This month’s open thread for climate science related items. The open thread for responses to climate change is here.
Reader Interactions
408 Responses to "Unforced variations: Mar 2018"
Killiansays
#131 David Miller said Unfortunately, these are not the droids I’m looking for.
She doesn’t deny climate change – she regards it as a problem that we absolutely have to address. What she doesn’t have a handle on, and where we differ, is how quickly the changes are coming.
You are wasting your time, then, because the same problem applies across the spectrum. One’s sense of the risk is vital to one’s solution set. If you believe tipping points into oceans full of goo and non-survivable wet bulb temps are hundreds of years away, you go one way. Political change, slow and tedious, might seem like an option. If you look at rates of change already and that changes are from decades to a century ahead of schedule, and think Arctic permafrost and clathrates have a realistic probability of breaking down on a massive scale within years or decades, then you take another.
It’s the question that should start every climate discussion, yet is never part of any climate discussion. Believe me, I’ve tried.
Short answer: There is no answer, no consensus on how long we have till we risk ending up extinct, or nearly so.
I suggest you poll the people here and see what you get. Nail them down to a hard number, or at least a fairly limited range, say 50 years, and see what you see.
I focus on risk, so the answer doesn’t even matter. What matters is, what we risk with slow responses or what we avoid with fast responses.
Thomassays
RE #140 Hank Roberts I have a suggestion ….
I have a suggestion HANK … Educate yourself better so you don’t so regularly come across in public as utterly ignorant and not very smart. HANK have ever considered your addictive approach and many others here is Redundant today in more ways than one?
Nah don;t bother it’s a questio above your pay grade in my humble opinion.
And whatever you do do not ever take personal advantage of the references to chew on which I provided above. Besides I suspect it would take you until CO2 hits 435 ppm before you got up to speed. Until then I will continue to ignore you as ‘my inferior’ which you undoubtedly are.
Maybe HANK believes he is YANKING my chain.
So funny and yet truly Sad at the same time.
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Examples from this page of a Waste of Real Climate’s resource opportunity and space and using posts not in line with their Mission Statement and Reason for Being as per https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/about/ and This month’s open thread for climate science related items. The open thread for responses to climate change is here (FR).
106
Mel Reasoner
111
Mr. Know It All
115
MA Rodger
116
Hank Roberts
117
Ray Ladbury
118
Hank Roberts
119
Barton Paul Levenson
120
jb
122
Victor
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Thomas
131
David Miller
132
Thomas
133
Barton Paul Levenson
134
jgnfld
135
MA Rodger
136
Ray Ladbury
137
Ray Ladbury
138
CCHolley
139
Hank Roberts
140
Hank Roberts
Some will no doubt conclude that “my posts” are even more so. You are entitled to your opinions, but that’s only what they are. They are not by default true let alone *authoritative* and based on anything beyond faulty misguided and ignorant thinking and entrenched false beliefs. No one can change or improve those. Except the ones who possess them.
My posts my be judged as *crap* or whatever but at least they are grounded in evidence, facts and reality. Which is much more than I can for the list above.
Yeah, doh, that’s only *my opinion* you cry? Yep. Feel free to ignore it.
I’ll repeat one of Ray’s question again because it needs to be answered by everyone here:
Is this really the best you can do?
nigeljsays
David Millar @131,
Regarding your question on climate change effects over the next 30 years.
I suggest your friend ask their countries national climate and weather agency for projections until 2050. They will probably have something. These things are regional in impact, so that’s the most useful approach. My country has released a report like this.
You will also find a simple google search of climate impacts by 2050 listing your own country should provide some good hits.
I also had a quick look on the net, and here’s some material related to the points you raised. Its by experts, not the media or activist groups. I have not read it in any detail.
OECD environmental outlook by 2050. (This is a 2011 publication, but may still be of use)
It is hoped the moderator will understand the purpose of this post.
MA Rodger likes numbers to insult others. Let’s try it on him:
Unless I missed one, 9/12 posts were in response to trolls or were his own trolling of others, insults all around. 4/12 contained inappropriate personal attacks, though the total number of personal comments was significantly greater than 4.
75% with garbage content.
3 MA Rodger said Your pedantry (which I see you attempt to repeat @1) is entirely unfounded. I do appreciate that you dislike messages that do not reflect your personal ultra-doomy version of AGW, but if you do feel like a bit of a swipe at something, do try to pick on things within your understanding.
39 MA Rodger says Victor the Troll @28.
Any denialist nonsense that drags you out from under your bridge is going to be a laugh a minute, and so it is with the abet-turged “content of the essay” provided here @10 by the chain of shites; alleged journalist Christopher Booker who read a book four years ago and so is now expert in the psychology of ‘Groupthink’, those Gentlemeen Who Prefer Fantasy and who masquerade as an Educational Charity…
56 MA Rodger says Victor the Troll @40.(And Victor, I go to this trouble because I know you are hopelessly stupid and would flounder without such assistance.)
75 MA Rodger says Thomas.
Why do I object to your contributions here @RealClimate? Let me entirely frank with you.
There are three reasons for this.
(1) As a single commenter here, your contributions are unreasonably sized. So far in this month’s UV column you have posted 18 of the 63 posts-to-date, comprising 2,801 of the 10,784 words. That is 29% of the posts and 26% of the wordage… And this is after you have been instrumental in our hosts’ decision to set up a thread specially for non-climatological blather.
[Note: MAR takes up 8.57%. I’m fairly certain he is not 11.668% of all posters here. While not at the same level as Thomas, he is definitely taking more than his share. This is called hypocrisy.]
The value of your UV comments varies (in the main) from the banal to out-right flaming.
[Note: This is factually incorrect, and/or purely a matter of opinion. Why is MA’s opinion important here? Why does he assume anyone cares what he thinks?]
(Yet do note – I personally don’t give a monkey’s about personal insults down these threads. Indeed, on occasion I provide them myself but importantly, always in measured doses.)
[Ergo… why is he wasting space with this? To hear her-/himself type?]
(3) Although mitigation is off-topic in the present UV threads, it has been quite marked that you do not set out your own position regarding AGW. We get a lot of hand-wringing and doom-mongering and the odd bit of skyrocketry…
[Note: So? What does it serve the UV thread to belittle Thomas here? Different strokes, no? Why can’t MA scroll rather than make personal attacks? Why does MA think these personal attacks are appropriate?]
I have no appreciation of your position. For one criticising others as you do, that is also unacceptable.
So attack? Then hypocrisy?
It is hoped the moderator will understand the purpose of this post.
Killiansays
What of BPL, another famous poster with a taste for attacking others?
A sedate 5 posts. 5/5 insulting or responses to denialists. 4/5 with a insults. Between MAR and BPL we have 8 of 17 posts unnecessarily insulting, and an incredible 13/17 of dubious usefulness, depending on your view of bashing denialists.
Just sayin… The problem isn’t always where the gaslighter indicates.
31 Barton Paul Levenson says Victor @28 citing some incredible ass
[Insulting people not even posting here. Odd.]
42 Barton Paul Levenson said …is a damned lie, and you know what that makes you, don’t you?
[Note: A fair point, but still name-calling.]
119 Barton Paul Levenson says I’d tell him to grow up, but I have the sinking feeling he’s already technically an adult, and therefore not capable of any further maturing.
133 Barton Paul Levenson says Gee, I wonder why?
Thomassays
ESRL CO2 Weather Report
Last 5 days avg. is 409.7 ppm
This represents approx. +2.5 ppm above the Avg. March 2017 readings
CO2 levels from now are expected to keep rising through to May 2018
This present trend in CO2 Weather is indicative of a May 2018 average of at least 412 ppm
(all other things being equal)
This means it is quite possible that May 2018 avg. could easily hit 413 ppm if what’s actually happening in the Atmosphere is not equal with the recent past system. This is logical and reasonable to conclude. Of course only time will tell and everyone who follows these numbers will know by May 31st.
Which may be somewhere around 0.0005% of the world’s population.
CO2 @409.7 ppm in early March, Scorchimiso GHG Forcings maybe?
Any comments / thoughts?
Unlikely but still worth asking the question at this point of time, imv.
In what follows, MA stands for Mr. Rodger and V for yours truly.
MA: Victor the Troll @122,
. . . The thesis in Munshi (2018) ‘Circular Reasoning in Climate Change Research’ (Self-published) sets out to “demonstrate the use of circular reasoning in three broad areas of climate change research.” . . .
Addressing these three broad areas of climate change research in reverse order:-
(3) The anthropogenic origin of the rise in atmospheric CO2 levels is questioned because the levels of uncertainty of the size of natural fluxes within the carbon cycle are seen as too large for such a conclusion to be made. It is a fatuous argument.
Also no alternative source is suggested for the 1.0Tt(CO2) that has been so-quickly and uniquely added to the atmosphere in recent history. Nor is the additional evidence showing the anthropogenic origin of that CO2 mentioned. And even so, the alleged circularity is not demonstrated.
V: On this point I agree. I was surprised to see this argument presented here because of the very strong evidence for the relation between fossil fuel emissions and atmospheric CO2 levels since the beginning of the industrial revolution, which even extreme CC skeptics accept without argument. His analysis on this point seems rather pedantic.
MA: (2) The anthropogenic causes of SLR (a very Victor-the-Troll subject) is questioned. Remarkably, a circularity of argument is achieved within Munshi (rather than being demonstrated within the subject of Munshi’s analysis) but detail of the Munshi analysis may be set out in a further Munshi self-published paper, although I will assume this is not the case.
V: You need to be more specific if you want to accuse him of presenting a circular argument. Where is it exactly?
MA: Further hand-waving concerning pre-20th-Century SLR rather muddies the argument, such SLR being a live area of research which is not set out in any proper way by Munshi.
V: Munshi’s argument strikes me as unnecessarily long and complicated, which makes it rather difficult to follow, granted. He also points to methodological problems which seem more closely related to confirmation bias than circular reasoning per se, thus confusing the issue.
MA: Munshi then ventures briefly into the issue of calibration of satellite data and in so doing, badly misrepresents Nerem et al (2018) and adds a little Victor-the-Trollishness by plotting 25-year SLR trends against annual FF CO2 emissions.
V: His point is that Nerem (among others) tends to adjust his sights in such a way as to confirm a pre-ordained hypothesis, [in other words: Seek and Ye Shall Find] and I think his accusation is well founded. How such maneuverings relate to circular reasoning is not always clear, however.
As I see it, the following statement from the Nerem paper (http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/02/06/1717312115) illustrates the problem more simply and clearly than Munshi’s perhaps overly complicated analysis: “As described in ref. 12, the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 caused a decrease in GMSL just before the launch of TOPEX, followed by a slow recovery that resulted in an apparent deceleration of sea level of −0.02 ± 0.01 mm/y2 over the 25-y record. To isolate the climate-change–driven acceleration, we remove this effect (Fig. 1), which increases the acceleration of the adjusted GMSL record from 0.097 to 0.117 mm/y.”
What this tells us is that “climate-change–driven acceleration” has been assumed ahead of time, and since the raw data failed to confirm the existence of such an acceleration (“In stark contrast to this expectation however, current altimeter products show the rate of sea level rise to have decreased from the first to second decades of the altimeter era.” — see https://www.nature.com/articles/srep31245), an estimate of the effects of the Mt. Pinatubo eruption has been inserted as a “correction” in order to produce the desired result. Since the existence of sea level acceleration is routinely produced as EVIDENCE of AGW, the role of circular reasoning should be evident. If the raw data had produced the desired result without the need for any such correction, then it seems unlikely that any search for any factor similar to the Pinatubo event would have been pursued in an effort to produce a more objective (but possibly undesirable) result.
MA: (1) The impact of AGW on tropical cyclone intensity & frequency covers much trampled ground but Munshi’s analysis concentrates on a single paper of some age (Emanuel (2005), the one which first defined PDI and which, mathematically flawed or not, is immaterial to the subject as a whole. Munshi badly represents climatology by stating that with the findings of Emanuel (2005), “it remained for climate science only to tend to the details of presenting the data in the appropriate format.” It is simply untrue to suggest that the relationship between PDI and SST is immutably derived from and solely based on Emanuel (2005), as this GFDL web-page clearly demonstrates.
V: No, but the Emmanuel paper is presented as an example of how data can be massaged to produce a pre-determined result. Since 2005, the lack of any meaningful relation between past cyclone activity and either global atmospheric warming or sea temperature has become evident to just about everyone– yet certain climate scientists refuse to give up, moving from the evaluation of past activity to projections into the future, which are highly hypothetical.
For “Victor the Troll” the use of circular reasoning has been obvious from the start. It is first assumed that anthropogenic CO2 emissions have caused global temperatures to rise steadily and dangerously over the last 100 years or so. And on the basis of that assumption it is further assumed that such temperatures will continue to rise indefinitely, producing disastrous effects. Thus, whenever any extreme weather event occurs, it is interpreted as evidence of “climate change,” which term has become equivalent to AGW, despite the fact that the relation between the two has never been established, but merely assumed. Of course, the possibility that temperatures may not continue to rise is rarely even considered.
Victorsays
138 CCHolley says:
CC: I took a cursory look at this paper. Without even getting to the statistical analysis, I find the paper to be deceitful and not very credible. Keep in mind, the SSRN site is for papers that are in their early stages prior to peer review and actual publication in a journal. The site’s focus is on the social sciences and humanities.
CC: (1) Storm Intensity.
The papers referenced on storm intensity are quite old when the signal was weaker.
V: Yes, but more recent events make the point even more strongly. According to the most recent evidence, there does not seem to be any sort of trend toward more hurricane activity and the signal for a possible increase in intensity is weak. But you are missing the point of Munshi’s paper, which is the tendency of Emmanuel (and by extension a great many others) to massage their data until it comes out “right”.
Temperatures and sea levels have NOT been mostly rising since the last glacial maximum, at least not in the last 10,000 years or so. The starting point of his argument is false, therefore his conclusions are wrong, regardless of the methodologies of the referenced studies.
V: Regardless of whether or not he was wrong, his focus is on the nature of the methodologies employed, not the results obtained.
CC: (3) CO2 in the atmosphere
This one is just silly.
V: On this point I agree. The relation between FF emissions and CO2 levels seems clear.
CC: Conclusion
Seems to me this is a fallacy fallacy and it is the author who is using a circular argument to attempt to prove a circular argument.
