperature trend and in ENSO variability. The latest such event is known as the great climate shift of the 1970s.” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2007GL030288
ENSO and shifts in hydroclimates is where I started. The big question is where it goes next.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/vance2012-antartica-law-dome-ice-core-salt-content.jpg
More salt in the Law Dome ice core is La Nina and rain in Australia.
“And if a wood for dimwits graph is all you have it’s a bit sad.”
I naturally prefer the Moyhu facility for most things. But it doesn’t do multiple regression fragments. WFT gets it right, and shows on the graph what was done.
“Please read the notes on things to beware of – and in particular on the problems with short, cherry-picked trends. Remember that the signals we are dealing with are very, very noisy, and it’s easy to get misled – or worse still, to mislead others.”
Nonetheless – here’s a graph.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/uah6/from:1997/plot/uah6/from:1997/trend/plot/rss/from:1997/plot/rss/from:1997/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1997/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1997/trend
It just doesn’t mean much without a sophisticated scientific context. It does not address the core ideas.
“In 1963, Lorenz published his seminal paper on ‘Deterministic non-periodic flow’, which was to change the course of weather and climate prediction profoundly over the following decades and to embed the theory of chaos at the heart of meteorology. Indeed, it could be said that his view of the atmosphere (and subsequently also the oceans) as a chaotic system has coloured our thinking of the predictability of weather and subsequently climate from thereon.” Julia Slingo and Tim Palmer
And I think it is more clearly seen in the Claus Wolter MEI – atmospheric temp is a secondary effect subject to many influences and with not entirely consistent data.
Robert I Ellison: The trajectories of model solutions do depend on initial conditions.
The trajectories of model solutions are computational outputs that you purport to eschew. They are numerical integrals of systems that are generally not “integrable”.
Robert I Ellison: Nick contradicts a dozen or so of the best known names in the field – that I have cited just here – and it doesn’t seem to phase him.
What propositions, quoted exactly, did Nick Stokes contradict, and where (or how), quoted exactly, did he contradict them?
Matthew’s comments frequently have a level of abstraction that sums to gobblebegook.
The point is not the obvious nonlinearity of any particular solution – but that each model solution space contains many 1000’s of plausible solutions due to initial differences and nonlinear evolution of trajectories.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/rowlands-2012.jpg
RIE, that plot is not just from initial perturbations. The model is also perturbed and the divergence is due to that. If you just perturb initial conditions and keep the model the same the trajectories remain constrained by the forcing. E.g.
http://www.cesm.ucar.edu/projects/community-projects/LENS/images/Figure1.gif
I realize you don’t read science Jimmy – but that is no excuse for making things up.
Do you even know where the graph comes from?
It is from the LENS project, also discussed here.
https://judithcurry.com/2016/10/05/lorenz-validated/
Yes I know Jimmy. The result is engineered to produce small perturbations in the solution space. The unrealistic initial differences were in the order of 1^-15 K.
Plausible initial differences in the real world are many, many orders of magnitude greater.
RIE, if you look at the article there are some very large local differences in multidecadal trends, and that is the point. These solutions are widely varying on local scales. The perturbations grow to their full size in a few years. After that it doesn’t matter what the initial size was, that’s as much natural variability as you can get with the given forcing. Forcing is a major constraint.
Again this is made up stuff Jimmy – that you manage to convince yourself of but not anyone else.
I pointed you to the study and you still think it’s made up.
No Jimmy – I know what they did. They used sensitivity to minute initial conditions to evolve a solution space with very small bounds.
More realistic experiments have been done.
e
… more realistic experiments have been done.
e.g. https://www.nature.com/articles/ngeo1430
But reality is not a prominent feature of Jimmy’s agnotology.
You clearly don’t understand. What perturbation do you think you need? If you take their ensemble after a year those perturbations are already many degrees locally, so how is that going to evolve differently from starting with large perturbations? Think it through.
Once again, that Nature paper perturbed the physics in their ensemble, the LENS ensemble kept the model the same and only perturbed initial atmospheric conditions. This is a major difference, and it shows that under natural variability alone, the solutions don’t diverge and are constrained by the forcing. Where there is divergence as in the Nature case, it comes from model differences. It is good to be able isolate model differences from purely initial condition differences.
more realistic experiments have been done.
I don’t think so, you linked to a model experiment, we know none of those worked.
Perturbed physics ensemble is a generic term for a solution space derived from slightly different starting points in a single model.
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/roypta/369/1956/4751/F8.medium.gif
“Schematic of ensemble prediction system on seasonal to decadal time scales based on figure 1, showing (a) the impact of model biases and (b) a changing climate. The uncertainty in the model forecasts arises from both initial condition uncertainty and model uncertainty.”
Both LENS – minute initial differences – and Rowlands – more realistic differences – are perturbed physics ensembles – as opposed to the opportunistic ensembles of the IPCC.
RIE, LENS is NOT a perturbed physics ensemble. It is an initial condition ensemble. Also you don’t seem to understand how growth rates work in Lorenz type systems. Lorenz showed you can use the absolute minimum initial perturbation and it divergences to differences only limited by the size of the phase space, and only at that point it stops diverging. In the LENS experiment, they looked at this and it was within a year that the phase space was well sampled. At the end of 180 years the variability is about the same as at 1-2 years, not diverging because that is the size of the natural variability phase space.
Perturbed physics ensemble is a generic term for a solution space derived from slightly different starting points in a single model.
Natural climate cycles is a generic term for repeating cycles that are slightly different with slightly different starting points and slightly different ending points and slightly different periods of each phase in the cycles.
“A perturbed physics ensemble (PPE) is an ensemble of model runs from different model variants, produced by varying the values of parameters in a given climate model configuration.” http://ukclimateprojections.metoffice.gov.uk/23251
Jimmy fails to understand even the basics and substitutes made up stories. Nor is he even remotely cognizant of nonlinear dynamics of models.
Even they are explaining to you what perturbed physics is. You copy the words and don’t comprehend them. They vary the model, not the initial conditions. LENS varies the initial conditions, not the model. See the difference? Do you know the difference between initial conditions and the model? This is so hopeless.
… varying the values of parameters in a given climate model configuration…
How does he not understand? Is it nuts or is it deliberate prevarication.
RIE, do you know the difference between model parameters and initial conditions? Or how about the difference between parameters and variables in general?
Climate models do not match real data. It really does not matter what the models project or what anyone thinks of the models or model output. Wrong is wrong!
Models do not match real data. Models are worse than useless. They lead people down a wrong path.
A parameter is a measurable factor forming one of a set that defines a system. Perturbed physics ensembles are also called perturbed parameter ensembles. Small differences in the initial – and boundary – values of climate parameters (indistinguishable within sampling uncertainty) amplify with time at an exponential rate. (McWilliams 2007)
“Perturbed physics ensembles form a major scientific focus of the whole project, especially using the coupled model. Modern climate models do a good job of simulating many large-scale features of present-day climate. However, these models contain large numbers of adjustable parameters which are known, individually, to have a significant impact on simulated climate. While many of these are well constrained by observations, there are many which do not directly relate to observed quantities and are subject to considerable uncertainty as they are obtained in a trial-and-error way, trying to best match observations.
We do not know the extent to which different choices of parameter-settings may provide equally realistic simulations of 20th century climate but different forecasts for the 21st century. The most thorough way to investigate this uncertainty is to run a massive ensemble experiment in which each relevant parameter combination is investigated. Thus the perturbed physics ensemble is a central feature of the climateprediction.net project.”
The structure of the model does not change – simply parameter values within sampling limits that result in exponentially increasing uncertainty in forecasts over time.
e.g. https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/bitstream/handle/10871/9287/Broad%20range%20of%202050%20warming%20from%20an%20observationally%20constrained%20large%20climate%20model%20ensemble.pdf?sequence=2
RIE, if you now realize that changing a parameter in the physics is what they were doing, you are halfway to understanding what LENS didn’t do, which is that. They kept all the parameters the same and just changed the initial values of variables. See the difference yet?
We do not know the extent to which different choices of parameter-settings may provide equally realistic simulations of 20th century climate but different forecasts for the 21st century.
We know that the different choices of parameters have provided no realistic simulations of the 20th century and therefore not likely for the 21st century.
Wrong causes wrong.
The varied the starting point of temperature in the Community Climate System Model by 1E-15 K. The objective was to engineer an uncertainty envelope of +/- 0.2K in 100 years. It has no meaning beyond this and sank almost without a trace. In terms of parameter uncertainty – nearly as unreal as Jimmy.
That wasn’t the objective which you made up. It was to see what range it settles to and that was what it was. This follows from Lorenz’s growth rates of errors. He tells you that the size of the attractor is NOT dependent on the size of the initial perturbation, so what you see there is the size of the attractor, and this is no larger than an El Nino. Also the earth’s state traverses much of the attractor in an ENSO cycle of a few years, so 180 years is enough for each member to have many orbits to sample that space.
What they say about the initial perturbation is this “After initial condition memory is lost, which occurs within weeks in the atmosphere, each ensemble member evolves chaotically, affected by atmospheric circulation fluctuations characteristic of a random, stochastic process (e.g., Lorenz 1963; Deser et al. 2012b).”
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/BAMS-D-13-00255.1
“Lorenz was able to show that even for a simple set of nonlinear equations (1.1), the evolution of the solution could be changed by minute perturbations to the initial conditions, in other words, beyond a certain forecast lead time, there is no longer a single, deterministic solution and hence all forecasts must be treated as probabilistic. The fractionally dimensioned space occupied by the trajectories of the solutions of these nonlinear equations became known as the Lorenz attractor (figure 1), which suggests that nonlinear systems, such as the atmosphere, may exhibit regime-like structures that are, although fully deterministic, subject to abrupt and seemingly random change.” julia Slingo and Tim Palmer
With realistic estimates of parameter observational uncertainty – not 1E-15 K – model uncertainty is larger than the range of IPCC opportunistic ensembles.
“Unlike perturbed physics ensembles (e.g., Murphy et al. 2004) or multimodel ensembles of opportunity (e.g., CMIP5), all 30 CESM-LE members use the same model and the same external forcing. Each CESM-LE ensemble member has a unique climate trajectory because of small round-off level differences in their atmospheric initial conditions. Simply put, the CESM-LE ensemble spread results from internally generated climate variability alone.”
CESM use the same model and minute perturbations to manufacture a model state space that was predetermined. Classic circular thinking that appeals to Jimmy’s tribal bias. Rowland et al use the HadCM3L model and realistic estimates of parameter precision to find that model uncertainty is even greater than the IPCC range.
RIE, you don’t want to see that it already stopped growing in the first year, and the other 179 years just shows the attractor size and the slow common forcing change which dominates all the members. Chaos is bounded by the available energy which acts as a constraint on the attractor size. The regional trend variation is very large, as they show in Figure 6. Only the global trend averages out due to the forcing that constrains the mean temperature. Only you are surprised by this result.
I don’t know Jimmy – my eyesight isn’t that good. I prefer the other ensemble – that continues to exponentially diverge over time in accordance with theory. It is easier on my eyes.
The real atmosphere behaves more like constant physics so that’s the LENS result. Your other paper mimics a model ensemble spread, not natural internal variability at constant physics. Growth rates are only a few hours so it only takes days for even those small perturbations to become weather-scale differences.
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/MWR-D-14-00140.1
I am gratified that you are at last citing literature – if making the wrong connections.
“In science, e-folding is the time interval in which an exponentially growing quantity increases by a factor of e; it is the base-e analog of doubling time. … The process of evolving to equilibrium is often characterized by a time scale called the e-folding time, τ.”
The model continues to diverge exponentially – albeit at lower rates. It is fundamentally different to model uncertainty. That depends on how well the set of system defining parameters is known – i.e. the size of the uncertainty bars on forcing and feedback. If it were all known precisely and grid sizes were very much smaller and all of the factors could be exactly numerically defined – things would be perfect.
At even the longer growth time scales of 12 hours, it is still only a few weeks before it would saturate, and that is what they say in the paper, as I quoted before. You seem to think it is centuries for some reason that has no basis in fact.
Jimmy seems to imagine that the e-folding time of a fine scale atmospheric model is the same as a large scale climate model.
Here is the evolution of model uncertainty.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/rowlands-2012-add.png
The thick black line is mine.
It is the e-folding time in the atmosphere and by the time it is 12 hours any model resolves those scales. This is also what limits weather predictability to a few weeks at best. It is known as the butterfly effect because those only need to be small initial perturbations and they change the weather a few weeks later (Lorenz). RIE acts like these time scales are all new to him.
“The growth of small-amplitude, spatially uncorrelated perturbations has been studied in a weather forecast of a 4-day period in the summer of 2007, using a large domain covering Europe and the eastern Atlantic and with explicitly resolved deep convection. ”
It is of course a weather forecast diverging from reality over a few days. Uncertainty in climate models evolves over decades. As is shown in the HadCM3L perturbed physics ensemble. This would seem to be unmistakably there in blue, black and white. Yet somehow Jimmy is able to deny it – with the usual prevarication.
You have already conceded below that chaos is self-canceling white noise and is basically the size of the ENSO even when you run models hundreds of years. However conflating chaos with physics ensemble spread is your remaining error. Nature has one physics, not a spread of them. Follow?
You are not very good at irony Jimmy and you can’t distinguish between climate and models.
Climate data is very imprecise and this is a source of exponentially increasing uncertainty in models over the simulation period. It’s clearly there in the HadCM3L ensemble. Your eyes must be worse than mine.
RIE, chaos and uncertainty are different things and you just conflate them. HadCM3L shows uncertainty from models and LENS shows chaos on its own. Chaos does not have an unbounded spread because of the attractor (see Lorenz), but uncertainty does because no model is perfect. People who want to attribute climate change to chaos don’t even consider the changing energy balance because chaos models are too simple to include that, but the forcing is a first-order factor in the energy change seen already.
Nick Stokes: I think it is a bad idea to pin the case against on chaos.
I agree.
Nothing presented so far with respect to chaotic modeling of climate or particular processes has helped to elucidate the potential role of CO2 in warming since 1880 or so; or whether the observed warming has been harmful or beneficial on the whole; or whether reducing CO2 emissions can reduce future warming; or whether some or all of sea level rise is due to anthropogenic greenhouse gases; or any of the other questions of practical or theoretical interest.
As to step changes, you can get step changes in the measured outputs of a high-dimensional dissipative dynamical system with constant input yet without any changes in the system parameters. As before, I present the book Modern Thermodynamics by Kondepudi and Prigogine for experimental and computational examples.
Among the chaotic processes not completely computable is the airflow over an airplane wing; without knowing the potentially but not yet computable flow details, wing designers have put devices like upturned wingtips and other things that you can see from the airplane window to smooth the airflow and reduce drag. Even the highly functional ailerons and flaps have been developed without complete or accurate solutions of the governing equations. Unlike the case with airplane wings, no one can literally experiment with the effects of CO2 on climate, but we observe the results of an uncontrolled experiment.
For another example, consider the role of experiments with anti-retroviral medications in elucidating the role of HIV in AIDS; the differential equations did not describe the flow of the viral particles in any great detail, and made no allowance for the differing distributions of the viruses in different people; yet they quantitatively showed that the appearance of AIDS depended on viral load, and that without the anti-retrovirals the virus reproduced extremely rapidly.
The inability to perform controlled experiments on the whole climate system is the fundamental impediment to answering the questions.
I note that your post stimulated a lot of responses. As of my posting this, they do not address the limitations of the developments of the chaotic theories applied to climate.
Reprise, about this: I think the proposition that climate change occurs in shifts is not something that meteorologists, solar physicists etc would agree about. Apparent shifts in the times series of measurements can be identified statistically even in the absence of actual changes in inputs or parameters; therefore, identified “shifts” do not imply changes in the dynamics. As far as I can tell, no one here has yet taken an interest in the book by K & P that I have often referenced. It’s a pity. The phenomena are described in lots of books and articles, but K & P directly references thermodynamics, and has a gentle introduction in relatively “low” dimensional “high dimensional” dissipative systems. With all due respect to Robert I Ellison’s usually interesting posts and references, K & P present a clearer exposition of some of the main ideas that Dr Ellison presents.
I have a Masters degree – and prefer data to waffling on about high dimensional dissipative systems.
But I am sure the intent is much less ambitious – simply to define the fundamental mode of climate variability. Stable equilibrium, purely periodic or something more real.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2016/01/ghil-e1519934086457.png
Robert I Ellison: I have a Masters degree – and prefer data to waffling on about high dimensional dissipative systems.
I would not use the word “waffling”, but most of your posts are about chaos in high dimensional nonlinear dissipative systems.
The one that begins with this, for example: The trajectories of model solutions do depend on initial conditions.
And this: “Lorenz was able to show that even for a simple set of nonlinear equations (1.1), the evolution of the solution could be changed by minute perturbations to the initial conditions,
To continue another of my themes, Lorenz was among many who did not show that their model equations accurately described anything in the climate.
And this: “We find that in those cases where the synchronous state was followed by a steady increase in the coupling strength between the indices, the synchronous state was destroyed, after which a new climate state emerged.
And this: “Atmospheric and oceanic computational simulation models often successfully depict chaotic space–time patterns, flow phenomena, dynamical balances, and equilibrium distributions that mimic nature.
And this: Anastasios Tsonis, of the Atmospheric Sciences Group at University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, and colleagues used a mathematical network approach to analyse abrupt climate change on decadal timescales.
Sure, Tsonis et al used data, to select which of a bunch of models, some including statistically estimable break points, fit the extant data best. Statistical models include models for the “noise”, and they excluded noise models with long periods in their spectral decompositions. And they did not demonstrate any relevance to the questions of CO2 and temperature increase.
Everybody here has education and experience. I have a PhD degree in statistics. My thesis topic was “Nonlinear Covariance Structures of Brainstem Auditory Evoked Potentials” for which I explored a variety of specific kinds of departures of time series from the usual stationarity assumptions. But what matters here is what you write here. I would not doubt your reports of the Hurst coefficients of the record of Nile flows, but I do point out that they don’t have anything to do with whether a process independent of CO2 has caused the warming since the late 19th century; or whether the increase of global mean atmospheric temperature has increased the energy transfers of tropical cyclonic storms; or how much of current warming has been the result of land use changes; or any of the important practical questions addressed in the CO2-Temperature-Policy debates. Nor have you ever shown that they do.
Robert I Ellison: I have a Masters degree – and prefer data to waffling on about high dimensional dissipative systems.
I have not noticed that to be true. I would enjoy some good discussions about the data that shows it snows more in warm times and it gets cold after that. Ice ages occur after warm times with more IR out that was released when the ice was produced. Simple stuff that is from the data.
I was trained in engineering – a hydrology specialization – and environmental science. Not relevant as such – I was correcting a misapprehension by Matthew.
But I find your reduction of the dynamical complexity
of the system to a simple narrative about ice dynamics to be not all that compelling or interesting.
But I find your reduction of the dynamical complexity of the system to a simple narrative about ice dynamics to be not all that compelling or interesting.
Right, you reject any simple theory. ice dynamics always correlates.
the dispute is if it the ice dynamics is all result of chaos and external influence or if the ice dynamics plays an important part.
The complicated answer is yours ice dynamics is a result of chaos and external influence.
The simple answer is that the ice dynamics is an important part of what has happened and is happening and will happen.
Robert I Ellison: Not relevant as such – I was correcting a misapprehension by Matthew.
So you say, but as always before you did not quote the “misapprehension”.
… that Dr Ellison presents.
Robert I. Ellison | May 31, 2018 at 6:35 am |
I have a Masters degree –
Robert I Ellison: Robert I. Ellison | May 31, 2018 at 6:35 am |
I have a Masters degree –
I apologize for my error.
Well Nick, I would disagree in that chaos has a strong consequence for climate models or indeed for CFD simulations. Since the adjoint diverges, there is no feasible to assess or control numerical errors. That does make the assessment of “accuracy” and “stability” virtually impossible and indeed if you try to find real validation for DDES calculations, you come up empty. There is some recent work in fact showing a lack of grid convergence. In that case, what do the calculations mean? That’s a serious question BTW.
Nick Stokes | May 30, 2018 at 10:03 pm | Reply
“I think it is a bad idea to pin the case against on chaos.”
Care to name a better one?
the proper definition of chaos is that solutions originally close together diverge rapidly in time. it means you can’t get a reproducible outcome from a known initial state,
Hmm, so many contradictions in one chaotic little paragraph.
“a reproducible outcome?” for instance.
If you want pink it only takes a few minutes.
And you can get it really really close every time.
“Hardware stores use a mechanical shaker, but it still takes minutes”.
“You want patches of red, initially close, to end up far apart.”
No you want them to average out in a confined space, not to the restaurant at the end of the universe.
It really would help if you used examples that actually matched your statements and knowledge.
“Care to name a better one?”
I’m on the blue team. Remember?
“Reproducible?”
The definition of chaos, much misused here, is that states that are very similar can end up in different places. State is a DE concept here, and means all the variables that define the state. Paint stirring is chaotic, because you don’t know which bit of red will end up where.
Of course, you don’t care. And that what goes wrong with the routine disparagement of chaos in climate. You don’t care there either. In paint, all that matters, if mixed properly, is the amount of red. In climate too, what matters is a subset of things that are unaffected by the chaos.
Still, paint stirring is a picture of chaos. You start with lumps of red, and you do want to create a flow which will take each little bit of red well away from its neighbors. If you do it with a stick, you can see it happening, with some difficulty.
“Entropy ≡ Uncertainty quantified”
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Demetris_Koutsoyiannis/publication/318226882_%27Panta_Rhei%27_and_its_relationship_with_uncertainty/links/595e153e0f7e9b1d9cde0719/Panta-Rhei-and-its-relationship-with-uncertainty.pdf
So I suppose that mixing is chaotic – and I guess that Nick is channeling fluid flow dynamics. So I suppose it is chaotic – but pink paint is an utterly trivial example.
But nor is the Lorenzian initial difference a factor in physical systems like Earth’s climate. Just in models.
Try this instead.
“What defines a climate change as abrupt? Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause. Chaotic processes in the climate system may allow the cause of such an abrupt climate change to be undetectably small.” https://www.nap.edu/read/10136/chapter/3#14
And it operates on scales from ocean oscillations to glacials and interglacials. Modulating – btw – the energy budget of the planet.
“But nor is the Lorenzian initial difference a factor in physical systems like Earth’s climate. Just in models.”
Of course it is a factor. What about that butterfly in Brazil?
You can test it by releasing two hydrogen balloons. They won’t stay together long.
You can have abrupt change without chaos; they are really unrelated. A multivibrator undergoes abrupt change, but there is no chaos.
Now you are just being objurate Nick. The butterfly is not real, balloons have no relevance except perhaps to chaos in the atmosphere, abrupt climate change – as the NAS said – is driven by chaotic processes – internal coupled mechanisms – and multivibrators are an example of synchronous chaos.
https://journals.aps.org/pre/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevE.50.1874
You are just not up to speed and substitute folksy parables pulled out of your arse for something – anything – in the way of actual science. It is getting a little repetitive and more than a little tedious.
What defines a climate change as abrupt? Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause.
That works for me. when oceans warm, sea ice thaws, that increases snowfall, ice builds up and spreads out causing colder. When oceans cool, sea ice forms, that decreases snowfall, ice depletes, and retreats and warming removes the sea ice. That is the results of the thermostat, the temperature that oceans freeze and thaw. That is not abrupt, that is as determined by simple physics.
There is no chaos in the atmosphere, it snows more when oceans are warm and thawed, it snows less when oceans are cold and frozen, that keeps climate bounded, there is no chaos in the natural cycles.
the power point slide:
The left side is fine
Right side:
Headline
The Climate Is Chaotic
Past led to Present, (I don’t have the symbol: does not equal) Future.
first statement too wordy
add: Scale: model view is 100 km, natural process at 100 meter to molecular.
I’ve changed my mind. Left side is not fine.
Headline
Climate Change is Linear
CO2 Raises Temperature
huh, agw does not believe the change is linear. nor that co2 is the only culprit.
take sea level change.. not predicted to be linear.
To the layperson an analogy to weather might help. As stated here previously, weather is mathematically modeled as a matrix of non-linear differential equations. Climate is those same equations except that some things that change slowly and are modeled as constants in weather prediction must be modeled as variables in climate prediction. It is therefore mathematically and scientifically illiterate to claim that weather is chaotic and climate is not. The issues with prediction of long term states is common to both.
AR4 acknowledges this in the famous quote acknowledging that the climate system is chaotic and long term prediction is not possible. It then states that new statistical methods must be developed. We should be debating the veracity of these methods.
It is the TAR – s14.2.2.2.
Judy
Historical hurricane paths give a good visual of chaotic weather.
e.g. NOAA’s figs
https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/news/historical-hurricanes/
https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.org/blog/analyze/analyze-seasonal-hurricane-costs-have-been-rising-sharply
http://costarica-invest.blogspot.com/2012/11/why-hurricanes-rarely-hit-costa-rica.html
hurricane paths are not climate.
climate would be the average number of hurricanes
the first… hard to predict.
the second.. judith makes a living predicting.
the first, weather and chaotic, sensitive to initial conditions.
the second, climate and not chaotic, bounded. if the water isnt warm enough no hurricanes.
Steven Mosher – Need also Hadley cell circulation. Look at hurricane tracks. At the equator you have warm water but very few hurricanes within 4 deg N/S.
The whole climate debate is just plain dumb. We don’t even know if the Medieval, Roman, and Minoan warm periods were warmer than today, and yet the consensus says that Mann’s hockey stick has handily dispatched those periods. If those periods were warmer than today’s then the argument that our climate is unprecedented and forced by CO2 is bogus.
Everywhere I’ve looked I’ve seen bad arguments put forward for why CO2 is causing this and CO2 is causing that. CO2 is causing nothing, and to imagine that it’s doing anything at all is a massive waste of time and energy. The entire debate is an abuse of radiative physics on a grand scale. CO2 raises the emission height and warms the planet because we count down using the lapse rate– right! And there’s swampland in Florida good for houses, too.
CO2 is not killing reefs. CO2 is not raising the oceans. CO2 is not heating the oceans. CO2 is not dissolving seashells. The more I learn, the more I see this as a colossal blunder. Future generations will use this as a prime example of how not to do science: don’t confuse causality or abuse causality in order to defend your paradigm. That’s exactly what’s happening with this pretend “science.” It’s not a science, it’s a shaky and uncertain paradigm pretending to be an irrefutable and incontrovertible science.
How to defeat Michael Mann? Just come our swinging and denounce the whole thing as junk science on a grand scale. People’s minds are made up anyhow, might as well tell the truth!
/end of venting
Don
“The whole climate debate is just plain dumb. We don’t even know if the Medieval, Roman, and Minoan warm periods were warmer than today, and yet the consensus says that Mann’s hockey stick has handily dispatched those periods. If those periods were warmer than today’s then the argument that our climate is unprecedented and forced by CO2 is bogus.”
Don, I am always concerned that there rarely sees to be any attempt to put modern climate (and extreme weather events) into its historical context. When it is, modern climate looks a lot less scary.
tonyb
I think there are a number examples of this being done. For example.
ATTP: so where exactly is the physics in that propaganda piece? It’s speculation. Do we know what caused the PETM? No, we do not.
Proof of causality? Or speculation parading around and serving as fear-mongering?
Show me the specific experiment that proves that an 800 ppm atmosphere will cause warming of a volume due to equipartition of internal energy. I’ve asked around and I’ll be damned if no one had ever shown me one when this would be simple to demonstrate. Instead I get hand-waving and allegations that I don’t understand and people telling me that this is beyond dispute, but not one single experiment. Strikes me as curious when this hypothesis is the basis of an entire branch of science.
800 ppm CO2 atmosphere.
“I’ve asked around and I’ll be damned if no one had ever shown me one when this would be simple to demonstrate.” – Don132
If no one has shown you and it is so simple to demonstrate CO2 has no affect on warming of the atmosphere, then by all means perform that simple demonstration, write it up, get it published in a journal and collect your Nobel Prize for debunking the whole sham! Seems like a golden opportunity for you to put everyone straight once and for all.
I’ll be damned if no “skeptic” has ever shown me this either when I have asked.
You will have many excuses why it’s not your responsibility to do this.
https://micro6500blog.wordpress.com/2016/12/01/observational-evidence-for-a-nonlinear-night-time-cooling-mechanism/
Show me the specific experiment that proves that an 800 ppm atmosphere will cause warming of a volume
800 parts per million is one molecule of CO2 for 1250 other molecules. Get that molecule really hot and share the energy with 1250 other molecules. If it makes a difference and does any warming, it will cause an increase in convection and promote the natural cooling that is enhanced by convection. Any result will not be measurable, no one would ever really know. Temperature has been regulated by natural processes forever, those processes have not stopped, those processes are self correcting and they will adjust for whatever happens to repeat the cycles of the past ten thousand years, the new normal. If CO2 can cause warming of a volume, that does not apply to our atmosphere, our volumes are not in greenhouses and they move up differently and around differently to make up for any imbalances. The warming of a constrained volume has no meaning unless you refer to the total atmosphere volume that is constrained by the surface and gravity.
Micro, your blog post does not appear to be from an experiment either. If you were able to create and control the conditions that produced the observed results, please elaborate on how you did that. Don would be interested.
The main chart with net radiation is measured data from a site in Australia, the ones without net radiation are from my home weather station. I see the nonlinear cooling most clear calm night cooling most mid latitudes would have a variant of that, where deserts cooling at the high cooling rate, and tropics cool mostly at the slow rate all night. You can use an ir thermometer to see how cold the sky is in the optical window, and it’s nearly the same difference between both cooling rates(measure cooling rates, and ir temps all night), but wideband ir shows a big drop of outgoing radiation when the cooling rate slows.
