The Oxburgh report on the science done at the CRU has now been published and….. as in the first inquiry, they find no scientific misconduct, no impropriety and no tailoring of the results to a preconceived agenda, though they do suggest more statisticians should have been involved. They have also some choice words to describe the critics.
Carry on…
simon abingdon (550) — But as is repeatedly mentioned, climate is not weather. What is being projected is various long term averages. For a decadal prediction of global GISTEMP, my simple
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/03/unforced-variations-3/comment-page-12/#comment-168530
using just CO2 plus AMO for small corrections does a decent job, I claim, of predicting the average temperature for the 2010s.
I’m relucant to attempt to project further in the future than that; for 9 decades of projection, probably the big AOGCMS do rather well and in any case are better than nothing.
In his post on the 20th April 2010 at 3:39 PM, Mr. Abington confuses climate with weather. I may not be able to predict a sequence of unbiased coin tosses, yet I can calculate that the expectation of either heads or tails will be one half.
The hell with the statisticians, professional or otherwise, global warming is here to stay and our climate scientists are and were and will be right, correct, accurate and true before and notwithstanding this socalled review or report. Mr. Jones should keep his head high and not loose any sleep at all.
Look around you, observe and think. It is plain to see, it is the only obvious thing on this planet: IT IS WARMING.
I, a member of the set of homo sapiens, feel insulted by this report. There never was a question as to the veracity of the results of our scientist’s efforts. In fact no judgement of any board of inquiry whether positive or negative would or could have changed my mind.
Science is NOT done by concensous (that usually applies to sex or some related activity). Nor is it done by agreement or by adherence to a set of protocols or whatever other difficult word you can come up with.
Read Darwin’s books. He does not start by saying that he hired a group of statisticians or any other experts. No, indeed not all. He observed, he talked to other people, he even sent emails(snailmails). He thought. And then he took a leap and proposed his hypothesis, provided sufficient evidence and made it into a theory. The rest is history and the reactions were mostly gobblethegook, whether pro or con.
Mendelyev did not ask any statisticians or mathematicians what was wrong with his table. He put forward his hypothesis, made some logical decisions and then made some socalled predictions of not yet discovered elements. But I do not call this a prediction at all. Instead it is a logical and necessary consequence of his proposal. He did not know about isotopes, he did not know about valence bands or electrons or whatever our scientists discovered afterwards. But the implied consequence was the soon to be discovered elements, valence bands etc. .
The same can be said about Euclid or Archimedes or Newton or Leibniz or Mendel or Arrhenius or any other of our truly outstanding scientists. We have been blessed to have so many.
Mr. Jim Hansen has to use his own grandchildren to convince us of the gravity of the climactic situation. You cannot read a better and more comprehensive report of global warming than the ones he has produced so many times and in so many ways.
The whole socalled climategate story is just a disgusting example of sacriligeous sanctimony on the part of the ignoramuses.
I read with absolute amazement all over the press and the internet what the Boethians thought were the requirements to be a good scientist.
This is risible in the extreme. The ONLY requirement is to put forth a good hypothesis, back it up with as small a sample of evidence as possible to justify said hypothesis and build a theory that stands up to the current tests. The rest is so much garbage. We know it will get more detailed and more accurate over time but that is just that:”a detail”.
With Gauss I say (quoting very liberally)” I do not want to listen to the Boethians and I do not care a wit about what they have to say.
550 (simon abingdon),
The problem is that you misunderstand the problem.
No one is trying to, or needs to try to, predict exactly how each gust of wind on the planet will form, grow, move and die. One only needs to predict, on aggregate, how things are likely to develop, over a range of possibilities and conditions. Such simulations may, in turn, be run thousands of times so that a range of possible outcomes is considered.
Consider a coin. No model I could design will accurately take into account enough factors (uneven weight of the coin, slight breeze, how a person flips the coin, shape of the surface on which is lands) to predict whether it will come up heads or tails with any accuracy.
But consider 1,000 coin flips. One can predict a distribution of heads and tails among those coin flips with fair accuracy.
Predicting weather is predicting one coin flip. Predicting (or rather, modeling) climate is thousands of coin flips in aggregate, repeated hundreds of times.