V: can you be more specific, because I can’t detect any circularity in any of his arguments. He IS biased, however, but that’s a different matter. Hardly anyone writing on this topic lacks some degree of bias.
CC: His argument does nothing to cast doubt on the physics behind global warming. Not a surprise, since the actual physics behind AGW is irrefutable, it appears to be a typical *denier* argument attempting to attack the fringes of the science.
V: The so-called “physics of climate change” is purely theoretical. Sure, there have been many results produced from relatively simple lab-based experiments, but projections of something as complex as the climate of both land and sea on this Earth are another matter entirely. So the idea that “the physics” can be regarded as, in itself, irrefutable with respect to long term climate change is hopelessly naive. There are some physics-based theories regarding the nature of climate change yes, but the ONLY way to test them is on the basis of the sort of evidence that climate scientists have been collecting for many years now, on, for example, global temperatures, ocean temperatures, sea level, frequency of drought, hurricanes, rainstorms, etc. This is where the danger of circular reasoning comes in, because so many have become convinced that AGW is a fact proven ahead of time by “the physics” that they tend to see any evidence that might be construed as consistent with “the physics” as evidence that AGW is in fact real, and not only real but significant, and moreover dangerous. Circular reasoning, as should be evident.
Now scientists have written a follow-up piece in which they argue scientists and economists need to switch their focus from encouraging growth to conserving the planet. “There are critical environmental limits to resource-dependent economic growth,” the authors state.
Thomassays
134 jgnfld says: “Can our resident deniers please provide an example of a single, generally accepted scientific inference that does NOT involve an “appeal to authority” somewhere in the inductive chain. […]”
jgnfld, overall that was a fairly useful well informed comment. Are you aware of the authoritative degree from decades of cognitive science, psychology and linguistics knowledge that supports Prof. George Lakoff’s scientific output and published books?
That work indicates using words like ‘deniers’ and their talking points in a passage actually activates subconscious memes. (I myself just did it too)
The question I would ask then is: Given what you said without any reference to ‘deniers’ stands alone as useful, why is that you couldn’t present such solid information absent being motivated by a ‘denier’ first?
Have you considered that you could take that content, place it into a different meme entirely, a more positive and constructive and forward looking context? Such as make a unique separate post that stands on it own authority instead. One that would of itself be useful to academic level readers and the ‘Public’. One that was a pertinent reminder for those who like you already know that, but worth highlighting occasionally to keep one’s “eye on the main game”?
—
jgnfld said to Sheldon the Denier: “As has been pointed out to you scores of times by people with knowledge of stats your graphs “prove” exactly nothing. At most they are a pretty way of displaying the data.”
jgnfld also said, after Sheldon introduced faux witch burning history: “But all this is, of course, a legal/political question not a scientific one. So why bring it up in a scientific forum? Is it part of being scientifically “skeptical”? (Hint: No.)
Wasn’t this already patently obvious why Sheldon et al would “bring it up in a scientific forum”, even before Tamino started his new Thread? How could anyone expect anything better where Sheldon, Victor, KIA, DDS et al are concerned?
As Leto concluded about Sheldon personally: ” You’ve taken the opportunity Tamino gave you and thoroughly beclowned yourself.”
I expected nothing less. What about Tamino?
(highlights of) Consequences
Posted on February 18, 2018 | 403 Comments Sheldon Walker’s main disagreement with the danger of global warming isn’t about whether or not it’s happening, or whether or not it’s man-made. He isn’t convinced that the consequences will be as harmful as is often claimed. […] This isn’t so much a post, as a comment thread. It’s about the science, and what we can expect the consequences of global warming to be. […]
This thread is also about discussing other scientific claims from Sheldon Walker — or from others who dispute the danger of global warming. But his opinion of the severity of the consequences seems to be our main point of disagreement. https://tamino.wordpress.com/2018/02/18/consequences/
I seriously question how many times the consequences arose as a scientific issues that was discussed. And I seriously question Sheldon’s ability to even make a scientific point to begin with – and yet Tamino invited him inside the room anyway. 16 days later he then concludes:
Gosh, was that a surprise to anyone? Really, was it? But Sheldon sure got a great opportunity to blow his trumpet and to send Open Mind awash with lashings of ‘denier meme’ lather and BS for free.
There were many really good issues and facts raised by scientifically grounded posters over there. It’s a shame that knowledge, perspectives, and excellent refs had to be wasted and now lost under ‘403’ bushels of blathering bs.
But why wait for a Sheldon to turn up to discuss serious scientific issues about the Consequences of AGW/CC progression and deal with that instead of arguing with a beclowned fool? Makes no sense to me, but each to their own self be true (I suppose).
—
I need to update/correct my quick summary of #Comments by ‘the smartest people in the RC Room’ (saying that is very lighthearted and affectionate!)
#Comments by Tamino x 16 = 3.97%
Barton Paul Levenson x 16 = 3.97% jgnfld x 19 = 4.72%
Mal Adaptedx 25 = 6.20%
Al Rodger (aka MAR) x 37 = 9.18%
Doc Snow (aka K.McK) x 38 = 9.43%
Sub-Total X 151 = 37.47% (was 32.8%)
—
On the bright side this comment was excellent and something already posted to RC for consideration (zero responses yet but that’s the normal SOP here)
Doc Snow | March 1, 2018 at 11:42 pm [Director] Lewis believes that ultimately Kill Climate Deniers must be read as a satire and that “satire is one of our most useful forms for critiquing really difficult politics”.
“It critiques the artist and the audience. It asks everybody to look at it through a different, lighter eye, in order to have the conversation, not the argument,” Lewis said. https://tamino.wordpress.com/2018/02/18/consequences/#comment-101032
Apologies for repeating myself through the ‘authoritative’ words of Lewis via the enlightened stream of consciousness which is Doc Snow and out of the physical cyberspace of Tamino’s Open Mind and back to the redundant past comments on Real Climate.
(smile)
Thomassays
Not another word has been said on Open Mind since tamino’s @ March 3, 2018 at 12:22 pm.
Nothing.
Apparently without a ‘denier’ in town to ‘argue with’, the scientific world and the ‘smartest people in the room’ are all speechless.
Chew on that. :-)
nigeljsays
Regarding the research paper on circular reasoning by Jamal Munchi.
Firstly when a so called science paper alleges bias and political activism and without any evidence it deserves to be rubbish binned pretty fast.
However looking at the claims on hurricane intensity. The paper criticises the maths used in a study by Emanuel on hurricane intensity. Its just one paper and obviously a scientist will look deeply for evidence of increased intensity, there’s nothing inherently wrong in that. It will be judged on its merits and methods.
However its only one paper out of many studies of hurricanes, and different research agencies have found different results on hurricane intensity. The IPCC looks at a range of studies before reaching conclusions.
Munchi implies “the validity of agw warming may be in question” from his research yet he bases this on just one paper on hurricane intensity so Munchi is guilty of “cherry picking”. He should be looking at a wide range of research and see what it adds up to.
Regarding sea level rise, the main criticism appears to be selection only satellite data. But there’s nothing sinister in this because its known the tidal data is less accurate. So this is not circular reasoning.
Munchi also bases his conclusions on one paper on sea level rise only by Jevrijeva, so is again guilty of cherrypicking himself.
Regarding sources of atmospheric C02. This shows his lack of understanding of the climate issue. Sure there are uncertainties in the flows, but theres a lot of evidence that extra atmospheric CO2 has fossil fuel origins and no compelling alternative explanation, and you have to consider this “as well” as uncertainties. I’m not a climate scientist or statistician, more of an educated lay person and it should be obvious to someone like Munchin.
I think there’s a lot of circular reasoning, cherrypicking and confirmation bias and veiled political motives in Munchins own research paper!
Thomassays
New AGW/CC Science (and Impacts) Paper – Agronomy 2018, 8, 25. Pg 3 of 27
California USA – 3.2. Temperature
Climate change is often exemplified by increased temperature. However, variability in temperature is one of the primary factors affecting agriculture, forestry, water supplies, and human and ecosystem health [6]. Figure 1a shows how the global temperature has increased by 1.4◦C since1880 [7], whereas Figure 1b depicts the temperature variation in the state as compared to that of global temperatures. The rate of increase in minimum temperatures is greater than that of the mean or maximum temperatures [8]. Hansen et al. [9] characterized temperature increases in California from the past century, especially after 1975, using increments in mean temperature of about 1.2–2.2◦C [10].
[…]
Figure 2 displays annual maximum temperature projections until the end of the century (2100) based on observations from 1950 to 2005, employing two Representative Concentration Pathways scenarios (RCP4.5, left and RCP 8.5, right) [13]. These annual values are derived from four climate models: […]
153 nigelj, if you have any other similar papers/refs that you found ‘enlightening/useful’ would you mind dumping them into FR as you go about your business please. No rush, a long term project I am compiling for the public. thx thomas the tongue-tied :)
Thomassays
What is the Forced Responses section on RC for?
Quote: “This month’s open thread on responses to climate change (politics, adaptation, mitigation etc.). Please stay focused on the overall topic.”
To some posters here on RC this is opined to be “non-climatological”
Oh really? How nice!
But is that even a genuine word? I can’t remember off the top of my head, so let us check that to be absolutely certain if it is and what it might mean in English and in Scientific circles.
Quoting directly Climate change as a result of human activities, or anthropogenic global warming, is now generally accepted as reality and includes a wide range of climatic processes and impacts in the global system that are affected by human activities.
This course provides an introduction to climate change science, impacts and policy implications. The fundamentals are provided in an overview of climate change science, focussing on the atmospheric processes that drive climatic variability and change, and an understanding of the global carbon cycle. Current and likely future impacts of global warming on ecosystems and human activities are also considered, including biodiversity, system buffering and resilience, and regional inequality and vulnerability. Societal response strategies are also investigated, focussing on international environmental treaties, international and Australian policy approaches to global warming, and management and adaptation strategies.
Now WE all know what the true facts of the matter is. Great.
Have a great day everyone ( except for MAR, HR, RL, MA, BPL, DDS, Victor, & Mr KIA, and of course jb. )
(smiling)
jgnfldsays
@161
Actually I think tamino provided a very good service in allowing sheldon to post though I’m not sure he himself thinks so. Sheldon provided a very clear psychological portrait of the mindset of committed deniers. (I know he says he agrees it’s warming. Regardless, he still denies the totality of the present science.)
In particular his use of fairly extreme ideological/political–even conspiratorial–thinking coupled with an inability/unwillingness to drill directly and deeply into any particular issue to maintain a singular world view is presented with great clarity.
At the risk of provoking recursive fury a la Lewandowsky, his writings there could easily be turned into a psychological case study showcasing denier thought processes. The general themes would be cherrypicking, shallow analysis, and irrelevant analogies directed at maintaining a particular ideological point of view rather than integration and deep analysis to try to understand what’s empirically happening.
What this means for communication of climate science to the wider public is possibly problematic. I think it’s clear sheldon’s ideology is fixed and not changeable. He is not going to be part of any consensus for action. This is true of many others as well. So in that sense communication may not be possible to his ilk.
It is the less ideological and presently inactive middle that must be reached, I think. That is where Dr. Hayhoe’s recent ideas on communication (i.e., seeking common ground) can come into play. There is no common ground to be found with committed ideologues, I fear.
Bob Jeffersonsays
RealClimate used to be an interesting forum before it was taken over by Thomas and Killian. Just checked in after a month away and see nothing has changed.
jgnfldsays
@161 (added)
Missed answering your 1st question…
The use of “denier” is provocative, sure. Sad, but true fact: You know, I know, everybody knows the denier group here has precisely zero wish to engage in actual deep analysis and integration of the scientific issues. They are ideologues and don’t, to my mind, deserve the same consideration that interested, dedicated knowledge seekers do. Churlish of me, perhaps. But human.
When I taught these concepts/issues to students desiring actually to learn them or honestly to explore/debate/even counter them I used no such provocative language even when they had other views.
That may beg the question–as you begged of me–of why then continue to post in response to said ideologues? The best answer I can come up with is that ideologues at the very least cannot be allowed to control the information flow. When they do we end up with, well, the the present situation in the US, the DT’s so to speak.
That said, the truly important group to reach is the non-ideologues–again as is obvious from our present situation. Given recent events, it is possible the non-ideological middle has learned its lesson and is now ready act on reason…we’ll see. For my part I’m not at all sure. Full detox is hard if I may continue my analogy.
Mel Reasonersays
Thomas (# 152). I had a look at the ‘mission statement’ for the site and as far as I can tell, questioning the credibility of the author of the ‘essay’ that Victor has been peddling here should not be too far not out of line.
Looks like Victor isn’t responding so I checked it out and yes the author of Victor’s groupthink ‘essay’, Christopher Booker, is the same journalist who, within the last year, claimed there has been no global warning for 19 years.
Thomas, I assume you would agree that RC is the wrong place for a discussion of anything written by Christopher Booker. If I’m wrong about this, I apologise in advance.
I encourage the moderators to consider raising the bar with respect to the comments posted here.
The ‘essays’ that Victor is promoting have nothing to do with science – and the focus of this thread (as noted in the comments above) is supposed to be about climate science. In my opinion, it’s time to hammer the gong and pull the plug on Victor and Mr. Know It All.
My hunch is that Victor and Mr. Know It All have no interest in advancing our understanding of climate science but are instead focused on turning the thread into a food fight in order to make RC look bad.
In any case, this thread has largely devolved into something that doesn’t resemble a rational discussion about science and if RC wants to maintain its reputation as a respected ‘go to’ site for intelligent scientific discourse, you really need to do something bout this.
I would also encourage the moderators to ban all comments that include any direct or indirect personal insults on all RC discussion threads starting now. Period. Too many in this thread to enumerate. There may be some good ideas buried somewhere among all the slander and scorn, contempt and abuse, but why the hell would anyone want to dig through all that crap to find them.
Russellsays
Bob Jefferson is an astute observer of this scene.
James McDonaldsays
A technical question:
Are there published arguments for the minimum number of measuring stations needed to track global temperature change with sufficient precision to see the signal of the current change above the noise?
I have a memory of seeing a very low number (40?) which surprised me at the time, but I can’t remember where I saw that, and various kinds of searches bog down because “minimum” along with thermometers invariably finds papers about minimum temperatures, not minimum numbers of thermometers.
Killian @154.