The same time relative humidity increases greatly.
Got to be the atm column cooling, wv condensing, supplementing the surface energy leaving.
Otherwise the temp would still be falling as fast all night, like the deserts do. That why they have such a wide daily range.
Tony B,
I agree with you that modern climate change (more correctly global warming) is not scary. However, I don’t agree “that there rarely seems to be any attempt to put modern climate (and extreme weather events) into its historical context.“. I think there are many attempts. You do it. Javier does it. Others here do it frequently. Professor Christopher Scotese has produce an excellent draft chapter for a forthcoming book which I linked in the second comment on this thread, and especially his Figure 15 which puts the present GMST in the context of the past 542 Ma.
Some Thoughts on Global Climate Change: The Transition for Icehouse to Hothouse Conditions https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275277369_Some_Thoughts_on_Global_Climate_Change_The_Transition_for_Icehouse_to_Hothouse_Conditions
I’d urge readers to read this chapter and consider the methodolgy, evidence and implications of the results carefully.
Peter
I was more relating this to Judith’s forthcoming efforts. She often asks for suggestions when being asked to make presentations to official and unofficial bodies and to the US govt. She rarely includes any historical data. that enables the overall context of historic context (in the Holocene especially) to be properly understood and being a proper scientist, when she does, it is hedged around with caveats
When Javier or myself make a presentation on historic climate change in these and other hallowed web pages, it holds little resonance with those elsewhere making policy decisions.
Meanwhile, those speaking of AGW make a clear and unequivocal case, and however wrong we may think them to be it is a message that resonates with policy makers.
tonyb
Reblogged this on Quaerere Propter Vērum.
Judith,
At the core is the inability of any researcher to date to distinguish between natural change and man-made change in any way that provides forecast ability.
Then, follows the reasons why. Your table gives some of the reasons why, but it does not clearly show the basic problem (of the science/observation).
The bigger problem has been the disproportionate policy response to uncertainty in the science.
Geoff
Judith
if that is an intended general public slide it seems rather complicated unless there has already been a series of slides that explain the concept. Have you explained what a ‘small wedge’ is?’
Are there any slides that explain our previous understanding that the current climate is by no means unprecedented? That is to say they just appear to happen randomly, or with some possible natural nudging
tonyb
Tony, I agree that the example slide is too complex for the general public.
Much of the consensus language used for public consumption is intellectually stepped down by marketers, from a PhD level to a grade school reading level, generally speaking, usually with added color for effect, or outright propaganda. The Left has always known how to market. I don’t give scientists like Mann credit for that, not their science; it came from political organization first and mostly. They’ve developed an audience that knows nothing about science, but are believers nonetheless, mostly coming from the power of marketing. There’s a strong argument for natural variability, but next to no organization or funding to deliver it.
Beyond content slides; I’m suspicious that the “conversations on climate change” debate is being sponsored by a law firm, with its stated focus billed around the divisive issue of what can and should be done to offset the effects of fossil fuels. The events preamble doesn’t suggest an invitation to a broader contextual discussion outside the bounds of the cultish status quo CAGWist perspective. Though these days a university sponsorship probably would have only invited a shout down. But Mann and company will certainly try to keep the debate reeled into their wheelhouse, maybe with the help of the moderator. Cynically I see the debate as a due diligence litmus exercise to ascertain perhaps certain legal strategies to thwart or navigate around future expert contrarian testimony that’s summoned to challenge climate science orthodoxy in a suit. So yea, I’m cynical, most everything one sees published about climate change is lathered with bias and exploited to full effect by pundits and the media.
I truly hope the “red team” approach in this debate is more tactical and punctuated rather than deep in the weeds academic. Metaphorically the other side will be pulling from their propagandistic weapons cache an arsenal of shiv’s just to make sure it’s unfair. I wouldn’t be surprised if the moderator facilitates an unbalanced battlefield, or the possibility that Mann and ilk are tipped to what the moderator is going to ask beforehand to enhance a squeeze play. If a presidential debate sees such tactics why would a low profile science debate be immune? The media will certainly be around to spin as they do. Sadly it’s the corrupt, deep state age we live in. Gee, I’m really, really cynical!
Regardless of the odds for a stacked deck, an anti orthodox climate science perspective would greatly benefit from using tactical political techniques to help it vault through droning topical lock-in traps that threaten to drain the energy from the room; specifically using pivoting techniques to shift into topics of choice to force a defensive stance on the opposition. Don’t let the warmist opposition mire the debate in talking point screeds; interrupt it, keep the opposition on their heels, off balance, defensive, with constant challenges to what should be expected from typical consensus ramblings.
While I’m sure the debate is for a reason other than a scientific expression for discovery, an honest intellectual pursuit of truth or ideas, it can still indeed be engaging and fun. I hope the debate for Dr. Curry is as fun as she suggests; she’s definitely not naïve to the gamesmanship we see so often, so hopefully it will be as fun for critically thinking spectators. I’m not hopelessly cynical!
If I’m being generous, then the distinction being suggested is simply confused. Clearly the system will tend towards a state in which the amount of energy coming in matches the amount of energy going out. It may never achieve this state, but it will typically be tending towards this state. There is also a limit to how far it can be from this state.
What largely defines this state are a few parameters (which have sometimes been regarded as the boundary conditions). These parameters are the amount of energy we get from the Sun, the amount that is reflected back into space, and the relationship between surface temperatures and the flux of energy into space (which is determined by the composition of the atmosphere – the greenhouse effect).
If all these parameters are fixed, then the chaotic nature of the system means that we can’t precisely determine how the system will evolve, but we can be pretty confident that it will remain reasonable close to this equilibrium state. If we perturb one of these parameters (by, for example, dumping CO2 into the atmosphere) then we will change the equilibrium state. The system will then tend towards this new state, but may do so in a complicated way because of the chaotic nature of the system.
If you want the chaotic nature to actually lead to long-term cooling/warming, then this would typically require changing one of these factors/parameters. One way this could happen is that some big change in some ocean circulation leads to a change in ice sheets which leads to a change in albedo and, hence, leads to long-term cooling/warming (depending on whether or not they grow, or retreat). In fact, Dansgaard-Oeschger events may be an example of this. However, it’s extremely unlikely that the chaotic nature – by itself – can be responsible for long-term cooling/warming. Also, we are currently in a state with relatively small ice sheets, so such a process may be less likely now than it would be if we had large ice sheets.
So, the key point I’m suggesting is that it’s not really CO2 versus chaos, but if you really want chaos to play a significant role in defining the long-term evolution, then you’re going to have to find some way for the chaotic nature to significantly influence the energy balance of the system. Just because the system is chaotic does not mean that we can’t say something about the typical state of the system.
“The idea that under the same external forcing conditions, the climate system is able to have several (statistical) equilibrium states is both fascinating and worrying: fascinating because the interaction of different positive and negative feedbacks can then lead to different large-scale reorganizations of the transport of heat (and other properties) over the globe; worrying because perturbations on the current equilibrium state can then unexpectedly cause transitions in large-scale transport properties, with potential disastrous changes in regional weather conditions. In this article, the development of the idea to explain peculiar climate changes using multiple equilibrium states is presented.” http://climatescience.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228620.001.0001/acrefore-9780190228620-e-85
I was saving this for a rainy day – but I think there is a confusion here. Chaos is not a mechanism but a term loosely defined by virtue of behaviors.
“The top-of-atmosphere (TOA) Earth radiation budget (ERB) is determined from the difference between how much energy is absorbed and emitted by the planet. Climate forcing results in an imbalance in the TOA radiation budget that has direct implications for global climate, but the large natural variability in the Earth’s radiation budget due to fluctuations in atmospheric and ocean dynamics complicates this picture.” https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10712-012-9175-1
So there are direct measurements of large changes in TOA power flux as a result of changes in ocean and atmosphere circulation – and this tends not to evolve smoothly but more closely resemble chaotic oscillators – regimes in the Earth system that while completely deterministic shift in ways that appear completely random.
As for how TOA power flux is modulated? I’d suggest it involves Rayleigh–Bénard convection.
“Marine stratocumulus cloud decks forming over dark, subtropical oceans are regarded as the reflectors of the atmosphere.1 The decks of low clouds 1000s of km in scale reflect back to space a significant portion of the direct solar radiation and therefore dramatically increase the local albedo of areas otherwise characterized by dark oceans below.2,3 This cloud system has been shown to have two stable states: open and closed cells. Closed cell cloud systems have high cloud fraction and are usually shallower, while open cells have low cloud fraction and form thicker clouds mostly over the convective cell walls and therefore have a smaller domain average albedo.4–6 Closed cells tend to be associated with the eastern part of the subtropical oceans, forming over cold water
(upwelling areas) and within a low, stable atmospheric marine boundary layer (MBL), while open cells tend to form over warmer water with a deeper MBL.” https://aip.scitation.org/doi/pdf/10.1063/1.4973593
I don’t really disagree with this. I would however just observe that chaotic systems are inherently very hard (perhaps impossible) to model accurately. As observed here and at ATTP by Holger, its really about the attractor and its properties. We don’t know much. That’s the problem here. Aside from things like energy balance methods (which depend on GCM’s for forcing estimates), we don’t have a lot of solid modeling evidence to help us.
My two cents:
The climate scare is built on three assumptions: fossil fuel is the only thing that makes carbon dioxide levels rise, carbon dioxide levels is the only thing that makes the earth warmer and this warmer world will be our death.
Carbon dioxide levels do increase as we burn fossil fuel but the main cause that we see levels going up is since the earth, and the ocean in particular, is warming. The so call Bern model that claims that carbon dioxide from fossil fuel stays in the atmosphere is wrong an this is easily shown so by looking at bomb-C14 or simply fossil fuel consumption over the last 200 years. Our contribution to the increased levels of carbon dioxide is minor.
Does carbon dioxide drive the climate? From 1850 to 1950 levels rose by aprx 40 ppm, from 1950 to present the change is aprx 100 ppm. If 40 ppm causes a change then 100 ppm should cause an even more dramatic change. Take a look at a glacier of choice with a long track record. In Europe you could pick Mer de Glace in Chamonix but I would guess that you will find the same in Alaska. Here is a graph of the extent of the glacier. How does the change correlate to the increase in carbon dioxide levels?
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-E0AwCZFsc7M/VbsaldtCIVI/AAAAAAAASog/RwDV2lcDIXA/s1600/merdeglace-010.png
Is a warming world a threat? When I talked to my wife’s grandmother some years ago she never mentioned the change in climate during the 20-centure. She was born in 1914 and lived for 102 years so she had a lot to say about the world but a change in one degree of the world global temperature never came up. I would guess that if you talk to someone in 2116 who was born in 2014 they would also have a lot of things to say but I doubt that a change in temperature will be on the top 10.000 list. The effect of a climate change is exaggerated to the degree of absurdity.
If people still are worried about a warming world one can point out that all epochs in modern era when the earth has been warmer than today (Minoan, Roman, Medieval) civilization has benefited. The cold eras are the one we could be worried about but with the technology we have today that is not a problem.
Still worried – well the only significant effect we have seen so far from increased carbon dioxide levels is a greener planet. What could possibly be wrong with that?
The scaremongers want us to decrease fossil fuel consumption at enormous costs to society. Even if we reduced fossil fuel consumption by 50% (which will of course never happen until people change their mind about nuclear), the effect of carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere will be small. This reduction in levels of carbon dioxide will only have a marginal effect on temperature. So all in all we would spend trillions of dollars unsuccessfully mitigating … something that is good.
That slide is very good. It’s hard to see how one can do much better in one slide.
Assuming that this is a public talk, the problem is that unfortunately the general public don’t really understand what chaotic systems are.
I would follow it up with a picture, perhaps of a turbulent water jet or a rising plume of smoke, or a weather map, and a question such as “What ’caused’ this plume to swing to the right here?” or “What ’caused’ it to rain today?”
too funny. Skeptics believe the climate is chaotic but they doubt the efficacy of the the c02 butterfly
It is climate chaos, but it leads to some astonishing regulative loops, which are not understood.
See how annual average absorbed incoming shortwave radiation is essentially the same for the two hemispheres in spite of a huge difference in their clear sky albedoes.
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00132.1
Therefore there is work to do for climate scientists beyond stressing uncertainty or being preoccupied with CO2.
There are hidden regularities in the climate system, which escape understanding, for their very theoretical bases are lacking.
There is no theory of irreproducible quasi stationary open non-equilibrium thermodynamic systems, of which wide class the terrestrial climate system is a member of.
However, other members of this class, unlike the climate system, would fit into a lab happily, but for some reason no one does such experiments.
So. It is better to do the work, than whining.
if there are hidden regularities, they are not hidden. cause you claim to know about them, hence not hidden
I do not know all of them, I am not an expert. But I know some, because it is published in the peer reviewed literature. With no meaningful follow up whatsoever.
A sad state of affairs.
It’s probably been said by someone above but nevertheless:
Model forecasts are valid / model forecasts are of unknown validity and thus not reliable forecasting tool
(the corollary of everything said)
Andy Lacis states: and ATTP channels
” This is because climate is a boundary value problem in physics, while weather is an initial value problem.”
“”Initial value problem vs boundary value problem
Posted on May 29, 2018 by …and Then There’s Physics “”
Both are wrong and both are trying to divert the conversation.
Climate and weather have the same boundary values and initial values. What is different is the different speeds of weather and climate over time,
It’s only wrong if you’re not willing to understand what is being highlighted. Clearly both weather and climate require initial values and boundary values. The point is that the initial values are crucial if you want to make a prediction about the weather, while the boundary values (or, maybe more correctly, the parameters that constrain the boundary conditions) are much more important if you want to understand climate.
You are quite right about the highlighting.
I am willing to understand what is being highlighted.
But they are of different subjects.
–
You can compare apples and oranges, both fruits, grow on trees and round but obviously different in color, taste and texture.
–
Initial values are crucial to both climate and weather, not just weather.
Boundary values are necessary and important for both climate and weather.
–
The difference is threefold.
–
Firstly for warmists any argument that however obliquely threatens the narrative has to be dismissed. How to dismiss the fact that weather after 3 days becomes difficult and then massively unpredictable after a week even with the same supercomputers we use to predict out centuries.
A glib argument but very hurtful.
Instead of explaining the reasons claim that they the information they are using just varies in importance because it just varies in importance.
–
The real reasons for the difference are firstly that weather is local and quick in time. In 24 hours you have a day night cycle with a temperature variance capable of up to 30 degrees. Local features, sea breezes, valleys mountains ocean currents highs lows and humidity variations. No wonder with trillions of variations possible the supercomputers get a trifle shell shocked by natural chaos.
Secondly Climate is a slow walk down summer and winter seasons for a couple of 100 years with a bit of solar variation and drift, ENSO, Volcanoes and clouds thrown in. It takes a year or two to replicate the slower paced large picture changes that can occur in 1 day of weather.
Chaos works more slowly as well with more massive data conglomerations to work with, but it is still there.
–
AGW is probably occurring to some extent with CO2 rise., The long time frame of climate changes is such that small acute changes can often be mistaken for a shift in the climate when actually no such change is occurring. To see such a change over 40 years and believe in it is akin to perceiving a pause in 20 years data and thinking it is real. Exactly the same magical thinking of wanting a belief to be true to the exclusion of all other possible causes.
Fundamental disagreement about climate change How can the fundamental disagreement about the causes of climate change be most effectively communicated? I am soliciting your input on how to convey this to the public on a single slide.
–
Arrrgh.
Climate change, CAGW, has only two features, a monotonous CO2 rise in the last 50 years and a fake news positive feedback mainly due to water vapor effects.
Perhaps a graph of the CO2 rise.
The normal temp response expected to a doubling over this time and the greatly exaggerated water vapor response simulation [and the RCP 8.5 scenario?] contrasted with the actual temp data to date over this time.
Similar to Christie’s graph but with the key difference of taking out the wide error band and multiple graphs and making a stark contrast between reality and expectation.
Use Christie’s comments along the lines of the great divergence between reality and climate change models currently show that the theory is quite wrong at the moment.
Judy – I strongly suspect that this is way too difficult for the public, who will simply glaze at the mention of such arcane mysteries as ‘forcings’ and ‘feedbacks’ and ‘energy balance’. Instead I would simply contrast the ‘plain English’ IPCC core opinions with the skeptical core opinions.
The IPCC core opinions:
• The AGW theory shows that observed global warming since the Industrial Revolution has been caused almost entirely by human activity (in particular our greenhouse gas emissions).
• The AGW theory/models show that the only possible explanation for the observed late-twentieth century global warming is that it was caused by human activity (in particular our greenhouse gas emissions).
• The AGW theory/models show that CO2 warming of the atmosphere (climate sensitivity) is relatively high.
The skeptical core opinions:
• The assumption in the AGW theory that natural climate variability had virtually no effect on global warming since the Industrial Revolution is wholly unrealistic.
• The assumption in the AGW theory/models that natural climate variability had virtually no effect on the late-twentieth century global warming is wholly unrealistic.
• The assumption of CO2 warming of the atmosphere (climate sensitivity) in the AGW theory/models is unrealistically high.
• Once realistic/likely values for natural climate variability and climate sensitivity are incorporated the certainties about dangerous man-made climate change disappear.
Reblogged this on Tallbloke's Talkshop and commented:
One for the communication specialists.
I fundamentally disagree with both.
NAO/AO noise is indirectly solar forced at daily-weekly scales. The leading atmospheric modes then drive the oceanic modes which function as powerful negative feedbacks with considerable overshoot. Such that low solar results in negative NAO/AO, driving a warm AMO, which then drives additional atmospheric negative feedbacks of reduced cloud cover, increased low-mid troposphere water vapour, and reduced CO2 uptake in the North Atlantic.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/association-between-sunspot-cycles-amo-ulric-lyons
Mann & Co have understood that the AMO was warm during the Maunder Minimum. Albeit based on TSI rather than solar wind.
‘Solar Forcing of Regional Climate Change During the Maunder Minimum’
“Modeled surface temperature changes
show alternating warm oceans and cold con-
tinents at NH mid-latitudes (Fig. 1), with
maximum amplitude in winter.”
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/5cbd/083da522a1164131bf592cd2d4b4a3157d42.pdf
Dr Curry… Great idea. I suggest you need a key or legend to translate all the “insider jargon” that will be “Greek” to normal people [the intended audience]: Forcing, Coupled, Spatio-temporal, Resonant [and others]….. Have an educated non-scientist read this and ask if there is anything they understood……
Obviously it is about defining the fundamental mode of climate variability – not discounting the radiative properties of greenhouse gases as such – but the slide can’t do it. You have seen the result. I’d go with something real – rather than stable equilibrium or purely periodic – but the abstractions are way beyond most people’s grasp.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2016/01/ghil-e1519934086457.png
I’d go with Koutsoyiannis’ structured random in the Nileometer data. Easily grasped, fascinating bit of history, instrumental data more than a millennia old – and the message is perpetual change regardless of anthropogenic CO2.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/nile-e1527722953992.jpg
I suggest an introductory slide before the slide in question to make two points. The first point is to emphasize that this is not yes or no for either choice but is a question of which is more likely. Making this a binary choice excludes all the nuances that make this a difficult policy issue. The second point is that it is much more likely that the external forcing from CO2 is a small effect relative to other processes that have controlled climate change before man’s impact. The small effect or “wedge” likely makes things a little warmer or a little less cooler but it is very unlikely that CO2 is a control knob that overwhelmingly controls climate. Then go to your slide that explains why you believe that is the case.
Judith,
The small effect of CO2 itself should not be in question. Then you can pitch the postulated amplifications from water vapor and clouds more clearly against the observed behavior. Therefore, science not settled at all.
When the history: “The Rise and Fall of Western Civilization” is written a couple of centuries hence, the writer will identify AGW and Climate Change as the policies that destroyed the western economies.
Yes!. It’s the economic impacts that are relevant – in simple language for the mob: “It’s the economy stupid!”
Climate chaos comes from fluid dynamics. You can turn chaos into order if you have exact analytical solutions to the Navier-Stokes equations. This mathematical problem remains unsolved for almost 200 years. Clay Mathematics Institute offers a million-dollar prize to anyone who can solve it. Here’s a description of the problem.
http://www.claymath.org/sites/default/files/navierstokes.pdf
Show it to anyone who claims they can predict long-term future climate states. Tell them to submit their solutions to Clay Mathematics Institute. Or else it’s fake physics
https://www.nuclear-power.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Navier-Stokes-Equations-definition.png
“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
I have read all the blog post comments and I barely understand a word.
But then I’m a layman, so my vote stays in my pocket, or goes with the person who communicates with me, in my language.
How many scientists are in the world Vs how many people with a secondary education only. I’ll wager it’s 20/80 at the very best. So why on earth speak to the 20% when they can’t possibly influence the outcome of the debate by more than 20%?
The job is not to convince the scientists at the debating table, Mann will never be convinced he’s wrong in a million years. Nor will any other scientist there, much as sceptical scientist’s will not be convinced the other way. So a 10/10 impasse, with 80% still persuaded by the simple rhetoric of the alarmists. OK there will be sceptics amongst the 80% but I’m not sub dividing that number as well.
The terrifyingly simple alarmist messages have set the tone and, so far, won the battle to spend taxpayers money on wasteful projects.
This is what matters to people, and politicians; what happens to our money and our environment. And on that subject there is an alarmingly simple illustration provided by Matt Ridley on the practicalities of renewable energy:
“If wind turbines were to supply all of that growth [2% annually, HotScot] but no more, how many would need to be built each year? The answer is nearly 350,000, since a two-megawatt turbine can produce about 0.005 terawatt-hours per annum. That’s one-and-a-half times as many as have been built in the world since governments started pouring consumer funds into this so-called industry in the early 2000s.
At a density of, very roughly, 50 acres per megawatt, typical for wind farms, that many turbines would require a land area [half the size of] the British Isles, including Ireland. Every year. If we kept this up for 50 years, we would have covered every square mile of a land area [half] the size of Russia with wind farms. Remember, this would be just to fulfil the new demand for energy, not to displace the vast existing supply of energy from fossil fuels, which currently supply 80 per cent of global energy needs. [para corrected from original.]”.
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/wind-still-making-zero-energy/
Or try the disarmingly simple TED talk given by a fanatical green, the late Dr. David McKay, who also demonstrates the futility of renewables by using beer mat arithmetic. Simple, illustrative, and understandable by the layman. Well worth 18 minutes of your life, he’s also quite amusing.
https://www.ted.com/talks/david_mackay_a_reality_check_on_renewables
This debate needs less science, not more.
Took me a little while, but I found the crucial error in this guy’s calculation.
World electrical energy demand is not rising at 2000 TW per year, which would be about 10%, it is more like 2%.
On the other hand, If the entire economy of the US was devoted to building wind turbines, we could supply the entire world’s electrical demand in one year.
Impossible, but a trillion dollars here a trillion there and soon the job is done.
And Texas and its off shore is big enough.
Bob Droege
Mackay was chief scientist ay the Department for energy and climate change in the UK.
Here is his book which if you have an interest in renewables I think you will find it fascinating
https://www.withouthotair.com/download.html
There are a considerable number of errata. Your error catch’ might be there. If not I would double check your calculations report back here and his work can be amended . Or was it Lomborgs work you were querying?
tonyb
Bob
Just checked the figure
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_consumption
An increase of 2000TW a year looks about right or a little on the high side but confused by the drop in coal energy. Are you suggesting it is about 200TW?
tonyb
I looked at your cite
“The energy consumption growth in the G20 slowed down to 2% in 2011, after the strong increase of 2010.”
Which is what I was talking about, electrical demand world wide about 20,000 TW, and increase of 2000 TW a year would be about 10 %.
And the first graph shows a 30000 TW increase in 50 years for total energy, so much less than 2000 TW a year.
Anyway, I used his numbers for power output per wind turbine and on the back of a napkin calculation found that Texas is big enough with a little off shore wind to produce the worlds electrical demand.
And if we did build 350,000 wind turbines a year, we would get their in 20 years, but that would be building 150% of the number we have now every year.
But looking at your cite, we spend 6 trillion a year world wide on energy, If we spent it all on renewables, we could decarbonize the world’s energy supplies. Faster than the Manhattan project built the first bomb.
And the trend is in the right direction, from this cite from 2015 to 2016, renewable energy investors spent less but got a bigger increase in output.
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/04/global-investment-in-renewables-fell-in-2016-but-thats-not-a-bad-sign/
Bob
I have long advocated an Apollo type project in which there is ten years of funding by member states in order to develop existing renewable technologies, develop new ones and to develop battery technology which is at present the Achilles heel of renewable energy.
The thought has not always gone down well either here or at wuwt.
Tonyb
bobdroege
Forgive me for my ignorance, but I assume you’re referring to Matt Ridley’s article.
He does say somewhere in it, from memory, that global demand is rising at 2% per year. Perhaps he cocked up his numbers with the 2000 TW?
Most counters to Lomborg’s works amount to “I don’t like the inferences he highlighted from the obvious implications of my work.”
“Or try the disarmingly simple TED talk given by a fanatical green, the late Dr. David McKay”
I don’t think it is fair to describe David McKay as having been a fanatical green. And, FWIW, he viewed the UK government policy response to anthropogenic warming / climate change as being pretty crazy.
Nic
I corresponded several times with Mckay. As you say he was quite rational about the absurdity of the UK AGW response as Chief Scientist at the UK’s DECC-mercifully now disbanded.
However he did once say that burning gas should be made a thermogenic crime, so fanatical -or at the least highly committed- is not that far off for some parts of his outlook
tonyb
niclewis
Agreed, but he does say in his TED talk that he is a green. Fanatical, perhaps not, but I seem to remember him saying he would rather we went down the path of mitigation rather than adaptation. Perhaps that’s just my interpretation.
“One of the real tragedies that totally distorted the debate over climate change was that it got tied into the solution in a way that if you accepted the first you had to accept the second. And I think that was profoundly wrong.” – Newt Gingrich.
Here’s a picture: https://www.dropbox.com/s/pr0apzitd16iymj/What%20Changed%3F.gif?dl=0
David MacKay, one of the worlds leading academics on the energy subject, tried for his 6 years as UK DECC Chief Scientist to explain this to government. They didn’t understand and preferred to impose an easy money for lobbyists fraud on the energy generation fact that makes each policy measure exensively worse than preferring the ultimately inevitable nuclear, as renewables are woefully inadequate energy sources to power a developed nation’s grid.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/03/idea-of-renewables-powering-uk-is-an-appalling-delusion-david-mackay?CMP=share_btn_fb
The point here is not climate change, but the climate change protection racket that is falsely claimed to be justified by it, which is technically flawed on the facts, no models are required or appropriate to prove this self evident truth, as we know the absolute facts and laws of physics that apply. Not enough and not when needed, a dollar short and a day late, is an absolute description of renewable energy for almost evrywhere except Norway and Parguay. And daft Pacific Islands t who believe they can go solar. No they cannot. Not enough sun, and more than ten times fossil or nuclear cost with storage included.
If the fraudulent subsidy money disappears so does the cash that fuels the climate rhetoric used to justify it, FALSELY. An support for the dodgy priesthood of climate modelling acdemics for hire, whose only question for theirmodelling grant is “what do you want it to prove?”.
Perhaps the most telling point is that academic computer models are like bookmaking or economics, they are not based on proven relationships in complex systems, they just guess based on some idea of history without understanding cause and effect.. So they are mostly wrong. In particular Mann’s tree rings don’t match actual history as recorded by humans in writing.
Such prophesies only guarantee a result for the booky, not for the punter, and can’t predict what will actually happen as real science must or be disproved.
David’s last video for Mark Lynas was more telling. He said two clear things anyone can get, having explained the reasons. he described the idea of powering the UK with renewables “an appalling delusion” and also the fundamental logic that (for the UK and most Northern countries where solar PV is weak and duty cycle is 11%, is pointless – but non real time solar thermal IS useful)
“If you can get through the winter (max load period), with nuclear (e.g. when there are insignificant renewables), you don’t need renewables”.
Just note that this is a cold winter/little aircon situation, so max load is when no solar and winter HIGHs occur. The situation is different where air con load matches peak solar, but nevertheless natural renewable energy is too weak/diffuse and variable, and massively inferior to nuclear once capable 24/7 fossil is off the grid and storage is required, which makes the joined up cost more than ten times greater. WEak and intermittent renewables are basically a parasite on capable fossil generation through the mechanism of the grid. And of no practical value without fossil to fulfill this function, unless you are off the grid, the grid being the best possible way to generate and distribute energy, islands and off grid the leat efficient and most expesnive. A fact’s a fact.
One more graph idea for the lay audience. Correlation. I rather like the top left showing the sensitivity of temperature in degrees Kelvin to Mauna Loa CO2 levels in ppm on the same absolute y axis scale – with Common suppressed zero. What happens when you use comparable scales. Supported by what happened when you overamplify temperature y to make 0.8 Dehrees look like a lot – still no clear correlation, both positive and negative, barely discernible. Made this using woodfortrees graphing tool on Hadcrut4 and Mauna Loa data. Underwhelming:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/5urty7nsazo1w3b/Correlation%20CO2%20and%20Temp%20Interglacial.jpg?dl=0
PS Just one more…. now want to plot what everyone else says the last thousand years looked like on the historical fact and also from GISP2 series against what Mann claims it was, using some disparate concatenated series and tree ring wangling. I believe what Mann denies remains the academic consensus on the factual climate history in the real world outside the climate modelling bubble, not what his adjusted data wrongly suggests. Can that nail him, and how a “modellers consensus” means compares to the broader consensus on natural facts of what really happened according to observers at the time, or the ice cores.
“For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled.” – Richard P. Feynman
Your Greenland chart doesn’t show the modern warming.
