by Judith Curry
Today I’m participating in a panel on K-12 education, hosted by the National Association of Scholars.
You can watch the event on youtube. The even is launching a new document called the Franklin Standards on K-12 education, which are available online link
JC’s remarks
Hello everyone. I appreciate the opportunity to participate in this panel.
Let me start off by saying that I would be delighted to teach freshman college students that had been taught the content that Franklin proposes.
I strongly endorse Franklin’s recommendations on teaching Scientific Inquiry, History of Science, and Engineering and Technology.
I also abhor the creep of activism and equity into the K-12 curriculum.
That said, I see several broad issues facing the K-12 curriculum, that the Franklin Standards doesn’t directly address.
I would first like to address the motivation of students to study science. In the spirit of Ben Franklin, the Franklin Standards emphasizes curiosity as a motivator, and I agree that this is particularly important in the earlier grade levels. However, nurturing curiosity is not sufficient motivation to increase the number of students majoring in STEM subjects in university. The spirit of Ben Franklin is not just about curiosity, but also about inventions that improve our lives, and political philosophy that provides a societal context for science. These additional dimensions make science more interesting and important to high school students. and help provide motivations to explore a career in STEM fields.
The Franklin Standards emphasize content, which I agree is important. However, the best content won’t produce good learning outcomes without effective pedagogy. I’ve seen that many high school students entering university who have taken AP science courses retain little of the material and show essentially no operational ability to draw on the relevant content. And of course, less motivated students retain even less of the content that they were taught. By contrast, some students have an excellent operational grasp of what they were taught in high school. Invariably, these students had teachers that challenged them not just with content, but engaged them in active learning.
The neuroscience of active learning shows that the more we can activate students’ brains in different ways, the more they learn. I’ve seen this in my own teaching. I include this topic as a result of discussions with my granddaughter, who just finished 8th grade in an accelerated academic program. She has an innate interest in science, but said her science classes were the most boring. The teacher taught a lot of content, but didn’t provide any context for the importance of what they were learning. The labs were pure cookbook, with no opportunity for critical thinking. Surprisingly, she thought her math teacher did a better job, with less obvious material for engagement. Pedagogy matters, and inquiry-based learning is important for the strongest science students.
The Franklin Standards recognizes that there are dual objectives of science education. The first is that of pre-professional education, addressing the needs of students such as my granddaughter. The second is the citizen-focused need to have an understanding of the complex world that they will confront as citizens over their lifespan.
I’ve been asked to comment on the importance of Franklin Standards for the public understanding of science and scientific debate, particularly with reference to climate science.
A major concern raised by the Franklin Standards document is the politicization of the science curriculum and activism. I agree that this is a huge problem. However, apparently strong science content education in the high school curriculum hasn’t inoculated many A students from being convinced that humans face extinction from climate change, and that they can change their sex. I encountered some of these students in the lawsuit filed by Our Children’s Trust against the State of Montana. Where a number of very bright native American high school students were convinced that human-caused climate change was an existential threat to their future.
There are several problems here. Even if schools have a state- or district-adopted curriculum, that doesn’t mean that it’s getting taught. Further, children are being taught materials at the discretion of the individual teacher that have no official oversight or approval.
The bigger issue is that societally-relevant issues related to health, the environment, and climate change are deeply complex, and fraught with ethical ambiguities. It’s naïve to think that providing students with fundamental science content will arm them against wrong beliefs. When experts disagree on both the problems and their solutions.
Engaging students with the societal context for science, both current and historical, not only increases their learning potential and motivation for learning science, but it can also support critical thinking about complex issues facing society.
How is this to be accomplished? We should work to integrate science more broadly across the curriculum. Not just mathematics, but also social studies and English and Language Arts. Among other things, such integration effectively increases the amount of time in the school day that includes science. But more importantly, it promotes critical thinking about complex scientific topics and societal issues.
Instead of endless history courses on wars, why not a course on the History of Science and Discovery? The Franklin curriculum includes material about famous scientists, which can be motivational. But there’s opportunity and need for much more, integrating inquiry and discovery with the history and the social context of science. As an example, Isaac Asimov’s book, Chronology of science and discovery, beautifully describes how science has shaped the world and how it interfaces with technology. Bill Bryson’s A short history of everything is another good resource, describing the events, conversations, feuds, competitions and necessities that drove science forward. Such a course would be motivational for strong students that are potential STEM majors, as well as providing interesting and accessible material to students who find the math and science curriculum to be difficult. With suitable examples, such a course could provide societal context for the science and discovery, and help inoculate against politicized science and enforced consensus.
The bottom line is to promote independent thought and critical thinking, about pure science, technology and related societal issues. This is important for motivating students for the pre-professional track as well as for general education to sensibly think about the increasingly complex science related issues that they will encounter .
Thank you
Judy: Thank you for posting your contribution on this panel. I fully support your recommendations here. Curiosity is an essential element of scientific discovery. The development of a course curriculum for the history of science is an excellent suggestion. I am reminded of the James Burke TV series in the late 1970s exploring the unexpected connections in some notable scientific discoveries. As you are also aware, Carl Sagan’s TV series COSMOS (and its second and excellent installment by Leo de-Grasse Tyson) are wonderful roadmaps that could also be used to help develop several courses for the K-12 levels. Please keep me posted. MikeMont.
In an age where Franklin’s American Philosophical Society still distills intellectual excellence at the expense of bipartisan colloquy, it’s sad to see Judith invoke Isaac Asimov as a scientific historian rather than a prolific recycler of encyclopedia articles.
Simplifying the history of science can only widen the gap between the aspirations of the National Association of Scholars and the hegemonic lock on high production value, republican-free science popularization enjoyed by the American Academy, the AAAS and their anthropological and linguistic studies counterparts.
” . . .republican-free science popularization . . .”
Omega Tau Phi
“…(and its second and excellent installment by Leo de-Grasse Tyson) are wonderful roadmaps…”
I loved the Carl Sagan Cosmos but I remember there were people that hated it, mostly due to Sagan’s secular views. I was very disappointed with the Neil de-Grasse Tyson Cosmos because it was clearly political, focusing its conclusion that James Hansen is a modern hero due to his discovery of climate change. And Hansen’s story followed the discovery of environmental lead coming from leaded gasoline, making the whole project about oil companies being a great evil controlled by evil men bent on destroying the planet but not for a few good scientists. Cosmos II was like the the 1619 project for American science.
Sagan failed to credit Jacob Brownovski’s Ascent of Man for the intellectual scaffolding of the Cosmos script, and Alexander von Humboldt , both for its title, and being the first to pen an all encompassing grand tour of the universe as science reveals it.
DeGrasse had the grace to mention Humboldt early on in the PBS remake, and the sense to prune away Sagan’s attempt to portray “nuclear winter” as something more than a Cold War political gambit.
Ron, I tried to forget material that mentioned Science Fiction genres because they were based on imagination; and imagination is not science – though it can assist students to enjoy and study more science. Geoff S
Science fiction has its value, but it depends on the source. A good source extrapolates on good science; a bad source extrapolates on bad religion.
Below two examples of ‘theory’ and ‘practice’.
Jacob Bronowski
“It is important that students bring a certain ragamuffin, barefoot irreverence to their studies; they are not here to worship what is known, but to question it.”
Arthur C. Clarke and the Global Communications Satellite
https://web.mit.edu/m-i-t/science_fiction/jenkins/jenkins_4.html
Thank you Michael. Like you, I thought of James Burke’s series, which offered wonderful linkages between basic discoveries, economic developments and technological breakthroughs. As a former teacher, I found students to be most inspired when challenged to see such connections. Later, it was interesting to see how scientists can often be expected to produce advances on demand, without their ‘patrons’ appreciating how such advances might actually happen. Terry
Reluctant to score past gurus of the philosophy of science, but I would have neither Carl Sagan nor de-Grasse Tyson high on the list, or even on it.
Mathematician and Philosopher Jacob Bronowski (1908 – 1974) was commandingly erudite at an early time inthe insertion of mass media into the discusion, particularly with the TV series “Ascent of Man”.
Geoff S
From Judith’s comment in the next to last paragraph – “Instead of endless history courses on wars, why not a course on the History of Science and Discovery?”
A broad understanding of history is very important :
vaclav Smil has written several good books well worth reading and understanding.
How the World Really Works: A Scientist’s Guide to Our Past, Present and Future
Judith’s comment mentions wars – Victor Hanson book – “the second world wars” has an excellent introductory chapter on the geopolitical causes for most wars throughout history. Compare and contrast the history of the cause of wars and its quickly obvious the current talking point that climate change will cause future wars is nothing but a joke.
The “History of Wars” has been questioned by some for about the past near sixty years. What archaeology had for many years considered as the destruction of human conflicts now more than before is being seen as periodic natural destructions.
Maybe an expansive subject to have to prepare, but it is what the real evidence and the fruits of much dedicated research is showing. The old taught material is in conflict with a Youtube piece on the same matter, when one is clearly out-dated and the other ill prepared.
Good thoughts. I took NYS Regents Earth Science in the 9th grade from Mr. Babcock. His idea of laboratory work was to lead us out into the world and have us come up with real rather than cookbook lab manual problems. One I remember is the “puddle watch” where we went out to a puddle after a rainstorm, measured the size and depth of the puddle, and then went back every day measuring the same things as well as temperature and humidity. And then watching as mud cracks developed and sketching their geometry as they shrank in a “science notebook”. Other trips went to fossil locations and sedimentary rock locations.
When my parents took us kids to their hunting lodge near the NY-Pennsylvania border, I started hiking up through the fields and found different rock types including those with brachiopods.
Much later, I found out that Mr. Babcock had won a NY State “outstanding science teacher” award. Not surprised.
My Ph.D. advisor, the late Gil Hanson, had a similar philosophy: “Geology starts when you walk out the door”. All you had to do was look and think.
Yep, pedagogy matters.
With the global warming hoax and for all of those who have respect for truth for its own sake and as bad as it now is for trust in the authority of science, nothing is ever so bad as when no one will listen. That is why America owes denier William Gray and Kyoto-fighter George Bush so many kudos for standing tall against the nihilism of the Left’s Doomsday Global Warming Machine when it was the most hard for anyone to do that. There is a lot of despair and suffering in doing the right thing when others won’t.
When people agree that patterns and relationships between things are not well understood no one is surprised that events are unpredictable. When we run into problems is when people like — for example, Al Gore a seminary school dropout, Leftist, lifetime politician coming from a background of entitlement and privilege — is allowed to make the case (for political and ideological purposes) that everything is very well understood and anyone who cannot appreciate that fact is an idiot. That is when everything becomes Oh so predictable. And, that is what has lead to the sacrifice of individual liberty on the altar of self-interested government action against CO2 and the attempted takeover of energy and by extension the economy. That is what liberal fascism is all about.
“Your typical right wing climate denial organization trying to indoctrinate children in right wing ideology.”
As opposed to the current far left woke indoctrination?
The US is falling far behind other industrialized countries in math, science and history. Yet the current woke indoctrination wants to focus on CRT, DEI, racism, transgender, etc. You should welcome the shift back to the core subjects.
that is in reply to HJordan | June 18, 2024 at 2:33 pm | Reply
In my editorial experience , SJW indoctrination and WSJ indoctrination are equally expendable.
There is no organized attempt on the left to indoctrinate anyone. The problem is that FACTS do not support conservative ideology. It’s not progressives that want slavery portrayed as something beneficial. It’s not progressives that are banning books that don’t conform to ideology. It’s not progressives that want creationism taught in science classes. Evolution is science. Creationism is not.
Would you like conservative economic ideology taught in economics class? You know, the ideology that caused the Great Depression, the Great Recession, income inequality, and massive debt and deficits. The problem is not a bias against conservative ideas. It’s that conservative ideas don’t work. Conservatism is a lot of bad ideas wrapped in a pack of lies.
It’s getting harder and harder to deny climate science. The summer is just getting started and we have two large wildfires out west. We’ve had massive flooding in TX and FL. Deadly heat waves. Hurricane season is just gettin started. What we are seeing is not natural variability. Over 60% of the public believe climate change is happening and want something done about it other than wait and see. It hard to argue against the science when people can look out a window and know something is wrong.
H Jordan | June 18, 2024 at 3:57 pm | Reply
Thanks for confirming that you have been fully indoctrinated by the woke left. With the exception of your comment on evolution, your entire tirade speaks volumes about the level of success the indoctrinators have achieved.
You don’t really believe that Mr. Alinsky existed.
I’m haven’t been indoctrinated. I can back up everything I said.
Let’s talk about math education. The first thing I’ll say is that good students have good parents who are proactive in their child’s education. By that I don’t mean the idiots who storm school board meetings screaming that what their children are being taught is woke — whatever that means — or they let their inner Nazi out and want to ban books.
Why don’t kids get math? The problem is how it is taught. The classical way of teaching it is to teach the mechanics of math. They learn how to add and subtract, multiply and divide. What they are not taught is why that works. Why that gives you the right answer. You’re given an equation to solve but no one ever explains where that equation comes from and what it represents.
Math is not about memorization or mechanics. It’s about reasoning. Students are expected to make the “leap” to reasoning on their own. When I was in high school we were studying parabolas. On a graph a parabola looks like a mountain. There are equation to determine the peak location from the equation for the parabola. We were assigned a problem for extra credit. I don’t remember much about the problem except it involved a deck of cards. There was no equation given. I stared at that problem for an hour and then it dawned on me. I could solve it by using the data from the problem to write a quadratic equation and the solution is the peak of the parabola. We had 30 people in that class and 3 got the problem right. 90% of the people in that class didn’t understand how to use math.
There was an attempt to change how math was taught to emphasize math reasoning. It was called “new math.” Parents complained about it because they didn’t understand it. No $hit! They suck at math. They went back to the old way and we still are getting lousy results. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
Income inequality will exist no matter what is done. It’s a fact of life, like the Sun. Very, very few countries come close to achieving it. And governments that you probably like will likewise have an upper class: the members of the government. It’s inescapable.
Socialist and Communist ideas don’t work either, H.
Intelligent children will “get math” and science no matter what. The less intelligent will understand less. It has nothing to do with the way it’s taught. Proactive parents will take away the power of the “progressive” state by home schooling their kids, their way, in the light of their culture.
H Jordan | June 18, 2024 at 5:48 pm |
“I’m haven’t been indoctrinated. I can back up everything I said.”
Yes you have been fully indoctrinated. As previously stated, with the exception of your comment on evolution, everything you stated is from the delusional woke playbook.
First of all, I agree with the points I think you are trying to make about indoctrination by so called conservatives. But your last comments betray some flimsy reasoning. Just because 60% of people have a particular view, doesn’t mean it is justified by the evidence, and looking out a window is, well… you might want to look up the meaning of the term “availability heuristic”.
I’d prefer not to use terms like “right/left” “progressive/conservative”. Propositions are either supported by evidence or not, depending on what the underlying assumptions are. If people want to start with their ideological conclusion and work back from there, its not really the basis for a discussion. They need to go back to logic 101.
You already mentioned evolution/creation, which is low hanging fruit. I would go further on issues like guns and abortion, which are even more important (IMO) because being a doctor and public health researcher, these are massively important in terms of the burden of disease. For some reason many on both sides of the right/left in the US think it is a good idea that people be allowed to carry loaded weapons in public, and to keep them in their home, when this is the cause of over 30,000 preventable deaths per year and probably twice as many injuries (ie. More than what would be the case if the US had similar gun ownership and laws as say Canada or Australia). But rather than mass shootings in schools (which make the news), most are suicides, and a small but significant number are accidents, some of which involve young children. This is despite the 2nd amendment (to my non US constitutional lawyer perspective) meaning that people shouldn’t own weapons unless they are part of a well-regulated militia. Somehow the right wing and the SCOTUS have interpreted that as meaning any teenage psychopath with a death wish.
Ditto abortion, which the Dobbs decision has resulted in thousands of women loosing their rights to control their own life, even though (again only my interpretation as a utilitarian Australian doctor, not a US constitutional law expert) the 14th Amendment clearly states that people only attain rights as US citizen after they are born (or naturalized), so therefore fetal personhood does not legally exist (except in the minds of certain religious conservatives). There are lots of reasons to regulate and control reproductive medicine, but restricting a woman’s right to choose prior to viability doesn’t add up from a benefit/harm perspective in my opinion.
What I would like you to consider though is what is the cost / benefit analysis in regards climate change and what do we do about it. I don’t think there are many (or any) people who “deny” the underlying physics and chemistry of CO2 emission influencing the climate. What is up for discussion though, is what is the net impact and what is the best way to deal with it. I can only comment from a burden of disease perspective, although this is a significant chunk of the Integrated Assessment Models which purport to show the economic impact of climate change. The WHO kindly publish their estimates here:
https://www.who.int/data/gho/indicator-metadata-registry/imr-details/2391
From there, the total net and comparative impact of climate change on global burden of disease can be estimated. I’ll summarize if you don’t want to do your own calculations. Overall, total burden of disease is coming down in low and middle income countries, significantly. In low income countries, the burden of disease measured in DALYs/capita (Disability Adjusted Life Years) in 2019 Low income countries was around half (51.4%) what it was in 2000. The decrease is less pronounced in middle income countries, and virtually the same in high income countries (99.6%). The other trend is the change in the causes of disease/illness. Infectious diseases, childhood conditions, road trauma, etc. are decreasing, while lifestyle related conditions are increasing (heart disease, diabetes, dementia). So that is the overall trend, as poor countries become richer they will be more and more similar to the profile we see in rich countries, which is more and more conditions related to lifestyle and aging.
Which brings us to climate change. The estimated impact of climate change overall is to increase the burden of disease by 0.23%. This compares with other environmental factors like air and water pollution of between 10 and 20 %. So climate change in itself is not a significant health problem, not even close, even though publications such as The Lancet claim it is the greatest public health threat of the 21st Century. Looking more closely, the impact is even less significant, since almost all of the impact is in poor countries. In high income countries, the burden of disease caused by climate change is a net increase of 0.005 %. In the US, this then results in a comparison of approximately 1 % for guns and 7 % for heat disease (the number one cause). So climate change (in the US) is around 1/150 of a health problem in comparison to guns.
Sorry … HEART disease not HEAT disease (freudian slipper)
So, the agents of Brazilian Marxist Paulo Freire are not leading the University School)s of Educrats to water down science with “Native ways of knowing” and turn the subject into SWJ indoctrination?
Then you ought get out more and into the real world. You could start with Ed school syllabus’s rounded up on the NAS web site in reports free to download
Alas, Australia is falling back more quickly, with declining standards across the board. Back in the 1970s, Joan Kirner, Victorian Education Minister then Premier, and communist unionist Laurie Carmichael decided that their dogma could prevail only through the school system, from the earliest stage. Their approach has, unfortunately, been very successful, indoctrination begins even in pre-school. and proven teaching methods have been cast aside. (As a government policy adviser, I had dealings with both Kirner and Carmichael.) The unwarranted pandemic school closures and lockdowns made things worse.
“Back to the basics” has been a common refrain I’ve heard for over 6 decades. And yet, with the hijacking by ideologically bent teachers becoming more pervasive, schools are going further away from the basics all the time.
Every parent and grandparent should be concerned about the direction of education, not just K-12 but also in universities as well.
My youngest grandchild just graduated from 8th grade. Hopefully, he will be coming out to spend a couple of weeks of fishing this summer. I plan to discuss his thoughts about his education so far, in between his hooking the worms with a pair of pliers, if he is still doing that.
Wonderful article that is a wake-up call for those who are concerned with the sustainability of our civilization.
“Education is the transmission of civilization”
Will Durant
Isaac Asimov was the continuation of Will Durant by other means.
Man creates 30 billion tons of C02 each year (the US ccounts for 20%) that goes into an atmosphere that already has 3,000 billion tons of C02. And terrestial plants absorb 450 billion tons of C02 each year, far greater than what man produces, and it actually only represents 15% of all plant C02 absorption…85%(2,550 billion tons) from oceanic photosynthesis. In other words, a lot of C02 is recycled every year.
Water vapor accounts for about 80-90% of all greenhouse gas effects. The other 10% are from CH4, C02, 03, NOx, SF6, CFCs. Of that 10% of greenhouse gas effects includes C02’s contribution (all 3,600 billion tons) 2-3%, CH4 1%, etc but the numbers vary so much.
Rising temp from solar activities can increase oxidative and anaerobic metabolism, increasing CO2 and not necessarily C02 causing rising temp.
To clarify my position, I’m a skeptic, not a denier. And more importantly, a skeptic of the C02 AGW. To my knowledge, the numbers have never added up. And to my dismay, many fellow scientists have abandoned their scientific curiosity by simply adhering to the C02 mantra. I don’t deny that the earth is getting warmer over the millennia, after all, we are only 10k years out of an ice age that lasted over 100k years(what caused the ice age in the first place?). My fear is that without healthy skepticism from the scientific community, we may miss the other important reasons for climate change.
