Sorry for the low rate of posts this summer. Lots of offline life going on. ;-)
Meantime, this paper by Hourdin et al on climate model tuning is very interesting and harks back to the FAQ we did on climate models a few years ago (Part I, Part II). Maybe it’s worth doing an update?
Some of you might also have seen some of the discussion of record temperatures in the first half of 2016. The model-observation comparison including the estimates for 2016 are below:
It seems like the hiatus hiatus will continue…
Gotta just LAUGH at the “climate emergency” talk. REALLY? Ater ten years of me saying things were going much faster than anticipated, that there were zero significant hystereses, that we had to act like it was a WWII mobilization (god, it galls to see that all over the place now!), that the response to GHG’s was higher than modeled, et., etc….
NOW you want to talk emergency?
Yet, you still won’t want to ask me. LOL….
Gotta love the ego.
Ask someone who knows how to design resilient, carbon sequestering, regenerative systems.That ain’t you.
Thanks to Gavin for his link to tabular data on how months vary in temperature seasonally. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/faq/merra2_seas_anom.txt
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2016GL070428/abstract
Ha. HA. HAHAHAHAHA. Whack!
No, it won’t change what gets posted by the likes of V____r, but it’d be of interest to any reasonable person willing to consider basic statistics to inform their perspective on how the world works.
Last Week
August 14 – 20, 2016 401.85 ppm
August 14 – 20, 2015 399.10 ppm
weekly increase of 2.75 ppm year to year comparison. Nice to see anything under 3 ppm.
Mike
AJ 244: Folks generally go apoplectic when one mentions eugenics, but I’ve never heard of any woman accepting sperm from a non-family low-IQ donor.
BPL: Ah, in addition to defending Victor and nuclear power, AJ is a eugenics fan, and believes IQ means intelligence and is inherited. Way to go, AJ. How do you feel about astrology?
Th 248: A while back I mentioned a passing opinion that I do not consider economics as a science, but being more akin to magical religion.
BPL: And mentioned it. And defended it. And mentioned it again. And again. And again. And now again.
Th: Being off-topic I won’t be talking about any of this further…
BPL: Oh dear sweet Jesus, let him be telling the truth this time.
Capitalism and the crisis of climate change resp. the general pollution and destruction of the earth system are deeply connected without any doubt. As soon, as one criticizes the real existing form of capitalism, falsely optimistic folks yell “You are a communist, you are a socialist!” But I don’t care about communism nor socialism nor any -ism at all. I give a shit about politics, I am an anarchist. I don’t believe in the apparatus of corrupted politics anymore at all. I only voted ONCE in my whole life and when I saw the real politics of the party I voted for (when they came to power), I never voted again. That’s a fact :-) But I vote desperately for rough, grim reality, the struggle for survival, because that is the main lecture I learned in my life.
Almost nobody wants to see the truth, there is huge denial about the failure of the economic system and that is extremely dangerous, because it blocks the whole process of reasonable climate mitigation. If we don’t change the economic system lightning fast, we are doomed. Let’s look at it from a serious scientific point of view:
” Capitalism and Climate Change: Can the Invisible Hand Adjust the Natural Thermostat?
ABSTRACT
Can climate change be stopped while fossil fuel capitalism remains the dominant system? What has to be done and what has to change to avoid the worst-case consequences of global warming? These questions are debated in the six contributions which follow. This introduction to the debate sets the stage and puts the often widely diverging views in context, distinguishing two axes of debate. The first axis (`market vs. regulation’) measures faith in the invisible hand to adjust the natural thermostat. The second axis expresses differences in views on the efficiency and equity implications of climate action. While the contributions do differ along these axes, most authors agree that capitalism’s institutions need to be drastically reformed and made fundamentally more equitable. This means a much broader agenda for the climate movement(going beyondcarbontrading and technocratic discussion of mitigation options). What is needed for climate stability is a systemic transformation based on growth scepticism, a planned transition to a nonfossil fuel economy, democratic reform, climate justice, and changed global knowledge and corporate and financial power structures.
… ” AXES OF OUR DEBATE
What has to be done and what has to change to avoid the worst-case consequences of global warming and the associated broader environmental crisis? Our starting point is that global warming, which is the collateral damage of rapid and unequal capitalist development, in ways described by Karl Polanyi long ago, must be seen as a key manifestation of system failure. Capitalism does not work when it comes to protecting our climate, because it is flying blind’: it lacks the sensory organs that would allow it to understand and adjust to the climate system (Speth, 2008). Economists mean the same when arguing, as the Stern Review does, that climate change is the greatest externality the world has ever seen’, but they typically forget to add that capitalism is, in essence, anexternalizing machine’, committed to keeping the real (environmental) costs of economicactivities andtheir environmental liabilities off the accounting books (Martinez-Alier, this issue; Speth, 2008).”