Just doesn’t, it ends about 1850 or so.
I know. So what? The intent is to show the lack of correlation. Job done. The Mauna Loa record vs HADCRUT4 handles the recent past best in that regard. No significant correlation there either.
Tacking Mann’s version of history onto the Interglacial temperature record has been done by various authors, here is one which is the most aggressive in his support. https://www.dropbox.com/s/iwlghkzum2o699j/Last%2010K%20Years%20Interglacial%2
0Temps%20from%20Greenland%20Ice%20Cores.jpg?dl=0
bobdroege
“Your Greenland chart doesn’t show the modern warming.
Just doesn’t, it ends about 1850 or so.”
Forgive me again, but I’m really bad at graphs, illustrative dyslexia or something I guess. Or I could just be thick. I favour the latter.
brianrlcatt produces graphs of 11,000 years (is that right?) and your criticism focusses on 168 years or so?
That doesn’t sound credible to this layman.
Yeah, job done by selecting your endpoints
If you put the last 6 years of GISS data on the graph you would see the GISS numbers have exceeded the peak on your graph of Feb 1998 some 14 times, so lately the correlation is stronger than your graph suggests.
And then Central England nor Greenland temperature series represent global temperatures.
Honest graphs show correlation, yours don’t, so yours are dishonest.
The same data also shows this when you look more carefully. This is a period in which 75% of the emissions have occurred and the CO2 forcing rate of change tripled and started to dominate, especially after 1980.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.35
brianrlcatt,
Excellent comment on the energy stuff. I couldn’t care less about the sciency stuff because any global warming we can get is beneficial, not dangerous and not damaging.
This opinion piece shows how we screwed up badly because of the anti- nuclear power protest movement: https://www.thegwpf.com/what-could-have-been-if-nuclear-power-deployment-had-not-been-disrupted/
I would like to include you in my nuclear energy and associated subjects mail list. You will know many of the names on it, it has a UK bias but has recipients around the world who are prominent in this debate on the facts of electrical energy delivery, your own IP and RA included, issues are focussed on delivery today, future sustainability at higher levels than today, and after fossil – and CO2 emissions, assuming they matter. It is limited, usually summary, there are some fairly busy politicians and journalists amongst the engineers and scientists. The thrust is always what works, engineering delivery fact based, infrequent, and I hope is useful to some of the people all of the time. I ask because I have a couple of new ones coming. The last just noted the AREVA EPR had gone critical in China. Another costed impact of getting URanium from seawater on final fuel rod cost, and David MacKay helped a longer one on the cost of making petrol from CO2 and H2O with nuclear power…. etc. Mostly not earth shattering, almost always pointing out the facts of what works and what cannot. Because there are no alternative laws of physics.
If YES, let me know please. FAR higher quality than most of the unknowing tweets you get! (CEng, CPhys, MBA, rtd.) brian.catt@physics,org
Thanks Brian. Please do add me. I’ve sent you an email.
Reblogged this on Climate Collections.
FWIW, here’s a notional image.
I think it goes to the conflicting views.
Radiative Forcing implies warming, regardless of dynamic fluctuation.
Dynamic Fluctuation implies climate change, regardless of radiative forcing.
https://i0.wp.com/turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/rf_df.png
I think RiHo08 had a good notion: Simplicity. You are not communicating with scientists, so you need to translate to lay-terms, and setup your counter-arguments.
Left side:
Head: The climate is well understood and Human-driven CO2 is the primary driver.
Points:
– We can safely ignore multiple warming periods
– Our adjustments to the data are not significant
– The uncertainty in historical temperatures for hundreds of years is not significant
– The variation in solar output is not significant
– The natural variation and randomness is not significant
– The repeated failures of our predictions is not significant
Right Side:
Head: the climate is complicated and heavily chaotic, and Co2 is one of many drivers
Points:
– Multiple warming periods absent CO2 need to be explained
– A large part of the observed warming is the result of adjustments
– Solar output is a large driver
– The effect of H2O levels is a significant driver
– The uncertainty is measurements over 200 years old makes firm conclusions difficult
– We cannot say with certainty that this warming is not just random noise
Agree that simplifying is the right approach.
The fundamental disagreement – outliers on both “sides” excepted – is how much warming would anthro CO2 produce and how damaging that would be.
The science says the initial amount of warming expected is high and there is good reason to believe current consensus is high as well.
The bigger fundamental disagreement is over what needs to be done. Those demanding radical action (such as trying to power the entire state of California with windmills and solar panels) will necessarily cling to outdated high estimates of warming while those demanding less radical action (such as switching from coal to natural gas) will be motivated to favor the lowest estimates.
The real question today: 30 years after James Hansen gave his presentation to Congress, what do we know?
-The estimates of warming are less than we thought. He used an ECS of 4.2, we have good reason to believe it’s half of that.
-Half of that is still worth addressing.
-26 years after the Rio Summit we know we aren’t going to tax our way out of the issue, or sign a global treaty that actually reduces emissions instead of moving them to China, or power modern economies with renewable energy, or continue to pretend nuclear is not the clear option if we’re serious.
Hi Judy – please see slides in my talk “Need for Robust Assessment of the Climate System”
https://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/ppt-139.pdf
Here is how I framed your two perspectives
“TWO DISTINCT HYPOTHESES
Hypothesis #1 The skill of initial value multi-decadal regional
predictions of changes in climate statistics provide an upper bound
on what is achievable using multi-decadal climate projections based
on external forcings from added CO2 and other human climate
forcings.
Hypothesis #2 Skill at projecting changes in regional climate statistics
emerges on time period beyond a decade when the external
forcings from added CO2 and other human climate forcings
dominate over natural variability and initial value conditions.
Testing of these two hypotheses must be accomplished using
hindcasts.”
You are welcome to use any of my slides if you feel useful. Mike Hulme’s view might be good for you to include in your materials. He wrote
1) “The overwhelming scientific evidence tells us that human greenhouse gas emissions are resulting in climate changes that cannot be explained by
natural causes. Climate change is real, we are causing it, and it is happening right now.”
or
2) “The overwhelming scientific evidence tells us that human greenhouse gas emissions, land use changes and aerosol pollution are all contributing to regional and global climate changes, which exacerbate the changes and
variability in climates brought about by natural causes. Because humans are contributing to climate change, it is happening now and in the future for a much more complex set of reasons than in previous human history.”
As Mike Hulme writes
”….these two different provocations – two different framings of climate
change – open up the possibility of very different forms of public and policy
engagement with the issue. They shape the response.”
Roger Sr
thanks roger
rpielke
Forgive a layman for making observations on your slides however, I have a little to offer in that I have been in sales and marketing for 35 years or so, from selling double glazing, to multi million pound IT systems.
Judith has the opportunity to sell a concept to a group of people, most of whom probably know very little about science. Michael Mann knows tons about science, but he’s not the subject of the proposition.
The operative term on almost every slide of your presentation is “So what?”
‘So what’ means, how does that affect my life, my wealth and my constituents welfare?
If you apply that question to every statement you make in your presentation and leave the answer unuttered, or left as a natural conclusion, or as an application of common sense, then the statement wasn’t worth making in the first place.
Every statement on that slide should end with an explicit answer, ideally a practical example of how it affects the observers, health, or wealth, or the environment, or the future of their grandchildren, something which gets it into a quantifiable, personal perspective.
e.g. Sea levels are rising, but not accelerating. “So what” [does that mean to me].
‘It means that even if they were accelerating, the lower parts of New York and London might be flooded in 150 years, but that gives us 150 years to move out. If sea level rise isn’t accelerating, we have 350 years to move out.’ (I have no idea of the numbers here which is probably obvious).
“But what about our grandchildren?” – “What about them?” (a variation of So What). If we stop building on flood plains now, and make sensible contingencies for sea level rise now, the threat will pass unnoticed.
~And just on that point, my understanding is that man was a nomadic species before becoming anchored to the land by agriculture. It’s our fault we’re getting flooded out, because we refuse to move, not the planet, and certainly not CO2~
The moral being, adaptation is the answer, not mitigating against a trace atmospheric gas we barely understand.
Now, marketing is a science itself. As a salesman, I was fortunate to be able to call upon that science to support my endeavours to convince someone to enter into a mutually beneficial proposition with me. The operative term being “mutually beneficial”. A sale isn’t a sale until the buyer is happy with his/her purchase 10 years down the line. Even if it’s a paper clip.
Sales is kind of a black art, but good sales comes with some basic ground rules. Questioning someone on their desires or ambitions for their purchase is vital. (There is a point to this, I promise). There’s no use selling a guy the pickup truck he thinks he wants, but can barely afford, when he needs a Nissan Leaf. To get to the objective, of selling him a car of any type is to question him mercilessly. Establish his needs and desires, isolate the two and overcome the objections to the Leaf by logic.
In Judith’s case, the objective is to question Michael Mann et al on their beliefs in AGW and overcome their objections to scepticism by simple layman’s logic. The questions must, of course, be open:
I KEEP six honest serving-men
(They taught me all I knew);
Their names are What and Why and When
And How and Where and Who.
I send them over land and sea,
I send them east and west;
But after they have worked for me,
I give them all a rest.
I let them rest from nine till five,
For I am busy then,
As well as breakfast, lunch, and tea,
For they are hungry men.
But different folk have different views;
I know a person small—
She keeps ten million serving-men,
Who get no rest at all!
She sends’em abroad on her own affairs,
From the second she opens her eyes—
One million Hows, two million Wheres,
And seven million Whys!
Rudyard Kipling.
The Elephant’s Child
But leave out ‘Why’, it invites questions of philosophy and belief.
The point of all this is that on this occasion, Judith is the layman’s advocate. Mann has been confronted by the science time and time again and has always wriggled free.
The illusion he sold over ten years ago is now unravelling because laymen don’t see change. The paper clip he sold us is busted and we’re not happy.
So he needs to be cornered on a practical level, and I’m only using him as a convenient example, it could be any alarmist we’re talking about here.
If a presentation is to be made, it must be with ‘So What?’ at the forefront.
If Mann is to be challenged, it must by by questioning, not by making statements.
You science guys ask questions every day of your lives. You encounter and deal with objections and failures every day of your lives. You overcome them all, or admit defeat and walk away.
You should be better at my job than I am, but you’re not, because you believe the answers lie in the science you know, only someone always knows more science than you do, and you all want to tell the world of your amazing discoveries.
But without wanting to be rude, how about listening to the world first. Question the people, and understand what they want. As a starter for 10, we don’t want scientific arguments ad nauseam, we want practical solutions.
I have, all my life, understood scientists to be my advocates. To investigate phenomenons on my behalf, because I’m too stupid to, and to report back to me, in my language with their results. Technology does that rather well by providing the telephone, TV, cars, clean cooking and heating, mobile phones, electric kettles etc.
Climate science doesn’t seem to be delivering any type of results to me. More to the point, it disguises that failure by layering the subject with unintelligible gobbledygook.
Please stop, ask the question ‘So What’.
HotScot
+100
The audience can be talked at, or talked to. To talk to them you must understand how they communicate, and what language they use.
A few years ago I met with a science communicator who won the Prime Ministers science award. She advised me that her role was critical as the vast majority of scientists are very poor communicators. Most assume that everybody thinks in their language.
Regards
HotScot,
As a fellow layman, I admit agreement with many of your thoughts. Climate change ranks very near the bottom on my list of concerns in a world that has always been brimming with hundreds, if not thousands, of more pressing threats to our safety and well-being. One friend of mine is battling cancer and another lost his life merely by slipping on some stairs.
On the other hand, I see great practical value in scientific endeavors to improve regional climate and weather forecasting on time scales ranging from a few minutes (is a tornado coming?) to a few decades (shall I plant a vineyard here?) Going much beyond that risks presumption.
Considering your point about humanity’s nomadic history, I’d add that if we can’t figure out how to adapt to slowly rising temperatures or get out of the way of slowly rising seas, we no longer deserve the label “Homo sapiens”. As a card-carrying member of that species, I choose not to live my life consumed with worry about such things.
HotScot
Dead right. “So what?” is the question that needs to be answered. That is the question that needs the attention.
The assertion that global warming is dangerous is nothing more than a supposition, or a belief. It is not supported by valid evidence. Even IPCC admits the evidence to support the damage functions used in the models that project the impacts of global warming are “sparse” – i.e. virtually baseless. [IPCC AR5 WG3 Chapter 3] https://judithcurry.com/2016/11/25/week-in-review-science-and-policy-edition-3/#comment-826500
Peter
excellent link. to your earlier article. Made sense, even to me.
👍
Hot Scot
I agree with you.
The difference between Mann and Hansen and people like Judith is that the former are activists who fervently believe in their cause and are determined to ‘sell’ it.
in contrast Judith is in effect querying how good the product is, that there might be some flaws to it, although there are probably good points to it also. But ultimately she is much more equivocal in her message with nothing tangible to sell, only doubt.
Now,. we might like that approach and see that it meets the motto of the royal society ‘Nobody’s word is final’ but the layman on the whole likes strong and clear messages, that are not hedged about with things that merely confuse the selling proposition.
tonyb
tonyb
I think the sceptical community have a lot to sell.
The planet has greened by 14% in the last 35 years. Global temperatures haven’t risen anything like IPCC predictions whilst CO2 has continued on a steady upward trend.
And I believe Judith is considered an expert on sea level rise, and sea levels rise has not accelerated as predicted, Mann would find it very difficult to take Judith on discussing that subject.
Severe weather events are not getting worse or more frequent, droughts and wildfires also remain much the same.
Peter Ridd, an expert on the Great Barrier Reef tells us it’s not bothered by climate change.
These are all confirmed by observation, not predictions, computer generated or otherwise.
There are powerful illustrative message there that resonate with the public because they are memorable and backed up by empirical science, not fantasy.
Nothing has happened in the last 40 years of dire predictions, and the older members of the public know that.
But of course to deliver the underlying observational science to them needs the MSM to start seeing it as well. They are no more informed about the subject than the general public so also need the sound bites like 97%.
Decouple the CO2 driven temperature myth by showing one clear, simple graph with the observational progress of both and it should be glaringly obvious to even journalists that CO2 has nothing to do with temperature.
Part of the problem is that I believe Judith is a ‘lukewarmer’ and believes man made CO2 has something to do with temperature rise, only not as much as the alarmists. In which case, judging by the non temperature rise over the last 100 years or so, the effect of man made CO2 is so inconsequential enough not to be worth bothering about.
But I don’t think that’s a position Judith will take because she want’s to be perceived as a rational scientist. The problem is, everyone thinks Mann is the rational scientist because of he says his piece loud and clear, with no doubts whatsoever.
Judith needs to equally robust in her conviction and demonstrate empirically that nothing has happened and Mann’s hockey stick graph is a misleading relic he won’t allow to be challenged by releasing his data for examination. That in itself is heretical irrespective of whether the data is his, or publicly owned and he should be shunned by all scientists.
I don’t understand why he’s even been invited to this debate.
Sorry, getting ranty but as I said, there is a lot for sceptics to sell, we just have to recognise it and know how to deliver it.
Everything else you say is absolutely correct.
RedHot HotScot.
😫😉
The IPCC’s Global Circulation Model, boundary-value’s based prediction for the 1st two decades of the 21st century is .2 ℃ per decade: 2001 thru 2020. ~2/1/2 years to go, the “decadalized” 21st-century rate of warming is .1899 ℃.
https://i.imgur.com/gn7efOK.png
Professor Curry has forecast it’s possible there will be an El Niño starting late 2018/early 2019. That would virtually assure hitting the .2 ℃ right between the eyes.
Oh, and the ENSO models were dead on when they predicted the last La Niña was about to die. She’s dead.
JCH
First off, I have no idea what you just tapped out on your PC, which rather makes my point. If scientists continue to talk in a language the vast majority of the earth population doesn’t understand, how on earth do you expect to communicate anything you say?
Secondly, whilst the generally accepted norm of a 30 year measurement of climate change is the globally accepted standard, how on earth do you imagine quoting a 20 year period would impress even an idiot like me?
Dr. Pielke,
That quote from Mike Hulme is a false dichotomy. The true opposite of human influence on climate is little or undetectable effect on global temperature. We should consider the position that we have not yet measured any statistically significant man-made effect on global climate. Everything we’ve seen since 1950 is also consistent with natural climate change. IPCC is merely attributing it to humans without enough empirical evidence. Models and theories are not empirical evidence. They are suggestive but not conclusive.
Here’s a landmark study by Christy et al claiming that the human attribution to global warming is invalid because once you remove natural factors such as ENSO, there is no warming left to explain. What do you think Dr. Pielke?
https://thsresearch.files.wordpress.com/2017/04/ef-data-research-report-second-editionfinal041717-1.pdf
Pingback: Fundamental disagreement about climate change — Climate Etc. – Finding Confluence
Judith
Use the term complex, not chaotic.
Chaotic to most folks implies out of control and that you know nothing about it.
Complex implies that you understand parts of the system.
Where I live the seasons, general weather patterns, temperatures etc all remain pretty constant.
Regards
You have set yourself an important and difficult task.
The word on the left side need little explanation, but those on the right “spatio-temporal chaotic”, “discrete shifts”, “equilibrium” need to be reduced to simpler language for the general public to hoist aboard. Assuming the general public is the audience, then the terms used need to be put into language commonly heard.
There is an analogy to be made in the failure of the intellectual economics establishment to predict 2008.
1) NeoClassical economists (i.e. establishment consensus) thought debt was irrelevant to economic growth and that GDP could soar indefinitely despite rising debt.
2) In fact, debt was HIGHLY coupled to the functioning of the economy, creating a rise in asset prices and more borrowing, a nonlinear feedback, that finally collapsed the entire system.
So, basically, the arrogance of the consensus thought they understood how the system worked, and they didn’t, and they were shown to be completely wrong and amateur because they failed to see the nonlinear coupling.
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/why-neoclassical-economics-doesnt-work-in-the-age-of-deleveraging-2012-1
Economics and climate have much in common.
“We present a generic phase diagram to explain the generation of dragon-kings and document their presence in six different examples (distribution of city sizes, distribution of acoustic emissions associated with material failure, distribution of velocity increments in hydrodynamic turbulence, distribution of financial drawdowns, distribution of the energies of epileptic seizures in humans and in model animals, distribution of the earthquake energies). We emphasize the importance of understanding dragon-kings as being often associated with a neighborhood of what can be called equivalently a phase transition, a bifurcation, a catastrophe (in the sense of Rene Thom), or a tipping point.” https://arxiv.org/abs/0907.4290
https://www.ted.com/talks/didier_sornette_how_we_can_predict_the_next_financial_crisis/up-next
The discussion is always predominately about the atmosphere. Very little about oceanic items. Perhaps someone can explain the anomalous cooling that has occurred in the tropical Atlantic driving nearly every Hurricane forecast down recently. How well do we really know the ocean and it’s climate impacts on the 30% of the planet we always focus on?
We always hear the shrill about climate hurting us, but yet there is no evidence of such to date. The attempt to say downpours are worse is about the only thing that had a chance, but the flood data disproves it on a global scale. Save your Ellicot city argument for someone who doesn’t know that has happened 15 times prior, and now has been exacerbated by paving over the forrests with impervious developments up stream of the downtown area which is in the middle of the basin drainage path.
Julia, I do not know how to advise you as to how to change you presentation to the general public but as for me I find some terms difficult to understand, such as: Forcing is amplified by positive feedbacks (primarily CO2) Thermal energy balance top of atmosphere Spatio-temporal chaotic resonant system As I understand it: one side believes that CO2 is the control knob to climate change and the other believes (as I) that the climate system is very complex and CO2, though it has some small insignificant effect, cannot presently be modeled to predict change. Hope that this is of some help. Sincerely, Doug Lyons
Judy, You really should add the field of computer science to the left panel.
At the rate technology is advancing the real debate will be can we trust the AI and ML results of modeling a fully coupled biosphere with all feedbacks? (include adding billions more people and gigatons of pollution)
http://www.brinknews.com/a-new-era-in-modeling-catastrophic-risk/
http://www.jupiterintel.com/
All hail the AI overlord.
JUDEA PEARL And DANA MACKENZIE
THE BOOK OF WHY: THE NEW SCIENCE OF CAUSE AND EFFECT
http://bayes.cs.ucla.edu/WHY/
I AM CONFLICTED. WHETHER FRANK ZAPPA – MOVING TO MONTANA SOON – OR KOUTSOTIANNIS IS THE MORE RELEVANT RESPONSE?
“Change is Nature’s style and occurs at all times and all time scales (i.e. Πάντα ῥεῖ). The frequent use of the term nonstationarity lately indicates that it is confused with change. However, change is not synonymous with nonstationarity: While change is a general notion applicable everywhere, including to the real (material) world, stationarity and nonstationarity apply only to models, not to the real world, and are defined within stochastics. The confusion about these terms extends also to the world of models, as several properties related to stochastic dependence of processes are often interpreted as nonstationarity. Nonstationary descriptions are justified only if the future can be predicted in deterministic terms, and are associated with reduction of uncertainty; however, misuse of nonstationarity results in underestimation of variability, uncertainty and risk. In the absence of credible predictions of the future, admitting stationarity (and larger uncertainty) provides a more consistent and more effective modelling option.”
Prof. Judea Pearl is one of the most cited researcher and scientist in the field of computer science.
“Prof. Pearl is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the Cognitive Science Society and a founding Fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence. In 2012, he won the Technion’s Harvey Prize and the ACM Alan Turing Award for the development of a calculus for probabilistic and causal reasoning. ”
https://scholar.google.gr/citations?user=OPA_BScAAAAJ&hl=en
His new book, “Why” has been hailed as revolutionary breakthrough in AI”
Recommended by:
Daniel Kahneman, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences and author of Thinking Fast and Slow.
Vint Cerf, Chief Internet Evangelist, Google, Inc.
Eric Horvitz, Technical Fellow and Director, Microsoft Research Labs
*I already have the new book… Amazing.
And Koutsoyiannis is chicken soup?
“Climate is ultimately complex. Complexity begs for reductionism. With reductionism, a puzzle is studied by way of its pieces. While this approach illuminates the climate system’s components, climate’s full picture remains elusive. Understanding the pieces does not ensure understanding the collection of pieces.” Marcia Wyatt
The left hand side is characterized by reductionism and simple cause and affect. The right hand side by control variables and ‘catastrophe’.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/bifurcations1.png
Good luck with that one AI overlord.
I would hope Prof. Koutsoyiannis, Marcia Wyatt & Prof. Curry will read Pearl’s new book; ‘Why’. I would like to hear their critique.
Speaking of AI, our real overlords (the globalist corporations) just bet 3.35 billion dollars on autonomous vehicles.
https://www.theverge.com/2018/5/31/17412716/gm-cruise-self-driving-car-softbank-investment
Something that won’t happen when the AI overlord takes over centralized economic planning.
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/71NgokAhNOL.jpg
http://www.lse.ac.uk/researchAndExpertise/units/mackinder/pdf/mackinder_Wrong%20Trousers.pdf
You cite a paper from a couple of economic researchers from 2007 that proposes seven partial solutions. If one thing is clear there has been a lot of investment in R&D already. For the rest of the ideas I haven’t seen any meaningful action from the market. I fully support their #7. The health of the biosphere is not an instrument.
1. Use silver buckshot;
2. Abandon universalism;
3. Devise trading schemes from the bottom up;
4. Deal with problems at the lowest possible levels of decision-making;
5. Invest in technology R&D;
6. Increase spending on adaptation;
7. Understand that successful climate policy does not necessarily focus instrumentally on the climate.
More ideas;
http://www.drawdown.org/solutions
I wasn’t citing the paper – although there are several documents that build on this base – I was wanting the AI overlord to build the pants.
“Negligent killing of scientific concepts: the stationarity case”
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02626667.2014.959959
Then I would add the statistical science community to the right. There are numerous critiques of shaky statistics in AGW climate science.
For a possible laugh you could add Democrats on the left and Republicans on the right.
To have any form of scientific validity each side needs to make predictions and then test them. The predictions can only be by mathematical models, how else can one make a scientific prediction in physics (which is what climate science is a subset of)?
Climate is chaotic, who could deny that? It’s built into the Navier -Stokes part of the physics before all the other stuff is loaded in.
The Left side of the dichotomy majors on an assertion that forcings have a net positive effect. Where’s the evidence? They can’t even model clouds which are quite significant in terms of reflecting energy back into space.
The right side of the dichotomy recognises the chaotic aspect of climate and is the only mathematically consistent side. No need for assumptions but unfortunately impossible to solve the equations so for example to derive coud behaviour.
The conclusion has to be outside of all the mathematical physics and green religion. Look at what has actually happened in terms of development of the world since the Inustrial Revolution. Ask the left side “When should we have stopped the Industrial Revolution and all its benefits, which is heavily CO2 dependent.
Ultimately look at the evolving balance of upsides vs downsides of Industrial development and fly a flag when stuff starts to hurt. I think we’ll have a long wait for that and it will be more related to peak oil than climate catastrophe.
son of mulder,
Excellent point.
Dr. Curry: I like this slide because while it is simple, it is also very technical. A lay audience cannot fully understand most of the concepts used, but this communicates the central fact, which is that the scientific debate is deeply scientific. This slide is a glimpse into the central science. You might even title or subtitle it “The scientific debate is deeply technical” or some such. Do not plan onexplaining the slide in detail.
Re the scientific communities listed at the bottom, I would preface each list with “many” because none is unanimously on either side. In fact I think Adm. Titley was Oceanographer of the Navy.
David
— a lay person cannot understand the technical etc etc.
What a lot of nonsense.
In 2007 Al Gore did a movie and speaking tour, he spoke simple English and kept it very simple, he may have exaggerated or made up some of the facts but they got the message right between the ears. He knew exactly how to connect.
No one has reversed that position since, or really made a dent.
Regards
Dr. Curry: A number of years ago I gave a series of five lectures at the Naval Research Laboratory, on the implications of chaos theory for science. The implications are far from simple, so even scientists will have trouble with the right hand column of this slide. The lawyers will be clueless. This is no reason not to use the concept of chaos, just expect a lot of confusion when you do.
What needs to be communicated is how scientifically deep the disagreement really is, something one would never guess from the press coverage, which is all most people see.
JC,
I think you pretty much nailed it. The only suggestion I have is that you should match up what is say on one side to the opposite opinion on the other side. For example:
20 & 21st century warming is caused by CO2
VS
20 & 21st century warming is caused by sun, other natural causes and CO2
I’ve seen this often on argument presentations us vs them
There are two columns like yours but the two views are in juxtaposition.
That helps make it easier to understand and decide. Since these are just bullet points one can’t really decide on anything but I’m understanding your just trying to frame the argument to spell out the division.
Change on the right is the result of small change in control variables and consequent ‘catastrophe’.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/bifurcations1.png
“What defines a climate change as abrupt? Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause. Chaotic processes in the climate system may allow the cause of such an abrupt climate change to be undetectably small.” NAS 2002
A double edged sword there.
The right side is definitely scarier. When climate is as unpredictable as the weather in two weeks than the ongoing climate change could be much larger than predicted by the IPCC.
That’s true Bernhard, but life is full of scary possibilities. Recent observational evidence suggests that in the near future we are not in danger of an apocalypse.
An argument from ignorance there.
“This pragmatic strategy centers on efforts to accelerate energy innovation, build resilience to extreme weather, and pursue no regrets pollution reduction measures — three efforts that each have their own diverse justifications independent of their benefits for climate mitigation and adaptation. As such, Climate Pragmatism offers a framework for renewed American leadership on climate change that’s effectiveness, paradoxically, does not depend on any agreement about climate science or the risks posed by uncontrolled greenhouse gases.” https://thebreakthrough.org/archive/climate_pragmatism_innovation
“Soil carbon (C) is a dynamic and integral part of the global C cycle. It has been a source of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) since the dawn of settled agriculture, depleting more than 320 billion metric tons (Pg) from the terrestrial pool, 78±12 Pg of which comes from soil. In comparison, approximately 292 Pg C have been emitted through fossil-fuel combustion since about 1750. However, terrestrial pools can act as a sink for as much as 50 parts per million of atmospheric CO2 for 100 to 150 years. The technical sink capacity of US soils is 0.288 Pg C per year; Earths terrestrial biosphere can act as a sink for up to 3.8 Pg C per year. The economic potential of C storage depends on its costs and cobenefits, such as global food security, water quality, and soil biodiversity. Therefore, optimally managing the soil C pool must be the basis of any strategy to improve and sustain agronomic production, especially in developing countries.” https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/60/9/708/238009
Wind turbines and solar panels are at best fragmentary responses to narrow obsessions with energy emissions. A comprehensive strategy addresses broader social, development and environmental concerns and builds prosperous and resilient communities.
“Recent observational evidence suggests that in the near future we are not in danger of an apocalypse.”
Black swans are not observed so observational evidence is not the right meter for apocalypses.
Past history suggests that on an earth scale a significant event occurs every 500,000 years. That could be tomorrow or in a million years as a rough boundary.
On an evolutionary scale 99% of species are no longer existent, scary stuff. Biological apocalypse could be in the next 10,000 years.
Human derived apocalypse could be happening right now with all those fingers on buttons. Certainly expected one or two wars to end all wars this century.
dpy6629
In fact, we are never in danger of an apocalypse. GMST was up to 13 C warmer than now and life survived. Abrupt cooling would be very bad for humanity and most life, but not warming.
The chaotic aspect of the climate system cannot be used credibly as the mother lode of explanation on a global basis. Chaos is confined largely to the transport of heat by convection, winds, and ocean currents from on location to another; it has little demonstrable effect upon the total heat content. Nor can resonance be found in the first-order equations of thermodynamics.