WSUG: “I don’t deny that the earth is getting warmer over the millennia”
How about the last 60 years. What is causing that warming? Not solar – that peaked about 1990 and any “integrated excess” should have started to decline after a decade or two of oceanic mixing – hasn’t happened.
Actually, “over the millennia” global temperature had been slowly cooling since the Holocene climatic optimum (maximum) about 8000 years ago; consistent with calculated orbital effects. That is, until about 150 years ago, when pumping excess GHGs into the atmosphere caused GHE warming effects that exceeded the slow orbital cooling. That process continues.
“My fear is that without healthy skepticism from the scientific community, we may miss the other important reasons for climate change.”
There are lots of people (including climatologists) looking for “other important reasons for climate change” – they just haven’t been very successful so far. Skepticism is still healthy within the scientific community and valid/correct skepticism leads to scientific advances; however, it is important to realize that most skepticism ends up being unjustified.
“What is causing that warming?” We don’t know. Maybe CO2 does, but IPCC models predict much more warming than observed.
https://nso.edu/blog/scientists-develop-new-model-to-estimate-solar-irradiance-variation-over-the-last-five-centuries/
https://spot.colorado.edu/~koppg/TSI/Historical_TSI_Reconstruction.png
https://skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=5
https://www.climate.gov/media/13196
solar activity is still higher than most of the 20th century. Is there a reason to believe the changes in solar activity would manifest itself in such a short period, especially given the slow inertia of the oceans.
George,
Perhaps you don’t know, but that is your choice.
Which “IPCC” models? Some show more warming, some show less. They are based on different scenarios of human response, called RCPs and now SSPs.
Bruce wrote: “How about the last 60 years. What is causing that warming? Not solar – that peaked about 1990 and any “integrated excess” should have started to decline after a decade or two of oceanic mixing – hasn’t happened.”
It is solar, but you refuse to consider the evidence. I get that you won’t consider the very accurate predictions on my github page even though the model is extremely simple linear filter which extracts solar activity from the sunspot signal and simultaneously models the integral response of the earth.
But you have no excuse for not considering this plot showing the frequency response between global temperature and the sunspot signal. It shows the earth’s coherent response to solar activity having a time constant of greater than 60 years, and I have reasons to suspect the time constant is longer than 100 years. I don’t know where you get your “decade or two” prediction.
https://localartist.org/media/TempSunspotFRF.png
To get away from my model vs your model kinds of arguments, I’ve shown how solar activity can be estimated using basic spectral analysis techniques. Solar activity is related to the frequency of the 11-year Schwabe cycle (~0.09 yr^-1). The frequency trajectory is a very good predictor of global temperature. These results you’ve also ignored.
In this plot the 150 year FFT length in the upper plot shows your 60 years of warming, and the slight cooling period between 1940 and 1980. The 100 year FFT length in the lower plot provides more detail, but needs to be adjusted forward in time because it’s predictive which, like my model, predicts we’re going to start to see slight global cooling.
https://localartist.org/media/TempSunspotFRF.png
I’ve even extended the analysis using 14C proxy data. It shows the Little Ice age and Medieval Warm Period (MWP) were global.
https://localartist.org/media/stftC14_150.JPG
https://localartist.org/media/stftC14.JPG
Solar activity compares well to this plot which the IPCC used at one point in time. Of course the MWP was a problem for the AGW crowd, so was reclassified as a local phenomenon, and this estimate of NH temperature ‘debunked’.
https://atmos.uw.edu/academics/classes/1998Q4/211/project2/lia-pic3.gif
I’ve shown you data. If you’re truly a scientist, you need to consider that data.
Joe,
Yes, there is a reason to believe it. From 1850 to 1970 temperature closely followed solar activity over a narrow range of ~0.2 C (peak to peak). Since 1970, they have diverged with irradiance decreasing, while global temperature has increased about 1 C.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_activity_and_climate#/media/File:Temp-sunspot-co2.svg
BA – “Which “IPCC” models?” All of them show too much warming. I noticed.
Look at the period 1850-early 1900
good indication that changes in solar activity takes decades to manifest in temp changes.
As pointed out- present day solar activity remains higher than the most of the 20th century.
Robert: “I’ve shown you data. If you’re truly a scientist, you need to consider that data.”
If you are truly a scientist, you need to publish in a scientific journal. Maybe then I’ll consider it in more detail. My usual first questions is: If the last is just a “usual solar thing”, when was the last time it happened?
Delay to peak is about one decade; after that it should start decaying – it doesn’t. The divergence is real and caused by anthropogenic factors. However, you are free to believe what you want.
This is exactly the response I expected from you, and it’s not because I think you unable to interpret basic frequency response and spectrum plots without a paper.
So Bruce, what motivates you to ignore data that conflicts with your narrative?
George,
All the SSPs show continued warming through at least 2050. Is that what you think is “too much”?
https://science.nasa.gov/earth/climate-change/study-confirms-climate-models-are-getting-future-warming-projections-right/
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019GL085378
I find their arguments to be more convincing than yours, but thanks anyway.
It’s not my narrative, and I don’t ignore data; I, like many others, just don’t find it convincing as a major effect. Publication is a pretty low hurdle for “original science” – I’ll wait, thanks.
PS ~ yes, I can interpret your graphs.
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | June 19, 2024 at 2:24 pm |
“Delay to peak is about one decade; after that it should start decaying – ”
As noted by the links I provided – that conclusion conflicts with the solar activity since the early 1800’s and thus the current climate science dogma dismissing solar activity remains subject to legitimate scientific debate.
Joe,
Thanks for your solar TSI reconstructions. They all show that nothing very unusual has been going on and that for hundreds of years TSI hasn’t varied by more than +/- 0.1%. Century-long minima (e.g., Maunder) or maxima (MWP?) may cause slow changes on the order of 0.1 C/century or less; nothing like the 1 C in 60 years that is happening now.
Climate science dogma does not dismiss solar activity – it has been investigated extensively, with the general conclusion that it can’t account for the warming that has occurred over the last 60 years.
The variability in TSI reconstructions and composites is one reason not to trust them, and I don’t. That said, the biggest mistake people make when using solar activity to predict temperature is that they think the response should be immediate (or within a decade or two). As I’ve shown in the frequency response plot, the corner frequency of the earth’s response to solar activity is lower than 1/60 yr^-1, or a time constant longer than 60 years. I suspect the true time constant is at least 125 years based on the temperature spectrum.
Why is this important? Because the small changes in solar activity are integrated over long periods in time. The 20dB/decade line in the frequency response plot is that of a pure integrator. providing the earth has a time constant longer than 100 years, then the response is 10x as sensitive to changes in solar activity over 100 years than it is to changes over 10 years. (Plot’s links included again for convenience).
https://localartist.org/media/TempSunspotFRF.png
I didn’t mention this before, but the 100-200 year data lengths used in the spectral plots act as a pseudo integrator to account for the earth’s response to solar activity.
https://localartist.org/media/stftC14_150.JPG
Bruce, if you look at the spectral analysis, solar activity was increasing at about the same rate prior to 1350 as it is today. Activity has just peaked a bit higher this time. So to answer your question, yes, this is usual solar activity.
Robert Cutler: “Bruce, if you look at the spectral analysis, solar activity was increasing at about the same rate prior to 1350 as it is today. Activity has just peaked a bit higher this time. So to answer your question, yes, this is usual solar activity.”
Yes, and thus something else must explain the current rapid TEMPERATURE increase that didn’t happen during the 1350 “event”. I already addressed the difference between MWP/LIA and AGW. It is not a matter of “existence”, rather magnitude and rates of change.
BA – “TSI hasn’t varied by more than +/- 0.1%”. Wrong. TSI varies by 5% due to the eccentricity of the Earth’s orbit.
George,
Orbital eccentricity has nothing to with total solar irradiance (activity). SMH
Bruce: ‘Yes, and thus something else must explain the current rapid TEMPERATURE increase that didn’t happen during the 1350 “event”. ‘
You can’t prove that global temperature didn’t change with the same rate and magnitude indicated by my spectral plots — even if you cite some Wikipedia entry. Global temperature reconstructions vary widely, are subject to regional and researcher bias, and are therefore unreliable.
The 14C data I used in the spectral analysis may not be reliable in amplitude for any number of reasons, but it is likely to be reliable for extracting the rate of the 11-year cycle as it is based on ice-core data with strong annual markers. And since we’re talking about a solar activity based on 14C, there is no regional bias.
https://localartist.org/media/stftC14_150.JPG
Robert: “You can’t prove that global temperature didn’t change with the same rate and magnitude indicated by my spectral plots”.
I don’t have to prove anything, particularly a negative.
Thanks for your thoughts, and good luck on your quest.
Bruce: “I don’t have to prove anything, particularly a negative.”
Perhaps not, but then perhaps you should also refrain from stating as fact that something didn’t happen.
Bruce: ‘Yes, and thus something else must explain the current rapid TEMPERATURE increase that didn’t happen during the 1350 “event”. ‘
Good luck.
(what caused the ice age in the first place?)
ICE!
It snows more in and around the Arctic when the deeper and warmer oceans promote more evaporation and ice sequestering. The more ice spreads and causes colder.
Warm thawed oceans in polar regions are necessary to move ocean water to land as sequestered ice.
If anything caused climate to get cold first, the frozen oceans could not evaporate and produce snowfall to build ice on land. Ice core records show the ice accumulations that caused ice ages only occurred in the warmest times.
It’s impossible to comment on what would motivate everyone to learn science, since the triggers to pique interest are undoubtedly extremely variable. Here are a few that spring to mind:
1. A connection to a teacher – I know from my own experience that if when a teacher engages with you, you respond, then there’s a far, far higher likelihood that you will become engaged in response.
2. ‘Why is what I am being told to learn useful?’ If you wanted a rationale for probability and statistics in maths, how about ‘what does an actuary do? How do you evaluate the results of clinical trials of new potential medicines?’ How about ‘Here are some potential life scenarios where knowledge of science would help inform your decisions: ‘Should I vaccinate my children? Is this hot weather just weather or something more sinister? Why are my elected representatives not following rigorous science when making their decisions?’
3. Certain career paths require me to study science – notably medicine, engineering, even becoming a farmer these days benefits from a science education.
4. How can I ‘campaign for the environment’ without knowing the scientific evidence to justify what I am campaigning for?
5. What potential one-off apocalyptic events might possibly happen? How likely are they, do we know any early warning signs? And how should we prepare for them, even if we think that they might never actually happen in our lifetimes?
The most important thing that young people need to grasp is that science should serve society, not rule it.
The other question young people should always be encouraged to raise is not simply: ‘could it be done?’, rather ‘even if it could be done, should it be done?’ Many times, it’s clear that you have technological genii and spiritual pygmies in scientific form. Society would benefit more from having technological professionals that have sufficient humility to recognise that society is bigger than test tubes, super-computers and DNA sequencing factories.
Even in many of the comments there is much disagreement about who the goodies and baddies were and yet there were and are events that we can all agree changed the thinking of many a profound human brain.
It is the changes coupled with the ability to both stretch and contract our thinking that exercises all parts of our brain from the most subtle to the most logical processing. It is here that the huge differences between “human minds” as compared to “machine minds” become clear – we see this in language and conversation at all levels. Machines have no original conversation because it is all there from the start and adding more data simply allows for more variation but it still isn’t original and never will be.
I was taught that education is not about filling a child up – it is about bringing the person in the child out and is the most subtle of skills which many contemporary teachers do not appear to have or any desire to have.
Indeed the fairy tales we tell these days do not help anyone but must harm many. Just look at the mess we have made.
For the sake of fairness, there is too much application of formula and multiple choice. My children’s H.S. math and science was about memorization of countless formula, and disconnected bits of science. 10th graders asked to memorize the Citric Cycle and the ATP cycle!
I wonder how many high school graduates can explain what it means to multiply two numbers together?
You’re totally correct in saying that education is about ‘bring the person in the child out’, however there is no one way to do that as each child is different. As school education is never going to be 1 teacher to 1 child, inevitably teaching methods get reduced to a common denominator, which arbitrarily selects out those whose personality just happens to be brought out by the arbitrary teaching method chosen.
More to the point, what part of a personality gets brought out at school may also be completely arbitrary e.g. your ability for foreign languages might be brought out, but your ability to engage in literature might be totally repressed.
I experienced this by attending a totally different kind of school overseas in a gap year prior to University, which brought out many aspects of my personality totally repressed in the UK. A lot of those aspects brought out overseas were once again fairly brutally crushed over a few years back in the UK.
A few nations on earth would do well by asking themselves: ‘by bringing out the aggressive, unthinking aspects of young personalities, are we setting ourselves up for a fall when such personalities are unable to hold senior office effectively due to being all aggression and no thought processes?’
Thanks for writing about your experiences, RJ.
Teachers can and do notice the personalities in their classes just as we all notice others in life and we have done this, I would imagine, since human beings started appearing and evolving.
Of course, as always, what ‘we/you’ do with ‘information in’ is our/your responsibility and should receive all the tender loving care -TLC – your open mind can afford (open is the key word). Woke practices kill openness and replace it with formula and agenda (like box ticking) which do even more harm to us in past, present and future.
In a healthy society expression, reaction, agreement or disagreement exist together without limits and allow us to learn what personality actually means to us and others, and how different we all are.
In fact we are all unique and that is how clever Nature is with Her plaything – Infinity.
Judith,
For another view from another place, Australia appears to have similar problems and similar solutions to those of which you spoke. Of course, there are some large differences too complex to discuss here, but there is material available about Australia’s educational problems.
Experienced journalist Tony Thomas has written several topical, penetrating articles for the conservative journal “Quadrant” as well as some privately-published books. See link. Other articles are specific about the Australian Academy of Science captued by a small alarmist group detrimental to national education. Sorry, no quick cures pop out.
Geoff S
https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/verbatim/2023/05/tony-thomas-at-the-school-sucks-launch/
Very insightful comments Dr Curry. Thanks for staying so deep in the game.
One of the big problems with the education system is producing enough tradespeople, getting people to do practical things with tools. Jordan Peterson did an interview with Temple Grandin a year ago that explains the problem well:
A shorter summary video:
Pingback: Reflections on K-12 science education - Climate- Science.press
May I suggest this is not just a matter of STEM education, but universal. We must assess what is wrong, what has worked, and what will most likely succeed. In that, we can apply the 20/80 theorem, being 20% drives 80%. 20% of problems cause 80% of failures. Same principle for success.
A few things I have learned, things that need to be tackled fundamentally:
we have students graduate high school, but they cannot make change for a dollar.
teachers abhor having to serve in inner city school
truancy, violence, lack of discipline, distractions, lack of parental involvement are major obstacles
many teachers are not qualified or motivated to teach
students get many easy ways out, and are not held accountable
students are discouraged by boring curricula
the unfit learning surround stifles those who want to learn
A few stories of past success:
Foxfire concept of having students interview, write and publish articles and books, leading to professional success
Khan academy with few highly qualified and motivated teachers driving to perfect math scores via computer driven curriculum
A high school principal pushing parents and students together to foster achievements. He phones parents, knows all the students personally and by name
Montessori teaching
And we know what constitutes tiger moms’ and their young ones’ dedication
If I were education dictator I would
weed out inferior educators and pay the remainder well
encourage careers in public teaching
augment a teacher with mentors. They remain with individuals and small groups during the school year to maintain encouragement and learning power.
single out promising students who have dark past and horrible home environments to help lift them up. Make psychological resources available.
enforce discipline. No walking around, back talking, acting up, bathroom excuses, etc.
cell phones are locked up during lessons
change school architecture from depressing prison-like arrangements, like long unattractive concrete block walls with rooms with row seating and artificial lighting and antiquated furnishings
limit individual learning centers to 300 students to maintain intimacy. Link them together for activities that benefit a large set of participants, like connected nodes.
give outdoor breaks; encourage sports and exercise
minimize cheating bypasses; give challenging assignments, often as teams and with opposing positions
re-assess teacher union priorities
let students learn about farming, what a job entails, responsible finances, etc. Give them a chance to earn real money from age eight on. That would fit the time of summer break.
rethink curriculum of history and its relation to society and people. Take David Mc Cullough’s book on the Brooklyn bridge, or the background of the Statue of Liberty. There is human drama, health science, fire and geotechnical physics, new material science, political intrigue, enlightenments within and between nations, plus captivating read all together. No need to remember historic dates specifically, they remain within the tale, and won’t be forgotten.
assign broad tasks and projects to analyze the basics, encourage creative solutions, pluck apart the physics, chemistry, identify shortcomings, learn project management and of financial implications. Often students could grade themselves, which surprisingly forces honesty.
We can proceed with pilot programs and evaluate periodically and spread successes comprehensively. Probably the biggest obstacles will be parental complacency, union power, politics; also maintaining the cooperation to drive students out of laziness and lack of discipline into reality of needing to excel. I think STEM achievements will fall into place with the rest of education.
“students are discouraged by boring curricula
the unfit learning surround stifles those who want to learn”
That is why those who can afford it, they send children to private schools.
Show all high school kids this amazing Discovery video “Battlefield Cell”. I suspect some number would become quite interested.
It has to be more interesting than memorizing pronouns.
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x150im3
“Climate Change” is affecting the elections. Pain from the lefty-spawned wind and solar build-outs is beginning to hit home and voters don’t like it. In fact, if heat deaths start to exceed ones from cold, it will be because electricity is unreliable and blackouts will occur precisely when electricity is needed most: to cool!
In France, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally, forecast to win the most seats in legislative elections starting June 30, has pledged to roll back key parts of the 27-nation EU’s Green Deal.
It would halt the development of wind power, ditch a ban on the sale of gasoline- and diesel-powered cars slated for 2035, loosen housing-renovation requirements, and curb plans to bar the most polluting vehicles from major cities. The focus would be on new nuclear reactors and clean fuels such as hydrogen.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-06-20/the-rise-of-right-wing-populism-threatens-fight-against-climate-change
More new developments in climate science.
Solving a cloud conundrum
The finding may solve an 80-year-old mystery in climate science. Measurements of how clouds absorb sunlight have often shown that they are absorbing more sunlight than conventional physics dictates possible. The additional evaporation caused by this effect could account for the longstanding discrepancy, which has been a subject of dispute since such measurements are difficult to make.
“Those experiments are based on satellite data and flight data,“ Chen explains. “They fly an airplane on top of and below the clouds, and there are also data based on the ocean temperature and radiation balance. And they all conclude that there is more absorption by clouds than theory could calculate. However, due to the complexity of clouds and the difficulties of making such measurements, researchers have been debating whether such discrepancies are real or not. And what we discovered suggests that hey, there’s another mechanism for cloud absorption, which was not accounted for, and this mechanism might explain the discrepancies.”
https://news.mit.edu/2024/how-light-can-vaporize-water-without-heat-0423
Let’s go nuclear!
If Biden enacts the bill, which has already passed the House, it will be a tool for simplifying the permitting process for advanced nuclear reactors, refine the process for exporting certain nuclear power technologies abroad, augment the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC) staff, facilitate advancement of nuclear fusion and related technologies and more, according to its text
https://dailycaller.com/2024/06/18/senate-passes-pro-nuclear-bill-biden/
Is it just regulation or better technology? I really don’t know but China is building a lot of nuclear plants in other countries too.
https://itif.org/publications/2024/06/17/how-innovative-is-china-in-nuclear-power/
“China intends to build 150 new nuclear reactors between 2020 and 2035, with 27 currently under construction and the average construction timeline for each reactor about seven years, far faster than for most other nations.”
I think we should do a Covid style Project Warp Speed for ultra deep geothermal power. I should be much faster to build and if you knock the price down to below nuclear, wind and solar it kills two birds with one stone (intermittent power & radioactive waste). Heck we already have the crypto guys on board (El Salvador)
I know there are companies working on that. If it is a cost-effective solution, it should take of by itself.
Geothermal is progressing, slowly…
6/25/24
“Startup Fervo Energy will supply 320 MW of clean, firm power to Southern California Edison from an enhanced geothermal plant under construction in Utah.”
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/geothermal/next-generation-geothermal-will-soon-power-southern-californias-grid
They have one 3.5MW plant up and running 24/7 and this next project will build out 100 more wells aiming for 400MW online by 2028. Fervo is what I would categorize as a geo-constrained system that is limited by underground geology (permeability, near surface heat reservoirs and possibly earthquakes). The prize will be the ultra deep geothermal (12,000′-15,000′) which can be built anywhere and will be closed loop systems.
Texas has fracking technology down. It could be useful for geo.