( With insight and foresight, Polanyi (1944: 73) wrote: `To allow the market mechanism to be sole director of the fate of human beings and their natural environment… would result in the demolition of society… Nature would be reduced to its elements, neighborhoods and landscapes defiled, rivers polluted, military safety jeopardized, the power to produce food and raw materials destroyed… The commodity fiction disregarded the fact that leaving the fate of soil and people to the market would be tantamount to annihilating them’.)…”
Full Paper:
http://sttpml.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Capitalism_and_Climate_Change.pdf
Quote:
“… CAPITALISM IS IN ESSENCE AN EXTERNALIZING MACHINE”
That sums my political and economical view up perfectly, it is my main conclusion regarded (not only) to climate change, it’s causes and propable mitigation. I am shure, the claims of the paper are 100% valid, but let me tell you one thing:
I don’t think that turbo capitalism will change, I just don’t believe it. It will go on faster, higher, farther, like the tower of Babel (no, I am no funny christian), until it crashes down forever. I gave up any illusions a long time ago.
249 titus, nah, I’m quite comfortable with my ‘beliefs’ and the world in which I live. If you’re interested I am regularly “resetting” my beliefs, and have been all my life as new information a better understanding comes along. Though too have had a few whacko sidetracks along the way. :-)
You say my comment “The more serious issue is when some people continue to deny that news when it is true and proven be true beyond doubt”; is not science. I say it is. It’s called psychology science and cognitive science etc. ‘Scientists’ have deeply studied delusions, self-delusions, personal beliefs, cognitive therapy, and much more.
Titus: “(Science’s) goal is to encourage and respond to the ‘unknown unknowns’.”
I think you’re wrong there. To put it simply in lay terms, Science in general is to study “observations” and investigate their causes/effects and basic nature. If something is unknown, or even an unknown unknown, there is nothing to observe because it is unknown and so nothing to study and nothing to respond to in the first place.
Of course there is another advanced aspect to that where scientific theory (maths) suggests something should exist and behave in particular way but has not as yet been “observed”. That’s why they do things like create a major experiment to find the Higgs Boson. In this case it might be known as a unknown known until it can be observed.
Much of climate science and global warming research the last 30 years has been very much about doing things like that. Doing new research investigations to see if earlier ‘theories’ based on predictive maths of what was already known/half-known or “hinted” at as being possible is actually true and can be proven so. It’s as simple as satellites measuring arctic ice and the ghe from space.
There is no smoking gun. More like a machine gun of self-evident facts which together tells the ‘whole story’ about all the known observations to date.
As soon as a climate scientist finds a new “unknown” I’ll bet my ass they’ll be rushing to publish and get that news out asap. That’s what scientists do. It’s in their “nature”.
Titus a PS “to gain true knowledge via the internet”.
Falsehoods can also be found. The point of power is within the “observer”. Their skill level for searching/finding, judging what is valid vs BS, iow all the personal choices they make along the way.
I was simply suggesting that it is possible “to gain true knowledge via the internet”. I never said that was a guaranteed proven fact 24/7365 nor the only thing that ever happens. It all depends upon the individual. That’s where the only power and the responsibility lays.
Foolish gullible people will willingly embrace foolish things. That’s not the “internets” fault. Nor is it the fault of climate scientists what people think about their science. Wisdom is earned, not force fed down a tube.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/aug/21/arctic-will-be-ice-free-in-summer-next-year
http://www.nature.com/climate/2008/0812/full/climate.2008.122.html
NASA: First Map Of Thawed Areas Under Greenland Ice Sheet http://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/nasa-first-map-of-thawed-areas-under-greenland-ice-sheet
“Giant natural fluctuation models”
Is that something like “rodents of unusual size”?
Thomas @ 145
I like your commentary on trolling. The latest Time magazine has a great article on trolling and covers many aspects, including some of the research you mentioned.
Trolling is basically a fishing expedition and driven by a wish to be noticed and is very domineering. Trolling is not always openly insulting, but there is often hidden superciliousness and nastiness. Of course much trolling is nasty in language. I think there are three basic kinds of troll that I have observed.
Firstly we have people who have a professional interest, for example they belong to a lobby group. They make inflammatory statements or crazy claims and are just trying to get attention and promote their cause, and want people to respond to their posts so they can amplify all the craziness. Victor may be one of these or may not be. These people can be nasty, or quite polite.
Then you have the nasty trolls. These people obviously have strong opinions on some subject, usually somewhat irrational ones, or some “bee in their bonnet”, and want attention. However their defining characteristic is they are quite nasty and obviously get a kick out of being nasty. I suspect we all get a little like this sometimes, but we mostly “pull back”.