What distinguishes the scientifically informed skeptical view from the simplistic “CO2-control knob” advocacy is the recognition that unlike the planetary temperature seen from space, the critical surface temperature is governed primarily not by radiative effects, but by all the mechanisms of the hydrological cycle, as shown by the Bowen ratio of careful experiments world-wide. While strong changes can occur rapidly, “discrete shifts” resembling steps are obviated by strong thermal inertia of water.
Look at the evaporation and thermals. They account for -102 W/m^2. Doubling of CO2 gives +3.7 W/m^2. Fluid heat transport is just 27 times greater than man-made CO2. If fluid dynamics has little effect on total heat content, then CO2 is negligible
https://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/graphics/EarthsEnergyBalance.png
BTW I should also add the -77 W/m^2 from cloud albedo. Condensation is also part of fluid heat transport
Chaos is a word. As a scientific theory it is not rigorously defined. It is defined in terms of behaviors. Equivalently phase transition, bifurcation, catastrophe (in the sense of Rene Thom), a tipping point, abrupt climate change or stochastic resonance. It involves small changes in external conditions that initiate large internal changes – emergent behavior that is characteristic of chaotic systems.
“What defines a climate change as abrupt? Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause. Chaotic processes in the climate system may allow the cause of such an abrupt climate change to be undetectably small.” US National Academy of Sciences, 2002
Climate data suggests that the system is pushed by greenhouse gas changes and warming – as well as solar intensity and Earth orbital eccentricities – past a threshold at which stage the components of the climate system start to interact in multiple and changing negative and positive feedbacks – as tremendous energies cascade through powerful subsystems. Some of these changes have a regularity within broad limits and the planet responds with a broad regularity in changes of ice, cloud, Atlantic thermohaline circulation and ocean and atmospheric circulation. Chaos is very far from confined to turbulence in fluid flows. It is the fundamental mode of climate.
“The climate system has jumped from one mode of operation to another in the past. We are trying to understand how the earth’s climate system is engineered, so we can understand what it takes to trigger mode switches. Until we do, we cannot make good predictions about future climate change… Over the last several hundred thousand years, climate change has come mainly in discrete jumps that appear to be related to changes in the mode of thermohaline circulation.” Wally Broecker
The rest of John’s comment is similarly ill-informed. Resonance in climate can be the special case of stochastic resonance – https://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/17/431/2010/npg-17-431-2010.pdf – or involve reflection of gravity waves in ocean and atmosphere.
There is indeed an energy partitioning between latent and sensible heat at the surface. Changes in the balance result from changes in soil moisture.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/spei-e1527825601176.jpg
This should result in a divergence of temperatures over land and ocean since the 1980’s. As well as introducing artifacts into the record at the scale of ENSO. I argue the superiority of the satellite record for this reason – but it is hardly a fundamental objection to the science of radiative physics.
Chaos is a word. As a scientific theory it is not rigorously defined. It is defined in terms of behaviors. Equivalently phase transition, bifurcation, catastrophe (in the sense of Rene Thom), a tipping point, abrupt climate change or stochastic resonance. It involves small changes in external conditions that initiate large internal changes – emergent behavior that is characteristic of chaotic systems.
In more simple terms, chaos is junk! Something you don’t understand causes something you don’t understand. And then you write volumes about what you don’t understand, chaos.
Robert I Ellison: In the climate system these quasi standing waves are better known as oscillations captured by ocean and atmospheric indices.
Sure, and we have good fits of model outputs to data to show that?
Robert I Ellison: Resonance in climate can be the special case of stochastic resonance – https://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/17/431/2010/npg-17-431-2010.pdf – or involve reflection of gravity waves in ocean and atmosphere.
Thanks for the link, but it is another purely theoretical exposition without a single example of a system fit to actual climate data.
Since we have have neither resonance in climate displayed over any great length of time, nor a fit of a model to data, the operative phrase remains “can be”.
Give ’em the old razzle-dazzle, razzle dazzle them!
That is another paper that does not inform the discussion of whether there is a 1000 year cycle that has warmed the planet since the late 19th century; nor whether the increased temp has resulted from CO2, nor whether future CO2 increase will cause future warming; no whether the warming would be detrimental to something or other. It is an enjoyable read.
To Continue with Robert I Ellison’s article on stochastic resonance, here is a quote: Let us now returnto the climate. As we have seen, the
effect of a small periodic forcing in our “simplified” climate
model is to produce a periodic glaciation-interglaciation
transition in phase with the Milankovitch forcing. However,
the signal shown in Fig. 3 poorly compares against the
observed behavior of the “proxy” earth temperature. The
latter shows a kind of saw tooth behavior with strong
asymmetries between cold and warm periods. Thus it seems
that our theory cannot represent the real climate.
Trajectories “like” climate temperature series in some respects can be computed from stochastic diffeqn models that have “Milankovich-Like” periodic forcing, but the actual climate processes have not been so modeled. yet. That is another paper largely about computed trajectories but not much data analysis.
It is, however, a paper worth reading for anyone interested in the topic of stochastic resonance as it may be eventually relevant to modeling Earth climate.
“Robert I Ellison: In the climate system these quasi standing waves are better known as oscillations captured by ocean and atmospheric indices.
Sure, and we have good fits of model outputs to data to show that?”
It is quite bizarre. This is climate data showing aperiodic, nonlinear oscillations in the climate system. And they synchronize.
“Synchronization between nonlinear (chaotic) oscillators occurs when their corresponding signals converge to a common, albeit irregular, signal.” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2007GL030288
“Robert I Ellison: Resonance in climate can be the special case of stochastic resonance – https://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/17/431/2010/npg-17-431-2010.pdf – or involve reflection of gravity waves in ocean and atmosphere.
Thanks for the link, but it is another purely theoretical exposition without a single example of a system fit to actual climate data.
Since we have have neither resonance in climate displayed over any great length of time, nor a fit of a model to data, the operative phrase remains “can be”.
Give ’em the old razzle-dazzle, razzle dazzle them!”
It discusses stochastic resonance in the climate system – but here’s on I supplied yesterday.
http://www.ajsonline.org/content/312/4/417.short
Here’s another.
“Synchronization is a fundamental nonlinear phenomenon and one basic mechanism of self-organization in complex systems14
and synchronization of nonlinear oscillators to external forcing (see Supplementary Information) is commonly encountered in physics, chemistry, biology, engineering and climatology13–17”
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258807321_Synchronization_of_the_climate_system_to_eccentricity_forcing_and_the_100000-year_problem
“That is another paper that does not inform the discussion of whether there is a 1000 year cycle that has warmed the planet since the late 19th century; nor whether the increased temp has resulted from CO2, nor whether future CO2 increase will cause future warming; no whether the warming would be detrimental to something or other. It is an enjoyable read.”
This is an incorrect framing of the problem as Matthew is someone whose abstractions sum to gobbledegook.
https://www.facebook.com/Australian.Iriai/posts/1608494905933432
Roibert I Ellison: https://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/17/431/2010/npg-17-431-2010.pdf
One of the computed trajectories that are presented in that paper displays something I have written of before. Figure 3(a) shows that a system can produce step output without a change in parameters or inputs. So observed step changes (with respect to particular statistical criteria for deciding that step changes exist) do not necessarily imply changes in the underlying system or its inputs. The computed trajectory displayed in figure 3(c) is the headline result; if the system produces step changes, then the step changes may be synchronized to a periodic change in the input.
Robert I Ellison“That is another paper that does not inform the discussion of whether there is a 1000 year cycle that has warmed the planet since the late 19th century; nor whether the increased temp has resulted from CO2, nor whether future CO2 increase will cause future warming; no whether the warming would be detrimental to something or other. It is an enjoyable read.”
This is an incorrect framing of the problem
Whose problem is “incorrectly” framed there? Those questions, and possible answers, are what the public policy debate is about. Writers here discuss them all the time. You can read all of the dynamical systems papers and books cited by Robert I Ellison and not learn any more that is relevant to the question of whether CO2 ought to be controlled than if you hadn’t read any of it.
Only someone who fails to comprehend all reference to fundamentals of proven mathematical physics and remains obstinately clueless about systems that can, or cannot, produce chaotic behavior, or resonance, would write:
Arguing with a panoply of CYA irrelevancies, such as stochastic resonance, soil moisture, etc., is utterly pointless.
You resolutely fail to come up to a reasonable standard – and cover it with insults and pompous and empty dictum – a word that you confused with obiter dicta btw – about the nature of science at the level of sophistication of a petulent child.
So unless you have something – anything – substantive to say…
Predictable polemical rubbish. For a rather definitive treatment of dynamical systems and chaos by those who really know what they’re talking about, see: http://www.math.rug.nl/~broer/pdf/nova.pdf.
John321s: http://www.math.rug.nl/~broer/pdf/nova.pdf.
Thank you for that link. Quick perusal shows that it looks good. Was it published as a bound volume?
Predictable calumny – and a textbook on temporal chaos.
“The most important point that everybody who wants to understand something about temporal chaos theory should understand that it is all about geometry in a finite dimensional phase space. In other words it deals mathematically with systems of non linear ODE where all unknowns are coordinates of the phase space and the state of the system is perfectly defined by a point P(t) in the phase space by giving its coordinates (degrees of freedom). If this rings a bell with Hamiltonian mechanics, it is good as it should…
There is something much more complicated and qualitatively radically different from the temporal (Lorenzinan) chaos – the spatio-temporal chaos. There is no established spatio-temporal chaos theory. It is cutting edge and a few people have worked on this only for a few decades. Spatio-temporal chaos deals with the dynamics of SPATIAL PATTERNS…
The biggest difficulty comes from the fact that we lost this convenient finite dimensional phase space. That’s why almost nothing transports from temporal chaos to spatio-temporal chaos. There are no attractors, bifurcations and such. The whole mathematical apparatus has to be invented from scratch and it will take decades. To know the state of the system, we must know all the fields at all points – this is an uncountable infinity of dimensions. As the fields are coupled, the system produces quasi standing waves all the time. A quasi standing wave is a spatial pattern that oscillates at the same place repeating the same spatial structures in time. However in spatio-temporal chaos these quasi standing waves are not invariants of the system on the contrary to the attractors which are the invariants of the temporal chaos. They live for a certain time and then change or disappear altogether.” https://judithcurry.com/2011/02/10/spatio-temporal-chaos/
In the climate system these quasi standing waves are better known as oscillations captured by ocean and atmospheric indices. There are many of them at many scales – included the glacial/interglacial scale of polar phase shifted synchronous chaos discussed yesterday. Network math treating indices as chaotic oscillating nodes on a coupled system.
“We construct a network of observed climate indices in the period 1900–2000 and investigate their collective behavior. The results indicate that this network synchronized several times in this period. We find that in those cases where the synchronous state was followed by a steady increase in the coupling strength between the indices, the synchronous state was destroyed, after which a new climate state emerged. These shifts are associated with significant changes in global temperature trend and in ENSO variability. The latest such event is known as the great climate shift of the 1970s. We also find the evidence for such type of behavior in two climate simulations using a state‐of‐the‐art model. This is the first time that this mechanism, which appears consistent with the theory of synchronized chaos, is discovered in a physical system of the size and complexity of the climate system.” https://judithcurry.com/2011/02/10/spatio-temporal-chaos/
John fundamentally has not the slightest clue and behaves like a petulant child when his incomprehension is challenged.
John321s: http://www.math.rug.nl/~broer/pdf/nova.pdf.
It’s hard to write an adequate review of a book about chaos in a short period of time, but that is an excellent book.
thanks again for the link.
… Network math treating indices as chaotic oscillating nodes on a coupled system (has been the best approach thus far)…
How easy it must be to believe in a physics-free world, where the verbiage of unsubstantiated mathematical conceptions repeated as a mantra constitutes one’s sense of reality.
“Chaos” is a tricky thing to define. In fact, it is much easier to list properties that a system described as “chaotic” has rather than to give a precise definition of chaos.
Gleick (1988, p. 306) notes that “No one [of the chaos scientists he interviewed] could quite agree on [a definition of] the word itself,” and so instead gives descriptions from a number of practitioners in the field. For example, he quotes Philip Holmes (apparently defining “chaotic”) as, “The complicated aperiodic attracting orbits of certain, usually low-dimensional dynamical systems.” Similarly, he quotes Bai-Lin Hao describing chaos (roughly) as “a kind of order without periodicity.”
It turns out that even textbooks devoted to chaos do not really define the term. For example, Wiggins (1990, p. 437) says, “A dynamical system displaying sensitive dependence on initial conditions on a closed invariant set (which consists of more than one orbit) will be called chaotic.” Tabor (1989, p. 34) says, “By a chaotic solution to a deterministic equation we mean a solution whose outcome is very sensitive to initial conditions (i.e., small changes in initial conditions lead to great differences in outcome) and whose evolution through phase space appears to be quite random.” Finally, Rasband (1990, p. 1) says, “The very use of the word ‘chaos’ implies some observation of a system, perhaps through measurement, and that these observations or measurements vary unpredictably. We often say observations are chaotic when there is no discernible regularity or order.” http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Chaos.html
Handwaving at math and physics without any reference to the physical system doesn’t count for much. Chaos is not confined to turbulent fluid flows. John is quite simply ill informed and ill mannered. On any of a number of topics it seems.
Amateur reliance purely upon outdated web sources for scientific knowledge often leads to illusional “expertise.” Here, inter alia, is a rigorous definition of chaos given by Broer and Takens in their Springer-published (2010) monograph:
This no doubt will, once again, be impugned as “ill-informed” handwaving by the resident self-styled guru, whose demonstrated comprehension of matters scientific is no better than his etymological grasp of the term “obiter dicta.”
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Judith
I would explain that the scientific method depends on making hypotheses and models that are tested against predictions. Then ask what predictions from climate models have been confirmed.
D. M.
First, not all science operates exclusively as a Hypothesis/Test paradigm.
Observational sciences ( geology, astronomy, etc) cannot do “controlled” experiments. If you are lucky, nature may provide some opportunities to “test” a hypothesis. Or take forencic sciences. Suppose you have a hypothesis that the world trade towers were taken down by airplanes. Do you really want to test that hypothesis by flying more planes into buildings? or does a simulation showing its possible, give you scientific confidence? One example ( the real event) and supporting scientific and engineering information, gives you confidence you need. No need to test the hypothesis.
You find a giant hole in the earth. You hypothesize that it is an impact crater.
you collect evidence that is either consistent with or inconsistent with your hypothesis. you never run out and say “lets test that hypothesis so we know its science!” Let’s engineer an asteriod impact so we can test all this.
Nope. Its forensic science. Given one time occurances, you set about to come up with the best explanation possible. Because you cannot do controlled experiments. You cannot repeat the past and hold control variables constant while you manipulate others.
These foresenic explanations will always have holes. And conspiracy nuts
take advantage of the gaps in explanation.. Like what about building 7,
same for JFK conspiracies, etc etc. These people usually view science as a kind of defense trial. They think poking holes in a forensic interpretation settles the matter.
As for GCMs.
First off GCMs predict a Huge number of variables to test. air temp, sea temp, winds, clouds, ice, rain, snow, sea surface salinity. With a huge number of variables to predict, we can predict that they will always get some wrong. However, for the variables that matter to things like crops and economies, they do pretty well
https://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2017/03/15/the-first-climate-model-turns-50-and-predicted-global-warming-almost-perfectly/&refURL=https://www.google.com/&referrer=https://www.google.com/
The question is given an uncertain future, given a process that is complicated and sensitive, what is the best way to predict the future.
And given that best way could be wrong, either over predicting or under predicting the warming, what do you do.
One more variable. If it warms more than you plan, you are stuck as it is very hard to cool the planet
It has been 30 years, almost to the day, since James Hansen presented this issue to congress.
30 years is a pretty good test of the models.
What have we learned?
What do we know and with what degree of certainty?
The climate system at its heart is about the distribution of heat – and the amount of heat in the climate system, which can change. Primary direct agents of change – solar output, Milankovitch cycles, and the greenhouse effect. You do not want to stop there.
Change in the climate system itself and the processes by which the climate system operates may indeed be in “step” changes and oscillations, respectively – example of the latter, the current interest in the PDO and the AMOC. I say interest, since our understanding at this stage is pretty humble on many of the details, albeit moving ahead rapidly.
Now, is there an actual alternative to the changes in the greenhouse forcing and the resultant added heat from a global energy imbalance being what we are observing today? Or it is just uncertainty that is only gradually being reduced? Again, the latter is going to inherently be a pretty weak position.
I would not try to construct a list of expertise fields on the two “sides” – quite a few solar scientists and oceanographers are likely to lean towards the left – and what do “engineers” have to with it?
Judith
Thanks for your continuing efforts to clarify the different perspectives on climate change. Overall, I like what you’ve included in your one slide. I tend to prefer including the words “deterministic chaos” and “predictability” when I’m discussing these topics. I particularly think that the phrase “climate chaos is ‘noise’ that averages out” captures the essences of the disagreement. This seems like the key point that we need to get more agreement on. Does the ‘chaotic noise’ average out or not? As an engineer I’ve found that much can be learned from simpler cases of the problem. There are many approaches to trying to predict what the future climate behavior could be. I am far from being well read on most of them. While I do not believe that chaos noise averages out. I would be open to and welcome efforts to demonstrate that it really does. Here’s how I would propose that we try to demonstrate that it does average out.
1. Take a simple deterministic chaotic system. I would suggest a double pendulum system.
2. Assume that we know the system dynamics (masses, lengths, equations) exactly.
3. With a known set of initial conditions (using rational numbers), determine the true state of the system at several times in the future. Lock this information away with a neutral third party.
4. Before you lock away the real initial conditions, derive several sets of close/approximate initial conditions from them by adding noise to the real initial conditions. Lock the statistical measures of the noise you added away with the other true data.
5. Provide climate modelers with the model of the double pendulum system and the approximate initial conditions sets and ask them to use their techniques to predict the state of the system of the times we selected in #3 above. I would suggest using a tool like mathematica for modeling as it supports arbitrary length arithmetic and we can thus avoid truncation errors.
6. Collect everyone’s predictions and publish how they compare to the true system states using the true initial conditions.
7. Based on the results of the above consider redoing it with system dynamics that are only approximate.
Overall, if the hypothesis is that the chaos is noise that can be averaged out, then we need to test that hypothesis.
Schneider summed it up nicely:
On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but – which means that we must include all doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people we’d like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climate change. To do that we need to get some broad based support, to capture the public’s imagination. That, of course, means getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This “double ethical bind” we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest. I hope that means being both.
Mann is effective, Curry is honest
Hans Erron,
The problem is that the whole thing is built on a wrong premise. Global warming is not dangerous. It’s beneficial.
Nick Stokes | May 30, 2018 at 10:03 pm
“I think it is a bad idea to pin the case against on chaos.”
–
Well unless he is really, really deep you had better run with this one Judith. What the enemy rail against the most is the thing they are most feared of.
Not that Nick is an enemy himself, he is just taking the Mannian viewpoint.
Mann will use specific graphs that evade the issues much like Nick Stokes | May 31, 2018
“Why would you use northern hemisphere HadCRUT?”
Because I thought that is what Swanson and Tsonis used.”
So tip 2
Have a clip of graphs that will cover the excuses and misleading information he presents to use as soon as you can interject. Christie’s chart of model wrongness would be perfect.
Plus a graph showing how much more detail and coverage is possible both in time, space and level to counter arguments re satellite unreliability.
–
Tip 3 would be to mention that life has prevailed for billions of years precisely because the atmosphere has not gone berserk despite much greater CO2 rises in the past and could not have arisen without the presence of large amounts of CO2 for life to start making oxygen from.
I think if you are looking at communicating uncertainty then starting with logic and “fact” is a poor place to start. Most people have already made up their minds and trying to “win” a rational debate is to play the wrong game. I suggest you visit Scott Adams’ site and see how he frames this debate. ie
1 CO2 in per lab tests shows that adding it to the atmosphere should increase temperature
2 But actually the climate system is massively complex and no one understands it well enough to predict the weather next week, never mind in 100 years
3 Scientists and indeed no one can predict the world in 100 years and how it might adapt to a arise in temperature – tech, social and political changes – anyone who says the can is selling snake oil
The alarmist position is something like “science proves the world will end unless you do what we say”. At least half the population think this is true, including some otherwise sensible people. In my view the acceptance of this view is akin to a religious belief – you will not easily be able to alter it. So you may technically “win” a debate on points, but an irrational observer (ie every human being) will tend to filter that out and only hear what they think you are saying.
I advise thinking of a way in which you can take the moral and emotional high ground.
“The alarmist position is something like “science proves the world will end unless you do what we say”.”
I don’t believe it is. But suppose you can counter with
“Science suggests the world might get very difficult if GHG emissions continue unabated. Or maybe not. Nobody really knows. Uncertainty and all that.”
Do you think that is a winning argument?
Dr Curry,
[“My specific motivation for this post is to encapsulate this disagreement in a single .ppt slide.”]
With respect, keep it simple..
Left side = CO2 is the mechanism
Right side = There is no mechanism!
Any debate which starts with an assumption will always end nowhere (and nowhen) unless the assumption can be shown to be an assumption.
The entire CO2 => cAGW debate starts with an assumption that CO2 actually has a measurable ‘forcing’ effect. This has never been evidenced scientifically. So don’t get drawn in to the ‘false (or abused) data…model projection…precautionary principle…humanity is doomed…political agenda’ meme.
Stick to the fundamental scientific assumption. Argue that. If you can effectively argue that assumption, the opposition arguments will be shown to have been constructed on quicksand.
Good luck.
With respect, keep it simple..
Left side = CO2 is the mechanism
Right side = There is no mechanism!
A history of repeating cycles shows there is a mechanism.
A history of CO2 correlations sometimes and other times not shows that CO2 cannot be the mechanism.
Look for a different answer that works.
The repeating cycles evolved as continents drifted and ocean circulations changes and as the changes supported changing balance between ice on land and water in the oceans. There was always more ice extent on earth and ocean in colder times and there was always less extent on earth and ocean in warmer times. This is cause and not result.
This is balance between ice and water is acknowledged by most all, but most all treat it totally as a result, yet there is no forcing that can explain it.
Go figure!
[“A history of repeating cycles shows there is a mechanism.”]
Yes it does but that would be a mechanism for natural variability/change, not anthropogenic climate change, which is what the debate is about.
Maybe I should have been more precise but the mechanism I was referring to was the CO2 forcing mechanism.
Right, the CO2 forcing is greenhouse. our atmosphere is not a greenhouse, the energy from the surface is carried up by convection, not just radiated up, and a greenhouse mechanism is not there to block energy from going up and being radiated from clouds when water and ice is produced from the water vapor.
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The ice core data clearly shows that it snows more when it is warmer and the oceans are more thawed. it snows less when it is colder and the oceans are more frozen. This provides self regulation that trumps chaos and external forcing changes. it is not instant. it snows more for several hundred years in a medieval warm period. the more ice flows and cools by reflecting and thawing and makes a little ice age colder. it snows less for several hundred years during a little ice age. The ice depletes due to lack of snowfall and then the ice retreats until we get a modern warm period. it is now snowing more and this will continue for a few hundred warm years and then the more ice will flow and cause another little ice age.
This post started with two sides and left out the evidence provided by ice core data. In the real world, the chaos and the external forcing are tamed by the bounding provided by ice and water. Temperature still responds to the external forcing changes and it still responds to the chaos giving correlations for people to bring to the debate, but temperature stays inside bounds.
Earth climate is self correcting due to the actions of water and ice. It happens slow enough that the people on the different sides put all their effort looking at shorter term correlations and they totally ignore the longer ice cycles as any cause and treat them as a total result.
Maurice Ewing and William Donn published this correct, powerful, theroy in the 1950’s. It is still not understood. People put all their trust in thermometer data and computer output. Both of these have been here to short a time. Look at longer term data and common sense.
When the different sides in a debate can argue for decades and no side can clearly beat the other side, they all have left out something very important.
They all treat ice as a result and none consider ice any part of cause.
Ice core data holds answers. Ice core data has a record of ice accumulation rates and temperature and CO2. Ice core data is available for hundreds of thousands of years, more in the SH and less in the NH, but more than enough to help understand an important factor in the self regulation of earths temperature.
Milankovich cycles would have called for more differences in the climate of the NH and SH with more cycles of alternating climate in the two hemispheres. Oceans and ice provide much help in bounding the changes due to huge differences in solar into the two hemispheres. Ocean level is important for providing or not providing snowfall in both hemispheres and that coordinates major warm and cold cycles, major warm and ice age cycles. The minor warm and cold cycles are superimposed on the major cycles and the minor cycles operate independently in each hemisphere. the ice cycles in the SH are more regular and more tightly bounded. the ice cycles in the NH are less regular and not as tightly bounded. That is due to the complications of the geometry differences of the two hemispheres.
There is a major “Fundamental disagreement about climate change”.
A MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR was never PROPERLY considered!
The role of “ICE AND WATER”!
Let us make a simple comparison.
What do climate models do when earth warms, it tips and removes all the ice.
What does ice core data show that happens when earth warms, it tips and increases snowfall and replenishes all the ice.
In a major warming period, ice core data provides enough snowfall for a major ice age. In a Roman or Medieval warm period, ice core data provides enough snowfall for a little ice age. Look at the records in the ice cores of what actually did happen and try to understand what did happen. The answers have been preserved for us. Earth gave us the ice cycles, big and little and recorded the results for us to study. People put all their eggs in computer output of the time coming out of the little ice age the thermometer data. That time is only a warming part of only one cycle, that is not worth much, not by itself.
To produce ice, an ice machine requires energy to power it and it requires that energy be removed from the water and taken away. This happens the most when oceans are warm and full of energy and IR leaving earth is very large.
Consensus theory creates ice when earth is cold and does not have energy to power the process and is not removing energy from the earth.
That is a time that it is cold because ice is reflecting and thawing and that is not a time the ice machine can run full blast.
The energy removal that causes an ice age happens in the warm time when the oceans have energy and earth is warm enough to send the IR out.
The ice is sequestered in the warm time and the cooling is done later by reflecting and thawing. Simple laws of physics tell us we are not producing ice when we are not removing energy. Simple laws of physics tell us we are producing ice when we are removing energy. Simple lows of physics tell us we do not have energy to power the ice machine when the oceans are not full of energy to power the process. Simple laws of physics tell us we do have energy to power the ice machine when the oceans are full of energy to power the process.
Climate changes in natural, normal, necessary and unstoppable cycles.
Man-Made CO2 never powered past cycles and does not power the current cycles.
The way I see it….
The bottom line is that at the end of the LIA CO2 levels were very low compared to what is needed for life to flourish. The CO2 level for this period were an anomaly! Why should we wish to return to it?
As the planet has warmed out of the LIA due to increase solar radiance, CO2 levels quite naturally rose. As the oceans warmed and land defrosted CO2 was released, and the planet began to re-green those previously frozen area. This re-greening was nature playing catch-up with the warming and rising CO2 level. (IMO The greening lagged the CO2 increase.)
For more than a hundred years this re-greening sucked-up the increasing CO2, resulting in a maintaining, or very slightly increasing the global CO2 levels. As vegetative growth reaches saturation levels globally (and we’re not there yet) then the CO2 levels rise a little faster than the biosphere can use it, hence the current minor uplift in CO2.
All that humans have done is add a minuscule amount to the CO2 levels, and thus, in a minor way, added to the accelerated re-greening of the planet.
IMO CO2 level at 280 to 350ppm are not the place to be, this planet should be 600 to 1000ppm to make life so much easier, and (probably) kill-off all UN funded hunger relief programs.
Good post except this:
“As the planet has warmed out of the LIA due to increase solar radiance”
Earth warmed out of the LIA because it snowed less in the LIA and ice depleted and retreated and that causes the warming.
A little ice age is caused by more ice and it ends when the ice depletes and retreats.
This is proved true by ice core data!
Hi Judith. On the climate chaos side of the power point at the bottom where it says response: CO2 is small ‘wedge’ …
I would say ‘The effect of CO2 has not been demonstrated to rise above the background noise level of the data.’
Sandy, Minister of Future
Pat Michaels would be a good expert to consult for conciseness:
The temperature of deep, still, parts of the ocean have barely risen one degree in 22,000 years, the last glacial max.
The temperature of the deep parts of the ocean are determined by the density of water at that temperature puts that water down there. When ocean energy levels are lower or higher, the deep temperature stays the same. The circulation of that water is adjusted as other things change, but that temperature is fixed by the physics of water density. That temperature is the same during a major ice age as during a major warm period.
I will go back and read some of the rest you wrote.
That comment should have been at interzonkomizar, down below here.
https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/30/fundamental-disagreement-about-climate-change/#comment-873205
Hi Judith. Ice core data from both poles show CO2 increase lags the rise out of glacial cold by 800 yrs.
I posted this on Ice Age Now 9 apr, and sent to a US senator and a FOX news weather person. Response, *crickets*.
. ~ . ~ . ~
NOAA, NASA, and the IPCC have failed humanity, and we’re all in for a nasty surprise … Abrupt Climate Change. This is a summary and warning i put together:
The MsM and warmist alarmists are wrong. It is the heighth of hubris and arrogance to think humans, in the space of 150 years, can change thermal cycles that are thousands of years long and have existed for millenia. The thermal mass of the land and oceans is enormous. The temperature of deep, still, parts of the ocean have barely risen one degree in 22,000 years, the last glacial max.
My reading of the climate tea leaves says we’re already past the interglacial plateau of relatively stable climate.