It’s nice to say the purpose of education is to bring out the best in each child. Leaving aside who decides what ‘best’ is, the reality is that each child needs to have skills to provide for themselves in society. Determining what level of education is needed to accomplish that per individual must be counted as one of the highest priorities, and one of the most difficult. What happens when we over-educate, or under-educate? It seems that there is much agreement on the negative conception of under-education. Surprisingly, or not, there doesn’t seem to be much agreement on a negative conception of over-education. In fact, anyone who speaks about over-education as potentially negative for the welfare of the student arouses anger and sometimes violence. Charles Murray, author of “The Bell Curve” is a prime example.
It may very well be that each of us has a Shakespeare inside. That doesn’t mean attempts to bring it out should be prioritized over economic skill sets. And what affect does an unsuccessful attempt have on the students concept of self-worth? Our lives are finite. What is the loss of four, or more, years worth to someone’s development? Their happiness?
As Mike Dombroski suggests above, trade school may be an appropriate, not to mention necessary, alternative in many cases.
Murray and Hernnstein have been pilloried for looking at such issues.
Bill,
“And what affect does an unsuccessful attempt have on the students concept of self-worth? Our lives are finite. What is the loss of four, or more, years worth to someone’s development? Their happiness?”
(emphasis added)
–
an unsuccessful attempt destroys someone’s life.
What most of children do in schools is to learn sitting quetly and listening to what teachers have to say.
They learn to be rewarded for being good students, just sit quetly…
Later in their life they look for a job where they could sit.
Hey Christos … thanks for your reply.
Yes, it can have negative consequences on a young person’s life.
There’s been an industry to send people to college and grad school … loans, government assistance, a dominating cultural narrative. But it seems like it may have reached its zenith. Or, maybe just another peak … like the one I experienced in the mid-late 70s.
It is about what UK-W Lass said above … bringing out the person in the child. Which has to include the option that there are some children best served by avoiding over-education.
Hey Bill. I am very glad we discuss that very important issue.
” But it seems like it may have reached its zenith.”
(emphasis added)
Yes, it has reached its zenith already many years ago.
“bringing out the person in the child”
(emphasis added)
A child has numerous options in life. No one else, but the child himself can determine what is best for him.
Children grew up in peasants families. Most of the population where peasants once.
Children were brought up the traditional, the well tested (millenials long method) learning about everything as they grew and participating (according to their small strength) in the everyday’s work their parents did.
Children were rewarded, because they new they helped, which was very necessary. And they felt proud, and they felt needed, and they felt being accepted.
Nowdays society has proceeded experimenting how to educate the new generation in the new conditions we suddenly got in.
Nowdays children are put in a situation when they do not help to family’s wellfare. Children feel accepted only when they met their parents expectations – which never – because no child can met the enormous “educational” demands the adults put upon them.
Children are forced to do things in order to “bringing out the person in the child”.
When a child is asked if he likes to do this or that, the answer is always positive.
Because the child knows it makes the parents happy. So child does everything to feel accepted.
Judith, I’ve done some work with STEM educators. What I’ve found is that teachers largely don’t understand the breadth of opportunities for those with technical degrees. Not everyone who graduates with a technical degree ends up wearing a lab coat and sitting around solving differential equations for the rest of their lives, and the majority of students wouldn’t want that anyway.
Many people end up in sales, manufacturing, operational, and support roles which require various levels of technical competence and different personality traits. Exposing students to the breadth of opportunities that come with a technical degree can provide the motivation necessary to get through the rigors of acquiring one.
Robert,
It is sad but true that not everyone is cut out to fill a university place or to be a scientist, In any field, from golf to mathematics, there are some people who simply were not made that way, while others become champions. The universities need to seek and nurture the champions. Instead, they have turned into enormous people sausage machines intent on maximising money income, which is far from what universities grew from. They grew from an urge to discover and use scientific, mathematical, religious etc knowledge. If you wish, we should have “Universities” only for the very capable technical folk and extended high schools for whatever sausage is required. They are two rather different beasts.
Sherro01, I think you may have misunderstood my point.
The person who can transform customer technical requirements into a configured solution is just as important as the scientist who invented one key element of the solution, while both require levels of technical expertise that go beyond “extended HS education”. My point is that STEM messaging should attract both individuals.
Science usually does not give us policy, policy is often politics and value judgements. I remember protesting a landfill near my home in NJ in the old days (typical Sopranos-style). I was shocked when a co-worker spoke out at the meeting, saying he was a chemical engineer, and he had calculations to show this was the best landfill ever built and should continue operations. I spoke out too. I said I was a chemical engineer and I see a lot of problems, not the least of which were being buried in a sea of trash from out-of-state. At least we neutralized each other. Actually the landfill was shut.
Just curious, hdtbill, was burning the trash for electricity ever discussed … much like COVANTA does?
My fair lady used to teach math to future math teachers at CalState San Francisco, in late sixties. One day her boss brought a new textbook and asked for her opinion. She said, this is a horrible textbook, and if math teachers don’t know any math, how can they teach it? The boss reassigned her to teach programming.
Dear Dr. Curry, What should Teachers be teaching about what the Real World is experiencing? (free link) https://wapo.st/4cyweLk
That the world’s climate is warming slightly as the human population grows. The warmer climate will be adapted to easily by humanity.
Humans (apex predators) are not that good at mitigation because the dangers are distant and abstract, so we use technologies like A/C to ‘adapt’. The rest of the biosphere doesn’t have that option though.
Jack
Other species will be negatively impacted by the ever expanding human footprint far more than higher temperatures.
Elizabeth Warren tweet from an hour ago.
“ We must tax the rich so that we can build a stronger, fairer America with opportunity for everybody—where every kid has a first-rate education, where our transportation system isn’t the butt of jokes, and where families aren’t bankrupted by one bad medical diagnosis.”
Since the Congressional Budget Office updated their 10 year forecast this week, I’ve watched several interviews discussing how the rich need to pay more taxes.
I have no problem with the rich paying more. I do have problems with politicians going unchallenged on that assertion during those interviews. There was not a single question about what the rich currently pay. Not a question about how much more that taxation would generate. Not a question about what they used to pay nor the effect on growth of the economy. Each politician simply sold the idea of taxing the rich as a panacea to our deficit and debt problem and the need for more spending.
The top 1% pays 46% of total individual tax revenue. If they paid an effective tax rate that they paid post WWII to 1963 when the top marginal tax rate was 91%, that would generate another $250 to $300 billion per year. Certainly significant but it would not come close to balancing the budget nor support yet more spending.
Politicians are incentivized to lie. They tell us what we want to hear. This comment surprisingly is not intended to criticize lying politicians. This tirade is directed at the profession of journalism. They no longer have time to report facts. They don’t seek out the truth. They are not inquisitive about the subject matter. They, like teachers, now see themselves as self appointed narrative purveyors, with an ideological bent.
During those interviews noted above, not a single journalist questioned the guest about their statements. None of them displayed any knowledge about taxes or the budget. The narrative of needing to tax the rich more went completely unchallenged.
Journalists who carry the water on global warming stories do the same on taxes and the budget. With all the talk about which party poses the greatest threat to democracy going around today, I nominate the deplorable condition of journalism as surpassing the other choices.
In Australia, less than 50 per cent of adults are net taxpayers, more than half get various benefits funded by the higher-taxed. I believe that people benefit from developing self-reliance and initiative, our governments encourage the reverse.
Cannot disagree with a word, ck, but I believe the global disease causing the most insufferable damage to all people is mediocrity in everything. Mediocrity creates disingenuous and deceitful claims and enables them to carry increasingly more credibility and weight than ever is the fact of a matter. That is why Mann was allowed to murder scientific practice and then win over a Washington DC trial’s jury when the evidence clearly said he was the one who had done wrong and also lied .
We are led by gamblers, charlatans and mercenaries and to stand out in a crowd is now something done for all the wrong reasons. That is why some people even have problems defining simple things like gender let alone difficult stuff like deciding whether to eat or heat.
This stuff historically goes on for a while (20-30 years) and then ceases as suddenly as it started. The only drawback I can see is the present demise didn’t start suddenly it just gradually got worse and worse until it did become insufferable.
Ceresco,
It is strange that society lets itself be pushed around by the ultra-wealthy. They got rich mainly from luck and a superior ability to take money from your pocket and mine, to theirs. This ability does not give them any right to superior knowledge translated to giving orders to others. In many cases, the source of wealth was commerce, which has little relevence to matters like climate change. In many other matters, the rich person did not even do the work that made the money – they used acquisition, a skill that climate studies do not require.
But then, the modern world is full of strange circumstances beyond the comprehension of oldies like me. All I can do is refer again and again to my concept of a more ideal world that could have existed.
Kid …
> They, like teachers, now see themselves as self appointed narrative purveyors, with an ideological bent.
That nailed it.
Bill – Any teachers in your family?
Extended family, yes. And several who are good friends.
Pat … not that you asked, but I grew up in a first generation family. Blue collar, so there was a carpenter, an electrician, clerical, salesman, a smattering of white collar (an engineer, CPAs, a pediatrician), amongst other occupations. They were all Democrats, as was I up until about 40 years ago. That 1st generation of Americans were WWII veterans, both Europe and the Pacific. They grew up during the Depression.
The Democrat Party isn’t what it once was. You may see that as a positive, and you’re entitled to that view. But even though I was a registered Democrat, raised one, was a union member, I have to honestly say that today’s Democrat Party doesn’t represent my values … at all. Now if those values that I don’t share are taught in the schools, via the unions who control K-12, which friends of mine who are still currently teachers tell me about, then I have to say I don’t have a high opinion of what is being taught K-12 today.
Are there ‘good’ teachers? Of course there are. But the structure teachers work in has only so much wiggle room. Go beyond that and there’s h*ll to pay. Ask Judith, who had far more autonomy as a chair than a HS teacher.
The problem isn’t the teacher, per se. It’s the ideology.
Bill – thanks for your perspective. It could lead to a long, mutually respectful discussion, perhaps over a little Tennessee whisky (as Dickel likes to spell it), after which we would still disagree, but at least feel we occupied the same planet. One can imagine.
Pat … I would enjoy that. First bottle is on me! And I’m not so sure we would disagree on everything. I’d be willing to bet a second bottle that we share many basic principles. The rub, as always, is how we implement them.
What we have with the secular, socialist public-funded education machine is its whole-hearted abandonment of capitalism and the throwing-off of America’s foundational principles. Add to that this Government-Education Industrial Complex has adopted the use of global warming pseudo-science and has facilitated global warming superstition and the politics of fear for money.
Apparently, the smart money says sea level rise is a non-starter.
A tiny California coastal community has become one of America’s hottest property markets – despite rising sea levels posing a threat to dozens of homes.
Prices for beach houses in Stinson Beach – an enclave in Marin County along Bolinas Bay – have increased five-fold from $688,000 in 2000 to $3.7million in May this year, figures from Zillow show. In the past year alone home values have risen 40 percent.
It comes despite the fact county officials have repeatedly warned rising sea levels could swallow the community’s beaches and damage properties.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13546835/coastal-town-america-hottest-property-market-home-problems.html
Climate protesters ran out on the 18th green after the final group hit their approach shots and threw smoke bombs and powder on the green in today’s PGATOUR event. This action, in front of a national audience just reinforces the perception that they are not a serious group. The same as those who deface priceless artwork. Whack jobs come to mind.
I’m sure they feel more important after their actions but the effect is just counterproductive. They fall into the same camp as those who blame every flood and heatwave and drought on global warming. So easy to dismiss.
It wasn’t supposed to be this cold and windless in Australia
For some reason that no climate model can explain, Australia has run out of wind power three months in a row, which means we had to use more gas than expected. It’s also been colder than climate models predicted, despite global emissions being higher than ever in history. For some other reason that no rational adult can explain, the State of Victoria banned gas drilling for most of the last decade (to reduce the beachy-weather days in eighty years) and thus, as night follows day, the state is running out of gas. Ergo, predictably, it is also facing blackouts, cost blowouts and manufacturers dependent on gas are warning they may have to close down, or move to the US, where gas is still cheap.
If only the climate models could predict temperatures and wind even a month in advance?
The AEMO (our electricity grid manager) says Victoria will run out of gas before winter runs out of bite. Apparently Victorians are pulling twice as much gas out of their main storage as they can afford to at the moment. Not only does Victoria need the gas for electricity, but 80% of Victorian homes have gas for cooking or heating. And then there is manufacturing, not just in Victoria but most of Australia as gas prices rise all over the East Coast.
This is from the site joannenova dot com dot au or just search on jo nova.
It wasn’t supposed to be this cold and windless in Australia
For some reason that no climate model can explain, Australia has run out of wind power three months in a row, which means we had to use more gas than expected. It’s also been colder than climate models predicted, despite global emissions being higher than ever in history. For some other reason that no rational adult can explain, the State of Victoria banned gas drilling for most of the last decade (to reduce the beachy-weather days in eighty years) and thus, as night follows day, the state is running out of gas. Ergo, predictably, it is also facing blackouts, cost blowouts and manufacturers dependent on gas are warning they may have to close down, or move to the US, where gas is still cheap.
If only the climate models could predict temperatures and wind even a month in advance?
The AEMO (our electricity grid manager) says Victoria will run out of gas before winter runs out of bite. Apparently Victorians are pulling twice as much gas out of their main storage as they can afford to at the moment. Not only does Victoria need the gas for electricity, but 80% of Victorian homes have gas for cooking or heating. And then there is manufacturing, not just in Victoria but most of Australia as gas prices rise all over the East Coast.
This is from jo nova’s site.
No wind in the sails for Australia.
In aggregate terms, eyeballing the chart it should be relatively easy to see that 2024 might be as much as 3,000,000MWh ‘short’ of wind production through 2024 Q2 compared to what some might have expected
All in all, what’s above is (at the same time) both a frightening picture … but also completely expected (at least by some of us).
https://wattclarity.com.au/articles/2024/06/22june-lowwind-2024-q2/
Like a ritual burning of money, global warming alarmism and the Left’s policies — i.e., their proposed fixes for the problem of climate change that they claim confronts everyone on Earth — are actually a protest against Americanism. The Left has embraced a negative act of pure nihilism. Rather than any science-based behavior designed to serve humanity, the Left’s actual desire is to leave all of humanity out in the cold like a bad dog.
1) Love Spell to get ex-boyfriend back
2) Stop divorce.
3) Save marriage/relationship
4) Herpes cure..
5) Resolve relationship/marital issues
6) Reclaim Soulmate.
7) Make Ex run after you
8) Return/reunite with Ex
9) Win back my love
10) Make your ex-husband/wife yours forever
VISIT… DR_MA C K ( @Y A H O O ) C O M)….
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Obviously, I didn’t post the above. Maybe time to delete the WordPress account?
Id ee ots can put whatever they want in the name field to comment.
LOL. I have not seen that before here.
Rival expert in pathaphysics?
From the June 22 Economist, and directed at those equating renewables with high costs. (To avoid a paywall, I have provided excerpts rather than a link. The whole article is worth reading.)
“It is 70 years since AT&T’s Bell Labs unveiled a new technology for turning sunlight into power. …Panels now occupy an area around half that of Wales, and this year they will provide the world with about 6% of its electricity… Yet this historic growth is only the second-most-remarkable thing about the rise of solar power. The most remarkable is that it is nowhere near over… Installed solar capacity doubles roughly every three years, and so grows ten-fold each decade. … Solar cells will in all likelihood be the single biggest source of electrical power on the planet by the mid 2030s… On current trends, the all-in cost of the electricity they produce promises to be less than half as expensive as the cheapest available today.
To grasp that this is not some environmentalist fever dream, consider solar economics. As the cumulative production of a manufactured good increases, costs go down. As costs go down, demand goes up. …In earlier energy transitions—from wood to coal, coal to oil or oil to gas—the efficiency of extraction grew, but it was eventually offset by the cost of finding ever more fuel…solar power faces no such constraint. The resources needed to produce solar cells and plant them on solar farms are silicon-rich sand, sunny places and human ingenuity, all three of which are abundant. Making cells also takes energy, but solar power is fast making that abundant, too. … in contrast to earlier energy sources, solar power has routinely become cheaper and will continue to do so.
Other constraints do exist. … solar power needs to be complemented with storage and supplemented by other technologies. …Fortunately, these problems may be solved as batteries and fuels created by electrolysis gradually become cheaper.
Another worry is that the vast majority of the world’s solar panels…come from China. … In the long run, a world in which more energy is generated without the oil and gas that come from unstable or unfriendly parts of the world will be more dependable. Still, although the Chinese Communist Party cannot rig the price of sunlight as OPEC tries to rig that of oil, the fact that a vital industry resides in a single hostile country is worrying.”
China is a highly industrialized country with low labor costs per hour. Is was a good place to outsource manufacturing to in the early 2000’s. Now manufacturing is slowly moving to countries like Vietnam.
Fortunately for us, economists can’t make the Sun shine 24/7/365. Economist needs to tell us what Magician will “poof” these huge battery farms out of thin air. (Or is that from the backs of children in third world countries?)
There are so many ways to make batteries, and so many ways to do energy storage, I will leave it to clever people, entrepeneurs, and the market to find the best method of grid level storage. I do not believe magicians will be necessary. But if you would prefer to invest in coal futures, you are free to do so.
I do appreciate your concern for children in third world countries.
But David – trillions of dollars are available to make batteries. I do believe it will take a magician. As to children, Bloomberg is starting to beat that drum. Will it matter?
Perhaps we are defining “magician” differently. You are correct that no one can take an order today for grid scale batteries at a price that allows solar to reach its full potential. My favorite grid scale battery candidate is sodium-ion batteries. They are heavier than lithium-ion and therefore not so attractive for EV’s, but weight is no big deal for a stationary installation, and sodium is cheap and plentiful. If you think it will take a magician to complete the development of sodium-ion batteries, there are plenty auditioning for that role in China.
Yes, China. The country that welded shut the doors of their citizens during the pandemic. China is the paragon of fair and equal treatment of their citizens. They abuse all of them equally, except of course, themselves who run the government.
Justice!
China has executed billionaires and frequently put their wealthy criminals in prison for life.
“China insurance boss jailed for life in corruption crackdown”
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-66793613
In the US (#1 in imprisoning their own people) and the rich are above the law.
Jim2,
“Fortunately for us, economists can’t make the Sun shine 24/7/365. Economist needs to tell us what Magician will “poof” these huge battery farms out of thin air. (Or is that from the backs of children in third world countries?)”
–
Batteries are only efficient the faster their cycles of charging/discharging goes on.
If battery factories get seldom discharged to the 1/2 of their capacity the project never going to pay off the costs.
–
It is much better to backup the solar farms with fossil fuels burning electricity production. It is very much cheaper and it is the only perfectly balanced scheme.
–
Again, the fossil fuels burning does not pose any danger to global climate.
The global warming observed happens due to orbital forcing – it is a millenials long slow warming trend.
–
The more planet Earth gets along that trend – the faster the global average temperature rises. At the top of the Globe, at the Northern areas every year there is less sea ice cover.
Since the higher the latitude, the smaller the area is – thus the advance of sea-ice melting is every year proportionally higher.
–
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
“Pumped storage, compressed air, liquid air and stored thermal solar generation are all storage mechanisms from which electricity can rapidly be retrieved on demand.”
–
Of course they are energy storage mechanisms. Energy storage always reduces the renewables efficiency.
It is meant that we shall storage when we have excessive renewable electricity production.
There will be times the storage capacities were full, and still having plenty of exceesive renewable electricity.
How much storaged energy should we have untouched, for the emergency cases?
Now, imagine, there is not for long periods renewable energy and the storage capacities already empty.
Should we have supplementary renewable energy production to always support the storaging efforts?
–
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Fifty years ago there always were variations on the electric energy demand. When there were lower demand electric plants went on idle, or even stopped for a while. When there was higher demand the plants worked full capacity.
The emergencies higher demand was covered by gas turbines and by hydros.
We need a cheaper, not a more expensive electric energy.
There is no need to have built a tremendous gigantic infrastracture in order to store more and more electric energy, because the main argument – the Anthropogenic Global Warming is a huge scientific mislead.
There is not any problem for Earth’s climate when we proceed using fossil fuels as we always used to.
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
“On current trends, the all-in cost of the electricity they produce promises to be less than half as expensive as the cheapest available today.”
How can the cost going up, up, up have a trend to go down?
That optimistic quote is from the Economist, and surprised me a bit too since I read on this blog about expensive future energy due to decarbonization. But what solar cost is going up, up, up? Maybe just the labor involved in installing one on your roof, which is not particularly efficient.
I just got two quotes to put solar on my roof and was disappointed. I am not going ahead with the project for now. The salesman projected 4.5% increases/year in electricity costs to justify the payback. (He neglected to model the cost of capital.) EIA doesn’t forecast increases anything like that. Maybe the EIA reads the Economist.
