A consensus is usually established when one explanation is more convincing than alternative accounts, convincing the majority. This is also true in science. However, science-based knowledge is also our best description of our world because it is built on testing hypotheses that are independently reexamined by colleagues.
It is also typical that there are a few stubborn people who think they know better than the rest. When it comes to climate science, there is a small group of people who refuse to acknowledge the facts that have convinced almost the entire scientific community. Most of these contrarians are not even scientists.
But there are also about 500 scholars who recently have come forward and signed a declaration at odds with the scientific consensus, claiming “there is no climate emergency”. They represent a tiny fraction of the scholar community dismissing man-made climate change – by comparison, there is about 20,000 participants on the annual meetings of the American Geophysical Union.
A press conferences has been scheduled on Friday October 18th in Brussels, Rome and Oslo in order to promote the declaration. The intention behind the declaration is to influence the EU and the UN.
Most of the academics who signed the petition have no or little experience within climate research (check Google Scholar). Some of the signatures also have connections with political think tanks.
The message of the declaration is the same that the contrarians have repeated over and over again – but repeating it doesn’t make it more true.
I and some colleagues have examined the most common contrarian papers on climate change and have found that all of them were based on flawed methods/analysis (see previous post Let’s learn from mistakes). Some of the people who signed this petition have demonstrated their incompetence – the proof is in the papers that I and my colleagues reexamined in that study.
We cannot expect every scientist to have the same understanding, especially when it comes to scientific disciplines other than those in which they have professional experience. When they dismiss evidence on matters in an unfamiliar discipline without a convincing explanation, then they demonstrate a lack of respect for both science and the wider public.
They obviously don’t care whether people get true facts of false ideas. Below, I’ll try to explain why their arguments still do not convince.
The following statement is misleading:
“The geological archive reveals that Earth’s climate has varied as long as the planet has existed, with natural cold and warm phases. The Little Ice Age ended as recently as 1850. Therefore, it is no surprise that we now are experiencing a period of warming. Only very few peer-reviewed papers even go so far as to say that recent warming is chiefly anthropogenic”
It is true that Earth’s climate has changed over the past, but such changes have had specific physical causes, which are reasonably well understood.
There have been changes in the shape of the continents, formation of mountain ranges, changes in atmospheric composition, changes in Earth’s orbit around the sun (the Milankovitch cycles), changes in the sun, volcanic activity, and changes in ocean currents, all of which have influenced Earth’s climate.
As for the “Little Ice Age”, it was very different to the present global warming. It had a more regional character and was not as synchronised on a global scale as the ongoing climate change.
The scientific documentation of past changes in climate is one of the ways that we know that that the climate is sensitive to changed conditions. The Earth has never been as closely monitored as today, especially with the help of satellites and advanced modern instruments, giving unprecedented amounts of high-quality data.
This monitoring shows that the conditions that caused climate change in the past are absent today, except for the increases in greenhouse gases. The IPCC reports provide lists of peer reviewed papers on the global warming.
The following statement is incorrect:
“The world has warmed at less than half the originally-predicted rate, and at less than half the rate to be expected on the basis of net anthropogenic forcing and radiative imbalance. It tells us that we are far from understanding climate change.”
Indeed, comparisons between simulated and observed global mean surface temperatures indicate a good correspondence.
I can believe that the people who signed the petition don’t understand climate change, but they should speak for themselves. The rest of the science community has a fairly good understanding.
The fact that we can write computer code based on the fundamental laws of physics that is able to reproduce phenomena we observe on Earth, indicates that we do understand the climate system. See the description of climate models on both Carbonbrief.org and TED.com.
The following statement is incorrect:
“Climate models have many shortcomings and are not remotely plausible as policy tools. Moreover, they most likely exaggerate the effect of greenhouse gases such as CO2. In addition, they ignore the fact that enriching the atmosphere with CO2 is beneficial.”
The scientific knowledge underpinning climate policies is established both from observations as well as the laws of physics and climate models.
The global climate models share common description of the atmosphere with weather forecast models used on a daily basis to provide operational weather warnings.