The third type are similar and have some opinion on something, but they are real bullies, narcissists or psychopaths who like bullying people just for the pleasure. They often reply to other peoples posts. These people are a real hazard, and best avoided at all costs. You cannot ever reason with them and they are destructive and do it for pleasure. They think others are the same, but we are not.
So there is a gradation of various scales of trolling.
https://www.thethirdpole.net/2016/08/12/changing-climate-raises-earthquake-risk/
Notice that above earthquake stats statement does not add up with the stats from USGS
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/browse/stats.php
Spectral coherence between climate oscillations and the M ≥ 7 earthquake historical worldwide record
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11069-014-1571-z
The study assumption of a high earthquake cycle will coincidence with the projected acceleration of slr.
Thanks to Adam at 247 and AJ at 244 for thoughtful responses on ice loss and GCM stuff. I appreciate the sincere efforts there.
First, I have to say that I think the argument about the models is moot for most longterm planning purposes because I agree with Killian at 251 that we are late to the climate emergency party and our future efforts (if we mount them) will be in carbon capture and sequestration, but having gotten that out of the way…
Adam – I am primarily interested in sea ice loss because the change in albedo in the Arctic Ocean has so much potential for release of CO2e with disastrous consequences for lost of beings in the “habitable” zones of the planet. Also, I think that because 93% of the heat generated is being stored in ocean, the melt patterns for sea ice are going to be very, very different from land-based ice loss. I expect glacial ice loss will follow sea ice loss. The real risk is new large CO2e outputs from a warmed global north imho. Thanks for specific link to CESM, I am reading and trying to understand the material there.
I will look for a link to the small grid models that Hansen references and share link if I can find something specific. Also going to get in touch with sea ice scientists for a little overview. Will share what I hear back.
I think Wadhams is correct about Arctic sea ice. I think we essentially have a big slushy mess now with very little multi-year ice mass. We may have a rebound in sea ice mass and extent as EN falls away, but I would expect next significant EN heat event will create the blue ocean event and we could be off to the races at that point (like we aren’t already).
Warm regards
Mike
Alfred Jones @244,
I think I did more than misplace a decimal point or two @240.
The global ACE graph (from this web page by Dr. Ryan N. Maue) perhaps does give the impression of big northern wobbles & small southern ones. But it is pukka data. I think you would find on closer examination that it does show a similar size of wobble percentage-wise. Northern ACE ranges 700-1,400 and southern ACE 350-700.
The homework you set me @244, unlike the question @213, I would rate as “simple” (which doesn’t prevent wandering decimal points). The AMOC has various estimates (see Table 1 here) but the figure of 0.5PW is most commonly met. That is equivalent to 16 zettajoules/year. Global rainfall is usually quoted at something like 80W/m^2 or 1,300 zettajoules/year. My 50-average-tropical-cyclones-per-year calculation @240 yielded 25 zettajoules/year, thus representing 2% of global rainfall or 1½ AMOCs.
Hank Roberts @253,
That Keenan nonsense being debunked by Lovejoy et al (2016) (full paper) is or course the nonsense idea that nobody can tell the difference between a simple Random Walk and a Random Walk with a superimposed trend (representing the likes of AGW). Keenan’s $100,000 bet is that nobody can correctly categorise 900 of his 1,000 Random Walks into those with (i) No trend, (ii) Positive trend of 1°C/century, (iii) Negative trend of 1°C/century. As Lovejoy et al show, if you start walking about randomly, you will be lucky of you smack your head on a wall as walking over a cliff or under the wheels of a speeding are alternative outcomes.
While Victor the Troll will probably see nothing to exercise him in this Lovejoy et al (2016) paper, there was earlier Lovejoy (2014) which sets out to demonstrate AGW without resorting to any of them dang fanciful model thingamajigs. Figure 3a in this 2014 paper plots temperature against CO2 but properly; not like that fool Danley Wolfe’s silly graphic which Victor feels is so important to science (ha-ha). Because Lovejoy (2014) is proper & not fantasy, his calculation of and ECS range of 2.5ºC-3.7ºC is most interestingly in good agreement with the official IPCC estimate.
from https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/study/modeling.htmlStudying: Modeling
Modeling and its importance
“Information about sea ice processes can come from field camps or aircraft and satellites (see Remote Sensing section). However, data from these sources are limited. Sensors cannot account for all characteristics of sea ice anytime and anywhere. Furthermore, the record of sea ice data has a limited history. Satellite observations date back only to the mid-1970s; other observations, such as ship records, may go back as far as the late 19th Century, but they are sparse. Moreover, these data cannot predict the future of sea ice extent.