You defend the inundation of Thomas by suggesting that I am in no position to criticise given the volume of my own contribution to the thread. (This is not the first time you have leveled criticism at me, but for once here you manage a logical criticism.)
For the record, in this thread-to-date I am responsible for 12 prior comments (7%) comprising 3,850 words (11%). In total there are 27 different commenters. I thus comprise 4% of this total.
You dismiss nine of my twelve comments as “insults all round,” this because you adjudge my comments either address trolls or are themselves trolling. And five were indeed addressing trolls (Weektor & Mr KIA) while for a sixth, I note Thomas has branded David Miller a troll so presumably you are of a similar view.
However, do note that the substance of these six comments sets out evidentially-based argument discussing what has become of late a very rare subject within RC UV threads – climatology!!!!
If the 34% of Thomas-comments and 37% of Thomas-words were a positive contribution to this thread, an argument could easily be made supporting his presence here.
So where are those positive contributions? Show me a Thomas comment or two that justify the 12,900 words of vaccuous error-filled nonsense smeared down this thread?
Yes I insult him as though he were a troll because he is plainly a fool operating way beyond his depth. (Note his attempt to quatify a comment thread @Open Mind – be it incompetence, over-exuberance or insincerity, he cannot even count the comments but still expends many hundreds of words telling us repeatedly about it.)
Thomas is like some obsessed neanderthal slavishly copying the actions of homo sapiens yet blind to the resulting nonsense. Is that defensible?
Go on!! Show me a Thomas comment or two in the above thread, a positive contribution from Thomas, something that even starts to justify the 12,900 words he has smeared down this thread!!!
You point out Samset et al (2018) who model the complete removal of those negative forcings in a +1.5°C AGW world and find an extra +0.7°C results from their removal. Further, you see the TOA radiative imbalance as additional to today’s +1.0°C AGW and additional to that +0.7°C from removing the aerosols etc.
It is something to be worried about. Negative forcings have a far shorter atmospheric residency than GHGs. But unless the negative forcings are greatly reduced before we start making cuts in GHG emissions, we shoud be seeing the positive climate forcings dropping away alongside those reduction in aerosols. Within the timescales in which the aerosols will be reduced, we can/could also see reduced CH4 emissions and N2O emissions which will lead to lower GHG forcing in years rather than decades. And CO2 levels also will begin to drop significantly when the emissions are cut to a small portion of the current rate, cuts that may take two or three decades to appear. Such reductions in positive forcings would mean the pipe-line warming can be dodged and hopefully the loss of negative forcings will be less important.
Yet note that the level of negative forcings is poorly defined. As a result, a bigger worry is that there has been higher levels of negative forcing masking much of our AGW and the warming we see so far is associated with relatively low levels of net positive forcing coupled with a high climate sensitivity.
James McDonaldsays
I’ve partially answered my question with this paper:
Jones, P. D., T. J. Osborn, and K. R. Briffa. “Estimating sampling errors in large-scale temperature averages.” Journal of Climate 10, no. 10 (1997): 2548-2568.
If I read it correctly, this says that the number of effectively independent stations needed to track century-scale changes is about 5, and for yearly changes the number is around 150. So maybe 40 effectively independent stations to detect a 30-year change is consistent with that.
I understand this is a theoretical minimum for the number of stations, and it would be improbable to actually locate such stations in practice, but does this seem broadly correct?
If so, can anyone point to minimal sets of actual stations with the desired property? How much larger might one expect such sets to be? (50 for a century, 1000 for a year ??)
James McDonaldsays
I’ve partially answered my question with this paper:
Jones, P. D., T. J. Osborn, and K. R. Briffa. “Estimating sampling errors in large-scale temperature averages.” Journal of Climate 10, no. 10 (1997): 2548-2568.
If I read it correctly, this says that the number of effectively independent stations needed to track century-scale changes is about 5, and for yearly changes the number is around 150. So maybe 40 effectively independent stations to detect a 30-year change is consistent with that.
I understand this is a theoretical minimum for the number of stations, and it would be improbable to actually locate such stations in practice, but does this seem broadly correct?
If so, can anyone point to minimal sets of actual stations with the desired property? How much larger might one expect such sets to be? (50 for a century, 1000 for a year ??)
Thomas @166 discusses the descriptor “non-climatological” for the Forced Responses discussion thread and in so doing rather forgets that he is not supposed to be reading my comments so should not have seen use of the term “non-climatological” referenced to that thread, ‘climatology’ being the study of climate science and the subject-matter for the UV thread. ‘Climatology’ is apparently (as Thomas shows us @166) also used as the title for an ANU course on AGW.
CCHolleysays
Victor @158
I will respond individually due to time constraints.
V: Yes, but more recent events make the point even more strongly. According to the most recent evidence, there does not seem to be any sort of trend toward more hurricane activity and the signal for a possible increase in intensity is weak. But you are missing the point of Munshi’s paper, which is the tendency of Emmanuel (and by extension a great many others) to massage their data until it comes out “right”.
More recent events do NOT make the point more strongly.
BTW, the prediction is for storm intensity to increase due to higher sea surface temperatures (a rather obvious conclusion), frequency is debated. If storm intensity were shown to not increase with warmer sea surface temperatures, the conclusion would be that we are lacking in our understanding of tropical storms, not AGW.
This paper is still not current, first published in 2013, so again the latest high intensity storms are not included in the analysis. Your interpretation is that the current signal is weak, I believe this paper would dispute that. The latest storms would make the signal even stronger.
Questioning Munshi’s methodology does not by extension mean a great deal of others also do whatever is claimed. That is a one huge leap based on ONE single rather poor example. Are you that clueless in your critical thinking skills? The claim is absurd.
Looking at data by different methods to seek a trend is not massaging data and it is not a circular argument. It is only seeking what is expected in a rather noisy data set very early on the data gathering history. Conclusions based on such methodology may be weak and be highly uncertain, but that does not necessarily diminish the work. A circular argument says that a conclusion is based solely on the premise being true. The researchers in this case were looking for confirmation of a prediction and found that the data may show such, but they never claimed there was no uncertainty in the conclusion.
V 157: It is first assumed that anthropogenic CO2 emissions have caused global temperatures to rise steadily and dangerously over the last 100 years or so.
BPL: It is not “assumed” at all. It was predicted (Arrhenius 1896) from radiation physics. It was then confirmed by observations.
Th 162: Not another word has been said on Open Mind since tamino’s @ March 3, 2018 at 12:22 pm. . . Nothing. . . Apparently without a ‘denier’ in town to ‘argue with’, the scientific world and the ‘smartest people in the room’ are all speechless. . . chew on that. :-)
BPL: Apparently you missed the fact that comments were closed on that thread and no new comment threads have been opened. Chew on that.
We are currently in a heat and CO2e lull thanks to La Nina conditions.
The LN lull is reported to have some consequences for tornadoes. You can read about that here:
from that piece: “La Niña has prevailed in the tropical Pacific for the second straight winter. This winter’s weak to near-moderate La Niña event was more potent than the marginal La Niña episode of 2016-17. In its latest monthly ENSO update, issued Thursday, NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center calls for the current La Niña event to weaken through the spring. CPC also gives an 80% chance that either El Niño or neutral conditions will be in place by the end of 2018.”
I think it’s interesting to track CO2 and CO2e, but the tracks have the periodic ups and downs related to LN and EN conditions, so I do bote calculations to attempt to smooth those out for the purpose of estimating the background rate of increase in CO2 in the atmosphere. I think this is useful for evaluating emission (and other tangential) reports claims/stories that might lead folks to think we are making significant progress in responding to global warming.
In another way, smoothing out the LN and EN bumps makes less sense, and that other way is the impact that is observed and felt with an EN surge in CO2 and heat in the biosphere. I think that last big EN event was persuasive to a lot of folks who might have wanted for one reason or another to deny that global warming was going to be a problem during their lives or the lives of their children. The next big EN event is going to move all the needles as the last one did. I think the heat buildup is less “theoretical” now than it was a decade ago even though the heat buildup of a decade ago was easy to spot in the historical record. We have moved beyond the “well, everyone loves a nice, hot day” to news coverage of heatwave related deaths in conjunction with personal experience that it’s just too hot on a lot of days. It certainly was too hot for me here in the PNW last August. I think with each EN event now, more people will recognize that the heat we have generated on the planet is actually dangerous.
I am getting old and may not have to live through a lot more EN events, but the EN events are the moment in time when more people can be helped to understand that the baseline level of CO2 in atmosphere and oceans have reached a dangerous level. In that sense, EN events are now a teachable moment, so here we go. Maybe we have EN event ramping up by end of 2018 as Cat 6 suggests. That will lead to a new pulse of CO2 into the atmosphere in response to the elevated global temp and maybe all that will help more folks get on the bandwagon.
I can’t bite on the emissions good news report as I watch the CO2 levels remain on the rise with the rate of rise increasing. Does not look flat-ish to me.
Daily CO2
March 4, 2018: 409.97ppm
March 4, 2017: 407.46 ppm
Just a few years ago we passed the 400 mark for the first time in the record. Here we are now hanging out around 410. Weapons Grape Stupid.
Cheers
Mike
nigeljsays
jgnfld @167, I agree with your commentary on climate denial.
If you look at the history of new theories, most people come to eventually accept them, but there’s often a small core group who remain in permanent denial. This is typically very roughly around 20%, due a combination of vested job interests, addictions, ideology and psychological attributes. (vaccines, evolution, the tobacco disease link etc).
So there’s room to convince more people of climate science on the evidence and rationality, but a core group of maybe about 20% will remain in permanent or near permanent denial.
Feel free to dispute my numbers if you have actual evidence otherwise.
David Millersays
Bob Jefferson at 168…
I agree. I was a regular reader of the site and the comments from the sites inception until a few years ago. I learned a tremendous amount about climate science in the process. It’s really disappointing to see what’s become of the comments section. I’d add KIA and Victor and a few others to your list…
Thomas, you think I’m a troll? Oh, my. Try searching for my name on this site and you’ll see how absurd that notion is.
Nigel! Thank you!! Those are the kinds of things I was looking for. Definitely some reading for me before I pass them along:)
Thomassays
169
jgnfld,
Thank you very much for your well considered, well balanced, honest, decent, respectful and obviously genuine responses above. (fwiw Rome wasn’t built in a day … proper discussions in text based fora takes time, patience and effort, I appreciate your effort here) .. and I mean that sincerley.
A small note, however, is a query about my first question which was : Are you aware of the authoritative degree from decades of cognitive science, psychology and linguistics knowledge that supports Prof. George Lakoff’s scientific output and published books?
I cannot see that you actually answered that question (not that you must). I cannot connect what you have said back to that query. If you wish to now answer it, or whatever, feel free. No big deal to me either way.
Thank you, Thomas.
PS
Perhaps you may find some value in my latest comment about what happened on Open Mind if it makes it through the mods in tack in the FR thread.
170 Mel Reasoner, I am on board 100% with every thing you said. I concur. Thx for your response, nothing personal in including your comment in my list – it was only a matter of being *accurate*, which is why I included myself in it.
—|—
181 Barton Paul Levenson “BPL: Apparently you missed the fact that comments were closed on that thread and no new comment threads have been opened. Chew on that.”
No I did not miss that. You missed the fact that I have in fact already quoted the final comment by Tamino verbatim with the comment url here days ago. Doh!
People in glass houses should not throw stones, but you keep on doing this – getting facts wrong for years now.
My god man! Seriously! Elephants have no place in a china shop either. That’s a metaphor that applies to you BPL, not myself. Please seek out the information contained in my posts about *reading comprehension* and how to be successful at it mate!
Or, simply read what I wrote and seek a 2nd opinion about what I actually wrote and what that means to a ‘normal’ person not embittered.
Have a great day now, ya hear!
—|—
182
mike
Elsewhere La Nina is wreaking havoc in summer/autumn fyi.
fwiw re “either El Niño or neutral conditions will be in place by the end of 2018.” I posted reports urls here that ENSO is already in Neutral and it is *possible* an El Nino could form as early as May 2018 … time will tell of course.
and March 09: 409.97 ppm, as well as March 4th Mike.
Mike the ESRL week avg for March 3rd to March 9th is 409.8 ppm
La Nina is having little no effect on decreasing CO2e levels in the atmosphere. The rate of increase is still accelerating mate.
Cheers
Thomassays
AGW/CC Data ASIE
Day 68 of ASIE still breaking world record lows 14.23 2kms on March 9th – now accumulated 62 *skyrockety* days in unprecedented ASIE record lows during 68 days of 2018.
“Climate change computer model vindicated 30 years later by what has actually happened. Sceptics have long sneered at climate models but one made in the late 1980s has proved remarkably prophetic”
“Writing in the journal Nature Climate Change, Dr Ronald Stouffer, head of the climate and ecosystem group at Princeton University, and Dr Syukuro Manabe, a senior meteorologist at the same US college, said they had not expected the model to be so accurate.”
“It is quite surprising that the observed and projected pattern of surface temperature change are very similar to each other,” they wrote.
“It … suggests that the model likely contains the key physical processes that control the geographical pattern of global warming at the earth surface.”
Assessing temperature pattern projections made in 1989
“When the model results used here
were published, we did our best to make
the model’s simulation of the current
climate as realistic as possible. However,
we did not adjust our model in any way
to simulate the future climate changes for
the obvious reason that we did not know
how the climate was going to change
when the simulation was made. This is
why we are very much encouraged to find
that the salient features of climate change
distribution projected by the model are
becoming evident in the observations.
“In other words, the projections shown
here were made before the observations
confirmed them as being correct, striking
at the heart of the argument that modellers
tune their models to yield the correct
climate change results.”
Digby Scorgiesays
Mike @182
Weapons Grape Stupid?
CCHolleysays
Victor @158
Post @178 above: Questioning Munshi’s methodology does not by extension mean a great deal of others also do whatever is claimed. Should have read: Questioning Emmanuel’s methodology does not….
V: The so-called “physics of climate change” is purely theoretical. Sure, there have been many results produced from relatively simple lab-based experiments, but projections of something as complex as the climate of both land and sea on this Earth are another matter entirely. So the idea that “the physics” can be regarded as, in itself, irrefutable with respect to long term climate change is hopelessly naive.
Here in lies the complete ignorance of Victor. This has been discussed so many times that either Victor does not have the intellectual capacity to understand the physics, or he is unwilling to make the effort to learn what the science actually tells us. Victor makes an argument from personal incredulity while accusing others of using logical fallacies.