All climate models have been evaluated and tested, and they do reproduce the observed global warming as seen with the observations.
The concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is increasing. Their physical properties can be established accurately through lab studies.
Carbon Dioxide (CO2) is a greenhouse gas which is a byproduct from the consumption of fossil energy, and the increase in the atmospheric CO2 concentrations represents approximately 40% of the total amount produced from the exploitation of fossil fuels.
The CO2 bears a fingerprint that connects the increased amount to coal, oil and gas, in terms of the isotopes carbon-13 and carbon-14, as well as the comparable concentrations of oxygen and nitrogen and ocean acidification.
The climate models reproduce the observed sensitivity, as shown in Benestad and Schmidt (2009) and the figure below.
The following statement is irrelevant:
“CO2 is not a pollutant. It is essential to all life on Earth. Photosynthesis is a blessing. More CO2 is beneficial for nature, greening the Earth: additional CO2 in the air has promoted growth in global plant biomass. It is also good for agriculture, increasing the yields of crops worldwide”
Water too is essential to all life on Earth. Too much is not good, such as flooding or drowning.
The following statement is incorrect:
“There is no statistical evidence that global warming is intensifying hurricanes, floods, droughts and such like natural disasters, or making them more frequent. However, CO2-mitigation measures are as damaging as they are costly. For instance, wind turbines kill birds and insects, and palm-oil plantations destroy the biodiversity of the rainforests.”
CO2 has an indirect effect on extreme weather conditions through increasing the greenhouse effect and changing Earth’s hydrological cycle. It is well-established that increased surface temperatures lead to increased evaporation and water vapour in the atmosphere.
Water vapour is the main fuel for weather phenomena such as storms and rainfall. Global warming is also accompanied by changes to the large-scale circulation pattern, such as the Hadley cell, affecting both extreme rainfall in the tropics and drought conditions in the sub-tropics.
The observed number of record-breaking temperatures and rainfall provide statistical evidence for the weather becoming more extreme. One example is the increased probability of heavy precipitation.
The following statement is misguided:
“There is no climate emergency. Therefore, there is no cause for panic and alarm. We strongly oppose the harmful and unrealistic net-zero CO2 policy proposed for 2050. If better approaches emerge, we will have ample time to reflect and adapt. The aim of international policy should be to provide reliable and affordable energy at all times, and throughout the world.”
There is ample evidence of changing risks connected to weather, with more heatwaves and more extreme rainfall.
The global mean sea-level is rising and coral reefs are dying. Glaciers providing predictable water supply are melting, such as in the Himalayas. The consequences for ecosystems and agriculture are dire.
The insurance sector is already affected, and the consequences from climate change will increasingly disrupt new sectors such as agriculture, water management, transport, tourism, and trade.
There will be regions where people no longer will be able to reside and there will be increased levels of migration and conflicts connected to climate change.
Rather than pushing a petition, the contrarians should present scientific evidence for their view. If such evidence exists, it needs to be transparent so that others can reexamine it and get swayed by the information. So far, the typical contrarians (and one of the signatures) have preferred not to disclose their work.
There have already been some reactions to this petition, e.g. on Climatefeedback.org. It was also preceded by a similar Italian “pro-fake-news” petition (signed by more or less the same Italian contrarians as this version) that prompted a response from Italian scientists.
The claims presented in the petition signed by 500 contrarians is the strongest case the contrarians can muster against climate science. In other words, the best shot from the majority of world’s supposedly prominent academics known to have an alternative opinion (i.e. the majority of a tiny minority).
Obviously, there is not much convincing evidence against anthropogenic climate change.
–>
References
- R.E. Benestad, and G.A. Schmidt, "Solar trends and global warming", Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, vol. 114, 2009. http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008JD011639
Has anybody done the thought experiment on how much of physics and chemistry are falsified is global warming is not happening? It seems to me that it is much easier to throw rocks at the models in isolation, but arguing that large chunks of the chemistry, physics, and biology are wrong will be far less convincing to lay folks.