To fill in the gaps in knowledge about sea ice, scientists use models to simulate sea ice processes. A model is a mathematical representation of a real-world physical process. These models allow scientists to reconstruct historical patterns of sea ice and predict future changes. Due to the complex nature of the models, they are run on computers.”
mike says: from the website: models allow scientists to… predict future changes. That really is the point of models. They are complicated, but prediction is a primary function of the models.
more from that website: “Until recently, sea ice has been included in a rudimentary manner in GCMs. Because GCMs have shown that the the polar regions are particularly sensitive to small changes in climate, newer GCMs have improved sea ice models considerably.”
I don’t think any reasonable person fails to understand that folks doing the work acknowledge that the GCM product with regard to sea ice prediction has been poor.
Here is link of interest on sea ice models from Bathiany et al
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/JCLI-D-15-0466.1
from discussion at the end of that piece:
“6. Discussion
Our analysis so far has only been based on models.
Unfortunately, most Earth system models simulate the
present-day distribution of sea ice volume rather poorly
(Holland et al. 2010; Stroeve et al. 2014).”
Too bad for me that the authors did not mention any specific earth system model that is better than the rest, but my interest in knowing who does the best with this piece of climate modeling is pretty academic because I believe that the future of sea ice is not what it used to be. Bathiany et al is worth a read for folks who are interested in sea ice status.
This is an interesting piece with discussion of possible steady dynamics and abrupt change versus steady state scenarios. Bathiany is specific to sea ice loss with a focus on how we might get to a state of “winter sea ice loss” due to warming of ocean that would be a little different from a (somewhat) simple expansion of summer sea ice loss overcoming the winter ability to recover ice mass and extent. The underlying mechanics appear to be warming of ocean.
I would not even have initiated these discussions but for the pose with the August UV thread regarding Hourdin. This is a topic for discussion where criticism/skepticism and outright trolling and denialist attacks can be expected and sorting out the denialist attack and trolling from good faith criticism may be difficult. We all do better with this stuff if we overcome the impulse to call each other out by name and personalize the discussion with unnecessary ad hominen attacks.
You got an axe to grind? Maybe do it quietly in the privacy of your own home or with your therapist or father confessor as your practice dictates.
Warm regards,
Mike
The report of Bishop Hill’s demise may be somewhat premature.
He’s taken to propagandizing 4 to 6 year olds.
CMIP3 looks very successful as a common prediction ensemble. CMIP5 tried to take advantage of the tendencies, but I think that more work should have been done on the evaluation of the relevant time windows. The schedule of building new prediction (i.e. ensemble systems) every 5 or 10 years is too ambitious. Recall that climate prediction is a very recent exercise, with poor knowledge of the historical and actual scale interaction, and facing an unprecedented evolution. We should work this out for 10 or 20 years before issuing new (probabilistic) prediction. CMIP3 will do a good job until then.
Thomas @259 You say the following on finding ‘truth’ on the internet:
“The point of power is within the “observer”. Their skill level for searching/finding, judging what is valid”
So I’m to believe Thomas has that ‘power’.
Also: “It all depends upon the individual. That’s where the only power and the responsibility lays.
You now reinforce that you have the ‘power’.
Also: “Foolish gullible people will willingly embrace foolish things. That’s not the “internets” fault”
So we are know reassured that you are not Foolish and Gullible.
Finally: “Wisdom is earned, not force fed down a tube”.
Wisdom is ‘learned’. With great respect and offered as help, I observe you are showing delusional tendencies with such belief in your abilities.
> I think Wadhams is correct about Arctic sea ice.
As of which time? He’s been, for a long time now, predicting it will be all gone soon.
He’ll be right eventually if he persists.
RC seems to have changed it’s posting policy about ‘mitigation and politics’. I good thing imo. Nothing exists in a vacuum.
257 Nemesis
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2016/08/unforced-variations-aug-2016/comment-page-6/#comment-659303
Kudos, you’re cookin’ with gas imo. Nice refs. You and the papers nailed it.
“The first axis (`market vs. regulation’) measures faith in the invisible hand to adjust the natural thermostat.”
I will happily sing off on individual freedom, supposedly “free” markets, neo-liberal (illiberal) economics, and that magical invisible hand of the market the day the Right Wing/Corporate Think tanks sign off on the removal of all traffic lights from intersections so the “free market and freedom” can rule the day forever.
They should run the experiment to prove beyond all doubt that their ideology/beliefs ares logical and sound and works. Of course they won’t. And you also know why. And still American keep voting for their faux two-party polticial system that got hijacked from the people a long long long time ago.
Marketing works! It’s Psychology and Cognitive Science:101 and the Wealth of nations .. =that too was hijacked and corrupted. Adam Smith would scream like hell about how his “ideas” have been reframed and twisted out of all semblance of his original meaning and values.
Because the RW/Corporate think tanks and their political shills are all embedded in a corrupted system up their necks of embedded laws of “regulations” for their own advantage and not the peoples nor the environment or the planet and future generations.