The so called “physics of climate change” is purely theoretical.
Nonsense.
The greenhouse effect is based on physical laws.
The radiative properties of substances under multiple conditions determined in the lab are irrefutable. Such properties of substances are confirmed by quantum mechanics and they do not change in the “real world” from what was determined in the laboratory. Likewise for our understanding of thermodynamics. We have the First, Second, Third, and Zeroth LAWS of thermodynamics. How we apply these laws to to greenhouse gas theory is not questioned. Beyond thermodynamics, we also have a thorough understanding of the mechanisms of heat transfer. The how of heat transfer is irrefutable. Stefan-Botzmann Law, Wien’s Displacement Law, Planck’s Law, Fourier’s Law, and Newton’s Law of Cooling are examples. How we apply these laws to greenhouse gas theory is irrefutable. Physical laws are physical laws.
The effect of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere can be determined through mathematical modeling based on the known physical laws. This is not in dispute by any scientist with any expertise at all in climate science. Not Curry, not Lindzen, not Spencer. None. The effect of a doubling of CO2 is about 1 degrees celsius. This IS irrefutable physics.
Water vapor is the largest and strongest feedback to CO2. Humidity is rather complex, but we do have a good understanding the relationship of humidity to temperature. Psychometric Charts have been around a long time. Although there is some uncertainty as to exactly how much the humidity will increase it can be irrefutably stated that the feedback is at least another one degree celsius per doubling of CO2. Again, this is based on known irrefutable physics. Warmer air holds more humidity and we can calculate the effect of that increased water vapor on the radiative balance
In 2002 the Aqua satellite was launched with AIRS instrumentation for measuring humidity at all atmospheric layers. Analysis of the data in 2008 by Dressler and his team confirmed that for every increase in surface temperature of 1 degree celsius, the water vapor feedback was 2 watts per square meter. The latest studies done in 2015 indicate that humidities are now higher due to the warming than many models predicted. More on the lines of a total climate sensitivity of 4.0 degrees. Contrary to Victor’s statements, the result of the application of physics to the greenhouse gas theory has been confirmed through direct observations.
Overall, the PHYSICS tells us irrefutably, that the combined climate sensitivity of CO2 and water vapor is at least 2 degrees celsius and the physics is backed up by satellite observations. Two degrees is the lowest climate sensitivity possible without negative feedbacks. Negative feedbacks are possible, but to date there is no evidence that such exist and no known physical mechanism for such to occur. Clouds were a possibility, but the evidence, from satellites, appear to show this is not so. Clouds are moving from the equator making them a positive feedback.
So the idea that “the physics” can be regarded as, in itself, irrefutable with respect to long term climate change is hopelessly naive.
Wrong. Climate is complex but that does not mean it is impossible to understand. The climate must respond within the bounds of physical laws. Physical laws that are well understood. There are uncertainties as to how long it will take to reach equilibrium so the speed of warming is not clearly known, but warm it will. There are uncertainties as to the magnitude of the feedbacks and how fast they will respond, but none of that tells us that it will not warm. On the contrary, the physics IS irrefutable. Adding CO2 will result in warming. At least 2 degrees per doubling. And very likely higher.
Naivety is believing that there is some other magical explanation for the current warming trend and that AGW won’t have significant impact on society.
Mr. Know It Allsays
170 Mel Reasoner
“I encourage the moderators to consider raising the bar with respect to the comments posted here.
The ‘essays’ that Victor is promoting have nothing to do with science – and the focus of this thread (as noted in the comments above) is supposed to be about climate science. In my opinion, it’s time to hammer the gong and pull the plug on Victor and Mr. Know It All.”
Perhaps you missed my post 62 where I tried to steer the conversation back to science. In any case, “Let’s get to it” as Kris Kristofferson says at 2:50 in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gILYTdqqCo0
Whatcha say? Here’s a science question for you, and for any and all climate scientists:
What is the general methodology used in climate science models to calculate the future rise in temperature due to increased CO2 in the atmosphere. Mathematically, how do the models work. BPL and others have occasionally provide insight into it, but I lose track of the posts! And as you indicate I don’t want to read thru the insulting posts constantly being posted here to try to find the good posts!
So, the question stands. I’m wondering how the models calculate the temperature increases. I understand the general principle that more atmospheric CO2 reflects more IR radiation back to earth making earth warmer, but I want to know how do the models calculate the temperature rise. Is it just Plancks Law, Wein’s Diplacement Law, and the Stefan-Boltzmann Law? Or is there more?
Victorsays
170 Mel Reasoner says:
MR: Looks like Victor isn’t responding so I checked it out and yes the author of Victor’s groupthink ‘essay’, Christopher Booker, is the same journalist who, within the last year, claimed there has been no global warning for 19 years.
V: Is that literally what he said? It would help to have an exact quote, and a reference. The degree of warming over the last 20 years or so has been hotly debated, as I’m sure you are aware. Regardless of how any one person might want to interpret the data, it does seem clear that the steep warming trend over the last 20 years of the 20th century has not been continued into the 21st. Even Michael Mann has acknowledged that. While technically there does seem to have been some warming between 1998 and ca. 2015 (according to some records at least), leading to (misleading) claims of “record breaking” heat, the increases have been minimal, and according to some, statistically insignificant. And yes, things have heated up in the last few years, probably due to an unusually intense El Nino, but that is the sort of thing climate scientists used to refer to as “weather” as opposed to “climate,” though now they seem to be changing their tune. In any case, Booker’s views on 21st century temperature trends have no bearing on his very different argument regarding group think, which I find convincing.
MR: The ‘essays’ that Victor is promoting have nothing to do with science – and the focus of this thread (as noted in the comments above) is supposed to be about climate science. In my opinion, it’s time to hammer the gong and pull the plug on Victor and Mr. Know It All.
My hunch is that Victor and Mr. Know It All have no interest in advancing our understanding of climate science but are instead focused on turning the thread into a food fight in order to make RC look bad.
V: The most convincing evidence for the validity of Booker’s argument can be found right here on this blog, where the vast majority of responses to ANYTHING posted by ANYONE expressing skepticism of the mainstream view is dismissed with insults and ad hominem attacks, in perfect accordance with the “group think” paradigm. Your comments above are an excellent example.
From Booker’s essay:
“The views of anyone who fails to share [the “consensus” view] become wholly unacceptable. There cannot be any possibility of dialogue with them. They must be excluded from any further discussion. At best they may just
be marginalised and ignored, at worst they must be openly attacked and discredited.
Dissent cannot be tolerated.”
Ray Ladburysays
Despite what some here contend, Tamino’s experiment with listening to the denialati was not a failure. It did yield some interesting results for a particular type of denialist–the narcissist. For this particular species, the contrarian stance ensures that they get attention–both from the unsophisticated rubes at WTFUWT and from the reality-based community. There are a lot of denialist trolls out there that are motivated by narcissism and seem to think that they only way to prove they are smarter than all the smart people out there is to disagree with them. Dick Lindzen comes to mind among actual once-publishing climate scientists. This particular type of denialism is unfortunately very difficult to treat, because the attention received for their contrarianism provides more reward to their psyche than the pleasure of understanding.
For the particular denialist studied at Open Mind, how the research–or those presenting it–made them feel was more important than its truth or predictive/explanatory power. This was also seen in some of the anti-feminist views presented by the subject.
So, the exercise did present some insight into a particular type of denialist troll even if it did not prove persuasive to the subject.
The thing is that there are many different types of troll, and any particular troll may present a mix of motivations. Some of them can be persuaded. At this point in the debate, however, most would have been persuaded by evidence already if such persuasion were possible. You can’t fix stupid.
For a simpler, gross approximation simply note that the Central Limit theorem suggests that standard error is related to the square root of the number of observations. Going from 6000 station to 600 increases the standard error only 3.2X and down to 60 stations increases the error only 10X.
Thomassays
Prof Benjamin P. Horton
Associate Chair (Faculty), Asian School of the Environment
People are hungry for news about the risk of climate change but boring, technical jargon is alienating them, said the United Nations top environment official Erik Solheim in December 2017.
People need to be excited and inspired to take action and change their behaviour, he added.
Yet “the language of environmentalists has been boring, so uninspiring … If we just speak a technical language, with many acronyms and politically-correct phrases, no one will listen,” he said in an interview during a Bonn conference on landscapes.
Perhaps the consequences of human-driven climate change seem abstract, technical or too far away in the future.
AGW/CC Mitigation – 22 national academies and societies of science from around the Commonwealth call for urgent Government action and Net Zero GHG Emissions
The consensus statement, which represents the consensus views of tens of thousands of scientists, …. […]
Secretary of Science Policy at The Australian Academy of Science, Professor David Day, said […] “Even if all the country commitments from the Paris Agreement are met, the best interpretation of the latest data shows that by the end of the century the global climate is likely to be 3°C above pre-industrial levels.
Up-to-date weekly average CO2 at Mauna Loa
Week beginning on March 4, 2018: 409.84 ppm (+3.28 ppm -yr)
Weekly value from 1 year ago: 406.56 ppm
Weekly value from 10 years ago: 385.95 ppm
Last updated: March 11, 2018
Chew on that! :-)
Thomassays
AGW/CC Science & CO2 ppm growth rates were still accelerating a day ago
UV January #103 Thomas says:
14 Jan 2018 at 3:36 PM
Quote: Interesting CO2 ppm data coming out of Mauna Loa already this non-El Nino year.
(my estimated) January-February weekly ppm average
2015 ~400
2016 ~403
2017 ~406
2 weeks of Jan 2018 ~409 ppm avg., and heading towards 410 ppm / +4 ppm above last year.
(ie above 2017 Jan-Feb wkly ppm average by the end of February)
12th March – Many abusive belittling and insulting ridicule response comments ensued from RC regulars.
12th March – Week beginning on March 4, 2018: 409.84 ppm (+3.28 ppm -yr)
409.84 ppm is 0.16 ppm under the +4 ppm above the 2017 Jan-Feb wkly ppm average and within the error bars.
409.84 ppm wkly avg has occurred within 1-7 days of the last weekly avg of February 2018.
Therefore my suggestion that CO2 was “heading towards 410 & +4 ppm” by the end of February above the Jan-Feb avg was essentially correct with the real world observation results delayed by one week.
Any comments about that?
—|—
UV January #17 Thomas says:
3 Jan 2018 at 4:42 AM
Quote: (b) Our current climate models omit numerous feedback mechanisms including freshwater hosing [e.g. Hansen et al. (2016), DeConto & Pollard (2016) and Bakker et al. (2017)];
(c) Our current climate models cannot replicate the relatively high climate sensitivities, and Arctic Amplifications, of Super Interglacial periods, which are most relevant to our future in 2100;
UV January #52 Thomas says:
5 Jan 2018 at 5:38 PM
Quoting Published Peer-Reviewed Science Papers: “Our results suggest that achieving any given global temperature stabilization target will require steeper greenhouse gas emissions reductions than previously calculated.” […] We conclude that the world has already overshot appropriate targets for GHG amount and global temperature, and we thus infer an urgent need for….
12th March – Only one response comment made by Killian
—|—
jbsays
Regarding 166:
1. Thomas: Have a great day everyone ( except for MAR, HR, RL, MA, BPL, DDS, Victor, & Mr KIA, and of course jb. )
(smiling)
jb: Hello Thomas
(smiling)
2. To all of Thomas’ targets. He is very exasperating, isn’t he? That’s his goal. He wants to wear you out with ad thominem. But you know that.
3. To the moderators, about comment 166. This is a wonderful microcosm of Thomas. This is a long set of words, most of which compose links, introductions to links, and wholesale quotes. The only statement from Thomas other than insults is “[A]pparently yes, it is a ‘word.’ [sic]” and “Now WE all know what the true facts of the matter is [sic]. Great.” Frankly, there are no real hints about the “true facts of the matter” anywhere in the post.
What is the point of allowing such a hodge-podge of words on your blog? It frustrates your old posters. It aggravates people who don’t post but use the blog as a resource – and there are many such people. It discourages new people from returning.
5. If I wanted to undermine this blog, this is the way I would do it. I would send someone to overwhelm the physical space of the blog with quotes, links and insults. In other words, if Thomas didn’t exist, I would have to create him.
#131 David Miller said Unfortunately, these are not the droids I’m looking for.
She doesn’t deny climate change – she regards it as a problem that we absolutely have to address. What she doesn’t have a handle on, and where we differ, is how quickly the changes are coming.
You are wasting your time, then, because the same problem applies across the spectrum. One’s sense of the risk is vital to one’s solution set. If you believe tipping points into oceans full of goo and non-survivable wet bulb temps are hundreds of years away, you go one way. Political change, slow and tedious, might seem like an option. If you look at rates of change already and that changes are from decades to a century ahead of schedule, and think Arctic permafrost and clathrates have a realistic probability of breaking down on a massive scale within years or decades, then you take another.
It’s the question that should start every climate discussion, yet is never part of any climate discussion. Believe me, I’ve tried.
Short answer: There is no answer, no consensus on how long we have till we risk ending up extinct, or nearly so.
I suggest you poll the people here and see what you get. Nail them down to a hard number, or at least a fairly limited range, say 50 years, and see what you see.
I focus on risk, so the answer doesn’t even matter. What matters is, what we risk with slow responses or what we avoid with fast responses.
RE #140 Hank Roberts I have a suggestion ….
I have a suggestion HANK … Educate yourself better so you don’t so regularly come across in public as utterly ignorant and not very smart. HANK have ever considered your addictive approach and many others here is Redundant today in more ways than one?
Nah don;t bother it’s a questio above your pay grade in my humble opinion.
And whatever you do do not ever take personal advantage of the references to chew on which I provided above. Besides I suspect it would take you until CO2 hits 435 ppm before you got up to speed. Until then I will continue to ignore you as ‘my inferior’ which you undoubtedly are.
Maybe HANK believes he is YANKING my chain.
So funny and yet truly Sad at the same time.
—
Examples from this page of a Waste of Real Climate’s resource opportunity and space and using posts not in line with their Mission Statement and Reason for Being as per https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/about/ and This month’s open thread for climate science related items. The open thread for responses to climate change is here (FR).