The list of petitioning denialists actually numbers 506. I’m sure they could have done better numerically or better in terms of quality if they had wanted. But then, may be not. Note the absence of many of the names in the Wikithing list of denialists. Of the US contingent of 33 in Wikithing (to appear in the Wikithing list, they have to be peer-reviewed published in natural sciences and have a Wiki-page), only six appear as petitioners (18%). I assume the rest of the Wikithing list is similarly poorly represented in the petition. This poor showing is probably partly because many denialists are less extreme in their climate-change denial and wouldn’t sign up to such misleading, incorrect, irrelevant and misguided statements.
When sunny you sweat, when cloudy you shiver, and CO2, elixir of life, is rising:
It’s the weather, stupid! Then think about how crazy and or corrupt you would be if you (allegedly) believed that climate, the statistics of weather, was not driven by sun, cosmic rays, clouds and oceans but by (anthropogenic) CO2.
No science-denying green plant could ever hit on the idea to (un)consciously deny sun, cosmic rays, clouds and oceans (low-pass filter of the climate system because of their heat content), blame O2 as the “toxic climate (change) culprit” and even want to sequestrate it.
Actually it is even worse because, from the green plants’ perspective, O2 is toxic by allowing to destroy aka to burn (them). But I guess no green plant could ever become as arrogant, ignorant and intolerant to fight the fauna’s and human’s elixir of life O2, as some humans can.
The IPCC is a fraudulent political UN organisation (see Climategate) that even manipulates data (see e.g. Tony Heller) so that the Roman Warm Period, the Medieval Warm Period, the 1930ies Warm Phase, the Global Cooling from 1945-1975 and the hiatus from 1998 ff. are flushed down the memory hole because their misbelief is disproved for many years.
As a not brain-dead human(ist), scientist and cardiologist I can say that the arrogant, ignorant, intolerant anti-CO2-, so anti-life cult #IPCCCO2Hoax is one of the most inhumane, unscientific and sickest of all inventions by psychopaths.
Thomas Binder, MD
You should read the comment about too much water – I think you misunderstood most of the points I made here. Besides, the so-called “Climategate” did not indicate any fraud apart from the crime and the hack that stole emails and documents and tried to present the stolen information as something that it wasn’t. And there was no hiatus. -rasmus
The one assertion In the contrarian petition I agree with is the one about palm oil. It is a problem and much of it is used as biofuel. But biofuels won’t solve the climate crisis, solar energy will.
Thomas Binder
That level of satire is wasted here, too many people will think you’re serious
@ ~ #3
Holy “science denying green plants” and hookah smoking caterpillars, Batman!
That was a fun troll, Tommy!
Thomas Binder,
Congratulations on having posted the stupidest thing I’ve read yet on the Intertubes this week. It doesn’t seem to bother you in the slightest that the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine say you are just flat wrong?
Speaking of Oslo, Norway: Exxon (the oil company) should be awarded a Nobel Prize for their (internal) 1982 climate report, that now, 37 years later, has proven be most impressive in its predictive skills.
https://insideclimatenews.org/sites/default/files/documents/1982%20Exxon%20Primer%20on%20CO2%20Greenhouse%20Effect.pdf
Back in 1982, when the CO2 concentration was approx. 340ppm, they predicted the 2020 CO2 concentration to approach 420ppm. We will likely hit 418ppm next year, so they nailed it.
The accompanying temperature increase from 1982 to 2020 was predicted by Exxon to be 0.85C. We will likely see approx. 0.7C over 1982 level next year, so not quite as bad as Exxon estimated in 82, but judging from the record setting temps over the last few months, including UAH, we might approach 0.8C next year.
Looks like Exxon had a pretty darned good climate model running even back then.
As a … cardiologist … Thomas Binder, MD
And thus possessing precisely zero professional expertise in atmospheric science or in the radiative physics of CO2. But hey, never let facts or established science get in the way of expressing a perfectly ignorant opinion.
@1: This is the same case as with Creationists denying evolution–they will engage in extremely convoluted false logic in order to make their beliefs seem consistent with science. Another similarity is the role of ideology in driving their denialism.