I am not against “capitalism” per se because really it’s just a word and that’s it. One that has lost all meaning to it’s original form. Yet no one notices, well not many.
I am pro-business and entrepreneurialism and self-reliance and fairness and equity and reward for effort and talent.
Yet, the wealth of a nation belongs to all the people of that nation whether still in the ground or being used in business and products and whatever. Impossible to explain because people’s entrenched beliefs in the myths get endlessly bent out of shape by “trigger words” and they usually go …… well whatever.
I am against the abuse of power.
Is that simple enough and yet instantly complex but in 7 easy to understand words?
I’m encouraged by more and more scientists and academics and professionals like Doctors going public with their views and their values and their intelligence and calling things out for what they are. That I like. It may still be too late.
Be it the foul detention centers filled with verified asylum seekers run by Australia’s governments, or an op-ed by a climate scientist about the still ongoing bs from the anti-science deniers camp (talking heads for the RW/Corporate think tanks is what they are), or a Hansen putting himself down to represent future generations in the Court cases being run now.
fwiw the civil rights gains that were made in the 60s in the US and elsewhere, did not happen because of “protesters or riots” .. they came about because the Civil Rights movements won in the Courts first. Similar to the Mabo Land rights case in Australia. It forced the Government to follow the Law, to do so they were forced to change their Laws.
The same applies to agw/cc. Without court actions and as mentioned above logical sane Regulations, all the work of climate scientists for almost 50 years will be of no benefit to anyone.
I wanna see more of Gavin going “hard as” on Twitter. Let the junior folks do the hard grunt work Gavin. Please keep kicking some ass! :-)
Thankfully I don’t lose any sleep over it anymore. I’m still in a seat in the stadium cheering on the good guys though.
260 Chris Machens, so Waddams is going on a book tour. OK.
But why does he have to say “Next year or the year after that, I think it will be free of ice in summer and by that I mean the central Arctic will be ice-free.”
I don’t have access to a super-computer but to me it appears for that to happen sea-ice loss will need to increase by an order of at least 5 fold (?) the next two summers, above the average the last decade or two to achieve that kind of loss. Where is all that forcing coming from? I don’t believe him. 2025 maybe … if xyz all happens at once for a decade.
And a small point re albedo, has he forgotten that the Arctic is in darkness during winter time and on the horizon for most of spring and autumn?
imo he just handed the denialists another talking point. Great, just what’s needed not.
re the methane co2 issue, I think the 100 to 1000 years life of co2 is poorly articulated in general and little understood by the public. Obviously it depends on what happens to each molecule, mixing etc etc etc … way too complex for the average person imo.
and re: “It is 23 times more powerful. However, methane dissipates much more quickly than carbon dioxide. It gets oxidised so that it only lingers in the atmosphere for about seven or eight years.”
But he doesn’t mention that methane breaks down into CO2 molecules that then last 100 to 1000 yrs whatever? (please correct if that’s not right) No, instead he says “oxidised” and that goes into the mass media and the blogs .. and how many know what that word really means?
I know he means well, but still. Will it help? I don’t know.
273 Titus says: “So I’m to believe Thomas has that ‘power’. You now reinforce that you have the ‘power’. So we are know reassured that you are not Foolish and Gullible. I observe you are showing delusional tendencies with such belief in your abilities.”
Titus, it looks to me that you just expressed your own beliefs – not mine.
re: “Wisdom is ‘learned’.” Nope. It’s earned. Wisdom comes from the inside out, not the outside in. You may be confusing it with knowledge and education. That’s not wisdom in my world view/experience.
noun
-the quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgement; the quality of being wise.
“listen to his words of wisdom”
-the fact of being based on sensible or wise thinking.
“some questioned the wisdom of building the dam so close to an active volcano”
All About Wisdom
It can be difficult to define wisdom, but people generally recognize it when they encounter it. Psychologists tend to agree that it involves an integration of knowledge, experience, and deep understanding that incorporates tolerance for the uncertainties of life as well as its ups and downs. There’s an awareness of how things play out over time, and it confers a sense of balance.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/basics/wisdom
MARodgers at 240: thank you so much for the response. I will review carefully. Chrs
Also for Mike, an earlier Wadhams (op. cit.)
He’ll be right, eventually, if he keeps on.
Wolf, wolf ….
Titus @ 273
I will tell you one thing, having read various posts by yourself and Thomas. Thomas has considerably more skill at judging what is valid than you.
Oops.