106
Mel Reasoner
111
Mr. Know It All
115
MA Rodger
116
Hank Roberts
117
Ray Ladbury
118
Hank Roberts
119
Barton Paul Levenson
120
jb
122
Victor
124
Thomas
131
David Miller
132
Thomas
133
Barton Paul Levenson
134
jgnfld
135
MA Rodger
136
Ray Ladbury
137
Ray Ladbury
138
CCHolley
139
Hank Roberts
140
Hank Roberts
Some will no doubt conclude that “my posts” are even more so. You are entitled to your opinions, but that’s only what they are. They are not by default true let alone *authoritative* and based on anything beyond faulty misguided and ignorant thinking and entrenched false beliefs. No one can change or improve those. Except the ones who possess them.
My posts my be judged as *crap* or whatever but at least they are grounded in evidence, facts and reality. Which is much more than I can for the list above.
Yeah, doh, that’s only *my opinion* you cry? Yep. Feel free to ignore it.
I’ll repeat one of Ray’s question again because it needs to be answered by everyone here:
Is this really the best you can do?
David Millar @131,
Regarding your question on climate change effects over the next 30 years.
I suggest your friend ask their countries national climate and weather agency for projections until 2050. They will probably have something. These things are regional in impact, so that’s the most useful approach. My country has released a report like this.
You will also find a simple google search of climate impacts by 2050 listing your own country should provide some good hits.
I also had a quick look on the net, and here’s some material related to the points you raised. Its by experts, not the media or activist groups. I have not read it in any detail.
OECD environmental outlook by 2050. (This is a 2011 publication, but may still be of use)
https://www.oecd.org/env/cc/49082173.pdf
“Challenges to global agriculture in a climate change context by 2050:”
http://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/bitstream/JRC106835/jrc106835_agclim50_jrc_science_for_policy_report.pdf
“Food security, farming, and climate change to 2050
Scenarios, results, policy options” (This is a book)
http://www.ifpri.org/publication/food-security-farming-and-climate-change-2050
It is hoped the moderator will understand the purpose of this post.
MA Rodger likes numbers to insult others. Let’s try it on him:
Unless I missed one, 9/12 posts were in response to trolls or were his own trolling of others, insults all around. 4/12 contained inappropriate personal attacks, though the total number of personal comments was significantly greater than 4.
75% with garbage content.
3 MA Rodger said Your pedantry (which I see you attempt to repeat @1) is entirely unfounded. I do appreciate that you dislike messages that do not reflect your personal ultra-doomy version of AGW, but if you do feel like a bit of a swipe at something, do try to pick on things within your understanding.
39 MA Rodger says Victor the Troll @28.
Any denialist nonsense that drags you out from under your bridge is going to be a laugh a minute, and so it is with the abet-turged “content of the essay” provided here @10 by the chain of shites; alleged journalist Christopher Booker who read a book four years ago and so is now expert in the psychology of ‘Groupthink’, those Gentlemeen Who Prefer Fantasy and who masquerade as an Educational Charity…
56 MA Rodger says Victor the Troll @40.(And Victor, I go to this trouble because I know you are hopelessly stupid and would flounder without such assistance.)
75 MA Rodger says Thomas.
Why do I object to your contributions here @RealClimate? Let me entirely frank with you.
There are three reasons for this.
(1) As a single commenter here, your contributions are unreasonably sized. So far in this month’s UV column you have posted 18 of the 63 posts-to-date, comprising 2,801 of the 10,784 words. That is 29% of the posts and 26% of the wordage… And this is after you have been instrumental in our hosts’ decision to set up a thread specially for non-climatological blather.
[Note: MAR takes up 8.57%. I’m fairly certain he is not 11.668% of all posters here. While not at the same level as Thomas, he is definitely taking more than his share. This is called hypocrisy.]
The value of your UV comments varies (in the main) from the banal to out-right flaming.
[Note: This is factually incorrect, and/or purely a matter of opinion. Why is MA’s opinion important here? Why does he assume anyone cares what he thinks?]
(Yet do note – I personally don’t give a monkey’s about personal insults down these threads. Indeed, on occasion I provide them myself but importantly, always in measured doses.)
[Ergo… why is he wasting space with this? To hear her-/himself type?]
(3) Although mitigation is off-topic in the present UV threads, it has been quite marked that you do not set out your own position regarding AGW. We get a lot of hand-wringing and doom-mongering and the odd bit of skyrocketry…
[Note: So? What does it serve the UV thread to belittle Thomas here? Different strokes, no? Why can’t MA scroll rather than make personal attacks? Why does MA think these personal attacks are appropriate?]
I have no appreciation of your position. For one criticising others as you do, that is also unacceptable.
So attack? Then hypocrisy?
It is hoped the moderator will understand the purpose of this post.
What of BPL, another famous poster with a taste for attacking others?
A sedate 5 posts. 5/5 insulting or responses to denialists. 4/5 with a insults. Between MAR and BPL we have 8 of 17 posts unnecessarily insulting, and an incredible 13/17 of dubious usefulness, depending on your view of bashing denialists.
Just sayin… The problem isn’t always where the gaslighter indicates.
31 Barton Paul Levenson says Victor @28 citing some incredible ass
[Insulting people not even posting here. Odd.]
42 Barton Paul Levenson said …is a damned lie, and you know what that makes you, don’t you?
[Note: A fair point, but still name-calling.]
119 Barton Paul Levenson says I’d tell him to grow up, but I have the sinking feeling he’s already technically an adult, and therefore not capable of any further maturing.
133 Barton Paul Levenson says Gee, I wonder why?
ESRL CO2 Weather Report
Last 5 days avg. is 409.7 ppm
This represents approx. +2.5 ppm above the Avg. March 2017 readings
CO2 levels from now are expected to keep rising through to May 2018
This present trend in CO2 Weather is indicative of a May 2018 average of at least 412 ppm
(all other things being equal)
This means it is quite possible that May 2018 avg. could easily hit 413 ppm if what’s actually happening in the Atmosphere is not equal with the recent past system. This is logical and reasonable to conclude. Of course only time will tell and everyone who follows these numbers will know by May 31st.
Which may be somewhere around 0.0005% of the world’s population.
CO2 @409.7 ppm in early March, Scorchimiso GHG Forcings maybe?
Any comments / thoughts?
Unlikely but still worth asking the question at this point of time, imv.
135 MA Rodger says: (see below)
Once again I want to express my gratitude to MA Rodger for presenting a relatively thoughtful and mostly respectful response to the “Circular Reasoning” essay I linked us to — https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3130131
In what follows, MA stands for Mr. Rodger and V for yours truly.
MA: Victor the Troll @122,
. . . The thesis in Munshi (2018) ‘Circular Reasoning in Climate Change Research’ (Self-published) sets out to “demonstrate the use of circular reasoning in three broad areas of climate change research.” . . .
Addressing these three broad areas of climate change research in reverse order:-
(3) The anthropogenic origin of the rise in atmospheric CO2 levels is questioned because the levels of uncertainty of the size of natural fluxes within the carbon cycle are seen as too large for such a conclusion to be made. It is a fatuous argument.
Also no alternative source is suggested for the 1.0Tt(CO2) that has been so-quickly and uniquely added to the atmosphere in recent history. Nor is the additional evidence showing the anthropogenic origin of that CO2 mentioned. And even so, the alleged circularity is not demonstrated.
V: On this point I agree. I was surprised to see this argument presented here because of the very strong evidence for the relation between fossil fuel emissions and atmospheric CO2 levels since the beginning of the industrial revolution, which even extreme CC skeptics accept without argument. His analysis on this point seems rather pedantic.
MA: (2) The anthropogenic causes of SLR (a very Victor-the-Troll subject) is questioned. Remarkably, a circularity of argument is achieved within Munshi (rather than being demonstrated within the subject of Munshi’s analysis) but detail of the Munshi analysis may be set out in a further Munshi self-published paper, although I will assume this is not the case.
V: You need to be more specific if you want to accuse him of presenting a circular argument. Where is it exactly?
MA: Further hand-waving concerning pre-20th-Century SLR rather muddies the argument, such SLR being a live area of research which is not set out in any proper way by Munshi.
V: Munshi’s argument strikes me as unnecessarily long and complicated, which makes it rather difficult to follow, granted. He also points to methodological problems which seem more closely related to confirmation bias than circular reasoning per se, thus confusing the issue.
MA: Munshi then ventures briefly into the issue of calibration of satellite data and in so doing, badly misrepresents Nerem et al (2018) and adds a little Victor-the-Trollishness by plotting 25-year SLR trends against annual FF CO2 emissions.
V: His point is that Nerem (among others) tends to adjust his sights in such a way as to confirm a pre-ordained hypothesis, [in other words: Seek and Ye Shall Find] and I think his accusation is well founded. How such maneuverings relate to circular reasoning is not always clear, however.
As I see it, the following statement from the Nerem paper (http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/02/06/1717312115) illustrates the problem more simply and clearly than Munshi’s perhaps overly complicated analysis: “As described in ref. 12, the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 caused a decrease in GMSL just before the launch of TOPEX, followed by a slow recovery that resulted in an apparent deceleration of sea level of −0.02 ± 0.01 mm/y2 over the 25-y record. To isolate the climate-change–driven acceleration, we remove this effect (Fig. 1), which increases the acceleration of the adjusted GMSL record from 0.097 to 0.117 mm/y.”
What this tells us is that “climate-change–driven acceleration” has been assumed ahead of time, and since the raw data failed to confirm the existence of such an acceleration (“In stark contrast to this expectation however, current altimeter products show the rate of sea level rise to have decreased from the first to second decades of the altimeter era.” — see https://www.nature.com/articles/srep31245), an estimate of the effects of the Mt. Pinatubo eruption has been inserted as a “correction” in order to produce the desired result. Since the existence of sea level acceleration is routinely produced as EVIDENCE of AGW, the role of circular reasoning should be evident. If the raw data had produced the desired result without the need for any such correction, then it seems unlikely that any search for any factor similar to the Pinatubo event would have been pursued in an effort to produce a more objective (but possibly undesirable) result.
MA: (1) The impact of AGW on tropical cyclone intensity & frequency covers much trampled ground but Munshi’s analysis concentrates on a single paper of some age (Emanuel (2005), the one which first defined PDI and which, mathematically flawed or not, is immaterial to the subject as a whole. Munshi badly represents climatology by stating that with the findings of Emanuel (2005), “it remained for climate science only to tend to the details of presenting the data in the appropriate format.” It is simply untrue to suggest that the relationship between PDI and SST is immutably derived from and solely based on Emanuel (2005), as this GFDL web-page clearly demonstrates.
V: No, but the Emmanuel paper is presented as an example of how data can be massaged to produce a pre-determined result. Since 2005, the lack of any meaningful relation between past cyclone activity and either global atmospheric warming or sea temperature has become evident to just about everyone– yet certain climate scientists refuse to give up, moving from the evaluation of past activity to projections into the future, which are highly hypothetical.
For “Victor the Troll” the use of circular reasoning has been obvious from the start. It is first assumed that anthropogenic CO2 emissions have caused global temperatures to rise steadily and dangerously over the last 100 years or so. And on the basis of that assumption it is further assumed that such temperatures will continue to rise indefinitely, producing disastrous effects. Thus, whenever any extreme weather event occurs, it is interpreted as evidence of “climate change,” which term has become equivalent to AGW, despite the fact that the relation between the two has never been established, but merely assumed. Of course, the possibility that temperatures may not continue to rise is rarely even considered.
138 CCHolley says:
CC: I took a cursory look at this paper. Without even getting to the statistical analysis, I find the paper to be deceitful and not very credible. Keep in mind, the SSRN site is for papers that are in their early stages prior to peer review and actual publication in a journal. The site’s focus is on the social sciences and humanities.
CC: (1) Storm Intensity.
The papers referenced on storm intensity are quite old when the signal was weaker.
V: Yes, but more recent events make the point even more strongly. According to the most recent evidence, there does not seem to be any sort of trend toward more hurricane activity and the signal for a possible increase in intensity is weak. But you are missing the point of Munshi’s paper, which is the tendency of Emmanuel (and by extension a great many others) to massage their data until it comes out “right”.
CC: (2) Sea level rise.
Sea levels were fairly stable with variability from 500 AD until about 1,000 AD. From 1,000 AD until the 1800s, sea level was mostly falling.
From chart in Stefan’s article here:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/06/2000-years-of-sea-level/
Temperatures and sea levels have NOT been mostly rising since the last glacial maximum, at least not in the last 10,000 years or so. The starting point of his argument is false, therefore his conclusions are wrong, regardless of the methodologies of the referenced studies.
V: Regardless of whether or not he was wrong, his focus is on the nature of the methodologies employed, not the results obtained.
CC: (3) CO2 in the atmosphere
This one is just silly.
V: On this point I agree. The relation between FF emissions and CO2 levels seems clear.
CC: Conclusion
Seems to me this is a fallacy fallacy and it is the author who is using a circular argument to attempt to prove a circular argument.
V: can you be more specific, because I can’t detect any circularity in any of his arguments. He IS biased, however, but that’s a different matter. Hardly anyone writing on this topic lacks some degree of bias.
CC: His argument does nothing to cast doubt on the physics behind global warming. Not a surprise, since the actual physics behind AGW is irrefutable, it appears to be a typical *denier* argument attempting to attack the fringes of the science.
V: The so-called “physics of climate change” is purely theoretical. Sure, there have been many results produced from relatively simple lab-based experiments, but projections of something as complex as the climate of both land and sea on this Earth are another matter entirely. So the idea that “the physics” can be regarded as, in itself, irrefutable with respect to long term climate change is hopelessly naive. There are some physics-based theories regarding the nature of climate change yes, but the ONLY way to test them is on the basis of the sort of evidence that climate scientists have been collecting for many years now, on, for example, global temperatures, ocean temperatures, sea level, frequency of drought, hurricanes, rainstorms, etc. This is where the danger of circular reasoning comes in, because so many have become convinced that AGW is a fact proven ahead of time by “the physics” that they tend to see any evidence that might be construed as consistent with “the physics” as evidence that AGW is in fact real, and not only real but significant, and moreover dangerous. Circular reasoning, as should be evident.
Algorisky – IRL: Online Life Is Real Life
https://irlpodcast.org/episode12/?utm_term=7993&sample_rate=0.001&utm_campaign=IRL12&snippet_name=7993&utm_medium=snippet&utm_content=REL
Scientists say conserve, not growth. 20k of them.