The opportunity cost of the West’s solar power mandate is the indiscriminate bombing of Ukrainian cities, Taiwan becoming the next Hong Kong, the massacre of the only democracy in the Middle East, and the legacy of Judeo/Christian principles and ideals underlying Americanism being sacrificed on the altar of liberal jackboot utopianism.
1) Get ex-boyfriend back…………………………………….
2) Stop divorce.
3) Save marriage/relationship
4) Herpes cure..
5) Resolve relationship/marital issues
6) Reclaim Soulmate.
7) Make Ex run after you
8) Return/reunite with Ex
9) Win back my love
Coal is dead. Long live Coal!
Blacklisting the coal industry won’t get the world to net zero emissions, according to an Australian pension fund that says such exclusions ultimately slow down the transition to a low-carbon economy.
Vision Super Pty., which oversees a A$14 billion ($9.3 billion) portfolio, is adding its voice to an increasingly heated debate on how institutional investors should tackle climate change.
“We don’t think exclusions make any difference in practice to getting to net zero,” Chief Investment Officer Michael Wyrsch said in an interview on Tuesday. “We don’t see it as a victory, us holding a net zero portfolio while the world goes to hell in the hand basket, which is its current trajectory.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-06-25/exiting-coal-isn-t-the-way-to-net-zero-australian-pension-says
Or, go nuclear!
…
All this can be fixed — just not on the cheap and not in time. Modeling from Aurora Energy Research suggests that paying for the cables, transformers, substations and the like would come to around £116 billion over the next 11 years (but also be “likely impossible”). All this is made harder by the fact that electricity demand is not static (the National Grid expects it to double by 2050) and by the trouble of getting people to reduce their energy use.
…
A recent article from Eann Patterson and Richard Taylor for the Royal Society of Open Science at Liverpool University makes the case. It is, they say, perfectly possible within the confines of exiting technology to build factories that produce “sealed micro power units within a digitally enabled holistic assurance framework.” What this means is, if you were so minded you could pop up a factory, commoditize the production of mini power stations in contained boxes, roll them off the line and take them directly to the outskirts of the cities that need them. They would be manufactured, operated, removed and recycled by the same supplier.
Just one factory would replace a third of current fossil fuel-based electricity generation over 15 years. And four? Well, the entire electricity system would be fossil-free within 12 years and at a relatively reasonable cost (a few hundred million pounds per station perhaps). The grid would have to be upgraded but not by anywhere near as much as currently envisaged. There would be no intermittency problem and no need for back-up power plants. There would also be a security positive — a grid that relies on far away infrastructure and long-distance transmission is much more vulnerable than one comprised of localized, isolated mini stations. …
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-06-12/can-small-nukes-power-a-greener-uk-future
Jim2 wrote:
There would be no intermittency problem and no need for back-up power plants. There would also be a security positive — a grid that relies on far away infrastructure and long-distance transmission is much more vulnerable than one comprised of localized, isolated mini stations. …
Local grids that can be protected and are not dependent on long-distance transmission and complicated grids, that do not go down when there are issues very far away, or just hackers who can get into any part of a complicates grid should be the future.
Wind and Solar farms and complicated grids with extremity long transmission lines and intermittent power and too many power generators, solar roof-top, etc, have too many points of failure, that cannot even be planned for.
Jim2,
Why do you have a need for expressions like “the trouble of getting people to reduce their energy use.”? Not you in particular, this is a widespread way that people have been drilled to think.
Why should we try to reduce our energy use? Can we not see energy like nutritious food, breathing oxygen freely, exercise for better health and the like, to be tapping abundances for our betterment? Reduction is like preaching the benefits of conduct that nobody wants, like encouraging premature withdrawl during sex, because (multiple choice reasons follow).
I see this urge to reduce energy use as just another ignorant, killjoy technique flowing from the current social class of those telling others what they can and cannot do. I dislike this prevalent current theme of voluntary and enforced restraint to save the environment, partly because of its capacity to keep the mind in guilt when it should be in enjoyment.
Children being educated should not be taught, directly or incidentally, to feel guilty if they are not into environmental protection. I suggest that this causes a state of negativity. Youngsters should be thinking of the fun of abundant consumption, enjoyment of what Life offers to those who dare, not about cowering in the corner, afraid of criticism from those who are by now indoctrinated by the green tinge of control through negativism. Geoff S
sherro01, please! The text in italics is a quote from the article. I didn’t write it! Write that down!
Germany hit a new “green” energy penetration record, but then, electricity in Germany costs 4 times more than in France.
https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/data-tools/real-time-electricity-tracker?from=2024-5-26&to=2024-6-25&category=price&compareCountry=true
A series of fiery explosions erupted in a lithium battery factory in an industrial area in South Korea Monday, killing at least 22, multiple outlets reported.
Videos published by Reuters and Sky News show smoke billowing skywards with fire trucks at the scene, and the smoldering warehouse after firefighters appeared to have contained the blaze. South Korea-based lithium battery manufacturer Aricell owns the factory, located in Hwaseong, a major industrial cluster 90-odd minutes southwest of Seoul, Reuters reported.
https://dailycaller.com/2024/06/24/videos-aricell-lithium-battery-factory-explosion-22-dead-south-korea/
Social ‘justice’ acts from defacing famous works of art to disrupting everyday activities involved in the business of living (like simply driving to work or home) and sometimes even involving the robbing and burning down of businesses, minimize the significance of previously commonly recognized rebellious activities like, e.g., MLK’s march. Similarly, the acts of the Hot World global warming.catastrophists of Western academia minimizes the integrity of and respect for science.
Since we’ve been talking about education this week, how should the approximately 30% increase in ocean acidity over the past ~200 years be discussed?
Err, Stephen. How many pH points was that change, in absolute numbers. And I hope you were able to sample that very large ocean with enough samples.
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | June 26, 2024 at 9:14 am | Reply
Jim2, “Over the industrial age, ocean pH has dropped about 0.1 pH units”
…
When one is taking pH of typical ocean waters using a pH electrode, factors such as the presence of suspended solids in a biologically active, time-responsive system cause a measurement problem of “drift”. It takes time for the whole analytical system to equilibrate. This time can (and maybe does) often exceed the patience of the observer, resulting in an error that is about as big as the 0.1 pH units you mention, since must past data were recorded to the first decimal place . This error cannot be adjusted out of sight. Sometimes it is positive, sometimes negative, I’ve seen up to half an hour to settle.
I suspect that you have seen such drift and tried to combat it in your past work.
Geoff S
Geoff,
Yes, I’ve had such experience, bench top centrifuges are used to remove/segregate suspended solids.
You have already stated your opinion about the precision of field-engineering handheld meters (uncertainty ~0.1 pH), I agree. As for drift, real analytical chemists use reference standards and procedures.
Measurements 50 years ago were not as good as the ones made today (what a surprise). Let us know when you have a time machine so we can go back and fix the insufficiencies in the historical data. That doesn’t mean the older data is useless – it just has less statistical weight corresponding to its greater uncertainty.
Despite your experience, real scientists (oceanographers) can measure seawater pH with precision and accuracy of ~ 0.005 pH using modern methods and instrumentation.
Oceans are not acid, how can oceans that are not acid increase in something that they are not? There is no need to discuss something that actually is not!
Not to be a pedant or anything but it is technically correct to say that an alkaline solution that has become more neutral has “acidified”.
Where to challenge Stephen Segrest on is the quantification “30%”. 30% relative to what? From completely neutral to completely alkaline? If so that is clearly BS.
30% relative to previous pH changes?
As Jim says, you need to put it into absolute terms, and into historical context. If the oceans were unusually alkaline 200 years ago (relative to some other much longer period baseline) then this would be represent a natural and normal correction. How does the small change in ocean pH compare to local variations? What range of pH has an impact on carbonate lifeforms. From my reading they tolerate much greater changes in pH (and often evolved in completely different pH levels) than the changes we se in the ocean.
Lies, damn lies, statisitics, democrats, and percent change.
To what extent have the oceans become more Neutral ? ( or using the phase more acidic/acidification as the activist prefer to use for emphasis).
The oceans are quite large, while ph levels vary considerably by depth , distance from land, by temperature, and by hosts of other factors. How do you get a meaningful “average ” in which to measure the average movement to neutral?
How do you get a meaningful measurement of PH 10 years ago, 20 years ago 50 or 100 years ago or 1,000 years ago?
What was the previous ph level?
Do you ignore the measurement deficiencies when it suits your agenda
If you are truly interested in ocean chemistry, here are a few references. It is past time for some of you to get out of your information silos and read some science. These articles which pop up on Google may help:
https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-environ-012320-083019
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1208277
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-023-02042-0
https://academic.oup.com/icesjms/article/65/3/414/789605
Let me help you out, David. The surface pH of the ocean has, allegedly, changed by 0.1 pH units.
agnostic2015: “Where to challenge Stephen Segrest on is the quantification “30%”. 30% relative to what?”
It is a 30% increase in hydrogen ion concentration relative to preindustrial. Nearly half of that has occurred over the last 30 years.
Oceans can increase in acidity by adding acid to them – In this case, carbonic acid from CO2.
I think you might need to discuss this with a chemistry textbook, because changing pH in the ocean is real, exists, and clearly deserves discussion, because it’s clearly not understood by many.
A pH change from 8 to 7 is 900 percent. This is why it”s really stoop id and misleading to use percents for pH. And BAB knows it. Yet he continues the con.
Jim2: “A pH change from 8 to 7 is 900 percent. This is why it”s really stoop id and misleading to use percents for pH. And BAB knows it. Yet he continues the con.”
No, what is really “stoop id” is to think that the percentage is applied to pH. It isn’t, it is applied to the hydrogen ion concentration (absolute, and linear) which can be derived from the pH. Oh well, I can see why you got out of chemistry.
I’m not conning anyone, but obviously I’m not doing well at teaching chemistry to someone who doesn’t understand the difference between a number and its (negated) logarithm.
Keep trying.
Jim2,
Over the industrial age, ocean pH has dropped about 0.1 pH units. That corresponds to a hydrogen ion concentration increase of about 30%. The relationship between linear and logarithmic scales is not that difficult. Should have been covered in a chemistry class (I thought you had a chemistry degree?).
https://www.noaa.gov/education/resource-collections/ocean-coasts/ocean-acidification
BAB – So when I request an absolute measure, it means I don’t have a Chemistry degree? I thought you could apply logic better than that.
Jim2,
The 30% increase is an absolute hydrogen ion concentration increase. If I remember right, you claimed to have a BS chemistry degree – I would hope that you would retain some of it, even if you didn’t follow a career in chemistry.
Absolute concentrations:
Preindustrial pH of 8.15: [H⁺] = 10^(-pH) = 7.08E-9 moles/liter
Current pH of 8.05: [H⁺] = 10^(-pH) = 8.91E-9 moles/liter
Those are the absolute molar concentrations of the H⁺ as you requested. The relative change in concentration is.
(8.91/7.08)-1 = 0.26, or 26% (~30% ?)
Hey Genius! A drop from 8 to 7 is 900% based on hydrogen ion. If you think you can derive a 900% change from the integers 8 and 7, I would love to see it!
A drop of 0.1 pH relative to 14 (the most basic) and 0 (the most acidic) is 0.7%. Not 30%.
Various parts of the oceans have different acidities on a range that is much wider than 0.1 pH. The Bering sea for example has an average pH of 7.7. The water in the Mariana Trench has been recorded at 10.7.
So a 0.1 pH change is a 3% drop over the most extreme environments in the ocean.
So absolute terms makes the most sense, and then put it into the context of the expected range, the interannual variability, and historic context. For example, corals that live in more variable and slightly more acidic environments tend to grow more strongly.
Agnostic: “A drop of 0.1 pH relative to 14 (the most basic) and 0 (the most acidic) is 0.7%. Not 30%”
Methinks you don’t understand what you are saying. pH is not limited to a range of 0 -14, e.g., 10 molar hydrochloric acid has a pH of -1. Also, it appears that you think a number and its logarithm are the same and interchangeable: a reduction in pH units of 0.114 corresponds to a hydrogen ion concentration increase of 30%.
And yes, ocean pH is variable with time, location, temperature, salinity, etc. – has always been that way – doesn’t change the fact that the average pH is getting smaller = more acidic.
No organism lives in the “average pH”.
Jim2: “No organism lives in the “average pH”
Wow – that’s correct – the organisms in question live in the ocean, and the average pH they are, and have been, exposed to is becoming more acidic.
Guess the saying, “can’t fix stupid” applies in this case. Please keep replying; each makes your scientific capabilities and lack of understanding more obvious.
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | June 27, 2024 at 9:44 am |
And yes, ocean pH is variable with time, location, temperature, salinity, etc. – has always been that way – doesn’t change the fact that the average pH is getting smaller = more acidic.
Which makes computing the “average” PH of the oceans problematic.
Joe Kosanda,
https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-tech/meet-5-noaa-buoys-help-scientists-understand-our-weather-climate-and
Stephen,
As fiction.
I wrote a Draft Masters thesis on pH measurement that I pulled because boring. I owned a lab actually measuring pH and its uncertainty. We researched items like electrode performance under non-ideal conditions, not just pH, also the emerging Specific Ion electrodes, such as when solids like seaweed were in the sample. It gets horribly complicated, the deeper you look. Chemical, not electrode pH measurement shared some complications.
The thought that confidence can be placed on a pH measurement taken 50 years ago by dipping an electrode in some ocean water, with little associated data is simply ludicrous.
Try reading Debye Huckel relationships.
Geoff Saaa
Geoff,
Did you ever do any seawater measurements? Seems that they were good to ~0.005 pH units 35 years ago, and those colorimetric methods are now the standard for seawater pH measurements.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0304420389900613
Maybe you would like to see what your BOM has to say about “ocean acidification” (search in the document).
http://www.bom.gov.au/state-of-the-climate/oceans.shtml
In as much as the oceans are infinitely buffered, concerns about changes in acidity are irrelevant.
If I remember correctly (which is itself a topic for debate), wasn’t ocean acidification, at one time, related to coral reef health?
https://x.com/BjornLomborg/status/1809547890576036291
Green New Flop.
The world’s most ambitious climate plan has become a major political liability.
Public support for the European Union’s Green Deal, aimed at eliminating carbon emissions by 2050, is under threat as an energy crisis hits voters’ wallets. A flood of incentives for clean technologies unleashed by the US and China has also stoked concerns that Europe’s sticks-over-carrots approach will make it less competitive.
The extent of the damage will be made clear when citizens vote in parliamentary elections from June 6 to June 9. In their campaigns, leading mainstream candidates have shifted from framing the climate action as a way for Europe to lead globally to focusing on how they’ll protect domestic industries and limit the cost to households. Meanwhile, discontent over everything from boiler bans to sustainable farming directives has helped climate-skeptic right-wing parties gain support.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-06-01/what-to-know-about-the-green-deal-as-europe-heads-for-elections
Jim2, “And BAB knows it. Yet he continues the con.”
Sorry, are the calculations beyond you (it’s really only high school level chemistry)? Is that why you think it is con? Says a lot about your understanding of science.
Bye, Jim
Your reply says a lot about you being a propagandist rather than a scientist.
Oh, Jimmy – my feelings are so hurt – LOL. Problem is, I am a scientist, you are the propagandist – your response is obviously projection without content. So sorry, you don’t understand science and can only resort to personal attacks when you can’t deal with the science. Maybe you should stick to posting your thread-bombing schadenfreude news clippings.
Joe TNCS:
“Ganon – at this point – you are absolutely fully aware that the resolution of the data is insufficient to make the claim you keep repeating – ”
You have no idea of what I am absolutely fully aware of – typical presumption on your part. The only claim I keep making is that nobody (including you) has provided evidence of an “event” similar to the current one; that includes temporal profiles, rates of change, and physical causality. I’m still waiting for the century when it happened, if you have evidence.
“Could have happened” is not evidence.
Above in the wrong place
https://judithcurry.com/2024/06/18/reflections-on-k-12-science-education/#comment-1007362
Jim2’s referenced comment:
“Hey Genius! A drop from 8 to 7 is 900% based on hydrogen ion. If you think you can derive a 900% change from the integers 8 and 7, I would love to see it!”
No problem. Is this another of your failed “gotcha” questions?
Hydrogen ion concentrations: ([H+] = 10^(-pH):
A(start, pH 8): 10^-8 = 0.00000001
B(end, pH 7): 10^-7 = 0.0000001
Percentage change = 100*(end-start)/start
= 100*(1e-7 -1e-8)/1e-8) = 100*(9e-8/1e-8) = 900% change.
You’re welcome! Once again, you show how little you understand simple chemistry, exponents and logarithms.
Say “thank you”, to the genius scientist that provided what you requested. Maybe you should tell him how much you “love” seeing it – my hope is that you can just understand it.
So you have confirmed my original assertion, the 900% change. You appear to have a reading comprehension problem or maybe it’s just ADD.
Jim2,
I never contested your 900%; I confirmed it and showed how it is calculated – exactly what you asked for. Even though it is not relevant to ocean acidification which stands at about a 30% increase in terms of [H+]. As for reading comprehension and ADD – you must be projecting again (thanks for the continuing insults, it just shows who you are).
You are right in that I don’t have to point out what you are doing. Everyone can see it.
Yes, Jim – people can see what I’m doing – refuting your false claims with scientific calculations. What you are doing (losing an argument based on facts) should also be abundantly clear.
I love the sound of desperation in the morning!
JIm2: “I love the sound of desperation in the morning!”
You must be talking to yourself, since you don’t hear the things I have to say about climate science.
IMHO, responses that resort to insults only, with no discussion of the relevant science, are a clear sign of where the desperation lies. Please keep making a fool of yourself – it is so much fun.
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | June 27, 2024 at 6:08 pm |
Geoff, “Did you ever do any seawater measurements? Seems that they were good to ~0.005 pH units 35 years ago, and those colorimetric methods are now the standard for seawater pH measurements.”
…
Yes, did sea water re Debye Huckel.
We have no way now to know that they were good to any stated level, be they by electrode or titration. You cannot produce any evidence that they were good to 0.005 pH at the time, because the evidence does not exist.
(I am searching some National Standards Laboratories for pH publications but blanks so fa.)r Geoff S
Geoff,
Accurate scientific measurements require, most importantly, good reference standards, as well standard addition and dilution techniques. It seems your experience is with “quick” measurements.
https://www.nist.gov/programs-projects/ph-metrology
I already gave you the reference/evidence for ~0.005 pH uncertainty (1 s.d.).
Here it again:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0304420389900613
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | June 27, 2024 at 8:42 pm |
Geoff, Accurate scientific measurements require, most importantly, good reference standards, as well standard addition and dilution techniques. It seems your experience is with “quick” measurements.
….
Bushaw, you are reciting elementary analytical chemistry stuff.
In the real world, there are limits to accuracy because the “good reference standards” you mention are difficult to match to the composition of what is being analysed. For sea water, you can create an analogue with pure chemicals, but you cannot easily, or at all, match the consequences of sea water being a living environment hosting reactions and products that you cannot replicate in your standards. There is a fundamental limit on accuracy because of mismatch of standard and analyte. Current procedures are good, but have limits. You might get +/_ 0.005 pH for optimum lab conditions and compliant analytes by colorimetry, but the real world is harder. Geoff S
Geoff,
The data belies your claims. I already gave you (twice) the 35-year-old paper demonstrating the limits of determination. Here is an example of real-world measurements: oceanic pH and pCO2, and [CO2]atm for Hawaii (Mauna Loa and ALOHA Station):
https://dornsife-blogs.usc.edu/wrigley/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Picture23.png
Geoff,
(Real) ocean water reference standards are readily available. I expect that additional measurements/corrections for ionic strength/salinity are used for very precise measurements.
https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/feature-story/standard-seawater-yes-there-such-thing
Sherrod1
concur with your observations on the limitations of the measurements
Note the multitude of dodges of your question
lab v real world
Sparseness of the measurements
quality of the field measurements over time
large variations in ph levels from region to region, by depth, etc
Same issue with “what has happened in the last 60 years hasnt happened before”
Simply reaching conclusions with insufficient data – all the while knowing the data is insufficient to reach said conclusion.
JTNCS: ““what has happened in the last 60 years hasnt happened before”
That is probably right, but what I said was, “what has happened in the last 60 years” has not been observed for previous times. Quite simply, there is no evidence and none of you have been able to provide anything convincing. No evidence is very different from the overwhelming evidence for what HAS happened in the last 60 years. Frankly, I think there is a large group here that can’t handle it (ACC), neither intellectually nor emotionally.
In the past 60 years Humanity has prospered and expanded more than any time in history. This trend is likely to continue under slightly warmer conditions.
Ganon – at this point – you are absolutely fully aware that the resolution of the data is insufficient to make the claim you keep repeating –
“what has happened in the last 60 years” has not been observed for previous times. Quite simply, there is no evidence and none of you have been able to provide anything convincing.”