For the last three thousand years, Since 1000 BC, the end of the Minoan Warm Period, the global temperature trend has been -0.5 to -0.7 dgC per 1000 yrs, projecting full glacial of 8 dgC in another 7,000 yrs. Another clue, the obliquity dropped below 23.5 degrees around 1300 AD, the onset of the Wolf Minimum. Now the glacial cold lurking in the deep ocean, held in check by obliquity for 10,000 years, has been set free, ending the Holocene Interglacial. We are in the transition zone to glacial cold, expect Finoscandian ice sheets to start in 2000 yrs.
(This part updated)
Up until two weeks ago I was thinking we are coming into a grand solar minimum. But I’ve reconsidered after rereading some articles on skeptic climate blogs. I now believe we entered a ‘Micro- IceAge’ in 2004 when Bob Weber’s fig.10 showed a drop in 10.7 cm solar flux, leading to ocean cooling. I’m calling this a ‘Micro’ because I don’t expect it to last more than solar cycle 24, 25, and 26. Then there will be 7 years to transition back to warmer global temps, but cooler than now, mabe 13 C; say by 2050.
What the mainstream media is not highlighting is this last winter was the coldest in 40 years in many countries in the northern hemisphere. North Western European countries on the Atlantic coast reported last summer was the coldest in 40 Years also.
This spring has been cold and longer than usual which will affect planting and the growing season.
During the Little Ice Age the temperature dropped about half a degree globally. As you can see from the Delingpole essay, it has dropped by 0.56 degrees already.
This is what we can expect starting from last Dec; some winters early and extremely cold, some wet cool springs to kill crops, later spring frost dates, some cold summers, and more frequent and severe storms. The storminess index went from 6.5 to 14 during the LIA. This slide into cold is showing up in German weather station records where the last 30 yrs of winter (DJF) are trending -19 dgC per 1000 yrs, much faster than the slow decline to normal glacials, -0.7 per thousand yrs. Also the USHCN chart of summer max for the last hundred yrs shows -13 C per thousand yrs trend. Ground Station solar insolation shows a cooling trend from 2000 of about -10 watts per meter squared per decade. So after this Micro Ice Age we may just keep stair stepping down for the next four thousand years.
I expect in the next ten years one billion will actually starve due to crop failures*, and one billion will be eaten by stronger omnivores; feral dogs, cats, and … humans.
Dont wait for the flames to die and rubble stops bouncing, the sooner you act, the better your chances of survival.
Sandy, Minister of Future
*NB- the WHO reports 800 mln suffer from hunger, 10 mln die from starvation each yr, 60 mln die from disease each yr.
So now thats 70 mln / yr, plus more food stress, weakening immune system, more disease, amplified by cold climate / storm stress, could easily be 100 mln /yr … Thats 1 Bln / 10 yrs.
Sandy, Minister of Future
We are in the transition zone to glacial cold, expect Finoscandian ice sheets to start in 2000 yrs.
This period, the most recent ten thousand years, is unlike any period in the last fifty million years. This new, better bounded time period, will continue for many thousands of years, The most recent fifty million years has been an evolution of continent drift, ocean circulation changes, ice volume on land and water volume in the oceans. This new normal will stay with us until continent drift makes changes to NH ocean circulation of water in and out of the Arctic Ocean. We will continue to have warm periods like the Roman and Medieval and cold periods like the Little Ice Age, but no major ice ages or warm periods without critical ocean circulation changes.
Proxy data was saved for us by earth to help us understand what happened in the past. Ice and Water was important in causes of what happened in the past. Ice on earth is treated like a victim of everything else. Water was blessed with its special properties so it could take a lead roll in what goes on. As long as water, in all of its wonderful states, is not considered properly in climate theroy and models, the theroy and models will continue to fail.
I expect in the next ten years one billion will actually starve due to crop failures*, and one billion will be eaten by stronger omnivores; feral dogs, cats, and … humans.
These chicken little forecasts of doom have been with people ever since they started recording things. Likely it goes back before it was recorded, past down by word of mouth.
In the next ten years, more people will be living even better than today, except in brief periods of history, this has always been the case.
Doom forecasts fail and the people surge past the man-forecasted doom limits.
@Kip said- comprised of the ocean system and the atmosphere, both of which are …
I think Land Masses and Cryosphere should have been included. Maybe thats why the models dont work, heh.
Sandy, Minister of Future
@Kip said- The disagreement is about whether or not such a system can be “predicted” far into the future and whether our current models have any ability to do so or even if they are fundamentally fit for that purpose.
Ahem. There is no disagreement. The system cannot be predicted far into the future, the models have not demonstrated the ability to predict 99 years into the futute, and they are fundamentally not fit for purpose. They have too many pre adjustment settings and a very large grid size.
Sandy, Minister of Future
Hi Judith. OK, I’ve read all the posts up to where I first posted. Several have suggested that you should replace chaos in your PowerPoint with complexity, I would agree.
This debate is going to be primarily about demonstrating to the reporters present and the possibly live stream audience about the problems with understanding the data and presenting it without a preconceived political agenda. You should also highlight that several of the government maintained climate databases have been hammered and filed to fit the warmest agenda. They cannot be used to discover the truth of what has been happening.
Of course you must refute or question every argument presented by Dr Mann. But never forget your target audience is the reporters.
Also, I didnt think paleoclimatologists were warmists.
Good Luck in your presentation.
Sandy, Minister of Future
Hi Judith. Another thing to stress is we are out of the interglacial stable period and due to Milankovitch forcing we are well on the way to the next stadial. It would be a bigger waste of money than the carbon tax Fiasco to try and prevent our descent into a glacial. Money would be better spent on genetic Improvement of food crops to grow in a colder climate with a shorter growing season and less CO2.
Sandy, Minister of Future
Climate data, ice cores and other proxies is full of cycles of alternating warm and cold.
Climate theory is mostly hockey stick. That will never match real cycles.
Chaos does not do alternating cycles, chaos will never match real clycles.
Given that by definition chaos is an aperiodic oscillator, I think you are mistaken. Alternating cycles is all it is.
Alternating is regular, not chaos. Chaos would jump all over the place and go out of bounds. It does not go out of bounds. the bounds change, but become alternating in the new range.
Spatio-temporal chaos is ergodic.
Robert I Ellison: Spatio-temporal chaos is ergodic.
That is a quote worth a citation.
Yes, I’d like a citation as well. I am not aware that navier-stokes has been shown to be ergodic. But I’d like to know more.
It is not ergodic if you are adding energy to it the whole time. The states never repeat. More like a spiral than a circle.
I’m not aware that Navier-Stokes has been solved. But climate chaos has states that repeat within the the limits of the interacting physical systems. Cycle are fine but ergodicity isn’t?
https://www.facebook.com/Australian.Iriai/posts/1505623482887242
Cycles also won’t repeat when you have added energy between them.
But climate chaos has states that repeat
But, then, that is not real good chaos.
Energy in the system changes substantially all the time – with CO2 as a small part of that. One side of the chaos coin is that ‘wiggles’ do not sum to zero. The other is that the speed, extent and direction of abrupt change – the nature of internal chaotic responses – is unknowable.
“This report is an attempt to describe what is known about abrupt climate changes and their impacts, based on paleoclimate proxies, historical observations, and modeling. The report does not focus on large, abrupt causes—nuclear wars or giant meteorite impacts—but rather on the surprising new findings that abrupt climate change can occur when gradual causes push the earth system across a threshold. Just as the slowly increasing pressure of a finger eventually flips a switch and turns on a light, the slow effects of drifting continents or wobbling orbits or changing atmospheric composition may “switch” the climate to a new state. And, just as a moving hand is more likely than a stationary one to encounter and flip a switch, faster earth-system changes—whether natural or human-caused—are likely to increase the probability of encountering a threshold that triggers a still faster climate shift.
We do not yet understand abrupt climate changes well enough to predict them. The models used to project future climate changes and their impacts are not especially good at simulating the size, speed, and extent of the past changes, casting uncertainties on assessments of potential future changes. Thus, it is likely that climate surprises await us.” https://www.nap.edu/read/10136/chapter/1#v
The heat content of the system has been increasing steadily for many decades, and the source of this is no mystery because there has been a steady forcing increase that is large enough to account for all of the heat gain and more. It’s just energy conservation at play here. We know both sides of the long-term energy balance – the source and the net gain.
Energy in the system changes substantially all the time – with CO2 as a small part of that. One side of the chaos coin is that ‘wiggles’ do not sum to zero. The other is that the speed, extent and direction of abrupt change – the nature of internal chaotic responses – is unknowable.
We have CERES data that shows annual repeatable cycles, year after year, no CHAOS there. I agree CO2 is not part of that, but neither does chaos even show up. Annual cycles would be chaotic, not repeatable.
TOA power flux shows large measured variability due to ocean and atmospheric circulation. The chaotic nature of ocean and atmospheric shifts means that the ‘wiggles’ do not sum to zero. This is the essence of the difference between the two sides of the slide. No mystery there.
The heat content and forcing have both been increasing steadily for decades. To explain a steady increase over such a long period you need a steady forcing and that is provided by increasing GHGs.
The Pacific has been warming over the last century – apart from the mid-century cooling.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/vance2012-antartica-law-dome-ice-core-salt-content.jpg
Robert I Ellison: Cycle are fine but ergodicity isn’t?
How does that satisfy the definition of ergodicity?
Hi Judith. Here are some resource links …
1. this document shows ground Station solar insolation. It looks like one chart shows a cooling trend from 2000 of about 10 watts per meter squared per decade. So after this micro Ice Age We may just keep stair stepping down for the next four thousand years. Stay tuned.
from satellite and ground measurements: Comparisons and challenges
Laura M. Hinkelman Paul W. Stackhouse Jr. Bruce A. Wielicki Taiping Zhang Sara R. Wilson
First published: 15 August 2009
https://doi.org/10.1029/2008JD011004
2. Hi Chief. NoTrickZone has lots other links and data on the website. I check it daily.
http://notrickszone.com/2017/04/10/a-swelling-volume-of-scientific-papers-now-forecasting-global-cooling-in-the-coming-decades/#sthash.cNPctd7I.6jQ3mg0p.dpbs
http://notrickszone.com/category/cooling/
3. https://realclimatescience.com/100-of-us-warming-is-due-to-noaa-data-tampering/
4. https://realclimatescience.com/2018/06/why-data-tampering-matters/
Sandy, Ministr of Future
To cut, or not to cut. That is the question: Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous economic fortune, or to take arms against a rising sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them?
The debate is about how much is natural vs man made. That is an easier concept to present than chaos.
The idea that internal variability will average out over short timescales is absurd. It can stay in state long enough to drop us into an ice age or rapidly pull us out of one. I think you can destroy Mann & company if they will bite on claiming that. The strong positive water vapor feedback has not been observed in the real world. They can be defeated with empirical data. The range of internal variability dwarfs CO2 in W/m^2. CO2 clearly isn’t the control knob.
I think chaos is better because it means change, while natural does not. CO2 versus chaos.There is also a lot of disagreement about how much there is (and many different there’s there, not just temperatures).
“I think chaos is better because it means change,”
How many people are unaware that climate changes?
What’s causing the change is what the debate is about. Other’s have pointed out that chaos not that great as a bullet point.
There is no argument about what causes climate change – just that intrinsic variability is not random.
Large scale and/or persistent natural climate change is basically ruled out by AGW, so lots of people are unaware of or do not believe in it. Only short term minor oscillations are recognized, like ENSO and PDO. This is central to the AGW claim that CO2 controls climate. If you look at the CMIP/IPCC modeling all ten or so of the significant forcings are anthropogenic. Natural climate change on the scale of century warming is simply not recognized.
So the answer to your question: “How many people are unaware that climate changes?” is lots of people, including lots of climate scientists, if the scale of the change is that of AGW.
Robert, I have no idea what this sentence means: “There is no argument about what causes climate change – just that intrinsic variability is not random.”
But given the deep argument about why climate change is occurring, I cannot imagine how it can be true.
On one side of the slide is CO2 and intrinsic variability as random white noise. On the other is CO2 and intrinsic variability on all scales as regimes and abrupt change. Not random noise.
The difference is not what causes climate change – but the appropriate statistical inferences. Much of the discussion of this slide – and the ‘deep argument’ – is profoundly misguided.
Chaos is a threshold concept.
“Meyer and Land [4] have likened the crossing of the pedagogic threshold to a ‘rite of passage’ (drawing on the ethnographical studies of Gennep and of Turner in which a transitional or liminal space has to be traversed; “in short, there is no simple passage in learning from ‘easy’ to ‘difficult’; mastery of a threshold concept often involves messy journeys back, forth and across conceptual terrain. (Cousin [2006])”.” https://www.ee.ucl.ac.uk/~mflanaga/thresholds.html
Once past the threshold new vistas open up – but very few have the conceptual framework to approach it. Stick to data and perpetual change.
Again – the comparison random (white noise) and Nilometer data.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/nile-e1527722953992.jpg
Academically correct but not persuasive I feel.
Warmist side is definite. You can make policy with that. Skeptic side takes no position, uou can’t do anything with it, even to put actions on hold pending IMMEDIATE review of fundamental failures of to-date prognostication, determination of appropriate scenario after 30 years of hard study, including climate sensitivities within the IPPC bibles etc.
Skepticism should not be seen as wallowing around waiting for something to show up – or the temps to drop, ice to form. It has to be active in its own way. If chaos and wicked problems are the way things work and negate the doomsday approaching scenario, that fact has to be made.
The Precautionary Principle and its use by virtue-signalling activists requires only a hesitancy on the skeptical side to thrive. After the last 30 years of pushback on CAGW, there has to be some solidity to the non-alarmist side. If not, we have no place to stand worth defending.
I feel the right side needs to show how the premises on the left are false or exaggerated into insubstantiability. We are way beyond noting there are legitimate and equal positions of different opinion.
I offer this as requested. I mean no disrespect, I hope other readers understand.
From reading the above, I conclude the fundamental disagreement is whether the climate is controlled by CO2 or H2O. In the latter case, CO2 is a small 2% perturbation in the hydrological cycle which is handled easily by evaporation, convection, storms, clouds, etc.
Judith, KISS: Remember, this is a science, apply the scientific method.
1) Be sure to revert back to the only way CO2 can CAUSE/AFFECT Climate Change is through the thermalization of 13 to 18 micron LWIR. That is the only defined mechanism.
2) LWIR between 13 and 18 micron will not penetrate or warm water. The oceans are warming, and the oceans control atmospheric temperature and climate. If you can’t tie CO2 to the warming oceans, you can’t tie CO2 to climate change.
3) CO2 demonstrates a log decay for W/M^2, yet the temperature charts are continually “adjusted” to become more linear, The simple relationship between CO2 and temperature isn’t linear.
4) H2O dominates the lower atmosphere, in fact, the first you see the CO2 signature is at an altitude of 3km. When you select temperature data that is controlled for H2O (Antarctica), you find CO2 has no impact on temperatures at all after a 33% increase.
5) CO2 is 400 ppm all the way up to 70 km, yet temperatures cool, warm, cool, and warm with altitude over that 70 km. CO2 has basically no impact.
6) The blackbody temperature of 13 to 18 LWIR is -80 Degree C. Try warming water with that energy.
7) Geologic records should CO2 being as high as 7,000 ppm and we never experienced catastrophic warming. The physics of the CO2 molecule simply don’t support it.
8) Both the Hockeystick and new Sea Level chart have dog-legs in them. Ignoring the fact that they don’t match, there is nothing about the physics of the CO2 molecule that would support a sudden dog-legs in temperatures of sea levels.
9) The Greenland Glaciers are melting from below. CO2 can’t cause geothermal warming.
10) The Arctic sea ice is melting from below. CO2 can’t warm the oceans.
Judith, you have received lots of advice. My two cents flows along the lines of Hot Scot and Ron Clutz.
Often in my consulting career to explain something to a ‘layman’ Board of directors I would prepare a slide, but then say: the slide you have summarizes the issue, and I would be glad to go into details. But first lets simplify it even further. Then launch a sound bite that used maybe only a couple of key words from the slide. Because the issue was to get them to understand the most basic issue or distinction so they could make an informed decision. My job was to do all the detail work, then boil it down to the decision essence.
The essence of your slide is whether climate models can be relied upon. The sound bite would be something like: We all know long range weather forecasts are not reliable. The technical reasons are on the right side of the slide. Yet AGW propoenents assume the long range climate impacts of CO2 emissions are reliably predictable; their reasoning is on the left side of the slide. That ‘linear’ cause and effect reasoning is, as weather shows, not sound. Remember, Climate is defined as weather averaged over 30 years. We have many examples where the ‘left side’ reasoning embodied in climate models has objectively failed. For example: They vastly overstate observed warming this century (in the tropical troposphere, by over 3fold; They predict an acceleration in sea level rise that has not happened, and They produce a long term end warming result (ECS) about two times that observed using actual energy budgets.
Yes Rud, the point being made with the chaos stuff I think is really about the models and the uncertainty in their results. That uncertainty is larger than the IPCC acknowledges.
That it is about models is quite obviously confirmation bias.
ristvan, a bit more than 2 cents please. but keep it simple. Come on you are one of the best at this/
any clues on what Mann and the Admiral will attack? Defence??
They will likely repeat their performances at the last two congressional hearings. I would prepare sound bite rebuttals to each of their previously made main points. Literally on a crib sheet or index cards. The actnof preparingnthem in writing is sufficient ‘rehearsal’.
An example. You know Tetley will point to recent SGW warming and erase the post 2000 pause. The simolest counter to his ‘certain’ argument is attribution. The sound bite for it is derived from my WUWT post, why models run hot. “The warming from ~1920-1945 is essentially indistinguishable to that from -1975-2000. Yet IPCCAR4 WG1 SPM fig 4 said the former period was mostly natural; not enough change in CO2. You cannot assume natural variability stopped in 1975. So itnis illogical to assume that all the recent warming you show is anthropogenic.” Also gives Judith a simple two part visual to support the sound bite.
Thanks Rudd, a pity no one else is helping on this issue but I know Judith will read your post.
Wish my brains were better and could read and put together more on this for her.
Saw JD had put up something good as well.
That is absolutely a gorgeous slide and I want to thank you for brightening my day with it. My only suggestion would be something to the effect of “Many parameters amenable to high-reliability computer model predictions within policy-relevant ranges” on the left and “Few parameters predictable on useful time horizons” on the right.
Oh, also maybe “Equilibrium states are unstable, fleeting.” Seriously though, it’s pretty awesome already.
Judith,
For me the disagreement has two separate parts, the technical and the political.
The technical disagreement is not really all that large: on one hand you have multiple empirical studies based on best estimates of forcings, ocean heat uptake and historical warming over the past 120 years or so; these empirical studies are reasonably consistent with each other and suggest the climate’s long term sensitivity to forcing is near the low end of the credible range, say 1.6C to 2.0C per doubling of CO2. The uncertainty in the empirical estimates is significant, but is known to come mainly from the uncertainty in man made aerosol effects, and to a lesser extent from uncertainty in the “linearity” of future warming in response to increases in forcing. Reducing the uncertainty in empirical estimates depends mostly on better definition of aerosol effects.
On the other hand, you have estimates from climate models, which predict long term sensitivity to forcing in the range of ~2.8C to ~4.5C per doubling, with an average estimate of ~3.4C. Uncertainty in the climate models comes mostly from the coarseness of the scale of calculations (the grid size), imperfect understanding of the processes being modeled, and the need to use parameterized estimates for everything which happens below the grid size scale. The wide range of estimated sensitivities from different individual climate models is clear confirmation of the large uncertainty inherent in current models. Improving the models will require orders of magnitude faster computers, improved understanding of processes at all scales, and the least possible use of parameterized processes.
So the technical disagreement is: which estimate is more credible: ~1.8C per doubling or ~3.4C per doubling. There is little reason to not conclude long term warming will be somewhere in that range; the technical disagreement is where in that range the “real” value most likely lies. Most critically, the technical disagreement can be resolved, and likely will be within the next couple of decades.
Of course, there is even greater uncertainty in the consequences of future warming, but these all depend on the true sensitivity of Earth’s climate to forcing.
The political disagreement is much more difficult. It is far more complicated and only weakly connected to the technical disagreement. The political disagreement is about personal values, priorities, perceived costs, perceived benefits, acceptance of risk, what you think people’s obligations are to each other and to other living things, the value you place on individual liberties versus collective control, your faith in technology providing future solutions, and many more. Even with all technical disagreement resolved, the political disagreement will remain.
In the near term, the political disagreement seems insoluble. There are too many conflicting interests, both nationally and internationally, for a consensus to emerge, never mind binding international restrictions on fossil fuel use. I hold out hope that by the time the technical disagreement is resolved, there will be virtually no remaining extreme poverty (less than US$3 income per day per capita), and the possibility of political compromise will increase. Like all political disagreements, this one will ultimately be decided either in the voting booth or through violence. I hope it’s the former.
stevefitzpathric
“For me the disagreement has two separate parts, the technical and the political.” with which I generally agree.
“Like all political disagreements, this one will ultimately be decided either in the voting booth or through violence.” with which I don’t agree.
Seeing politics through a dichotomous lens severely limits the processes and outcomes, besides what is possible. Politics to me is a process of accumulating enough support/votes under one tent whereby there are sufficient numbers to get elected. It’s an accumulation process that results in a amorphous mass not necessarily coherent in all aspects yet, sufficient for the time being.
Climate Change as a political process, is currently played mostly by people with big egos and those with a skewed sense of integrity a la Stephen Schneider (its OK to tell white lies because the cause is virtuous.) and the email leaked Climategate co-conspiritors. What has happened politically, the whole catastrophe scenario has been played out over and over again; there is broad acknowledgement that climate models are imperfect including using parameterization for the substitution of observational data; equilibrium of climate remains a fallacy; new information raises more issues than are settled; the public in general has a declining interest in climate change as a pocketbook issue except for rising electricity rates; catastrophic climate change fatigue has set in and the current Government trying out something new just doesn’t resonate negatively with many people anymore. Hence, I seriously doubt folks with torches and pitchforks will storm, let alone breach the EPA/Energy/Commerce Departments doors. Rather, the majority of angry voices will go quietly in the night. Proceeding forward, the work on climate will have different funding guidelines, focus will change again and some other litany will become the standard bearer for a while, only to be replaced by something else later on at less cost and a lot fewer decibels.
So in essence, the climate change story will become less relevant to the politics of the day, which is good.
So the technical disagreement is: which estimate is more credible: ~1.8C per doubling or ~3.4C per doubling. There is little reason to not conclude long term warming will be somewhere in that range
There is every reason to throw out all of this junk. None of it is credible. Alarmism is not credible and Lukewarmism is not credible.
Climate changes in natural cycles and man-made CO2 does not cause natural cycles. Natural cycles have been around forever, natural cycles did not suddenly stop and get replaced by man-made warming.
good summary Steve.
With the discussions about how paint mixes and whether it can be unmixed I’m attaching a link to a youtube video about unmixing dyes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p08_KlTKP50
I like it for it coolness factor.
As a lawyer who has had a good number of jury trials where a major part of my work required explaining complicated things to many jurors who functioned at a Sixth Grade level, here are my observations/comments.
1. The “small wedge” concept is a good one. Virtually everyone can understand that idea. [The left side corresponding concept: “climate chaos is “noise” that averages out” is fairly clear to me also]
2. The phrase “globally coupled, spatio-temporal chaotice, resonant system” is very hard to understand and most lay people will have virtually no idea what this means. If you are going to use it, I think it would be very helpful to give concrete examples of what each component of the phrase means. Rather than focusing on a large overarching explanation, I would consider focusing on the the 2 or 3 biggest currently poorly understood elements of the climate and not try to explain the whole system. (For example, you could explain the top 3 and state that there are many others but that only so much can be discussed in a debate). I have close to a zero idea what this means.
3. The phrase “Climate change occurs as discrete SHIFTS in the system” is confusing to me. If the word “SHIFTS” used in a sense different from “CHANGE.? If not, then I would use the word “change.”
4. The phrase “Equilibrium is fleeting.” could cause some confusion. I looked up the scientific meaning of the phrase. [a state of rest or balance due to the equal action of opposing forces] If it is not explained simply, it will go over the heads of most people in the audience. I suspect that a simpler way of making much the same point is to say that change has been the norm in climate. Whatever opposing forces you discuss need to be explained at a very basic level.
You may want to quickly scan a post by Lucia as well as the comments dealing with trying to explain the R2 of statistics to jurors. See http://rankexploits.com/musings/2014/the-meaning-of-r2-in-pictures-mann-v-steynsimbergceinro/#comment-123899 As a general comment I would add that, to the extent that there is complexity and confusion, it aids the alarmists because they can claim that the consensus supports their position.
I hope that my comments may help some. Good luck in the debate.
JD
Excellent comments.
However, I still say the most important point to get across is that none of it matters because any global warming that might occur would be beneficial, not dangerous. Cooling is damaging and could be catastrophic for humanity, but global warming is not.
*Warming is beneficial*
It would be useful to have a 3×5 card at hand, and perhaps a slide, of the major benefits. I’m pretty sure that CO2 fertilization of crop growth alone is in the $Trillions range. No doubt readers can supply refs.
Difficult to argue for spending $100 billions of billions to “fix” a (non)”problem” that is enriching everyone…..
pdtillman,
I agree and here are some useful figures:
FUND3.9 projects the economic impact of the main impact sectors in 2100 (relative to 1900) (in % of global GDP) at ECS=3.0C would be:
Storms -0.01%
Agriculture 0.64%
Water supply -0.18%
Sea Level -0.03%
Health -0.05%
Energy -0.93%
Ecosystems -0.17%
Total -0.72%
However, the impact of global warming on energy consumption may be grossly in error. It may be slightly positive or near zero. In which case the economic impact of global warming would be positive (up to around 4C GMST increase relative to 1900) – see Tol (2013) Figure 3 here: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-012-0613-3
Thanks JD.
I agree with jddohio. Your May 26 article explaining natural variation foiling confirmation of claimed CO2 effects is a line of argument the other side spent a lot of time and effort to hide a decade ago because it was understandable.
Now a decade later its still there and apparently central to your position.
Natural variation doesn’t matter because it is random white noise and sums to zero. Only forcing matters.
This is what he means.
http://www.cesm.ucar.edu/projects/community-projects/LENS/images/Figure1.gif
No – really – this is what I mean.
“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.” Julia Slingo and Tim Palmer
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/roypta/369/1956/4751/F12.large.jpg
“Time series of sea surface temperatures (Ts) for the Nino3 region (5° S–5° N and 150° W–90° W), in the equatorial east Pacific from (a) 2000 years of climate model simulation with constant forcing representative of the current climate; (b) shows the equivalent time series from observations. Green circles show multi-decadal periods with contrasting El Nino behaviour, including a period in the model’s sixteenth century that closely resembles the observed record. Red and blue boxes show extended century-scale periods with contrasting strong and weak El Nino activity, respectively. (Figure courtesy of V. Ramanathan, GFDL, Princeton, NJ, USA).”
The issue with this is the forcing is adjusted by feedback, that whole nonlinear stuff that ppl try to linearize out.
It’s part of the operation of the forcing.
In fact I think that’s what most the temp series are, normalized for everything except the noncondensing GHG’s forcings, so that’s what they show.
It’s just wrong.
https://micro6500blog.wordpress.com/2016/12/01/observational-evidence-for-a-nonlinear-night-time-cooling-mechanism/
Robert I Ellison: Natural variation doesn’t matter because it is random white noise and sums to zero.
Where did you get that stuff? Taking them in reverse order:
1. Even processes with 0 mean do not sum to zero over each finite time interval. Taking, for example, a hypothetical warming/cooling quasi-periodic process with a period of approximately 950 years, it would not necessarily sum to zero from 1880 to 2080, which is why the question of its possible existence is important.
2. Lots of Natural processes that come into this discussion are not white noise: ENSO, PDO, NAO, Stadium wave, etc.
I think he means that natural variation doesn’t provide a significant long-term trend. That is, you can sample trends from different averages or end-points and you would get nothing significantly different from zero because it changes sign depending on the interval.
I think he means that natural variation doesn’t provide a significant long-term trend.
Evidently, the century scale trends indicate
1.) a decrease of intense La Nina
2.) a decrease of La Nina
3.) an increase El Nino and
4.) an increase of intense El Nino
https://turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/extended_mei_change_2017.png
ENSO may sum to zero over 1000 years – but perhaps not.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/vance2012-antartica-law-dome-ice-core-salt-content.jpg
Jim D: I think he means that natural variation doesn’t provide a significant long-term trend.
If that is what he meant, then he can correct his post. What appeared under his name was wrong on the two counts that I listed.
Judy, I’ve posted your diagram on my website asking anyone who thinks they can help to get in touch with you.
Every good wish,
Don
Good. The power of the internet and collective minds is awesome.
The average layman associates the word “chaos” with rapid change over a short period of time. A tornado, thunderstorm, or similar “weather” event would be considered chaotic. The thefreedictionary.com defines chaos as “a condition or place of great disorder or confusion.” It is hard for a layman to view “climatic” changes over decades or centuries to be “chaotic.” Chaos in slow motion is hard to visualize.
“Writers here discuss them all the time. You can read all of the dynamical systems papers and books cited by Robert I Ellison and not learn any more that is relevant to the question of whether CO2 ought to be controlled than if you hadn’t read any of it.” Matthew Marler
It seems more likely that Matthew hasn’t read any of it.
“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.” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2008GL037022
The next climate shift is due within the decade. The size, speed and direction of abrupt change is not knowable. It may be abrupt – less than 10 years – and extreme – as much as 16 degrees C locally. With massive changes in hydroclimates. The solution – whether the origin is intrinsic or anthropogenic is – as I keep saying – to build prosperous and resilient communities in vibrant landscapes.
https://watertechbyrie.com/2017/02/15/the-climate-problem-and-the-solution/
The solution – whether the origin is intrinsic or anthropogenic is – as I keep saying – to build prosperous and resilient communities in vibrant landscapes.