Seasonal Evolution of Supraglacial Lakes on an East Antarctic Outlet Glacier
DOI: 10.1002/2016GL069511
Abstract
Supraglacial lakes are known to influence ice melt and ice flow on the Greenland ice sheet and potentially cause ice shelf disintegration on the Antarctic Peninsula. In East Antarctica, however, our understanding of their behaviour and impact is more limited. Using >150 optical satellite images and meteorological records from 2000-2013, we provide the first multi-year analysis of lake evolution on Langhovde Glacier, Dronning Maud Land (69°11’S, 39°32’E). We observe 7,990 lakes and 855 surface channels up to 18.1 km inland (~ 670 m a.s.l.) from the grounding line, and document three pathways of lake demise: (i) refreezing, (ii) drainage to the en-/sub-glacial environment (on the floating ice), and (iii) overflow into surface channels (on both the floating and grounded ice). The parallels between these mechanisms, and those observed on Greenland/the Antarctic Peninsula, suggest that lakes may similarly affect rates and patterns of ice melt, ice flow and ice shelf disintegration in East Antarctica.
http://mashable.com/2016/08/16/astrophysicist-climate-change-skeptic-twitter-burn/
Collaborative Research: Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere Recycling of Refractory Dissolved Organic Carbon in Seawater http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1536605&HistoricalAwards=false
Coupled ocean-atmosphere loss of marine refractory dissolved organic carbon
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2016GL068273/full
Thomas @277
Wisdom does not come from passing a STATS test or earning a degree.
Confucius says:
“By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest”
We live in different worlds so we can leave it there.
I did learn here that a lot of information has become available on the internet from the break up of the old USSR. Thanks to Kevin McKinney.
Bye bye for now. Cheers
Re: #215 Susan Anderson
Thank goodness, a voice of reason manages to overcome all the noise.
Susan, I agree 100% that communication is key to achieving any progress in the fight against climate change.
In my earlier comments I was wondering why most climate scientists avoid using the term “climate emergency”.
Well, US presidential candidate Jill Stein / Green Party held a news conference yesterday (August 23) where she quotes James Hansen latest paper on SLR, and calls for declaring a state of global climate emergency (in sharp contrast to both Trump and Hillary).
Seeing as Jill / the Green Party are likely to win > 5% of the votes in the 2016 election cycle, that means that millions of Americans are already convinced that we have reached a point in climate change where emergency public policies are required.
Sharp contrast with IPCC members who are still discussing carbon budgets and temperature overshoot for a 2018 report on the 1.5C target mentioned in the Paris agreement. Just like most climate scientists worldwide (apart from James Hansen and very few others).
Again, why won’t the IPCC and most climate scientists worldwide come out with a special report stating that we are in a global climate emergency and call for the immediate application of emergency policies?
Why aren’t most US climate scientists standing behind Jill Stein / the Green Party?
Sorry I forgot to provide links:
Jill’s news conference is on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7X_aqEr1vCY
About 5 minutes in, Jill uses the exact words “a state of global climate emergency”.
The Green Party platform has a comprehensive plan to fight climate change, here:
http://www.jill2016.com/platform (you can’t miss it, it’s right at the top)
James Hansen’s paper on SLR is the well-known : Ice melt, sea level rise and superstorms: evidence from paleoclimate data, climate modeling, and modern observations that 2 ◦C global warming could be dangerous
http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/16/3761/2016/acp-16-3761-2016.pdf
Andrew, only people who are not in swing districts can afford to throw their vote away to emote about perfection — those who do are relying on others to elect a candidate who will be tolerable and can be pushed toward being smarter.
Anyone whose vote can add up to a win — at any level from dogcatcher up to top dog — wants to think first about how to vote. At every level.
Why vote for the lesser evil, instead of holding out for perfection?
Think about it.
One of the better collection pages for climate info — mostly pictures, but with good links to source pages.
I’ve thought for years it would help to treat climate change as a medical, public health, emergency.
That’s like the current warning that sepsis should be treated as a medical emergency — because people have been seeing and ignoring warning signs that should be taken as urgent and serious.
talking abt arctic sea ice is like nailing jello to the wall. There are significant differences between new and old ice. Formation of new ice and “recovery” of ice mass and extent from formation of new ice on blue sea when temperatures promote new ice formation can confuse the issue of how the arctic sea ice feature of the planet is changing.
Wang and Overland suggested in 2009 that we would see an ice-free arctic within 30 years (really, 2037). http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2009GL037820/full The 2037 date seemed reactive to IPCC 4 that suggested ice-free arctic by 2100. That date probably looked too long after melts of 2007 and 2008. Then I think there was refreeze “surprise” in 2012 with apparent rebound of arctic sea ice.