#3 I am not surprised that an MD would have such ignorance about the reality of global warming as I went to one who while an effective and dedicated physician thought the Earth was actually flat, this even though he had flown to Europe and had to of seen the curvature of the earth. SAD!
It is impossible for tens of thousands of people from literally every nation in the world to maintain a conspiracy such as what is claimed by deniers. It is mathematically impossible. https://phys.org/news/2016-01-equation-large-scale-conspiracies-quickly-reveal.html
@1 Re. How much would be falsified? Fo starters consider ALL fields which require models and spectroscopy like, oh, most of 19th through 21st century astronomy.
A recent study on why some people fall for conspiracy theories. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2014-12-psychology-conspiracy-theories.html
Thomas Binder. A quick google search reveals some tweets that show where Thomas is coming from:
https://twitter.com/Thomas_Binder
“#CO2Hoax is one of the countless neoliberal scams for redistribution from bottom to top, state to private & south to north by privatisation, tax reduction & cuts in social services, and declares the victims of neoliberalism the perpetrators of its (environmental) destruction.”
“In green sheep’s clothing, neoliberalism aka green capitalism, after having done this with many leftists before, can finally fool many green & manage, by the way, to introduce unmolestedly another antisocial (CO2) tax for further redistribution to the top: The total victory!”
Thomas Binder is clearly a leftist, and appears to think climate change mitigation is designed to enrich the top 10% of people, and will hurt the poor so is trying to trash the science. Imo he is is a well intentioned, but deluded individual.
Please Mr Binder, you are wrong about both the science and the mitigation. Climate mitigation is not some neoliberal plot to enrich the top 10%, otherwise they would not be fighting climate mitigation so hard. While cap and trade is rather opaqe and open to some fair criticisms, it is not designed to enrich anyone, and the IMF has recently proposed carbon taxes as the preferred option anyway. Carbon tax schemes can be designed to be gentle on poor people, by incorporating either a dividend, or other help. Subsidies are another device. If we don’t fix this climate problem, it is the poor who will suffer most.
Rasmus,
Shouldn’t the sentence beginning “There will be regions where people no longer will be able to subside and …” read “… where people will no longer be able to subsist and …”?
Re: comment #3
Take heart teachers. Now you can tell virtually every one of your students, no matter how dense: “If this guy can become a doctor, so can you.”
You can pretty much tell your pets the same thing. Even the goldfish. Goldfish are so dumb.
re: #3
Did someone shut the Crankhole?
3: ” think about how crazy and or corrupt you would be if you (allegedly) believed that climate, the statistics of weather, was not driven by sun, cosmic rays, clouds and oceans but by (anthropogenic) CO2.
No science-denying green plant could ever hit on the idea to (un)consciously deny sun, cosmic rays, clouds and oceans (low-pass filter of the climate system ”
If Dr. Binder stopped wasting his time on cardiology. he could become one of the greatest homeopaths of his generation.
Dr. Binder, your comment is very unusual word salad. I’m not sure what kind of dressing I should put on it.
Quote from the article: “This monitoring shows that the conditions that caused climate change in the past are absent today.”
Just look at the actual graph used in the article. What were the conditions that caused the warming of 1900-1940 that are missing today?
What caused the cooling from 1940-1970?
Nobody knows, but 1980-2020 that was CO2. You know that for sure because you have a consensus, not science.
I think you confuse natural conditions such as solar activity with mane-made conditions. You also got it wrong way round: established scientific facts results in a consensus. Is it so hard to understand? -rasmus
Dan DaSilva: how about you read the IPCC reports on this topic. The explanation is there. Don’t be so lazy, do some work yourself. Or admit you don’t care about the explanation, you just want to vent your frustrations that your beliefs do not match the facts.