I do agree with you on this.
Robert I Ellison: The next climate shift is due within the decade. The size, speed and direction of abrupt change is not knowable.
Well, you see what I mean. Taking CO2 into account does not sharpen the prediction, either as to time, location, or the best set of measurements for detecting the shift (e.g., will the greening of the Sahel chnge? will agriculture benefit? Will typhoon frequency, intensity or duration increase in the Philippines?); and the prediction is of no use to the policy debate about CO2.
Is there a better prediction?
Although a significant factor in global climate on the scale of decades – the Pacific Ocean modes are part of a global climate system that is variable at many scales in time and space.
In the words of Michael Ghil (2013) the ‘global climate system is composed of a number of subsystems – atmosphere, biosphere, cryosphere, hydrosphere and lithosphere – each of which has distinct characteristic times, from days and weeks to centuries and millennia. Each subsystem, moreover, has its own internal variability, all other things being constant, over a fairly broad range of time scales. These ranges overlap between one subsystem and another. The interactions between the subsystems thus give rise to climate variability on all time scales.’
Chaos theory suggests that the system is pushed by greenhouse gas changes and warming – as well as solar intensity and Earth orbital eccentricities – past a threshold at which stage the components start to interact chaotically in multiple and changing negative and positive feedbacks – as tremendous energies cascade through powerful subsystems. Some of these changes have a regularity within broad limits and the planet responds with a broad regularity in changes of ice, cloud, Atlantic thermohaline circulation and ocean and atmospheric circulation.
Dynamic climate sensitivity implies the potential for a small push to initiate a large shift. Climate in this theory of abrupt change is an emergent property of the shift in global energies as the system settles down into a new climate state. The traditional definition of climate sensitivity as a temperature response to changes in CO2 makes sense only in periods between climate shifts – as climate changes at shifts are internally generated. Climate evolution is discontinuous at the scale of decades and longer.
In the way of true science – it suggests at least decadal predictability. The current cool Pacific Ocean state seems more likely than not to persist for 20 to 30 years from 2002. The flip side is that – beyond the next decade – the evolution of the global mean surface temperature may hold surprises on both the warm and cold ends of the spectrum (Swanson and Tsonis, 2009).
Robert I Ellison:Is there a better prediction?
Is that your way of conceding that CO2 does not enter into the prediction? And that the dynamical systems theories an examples that you cite are irrelevant to predicting the effects of CO2 accumulation?
You missed the Tim Palmer video? Pay closer attention and consider more deeply – Matthew – rather than emulating a pompous arse. CO2 is a “wedge’ – as Judith said.
Hilarious. There is no fundamental disagreement among scientists about climate and chaos theory, or control knobs and wedges.
JCH
That time of month.
No comment on GISS or UAH or warming atmosphere this month gone?
What could the reason be?
Here’s hoping for another fall in UAH and not egg on my face.
I don’t think you grasp the situation in which you find yourself. You have to have a huge cold dip, and so far you have none.
https://i.imgur.com/YrMzv9v.png
Robert I Ellison: In the words of Michael Ghil (2013) the ‘global climate system is composed of a number of subsystems – atmosphere, biosphere, cryosphere, hydrosphere and lithosphere – each of which has distinct characteristic times, from days and weeks to centuries and millennia. Each subsystem, moreover, has its own internal variability, all other things being constant, over a fairly broad range of time scales. These ranges overlap between one subsystem and another. The interactions between the subsystems thus give rise to climate variability on all time scales.’
Sure, and none of that is relevant to predicting climate effects of CO2 accumulation or CO2 control policies.
Abrupt climate change from internal responses to forcing – are not predictable. But greenhouse gases are a change in the dynamical system that may initiate a large and unwelcome response. So practical and pragmatic means of reducing greenhouse gases are welcome.
“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.” NAS 2002
I have quoted that elsewhere here – a quote from climate luminaries – but Matthew’s obtuseness is typically invincible.
My question was does he have a better prediction? The answer to that is emphatically no if – like Matthew – you hadn’t anticipated the correct answer.
Robert I Ellison: My question was does he have a better prediction?
My questions, have been, in variations of wordng:What do the dynamical systems studies tell us about the effects of CO2 up til now and in the future? If the main topic of discussion is effects of CO2, then dynamical systems theories now are an interesting red herring.
Abrupt climate change from internal responses to forcing – are not predictable. But greenhouse gases are a change in the dynamical system that may initiate a large and unwelcome response.
May, and may not. That’s the input regarding CO2 from dynamical systems theory.
JCH no comment on global temps this month exactly because they went down in May.
You could at least acknowledge that..Still 3 more months of UAH falls in the pipeline
Robert I Ellison: The solution – whether the origin is intrinsic or anthropogenic is – as I keep saying – to build prosperous and resilient communities in vibrant landscapes.
Lots of us advocate that. As has been said many, most prominently by Steve Mosher, the US would be a step ahead if it merely prepared for the recorded past. No dynamical systems theory is necessary for that.
Emissions are being addressed pragmatically across a plurality of gases and sectors with a plethora of technologies and systems – underpinned by economic growth and development. Uncertainty creates the impetus to focus on pragmatic emission reductions regardless of short term climate variability. The bottom line is that the right questions to ask about climate change are not scientific but about appropriate responses to diverse human and environmental challenges.
You wrote: Uncertainty creates the impetus to focus on pragmatic emission reductions regardless of short term climate variability.
Harm from CO2 is not known or proven. Good from CO2 is known and proven.
The need to increase emissions of CO2 is clear in all real known data.
Only unproven theroy and models show different.
Robert I Ellison: Emissions are being addressed pragmatically across a plurality of gases and sectors with a plethora of technologies and systems
That may be so, but droughts, floods, hurricanes and storm surges will continue to occur in the places where they have occurred, and almost no place in the US is preparing to handle extremes of even the last 150 years. California is not prepared for its well-documented 1863 flooding, or any of its well-documented droughts.
What effects CO2 reductions will have are mostly conjectural, with the “official” calculations of the effects of currently proposed reductions being quite slight.
Dr. Curry, I wrote a post demonstrating how if you use the Satellite and other data to isolate the impact of CO2, CO2 has no impact at all on temperatures. These graphics may help with your project.
Climate Data Doesn’t Support CO2 Driving Climate Change and Global Temperatures
https://co2islife.wordpress.com/2018/06/03/climate-data-doesnt-support-co2-driving-climate-change-and-global-temperatures/
I will repost this that I said in a thread above.
People who want to attribute climate change to chaos don’t even consider the changing energy balance because chaos models are too simple to include that, but the forcing is a first-order factor in the energy change seen already.
The US National Academy of Sciences (NAS) defined abrupt climate change as a new climate paradigm as long ago as 2002. A paradigm in the scientific sense is a theory that explains observations. A new science paradigm is one that better explains data – in this case climate data – than the old theory. The new theory says that climate change occurs as discrete jumps in the system. Climate is more like a kaleidoscope – shake it up and a new pattern emerges – than a control knob with a linear gain.
https://watertechbyrie.com/2014/06/23/the-unstable-math-of-michael-ghils-climate-sensitivity/
There is large measured variability in radiant energy at the edge of space due to change in atmosphere and ocean circulation. Mechanisms include coupled sea surface temperature and cloud effects seen prominently in the eastern tropical and subtropical Pacific. And of course ocean and atmospheric circulation has immense variability at all scales.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/tsonis-2009-figure-1.png
Figure 1: Laguna Pallcacocha, ENSO proxy – greater red intensity shows El Niño conditions (Source: Tsonis, 2009)
Moy et al (2002) present the record of sedimentation shown above which is strongly influenced by ENSO variability. It is based on the presence of greater and less red sediment in a lake core. More sedimentation is associated with El Niño. It has continuous high resolution coverage over 12,000 years. It shows periods of high and low ENSO activity alternating with a period of about 2,000 years. There was a shift from La Niña dominance to El Niño dominance that was identified by Tsonis 2009 as a chaotic bifurcation – and is associated with the drying of the Sahel. There is a period around 3,500 years ago of high ENSO activity (red intensity frequently greater than 200) associated with the demise of the Minoan civilisation (Tsonis et al, 2010). For comparison red intensity in 1997/98 was 99. It shows ENSO variability considerably in excess of that seen in the modern period.
As with the Nilometer record shown above somewhere – influenced by sea surface temps in both the Pacific and Atlantic – it by no means sums to zero.
https://www.facebook.com/Australian.Iriai/posts/1608494905933432
People have considered the energy budget for a very long time – and deterministic chaos is a metatheory for how and why it changes. Climate is one of a broad class of deterministic chaotic system. The
… systems have behaviors in common.
One of the more likely abrupt changes in the near future is where an already accelerating Greenland melt rate basically kills the AMOC with meltwater preventing sinking, driving a cooling in Europe, and raising sea levels faster. Rapid warming has these consequences, and arguably the climate is already undergoing an abrupt change with a degree in a century and up to several more in the next one.
So much science to deny – Jimmy – and so little time.
It’s already abrupt change. Abrupt change begets more abrupt change, even possibly cascading tipping points.
Here’s more reading on tipping points. I have only glanced through it.
http://www.pnas.org/content/105/6/1786.full?utm_source=phplist594&utm_medium=email&utm_content=HTML&utm_campaign=DGS-Newsletter+vom+13.01.17+-+Jahresgru%C3%9F%2C+Gewinnspiel%2C+Aluherstellung%2C+eBook%2C+Veranstaltungen+und+Golfstrom
I read it years ago – narratives of catastrophe that are less than compelling.
“What defines a climate change as abrupt? Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause. Chaotic processes in the climate system may allow the cause of such an abrupt climate change to be undetectably small.” NAS 2002
Unless there are those elements it is not the abrupt climate change we are talking about Jimmy.
Other words are available – sudden or steep climate change. Anyway we are at the start of such a phase and tipping points aren’t even included.
https://skepticalscience.com//pics/Shakun_Marcott_HadCRUT4_A1B_500.png
Lol, No. It’s naturally dampened, with 10x the response range of the changes that humans have made
Greenland melt rate basically kills the AMOC with meltwater preventing sinking,
Has not happened in ten thousand years, has not happened in millions of years, ice is melted by contact with salt water, land melt water mixes with the salt water. The water will sink, there is not more melt water than in other warm periods during the past ten thousand years. You just keep looking for any wild alarmist idea to promote.
Look up meltwater pulses. There have been several since the last Ice Age from various glaciers collapsing.
(you know jim’s in trouble when he has to whip out marcott… ☺)
Look up meltwater pulses. There have been several since the last Ice Age from various glaciers collapsing.
Those meltwater pulses came from the great ice sheets as they thawed and returned to the ocean. They had nothing to do with meltwater from Greenland or Antarctic, those places rebuilt more ice as we warmed, ice core data shows they build ice in warm times and lose ice in cold times.
Greenland is not any different from the former glaciers that melted after the last Ice Age and caused those pulses. It is just the next one in a warming world, along with parts of Antarctica. This is a net mass loss process that is already starting, and has accelerated since 2000.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CxOFw40WEAEcf1F.jpg
Greenland is not any different from the former glaciers
That is total BS!
Greenland is different, ice core data shows that Greenland ice was growing while the major ice age glaciers in warmer places were thawing and going away.
You’re only saying that Greenland has been immune to melting. But now we have exceptionally high GHG levels compared to the last few million years, so that is why the Greenland ice sheet is on the way out, and this became more noticeable as CO2 levels approached 400 ppm, a value far above what Greenland has seen through the Ice Ages.
http://plantsneedco2.org/html/TheLastFourGlacierCycles1a.gif
Lol, 3.7W/m^2 is like a half a 7W nightlight spread out over a sq meter, if you wrap your hand around it, divide that by 775.
Only 2 W/m2 so far, but enough to provide all the warming we have seen and more to come when you do the energy budget. This is a variant of the “just a trace gas” argument.
No, it’s how minuscule 2W spread over a sq meter really is.
It’s nonsensical to say this is the cause of the modern warm period.
They’re UL approved for use on 90 day old dried out incendiary Christmas trees. And that’s before you divide the output by 775.
The key is that it is steady. It integrates over time. In the last century or so, CO2 additions have provided an extra 3 GJ/m2 over the whole surface of the earth. If all that goes into heating water, it can warm 700 m depth of water by 1 degree C. This is not a small amount and no wonder it caused global warming. A lot of skepticism is based on not understanding the magnitudes of the numbers properly.
Nonsense, the optical window is losing 20-40W/m^2 24 x 7.
Non sequitur.
Only if you accept the same for when you pointed out that the 2W was all the time.
Problem with the warming during the ice ages argument is that it is proof positive that CO2 does not cause the warming. GHG warming during the transition from glacial to interglacial causes just a fraction of the warming and co2 causes but a small fraction of that. Among the strongest arguments that ECS is less than 1°C is the warming during the ice ages…
There is a compelling argument that dust from CO2 deserts on ice sheets changes albedo and causes the initial warming. Atmospheric feedback from warming is mostly H2O of course.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1674987116300305
CO2 was not enough to cause past major warm periods and they happened anyway. We are nowhere near a major warm period now. We are not near as warm as other warm periods in the most recent ten thousand years. CO2 is here to make green things grow and more is better. Water is here, in all of its states, to regulate temperature. Water influence can be adjusted by earth to deal with whatever comes at us. CO2 is good for green things that grow and green things that grow are good for all life on earth. The war against CO2 is the worst evil of modern times.
dust from CO2 deserts
Dust from deserts was mainly because in cold times with low frozen oceans, it does not rain enough to grow green things and low CO2 does make it worse. Cold times end because there is not enough ocean moisture available for rain or snow and ice thaws and depletes and retreats and that brings us out of the ice age. As we warm, precipitation increases, CO2 increases, growth of green stuff increases. CO2 is one factor, Water is the major factor.
Yes Alex – dust from deserts deposited on ice and reduced Earth albedo. Or so the argument in published science goes.
It ramped up to 2 W/m2 and that was accounted for in the net which has been 3 GJ/m2 so far. This applies to the change in forcing from just CO2. Other anthropogenic components add to it. As mentioned 3 GJ/m2 is not a small number when compared to climate change so far, and, on the contrary, easily accounts for it.
It’s a made up estimate for what is actually radiated to space within hrs.
That’s what the regulated cooling does.
So, if the sun increased its forcing by 2 W/m2 you think it would not warm the earth? How?Why? Make the case.
Measured sensitivity to insolation is <0.02°F/Whr. And in many places its 1/4 that.
OK, so then you think it would be impossible to see the 11-year cycle in the global temperature record, right? That has an amplitude of 0.2 W/m2. I don’t know where you get your number from, but it is not suited to steady forcing.
I’m sure I’ve told you before, it’s based on measurements of the day to day change in temp, and the corresponding change in insolation. It’s on my wordpress page.
It amounts to 1 C warming per day for a sustained 2 W/m2. How do you interpret that? After a year of 2 W/m2 you have 350 degrees of warming? Doesn’t look right to me. I know it’s strong, but it isn’t that strong.
No, it’s 0.04°F/Whr, that’s 1F for 24hr, but I don’t think its 24 hrs, only the day cycle. But even if it was 1°, that’d be 15 extra minutes of the high cooling rate, at a loss of 15 minutes of the slow rate, 1/4°-1/8°F excess by Tmin
If 2 W/m2 is sustained day and night for a year, how much warming do you get?
0.04°F
Wrong. How many Wh do you get when it is applied at 2 W for a year? Clue: it’s big.
It’s not “applied” for a year, any more than CS is applied for a year.
It’s effectively been growing to 2 W/m2 for a century, so take an average of 1 W/m2 for a century if you prefer. The number is only bigger. The thing about CO2 is that it applies the whole time and at a steadily growing level. It integrates to 3 GJ/m2 which can warm 700 m depth of water by a degree. This is not a small amount of heating that has been applied.
No it’s not. And of course you ignore any losses due to cooling. Which occurs daily.
With CO2, this 2 W/m2 is applied as a reduction in cooling to space because it acts like extra insulation. Adding insulation causes warming. The climate sensitivity tells you how much.
And that is the wrong theory. As I explained to you for days and days and days.
There is NO reduction in cooling because wv has a nonlinear response at night as it cools, preferentially cooling any excess warming, such as might happen from co2 first.
This is the part where you go off into your own theory where Everyone is wrong except You.
Yep, it’s all about the data. Actual measured data, not someone’s idea about what he thinks the data should be, real data.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/best/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.25
Sixty years of global data.
And it does not represent what was measured either. I’ve showed you that as well.
Oh, and for decades we’ve been told “climate is a complex nonlinear coupled system”
But when I point out cooling is nonlinear, I’m the one who is wrong.
You said you like data when you don’t really. This is another independent dataset.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.25
None of those are independent.
Oh I like data, I just won’t stand for manipulation of data in an attempt to be lied to with it, there’s a difference.
And a third independent group produced this one. You don’t think we have had a degree of global warming, but have no data to say otherwise that anyone believes except yourself.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.35
They all three followed the same basic process, so call me not surprised they get the same general results.
That’s not independent.
BEST started out as skeptics and used a completely different method but got the same trend. What better process have you come up with? The skeptics are drawing a blank on global temperature so far. Maybe they just can’t improve on it or are they still working on it? Don’t hold your breath.
No they didn’t. What better process? I used the actual measurements.
If you have a better method than BEST, you should publish it, because theirs uses a very large number of stations and their method allows the use of stations that didn’t even stay fixed or were not there the whole time.
Ocean warming is hundredths of a degree – not 1 degree C. The key to this is the Planck response – a fundamental law of physics that says that radiative heat loss from any object depends on its temperature.
And there are sources of warmth other than CO2
RIE, yes, the forcing goes into two terms. One is the heat content, and the other is the Planck Response, aka surface warming, that offsets the imbalance by radiating more out. The surface ocean has warmed by almost a degree, but the total OHC change is maybe about a quarter of the 3 GJ/m2 by my reckoning. Anyhow the forcing is more than enough.
If you know that simple physical fact why talk such unphysical nonsense? And then compound it with yet more nonsense?
Just putting the numbers together for you. 3 GJ/m2 of CO2 forcing so far – maybe 25% has gone into OHC, most of the rest is countered by the surface warming of a degree C that we have already had. The current state is 2 W/m2 plus of which 25% is going into OHC (aka the imbalance), the rest already made up for by surface warming to date (aka the Planck Response). Few skeptics realize that the forcing accounts for the energy changes. The usual mistake is that they think 2 W/m2 is too small.
I doubt if skeptics would accuse me of being a skeptic. Most of your gigaJoules is lost back to space – and there are big wiggles in toa power flux that do not sum to zero – as the slide says. There is a bigger picture Jimmy.
The GJ are only canceled out by surface warming, which is the point. Forcing then warming. Cause and effect. In fact Cause > Effect as some remains uncanceled in the pipeline even after all this warming, and there is much more to come under most emission scenarios.
sources of warmth other than CO2
Warming on the whole depends on the system’s response to those other sources of warming verses the response to CO2. Until we know what the feedbacks to natural forcings verses feedbacks to CO2 forcing are, then we don’t know how much of the warming is natural and how much is from CO2. (just because co2 forcing can account for all the warming does not mean that co2 does account for the warming)…
You assume that clouds don’t change with ocean and atmospheric circulation? I have always found that to be an odd assumption.
Here’s my shot at a one slide Powerpoint that MAY be clearer to the general public, which is what I believe Judith was asking for advice on….
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10156251892802696&set=gm.1580068088786233&type=3&theater&ifg=1
thx, i decided to go with something like this – stable on the left hand side, dynamic on the right hand side. Its much simpler and makes the point that if the left side is correct, then climate is controllable by reducing CO2, on right side climate is not controllable.
That also reduces to the question is raising CO2 changing climate?
And, can you identify what is causing the climate to change if it’s not CO2?
can you identify what is causing the climate to change if it’s not CO2?
It was not CO2 for the previous cycles during the most recent ten thousand years.
Yes, the cause is documented in the ice core data.
Ice Extent increases when it gets colder, ice extent decreases when it gets warmer. It snows more when it is warmer, it snows less when it is colder. ice volume increases when it snows more, ice advances when ice volume is more.
Yes, water and ice are abundant, water in all of its states is a cause that climate cycles are well bounded, not a result. CO2 does not cause or prevent water from changing state. It can’t be colder without more ice extent, it cannot be warmer without less ice extent.
Bring actual data to the debate. Bring ice core data.
agree, “stable vs dynamic” really says it best, and has strong scientific backing
looking forward to seeing the finished product! I trust there will eventually be video, from someone, unless Mann has somehow declared this a secret or copyrighted public debate… might be prudent for skeptics to insist a full video record be kept, given the potential for abuse, mischaracterization, and/or legal action…
If you argue that climate is “fairly stable”, I believe you need to be prepared to explain the end of the last ice age (and the cyclical nature of ice ages over hundreds of thousands of years) and clearly explain/distinguish the little ice ages that occurred in the medieval period and the medieval warming period. I could see where it could get confusing to argue that the climate is generally stable and at the same time deal with the most recent little ice ages and the medieval warming period. A lot of people instinctively believe that the climate is always changing. I believe you are aware of this article and many other articles on this subject. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-thawed-the-last-ice-age/
Hope this helps a bit.
JD
Our planet sits isolated in a 3k bath, our temperature ground, we should be looking at surface temps referenced to our ground, in K.
If you do so, it is quite stable, and the daily range is about 3.5% ripple, that’s a pretty decent regulator.
i think your panels are just two different versions of Dr Curry’s left panel. Climate being dominated by positive feedbacks verses being dominated by negative feedbacks. (dr curry’s right panel is getting at something different than that)…
“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.” NAS 2002
The ‘wedge’ at work in a dynamic system. Where does that lead in terms of rational and effective policy responses?
There is a risk of low probability but high impact events – something that in a risk management framework would be classed semi-quantitatively as extreme. But there is equally an extreme risk from intrinsic variability that cannot be addressed with wind turbines and solar panels.
There is a pragmatic strategy to address both sources of uncertainty and instability. This “strategy centers on efforts to accelerate energy innovation, build resilience to extreme weather, and pursue no regrets pollution reduction measures — three efforts that each have their own diverse justifications independent of their benefits for climate mitigation and adaptation.” https://thebreakthrough.org/archive/climate_pragmatism_innovation
It requires smart strategies on population, development, technical innovation, repair of agricultural soils, restoration of forests and grasslands and reclamation of deserts – fueled by economic growth – on which America might take a leading role. Just don’t mention deterministic chaos.
pursue no regrets pollution reduction measures
CO2 is not pollution and reducing CO2 would damage the growth of all green plants on earth and it would make the plants more dependent on more water and there would be huge regrets.
Substances my be essential to life at one concentration and deadly at another. Pollution is when human actions change the concentration of substances – or even introduce many new substances – into the wider environment. But even if not deadly at anywhere near current concentrations – changing the concentration of gases in the atmosphere – with little understanding of consequences is pollution. There is a prima facie case that we shouldn’t mess with things we don’t understand – especially in a system where small changes in external factors are amplified in internal responses. As skeptics claim and then deny in almost the same breath.
The specific mechanism of “CO2 fertilization” is stomatal conductance and this changes terrestrial hydrology and biology. Biology and hydrology – my joint professional specialization – are emphatically deterministic chaotic systems – small variability in conditions can drive large changes.
In forests the “underlying mechanism emphasizes the role of evaporation and condensation in generating atmospheric pressure differences, and accounts for several phenomena neglected by existing models. It suggests that even localized forest loss can sometimes flip a wet continent to arid conditions. If it survives scrutiny, this hypothesis will transform how we view forest loss, climate change, hydrology, and environmental services. It offers new lines of investigation in macroecology and landscape ecology, hydrology, forest restoration, and paleoclimates. It also provides a compelling new motivation for forest conservation.” https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/59/4/341/346941
“On the face of it, elevated CO2 boosting the foliage in dry country is good news and could assist forestry and agriculture in such areas; however there will be secondary effects that are likely to influence water availability, the carbon cycle, fire regimes and biodiversity, for example,” Dr Donohue said. https://www.csiro.au/en/News/News-releases/2013/Deserts-greening-from-rising-CO2
I know these are skeptic memes – but what makes you imagine I should believe it? Low probability and high impact events emerging out of small anthropogenic or natural variability – and despite lil’ Jimmy this is the scientific consensus – are an extreme risk for society and environments. And this is not a speculative narrative of catastrophe – it is the history of climate. The rational response is to redsuce the speed of anthropogenic change in the system – but also to build prosperous and resilient communities in vibrant landscapes and to transition to cheap and abundant 21st century energy sources. The latter would seem inevitable and railing about how good CO2 is – carbon is better in soils and vegetation – irrelevant.
changing the concentration of gases in the atmosphere – with little understanding of consequences is pollution.
When you don’t understand then you cannot say it is pollution, especially when you know CO2 has been orders of magnitude in earth’s history and our fossil fuels were created and sequestered then for out use now.
And you cannot see that arguing for anything but uncertainty is an argument from ignorance?
CO2 levels are elevated in greenhouses and even in outdoor fields because it is well known that the worst pollution is not enough CO2.
Given the desert and Amazon spanning arguments in published science – reduction to a controlled greenhouse is reductio ad absurdum.
Oh -and I meant to add that there are other greenhouse gases – and aerosols. CFC’s, ozone, nitrous oxide, methane, sulfides and black carbon.
Substances my be essential to life at one concentration and deadly at another.
It is well known that CO2 is not deadly at thousands of parts per million, in submarines and in spacecraft. You have much less than nothing when you make CO2 any kind of pollution at 400 parts per million.
Uncertainty is a result of ignorance! When you look at data from ice cores and other proxies, the uncertainty and ignorance goes away.
“Substances my be essential to life at one concentration and deadly at another… But even if not deadly at anywhere near current concentrations – changing the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere – with little understanding of consequences is pollution.”
Quoting out of context is intellectual dishonesty.
Increased Fossil Fuel use did make life better for billions of people, without it, there were not billions of people and possibly there could not have been.
Increased CO2 has helped feed those billions of people. It is established science that increased CO2 makes things grow better while making more efficient use of water.
The good things that come from more CO2 are well known and documented. The bad things that were supposed to come from more CO2 have not happened yet and are appearing more and more unlikely.
Enough people now believe CO2 is not bad that they elected someone who wanted to stop the mad, crazy alarmism before before it destroys our economy and energy production, as it has in many places in the world and in our country. People who had lowest power rates now have the highest power rates, We are stopping that here by ending the war against fossil fuels and all of life on earth.
Fossil fuels don’t bring benefits – human ingenuity does. The latter doesn’t stop here.
And carbon is better in agricultural soils than in the atmosphere.
The last line of your “stable” theory says
“Therefore, increasing CO2 levels are not dangerous because other complex, interacting natural forces have been triggered.”
That doesn’t sound stable at all. And certainly not reassuring. It seems to just say, well, however bad CO2 might be, there could always be something worse.
Chasing Alice down bunny holes?
Judith,
If the discussion moves away from purely scientific matters to encompass sociological aspects of the climate debate then you may need to have in mind (but should perhaps be wary of mentioning) the following:-
Post-modern science contrasted with traditional science;
Group-think;
The Iron Triangle as per president Eisenhower’s farewell speech;
The suborning of the mainstream media to the Alarmist agenda;
Cristiana Figueres (ex-UNFCCC senior staffer) and her comment regarding changing the economic development model – unfortunately she seems not to have explained in which ways the change would be effected!
Knee-jerk reaction being the goal of propaganda.
Best wishes,
Idiot_Wind.
Data collection analogy with astrology. It’s scientific looking data but what happens to it isn’t.
In a debate between an alarmist and a lukewarmer, the lukewarmer has lost before the debate starts, the lukewarmer is already halfway agreeing with the alarmist. Actually a 1.6 degree lukewarmer is already agreeing with 80% of the 2 degree danger point.
During the most recent ten thousand years, the ice core data from Antarctic and Greenland both show repeating, alternating, warm and cold cycles inside the same bounds. The Antarctic and Greenland ice cores show cycles of different phase and periods, but inside the same bounds. For an alarmist and for a lukewarmer, I ask both to prove that whatever caused past cycles stopped working. I ask for proof that this modern warm cycle is outside the bounds of past cycles, proof that this warm cycle could not have happened without man. I would also like to ask for proof that modern weather events are outside the bounds of the past ten thousand years. I would especially ask if humans on earth would have been better off if we never started using fossil fuels. What would life on earth be like now without fossil fuels?
When a Judge asks easy questions in a court of law, the alarmists fall flat. Neither Alarmists nor Lukewarmers can answer these questions and justify the war against Man-Made CO2.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/06/speculative-climate-chaos-v-indisputable-fossil-fuel-benefits/
popesclimatetheory
“In a debate between an alarmist and a lukewarmer, the lukewarmer has lost before the debate starts, the lukewarmer is already halfway agreeing with the alarmist. Actually a 1.6 degree lukewarmer is already agreeing with 80% of the 2 degree danger point.”
+1,000
And all with no empirical data confirming CO2 causes global warming. Nowhere in the “Climate chaos” side of the slide being discusses does it say anything about CO2 causing global warming. Yet when the debate begins everybody is in agreement that CO2 causes global warming; the debate just quibbles over who is responsible: God or man!.
In her April 2013 congressional testimony, Dr. Curry said “If all other things remain equal, it is clear that adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere will warm the planet. However the real difficulty is that nothing remains equal, and reliable prediction of the impact of carbon dioxide on the climate requires that we understand natural climate variability properly. Until we understand natural climate variability better, we cannot reliably infer sensitivity to greenhouse gas forcing or understand its role in influencing extreme weather events.”