You are also, I suspect, listening to too many weak denier arguments and putting far too much weight on the outcomes of the models among the sizable body of other evidence available. The models support the science, but there is no keystone that you can knock out and then declare the issue as settled.
By the way, man would never have gotten to the moon or achieved thousands of other milestones with your approach to what can or cannot be done, and how to go about doing it.
simon abingdon says:
20 April 2010 at 3:39 PM
“No computer model can reliably forecast very far into the future without having continuously updated inputs. Any meteorologist who doesn’t continually “look out of the window” will get his forecasts embarrassingly wrong. Hence this week’s unnecessary total shut-down of UK airspace.”
Unnecessary? Planes have had all four engines shut down (and subsequently scrapped) by volcanic dust and their windscreens sandblasted to the point of opacity. I think there was a reasonable argument for shutting down an airspace in which there was a high concentration of volcanic dust at flying altitudes. Or should they have waited for planes to start falling from the sky before they did anything (the libertarian solution)?
#550 Climate unpredictable? (Simon Abingdon)
As has been said in these threads a thousand times: weather is not climate. Climate is an average thing, that can be predicted with an accuracy that’s useful. See here:
http://www.grist.org/article/we-cant-even-predict-the-weather-next-week/
I dont think anyone has a real handle on what it would take for our current civilization to collapse (not to mention what do you define as “civilization”). What we have seen in past is societal collapse under far less pressure than rapid warming would produce but then these societies had much less resources than we have. Against this, the change would be global not regional and involves rates of change in the natural world that are unprecedented for our global civilization so who knows? What we can say with confidence though is that rapid climate change lays us open to all manner of very bad things. Do we really want to take that risk?
Simon, that’s the old weather/climate confusion.
Say you planned to fly across the Arctic, considering the possibility of landing on the ice, would you rather plan your trip for March or for May? The forecast for ice thickness is rather reliably different, and you can make that forecast far more than ten hours in the future.
Not everyone pays attention, though:
“May 16, 2000 Associated Press
Five people aboard a Russian-designed biplane were stranded Monday when the plane landed at the North Pole and sank through the ice.”
You’ve stated a classic example of confusing weather and climate.
Frank Giger wrote: “I just don’t believe that people will voluntarily limit population growth …”
Hmmm, that’s not what the dat show:
http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_reveals_new_insights_on_poverty.html
@550
Capt. Abingdon, speaking as one who used to compute the wind field over the Atlantic and keep your aircraft right on schedule (remember when you used to carry a navigator?), I can assure you that there’s almost no connection between the physics of those wind forecasts and the physics behind the climate models that apply to AGW. The dymamics of weather, even for very big storm systems, takes place on scales of time and space that completely vanish in a climate model. The smallest unit of time that a climate model deals with is (by convention)30 years. That’s a full career in the cockpit.
Believe me, the scientists who design and run climate models know their meteorology from the ground up and their geophysics from the exosphere down. The main problem with climate models isn’t lack of understanding of what makes the atmosphere tick, it’s how to integrate that knowledge into a set of equations that will make a computer behave the way the atmosphere behaves for enough model time to yield a valid forecast. It took about 40 years to accomplish that for a weather model that covers only 24 hours over a continent, and we did that about 50 years ago.
To a meteorologist of my generation, the progress we’ve made in the past 20 years is astounding. Climate models are getting better every month as experience accumulates and better data becomes available. You’ve gotta remember that looking out of the window doesn’t tell you a thing about the climate.
Simon Abingdon, Here. Read.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate
Not the same thing.
Do you invest in stocks or mutual funds? No sane person buys a stock today intending to sell it tomorrow–too much uncertainty. Over time, though, there is an upward trend. It is literally bankable. Now go clean up all that straw from that straw man you demolished.
Once again, simon abingdon @550 confuses weather forecasting with projecting long term changes in climate.
CM and Bob,
There is a difference between predicting imminent collapse and pointing out that risk is at present unbounded. The latter is a condition of our state of knowledge. However, we must treat the situation serious and spare not effort to avert the threat until the risk is better understood. That is simply probabilistic risk assessment 101.
It is simply fact that Earth is over its carrying capacity. It is also a fact that agriculture and human civilization have only existed during the past 10000 years of relative climate stability, and that without a healthy agricultural infrastructure we are 3 orders of magnitude over carrying capacity rather than merely one order of magnitude above. I consider that an important distinction.