134 jgnfld says: “Can our resident deniers please provide an example of a single, generally accepted scientific inference that does NOT involve an “appeal to authority” somewhere in the inductive chain. […]”
jgnfld, overall that was a fairly useful well informed comment. Are you aware of the authoritative degree from decades of cognitive science, psychology and linguistics knowledge that supports Prof. George Lakoff’s scientific output and published books?
That work indicates using words like ‘deniers’ and their talking points in a passage actually activates subconscious memes. (I myself just did it too)
The question I would ask then is: Given what you said without any reference to ‘deniers’ stands alone as useful, why is that you couldn’t present such solid information absent being motivated by a ‘denier’ first?
Have you considered that you could take that content, place it into a different meme entirely, a more positive and constructive and forward looking context? Such as make a unique separate post that stands on it own authority instead. One that would of itself be useful to academic level readers and the ‘Public’. One that was a pertinent reminder for those who like you already know that, but worth highlighting occasionally to keep one’s “eye on the main game”?
—
I owe you jgnfld an apology too, for overlooking your contributions to the 403 responses to “Consequences” over at Open Mind in my post here:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/02/unforced-variations-mar-2018/comment-page-2/#comment-695826
jgnfld said to Sheldon the Denier:
“As has been pointed out to you scores of times by people with knowledge of stats your graphs “prove” exactly nothing. At most they are a pretty way of displaying the data.”
jgnfld also said, after Sheldon introduced faux witch burning history:
“But all this is, of course, a legal/political question not a scientific one. So why bring it up in a scientific forum? Is it part of being scientifically “skeptical”? (Hint: No.)
Wasn’t this already patently obvious why Sheldon et al would “bring it up in a scientific forum”, even before Tamino started his new Thread? How could anyone expect anything better where Sheldon, Victor, KIA, DDS et al are concerned?
As Leto concluded about Sheldon personally: ” You’ve taken the opportunity Tamino gave you and thoroughly beclowned yourself.”
I expected nothing less. What about Tamino?
(highlights of) Consequences
Posted on February 18, 2018 | 403 Comments
Sheldon Walker’s main disagreement with the danger of global warming isn’t about whether or not it’s happening, or whether or not it’s man-made. He isn’t convinced that the consequences will be as harmful as is often claimed. […] This isn’t so much a post, as a comment thread. It’s about the science, and what we can expect the consequences of global warming to be. […]
This thread is also about discussing other scientific claims from Sheldon Walker — or from others who dispute the danger of global warming. But his opinion of the severity of the consequences seems to be our main point of disagreement.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2018/02/18/consequences/
I seriously question how many times the consequences arose as a scientific issues that was discussed. And I seriously question Sheldon’s ability to even make a scientific point to begin with – and yet Tamino invited him inside the room anyway. 16 days later he then concludes:
tamino | March 3, 2018 at 12:22 pm |
It’s time for this thread to come to an end. I don’t regret the attempt to communicate, but it was not successful.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2018/02/18/consequences/#comment-101052
Gosh, was that a surprise to anyone? Really, was it? But Sheldon sure got a great opportunity to blow his trumpet and to send Open Mind awash with lashings of ‘denier meme’ lather and BS for free.
There were many really good issues and facts raised by scientifically grounded posters over there. It’s a shame that knowledge, perspectives, and excellent refs had to be wasted and now lost under ‘403’ bushels of blathering bs.
But why wait for a Sheldon to turn up to discuss serious scientific issues about the Consequences of AGW/CC progression and deal with that instead of arguing with a beclowned fool? Makes no sense to me, but each to their own self be true (I suppose).
—
I need to update/correct my quick summary of #Comments by ‘the smartest people in the RC Room’ (saying that is very lighthearted and affectionate!)
#Comments by Tamino x 16 = 3.97%
Barton Paul Levenson x 16 = 3.97%
jgnfld x 19 = 4.72%
Mal Adaptedx 25 = 6.20%
Al Rodger (aka MAR) x 37 = 9.18%
Doc Snow (aka K.McK) x 38 = 9.43%
Sub-Total X 151 = 37.47% (was 32.8%)
—
On the bright side this comment was excellent and something already posted to RC for consideration (zero responses yet but that’s the normal SOP here)
Doc Snow | March 1, 2018 at 11:42 pm
[Director] Lewis believes that ultimately Kill Climate Deniers must be read as a satire and that “satire is one of our most useful forms for critiquing really difficult politics”.
“It critiques the artist and the audience. It asks everybody to look at it through a different, lighter eye, in order to have the conversation, not the argument,” Lewis said.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2018/02/18/consequences/#comment-101032
Apologies for repeating myself through the ‘authoritative’ words of Lewis via the enlightened stream of consciousness which is Doc Snow and out of the physical cyberspace of Tamino’s Open Mind and back to the redundant past comments on Real Climate.
(smile)
Not another word has been said on Open Mind since tamino’s @ March 3, 2018 at 12:22 pm.
Nothing.
Apparently without a ‘denier’ in town to ‘argue with’, the scientific world and the ‘smartest people in the room’ are all speechless.
Chew on that. :-)
Regarding the research paper on circular reasoning by Jamal Munchi.
Firstly when a so called science paper alleges bias and political activism and without any evidence it deserves to be rubbish binned pretty fast.
However looking at the claims on hurricane intensity. The paper criticises the maths used in a study by Emanuel on hurricane intensity. Its just one paper and obviously a scientist will look deeply for evidence of increased intensity, there’s nothing inherently wrong in that. It will be judged on its merits and methods.
However its only one paper out of many studies of hurricanes, and different research agencies have found different results on hurricane intensity. The IPCC looks at a range of studies before reaching conclusions.
Munchi implies “the validity of agw warming may be in question” from his research yet he bases this on just one paper on hurricane intensity so Munchi is guilty of “cherry picking”. He should be looking at a wide range of research and see what it adds up to.
Regarding sea level rise, the main criticism appears to be selection only satellite data. But there’s nothing sinister in this because its known the tidal data is less accurate. So this is not circular reasoning.
Munchi also bases his conclusions on one paper on sea level rise only by Jevrijeva, so is again guilty of cherrypicking himself.
Regarding sources of atmospheric C02. This shows his lack of understanding of the climate issue. Sure there are uncertainties in the flows, but theres a lot of evidence that extra atmospheric CO2 has fossil fuel origins and no compelling alternative explanation, and you have to consider this “as well” as uncertainties. I’m not a climate scientist or statistician, more of an educated lay person and it should be obvious to someone like Munchin.
I think there’s a lot of circular reasoning, cherrypicking and confirmation bias and veiled political motives in Munchins own research paper!
New AGW/CC Science (and Impacts) Paper – Agronomy 2018, 8, 25. Pg 3 of 27
California USA – 3.2. Temperature
Climate change is often exemplified by increased temperature. However, variability in temperature is one of the primary factors affecting agriculture, forestry, water supplies, and human and ecosystem health [6]. Figure 1a shows how the global temperature has increased by 1.4◦C since1880 [7], whereas Figure 1b depicts the temperature variation in the state as compared to that of global temperatures. The rate of increase in minimum temperatures is greater than that of the mean or maximum temperatures [8]. Hansen et al. [9] characterized temperature increases in California from the past century, especially after 1975, using increments in mean temperature of about 1.2–2.2◦C [10].
[…]
Figure 2 displays annual maximum temperature projections until the end of the century (2100) based on observations from 1950 to 2005, employing two Representative Concentration Pathways scenarios (RCP4.5, left and RCP 8.5, right) [13]. These annual values are derived from four climate models: […]
https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4405251/Agronomy-08-00025.pdf
153 nigelj, if you have any other similar papers/refs that you found ‘enlightening/useful’ would you mind dumping them into FR as you go about your business please. No rush, a long term project I am compiling for the public. thx thomas the tongue-tied :)
What is the Forced Responses section on RC for?
Quote: “This month’s open thread on responses to climate change (politics, adaptation, mitigation etc.). Please stay focused on the overall topic.”
To some posters here on RC this is opined to be “non-climatological”
Oh really? How nice!
But is that even a genuine word? I can’t remember off the top of my head, so let us check that to be absolutely certain if it is and what it might mean in English and in Scientific circles.
Apparently yes, it is a ‘word.’
Definition of climatological in English:
adjective ‘climatological’ – See climatology
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/climatological
Oh, ok then.
Definition of climatology in English:
noun ‘climatology’ The scientific study of climate.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/climatology
Oh, ok then. What’s the scientific study of climate all about?
ANU Course – Climatology
An undergraduate course offered by the Fenner School of Environment and Society.
http://programsandcourses.anu.edu.au/course/ENVS3013
Quoting directly
Climate change as a result of human activities, or anthropogenic global warming, is now generally accepted as reality and includes a wide range of climatic processes and impacts in the global system that are affected by human activities.
This course provides an introduction to climate change science, impacts and policy implications. The fundamentals are provided in an overview of climate change science, focussing on the atmospheric processes that drive climatic variability and change, and an understanding of the global carbon cycle. Current and likely future impacts of global warming on ecosystems and human activities are also considered, including biodiversity, system buffering and resilience, and regional inequality and vulnerability. Societal response strategies are also investigated, focussing on international environmental treaties, international and Australian policy approaches to global warming, and management and adaptation strategies.
[end quotes]
Further reading if required see:
http://programsandcourses.anu.edu.au/course/ENVS3013
For those with disabilities or anyone in need of assistance please refer to Reading Comprehension Tips in this comment:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/02/unforced-variations-mar-2018/comment-page-3/#comment-695935
You’re welcome.
Now WE all know what the true facts of the matter is. Great.
Have a great day everyone ( except for MAR, HR, RL, MA, BPL, DDS, Victor, & Mr KIA, and of course jb. )
(smiling)
@161
Actually I think tamino provided a very good service in allowing sheldon to post though I’m not sure he himself thinks so. Sheldon provided a very clear psychological portrait of the mindset of committed deniers. (I know he says he agrees it’s warming. Regardless, he still denies the totality of the present science.)
In particular his use of fairly extreme ideological/political–even conspiratorial–thinking coupled with an inability/unwillingness to drill directly and deeply into any particular issue to maintain a singular world view is presented with great clarity.
At the risk of provoking recursive fury a la Lewandowsky, his writings there could easily be turned into a psychological case study showcasing denier thought processes. The general themes would be cherrypicking, shallow analysis, and irrelevant analogies directed at maintaining a particular ideological point of view rather than integration and deep analysis to try to understand what’s empirically happening.
What this means for communication of climate science to the wider public is possibly problematic. I think it’s clear sheldon’s ideology is fixed and not changeable. He is not going to be part of any consensus for action. This is true of many others as well. So in that sense communication may not be possible to his ilk.
It is the less ideological and presently inactive middle that must be reached, I think. That is where Dr. Hayhoe’s recent ideas on communication (i.e., seeking common ground) can come into play. There is no common ground to be found with committed ideologues, I fear.
RealClimate used to be an interesting forum before it was taken over by Thomas and Killian. Just checked in after a month away and see nothing has changed.
@161 (added)
Missed answering your 1st question…
The use of “denier” is provocative, sure. Sad, but true fact: You know, I know, everybody knows the denier group here has precisely zero wish to engage in actual deep analysis and integration of the scientific issues. They are ideologues and don’t, to my mind, deserve the same consideration that interested, dedicated knowledge seekers do. Churlish of me, perhaps. But human.
When I taught these concepts/issues to students desiring actually to learn them or honestly to explore/debate/even counter them I used no such provocative language even when they had other views.
That may beg the question–as you begged of me–of why then continue to post in response to said ideologues? The best answer I can come up with is that ideologues at the very least cannot be allowed to control the information flow. When they do we end up with, well, the the present situation in the US, the DT’s so to speak.
That said, the truly important group to reach is the non-ideologues–again as is obvious from our present situation. Given recent events, it is possible the non-ideological middle has learned its lesson and is now ready act on reason…we’ll see. For my part I’m not at all sure. Full detox is hard if I may continue my analogy.
Thomas (# 152). I had a look at the ‘mission statement’ for the site and as far as I can tell, questioning the credibility of the author of the ‘essay’ that Victor has been peddling here should not be too far not out of line.
Looks like Victor isn’t responding so I checked it out and yes the author of Victor’s groupthink ‘essay’, Christopher Booker, is the same journalist who, within the last year, claimed there has been no global warning for 19 years.
Thomas, I assume you would agree that RC is the wrong place for a discussion of anything written by Christopher Booker. If I’m wrong about this, I apologise in advance.
I encourage the moderators to consider raising the bar with respect to the comments posted here.
The ‘essays’ that Victor is promoting have nothing to do with science – and the focus of this thread (as noted in the comments above) is supposed to be about climate science. In my opinion, it’s time to hammer the gong and pull the plug on Victor and Mr. Know It All.
My hunch is that Victor and Mr. Know It All have no interest in advancing our understanding of climate science but are instead focused on turning the thread into a food fight in order to make RC look bad.
In any case, this thread has largely devolved into something that doesn’t resemble a rational discussion about science and if RC wants to maintain its reputation as a respected ‘go to’ site for intelligent scientific discourse, you really need to do something bout this.
I would also encourage the moderators to ban all comments that include any direct or indirect personal insults on all RC discussion threads starting now. Period. Too many in this thread to enumerate. There may be some good ideas buried somewhere among all the slander and scorn, contempt and abuse, but why the hell would anyone want to dig through all that crap to find them.
Bob Jefferson is an astute observer of this scene.
A technical question:
Are there published arguments for the minimum number of measuring stations needed to track global temperature change with sufficient precision to see the signal of the current change above the noise?
I have a memory of seeing a very low number (40?) which surprised me at the time, but I can’t remember where I saw that, and various kinds of searches bog down because “minimum” along with thermometers invariably finds papers about minimum temperatures, not minimum numbers of thermometers.
Any pointers welcome, and thanks in advance.
Killian @154.
You defend the inundation of Thomas by suggesting that I am in no position to criticise given the volume of my own contribution to the thread. (This is not the first time you have leveled criticism at me, but for once here you manage a logical criticism.)
For the record, in this thread-to-date I am responsible for 12 prior comments (7%) comprising 3,850 words (11%). In total there are 27 different commenters. I thus comprise 4% of this total.
You dismiss nine of my twelve comments as “insults all round,” this because you adjudge my comments either address trolls or are themselves trolling. And five were indeed addressing trolls (Weektor & Mr KIA) while for a sixth, I note Thomas has branded David Miller a troll so presumably you are of a similar view.