Unfortunately science has come down to name calling eg deniers and alarmists instead of repeated testing and observation to demonstrate truths, theories need to be rigorously challenged as a simple fact can destroy a theory. I note this challenge to the 506 scientist’s is not very factual at all. Its more about name calling. The following link is a speech given by Viscount Christopher Monckton, he uses simple maths to show the flaws in the calculations used in the global warming projections. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oi7ZFlCKoj0 The calculations he is proposing showing the flaws is being put out for pier review, This is good science. Throw away any preconceived bias and let the evidence or non evidence speak for itself. Surely the truth is what we all want isn’t it.
Anybody have any idea where the “press conference” will be held in Brussels? It might provide some light entertainment.
Thomas Binder, M.D.,
If you have proof it’s a hoax, produce it. If you have no proof, STFU.
DDS 14: You know that for sure because you have a consensus, not science.
BPL: Peer review and the scientific consensus are how modern science is done, and it has been a fantastically productive system. That’s what got us to the moon, eliminated smallpox, sequenced the human genome, and discovered thousands of planets of other stars. If you have something better to suggest, let’s hear it.
rasmus,
See my comments at ATTP (but mainly this one) …
https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2019/09/26/should-climate-scientists-admit-failure/#comment-163094
“The original petition was stillborn on May 10, 2019 from Rome, Italy.
https://www.conftrasporto.it/allegati_news/5d8b64fab5d1c_PETIZIONE-SUL-RISCALDAMENTO-GLOBALE-ANTROPOGENICO.pdf
(it is in Italian and this version has a PDF date of 2019-05-15)
The original seven names are:
Uberto Crescenti
Alberto Prestininzi
Renato Angelo Ricci
Franco Battaglia
Mario Giaccio
Enrico Miccadei
Nicola Scafetta
This petition started to morph into the current petition about 2019-08-06
https://klimarealisme.dk/2019/08/06/der-er-ingen-klimakrise/
(in Norwegian)
The English speaking MSM became aware of the petition in early September (about a couple days after I stumbled upon a PDF copy (AFAIK)) when the petition had 400+ names.
https://www.desmog.co.uk/2019/09/06/climate-science-deniers-planning-coordinated-european-misinformation-campaign-leaked-documents-reveal
I think I’ve saved all relevant nonsense to archive.org and/or archive.is.”
I also have a slightly earlier PDF copy with “300(?)” signatures dated 2019-08-24 which I tripped over on 2019-09-02.
“The calculations he is proposing showing the flaws is being put out for pier (sic) review, This is good science.”
If it is such good science one has to ask why he has not submitted it to any scientific publication. I wonder what the reason could be? Oh. Right. He’s being silenced by a cabal of evil scientists who control climate research worldwide!
BTW, the article does not use any derogatory words unless you find contrarian somehow not an accurate description but rather a slur of some sort.
#25 Steve Dombroski,
I’m trying to get people here away from automatically rejecting things, but the problem is that people like you never explain how they arrive at their conclusions. If there’s simple math, why don’t you share that with us?
The only requirement I would impose would be that you have to establish what we all agree upon before we can disagree, because otherwise it just becomes people talking past each other.
In “real science”, people disagree all the time, but they are arguing from a common basis of understanding. So, for example, in physics, we all agree about the conservation of energy. Starting from there, we might disagree about how the energy is distributed in a system… that makes for a good debate, and progress. We just had one such on the UV thread.
It really doesn’t help for you to suggest that people watch some youtube thing where they can’t question the person’s reasoning. Then it is just propaganda, not science.
24 Marco
List the reasons if you know them.
@32 DDS: do your own homework. Show that you have a genuine interest in learning, instead of your repeated dismissive comments here. Read it, and come back if you have genuine interest. There are a few climate scientists here who would gladly answer honest and genuine questions.
#32 Dan DaSilva,
I refer you to my comment #31. Same problem; if Marco doesn’t know what you and he agree about, it is pointless to discuss what you might disagree about.
If you really want to have a serious discussion, why don’t you first tell us whether you agree that increasing CO2 increases the energy in the climate system? If not, why not?
That’s how real science works… we start with the basic physics, and then proceed to debate how stuff happens in more detail. Otherwise, it’s just spinning-your-wheels, for both “sides”.