Frank Giger,
Humans have limited population growth voluntarily. Many Europeans countries and Japan are now below replacement levels. This only happens at a fairly high standard of living, unfortunately, and that means greater energy consumption, or at least adequate quality of life. Somehow, we must find a way to ensure quality of life in a way that is sustainable, or our lives will have no quality to speak of.
@Barton #473 and CFU #510,511
I think,
‘human civilization could be completely destroyed ‘
this demonstrates what lack of balance is !
and
with regard to ‘both sides equally’ balance does not mean eqivalence, only the ability to weigh each side of a discussion.
That means you do not start with the assumption that you know the perfect answer to a debate before it has started, (same as saying the science is settled actually)
Simon Abingdon says: No computer model can reliably forecast very far into the future without having continuously updated inputs.
Climate science doesn’t depend on computer models. Check out a good, college-level textbook to learn why. From reading the pre-print, I recommend Ray’s book, but unfortunately it won’t be out until the end of the year.
Simon Abingdon (#550)
” No computer model can reliably forecast very far into the future without having continuously updated inputs…
And hence the futility of any prognosis of global climate behaviour in the long term.”
A total non sequitur. It’s like saying that because a river-flow model can’t predict the exact trajectory of every leaf that falls into the stream, the model is incapable of forecasting that torrential rains will cause the water to rise.
The NASA GISS data on their website show a station’s temp data ‘after combining sources at same location’ and another data set showing ‘after homogeneity adjustment’. They are quite often different.
Last year I checked the weather station data for Lismore (Centre St) Australia. The AHA set was different from the ACSASL set. Sometime this year I checked again and found that they the AHA is the same. This seems to have happened to some other stations. Can anyone tell me the reason why they have been changed?
You can see the ACSASL set at:-
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=501945860000&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1
and the AHA set at:-
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=501945860000&data_set=2&num_neighbors=1
simon abingdon
If you cannot tell the difference between climate and weather then you are not well enough informed to comment on this site. Please return to CA or some other fool magnet.
This has been a public service announcement from the
It-is-impossible-to-call-the-roll-of-a-die-but-easy-it-call-the-average-of-thirty-of-them institute.
Simon Abingdon – unfortunately your meteoroglical training has not made clear to you the difference between climate and weather. The former being the long term (usually 30 years) trend of the latter. The physics telling us that the earth is and shall be warming is fairly well understood, and therefore we have a completely non-futile understanding of the evolution of climate over the coming century.
Too true. My fav page for demonstrating the salient effect of greenhouse gases on climate:
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/not-computer-models/
Two illogical ‘hences’ and one false ‘unnecessary’.
There is no evidence of faulty weather forecasts unless the Telegraph made it up. The shut-down was based on short term forecasts which were constantly being up-dated. The justification was nothing to do with forecasts but the policy of ‘zero tolerance’ of volcanic ash , which is still in operation in the US. That in its turn was based on expert opinion as it stood one week ago. The tolerance level for ash has been raised to-day by a factor of 10 in Europe (Yes it sounds odd if it was zero before).
This has been the result of enormous pressure from the aviation industry.In great contrast to the global warming issue , the industry appear to have conducted some research and produced new data to support their case. This was supposed to have been based on flights by e.g. KLM over the ash clouds , followed by careful inspecton of the engines in consultation with the engine manufacturers.
Climate models are not just long range weather forecasts and are not essential anyway for the prognosis of global warming.
I hope for the sake of safety of others that this kind of commercial Telegraphy type propaganda is not guiding the aviation industry’s major decisons.
There is of course a connection with global warming which is the risk that jet engines might run less efficiently after slight damage by ash. This means more CO2 per mile. No idea if true.
Sobry 553: “The hell with the statisticians, professional or otherwise, global warming is here to stay…”
Heh, besides cursing them it’s worth noting that this topic seems to be gaining salience among mainstream statisticians, which ought to prove constructive. See for example the discussion following a March article in AmStat News, including a challenge to the ASA by Hank Roberts:
“> The views of climate change ’skeptics’ and ‘deniers’ appear in many media,
> from blogs and videos to op-eds and congressional testimony. We prefer to
> think of the views of skeptics as part of the scientific spectrum, but
> nevertheless believe they are a minority who do not represent the
> mainstream scientific viewpoint.