However, do note that the substance of these six comments sets out evidentially-based argument discussing what has become of late a very rare subject within RC UV threads – climatology!!!!
If the 34% of Thomas-comments and 37% of Thomas-words were a positive contribution to this thread, an argument could easily be made supporting his presence here.
So where are those positive contributions? Show me a Thomas comment or two that justify the 12,900 words of vaccuous error-filled nonsense smeared down this thread?
Yes I insult him as though he were a troll because he is plainly a fool operating way beyond his depth. (Note his attempt to quatify a comment thread @Open Mind – be it incompetence, over-exuberance or insincerity, he cannot even count the comments but still expends many hundreds of words telling us repeatedly about it.)
Thomas is like some obsessed neanderthal slavishly copying the actions of homo sapiens yet blind to the resulting nonsense. Is that defensible?
Go on!! Show me a Thomas comment or two in the above thread, a positive contribution from Thomas, something that even starts to justify the 12,900 words he has smeared down this thread!!!
Ken Fabian @126,
You point out Samset et al (2018) who model the complete removal of those negative forcings in a +1.5°C AGW world and find an extra +0.7°C results from their removal. Further, you see the TOA radiative imbalance as additional to today’s +1.0°C AGW and additional to that +0.7°C from removing the aerosols etc.
It is something to be worried about. Negative forcings have a far shorter atmospheric residency than GHGs. But unless the negative forcings are greatly reduced before we start making cuts in GHG emissions, we shoud be seeing the positive climate forcings dropping away alongside those reduction in aerosols. Within the timescales in which the aerosols will be reduced, we can/could also see reduced CH4 emissions and N2O emissions which will lead to lower GHG forcing in years rather than decades. And CO2 levels also will begin to drop significantly when the emissions are cut to a small portion of the current rate, cuts that may take two or three decades to appear. Such reductions in positive forcings would mean the pipe-line warming can be dodged and hopefully the loss of negative forcings will be less important.
Yet note that the level of negative forcings is poorly defined. As a result, a bigger worry is that there has been higher levels of negative forcing masking much of our AGW and the warming we see so far is associated with relatively low levels of net positive forcing coupled with a high climate sensitivity.
I’ve partially answered my question with this paper:
Jones, P. D., T. J. Osborn, and K. R. Briffa. “Estimating sampling errors in large-scale temperature averages.” Journal of Climate 10, no. 10 (1997): 2548-2568.
If I read it correctly, this says that the number of effectively independent stations needed to track century-scale changes is about 5, and for yearly changes the number is around 150. So maybe 40 effectively independent stations to detect a 30-year change is consistent with that.
I understand this is a theoretical minimum for the number of stations, and it would be improbable to actually locate such stations in practice, but does this seem broadly correct?
If so, can anyone point to minimal sets of actual stations with the desired property? How much larger might one expect such sets to be? (50 for a century, 1000 for a year ??)
I’ve partially answered my question with this paper:
Jones, P. D., T. J. Osborn, and K. R. Briffa. “Estimating sampling errors in large-scale temperature averages.” Journal of Climate 10, no. 10 (1997): 2548-2568.
If I read it correctly, this says that the number of effectively independent stations needed to track century-scale changes is about 5, and for yearly changes the number is around 150. So maybe 40 effectively independent stations to detect a 30-year change is consistent with that.
I understand this is a theoretical minimum for the number of stations, and it would be improbable to actually locate such stations in practice, but does this seem broadly correct?
If so, can anyone point to minimal sets of actual stations with the desired property? How much larger might one expect such sets to be? (50 for a century, 1000 for a year ??)
Thomas @166 discusses the descriptor “non-climatological” for the Forced Responses discussion thread and in so doing rather forgets that he is not supposed to be reading my comments so should not have seen use of the term “non-climatological” referenced to that thread, ‘climatology’ being the study of climate science and the subject-matter for the UV thread. ‘Climatology’ is apparently (as Thomas shows us @166) also used as the title for an ANU course on AGW.
Victor @158
I will respond individually due to time constraints.
More recent events do NOT make the point more strongly.
BTW, the prediction is for storm intensity to increase due to higher sea surface temperatures (a rather obvious conclusion), frequency is debated. If storm intensity were shown to not increase with warmer sea surface temperatures, the conclusion would be that we are lacking in our understanding of tropical storms, not AGW.
Latest paper that I can find is here:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00382-013-1713-0
This paper is still not current, first published in 2013, so again the latest high intensity storms are not included in the analysis. Your interpretation is that the current signal is weak, I believe this paper would dispute that. The latest storms would make the signal even stronger.
Questioning Munshi’s methodology does not by extension mean a great deal of others also do whatever is claimed. That is a one huge leap based on ONE single rather poor example. Are you that clueless in your critical thinking skills? The claim is absurd.
Looking at data by different methods to seek a trend is not massaging data and it is not a circular argument. It is only seeking what is expected in a rather noisy data set very early on the data gathering history. Conclusions based on such methodology may be weak and be highly uncertain, but that does not necessarily diminish the work. A circular argument says that a conclusion is based solely on the premise being true. The researchers in this case were looking for confirmation of a prediction and found that the data may show such, but they never claimed there was no uncertainty in the conclusion.
V 157: It is first assumed that anthropogenic CO2 emissions have caused global temperatures to rise steadily and dangerously over the last 100 years or so.
BPL: It is not “assumed” at all. It was predicted (Arrhenius 1896) from radiation physics. It was then confirmed by observations.
V 158: The so-called “physics of climate change” is purely theoretical.
BPL: Just because you’re not aware of the mountains of evidence for it doesn’t mean the evidence doesn’t exist.
Th 162: Not another word has been said on Open Mind since tamino’s @ March 3, 2018 at 12:22 pm. . . Nothing. . . Apparently without a ‘denier’ in town to ‘argue with’, the scientific world and the ‘smartest people in the room’ are all speechless. . . chew on that. :-)
BPL: Apparently you missed the fact that comments were closed on that thread and no new comment threads have been opened. Chew on that.
We are currently in a heat and CO2e lull thanks to La Nina conditions.
The LN lull is reported to have some consequences for tornadoes. You can read about that here:
https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/fading-la-nia-may-queue-enhanced-severe-weather-risk-southern-plains
from that piece: “La Niña has prevailed in the tropical Pacific for the second straight winter. This winter’s weak to near-moderate La Niña event was more potent than the marginal La Niña episode of 2016-17. In its latest monthly ENSO update, issued Thursday, NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center calls for the current La Niña event to weaken through the spring. CPC also gives an 80% chance that either El Niño or neutral conditions will be in place by the end of 2018.”
I think it’s interesting to track CO2 and CO2e, but the tracks have the periodic ups and downs related to LN and EN conditions, so I do bote calculations to attempt to smooth those out for the purpose of estimating the background rate of increase in CO2 in the atmosphere. I think this is useful for evaluating emission (and other tangential) reports claims/stories that might lead folks to think we are making significant progress in responding to global warming.
In another way, smoothing out the LN and EN bumps makes less sense, and that other way is the impact that is observed and felt with an EN surge in CO2 and heat in the biosphere. I think that last big EN event was persuasive to a lot of folks who might have wanted for one reason or another to deny that global warming was going to be a problem during their lives or the lives of their children. The next big EN event is going to move all the needles as the last one did. I think the heat buildup is less “theoretical” now than it was a decade ago even though the heat buildup of a decade ago was easy to spot in the historical record. We have moved beyond the “well, everyone loves a nice, hot day” to news coverage of heatwave related deaths in conjunction with personal experience that it’s just too hot on a lot of days. It certainly was too hot for me here in the PNW last August. I think with each EN event now, more people will recognize that the heat we have generated on the planet is actually dangerous.
I am getting old and may not have to live through a lot more EN events, but the EN events are the moment in time when more people can be helped to understand that the baseline level of CO2 in atmosphere and oceans have reached a dangerous level. In that sense, EN events are now a teachable moment, so here we go. Maybe we have EN event ramping up by end of 2018 as Cat 6 suggests. That will lead to a new pulse of CO2 into the atmosphere in response to the elevated global temp and maybe all that will help more folks get on the bandwagon.
Oh, did you want some good news? Here is something to read if you yearn for news that sounds good: https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-carbon-emissions-in-2017-fell-to-levels-last-seen-in-1890
I can’t bite on the emissions good news report as I watch the CO2 levels remain on the rise with the rate of rise increasing. Does not look flat-ish to me.
Daily CO2
March 4, 2018: 409.97ppm
March 4, 2017: 407.46 ppm
Just a few years ago we passed the 400 mark for the first time in the record. Here we are now hanging out around 410. Weapons Grape Stupid.
Cheers
Mike
jgnfld @167, I agree with your commentary on climate denial.
If you look at the history of new theories, most people come to eventually accept them, but there’s often a small core group who remain in permanent denial. This is typically very roughly around 20%, due a combination of vested job interests, addictions, ideology and psychological attributes. (vaccines, evolution, the tobacco disease link etc).
So there’s room to convince more people of climate science on the evidence and rationality, but a core group of maybe about 20% will remain in permanent or near permanent denial.
Feel free to dispute my numbers if you have actual evidence otherwise.
Bob Jefferson at 168…
I agree. I was a regular reader of the site and the comments from the sites inception until a few years ago. I learned a tremendous amount about climate science in the process. It’s really disappointing to see what’s become of the comments section. I’d add KIA and Victor and a few others to your list…
Thomas, you think I’m a troll? Oh, my. Try searching for my name on this site and you’ll see how absurd that notion is.
Nigel! Thank you!! Those are the kinds of things I was looking for. Definitely some reading for me before I pass them along:)
169
jgnfld,
Thank you very much for your well considered, well balanced, honest, decent, respectful and obviously genuine responses above. (fwiw Rome wasn’t built in a day … proper discussions in text based fora takes time, patience and effort, I appreciate your effort here) .. and I mean that sincerley.
A small note, however, is a query about my first question which was :
Are you aware of the authoritative degree from decades of cognitive science, psychology and linguistics knowledge that supports Prof. George Lakoff’s scientific output and published books?
I cannot see that you actually answered that question (not that you must). I cannot connect what you have said back to that query. If you wish to now answer it, or whatever, feel free. No big deal to me either way.
Thank you, Thomas.
PS
Perhaps you may find some value in my latest comment about what happened on Open Mind if it makes it through the mods in tack in the FR thread.
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/03/forced-responses-mar-2018/comment-page-2/#comment-696044
170 Mel Reasoner, I am on board 100% with every thing you said. I concur. Thx for your response, nothing personal in including your comment in my list – it was only a matter of being *accurate*, which is why I included myself in it.
—|—
181 Barton Paul Levenson
“BPL: Apparently you missed the fact that comments were closed on that thread and no new comment threads have been opened. Chew on that.”
No I did not miss that. You missed the fact that I have in fact already quoted the final comment by Tamino verbatim with the comment url here days ago. Doh!
People in glass houses should not throw stones, but you keep on doing this – getting facts wrong for years now.
My god man! Seriously! Elephants have no place in a china shop either. That’s a metaphor that applies to you BPL, not myself. Please seek out the information contained in my posts about *reading comprehension* and how to be successful at it mate!
Or, simply read what I wrote and seek a 2nd opinion about what I actually wrote and what that means to a ‘normal’ person not embittered.
Have a great day now, ya hear!
—|—
182
mike
Elsewhere La Nina is wreaking havoc in summer/autumn fyi.
fwiw re “either El Niño or neutral conditions will be in place by the end of 2018.” I posted reports urls here that ENSO is already in Neutral and it is *possible* an El Nino could form as early as May 2018 … time will tell of course.
and March 09: 409.97 ppm, as well as March 4th Mike.
Mike the ESRL week avg for March 3rd to March 9th is 409.8 ppm
La Nina is having little no effect on decreasing CO2e levels in the atmosphere. The rate of increase is still accelerating mate.
Cheers
AGW/CC Data ASIE
Day 68 of ASIE still breaking world record lows 14.23 2kms on March 9th – now accumulated 62 *skyrockety* days in unprecedented ASIE record lows during 68 days of 2018.
Science ref
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/
—|—
More Science
“Climate change computer model vindicated 30 years later by what has actually happened. Sceptics have long sneered at climate models but one made in the late 1980s has proved remarkably prophetic”
“Writing in the journal Nature Climate Change, Dr Ronald Stouffer, head of the climate and ecosystem group at Princeton University, and Dr Syukuro Manabe, a senior meteorologist at the same US college, said they had not expected the model to be so accurate.”
“It is quite surprising that the observed and projected pattern of surface temperature change are very similar to each other,” they wrote.
“It … suggests that the model likely contains the key physical processes that control the geographical pattern of global warming at the earth surface.”
COMMENTARY:
Assessing temperature pattern projections made in 1989
Ronald J. Stouffer * and Syukuro Manabe
https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3224.epd
Full access url @ https://goo.gl/hgsy6o
Special Climate Seminar: Syukuro “Suki” Manabe – 2 years ago
https://vimeo.com/148640211
—|—
and, 182 mike, again
“….the Tropics are now 50degr nth and sth and here in NZ we are preparing for the second fully fledged tropical cyclone of three in a week.”
https://earth.nullschool.net/#2018/03/10/1800Z/wind/isobaric/70hPa/overlay=mean_sea_level_pressure/equirectangular=-171.30,-0.03,277/loc=-123.572,-70.055
PS above
Assessing temperature pattern projections made in 1989
“When the model results used here
were published, we did our best to make
the model’s simulation of the current
climate as realistic as possible. However,
we did not adjust our model in any way
to simulate the future climate changes for
the obvious reason that we did not know
how the climate was going to change
when the simulation was made. This is
why we are very much encouraged to find
that the salient features of climate change
distribution projected by the model are
becoming evident in the observations.
“In other words, the projections shown
here were made before the observations
confirmed them as being correct, striking
at the heart of the argument that modellers
tune their models to yield the correct
climate change results.”
Mike @182
Weapons Grape Stupid?
Victor @158
Post @178 above: Questioning Munshi’s methodology does not by extension mean a great deal of others also do whatever is claimed. Should have read: Questioning Emmanuel’s methodology does not….