In the time frame that IPCC 4 was suggesting ice-free by 2100 and Wang et al were predicting (their word, btw) 2037, I believe Wadhams was predicting/suggesting ice-free arctic by 2020. I think Wadhams has occasionally said arctic could be ice-free this summer in interviews (that’s kind of annual event because Wadhams is a newsy type of guy), but my take on Wadhams’ story has been ice-free arctic by 2020. By a reasonable review of the prediction ranges, IPCC is out there on horizon with by 2100, Wang et al are near term with a pretty specific 2037 (I think amended to 2030 more recently) and Wadhams is leading the pack with his by 2020 prediction. CMIP 5 pulled the ice-free arctic closer, from by 2100 to something like 2030s, so more in line with Wang. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2012GL052868/abstract;jsessionid=1C2BD2FD6EDB66D3D20B968107D1A511.f02t02?systemMessage=Wiley+Online+Library+will+be+unavailable+on+Saturday+3rd+September+2016+at+08.30+BST%2F+03%3A30+EDT%2F+15%3A30+SGT+for+5+hours+and+Sunday+4th+September+at+10%3A00+BST%2F+05%3A00+EST%2F+17%3A00+SGT+for+1+hour++for+essential+maintenance.+Apologies+for+the+inconvenience
Bathiany et al did their interesting work trying to determine causes of sea ice loss that I linked earlier and I think they suggest that sea temperature is the most likely determinant of sea ice formation. Makes sense, but changes in ocean currents and regional temperatures may not have been easily predicted in past or possibly in the future. I think these systems are pretty dynamic and some pretty wide ranges of conditions are possible, so again: pretty difficult to predict ice-free arctic with much accuracy, but the history of predictions are moving steadily toward Wadhams’ 2020 time frame rather than toward IPCC 4 “by 2100” sloppy prediction.
The Wang and Overland update in 2012 reviews CMIP5 changes and they state: “While CMIP5 model mean sea ice extents are closer to observations than CMIP3, the rates of sea ice reduction in most model runs are slow relative to recent observations.”
So what happens next? I think the change in ocean currents/temperatures with drop off of EN conditon and the possibility of LN condition or an EN/LN ocean condition will determine where we go from August 2016 state. If I understand Bathiany, winter sea ice loss could happen if ocean temps are too high and that suggests a kind of anomalous transition to ice-free arctic that is triggered by “warm” winter ocean temperature. That could happen this winter, but I think it would surprise everyone, even folks like Bathiany that mention it explicitly.
My own guess is that the next EN cycle will cause the extent and condition of arctic sea ice to fall to the level usually defined as ice-free, but it will happen sooner if arctic ocean temperatures remain high, that’s an easy call.
Wadhams bases his predictions on data and observations rather than models, so there is an apples/oranges quality to comparison Wadhams with the model predictions.
Another approach to forecasting sea ice loss/formation is done by Slater. Slater’s work (not modeling, but statistical forecast on grid cells with less emphasis on complex dynamic functions of the models) is reported to do better at matching observations than the models. You can read about that here if you want: https://nsidc.org/about/monthlyhighlights/2015/10/evaluating-arctic-sea-ice-predictions
NSIDC researcher Julienne Strove “is not that optimistic about the future of forecasting. A key component of sea ice predictions requires a better sense of summer weather patterns. “Weather forecasts are not good for more than week or two out. We’re just not there. It’s too complex. It’s too chaotic,” Stroeve said. Without knowing what the weather will do, predictability will continue to be limited. Sea ice extent is shrinking, but also there is less multi-year ice, ice that has been around for two or more years. As the ice thins, climate models exhibit more year-to-year variability. “So our skill may actually decrease in the future,” Stroeve said. “That’s one of the things we need to better understand thinning ice. For now, we don’t know.”
At the end of this really interesting and confusing study of sea-ice loss we arrive at an ice-free arctic where the question changes from “when will see an ice-free arctic?” to “what is the global impact of the loss of arctic sea ice?” and “how stable are arctic carbon stores in this changed environment?” and then we are back to my specific area of interest: are we observing increases in global CO2e in atmosphere and ocean acidification from fundamental changes in the carbon cycle triggered by human fossil fuel use forcing? and is there anything we can do about our situation or is it time to kiss our asses goodbye (KOAG suggested acronym) because the SHTF moment is upon us?
Cheers to all, enjoy your day. why not?
Mike
Andrew,
It does not make much sense for a scientist, as a scientist, to come out for or against a candidate unless it is owing to that candidate’s antipathy to science overall. As a citizen any may support who they wish. But it does make sense, when a platform is strongly informed by science, for scientists to confirm that. It is just part of public education. And it is wrong to posture as scientists while making false claims about what a candidate has said. Some tweets about sea level rise were ill judged in my opinion since the paper you cited does say what Jill says it does, though Gavin cleared up the insurance journal stuff a while back. All the same, it quotes a government official doing her job. Hillary is scared enough that she has Gore out blaming Nader for the effects of a blue dress, something he has been noble enough in the past to avoid. Should be an interesting election.
