by Judith Curry
A remarkable essay by esteemed oceanographer Carl Wunsch.
While doing a literature survey for my paper on Climate Uncertainty and Risk, I came across a remarkable paper published in 2010 by MIT oceanographer Carl Wunsch, entitled Towards Understanding the Paleocean.
The paper is remarkable for several reasons — not only that it was published but that the paper was apparently invited by journal editor.
The paper is well worth reading in its entirety, for a fascinating perspective on paleo-oceanography and paleoclimatology. Here I provide excerpts of relevance to the sociology of climate science:
Introduction
From one point of view, scientific communities without adequate data have a distinct advantage: one can construct interesting and exciting stories and rationalizations with little or no risk of observational refutation. Colorful, sometimes charismatic, characters come to dominate the field, constructing their interpretations of a few intriguing, but indefinite observations that appeal to their followers, and which eventually emerge as “textbook truths.”
Consider the following characteristics ascribed to one particular, notoriously data-poor, field (Smolin, 2006), as having:
1. Tremendous self confidence, leading to a sense of entitlement and of belonging to an elite community of experts.
2. An unusually monolithic community, with a strong sense of consensus, whether driven by the evidence or not, and an unusual uniformity of views on open questions. These views seem related to the existence of a hierarchical structure in which the ideas of a few leaders dictate the viewpoint, strategy, and direction of the field.
3. In some cases a sense of identification with the group, akin to identification with a religious faith or political platform.
4. A strong sense of the boundary between the group and other experts.
5. A disregard for and disinterest in the ideas, opinions, and work of experts who are not part of the group, and a preference for talking only with other members of the community.
6. A tendency to interpret evidence optimistically, to believe exaggerated or incorrect statements of results and to disregard the possibility that the theory might be wrong. This is coupled with a tendency to believe results are true because they are ’widely believed,’ even if one has not checked (or even seen) the proof oneself.
7. A lack of appreciation for the extent to which a research program ought to involve risk.
Smolin (2006) was writing about string theory in physics. Nonetheless, observers of the paleoclimate scene might recognize some common characteristics.
Smolin’s (7) is perhaps the most important in his list. Good scientists seek constantly to test the basic tenets of their field–not work hard to buttress them. Routine science usually adds a trifling piece of support to everyone’s assumptions. Exciting, novel, important, science examines the basic underpinnings of those assumptions and either reports no conflict or, the contrary–that maybe it isn’t true. Imagine Darwin working hard to fit all of his observational data into the framework of Genesis (today we laugh at the so-called intelligent design community for doing just that).
The Hope for a Simple World
As both human beings and scientists, we always hope for explanations of the world that are conceptually simple yet with important predictive skills (in the wide sense of that term). Thus the strong desire that box models should explain climate change, or that simple orbital kinematics can explain the glacial cycles, or that climate change is periodic, is understandable. But some natural phenomena are intrinsically complex and attempts to represent them in over- simplified fashion are disastrous.
The pitfall, which has not always been avoided, is in claiming–because an essential element has been understood–that it necessarily explains what is seen in nature.
Extension of a simplified description or explanation outside of its domain of applicability is of little or no concern to anyone outside the academic community–unless it begins to control observational strategies or be used to make predictions about future behavior under disturbed conditions.
But strikingly little attention has been paid to examining the basic physical elements of “what everyone knows.”
The model problem
[General circulation] models now dominate discussions of the behavior of the climate system. As with future climate, where no data exist at all, the models promise descriptions of climate change–past and future–without the painful necessity of obtaining supporting observations. The apparent weight given to model behavior in discussions of paleoclimate arises, also, sometimes simply because they are “sophisticated” and difficult to understand, as well as appearing to substitute for missing data.
That models are incomplete representations of reality is their great power. But they should never be mistaken for the real world.
If a model fails to replicate the climate system over a few decades, the assumption that it is therefore skillful over thousands or millions of years is a non sequitur. Models have thousands of tunable parameters and the ability to make them behave “reasonably” over long time intervals is not in doubt. That error estimates are not easy to make does not mean they are not necessary for interpretation and use of model extrapolations.
Concluding remarks
Some of the published exaggeration of the degree of understanding, and of over-simplification is best understood as a combination of human psychology and the pressures of fund-raising. Anyone who has struggled for several years to make sense of a complicated data set, only to conclude that “the data proved inadequate for this purpose” is in a quandary. Publishing such an inference would be very difficult, and few would notice if it were published. As the outcome of a funded grant, it is at best disappointing and at worst a calamity for a renewal or promotion. A parallel problem would emerge from a model calculation that produced no “exciting” new behavior. Thus the temptation to over-interpret the data set is a very powerful one.
Similarly, if the inference is that the data are best rationalized as an interaction of many factors of comparable amplitude described through the temporal and spatial evolution of a complicated fluid model, the story does not lend itself to a one-sentence, intriguing, explanation (“carbon dioxide was trapped in the abyssal ocean for thousands of years;” “millennial variability is con- trolled by solar variations”; “climate change is a bipolar seesaw”), and the near-impossibility of publishing in the near-tabloid science media (Science, Nature) with their consequent press conferences and celebrity. Amplifying this tendency is the relentlessly increasing use by ignorant or lazy administrators and promotion committees of supposed “objective” measures of scientific quality such as publication rates, citation frequencies, and impact factors. The pressures for “exciting” results, over-simplified stories, and notoriety, are evident throughout the climate and paleoclimate literature.
The price being paid is not a small one. Often important technical details are omitted, and alternative hypotheses arbitrarily suppressed in the interests of telling a simple story. Some of these papers would not pass peer-review in the more conventional professional journals, but lend themselves to headlines and simplistic stories written by non-scientist media people. In the long-term, this tabloid-like publication cannot be good for the science–which developed peer review in specialized journals over many decades beginning in the 17th Century–for very good reasons.
Quotes from Wunsch’s papers
One often sees discussions of apparent visual correlations between two or more climate time series. One must be extremely careful not to be misled by oscillations that are merely the happenstance of random variability and imply no causal connection at all. The human eye developed to find patterns in nature; it sometimes sees patterns where none exist. Red noise (strongly auto correlated) processes are particularly prone to generating oscillations that to the eye look related.
Undoubtedly the real climate record contains physically significant trends and changes in spectral shape or energy levels. Two visually but statistically insignificantly correlated climate records may well be linked in a causal manner. Caution is required, however: short records of processes that are even slightly reddish in spectral character can easily lead to unwarranted, and incorrect, inferences if simple stochastic superposition is confused with deterministic causes. Sometimes there is no alternative to uncertainty except to await the arrival of more and better data.
Sometimes there is no alternative to uncertainty except to await the arrival of more and better data.
Better yet, go through the ice core data and become aware, it begins snowing more and causing more ice accumulation as temperatures increase. It takes hundreds of years for the ice to build, during a Medieval Warm Period to gain enough ice accumulation to turn the ice retreat into ice advance, when it starts getting colder, it is still warm enough for enough snowfall and no one realizes that it only got colder because it had gotten warmer and increased snowfall. We have enough data, go back in the data far enough and you can analyze multiple complete cycles. New better data will only confirm that we already had enough data.
“Red noise (strongly auto correlated) processes are particularly prone to generating oscillations that to the eye look related.”
This appears to be what misled Michael Mann & co-authors. They went on to compound the folly, with incompetent & invalid statistical manipulations. As ably reconstructed by McIntyre & McKittrick, years ago. The Climatists have been in denial about this ever since.
From the article:
Wally was right…
Wunsch:
Smolin (2006) was writing about string theory in physics, and I have no basis for judging the validity of his description (Woit, 2006, expresses much the same view). Nonetheless, observers of the paleoclimate scene might recognize some common characteristics, even though paleoclimate may have better prospects for ultimately obtaining observational tests of its fundamental tenets. The group identification Smolin refers to, clearly exists in paleoclimate, exemplified by the hagiographic title of one recent paper: “Wally was right…”
<a href="https://www.eoas.ubc.ca/~mjelline/453website/eosc453/E_prints/newfer08/alley07.pdf"Wally Was Right: Predictive Ability of the North Atlantic “Conveyor Belt” Hypothesis for Abrupt Climate Change – Richard B. Alley
“one can construct interesting and exciting stories and rationalizations with little or no risk of observational refutation”
Like yours.
I think I know better, but anything in particular you’d like to pursue?
Re: “I think I know better, but anything in particular you’d like to pursue?”
You habitually posting (for years) the fabricated blog image below, while ignoring any evidence that shows that image is nonsense:
http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/hot-spot/hot-spot-model-predicted.gif
https://judithcurry.com/2018/07/03/the-hansen-forecasts-30-years-later/#comment-876316
This is the real, non-fabricated image for the CCSP report:
https://itsnotnova.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/fourmodels.png
(Figure 5.7 on page 116 of: “Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere: Steps for understanding and reconciling differences”)
https://downloads.globalchange.gov/sap/sap1-1/sap1-1-final-all.pdf
But you don’t display CCSP’s 1979 – 1999 model-based projections from the above image. Instead you display an image that removes the 1979 – 1999 model-based projections, and replace them with model-based projections for 1959 – 1999. How does that make any sense? Why are you comparing a data analysis for a 21-year period, to model-based projections for a 41-year period?
Moreover, the color-scales also differ between the HadAT2 data analysis you showed vs. the model-based projections. For instance, warming of ~0.2°C/decade would appear yellow on the HadAT2 image. In contrast, that same rate of warming would be ~0.8°C on the 1958 – 1999 CCSP model-based image and would appear dark orange (almost red), not yellow.
So you illegitimately exaggerated any model vs. data differences, by manipulating the time-scale and the color-scale. You’ve been doing this for years, and using a fabricating from JoAnne Nova (and David Evans) in order to do this. Did you really think you could continue to get away with that?
And that’s not even touching on the other errors you made, such as you:
1) evading what the CCSP actually said in their report
2) not addressing the pre-1979 data, since it shows the hot spot that you’re trying to dodge
3) evading subsequent analyses that shows the hot spot
4) not addressing the known errors in post-1979 radiosonde-based trends, that result in an under-estimation of post-1979 tropical tropospheric warming [something the CCSP report itself notes]
And so on.
So, Eddie, instead of repeatedly posting fabricated, misleading images you saw on JoAnne Nova’s garbage blog, how about you actually read the primary literature for once? The following sources should help get you started:
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ylmxpHIufh4/Wq3B7WTk8GI/AAAAAAAABTg/twZeoZnXglsQLwJoXKaMxzUjJJbIDvp1ACLcBGAs/s1600/HadAt2%2Bimage.png
(from: “Revisiting radiosonde upper-air temperatures from 1958 to 2002”)
“Systematic, historically varying biases in day-time relative to night-time radiosonde temperature data are important, particularly in the tropics […]. These are likely to have been poorly accounted for by present approaches to quality controlling such data […] and may seriously affect trends [pages 115 – 116 and 121].”
(“Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere: Steps for understanding and reconciling differences”)
https://downloads.globalchange.gov/sap/sap1-1/sap1-1-final-all.pdf
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-i8YUV5DJezE/WoXH8RaUFmI/AAAAAAAABLY/OlstFnAyUUQcWr9o-KP9sG7SarMgCLGQACKgBGAs/s1600/ERA-I%252C%2BCMIP5.JPG
(“Common warming pattern emerges irrespective of forcing location”)
Atomsk’s Sanakan: This is the real, non-fabricated image for the CCSP report:
There follow graphs from 4 “experiments” and one graph from radiosonde data.
(from: “Revisiting radiosonde upper-air temperatures from 1958 to 2002”)
That’s radiosonde data.
(“Common warming pattern emerges irrespective of forcing location”)
That follows graphs based on 4 simulations, right?
Where is the evidence that the observed “hot spot” is closely matched by the modeled “hot spot”? I am not saying I disagree, but I literally do not see your point.
In which of the references is the similarity of modeled to observed “hot spot” most clearly displayed? That’s the one I’ll read first.
Atom,
wrt the quote: “one can construct interesting and exciting stories and rationalizations with little or no risk of observational refutation”, the Hot Spot is of course subject to observational refutation.
The RATPAC radio sonde analysis does not indicate a hot spot.
The radio sonde data, using only the most reliable ( 90% complete or more ) does not indicate a hot spot.
The UAH MSU analysis does not indicate a hot spot.
Don’t trust UAH? Fine – the RSS MSU analysis, reworked from the ground up by people who didn’t trust the UAH analysis, does not indicate a hot spot.
Don’t trust RSS? Fine – the NOAA STAR MSU analsysis, reworked by people who didn’t trust the previous analyses, does not indicate a hot spot.
Now, as usual, things are messy. Sherwood applied breakpoints and kriging to radiosonde data and the IUK indicates a slight hot spot in the NH only. There is some reason to doubt kriging is appropriate, given that raob stations are so far apart, such that a significant portion of a wave pattern anomaly spans the distance. That is, one shouldn’t expect neighboring stations to indicate similar changes because one may experience more ridging while the neighbor experiences more troughing.
The reanalyses (CFSR, MERRA, and ERA-I, anyway ) interestingly do indicate hot spots, but we should note that they all differ significantly from one another! But even if they were all uniform, they are not borne out by actual observations. How can this be? One answer is that the same parameterizations that exist in the GCMs which model the hot spot also exist in the reanalyses. So the reanalyses are wrong in the same way that models are wrong.
Now, things are always uncertain. It could be that some previously unknown correction needs to be applied to both the MSU and radiosonde data, at the same levels, and in the same way, and only at the latitudes of the hot spot.
This seems very unlikely.
Re: “There follow graphs from 4 “experiments” and one graph from radiosonde data.”
I explained the point already. It’s not that hard to grasp. Once again, Turbulent Eddie habitually posts this fabricated graph:
http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/hot-spot/hot-spot-model-predicted.gif
https://judithcurry.com/2018/07/03/the-hansen-forecasts-30-years-later/#comment-876316
This is the real graph in question:
https://itsnotnova.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/fourmodels.png
(Figure 5.7 on page 116 of: “Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere: Steps for understanding and reconciling differences”)
https://downloads.globalchange.gov/sap/sap1-1/sap1-1-final-all.pdf
Turbulent Eddie’s graph is a fabrication that:
1) Removes the 21-year model-based simulations, and replaces them with 41-year simulations that did not appear in the original figure.
2) Illegitimately compares model-based projections for 41 years, to one radiosonde-based analysis covering 21 years. 41 years =/= 21 years.
3) Illegitimately compares model-based projections with radiosonde-based trends that use a different color scale. That color-scale exaggerates the differences.
Is that clear enough for you? Because it’s really not that hard to understand.
Re: “The RATPAC radio sonde analysis does not indicate a hot spot.”
You’ve just gone back to repeating your usual falsehoods, which you’ve been repeatedly rebutted on. Please do better.
RATPAC shows the hot spot, and has done for quite awhile. Actually do your homework on this, for once:
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f2Gv1rCXRAA/Wq24QHsiXHI/AAAAAAAABTE/rjrqwQWftLckYf9vRhDqBRGhn-zIb1AnACLcBGAs/s1600/RATPAC%2Bimage.PNG
(Figure 4: “Radiosonde Atmospheric Temperature Products for Assessing Climate (RATPAC): A new data set of large-area anomaly time series”)
“Internal variability in simulated and observed tropical tropospheric temperature trends”
Re: “The UAH MSU analysis does not indicate a hot spot. Don’t trust UAH? Fine – the RSS MSU analysis, reworked from the ground up by people who didn’t trust the UAH analysis, does not indicate a hot spot. Don’t trust RSS? Fine – the NOAA STAR MSU analsysis, reworked by people who didn’t trust the previous analyses, does not indicate a hot spot.
More brazen falsehoods from you. RSS and NOAA/STAR show the hot spot, as does UW. That’s why they have amplification ratios (upper tropospheric warming vs. near-surface warming) of greater than 1 in the tropics:
http://journals.ametsoc.org/na101/home/literatum/publisher/ams/journals/content/clim/2015/15200442-28.6/jcli-d-13-00767.1/20150309/images/large/jcli-d-13-00767.1-t4.jpeg
(Table 4: “Removing diurnal cycle contamination in satellite-derived tropospheric temperatures: understanding tropical tropospheric trend discrepancies”)
RSS’ hot spot in the above table became even more pronounced, with a larger amplification ratio, once the RSS team corrected an error in their homogenization. I suggest you go read up on this:
“Sensitivity of satellite-derived tropospheric temperature trends to the diurnal cycle adjustment”
And I’m sure Carl Mears of the RSS team would appreciate it if you stopped persistently misrepresenting the research he and his colleagues worked on:
https://twitter.com/MearsCarl/status/940786708152553473
Other satellite-based analyses show the hot spot as well. Feel free to finally do your reading on this:
“Temperature trends at the surface and in the troposphere”
“30-year atmospheric temperature record derived by one-dimensional variational data assimilation of MSU/AMSU-A observations”
Re: “Sherwood applied breakpoints and kriging to radiosonde data and the IUK indicates a slight hot spot in the NH only”
Do you understand the “hot spot” at all? The hot spot applies to the tropics, where there’s enough moist convection to produce the water vapor condensation and latent heat release that results in the hot spot. IUKv2 shows the hot spot in the tropics, as expected, as do RATPAC, HadAT2 (for the full analysis from 1958 to the present), RAOBCORE, and RICH. Here’s IUKv2 for you, over the tropics:
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/10/5/054007/downloadHRFigure/figure/erl510711f2
(from: “Atmospheric changes through 2012 as shown by iteratively homogenized radiosonde temperature and wind data (IUKv2)”)
If you want an update on that, along with the other radiosonde-based analyses, then actually read the scientific literature:
“Internal variability in simulated and observed tropical tropospheric temperature trends”
Re: “The reanalyses (CFSR, MERRA, and ERA-I, anyway ) interestingly do indicate hot spots, but we should note that they all differ significantly from one another! But even if they were all uniform, they are not borne out by actual observations.”
Re-analyses include observational data. For example, ERA-I includes satellite data; NCEP includes radiosonde data. And I’ve already shown that you’re misrepresenting the observations to claim they don’t indicate a hot spot, when they actually do. So I don’t place much stock in what you say about the “actual observations”.
Anyway, every modern re-analysis I’ve looked at (ERA-I, JRA-55, CFSR, MERRA2, and NCEP-2 {20CR as well, but that’s not really relevant here}) show the hot spot, with tropical tropospheric warming at 300hPa being greater than tropical near-surface warming.
Re: “Now, things are always uncertain. It could be that some previously unknown correction needs to be applied to both the MSU and radiosonde data, at the same levels, and in the same way, and only at the latitudes of the hot spot.”
Or it could be that you don’t read the peer-reviewed scientific literature, and thus you have no idea what the data shows. Hence you continually repeating fabrications you saw on garbage blogs (like JoAnne Nova’s blog). Look within yourself for the problem.
Is it time Atomski updated to current data rather than pre 2006?
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01431161.2018.1444293
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/16000870.2018.1471911?src=recsys
Re: “Is it time Atomski updated to current data rather than pre 2006?”
Let me know when you’re done with the (likely pathological) passive-aggressiveness, use of nicknames, etc.
Anyway, if you paid attention, then you would have noticed that I cited papers from after 2006, up to and including 2017. It helps if you actually learn to read what’s cited to you. You should also actually read that first paper you cited. I have, and (garbage paper that it is) it actually undermines your case by showing the hot spot in radiosonde-based analyses, contrary to Turbulent Eddie’s made-up claims.
But congratulations on showing up to the game late. At least you finally got around to doing it.
https://twitter.com/AtomsksSanakan/status/1003791419201540098
“Let us suppose for the moment that the “hot spot” really has been missing while the surface has warmed. What would the implications be?
The implications for attribution of observed global warming are nil, as far as I can see. The regulation of lapse rate changes by atmospheric convection is expected to work exactly the same way whether global temperature changes are natural or forced (say, by greenhouse gases from fossil fuel burning).
The implications for climate sensitivity are also roughly nil. The total feedback from water vapour and lapse-rate changes depends only on the changes in relative humidity in the upper troposphere, not on the lapse rate itself (see Ingram, 2013). In fact, in climate models where the lapse rate becomes relatively steeper as climate warms (as would be the case with a missing hot spot), the total warming feedback is very slightly stronger because the increased lapse rate increases the greenhouse effect of carbon dioxide and other well-mixed greenhouse gases. So a missing hot spot would not mean less surface warming, at least according to our current understanding.
Moreover, the discrepancy with models was opposite from 1958-1979 (Gaffen et al. 2000)—that is to say, the observed tropical upper-tropospheric warming was evidently stronger than expected. But the world was warming then too. So if this interesting phenomenon is real, it probably is not connected to global warming.” Steven Sherwood
Discrepancies show that simple physics are insufficient to define climate. Yet Atomski continues to waste everyone’s time with simple minded climate activism.
Painfully obtuse and desperately motivated.
https://www.tandfonline.com/na101/home/literatum/publisher/tandf/journals/content/tres20/2018/tres20.v039.i11/01431161.2018.1444293/20180320/images/medium/tres_a_1444293_f0018_c.jpg
“Figure 18. Trend magnitudes (°C decade−1) from radiosonde and CMIP-5 climate model simulations over the period 1979–2016. In the upper box are the trend magnitudes of the TMT layer as calculated by the various datasets defined in Table 2 and in this paper.”
“Let me know when you’re done with the (likely pathological) passive-aggressiveness, use of nicknames, etc.”
This particular complaint has been moderated in the past. It comes with the activist group dynamic – the contempt routinely expressed for group outsiders. As for calling him Atomski – the more frequently he complains the funnier it gets.
What have you got against the GDFL? “Another noticeable difference is that the HadAT2 data show a relative lack of warming in the tropical troposphere, where all four models simulate maximum warming.” – from page 116. They say themselves “maximum warming.” Which means hotspot. In all four runs, I see a hotspot. So throw it all away because “hotspot” is semantics or something not scientific.
We can’t say the Arctic warms more, because I get to define more. Or when more is more enough to mean more. And not more double plus less.
You’ve got the scales backwards. The radiosonde data scale exaggerates warming, which is hardly there. The model scale minimizes it when compared to the other scale.
Re: “Painfully obtuse and desperately motivated.”
You still have no idea what you posted (nor how what I posted already addressed it), and the passive-aggressive pathology continues.
Re: ““Another noticeable difference is that the HadAT2 data show a relative lack of warming in the tropical troposphere, where all four models simulate maximum warming.” – from page 116. They say themselves “maximum warming.” Which means hotspot. In all four runs, I see a hotspot.”
You’ve gone back you usual habit of quote-mining things you’ve never read. Learn to stop doing that, Ragnaar. If you actually bothered to read the document you’re quote-mining, then you’d know that it says:
“Another noticeable difference is that the HadAT2 data show a relative lack of warming in the tropical troposphere, […] where all four models simulate maximum warming. This particular aspect of the observed temperature-change pattern is very sensitive to data adjustments […]. Tropospheric warming in the observations is most obvious in the [northern hemisphere] extra-tropics, where our confidence in the reliability of radiosonde records is greatest.
[…]
Systematic, historically varying biases in day-time relative to night-time radiosonde temperature data are important, particularly in the tropics […]. These are likely to have been poorly accounted for by present approaches to quality controlling such data […] and may seriously affect trends [5, pages 115 – 116 and 121].”
(From: “Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere: Steps for understanding and reconciling differences”)
https://downloads.globalchange.gov/sap/sap1-1/sap1-1-final-all.pdf
So if you’d bothered to actually read the document, then you’d be aware that for years scientists have known that the HadAT2 radiosonde analysis contains spurious cooling in the tropical troposphere. The spuriously cool radiosonde trends resulted from changes in radiosonde equipment during the 1980s; these changes made radiosondes more prone to direct heating by the Sun, such that the radiosondes were no longer just measuring air temperature. This is what CCSP refers to when they mention “historically varying biases in day-time relative to night-time radiosonde temperature data.” This is covered in a number of papers, including research that the CCSP cited and which you didn’t bother to read:
“Biases in stratospheric and tropospheric temperature trends derived from historical radiosonde data”
“Radiosonde daytime biases and late-20th century warming”
“Toward elimination of the warm bias in historic radiosonde temperature records—Some new results from a comprehensive intercomparison of upper-air data”
So radiosonde-based tropospheric warming trends that begin in 1979 will be spuriously low, due to artificially warm radiosonde readings from the 1980s. However, radiosonde trends that begin in 1958 will be less prone to this problem, as depicted in the 2005 HadAT2 figure below:
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ylmxpHIufh4/Wq3B7WTk8GI/AAAAAAAABTg/twZeoZnXglsQLwJoXKaMxzUjJJbIDvp1ACLcBGAs/s1600/HadAt2%2Bimage.png
(Figure 11: “Revisiting radiosonde upper-air temperatures from 1958 to 2002”)
RATPAC partially corrects for this 1980s solar-induced bias, while HadAT2 does not adequately address this 1980s heterogeneity. Thus the RATPAC figure displays more tropical tropospheric warming than does the HadAT2 figure. This confirms CCSP’s statement that for the tropical troposphere, “the observed temperature-change pattern is very sensitive to data adjustments.”. Once again you would know this if you ever bothered to actually read, instead of just quote-mining. Go read up on RATPAC:
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f2Gv1rCXRAA/Wq24QHsiXHI/AAAAAAAABTE/rjrqwQWftLckYf9vRhDqBRGhn-zIb1AnACLcBGAs/s1600/RATPAC%2Bimage.PNG
(Figure 4: “Radiosonde Atmospheric Temperature Products for Assessing Climate (RATPAC): A new data set of large-area anomaly time series”)
So please don’t waste my time, Ragnaar, pretending that one HadAT2 analysis from 1979 – 1999 in 2006 is the only relevant analysis. Not even the HadAT2 team buys that nonsense:
“To this end we strongly recommend that users consider, in addition to HadAT, the use of one or more of the following products to ensure their research results are robust. Currently, other radiosonde products of climate quality available from other centres (clicking on links takes you to external organisations) for bona fide research purposes are:
Radiosonde Atmospheric Temperature Products for Assessing Climate (RATPAC)
RAdiosonde OBservation COrrection using REanalyses (RAOBCORE) and Radiosonde Innovation Composite Homogenization (RICH)
IUK (Iterative Universal Kriging) Radiosonde Analysis Project”
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadat/index.html
Re: “You’ve got the scales backwards. The radiosonde data scale exaggerates warming, which is hardly there. The model scale minimizes it when compared to the other scale.”
As usual, what you wrote makes no sense, and you’re twisting words around to reach your pre-determined conclusion. If two colored images are to be compared, then they should use the same color-scale. Period. Turbulent Eddie’s fabricated graph does not do this, since it uses two different color-scales for the images, thus illegitimately differences between the images. Telling me you prefer the model scale to the radiosonde scale does nothing to address that, Ragnaar, since the issue is not which scale was used. The issue is that the same scale should be used for both, not a different scale for each.
And what you consider to be “hardly there” is irrelevant, since you clearly don’t know the statistical significance of the trends, nor what impact a trend of a certain magnitude will have. You’re simply trying to once again reach your pre-determined conclusion that climate change is largely irrelevant, on par with a non-expert in medicine saying a blood pH from from 7.35 to 7.00 is “hardly there”, when they have no clue how significant such a drop is.
Atomski retails trivial word salad with a demeanor that drips contempt and wonders why he isn’t accepted as the mental giant he deludes himself to be. This is a all too common pathological – to echo his tedious little whine – affliction with global warming ideologues.
He opined that fig 18 from the Christy et al study – that compares models, to radiosonde data to satellite observations confirms the reality of AGW – without actually showing the figure. He is unable or unwilling to consider the Stevens quote on the vacuity of this particular climate talking point, the gross differences between models and observations – and between models – or the inconsistencies between observations. Here it is again. It proves the only point I made – in that simple physics is not definitive here or just about anywhere in the Earth system.
https://www.tandfonline.com/na101/home/literatum/publisher/tandf/journals/content/tres20/2018/tres20.v039.i11/01431161.2018.1444293/20180320/images/medium/tres_a_1444293_f0018_c.jpg
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01431161.2018.1444293
It is bizarre but all too common behavior. And of course the observations from diverse sources don’t match the models so the observations are wrong.
Atomsk’s Sanakan:This is the real graph in question:
You re-present the same graphs that you presented before: 4 “experiments” and one radiosonde data set. Where exactly is the fit of model to data? One “experiment” has a prominent hot spot, two experiments do not, and the radiosonde data does not (or is there a hot spot that I do not see?)
mrm: two experiments do not
Oops, three “experiments” do not … .
Re: “You re-present the same graphs that you presented before”
And you’re simply quote-mining so you can dodge the point and pretend not to be aware of it.
Once again: Turbulent Eddie’s graph is a fabrication, for the reasons I explained. That was the point. Address it, instead of running from it.
Re: “He is unable or unwilling to consider the Stevens quote on the vacuity of this particular climate talking point, the gross differences between models and observations – and between models – or the inconsistencies between observations.”
And so you continue with the pathological passive-aggressiveness, nicknames, etc. Amazing.
You also show you haven’t read the relevant literature at all. Otherwise, you would know that Christy has been repeatedly called on his flawed model-data comparisons, how they are not reproducible by other groups, and how he fallaciously leaps to model error as an explanation. For example, see:
“Causes of differences in model and satellite tropospheric warming rates”
“Comparing tropospheric warming in climate models and satellite data”
“Internal variability in simulated and observed tropical tropospheric temperature trends”
Christy flat out admits that he can’t show that his (supposed) differences are due to model error:
“As noted, we cannot totally discount that natural variability or errors in forcing might also account for the discrepancy between modeled and observed [tropospheric TCR] [page 517].”
(from: “Satellite bulk tropospheric temperatures as a metric for climate sensitivity”)
But you’d actually need to read the scientific literature to be aware of things like that.
I am sorry you have a problem a problem with the way the authors of: https://downloads.globalchange.gov/sap/sap1-1/sap1-1-final-all.pdf
write.
I looked at section 5.5 on page 115 again. I know the advised structure of communication because they (Minnesota’s largest campus) thought we needed to know that so we did business communications in the best way.
So they make a main statement at the beginning of paragraph two. In paragraph two, they do not qualify other than bring up data adjustments without indicating anything solid. Then, at the beginning of paragraph three they say:
“Note that some of the details of the model fingerprint pattern are quite different.”
Then they complete paragraph three without qualifications.
In paragraph four they talk about the future, still without qualifications relating to or suggesting that the radiosonde data sucks.
Then they start a new section. Your objections is a criticism of their presentation style. You may have a point, but they themselves buried that point.
You pointed out a bias in the two scales. I’ll agree. It just happened to favor those looking for a hotspot. I mean with a 4 X CO2 level, bias, force the difference out. With a 2 X scale distortion, force the difference out. Don’t you like science?
Re: “I am sorry you have a problem a problem with the way the authors of”
Stop making up false claims, Ragnaar. I have no problem with how they write; I have a problem with you quote-mining a source you never read, so that you can misrepresent what the source said. I made that clear to you, so drop your straw man.
Re; “I looked at section 5.5 on page 115 again.”
The relevant material was quoted to you. Once again:
“Another noticeable difference is that the HadAT2 data show a relative lack of warming in the tropical troposphere, […] where all four models simulate maximum warming. This particular aspect of the observed temperature-change pattern is very sensitive to data adjustments […]. Tropospheric warming in the observations is most obvious in the [northern hemisphere] extra-tropics, where our confidence in the reliability of radiosonde records is greatest.
[…]
Systematic, historically varying biases in day-time relative to night-time radiosonde temperature data are important, particularly in the tropics […]. These are likely to have been poorly accounted for by present approaches to quality controlling such data […] and may seriously affect trends [5, pages 115 – 116 and 121].”
(From: “Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere: Steps for understanding and reconciling differences”)
https://downloads.globalchange.gov/sap/sap1-1/sap1-1-final-all.pdf
I already explained to you what these quotations mean. Actually pay attention this time, and read the source you quote-mine
Re: “You pointed out a bias in the two scales.”
Seriously, do you actually listen when people explain things to you?
Are you capable of accurately representing what people say?
I didn’t claim there was “a bias in the two scales”. So stop offering that straw man you fabricated. I said that Eddie’s image was a misleading fabrication that combined two images that have different color-scales and different time-scales. I did not claim a bias in the scales themselves, Ragnaar; I said there’s a bias in Eddie’s fabricated image that sticks the two scales together.
Do you get that now? Have I dumbed it down enough for you?
Why doesn’t Turbulent Eddie just post links to his own blog so that those interested in pseudoscience can read further and the rest of us can skip his long, repetitive and boring comments.
Why doesn’t Turbulent Eddie just post links to his own blog so that those interested in pseudoscience can read further and the rest of us can skip his long, repetitive and boring comments.
Hi Mike. That’s an interesting question. especially since it’s been about a week since I posted, so I’m guessing you’re ready for another.
Here is an update of atmospheric temperature trends since 1979, including some reanalyses:
https://i0.wp.com/turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/hot_spot_1979_2017.png
The area of the “hot spot” is roughly from 60S to 60N, and from about 850 millibars to about 150 millibars.
Remarkably, there’s not much definition of the hotspot, but from the GISS model, and from others, the hot spot is modeled in this region to:
1. exhibit temperature trends > 3 K/century
2. exhibit temperature trends > 2 K/century for most of the region
3. exhibit decreased lapse rate ( upper trop trends > lower trop trends )
1. temperature trends > 3 K/century?