On the contrary. the greenland and antarctica ice cores shows the warming having occurred has likely happened a few times in the last 10k-20k years.
https://cp.copernicus.org/articles/16/1325/2020/
gisp2
Rob,
Thanks for your opinion, you’ve stated it numerous times before.
Joe TNCS:
“Ganon – at this point – you are absolutely fully aware that the resolution of the data is insufficient to make the claim you keep repeating – ”
You have no idea of what I am absolutely fully aware of – typical presumption on your part. The only claim I keep making is that nobody (including you) has provided evidence of an “event” similar to the current one; that includes temporal profiles, rates of change, and physical causality. I’m still waiting for the century when it happened, if you have evidence.
“Could have happened” is not evidence.
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | June 29, 2024 at 6:11 pm |
Geoff, “Here is an example of real-world measurements: oceanic pH and pCO2, and [CO2]atm for Hawaii (Mauna Loa and ALOHA Station):”
….
JIM2: I am not picking on you, merely using your comment as a place to write my comments, usual way to find comment space, I think.
….
Bushaw,
You are 2 years behind the pace.
Here is a detailed dissection of uncertainty of CO2 measurements, mainly from Mauna Loa.
The bottom line is of general importance for those interested in hard science:
“Authors have to cease and desist from cherry picking, concealment of adverse data, misrepresentation of uncertainty and reluctance to respond to criticisms of their work.”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/04/20/sorry-but-hard-science-is-not-done-this-way/
Geoff S
Sherrington,
I don’t think you understand what trends in long-term calibrated data are. I’ll go with the NOAA studies and the results they produce, over your self-referenced blog on “WattsUpWithThat?” I don’t suppose you see the irony of your title? Needless to say, the limitations of your experiences do not set limitations on “hard science” measurements.
Ganon – Same fundaental logic error
Sherrod has pointed out you error multiple times.
The absence of data with sufficient resolution to determine if the signal exists is distinctly different from the absence of a signal with good data.
You know the difference yet you continue to base both your claims on the later.
JoeNCS,
Thanks, always fun to hear how you view things.
EV Mandated Revolution hits a hurdle
EV Bubble
The first buyers of EV’s were their most passionate fans, and presumably the people-most-likely to love them, and in the best position to use them. Yet, when surveyed, 49% of Australians who owned an EV and 46% in the US said they want to go back to an internal combustion engine for their next car.
And the US and Australia are two nations where nearly everyone has a home-garage or driveway which makes EV ownership a bit easier (as long as the house doesn’t catch fire). Yet even with this cheaper and easier form of charging half the EV owners don’t want another one.
McKinsey & Co surveyed 30,000 people in 15 countries and were said to be surprised at the result.
This is from Jo Nova’s site in Oz. Search on Jo Nova.
MICHAEL CRICHTON —
‘There was a time when I worked in a clinic and, uh, one day a young woman came in, she was in her early twenties for a routine checkup and, I said what‘s going on with you and she said I‘ve just become blind. And, I said, oh my gosh, really, when did it happen, she said, well just, uh, coming into the clinic, walking up the steps of the clinic I became blind. And I said, oh, and I‘m—by now I‘m looking through the chart and I said, well, has this happened before, she said yes, it‘s happened before. I‘ve become blind in the past, and, what she had of course was hysterical blindness. And the characteristic of that, is that, the severity of the symptom is not matched by the emotional response that‘s, that‘s being presented. Most people would be screaming about that but she was very calm, oh yes, I‘m blind again. And I‘m reminded of that whenever I hear, that we‘re facing, whether we wanna call it a crisis or not, a significant global event, of, of, of importance where we‘re gonna have species lost and so on and so forth— that we can really address this by changing our light bulbs. Or that we can really make an impact by unplugging our appliances when we‘re not using them. It‘s very much out of whack. And so if… we’re only gonna do symbolic actions, I would like to suggest a few symbolic actions that right—might really mean something. One of them, which is very simple, 99% of the American population doesn‘t care, is ban private jets. Nobody needs to fly in them, ban them now. And, and in addition, [APPLAUSE] let‘s have the NRDC, the, the Sierra Club and Greenpeace make it a rule that all of their, all of their members, cannot fly on private jets, they must get their houses off the grid, they must live in the way that they‘re telling everyone else to live. And if they won‘t do that, why should we. And why should we take them seriously. [APPLAUSE] ~Michael ~Chricton
The helicopter money distributed during the pandemic is gone and the latest round of helicopter money from the dimowits isn’t helping families much. This will put even more political pressure to negate the Green Energy Unicorn.
The pandemic savings cushions that helped Americans weather high prices in recent years have worn through, contributing to a loss of consumer firepower that’s rippling through the economy.
Delinquencies are rising. Executives are flagging caution among shoppers in recent earnings calls, and retail sales barely increased in May after falling the month prior. Economists forecast solid inflation-adjusted consumer spending in data out Friday, helped by lower gasoline prices, but that would follow an outright decline in April.
Americans Saved and Spent Their Pandemic Windfalls
…
The resilience of American consumers — and their willingness to spend despite rising prices and high borrowing costs — has been a pillar of the unwavering strength of the US economy in recent years. A healthy labor market has played a key role, but so has the roughly $2 trillion in excess savings Americans accumulated during the Covid-19 pandemic.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-06-27/us-economy-feels-impact-of-dried-up-pandemic-savings
This and high interest rates means EV sales will fall even further. People will be less accecpting of higher electricity and gas prices due to wind and solar and due to id ee ot ic “green” energy policy. Look at the EU. Their aggressive foray into the “energy transition” is helping more conservative political parties who don’t buy in to the AGWC meme.
Vote for natural gas this November!
They may also lock horns over liquefied natural gas. It’s no exaggeration to say the future of the nascent sector in the US hangs in the balance as the country heads toward the polls in November.
America is already the top shipper of LNG this year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. But what’s at stake is the longer-term trajectory of the industry, with various companies jockeying to add more export capacity.
If enough new terminals get built, the US can remain at the forefront of the LNG market for decades to come.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-06-27/american-lng-s-long-term-future-hinges-on-election
Yep, we need to go back to burning coal and using higher sulfur bunker fuel (for ships).
This result is robust, independent of which aerosol module or SSP scenario is used. Non-linear aerosol-cloud interactions dominate as a forcing agent over aerosol-radiation interactions. Aerosols’ ability to counterbalance GHG forcing on the global scale is today at a level comparable to that at the beginning of the last century. In the 1980s, the decade of largest global aerosol loads, aerosols balanced up to 80% of GHG forcing. As a consequence, global warming of the last decades, which is primarily driven by greenhouse gases, has been augmented by the effect of decreasing aerosol cooling in our model. By the end of this century, following the SSP scenarios, aerosols will only counterbalance 0%–20% of GHG forcing, depending on model and on scenario.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2022MS003070
Among other, very important lessons, about two (2) billions children are tought right now the scientifically mistaken concept of alleged Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW).
–
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
EV hell.
EVs in general have lower quality than traditional internal combustion engine vehicles. While EVs have fewer parts to break down, they also tend to be loaded with new technology that can go wrong, Hanley said.
In fact, he said, EV owners “are experiencing problems that are of a severity level high enough for them to take their new vehicle into the dealership at a rate three times higher than that of gas-powered vehicle owners.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-06-27/tesla-tsla-design-changes-confuse-drivers-undercut-ev-quality
I couldn’t help noticing that when asked about climate change in tonight’s debate, DJT chose to tell us how good the water was in his administration. Four years ago he would have shouted “hoax!” He is smart enough to know that position is no longer tenable.
Yes it is. It’s just that maybe some are scared to say it.
Andrew
The CNN Dimowits are going to ask questions slanted to Dimowit policy. Conservatives don’t want to give money to people for childcare, to buy homes, or to spend trillions on mitigation when adaptation is a more rational approach. Trump did the right thing by not answering those Dimowit-slated questions in any way, shape, or form. Instead he used those questions to highlight his accomplishments.
Dave … disclosure: I voted for Trump twice, will vote for him again. That said, I’ve never been satisfied with Trump’s debate performances. If Ramaswamy had been on the stage, his answers would have been quite technical. That’s not Trump’s strength. Trump addresses the Everyman, where he seems to have excellent insight. So, if he didn’t say hoax it may not be because that position is no longer tenable, but rather that the challenge to climate orthodoxy is already well past the ‘shock it’ stage.
Bill,
I think you likely have the trend in popular views on climate change wrong. Maybe the time you spend on this site is the reason. Views expressed here are hardly representative. Climate orthodoxy has gained credibility because its predictions turned out to be correct with recent record setting years. R’s have taken a beating on the abortion issue since Dobbs, and will want to avoid another debacle on the climate issue. They will not bring it up, but D’s will.
Or, David, perhaps the time you spend bareback riding among a stampeding herd of sacred cows is taking you down the wrong trail.
There must be peer review somewhere stating why mass hysteria is always right, otherwise you could be a science denier.
Dave … thanks for your reply.
I think we may be using the word popular differently. When I say Trump tries to appeal to the Everyman that popularity is amongst the population at large. I think your usage is amongst the ‘climate community’. I spend time on this site because it is a small(?) part of the climate community where I can hear alternate views. So I agree with you that the views here, amongst the climate community, are hardly representative. Yet even in that community, it seems these views are no longer in what I termed the shock stage. For me, politics is not just what goes in the social subsets, like the climate community, which are important, but in the society at large.
Bill,
It is the climate views of Everyman that I am talking about too. My own circle of contacts is not the basis of my statement, nor do I conduct surveys. I base my statement on the fairly clear movement in statements made by public officials, i.e. politicians, who I presume do poll Everyman opinions on climate.
I live in Montana. It was a purple state when I came here 21 years ago, but it is a deep red state today. Two years ago our Senator Daines (R) felt free to talk of the left’s “radical climate-crazy agenda”. But neither he nor R state officials disputed the science in the Held vs Montana decision a year later, nor in the ongoing appeal. Montana of course has a significant agricutural base. Farmers tend to worry a lot and could be among the losers as climate changes. It is not good politics to talk about a “Chinese hoax” with someone who can smell bs from a mile away. That is why I was not surprised when Trump ducked the question in the debate.
Dave … hoax is a loaded term. This site has debate/information on alternative views. For any person who claims hoax, there’s a person who pushes a false narrative. When I look at such things I’m not concerned with who is ‘right’, but try to see patterns that reflect the power relationships behind such … communications. When I see people who identify as liberals and conservatives agree on such power relationships, and particularly the fallout on those individuals from their respective groups, I don’t have to ‘believe’ in a hoax or a ‘catastrophe’ to know that we have to be careful what is being presented. This is with any subset in our culture.
An example is this discussion between Matt Taibbi (liberal) and Tucker Carlson (conservative). It’s long but covers much ground. The word climate isn’t mentioned once. But it is excellent on narrative, information, power and influence. All things extremely applicable to the climate subset.
https://x.com/TuckerCarlson/status/1806372267146051738
It’s a lot to ask, but I hope you’ll try it. If you do, let me know what you think.
Bill,
Yes, listening to Tucker Carlson for 2 hours 20 minutes was a lot for you to ask. I made it through 10 minutes, and fast forwarded ahead to get some other threads. Comments on what I heard:
-The conversation began about journalism being the most hated profession. Really? Sure, if you are a pathological liar, you hate journalists. They get in the way of your ambitions when they fact check. But in my humble opinion, and Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson’s too, journalists serve an important function in a democracy. I don’t hate them.
– There was a short bit of nostalgia for the journalism of ~1990. I have some nostalgia for that too, for the time when there was more of a common set of facts because of the “fairness doctrine” on network news. That didn’t lead to consensus on all issues of course, but we were less polarized. Getting out of silos and talking to people I disagree with is precisely why I read and comment on this blog.
-In my fast forward, there was some comment about D’s jailing political opponents. It would not be productive for me to state my views on that perspective. It also discouraged me from listening further.
You write “When I look at such things I’m not concerned with who is ‘right’, but try to see patterns that reflect the power relationships behind such … communications.” Getting the science right matters to me if not to you, and my retirement hobby has been to study and debunk junk science. I have found it is not very difficult to do.
You also talk of “hoaxes vs catastrophes”. I believe framing the question this way is wrong, and I think you do too. I am especially irritated when the climate issue is described as an “existential threat”. But that does not mean it isn’t a damn serious problem that needs to be tackled by both sides of the political divide.
Dave … I read papers posted on here that are deemed proof of CO2 induced warming as well as skeptical ones. As a non-scientist, it is difficult for me and takes much of my time. But I try anyway. So, thanks for spending the time.
What I found interesting listening to Taibbi wasn’t hatred of journalism, but how journalism has been subsumed by ideology. Journalism should be a check on power, not a tool of it. Yes, all humans have one ideology or another, so there have always been journalists and news organizations that have been biased. Being human it goes with the territory. Yet, something has happened in the past few decades where government and media have had contacts that go past simple bias. The Twitter Files proved that. One would expect Tucker to be screaming about it, but Taibbi is a liberal with impeccable credentials. Saving democracy by limiting democracy through censorship isn’t anything more than totalitarianism. They went through all the linkages. It’s not opinion.
I spoke about social subsets, the climate community being one. The creation and enforcement of narratives in the media is also evident in climate, politics, covid and others. All facts. So for me, the purported danger of CO2 pales with the actual subversion of the Bill of Rights. As a former liberal in another time, Marxist at one point, now difficult to put a label on but certainly somewhere on the right … I am satisfied we had this chat because in the end we can only meet and exchange what we believe to be the truth. If either of us is limited in that regard, by any means, then we are in the midst of a catastrophe.
Bill
Expressed beautifully. Our stories and journeys are similar. I was a liberal in the 1960s and was impacted at a younger age by the civil rights struggle in the 1950s. How could anyone not have been liberal during that period when our social conscience became more acute. I also began following the nightly news in the mid 1950s. There was never a hint of bias or ideology in those broadcasts. Only many years later did I find out my hero Walter Cronkite was liberal.
The media have changed. There were hints in the 1980s. The change became more pronounced in the 1990s, and the scab was ripped off completely when Dan Rather came out.
The liberal bias and outright propaganda in the media are so blatant and obvious, I don’t know how anyone can have a straight face when denying it. It’s not always blatant. It’s not always what they say. Sometimes it’s what isn’t said. Or it’s a very subtle use of only one word when another, more objective word would have sufficed.
Following Twitter has opened my eyes even more. Apparently, some journalists who decades ago would have gone to great links to convey an image of neutrality, just lay their ideology right out there. I’m surprised their employers aren’t concerned about destroying that once sacred image of pursuers of truth. The bias is out there to see in full force.
I saw an article about 379 lies told by Biden. And that was dated September, 2023. I understand economics, and I have researched the history of taxes and budgets and know them backwards and forwards. I see more Biden lies every day, when they are about these subjects. They are falsifiable lies, not the subjective exaggerations that the so called fact checkers get on Trump every day.
There are facts out there. If journalists wanted to search them out, they are for the taking. Maybe it’s just too much work to find them. But then, how much work would have it required to discredit the “Charlottesville, fine people on both sides hoax”. I’ve seen the video dozens of times and the transcript as many times and yet the media still lets Biden use it with impunity.
This quote, from a different time, wasn’t about this issue. And yet tyranny is tyranny, just in different clothing.
“ We know that they are lying, they know that they are lying, they even know that we know they are lying, we also know that they know we know they are lying too, but they are still lying.”
I thought about this quote when watching snippets of the debate and news coverage after. I saw Biden’s swing too. He is no 6.
Shame on journalism. They have sold their souls and our democracy is paying a price.
Good posts, Bill, and cerescokid.
“The creation and enforcement of narratives in the media is also evident in climate, politics, covid and others. ”
“Shame on journalism. They have sold their souls and our democracy is paying a price.”
The only people shocked by Biden’s performance in the recent presidential debate are those whom only watch MSM news—or the anachronistic big 3 network news. The MSM has covered-up most Leftist faux pas for decades, while inventing out of whole cloth controversies on the Right. But the MSM can’t hide a live feed. Their cover-up was on borrowed time; Biden’s infirmity was seen for the first time by many, it was extremely sad to see—though the media’s infirmity was blatantly exposed too, not so sad.
Biden ‘s cognitive decline was very obvious during the summer of 2020. The media and democrat operatives are irate because they cant hide it anymore
Bill,
It is more than a little ironic that you wish for me to learn about journalism ethics from Tucker Carlson, dismissed from Fox News after knowlingly lying about Dominion Voting and costing his employer a bundle.
Unlike you, I am (or was) a scientist. Therefore truth is very important to me. That is why I could never vote for the guy you will vote for. How can you expect sustainable policy to be built on falsehoods?
David,
Ever hear Dave Chappelle’s comedic narrative about the honest liar, in context of Trump?
Lies come in different forms, not all are intentionally malevolent, like the Russian hoax was for example. Tucker had to pay a price not because his lie was intentional, no need to get into the reasons; his price came from putting his network in legal jeopardy.
Right, David. The Dimowits and other leftys are paragons of truth and virtue. Like the 50+ intelligence officers, some who were actively on contract with the CIA, who swore the h biden laptop was a Russia hoax, or if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, or the Steele Dossier, and the list goes on.
Dave …
> -In my fast forward, there was some comment about D’s jailing political opponents. It would not be productive for me to state my views on that perspective. It also discouraged me from listening further.
> Getting the science right matters to me if not to you, and my retirement hobby has been to study and debunk junk science. I have found it is not very difficult to do.
In the first statement above, that also happens to me, where I shutdown my attention due to some item initiating a judgement that becomes final in my assessment of the material expressed. We all do this. Many times the judgement is correct.
In the second statement above, it has the same elements as the first. We focus our attention on an item we encounter where we have made a judgement and proceed to reinforce it. Again, we all do this. This is how we’re wired.
Certainly the above could be expressed simpler. One might use terms like confirmation bias. But sometimes use of abbreviated terms leave much to be desired. My point is, generally speaking, given how we approach knowledge it seems clear that unless we allow open discussion where other judgements are available we do ourselves and others a disservice. Giving a fair assessment to a contrary view may or may not yield complete agreement, may lead to a point valued for future consideration … and what I find most interesting, may open an appreciation not for the detail so much as the approach.
For me, an example is the book, “Manufactured Consent”, by Herman and Chomsky. I made a judgement a long time ago about Chomsky. But I may read the book, suspending my judgement (as much as I can), in order to see how his approach relates to what I’ve been, clumsily, trying to say. Why pick him instead of someone I judge to be … more acceptable? Because of the chance I may gain knowledge about an item troubling to me that also troubles those whose judgements I rendered biased. That judgement of a bias may or may not still be there after I read the book. But suspending that judgement, even for a short time, is the only way for me to embrace a possible piece of valuable knowledge. That’s why I found the Taibbi and Carlson discussion so interesting.
Kid and Trunks said some things above that made me think of why I considered myself a liberal so long ago. Having your mind opened, your judgement suspended, by something like minority civil rights, seemed to reaffirm the value of the liberal view in their approach to knowledge. But did it? Maybe then. Now 60-75 years later that view has encountered serious problems. Aside from the irony, why such things happen, how an approach to knowledge becomes destructive instead of enrichening, is a sobering question.
Forgive my cumbersome expressions.
Bill,
We both believe in respectful civil discussion with open minds. I believe we both see the climate question as neither a hoax nor an existential threat. I see it as a very serious problem nonetheless. To you “the purported danger of CO2 pales with the actual subversion of the Bill of Rights”.
I have long tried to understand why a scientific question causes such polarization, and in particular why “conservatives” are prone to what appears to me as wishful (and reckless) thinking on the issue. I don’t think it is the fossil fuel money that R’s receive, though I might be naive. I don’t think you are still campaigning against Al Gore, but that is when many first took political positions. I hear my R friends ask: “why take action when China does not?” If I am correct that there is a real problem, anyone can see the folly of the “America First” approach; we and China are in this together. I hear the argument that we can address the problem in 30 years when we are richer and smarter, but that conflicts with my high-tech manufacturing instincts, where it is a financial imperative to pounce on a problem as soon as possible, else you pay big later. But I think your “subversion of the Bill of Rights” argument is probably the key motivator to what I would describe as “reckless conservatism” on the climate issue.
“Freedom” is a loaded term. I had a conversation 35 years ago with a couple of French engineers who had done a job in the US and had been disappointed to find that we were not “free” after all. “You have speed limits” was their argument! Apparently speed limits do not subvert the Bill of Rights in your view, but mandated fuel economy does.
The political divide on climate seems to have been created because the problem begs for collective action, which is anathema to the right, which sees all problems as solvable by individuals responding to market forces. Now I am a fan of market forces too, though I am far removed from today’s Republican party. Hence my preference for a revenue neutral carbon tax, but that is another discussion.