Here in lies the complete ignorance of Victor. This has been discussed so many times that either Victor does not have the intellectual capacity to understand the physics, or he is unwilling to make the effort to learn what the science actually tells us. Victor makes an argument from personal incredulity while accusing others of using logical fallacies.
The so called “physics of climate change” is purely theoretical.
Nonsense.
The greenhouse effect is based on physical laws.
The radiative properties of substances under multiple conditions determined in the lab are irrefutable. Such properties of substances are confirmed by quantum mechanics and they do not change in the “real world” from what was determined in the laboratory. Likewise for our understanding of thermodynamics. We have the First, Second, Third, and Zeroth LAWS of thermodynamics. How we apply these laws to to greenhouse gas theory is not questioned. Beyond thermodynamics, we also have a thorough understanding of the mechanisms of heat transfer. The how of heat transfer is irrefutable. Stefan-Botzmann Law, Wien’s Displacement Law, Planck’s Law, Fourier’s Law, and Newton’s Law of Cooling are examples. How we apply these laws to greenhouse gas theory is irrefutable. Physical laws are physical laws.
The effect of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere can be determined through mathematical modeling based on the known physical laws. This is not in dispute by any scientist with any expertise at all in climate science. Not Curry, not Lindzen, not Spencer. None. The effect of a doubling of CO2 is about 1 degrees celsius. This IS irrefutable physics.
Water vapor is the largest and strongest feedback to CO2. Humidity is rather complex, but we do have a good understanding the relationship of humidity to temperature. Psychometric Charts have been around a long time. Although there is some uncertainty as to exactly how much the humidity will increase it can be irrefutably stated that the feedback is at least another one degree celsius per doubling of CO2. Again, this is based on known irrefutable physics. Warmer air holds more humidity and we can calculate the effect of that increased water vapor on the radiative balance
In 2002 the Aqua satellite was launched with AIRS instrumentation for measuring humidity at all atmospheric layers. Analysis of the data in 2008 by Dressler and his team confirmed that for every increase in surface temperature of 1 degree celsius, the water vapor feedback was 2 watts per square meter. The latest studies done in 2015 indicate that humidities are now higher due to the warming than many models predicted. More on the lines of a total climate sensitivity of 4.0 degrees. Contrary to Victor’s statements, the result of the application of physics to the greenhouse gas theory has been confirmed through direct observations.
Overall, the PHYSICS tells us irrefutably, that the combined climate sensitivity of CO2 and water vapor is at least 2 degrees celsius and the physics is backed up by satellite observations. Two degrees is the lowest climate sensitivity possible without negative feedbacks. Negative feedbacks are possible, but to date there is no evidence that such exist and no known physical mechanism for such to occur. Clouds were a possibility, but the evidence, from satellites, appear to show this is not so. Clouds are moving from the equator making them a positive feedback.
So the idea that “the physics” can be regarded as, in itself, irrefutable with respect to long term climate change is hopelessly naive.
Wrong. Climate is complex but that does not mean it is impossible to understand. The climate must respond within the bounds of physical laws. Physical laws that are well understood. There are uncertainties as to how long it will take to reach equilibrium so the speed of warming is not clearly known, but warm it will. There are uncertainties as to the magnitude of the feedbacks and how fast they will respond, but none of that tells us that it will not warm. On the contrary, the physics IS irrefutable. Adding CO2 will result in warming. At least 2 degrees per doubling. And very likely higher.
Naivety is believing that there is some other magical explanation for the current warming trend and that AGW won’t have significant impact on society.
170 Mel Reasoner
“I encourage the moderators to consider raising the bar with respect to the comments posted here.
The ‘essays’ that Victor is promoting have nothing to do with science – and the focus of this thread (as noted in the comments above) is supposed to be about climate science. In my opinion, it’s time to hammer the gong and pull the plug on Victor and Mr. Know It All.”
Perhaps you missed my post 62 where I tried to steer the conversation back to science. In any case, “Let’s get to it” as Kris Kristofferson says at 2:50 in this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gILYTdqqCo0
Whatcha say? Here’s a science question for you, and for any and all climate scientists:
What is the general methodology used in climate science models to calculate the future rise in temperature due to increased CO2 in the atmosphere. Mathematically, how do the models work. BPL and others have occasionally provide insight into it, but I lose track of the posts! And as you indicate I don’t want to read thru the insulting posts constantly being posted here to try to find the good posts!
So, the question stands. I’m wondering how the models calculate the temperature increases. I understand the general principle that more atmospheric CO2 reflects more IR radiation back to earth making earth warmer, but I want to know how do the models calculate the temperature rise. Is it just Plancks Law, Wein’s Diplacement Law, and the Stefan-Boltzmann Law? Or is there more?
170 Mel Reasoner says:
MR: Looks like Victor isn’t responding so I checked it out and yes the author of Victor’s groupthink ‘essay’, Christopher Booker, is the same journalist who, within the last year, claimed there has been no global warning for 19 years.
V: Is that literally what he said? It would help to have an exact quote, and a reference. The degree of warming over the last 20 years or so has been hotly debated, as I’m sure you are aware. Regardless of how any one person might want to interpret the data, it does seem clear that the steep warming trend over the last 20 years of the 20th century has not been continued into the 21st. Even Michael Mann has acknowledged that. While technically there does seem to have been some warming between 1998 and ca. 2015 (according to some records at least), leading to (misleading) claims of “record breaking” heat, the increases have been minimal, and according to some, statistically insignificant. And yes, things have heated up in the last few years, probably due to an unusually intense El Nino, but that is the sort of thing climate scientists used to refer to as “weather” as opposed to “climate,” though now they seem to be changing their tune. In any case, Booker’s views on 21st century temperature trends have no bearing on his very different argument regarding group think, which I find convincing.
MR: The ‘essays’ that Victor is promoting have nothing to do with science – and the focus of this thread (as noted in the comments above) is supposed to be about climate science. In my opinion, it’s time to hammer the gong and pull the plug on Victor and Mr. Know It All.
My hunch is that Victor and Mr. Know It All have no interest in advancing our understanding of climate science but are instead focused on turning the thread into a food fight in order to make RC look bad.
V: The most convincing evidence for the validity of Booker’s argument can be found right here on this blog, where the vast majority of responses to ANYTHING posted by ANYONE expressing skepticism of the mainstream view is dismissed with insults and ad hominem attacks, in perfect accordance with the “group think” paradigm. Your comments above are an excellent example.
From Booker’s essay:
“The views of anyone who fails to share [the “consensus” view] become wholly unacceptable. There cannot be any possibility of dialogue with them. They must be excluded from any further discussion. At best they may just
be marginalised and ignored, at worst they must be openly attacked and discredited.
Dissent cannot be tolerated.”
Despite what some here contend, Tamino’s experiment with listening to the denialati was not a failure. It did yield some interesting results for a particular type of denialist–the narcissist. For this particular species, the contrarian stance ensures that they get attention–both from the unsophisticated rubes at WTFUWT and from the reality-based community. There are a lot of denialist trolls out there that are motivated by narcissism and seem to think that they only way to prove they are smarter than all the smart people out there is to disagree with them. Dick Lindzen comes to mind among actual once-publishing climate scientists. This particular type of denialism is unfortunately very difficult to treat, because the attention received for their contrarianism provides more reward to their psyche than the pleasure of understanding.
For the particular denialist studied at Open Mind, how the research–or those presenting it–made them feel was more important than its truth or predictive/explanatory power. This was also seen in some of the anti-feminist views presented by the subject.
So, the exercise did present some insight into a particular type of denialist troll even if it did not prove persuasive to the subject.
The thing is that there are many different types of troll, and any particular troll may present a mix of motivations. Some of them can be persuaded. At this point in the debate, however, most would have been persuaded by evidence already if such persuasion were possible. You can’t fix stupid.
@172
The Jones, P. D., T. J. Osborn, and K. R. Briffa7 article cited above goes into the issues in great detail and is available in open source at https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/1520-0442%281997%29010%3C2548%3AESEILS%3E2.0.CO%3B2 .
For a simpler, gross approximation simply note that the Central Limit theorem suggests that standard error is related to the square root of the number of observations. Going from 6000 station to 600 increases the standard error only 3.2X and down to 60 stations increases the error only 10X.
Prof Benjamin P. Horton
Associate Chair (Faculty), Asian School of the Environment
People are hungry for news about the risk of climate change but boring, technical jargon is alienating them, said the United Nations top environment official Erik Solheim in December 2017.
People need to be excited and inspired to take action and change their behaviour, he added.
Yet “the language of environmentalists has been boring, so uninspiring … If we just speak a technical language, with many acronyms and politically-correct phrases, no one will listen,” he said in an interview during a Bonn conference on landscapes.
Perhaps the consequences of human-driven climate change seem abstract, technical or too far away in the future.
Read more here:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/03/forced-responses-mar-2018/comment-page-2/#comment-696076
AGW/CC Mitigation – 22 national academies and societies of science from around the Commonwealth call for urgent Government action and Net Zero GHG Emissions
The consensus statement, which represents the consensus views of tens of thousands of scientists, …. […]
Secretary of Science Policy at The Australian Academy of Science, Professor David Day, said […] “Even if all the country commitments from the Paris Agreement are met, the best interpretation of the latest data shows that by the end of the century the global climate is likely to be 3°C above pre-industrial levels.
https://www.science.org.au/news-and-events/news-and-media-releases/global-science-leaders-call-further-action-climate-change
Read the Consensus Statement on Climate Change
https://www.science.org.au/supporting-science/science-policy/position-statements/cwealth-acad-science-consensus-statement-climate-change
For RC Discussions / or hurling abuse go here:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/03/forced-responses-mar-2018/comment-page-2/#comment-696080
AGW/CC Science & Data – CO2 Weather Report
Up-to-date weekly average CO2 at Mauna Loa
Week beginning on March 4, 2018: 409.84 ppm (+3.28 ppm -yr)
Weekly value from 1 year ago: 406.56 ppm
Weekly value from 10 years ago: 385.95 ppm
Last updated: March 11, 2018
Chew on that! :-)
AGW/CC Science & CO2 ppm growth rates were still accelerating a day ago
UV January #103 Thomas says:
14 Jan 2018 at 3:36 PM
Quote:
Interesting CO2 ppm data coming out of Mauna Loa already this non-El Nino year.
(my estimated) January-February weekly ppm average
2015 ~400
2016 ~403
2017 ~406
2 weeks of Jan 2018 ~409 ppm avg., and heading towards 410 ppm / +4 ppm above last year.
(ie above 2017 Jan-Feb wkly ppm average by the end of February)
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/01/unforced-variations-jan-2018/comment-page-3/#comment-689429
12th March – Many abusive belittling and insulting ridicule response comments ensued from RC regulars.
12th March – Week beginning on March 4, 2018: 409.84 ppm (+3.28 ppm -yr)
409.84 ppm is 0.16 ppm under the +4 ppm above the 2017 Jan-Feb wkly ppm average and within the error bars.
409.84 ppm wkly avg has occurred within 1-7 days of the last weekly avg of February 2018.
Therefore my suggestion that CO2 was “heading towards 410 & +4 ppm” by the end of February above the Jan-Feb avg was essentially correct with the real world observation results delayed by one week.
Any comments about that?
—|—
UV January #17 Thomas says:
3 Jan 2018 at 4:42 AM
Quote:
(b) Our current climate models omit numerous feedback mechanisms including freshwater hosing [e.g. Hansen et al. (2016), DeConto & Pollard (2016) and Bakker et al. (2017)];
(c) Our current climate models cannot replicate the relatively high climate sensitivities, and Arctic Amplifications, of Super Interglacial periods, which are most relevant to our future in 2100;
and Any comments?
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/01/unforced-variations-jan-2018/#comment-688831
12th March – No response comments were made
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UV January #52 Thomas says:
5 Jan 2018 at 5:38 PM
Quoting Published Peer-Reviewed Science Papers:
“Our results suggest that achieving any given global temperature stabilization target will require steeper greenhouse gas emissions reductions than previously calculated.” […]
We conclude that the world has already overshot appropriate targets for GHG amount and global temperature, and we thus infer an urgent need for….
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/01/unforced-variations-jan-2018/comment-page-2/#comment-688979
12th March – No response comments were made
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UV January #66 Thomas says:
6 Jan 2018 at 11:50 PM
IPCC/NSIDC trends [based on SIE sea ice extent] underestimate the real speed of ASI loss – true/false/maybe.
October 2017 ASI volume was 65% below the maximum October ice volume in 1979 – true/false/maybe doesn’t matter.
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/01/unforced-variations-jan-2018/comment-page-2/#comment-689030
12th March – No response comments were made
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UV January #88 Thomas says:
10 Jan 2018 at 10:07 PM
Climate change to expand impacts of El Nino/La Nina extremes (New AGW/CC Science Letter)
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/01/unforced-variations-jan-2018/comment-page-2/#comment-689251
12th March – Only one response comment made by Killian
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Regarding 166:
1. Thomas: Have a great day everyone ( except for MAR, HR, RL, MA, BPL, DDS, Victor, & Mr KIA, and of course jb. )
(smiling)
jb: Hello Thomas
(smiling)
2. To all of Thomas’ targets. He is very exasperating, isn’t he? That’s his goal. He wants to wear you out with ad thominem. But you know that.
3. To the moderators, about comment 166. This is a wonderful microcosm of Thomas. This is a long set of words, most of which compose links, introductions to links, and wholesale quotes. The only statement from Thomas other than insults is “[A]pparently yes, it is a ‘word.’ [sic]” and “Now WE all know what the true facts of the matter is [sic]. Great.” Frankly, there are no real hints about the “true facts of the matter” anywhere in the post.
What is the point of allowing such a hodge-podge of words on your blog? It frustrates your old posters. It aggravates people who don’t post but use the blog as a resource – and there are many such people. It discourages new people from returning.
4. What about this habit of wholesale quoting? These lengthy quotes monopolize your blogspace to its detriment and they don’t represent the thought of the commenter. I’ll refer once again to the freaking awesome advice of zebra … https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/02/unforced-variations-feb-2018/comment-page-4/#comment-693325
5. If I wanted to undermine this blog, this is the way I would do it. I would send someone to overwhelm the physical space of the blog with quotes, links and insults. In other words, if Thomas didn’t exist, I would have to create him.
From 1985: Warnings from Carl Sagan and Al Gore https://climatecrocks.com/2018/03/11/from-1985-warnings-from-carl-sagan-and-al-gore