RATPAC? No. RATPAC Reliable? No. UAH? No. RSS? No. NOAA? No.
2. temperature trends > 2 K/century for most of the region
RATPAC? No. RATPAC Reliable? No. UAH? No. RSS? No. NOAA? No.
3. decreased lapse rate ( upper trop trends > lower trop trends )
RATPAC? No. RATPAC Reliable? No. UAH? No. RSS? No. NOAA? No.
Now, the reanalyses are another matter.
CFSR and MERRA2 meet all the criteria for hot spot!
ERA Interim fails the absolute warming rates,
but does exhibit decreased lapse rate.
How can this be? One way is if the same parameterizations ( not really physics at that point ) that are in the GCMs which predict a hot spot are also in the reanalysis.
This is not the only possibility, but it is a simple explanation and also explains why the three reanalyses differ so drastically from one another.
This is disturbing to those considering reanalyses a best representation of what’s actually happened.
Re: “The area of the “hot spot” is roughly from 60S to 60N”
Do you not understand where the “tropics” are?
(Hint: the tropics don’t go from 60S to 60N)
Re: “Remarkably, there’s not much definition of the hotspot”
Upper tropospheric tropical warming that’s greater than near-surface tropical warming, thereby decreasing the tropical lapse rate. It’s amazing how you conveniently forget this point, when you’ve made it yourself before:
“The issue I have is not that more warming is occurring at the surface than aloft. That seems corroborated by both sonde and satellite.”
https://judithcurry.com/2016/08/01/assessing-atmospheric-temperature-data-sets-for-climate-studies/#comment-800346
But I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you conveniently “forget” things when it suits your ideologically-motivated distortions of science.
The rest of what you wrote is just your usual tactic of posting unsourced images to support false claims you make, while you willfully ignore any published research that shows you’re wrong. For example, you write this:
“3. decreased lapse rate ( upper trop trends > lower trop trends )
RATPAC? No. RATPAC Reliable? No. UAH? No. RSS? No. NOAA? No.”
Of course, that’s just a bunch of false claims from you, since:
1) The lapse rate runs down to the near-surface.
2) You were already shown evidence that the lapse rate decreases from RSS, NOAA/STAR, UW (plus two other satellite-based analyses), HadAT2 (from 1958 – present), RATPAC, IUKv2, RAOBCORE, and RICH. You simply choose to willfully ignore the published evidence on that, as if you ignoring the evidence means no one else will notice the evidence you’re ignoring.
Re: “Here is an update of atmospheric temperature trends since 1979, including some reanalyses:”
Oh my goodness, did you just post another fabricated graph with misleading color-scales? Right after you were called out for doing that on a previous image you pulled from your contrarian blog?
Are you kidding me?!
You posted this image:
https://i0.wp.com/turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/hot_spot_1979_2017.png
(Your image makes the obvious mistake of writing this as “°K/century”, suggesting that you may have known what you were doing when you made this image or copied it from wherever you copied it.)
For the (supposedly) model-based panel on the top-left, your image uses a color-scale that appears to go from -5.1 K/century to 5 K/century. Yet the rest of your image’s panels from (supposedly) observationally-based analyses, your image uses a color-scale that appears to go from -13.1 K/century to 12.8 K/century.
Thus your image uses a color-scale that has a range is about 2.5-times smaller for the model-based panel vs. the observationally-based panels. So, for instance, a warming rate of 1.4 K/century would appear the darkest shade of red on your top-left model-based panel. But that same rate of warming would appear the lightest shade of yellow for the rest of your observationally-based panels.
So not only are you using an unsourced image (while willfully ignoring the peer-reviewed, published images that have been cited to you), but the unsourced image you used is an obvious fabrication meant to misleading exaggerate any differences between the model-based panel you showed and the observationally-based panels.
If I’m wrong in my analysis, then feel free to correct my error. I’d be happy to retract what I said and apologize for my mistake. Otherwise:
Did you really think you could get away with posting such a transparent fabrication, Turbulent Eddie?
Hi Atom.
“The area of the “hot spot” is roughly from 60S to 60N”
Do you not understand where the “tropics” are?
(Hint: the tropics don’t go from 60S to 60N)
Look at the GISS model. The region of enhanced warming rates is from around 60S to 60N. The name “Tropical Upper Tropospheric” hot spot is misleading in this regard. While the core is centered over the tropics, the feature is much larger – most of the atmosphere.
Re: “Remarkably, there’s not much definition of the hotspot”
Upper tropospheric tropical warming that’s greater than near-surface tropical warming, thereby decreasing the tropical lapse rate.
Yes, see criteria #3 that I identified.
The rest of what you wrote is just your usual tactic of posting unsourced images to support false claims you make, while you willfully ignore any published research that shows you’re wrong.
I would think someone interested in this topic would know that all the data are publicly available. If you have had difficulty finding the data, they are here:
https://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelE/transient/Rc_pj.4.03.html
https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ratpac
https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0/
http://data.remss.com/msu/
http://data.remss.com/msu/data/uah_compatible_format/
ftp://ftp.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/pub/smcd/emb/mscat/data/MSU_AMSU_v4.0/
https://nomads.ncdc.noaa.gov/data/cfsrmon
https://gmao.gsfc.nasa.gov/reanalysis/MERRA-2/
http://apps.ecmwf.int/datasets/data/interim-full-moda/levtype=pl/
“3. decreased lapse rate ( upper trop trends > lower trop trends )
RATPAC? No. RATPAC Reliable? No. UAH? No. RSS? No. NOAA? No.”
Of course, that’s just a bunch of false claims from you
No, that’s what the observations for the satellite era indicate.
Re: “Here is an update of atmospheric temperature trends since 1979, including some reanalyses:”
Oh my goodness, did you just post another fabricated graph with misleading color-scales? Right after you were called out for doing that on a previous image you pulled from your contrarian blog?
Are you kidding me?!
You posted this image:
(Your image makes the obvious mistake of writing this as “°K/century”, suggesting that you may have known what you were doing when you made this image or copied it from wherever you copied it.)
For the (supposedly) model-based panel on the top-left, your image uses a color-scale that appears to go from -5.1 K/century to 5 K/century. Yet the rest of your image’s panels from (supposedly) observationally-based analyses, your image uses a color-scale that appears to go from -13.1 K/century to 12.8 K/century.
Thus your image uses a color-scale that has a range is about 2.5-times smaller for the model-based panel vs. the observationally-based panels. So, for instance, a warming rate of 1.4 K/century would appear the darkest shade of red on your top-left model-based panel. But that same rate of warming would appear the lightest shade of yellow for the rest of your observationally-based panels.
So not only are you using an unsourced image (while willfully ignoring the peer-reviewed, published images that have been cited to you), but the unsourced image you used is an obvious fabrication meant to misleading exaggerate any differences between the model-based panel you showed and the observationally-based panels.
If I’m wrong in my analysis, then feel free to correct my error. I’d be happy to retract what I said and apologize for my mistake. Otherwise:
Did you really think you could get away with posting such a transparent fabrication, Turbulent Eddie?
Read the words on the graphic from NASA GISS:
“Ann 1979-2017 dChange in Temperature (C)”
The changes from 1979-2017 are calculated as century rates for the observational data sets. The rates of warming expressed are the same whether in terms of a century or the period of record.
Re: “Look at the GISS model. The region of enhanced warming rates is from around 60S to 60N. The name “Tropical Upper Tropospheric” hot spot is misleading in this regard. While the core is centered over the tropics, the feature is much larger – most of the atmosphere.”
You simply cherry-picked a particular model to get that result. When expanded out to include other models, it does not go from 60S to 60N; that’s why it’s called “tropical”. That was shown in the report your habitually misrepresent (via JoAnne Nova’s fabricated image), so you apparently didn’t even check that report:
https://itsnotnova.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/fourmodels.png
(Figure 5.7 on page 116 of: “Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere: Steps for understanding and reconciling differences”)
https://downloads.globalchange.gov/sap/sap1-1/sap1-1-final-all.pdf
Even Christy+McNider avoid making your mistaken claim in their abysmal paper, since they don’t even depict the modeled hot spot as being from about ~30S to ~30N:
Figure 1 of: “A Test of the Tropical 200‐300 hPa Warming Rate in Climate Models”
Re: ““The rest of what you wrote is just your usual tactic of posting unsourced images to support false claims you make, while you willfully ignore any published research that shows you’re wrong.”
I would think someone interested in this topic would know that all the data are publicly available. If you have had difficulty finding the data, they are here:”
We’ve been over this on other occations. Once again:
The unsourced images you post don’t match the peer-reviewed, published images from the research groups that work with the data-sets in question. This strongly suggests that you, unlike the experts, bungled your handling and presentation of the data. A non-expert like you can easily distort and misleadingly present publicly available data when you don’t have expertise with it.
Re: “No, that’s what the observations for the satellite era indicate.”
False, as has been repeatedly shown to you. So you’re again doing what I said you did: willfully ignore any published research that shows you’re wrong.
I’m sure Carl Mears of the RSS satellite-based team would love it if you stopped misrepresenting RSS’ research:
https://twitter.com/MearsCarl/status/940786708152553473?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E940786708152553473&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fjudithcurry.com%2F2018%2F07%2F22%2Fthe-perils-of-near-tabloid-science%2F
RSS and NOAA/STAR show the hot spot, as does UW. That’s why those satellite-based analyses have amplification ratios (upper tropospheric warming vs. near-surface warming) of greater than 1 in the tropics:
http://journals.ametsoc.org/na101/home/literatum/publisher/ams/journals/content/clim/2015/15200442-28.6/jcli-d-13-00767.1/20150309/images/large/jcli-d-13-00767.1-t4.jpeg
(Table 4: “Removing diurnal cycle contamination in satellite-derived tropospheric temperatures: understanding tropical tropospheric trend discrepancies”)
RSS’ hot spot in the above table became even more pronounced, with a larger amplification ratio, once the RSS team corrected an error in their homogenization. I suggest you go read up on this:
“Sensitivity of satellite-derived tropospheric temperature trends to the diurnal cycle adjustment”
Hence RSS’ greater warming in the upper tropical troposphere vs. lower troposphere, once one corrects from stratospheric cooling contaminating the TMT channel:
https://journals.ametsoc.org/na101/home/literatum/publisher/ams/journals/content/clim/2017/15200442-30.1/jcli-d-16-0333.1/20161219/images/medium/jcli-d-16-0333.1-f9.gif
(Figure 9: “Comparing tropospheric warming in climate models and satellite data”)
The UMD satellite-based analysis also showed an amplification ratio of greater than 1 in the tropics:
https://wol-prod-cdn.literatumonline.com/cms/attachment/73589a37-0e42-4f0e-8d98-5aa1cf61a3ff/jgrd12459-fig-0008.png
(Figure 8: “Temperature trends at the surface and in the troposphere”)
Moreover, a new, more tentative/suspect satellite-based analysis shows this as well:
https://media.springernature.com/original/springer-static/image/art%3A10.1007%2Fs00382-013-2012-5/MediaObjects/382_2013_2012_Fig13_HTML.gif
(Figure 13: “30-Year atmospheric temperature record derived by one-dimensional variational data assimilation of MSU/AMSU-A observations”)
And I already explained how your claims fail when applied to the radiosonde-based estimates. Yet you continue to willfully ignore the published evidence cited to you.
Re: “Read the words on the graphic from NASA GISS:
“Ann 1979-2017 dChange in Temperature (C)”
The changes from 1979-2017 are calculated as century rates for the observational data sets. The rates of warming expressed are the same whether in terms of a century or the period of record.”
My mistake, though it still doesn’t get you out of having cherry-picked your image using a misleading color-scale for the fabricated image you copied from JoAnneNova’s blog.
If you won’t accept the data, and I challenged you to examine for yourself,
then it’s pointless to engage motivated parrotry.
Good luck.
Re: “If you won’t accept the data, and I challenged you to examine for yourself, then it’s pointless to engage motivated parrotry. Good luck.”
It’s clear that you’re not a scientist, and that you’ve never done scientific research. That’s because you say it’s “motivated parrotry” when I do what every competent scientist does: cite the peer-reviewed literature for evidence on the points I make. The literature provides clear evidence that your incompetent, non-expert analyses are wrong. You can’t address that evidence, so you continue to dodge it. And that’s on par with a flat-Earther claiming that it’s “motivated parrotry” to cite peer-reviewed studies that provide evidence that Earth is round, not flat.
Atomski’s mind boggingly convoluted defense of what has to be the most trivial talking point in the climate blogosphere is ultimately unreadable. Try a source other than the motivated, very silly and very superficial collection of sources agreeing with whatever it is that he is trying to say.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/hot-spot.png
https://www.mwenb.nl/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Climatedialogue.org-summary-the-missing-tropical-hot-spot.pdf
Re: “Atomski’s mind boggingly convoluted defense of what has to be the most trivial talking point in the climate blogosphere is ultimately unreadable. Try a source other than the motivated, very silly and very superficial collection of sources agreeing with whatever it is that he is trying to say.”
It’s quite precious that you cite a non-peer-documented web article from 2014, since you can’t address the published scientific research (including the research published by Sherwood and Mears since 2014).
Next time, try to stay up-to-date, and read the literature.
“As both human beings and scientists, we always hope for explanations of the world that are conceptually simple yet with important predictive skills…
“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong” HL Menchen
Occam would have worded that differently!
Henry Louis Mencken
I can’t believe this was written without reference to the 97%.
It describes them perfectly!
That’s why it got published, and how we’ve all missed it all these years.
~¿~
“If a model fails to replicate the climate system over a few decades, the assumption that it is therefore skillful over thousands or millions of years is a non sequitur.”
What he said …
w.
Willis I would like you see commenting on my findings on solar activity and climate. Well my 2005 climate model has been the only model to project dropping temperatures. I saw some comment of yours about my hypothesis that planets tidally perturbate the solar surface. You commented that this would be a centimeter only change in solar surface. But this is not correct because solar surface is not any liquid but a very low density gas and any perturbation can lead to thousands of degrees change.
I give some history of the ideas:
already as of 2006 I shared my findings with the community via Climate Audit blog but the blog people refused to reproduce these fine findings.
This is my original 2005 thesis at the ITIA-NTUA library (National Technical University of Athens) in Greek
https://www.itia.ntua.gr/en/docinfo/680/
and this is a more recent paper of 2014 in the same ITIA-NTUA library in English explaining the sun-climate connection phenomena.
https://www.itia.ntua.gr/en/docinfo/1486/
In my blog I provide links to my more recent papers.
http://dimispoulos.wixsite.com/dimis
climate modeling can’t be accurate if not attributing to the correct phenomena.
if you don’t spread the truth and scientifically documented discoveries, you can’t solve anything but preserve a vicious state
But strikingly little attention has been paid to examining the basic physical elements of “what everyone knows.”
Everyone knows it snows more on Buffalo when Lake Erie is warmer and thawed. Everyone know more snowfall comes from thawed oceans. Everyone know the moisture for snowfall does not come from cold frozen ice covered lakes and oceans.
It snows more when water is warmer and thawed and it gets cold after snowfall has increased ice sequestered on land.
It snows less when water is colder and frozen and it gets warm after snowfall has been too little and ice on land depleted until it was forced to retreat.
This is based on basic truths that everyone knows, but ignored.
In the case of a Little Ice Age, the significant correlations follow by hundreds of years. In the case of a Major Ice Age, the significant correlations follow by thousands of years.
Everyone looks for the immediate correlations and don’t realize, in nature, some things take a long time to bring about results. Snowfall rates are in cycles that match temperature cycles. Ice volume cycles follow the snowfall rate cycles. Ice extent cycles follow the ice volume cycles. Temperature does match the ice extent cycles. It comes full circle and repeats.
Study modern glaciers, some are growing and some are shrinking, you can study them now.
“The perils of ‘near-tabloid science’”
You could do better. Drop the “near”!
Reblogged this on Climate Collections.
I sense that an awakening is beginning in climate science.
I really hope so, consensus is not any kind of science and does not belong in science
Scientists question each other and even question themselves.
The 97% do not question each other or themselves, they are not any kind of scientist. More and more people are realizing they have no clothes on.
Re: “I really hope so, consensus is not any kind of science and does not belong in science”
False. Evidence-based scientific consensus is common in science, such as the evidence-based consensus that Earth is round, HIV causes AIDS, smoking causes cancer, etc. You’re likely confusing what “consensus” means in politics with what it means in science.
Most non-experts don’t have the time/expertise to read peer-reviewed scientific evidence. So they have to rely on the expert consensus on those topics. That’s why, for example, expert testimony is allowed in court, but only if the expert is actually competent in the field in question and sticks to making testimony in the field in which they are competent. The non-expert judge and jury ends up relying on the expert’s testimony. It’s also why people rely on doctors, and expert specialists like oncologists, to give them medical advice. Similarly so for relying on the consensus of astronomers when it comes to astronomical topics. So evidence-based scientific consensus helps inform non-experts.
I suggest you go do some reading before making anymore false claims about consensus. The following sources will help you:
“European evidence based consensus on the diagnosis and management of Crohn’s disease: definitions and diagnosis”
http://gut.bmj.com/content/55/suppl_1/i1.short
“Twenty-first century behavioral medicine: A context for empowering clinicians and patients with diabetes: A consensus report”
http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/36/2/463
“Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming”
http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/11/4/048002/meta
“We selected original research papers, reviews, relevant opinions and reports addressing all the major issues that emerged in the debate on GE [genetically engineered] crops, trying to catch the scientific consensus that has matured since GE plants became widely cultivated worldwide.”
http://people.emich.edu/gzhou/Overview_10years.pdf
“Consensus Study Report: Consensus Study Reports published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine document the evidence-based consensus on the study’s statement of task by an authoring committee of experts. Reports typically include findings, conclusions, and recommendations based on information gathered by the committee and the committee’s deliberations. Each report has been subjected to a rigorous and independent peer-review process and it represents the position of the National Academies on the statement of task.”
https://www.nap.edu/catalog/23395/genetically-engineered-crops-experiences-and-prospects
“The Durban Declaration”
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v406/n6791/full/406015a0.html
http://www.pewinternet.org/files/2015/07/AAAS-Members-Elaboration-7-16-15-FINAL-Appendix-A.pdf [ http://www.pewinternet.org/interactives/public-scientists-opinion-gap/ ]
Re: “The 97% do not question each other or themselves, they are not any kind of scientist.”
What you’re saying is nonsense; evidence-based scientific consensus is not the same as “dogma” or “never questioning”. So don’t pretend otherwise, lest you resort to the sort of nonsense discussed below:
“Portraying Science as Faith and Consensus as Dogma”
http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0040256
@ Atomsk’s Sanakan (@AtomsksSanakan):
Of course you’re right—consensus by itself is not necessarily evidence of groupthink. It’s distressing to see such a simplistic identification so often asserted or implied on WUWT. As Henry Bauer wrote in Science or Pseudoscience (2000), page 8, “The reliability of science is owing to the effective knowledge-assessing or knowledge-filtering interactions that were evolved within the scientific community over the last several centuries.”
The Wunsch article discusses science in terms that are very similar to those of Irving Janus.
The non-expert judge and jury ends up relying on the expert’s testimony.
And the different sides bring in their own experts that disagree with each other. One from the 97% camp and one from outside the 97% camp.
More and more, lately, the Judges are siding against the 97% experts in law suits against fossil fuel companies. The right experts are being listened to.
“So evidence-based scientific consensus helps inform non-experts…I suggest you go do some reading before making anymore false claims about consensus…..You’re likely confusing what “consensus” means in politics with what it means in science.”
False claims about consensus then necessitates a description of what represents real consensus; this can only lead to an interesting implication since the 97% political meme isn’t relevant, as you say, and I agree.
So what percentage of the 97% of all scientists actually study climate science? A few percent I would imagine. So non consensus individual scientists like Dr. Curry, and many others, then take on a whole new weighted relevance when politics are stripped away; representing a much larger percentage than the previous implied 3% meme. You should agree unless you’re a cake and eat it too acolyte; because it’s only a strong novice/political argument that 97% of all scientists represent expert opinion.
A few percent of total scientists must represent the applied science of AGW consensus; those who have deep convictions about models, seeing little to refute substantively. Those who take the raw field data and formulate that data it into models.
So a few percent of total scientists make up the body of consensus is the implication of your argument, and of this consensus, a fraction of those are the modelers.
While the non relevant 97% meme relates to politics, unfortunately politics can’t be excised from remainder of applied climate scientists representing what’s left of the real consensus. This much smaller number still doesn’t eliminate funding prejudices, nor confirmation bias, nor all other forms of corrupting influences that necessarily are still part of the influencing catalysts behind policy, these are hard to separate from the influences of politics and money.
Ultimately, when you say “You’re likely confusing what “consensus” means in politics with what it means in science.” Interestingly, the illustrated dilutive numbered consensus argument isn’t nearly as impressive as you think it is because of the remaining applied scientists, and mainly the modelers, these still interface with the politics and policy.
To conclude; what “consensus” means to politics IS what it means to science. Politics is pollutive, coercive. The models must be more convincing to overcome this.
What you’re saying is nonsense; evidence-based scientific consensus is not the same as “dogma” or “never questioning”. So don’t pretend otherwise, lest you resort to the sort of nonsense discussed below:
If that were true, you would not be so upset when I disagree with the consensus. Without “dogma” or “never questioning” you would be able to discuss and debate ideas that disagree.
The models must be more convincing to overcome this.
It would be better if the models were just more correct.
The models say that what has happened, over and over, in the past, will not be repeated, and something different that has never happened before will happen next.
It does not work like that, cycles repeat. Whatever has happened will happen again, for the same reasons, for the same causes.
Mop-Up-Crew, excellent analysis. I’ve been saying that for years. The 97% “consensus” is completely irrelevant. This is because all scientists that are not climatologists or GCM modellers rely on the epistemic authority of the very small climatology community. This reliance is very similar to the same epistemological reliance the general lay public has concerning all matters of science. There is no epistemological authority concerning climate science in the nonclimate science scientific community. The concept that just because you are a scientist, you are granted epistemological authority on all matters of science, is false.
Sure, scientists are analytical and can have the ability to understand concepts outside their field of expertise. However, it’s the details that matter. It’s the details of the models and the data, not just the publications that are spawned from the details. I’ve worked with nonclimate scientists (part of the 97%) that have boiled the AGW problem down to just the CO2 through the vastly oversimplified statements that “… the Earth’s climate is a closed system and therefore adding CO2 must warm the climate.” That is a lay person’s incorrect interpretation of climate science; it carries no epistemological authority, even though that statement was made by scientists. It is truly much more complicated than that statement.
Great job Mop-Up-Crew.
Atomsk’s Sanakan (@AtomsksSanakan) | July 22, 2018 at 4:24 pm |
Re: “I really hope so, consensus is not any kind of science and does not belong in science”
False. Evidence-based scientific consensus is common in science, such as the evidence-based consensus that Earth is round, HIV causes AIDS, smoking causes cancer, etc.
Take your phrase, “smoking causes cancer”. If this were true, then everyone who ever smoked, or smokes, would have had or will get cancer. This is patently not the case, so the bald statement, smoking causes cancer, is incorrect. It clearly increases the risk, but that is not what you are saying.
*sigh*
Re: “The non-expert judge and jury ends up relying on the expert’s testimony. And the different sides bring in their own experts that disagree with each other. One from the 97% camp and one from outside the 97% camp.”
And siding with those outside the 97% is on par with siding with the small minority of scientist who claim that HIV doesn’t cause AIDS. Try again.
Re: “False claims about consensus then necessitates a description of what represents real consensus; this can only lead to an interesting implication since the 97% political meme isn’t relevant, as you say, and I agree.”
Not at all what I said. Learn not to misrepresent what people said using straw men that you fabricated.
Re: “So what percentage of the 97% of all scientists actually study climate science? A few percent I would imagine.”
You don’t need to imagine; you could just read the relevant literature, instead of making stuff up. I suggest you go do your homework on this:
Table 1: “Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming”
“Does it matter if the consensus on anthropogenic global warming is 97% or 99.99%?”
“The consensus on anthropogenic global warming matters”
Page 49 of: “Models, manifestation and attribution of climate change”
Figures 88 (v043) and 2 (v007) of: “The Bray and von Storch 5th International Survey of Climate Scientists 2015/2016”
https://www.hzg.de/imperia/md/content/hzg/zentrale_einrichtungen/bibliothek/berichte/hzg_reports_2016/hzg_report_2016_2.pdf
Re: “what “consensus” means to politics IS what it means to science.”
No, it isn’t, for the reasons that were already dumbed down for you. Evidence-based scientific consensus is about scienific experts agreeing based on evidence; political consensus is about people agreeing and compromising in order to get stuff done. In evidence-based scientific consensus, one does not compromise with those one disagrees with; one rebuts them with evidence.
Let me know when you’ve finally learned the difference between science and politics.
Re: “If that were true, you would not be so upset when I disagree with the consensus. Without “dogma” or “never questioning” you would be able to discuss and debate ideas that disagree.”
You have no idea what my emotions are, so stop projecting. I’m not upset with you; it’s more like contempt, of the same sort I have for most AIDS denialists, flat Earthers, anti-vaxxers, etc. I have little-to-no patience for denialism.
And you can stop pretending that people don’t discuss and debate ideas they disagree with. For example, I debate AIDS denialists, despite my utter contempt for most of them. Just because someone recognizes that your ideas are worthless, denialist points that contradict the evidence-based scientific consensus, that doesn’t prevent them from discussing and debating your worthless ideas.
Re: “There is no epistemological authority concerning climate science in the nonclimate science scientific community. The concept that just because you are a scientist, you are granted epistemological authority on all matters of science, is false.”
Climate scientists have epistemic authority over non-experts in climate science, because climate scientists are in a better epistemic position than non-experts when it comes to climate science. They’ve looked at the evidence, been trained in the subject, etc. Non-experts haven’t. This parallels how doctors have epistemic authority over non-experts in medicine. So please stop misrepresenting that as the idea that a scientist in one field has epistemic authority over non-experts in every branch of science.
Re: “Take your phrase, “smoking causes cancer”. If this were true, then everyone who ever smoked, or smokes, would have had or will get cancer.”
False. I don’t know if you really don’t understand how causation works, or if you are pretending not to understand so that you can be difficult. X causes Y, does not mean X always produces Y. Otherwise, by your ridiculous logic, gunshot wounds to the head don’t ever cause deaths, unless gunshot wounds to the head always cause death. Causation is compatible with other factors preventing a cause from yielding an effect in a particular circumstances.
But hey, if you really think that, then follow through on your logic, and allow numerous murderers out of prison. After all, by your ludicrous logic, those murderers didn’t cause their victims to die, if those murderers used a method (ex: guns, knifes, arson, poison, etc.) that does not result in death 100% of the time.
“I argue that the extent of the consensus does matter, most of all because scholars have shown that the stronger the public believe the consensus to be, the more they support the action on global warming that human society so desperately needs.”
“The consensus on anthropogenic global warming matters”
The above quote is the 2nd line that follows the 1st line that is just a set-up.
‘Most of all’, doesn’t mean what I say it means, as has been competently pointed out, and even the author of the paper is unclear about this, as I bet we are about to find out, as well as lacking paper writing skill. Policy. Policy is me. It’s whatever I want. If I want free healthcare and college, I get to decide. It doesn’t have anything to do with science, because it depends on my feelings. But if some weaponize the consensus, and bamboozles enough people, all’s fair.
Science can say we definitely need more Zinc in our diets. But it can’t say we need less gasoline. Take the Numero Uno consensus paper. What a line up of authors.
Consensus papers are as much science as President Trump’s’ tweets. They are a tool for a policy outcome. And hey, I’d sell my good name to save the world. I am a citizen of the world and don’t use plastic straws.
Ragnaar, the analogy is the effect of pollutants on the environment. Science tells us what safe levels are. How much lead and black carbon do we want our cars to spew? How much do we want to preserve the ozone layer? How much lead or arsenic do we want in our water? How much mercury in our food or particulate matter in the air? These are scientific questions, and consensus is needed before you can get a policy. How much do we want to let the global climate and sea-level rise rates change? As with refrigerants, there are alternative ways of doing things that are better in the long run.
jimd
You said
” the analogy is the effect of pollutants on the environment. Science tells us what safe levels are. How much lead and black carbon do we want our cars to spew”
Science always evolves. We think we know everything we need to know about say food and drink in a field that receives huge amount of research, but milk, fats, wine, coffee etc etc are at one time very bad, then at another very good, then back to bad again.
Similarly Diesel was heavily promoted in Europe as the panacea for climate change and as a means to substantially reduce pollution according to the science of the day.. 20 years later that has been turned on its head and you can’t give diesel vehicles away and they are considered anti social. So, from hero to zero in two decades.
Climate science is a very new one. It will evolve, such as with the statement by Phil Jones in 2005 that natural variability was much greater than had hitherto been realised. This from one of the most famous and informed people on this subject.
My point is that whilst we may be at a certain place regarding learning about climate, in realty that place is still very near the start of the curve and we have much to discover before we can claim to know enough to pontificate on certainties as some here do.
tonyb
tonyb, if anyone thinks 600, 700 or more ppm CO2 is safe, or at least not a degraded climate, they have not said so in as many words yet. Anything less than 500 ppm requires some substantial action. Safe levels is what it is about, pollutants or CO2. Unlike policies on food or the environment that can be switched about, growing CO2 has no forgiveness for delay. This is not a reversible situation. The earlier the better and even Wunsch sees it as a real threat. I suspect most other skeptics of the fine details would also.
Jim D:
From my above:
“…the action on global warming that human society so desperately needs.”
There is no consensus on this. The ECS can’t be narrowed down. The Effective Sea Level Rise might as well be unknown. Precipitation patterns are all over the map.
We desperately need many things such as reliable cheap grid power for large parts of the world. There in no consensus on renewables being some kind of cheap effective thing.
The climate scientists have a bunch of numbers, and the world has a bunch of problems. To elevate what they say to near the top of things that we have to do, I think is reckless.
Scientists say you shouldn’t eat potato chips. Who cares? We should eat less red meat and more fish. Winning the dietary wars doesn’t mean much. You need people like Vegans to see if anyone actually listen to the experts, and there aren’t that many Vegans.
You chase people out of bars and tax them and they still smoke cigarettes. People shouldn’t drink beer and micro breweries are a bunch of young people doing just that.
The quote above says something like this is why the consensus is important. It’s not. The guy said it was because of the policies he wants. Which further undermines its importance.
Ragnaar, if you want to compare it to diets, it is like the idea that obesity is bad and to be avoided, which is generally accepted. The world agreed to go on a diet rather than continue to binge. There may be some skeptics who say eating the wrong things doesn’t lead to obesity, or that obesity is not that bad or may even be good for you, but does that stop the rest of us from acting on the science? No.
“compare it to diets”
Jim—How often, in the past several decades have doctors/scientists made many claims about foods and diets only to subsequently realize that that they were wrong.
You believe that more CO2 will result in a worse climate for humans. Might you also be wrong?
MD’s are not scientists.
“MD’s are not scientists.”
But many MD’s are scientists.
The example I used was obesity. Most would agree that one is here to stay, and doubters are few and far between. Maybe its another 97%er.
“The example I used was obesity. Most would agree that one is here to stay, and doubters are few and far between. Maybe its another 97%er.”
There are many MD’s that research obesity. Metabolic Syndrome for example. You can pick out 3 MD researchers in just this one department.
https://www.uclahealth.org/comet/metabolic-syndrome-research
Atomsk’s
When I stated, quoting you: “False claims about consensus” then necessitates a description of what represents real consensus”, I’m referencing that the world doesn’t know your definition of expert opinion as being the small circle of consensus it represents. This means everything when attempting an honest open policy discussion. It’s hardly a misrepresenting statement.
You described a definition of expert consensus opinion to the previous poster, but you didn’t describe the 97% meme that was referred to by him; other than to say it was “likely” a political definition. “Likely”? That WAS his POINT, he was describing the political meme. Consensus almost always refers to the 97% meme in public discourse, colloquially referred to as consensus usually.
I don’t care how you define dichotomies of climate consensus, I described how the world uses the meme, and that’s my point. The 97% meme is used holistically as a cudgel misrepresented as expert opinion, by default, to the masses; used by the media, politicians, etc. The meme is a big bucket, including; lukewarmers, all scientists in general, and even a large number of skeptics who believe at least some percent of warming is anthropomorphic based.
I suggest you quit staring at your navel, you’ve undoubtably known every fold for years.
“I would rather have questions that can’t be answered than answers that can’t be questioned.”
― Richard Feynman
For the greenhouse theory to operate as advertised, i.e. warming the earth by 33 C, requires a GHG up/down/”back” LWIR energy loop to “trap” energy and “warm” the earth and atmosphere.
For this GHG up/down/”back” LWIR energy loop to operate as advertised requires forcing energy from an ideal black body, i.e. 1.0 emissivity, LWIR of 396 W/m^2 from the earth’s surface. (K-T diagram)
The earth’s surface cannot provide that much LWIR because of the contiguous participating media, i.e. atmospheric molecules, moving over 50% ((17+80)/160) of the surface heat through non-radiative processes, i.e. conduction, convection, latent evaporation/condensation. (K-T diagram)
Because of these contiguous turbulent non-radiative processes at the air/surface interface the oceans and lands cannot possess an emissivity of 0.97, actual emissivity being 63/396 = 0.16. (K-T diagram)
No GHG LWIR energy loop & no RGHE means no CO2/man caused climate change and no Gorebal warming.