Now that you’ve taken this public stance, I hope someone at the ASA is going to watch the comments and not ignore the people claiming to be statisticians who are making claims as statisticians about climate change.
You’ve taken notice of an open can of worms — which is good.
Now, please keep paying attention to the people claiming statistical expertise about climate change who only appear in blogs and videos.
They’re reaching the public with assertions they claim are good statistics.
Your move.”
http://magazine.amstat.org/2010/03/climatemar10/
Let me try to get to grips with the weather/climate question by coming at it from a different angle.
I understand what we mean by “weather” because we can pin it down by stating the values of various parameters, for example:
Place in question, time of observation, wind direction and speed, visibility, cloudbase and extent, precipitation, temperature and dewpoint, pressure.
How do we do the same for climate? What parameters define and specify climate? While we can use broad terms like maritime, continental, temperate, tropical, polar, equatorial, etc there remains a rather uncomfortable feeling of vague generality and lack of scientific rigour. What are a climate’s relevant numbers and units of measurement? What are the boundaries within which a climate exists? If we talk about climate change how do we say exactly what elements have changed and by how much? Is it possible in any case to talk about climate in terms which are convincingly specific?
If I think about it I have to say I honestly don’t know. Maybe some of you can help.
Simon, you might want to check out Barton’s excellent How to Estimate Planetary Temperatures. It’s a quick overview of how we use basic radiative thermodynamics to characterize simple atmospheres.
529, Hank Roberts
Thanks for the references.
Peter Guttorp, who co-wrote the Amstat News article on the current unpleasantness, is presenting a paper at an invited session on AGW at the Joint Statistical Meetings in Vancouver, BC this August. He has experience in dynamic modeling of fisheries.
Capt. A: The trouble is that the AGW situation is even more abstract than our usual way of thinking about climate. Maritime, continental and the like are classifications of the climate of particular localities or regions while AGW is about *global* climate, and mostly about temperature, at that. If you were to set up an observatory on one of the moons of Jupiter and measure the overall temperature of the Earth as a planet, that would be the global temperature. (It’s easy; astronomers have been making measurements of that kind for 120 years.) Since we’re stuck down here, we have to combine tens of thousands of individual temperature measurements to get the global average. (Don’t worry about measurements at individual weather stations being distorted by pavement, etc.; climatologists figured out how to compensate for that a hundred years ago.) The point is that every serious study of global temperature shows a gradual rise over the past 150 years and other solid evidence ties that rise to the CO2 that we have been pumping out. How that increase in temperature will play out in weather is still rather uncertain. This much is clear — we’ve added a lot of extra energy to the big heat engine of the atmosphere. That energy has got to show up somewhere and chances (like 99.9%) are that it will mean more active weather: heavier rain, hotter highs, lower lows, windier winds, that kind of thing. Right now, we’re having 700-year floods every year in the Midwest.
Several people have made the comparison to throwing dice. That’s right, the basic question is How many times do you have to throw before you catch on that the dice are loaded? Stay tuned and take notes. This is going to be on the final.
The link is broken.
Also, real climate could really do with a threaded/hierarchical reply system. Ideally, it should hide any reply below level X by default. These discussions are incredibly hard to navigate…
Oh, Simon has it much, much more wrong than “climate vs. weather” when he says this:
This week’s total shut-down was due in very large part to lack of data on what a highly-dispersed cloud of volcanic ash was likely to do to airplanes. I’ve seen nothing to indicate that forecasts or (more importantly) radar tracking of the ash cloud has been inaccurate.
The existing data for flying through ash clouds, even extremely low-density ones, isn’t very optimistic. It mostly includes three 747s that had three, four and four engines shut down flying in such conditions back in the 1980s. There’s not a lot of data and while these three represent almost anecdotal evidence, the results in each case were almost catastrophic (engine restarts after gliding with a 15,000+ feet loss of altitude, with in one case only two engines being startable, two airplanes were over alaska IIRC, no suitable airfield within gliding distance).
So airlines themselves instituted a zero-tolerance policy towards even extremely diffuse volcanic ash clouds. Simon should know this, because flights are diverted by flight operations folks for various airlines several times a month, minimum. Happens all the time. Just as Simon talks about no captain undertaking a 10 hr flight without taking on more than the legally required minimum fuel load, airlines are more cautious regarding ash clouds than they’re legally required to be.