I do not know how you can get from Dr. Curry’s congressional testimony (my bold) text above to quibbling about what the climate sensitivity is! Doesn’t sound very scienceeeee to me.
As far as the slide goes, I don’t know who the intended audience is. Chaos means “disorganization” to a layman and a branch of mathematics to those technically oriented. And how to make the giant leap from the slide to quibbling about climate sensitivity is too much for my poor little brain to comprehend.
+1000 back at you!
“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,” Anastasios Tsonis said.
In Tsonis’ world climate is dynamically complex. No simple cause and effect. In a dynamic world climate sensitivity is dynamic.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/unstable-ebm-fig-2-jpg1.jpg
Solutions of an energy-balance model (EBM), showing the global-mean temperature (T) vs. the fractional change of insolation (μ) at the top of the atmosphere. (Source: Ghil, 2013)
The model has two stable states with two points of abrupt climate change – the latter at the transitions from the blue lines to the red from above and below. The two axes are normalized solar energy inputs μ (insolation) to the climate system and a global mean temperature. The current day energy input is μ = 1 with a global mean temperature of 287.7 degrees Kelvin. This is a relatively balmy 58.2 degrees Fahrenheit.
The 1-D climate model uses physically based equations to determine changes in the climate system as a result of changes in solar intensity, ice reflectance and greenhouse gases. With a small decrease in radiation from the Sun – or an increase in ice cover – the system becomes unstable with runaway ice feedbacks. Runaway ice feedbacks drive the transitions between glacial and interglacial states seen repeatedly over the past 2.58 million years. These are warm interludes – such as the present time – of relatively short duration and longer duration cold states. The transition between climate states is characterised by a series of step changes between the limits. It caused a bit of consternation in the 1970’s when it was realized that a very small decrease in solar intensity – or an increase in albedo – is sufficient to cause a rapid transition to an icy planet in this model.
But the point remains that failing to plan for change in an immensely complex system – is a plan to fail.
Climate remains within the bounds set during the past 10,000 years. Math models that project rapidly increasing temperatures have not been confirmed. For a discussion of the many modes of variability thought to affect climate, see the Appendix.
Yeah right – saying that climate over 10,000 years is what it is may be a slight tautology.
Why is there no focus on what is relevant for justifying policy and funding? Why is there no rational discussion on this?
Whether or not the planet is warming, how much, and what’s the cause are not relevant for policy. What is relevant is the economic impacts of warming.
• Is warming beneficial, or is it dangerous as the alarmist believe?
• What is the evidence that global warming would be net harmful for the world economy?
• What is the evidence that it would be net beneficial?
• Which, on balance, is more likely to be correct?
• What are the potential consequences (both beneficial and damaging) and what are the probabilities of each
As you reject science – did you not say above that science can be damned – its lucky your crystal ball is working.
Alarmism gone mad:
Jerry Brown: 3 Billion Will Die from Global Warming
http://euanmearns.com/jerry-brown-3-billion-will-die-from-global-warming/
The main cause of the 3 billion deaths is lack of electricity.
Although billions of people still cook over wood and dung – the death toll from particulates is only about 4 million a year. Clean HELE coal plants in Africa and Asia would go much further in reducing those very unnecessary, drawn out deaths gasping for one more breath than wind turbines or solar panels.
e.g. https://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/programs/energy-and-climate/our-high-energy-planet
While mitigating indoor sources of black carbon is one of Lomberg’s smart development goals – economic growth is of course the key. The global economy is worth about $100 trillion a year. To put aid and philanthropy into perspective – the total is 0.025% of the global economy. If spent on Copenhagen Consensus smart development goals such expenditure can generate a benefit to cost ratio of more than 15. If spent on the UN Sustainable Development Goals you may as well piss it up against a wall. Either way – it is nowhere near the major path to universal prosperity. Some 3.5 billion people make less than $2 a day. Changing that can only be done by doubling and tripling global production – and doing it as quickly as possible. Optimal economic growth is essential and that requires an understanding and implementation of explicit principles for effective governance of free markets.
Economically the world is locked into a growth cycle – despite any and all reservations and interventions. A high growth planet brings resources to solve people and environment problems. The clearest way to economic growth is markets – and the biggest risk is market mismanagement.
The urban doofus hipster vision on the other hand involves narratives of moribund western economies governed by corrupt corporations collapsing under the weight of internal contradictions – leading to less growth, less material consumption, less CO2 emissions, less habitat destruction and a last late chance to stay within the safe limits of global ecosystems. And this is just in the ‘scholarly’ journals.
But none of it seems germane to the topic of climate predictability.
Put up a comment at ATTP on the AGW argument
“Basically there are [multiple] good lines of evidence [reasons] for some AGW.
There is a proven rise in CO2 levels.
There is a scientific expectation [good theory] that such levels would result in warming.
There is a rise in global temperature [ time duration significance is an issue].
There are some lines of evidence that this may cause problems.
Sea level rise.
An expectation [scientific?] that weather events become more extreme with a temperature rise.
Agriculture problems.
Infection [malaria] problems.
Migration problems.
Over an indeterminate and almost inevitable but sooner than later date possibly this century.”
–
And no, I am not a warmist.
The problems though are obvious for people arguing CAGW or should I say CAGW in a short time frame.
It has to be catastrophic and it has to be in a very short time frame.**
Which causes insoluble problems.
If it is happening in a very long time frame, thousands of years no one will care [be very interested].
Yet to make it happen, events that will take thousands of years to occur have to be compressed or lied about as to occurring in a few decades or a century.
Hence Hit one
Claims. They will claim.
The sea levels will rise by 12 feet by the end of the century. We will all be 100 feet under water if all the ice on Greenland or Antarctica melt in 200 years.
These are CAGW stock arguing points and attacks which are absolutely provable wrong but will be used by Mann and the Admiral.
Shoot them down. Make them play.
Demand an answer to how high are they predicting, on average the sea level to rise by 2100.
Their answer has to be 6 foot or higher.
Then whip out the graph of the last 100 years and extend 100 years showing 18 inches only. Comment that the amount of heat needed to create another 4 1/2 feet in that time is astronomically high.
Demand an answer to when, how many thousand years it will take to melt the ice off Greenland/ Antarctica completely scientifically then ask why they are scaring people by claiming it will happen in 200-500 years which is impossible.
Ask why we worry about something 10000 years away and how CO2 can stay in the air all that time.
** Like this thought a lot.
attacks which are absolutely provable wrong
BS.
Aha.
Care to give your estimate of either SLR or time to melt all the h3 Antarctic ice with CAGW?
I doubt it.
Silence on these issues, like silence on dropping temperatures speaks volumes.
IPCC AR5 RCP 8.5 estimates 500 years.
One fundamental disagreement about climate change is emotional, not rational:
“The negativity bias,[1] also known as the negativity effect, refers to the notion that, even when of equal intensity, things of a more negative nature (e.g. unpleasant thoughts, emotions, or social interactions; harmful/traumatic events) have a greater effect on one’s psychological state and processes than neutral or positive things.[2][3][4] In other words, something very positive will generally have less of an impact on a person’s behavior and cognition than something equally emotional but negative. The negativity bias has been investigated within many different domains, including the formation of impressions and general evaluations; attention, learning, and memory; and decision-making and risk considerations.”
Among other biases, “climate change” achieves undue emotional importance by the unverified imagination of disasters. This explains the continued hysterical reaction to the idea, which, given human nature, may endure.
They tell us the sky is falling so they can tax and control us.
Another way of looking at that- Humans are wired to solve problems, which means they’re wired to look for problems to solve.
The great problem with climate change is not that we’ve failed to present people with a problem to solve, but that advocates insist on “action” that won’t solve it. A problem that the most insistent advocates don’t want to solve is not a problem.
My wife tells me that the paint color on our walls is an urgent, serious issue, but she hasn’t picked a new color yet and I’m not about to rebuild the house out of stone. It’s a “problem” I will solve when a realistic solution is presented.
“It doesn’t matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are. If it doesn’t agree with experiment, it’s wrong.”
Richard P. Feynman
For the up/down/”back” radiation of greenhouse theory’s GHG energy loop to function as advertised earth’s “surface” must radiate as an ideal black body, i.e. 16 C/289 K, 1.0 emissivity = 396 W/m^2.
As demonstrated by my modest experiment (1 & 2) the contiguous presence of the atmospheric molecules participating in the conductive, convective and latent heat movement processes renders this ideal black body radiation impossible. Radiation’s actual share and effective emissivity is 0.16, 63/396.
Without this GHG energy loop, radiative greenhouse theory collapses.
Without RGHE theory, man-caused climate change does not exist.
(1) https://principia-scientific.org/experiment-disproving-the-radiative-greenhouse-gas-effect/
(2) http://www.writerbeat.com/articles/21036-S-B-amp-GHG-amp-LWIR-amp-RGHE-amp-CAGW
Dr Curry: I do have questions about two of your points. How would you answer them?
You say that CO2 is a “small” wedge. How “small” (or large) is it?
You say that climate change results from “shifts” in the complex of interacting systems; Will CO2 increase produce a shift? (or has it already done so?)
Additionally, if you want to take it on: warming has been forecast; on the whole, what is the balance of evidence concerning the costs and benefits of such warming as may occur?
Imagine answering questions from the audience. Who is the audience, anyway?
Matthewrmarler,
If I was answering your question, I’d say:
Valid evidence to support the contention that global warming would be net harmful for life on Earth and for human well-being is lacking.
On the other hand, there is strong evidence that global cooling would be very harmful.
And there is evidence that up to about 4C global warming (from 1900) would be net beneficial for the global economy, which means for human well-being https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/30/fundamental-disagreement-about-climate-change/#comment-872951 .
Furthermore, the costs of the Climate Change Industry, including the cost of climate policies to combat global warming, is many times higher than the projected climate damages.
Damage cost at 3C GMST increase from 2000 is about 0.72% of global GDP (projected by FUND3.9 with all parameters at default values). However, if the impact of energy consumption is corrected to be consistent with US empirical data, then the total impacts of all impact sectors would be beneficial https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/30/fundamental-disagreement-about-climate-change/#comment-873499 .
In contrast, if the ‘Paris commitments to 2030’ are fully implemented, and they continue to 2100, they would reduce temperatures by 0.17C. The cost would be about 2% of GDP in 2030 https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/30/fundamental-disagreement-about-climate-change/#comment-873080 .
In conclusion, the weight of valid evidence is that global warming would be beneficial, whereas global cooling would be very damaging.
Peter Lang: If I was answering your question,
Imagine me asking from the audience: Would you stand up and answer for her?
Matthew,
No. But I am not sure what point you are making. Are you suggesting no one other than Judith should to respond to comments you address to Judith? Surely, that is not how CE works. If Judith wants to answer, she’ll give her own reply.
Peter Lang: If Judith wants to answer, she’ll give her own reply.
Just so. And if she chooses not to answer, that’s up to her a well.
She requested feedback. My feedback is approximately, These are questions that she ought to be prepared to answer. If not, one of her opponents will answer for her, and then she’ll be on the defensive..
I agree with all that. But I am still not sure why you asked me if I would answer. I inferred, perhaps wrongly, that you wanted to tell me you wanted an answer from Judith only, no one else. Did I misunderstand the point of your comment/question?
Peter Lang: Did I misunderstand the point of your comment/question?
Yes. Prof (ret) Curry is going before an audience in a semi-debate format. How would she answer the questions for that audience?
Dr. Curry never satisfactorily answers the question about where the warming comes from. There are a lot of wheels inside of wheels, but that doesn’t mean we don’t know which ones are the largest and their timescales.
We know that the knob we control that affects the temps the most is CO2. Curry knows that the earth is warming, which does place her well above the outright strangeness of Heller. And she also knows that CO2 is an important forcing. But she spends a lot of time pretending that things are too complicated to know everything (correct) but by doing so masks the point that man is responsible for the additional CO2 and that earth’s warming is a result of that additional CO2.
CO2 is a large wedge. Simply saying “small wedge” is sloppy. She would have to explain what the other wedges were. There’s a reason a super majority of climate scientists call it the primary forcing.
Where is the extra heat coming from? Not Milankovitch cycles. Not the sun. There’s no hiatus of concern (try to find the “pause” years now) and there’s no question that ground station results can be trusted. Now that satellite results show the same warming we can expect the cries of “you have to trust satellites and not ground stations” to go away.
Curry thought the “hiatus” would extend into the 2030s. The latest years shows temps at or above IPCC projections, but we know this topic will be dormant until the next small blip. Watch the man walking the dog, not the dog.
Do you agree that if global warming is beneficial, not damaging, it doesn’t matter “where the warming comes from”? Therefore, instead of continuing to argue about where it comes from, we should be asking and investigating, whether warming is beneficial or damaging, I present some lines of evidence above supporting the contention that global warming is beneficial, not dangerous. This is what should be investigated.
Peter, your “lines of evidence” are beyond ridiculous.
You claim that because “life thrived” 500 million years ago, those conditions were optimum: as it was warmer, warmer is beneficial.
Equally, 500m years ago, the oxygen content of the atmosphere was as low as 14% and has been as high as 35%.
Would you argue that a sudden change in oxygen content of this magnitude would be “beneficial” ?
Your logic simply does not follow.
VTG,
I did not say that. Why do you continually use strawman arguments (i.e. lie)?
Have you no ethics, whatsoever?
Warming or cooling are not beneficial when it changes rapidly. Some places win, some lose. Moving entire cities is expensive. Leaving farmland and pretending that each farmer can simply relocate is absurd. Pretending that land previously covered with snow will be arable is silly.
Some crops win, some lose. Some countries will disappear (too much or too little water.) Some costal cities will have to build walls, some move entirely. Some states like FL will be hit hard.
The earth “thrives” at any temp, any CO2 percent. We are talking about changes in temp, wind, water, etc.
Would you aren that spending x amount today is better than spending 10x-100x in a century?
But ponts for the Gish Gallop. How many decades do we have to hear that the earth is not warming, followed by a wave of “we’re not responsible.” and now replaced with “This could be a good thing.” The point is that the earth is warming, CO2 is the primary forcing, and we will be forced to make costly changes.
An unsupported assertion.
Paleoevidence shows that rapid warming from the present cold temperatures (Earth is currently experiencing about the severest icehouse period since animal life began) is beneficial for life; rapid cooling is very bad.
Life responds to local changes, not to GMST change. Here’s one example. Coxon and McCarron show that regional temperatures (Ireland, Iceland Greenland) increased from near glacial to near current temperatures in 7 years and 9 years 14,500 and 11,500 years ago. Life thrived. It burst out.
Coxon and McCarron (2009) (figure 15.21). Cenozoic: Tertiary and Quaternary (until 11,700 years before 2000) http://eprints.maynoothuniversity.ie/1983/
“Earth’s surface temperature averaged about 7C warmer than now over the past 540 Ma. Life thrived for most of this time.” — Peter Lang
Who is Peter Lang, and how did he hijack your account?
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=site%3Ajudithcurry.com+%22peter+lang%22+%22thrived%22
First five hits.
Your logic is shot, your ethics are non-existent and your pants are on fire.
You haven’t refuted the evidence I posted here https://judithcurry.com/2018/05/30/fundamental-disagreement-about-climate-change/#comment-872951 nor explained the error you assert in the logic. You’ve provided no valid evidence that global warming would be damaging overall, leta alone dangerous or catastrophic.
Your method of arguing – i.e. use of derision instead of arguing points of substance and valid evidence – demonstrates you have nothing of substance to contribute to the policy debate.
Genuinely, it’s mind-boggling.
VeryTallGuy: You claim that because “life thrived” 500 million years ago, those conditions were optimum: as it was warmer, warmer is beneficial.
He did not say “optimal”, but the evidnce that warmer would be worse is absent.
Would you argue that a sudden change in oxygen content of this magnitude would be “beneficial”
Such evidence as has been reviewed supports the notion that the post 1880s increase in CO2, rainfall, and temperature has been beneficial to biota, “sudden” or not “sudden”.
Matthew
Peter
Before going over many more claims, let’s stick to your claim that ancient temperatures having been higher is evidence that current warming will not be damaging.
1) There are many instances of temperature excursions in the fossil record. Can you cite a single one not associated with an extinction event?
2) why does your logic apply to ancient temperature but not oxygen levels?
VTG I’ll answer your question after you’ve answered mine.
You also need to stop cherry picking. Read the whole. Regarding extinction events they are going on all the time. The largest are cooling events when in coldhouse and warming events when in hothouse conditions. We are currently in coldhouse conditions. Warming has been shown to be massively beneficial. I gave links to evidence. Furthermore, more new species form than go extinct. The major evidence I provided is that the mas off carbon tied up in the biosphere increased by 3 to 10 times since the LGM, and I also provided evidence of how life burst out in major rapid warming events – much faster than current.
I’ve supported my arguments. You haven’t. Over to you. Let’s see what evidence you can produce to show that what I’ve been saying is wrong. And, remember to stick to the topic, not diver or introduce new topics. See rules of rational discussion: http://twentytwowords.com/a-flowchart-to-help-you-determine-if-youre-having-a-rational-discussion/
And, explain support all your assertions.
By the way your comment begins with a misrepresentation of what I said. Go away, read it again, and rewrite it correctly. Don’t come back until you have got it right.
I read your comments very carefully Peter.
You provide no evidence that life thrived more in ancient climates than now, you assert it.
You provide no evidence that a sudden change in temperature will be beneficial. Indeed, you ignore the clear evidence that sudden temperature changes are invariably accompanied by extinction events. Your claim of benefit is pure assertion. We can note you are unable to cite any research claiming the same.
You take no account that atmospheric chemistry and even the existence of land based life was totally different in the periods you extol as “optimal”.
You refuse to acknowledge that your logic, if it applies to temperature, will also apply to oxygen levels. That’s because it is fatal to your fundamentally flawed logic.
(1) This is not what your AR4 cite actually states. I quote:
Taking the midpoint of these estimates as 600 GtC that’s an increase of 2,400 to 3,000. How this is “3 to 10 times” is a mystery. In what way it demonstrates a further sudden temperature increase is “beneficial” is left as an exercise to your readers.
Now we have
(1) Are you *seriously* suggesting that the timescale for evolution of new species is how you believe we should evaluate AGW. Seriously?? Or does “life burst out” mean something else. I suggest if you want to be taken seriously you stop making grandiose rhetorical claims.
(2) You have not provided evidence that historic warming events were faster than current. The reality is that the geological record does not allow such a judgement to be confidently made
Your cites do not support your argument. Indeed, in several cases you specifically misrepresent them in ways that are clearly factually incorrect.
But more significantly, your logic is simply flawed. There is no way to extrapolate any connection from gross statements about a 500 million year history with significantly different atmospheric conditions and ecosystems to the effect of a sudden temperature rise now. It’s simply not relevant.
The reason your arguments are met with derison is because they are risible.
Scott Koontz: CO2 is a large wedge. Simply saying “small wedge” is sloppy.
“Small” and “large” are equally sloppy — hence my question to her.
Here are the bottom lines:
1) RGHE theory claims the earth is 33 C warmer with an atmosphere, 288 K (WAG) – 255 K (240 W/m^2 at ToA).
Simply not true.
Nikolov and Kramm moon studies show that the earth would be hotter not cooler without an atmosphere.
The 30% albedo lowers the effective operating temperature from ISR 394 K / 250 F to ASR 360 K / 190 F and Q =U A dT explains the surface to ToA temperature difference.
2) RGHE fabricated the GHG energy loop as an explanation for the 33 C difference that does not exist.
The energy loop is an S-B “what if” theoretical calculation and not a physical reality.
3) The upwelling measurement measures/trends the near surface air temperature not the ground and incorrectly assumes a BB 1.0 emissivity
The downwelling measurement measures/trends the near surface temperature and incorrectly assumes a BB 1.0 emissivity. The radiation energy emitted by CO2 is dissipated within 15 to 20 m of air.
These measurement problems are obvious from close study of SURFRAD and USCRN data.
4) RGHE theory says “back” radiation from the colder atmosphere “warms” the earth.
Cold to hot w/o work violates thermodynamics and is demonstrably not true.
USCRN data clearly proves that during the day air and soil warm together and as the sun goes down and through the night soil is warmer than the air cools rapidly until the sun rises again.
No GHG energy loop – no RGHE – no man-caused climate change.
“Where did we get that (equation) from? Nowhere. It is not possible to derive it from anything you know. It came out of the mind of Schrödinger.”
— Richard Feynman
But it is like trying to describe a rainbow to a blind man. A photon is literally a packet of energy – the origin of quantum mechanics – with the energy equal to the Planck constant times the frequency. It behaves as a particle when it strikes a molecule with a matching resonant frequency. Because light behaves as a wave when radiated it is conceived of as a travelling Schrödinger wave with particle locations defined as probabilities. The origin of many worlds ideas – although it is probably just math.
The sun is the source of the vast majority of heat on the surface of the planet. The atmosphere is mostly transparent to incoming visible light and the surface is warmed. Warm surfaces emit infrared (IR) photons. At specific IR frequencies greenhouse gases resonate with outgoing photons resulting in vibrations, rotations, translations and electron orbit excitations. All with the quantum photon energy of the Planck constant times the frequency. The kinetic energy of molecules – heat – is transferred to other molecules in the atmosphere heating the atmosphere. Ultimately photons will be re-emitted in random directions – including down – as electron orbits jump to a lower quantum state of excitation – bouncing around the atmosphere – with more greenhouse gases micro seconds longer than they otherwise would. It is this mechanism that maintains the habitability of the planet – and more greenhouse gases result in incremental warming. We can be assured that it doesn’t violate fundamental laws of physics.
It’s a bit sad when people have just one idea – and it is completely mad. Sadder when it is repeated endlessly for our edification.
“It is this mechanism that maintains the habitability of the planet – and more greenhouse gases result in incremental warming. We can be assured that it doesn’t violate fundamental laws of physics.”
Except it does violate those laws: energy out of nowhere, cold to hot, perpetual loop.
Neither the atmosphere nor the GHGs “warm” the earth.
The atmosphere and the 30% albedo it produces makes the earth less hot aka cooler.
Surface is warmer than ToA due to Q = U A dT.
Emission of photons from greenhouse gas molecules in random directions – including down – is a quantum reality and not a violation of the laws of thermodynacics.
Refer to K-T power flux balance.
396 W/m^2 LWIR upwells from the surface, 116% of the 342 that actually arrives from the sun. This is not real. It’s the S-B ideal BB power flux calculation for any surface at 16 C aka 289 K.
GHG molecules (0.04%) absorb a net 333 W/m^2 and wiggle and jiggle using zero energy and emit 333 W/m^2 “back” to the surface, 139% of the net minus albedo 240 that entered the atmosphere, 248% of the net 160 to/from the surface.
Net 333 W/m^2 appears from nowhere and is not real.
Net 333 W/m^2 cannot ALL return to the surface.
Absorbing 396 or 333 should render 0.04% of the atmospheric molecules blazing hot, but it’s cold in the troposphere, -40, -60 C etc. At that temperature there is no way molecules can emit 333 back to the surface.
The molecules emit in ALL directions so only a fraction points back to the surface.
There are exactly zero ways this GHG energy loop can actually work.
This GHG up/down/”back” radiation energy loop is a “what if?” calculation that has no physical reality and all the QED handwavium in the world can’t ‘splain or “fix” it.
“The molecules emit in ALL directions so only a fraction points back to the surface.”
Yes quite a lot of photons go back to the surface. Increased scattering due to increased greenhouse gases has been measured from space. Your cognitive dissonance is showing.
“There are exactly zero ways this GHG energy loop can actually work.”
No – there is just one way.
nickreality65: RGHE theory says “back” radiation from the colder atmosphere “warms” the earth.Cold to hot w/o work violates thermodynamics and is demonstrably not true.
False: RGHE theory says that light from the sun warms the earth, and back radiation from the atmosphere slows the rate at which the earth cools.
Well it doesn’t do that either.
Energy flows, i.e. heat, through a thermal barrier such as the insulated walls of a house or a blanket or a layer of gas trapped between glass or non-condensable gasses in steam condenser or the atmosphere per the equation Q, Btu/h = U, Btu/h-A-dT * A * (Thot – Tcold). LWIR is neither needed nor invited.
For a given heat flow increasing the thermal resistance/decreasing the conductivity requires an increase in the temperature differential.
Wander the HD aisle full of insulation marked with R values.
If your furnace puts out a fixed Btu/h and you add thermal resistance insulation, R up / U down, maintain the equation’s balance requires dT to increase and the inside gets hotter. What actually happens is the thermostat reduces the firing rate and your fuel bill.
While CO2 has a lower conductivity than air, at 0.04% its contribution to conductivity is femto scale.
Anything that absorbs IR can act as insulation. GHGs absorb IR. Therefore GHGs act as insulation.
Jim D says “Anything that absorbs IR can act as insulation. GHGs absorb IR. Therefore GHGs act as insulation.”
Using the same logic – Anything that emits IR an act as an insulator. GHGs emit IR. Therefore GHGs act as a conductor.
I mean “can act . . .”
No, emitting is not the same as conducting. The GHGs hardly changes the conduction of air at all or its heat capacity, but they change its insulating properties. The surface emits at 288 K and the top emits at only 255 K. That’s a radiative difference that non-GHG gases can’t account for. It’s 33 degrees worth of insulation that provide a shielding of the surface as viewed from space.
Here, just for you.
Point One:
The notion that the earth’s surface is 33 C warmer with a “greenhouse” atmosphere is rubbish.
288 K is a wild ass guesstimate for only the land area’s surface temperature. (IPCC AR5 Glossary)
255 K is an unrelated-to-the-surface & with-atmosphere theoretical “what if” S-B BB equilibrium temperature calculated from the global averaged 240 W/m^2 OLR at ToA (100 km).
The lunar papers by Volokin and Kramm clearly confirm that the earth without an atmosphere and 30% albedo will be hotter not cooler.
288 K and 255 K are measured effective radiative temperatures. We have ground stations for surface temperature and satellites for IR. You are referring to things that are easily debunked just by observations.
288 K is 1.5 m above the ground.
255 K is a S-B BB calculation for 240 W/m^2 OLR.
BS – BS = BS^2
Temperatures are measured with IR. Power fluxes are ASSUMED – incorrectly.
Yes, 390 W/m2 upwards at the ground 240 W/m2 going out the top. The atmosphere does absorb. This is the point I was making. Also almost no longwave coming in at the top 324 W/m2 at the ground. The atmosphere does emit. I think you will agree.
This 390 W/m^2 is the IDEAL CALCULATED S-B BB power flux for a 288 K surface. (K-T 396 @ 289 K)
IT IS NOT REAL!!!!!!
It is measured. Engineers rely on it.
https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/radiation-heat-emissivity-d_432.html
It’s measured incorrectly.
IR instruments measure temperature and INFER power flux by ASSUMING 1.0 emissivity.
I’ve run the following by Apogee, Eppley and Kipp Zonen and they have not objected.
The Instruments & Measurements
But wait, you say, upwelling LWIR power flux is actually measured.
Well, no it’s not.
IR instruments, e.g. pyrheliometers, radiometers, etc. don’t directly measure power flux. They measure a relative temperature compared to heated/chilled/reference thermistors or thermopiles and INFER a power flux using that comparative temperature and ASSUMING an emissivity of 1.0.
The Apogee instrument instruction book actually warns the owner/operator about this potential error noting that ground/surface ε can be less than 1.0.
That this warning went unheeded explains why SURFRAD upwelling LWIR with an assumed and uncorrected ε of 1.0 measures TWICE as much upwelling LWIR as incoming ISR, a rather egregious breach of energy conservation.
This also explains why USCRN data shows that the IR (SUR_TEMP) parallels the 1.5 m air temperature, (T_HR_AVG) and not the actual ground (SOIL_TEMP_5). The actual ground is warmer than the air temperature with few exceptions, contradicting the RGHE notion that the air warms the ground.
Looks like you’re trying very hard not to believe what everyone else knows. Emissivities of common materials can be found from any physics or engineering textbook as I linked.
The ground is either colder or warmer than at 1.5 m depending if it is day or night, and on average these are very close. Another red herring.
There are two emissivities one for the incoming surface reflect/trans/absorb and one for the outgoing contiguous participating media, i.e. cond/conv/advect/latent/radiate.
“…and on average these are very close.”
USCRN data shows this is NOT the case.
Show a reference. Real physics only has one emissivity.
Your own experience should tell you that the ground can be colder than the temperature at 1.5 m or warmer. This is from just looking around you in the night and day.
Appeals to authority – another refuge of losers.
From extensive study of actual USCRN data the ground is warmer than the air pretty much all of the time. One notable exception is when it freezes.
How about night time? The ground cools first and stays colder until sunrise.
USCRN data shows clearly that your statement simply is not so.
There is an example graphic at this link. I have several more examples.
(1) https://principia-scientific.org/experiment-disproving-the-radiative-greenhouse-gas-effect/
Yes, that’s the one where those people define emissivity wrongly and proceed to build their house of cards on that. Do you actually believe that stuff?
Actual radiation / ideal radiation is the text book definition of emissivity.
Notice how it only includes radiation in the definition. See your mistake yet?
No.
Emissivity & the Heat Balance
Emissivity is defined as the amount of radiative heat leaving a surface to the theoretical maximum or BB radiation at the surface temperature. The heat balance defines what enters and leaves a system, i.e.
W/m^2 = radiative + conductive + convective + latent
Emissivity = radiative / W/m^2 = radiative / (radiative + conductive + convective + latent)
In a vacuum (conductive + convective + latent) = 0 and emissivity equals 1.0.
In open air full of molecules other transfer modes reduce radiation’s share and emissivity, e.g.:
conduction = 15%, convection =35%, latent = 30%, radiation & emissivity = 20%
Don’t you see that your newly defined denominator is different from the one in definition of emissivity? There is no wiggle room there. It is a definition.