Nick Schroeder, BSME (CU ’78), CO PE 22774
http://writerbeat.com/articles/15582-To-be-33C-or-not-to-be-33C
http://writerbeat.com/articles/14306-Greenhouse—We-don-t-need-no-stinkin-greenhouse-Warning-science-ahead-
http://www.writerbeat.com/articles/21036-S-B-amp-GHG-amp-LWIR-amp-RGHE-amp-CAGW
It should be noted that there are limits and Wunsch is not a denialist even though he took part in the TV documentary “The Great Global Warming Swindle”. He wrote a letter to complain about his portrayal.
http://ocean.mit.edu/~cwunsch/papersonline/channel4response
3. In some cases a sense of identification with the group, akin to identification with a religious faith or political platform.
4. A strong sense of the boundary between the group and other experts.
I think you’re exhibiting #4/
This isn’t particularly surprising – I believe, and society offers examples, that we are strongly evolved for group identification.
That may be why most of the truly breakthrough understanding comes from misfits and outcasts working alone ( Einstein, Darwin are some examples ). They are somewhat unpolluted by external thought, perhaps because personality prevents them from some amount of socializing.
It is very noticeable that the skeptics have no Darwins or Einsteins among them. That is, people doing active research, and finding paradigm shifts of note. Instead they accuse all mainstream scientists of groupthink or participating in various conspiracies and complain about being labeled outcasts because of that. That is not the way Einstein and Darwin operated. Take their example. Do some relevant work.
That may be why most of the truly breakthrough understanding comes from misfits and outcasts working alone
Breakthrough understanding can only come from someone outside the 97% consensus clique. It is generally ignored and can only survive if someone outside consensus keeps pounding on people to consider that some other theory is going to work better because what is being considered now clearly does not work.
People who find paradigm shifts of note are often recognized a generation or more later, you may not live long enough to know how wrong you were.
Their more likely fate is to be a flat-earther to the end.
Jim D: “It is very noticeable that the skeptics have no Darwins or Einsteins among them. … Take their example. Do some relevant work.”
Monckton has done relevant work. (If he has truly identified a “grave error” in consensus climatology about calculating feedbacks, he’ll qualify for a Nobel, at a minimum.) Ditto for Eschenbach, Svensmark, Lindzen (iris effect), the stadium-wave proponent, etc.
Moreover, skeptics who only snipe at consensus climatology are not being irrelevant. Looking for holes in a claimant’s argument and pointing them out is a vital part of science, and is much lacking in the mainstream. The paucity of internal self-criticism of the basics of the warmist position is a yellow flag that groupthink may be in operation.
“Monckton has done relevant work. (If he has truly identified a “grave error” in consensus climatology about calculating feedbacks, he’ll qualify for a Nobel, at a minimum.)
1. Err No he hasnt.
2. There is no error he is mistaken.
Ditto for Eschenbach, Svensmark, Lindzen (iris effect), the stadium-wave proponent, etc.
1. Willis ? sorry. he is friend. Nothing notable or current. Nothing
relevant to any active question in the science.
2. Svensmark? Wrong. there is no GCR effect.
3. Iris effect? wrong. no Iris effect.
Here is the point
Science is more than skepticism. Skeptics have doubts. doubts are easily manufactured about ANY scientific finding. In the end you strive for better understanding. better explanations, better predictions.
Skeptics do none of that
And when they do have data that could help? They HIDE the data.
6 years have no gone by since I requested data from Anythony watts 2012 paper he “published with Steve mcIntyre” 6 years. no data still
“Science is more than skepticism. Skeptics have doubts. doubts are easily manufactured about ANY scientific finding. In the end you strive for better understanding. better explanations, better predictions.”
In other words, until you publish in peer reviewed sasquatch journals with all your data available, your silly skepticism of Bigfoot is irrelevant and unsupported.
Meanwhile, in climate news, Gallup asked people what issues were important to them and left it open-ended. 36 different items made the list, climate change didn’t. There was a catchall “environment/pollution” that 2 percent thought was important. That’s “two” percent. And trending down. 98% of America is not reading Anthony Watts, they reached these conclusions by reading the NYTimes, Washington Post, and being bombarded with consensus scare tactics for 30 years on their television. (Don’t talk to me about Fox News, even when it’s at the top of the cable news ratings, Fox has fewer viewers than ’60s TV reruns in terms of total audience).
“Merchants of doubt” didn’t do this- this is the product of laughable alternative energy policy, sophomoric political gamesmanship, bizarre treaty strategy (Chinese CO2 doesn’t count!) and schizophrenic doomsday prediction (it will cause more snow, no, I mean less snow, possibly the same amount of snow, I dunno, look out your window, whatever you see AGW caused!)
Gallup: https://news.gallup.com/poll/1675/most-important-problem.aspx
Jim D | July 22, 2018 at 4:24 pm |
“It is very noticeable that the skeptics have no Darwins or Einsteins among them. “
–
It may have escaped your attention that both Darwin and Einstein were skeptics of the consensus of their times, Jim D.
angech, the difference is that Darwin and Einstein had developed new ideas that fitted the observed facts. Skeptics, not so much. Nor is there any room to because the observations fit with known science already leaving the skeptics with the unenviable task of trying to undo known science.
Jim D. Thank you for the link to the Wunsch lettters.
I was believing he was not locked into the 97%, he said some important reasonable things, but it appears he is a 97% alarmist after all.
Bright guy. Where else could he be?
Re: “It should be noted that there are limits and Wunsch is not a denialist even though he took part in the TV documentary “The Great Global Warming Swindle”. He wrote a letter to complain about his portrayal.”
I was just about to point that out. Thanks.
I’m getting fed up with people quote-mining scientists to try and manufacture false doubt about mainstream climate science. It’s getting tedious. Since when do comments on the status of string theory imply that paleoclimatology has exactly the same problems? My goodness.
It’s not 2010 anymore. There is greater convergence/consilience among data sets, which would (by Wunsch’s own reasoning) make paleoclimate science unlike string theory, as you noted in your previous quote from Wunsch:
“Nonetheless, observers of the paleoclimate scene might recognize some common characteristics, even though paleoclimate may have better prospects for ultimately obtaining observational tests of its fundamental tenets.”
Some examples of convergence/consilience:
“Convergent Cenozoic CO2 history”
“Palaeoclimate constraints on the impact of 2 °C anthropogenic warming and beyond”
“Climate sensitivity in the geologic past”
It’s not 2010 anymore. There is greater convergence/consilience among data sets, which would (by Wunsch’s own reasoning) make paleoclimate science unlike string theory, as you noted in your previous quote from Wunsch:
There is not greater convergence/consilience among data sets, and not in model output. They keep adjusting data away from older more trusted data sets which decreses convergence.
Re: “There is not greater convergence/consilience among data sets”
Cite evidence for your claims, or stop wasting my time.
Cite evidence for your claims first, or stop wasting everyone’s time.
Re: “Cite evidence for your claims first, or stop wasting everyone’s time.”
Evidence was already cited. Open your eyes. Let me know when you have the ability to read it and address it cogently (so no paranoid, baseless conspiracy theories from you).
“Convergent Cenozoic CO2 history”
“Palaeoclimate constraints on the impact of 2 °C anthropogenic warming and beyond”
“Climate sensitivity in the geologic past”
Atomsk’s Sanakan: Since when do comments on the status of string theory imply that paleoclimatology has exactly the same problems? My goodness.
A fine comment. I have been working up to write something along the lines of: Without a substantive “compare and contrast” (a phrase I have used before) with lots of documented examples, the presentation of the essay is empty innuendo. AKA “preaching to the choir”.
I’m getting fed up with people quote-mining scientists to try and manufacture false doubt about mainstream climate science.
There are good reasons for doubting that: climate sensitivity is greater than 1C per doubling of CO2; that warming has been or will be damaging to wildlife; that massive reinvestment in CO2-reducing infrastructure is either necessary or likely to affect the changing climate; that investment in low-CO2 power generation is better than investment in better flood control and irrigation in any particular location (Indus Valley? Queensland, Australia? California/). For those doubts, all one needs to do is read the peer-reviewed science and avoid the exaggerated editorials, even the editorials written by scientists with excellent publication/scientific records.
When you claim “quote mining”, you have seldom if ever shown that the quote is either a false statement or a statement that changed meaning when pulled out of context.
Re: “There are good reasons for doubting that: climate sensitivity is greater than 1C per doubling of CO2, that warming has been or will be damaging to wildlife”
No, there aren’t, anymore than there are good reasons for doubting whether HIV causes AIDS, or whether smoking has ever caused more than 10,000 cases of cancer. There’s a reason informed experts (who are more likely to actually read up on the evidence) tend to agree on these things, while it’s ideologically-motivated crackpots online who claim to doubt them.
Re: “that investment in low-CO2 power generation is better than investment in better flood control and irrigation in any particular location (Indus Valley? Queensland, Australia? California/)”
I’m really not interested in the particular political points you have, that prevent you from accepting mainstream climate science. I’m not interested in fallacious appeals to consequence, just like I’m not interested in someone whining about a cigarette tax in order to justify their nonsensical doubts about whether smoking causes cancer.
Re: “For those doubts, all one needs to do is read the peer-reviewed science”
…which I suggest you get around to doing one day. Here’s some recent reviews to get you started:
“The response of temperature to CO2 change (climate sensitivity) in the geologic past may help inform future climate predictions. Proxies for CO2 and temperature generally imply high climate sensitivities: ≥3 K per CO2 doubling during ice-free times (fast-feedback sensitivity) and ≥6 K during times with land ice (Earth-system sensitivity). Climate models commonly underpredict the magnitude of climate change and have fast-feedback sensitivities close to 3 K. A better characterization of feedbacks in warm worlds raises climate sensitivity to values more in line with proxies and produces climate simulations that better fit geologic evidence.”
https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-earth-100815-024150?journalCode=earth
“Comparison of palaeo observations with climate model results suggests that, due to the lack of certain feedback processes, model-based climate projections may underestimate long-term warming in response to future radiative forcing by as much as a factor of two, and thus may also underestimate centennial-to-millennial-scale sea-level rise.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-018-0146-0
Re: “When you claim “quote mining”, you have seldom if ever shown that the quote is either a false statement or a statement that changed meaning when pulled out of context.”
False. When I point out quote-mining, I point out that actual claim in the source, and how the quote-mine id distortion meant to avoid that point. You, of course, often respond to this by quote-mining in a way that ignores the point again.
Sensitivity is γ – it is variable. * It is the change in temperature (ΔT) divided by the change in the control variable (Δμ) – the tangent to the curve as shown below. Sensitivity increases moving down the upper curve to the left towards the bifurcation and becomes arbitrarily large at the instability. The problem in a deterministically chaotic climate then becomes not one of quantifying climate sensitivity in a smoothly evolving climate but of predicting the onset of abrupt climate shifts and their implications for climate and society. The problem of abrupt climate change on multi-decadal scales is of the most immediate significance.
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)
Nor can it be computed.
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.”
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1956/4751
* e.g. https://watertechbyrie.com/2014/06/23/the-unstable-math-of-michael-ghils-climate-sensitivity/
Atomsk’s Sanakin: quoting me:“There are good reasons for doubting that: climate sensitivity is greater than 1C per doubling of CO2, that warming has been or will be damaging to wildlife”
Responding:No, there aren’t,
Here is a problem that I set some time ago. Given that the consensus figure is that a doubling of CO2 concentration produces an increase of 4 W/m^2 downwelling LWIR; and given the flow estimates in the global energy floow diagrams of Stephens et al and Trenberth and Fasullo; and given that the 3 processes transferring energy from surface to atmosphere are supralinear in surface temperature (radiation, for example, proportional to T^4); How much warming of the Earth surface is required to balance the 4 W/m^2 increased downwelling LWIR?
To my knowledge, no one has published an answer. I wrote mine out here some years ago (first draft is available at my ResearchGate page). The Romps et al paper in Science on increased rate of lightning strike frequency resulting from a 1C increase in surface temperature is a step in the right direction,, applicable to a large part of the U.S. They computed an 11% increase in a certain energy flow, of which a tiny fraction of energy is converted to lightning. How much of total energy flow from surface to atmosphere is that process? Can an 11% increase in the power of that process result from a 4 W/m^2 increase in the downwelling LWIR?
Where else on the Earth surface has been analyzed in that fashion, so that the energy transfer effects of a 1C increase in surface temperature have been estimated? Not the 3/4 of the Earth surface covered in water. How about Chad, or the Amazon forest?
Atomsk’s Sanakan: I’m really not interested in the particular political points you have, that prevent you from accepting mainstream climate science. I’m not interested in fallacious appeals to consequence, just like I’m not interested in someone whining about a cigarette tax in order to justify their nonsensical doubts about whether smoking causes cancer.
I can live with that. When scientists and the scientific organizations like AAAS, stop contributing to the political campaigns to reduce CO2 concentration the science will be able to move forward more smoothly. However, if they claim in editorials that their favored policy and spending recommendations are justified by the science, then it is appropriate to examine the science in great detail, and to compare the spending options.
Re: “Here is a problem that I set some time ago.”
That’s nice. Let me know when you can actually address the published evidence on climate sensitivity (since you pretended to care about the peer-reviewed science), instead of bringing up irrelevant points in order to dodge the evidence.
Re: “When scientists and the scientific organizations like AAAS, stop contributing to the political campaigns to reduce CO2 concentration the science will be able to move forward more smoothly.”
What you wrote is nonsense, on par with saying that the science on health risks of smoking cannot move forward, unless doctors stop supporting policies/laws outlawing smoking in hospitals. The scientific evidence is what it is on smoking, and research continues on smoking, regardless of what policy positions the scientists take. Parallel points apply to climate science.
Please learn the difference between science and policy. Science informs policy and can serve as a justification for a given policy. But science is not policy, and a policy may have justifications that are non-scientific. So please stop using the policy stances scientists take, as your excuse for not accepting the science. That’s a fallacious appeal to consequences.
Atomsk’s Sanakan: instead of bringing up irrelevant points in order to dodge the evidence.
Changes in energy flows and accumulations at the surface are not irrelevant to the question of the climate sensitivity to a change in atmospheric CO2. They are essential links in the causal change, mostly ignored in published science (Romps et al being a notable first contribution.)
There is always more than one point. Your point is probably not the only point that readers would like to read about.
Please learn the difference between science and policy. Science informs policy and can serve as a justification for a given policy.
I do not ignore the difference between science and policy. But when there is a claim that “the science” supports only a single policy, then I point out that “all of the science” supports more than one one policy option, and the policy options ought to be compared.
And you’re simply quote-mining so you can dodge the point and pretend not to be aware of it.
You did not show that my quotes were false, misleading, or had their meanings changed by taking them out of context. You just don’t like them. There is always more than point. You claim that Turbulent Eddy is being dishonest by highlighting the differences between models of the hot spot and measures of the hot spot, but you are unable or unwilling to present a graph showing a close correspondence of model to data.
Is there evidence showing a close fit of modeled hot spot to data?
1) Removes the 21-year model-based simulations, and replaces them with 41-year simulations that did not appear in the original figure.
2) Illegitimately compares model-based projections for 41 years, to one radiosonde-based analysis covering 21 years. 41 years =/= 21 years.
3) Illegitimately compares model-based projections with radiosonde-based trends that use a different color scale. That color-scale exaggerates the differences.
So put up some graphs showing that all the model projections closely fit all of the data. Otherwise you have no support for the claim that TE’s graphing choices are “illegitimate”. They merely highlight misfits that you prefer to ignore.
Ignoring evidence you dislike is common “confirmation bias”, a well-known psychological liability that all of us are prey to. Advocating that data/model misfits and other model shortcomings and omissions be ignored is not a good approach to evaluating a complex theory.
Re: “Changes in energy flows and accumulations at the surface are not irrelevant to the question of the climate sensitivity to a change in atmospheric CO2. They are essential links in the causal change, mostly ignored in published science (Romps et al being a notable first contribution.)”
Does nothing to change the fact that one does not need to answer your question in order to give an evidence-based estimate of climate sensitivity. For example, one can use paleoclimate data to estimate climate sensitivity. One doesn’t need to detail every part of a causal change in order to show the magnitude of an effect in response to a given change. For example, I don’t need to detail all the causal mechanisms at play in smoking causing cancer, in order to show how much smoking increases one’s likelihood of getting cancer. So your question was red herring.
Re: “There is always more than one point. Your point is probably not the only point that readers would like to read about.”
Your question was a red herring and a goal-post move.
You made a specific claim:
“There are good reasons for doubting that: climate sensitivity is greater than 1C per doubling of CO2 […]. For those doubts, all one needs to do is read the peer-reviewed science and avoid the exaggerated editorials, even the editorials written by scientists with excellent publication/scientific records.
I then cited you two peer-reviewed reviews (not editorials) covering the large amount of evidence that climate sensitivity is much greater than 1C per doubling of CO2. Instead of addressing that evidence, you invented a new question that addressed none of that evidence and which did nothing to support your claim about peer-reviewed science justifying doubts about whether climate sensitivity is greater than 1C per doubling of CO2.
Thus you moved the goal-posts and evade the evidence. Claiming that readers might be interested in other questions, does nothing to change the fact that you invented a new question to get around supporting your specific claim, and to get around acknowledging the evidence against your specific claim.
ProTip: if you can’t support your claims about what peer-reviewed scientific evidence shows, then don’t make those claims and don’t evade when you’re called on those claims.
Re: “You did not show that my quotes were false, misleading, or had their meanings changed by taking them out of context. You just don’t like them.”
Of course, I showed your quotes were misleading, and you just quote-mined again. I made it clear in the post that the point was that Turbulent Eddie’s graph was a fabrication. You repeatedly quote-mined my post to exclude any mention of that point, even after I told you that was the point. So you were willfully misleading; you tried to make it look like my point was unclear, even after you were repeatedly told what the point was. That made it easier for you to evade addressing the point.
Re: “You claim that Turbulent Eddy is being dishonest by highlighting the differences between models of the hot spot and measures of the hot spot”
Now you’re attacking a straw man. I never claimed he was dishonest, and I never claimed the issue was him “highlighting the differences between models of the hot spot and measures of the hot spot”. You simply fabricated those two claims.
What I actually said was: he repeatedly posted a misleading fabrication that illegitimately exaggerates by using two difference color-scales and two different time-scales.
Please learn the difference between “highlighting” and “illegitimately exaggerating.” One can do that former without doing the latter. You falsely claimed my point was the former; it was the latter.
Re: “So put up some graphs showing that all the model projections closely fit all of the data. Otherwise you have no support for the claim that TE’s graphing choices are “illegitimate”. They merely highlight misfits that you prefer to ignore.”
And now you’re simply engaged in fallacious logic, like usual. I don’t need to show a fit between the models and the data (though I already have: https://judithcurry.com/2018/07/22/the-perils-of-near-tabloid-science/#comment-877182; you just willfully ignore the cited evidence) in order to show that Eddie’s graphs are misleading fabrications. I simply need to explain why they misleading fabrications, and I’ve repeatedly done that. You apparently don’t see the difference between “Showing X is misleading” and “Showing Y is true”. So you try to move the goal-post to avoid addressing the explanation I actually gave.
Re: “Advocating that data/model misfits and other model shortcomings and omissions be ignored is not a good approach to evaluating a complex theory.”
Another blatant misrepresentation from you. You’re acting as if I ignored the model image in question, when I already gave a detailed explanation of the image, quoting the very source of the image:
https://judithcurry.com/2018/07/22/the-perils-of-near-tabloid-science/#comment-877440
Next time, actually pay attention to what’s written, without quote-mining.
Atomsk’s Sanakan: No, there aren’t, anymore than there are good reasons for doubting whether HIV causes AIDS, or whether smoking has ever caused more than 10,000 cases of cancer.
I think if you compare and contrast the anti-HIVers and anti “smoking causes cancer” groups on the one hand versus the “lukewarmers” like me on the other hand, the contrasts are more compelling than the similarities. I don’t deny any of the steps in the mechanism connecting increased atmospheric CO2 with atmospheric warming; but the quantitative case that doubling atmospheric CO2 will produce dangerous consequences is indeed full of holes. Reviews of warming to date show beneficial effects of increased warming and CO2 since about 1880; a serious analysis of the purported changes in energy flows shows that there are limits on how much warming the CO2 can produce; and there are other large problems with the “CO2 only causes warming” case.
When you get to politics and policy, the similarities are stronger. The “opponent” sides are much more consistently skeptical of increasing the size, cost and power of the Federal Govt and the UN than are the “proponent” sides. The populations affected by policy change are much larger in the case of “CO2 control” than for HIV and smoking policy, and the sums of tax money are much greater. It is a lot clearer that CO2 controls have a serious cost in, for example, providing electricity to the areas that do not now have much (as both Germany and Japan govt’s have recently conceded.)
Atomsk’s Sanakan: he repeatedly posted a misleading fabrication that illegitimately exaggerates by using two difference color-scales and two different time-scales.
How is that different from claiming TE to be “dishonest”.
Atomsk’s Sanakan: You apparently don’t see the difference between “Showing X is misleading” and “Showing Y is true”.
I would claim that showing Y to be true would be the only convincing element in showing X to be “misleading”.
Atomsk’s Sanakan: You’re acting as if I ignored the model image in question, when I already gave a detailed explanation of the image, quoting the very source of the image:
I didn’t write that you ignored the graph. I wrote that you advocated all the rest of us to ignore the displayed misfit. And, you did explicitly advocate reading only supportive papers and not challenging analyses with regard to climate sensitivity.
Atomsk’s Sanakan: One doesn’t need to detail every part of a causal change in order to show the magnitude of an effect in response to a given change. For example, I don’t need to detail all the causal mechanisms at play in smoking causing cancer, in order to show how much smoking increases one’s likelihood of getting cancer. So your question was red herring.
I don’t think my question was a red herring, as it addresses fundamental elements of changes in energy flows. That isn’t an incidental detail.
As to cancer, the knowledge of the mechanisms of how products of cigarette smoke cause diverse cancers provides strong support for the epidemiological evidence, at least for many people, whether strictly necessary or not. Holes in the knowledge of the causal change from lab-based studies of absorption/emission spectra of CO2 to the damage to the environment are much more substantial. That the surface can not increase its conveyance of energy to the atmosphere more than the increase of energy conveyed to it is more than a “detail”, but a fundamental constraint on surface climate sensitivity. That the problem is ignored by climate scientists is a limitation of the climate science community.
You judge it to be a red herring.
The doco title “The Great Global Warming Swindle” was accurate, the doco was indeed a swindle.
Wunsch felt he was swindled by it, as he wrote in one of his letters to Channel 4.
Jim D.
Yes, I read that letter by Wunsch. In hindsight he should have realised there was no chance of an honest, balanced discussion occurring.
A “doco” that stated it’s conclusions up front, selectively edited interviews and even fabricated charts – it just should not be this hard to have an honest debate.
I wonder if he knew the title when he signed up.
Wunsch seems like a reasonable chap. He’s making a simple point. There are many more complexities than some want to admit. This is what skeptics believe. Some warmists want to have a simple narrative and ignore realities about the complexities of climate science. That has two advantages. It’s part of a propaganda public relations strategy and it gives the more simple minded warmists great psychological comfort. That was the genesis of the control knob theory.
He describes climate change as a major threat, which I suspect is where many skeptics would part ways with his views.
The article was written in 2010. Wunsch is shocked when he finds himself being agreed with by people he thinks are off their rockers. It’s kind of funny.
As for abrupt climate change, gee, who was he aiming at?
This is very interesting and a good frame of reference for thinking about thinking.
In medicine, there is a clear distinction between observational studies and clinical studies. In climate prediction, there are not even observational studies. Sample size n=0
The tale of Ancel Keys and the now failed lipid hypothesis are more and more telling. Keys ascended to head hierarchies of power wrt his field ( American Heart Association ) in much the same way that some use the IPCC. Keys bullied those questioning his hypothesis until they were marginalized, like the exodus from the IPCC by those questioning claims.
Reason is great and an ultimate arbiter, but reason is not what makes us get out of bed each morning. Similarly, it is emotion that makes one conduct experiment to begin with. Those students now enrolled in Environmental Science did not choose this because of reason, but because they are interested, probably because of preconceived notions going in that they will have a difficult time shedding.
Re: “In medicine, there is a clear distinction between observational studies and clinical studies. In climate prediction, there are not even observational studies. Sample size n=0”
You’ve now wandered into a subject you likely know next-to-nothing about: medicine/biology. Please try to keep your misrepresentations to climate science, not medicine/biology. Moving on..
First, there are observational studies in climate science. Climate scientists make observations of climate on Earth, Mars, Venus, Titan, etc., where they observe their dependent variable (ex: emitted radiation) without intentionally adjusting their independent variable (ex: greenhouse gas levels). That’s an observational study.
Second, an observational study is a type of clinical study, just like dogs are a type of mammal. So it makes no sense for you to claim “there is a clear distinction between observational studies and clinical studies”. What you should have said was: “there is a clear distinction between observational studies and clinical trials“. So before you make false claims about science for ideological reasons, please make sure you actually understand the terms being used. Otherwise, more informed people will catch you.
Third, different branches of science don’t need to use the same type of studies, in order for those branches of science to reach equally strong conclusions. For example, I don’t need to a clinical trial to show that planets (like Earth) are round; an observational study suffices.
Re: “The tale of Ancel Keys and the now failed lipid hypothesis are more and more telling. Keys ascended to head hierarchies of power wrt his field ( American Heart Association ) in much the same way that some use the IPCC. Keys bullied those questioning his hypothesis until they were marginalized, like the exodus from the IPCC by those questioning claims.”
Like many political conservatives, you’ve not only misrepresented climate science, but also medicine and nutrition science as well. Medicine is quite important to people’s health. So, once again, please try to keep your distorting mind-set away from medicine; find some other target for you ideologically-motivated narrative on science.
The lipid hypothesis isn’t failed. You would need to have next-to-no understanding of biology/medicine to claim that. Or maybe you’re just repeating some nonsense you saw on a blogpost or press piece somewhere, like you do for climate science?
Anyway, there’s a robust correlation between saturated fat intake and heart disease. This correlation is causal, as shown by the evidence-based causal mechanism linking fat-intake to heart disease, interventions that reduce saturated fat intake end up reducing heart disease risk, etc. I suggest you go read the following sources to get familiar with this topic:
“Dietary guidelines: 2015 – 2020” (Chapter 1: “Key elements of healthy eating patterns”)
“A systematic review of the effect of dietary saturated and polyunsaturated fat on heart disease”
“Reduction in saturated fat intake for cardiovascular disease”
“Association of specific dietary fats with total and cause-specific mortality”
“Saturated fats versus polyunsaturated fats versus carbohydrates for cardiovascular disease prevention and treatment”
“Saturated fats compared with unsaturated fats and sources of carbohydrates in relation to risk of coronary heart disease: a prospective cohort study”
“Dairy fat and risk of cardiovascular disease in 3 cohorts of US adults”
“Saturated fatty acids and coronary heart disease risk: the debate goes on”
“Anyway, there’s a robust correlation between saturated fat intake and heart disease“
Sure is.
That is , none.
According to some physicians who did some research.
2017
“Coronary artery disease pathogenesis and treatment urgently requires a paradigm shift. Despite popular belief among doctors and the public, the conceptual model of dietary saturated fat clogging a pipe is just plain wrong. A landmark systematic review and meta-analysis of observational studies showed no association between saturated fat consumption and (1) all-cause mortality, (2) coronary heart disease (CHD), (3) CHD mortality, (4) ischaemic stroke or (5) type 2 diabetes in healthy adults.1 Similarly in the secondary prevention of CHD there is no benefit from reduced fat, including saturated fat, on myocardial infarction, cardiovascular or all-cause mortality.2 It is instructive to note that in an angiographic study of postmenopausal women with CHD, greater intake of saturated fat was associated with less progression of atherosclerosis whereas carbohydrate and polyunsaturated fat intake were associated with greater progression.”
It’s genetics AS. Some people have blue eyes, some brown. Some have heart disease, some not.
Mind you if you have heart disease (as in atheroma) eating less is always a healthy idea.
“Anyone who has struggled for several years to make sense of a complicated data set, only to conclude that “the data proved inadequate for this purpose” is in a quandary.”
This was the kind of intractible problem polar bear biologist Ian Stirling faced thirty years ago. “Climate change” became his solution:
http://polarbearscience.com/2018/06/25/hansens-1988-climate-change-testimony-was-the-answer-to-stirlings-polar-bear-problem/
A main inference is that too often the paleo literature aims to rationalize why a particular hypothesis remains appropriate, rather than undertaking to deliberately test that hypothesis.
Yes! How many times do we read “as the earth warms” or similar genuflections in a Nature paper pre-amble. This is John Ioannidis territory (Why most published research findings are false, PLoS Medv.2(8); 2005 Aug PMC1182327). You can try to laugh off Karl Popper and call deductiveness and falsifiability childish, but to no avail, he will have the last word.
Re: “This is John Ioannidis territory (Why most published research findings are false, PLoS Medv.2(8); 2005 Aug PMC1182327).”
Stop abusing Ioannidis’ work. It’s getting tedious, especially when it keeps happening on Curry’s blog:
https://judithcurry.com/2016/07/06/is-much-of-current-climate-research-useless/
The science showing anthropogenic climate change is about as certain as the science showing that smoking kills people. That doesn’t mean 100% certainty, since science doesn’t deal in that. Just enough certainty that one has little-to-no reasonable grounds for doubting the science.
That’s just not my assessment; that’s also the assessment of John Ioannidis, the man who’s work you’re abusing. See:
17:17 to 18:22 of “RS 174 – John Ioannidis on “What happened to Evidence-based medicine?””
http://rationallyspeakingpodcast.org/show/rs-174-john-ioannidis-on-what-happened-to-evidence-based-med.html
Ioannidis made an apt comparison between the science on “smoking causing cancer” and the science “humans causing climate change”. He made this comparison because he recognizes that scientific hypotheses become more reliable (and more likely to be true) as more and more research groups test the hypothesis using different lines of evidence, methodologies, etc., and keep finding that the hypothesis passes the tests. Here’s some of the literature for you:
“Why most published research findings are false”
“Most published research findings are false—But a little replication goes a long way”
“Why most published research findings are false: Problems in the analysis”
“Why most published research findings are false: Author’s reply to Goodman and Greenland”
“It’s like 99.999% — like climate change and the fact that humans are making a difference in that regard, or smoking is
killing people.”
Beyond the simple fact of greenhouse gases having an impact on climate is a world of turbulent dynamical complexity. Way beyond Atomski’s tedious demonstrations of his confirmation bias – is a science that is far from certain.
Re: “Beyond the simple fact of greenhouse gases having an impact on climate is a world of turbulent dynamical complexity. Way beyond Atomski’s tedious demonstrations of his confirmation bias – is a science that is far from certain.”
And you’re still resorting to the passive-aggressive use of nicknames, not directly responding to people, etc. Pathology is what it is.
Let me know when you’re done manufacturing false doubt about science. Because the National Academy of Sciences clearly knew better than you, even back in 2010. The evidence has grown stronger since then, of course:
“Advancing the science of climate change
[…]
Any scientific theory is thus, in principle, subject to being refined or overturned by new observations. In practical terms, however, scientific uncertainties are not all the same. Some scientific conclusions or theories have been so thoroughly examined and tested, and supported by so many independent observations and results, that their likelihood of subsequently being found to be wrong is vanishingly small. Such conclusions and theories are then regarded as settled facts. This is the case for the conclusions that the Earth system is warming and that much of this warming is very likely due to human activities [pages 21 – 22].
[…]
Most of the warming over the last several decades can be attributed to human activities that release carbon dioxide (CO2) and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere [chapter 2, page 28].”
https://www.nap.edu/read/12782/chapter/4#21
“In summary, although there is independent evidence for decadal changes in TOA radiative fluxes over the last two decades, the evidence is equivocal. Changes in the planetary and tropical TOA radiative fluxes are consistent with independent global ocean heat-storage data, and are expected to be dominated by changes in cloud radiative forcing. To the extent that they are real, they may simply reflect natural low-frequency variability of the climate system.” https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch3s3-4-4-1.html
The evidence for perpetual, dynamically complex climate change has grown stronger. Decadal changes are real. Atomski has not got the imagination or knowledge to move beyond confirmation bias. He is an extreme ideologue whose purpose is to disparage groupthink outsiders.
What complete nonsense. There is virtually nothing certain about man impacting the climate by dumping CO2 into the air. Simply beyond our current ability to determine. As to “consensus”, try sticking to the evidence, which is really thin one-way-or-other. Problem might be big, might be small or non-existent. Certainly does not merit taking billions of dollars from the poor and middle class to line the pockets of the green elite and their crony buddies.
On the other hand science suggests that up to 500GtC could be returned to soils and ecosystems that was lost over the period of settled agriculture doing simple things that must be done.
https://senr.osu.edu/our-people/rattan-lal
Re: “What complete nonsense. There is virtually nothing certain about man impacting the climate by dumping CO2 into the air. Simply beyond our current ability to determine. As to “consensus”, try sticking to the evidence, which is really thin one-way-or-other. Problem might be big, might be small or non-existent. Certainly does not merit taking billions of dollars from the poor and middle class to line the pockets of the green elite and their crony buddies.”