There’s not been a large incentive to try to gather more data because past incidences tend to be out over the pacific, or alaska, or the PNW (Mt. St. Helens nearly 30 years ago), rather than over extremely high-volume airspace like Europe.
Suddenly, airlines have taken an interest in exploring the safety margins rather than simply avoiding ash clouds. Without doubt, I imagine money will be spent to gather a lot more data after this extremely expensive incident.
Simon fails to note that this “totally unnecessary shutdown” wasn’t protested by airlines at the time. It’s only been as its stretched out to a week, with the possibility of an extended eruption, that the airlines began pushing back. If the airspace had been left open, airlines on their own would’ve made case-by-case decisions, and in the first days I don’t think there’s any doubt most flights would’ve been cancelled without government action.
Anyway, blaming computer models for this shutdown is simply stupid.
So after all your time posting here, you finally admit you know nothing of climate, really (not to mention climate science), yet that’s not stopped you from claiming that climate science is wrong, or (just now!) that climate models are useless.
You’re a piece of work, dude …
L Hamilton #545: the sea ice volume anomaly data is interesting. I plotted -1xGISStemp 5-year average and it looked pretty similar. I couldn’t find a processed version of the sea ice volume anomaly data as represented in the graph but it wouldn’t surprise me too much if, with the same 5-year average, you had a very high correlation with -1xGISStemp.
If anyone finds that data please post a link.
Wasn’t it Mark Twain who said that climate is what we expect and weather is what we get?
Simon, I am 100 percent skeptical of the AGW theory and I think the motivations of the people who push it are questionable. But I will concede that even though it sounds silly, long term average temperature predictions COULD have more predictive power then short term day to day temperature predictions. The key word though is could. In my head I think of it as an analogy to quantum physics where things get less and less predictable on smaller distance scales — of course for climate I see time scales that way and not distance. A stupid example is if I put a time bomb in my house and set it to go off in 3 days. I now can predict with much confidence that my house will explode in 3 days. I didnt have to simulate every particle in the house with a supercomputer either…. So the question as far as AGW theory goes is how strong is the evidence that CO2 acts to increase atmospheric temperatures. Is it anywhere as strong a predictor as that time bomb? Personally I think the evidence for CO2 driving climate or anything is really really weak. The basic idea behind it is seems plausible but when I look for the hard evidence what I find is shockingly unconvincing and based waaay too much on speculation. Basic science or properties of matter these are not. I mean if CO2 drives temps then why do ice cores clearly show the exact opposite? To me this is really strong evidence against CO2 — the trace gas — driving climate change, causing volcanoes or 5 billion human deaths.
Simon Abingdon #550:
About climate, would you be willing to bet against boreal summer 2010 being warmer than boreal winter 2010/2011? What odds would suit you?
Yep — numerical weather prediction. The very same, physics-based code you’ll find inside climate models. You know it works.
“with regard to ‘both sides equally’ balance does not mean eqivalence, only the ability to weigh each side of a discussion.”
They why when you weigh the denialotropes do you get any substance at all?
They don’t even agree what IS going on, they only agree on what ISN’T.
When the denial bring up non-science nonsence (G&T), why do you weigh them and find them appropriate?
You don’t, is the short answer.
You appeal to false balance.
Prove me wrong: assert the problems with denial of AGW. Let’s SEE you do the weighing.
“This only happens at a fairly high standard of living, unfortunately, and that means greater energy consumption, or at least adequate quality of life.”
Ray, that is only a side effect of what is REALLY needed: you need almost everyone out of the poverty trap, so that survival is no longer the constraint.
With a capitalist society, this means that, because most of the wealth is concentrated in a few powerful people or organisations, that there are massive amounts of “capital” tied up and that capital can only be realised by consumption.
“And there’s the rub. No computer model can reliably forecast very far into the future without having continuously updated inputs.”
Here’s the rib, simon: that is completely wrong.
“we can assume Eskimos and Cost Accountants are not “civilized” or sustainable? ”
No, we can assume that Cost Accountancy has relevance only where monetary civilisation such as we currently have (and require many billions of people to allow such speciali sation) and that being able to feed yourself is a useful trait we’re speciali sing ourselves out of.