Thanks, useful exposition, but as usual way too many people feel they need to answer the fakery in one of the comments. Several of you used humor to imply it was artistry in irony, which is an improvement.
I came across this a couple of weeks ago and had been waiting to see it used to deny honest science. Good evaluation here, a useful organization:
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/letter-signed-by-500-scientists-relies-on-inaccurate-claims-about-climate-science/
For those claiming the few, the proud, are geniuses subject to conspiracy, they might remember that the power and wealth is on the side of fake skepticism. Scientists are not particularly well paid, unless they fall for the better money available from big fossil.
Those 3% of scientific papers that deny climate change? A review found them all flawed https://qz.com/1069298/the-3-of-scientific-papers-that-deny-climate-change-are-all-flawed/
And while I’m grinding my axe, a reminder of the lengths deniers will go to to bury the truth: http://rabett.blogspot.com/2014/09/a-note-about-roger-revelle-julian.html
A timely reminder of how low people will go: A Note About Roger Revelle, Justin Lancaster and Fred Singer The quote below is followed by more information, about how bullying and the courts are used to undermine the truth.
Mark Duigon states “This is the same case as with Creationists denying evolution” Well Mark scientists have every right to review any theory this is how good science reveals facts by repeated testing, observations and pier review. We can’t test or observe any thing in the past all scientist can do is look at something in the present, this is historical science which should not be confused with good operational science. the methodology is not based on observation or testing at the time of occurrence. By the way from what I have read creationists don’t deny micro evolution this is variation within the same kind eg the dog kind, what they do disagree with is one kind changing into another, why because the fossil record denies it-no missing links if you know of one which is fact please tell me, remember there should be thousands in the fossil record. Please inform the readers of how non – living chemicals turned into a living life form. What is fact is life comes from life this fact as never once been falsified through observation and experimentation. No simple life form has been discovered as Darwin predicted.
There are many more issues with the theory so scientists should challenge them so we get to the truth.
Steve D @25,
You find that video convincing? First, Monckton starts with a red herring, “What is the ideal temperature of the earth?” He claims he asked some unnamed climate scientists, who all went “all girly” on him. If he had asked me, I would have responded, “ideal for what?” For human purposes, the ideal temperature is the temperature at which human civilization developed, the holocene climate optimum.
Then he says he will show that the climate sensitivity is 3 times to high, using only arithmetic. A complex dynamic system with multiple feedbacks on multiple timescales understood with only arithmetic!
He was then amazed that the blackbody temperature of earth, in the absence of greenhouse gases, didn’t cause feedback warming.
What a loon.
DaSilva @22
Actually, the consensus is based on science. No science, no consensus. It is that simple. That is how it works. DaSilva is such a bore.
#31 zebra,
Its a shame when a scientist researches and explains his findings and is willing to put it out for pier review for other scientist’s to scrutinise, he is putting his reputation on the line. He is clearly not concerned about his reputation but wants to get to the truth. It appears there is a fear to even look at the evidence he presents, its not for me to explain it, as it is his work, better to get it from the horses mouth no-one needs my interpretation. There is an interesting question he raises, who knows the optimum global mean temperature? apparently no-one, so how do we know what is to much heating or to much cooling? For me I like to look at the evidence from both sides, I think it gives a more balance picture, by the way the so called deniers absolutely agree the earth has gone through a warming phase and human activity assists in this. From what I have read the disagreement is – can a small rise in Co2 produce the affects that are been predicted. This is the question that needs answering, the link in 25 is addressing this. Co2 is vital for all life, if Co2 levels dropped to 150pm plants cannot survive. Its a fact that plants flourish with higher levels of Co2 than the current 400pm, green house keepers pump up to 4000pm into their green houses for this very reason. Its worthy of a view as its not propaganda as you suggest but a well researched presentation with the Maths to confirm his findings.
Steve Dombroski @25,
There comes a point when the names are entirely deserved. I say this as I do call a spade a spade, as the mad Viscount Monckton suggest we should.
Steve Dombroski @34,
I’m with Zebra @31 in that your comment @25 is entirely defficient.