And like most Internet critics of mainstream climate science, your political ideology motivates your refusal to accept the science, akin to how religious ideology motivates most people who refuse to accept mainstream evolutionary theory. Or akin to how some people didn’t accept the science on the health risks of smoking, because they didn’t want there to be a cigarette tax.
There are well-documented impacts of anthropogenic increases in atmoshperic CO2 on surface warming, tropospheric warming, stratospheric cooling, mesospheric cooling, thermospheric cooling, ocean acidification, sea level rise, and so on. Your politically-motivated refusal to accept the evidence changes none of that, anymore than the religiously-motivated refissal of creationists changes the fact that the are transitional fossils.
Carl Wunsch’s concluding remarks begin with:
This essay has indulged in a number of sweeping generalizations that will surely provoke and anger a number of readers, who can correctly point to published counter-examples. Nonetheless, scientific fields do develop their own cultures, and paleoclimate studies demonstrably have some widely-shared features that can be identified. The study of paleoclimate encompasses such a huge range of problems, methods, regions, phenomena, time and space scales, that no one has mastered it all. With that complexity, any science runs the risk of becoming so abstract, or so devoted to particular stories, or both, that they lose relevance to the physical world. As Chamberlin (1890) pointed out, it is essential to always be alert to alternative hypotheses.
Anticipating angry response from whom?
Which “particular story”?
Alert to alternative hypotheses to what?
Can’t help thinking that CAGW is in the frame here.
Cigarette companies got the “science”
they paid for — cigarettes were “safe”.
Left-wing politicians get the “science”
they pay for — predictions of a coming
climate disaster every year (and to prevent it,
we are told, we must do everything we are told
without question!)
We’ve been hearing about the coming
climate crisis, that never comes,
since the late 1980s,
so you’d think by now most people would stop
listening … but leftists are not most people
— climate change is their (secular) religion,
so facts, data, and logic are not required
— only faith.
As a life-long atheist, I have no hope
of convincing a religious person
there is no god (nor would I try),
and no hope of convincing a warmunist
that adding CO2 to the atmosphere
is greening our planet, and if there is
any warming from CO2,
it is totally harmless.
Religion is based on faith.
Junk science is based on faith
… that making scary predictions
will keep the grant money coming !
Richard Greene
Bingham Farms, Michigan
It seems consistent with human behavior, group dynamic and organizational behavior that such dynamics could emerge within a field of study. So why would anyone trust “concensus” within any scientific area or subfield? How foolish does concensus seem as an arguement? Thanks for the post.
Consensus is not needed within science itself. It is needed in going from science to policy. For example what level of pollutants or toxins in the environment is considered dangerous is a consensus question. Without consensus you get no science-based policies.
I support policymakers attempts to use the “best” available scientific understanding as a basis for policy evalution. Trusting in concensus to stifle debate, quash dissent or argue something approaching infallibility is an entirely different proposal.
An appeal to concensus to endorse a an approach to policy makes sense. As regards science (or public understanding of such) an appeal to concensus to support consensus seems highly problematic.
As you suggest, science should not need concensus within itself. I think you are being somewhat less than honest if you are implying that the “climate science” community does not use concensus to defend the “science”.
Science is an individual thing. Each scientist has their own set of things they believe to be true, very likely true, slightly dubious, completely false, etc. They base this on the building blocks that they know. People outside the science forming opinions don’t often have such a complete deck of cards, and some of those might be jokers, so that kind of debate plays out on blogs or in Congress.
Warmists need to be more honest on what the “consensus” really is. As I look at the science, the consensus seems to be that added CO2 has “some” increasing effect on temperature. I don’t know that 97% is the right number, but most “skeptics” would agree with “consensus” on the greenhouse effect, without stretching the point by attaching a percentage to it.
The problem is the lack of honesty in allowing a mistaken idea to take hold – that 97% agree that added CO2 adds up to an alarmingly overheated future in the relative short term. This is the popular view that more and more people agree with.
Also, your statement that “consensus…is needed in going from science to policy” is a clear statement of the real problem – that the science has been exaggerated in order to influence policy. This is so obvious that it seems almost unnecessary to bring it up. The climate science community seems more interested in promoting a progressive world view, and in manipulating a gullible popular press to achieve it, than in being honest about what is really established in climate science.
The latter point is what really irritates people like me who are not scientists. Why are not prominent “consensus” scientists more willing to call out “tabloid” science that is so prevasive (other than the obvious reason, that such science helps the cause). I could mention 50 examples, but I don’t have the time and consensus scientists wouldn’t be interested anyway. One I’ll mention briefly is climate coverage by the New York Times, which is so obviously wrong-headed and manipulative that the newspaper seems to have come totally corrupted.
In short, climate science to a non-scientist can be evaluated on its honesty as a political movement, and I think that is where a lot of skepticism originates. And unfortunately, that has resulted in some skepticism being degraded into denialism that is typical of such a polarized subject. But seldom is climate science discussed as a strictly scientific proposition. Rather, it’s become a means to an end – a world where carbon mitigation on a worldwide scale becomes a governmental
norm.
Conflating science with policy is a big problem for the politically minded. It is possible for a scientist to believe in 3 C per doubling without holding a view on policy, and many would not because that would require further assumptions outside of their expertise. Meanwhile the politically minded hold all scientists responsible for the policy recommendations when they might only go as far as 3 C per doubling. This lack of separation between science and policy leads them to denigrate all of science as motivated groupthink. I can make statements like for every 2000 GtCO2 we emit between now and 2100 is worth another degree C of warming by then. This is not a policy statement, but a quantification of an effect. It doesn’t suggest a policy, only a compromise to make between emissions and warming. Policy determines where on the spectrum we end up, but it needs exactly this kind of information.
Re: “Warmists need to be more honest on what the “consensus” really is. As I look at the science, the consensus seems to be that added CO2 has “some” increasing effect on temperature.”
Calling them “warmists” is on par with a flat-Earther calling people who accept the science “round Earthists”, or a creationists calling people who accept the science “evolutionists”. It’s hilarious.
Anyway, I highly doubt that you’ve looked at the science or the consensus. And it shows in your misrepresentation of what the consensus is.
There’s an evidence-based scientific consensus that:
A1) There has been global warming since the mid-20th century.
A2) Humans [largely via anthropogenic greenhouse gases] caused most of this recent warming.
A3) Most of the recent [or near future] climate change is [or will be] caused by humans.
A4) Climate change is a serious problem and/or a danger to humanity.
The following sources document the consensus on A1 and A2:
Table 1: “Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming”
“Does it matter if the consensus on anthropogenic global warming is 97% or 99.99%?”
“The consensus on anthropogenic global warming matters”
Page 49 of: “Models, manifestation and attribution of climate change”
For the consensus on A3 and A4:
Among AAAS (American Academy for the Advancement of Science) scientists with relevant expertise (PhD earth scientists current working), there’s a *95%* consensus that climate change was a serious problem and a *93%* consensus that recent warming is mostly caused by humans:
“Earth scientists views on climate change”
http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/07/23/elaborating-on-the-views-of-aaas-scientists-issue-by-issue/
And in another survey, *~87%* of climate researchers thought that humans caused (or will cause) most of the recent (or near future) climate change, while *~86%* of climate researchers thought that climate change poses a very serious problem and/or a threat to humanity:
Figures 88 (v043) and 2 (v007) of: “The Bray and von Storch 5th International Survey of Climate Scientists 2015/2016”
https://www.hzg.de/imperia/md/content/hzg/zentrale_einrichtungen/bibliothek/berichte/hzg_reports_2016/hzg_report_2016_2.pdf
Re: “Why are not prominent “consensus” scientists more willing to call out “tabloid” science that is so prevasive”
They are. You either don’t bother to pay attention, or you pretend not to notice (because it serves your politically-motivated ends). For example:
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/scientists-explain-what-new-york-magazine-article-on-the-uninhabitable-earth-gets-wrong-david-wallace-wells/
https://climatefeedback.org/claimreview/earth-is-not-at-risk-of-becoming-a-hothouse-like-venus-as-stephen-hawking-claimed-bbc/
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/the-telegraph-dan-hyde-earth-heading-for-mini-ice-age-within-15-years/
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/2017-track-among-hottest-year-recorded-scientists-not-surprised-thinkprogress-article-suggests-joe-romm/
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/climate-change-emergency-jet-stream-shift-warning-global-warming-extreme-weather-gabriel-samuels-the-independent/
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/alaskas-vicious-cycle-warming-tundra-spews-co2-speeding-up-warming-joe-romm-think-progress/
https://climatefeedback.org/claimreview/worlds-coral-reefs-severely-threatened-climate-change-human-impacts-abc-story-notes/
Re: “In short, climate science to a non-scientist can be evaluated on its honesty as a political movement, and I think that is where a lot of skepticism originates”
Climate science is not a political movement, anymore than medical science is a political movement. Please learn the difference between politics and science. It is a fallacious appeal to consequences to use your dislike of proposed political solutions, to justify your refusal to accept scientific claims. It’s on par with not accepting that smoking causes cancer, because you dislike the idea of a cigarette tax. And yes, the tobacco industry did use the fallacious tactics you’re using now, objecting to science by illegitimately painting science as politics:
“For example, tobacco companies describe academic research into the health effects of smoking as the product of an ‘anti-smoking industry’, described as ‘a vertically integrated, highly concentrated, oligopolistic cartel, combined with some public monopolies’ whose aim is to ‘manufacture alleged evidence, suggestive inferences linking smoking to various diseases and publicity and dissemination and advertising of these so-called findings to the widest possible public’.”
https://academic.oup.com/eurpub/article/19/1/2/463780/Denialism-what-is-it-and-how-should-scientists
Re: “But seldom is climate science discussed as a strictly scientific proposition. Rather, it’s become a means to an end – a world where carbon mitigation on a worldwide scale becomes a governmental
norm.”
You’re clearly appealing to a baseless, paranoid conspiracy theory.
“Resistance, in this latter case, sometimes referred to as climate “skepticism” or “denialism,” […]
Climate skeptics suggest the well-publicized consensus is either manufactured or illusory and that some nefarious force—be it the United Nations, liberals, communists, or authoritarians—want to use climate change as a cover for exerting massive new controls over the populace. This conspiracy-laden rhetoric—if followed to its logical conclusion—expresses a rejection of scientific methods, scientists, and the role that science plays in society.”
http://climatescience.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228620.001.0001/acrefore-9780190228620-e-328
Knowledge geek here….
I’m in awe of this debate and value the sophistication.
Also, I find you to be winning.
Want to listen to “tabloid science” then all you need to do is wait for someone like Scott Wagner to weigh in.
“I haven’t been in a science class in a long time, but the earth moves closer to the sun every year — you know the rotation of the earth,” Wagner said, according to State Impact, an NPR affiliate. “We’re moving closer to the sun.”
He added, “We have more people. You know, humans have warm bodies. So is heat coming off? Things are changing, but I think we are, as a society, doing the best we can.”
Boy, I’ve been seeing this quote a lot in the last couple days. To bad none of the Climate Faithful can link back to something showing where it came from. I’d love to see what kind of context it has.
I mean, I thought the true believers were very worried about people taking quotes ‘out of context’. Isn’t that their explanation for why all the Climategate quotes are supposed to be not as damning as they appear to be?
~¿~
“To[sic] bad none of the Climate Faithful can link back to something showing where it came from.”
Fair enough, it’s tough to find. Not like it’s referenced from his wiki page or anything.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Wagner
Ha, it IS on the wiki page! I hadn’t seen that. I had seen it a few other places before though. Politifact has it, and apparently felt they needed to weigh in on if it was true or not. (No, not if he said it, whether or not the earth’s orbit causes global warming 🤔 ) Penn live had an article, as well as several other Pennsylvania political blogs. And lots of people twittered about it. And all of them, even the wiki, got the quotes from State Impact Pennsylvania.
https://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/2017/03/28/wagner-keynotes-for-natural-gas-advocates-in-harrisburg/
For those not familiar with State Impact, it’s a ‘Project of NPR stations’. The Pennsylvania one is also produced in conjunction with The Allegheny Front.
https://www.alleghenyfront.org
They focus on Environmental Issues of the Pennsylvania area, such as Fracking, Climate Change, Enviro Justice, and Trump.
…No really. TRUMP.
https://trumponearth.org
Soo, on the one hand we have a get together with ‘over a dozen’ County Commissioners, where Senator (running for Governor) Wagner is one of the speakers. It’s apparently focused on Energy and Gas production. And the only report we have for what was said there comes from the NPR’s Environmental Justice Warriors.
Do I need to point out that the only quotes they give other then the Climate ones we’ve all heard were;
“There’s a huge difference between an active environmentalist and an environmental activist,”
And
“I love the outdoors, I grew up around the outdoors, I love fishing–I am in favor of drilling on state lands.”
Or maybe I should comments on the fact that they don’t provide or link to any kind of Video, Audio, or Transcript of the event.
Like I said before, we are surely lacking any kind of context here. Was he just joking? Was there more too it? Who knows.
On the gripping hand, I’ve read more from Wagner by now, and he really does come across as kind of a dumb ass when he goes off script. Considering how his last statement on Climate Change got the kind of coverage you usually have to misspell Potato for, you think he would have used this latest incident to clear up any misunderstandings. Instead, he seams to have just given his detractors more ammo.
Personally, while I certainly don’t agree with the position of ‘Young and Naive’, she at least came out of this looking less silly the ‘Dazed and Confused’ Wagner
~¿~
Climate Faithful? Don’t you mean people who understand science?
Too bad you didn’t take the 30 seconds to look for it. Go head, put one of the sentences in quotes and use something as simple as Google.
Too bad I could have linked to it, and any other person with minimal Google skills could have had you simply asked.
I thought true “believers”? I believe in atoms, but never saw one. Am I a true believer in atoms, or simply someone who knows a little bit about chemistry?
What is wrong with today’s deniers? Can’t they simply go back to cherry picking starting years to show a pause?
Hey Scott. You way have missed it, but I already posted a reply explaining where the quotes come from. I was mostly pointing out that most of the Climate Faithful don’t actually know where it’s from, they just repeat whatever they’ve heard from their ‘thought leaders’ aka their political masters and high priests.
And yes, they most certainly are the Climate Faithful. If you want to see just how little they understand science, just point out that there is also a concensus on Nuclear Power or GMO Foods.
~¿~
Scott Koontz: “I believe in atoms, but never saw one. Am I a true believer in atoms”
Wonderful. You can actually see atoms if you followed science in depth. IBM has such; I’ll just google for brains for you. University of California, Berkeley, also has imagery. Astonishing isn’t it!
https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-of-the-best-actual-images-of-real-atoms-and-molecules
Hey schrizree, “I was mostly pointing out that most of the Climate Faithful don’t actually know where it’s from”
OK, but the only people who knew were the people with some science background. Seems the deniers missed it, whined about it, then suggested that they knew it was an actual quote.
Weird. The people who didn’t know where those complaining that those in the know did not know. Very odd.
“OK, but the only people who knew were the people with some science background. ”
What? You need a ‘Science Background’ now to find out were a quote came from?
Scott, I pointed out in the first post that the Climate Faithful didn’t know the CONTEXT of the quote. I never said you couldn’t find it. I found it easily enough. Lots of places had it. And the ones that actually link back to were they got it all went to the same place. The NPR article.
So, have you read that yet? Did you find the CONTEXT? Of course not, there isn’t any, it was a straight up hit peace disguised as reporting. The only time they quote Wagner is when they know it will make him look bad to the Faithful.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I think Wagner probably is nearly as clueless about Climate Change as he seems. At least I can’t find any evidence were he has tried to improve or explain his position. But it isn’t easy to tell when the media goes so far out of their way to twist the story to fit their narrative.
And as I pointed out in the first post, none of the Climate Faithful ever checked to see if there was anything funny with the way the quotes were being spread. They weren’t linking to were the quotes came from because THEY didn’t know, or even care. Checking the veracity or context of the quotes never even entered their minds.
~¿~
He added, “We have more people. You know, humans have warm bodies. So is heat coming off?
Clearly this is not the cause of AGW, however….
… it is worth considering in other contexts.
I vaguely recall the global number for human energy use ( electricity and the like, not just metabolism ) being around 40 W/m^2 locally. Globally, the number was on the order of 0.01W/m^2, so not a cause of global warming.
But – studies back in the 1970s pegged anthropogenic energy for the area of New York City at around 200W/m^2! NYC is not 50C warmer than surrounding areas, so clearly, this heat is dispersing. Does it impose a contamination of local temperatures before incompletely dispersing?
“You can actually see atoms if you followed science in depth. IBM has such; I’ll just google for brains for you. University of California, Berkeley, also has imagery. Astonishing isn’t it!”
Yes, amazing that you think a pic is actually viewing atoms. Truly amazing. So you believe in a pic (which is fine, because you’re not an atom denier) but you don’t believe CO2 is the primary forcing. Were you eating for a specific picture?
“To bad none of the Climate Faithful can link back to something showing where it came from.”
You stand corrected. Maybe you should be more clear next time.
‘I’ stand corrected? Scott, I’m STILL the only one who has linked back to were the quotes originally came from.
And after spelling out the problem repeatedly, I still don’t think any of you on the Climate Faithful side even understand the problem. Which, frankly, doesn’t really surprise me. That’s what happens when your ‘Science’ is repeated as dogma, with no questioning it allowed. Heck, most of the Faithful never even THINK to question what they are told. They accept it as gospel and repeat it far and wide like evangelical missionaries.
“Climate Faithful”
People who understand the science. I accept your childish name.
“The price being paid is not a small one. Often important technical details are omitted, and alternative hypotheses arbitrarily suppressed in the interests of telling a simple story. Some of these papers would not pass peer-review in the more conventional professional journals, but lend themselves to headlines and simplistic stories written by non-scientist media people. One has the bizarre spectacle of technical discussions being carried on in the news columns of the
New York Times and similar publications, not to speak of the dispiriting blog universe. In the long-term, this tabloid-like publication cannot be good for the science–which developed peer review in specialized journals over many decades beginning in the 17th Century–for very good reasons.”
“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/pdf/10.1080/02626667.2013.804626
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/nile-e1527722953992.jpg
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.
Climate is a problem for dynamicists. The dominant climate paradigm says 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.
“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
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. Anything that isn’t built on perpetual change is certainly wrong and this applies equally to the narratives of both sides of the culture war. The implications are that climate is unpredictable and that rapid and adverse climate change – of one sort or another – is inevitable.
Wunsch, Alley, Broecker etc pioneered the climate dynamical complexity paradigm – along with notable early contributions from Hurst and Lorenz. And yes of course Wally’s ‘logo’ conveyor belt isn’t really a conveyor belt.
An amazing paper I agree Judith. Sometimes senior scientists can make a difference if they are willing to take a chance and perhaps Wunsch is trying to make a difference for science generally.
Judith,
I enjoyed reading the Wunsch paper… thanks for the heads up. A non-pay-walled pdf is available from a Harvard link (“author’s personal copy”).
“The perils of ‘near-tabloid science’”
That is a good description of climate change contrarianism, very little real science is available. But rhetoric in abundance.
If people want to claim science is no good, then the climate change contrarian science is no good either – an interesting stalemate.
Harry, You of course are changing the subject. Wunsch is drawing negative conclusions about paleoclimatology. Rather confirming many of the things Steve Mcintyre has said for at least 15 years.
The point here is not to draw false equivalencies and engage in sophist arguments about who is “worse.” If Wunsch and McIntyre are right (and its hard to argue they are completely wrong) there is something rotten at the core of an important (and much relied upon by alarmists) field of climate science.
“Changing the subject”, eh?
At least you are agreeing that if science is wrong, then contrarian science is wrong, too. Therefore scientists like Dr Curry are wrong. This then leaves everyone not knowing anything, and we might as well shut all the Universities down, and delete all the scientific papers.
I daresay McIntyre is wrong too, unless you are going to try and argue he has some sort of special and privileged position that makes him right – that would be a bold assumption.
Seeing as you mention Steve McIntyre, what is your reaction to the later studies which confirmed the “hockey stick” result?
For the record I don’t disagree with Wunsch’s opinion, he after all is a scientist and I am not. Some of the media coverage does make me cringe, which is why I try and read the studies in the peer-reviewed scientific literature and not worry too much about media headlines and blogs. But the problem is around 97% of the scientific literature supports the AGW position and 3% does not, so there is very little to read on the does not side. Plus the 3% do not agree with each other, there is no “consensus” there.
I forgot to mention in my original comment that we owe a debt of gratitude to Steve McIntyre who persevered over the years with his critique of the field. He has stated many times that the whole field is suspect because of selection bias. Few have endured such vile attacks as Steve and he seems to have been onto something. Many thanks are due.
And shame on the Mannian school of paleoclimate, who have engaged in fundamental deceptions all along and have gained immense acclaim.
“who have engaged in fundamental deceptions all along and have gained immense acclaim.”
Oh my, you are making me laugh so much it hurts. Care to elaborate on your justification for thinking Steve McIntyre is somehow correct? And for that matter, please present your evidence that Dr Mann participated in “fundamental deceptions”.
Who was right?
https://i.imgur.com/vobZTMK.png
Here lies the rub. If you want to publish a new perspective on one aspect of climate change that strays more than one-inch from the accepted science, you have absolutely no chance of doing so in a peer-reviewed journal. These journals will not even look at papers that propose an idea that does not support the current meme.
I have spent years trying to present evidence that supports the contention that extreme Perigean New/Full moons can influence:
a) the latitudinal and longitudinal profile of the peak pressure of the summer-time sub-tropical high- pressure ridge.
b) the rate of change of the world’s mean temperature on centennial and sub-centennial timescales via their influence upon the initiation of El Nino events.
I have published at least four papers in peer-reviewed journals supporting these contentions. However, each paper has been more difficult than the previous one to get published, with delays lasting more than a year between submission and publication becoming the norm.
I have at least three more papers written about topic b) but I have long since given up on the idea of ever getting them published in peer-reviewed journals. It is simply too time-consuming and costly to spend the next three to four years trying to get them through to publication. I will be releasing them in an e-book compendium of three or four papers in the coming months as this is the only way that I can get this information out to the wider scientific community.
“These journals will not even look at papers that propose an idea that does not support the current meme.”
Maybe it is because your papers are not up to a suitable scientific standard?
No, I have actually published all of the papers that I have submitted. The problem isn’t the standard. I have about 16 peer-reviewed papers published in both astronomical (Astronomy and Astrophysics, The Astrophysical Journal, Monthly Notices, Solar Physics, The Australian Journal of Physics, etc.) and climate science journals (Energy and Environment, The Open Atmospheric Science Journal, etc.). The problem is that new ideas are often met with a considerable amount of flack. This is particularly true if you are trying to publish work that spans too unrelated disciplines like Astronomy and climate.
astroclimateconnection.
You sound like a very important person! But words are cheap, how about the name of your best published paper, that would help remove doubts and strengthen your case.
Harold Duoweasel
You sound like a very unimportant person. Why don’t you explain to us how geothermal activity in Greenland and Antarctica is not contributing to Global Mean Sea Level Rise. Or for fun document that there are not peer reviewed papers with citations of the Medieval Warm Period. Prove that there are not papers with citations of the Little Ice Age. Or produce documents that prove there are not tidal gauge records with sea level rise under 2.00 mm/yr. Prove there were not previous warm periods in the Arctic. Prove that the rise in OHC during the 19th Century was not equal to the 20th Century. In short, thrill us with your acumen.
“You sound like a very unimportant person.”
Yawn. This is why it is usually a waste of time bringing science to a pseudoscience blog. Many of the readers are either trolls or just very very stupid, and I cannot tell the difference!
For the people who read my comment and are not familiar with the term yet, look up “Gish Gallop” in Wikipedia.
Harry: “Maybe it is because your papers are not up to a suitable scientific standard?”
Astroclimateconnection: “No, I have actually published all of the papers that I have submitted. The problem isn’t the standard.”
Editorial policy obviously plays a role when considering what is suitable for publication. Former editor-in-chief of Science, Marcia McNutt, claimed that climate science was ‘settled science’; so why would she have even looked past any submitted title undermining this philosophy, challenging settled science? She wouldn’t. The same roadblock exists for governmental RFP’s. It would take a monumental amount of kool-aid intake to believe the Obama administration would have been open to money being directed towards science that could possibly undermine redistributionist obsessions, no matter how valid the basis of the request.
Jeremy Berg replaced Marcia McNutt as editor-in-chief of Science in 2016. Berg expects to continue McNutt’s effort at Science to promote reproducibility in science—a problem that is “far from settled,” he says. Huh? But McNutt said climate science is settled, and reproducibility? I‘d like to believe Berg’s statement is damage control, but damage control for what, perception?
So, Harry, there’s not much relevance in a discussion about what’s “suitable” for publication when the science is stacked. FYI, It’s a little known fact that a gish gallop also describes what a horse does when pulling a precarious balanced apple cart.
Harry Twinotter – Suffice it to say that the level of my publication credentials is not the issue here. Try publishing a paper that introduces a new, and as yet unproven hypothesis. It is very difficult to do this. particularly if you are coming from a field that is outside of climate science. I am not saying that it should be easy to publish in peer-reviewed journals. far from it. However, if you submit a paper that mainly deals with astronomical concepts, many climate journal editors have a tough time finding a referee who is qualified enough to give a valid opinion about the paper. It would be like Wunsch sending a climate paper to the Astrophysical Journal. This is really the only point I want to make.
Astro, send me links to some of your papers, i would like to take a look. thx. curryja at yahoo.com
Harold
Let me translate your comment. You can’t rise to the challenge and are unable to refute simple facts about climate science. Pathetic.
I submit there is a simple reason that consensus occurs in warmist media. They are deliberately misrepresenting the strength of their position in an effort to manipulate the credulous in an old ploy. From Wikipedia : A push poll is an interactive marketing technique, most commonly employed during political campaigning, in which an individual or organization attempts to manipulate or alter prospective voters’ views/beliefs under the guise of conducting an opinion poll. In a push poll, large numbers of voters are contacted with little effort made to actually collect and analyze voters’ response data. Instead, the push poll is a form of telemarketing-based propaganda and rumor mongering, masquerading as an opin… i.e. the promoters are ‘Moving the Overton Window’ ( moving the goalposts ) of what seems reasonable rather than condescending to reasoned argument. For analysis based on science rather than psychology of marketing the comment ‘bringing a knife to a gunfight’ applies here.
Pingback: A remarkable essay on ‘near-tabloid science’ | Watts Up With That?
re: Textbook Truths
From today’s Wall Street Journal opinion page …
Unfortunately, skeptics have fostered doubt about climate change by misrepresenting the research. Some have claimed that Mr. Hansen’s models failed to predict temperatures accurately, but these evaluations use measurements based on major calibration errors. Researchers critical of mainstream climate science also have expressed doubt about the growing intensity of extreme-weather events, which in fact are more intense than they were 30 years ago, due to warmer oceans and other climate-related factors. And many have suggested that the rise of global temperature has paused or plateaued recently, though reliable records show this isn’t the case.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/capitalism-will-solve-the-climate-problem-1532289823
Hmmm…
some gross errors in this piece:
Some have claimed that Mr. Hansen’s models failed to predict temperatures accurately, but these evaluations use measurements based on major calibration errors.
Hansens’s models indicate warming, but at the low end.
Researchers critical of mainstream climate science also have expressed doubt about the growing intensity of extreme-weather events, which in fact are more intense than they were 30 years ago, due to warmer oceans and other climate-related factors.
extreme-weather events is not defined, the claim that these undefined events are more intense is not substantiated, and other climate-related factors indicates the author doesn’t really understand. If extreme-weather events means tropical cyclones, then the accumulated cyclone energy index certainly doesn’t support this claim. This idea could come from a conflation of thermal energy and kinetic energy, which is erroneous. Kinetic energy doesn’t derive from thermal energy, but rather the gradients of thermal energy, both horizontally and vertically. Kinetic energy is thought to decrease with increasing global temperature (Manabe), though like everything else, this is subject to verification.
Another fallacious idea is that extreme-weather events are something new. They have always occurred, and will continue, regardless of CO2. While there’s evidence of decreases of some extreme weather ( ACE and intense US tornadoes ), changes are marginal to begin with. While individual events are sensational, climate and weather are not significant causes of death, so marginal changes should similarly have marginal effects. If one has a poor diet, or does not exercise, or smokes, or drinks “too much”, or has “too many” sexual partners, one doesn’t get to worry about “climate change” because that would be irrational assessment of very low risk compared to self induced high risk.
And many have suggested that the rise of global temperature has paused or plateaued recently, though reliable records show this isn’t the case.
This is a distraction. Yes, global warming continues, near the low end of modeled projections:
https://i1.wp.com/turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/ncdc30_comparison_20181.png
The error is in assuming there’s some level of global temperature neatly correlates with harm ( and ignores benefit ). As global temperatures increase, variability has long been modeled to decrease and as above, so too has kinetic energy been modeled to decrease. This is not the stuff of disaster.
The model problem.*
Fig 1.4 IPCC 2nd order Draft, discrepancy btw models and obs.
https://climateaudit.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/figure-1-4-models-vs-observations-annotated.png
*
Soon to
disparu
down
the
memory
whole,
uh-oh…
I posted the above as an example of a “textbook truth” as mentioned in Wunsch’s article.
Colorful, sometimes charismatic, characters come to dominate the field, constructing their interpretations of a few intriguing, but indefinite observations that appeal to their followers, and which eventually emerge as “textbook truths.”
Sort of an “it’s true because I say it’s true” or “everybody knows that … “
beththeserf:
How about you post an up to date graph …
And even during the warming slowdown the 95% confidence interval was not reached (meaning that the envelop of NV covered it – as the model trend is an ensemble of runs that average out NV, in this case, caused by the prolonged -PDO/ENSO regime).
http://www.realclimate.org/images/cmp_cmip3_sat_ann.png
Yeah?
http://images.remss.com/figures/climate/RSS_Model_TS_compare_globev4.png
I don’t understand how you can miss the spectacular scientific sham that is CMIP ensembles.
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1956/4751
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/21/8709
At this stage it is laughable agnotology.
I triple dare you to try and get James C. McWilliams to agree with you that CMIP models are a sham. LMAO.
“CMIP models are a sham. LMAO.”
1. Manabe’s 1-D models demonstrated most of the success of AGW theory. But 1-D couldn’t capture the impact of advection which required a dynamic model.
GCMs have not advanced the 1-D global mean temperature trend predictions, though observations are lower than the 1-D predictions, probably because of the oceanic heat storage you reference from time to time.
Manabe’s 1-D predicted stratospheric cooling on radiative basis alone, so GCMs didn’t help there.
GCMs, starting with Manabe’s more than half a century ago, did indicate phase shift due to Arctic sea ice decline, but not really much improvement in fifty years of farting around since then.
Manabe did predict decreased kinetic energy and decreased temperature variability, but these are still not very well measurable.
And finally, GCMs from Manabe’s first 4-D models through CMIP predict the hotspot of warming, which is not observed by MSU or most accepted RAOB analyses.
2. You must be very lean, because you spend a lot of time LMAO.
Do you think James C. McWilliams agrees with you and Ellison? Are you that daft?
Do you think James C. McWilliams agrees with you and Ellison? Are you that daft?
In the spirit of the original post, I’m more interested in with what the observations agree with more than the persons involved.
This is the 5:
https://ourchangingclimate.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/realclimate_compare_1997-2015_data-june-2015.png
I don’t know much. I’ve seen the same plot with the 3. What am I to think? I think the 5 is better than than the 3.
Is there an explanation as to why the 3 is preferred to the 5 in this case?
The papers are there to read JCH.
I’ve read them.
Rag – I do think it matters one bit what an extremist libertarian thinks.
The sham is ignoring for ideological reasons the fundamentally chaotic nature of models. The reality is that his simplistic consensus is whatever he imagines it to be – science is very far from JCH’s spectacular scientific naivety.
“In each of these model–ensemble comparison studies, there are important but difficult questions: How well selected are the models for their plausibility? How much of the ensemble spread is reducible by further model improvements? How well can the spread can be explained by analysis of model differences? How much is irreducible imprecision in an AOS?
Simplistically, despite the opportunistic assemblage of the various AOS model ensembles, we can view the spreads in their results as upper bounds on their irreducible imprecision. Optimistically, we might think this upper bound is a substantial overestimate because AOS models are evolving and improving. Pessimistically, we can worry that the ensembles contain insufficient samples of possible plausible models, so the spreads may underestimate the true level of irreducible imprecision (cf., ref. 23). Realistically, we do not yet know how to make this assessment with confidence.” James McWilliams
The sham is pretending that there is a unique solution.
“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.” Slingo and Palmer
The sham is believing that arbitrarily choosing a non-unique solution to present to the IPCC is scientifically meaningful.
“The bases for judging are a priori formulation, representing the relevant natural processes and choosing the discrete algorithms, and a posteriori solution behavior.” James McWilliams
There is a strange dynamic with these advocates – they imagine that there is a consensus around their simple ideas – and JCH is an extreme example.
Sometimes add/justments must be made, re obs and models.
‘It don’t mean a thing, if it ain’t got that schwing…’
h/t kim.
“This is the 5”
Well it was 4 years ago.