David Andrews | July 1, 2024 at 11:14 pm |
“I have long tried to understand why a scientific question causes such polarization, and in particular why “conservatives” are prone to what appears to me as wishful (and reckless) thinking on the issue. ”
David – A significant portion of the the polarization can be traced back to the “climate scientists” behavior and the activists behavior. Virtually all skeptics agree that the earth is going through a warming trend and almost every skeptic agrees that human activity contributes to the warming (whether it be greenhouse gases or changes land use or other human causes).
The problem causing the polarization is that the science loses a tremendous amount of credibility when they get caught misrepresenting the science which unfortunately is very common occurrence through climate science field.
Whether its from reaching bold scientific conclusions even though the data is insufficient to reach any conclusion, conclusions made in spite of observational deficiencies, etc.
When delving outside the actual science into subjects such as extreme weather frequency, subsidies, renewables , etc where the activists are flat out wrong and/or grossly misstate the facts, certainly creates doubt about the “science”.
in summary, its the polarization is caused in large part by the scientists themselves. Perhaps, the scientists should do a better job policing the activists among themselves.
Dave … thank you for an engaging conversation. I really do appreciate it.
> I have long tried to understand why a scientific question causes such polarization …
This is exactly what I’m concerned about from a sociological view; the impacts of policy decisions from scientific exigency.
It would seem that the first question is what exactly is meant by exigent? You answered that, if I understood you correctly, that rising CO2 levels are a concern that should be addressed now before we pass a certain threshold.
I read others who point out benefits of elevated CO2, absorption rates, the sun’s effects, paleoclimatology, measurement accuracy, models, etc. So, as a citizen/taxpayer I am confronted by some doubt in the scientific community, which in itself (regardless of who is correct) intimates that the ‘problem’ isn’t exigent. So what’s a poor boy to do? Keep reading and trying to understand, not just the side I may favor, but how the ‘other side’ came to their conclusions. And, how all defend their positions.
This brings me back to the Taibbi/Carlson video. One negative thing that stood out, maybe you saw it, was when discussing why journalism has become so polarized they retreated to the convenient good/evil dichotomy. Sad actually, how humans resort to that. But it is understandable, when we believe our livelihoods are threatened and others employ disrespectful treatment. Just like kids in a schoolyard.
Dave, if one yells fire in a crowded theatre and there is one, that person is a hero. If there is no fire, what then? It would seem we need to be pretty darn sure. So I ask, are you that sure?
David, I’m curious as to what scientific evidence you find so compelling that you believe that climate is a “very serious problem”.
Here’s why I’ve come to believe that the only serious problem we have is how people in power are responding to the alleged problem.
A year and a half ago I was skeptical about the climate-change narrative, but only because I react poorly to propaganda. To be honest, climate wasn’t even a particularly important topic for me at the time. Anyway, one morning I read an article claiming that we’re heading into an ice age. I was skeptical but thought, if that’s true, I should be able to see a correlation between global temperature and sunspots. So I grabbed a cup of coffee, fired up Excel and loaded it with global temperature and sunspot data.
Knowing that the earth is big, and the sun is bigger, I decided to start my analysis with a simple 100 year moving average on the sunspot data. Before I’d even finished my first cup I had this result.
https://github.com/bobf34/GlobalWarming/blob/main/images/Simple99yearMovingAverageModel.png
I remember thinking that surely I wasn’t the first to discover this, so I began doing research. The first thing I discovered was that Google search results on anything climate related are very biased. Any search involving the sun and climate only brought results saying the sun doesn’t affect climate. There are other opinions, but it’s quite difficult trick Google into disclosing them. Fortunately, searches using scholar.google.com worked much better.
It only took a few weeks for me to convince myself that the result was not a spurious correlation. In about 3 months I understood things well enough to improve the model by simply adding a notch filter to make the model response to sunspot data match the earth’s response. It took about 9 months to fully understand how the deceptively simple moving average was simultaneously extracting solar activity from the sunspot signal proxy and modeling the earth’s response to that activity.
Not modeling the earth’s integral-like response to solar activity is the primary reason many researchers failed to link solar activity to global temperature. Because of the earth’s delayed response, I can also predict that the global temperatures should start falling slightly over the next decade.
I felt that what I’d discovered was important to humanity, and I’m not doing this for fame or fortune, so I made everything public. My name on this post is linked to my github site. I’ve also made an Excel version for those that would rather not read code. All of these results I posted before on CE (along with some further research which confirms that CO2 lags temperature).
https://localartist.org/media/SunspotPredictionExcel.xlsx
Most recently I extended the analysis further back in time and found an honest temperature reconstruction that was not based on tree rings. Here I’m using a different approach to extract solar activity and model the earth’s response. It works, but it’s not as accurate as the model because it’s using less information from the sunspot proxy.
https://localartist.org/media/SolarAndTempProxies.png
Clearly I’ve done the work and convinced myself that global temperature is responsible for almost all of the climate change. I’m not parroting someone else’s talking points.
So, back to my original question David, what convinces you that climate change is a serious problem? To that question I’ll add, what would it take to convince you that it’s not? Is that even possible?
“Clearly I’ve done the work and convinced myself that global temperature is responsible for almost all of the climate change. I’m not parroting someone else’s talking points. ”
Typo
Clearly I’ve done the work and convinced myself that SOLAR ACTIVITY is responsible for almost all of the climate change. I’m not parroting someone else’s talking points.
David
I agree with Joe, the behavior of some activists in climate science is deplorable. In fact, that is what motivated me to take a deeper dive into the issue.
My take on why skepticism is warranted. I will cover the reasons in descending order of importance. First, despite the marketing efforts of the establishment, there were warm periods preceding this one. We can’t get rid of the HTM, RWP and MWP. The MWP was global. Hundreds of studies tell us that. There was a global LIA, despite the best protestations by the usual characters.
A decade ago I compiled a list of hundreds of studies finding an association with long term climate changes and solar activity. They continue to find evidence that climate is affected by the sun.
The literature is replete with low frequency natural variability. The list is too numerous for here.
Before 1900, the quality of SAT and SST and OHC is suspect for many reasons, paucity of coverage just leading the pack.
We have influenced temperatures to some extent by changes in land use and a massive growth in urbanization.
Hundreds of tidal gauges and studies of individual tidal gauges indicate to me the SLR crisis is non existent. The satellite data have too many uncertainties to put much credence in the numbers.
Ganon has the best question. Isn’t the last 50 years unprecedented? We certainly have the best, most reliable data. But the paleo reconstruction leaves a lot to be desired so I’m not convinced we are able to compare apples against apples. We will never know.
The current warming can be explained by the following. Coming out of one of the coolest periods of the Holocene. Following an unusual above normal long term period of solar activity. In the warm phase of the AMO. Tangential effect from land use and UHI effects. Some AGW, which is and will always be unknown with any precision.
I will leave the partisanship for another time.
Joe,
Thanks for confirming “almost every skeptic agrees that human activity contributes to the warming”. Some on this blog seem to disagree with that, but a better discussion results when extreme positions are avoided. You don’t address the particular point of my last post, about the strong correlation between one’s politics and one’s views on climate change, but I will comment on your points.
The well publicized “Climategate” incident 15 years ago indeed damaged the credibility of climate science. I think it has recovered well in most circles. As for your comments on “activists”, while a scientist certainly needs to remain objective and limit his formal conclusions to what the data allow, I don’t think scientists should be barred from the public forum. Their speculations are likely to be more informed than most others.
David
Has the climate science community redeemed themselves after climategate? a few points in response –
As I stated, the behavior of the climate scientists community and the activists bear much of the blame for the high level of skepticism.
For example, During the course of the Mann v Simberg/Steyn/NRO litigation, Mann perjured himself, distorted facts, etc a few hundred times, yes that is a few hunderd times, not just a couple of times. Can you trust the validity of his scientific conclusions with that extreme level of dishonesty. That person would be unemployable in my industry and most other industries. Further, not one single climate scientist called him out for his dishonesty during the course of litigation. What does that say about the integrity of the entire paleo science community?
Another example is the numerous studies and commentary which deal with the subsidies and renewable energy using highly distorted facts, delusional concepts, unrealistic assumptions, simple bad logic, etc. Such studies are considered mainstream in the climate science community. All of which raise the basic question is how could someone be fooled by such garbage, yet possess the superior intellectual brain power to ascertain the validity of the vastly more complex climate science?
Further damaging the climate science reputation is the use of cherrypicked data and dubious defense of the use of cherrypicked data. Further damaging the climate science reputation is ability to reach conclusions with high confidence levels based on the absence of data or data with poor resolution.
In summary, it is the climate scientists themselves that created the appearance dishonesty.
Bill,
You write:
“I read others who point out benefits of elevated CO2, absorption rates, the sun’s effects, paleoclimatology, measurement accuracy, models, etc….So I ask, are you that sure?” I will addrss each of your points:
• Yes, plants like more CO2. Should we sacrifice Miami for them?
• Several authors are just plain wrong about carbon absorption rates deduced from the behavior of radiocarbon after atmospheric nuclear testing in the 1950’s and 60’s. If you wish to cite a particular paper or author, I will provide more detail. (This is something I have studied personally. In some other areas I need to rely on others.)
• Climate scientists ascribe next to no effects from solar variability on the current warming, but Javier Vinos waves his hands and begs to differ. Did you see any statements about statistical confidence levels in his analysis? I didn’t.
• Yes, the climate has always been changing, and long-ago changes could not have been caused by us. Do you deduce from this that we are incapable of changing the climate if we inject CO2 into the atmosphere at an unprecedented rate? I don’t.
• The measured warming signal that is most robust, in my opinion, is the increase in ocean heat content over the last 70 years. That is where 90% of the energy from radiative imbalance has been accumulating. There are no urban heat islands to worry about. See https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/global-ocean-heat-content/
• Some argue that models are not science, that the scientific method requires performing controlled experiments. Too bad we don’t have a spare Earth to play with, so we are stuck with models, which are always imperfect. But models made 25 years ago did a decent job of predicting today’s climate. With a little effort, you can find papers plotting a collection of models against observations.
How sure do we have to be to act? That depends somewhat on the cost of acting. Doomsday scenarios of very expensive decarbonized energy in the future may not be correct. See the recent Economist article predicting future electricity prices will DROP as solar reaches its full potential.
Dave …
>But I think your “subversion of the Bill of Rights” argument is probably the key motivator to what I would describe as “reckless conservatism” on the climate issue.
I can see, from your perspective not just as a scientist, but one who is very concerned about CO2 induced warming, how you could say that. As a non-scientist I base my perspective on reading other scientists who say the issue is not as concerning as you believe it to be.
If it is not an emergency, why would we subvert the democratic process? And if there is skepticism, why wouldn’t the scientific community engage/encourage an open process on the issue?
Isn’t it reckless to make policy decisions that will have affects throughout society without proper deliberations?
You mentioned being in tech manufacturing and ‘pouncing’ on a problem as necessary. I don’t doubt that, having owned a company myself. But companies are hierarchical. Be careful advocating that politically. Yes, our constitutional republic has hierarchical elements. But our founding documents spend a great deal of time on the dangers of hierarchy.
Forgive the Wikipedia source of the following, the Romans created the office of ‘dictator’ to resolve a specific issue:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_dictator
I shouldn’t have to belabor the point of how that eventually worked out. I’m not saying you are advocating this, Dave. I am saying it does seem that warmists, in their desire to do what they think is right, have no qualms about developing the power to make that happen.
Bill,
A more detailed reply addressing your various technical uncertainties that I tried to submit yesterday is hung up in the system. The Merchants of Doubt seem to have gotten to you. We’ll see if this goes through.
1. I don’t see how the very limited actions taken on climate in the US “subvert the democratic process.” The Inflation Reduction Act passed Congress. Any executive orders were issued by an elected president, though of course the future of such actions are in doubt will the reversal of Chevron. Polls show a majority want more action.
2. Given your apprehesion about dictators, how can you support a canditate who doesn’t respect elections?
Mornin’, Dave.
Considering the length I had to page up to hit reply, I’d say we’re having a pretty good conversation. ;-)
Trump’s questioning of the election results is similar to Al Gore and Hillary (who until recently still maintains the election was stolen from her). Did Trump foment insurrection? Regardless of how that’s argued, let’s say he did, the fact is the system held.
I’ve stated in these pages before that I don’t vote for Trump because of cult of personality. Back in the day, I was friends with his helicopter pilot, who wanted to introduce me to him because I was a contractor. My answer was a quick no thanks. LOL!
Rather, I vote for Trump because he is the only choice I have as he seems (we never really know do we), for the most part, to favor my values. Not all my values, but it isn’t even close when compared to the Dems and several Republicans.
You mentioned the IRA. Did you know it is approximately 755 pages? I’m curious how many in Congress read the whole thing before the vote. Both parties have to take responsibility for not knowing all that was in it. And this is not the first or only bill moved through Congress this way. For me, it’s a disgrace and very concerning.
Bill,
You had previously mentioned the Bill of Rights. My earlier comment was about majority rule and was not responsive to minority rights protected by the Bill of Rights. You are in the minority with your climate opinions. Do you care to be specific about which of the Bill of Rights protects you from climate policy determined by the majority, but does not protect you from having to observe speed limits?
You might like a nice little book called Bill of Obligations by Richard Haass.
Dave …
> You are in the minority with your climate opinions. Do you care to be specific about which of the Bill of Rights protects you from climate policy determined by the majority, but does not protect you from having to observe speed limits?
Are you confusing minority rights in the Constitution with the Bill of Rights? I ask because some tend to confuse them.
There are several amendments in the Bill of Rights and other amendments which can be construed to protect ‘minority’ rights. I’m not sure about going through all 33.
How about I answer this way …
– You may be right, but my sense is I’m not sure I’m in the minority with my climate opinion. If you’re going by a poll, that doesn’t confer much, as the construction of the questions can dictate the answers. For example, most people may answer that they are concerned about pollution, but if instead of pollution the phrase CO2 pollution is asked I would say that is possibly problematic. Also, if one is truly convinced and concerned about CO2 pollution, they may not support certain measures to ameliorate what they consider CO2 pollution to be.
– My supposed minority opinion is protected, we can both agree, from violence perpetrated by the majority.
My point throughout this conversation is not what is the minority or majority opinion, or which one is correct, but that either opinion holders do not violate any of our rights in any of our founding documents. I hope I’ve been clear that this is the greater danger. And I hope that answers you.
The following is offered with the hope that it does not divert this interesting discussion.
Bill: “Trump’s questioning of the election results is similar to Al Gore and Hillary…”
I’ll resist asking you to defend that statement.
Bill, further upstream you asked: “…if there is skepticism, why wouldn’t the scientific community engage/encourage an open process on the issue?”
Regarding the scientific issues, the open process has been going on since Angstrom criticized Arrhenius. But there is a point where working scientists recognize the diminishing returns in debating issues that have been convincingly resolved for all but a few stragglers (or newcomers). As ckid is fond of documenting, there are always questions and potential inconsistencies that require investigation, and so the process is ongoing. But the productive debates are conducted in labs, at meetings, and in publications – not on the internet or in the press. Attend a scientific meeting and you will witness plenty of controversy and challenge. But not on the stuff that you read about at CE, Wattsup, JoNova, etc.
Hey Pat …
> Bill: “Trump’s questioning of the election results is similar to Al Gore and Hillary…”
> I’ll resist asking you to defend that statement.
It’s easy to defend those exact words. All challenged the results and, as losers, they continue to find fault, one way or another. In addition, if you’re referring to insurrection, note that he’s never been charged with that crime. And I added that, for me, even if he did it is noteworthy that the system held.
When people say, Trump isn’t above the law, that is true as the SC just said for most official acts vs some acts committed in an official capacity. The other side of that coin is also true, Trump (just like all of us, including the Biden Family) is entitled to all the protections of the law.
> Bill, further upstream you asked: “…if there is skepticism, why wouldn’t the scientific community engage/encourage an open process on the issue?”
You answered this from the point of view of the scientific community, which is fine. My point is that if scientific exigency is used to suspend civil liberties, in any form, I think that has to follow from an ‘open’ process where all scientists and non-scientists participate. The exigency by definition is presented to affect us all, therefore I get to have a say in what affects me. There’s a political process for that, which again must be open and honest and not short-circuited by any side.
If you don’t agree with that last paragraph, I’d love to hear why?
David: “My earlier comment was about majority rule and was not responsive to minority rights protected by the Bill of Rights….Polls show a majority want more action.”
The U.S. is a representative government a republic) and not a pure democracy for a reason; the Founder’s understood that pure democracies fail because they lead to a tyranny of the majority.
David: “…which of the Bill of Rights protects you from climate policy determined by the majority, but does not protect you from having to observe speed limits?”
There’s a difference between a policy proposal, versus a law enacted by Congress.
Pat, did you hear Biden’s comments before the 2022 mid-terms about if a red wave were to materialize, would he consider it legitimate?
Biden: “…I’m not going to say it’s going to be legit. It’s – the increase and the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these – these reforms passed.” Biden further stated: “I think it easily could be – be illegitimate”.
While on the topic of illegitimate elections, the hand-wringing continued; Stacy Abrams: https://sos.ga.gov/news/raffensperger-defeats-stacey-abrams-stolen-election-claims-court
Bill: “It’s easy to defend those exact words.”
Ah. Resistance to no avail.
Bill: “…if you’re referring to insurrection, note that [Trump’s] never been charged with that crime.”
Should he have been? (You may take as rhetorical. Please, take as rhetorical.)
Bill: “…if scientific exigency is used to suspend civil liberties, in any form, I think that has to follow from an ‘open’ process where all scientists and non-scientists participate.”
Sure. And would not part of that ‘open process’ involve scientists forcefully arguing against scientifically untenable assertions?
And those who do not accept the validity of the scientific conclusions, for whatever reason (scientific or otherwise), or who feel excluded from the ‘open process’ because their views are not accepted, can always sabotage the ‘open process’ by sowing mistrust at every opportunity. Accusations of wholesale dishonesty, corruption, incompetence, arrogance and general unlikability are routinely employed to destroy trust. But such factors, on an individual basis, are ultimately irrelevant in determining scientific validity.
Bill,
I have given you multiple opportunities to explain why you think action on climate change is a “subversion of the Bill of Rights”, and you have changed the subject each time. I conclude that your grievance is imaginary. You said that you should be protected from violence for your minority opinion, and I certainly agree with that. I am sure you would have described an actual violent episode if there were one, so we are talking about a hypothetical situation.
The remaining open item in our conversation concerns your statement “I read others who point out benefits of elevated CO2, absorption rates, the sun’s effects, paleoclimatology, measurement accuracy, models, etc….So I ask, are you that sure?” As noted before I made a detailed point-by-point and respectful response to that which was for some reason not posted. If it does not appear by tomorrow, I will break it into pieces and try again.
Dave …
> I have given you multiple opportunities to explain why you think action on climate change is a “subversion of the Bill of Rights”, and you have changed the subject each time. I conclude that your grievance is imaginary. You said that you should be protected from violence for your minority opinion, and I certainly agree with that. I am sure you would have described an actual violent episode if there were one, so we are talking about a hypothetical situation.
If I haven’t answered clearly, my bad. Maybe this will help. It isn’t ‘action on climate change’ that is a possible subversion of the Bill of Rights or the Constitution. It is how that ‘action’ is discussed and executed.
> The political divide on climate seems to have been created because the problem begs for collective action, which is anathema to the right, which sees all problems as solvable by individuals responding to market forces.
You said the above in an earlier comment. I think this frames the entire discussion. I agree with your assertion that there is a tension between collective action and individual response on the climate. My concern is that it goes beyond ‘collective action’ vs ‘market forces’. As I stated above: It is how that ‘action’ is discussed and executed.
How the Constitution and Bill of Rights enter the story isn’t … just … on free speech of ‘minority’ opinion, or how States Rights are a form of ‘minority’ protection, or how two Senators are allocated to each state regardless of population, the Great Compromise, separation of powers, and so forth. It is how … all … of those items were woven into a political/social fabric whose purpose was to balance the common good and individual rights. Simply put, the Articles of Confederation were found to be deficient in providing for robust ‘collective action’. The discussions that followed the revolution (The Federalists Papers), explored creating a government that would balance individual rights and the common good.
My concern, again, is how ‘climate action’ has been discussed and policy executed. I’ve given answers above where I’ve intimated that ‘interests’ (i.e., certain aspects of: government, academia, media, industry, …), in my opinion, have behaved in a manner that jeopardizes the social balance, or social contract. Considering the discussions (The Federalists Papers are a good example.) forming the Constitution, and the discussions for the subsequent addition of the Bill of Rights, whose aim was to avoid a central power that becomes tyrannous (simply defined as taking away/no regard for individual rights), we need to tread very carefully when interests use ‘scientific exigency’ calling for … mandated (maybe we can find a better word) … collective actions.
Happy Fourth of July!