Why aren’t most US climate scientists standing behind Jill Stein / the Green Party?
Comment by Andrew — 24 Aug 2016 @
Several reasons: The Green Party [not Dr. Stein herself] once included homeopathic and alternative medicine in their platform. She’s left the door open for the anti vaxers instead of shutting them down outright. Being correct on a few issues doesn’t make the rest of their party platform palatable for the majority of the voting public. Aside from all of that, how many times has Jill Stein run for President on the Green Party ticket? I’ve lost count. How many elections have the Green party candidates won? I can’t think of any. Jill is not Presidential material and the Green Party is not viable as a political force… IMO. You have to win elections.
I think Wadhams is correct about Arctic sea ice. I think we essentially have a big slushy mess now with very little multi-year ice mass. We may have a rebound in sea ice mass and extent as EN falls away, but I would expect next significant EN heat event will create the blue ocean event and we could be off to the races at that point (like we aren’t already).
Warm regards
Mike
Comment by mike — 22 Aug 2016 @
“Wadhams will be right… eventually.”
Who’s to say 2017 isn’t ‘eventually’? From the descriptions I keep hearing the only thing keeping the Arctic Ice from completely disappearing is Greenland. If Greenland would move over the Arctic Ice would be gone yesterday. With no remaining multi-year ice and the rest of it looking like a slushie I think we’re down to semantics.
286 Andrew, if you click on the Youtube Share button, you’ll then see a checkbox with Start:…..
If you pause the video at the critical point you want to share, and tick that box you will get a link that looks like this: https://youtu.be/7X_aqEr1vCY?t=6m53s
fwiw I pretty much agree with your and Susan’s feelings on these matters. The evidence shows that the two party system is essentially an undemocratic political special interests con job. One day it will be changed. Don’t hold your breath. :-)
As another video there suggested: Hillary Clinton is a Fracking Candidate. lol
Doesn’t matter who wins the Presidency, the Congress is still pulling a ~5% approval rating. Therein lays the problem. Paid and Bought Career politicians vs Caring politicians. That and too many voters are still living in the 17th Century.
Every nation is confronting similar and imo related problems/challenges be they advanced or developing. It’s always been like this during times of massive change and competing interests. Watch a few docos from the 1960s. Before there was BLM there was the Black Panthers, proving the more things appear to change the more they have actually stayed the same.
Our newest Senator elect down under
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2016/08/australian-silliness-and-july-temperature-records/
RE: Ice melt, sea level rise and superstorms:
James Hansen et al, Published: 22 March 2016
6.9 Practical implications
Page 41
“We conclude that the message our climate science delivers
to society, policymakers, and the public alike is this: we
have a global emergency. Fossil fuel CO2 emissions should
be reduced as rapidly as practical.”
http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/16/3761/2016/acp-16-3761-2016.pdf
for Andrew:
http://rabett.blogspot.com/2016/08/risk-hazard-and-jill-stein.html
Thomas,
Been suggesting Keen on these pages for years, likely 2010.
Welcome aboard. Hint: You didn’t mention his most important contribution.
Cheers
A 285: Why aren’t most US climate scientists standing behind Jill Stein / the Green Party?
BPL: Because Jill Stein is, in some respects, an anti-science nut. For example, her (vacillating) embrace of vaccines-cause-autism and GMO-foods-are-dangerous, plus her running mate’s embrace of Holocaust deniers and conspiracy theories about terrorist attacks being “false flag” operations. Stein is good on global warming, but Hillary is also good on global warming, and has a chance to win, which Stein does not.
A cpl of queries, could anyone advise?
Is this a quality journal and/or it has some kind of with peer-review?
http://www.witpress.com/elibrary/wit-transactions-on-ecology-and-the-environment
The standards/quality of ScienceDirect peer-review?
Any info on neural network modelling software systems usefulness rigour, for use in weather/climate predictions accuracy etc eg NeuroDimensions’ next-generation predictive data analytics software called NeuroSolutions Infinity?
Similar “neural” s’ware has been applied to share trading fwiw.
thx
Dr Abram, from ANU’s Research School of Earth Sciences and ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science, said anthropogenic climate change was generally thought of as a 20th century phenomenon because direct measurements of climate are rare before the 1900s.
However their study had detected warming in the Arctic and tropical oceans from around the 1830s, just 80 years after the Industrial Revolution started in England.
“It was an extraordinary finding,” she said.
“It was one of those moments where science really surprised us. But the results were clear. The climate warming we are witnessing today started about 180 years ago.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-08-25/climate-warming-%27started-about-180-years-ago%27/7773270
with one-off access link to view the Nature paper
> is this a quality journal or ….?
Google it.
http://wessex-institute.blogspot.com/2009/12/spam-from-wessex-institute-of.html
http://bogus-conferences.blogspot.com/