This is it now ….
http://www.realclimate.org/images//cmp_cmip5_sat_ann-1.png
Tony Banton:
Thank you. Yours is better. Then the next step is to put an average line to the wanderings of the GISTEMP in your plot.
Ragnaar:
Ta.
You don’t understand why the upper/lower confidence limits are there then obviously.
It is said that the forcing in CMIP5 could also have been overestimated due to the solar decline and added aerosols in Asia, both since 2000. Forcing has some uncertainties, and the models can’t be blamed for those because they are inputs.
Wunsch has been an outlier in the climate change groupthink with his studies of deep ocean cooling. Perhaps his paper reflect this. Since 2008 the big guys has thrown out their paleoclimate cards, starting with Hansen, followed by the other celebrities who count in the media sircus. They have established a consensus on CO2 as the control knob. Can we see some sceptisism from Wunsch toward this? I would like to see what Wunsch has to say about this, if he has the same causal understanding of change. This causality has been formulated as earth system sensitivity, with values of 6 deg C or more. But his paper is pay-walled. Do anyone know?
He was one of the scientists who worked on the Charney Report. 1.5 to 4.5, or 3 plus or minus 1.5. He says it has held up well, and he clearly identifies with the consensus. If you try to paint him as a skeptic, he is going to run into the arms of Michael E. Mann. Does he think Linden is a denier? Lol.
Lindzen.
1.5 to 4.5, or 3 plus or minus 1.5. He says it has held up well
Minus 1.5 has held up well.
Minus 1.5 has held up well.
Near-tabloid science. That is exactly what Wunsch would tell you.
“Near-tabloid science. That is exactly what Wunsch would tell you.”
No, you’re busy and may have missed it – observations are between 1.6 and 1.8 C/century, with the maximum thirty year rate occurring in the 2003.
It is tabloid science to persist with the high end in spite of no evidence to support it. I laugh when I read Oreskes’ Merchants of Doubt because the IPCC can’t bring itself to close the door on the completely unsupported high end, because of addiction to doubt.
BTW, the Charney compromise is not an example of objective science you want to associate with( from Wiki ):
“A committee on anthropogenic global warming convened in 1979 by the National Academy of Sciences and chaired by Jule Charney estimated climate sensitivity to be 3 °C, plus or minus 1.5 °C. Only two sets of models were available; one, due to Syukuro Manabe, exhibited a climate sensitivity of 2 °C, the other, due to James E. Hansen, exhibited a climate sensitivity of 4 °C. “According to Manabe, Charney chose 0.5 °C as a not-unreasonable margin of error, subtracted it from Manabe’s number, and added it to Hansen’s. Thus was born the 1.5 °C-to-4.5 °C range of likely climate sensitivity that has appeared in every greenhouse assessment since…”
Certainly in 1979, the two models were error prone, of disimilar structure and parameters and probably not strictly comparable. Neither model was validated, so simply averaging the results is not a strictly scientific notion.
In the intervening period, observed rates of surface warming anyway, are lower than but closer Manabe’s model, making the average a worse estimate than simply using Manabe’s.
It is a complicated, nonlinear system, and people who think they know climate sensitivity is low are doing near-tabloid science.
No less than Charney, Hansen and the IPCC are involved with the average rate that as you point out is not suitable for non-linear systems. If it was suitable for a system, one could use it calculate costs and benefits. The thing about the average rate it is sums things in an simple way and it does not require one to understand the system. Its non-refinement says, they don’t understand the system. Using sensitivity to find a SCC is using some broad fuzzy guess to determine that. So a CPA would disclose how much of a WAG their calculated SCC is. So, can we count the ways that all this is divorced from the reality of efficient free markets?
Its non-refinement says, they don’t understand the system.
Not really true. In all likelihood, the Charney plus or minus 1.5 was way way too narrow, so the non-finement is figment.
It is a complicated, nonlinear system, and people who think they know climate sensitivity is low are doing near-tabloid science.
Well, they do have observations to point to.
What do you ( presumably thinking climate sensitivity is high ) have ?
In all likelihood, the Charney plus or minus 1.5 was way way too narrow, so the non-finement is figment.
Hmmm….
Observed peak rates of warming indicate 1.6C/century +/- 0.2C:
https://i1.wp.com/turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/ncdc30_comparison_20181.png
So, +/- 1.5C, which as above is based on the political mean between Manabe and Hansen, not science, is way too broad.
Sensitivity to man-made CO2. Sensitivity to one molecule in ten thousand. Identifying and separating that from natural climate change that has caused warming cycles before this that were warmer. What a waste of time and money and cost to energy production and manufacturing. Warming from CO2 is not causing a problem. Alarmism from natural warming that is not caused by CO2 is destroying our economy and energy production. Climate changes in natural cycles and we must adapt and roll with it. We need to stop doing stuff to stop something we cannot change.
Lee Smolin was talking about Leo Susskind of Stanford and Ed Witten of IAS, the leaders of the string cabal. The anti-strings are Smolin, Peter Woit and Sabine Hossenfelder. You should see the email exchanges between Susskind and Smolin. A dirty boxing match LOL Originally a private debate among professional physicists, it was published in The Universe, a compilation of selected writings of top physicists.
Reblogged this on Quaerere Propter Vērum.
Nice catch. Proving again that scientists are human and therefore displaying all the classical human foibles and failings. Tribal, prideful, …
They’re not gods? Quick. Somebody call the New York Times!
A quote from another 2010 opinion piece in Science coauthored by Wunsch that’s broader than his annoyance with oversimplified paleoceanography:
“We are deeply disturbed by the recent escalation of political assaults on scientists in general and on climate scientists in particular. All citizens should understand some basic scientific facts. There is always some uncertainty associated with scientific conclusions; science never absolutely proves anything. When someone says that society should wait until scientists are absolutely certain before taking any action, it is the same as saying society should never take action. For a problem as potentially catastrophic as climate change, taking no action poses a dangerous risk for our planet.
Scientific conclusions derive from an understanding of basic laws supported by laboratory experiments, observations of nature, and mathematical and computer modeling. Like all human beings, scientists make mistakes, but the scientific process is designed to find and correct them. This process is inherently adversarial—scientists build reputations and gain recognition not only for supporting conventional wisdom, but even more so for demonstrating that the scientific consensus is wrong and that there is a better explanation. That’s what Galileo, Pasteur, Darwin, and Einstein did. But when some conclusions have been thoroughly and deeply tested, questioned, and examined, they gain the status of “well-established theories” and are often spoken of as “facts.”
For instance, there is compelling scientific evidence that our planet is about 4.5 billion years old (the theory of the origin of Earth), that our universe was born from a single event about 14 billion years ago (the Big Bang theory), and that today’s organisms evolved from ones living in the past (the theory of evolution). Even as these are overwhelmingly accepted by the scientific community, fame still awaits anyone who could show these theories to be wrong. Climate change now falls into this category: There is compelling, comprehensive, and consistent objective evidence that humans are changing the climate in ways that threaten our societies and the ecosystems on which we depend.”
Yes, Wunsch is a straight-up consensus climate scientist.
“There is compelling, comprehensive, and consistent objective evidence that humans are changing the climate in ways that threaten our societies and the ecosystems on which we depend.”
AGW? Sure.
Climate Change? Marginal.
Threaten our societies and ecosystems? Only by inundation of this manure.
If this is really the case, it should be easy to cite.
Compel me.
Don’t be so sure about AGW, outside of the obvious UHI. See http://www.cfact.org/2018/01/02/no-co2-warming-for-the-last-40-years/.
The big bang is off topic but for the record I have an alternative theory. The big bang theory is based almost entirely on the observed red shift in the light from astronomically distant objects. I think the red shift can be explained by the curvature of time (space-time was my focus in grad school).
Stationery objects follow a non-euclidean geodesic (that is, a non-euclidean straight line) in space-time. From a Euclidean perspective these objects will be seen as in motion away from the observer, because the geodesic looks like a curved trajectory and that means motion. An actual curved trajectory in space-time means the object is in motion.
On this view the red shift is simply measuring the Euclidean-view curvature of the time dimension in non-euclidean space-time. A properly non-euclidean view would not see the red shift.
The conflation of warming with “changing the climate in ways that threaten our societies and the ecosystems on which we depend.” is part of the problem.
It’s conceivable that something else changes to negate or reduce warming. The theory of radiative forcing anyway is noncontroversial.
But the significance of warming as a threat is unsubstantiated speculation.
The public evidently cannot distinguish the real principles of warming from the hoaxes of exaggeration much less include the idea of benefits.
“The big bang is off topic but for the record I have an alternative theory. ”
Oh my aching sides!
Are you paid as a comedian too or just for spreading disinformation on climate change?
I love people who are too tall for their own britches and can only engage the ad hominem attack. It’s not very convincing to the adults in the room.
Hi dpy,
Not sure which bit of ad hominem you don’t understand, but David is on record here as being paid by CFACT.
Unless you support his alternative cosmology, perhaps? It’s hard to know, through the looking glass here at Judith’s. Regardless, the Wojick theory of quantum chromodynamics in press is eagerly awaited.
Anyway, I much appreciate your absolutely not ad-hominem accusation of “fundamental deceptions” at Mann. Good to see you keeping your resolution to stay technical.
Oh, and I love you too, baby (in an *adult* way, obviously).
Below 3600 meters the oceans are barely cooling, though the scientist who think it could be warming there might also be right.
We actually have no idea what is happening overall below 3600 meters. Nor above 3600 meters for that matter. These are data-starved guesses, not accurate statistics.
Thomas stocker of the ipcc said we do not have the technology to measure the deep oceans
Tonyb
Tonyb
So nice to see you back commenting. We had an exchange about the accuracy of mercury thermometers in buckets of water around ship water intakes as well as deep thermocouple measurements below 2,000 meters. All to come up with a 0.5*C trend in 30 years of data.
All way too precise for the actual accuracy of the temperature measurement.
Still enjoying the discussion, speculation and theories.
Any progress on Sea Level from Roman times to LIA/
Regards, Scott
Hi scott
I replied to one of your comments in the last thread (or it may have been a few days back)
Glad to see you commenting as well. I do get the feeling of deja vu all over again at present and its too hot to comment much
Everyone here is saying this is our hottest summer ever so I pulled out a dozen references from my data base covering the 13th century. Seems like we had this sort of heat every dozen years or so.
I prefer our cool rainy days!
tonyb
We actually have no idea what is happening overall below 3600 meters. Nor above 3600 meters for that matter. These are data-starved guesses, not accurate statistics.
We know that the water with highest density will reach the bottom of the oceans. We don’t guess, basic physics gives us the answer. The circulation at the bottom of the ocean is influenced by what happens at the top. When oceans are coldest, the coldest water comes from the contact between ocean currents and polar ice. The salt water is initially chilled to below the freezing point of fresh water and the cold water mixes with some other water as it sinks and the water with the highest density makes its way to the bottom and flows back to the tropics where it completes a cycle and starts the next.
TonyB says “Thomas Stocker of the ipcc said we do not have the technology to measure the deep oceans”
What is new? I have been saying the same for 15 years now. How unscientific it is to try to measure mm changes in ocean levels when we know very little about what is happening in the deep oceans. Now, we have unforeseen events being reported, but one of these being plausible large oscillations of the ocean floor, as I posted on Climate Etc June 25, 2018 –
“Over a period of a million years, which is our standard unit of measurement, the movement of the mantle can cause the surface to move up and down by hundreds of metres.” “Although we’re talking about timescales that seem incredibly long to you or me, in geological terms, the Earth’s surface bobs up and down like a yo-yo.”
M.J. Hoggard et al. ‘Global dynamic topography observations reveal limited influence of large-scale mantle flow.’ Nature Geoscience (2016). DOI: 10.1038/ngeo2709.” Geoff
Argo provides unprecedented accuracy to 2000m – where most of the heat is – thus far. You don’t really need a peer reviewed reference for it.
http://www.euroargo-edu.org/argoeu_2b.php
Far less do we need blather about mantle movement on geological timescales when discussing AGW. In science and engineering one achieves the precision that is possible. You don’t abjure the good for the perfect – while accepting a measure of uncertainty.
As for JCH making things up – par for that course.
I don’t see any contradiction Magma. But your comment seems off topic to me. The topic of this post is Wunsch’s pointed critique of paleoclimatology and climate models as substitutes for understanding. Both of those critiques seem correct to me.
Magma, I looked up the editorial you cite. It has around 150 authors including the infamous Peter Gleick. To juxtapose this expression of concern that looks like almost a petition people signed is completely irrelevant to the more detailed critique Wunsch has in this post. Perhaps next time you should bring forward the relevant details that indicate that Wunsch may not have had much to do with the content of the editorial. It’s called omission of adverse information and even though it happens in climate science, that’s not a reason for accepting it.
Wunsch plays this game. Once in awhile he goes slumming. The second he realizes he’s in bed with the likes of you he runs straight home to mommy consensus.
Oh come on JCH, ad hominems are not going to convince anyone.
Spend a day in a courtroom.
Some good discussion points, Magma. There is a consensus of concern.
However
,”there is compelling scientific evidence that our planet is about 4.5 billion years old (the theory of the origin of Earth), that our universe was born from a single event about 14 billion years ago (the Big Bang theory,”
Is not quite right.
The age at which the B.B. occurred is unknown and purely linked to our telescopic ability. When we could only see out 10 billion years ago it was of course 10 billion years. Hubble? 14 billion. The new telescope 15- 151/2 billion.
Reason ? The light from the further out galaxies is already pretty weak and blocked out (Asimov),
So the theory, such as it is, has to fit the facts.
The boundary the start of the BB is purely observational, not scientifically determined.
“3. In some cases a sense of identification with the group, akin to identification with a religious faith or political platform.
4. A strong sense of the boundary between the group and other experts.”
These points continue to resonate with me.
If some person espouses a theory, another may judge it valid or false.
A third person, perhaps irrespective of other differences, or perhaps because of them, groups with those of a similar assessment of the theory. Thus we have the d word versus hysterics. Skeptics versus warmists. Contrarians versus gullibles.
I can’t help but think much of the group dynamic is not so much about the science but the political outcome – the back end. This is true for both those advocating action, which is implicit in the existence of the IPCC, and those opposing it. The political outcome may not even be recognized by those effected – it remains subconsciously the motivation for caring about the issue in the first place. But this prevents the more nuanced assessment of “climate change” in the context of fossil fuel use.
Dogma prevents one group ( though not the majority ) from considering the likelihood of RF imposing heat accumulation.
But dogma prevents the other group from considering that the observed rates of warming are at the low end.
Am I still a denier if I assess that recent warming is likely due in large part to radiative forcing from CO2?
What group am I in if I note that the observed warming is at the low end of projections?
Am I still a denier if I note that some aspects of “climate change”, notably Arctic Sea Ice decline and sea level rise, were predicted and probably in part due to the warming which is likely from CO2?
What group am I in if I note other factors may well contribute to Arctic Sea Ice decline and Sea Level Rise?
What group am I in if I note that Manabe, long ago assessed that global warming would lead to decreased temperature extremes as well as decreased kinetic energy?
And what group am I in if I note the benefits of global warming and the limited harms? or the likely demographic led deceleration of RF?
Perhaps along with “Lukewarmer” there is a group that espouses “Watchful Waiting” rather than action or inaction, as an explicit policy stance, since probably all group members have an implicit policy stance behind there emotional masks.
Dr Curry asserted in a Metro News debate vid that temperature is increasing. Tony Heller publishes graphs of raw data that shows essentially no change over the past century. Are those charts at realclimatescience.com not accurate depictions of unvarnished temperature measurement data?
You can dismiss Tony Heller out of hand, he is a fraud.
Document how he is a fraud. Show us the data that is in error.
“Document how he is a fraud. Show us the data that is in error.”
No. I am answering a question.
“Document how he is a fraud. Show us the data that is in error.”
Google Nick Stokes on the subject and visit his website for an in detail breakdown of his deceptions re the data.
Or Google Watts at WUWT and find out why that personage thinks he is so.
PS: I’d link to Nick’s analysis here – but I keep getting “your url is to long” (for all links I try to post) via login on FB ??
Login via Google seems to work …..
https://moyhu.blogspot.com/2014/05/ushcn-adjustments-averages-anomalies.html
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/2018-07-22025510_shadow.png
Show the work that this is fraudulent
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/2018-07-23031557_shadow.png
Is this a fraud?
Are these not two versions of NASA graphs?
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/NASA-US-1999-2017.gif
Speaking of extreme weather, are all these dates before 1950 a fraud?
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/2018-05-30050721_shadow.png
Show your work that this is incorrect
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/2018-05-26173151_shadow.png
Showing a raw-data graph/earlier graphs is pointless. It proves nothing. Indicates nothing. Means nothing. Does nothing. Great you are so impressed.
He has not demonstrated anything.
USHCN, adjustments, averages, getting it right.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/psi-1934071_shadow-1.png
It’s a public service to educate people who have been brainwashed into thinking the current warm period is unprecedented.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/2018-07-24080913_shadow.png
For those who thought history began in 1950
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Image525_shadow.png
For those who think Greenland hasn’t been down this road before.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Image1354_shadow.png
Heat waves are nothing new.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Image1767_shadow.png
Even NOAA has gotten into the act.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Image905_shadow.png
The EPA doesn’t want to be left out.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/nhland_season1_shadow.png
And now Rutgers is piping up
https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/images/tornado/clim/EF3-EF5.png
Can’t leave out the non-upward trend of Tornadoes
http://policlimate.com/tropical/global_running_ace.png
And if anyone was wondering about this.
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/monitoring-content/temp-and-precip/nClimDiv-climatologies/tmax-tmin-ts.png
http://www.atmo.arizona.edu/students/courselinks/spring06/nats101s43/lecture_notes/mar2201.jpg
Banton outdoes himself – both trivial and irrelevant. Can we assume from this that he imagines that Clausius-Clapeyron is a mystery?
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/cowtan-1944-e1522781641257.png
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2017/12/moy-2002-wavelet1-e1530244572217.jpg
Here is that odd dynamic again – they imagine that their simple ideas are definitive.
I meant to add that the second graphic is a Holocene ENSO sediment proxy.
The CONUS Tmax/Tmin series is kinda interesting.
Presumably there’s some observation bias in there, because a large percentage of stations didn’t start reporting until 1910 or so, and a large number of stations closed well before the end of the plot also.
The series is also of Tmax & Tmin for all months.
Would be interesting and one for my list to examine Tmax/Tavg/Tmin by month, for consistent and persistent stations only.
Showing a raw-data graph/earlier graphs is pointless. It proves nothing. Indicates nothing. Means nothing. Does nothing. Great you are so impressed.
He has not demonstrated anything.
When you show data, it proves what it proves, it means everything. You don’t need to demonstrate anything, data proves what it proves. Some people look at data and they understand. Some people look at data and they don’t understand.
Some people look at data and they don’t even suspect.
Consensus Climate Scientists and people who believe them have that last problem.
Again the oddball group dynamic. They argue a science they barely comprehend in terms of simplistic memes and facetious interactions. A waste of everyone’s time. They would be better off arguing policy but seem incapable of that as well.
I didn’t miss any point since you had no point. I’m trying to help you with your obvious brainwashed mentality. Some don’t have the intellectual capacity to see how they are being used to further ideological goals. If displaying the facts about historical contexts result in collateral benefits for other observers, all the better. Those others who miss the obvious are gone forever, becoming one of Karl’s useful idiots.
What’s most interesting about the Tmin Tmax graph is the changes in variability. The Ts move almost in lock step ’til the late 50s, then the T and variability decline through the 60s. Then around 2000, everything goes to sh’t, variability spikes and Tmin and Tmax seem to move out of phase.
I was referring to Tony Banton’s graph.
Possibility for the temp decline and variability decline I suggest may be caused by movement of heat to the arctic, where it be little observed back then. Movement of heat and release of latent heat from increased ice formation. Similar to what may be happening now, but not observed well back then.
Ah, CONUS… increases snowfall, decreases melt? Erroneous adjustments?
Probably would be good to look at CONUS precip and cloud cover.
“In some cases a sense of identification with the group, akin to identification with a religious faith or political platform.”
Externalised narcissism.
This one is particularly true for defenders of the faith on social networks.
Except, there is no faith. It is a false accusation.
There is much faith in the infallibility of the 97%, so much that non-believers are routinely branded as deniers. The common vilification, discommunication, and even suggested punishments for the dissenting agnostics are not far flung from the works of Irenaeus of Lyons in his persecution of Gnostic heretics and schisms.
“Tremendous self confidence, leading to a sense of entitlement and of belonging to an elite community of experts.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_narcissism
Individual/Collective Narcissism Equivalencies Individual/Collective
I wish people would recognize my authority
I wish other people would recognize the authority of my group
I have natural talent for influencing people
My group has all predispositions to influence others
If I ruled the world it would be a much better place
If my group ruled the world it would be a much better place
I am an extraordinary person
My group is extraordinary
I like to be the center of attention
I like when my group is the center of attention
I will never be satisfied until I get what I deserve
I will never be satisfied until my group gets all that it deserves
I insist upon getting the respect that is due to me
I insist upon my group getting the respect that is due to it
I want to amount to something in the eyes of the world
I want my group to amount to something in the eyes of the world
People never give me enough recognition for the things I’ve done
Not many people seem to understand the full importance of my group
‘…a Welsh scientist who was the co-chair of the Nobel Peace Prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) scientific assessment working group. He was the lead editor of first three IPCC reports. He was professor in atmospheric physics at the University of Oxford, former Director General at the Met Office and founder of the Hadley Centre.
He is the president of the John Ray Initiative, an organisation “connecting Environment, Science and Christianity”, where he has compared the stewardship of the Earth, to the stewardship of the Garden of Eden by Adam and Eve. He is a founder member of the International Society for Science and Religion. He is also the current president of the Victoria Institute.’
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_T._Houghton
I just realized, I highlighted a Daily Affirmation by my past Senator, Al Franken.
“Good scientists seek constantly to test the basic tenets of their field–not work hard to buttress them.”
SLR is accelerating. Sea ice is spiraling to its demise. CO2 is whipping natural variability. Record temperatures are records. Statistically no chance of natural variability. Extreme weather is increasing. Wild fires are increasing. Karl. Everyone agrees. There was no pause. There was no semantic pause. Polar bears are dying. Coral is dying.
You have a theory. It’s not just defending it, it’s promoting it and to find as many reasons why it’s true as you can. Testing basic tenets is so yesterday.
Here’s a Disturbing Theory About Why Climate Change Seemed to ‘Pause’ for 15 Years
The unpause is about to unleash itself upon us.
Good – this is topical.
Wild and exciting ideas that aren’t validated by any actual observations.
There is a slowdown in the rate of power flux entering the planet that has nothing to do with heat partitioning between oceans and atmosphere.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/wong-et-al-2006-e1521674625292.png
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/ceres_ebaf-toa_ed4-0_anom_toa_net_flux-all-sky_march-2000tonovember-2017.png
And is there an expectation that there will be an AMOC resurgence?
http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/5/2/024001/meta
https://www.ocean-sci.net/10/29/2014/os-10-29-2014.html
https://www.ocean-sci.net/10/29/2014/os-10-29-2014.html
“A vacillating global heat sink at intermediate ocean depths is associated with different climate regimes of surface warming under anthropogenic forcing: The latter part of the 20th century saw rapid global warming as more heat stayed near the surface. In the 21st century, surface warming slowed as more heat moved into deeper oceans. In situ and reanalyzed data are used to trace the pathways of ocean heat uptake. In addition to the shallow La Niña–like patterns in the Pacific that were the previous focus, we found that the slowdown is mainly caused by heat transported to deeper layers in the Atlantic and the Southern oceans, initiated by a recurrent salinity anomaly in the subpolar North Atlantic. Cooling periods associated with the latter deeper heat-sequestration mechanism historically lasted 20 to 35 years.” http://science.sciencemag.org/content/345/6199/897
i have nothing against Chen and Zhou’s science – it may be part of the Earth dynamic. JCH’s motivated assertions and inability to put anything into a broader context is a another thing entirely. He believes that scientists agree with his simplistic ideas despite the evidence of their own words. He will then call me an a-hole for saying so. It is a familiar dynamic based on the need to feel intellectually and morally superior – and climate is where they have so much personal capital invested that to be wrong – and JCH most certainly doesn’t come close to being right – is a threat to their psychological integrity.
Lol:
https://i.imgur.com/HHd7R1w.png
JCH’s motivated assertions and inability to put anything into a broader context is a another thing entirely
Yawn.
Meanwhile: PDO negative; warming slows; PDO positive, warming skyrockets. LMAO.
Thanks for the link. This is what i have been saying for years now.
e.g. https://judithcurry.com/2011/02/09/decadal-variability-of-clouds/
SMH – does JCH understand anything that he links to at all? Somehow I doubt that Norman Loeb is part of JCH’s simple minded idea of consensus – the picture is far more complicated than JCH is willing or able to contemplate. Reducing climate to internet acronyms – worse even than sound bites – doesn’t appear to have much going for it.
“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
And again it is a very old story that I have been assiduously following in the literature for 30 years.
https://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/imagerecords/8000/8703/sst_anomaly_AMSRE_2008105.jpg
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/8703/la-nina-and-pacific-decadal-oscillation-cool-the-pacific
Cloud cover is anti-correlated with sea surface temperature in response to Rayleigh-Bénard convection in a fluid (the atmosphere) heated from below.
J
Rather than obsess about a drug of choice, you should be focused on an impending public relations disaster for the warmists. When the Arctic Sea Ice extent follows other nascent signs of change in Greenland and Arctic Sea Ice Volume, The Committed will have egg on their face, Alfredo sauce on their chin, and barbecue sauce on their blouse. Decades of doomsaying about an ice free Arctic have promoted that one metric to the lofty perch of CAGW poster child. When the extent grows and is above the 1981-2010 median, people will talk. And then they will ask questions. Regardless of all the other indicators of possible AGW, so much emphasis has been put on the Arctic, that the public has been conditioned to think it’s the only proxy worth following. Then, the warmists worst nightmare will happen…….people will begin thinking.
“Decades of doomsaying about an ice free Arctic have promoted that one metric to the lofty perch of CAGW poster child.”
No “doomsaying” from the IPCC. If there was then it was because the Arctic was just tracking as projected.
https://curryja.files.wordpress.com/2018/06/figure-127.png
Re Loeb, et. al.,
Of course RIE alerted you to this earlier this Spring.
And it was in May that I posted:
https://turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/ceres_alb_2017.png
I’m not sure I buy the explanations ( PDO and cleaner Chinese air ).
For one, that appears to include some bias of preconceived processes.
Two, the last months of CERES SW ( though, yes, it is uncertain ) indicates a fairly significant increase of albedo, reverting to the mean. The PDO probably didn’t swing that violently and China didn’t immediately repollute compared with Autumn 2017.
“Decades of doomsaying about an ice free Arctic have promoted that one metric to the lofty perch of CAGW poster child.”
No “doomsaying” from the IPCC.
And indeed, reduced Arctic Sea Ice limits both the violence and intense cold of NH winter storms.
And I alerted yu to it in 2012 when the water chef was predicting stasis, even cooling, for two or three decades.
You did not predict three years of a sharply reduced albedo, though I don’t think any human did, certainly not with a physical basis because that’s not clearly understood now. Further, the albedo decline is much larger than at least the GISS GCM indicates. This indicates that a large portion of 2015 through 2017 temperature anomaly was from internal fluctuation which models fail at.
I predicted aggressive warming.
On what physical basis? Certainly not from SW anomaly. And certainly not from LW radiative forcing, because the LW forcing, though continuing, is at a lower rate that the peak back in 1989.
You two clowns do not influence me
I’m not so sure, because you do spend a lot of time LMAO.
But, in the spirit of the OP, it is observations, not clowns, that should influence you. And that should apply, even if it is clowns that point it out to you.
“If as suggested here, a dynamically driven climate shift has occurred, the duration of similar shifts during the 20th century suggests the new global mean temperature trend may persist for several decades. Of course, it is purely speculative to presume that the global mean temperature will remain near current levels for such an extended period of time. Moreover, we caution that the shifts described here are presumably superimposed upon a long term warming trend due to anthropogenic forcing. However, the nature of these past shifts in climate state suggests the possibility of near constant temperature lasting a decade or more into the future must at least be entertained.” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2008GL037022
Are these guys right about this underlying dynamic or is JCH with his interminable scientifically naive drivel? He is always predicting ‘aggressive warming’ and it is as uninteresting and uninformative as a broken clock.
Ragnaar, there are skeptics for all of those views you list. Perhaps you give them less credence as experts, or marginalize them in your evaluation, but they are there and very vocal on blogs or certain other media for example.
“Now imagine that you have never seen the device and that it is hidden in a box in a dark room. You have no knowledge of the hand that occasionally sets things in motion, and you are trying to figure out the system’s behavior on the basis of some old 78-rpm recordings of the muffled sounds made by the device. Plus, the recordings are badly scratched, so some of what was recorded is lost or garbled beyond recognition. If you can imagine this, you have some appreciation of the difficulties of paleoclimate research and of predicting the results of abrupt changes in the climate system.” https://www.nap.edu/read/10136/chapter/3#13
“Wunsch stressed that “very little is actually proven in this subject” and possible policy solutions are beyond the reach of science.
“It’s an extraordinarily complicated social, economic, political and scientific problem that we’re now reducing to sound bites,” Wunsch said.” https://www.cnbc.com/id/19090539
“Daniel Lashof, senior scientist at the National Resources Defense Council, agreed that it’s impossible to know all aspects of the issue with scientific certainty.
“But there are some things that are quite fundamental that we know,” Lashof said. “We know that there’s more heat-trapping carbon dioxide in the atmosphere than there’s been for over 600,000 years. We know that the earth is warming up as a result. We see that in surface temperature records, satellite records as they’ve been corrected, we see that increasingly warm oceans, melting glaciers and ice sheets.” op. cit.
There is no contrarion science just better or worse paradigms in a system that is not merely complex but dynamically complex – and there is a world of difference there. Wunsch is a dynamicist – as all good climate scientists are. Until you understand this the mysteries of climate are a closed book. The fundamental idea – pioneered by Wunsch – is that windfields drive changes in ocean circulation modulating the AMO – and more importantly AMOC – as well as many other shifts in the globally coupled turbulent ocean and atmospheric flow field. These manifest as chaotic oscillations in dozens of indices across the planet. e.g http://shadow.eas.gatech.edu/~kcobb/abrupt/wunsch06.pdf
The latter quote in contrast is a meme as sound bite with little to recommend it. We don’t know that CO2 is the highest in 15,000 years- (e.g. http://people.geo.su.se/barbara/pdf/Steinthorsdottir%20et%20al%202013%20QSR.pdf) – let alone 600,000 years – despite the ice core records. We hypothesise that anthropogenic emissions should cause warming – and there is convincing satellite evidence – although it is set against perpetual change in a chaotic system. Warming there was – although satellite and surface observations suggest that most late 20th century warming was not anthropogenic but the result of cloud cover changes responding to chaotic shifts in the (globally coupled) Pacific state especially. (e.g. http://science.sciencemag.org/content/325/5939/460) CERES this century convincingly shows large natural variation in top of atmosphere radiant flux from variability in ocean and atmospheric circulation. (e.g. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10712-012-9175-1) But it is little enough data over a short period.
These are two very different parameters. Argo ocean heat to 1900m and the cumulative monthly radiant power flux at toa from incoming solar less emission and reflection. Arbitrarily zeroed at about the middle of an annual orbital cycle. The co-variance is predictable – the divergence in the earlier part of the records a mystery. I haven’t seen anything like this elsewhere?
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/ocean-heat-and-power-flux.jpg
The better paradigm is that intrinsic climate change evolves from solar modulation of polar pressure fields that in turn drive hemispheric meridional or zonal windfields and thus global albedo. (e.g. – https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/gsofacpubs/140/) It shifts as regimes with persistence in means and variance and shifts at decadal to millennial scales. What fun.
R I Ellison: This is to say that your concept of abrupt earth changes is IMO correct. Only more so than you/one thinks. I cannot speak about weather variables, but on abrupt dynamic changes that happened in the past I have had a brief peek which I am still trying to understand better.
Clear evidence shows that for a span from 5.2ky bce to 2k2y obliquity changed periodically and abruptly, and corroborating evidence is in various proxies. It is in ice-core proxies, ice rafting, ocean sediments; the list grows. Post 1k1y it was measured, so we know that it has not changed (entered another regime) apart from the secular change. But it is not known what it was before 5k2y bce. Any assumed figure is a false assumption.
Readers here understandably consider this as coming from way beyond the fringe. But I strongly recommend: figure out the evidence for yourselves first. Data here: https://melitamegalithic.wordpress.com/2018/07/24/searching-evidence-update/
Orbits are deterministically chaotic – one need only consider Poincaré’s evolving Hamiltonian – as are the internal fluid dynamics of the sun and Earth system geophysics. It’s chaotic turtles all the way down.
“Models have thousands of tunable parameters and the ability to make them behave “reasonably” over long time intervals is not in doubt.”
I’ve posted that thought many times. You can automate tuning with Kalman filter techniques, with no need for human intervention. The key is lots of knobs. Having realized that, you no longer believe models with lots of knobs. It’s curve fitting, not physics.