Linking to 40 minutes of rambling nonsense from the mad Vicount Monckton (who is the “ECO ambassador” for the UK in this demented petition by 506 denialists so your comment isn’t entirely off-topic): your linking imposes a ridiculous requirement for folk here to embark on. So why would you expect any here to give you the time of day?
But, rather than dismiss your input here (which is what it deserves), may I be so bold as to set out what it is that the mad Viscount Monckton takes 40 minutes to explain to his audience (who I think are a bunch of UKIPpers. As UKIPpers are Breiteers I can confidently predict the audience comprises hardened AGW denialists. They are also yesterday’s news as UKIP has been for some months superceded in politics by the Brexit Party). It may be you haven’t properly grasp his message yourself, so even you may find this useful.
..
Monckton describes climate scientists as saying ECS = 4K which he considers they derive from the pre-industrial climate having an average temperature of 287K which resuts from 255K due to insolation forcing + 8K of GHG forcing + 24k feedback. Climatology he says calculates ECS = 4K = 1K[doubling CO2] + feedback, where feedback = 24/8 = 3. (He also mentions that CMIP6 models are showing ECS=4.1K)
Monckton says ECS=4 is all wrong. The 24k of pre-industrial feedback is not exclusively the result of GHG forcing (with its warming of 8k) but must be divided with the solar forcing (with its much larger 255K warming). He first suggests that the 24K feedback could be allocated evenly between Solar & GHG giving an upper limit to ECS from GHGs which would then be ECS = 1K[doubling CO2] + 12/8 = 2.5K.
Monckton refines this by suggesting that the effect of clouds is being ignored in the the non-GHG temperature. No clouds, lower albedo, so the temperature due to insolation is not 255K but 274K and the 24K from feedback drops accordingly to 5k. ECS is thus lower still. He generously allocates 3k of the 5K feedback to GHGs. So ECH = 1.375. He generously brackets ECS = 1K to 1.5K.
Monckton ends with an attempt to use the AGW-forcing-to-2011 (2.5W/msq) (less TOA imbalance (0.6W/msq) and warming-to-2011 (+0.75ºC) to support his assertion of a low ECS but I think he has lost it by this point in his talk. (Using just these three numbers Monckton calculates ECS = 2.5/(2.5-0.6) x 1 = 1.33. Even without an explanation of the x1, this doesn’t make a lot of sense.)
..
Given all this twaddle from Monckton and given he mentions co-authors and wanting something published, I’m not sure that I see anything different from his previous grand revelation of bullshit that he provided for the world last year – Monckton of Brenchley, Jeschke, Soon, Legates, Briggs, Limburg, Henny, Whitfield, Morrison and Sheahen (Unpublished) ‘On an error in defining temperature feedback’ (For those who are unfamiliar with this year-old nonsense and who consider that wading though 50-pages of bullshit is too much, there was an explanetary posting about it on the rogue planetoid Wattsupia plus further explanation running to 7,000 words and from within that a helpful link to “a single-sheet scientific summary” that actually runs to 2 pages, presumably 2-sides of one sheet.
SD 25: The following link is a speech given by Viscount Christopher Monckton
BPL: Who has no training in climate science whatsoever. His degree is in journalism. As for “using simple maths” to show how wrong climate science is, think a little, will you? You really think all the scientists in the world have their simple maths wrong? Or just didn’t notice? How likely is that?
SD 34: what they do disagree with is one kind changing into another
BPL: Please define what a “kind” is. Hint: There’s no such taxon.
SD: why because the fossil record denies it-no missing links if you know of one which is fact please tell me, remember there should be thousands in the fossil record.
BPL: Look again.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC200.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC200_1.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional/part2c.html
SD 37: There is an interesting question he raises, who knows the optimum global mean temperature? apparently no-one, so how do we know what is to much heating or to much cooling?
BPL: The optimum temperature FOR US is the 287-288 K all of human agriculture and civilization developed under. A deviation of a few degrees either way would kill our civilization.