526 flxible and others: “What is the basis for the implicit assumption that large population reduction = loss of “civilization”?”
It is a matter of “history” as amplified by archeology and anthropology. It is NOT implicit at all. Something like 2 dozen previous civilizations have collapsed, and we know what happened, how it happened and why it happened. [ Probably many more civilizations that we don’t know about have also collapsed.] I have cited 2 key books repeatedly: “Collapse” by Jared Diamond and “The Long Summer” by Brian Fagan. Both Jared Diamond and Brian Fagan are world famous professors . READ their books. My numbers come from books of this type. 99.99% death is an average. Sometimes there are zero survivors.
The pattern is:
Collapse starts with a change in the environment, usually the climate. The change makes food unobtainable, usually because agriculture no longer works. Starvation causes mass death. When there is no food, people will not go to work, so civilization ends. With no police, there is no law and no morality. Neighbors sometimes hunt each other as food. Survivors, if any, wander off in search of food, if they can.
“Why do responses to that question always devolve to virtually religious ones?”
WRONG!!!! See the above books. See also the scientific literature on the subjects you question. Those other subjects are not part of climatology, so we only give you the results. By the way, when a collapse happens, there is a pattern of increasing religiosity until the end, when the priests are killed and everybody changes to another religion.
“what population would provide a sustainable future for your [I have none] progeny?”
See: “Now or Never” by Tim Flannery 2009
page 2: We have already exceeded Earth’s carrying capacity by 25%.
“Wouldn’t the population “crash” naturally reach some sustainable level?”
NO
The proper subject is called “Population Biology.” Population Biology is a well developed subset of biology. There is always OVERSHOOT and OSCILLATION Unless the population reaches ZERO. Zero population is EXTINCTION.
“Would a greatly reduced population necessarily be UNcivilized?”
See “Collapse” by Jared Diamond and “The Long Summer” by Brian Fagan.
“Is humanity somehow exempt from the population dynamics observed in other species? ”
Certainly NOT. Human is a race of chimpanzee. Laws of Nature apply.
“Does the fact that most would find loss of say a billion or 2 humans a tragedy, mean we must find a way to preserve an unsustainable number? Is there a way to ramp down the population gradually? The Chinese approach? Discuss, don’t dismiss as if it’s not a relevent problem.”
We can’t discuss that because it is too difficult. I can only say that we are trying to limit the tragedy as much as possible. I am hoping to prevent the extinction of the human race. WE CAN NOT find a way to preserve an unsustainable number, by definition. Politicians will have to answer the questions that are beyond science.
Ray,
#563: I agree with everything you say here. Except the order of magnitude.
#531: Well, that sure made me choke on my coffee. But look again. World potential arable land comes to around 4 billion hectares, not 40 million (did you mix up km2 and ha?). Of this, we’ve already cultivated 1.5 billion ha. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arable_land, citing FAO World Soil Resources Report 90).
Of course, much of the remaining potential arable land is rainforest, which we are well advised to let stand; much of the cultivated land is badly degraded; your point about the oceans stands; and climate change is a big, bad joker, so there’s plenty of real reasons to worry.
Dan Lufkin says: “This much is clear — we’ve added a lot of extra energy to the big heat engine of the atmosphere. That energy has got to show up somewhere and chances (like 99.9%) are that it will mean more active weather: heavier rain, hotter highs, lower lows, windier winds, that kind of thing.”
I don’t follow that at all. Since the temperature difference between the equator and the poles will lessen, my admittedly naive expectation would be for less active weather. Really, though, the Earth looks way too complicated for such simple arguments. If the modelers have reached a consensus on future storm strength I’d like to hear it, otherwise I’m willing to wait. In the mean time, we can be confident there will be change, and despite the old saying change is usually bad, or at least expensive.
simon is doing a 91:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/chaos-theory-global-warming-can-climate-be-predicted.htm
Sam (#582), don’t you find it odd that so many scientists and scientific bodies clearly don’t share your personal feeling about the strength of the evidence? As for ice cores, temperatures and CO2, see here:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/04/the-lag-between-temp-and-co2/
“Really, though, the Earth looks way too complicated for such simple arguments. ”
Ah, well, there’s a problem right there.