Pingback: “Differences between ocean circulation and climate more generally” by Carl Wunsch 2010 | Oceans Govern Climate
What does ‘The perils of ‘near-tabloid science’ mean exactly if one were to dissect it on a personal level? Step back from daily science/poiitical posturing and ask who moves the dialogue along and why? Is it mainly scientists? Is it mostly politically centric; a hybrid of reasons? Is it follow the money?
For most, cultural influence plays a very large part in sculpting the paths we take, it often starts with preconceptions (influenced by culture) that in turn leads to the drive for answers. But the latter poses an interesting dilemma; humans intrinsically look inwards first for personal motivation in order to find life’s meaning, it’s central to who we are. This is not questioned, it just is. But ultimately, like so many things, science needs to be funded.
Here’s ‘The perils of ‘near-tabloid science’ from wealths perspective, the ones who fund for answers:
How tech’s richest plan to save themselves after the apocalypse
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jul/23/tech-industry-wealth-futurism-transhumanism-singularity
As they say 93% of global heat is in the oceans, 1% in the atmosphere – much less at the surface – and the rest on land and in latent heat. Surface temperatures are volatile with – inter alia – ENSO influences and drought artifacts. The ‘spike’ has both.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/loeb-2018.png
http://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/6/3/62?type=check_update&version=1
From an energy perspective there was no hiatus – perhaps just a slowing of warming. With both ocean and power flux pre 21st century data limitations and imprecision – we shall never know for sure. It is suspected that the Pacific in particular added to atmospheric warming to 1998 and has countered it since – largely as cloud changes in a coupled ocean/atmospheric mechanism.
But given a solar connection to more meridional or zonal polar windfields and the resultant modulation of oceanic gyres and coastal upwelling – I suspect that the hiatus has centuries to play out. More salt in a Law Dome ice core is La Nina.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/vance2012-antartica-law-dome-ice-core-salt-content.jpg
“Modern hydrology places nearly all its emphasis on science‐as‐knowledge, the hypotheses of which are increasingly expressed as physical models, whose predictions are tested by correspondence to quantitative data sets. Though arguably appropriate for applications of theory to engineering and applied science, the associated emphases on truth and degrees of certainty are not optimal for the productive and creative processes that facilitate the fundamental advancement of science as a process of discovery. The latter requires an investigative approach, where the goal is uberty, a kind of fruitfulness of inquiry, in which the abductive mode of inference adds to the much more commonly acknowledged modes of deduction and induction. The resulting world‐directed approach to hydrology provides a valuable complement to the prevailing hypothesis‐ (theory‐) directed paradigm.” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/2016WR020078
Climate is not merely complex but dynamically complex with all that implies about perpetual change as regimes and abrupt shifts. Consensus as a meme is intended to paper over uncertainties in a claim of unassailable authority. It is rarely defined but seems to imply the validity of a body of narratives that have infested the popular notions of climate change. Consensus as a meme has implicit policy implications that are rarely made explicit but that are the fruit of progressive politics. At the hilarious extreme is poor wee willies central economic planning AI overlord – but much of it is barely less absurd. The urban doofus hipster vision 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.
The broader field of climate science involves following evidence that is partial, imprecise and sometimes conflicting. The result is a science that is less certain than with a traditional notion of hypothesis testing but that is far richer and more fruitful. The irony is that all science is believed to buttress the notion of the rarely defined consensus – as whatever they believe it to be.
They would be far better off arguing pragmatic responses to both intrinsic and potential adverse anthropogenic climate change. But this is not the agenda of the extreme left. Far from the reality of science – the objective there is to use the vague notion of consensus applied to narratives of catastrophe as a rationale for transformation of societies and economies. The world is far better off understanding and marginalizing these views.
I have sometimes called myself a catastrophist – in the sense of Rene Thom. This reflects the inevitability of abrupt and potentially adverse change in the deterministically chaotic Earth system – from whatever cause. But a radically different and more nuanced and practical policy response is required – one that delivers on the real needs of humanity.
Well said.
Science(?) distilled to a single word, “Consensus”. For its simplicity that single word represents the best push poll ever devised by humankind; relative to the way it’s leveraged with climate science specifically and the subsequent profound effects this has had on society. For the vast majority who superficially follow the discussion it merely needs to be inserted into any AGW sentence to make it unassailable, to close debate respective to its implied authority.
While obviously there’s a large body of good science on climate, it’s been co-opted at every opportunity. It’s the global body of scientists who ironically, mostly unwittingly, were recruited as a defacto virus to infect a “settled” discussion on the global population. “Consensus”, as defined by the meme, spreads unstudied presumption from those scientists who were lulled into acquiescence. The impetus for this manifested itself as messaging from within the command structure of the scientific standards bodies, and other institutional forces; they mostly owe their funded existence to the brokers of global political aspiration, those who only see the scientific method as a tool. It’s all driven by highly motivated politics, and naturally, massive government funding. The way I would define it, “consensus” and “convoluted” are near synonymous relative to climate science.
Robert I Ellison: Though arguably appropriate for applications of theory to engineering and applied science, the associated emphases on truth and degrees of certainty are not optimal for the productive and creative processes that facilitate the fundamental advancement of science as a process of discovery.
If not “truth”, then “discovery” of what?
If that statement were false, how could anybody tell? Or, in other words, how is that known?
Personally I prefer to go with “accuracy” and “usefulness” over “truth”, because accuracy and usefulness can be assessed with respect to public standards, and the accuracy and usefulness of alternate theories can be ranked, not merely assessed as “present” vs. “absent”. Newtonian and Einsteinian theories can be appraised that way, without the worry that if relativity is “true” then Newton’s framework must have become false, despite its obvious usefulness. But enough about me. Why are the processes of science preferred to other processes, if not due to the fact that they produce better results?
Was not the “Cargo Cult” creative? It seems to me that the thrust of the paragraph is to disparage the parts of the scientific processes that distinguish “science” from “cargo cult science”.
“The words or the language, as they are written or spoken, do not seem to play any role in my mechanism of thought. The psychical entities which seem to serve as elements in thought are certain signs and more or less clear images which can be “voluntarily” reproduced and combined. There is, of course, a certain connection between those elements and relevant logical concepts. It is also clear that the desire to arrive finally at logically connected concepts is the emotional basis of this rather vague play with the above-mentioned elements. But taken from a psychological viewpoint, this combinatory play seems to be the essential feature in productive thought–before there is any connection with logical construction in words or other kinds of signs which can be communicated to others.” Albert Einstein
In a field like climate science certainty is a moot point. On the other hand we have abductive reasoning. “Abductive reasoning (also called abduction,[1] abductive inference,[1] or retroduction[2]) is a form of logical inference which starts with an observation or set of observations then seeks to find the simplest and most likely explanation. In abductive reasoning, unlike in deductive reasoning, the premises do not guarantee the conclusion. One can understand abductive reasoning as inference to the best explanation…” Wikipedia
And somehow I doubt that Matthew read the linked article before waffling on with
abjectly unsophisticated musings.
Consensus is a meme now? Climate science strikes again! In any other field, consensus would be nothing more than a majority of experts agreeing on a best explanation for the available evidence. Depending on the quality of the evidence, that explanation may simply be a guess. Consensus says nothing about the likelihood of the explanation being correct.
Climate is complex, there are still critical unknowns, supporting data is relatively sparse and in some cases conflicting, some of the supporting statistical analysis that’s been carried out looks a bit dodgy, and there is much reliance on subjective interpretation of proxies. At the moment the consensus hypothesis looks little better than a stab in the dark. I think some consensus climate scientists would agree and yet with the limited evidence available they accept the hypothesis as the best guess so far.
However, some people like to attach much more certainty to this particular hypothesis than the evidence warrants and I like Carl Wunsch’s explanation as to why this is.
Consensus is a meme that exists beyond science. In science there is a great deal of diversity and uncertainty.
willb01: ‘Consensus is a meme now? Climate science strikes again! In any other field, consensus would be nothing more than a majority of experts agreeing on a best explanation for the available evidence.’
Indeed. But technically consensus is a social process, which process is at the heart of cultures and from our evolutionary past, via gene-culture co-evolution, works on mechanisms buried deep within us. Particular cultural consensuses are centred on emotive memes, typically a co-evolving set under an umbrella narrative such as say nationalism or imminent climate catastrophe or particular religious narratives. Majority agreements can certainly be reached without (largely) triggering the deep emotively based mechanisms that makes the process swerve away from logic and reason, most often when the stakes are not perceived to be high, the focus is narrow, and major uncertainties don’t dominate. But there is little utility even for ‘consensus light’ in science, let alone the full blown cultural consensus, and even the light version is a social negotiation so always at risk of triggering the deeper mechanisms. It might be a handy parking place for a while, a marker for where folks have got to so far in an immature science area, but that marker should always be flexible, ready to evolve or even accept complete overthrow, and this is where it is so easy for resistance and dogma to gather and choke off flexibility. Science is very fragile to this kind of occurrence, it happens often, in line with the needs of a cultural consensus, which structures have for a very long time indeed been selected for in humans in order to facilitate group advantage. Mature science needs no consensus anyhow, because it can be independently demonstrated, yet even in this case its tennets can unfortunately morph into a social consensus just by long habit and reinforcement, which is an issue if some radical new discovery overturns the area.
As I have said somewhere else, consensus is not needed for science, but it is needed for science-based policy. This is how we get pollution and other safety levels for health and the environment. Without consensus there would be no guidelines for safe levels. These come from the scientific consensus developed by the responsible agencies. The IPCC is just another example of this.
Consensus light (i.e. not too heavily diverted to the cultural) is fine for science-based policy, for CC as elsewhere, as long as the science used is itself not rooted in cultural consensus. So to what extent might cultural consensus affect the IPCC? Plus, even if the answer to this is ‘very little’, the IPCC represents the mainstream position that there is not a high certainty of imminent catastrophe. So to what extent is policy rooted in science from the opposite minority fringe to skeptics, which fringe touts the catastrophic narrative (as deduced from their non-mainstream science, one presumes), which narrative has also been propagated by a-list western / UN leaders / elite for decades (until the exception of the current US admin). One would think such pronouncements from the heads of governments / high ministers / major international orgs, would at the very least have a significant impact on policy.
What I am saying is you need a consensus for a science-based policy, so don’t bash the idea of getting a consensus view. What is a consensus? It is a central estimate that tends to discount extremes from either side by the way it is arrived at. It is a view that the majority of scientists would not consider wrong. There are always people on both ends of the distribution who don’t like the consensus as either being too strong or too weak. That happens by its nature.
I agree you need consensus for policy but you are conflating consensus with IPCC. If you want to make a claim about a consensus view then you would first need to conduct a proper survey asking for individual opinions on the specific view in question from a large enough sample of scientists.
In hindsight, the IPCC should probably have been much more conservative in assigning a likelihood value to their AGW hypothesis. Their ‘highly likely’ assessment has resulted in what looks like a premature rush to mitigate CO2 emissions with immature renewable technologies. Climate scientists now seem to be struggling to defend this IPCC assessment in the face of more and more evidence to the contrary.
The IPCC had almost 1000 working group members who were scientific experts on each topic of their AR5 assessments, and they considered peer-reviewed science from many times more. How many experts would you have needed?
What do you call a collective of climate scientists?
CO2 is a greenhouse gas and nearly all late 20th century was down to anthropogenic emissions? The latter is far from certain – as Wunsch said of climate science in general.
The IPCC view that is driving policy in many jurisdictions is the ‘highly likely’ characterization that they attach to their science. Do all 1000 scientists agree with the likelihood assessments? What was the consensus view of statisticians on the likelihood methodologies?
If the IPCC had used a much more conservative likelihood value for their science perhaps policy would have been driven more towards spending money on research, to understand the problem more clearly and also to develop more optimized solutions to solve it.
There was a poll and the scientists most directly associated with climate attribution studies had the most likelihood. Even “extremely likely” is a diluted view (verheggen et al., 2014).
There are many methodological challenges associated with a survey such as the one conducted by Verheggen et al 2014. For it to have any credibility, it really needs to be designed and conducted under the supervision of a statistician who is an expert in survey methodology.
Jim: ‘What I am saying is you need a consensus for a science-based policy…’
I see that. And I’m saying this is why the nature of such a policy consensus is critical. If it is one that anywhere in the main chain which leads to the final output, has fallen prey to cultural consensus mechanisms, then it will be wrong, because all cultural consensuses are necessarily wrong (they emerge to fulfil a social function and do not serve the truth). If this has not occurred, then fine: whether future history deems the consensus to have been optimum or not, at least it operated via logic and reason, not via cultural burdening, and hence was the best shot at the time. So, it is reasonable to ask a) how much is the IPCC process impacted by cultural bias mechanisms? and b) how much does the policy consensus, assuming that there is one, rest not in any case upon the IPCC output, but instead upon the narrative of high certainty of imminent catastrophe (a cultural phenomenon not rooted in mainstream science) as propagated by a-list western leaders and the UN elite (plus an array of NGOs and others) for all of the 21st century and more.
Re: “If you want to make a claim about a consensus view then you would first need to conduct a proper survey asking for individual opinions on the specific view in question from a large enough sample of scientists.”
This has been done multiple times already. Please actually read the scientific literature:
Table 1: “Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming”
Page 49 of: “Models, manifestation and attribution of climate change”
Figures 88 (v043) and 2 (v007) of: “The Bray and von Storch 5th International Survey of Climate Scientists 2015/2016”
https://www.hzg.de/imperia/md/content/hzg/zentrale_einrichtungen/bibliothek/berichte/hzg_reports_2016/hzg_report_2016_2.pdf
Re: “In hindsight, the IPCC should probably have been much more conservative in assigning a likelihood value to their AGW hypothesis. Their ‘highly likely’ assessment has resulted in what looks like a premature rush to mitigate CO2 emissions with immature renewable technologies. Climate scientists now seem to be struggling to defend this IPCC assessment in the face of more and more evidence to the contrary.”
Now you’re just making up false claims, likely for politically-motivated reasons. Attribution of global (large-scale) warming to anthropogenic increases in greenhouse gas levels, has held up rather well, as covered in recent reviews such as:
“Assessing the observed impact of anthropogenic climate change”
Also, the IPCC doesn’t need to be more conservative, contrary to what you claimed. They were, in fact, too conservative on average.
The IPCC tends to *under-estimate* the impacts of climate change, which runs contrary to the charge of alarmism:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-the-ipcc-underestimated-climate-change/
“Climate Change Skepticism and Denial: An Introduction
[…]
A constant refrain coming from the denial campaign is that climate scientists are “alarmists” who exaggerate the degree and threat of global warming to enhance their status, funding, and influence with policy makers. The contribution by William Freudenburg and Violetta Muselli provides an insightful empirical test of this charge and finds it to lack support. […] They then present evidence that IPCC assessments have in fact understated the degree of subsequently reported climate disruption, supporting their argument.”
And this is some of the relevant supporting research on this point:
“Reexamining Climate Change Debates: Scientific Disagreement or Scientific Certainty Argumentation Methods (SCAMs)?”
“Climate change prediction: Erring on the side of least drama?”
“Global warming estimates, media expectations, and the asymmetry of scientific challenge”
Re: “There are many methodological challenges associated with a survey such as the one conducted by Verheggen et al 2014. For it to have any credibility, it really needs to be designed and conducted under the supervision of a statistician who is an expert in survey methodology.”
Congratulations on your attempt to move the goal-posts.
“Pushing Back the Goalpost
Of all the characteristics of deniers, repeatedly nudging back the goalpost—or the threshold of evidence required for acceptance of a theory—is often the most telling. The strategy behind goalpost-moving is simple: always demand more evidence than can currently be provided. If the evidence is then provided at a later date, simply change the demand to require even more evidence, or refuse to accept the kind of evidence that is being offered.”
http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0040256
andywest, you are taking a scientific finding of large anthropogenic influences on climate and turning it into just a “cultural bias”. I would suggest looking first at your own biases when doing that because you have made an enormous step away from accepting the scientific process when assuming that. The scientific process provides an objective basis of knowledge, independent of politics or even nations, that has developed over centuries.
willb, it is very easy to sit there and denigrate published polls without any specifics and it is a common modus operandi of skeptics on blog sites. The part that is always missing is where they go on and use their supposed “more correct” methods and repeat those studies. Or if they have, they may have just confirmed the results even more strongly and stayed silent instead of informing the other skeptics that it is a dead-end argument.
D: What is a consensus? It is a central estimate that tends to discount extremes from either side by the way it is arrived at. It is a view that the majority of scientists would not consider wrong.
willb01: Consensus is a meme now?.. consensus would be nothing more than a majority of experts agreeing on a best explanation for the available evidence.
“Settled science” isn’t an extreme? Agreeing on the best explanation includes “settled science”?
This paragraph from a 2016 Science article titled: “Crippled Atlantic currents triggered ice age climate change”
“A 2014 study of the AMOC, based on a core from a nearby spot on the Bermuda Rise, found that the currents maintained much of their strength throughout the last glacial period. But because that team took fewer samples from the core and missed the sharp swings in strength. “Now these [new] guys have increased incredibly the data resolution,” says Jörg Lippold, a paleo-oceanographer at the University of Heidelberg in Germany and the leader of the 2014 study. “They found the peaks we missed.” …
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/06/crippled-atlantic-currents-triggered-ice-age-climate-change
The data difference brought about by granularity, between 2014 and 2016, is no small faux pas relative to the meme. To be sure, it’s only a faux pas because the science has been deemed settled, where if it weren’t deemed as settled it would simply be an evolution in data collection. The science wasn’t settled 2014 (using this one example), and the ramifications could be quite significant as a consequence of refined 2016 field data.
From the article:
“Another question is whether the AMOC—currently known to be in decline—could drop off suddenly today, as depicted in the 2004 movie The Day After Tomorrow, causing temperatures to plummet across northwestern Europe. Schmittner says the past provides an eye-opener. “It’s evidence that this really did happen in the past, on short time scales.” But McManus says that studies looking deeper into the ice ages have found that the 1500-year climate oscillations tend not to be nearly as strong during interglacial periods.”
Guessing isn’t synonymous with conclusion. The meme still prevails.
Jim: I asked 2 questions, what is the level of cultural bias impact upon the IPCC, and also to what extent is policy formed from the manifest narrative of catastrophe, i.e. not from the mainstream science anyhow. Science-based policy and science itself is very fragile to cultural bias, even writ small rather than large, it was enough to sustain an incorrect consensus on saturated fats for about 50 years, for instance, so the questions are reasonable to ask.
andywest, it is demonstrated that policy is infected with “cultural bias” in some cases. You only have to look at the current US Congress, EPA and President as the last global bastion against the idea that human-induced climate change is at all important. I don’t call this “cultural bias”, but it is an industry-money bought bias, so it may be related to the political “culture” in a money-driven system. The IPCC on the other hand hews towards what the scientists have been saying about our profound impact on the climate, and therefore the environment, with our emissions, and that is as it should be for technical discussions like those around climate change. The IPCC have realized that business as usual is not advisable from the perspective of environmental impacts and that every effort should be made to reduce emission rates as soon as possible. The UN have no money-driven agenda, so they can promote policies driven by the science alone.
Jim: Usually, culture drives money, not the other way around. Nevertheless even if the IPCC is pristine, any pushes on policy owed not to its mainstream output, but instead directly to a narrative of imminent catastrophe (absent action) as propagated by a-list presidents and prime ministers and high officials for decades, would be unaffected by its status, pristine or otherwise. Regarding what does happen within the IPCC, this is mostly post-science, the heavy lifting of the scientific process happening within the collected papers themselves, and the collation / co-ordination / negotiation across many parties / disciplines to arrive at integrated positions, being much more subject to bias than the core scientific work that produced the many papers. Regarding the UN, it is of note that its top leadership has also propagated the narrative of catastrophe for many years, in direct contradiction to its own body the IPCC, whose mainstream position does not support that narrative. This strongly suggests internal pressure, and may indeed explain some blue water between the WG reports and the summary for policy makers, but anyhow certainly doesn’t suggest a pristine environment. Agendas are not the main issue, beyond a certain point cultural bias is an emergent phenomenon.
I am saying that in the US, it is money that drives policy, not culture nor in this special case science. In the case of the UN, it is science that drives policy, not money nor “culture” whatever that means in the UN context. The UN has a mission that prioritizes helping developing countries and protecting the environment. What they see as real dangers to these, you seem to view as some kind of cultural bias that they even care about these things and the way things are going. It stems from their core mission and cannot be dismissed as just cultural bias. You need to examine how you sound when you start attributing UN recommendations to individuals and not to their mission. All they can recommend is that everyone try as hard as they can to reduce emissions as soon as possible. They have no real power, and the individual nations are the ones that can impose peer pressure as they individually see fit via their INDCs. If all these nations did not believe something needed to be done, they would not be signing up.
Jim D, it’s very easy to sit there and denigrate climate-related papers and blog posts without any specifics just because they aren’t published in peer-reviewed journals. And yet it’s a common modus operandi of AGW advocates.
What’s your opinion of that statement?
willb, there is usually a good reason they are not published, and that is because they are wrong, and furthermore it is possible to point out why using peer-reviewed or just basic science.
Atomsk, I suppose you noticed that slightly less than 1/2 the climate scientists in the Bray and von Storch survey ticked the “very much” answer to the question
It implies that over half the climate scientists in the survey harbor some doubts that climate change is due to anthropogenic causes.
Well then, Jim, my answer to you is:
There are good reasons why consulting with an expert on survey methodology should be done during the design and conduct of a survey. Statisticians who are expert at survey methodology are consulted for government surveys, for public health surveys, for public opinion polls, and for many other types of surveys. It is done to reduce as much as possible bias and errors in the survey results.
willb, and your reasons for assuming no survey experts were involved in that publication are…? How would it get published without at least such experts reviewing it? What would you have done different?
Re: “Atomsk, I suppose you noticed that slightly less than 1/2 the climate scientists in the Bray and von Storch survey ticked the “very much” answer to the question”
[…]
It implies that over half the climate scientists in the survey harbor some doubts that climate change is due to anthropogenic causes.
I notice that (despite your trite comments on statistics and statistical tools) you don’t understand how scoring on a Likert (or Likert-like) scale works. On a Likert, or Likert-like, scale you don’t get to arbitrarily choose the highest-numbered response as being the response that means “agreement”. 5 – 7 all constitute “agreement”. You would know this if you bothered to read the accompanying paper on that that I cited for you:
Page 49 of: “Models, manifestation and attribution of climate change”
Oh, and congratulations on your failed attempt to manufacture false doubt, in a vain attempt to get around agreement on this subject. The scientists agreed to the claim that you fail to accept; any (supposed) doubts they have don’t prevent them from agreeing that the claim is true, anymore than a doctor’s (supposed) doubts prevent them from accepting that smoking causing cancer. If you would like to pretend that doubt-less, absolute certainty is what is required, then science is not for you and you would be confused on how science operates.
“Advancing the science of climate change
[…]
Any scientific theory is thus, in principle, subject to being refined or overturned by new observations. In practical terms, however, scientific uncertainties are not all the same. Some scientific conclusions or theories have been so thoroughly examined and tested, and supported by so many independent observations and results, that their likelihood of subsequently being found to be wrong is vanishingly small. Such conclusions and theories are then regarded as *settled facts.* This is the case for the conclusions that the Earth system is warming and that much of this warming is very likely due to human activities [pages 21 – 22].
[…]
Most of the warming over the last several decades can be attributed to human activities that release carbon dioxide (CO2) and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere [chapter 2, page 28].”
https://www.nap.edu/read/12782/chapter/4#21
“Many of the strategies used by the opponents of both evolution and global warming are based on sowing misinformation and doubt. This approach is often called the “tobacco strategy”, because tobacco companies used it effectively to delay health warnings and regulation of smoking.”
http://reports.ncse.com/index.php/rncse/article/viewFile/71/64
Jim: Belief in AGW in the US largely follows Dem / Rep lines, and while both parties spend money constantly to maintain their profile generically and sometimes also on particular primary issues, the pattern of support / opposition is long term and extends over several administrations with their particular issue and election campaigns plus personalities and spending strategies. Belief / opposition is mainly a function of culture, not money. I made no comment upon the majority of UN missions, nor am I questioning the noble intent of all their individual staff in the execution of all their missions, which no doubt is sound. But for the climate change mission in particular, the UN leadership echelon including multiple general secretaries, deputies and others, has for many years propagated a catastrophe narrative that is simply not supported by mainstream climate science, as represented by their own body the IPCC. I do not believe this is in any way a nefarious agenda of any kind, no doubt they passionately believe this narrative, yet noble cause is indeed a strong sources of bias, and given the IPCC comes ultimately beneath this same leadership level, that contradiction is directly relevant and a serious issue. Some who propagate a narrative that disagrees with mainstream climate science are labelled deniers, yet this cadre are not labelled as such for their expressions, but instead are typically praised. What is this if not bias, their own and that of much of their audience. The admirable purpose of organisations should not put their operations and assumptions beyond question, especially at leadership level. Various charities have for instance on occasion systemically lost their way, and it is lack of regular scrutiny and questioning that encourages same.
andywest, you want to separate Republican views on climate from the fossil fuel lobby that supports them heavily not to do anything. In US politics support is everything for re-election (look at the Kochs who they have to court). The main anti-IPCC Republicans are from oil and coal states. This is not a coincidence, nor that they put these people in charge of key science and environment committees. That’s a not-so-hidden agenda for that Party.
As for the UN, you inject catastrophism as a straw man to make them look extremist. What is being asked for is stabilizing the climate via controlling emissions. Every moderate person accepts the climate is changing fast and wants to stabilize it and knows what needs to be done for that. This is not an extreme view. Put the discussion in those terms and we can get somewhere. If you view 3+ C warming and meters of sea-level rise as catastrophic, so be it. That would be your personal valuation. It is hard to objectively define catastrophe. It depends who/what/where/when you care about, and some people just don’t, so it pays no dividends arguing in those terms.
Jim:
>’ you want to separate Republican views on climate from the fossil fuel lobby that supports them…’
As you point out, in a democracy election is everything, so support of party cultures long-term is necessary too, otherwise policies can’t be sustained anyhow whatever the beliefs. Short-term, you can buy or tilt results with money, long-term, you need the cultural support of enough folks to keep returning to power, which is deeper than money.
>’As for the UN, you inject catastrophism as a straw man to make them look extremist.’
But I didn’t inject this angle, *they* did, and have consistently done so over the years at leadership levels. I merely describe that which they manifestly do. This not about my view, I am describing *their* view. As for what that means, you’re right it’s vague, for which an outcome is that the lay-public will generally assume the worst.
andywest, the influence of money isn’t short-term. There are safe Republican districts where money matters, and if you don’t go with the party line on fossil fuels you get primaried. This means the Republicans running against Dems are always pro-fossil, and many regions just return the Republicans anyway, whatever their faults.
If you want to talk about catastrophe, you have to define it first. What would be a catastrophe to you? Is it a level that is a straw man that the science never suggests is possible? There is a gap here of your own making if you are not talking about published scientific projections that come with probabilities based on emission rates. The IPCC goes with what is published for its reports. The policymakers go by those too, and the view of almost all global governments is yes, stabilize the climate because it is more costly not to.
>’…many regions just return the Republicans anyway, whatever their faults.’
Yes indeed, I presume the same happens for some Democratic regions too. This is entrenched culture.
The high level of political polarization on CC in the US is unusual, although more recently Australia is similar. In the UK for instance, all 4 main parties (Labour, Conservatives, Lib-Dems and Scottish Nationalists), officially support orthodox policies on CC (essentially emissions reduction by various means). Actually all the small parties do as well, except 1, UKIP, which I think has never had more than 1 seat in parliament (out of 650), and currently has zero. Yet according to surveys, there is consistently about the same proportion of the public who are sceptical regarding CC and related policies in the UK, as in the US (in both countries, the number varies somewhat depending upon how the questions are asked). Via what political machinery do you think spending by fossil fuel companies could be producing that result in the public, given no official political support in any party? By what other means than politics, could fossil fuel spending achieve such a result?
‘If you want to talk about catastrophe, you have to define it first…’
The issue regarding catastrophe has nothing to do with my personal perception of what it means. Not me, but an a-list of presidents and prime ministers and high ministers and UN leadership cadre not only ‘want to talk about catastrophe’, they frequently project their catastrophic views into the public domain, and have done so for many years. What matters is the perceptions of all the people: public, politicians, policy-makers, or whoever else, that hears these highly influential leaders. While that will be a range because as you rightly note the term is vague, it is also highly emotive and highly negative. Mostly, perceptions will contradict published science.
In other words, don’t shoot the messenger. In the case of the UN, the fact that this narrative directly contradicts mainstream science as represented by the UN’s own sub-unit called the IPCC, is highly relevant, not least because that same list of speakers claim backing by mainstream science, which is clearly not right. Yet this widely accepted and practically unchallenged perception is adding its unfounded weight to the driving of policy, effectively by-passing science. In the UN case, neither does this speak to a lack of bias or internal conflict within the organisation.
If you’re a skeptic in the UK, where do you get your information from? It doesn’t have to be from politicians or even from the fossil fuel industry, and it isn’t. You start by being a conspiracy theorist with libertarian leanings, then you go on the blogs to look for confirmation. Climate skeptics often have in common conspiracy ideation on other issues too. They fear “world government”, and the UN has that ring to them. Blogs drive this by playing to that fear with likeminded bloggers, plus some thinktanks that may be more economically motivated, maybe GWPF, and add in a few biased reporters like David Rose who have a soapbox, and you have a full blown closed feedback loop that only has you listening to your select sub-culture.
Regarding catastrophe, that is not what drives all the governments to enact emissions reductions. It is a conservative attitude of keeping the climate as it is rather than going further into the unknown, and yes that way lies more disasters because climate change drives more and more unprecedented events. The damage is at the leading edge of climate change. So, while a statistical case can be made for more disasters, that argument doesn’t seem to take among the public because it is too complex to explain with moving bell curves. Temperature rises of a few degrees don’t sound much, but they are. Similarly sea level rise, two meters doesn’t sound much, but has large impacts. The damage is mostly from ever more extreme events. If that is what you mean by catastrophe, then it is.
JimD
“You start by being a conspiracy theorist with libertarian leanings, then you go on the blogs to look for confirmation. Climate skeptics often have in common conspiracy ideation on other issues too. They fear “world government”, and the UN has that ring to them etc etc etc’
Jim this is complete and utter drivel from beginning to end, which is an insult to our intelligence.
Perhaps scepticism comes from having the best records in the world which tell us of warm periods in the past and from places-such as upland Dartmoor- whereby we can see that past warming in the Holocene was worse than today and where govt web sites actually confirm the climate was warmer than today?
As for conspiracy theorists; do you believe there are millions of us convinced the Americans never landed on the moon and that the earth is flat?
Do please credit sceptics with more intelligence-you are just fooling yourself with this nonsense
tonyb
tonyb, it is hard to rationalize why people don’t trust the UN. What is your view on that? I know those with world government conspiracies exemplified by Monckton are the vocal ones who have many fans. See his appearances at Heartland or anywhere where they worship him for his various theories. That’s what I’m basing it on. You won’t draw crowds like that sharing your views. Others just don’t like the UN or scientists in general because they think they are elites or something. Others have their own theories to sell that don’t work within the framework of general physics. Why do you especially not trust climate scientists to be objective when you might trust other scientists to be? Maybe you’re not typical, but when you look at the others on these blogs or at those meetings, you will see what I mean.
Yes. We don’t want or need a world government with coercive powers. The joke we have have now should be disbanded.
RIE, good, because Paris isn’t that at all unless you consider peer pressure coercive.
Jim:
>‘Blogs drive this by playing to that fear with likeminded bloggers, plus some thinktanks that may be more economically motivated, maybe GWPF, and add in a few biased reporters like David Rose…’
So you think a few blogs with tiny reach plus the rest of above are causing ~half the population of the UK to be sceptical, also in the face of zero official support of scepticism from the political parties? And also that these blogs / very minority reportage etc are all funded by the fossil fuel industry? i.e. that this is primarily money driven, per your above?
>’Regarding catastrophe, that is not what drives all the governments to enact emissions reductions.’
Given the a-list of presidents and prime ministers and high ministers and the UN leadership cadre and a raft of other orgs and even religions that propagate the catastrophe narrative, this does not seem intuitive. How would you know this? National leaders drive policy, that’s what they are elected for. The UN co-ordinates policy globally, that’s what they’re there for. Are these leaders all lying when they promote the catastrophic as the primary motivation for action on CC? This seems highly unlikely. I think it far more likely that they passionately believe what they say.
>’If that is what you mean by catastrophe, then it is.’
As I’ve tried to make clear several times above, I’m not talking about catastrophe, and my personal interpretation of it is in no way relevant here. I’m talking about people. Those people who have for many years propagated the narrative of a high certainty of imminent (decades) climate catastrophe, and also claim that mainstream science backs their narrative (which is not so). More specifically, the sub-group who happen to be a raft of the most influential people in the world, and which is inclusive of the UN leadership cadre. Whatever the precise interpretations of this emotive narrative by general audiences, they will be very far from the position of mainstream science.
jimd
It surely can’t have escaped your notice after all these years that I regularly defend such as the met office? I have had regular contact with them and with such as Phil jones. I use their library and archives extensively and also that of the Scott Polar institute in Cambridge
I tend to deal in weather records and have compiled those covering England back to 1200. They tended to become more reliable about then and less prone to religious observation, although there are some good earlier records such as for manorial crops-which I helped to translate from Latin/French to English.