SD: Co2 is vital for all life, if Co2 levels dropped to 150pm plants cannot survive.
BPL: There is no possibility of CO2 dropping that low in the foreseeable future. It has not been that low any time in the past 800,000 years.
And for God’s sake, SD, it’s “peer review,” not “pier review.” Peer = someone on the same level. Pier = a place where ships dock.
“…green house keepers pump up to 4000pm into their green houses for this very reason…”
Uh, perhaps you are unaware of two facts:
11
RE: #12
“I went to one who while an effective and dedicated physician thought the Earth was actually flat.”
Well, I have driven across Kansas and attest to the fact the earth is flat!!!
#37 Steve Dombroski,
Well, you complain and complain but really you (and Monckton) and Creationist Religion people are just Science Welfare Queens.
You are not willing to do any work to prove your arguments, you are not willing to get an education, but you just repeat the same words over and over. You can’t think for yourselves, obviously. But, you use all the stuff scientists and engineers and smart people have created for you… it’s a free ride, but that’s not enough.
I think most people like you (and others here) are engaging in the politics of resentment and envy. When you were in school, maybe you could memorize things, but you weren’t able to achieve at the higher levels, so you hate educated people, and those who succeeded by creating new products, and those who have other talents.
Really, why do you think any of those people should listen to you? You hate us but we’re supposed to be sympathetic?? Sorry, we only do that with little children. And I’ve known lots of hard-working people with less education who are real adults, who appreciate what science has given us.
Thanks for rebutting. Of course, it’s all been done before, but if the usual clowns insist on continuing to clown, then critics must continue to point out that they’re doing a lousy job.
Steve Dombroski, #37–
“pier review…”
Sorry, your credibility quotient get docked for spelling.
Steve Dombroski wrote:
Good thing that CO2 levels stay well above that even at the depths of glaciations, isn’t it? The Sahara was a forest; hardly “devoid of plants”.
This may astonish you, but the world is not managed like a greenhouse, and cannot be. Greenhouse farmers make sure their plants have extra nitrate, phosphate and potash to take advantage of the extra CO2; without that, by Liebig’s law of the minimum, extra CO2 benefits them little or not at all.
Even if the plants grow better, they may be less good for us:
If you’re going to experiment with the food supply, experiment in your own greenhouse. Don’t do it with the entire planet; we not only did not agree to it, we were never asked.
#37 The “fact” that greenhouse keepers use high levels of CO2 to grow plants has what to do with the fact that it acts as a green house gas raising average temperatures in the atmosphere? The effect of low level of the gas on plants again says nothing about temperature effects of various levels.
Susan Anderson @23
“Thanks, useful exposition, but as usual way too many people feel they need to answer the fakery in one of the comments. Several of you used humor to imply it was artistry in irony, which is an improvement.”
You deplore people responding to the fakery in one of the comments, yet seem comfortable with the main article responding to the fakery in this signed petition of sceptics and peoples efforts to expose F Singer’s fakery. Do you not see the contradiction?
Leaving nonsense unchallenged gives it life. But I agree with most of your comments.
Steve Dombroski @25
“I note this challenge to the 506 scientist’s is not very factual at all”
Oh come on the article is full of facts, hundreds of them so you are either lying or can’t comprehend simple english. Moncton is out of his depth and simply doesn’t have the academic background for this. His only maths qualification is a course in geometry for architectural history. His previous attempts at debunking climate science have been fizzers.
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Steve Dombroski @34, creationism is off topic. Read the moderation rules. And thousands of transitional fossils have been found, eg early horses. There’s no such thing as a missing link, just common ancestors. Now please just go away.
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Steve Dombroski @37 Moncton is not trying to get at the truth. He is an attention seeker and fanatical libertarian who doesnt like where the science leads. Psychology 101. Read his frigging history.
Ideal global temperature is a strawman argument. Whats ideal is stability. Nobody is suggesting CO2 at 150ppm. Do you seriously think posting all this already debunked rubbish is going to fool anyone anymore? The public have finally woken up to you people and your ridiculous lies.