No it’s not different.
The denominator is the ideal power flux of the surface at temperature. What’s wrong with that?
So, if you even know how ’bout just spit it out instead playing pretentious twenty questions.
The denominator is the blackbody equivalent radiative flux calculated from the temperature alone. Yours isn’t anything to do with that. (radiative + conductive + convective + latent)
You now have shown two completely different denominators for your emissivity. Total leaving is not equal to the ideal blackbody radiation which is the denominator in the emissivity used by physics and engineering. Your own equations are self-contradictory and you are hopelessly confused as a result.
One for radiation arriving & one for radiation leaving.
Identical formats.
Arriving? What are you talking about? Emissivity is defined in terms of radiation emitted over what a black body emits, hence the name. Nothing about arriving there, or other fluxes.
Belief is religion.
USCRN data contradicts your view of ground/air temperature yet you choose t believe otherwise.
You, apparently with all your belief, have stated you don’t expect the ground to be cooler than the air on a typical night.
That’s what USCRN data clearly prove.
Belief has nothing to do with it.
Actually it doesn’t.
Actually it doesn’t.
BS
Real data to back it up.
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6336714760406523904
Impossible to see what you are plotting there.
Your statement is contradicted by your graph. You clearly see large negative differences (colder ground) much of the time.
…and you got the sign wrong. Negative means the ground is warmer. December the ground is mostly colder than the air. You need to correct this.
Jim D:
GHG’s both absorb and emit IR.
Kirchoff observed that the maximum a surface can emit is the amount absorbed.
A surface that reflects and transmits 60% of the incoming can only absorb/emit 40%.
But a surface with contiguous participating media, i.e. atmospheric molecules, can emit less than absorbed because of conduction, convection, latent heat processes.
Ideal S-B BB radiation only works in a vacuum.
For the GHG LWIR energy loop to act as advertised requires the surface to emit as a S-B BB surface.
Not possible.
For the up/down/”back” radiation of greenhouse theory’s GHG energy loop to function as advertised earth’s “surface” must radiate as an ideal black body, i.e. 16 C/289 K, 1.0 emissivity = 396 W/m^2.
As demonstrated by my modest experiment (1 & 2) the contiguous presence of the atmospheric molecules participating in the conductive, convective and latent heat movement processes renders this ideal black body radiation impossible. Radiation’s actual share and effective emissivity is 0.16, 63/396.
Without this GHG energy loop, radiative greenhouse theory collapses.
Without RGHE theory, man-caused climate change does not exist.
(1) https://principia-scientific.org/experiment-disproving-the-radiative-greenhouse-gas-effect/
(2) http://www.writerbeat.com/articles/21036-S-B-amp-GHG-amp-LWIR-amp-RGHE-amp-CAGW
Jim D:
If emitting is not the same thing as conducting than absorbing is not the same thing as insulating.
It is a rule of physics that absorption efficiency matches emission efficiency. The 255 K emitted to space largely comes from GHGs that have absorbed warmer IR from below and re-emitted at their cooler temperature. Don’t assume all insulation is caused by conduction. In the case of gases radiation transfers much more energy than conduction does, and by the time it gets to space that is the only way heat flows. Without GHGs the surface emission at 288 K would all escape to space and that is 60% more than does. They are keeping a lot more energy in the atmosphere by absorbing it on its way up, which in turn keeps the surface warmer because of the GHG re-emission.
W/O an atmosphere the earth would be 390 K.
W/O GHGs there would be zero life.
Without an atmosphere there would be no life either. Point being?
W/O CO2 no life – and very different/lower albedo – and a hotter – not colder.
Also, no O2, we’re in trouble. Or take away the N2, everything becomes flammable. Important points.
99.96% of the atmosphere is N2, O2, Ar. They and H2O are responsible for the U in Q = U A dT and the dT between surface and ToA (32 km).
Yes, they don’t insulate. IR passes right through those gases. No absorption or emission. Important to realize.
No, they DO insulate!! No different from the air trapped in the walls of a house.
IR DOES NOTHING!!!!!!
How do you insulate against radiative heat transfer without absorbing any? Think it through. You have 390 W/m2 up from the bottom, 240 W/m2 out from the top. Absorption.
“You have 390 W/m2 up from the bottom, 240 W/m2 out from the top. Absorption.”
This 390 W/m^2 – does – not – exist!!!!
For crying out loud – 390 W/m^2 is more than arrived from the sun!!! It’s nothing but a calculation a “what if” creating energy out of thin air- violates conservation of energy!!!
Here!
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6369927560008212481
Your link to a crank does not help your cause. Link to engineering or physics sites. The emissivity is close to one. 390 W/m2 is easily emitted from surfaces near 288 K.
So, ad hominem, the refuge of losers.
The actual emissivity is 63/396=0.16.
288 K & 390 W/m^2 only w/o a contiguous participating media aka into a vacuum.
What physics tells you is that the emissivity of the surface is near 1, and that 80% of the upward energy from the earth’s surface is via radiation. You don’t even have an equivalent of the Kiehl-Trenberth diagram where the energy is balanced at the top, the surface and within the atmosphere. If you don’t have an energy budget, you don’t have an explanation.
https://chriscolose.files.wordpress.com/2008/12/kiehl4.jpg?w=500
nickreality65: Well it doesn’t do that either.
Nevertheless, you wrote a false statement about RGHE theory.
As to your furnace analogy, is the furnace outside the house, warming the house via radiation? If not, then the furnace analogy isn’t informative about the Sun-Earth system..
The system does not care where the heat came from.
It came from the natural gas line outside the hose.
nickreality65:
RGHE theory says “back” radiation from the colder atmosphere “warms” the earth. Cold to hot w/o work violates thermodynamics and is demonstrably not true.
matthewrmarler:
False: RGHE theory says that light from the sun warms the earth, and back radiation from the atmosphere slows the rate at which the earth cools.
nickreality65:
Well it doesn’t do that either.
First we see violates thermodynamics as we’ve seen a bunch of times which I think is at least partly semantics. Then this is clarified to what is a standard explanation also seen a bunch of times and used by myself. And we have from nickreality65, No.
Back radiation, call it whatever you like, is fact or fiction. If CO2 cannot absorb IR and water vapor cannot absorb IR what do we have? If we assume the rest of the atmosphere cannot absorb IR we have something like a black body. IR will still be emitted by the surface but not be impeded by the atmosphere. Measuring IR above the surface in all conditions is then just a function of the surface temperature. But I do not think that is what the data says. IR variability of the atmosphere is impacted by the composition of the GHGs in the atmosphere.
nickreality65: The system does not care where the heat came from.
That’s absurd. The energy flows depend on the energy sources, and your thinking ought to reflect that.
nickreality65: Appeals to authority – another refuge of losers.
And your beliefs rely upon whom? Answer: different authorities.
nickreality65: The Instruments & Measurements
But wait, you say, upwelling LWIR power flux is actually measured.
Well, no it’s not.
All measurement systems have measurement errors; think you know your blood pressure or hematocrit? Then you have not studied their mechanics and calibration results. All you have shown is that the downwelling and upwelling LWIR flows are not known to 3 significant figures where ever they are measured, not that the flows don’t exist or can’t be measured.
There have been commentators that help me understand other people’s points of view.
Why do people keep what the alternative source of energy is?
“The top-of-atmosphere (TOA) Earth radiation budget (ERB) is determined from the difference between how much energy is absorbed and emitted by the planet. Climate forcing results in an imbalance in the TOA radiation budget that has direct implications for global climate, but the large natural variability in the Earth’s radiation budget due to fluctuations in atmospheric and ocean dynamics complicates this picture.” https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10712-012-9175-1
The source of the large natural variability in the short term is cloud changes. The implications for much longer term change emerge from chaotic regime change in ocean and atmosphere circulation.
The wedge btw is an actual wedge inserted under a magnetic pendulum.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFdZ9t4Y5hQ
So that’s how chaotic systems work. A small wedge changes the system statistics by a lot. Climate is chaotic and what are the wedges?
… (keep) asking…
I prepared a single slide contribution. It follows much of the discussions above and have placed on twitter @john_rhsyjones in reply to the tweeted contribution by @RogerAPielkeSr
https://twitter.com/john_rhysjones/status/1003375284974804992
The idea on the slide was to have like-for-like comparisons and contrasts, and thus a direct response to the arrangement in the original. This is because as a slide to present to the public, it allows the difference to become apparent, based on my understanding of the difference.
Thus, for headings: ‘GHG as the determinant of climate’ vs ‘Distribution of energy determines climate’ which is the impacts of low- and high-frequency natural phenomena, a topical example of which is that of the North Atlantic.
The term ‘Distribution of energy’ for the public is a clear concept – piled up vs spread-out.
Point one:
a) the straight-forward contention that energy balance determines climate (yes, wholly consistent with Tubulent Eddie’s images where
Radiative Forcing implies warming, regardless of dynamic fluctuation.)
b) Distribution of energy to regions determines T and phenomena (eg sea ice reduction, or warm pool, or ACE – the Distribution of energy by advection to the Arctic mid-century and turn of century, for example. (again, wholly consistent with Tubulent Eddie’s images where Dynamic Fluctuation implies climate change, regardless of radiative forcing.)
Point two:
a) GHG production by industrialisation is the cause – because of point one.
b) The increased energy in system through GH production enters the climate system of distributions, ie a contributory factor.
So far the difference is in role of [GHG], its relative importance – whole v contibutory
Point three: in my understanding the fundamental difference –
a) Natural variation is trivial, uninfluential noise that cancels out. his is seen time and time again especially with high-frequency ENSO
b) Natural variation is profound, particularly the low-frequency phenomena.
Over the course of their cycles, natural variation, which distributes energy to regions, has decadal periods in which to influence climate regionally, and so in one mode of the AMO cycle mid-century: a prolonged period of glacial melt, of Arctic sea ice reduction, of low NA ACE, a correlating expansion of the Pacific Warm Pool (which may be a co-varying other cyclic phenomenon) and as a consequence produces new “initial” conditions upon which the impacts of the opposing mode, of glacial retreat, Arctic sea ice build-up, of high NA ACE, of an efficiently discharging Warm Pool. But the new conditions at end of first mode are those upon which the second mode acts: building ice upon a diminished Arctic, distributing WP effectively upon an expanded WP. (To that end I produced a twitter thread from https://twitter.com/john_rhysjones/status/997940724099264512 )
So the mid century ‘extended hiatus’ where T is seen not to reduce down to early century levels is the impact of the phenomena following the earlier warming; the conditions as we entered the ’80s (at Pacific event )were not as early in the century, but “new initial conditions” and of cource in the late ’90s there was the +ve AMO acting in its way.
Anyway, back to the original slide: For use to show to the public, the acurate term “chaotic” will likely be understood as “all over the place” “unpredictable” and similar “we don’t know” themes. The idea of re-calling this a distribution of energy was to show a unifying theme of energy in the system as important, but saying where it is regionally is what makes climate change.
Oddly, GHG determining climate has produced the most linear extrapolations of T, and I spied one at Berkeley Earth where the C20th variation was ignored and a graht took off with an extrapolation from the early 80’s – and off we were in a jiffy to a hot planet. Extrapolation being the most prone excercise to unexpected perturbations, I did another extrapolation based on the whole C20th and got to 1.5degree increase in the 70s – oh!! – but this is a doodle, a demonstration of what exrapolation can do or be subject to. It was accompanied by Cognitive Bias points, something I feel can be addressed more fully in the climate research field. It’s at
https://twitter.com/john_rhysjones/status/992900442509070336
Being able to communicate to the general public so they can see how much agrement there is, but what the twist of differnce makes, is a most pro-active step in science communication. It opens the way back to discussing the null hypotheses of the two views, and speaks loudly to the quest to determine an ECS.
Maybe then the idea that we formulate policy that is a combination of both reducing GHG (agreeable regardless for energy sustainability in a world of 10B people all using electricity) and mitigation focussed on regions, for specific matters to address and time periods expected to be relevant.
Co-operative discourse between the two view holders and a wider perspective of the contributors to “climate” would be pleasant.
John
“The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is responsible for a variable and climatically important northward transport of heat. Using data from an array of instruments that span the Atlantic at 26°N, we show that the AMOC has been in a state of reduced overturning since 2008 as compared to 2004–2008. This change of AMOC state is concurrent with other changes in the North Atlantic such as a northward shift and broadening of the Gulf Stream and altered patterns of heat content and sea surface temperature. These changes resemble the response to a declining AMOC predicted by coupled climate models. Concurrent changes in air‐sea fluxes close to the western boundary reveal that the changes in ocean heat transport and sea surface temperature have altered the pattern of ocean‐atmosphere heat exchange over the North Atlantic. These results provide strong observational evidence that the AMOC is a major factor in decadal‐scale variability of North Atlantic climate.” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/2017GL076350
NH meridional blocking project onto north Atlantic heat transport and to strong tracks. That makes Central England Temperature such a good indicator of NH climate variability.
e.g. https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/2014JD021983
Meridional blocking patterns emerge from surface increases at the pole. This in turn depends in part on solar UV/ozone interactions translating to surface pressure through atmospheric pathways.
e.g.
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms8535
With lower solar activity this century – NH cooling seems a reasonable hypothesis.
But it also projects onto upwelling in the eastern Pacific with global cooling from increased cloud.
e.g. https://aip.scitation.org/doi/abs/10.1063/1.4973593
and
http://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/3/4/833/htm
I’m not counting on the CO2 ‘wedge’ resulting in warming this century.
Policy relevant key points:
The global climate change industry is estimated at about 1.9% of global GDP in 2013, and increasing at 4-24% pa, or at about 2-10 times the rate of global economic growth https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/07/30/377086.htm .
This is huge cost for no significant impact on the climate.
If all the Paris commitments are implemented it is projected they will avoid just 0.05 C GMST increase in 2030, and cost about 2% of global GDP. However, this cost is only a small proportion of the total cost of the climate change industry. If the Paris commitments are implemented and continue to 2100, they would avoid just 0.17 C of projected GMST increase. Given the current rate of growth (4% to 24% p.a.) we can expect the annual cost of the climate change industry to avoid just 0.17 C would be much higher than 2% of global GDP in 2100.
But what would the cost be to avoid 2C, instead of 0.17 C, of the projected 3C of warming from 2000 to 2100?
If GMST increases by 3C from 2000 to 2100, the economic impact projected by FUND3.9 is -0.72% of global GDP. However, empirical evidence suggests this projection may be wrong, and instead the impact may be positive to up to about 4 C GMST increase.
The cost of the climate change industry is huge for negligible impact on GMST. Worse still, we are spending that huge amount and losing the potential benefits of any warming we do manage to avoid.
The broader context is population, development, food security and environment.
The Copenhagen Consensus has 19 smart goals – each with climate implications and each with $15 dollars benefit for each $1 spent. Increasing agricultural productivity by 40% requires that massive amounts of carbon be removed from the atmosphere and restored to soil.
Australia’s Paris commitment is low cost, largely in the land use sector and has productivity and environmental conservation benefits.
http://www.environment.gov.au/system/files/styles/width-450/private/resources/c42c11a8-4df7-4d4f-bf92-4f14735c9baa/images/fig5.jpg?itok=vSrJr0ud
The US commitment is largely predicated on natural gas. Not doing that anymore? Yeah right.
And as I say just above the combination of regime shifts from intrinsic and anthropogenic sources seems not guaranteed to produce warming.
“This pragmatic strategy centers on efforts to accelerate energy innovation, build resilience to extreme weather, and pursue no regrets pollution reduction measures — three efforts that each have their own diverse justifications independent of their benefits for climate mitigation and adaptation.” https://thebreakthrough.org/archive/climate_pragmatism_innovation
Rational climate policy goes way beyond energy emissions.
What’s that mean. Are you trying to deny that you refused repeatedly to accept and abide by the rules of rational discussion and said it was “bonkers” – your words.
A flowchart to help you determine if you’re having a rational discussion
http://twentytwowords.com/a-flowchart-to-help-you-determine-if-youre-having-a-rational-discussion/
No it’s not – yours is? Now that’s rational discourse – for a 5 year old.
Ad hominem, as usual.
You didn’t show what was wrong with what I presented. You just disagreed and made assertions it is wrong and made irrelevant comments (as usual).
The ad hominems you post in most of your comments are mostly projections of yourself.
Ad hominem
“Your continual diversion from the points being made are not rational discussion. You have previously stated that expecting you to participate in rational discussion is bonkers, so there is no point discussing anything with you.”
Any disagreement initiates fatuous observations like the above. Any response – and I call your habitual deprecation of anyone who challenges you a spade – then there is a deluge of insults and self justifying ad hoc rationalization.
And no – what I said is that your rules are bonkers, you use them to arbitrarily define disagreement as irrational and that I am not playing.
Subsidies for wind and solar – that were some $3B/year – do not relate to Australian Paris commitments. Wind and solar have not actually resulted in energy emission declines – despite the cost.
“Australia is meeting our 2020 target through Direct Action policies that reduce emissions, increase energy productivity and improve the health of soils and the environment. These policies will also enable us to meet our 2030 target.” http://www.environment.gov.au/climate-change/publications/factsheet-australias-2030-climate-change-target
The point made was that there are many options to address population. development, energy, etc that have benefits far in excess of costs and have mitigation and adaptation potential – and which build resilience to intrinsic climate extremes as well as to highly uncertain anthropogenic effects.
Robeeert I Ellison: Rational climate policy goes way beyond energy emissions.
Maybe, but there are documentable and documented benefits to raising CO2 and global mean temperature; along with little to no documented costs. Pretty much as Peter Lang has frequently written.
You quote my line on a spatio-temporal chaotic resonant system – and it applies to both ecology and climate – but it is just words for you.
“On the face of it, elevated CO2 boosting the foliage in dry country is good news and could assist forestry and agriculture in such areas; however there will be secondary effects that are likely to influence water availability, the carbon cycle, fire regimes and biodiversity, for example,” Dr Donohue said. https://www.csiro.au/en/News/News-releases/2013/Deserts-greening-from-rising-CO2
” … 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.” https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Has-the-climate-recently-shifted-%3F-Swanson-Tsonis/125b9f9c8b1d7ea8f7608ed7ce08a7bbe3cfde6b
Documented? Not by you I think.
The up/down/”back” radiation greenhouse gas energy “trapping” loop of the radiative greenhouse effect theory is pencil on paper, a spreadsheet cell, a “what if” scenario and NOT a physical reality.
Without this GHG energy “trapping” loop, radiative greenhouse theory collapses.
Without RGHE theory, man-caused climate change does not exist.
And with a snap of the fingers and “Presto!!” the bazillion dollar global climate change fantasy is suddenly unemployed.
Must be why nobody is allowed to talk about this possibility. Not newsworthy enough? Or too far outside the fake news hysterical CAGW narrative?
The idea seems almost trivial – it is not insulation or whatever strange idea Nick is peddling. Extra greenhouse gases increase the length of photon pathways in the atmosphere – increasing net energy in the system at any time.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/gw-photons-animated.gif
But the only thing that really matters is heat and work in the system – mostly ocean heat – that is equal to energy in less energy out. All strictly in accordance with the 1st law of thermodynamics. Something that can’t be set aside with a misapplication of the 2nd law.
Δ(H&W) ≈ Ein – Eout
Energy in varies with distance from the Sun on an annual basis – and very slightly with solar activity. Energy out varies in shortwave and infrared due to many factors and the planet warms or cools.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/ein-eout-argo-ocean-heat3.jpg
The graph needs a bit of work – but it shows cumulative average monthly radiant imbalance – energy in less energy out from CERES observations – co-varying with Argo ocean heat. As it should.
I’d suggest you try to get beyond trivial talking points to some pertinent science – the next post for instance – but that would be pointless.
“…length of photon pathways in the atmosphere…”
Handwavium nonsense.
Sure it is Nick. Just as greenhouse molecules emit photons in random directions except down – photons bouncing around more greenhouse gas molecules in the atmosphere doesn’t matter a damn.
Highly complex system: globally coupled, spatio-temporal chaotic, resonant system.
Does not the IPCC say that? Does it imply that no simple relationships exist, such as, for example, retaining radiant energy will raise the temperature of the system? Or raising the mean temperature of the surface will increase the global annual rainfall?
Sorry I haven’t been keeping up with your blog and this will arrive too late to impact what you say – this time. My prejudice is that an audience gets very little information from words on powerpoint slides; figures convey information. And a figure showing the EQUILIBRIUM relationship between GHGs (in CO2 equivalents) and warming allows you to explain the debate over climate sensitivity and how we might need to do little to keep warming to 2 degC if climate sensitivity is low. And explain by RCP 8.5 is misleading.
Then on a separate slide you could say that the dirty secret is that our planet is never in equilibrium: It sits between a 5600 K sun and 3 K space. The 50 m of ocean that controls our climate is floating on 40X more water that is much colder than surface. The study of systems far from equilibrium is in its infancy, but we do know that they can and do behave chaotically. Chaotic systems exhibit change without apparent cause referred to as internal or unforced variability.
The end of the last ice age appears to provide a clear refutation of the CO2 control knob hypothesis and illustrates the role of chaos. We believe that ice ages start when regular shifts in the Earth’s orbit deliver less sunlight during summer and more in winter to high latitudes in the NH where great ice caps grow. Ice ages are not driven by EXTERNAL FORCING, but by the same amount of heat being delivered to different location. (By the way, we are in such a period today; the LIA was the coldest period since the last ice age.) Ice ages end when more sunlight is delivered to the NH during summer, but we still don’t understand why a termination doesn’t occur every time this happens. Nevertheless, we crossed a critical threshold about 20,000 years ago and temperature began to rise in Antarctica. And CO2 and CH4 soon began rising to “amplify” that warming – though no responsible climate scientists believes that these GHGs INITIATED warming. However, this was not GLOBAL warming. Ice cores in Greenland (where CO2 is also rising) show essentially no warming for another 3000 years, despite the perception that CO2 is the control knob for global temperature. Today, CO2 is being accused of causing the most global warming in northern polar regions and essentially none near Antarctica (where the sea ice has been increasing in recent decades despite a warmer ocean). But 15 millennia ago, rising GHGs didn’t cause any warming in Greenland for 3 millennia while Antarctica was warming. Then suddenly temperature shot up to nearly current level in Greenland, gradually declined to ice age temperature over several millennia (the Younger Dryas) and shot back up again. The slow steady rise in Antarctica was halted with Greenland temperature rose rapidly and returned when it fell.
http://www.kivu.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/20000yrs-ice-age.jpg
http://www.skepticalscience.com/pics/ShakunFig2a.jpg
So the simple story told by Al Gore, that ice cores prove that rising GHG’s cause GLOBAL warming, becomes in the hands of climate scientists that GHGs amplify GLOBAL warming that is initiated without external forcing, actually turns into asynchronous hemispheric changes with abrupt chaotic changes at one pole, but not the other. This type of chaotic behavior is observed on all time scales from El Nino (an unpredictable rush of warm water across the Pacific, perturbing upwelling and downwelling), to the Great Pacific climate shift in 1978, to the warm Dust Bowl era in the 1930’s, to the unexplained rise and fall of the LIA and numerous other warm and cool period in the Holocene. The planet is unlikely to smoothly transition into a new equilibrium state as predicted by climate models that don’t properly reproduce current unforced variability. Nothing can tell us whether the next century will be dominated by equilibrium projections of climate models with unrealistically high ECS or the chaotic fluctuations in climate that we recognize have occurred in the past.
At TOA 100% correct, but there is one time a day(late at night) under clear skies at the surface, when it just might be in dynamic balance, but only because it’s being regulated locally to be that way. It will never do this during the day under clear skies, and the transition from warming to cooling at dusk and dawn is continuous.
https://i2.wp.com/micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/aug-13th.png
I just saw this in one of Michael Shellenberger’s recent excellent articles in Forbes:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/06/11/if-nuclear-power-is-so-safe-why-are-we-so-afraid-of-it/
“Having suppressed an evidence-based challenge to his “linear no-threshold” (LNT) model of radiation effects, Nobel laureate Muller thereafter continued to promote and defend the LNT model whenever and wherever the question arose.
Muller’s professional motivations overlapped with the agendas of anti-nuclear scientists and activists. “An antinuclear movement that originated in hostility to population growth in a supposedly Malthusian world,” writes Rhodes, “promoted in turn the LNT model, exaggerating its effects.”
So a scientist fakes it. Helping to take out a solution. The population grew anyways. Now that we need the solution that has been 86ed, the situation is worse. Like wise they can oppose fracking, pipelines and power lines.
Three decades of rancorous handwavium debate over evidence for and the physics behind the Radiative Greenhouse House Effect and man-caused climate change, aka CAGW.
What a waste since none of it is real.
The earth being 33 C warmer with an atmosphere is based on the difference between two completely unrelated made up numbers: 288 K, a wild ass guess pulled straight out of WMO’s butt and 255 K, a theoretical S-B BB ideal calculation for the 240 W/m^2 Long Wave Infrared Radiation leaving the top of the atmosphere.
Furthermore, the lunar studies by Volokin and Kramm clearly conclude that without an atmosphere the earth would be much like the moon, a barren rock with the lit/hot side maybe 390 K, the dark/cold side maybe 190 K and not even colder by 33 C.
The LWIR up/down/”back” GHG energy warming loop is a theoretical S-B BB ideal baseline calculation for any surface at 288 K and likewise not real. Contiguous participating media, i.e. atmospheric molecules, render impossible any BB emission from the surface.
No 33 C warmer + No GHG energy loop = No RGHE & No CAGW.
Am I wrong?
Always possible – for all of us.
’cause if I’m not wrong decades of research, “evidence,” publications and billions of dollars goes straight in the dumper and the entire trillion dollar global climate change industry is suddenly unemployed.
Where are you getting 390 K for the hot side and 190 K for the cold? A quick search yields numbers of 373 K for the hot side and 100 K for the cold. Could you provide a link to the Volokin and Kramm Study?
nick:
” ….. and 255 K, a theoretical S-B BB ideal calculation for the 240 W/m^2 Long Wave Infrared Radiation leaving the top of the atmosphere.”
Not only theoretical but actually measured ….
https://ttu-ir.tdl.org/ttu-ir/bitstream/handle/2346/72957/ICES_2017_142.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
https://phys.org/news/2015-02-carbon-dioxide-greenhouse-effect.html
“The scientists used incredibly precise spectroscopic instruments operated by the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Climate Research Facility, a DOE Office of Science User Facility. These instruments, located at ARM research sites in Oklahoma and Alaska, measure thermal infrared energy that travels down through the atmosphere to the surface. They can detect the unique spectral signature of infrared energy from CO2.”
“Am I wrong?”
Yes, as confirmed by measurement, not JUST theory.
The Instruments & Measurements
But wait, you say, upwelling LWIR power flux is actually measured.
Well, no it’s not.
IR instruments, e.g. pyrheliometers, radiometers, etc. don’t directly measure power flux. They measure a relative temperature compared to heated/chilled/reference thermistors or thermopiles and INFER a power flux using that comparative temperature and ASSUMING an emissivity of 1.0. The Apogee instrument instruction book actually warns the owner/operator about this potential error noting that ground/surface ε can be less than 1.0.
That this warning went unheeded explains why SURFRAD upwelling LWIR with an assumed and uncorrected ε of 1.0 measures TWICE as much upwelling LWIR as incoming ISR, a rather egregious breach of energy conservation.
This also explains why USCRN data shows that the IR (SUR_TEMP) parallels the 1.5 m air temperature, (T_HR_AVG) and not the actual ground (SOIL_TEMP_5). The actual ground is warmer than the air temperature with few exceptions, contradicting the RGHE notion that the air warms the ground.
http://www.writerbeat.com/articles/21036-S-B-amp-GHG-amp-LWIR-amp-RGHE-amp-CAGW
“IR instruments, e.g. pyrheliometers, radiometers, etc. don’t directly measure power flux.”
That’s right. College grads don’t read instructions that came with the gizmo. And the gizmo and similar gizmos are frauds.
“The actual ground is warmer than the air temperature with few exceptions, contradicting the RGHE notion that the air warms the ground.”
Someone made the same point for about year. I think they moved on to bigger and better things. I used to think that someone in danger of freezing to death in the woods would be warmed by blanket. But instead of giving them one, I debated them, telling them it wouldn’t matter.
nickreality65: IR instruments, e.g. pyrheliometers, radiometers, etc. don’t directly measure power flux. They measure a relative temperature compared to heated/chilled/reference thermistors or thermopiles and INFER a power flux using that comparative temperature and ASSUMING an emissivity of 1.0.
Nothing measures anything “directly” — a clinical thermometer, for example, measures mercury expansion or thermistor output voltage. And so on. So the issue becomes: how accurate is the “inferred” number compared to the “real” number or, failing that, “gold standard”? So if the “estimated” change of upward LWIR is 11 W/m^2, say, what is the “real” flux change? 7 – 15? 0?
0 for upwelling and downwelling LWIR fluxes is indefensible where the measurements/estimates/inferences show sufficiently large values compared to the measurement error..
“IR instruments, e.g. pyrheliometers, radiometers, etc. don’t directly measure power flux. They measure a relative temperature compared to heated/chilled/reference thermistors or thermopiles and INFER a power flux using that comparative temperature and ASSUMING an emissivity of 1.0.”
In that case we will have to throw out RSS and UAH tropospheric temperature series as well.
In addition, there are business card scanners using particular attributes like people which have the ability to find coloration. Some scanners could also find and browse different languages, even the majority which may have assembled in applications in these. In addition, there are the ones that can browse cards irrespective of what their measurement will be. What’s more, you’ll find more scanners offering larger resolution compared to several other card scanners : https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.business.card.scanner.reader