Living close to Dartmoor there is actual physical evidence of past climates. Unfortunately climate scientists like all of us are prone to group think and constructing scenario that matches their thesis. so for example the very warm 1730’s can be brushed out if a later record is used.
It seems clear to me from the data I have collected over 10 years ,which is very extensive, that temperatures have been rising over some 300 years, following an intermittent little ice age, and there was a period at least as warm as today from around 750 to 1190 or so. (observations, tree lines, crop records, etc)
So I can check what has been written and recognise the scenario painted do not always tell the full story. Ironically govt agency web sites for such places as Dartmoor talk about the things that can be observed as being due, for example, to a warmer climate in the Bronze ,. Roman and MWP.
United nations. What has that got to do with anything? I agree with the principle. Why shouldn’t !, its generally a good organisation although very bloated and cumbersome. Like the EU it needs root and branch reform but not abolishing.
The current reality of its structure means its always someone’s ‘turn’ to take up the head of an important dept for reasons entirely unrelated to their skills, but entirely related to their politics and country of origin..( I am talking generally, not about the IPCC)
I know of no one at all in my peer group who are Conspiracy theorists and none of them believe in anything but evolution before you ask.
Stop painting everyone with the sae very broad brush to feed your own prejudices
tonyb
andywest, where do you get that half the UK population are skeptical? Skeptical of what exactly? Most people favor controlling emissions, and doing that to constrain climate change. They are fully aware of this connection and most don’t doubt it. They are also aware that the majority of scientists see it that way. Plus they see unprecedented disasters and rightly or wrongly attribute them to climate change. As long as these 500-year events keep appearing in the news, the skeptics have an uphill battle when they refute any connection to climate change. So you’re saying catastrophe is what drives the public majority view, and maybe all the news of disasters does, but it can be without the help of politicians because they interpret it from what they see. Extreme events are increasing in frequency and severity as climate change would predict. This is statistical, not case by case. Are people perceiving a statistical increase in extremes? Maybe so. They would be aware of what the global mean temperature has been doing in the last few decades and what the explanation is. How do the skeptics interpret the same information? I have no idea what their worldview tells them. Coincidence? Bad observations? Just hype? They don’t like that science connects rising CO2 to these record conditions, and they find people to blame, the scientists, the IPCC, the politicians, you name it. It’s a minority view, and the world has moved on, except in some corners.
tonyb, you clearly don’t trust the majority view of the climate scientists (including paleoclimate) as shown by the IPCC reports and in all their journals. I can’t guess why that is in your case, but others think that some kind of cabal, driven by politics, has taken over climate science in what I would label a conspiracy theory of the Monckton kind. I see various shades of that on this blog, but when I call it out, I get criticized.
JimD
You said
“tonyb, you clearly don’t trust the majority view of the climate scientists (including paleoclimate) as shown by the IPCC reports and in all their journals”
Don’t trust? Science changes all the time. In my bookcase I have a copy of ‘history of science dated 1886 and obviously given as a prize at a vcollegre
The 1886 version of how science and things work is drastically different to todays and I dare say would have had to be thoroughly revised every decade over the last 130 years or so as out understanding changes.
The Met Office typify the evolution of thinking.
Circa 2008 their web site stated that temperatures were relatively constant until the 1880’s when they shot up. (a clear reference to Dr Mann)
Following research they deleted this around 2010 and agreed there had been very considerable natural fluctuation as exemplified by such as Phil Jones who, following work by such as Lamb and Budyko, admitted that natural variability was far greater than had hitherto realised.
Close to us on Dartmoor there is clear evidence, by way of a moraine, of glacial action. It was said that Dartmoor had not been involved in the last glacial movements. Three years ago a tram from nearby Exeter University (who are partly funded by the Met Office) conformed that there had been glacial action and the pile of stones I always thought looked like a moraine WAS a moraine.
There is evidence of previous habitation and agriculture at heights not possible today on Dartmoor. Indeed the domesday book confirmed the number of ploughs etc on farms there. These had disappeared as the climate cooled and people had to move away. The Dartmoor authoritires (a govt agency) state this on their literature because that is the evidence on the ground.
So, science evolves and our view of things evolves with it. If you want to believe Dr Mann circa c1998 is the be all and end all, that is fine. Others, including his peers, believe that things are not as clear cut as they first thought.
tonyb
“It seems clear to me from the data I have collected over 10 years ,which is very extensive, that temperatures have been rising over some 300 years”
An assertion which, as we have been over many times before, is directly refuted by CET, which shows a hockeystick, with no trend up to c. 1900 and a clear rising trend thereafter.
“science evolves and our view of things evolves with it.”
Indeed. Unfortunately, ignored by “sceptics”. Pages2k, 2013:
https://i1.wp.com/climatestate.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/PAGES2k_MBH991.png
https://www.globalchange.gov/sites/globalchange/files/styles/resource_image/http/data.globalchange.gov/assets/72/c3/2162ff56b7965197062b61a8ade6/APP_global_temperature_proxy_data_v5.png?itok=B0rz2EjE
Figure source: adapted from Mann et al. 2008
Who are the above people:
https://www.globalchange.gov/agencies
I am going with warming for the last 300 years. Mann does not live by bread alone.
tonyb, the warming in the last 150 years is unprecedented in thousands of years. It represents a large gain in the earth’s heat content. The scientists can explain it with an energy budget that shows what is added by raising GHG levels alone easily accounts for it. The skeptics have an understanding gap, and that seems to lead to mistrust. Perhaps energy budgets are beyond their comprehension.
Jim:
>‘Skeptical of what exactly?’
This is the right question, because surveys have very wide variance depending not only on what is asked, but how it is asked, and what asks / topics are grouped together. Even a single and pretty focussed survey can give results that allow both sides to claim majorities. E.g. the climate change section of the recent social census in Britain: 62% think humans are not mainly or entirely the cause of climate change. Victory! 70% worry about climate change. Victory! Yet the breakdown of both these reveal the largest number of folks hover around the middle, and in this survey or others slight changes can make them lean one way or another. So surveys that ask in isolation about support of policy to address climate change, often get very high figures. But when coupled with indications of even very modest spend to do that, the figures drop much lower, and mixed with the need to address other (non-climate) issues too, often drop at or near the bottom of the pile. Asking about scientists’ belief of the truth of climate change, produces markedly different results to asking about the same belief via the same phrasing but for the survey targets themselves, especially within polarised countries (per Kahan’s work and due to identity protective issues). And one can’t even integrate a bunch of these surveys over different types and several years to get a kind of average, because it’s apples and oranges. I think the best one can say is that neither side dominates, the largest group are kind of undecided floating voters, and the only ‘figure’ that can attempt to summarise it with, is that orthodox leaning is about as likely as sceptical leaning, i.e. 50:50. Nevertheless, even if rejecting this figure as not an appropriate one to represent the complexity, the surveys / questions that weigh heaviest to one side or the other, still leave millions of folks in the minority (if applied to the whole population). Such numbers dwarf those upon either side who have inserted themselves into the climate domain in one way or another.
>’So you’re saying catastrophe is what drives the public majority view…’
Either a majority or a very substantial minority. Because of polarisation effects (below) and per the above survey variability, it’s difficult to know. Yet certainly plenty of grass-roots support for orthodox CC policy. Indeed those a-list leaders and many other politicians and orgs cite catastrophe as the main motivator for action, incorrectly claiming too that mainstream science supports their position. But this same narrative also causes major public polarisation (i.e. a large rump of the public who reject the message entirely), because the heavily overplayed theme of catastrophe is instinctively perceived for what it is, i.e. an emotive mistruth (albeit emergent, not deliberately planned, in the same way that religious narratives are emergent). This is a strong contributory factor to widespread scepticism from members of the public who have never seen a skeptical blog or followed skeptical press (espc in countries like UK, where very minority sceptical publication anyhow), very probably contributing far more to scepticism than any spending by any lobby. Most cultural narratives are polarising; even as they recruit adherents, they create opposition too. In the US due to cultural alliance effects, the polarisation aligned itself to pre-existing Rep / Dem division. Similar alignment is very weak in the UK. In Germany, the most CC orthodox party is right of centre, not left of centre (Merkle sometimes known as ‘the climate chancellor’); originally very little officially expressed skepticism, but now growing on both left and far right, mainly due to the difficulties of the energieviende.
>‘…but it can be without the help of politicians because they interpret it from what they see…’
Politicians tell them that climate catastrophe is imminent, and have done so since before extreme weather events even became the hottest (terrible pun!) thing with which they justify that position. Yet whether extreme weather is actually increasing or not (I seem to recall that AR5 says most types of extreme are not), and coverage of it most certainly has increased over decades which probably impacts perceptions most, this still does not justify a position on catastrophe that directly contradicts the mainstream science. However, this is exactly how the issue is being used. When known skeptics associate the catastrophic with mainstream science, for instance on blogs such as this, there is usually a pretty strong reaction from orthodox folks, sometimes associated with emotive backlash such as ‘denier tactic’ or whatever. Ignoring the emotive phrasing, this association is indeed inappropriate, because that scenario is not what mainstream science indicates. Yet a raft of the most influential folks in the world, and many lesser politicians and orgs too, have been doing exactly this for decades, and not only do they receive no sanction, they are typically praised. Cultural bias in action.
>‘They don’t like that science connects rising CO2 to these record conditions…’
The catastrophic is perceived as a blunt instrument to force compliance, notwithstanding in reality it’s emergent and hence not wielded, so to speak. In such circumstances uniformed sceptical leaners in the public (who number millions, don’t ever look at climate blogs or have never searched out significant / deeper information on climate change), simply assume any touted justifications (whether future history will deem them true or false) are simply part of the same instrument.
andywest, you’re attributing public knowledge that the warming records are due mostly to CO2 rises to politicians when I would give them more credit than that into actually listening to the scientists first or just learning that at school or from popular science articles. The skeptics, on the other hand, are clearly driven by other sources than scientists, maybe politicians, maybe their own political biases, and that explains why they don’t believe the scientists, let alone summary reports produced by the UN because those things combine everything they don’t trust, academia and government. There is a divide between those who will listen to the academics and believe the textbooks, and those who won’t trust them.
The public don’t read textbooks on climate science, or their on-line equivalent, or any IPCC reports, or any blogs that may summarize all such material (whether orthodox or skeptic). Most of their perception of what scientists think comes from the aforementioned politicians, who constantly tell the public that mainstream science backs the catastrophic narrative, which is not so. And newspaper reports of IPCC confs or such abound with the catastrophic that is bolted on, either as explicitly expressed by politicians or just tossed into the mix by journalists. Within those very few climate scientists who are popular enough to have a significant public profile independently of politicians or political posturing, you have distinctly non-mainstream catastrophists like James Hansen (probably with the highest profile), who unfortunately just reinforces the political message that science backs this emotive narrative; the public wrongly perceive that he is mainstream (and indeed there are articles specifically saying that he is mainstream). There are no significant channels via which the public might receive the proper position of mainstream science, which aren’t contaminated by the catastrophic. You can’t distrust what you never even hear, but for sure some are attracted to the emotive appeal of the catastrophe narrative that they do hear, and some reject it for detecting the very same heavily over-played emotive content – hence the public polarisation that surveys reveal, whether or not in some countries like the US and to a lesser extent Oz, this polarisation gets aligned to existing political divides, sucking in older cultural conflicts where this is the case.
jimd
you said
“tonyb, the warming in the last 150 years is unprecedented in thousands of years.”
At last we seem to be getting somewhere!
‘Thousands of years’ (rather than hundreds of thousands) being unprecedented since the Roman warm period? The Bronze age warm period? Please advise which period and confirm the co2 concentration at the time. Thanks
tonyb
andywest, you paint a sad picture of a public who only trust the politicians in favor of what they see in the media from the scientists themselves. As a member of the public, I would not first trust a politician on anything, let alone science. Look at the kinds of questions the experts get in congressional committees. Some of them haven’t the first clue what the science actually says, and that’s even on the science committee. Regarding catastrophe, you can talk about disasters and their frequency, or new record temperatures almost every year, and sea levels rising faster, and this often comes up in the news, and yes the public notice and make the connection to climate change, which most of them are able to connect to emissions. Again, hard to debate catastrophe scientifically without a specific definition. Is it 4 C of warming? Is it over 2 meters of sea-level rise? Is it losing the tropical rainforests? Is it more drought, fires, floods, famines, disease, storms, less fresh water,…? All of the above together?
tonyb, OK, let’s look at the long view.
https://skepticalscience.com//pics/Shakun_Marcott_HadCRUT4_A1B_500.png
The Bronze Age was towards the end of the Holocene Optimum. At the left end of the green line, CO2 levels were below 200 ppm but it was mostly ice albedo keeping us cold. In the blue period until recently it stayed below 300 ppm, and as we go towards 2100, headed towards 600 ppm in the short span of two centuries. We are currently at about 1 degree on that sharp uptick at 400 ppm. The uptick in temperature occurs coincidentally with the equally sharp CO2 rise.
Jim:
‘you paint a sad picture of a public who only trust the politicians in favor of what they see in the media from the scientists themselves’
Whether sad or not is hardly the issue. And what mainstream science that isn’t contaminated by the catastrophe narrative makes it to which mainline media in order to reach the public? Not from Hansen for instance, who has likely the highest profile in the public eye as a climate scientist. It’s not necessarily that they trust the politicians (~half do and ~half don’t, but both halves in the main via an emotional reaction, for or against as the surveys show, but not via reason), it’s that they largely don’t see an alternative message for comparison. The narrative of high certainty of imminent (decades) catastrophe hardly lends itself to reasoned consideration, especially as it is often presented in highly emotive terms. And after all, many of these politicians lead whole nations and the UN too, one can hardly blame the public for hearing them.
‘Look at the kinds of questions the experts get in congressional committees…’
The mass public no more look at congressional committee sessions on climate change than they look at climate blogs. Hence whether those experts are good, bad, or indifferent will have little impact.
‘Again, hard to debate catastrophe scientifically…’
Absolutely! Which is why the vagueness of the catastrophe narrative lures each of the public into thinking the worst in their own terms. It immediately changes the frame into an emotive one and is *not* a scientific discussion from that point on. Those who propagate the narrative never define it of course, though often drop emotive bombs implying the demise of humans or life, or X months / years to ‘save the planet’ or ‘there is no planet B’ etc. The lay public do not understand science, but they sure understand the apocalyptic when they hear it, and hence the polarization effects (similar happens with religious narratives). And per above (repeatedly), I am not debating the catastrophe, I am talking about those people who propagate the catastrophe narrative, which includes a raft of the most influential people on the planet, and the effect on the public, which effect occurs in part precisely because of the definitional issue you point out.
andywest, I am disputing that the public listen to politicians for their science any more than they do to the media that includes scientific articles or quotes from actual climate scientists, including references to extreme events. Maybe you are speaking for a small minority. Very few even listen to politicians for anything and especially not science. There’s always a media filter. These days they learn in schools about CO2 and climate change in the same way as they learn about evolution, so there is hope for the future generation to be more informed on the basics. It’s too late for some of the older folk, especially the ones who only listen to their favorite politicians for their science, which is sad especially if that happens to be Trump.
Jim:
When for decades the leaders of many nations, the UN, legions of lesser / local politicians, plus NGOs and even the church and some businesses, plus the actual mainstream media themselves by their own exaggeration / invention, all propagate the catastrophic, the public has had little choice but to hear, indeed be soaked in this message. And most of the these sources claim that mainstream science *does* support this narrative; how is the public supposed to know that is wrong? The mainstream scientists (i.e. not the minority occupying the opposite fringe to skeptics) has had comparatively little footprint, some of which is also distorted by journalists or politicians or both attaching their catastrophic narrative to reasonable quotes. Nor are the sources ever castigated for associating mainstream science with the catastrophic, as happens when known skeptics do that on blogs such as this. If mainstream science wants its true voice to be heard, vociferous objection to those sources for doing this would be a great start.
The social data speaks to who is listening to what. Whether aligned to pre-existing political divides or not, it is the classic polarisation / conflict that strong cultural narratives produce, via emotive framing and reception. This data doesn’t match what one would expect from a non-cultural / objective consideration by the majority of the public. Whatever the future holds, we are where we are due to these past decades of messaging, up to the exception of the current US admin for 18 months or so. Issues that gain cultural prominence in this manner build up much social inertia.
andywest, again you keep using the word catastrophic and that the public think things will be catastrophic but don’t define what that means. For science to refute catastrophe it needs examples, not just words. Anyway, what matters for policy is the scientific summaries such as that of the IPCC and various national scientific experts that speak directly to the policymakers, not what (you think) the public perceives as a catastrophe. The IPCC does say that climate change is costly not catastrophic. Is the cost alone a catastrophe in your mind? How about the people who say that any IPCC-advised solutions would be catastrophic to the economy. Do you notice them at all? The US Republicans in Congress are an example of that mindset.
Jim:
‘again you keep using the word catastrophic and that the public think things will be catastrophic but don’t define what that means.’
No. I am not. For the nth time, I am only describing those people who ARE deploying the term in the public domain, and who indeed typically don’t say what they really mean. Their vagueness is as you imply a serious issue, because it emotively lures audiences into thinking the worst. But those people include an a-list of the most influential people on the planet, the leaders of nations, leaders of the UN, not to mention legions of lesser and local politicians, a raft of NGOs, some businesses and even the church, plus of course much of the mainstream media. Those leaders drive and co-ordinate policy, this is what they are elected / appointed for. Not only that, they openly tout the catastrophic as the main motivator for climate policy compliance. Clearly, to describe what all these people / entities are doing I need to use the word ‘catastrophic’, but I’m obviously doing no more than relating their action to you.
As you note, to refute ‘catastrophe’ science needs some actual scenarios to bite on, so why don’t you ask the above people what they all mean by ‘catastrophic’? Most sources also say that their narrative is backed by mainstream science, which is not correct, and which per the IPCC as you note immediately above, is just flat wrong. So if a known skeptic makes an association between the catastrophic and mainstream science, for instance on a blog such as this one, there is typically vociferous objection to this inappropriate association. So where is the same vociferous objection from the orthodox folks, and indeed mainstream science itself, to all the above listed persons and entities that are making precisely this same association? So if you want to pursue this yourself, that leaders a-list and all the rest are the people you need to address your questions to regarding precise scenarios / examples.
As I’ve mentioned above, the narrative of catastrophe to which the public has been exposed from the highest authorities downwards, over decades, has produced a polarised response, typical of emotive cultural narratives. Unlike in most countries, in the US that polarisation has become fully aligned to a pre-existing (con / lib) cultural division (though Australia seems to be heading the same way). This means that other cultural narratives and conflicts (sometimes those that pre-date the CC issue) are raised in a climate change context. Hence your issue below about ‘catastrophic costs’. If such claims are not supported by science / economics, they’d be just as wrong as the CC catastrophic claims above, and in any case whatever their potential theoretical backing, if made very vaguely and emotively will be incorrectly perceived anyhow, just as the CC catastrophe claims likewise are incorrectly perceived. So two wrongs don’t make a right. And this changes absolutely nothing of the above regarding the major problem with the narrative of climate catastrophe, it just adds (in the US at least, probably wider to a lesser extent), another narrative with similar issues to the mix. This is often what happens with cultural conflicts, in particular when cultural linkage pulls in allies, and therefore oppositions too, from pre-existing cultures.
Robert I Ellison: And somehow I doubt that Matthew read the linked article before waffling on with abjectly unsophisticated musings.
I downloaded it and read it some time ago when you posted it.
But taken from a psychological viewpoint, this combinatory play seems to be the essential feature in productive thought–before there is any connection with logical construction in words or other kinds of signs which can be communicated to others.
Is there someplace where Einstein de-emphasizes “truth” in the phase before connection to logical construction?
Though arguably appropriate for applications of theory to engineering and applied science, the associated emphases on truth and degrees of certainty are not optimal for the productive and creative processes that facilitate the fundamental advancement of science as a process of discovery.
If not “truth”, then “discovery” of what? Surely it is worthwhile to distinguish between the creations of C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien on the one hand and the creations of Kepler and Newton on the other.
Discovery of the most likely explanation until something better comes along? With better data and more refined theories? Well if you put it that way.
Robert I Ellison: Discovery of the most likely explanation until something better comes along? With better data and more refined theories?
Those are your answers, strongly concordant with my preference for “accuracy” and “usefulness” (to assess “better” vs “the same” or “worse”). But what of the author, for whom “truth” is “arguably appropriate for applications of theory to engineering and applied science, “? What does he say is the goal of “discovery”? How is “discovery” to be recognized and distinguished from “false discovery”?
The Hope for a Simple World
… even if it means abandoning the natural sciences and inventing perils that are not really there. Global warming alarmism has always been a matter of choosing the least significant contributor to global warming — CO2 — and then creating mystical properties that are not observed in nature. The magic properties of CO2 are achieved by applying magical magnification formulae such that the scant contributor may become the source of a peril called AGW (Anthropogenic Global Warming).
Reblogged this on I Didn't Ask To Be a Blog.
Atomski call pile it on and Jimmy’s discovery of math and geophysics is AR5 – but – come to think of it – I am firmly in favor of tabloid science. Take polar annular modes – lower or higher polar pressure pushes more meridional (north-south) or zonal (east-west) windfields. e.g.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/aao/new.aao.loading.gif
There’s Australia – OY OY OY
Annular modes vary at daily and monthly scales. Higher – more negative counter intuitively – pressures at the poles drive winds and storms into lower latitudes. They are measured with indices. These are graphed date from 1st April with 7, 10 and 14 day forecasts – for both poles. .
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/aao/aao.mrf.gif
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao.mrf.gif
Negative modes influence temperature, biology, clouds, ice and ocean currents – perpetually changing. The latest Pacific Ocean climate shift in 1998/2001 is linked to increased flow in the north (Di Lorenzo et al, 2008) and the south (Roemmich et al, 2007, Qiu, Bo et al 2006)Pacific Ocean gyres. Roemmich et al (2007) suggest that mid-latitude gyres in all of the oceans are influenced by decadal variability in the Southern and Northern Annular Modes (SAM and NAM respectively) as wind driven currents in baroclinic oceans (Sverdrup, 1947).*
Speeding up in Pacific gyres enhances upwelling on the eastern coast – and then central Pacific upwelling – cooling the atmosphere and enhancing cloud cover – over the eastern and central Pacific. Clement et al said it was about 15% of global cloud variability.
A short term tendency to cooler surface waters, lower atmospheric temperature and abundant biology? An incipient La Nina state whose intensity depends on direction, persistence and strength of evolving windfields.
* e.g. https://watertechbyrie.com/2014/06/23/the-unstable-math-of-michael-ghils-climate-sensitivity/
Great piece. Peer review is a journalistic standard, not a scientific one. Climate science in particular often tends to make better journalism than science.
The issue with tunable GCM parameters is interesting… would be a good meta-study to see how those have spawned and evolved over the years. Hansen 1988’s defenders are always quick to point out if you use different assumptions than Hansen used for how emissions would affect concentrations (i.e., tune the parameter better), you can get something roughly approximating the actual 1988-2018 trend. (Of course, it also looks like the temperature trend he predicted would require “draconian” emissions controls, but still interesting). No doubt similar re-tuning will be applied to the various IPCC predictions (or “projections” or even “numbers about the future intended for use by policymakers” if you prefer).
Re: “Peer review is a journalistic standard, not a scientific one.”
Then you clearly have no idea how science works. Peer review is part of modern science; it’s not about journalism. Deal with it.
“Characteristics of denialism
Identification of conspiracies: Denialists argue that scientific consensus arises not as a result of independent researchers converging on the same view but instead because researchers have engaged in a complex and secretive conspiracy. They are depicted as using the peer review process to suppress dissent rather than fulfil its legitimate role of excluding work that is devoid of evidence or logical thought.”
http://www.bmj.com/content/341/bmj.c6950.full
Re: “Hansen 1988’s defenders are always quick to point out if you use different assumptions than Hansen used for how emissions would affect concentrations (i.e., tune the parameter better), you can get something roughly approximating the actual 1988-2018 trend. (Of course, it also looks like the temperature trend he predicted would require “draconian” emissions controls, but still interesting).”
Please learn the difference between a “projection” and a “prediction”. Suppose that as a scientist, I make the following two claims:
1) If one engages in unsafe sex, then one has an increased risk of contracting an STI.
2) If one avoids unsafe sex, then one has a decreased risk of contracting an STI.
Those are projections: they make claims (the conditional’s consequent) based on inputted information (the conditional’s antecedent).
So suppose you tell me that someone engaged unsafe sex. Then, based on my projections 1 and 2, I can make the prediction that that person increased their risk of contracting an STI. Thus when evaluating the prediction made, you need to look at whether the antecedent conditions were met.
Therefore it would be ridiculous, for example, for you to claim that I predicted that a decreased risk of contracting a UTI, even in conditions where one engages in unsafe sex. Yet this is precisely what many critics of Hansen (like you) do. You pretend as if he made a particular prediction, when you didn’t even bother to check if the antecedent conditions of his projection had been met. That is not an appropriate way to evaluate predictions and projections in science, regardless of whether one is dealing with medical science, climate science, etc. It’s ridiculous that your side of discussion tries to get away with that sort of nonsense.
Re: “No doubt similar re-tuning will be applied to the various IPCC predictions (or “projections” or even “numbers about the future intended for use by policymakers” if you prefer).”
It would help if you actually looked at the IPCC’s projections, instead of making false, politically-motivated insinuations. Then you’d know that he IPCC tends to under-estimate the impacts of climate change, which runs contrary to the charge of alarmism:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-the-ipcc-underestimated-climate-change/
“Climate Change Skepticism and Denial: An Introduction
[…]
A constant refrain coming from the denial campaign is that climate scientists are “alarmists” who exaggerate the degree and threat of global warming to enhance their status, funding, and influence with policy makers. The contribution by William Freudenburg and Violetta Muselli provides an insightful empirical test of this charge and finds it to lack support. […] They then present evidence that IPCC assessments have in fact understated the degree of subsequently reported climate disruption, supporting their argument.”
And this is some of the relevant supporting research on this point:
“Reexamining Climate Change Debates: Scientific Disagreement or Scientific Certainty Argumentation Methods (SCAMs)?”
“Climate change prediction: Erring on the side of least drama?”
“Global warming estimates, media expectations, and the asymmetry of scientific challenge”
What do you call a collective of climate scientists?
CO2 is a greenhouse gas and nearly all late 20th century was down to anthropogenic emissions? The latter is far from certain – as Wunsch said of climate science in general.
Jimmy posited 1000 AR5 experts – somewhere above. I meant to post there.
But data and theory show intrinsic change added to late 20th century temps.
During the “pause” the other changes were subtracting.
… yet both ocean heat and cumulative toa radiant flux increases… albeit at perhaps a lower rate…warming in sw and cooling in ir – as expected with low level cloud changes…
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/ocean-heat-and-power-flux.jpg
You should be considering changes in the sun, aerosols, volcanoes and oceans. They all can count and give a pause or enhance when added together. It’s random noise on top of a strong and growing background forcing.
It’s not random and the pattern of radiant flux changes is the signature of low level marine strato-cumulus especially.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/nile-e1527722953992.jpg
And it seems pretty likely – with agriculture, production, conservation and energy innovation – that emissions will peak within decades.
The emergent constraints studies summarized here a while back indicate that the models with a positive cloud feedback in the tropics are doing better with the current climate measures and have a higher sensitivity than those that don’t. Bottom line: what you are seeing is the positive cloud albedo feedback in action. It turns out that a lot of the radiation response to increased forcing appears in the albedo changes.
… and there is no intrinsic change in ocean and atmospheric circulation anyhoo… convenient huh? And seriously? CMIP opportunistic ensembles?
The global cloud albedo has been decreasing as it gets warmer. This is opposite to what the negative cloud feedback people hoped because that’s just not kicked in yet. For low sensitivity, their last big hope was a negative cloud feedback. Not there.
Model estimated cloud feedback is some 0.18-1.18 W/m2/K. How much was 20th century warming? How much was intrinsic? Not easy questions apparently.
And other mechanisms than with low marine cloud responding to sea surface temperature – and ocean sulfate sources.
By “intrinsic” you probably mean the global clouds conspiring to have less albedo independent of the temperature change they are experiencing. That is, by some temperature-independent and aerosol-independent, yet widespread mechanism. Explain what you are talking about. How do the clouds conspire with each other if not in response to a common forcing change? Who has a paper on this?
Intrinsic is simply internal climate variability. I prefer intrinsic. I have explained Rayleigh–Bénard convection open and closed cell marine stratocumulus by reference to a considerable body of science – observations and modelling – many times. Here’s one I am just reading.
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-17-0208.1
Mostly clouds over the ocean respond to the temperature, but you are ruling that out, perhaps suggesting it is the reverse with the clouds changing spontaneously, but in some globally coordinated way, and then ruling the ocean? Where are the papers on this, or are you making it up as you go along?
I have been over this with Jimmy too many to want to repeat it.
https://www.facebook.com/Australian.Iriai/posts/1712078145575107
It’s positive albedo feedbacks, just like the models predicted.
0.18-1.18 Watt per square metre per Kelvin computed cloud feedback is an order of magnitude too small to be the main source of
global warming. Something dominated on short scales certainly by internal, low frequency variability.
Yes, the water vapor feedback and ice/snow albedo feedback would be more important, but even a small positive cloud feedback is a loss of the last great hope for low sensitivities that the skeptics had. It is very significant from that perspective.
By a considerable margin the most important feedback is the negative – stabilizing – Planck response. And is there any hope that sensitivity in the nonlinear Earth system means squat?
A response is not a feedback. There’s a difference. You can define a no-feedback response, for example, which is one that is neither positive nor negative. Your attempt to confuse is limited to yourself.
The Planck feedback – whoops response – is minus 3.2 W/m2/K – apparently.
That’s physics. Heat things, they warm. Change the forcing, it warms. The response to heating is indeed warming. No disputing that.
The response to heating is an exponentially increased rate of cooling you mean? Implied in the Planck feedback?
It radiates more to space because it is warmer. Not sure you understood that part. More heat in means more heat out. How do you increase heat out? Warming, of course. Warming is a natural response to heating. The sun comes out, things get warmer in response. Is this so hard to understand? Do I need to explain it more?
Jim D | July 30, 2018 at 11:14 pm |
Suppose that I want to find out about how temperature affects solids. I take a 75 kg block of steel, and I put the bottom end of it in a bucket of hot water. I duct tape a thermometer to the top end in the best experimental fashion, and I start recording how the temperature change with time. At first, nothing happens. So I wait. And soon, the temperature of the other end of the block of steel starts rising. Hey, simple physics, just like Jim D. said, right?
To verify my results, I try the experiment with a block of copper. I get the same result, the end of the block that’s not in the hot water soon begins to warm up. I try it with a block of glass, same thing. My tentative conclusion is that simple physics says that if you heat one end of a solid, the other end will eventually heat up as well.
So I look around for a final test. Not seeing anything obvious, I have a flash of insight. I weigh about 75 kg. So I sit with my feet in the bucket of hot water, put the thermometer in my mouth, and wait for my head to heat up.
After all, as Jim D. told us, simple physics is my guideline, I know what’s going to happen, I just have to wait.
And wait … and wait …
As our thought experiment shows, simple physics may simply not work when applied to a complex system.
w.
Robert I. Ellison: https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-17-0208.1
Thank you for the link.
“It’s positive albedo feedbacks, just like the models predicted.”
Sorry, that’s false and you don’t get to just make things up.
Here is NASA GISS modeled albedo compared with CERES:
https://i2.wp.com/turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/albedo_comparison_2017.png
Beyond the gross difference in absolute value, note that the recent change in CERES is much larger than even the century trend in the model runs.
Also note, the larger the CO2 forcing, the less that albedo is modeled to change.
There’s probably not a good correlation between albedo and global temperature, but that’s what the model indicates – as usual, the models are broken.
What’s more likely is that albedo accounts for temperature, but is not a result of it.
TE, not sure what you’re showing, but the emergent constraints have the models with a positive cloud feedback doing better against the past observations and also tending to have the higher sensitivities. There was a whole set of articles on this here because the skeptics are very interested in cloud albedo feedbacks, especially low clouds around the tropics.
TE, not sure what you’re showing, but the emergent constraints have the models with a positive cloud feedback doing better against the past observations and also tending to have the higher sensitivities.
Look at the graphic again, or better yet, the original NASA GISS plot.
Which scenario, RCP8.5 or RCP4.5, has the highest albedo?
It’s RCP8.5.
This is probably screwed up, but it means the models have a negative, not positive feedback, because the higher forcing and higher warming scenario has a greater alebdo.
Recent years were warmer because of albedo change (more energy absorbed).
For the US, anyway, cloudiness appears unrelated to seasonal response because the peak month varies so much:
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nFmKxi7GjpA/WBqTdTJwNrI/AAAAAAAAFLg/3qMRhMJVHjQqw250YiS59B_rV0QvJokUgCLcB/s1600/CloudiestMonthYear.jpg
TE, your interpretation is wrong. The albedo decreases with warming meaning a positive feedback and they all do that. As for why RCP8.5 has less positive feedback with the most forcing, you would need to look for their explanation of that. I can only guess at a reason.