Bill,
My brief rebuttals of your list of technical doubts about the mainstream climate narrative have appeared. They are shown above as posted on July 3 at 9:19 AM, though I am quite sure they were not there yesterday, and I first tried to post them July 2. I am happy to elaborate on any of the points.
I agree with your basic summary of the civics problem: how to balance individual rights with the common good. Greater minds that ours have worried about this. You add for the particular case of the climate discussion that in your opinion “ certain aspects of: government, academia, media, industry … have behaved in a manner that jeopardizes the …balance.” That is where we disagree. We disagree because we disagree on the weight that should be given to the arguments of “the 3%”, by which I mean the (disputed) fraction of “skeptical” scientists who contest the basic narrative. Of course “the 97%” do not agree on all details.
I have not always been biased against the skeptics, but I admit to having developed a low opinion of them. My low opinion comes not because of the black and white mistakes I have found in their analyses. Everybody makes mistakes. That is why peer review is so important. My low opinion comes from their reaction when mistakes are pointed out. It seems that retraction is out of the question in this politicized environment. My personal involvement has been with those arguing that the current atmospheric CO2 rise is “natural”, not anthropogenic. So while you see “the establishment” as railroading its ideas and censoring mavericks, I see the 3% as having far more influence, with people like yourself, than it deserves.
I see the great secret of the “climate debate” as being the poor quality of the arguments of the 3%.
Dave … yes, I saw your post that was held in moderation. Thank you. Happened to me, as well.
> That is where we disagree. We disagree because we disagree on the weight that should be given to the arguments of “the 3%”, by which I mean the (disputed) fraction of “skeptical” scientists who contest the basic narrative. Of course “the 97%” do not agree on all details.
Just to be clear, it’s not the 3% (or whatever number it actually is) that I find troubling in accepting what you say is the majority scientific opinion for climate action. It’s how that 97% has behaved socially/politically in trying to have their view of what climate action to take implemented in policy. Even if the 3% didn’t exist, the small number of climate scientists in relation to the population, regardless of their stated scientific exigency, doesn’t entitle them to ‘make decisions’ for me. Elitism, in any form, doesn’t short circuit the social contract we have.
Again, in the polarization that surrounds us, I greatly appreciate our civil discussion. Thanks so much.
David Andrews,
On the topic of divergent views that people hold on whether CC in summary is plausible or a hoax. Why are there 2 main views? Why is there some alignment with US politics?
Here is my experience as a scientist, chemistry major 1967, James Cook University, Australia, hence non-US-political.
In 1973 I was invited to join Geopeko, the group that had discovered the Ranger Uranium mines which were then the largest and richest known globally. I had consulted to them from shortly after the 1969 discovery. All up, Geopeko.discovered more than 10 new mines, 5 big base metal and gold mines in my term. Ranger matters were a strong interest until 1993, when the imposition of regulatory excesses over all mining had become so intolerable that in 1987 or so I elected to emphasis government matters over the science I love in my corporate career among many competent colleagues.
Much of the science in CC has points in common with general earth sciences, such as use of statistics for measurement of earth properties.. Detailed examination of the CC methodology as it evolved showed that compared to mineral methods, it was poor to a concerning extent. It was poor from an interactive, progressive science viewpoint because of a large new CC practice of dogmatism coupled with reluctance to debate points of difference. It became required to estimate if this CC way was valid or, essentially, self-assumed hubris taken to extremes.
My conclusion was not flattering
I detected a relation between “sides” and scientific capability. For brevity I term the less capable players “green”. Interactions in person, exposure to literature, coping with regulatory orders all showed that green was populated by people who were cunning and devoted, but so bad for science that society should never have let these folk get close to CC science and some offshoots like school education and of course the big one of fossil fuel resistance in a few countries including, now, US. Australia, GB, Canada and others as we know.
I realise that some thinking people will regard my conclusions as insulting. They are meant to be observationally correct, not insulting, because it is correct to assume a relationship with intelligence and test it. Others might not have found such informal correlation. Others might not have been close to the action, such as taking a Federal Environment Minister here through the Courts to the full bench of the Supreme Court, bringing in view some top greens for inspection.
In summary, for reasons I cannot understand (possibly showing that some very wealthy green sponsors are as thick as two planks) why green poor science ever got to the table, because when examined, it frequently fails past scientific standards. It also has important cases of monetary corruption, such as capture of the Linear No Threshold theory of dose/harm relations of toxins.
No scientist smart enough to do good gains benefit from going green and joining poor science and corruption. Geoff S
Dave …
> I have given you multiple opportunities to explain why you think action on climate change is a “subversion of the Bill of Rights”, and you have changed the subject each time. I conclude that your grievance is imaginary. You said that you should be protected from violence for your minority opinion, and I certainly agree with that. I am sure you would have described an actual violent episode if there were one, so we are talking about a hypothetical situation.
If I haven’t answered clearly, my bad. Maybe this will help. It isn’t ‘action on climate change’ that is a possible subversion of the Bill of Rights or the Constitution. It is how that ‘action’ is discussed and executed.
> The political divide on climate seems to have been created because the problem begs for collective action, which is anathema to the right, which sees all problems as solvable by individuals responding to market forces.
You said the above in an earlier comment. I think this frames the entire discussion. I agree with your assertion that there is a tension between collective action and individual response on the climate. My concern is that it goes beyond ‘collective action’ vs ‘market forces’. As I stated above: It is how that ‘action’ is discussed and executed.
Part one …
Part two …
How the Constitution and Bill of Rights enter the story isn’t … just … on free speech of ‘minority’ opinion, or how States Rights are a form of ‘minority’ protection, or how two Senators are allocated to each state regardless of population, the Great Compromise, separation of powers, and so forth. It is how … all … of those items were woven into a political/social fabric whose purpose was to balance the common good and individual rights. Simply put, the Articles of Confederation were found to be deficient in providing for robust ‘collective action’. The discussions that followed the revolution (The Federalists Papers), explored creating a government that would balance individual rights and the common good.
My concern, again, is how ‘climate action’ has been discussed and policy executed. I’ve given answers above where I’ve intimated that ‘interests’ (i.e., certain aspects of: government, academia, media, industry, …), in my opinion, have behaved in a manner that jeopardizes the social balance, or social contract. Considering the discussions (The Federalists Papers are a good example.) forming the Constitution, and the discussions for the subsequent addition of the Bill of Rights, whose aim was to avoid a central power that becomes tyrannous (simply defined as taking away/no regard for individual rights), we need to tread very carefully when interests use ‘scientific exigency’ calling for … mandated (maybe we can find a better word) … collective actions.
Happy 4th!
A little tiny delated backdown from extreme climate hype begins
In 2018, a study of aerial photos of 700 Pacific Islands showed that 89% were the same size or growing. This rather destroyed the idea that sea levels were swallowing small nations. The New York Times said nothing. Indeed, the only Pacific things shrinking were deserted sand drifts. No islands bigger than 10 hectares were getting smaller. Measured in square kilometers that’s “0.1”. Despite the media headlines and delegations from Kiribati and Tuvulu begging for money to hold back the tide, no islands with people living on them were shrinking. None, not one island in the Pacific big enough to matter, was disappearing. The largest 630 islands in the Pacific were had not being touched by climate change for decades.
…
Now, six years later, the New York Times is catching up on one small part — the Maldives, they admit, are not vanishing like they were supposed to. But the Times are still not saying that the original study came out in 2018, and that hundreds of media stories on sea levels were wrong, out of date and pointless, and all the claims of damage by Pacific Islanders were not just grossly exaggerated but utterly baseless. They’re not saying that all the anxiety that ideological scientists and sloppy journalists have whipped up has probably harmed the very islanders they pretended to care about. They’re not admitting that this must have been obvious to many of the islanders who lived there, surely, but who were happy to milk the fake crisis for all it was worth.
This is from Jo Nova’s site. Search on Jo Nova.
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=lm&q=Jo+Nova&ia=web
Chevron Deference was overturned by the Supreme Court … in two decisions … specifically in Loper Bright vs Raimondo and tangentially in SEC vs Jarkesy.
This will have major impact on the power of the administrative state.
Specifically, the EPA will have serious repercussions on how it has functioned.
An excellent decision.
Historical tidbt: Chevron was considered a big win for conservatives at the time the decision came out because it transferred rule making power from Congress dominated by Democrats from the 1930s and courts which had similarly been dominated by Democrat appointees reaching back to the FDR administration, and put it in the hands of Executive branch officials who were more responsive to GOP Presidents and Congressional leaders. Maybe a bit of an example of being careful what you wish for.
This will affect every part of the executive branch except maybe DoD.
You may be right, Jack, but the Burger Court was known for several decisions … not least Roe vs Wade … which wound up being liberal pillars.
Chevron
Authored by Stevens
Kelo authored by Stevens
Heller dissent – by Stevens – fwiw – Stevens pretended to use historical analysis to argue that RKA was limited to militia use while ignoring that a proposal to limit the RKA to militia was defeated in the Senate at the time congress was debating the 12/10 proposed amendments.
Stevens was not very honest/adherent with the constitution
Natural Gas!! Drill, Baby, Drill!!!
A fund in Texas to support the building of natural gas-fired power plants received 125 applications for the development of 56 gigawatts of new generation. That’s roughly the same amount of power that could be produced from more than 18,600 wind turbines.
In November, Texas voters – by a 65-to-35% margin – approved the creation of a fund to provide low-interest loans and grants for the building of new natural gas-fired power plants, and the Texas legislature allocated $5 billion to the fund.
The deadline for applications to the Texas Energy Fund, which is managed by the Public Utility Commission of Texas, was Friday, and the applications total $38.9 billion, according to the agency.
“Since Winter Storm Uri in 2021, I have been abundantly clear that we must bring new dispatch-able generation (primarily new natural gas plants) to Texas to ensure we maintain reliable power under any circumstance,” Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said in a statement on the “overwhelming” response the program has received.
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/energy/voter-approved-fund-natural-gas-generators-texas-gets-overwhelming-response
“dispatch-able generation” ?? :)
Some of us (nit pickers) would request better info. Such as “Two cycling generation with fast rise times from cold standby. Designed for Life Cycle Time of ‘xxxx’. Dual fuel capability required”.
Whatever the “capability”, the ramp up times and fuel use is not under anyone’s control if the source is a wind turbine or solar panel.
jim2, Sure. Wind and solar are Ok, when and if the costings are favourable. However, and to your point, when you need dispatchable gen, often in tough situations, you need it reliable and ready to go. That means a deep and detailed study beforehand. (You may be surprised how many times it happens that one finds the backup ‘dead in its boots’ when needed).
I lived through Uri. I am aware that some plants didn’t function due to the extreme cold. But this problem is addressable and, of course, you want to have a few more plants than your plans indicate.
jim2 | June 29, 2024 at 3:24 pm |
I lived through Uri. I am aware that some plants didn’t function due to the extreme cold. But this problem is addressable
Adding Jim’s comment – I also lived through the Feb 2021 freeze. While the renewable advocates claim wind and solar did better than expected. The reality is that wind and solar proved they are not the solution.
Wind was producing 10-20% of normal for 6-7 days. Solar produced approx 20% of the normal compared to summer – Solar only produces around 8-9% of normal during the winter months north of the 42/43/44th parallel.
In other words, wind and solar underperformed by 70-80% for a week while Gas generation lost about 40% of production for 36-48 hours.
Simply put – it shows the fallacy of the wind and solar and other renewables providing 100% of electricity
joe the ncs says “Simply put – it shows the fallacy of the wind and solar and other renewables providing 100% of electricity”.
Precisely. That is why your ‘Dispatchables’ need to be dependable. In ‘W+S’ no one controls the source of energy, cheap as it may be. The other you will need most when it gets really tough.
Usually vendors offer design to uninformed purchaser that look good when it is plain sailing. Or worse to some purchaser’s uninformed notions. The essential for that rare high-impact event gets little thought – and investment-. (watched the film Fukushima yesterday evening; first ~15m, in a language I did not want to understand).
Years ago I came across plants that were no better than the Vasa was at war. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasa_(ship) ). Or one (I inherited) that required electricity to restart in a blackout. Such small essentials are rarely given much thought at the design stage.
Environmental Destruction from solar farms.
More than 3,500 majestic Joshua trees in California’s Mojave Desert are being shredded onsite to make way for thousands of solar panels under a plan approved by California and Kern County officials.
The sprawling solar project will produce intermittent energy on 2,300 acres of land near the small towns of Boron and Desert Lake. It is not clear whether any of the electricity produced at the solar site will serve some nearby communities. But the project’s developer, California-based Avantus, says contracts have been signed to deliver some of the power to Silicon Valley Clean Energy and Central Coast Community Energy, both are nonprofits that provide green energy to homes in more affluent coastal communities, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Even though many of the trees are estimated to be between 100 and 200 years old, government approval of the solar project in 2021 predated a state decision to protect the Joshua tree under the California Endangered Species Act and last year’s enactment by the legislature of the Joshua Tree Conservation Act, which bans unpermitted killing of the trees. As a result, the targeted trees are defenseless.
https://dcjournal.com/thousands-of-joshua-trees-set-to-fall-victim-to-green-energy-transition/
1970 earth day – Save the trees
2024 – ______ the trees to save the planet
The Rotational Warming is a UNIVERSAL PHENOMENON, because what we have discovered is that
for all planets and moons the average surface temperatures, measured by satellites (Tsat)
RELATE, (everything else equals),
as their respective (N*cp) product in SIXTEENTH ROOT.
(Tsat.planet.1) /(Tsat.planet.2) = [ (N1*cp1) /(N2*cp2) ]^ 1/16
Where:
Tsat – Kelvin, is the planet’s average surface temperature
N – rotations/day, is the planet’s axial spin.
cp – cal/gr*oC, is the planet’s average surface specific heat.
**********************
Example:
Planet 2 rotates twice as fast as Planet 1.
(N2) = 2*(N1) everything else equals, the average surface
temperatures (T2) /(T1) relate as:
(T2) /(T1)= [ (N2*cp2) /(N1*cp1) ] ^1/16
everything else equals, and, in the present example,
the average surface specific heat (cp) is the same, so
cp2 = cp1
and, the above equation re-writes as:
(T2) /(T1)= [ (N2) /(N1) ]^ 1/16
and because N2 = 2*N1, then we shall have:
(T2) /(T1)= ( 2 )^1/16
(T2) = (21/16)*(T1) = 1,0443*(T1)
If for Planet 1 the (T1) = 250K,
Then for Planet 2 the (T2) = 1,0443*250K = 261K
–
Link: https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Correction:
(T2) = (2^1/16)*(T1) = 1,0443*(T1)
If for Planet 1 the (T1) = 250K,
Then for Planet 2 the (T2) = 1,0443*250K = 261K
–
Link: https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Anyone who may have thought a generation ago that the US and the UK and all of Western civilization in general for that matter was invulnerable to an academic integrity crisis such as the one that has struck the secular, socialist Education Industrial Complex must surely awaken from their slumber.
“The Temperature Amplification leads to what Hansen called a tipping point, meaning the exponential increase of signal per iteration will eventually run away to infinity.”
–
Hansens Earth’s alleged greenhouse effect on Earth’s surface is very much wrongly estimated to currently be +33C.
But in real world there is not any +33C greenhouse effect on Earth’s surface.
–
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Some people in Cali blamed PG&E for the wildfires there. Be careful what you wish for!
A major utility provider cut power in certain areas of California on Tuesday morning to address wildfire risks.
Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) warned Monday that it may shut off power in parts of Northern California and the San Francisco Bay area on Tuesday if weather conditions warrant. The utility company announced Tuesday morning that it cut power to approximately 2,000 customers to protect against wildfire risks, which are elevated in dry, gusty and hot conditions.
“Early Tuesday morning, PG&E shut off power for safety for approximately 2,000 customers across small portions of eight counties and one tribal community,” the company said in a Tuesday morning notice. “These customers had previously been informed of a potential [Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS)] event.” (RELATED: Judge Skewers PG&E Over Wildfires: ‘Global Warming Is Not Starting These Fires’)
https://dailycaller.com/2024/07/02/pacific-gas-electric-power-cut-wildfire-risks/
@David Andrews. I’m not sure why you believe all of climate science has recovered it’s gravitas. See here, for example …
Reconstructing the Esper Reconstruction
Jun 2, 2024 – 5:28 PM
As discussed in previous article, Esper et al (2024) link, the newest hockey stick diagram, asserted that 2023 was the “warmest summer” in millennia by an updated version of “Mike’s Nature trick” – by comparing 2023 instrumental temperature to purported confidence intervals of temperature estimates from “ancient tree rings” for the past two millennia. In today’s article, I will report on detective work on Esper’s calculations, showing that the article is not merely a trick, but a joke.
https://climateaudit.org/2024/06/02/tracing-the-esper-confidence-intervals/
That’s right – climate change isn’t real because McIntyre (not a climate scientist), doesn’t approve of the way real climate scientists analyze their data. McIntyre and his “climateaudit” are the joke.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11646-climate-myths-the-hockey-stick-graph-has-been-proven-wrong/
Mann perjured himself a few hundred times during the course of the mann v simberg/steyn/nro litigation. That is a few hundred times, not a couple of times. Are you going to trust a scientist that is a serial liar.
Not a single climate scientists from the paleo community called Mann out for his serial lying. All McIntyre has done is document the corruption that dominates the paleo community.
Joe,
Yes, I’m sure that’s why Mann was awarded $1 million in damages, and his results have been confirmed (within uncertainty) by dozens of studies, using many different proxies.
Mann won a judgement of $1m because he filed in a jurisdiction in which had an extremely biased and favorable jury pool and because the judge barred testimony and instruction of the law under the applicable standards set in the Harte Hanks supreme court case.
No – the HS stick has not been confirmed (within uncertainty levels) by dozens of other reconstructions, at least not by uncertainty levels that have any credibility.
I sincerely doubt that you are unaware of the level of corruption in the paleo community.
Note also that not a single paleo climate scientist called Mann for his serial lying during the litigation. That alone should shed light on the integrity of the paleo community.
Joe,
You are rationalizing, it’s not working.
Let’s see, should we trust someone who does the work for free out of concern for science or those who have to produce alarming reports to get more funding?
Jim2
It’s not an either/or question. But I’d go with the paid scientists over biased amateurs.
Bushaw,
While you by admission do not claim to be a climate scientist, that puts you in the group containing Stephen McIntyre, whom you criticise.
Yesterday I wrote about green and intelligence.
Own goals matter.
Geoff S
Geoff,
I don’t claim to be a climate scientist when I am a statistical economist.
I also don’t claim to be a scientist without evidence for the same, like you.
McIntyre’s work is public and open to examination. You are free to examine it with your “scientist superpower”. Seems like someone like you could and should offer something better than an argumentum ad hominem.
Thanks, Jim,
I am aware of McIntyre’s work. He reanalyzes other’s work and gets slightly different results – big deal. After multiple inquiries, he has failed to prove any malfeasance – all that was left is a sandbox fight, which Mann won. I’m also familiar with Mr. McIntyre’s education and professional background (BS math, MS Philosophy, mining consultant).
Correction – I credited Mr. McIntyre with being a statistical economist. That was incorrect – that was McKitrick.
Ganon –
Demonstrate some knowledge on the subject matter
Tell us which part is rationalizing
Biased jury pool?
Favorable jurisdiction?
Failure of proper jury instructions?
wrong application of the harte hanks standard?
The serial lying by Mann during the litigation?
Failure of the climate science community to call Mann out for his serial lying?
Demonstrate some actual knowledge of the subject matter
Provide us with documentation that refutes any of the statements made.
All of it. Your obvious preference lost in our legal system, and like others I can think of, you can’t handle it. It’s all rationalizing the loss, and it doesn’t even matter if true or not.
In other words you have demonstrated zero ability to refute any statement. We already knew you were ignorant on the subject matter. Why did you need to continue to provide proof of you ignorance.
No, you are the ignorant one – Mann won the case, no matter how much you try to rationalize it.
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | July 3, 2024 at 1:13 pm |
No, you are the ignorant one – Mann won the case, no matter how much you try to rationalize it.
Ganon again demonstrates high level of ignorance
High probability of reversal on appeal – Gross errors in not following the Harte hanks standard.
Ganon are you even familiar with Harte Hanks?
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | July 3, 2024 at 1:13 pm |
No, you are the ignorant one – Mann won the case, no matter how much you try to rationalize it.
Ignorance – A Ganon trademark of which he proudly displays
Did you realize there remains 5-7 motions that have not been ruled on as of July 3, 2024
Ganon professes to be a “legal expert” along with being a climate science “expert”
JoeNCS:’ “Ganon professes to be a “legal expert” along with being a climate science “expert””
I don’t profess to be either. I am a chemistry and physics “expert”. Seems you just make up poop whenever it suits you.
BTW, are you an “expert” at anything relevant? I’ve seen no evidence of that.