Just because the interaction of electrical forces are complex, it doesn’t mean that you can’t just say “well, if I burn this bit of wood, it will disintegrate”.
What “complicated” thing would stop more energy in being expressed as higher temperatures?
“If the modelers have reached a consensus on future storm strength I’d like to hear it, otherwise I’m willing to wait.”
And when consensus is reached, you or another patsy will proclaim that consensus is not science. Or that there are 3 people who disagree. Or…
“the old saying change is usually bad, or at least expensive.”
So let’s stop changing the climate.
Edward: “With no police, there is no law and no morality. ”
Not so.
With survival being the overwhelming need, morality takes a second place.
If you’re starving you WILL steal to eat. It’s not a breakdown in morality, it’s a lack of food.
“Personally I think the evidence for CO2 driving climate or anything is really really weak.”
Fair enough.
Have you read the evidence, though?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/water-vapor-greenhouse-gas.htm
or are there no such things as greenhouse gasses?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/human-co2-smaller-than-natural-emissions.htm
we’re upsetting the balance.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-co2-enhanced-greenhouse-effect.htm
empirical evidence abounds.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-global-warming.htm
and we can see it’s warming.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-higher-in-past.htm
why would the past record *accidentally* accord with stellar physics and the evolution of our sun according to the main sequence?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/saturated-co2-effect.htm
and we can still see the effects of more CO2.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/solar-cycle-length.htm
how can the IR know it came from the Sun rather than from IR retention?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/its-not-us.htm
more empirical evidence.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-levels-airborne-fraction-increasing.htm
more evidence of CO2 increasing.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/solar-cycles-global-warming.htm
evidence or at least appropriate correlation between extra energy to the surface causing warming.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/CO2-was-higher-in-late-Ordovician.htm
again with the sun’s evolution concording with climate physics.
“Wasn’t it Mark Twain who said that climate is what we expect and weather is what we get?”
Which proves what?
AGW and climate science say that we should expect warmer weather.
We have seen this.
And cries of “what about all this snow, eh?” is contraindicated as valid by your comment.
“I mean if CO2 drives temps then why do ice cores clearly show the exact opposite?”
Because they don’t.
The ice cores show that CO2 drives warmer temperatures. If it weren’t for CO2’s effect as a driver of temperatures, the much smaller effect of the Milankovich cycle would not thaw us out of an ice age.
An odd definition of “the exact opposite”.
hi guys,
not a scientist, just a layman here.
what do you make of the claim making the denialist rounds about a study from finnish scientist Jyrki Kauppinen saying that “increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide explains only 5-10 percent of observed global warming?
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=5540&linkbox=true&position=2
***PROJECT JIM***
[Response: Very likely nonsense (or terrible reporting). I’d bet serious money no such paper willl appear in the June issue of Nature (these things can’t be predicted like that at all). – gavin]
CM, Yes, I did mix up ha and km2. However, I did it twice (the amount of land to support a single hunter-gatherer is aboout 0.5 km^2–so the carrying capacity for hunter-gatherers is still about 90 million. Personally, I think this is the major risk we must confront, and we don’t even know how to evaluate it yet.
Sam #582: ice cores record events before massive human intervention of emission of billions of tonnes of CO_2. Over that period, there was no primary driver of CO_2 emissions, so CO_2 increases were mostly caused by temperature increases. As the sea gets warmer, its capacity to dissolve CO_2 reduces, and it outgasses CO_2. More CO_2 in the atmosphere amplifies the initial warming. This effect is well known and has been extensively studied; without changes in greenhouse gases, the temperature swings between ice ages and interglacials can’t be as big, and there is no explanation other than the greenhouse effect for venus.
That is not the mechanism today. There is no external trigger for warming. The solar constant over the last few decades has been constant and nothing else has introduced a trend. CO_2 is the only factor we know of that can be causing a temperature rise when there is no change in orbital parameters or solar output. The fact that there is a linear increase in temperature (smoothed out for natural variability) when CO_2 is increasing exponentially fits the theory pretty well.
The basic science is not at issue, and is not discussed much because it was all well accepted by the 1940s. For the same reason biologists do not have lengthy debates any more about the structure of DNA.
And anyway, who said CO_2 causes volcanoes?