Turbulent Eddy: Look at the graphic again, or better yet, the original NASA GISS plot.
That is an interesting graph. All three scenarios show albedo decreasing up through about 2050, but not thereafter; scenario 4.5 has consistently the lowest albedo, whereas the other 2 scenarios are practically indistinguishable. It is as if albedo is non linearly increasing in CO2, nonlinearly decreasing in temperature (or something else that changes with time), with an interaction between them.
mm: “All three scenarios show albedo decreasing up through about 2050, but not thereafter”
FWIW, I don’t put much credence in the model.
GISS, ( https://data.giss.nasa.gov/ar5/lptim.html )
offers up “Non-interactive”, or with “Chemistry, Aerosols & Dust”, and finally “+ Indirect Effect on Clouds”
For “Non-interactive”, albedo actually increases.
Like precipitation, cloudiness is parameterized in the models – removed from physics, and necessarily inaccurate.
Willis
Thank you.
“The albedo decreases with warming”
This is not justified by observation or physical principle, so, no.
Though seasonal and spatial distribution of dynamics vary:
Spatially the hot Sahara and the cold Antarctic are both very clear.
Seasonally, though dynamic bands bounce between the hemispheres, there’s no evidence of the summer hemisphere being clear and the winter hemisphere being cloudy.
Clouds are largely dynamic ( condensation from ascension ) and as such, beyond predictability. So, no, there’s no physical principle to support your claim.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:5_11_15_Brian_AquabyMonth.gif
Annual Cloudiness
Jim D | July 30, 2018 at 6:28 pm |TE, not sure what you’re showing, but the emergent constraints have the models with a positive cloud feedback doing better against the past observations and also tending to have the higher sensitivities. There was a whole set of articles on this here because the skeptics are very interested in cloud albedo feedbacks, especially low clouds around the tropics.
Jim D | July 30, 2018 at 4:33 pm |It’s positive albedo feedbacks, just like the models predicted.
–
Jim D multiple past models actually claim negative feedback. See JCH Below
“Accounting for changing temperature patterns increases historical estimates of climate sensitivityAbstract Eight Atmospheric General Circulation Models (AGCMs) are forced with observed historical (1871‐2010) monthly sea‐surface‐temperature (SST) and sea‐ice variations using the AMIP II dataset. The AGCMs therefore have a similar temperature pattern and trend to that of observed historical climate change. The AGCMs simulate a spread in climate feedback similar to that seen in coupled simulations of the response to CO2 quadrupling. However the feedbacks are robustly more stabilizing and the effective climate sensitivity (EffCS) smaller. This is due to a ‘pattern effect’ whereby the pattern of observed historical SST change gives rise to more negative cloud and LW clear‐sky feedbacks.”
–
This strongly contradicts your narrative does it not?
Re: ““It’s positive albedo feedbacks, just like the models predicted.” Sorry, that’s false and you don’t get to just make things up.”
You’re making false claims on cloud feedback as well, just as you habitually do on the hot spot. Jim is right: cloud feedback is net positive (as predicted by climate models), though less positive than the water vapor feedback. Those positive feedbacks augment climate sensitivity.
Clouds reflect solar radiation into space and thus can act as a negative feedback in response to warming; clouds also reflect/absorb radiation emitted by the Earth and thus can act as a positive feedback in response to warming. Lower level clouds tend to act as a negative feedback, while higher level clouds tend to act as a positive feedback. Climate models predict a net positive feedback from clouds due to increases in higher level clouds and reductions in lower level clouds in response to warming. That positive cloud feedback has been observed. For further evidence and discussion, see:
“Clearing clouds of uncertainty”
“Evidence for climate change in the satellite cloud record”
“A net decrease in the Earth’s cloud, aerosol, and surface 340 nm reflectivity during the past 33 yr (1979–2011)”
“A determination of the cloud feedback from climate variations over the past decade”
“Cloud feedback mechanisms and their representation in global climate models”
“New observational evidence for a positive cloud feedback that amplifies the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation”
“Impact of dataset choice on calculations of the short-term cloud feedback”
“Long-term cloud change imprinted in seasonal cloud variation: More evidence of high climate sensitivity”
“Thermodynamic constraint on the depth of the global tropospheric circulation”
As noted in the second paper listed above:
The primary drivers of these cloud changes appear to be increasing greenhouse gas concentrations and a recovery from volcanic radiative cooling. These results indicate that the cloud changes most consistently predicted by global climate models are currently occurring in nature.
[…]
Our results suggest that radiative forcing by a combination of anthropogenic greenhouse gases and volcanic aerosol has produced observed cloud changes during the past several decades that exert positive feedbacks on the climate system. We expect increasing greenhouse gases will cause these cloud trends to continue in the future unless offset by unpredictable large volcanic eruptions.
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature18273
“This is not justified by observation or physical principle, so, no.”
False, as shown above.
Re: “multiple past models actually claim negative feedback. See JCH Below […] This strongly contradicts your narrative does it not?”
Jim made accurate scientific points to you, so stop conflating that with a “narrative”. And the paper actually supports what Jim said, though you quote-mined the paper’s abstract to avoid that point. The paper is also one in a long line of papers undermining/rebutting the energy-budget-model-based estimates used by people such as Nic Lewis and Judith Curry. To expand on these points further:
You conveniently left this part out of your quote-mine of the paper’s abstract:
“Assuming the patterns of long-term temperature change simulated by models, and the radiative response to them, are credible, this implies that existing constraints on EffCS from historical energy budget variations give values that are too low and overly constrained, particularly at the upper end. For example, the pattern effect increases the long-term Otto et al. (2013) EffCS median and 5-95% confidence interval from 1.9K (0.9-5.0K) to 3.2K (1.5-8.1K).”
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2018GL078887
So the paper supports a higher climate sensitivity estimate and argues against the lower energy-budget-model-based estimates of people like Curry. That fits with what Jim said regarding higher climate sensitivity estimates. As Jim said:
“but the emergent constraints have the models with a positive cloud feedback doing better against the past observations and also tending to have the higher sensitivities.”
For more direct support of what Jim was saying, see papers such as:
“Variability in modeled cloud feedback tied to differences in the climatological spatial pattern of clouds”
“Long-term cloud change imprinted in seasonal cloud variation: More evidence of high climate sensitivity”
“Spread in model climate sensitivity traced to atmospheric convective mixing”
You also seem to misconstrue what the paper’s abstract says, which causes you to think the paper contradicts Jim. You take this quote from the paper’s abstract:
“Eight Atmospheric General Circulation Models (AGCMs) are forced with observed historical (1871-2010) monthly sea-surface-temperature (SST) and sea-ice variations using the AMIP II dataset. The AGCMs therefore have a similar temperature pattern and trend to that of observed historical climate change. The AGCMs simulate a spread in climate feedback similar to that seen in coupled simulations of the response to CO2 quadrupling. However the feedbacks are robustly more stabilizing and the effective climate sensitivity (EffCS) smaller. This is due to a ‘pattern effect’ whereby the pattern of observed historical SST change gives rise to more negative cloud and LW clear-sky feedbacks.”
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2018GL078887
That quotation is not saying that most of the AGCMs have negative cloud feedback, contrary to what you claimed. The paper is instead saying that the clouds feedbacks are less positive in AGCMs forced with observed sea surface temperature trends, than in coupled, longer-term simulations for AOGCMs.
(The AGCMs were forced with observed sea surface temperature trends since AGCMs lack the ocean component included in the AOGCMs [Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Models] that the paper also discussed.)
Hence the paper saying:
“The lower historical EffCS [effective climate sensitivity] relative to abrupt-4xCO2 is predominantly because LW clear-sky and cloud radiative feedbacks are less positive in response to historical SST and sea-ice variations than in long-term climate sensitivity simulations.”
Your problem is that you confused “more negative” (and “less positive”) with “negative”. That confusion of your’s doesn’t work. For example, 2 is more negative and less positive than 7; but neither 2 nor 7 are negative.
Anyway, to wrap things up: the paper says that, based on the climate models, cloud feedback from historical ocean temperature trends (especially recent, post-1980 trends) is less positive than what the cloud feedback will be during subsequent, longer-term warming. Thus energy-budget-model-estimates that rely on these historical trends will likely under-estimate longer-term climate sensitivity. That’s explained “Summary and discussion” portion of the paper, especially the 3 numbered points near the beginning of that section.
So this paper actually rebuts the “narrative” (to borrow your term) offered by folks like you. You probably didn’t know that when you cited this paper, now did you? Did you actually read the paper before you cited it, or did you just stop at what you quote-mined and distorted from the abstract?
Hi Atom,
wrt the NotSpot, you may wish to review,
I corrected some of your misconceptions above.
Re: “Hi Atom,
wrt the NotSpot, you may wish to review,
I corrected some of your misconceptions above.”
Already saw it and responded to it. It was most just the usual false claims you usually repeat. Let me know when you can actually address the published evidence on cloud feedback, and not simply ignore it as you do for the published evidence on the hot spot.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2016GL071978
cloud feedback is net positive
According to unverified, non-validated models? That’s unconvincing.
Can you identify the physical principle?
Can you point to any example?
Models are predictions, in this case of the unpredictable, not observations.
Further, reflect upon the estimates of the past:
https://i2.wp.com/turbulenteddies.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/albedo_comparison_2017.png
According to GISS model, albedo is to return to the values of about 150 years ago. Neither is likely known or understood, but that’s what the models say.
And the models can’t even get the absolute value of albedo right, nor the shorter term variability, so it’s doubtful they contain much reality.
Already saw it and responded to it.
Doesn’t seem to appear.
Re: “cloud feedback is net positive
According to unverified, non-validated models? That’s unconvincing.”
You’re willfully ignoring evidence again (as I predicted), as anyone can see by checking the post of mine that you’re responding to:
https://judithcurry.com/2018/07/22/the-perils-of-near-tabloid-science/#comment-877593
Evidence was repeatedly cited for you in that post. You’re acting as if it isn’t there. It’s particularly hilarious that you think you can get away with saying “unverified, non-validated models” even after this was cited to you:
“Evidence for climate change in the satellite cloud record
[…]
The primary drivers of these cloud changes appear to be increasing greenhouse gas concentrations and a recovery from volcanic radiative cooling. These results indicate that the cloud changes most consistently predicted by global climate models are currently occurring in nature.
[…]
Our results suggest that radiative forcing by a combination of anthropogenic greenhouse gases and volcanic aerosol has produced observed cloud changes during the past several decades that exert positive feedbacks on the climate system. We expect increasing greenhouse gases will cause these cloud trends to continue in the future unless offset by unpredictable large volcanic eruptions.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature18273
Re: “Can you identify the physical principle?”
Already explained to you; you’re simply willfully ignoring it. Once again:
“Clouds reflect solar radiation into space and thus can act as a negative feedback in response to warming; clouds also reflect/absorb radiation emitted by the Earth and thus can act as a positive feedback in response to warming. Lower level clouds tend to act as a negative feedback, while higher level clouds tend to act as a positive feedback. Climate models predict a net positive feedback from clouds due to increases in higher level clouds and reductions in lower level clouds in response to warming.”
https://judithcurry.com/2018/07/22/the-perils-of-near-tabloid-science/#comment-877593
You’d be aware of this if you read the relevant scientific literature, for once. For example:
“Processes responsible for cloud feedback”
“An analysis of the short-term cloud feedback using MODIS data”
“Thermodynamic control of anvil cloud amount”
Re: “Can you point to any example?”
Already cited you examples; you just willfully side-step them. For example:
“Clearing clouds of uncertainty”
“Evidence for climate change in the satellite cloud record”
“A net decrease in the Earth’s cloud, aerosol, and surface 340 nm reflectivity during the past 33 yr (1979–2011)”
“A determination of the cloud feedback from climate variations over the past decade”
“Cloud feedback mechanisms and their representation in global climate models”
“New observational evidence for a positive cloud feedback that amplifies the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation”
“Impact of dataset choice on calculations of the short-term cloud feedback”
“Long-term cloud change imprinted in seasonal cloud variation: More evidence of high climate sensitivity”
“Thermodynamic constraint on the depth of the global tropospheric circulation”
https://judithcurry.com/2018/07/22/the-perils-of-near-tabloid-science/#comment-877593
I even quoted that second paper for you again above.
Re: Models are predictions, in this case of the unpredictable, not observations.”
As I showed above, you’re just willfully evading what the observations show (observation from research I cited to you), since you’re committed to saying the observations don’t match the models. For example, here’s a couple of the papers I cited for you, which you continue to ignore:
“New observational evidence for a positive cloud feedback that amplifies the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation”
“Evidence for climate change in the satellite cloud record
[…]
Observed and simulated cloud change patterns are consistent with poleward retreat of mid-latitude storm tracks, expansion of subtropical dry zones, and increasing height of the highest cloud tops at all latitudes. […] These results indicate that the cloud changes most consistently predicted by global climate models are currently occurring in nature.”
Computations are all over the place.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2016GL071978
Low level marine cloud overe the east and central Pacific is the dominant source of global cloud variability. (Clement et al 2009)
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/325/5939/460
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-17-0208.1
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/2016GL071978
et.c etc. Decadal change at least is dominated by intrinsic climate variability. Sucks eggs to be Atomski.
Mannkind..
A flush of brilliance.
An adjustment.
Of course.
A consensus of climate scientists.
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Accounting for changing temperature patterns increases historical estimates of climate sensitivity
“Accounting for changing temperature patterns increases historical estimates of climate sensitivity byTimothy Andrews Jonathan M. Gregory David Paynter Levi G. Silvers Chen Zhou Thorsten Mauritsen Mark J. Webb Kyle C. Armour Piers M. Forster Holly Titchner” ..
JCH
“This is due to a ‘pattern effect’ whereby the pattern of observed historical SST change gives rise to more negative cloud and LW clear‐sky feedbacks.”
–
Perhaps someone should give them a nudge to explain that one cannot have both more negative cloud and more negative LW clear sky feedbacks at the same time in a model?
If there is more cloud there is less clear sky and one cannot have both mechanisms operating at the same time, can one. By definition.
If on the other hand both clear sky and cloudy sky produce negative feedback on GHG models why did the clever modellers not include such a marvel of modern science in the first place.
I see it is in pre publish phase, perhaps some would like to jump ship?
Good luck to your nonsense.
Some of it, a little, on reflection, might be nonsense, sad to say. Based on a shoot first, proofread later philosophy that gets me into trouble.
“ the pattern effect increases the long‐term Otto et al. (2013) EffCS median and 5‐95% confidence interval from 1.9K (0.9‐5.0K) to 3.2K (1.5‐8.1”
–
The observed ECS is1.9K.
This is too low for theory that demands an ECS of 3.2.
This is the response expected and shown “by coupled simulations of the response to CO2 quadrupling.” Why a simple maths formula is called a simulation one can only wonder.
Therefore we run the models again (8 this time) showing ECS of 1.9 similar to (and hence proving) the 2013 study by Otto.
(Eight Atmospheric General Circulation Models (AGCMs) are forced with observed historical (1871‐2010) monthly sea‐surface‐temperature (SST)
–
and we blame this on clouds and clear sky which were both abundant in the historical data.
By bundling 2 exactly opposite explanations we can double the negative feedback claim.
Which conveniently (neither was sufficient on its own) adds the needed extra 1.3K to the ECS.
Then we state that this abnormal local set of events for 140 long years, that is both more clear sky and more clouds at the same time, will never happen again?
Back to the drawing board.
I hope the authors see these comments and reflect and withdraw.
I hope JCH sees the error.
JCH, best of luck with the global temps this month. Like on the Arctic Sea ice blog you can tell by the paucity of comments when results are not going your way. Unless you are playing the rope a dope game your failure to mention GISS and UAH and El Niño over the last 3 weeks means a temp drop of 0.04, hopefully more is a Monty, a lay down misere etc etc.
What on earth are you smoking?
https://i.imgur.com/HFcZ3Dx.png
Good thing about climate there is always next month
What on earth do you think is going to happen? Global cooling? Lol. You seem to think skeptics have a better argument. They don’t. Their arguments are junk.
Pray for the devine wind. It’s your only shot.
I’ve been at a music camp jamming bluegrass all day and well into the night.
Well then, that explains it.
That’s it ? 0.048C on a non GISS or UAH data set. Guess I will wait for the real news.
And you won’t like it.
UAH might as well be LSD.
UAH, which is worthless, reports +0.32 ℃, the highest monthly anomaly of 2018. Lick it and have a nice trip.
Atomsk’s Sanakan: . There’s a reason informed experts (who are more likely to actually read up on the evidence) tend to agree on these things, while it’s ideologically-motivated crackpots online who claim to doubt them.
For some important examples of agreement among informed experts that turns out to be unsupportable by evidence readers might be interested in the NAS publication Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward. The PDF is available for free at
http://nap.edu/12589 .
There are other published studies of the overconfidence of panels of informed experts that have been referred to at CE. Some critics of informed experts are ideologically-motivated crackpots, as are some supporters of those same experts. But not all critics of informed experts are crackpots, and some of the criticisms are important.
Re: “For some important examples of agreement among informed experts that turns out to be unsupportable by evidence readers might be interested in the NAS publication Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward.”
… you say, as you cite a document written and agreed to by informed experts.
I didn’t claimed that informed experts are infallible. The point is that non-experts should rely on the expertise of informed experts, unless non-experts are willing to look up the evidence to become informed experts themselves. So claiming that experts have been wrong before, or made uninformed claims before, has no effect on the point I made.
To claim otherwise, would be as silly as claiming that people shouldn’t bother listening to their doctors anymore when it comes to medicine, since at some point doctors once made a false claim. Reliability does not require perfection. And experts are more likely to know what they’re doing than are willfully ignorant non-experts.
Re: “But not all critics of informed experts are crackpots, and some of the criticisms are important.”
The vast majority of criticisms offered on this website are merit-less and appear to be crack-pottery. That’s quite easy to tell when one reads the peer-reviewed, published evidence, examine the fallacious (often paranoid) reasoning behind these criticisms, etc. They have more in common with the criticism from AIDS denialists and flat Earthers towards informed experts.
A S
“The vast majority of criticisms offered on this website are merit-less and appear to be crack-pottery.”
After seeing your name or comments here 96 times in 392 comments I thought I might congratulate you on your perspicacity and ability but this particular criticism is unfortunately full of merit.
Atomsk’s Sanakan: The vast majority of criticisms offered on this website are merit-less and appear to be crack-pottery.
I don’t think that is true of the “vast majority” of criticisms of the CAGW school of thought. Maybe someone has done a tally? Promoters of CAGW, here at least, object to the label “catastrophic” while going along with some version or another of “extremely harmful negative consequences”. Most of the criticisms here are of the “extreme” claims: high sensitivity to CO2; really rapid temperature increase; extinction of populations of small marine invertebrates; gross damage to ecosystems (by CO2-induced warming; acceptance of consequences of land use changes); plus some details, such as fit of models to data (e.g. hot spot).
As to policy, there are critics of investment in costly CO2 reduction. And most are based on solid evidence or solid reasoning from physics and other fields of science.
Which of my criticisms did you identify as “crack-pottery”?
“The point is that non-experts should rely on the expertise of informed experts, unless non-experts are willing to look up the evidence to become informed experts themselves.”
So I should rely on economists when I invest my retirement money. No. Stockbrokers? No.
It’s clear you shouldn’t do your own income tax return and instread hire people like me.
When I raise my kids, I’ll read peer reviewed science on that subject once a week.
When I discuss school district finances, I’ll learn accounting first or ask an accountant who has investigated my district.
Before I vote, I’ll read peer review science or just ask some college professor that teaches on the subject.
Before I attempt to ride a motorcycle, I’ll consult with a physicist and request peer reviewed science covering cornering physics.
Except, this is America. Land of the Free and home of the Brave. We don’t want to be ruled by experts. When 9 out of 10 experts agree, we want to talk to hear what the 10th one has to say. Because we believe in diversity.
You don’t see us snowflaking when someone comes to an institution of experts to say something that might offend us. And I think that’s because we are confident in ourselves and we aren’t listening to experts that say we shouldn’t be. Because if they were really smart, the problems that makes them lose sleep would already be solved. I don’t want an expert that only tells me there is a problem. I don’t want an expert to tell me I am the problem. He’s the problem and should have listened the libertarians instead of listening to and voting for a bunch of witless politicians.
In the history of experts that haven’t solved a problem they have claimed to identify, no group has matched climate scientists to the extent they have failed to solve the problem while inflicting so much economic dysfunction on the world.
Ragnaar
Having been a motorcycle mechanic, plus success at racing motorcycles (GP), designing and building frames etc, may I offer the following advice.
1 – under about 30 km per hour turn the handlebars left to go left,
2 – over about 30kph turn the handlebars right to turn left, but do it gently the faster you go.
When you are in a fast sweeper and you want to increase the angle of lean gently push the inside handlebar forward, the geometry of the steering head and forks will tip you in.
This has saved you the cost of the physicist.
I would also suggest that you take a ride with the chap in the video below – Michael Dunlop of Ireland, a very talented rider. The video is a lap of the Isle of Man TT where he set the outright lap record at >133 mph average. He will know more than your physicist anyway, and you can always ask his peers for a review of his riding as they are usually behind him so they get a great first hand look.
Regards
ozonebust:
That’s a good video. The question might be, Why do I ride my Nighthawk 450? It’s dangerous. I can be at the mercy of those people that left turn in front of us. Dunlop in the video is in what I call, a state of grace. Each turn has an optimal solution. It is solved, close enough, most of the time, without a sliderule. Dunlop does what he does and he doesn’t need an expert on the course with him.
More than 30 years after I rode my 125 two cycle as a teenager, I decided I wanted a motorcycle. Honda’s parallel twin was my answer. 3000 miles later and I’ve had no mechanical or other problems.
On the subject of physics, being of the Wile E. Coyote school of physics, I’ve drawn up vector diagrams of a motorcycle in a turn. To tighten a turn, oops I am too fast, you push more on the lower handle bar.
To return to the weeds, the Dunlop video above illustrates the order of ECS science and the chaos of the climate. He on the track, navigates between order and chaos.
Ragnaar
Mr Dunlop does not see it as chaotic. He has enormous feel and sensitivity. He feels everything down to the precise level of adhesion between the rubber and the road. If you watch the video again listen to the sound of the motor, a lot of his directional control is through the throttle, along with maintaining speed.
From my observations the climate is not chaotic. It is complex, intimately interconnected, hierarchical, with a high level of annual repeatability, almost to the day.
Temperature anomalies are taken at face value with little interest in the mechanisms that control them. During periods of increased tropical evaporation downstream mechanisms change affecting the anomalies producing a high latitude NH bias.
Temperature is the primary value used to indicate the current state. No consideration is given to the annual efficiency of earths systems to remove ocean heat and it is assumed that all evaporation releases 100% of the heat to space. This appears not to be the case.
Regards
What do 1000’s of climate experts agree on? There are greenhouse gases? Nearly all recent warming was anthropogenic? Climate change is predominantly intrinsic at decadal scales at least. So I don’t believe the second is proved. As Wunsch said – very little in climate science is.
In 2010. Before he dot a full dose of the genuinely deplorable. And, he explains himself one H of lot better than you do.
Well it would be difficult to explain myself worse than this deplorable example.
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I believe that climate change is real, a major threat, and almost surely has a major human-induced component.
The science of climate change remains incomplete. Some elements are so firmly based on well-understood principles, or for which the observational record is so clear, that most scientists would agree that they are almost surely true (adding CO2 to the atmosphere is dangerous; sea level will continue to rise,…).
Of course climate change is real. It’s the consensus science that denies (natural) climate change since the mid-20th century. Their best estimate is total denial – there is only the human induced component.
http://www.realclimate.org/images/ipcc_fig_10.5.jpg
These are the IPCC warming trends over the 1951 – 2010 period.
They do not ignore natural variation.
Meanwhile, the 30-year trend continues to rise despite back-to-back La Niña events, and the forecasts for an El Niño are not backing off, July 31st:
https://i.imgur.com/02fp35E.png
+ .2 ℃ per decade possible in 2019.
Here it is in plain sight, the denial of climate change denial.
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In case you forgot:
Michael Mann — Extreme Weather Is The Face Of Climate Change
“This is the face of climate change. We literally would not have seen these extremes in the absence of climate change,” he says, “The impacts of climate change are no longer subtle. We are seeing them play out in real time and what is happening this summer is a perfect example of that. We are seeing our predictions come true. As a scientist that is reassuring, but as a citizen of planet Earth, it is very distressing to see that as it means we have not taken the necessary action.”
https://cleantechnica.com/2018/07/31/michael-mann-extreme-weather-is-the-face-of-climate-change/
The tragedy of the discussions in this post so far is their display of poor science in action.
People are peddling favorite interpretations of the studies of other people. That is not good science. That is more akin to science journalism, which has never enjoyed a high reputation. (Some, like me, doubt it is needed).
Here are two fundamental questions. Until they can be answered, climate ‘science’ should continue to be regarded with scepticism.
1. What is the proper value of climate sensitivity, however defined, if it is not zero?
2. What method can discriminate between climate changes caused by Man and those that happen naturally?
These are foundation questions and climate ‘science’ has failed to provide an answer after 50 years of talk-fest and imitation of proper science.
Geoff.
Geoff
Your two questions are highly relevant, however they are not foundation questions but end game answers.
Basic unknowns such as
1. The churn cycle of ocean heat not released by evaporation at the instant of occurrence.
2. What is the efficiency if the atmospheric system to remove surface evaporation.
3. When evaporation does occur what proportion of that uplift results in 100% heat release and what proportion falls back to earth as warm water.
If you look at the Greenland ice accumulation this year compared to others this gives an isolated example of heat removal variability.
In Florida one year complaints of continuous extreme humidity are caused by inadequacy of the atmospheric systems to remove and redistribute that water vapor from surrounding ocean surface. The system has choked leaving heat in the ocean.
When I buy an air conditioning unit it comes with a performance plate on the side. We haven’t found earths sticker yet so therefore your answers are to be found sometime in the future. There are many more examples to those above that are not considered or understood.
Regards
In several places above there are comments like “It’s also why people rely on doctors, and expert specialists like oncologists, to give them medical advice.”
It is silly to compare medical doctors and specialists to other groups of scientists, with the inference being that climate ‘scientists’ have ethics and morals and general conduct akin to medicos. They do not.
Medicos are required to pass specific tests before they gain an official licence, that enables them to do things to other people that are forbidden to the public in general. The medicos are also accountable; should one cause excess harm, there are procedures for review and punishment, often including jail terms. Medicos (mostly) do not tout or advertise or advocate.
The climate people, OTOH, are generally not licenced; they do not sit for specific tests of proficiency; and they are for all practical purposes, unaccountable to the public.
The usual climate advocate can and does utter words of great ignorance. A common theme at present concerns the scare of increased extreme events, when in reality there is no such increase for most climate matters we might fear. One does not hear of medicos going public to pontificate that people will die unless they start to take large synthetic doses of multi-vitamins. Alternative medicine advocates do, so there goes their reputation.
A basic observation is missing from the chatter on this post. It concerns the evidence of past public scare movements. The mechanics of the lase scare are detailed well by Edith Efron in her book ‘The Apocalyptics’, about the USA 1970-80 prediction that an epidemic of cancers has commenced from the use of man-made chemicals. Through the early stages of this largely governmental scare, there was a false plausibility. What if it was correct? We should ban man-made chemicals as fast as we can? The climate scare in progress has yet to reach the blinding truth stage. We are still at the “CO2 is evil, ban it” stage.
Some skeptics are themselves scientists with good track records. Those who would label them ‘denialists’ have lost their claim to credibility. Science is not an opinion poll. It relies heavily on the reproducibility of observation and measurement, of which there is a distinct lack among the climate fraternity.
Geoff.
Sorry to rain on Judy’s factoid parade but ss Europe bakes in another heatwave, all-time temperature records may fall in the coming days.
The current European record, 48C (118.4F) was set in Athens in 1977.
Temperatures are rising in Spain and Portugal, and today’s forecast for southern Spain and southeastern Portugal is 47C (116.6F).
The Portugugese national record iof 47.4C (117.3F), was set in 2003. Spain’s peak of 47.3C (117.1F) was recorded last July.
Cue sputtering noises from Anthony Watt’s backyard- the ge=reen & leafy suburbs of LA reached 120 F last month.
So, the current European record was set in the coldest decade of the AGW period (70s). Interesting.
Not even remotely interesting. The hottest day in my home state’s record was set just a few miles from my Dad’s ranch in 1936: 120 F. That record was tied in 2011, which was, a relatively cold year.
Warmists often bring up heatwaves and temperature records as evidence, not only for warming, but for AGW. It’s interesting in that context.
Since we are swimming in CO2 as compared to 1936, the extreme was in 1936.
Well, the soil is described as black (medium to dark gray,) and they called it the Dust Bowl because they were swimming in it.
Both photos were taken less than 100 miles from the ranch:
https://i.imgur.com/TNnD9Te.png
https://i.imgur.com/XQrKGjw.png
The shorter the term and the smaller scale that any phenomenon exhibits, the less likely it has anything to do with global warming?
I think that’s probably the case.
Global warming is the general, not the specific heatwave, which, just like past events, is caused by fluctuation of dynamic circulation.
In fact, the earliest models of Manabe, and others since indicate a decrease of temperature variability with increasing global mean temperature. How could that be? If mean latent heat increases, modeled by increased water vapor, then the turbulent thermal exchange of any two “parcels” of air becomes more efficient.
+1000
Two of my polar blogs neven and tony have diametrically opposed ice stories. According to Neven Wadham is lurking around the corner with a blowtorch melting the ice.
Tony says it is going to be the least melted ice year in decades.
They both have access to the wide range of partly conflicting data sources.
Help!
Angech is referring to Tony Watts.
My interpretation would be that the Arctic ice was holding up quite well until mid July but has dropped considerably since then.
Much of what is recorded as melt might be melt ponds on top of the ice, so until later in the season we can’t be sure exactly what is happening, but I would say the ice extent is going to go into winter at a relatively low level
tonyb
Arctic ice extent has been below two standard deviations of the 1981-2010 median for the entire year to date. For some of that period, it has been at all time record lows for the time of year.
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
Arctic ice volume is below it’s long term trend, which is, of course, downwards.
http://psc.apl.uw.edu/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/schweiger/ice_volume/BPIOMASIceVolumeAnomalyCurrentV2.1.png
To summarise this as “holding up well until mid July” could be a great example of near-tabloid science.
VTG
Take it up with NSIDC and Neven
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
tonyb
“Take it up with NSIDC and Neven”
I see no mention of “holding up well” at your link.
Indeed, they seem to agree with what I said, for instance “by July 31 daily extent tracked fourth lowest in the satellite record”
Which is unsurprising, as they were the source for my data.
VTG
Why are you twisting my words?. I never said it was holding up well.(your 11.57) I said it was holding up quite well which is a substantial qualification. It was coming up to within the range, then dropped quite considerably in july to fall well below the range. This is apparent on the graph.
Do you also disagree that ice extent is going to go into winter at a relatively low level?
tonyb
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/FullSize_CICE_combine_thick_SM_EN_20180602_shadow.png
Maybe holding up is a relative term.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/FullSize_CICE_combine_thick_SM_EN_20080602_shadow.png
Compared to 2008, things are looking up. An old proverb of ancient cultures front centuries ago. “First the volume, then the extent.”
My apologies for omitting the word “quite”. My mistake, no twisting intended.
Error corrected, I fail to see how being constantly beyond two standard deviations of the historical median, and sometimes at record lows constitutes “holding up quite well”.
I’d contend that “continuing its consistent long term decline” would be a more reasonable description.
“Compared to 2008, things are looking up”
Wow. There’s a word for that.
The 1000 mile journey starts with a first step.
They’re ain’t gonna be no journey. The negative phase of the AMO is not coming to save the world. Nor is the stadium wave. ACO2 is the control knob of the 21st-century climate. Up up and away.
Extent change is also due to cyclone break up. Might lead to more melt, might lead to thickening. Depends on winds, currents, turbulence.
” Depends on winds, currents, turbulence.”
Yes, the consistent trend over 40 years is definitely down to winds, currents and turbulence.
Evidence suggests mostly currents for long term trend, which is probably fueled somewhat by GHGs.
“Evidence suggests mostly currents for long term trend”
Citation required.
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/04/warm-atlantic-waters-wage-new-assault-arctic-ice-below
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/1046/warm-rivers-play-role-in-arctic-sea-ice-melt/
https://phys.org/news/2017-04-eastern-arctic-ocean-atlantification.html
Aaron,
Your cite does not remotely support your claim “mostly currents for long term trend”.
Did you even read it?
Try again.
That was for the first cite. The second explicitly attributes the changes to warming atmosphere.
Are you *trying* to undermine your own case?
We in the Southern Hemisphere are distant from the daily distraction of Arctic ice sweepstakes and half a year out of phase.
Some of us feel it more productive to research ways in which natural variation can be distinguished from anthropogenic. That topic, still lacking an answer, seems to have more value. Geoff.
https://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/why-arctic-sea-ice-is-shrinking.html
Geoff, yup. Good on you.
We have little data on the arctic. And ice seems to decline gradually and build quickly.
That is the question.
“JCHAugust 3, 2018 at 11:37 PM
BoM models apparently are not forecasting an El Niño in 2018.”
–
Now if I could only find his recent quotes onEl Niño.
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