Dr. Curry – you said that many high school students are “convinced that… they can change their sex.” What do you mean by changing sex, and how are they mistaken?
A man can not become a woman. They can have surgery to look like a woman, but their chromosomes don’t change.
Yes, but the difference between birth sex and sexual identity is (intentionally) ignored some. Sexual identity can be whatever one wants (and it is none of your business).
And how I refer to those people is none of your business.
JIm2,
I don’t know how you refer to “those people,” care to enlighten us?
ganon
“ Sexual identity can be whatever one wants (and it is none of your business).”
I’m assuming we’re talking about children. The welfare of a child should be everyone’s business. That is what advanced, enlightened societies do, protect their children. That is why we have laws prohibiting 10 year old girls from getting married, while other societies, still living in the Stone Age, look the other way as 40 year old men marry them.
Only leftwing extremist lunatics could believe that it’s acceptable for children to decide on irreversible mutilation of their bodies. And yet some politicians have disguised it with the euphemistic gender affirming care.
Some have rationalized that it is none of our business that women, buried up to their necks, are being stoned to death. And they look away when a gang of morality police puts a .32 slug into a woman’s brain for blasphemy.
Societies evolved over millennia to make things their business. And humanity is better off for it. The sustainability of civilizations depends on how much we care.
“Sexual identity can be whatever one wants (and it is none of your business).”
It becomes our business when the person wanting to change their identity wants society to accept their new identity as truth. Men should be separate from women’s sports.
ckid,
We’re not talking about children here – you are, and you are the first one to bring it up. But, I’m sure you like talking about children. I was talking about adults (age of consent) – for children it is between them and their parents as long as it is legal. And none of your business, either.
Rob,
I guess you still don’t understand the dfference between sex
… and sexual identity. No surprise.
BAB writes- I guess you still don’t understand the difference between sex and sexual identity.
I understand quite well. I simply disagree with your progressive unscientific agenda,
Rob, that’s OK – I disagree with your regressive fascist agenda.
When someone wants to change their sexual identity, they have serious mental health issues.
Rob, The American Psychiatric Association doesn’t agree with you.
ganon
Pay attention to what the very first question posed by Angulo was. You are welcome.
BAB
You like to piontlessly cite biased agencies that sgree with your Progressive positions.
The vast majority of people who question their sexual idenity could benefit from mental health counseling.
You are a progressive who lies about others being fascist.
ckid,
Pay attention to my first response, which was made in response to Rob Starkey, not John Angulo and not you. I stand by it.
Yeah. I reference “agencies” (I imagine you meant “professional associations”) that are experts in the subject field. You are not, and have not, and apparently can’t reference anything but your own bigoted opinions – goes well with the fascism.
ganon
Reminds me of our protracted exchanges about SLR where I have to snap you back on point, sort of like those Biden mid afternoon wonderings in the West Wing.
At least you’re not identifying as a black woman.
BA Bushaw (ganon1950) | July 4, 2024 at 5:18 pm |
Rob, The American Psychiatric Association doesn’t agree with you.
The APA’s treatment protocols very much show that the APA knows gender dysphoria is a mental illness, contrary to the removal of gender dysphoria from the DSM by the APA which was done for political purposes.
Ganon not only cant recognize junk science, he embraces junk science.
ckid,
I’ll take that deflection as an admission of being wrong. Thanks for that.
You must be proud of your defective memories – you keep repeating them. Actually, you kept cherry-picking single locations that showed low SLR and acceleration, and completely ignored modern global data. It’s ok, some people get stupid, biased, and forgetful as they grow older; not to mention suffering illusory superiority. I guess you, like many here, are silly enough to think the past makes linear predictions of the future; try physical causality and nonlinear dynamics.
JNCS, You are wrong. APA agrees with me – they removed gender dysphoria from the DSM.
PS ~ they, not you, know why they did it. It is called new scientific knowledge, and not being stuck with past prejudices.
As for junk science: Do you have any experience at all to make those statements, or do you just try to make up insults that your pea brain thinks sound good?
Ganon –
Read and understand what I wrote –
Most everyone knows the APA removed gender dysphoria from the list of mental disorders. As I also wrote, the APA treatment protocols continue to demonstrate the APA knows gender dysphoria is a mental illness.
My second point is that you are easily fooled by propaganda and junk science.
NCS – you make your beliefs clear. Thanks for that.
APA removed gender dysphoria from the DSM because they no longer consider it a mental disorder. Your conspiracy theories don’t matter.
ganon
Apparently you don’t understand the behavioral sciences. Many of these decisions are reflective of societal values and norms. There is nothing scientific about that. It’s like having a national referendum on what is beautiful.
The best “science” in the psychiatric profession led them to eventually deinstitutionalize the mentally ill. Now, 70 years later, they realize it was a disastrous decision, not only for those individuals who ended up in perhaps more dire circumstances but for society as a whole.
A movement has been underway for quite a time to de stigmatize and decriminalize pedophilia. MAP, minor attracted persons, is a euphemism for a criminal. That judgment call is not a scientific question. It reflects what a culture thinks about such behavior. I’m sure the proponents will use science as a justification and will call for a stop to the prejudices.
Tolerance has its limits.
https://x.com/RickyDoggin/status/1604525642942271490/photo/1
ckid,
Seems you think you know what I do and don’t understand; but you don’t. So, I’m not interested in how you think (mostly deflection and misrepresentation) – that’s been apparent for a long time.
My guess is the APA made that decision because it is “politically correct”, at least for their political cohort.
Sorry, John. If you tell me you identify as a border collie, I refuse to call you Lassie and won’t be forced to, either.
Thanks – are you speaking on behalf of Judith Curry?
I think he’s speaking on behalf of reality.
In the scientific worldview, no one has special access granting them absolute authority on “reality”. I was asking Dr. Curry about her scientific perspective.
John
There is a biological science perspective and then a social science perspective. Take your pick.
There was a time when only one was infected by political ideology.
John …
> In the scientific worldview, no one has special access granting them absolute authority on “reality”. I was asking Dr. Curry about her scientific perspective.
K-12 education has a scientific perception/description of reality and a social perception/description of reality. The social component involves values.
If we discussing adults it would be much easier, but when it comes to children, which is what K-12 education is about, it becomes more complicated, as we now have to take into account the values of the parents of the child in question. If there is no conflict between parent and child, we then have to take into account the values of the parents of the other students (and those students themselves), as the child in question makes choices, i.e., bathroom and sports, which directly impact the values of the other students, etc.
In the above, I’ve mentioned the parents role. We need to be clear about the authority of the school system and that of the parents. Some might be tempted to frame transgenderism in the schools similar to evolution, the Scopes Trial. I think that would be a mistake as they involve different aspects. One is a view of the external world, the other internal identity.
There is also a danger to enlarging state authority over children. Yes, there are parents who present a danger to their children. But that is not the case with the overwhelming majority. Parental authority is primary, and is in fact prehistorical.
I feel for the child who identifies with a non-biological gender. It isn’t an easy row to hoe. I can only offer weak guidance from a medical truism … do no harm … to that child, and to the other children.
John: “In the scientific worldview, no one has special access granting them absolute authority on “reality”.
Wow, though not a suprising comment; Neo-Marxists regularly expose themselves here. A scientific worldview is synonymous with political science.
The scientific method doesn’t consider worldview as a litmus test for science; much less using it as a guardrail for “reality”. Unfortunately, you’re not alone, there’s a few Neo-Marxists supporting the philosophy on this blog.
Joe-who-is-a better-climate-scientist-than-Gagme 50: Brilliant job shooting down the serially uninformed Gagme, who cannot accept observations, reason or logic on any topic, all the while desperately clinging to a few junk papers as his Bible. Yet Game claims to be an expert in physics and chemistry (perhaps at some day-care centre?). And he praises Mann while insulting the brilliant McIntyre, whose work is clearly beyond his comprehension. And he consistently manages to be surly, vindictive, small-minded and a champion of himself — serious discussion is beneath him. Now that I think of it, he’s got everything required to be a climate scientist!
Sure thing, great blubbery one.
David Andrews …
I’m also having difficulty responding through the moderator. Here’s a repeat attempt.
> I have given you multiple opportunities to explain why you think action on climate change is a “subversion of the Bill of Rights”, and you have changed the subject each time. I conclude that your grievance is imaginary. You said that you should be protected from violence for your minority opinion, and I certainly agree with that. I am sure you would have described an actual violent episode if there were one, so we are talking about a hypothetical situation.
If I haven’t answered clearly, my bad. Maybe this will help. It isn’t ‘action on climate change’ that is a possible subversion of the Bill of Rights or the Constitution. It is how that ‘action’ is discussed and executed.
> The political divide on climate seems to have been created because the problem begs for collective action, which is anathema to the right, which sees all problems as solvable by individuals responding to market forces.
You said the above in an earlier comment. I think this frames the entire discussion. I agree with your assertion that there is a tension between collective action and individual response on the climate. My concern is that it goes beyond ‘collective action’ vs ‘market forces’. As I stated above: It is how that ‘action’ is discussed and executed.
How the Constitution and Bill of Rights enter the story isn’t … just … on free speech of ‘minority’ opinion, or how States Rights are a form of ‘minority’ protection, or how two Senators are allocated to each state regardless of population, the Great Compromise, separation of powers, and so forth. It is how … all … of those items were woven into a political/social fabric whose purpose was to balance the common good and individual rights. Simply put, the Articles of Confederation were found to be deficient in providing for robust ‘collective action’. The discussions that followed the revolution (The Federalists Papers), explored creating a government that would balance individual rights and the common good.
My concern, again, is how ‘climate action’ has been discussed and policy executed. I’ve given answers above where I’ve intimated that ‘interests’ (i.e., certain aspects of: government, academia, media, industry, …), in my opinion, have behaved in a manner that jeopardizes the social balance, or social contract. Considering the discussions (The Federalists Papers are a good example.) forming the Constitution, and the discussions for the subsequent addition of the Bill of Rights, whose aim was to avoid a central power that becomes tyrannous (simply defined as taking away/no regard for individual rights), we need to tread very carefully when interests use ‘scientific exigency’ calling for … mandated (maybe we can find a better word) … collective actions.
Happy 4th of July
Bill,
Well expressed. Spare our descendents the growth of the current curse. In a few simple words, the curse:
Too many dumb people are telling too many lies about science.
Geoff S
But in real world there is not any +33C greenhouse effect on Earth’s surface.
–
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Bushaw,
Judith’s article is about science education, not about your series of deflections that I have tried to discourage by showing that they are not conclusive. My apologies for their addition and also diversion.
You are showing an attitude that could influence education, through showing the difference between adult choices on how to handle data with intelligence rather than with goodies and baddies classes and demonising. Stephen McIntyre did not fail to prove any malfeasance, as you claim. He demonstrated it, which is intelligent, but he failed to activate an inquiry with authority to punish, he tried, not his fault, but failure to investigate is more in the goodies/baddies manner. Which manner do you prefer students to accept?
Hard science is hard, uncertainty is important, wicked problems are what children will face. They should be educated to expect such challenges in science, not the present systems in CC that are more like an extension of computer games than something useful.
Geoff S
ESG funds can’t catch a breeze …
Global investors are turning their backs on sustainability-focused stock funds, as poor performance, scandals and attacks from US Republicans hit enthusiasm for a much-hyped sector that has pulled in trillions of dollars of assets.
Clients have withdrawn a net $40bn from environmental, social and governance (ESG) equity funds this year, according to research from Barclays, the first year that flows have trended negative. Redemptions, which include a record monthly net outflow of about $14bn in April, have been widespread across all main regions.
The outflows mark a significant reversal for a sector that investors have flocked to in recent years, attracted by the claim that such funds could help change the world for the better while also making as much — or even more — money as traditional stock portfolios.
https://www.ft.com/content/cf9001ab-e326-4264-af5e-12b3fbb0ee7b
Germany’s Green Energy fly hits the windshield of reality. Even though they say these gas plants will be converted to hydrogen at a later date, I “project” this will never happen due to the high cost of hydrogen.
Germany will begin lining up investors for its massive expansion of gas-fired power plants by early next year, marking a first step in its controversial strategy to ensure the nation’s electricity supplies.
By early 2025, five gigawatt of new plant capacity — which should later be converted to run on hydrogen — will be auctioned, the economy ministry said in a paper published Friday after weeks of protracted budget talks came to a conclusion. It added that another five gigawatt will be tendered as part of a new capacity mechanism, which is expected to be ready as of 2028.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-07-05/germany-to-seek-investors-for-new-gas-power-plants-by-early-2025
I wonder how much those gas power plants cost? Texas is putting up $10 billion to double their gas power plants by 2030.
“The state will look to boost the Texas Energy Fund from $5 billion to $10 billion, Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick announced on Monday. The fund was approved by voters in November 2023 to offer low-interest loans to incentivize development of new gas-fueled power plants.
…
The fund was also designed to pay out bonuses to companies that connect new gas-fueled plants to the main grid by June 2029, and to offer grants for modernizing, weatherizing and managing vegetation growth around electricity infrastructure in Texas outside the main electricity market, which meets around 90% of the state’s power needs.
The state received notices of intent to apply for $39 billion in loans — almost eight times more than what was initially set aside, Abbott and Patrick said. They added that the average plant will take three to four years to complete, and new transmission lines will take three to six years to complete.”
https://www.texastribune.org/2024/07/01/texas-power-grid-energy-fund/
Meanwhile in China…
https://electrek.co/2024/07/02/china-is-building-a-mammoth-8-gw-solar-farm/
China is building a mammoth 8 GW solar farm
To put the sheer size of the 8 GW solar farm in perspective, the three largest solar farms in the world by capacity are China’s Ningxia Tenggeli and Golmud Wutumeiren solar farms, with a capacity of 3 MW each, and a 3.5-GW solar farm outside Urumqi, Xinjiang’s capital.
In addition to the massive solar farm, the $10.99 billion project will also consist of 4 GW of wind, 5 GWh of energy storage capacity, 200 MW of solar thermal, and (disappointingly) 4 GW of coal-fired power. It will be sited in Ordos, in northern China’s Inner Mongolia region, the Shanghai-listed company said in a stock filing.
…
The project will break ground in September and is expected to come online by June 2027.
I’m rooting for China to win the wind and solar energy race. Suckers.
We hear a lot about how we are supposedly in a climate crisis and how The Science™ tells us we are about to succumb to global boiling. Most climate activists claim that we must cut emissions by spending more money on windmills and solar panels or we will all burn to a crisp.
I would describe myself as a lukewarmer, by which I mean that I acknowledge the earth is warming and that human emissions of CO2 have made some contribution to that warming. However, it is also true that the climate has changed dramatically without human intervention; clearly, there are other causes of climate change too.
The strategy of reducing emissions of greenhouse gases to Net Zero is classified as a “mitigation strategy” in the parlance of the IPCC. The alternative strategy is adaptation which means taking measures to adjust to climate change such as building flood defences, irrigation systems or developing new strains of crops to cope better with changing weather patterns. Most spending effort in the West is geared towards mitigation. But, what if the Net Zero cure is worse than the disease? What if mitigation is less effective than adaptation?
https://dailysceptic.org/2024/07/04/the-net-zero-cure-is-far-worse-than-the-disease/
From the Daily Skeptic, but I couldn’t paste in a link. Search on Daily Skeptic to find it. Article title is: The Net Zero Cure is Far Worse Than the Disease
We hear a lot about how we are supposedly in a climate crisis and how The Science™ tells us we are about to succumb to global boiling. Most climate activists claim that we must cut emissions by spending more money on windmills and solar panels or we will all burn to a crisp.
I would describe myself as a lukewarmer, by which I mean that I acknowledge the earth is warming and that human emissions of CO2 have made some contribution to that warming. However, it is also true that the climate has changed dramatically without human intervention; clearly, there are other causes of climate change too.
The strategy of reducing emissions of greenhouse gases to Net Zero is classified as a “mitigation strategy” in the parlance of the IPCC. The alternative strategy is adaptation which means taking measures to adjust to climate change such as building flood defences, irrigation systems or developing new strains of crops to cope better with changing weather patterns. Most spending effort in the West is geared towards mitigation. But, what if the Net Zero cure is worse than the disease? What if mitigation is less effective than adaptation?
I tried to post this in a comment reply, but it didn’t make it. It’s short and pretty funny. Of course humor doesn’t go over well here. One person’s humor is another person’s insult … ‘what a world, what a world’ (said the Wicked Witch of the West).
https://x.com/redpillb0t/status/1809127633478644183
Bill
Just like All in the Family, some of the humor In these shows is timeless. And sometimes satire is so exquisite.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GRSS50cbIAAoSWt?format=jpg&name=large
cerescokid, Whoever illegally put that sign up undoubtably will go to jail if they ever get caught in the act of posting truth to power again.
Snopes declared the photo false (like it matters), but there was a Kroger ad declaring $600+ in savings every week beneath the photo in question; Snopes itself may be a spoof.
Kid … that’s a good one!
Comedic satire is one of my favorite art forms, Bill. I’d bet the satire goes over the head of the target for many, these will see it as a comic life lesson for toeing the line. The individual will certainly see it as satirical comic relief.
Trunks … don’t worry, they’ll teach us to wear the red ribbon. ;-)
There is almost no mitigation measure that isn’t struggling in some way. Here’s the latest:
The oil company declared its traditional business was all but over. “The demand for fossil oil products will continue to decline,” it said in late 2020 as the pandemic slashed consumption. Even when Covid-19 is over, consumption wouldn’t “recover to previous levels.”
The solution? Abandon fossil fuels and pivot to biofuels. That’s exactly what oil refiner Neste Oyj did. For a while, investors loved the shift: It was the peak of the environmental, social and governance (ESG) bubble, when money poured into anything with the slightest shade of green. The company’s market value roughly doubled to more than $60 billion from mid-2020 to mid-2021. But soon it became clear that oil wasn’t going away.
Now, the hangover. After the stock market debacle for wind companies in 2023, the biofuel sector is the next deflating green bubble. The industry is battling several problems: significant cost overruns and engineering shortcomings, and a glut of biofuels as rosy forecasts for demand never materialized. Oil consumption, instead, is rising. Biofuel margins have tumbled.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-07-08/green-energy-the-biofuels-industry-bubble-is-deflating
Another mitigation tactic is failing …
Research: EV chargers less reliable than gas pumps
One of the study’s main findings, discovered using customized artificial intelligence (AI) models trained on EV review data, is that charging stations in the U.S. have an average reliability score of only 78%, meaning that about one in five don’t work. They are, on average, less reliable than regular gas stations, Asensio said. “Imagine if you go to a traditional gas station and two out of 10 times the pumps are out of order,” he said. “Consumers would revolt.”
https://www.hbs.edu/bigs/the-state-of-ev-charging-in-america
Have you noticed they don’t put up electronic signs advertising how much they charge, what types of payments are accepted (no cash!?) or which plugs they support? I would at least require they have red/green light on a pole so you don’t waste your time pulling off the road to find out.
They don’t have any of those problems in advanced countries so it makes the US look weak.
I might use a public charger twice a year and only if its free.
In this era of the internet and AI, an AI could monitor the charging stations and post the status as well as the price and payment options. There’s no excuse for this.
WUWT has a post many would not expect. That is, reefs around Australia are not doing as well as some would have us believe.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2024/07/08/cyclone-causes-increase-in-coral-cover-if-you-believe-their-nonsense-number/
Thanks, Jim.
Reliable spell caster……………..
Happy to win my Ex back..
restore broken relationship..
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The world is shifting too slowly from fossil fuels to avoid severe climate change, increasing the risks that the eventual transition to clean energy will be “disorderly,” BP Plc warned.
Fossil fuel consumption broke records last year, led by climbing oil demand, the company said in its annual Energy Outlook on Wednesday. Countries remain in an “energy addition” phase — increasing their consumption of both low-carbon energy and fossil fuels — and need to pivot to a “substitution” phase, it said.
If this trend continues to the early 2040s, the world may have exhausted the so-called “carbon budget” that would limit temperature increases to 2C above pre-industrial levels, BP cautioned.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-07-10/bp-warns-of-disorderly-clean-energy-transition-amid-record-fossil-fuel-use
There is no escape from Javon’s paradox. Even when you try to switch from one fuel source to another you can never satisfy the planet’s apex predator. My neighbor just installed 5 super bright LED flood lights on her house that she leaves on all night. I can read a book in my front yard at 1:00 AM, madness.
Put your solar PV panel on orientable mounts so you can point them at her house at night :)
Maybe I should get some of these and point them at the giant cell tower at the end of my block. God knows those guys are blasting out tens of thousands of watts because they even have their own distribution transformer.
“A Hawaii-based company has claimed an energy harvesting breakthrough with a device which it says can convert radio frequency (RF) signals into electricity.”
July 10, 2024
https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/startup-says-it-can-convert-radio-waves-into-electricity/
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