This month’s open thread for climate science issues.
Reader Interactions
409 Responses to "Unforced Variations: Aug 2018"
Ron R.says
“Hardly ever do I hear much of anything containing specifics regarding exactly WHAT is to be done.”
One thing might be to re-examine how we got here. For instance, on August 1st we ran into overshoot globally, the point when the Earth officially ran out of the sustainable resources that would be needed to replenish our consumption for 2018. Now we’re living on borrowed resources from the future, with each year the planet running out earlier. The first world leads the way here with A LOT more consumption than we are entitled to population-wise.
One way this happens is just based on our family habits, which have been carefully manipulated by business for decades. Our worth, we’re led to believe from grade school on, isn’t actually based in our personhoods, no, it’s in our being consumers. This means that people amount to little more than walking wallets in the minds of corporations. Thus, we’re counted in terms of “per capita” and given numbers as ultimate identification instead of names.
If we were to reassess some of the subtle propaganda we’ve been fed we could find solutions. In third world countries, for example, countries that, out of necessity are forced to live more sustainably environmentally-speaking, families tend to remain together, with several generations living in the same structure.
In the US, on the other hand, especially since the 1950s, people have been conditioned to feel that when they turn 18, or when they marry, they should move out and find their own homes. This has led to a boom in the construction industry, so of course they love it, but it has meant an unnecessary multiplication on the harvest of natural resources. From the virgin land needed to put all those homes and communities on, to the lumber needed to actually build those new homes, to all the resources needed to fill those homes with the same stuff that could likely be found in the parent’s home, etc. If we were to push for families to stay together longer, it would not only make for the use of lots less resources, but might even make for happier, closer families and even less lonely elders (providing that everyone is game).
We need to look at communities that are living sustainably now and find out how they are doing it. Maybe we can start with the countries in green here:
V 131: Scientists as intelligent as Michael Mann and James Hansen should have realized from the start that, if “the science” they endorse is as incontrovertible as they’ve claimed, the ONLY really effective option would have been to shut down the world economy in a manner that would have been (and currently remains) totally unacceptable, for reasons political, economic, social and also practical.
BPL: Fallacy of bifurcation. Your either-or choice is unnecessary; other options were available and still are.
V 132: Seems to me, then, that the real underlying agenda of the CC “movement” is not “fighting climate change” so much as the demand that all of us perform a series of sacrificial acts, to atone for our environmental sins. In other words, we are dealing with a cult.
BPL: Seems to me you are dealing with a straw man.
Fred Magyarsays
Killian @ 121 says:
Anywho… My point was rather fine-tipped: The paper’s author is confused, and engaging in speaking aloud his suicidal ideations, imo, and that part of your post belongs over on the other thread. Not a criticism, just an observation.
OK, point taken. So if examining this topic is truly OT on this thread then I don’t want to go too far down the rabbit hole with it here but I will just make one last comment for the sake of making it easier to follow the the logic of my thoughts without having to jump to another thread.
The first point is really a direct question to you, where exactly in the paper does the author say anything that would lead one to conclude he is having suicidal ideations?
Whether or not you agree with his conclusion, that there will be near term collapse of societies, it seems to me he is simply proposing that a discussion on how to adapt to such collapse, should it come to pass, is something that should be addressed. To be clear, I assume that even you would agree that there is a non zero percent chance, that we might see collapsing societies within this century, should we continue on a business as usual path with greenhouse gas emissions. There is certainly scientific evidence discussed in the literature which he cites that might lead one to be concerned about feedbacks and tipping points that may or may not have already been passed.
From the abstract:
The approach of the paper is to analyse recent studies on climate change and its implications for our ecosystems, economies and societies, as provided by academic journals and publications direct from research institutes.
That synthesis leads to a conclusion there will be a near term collapse in society with serious ramifications for the lives of readers. The paper reviews some of the reasons why collapse-denial may exist, in particular, in the professions of sustainability research and practice, therefore leading to these arguments having been absent from these fields until now.
The paper offers a new meta-framing of the implications for research, organisational practice, personal development and public policy, called the Deep Adaptation Agenda. Its key aspects of resilience, relinquishment and restorations are explained. This agenda does not seek to build on existing scholarship on “climate adaptation” as it is premised on the view that social collapse is now inevitable.
Second and my final comment here on this particular topic: Simply citing a paper that purports to see a need for the reframing of the conversation about implications of possible collapse of societies, due to the impacts of climate change is not, imho, the same thing, as discussing the nuts and bolts of any particular adaptation strategy. Which would be an example of what I have interpreted as being OT in this thread, at least up until now.
I.E. if we were to discuss the hows and whys of implementing permaculture practices or a large scale WWII like war effort, involving the implementation of distributed solar PV, in order to prevent ecological and societal collapse.
Carriesays
154 Fred Magyar quotes: “it is premised on the view that social collapse is now inevitable.”
I’m with Gem on that. I will add that international cooperation breakdown and then collapse is also inevitable. Isn’t it obvious? For most no it’s not, not yet.
Meanwhile MA Rodger @133 in asking: “Do you believe it possible that humanity will continue with its CO2 emissions at roughly 10Gt(C)/year for the rest of this century? shows he is missing the forest for the trees and cannot see the Elephant in the room despite all the scientific papers that have endlessly told him so.
Human CO2 emissions of 10 Gt (C) per year to date are not the only driver of global warming today and will not be the only driver of global warming into the future either. Some papers address these issues most of them do not. A handful of hundreds of GCMs (future modelling scenarios) consider only some of the feedbacks, but most do not, at least not at the mass scale implications of those feedbacks when the global temperatures are plus 1.5C, 2C, or 2.5C, or 3.4C as ref’d in the discussion with Nemesis.
This is self-evident for those capable of seeing the big picture over time into the future and who have been able to both keep up to date and to connect the dots of the SYNERGISTIC EVIDENCE & the KNOWLEDGE contained in individual climate science papers COMBINED plus in the context of what is said (and NOT said) in the various IPCC chapter reports especially in AR5 and SRM.
Ya can lead a horse to water but you cannot make them drink. :-)
KILLIAN, I even went to the time & trouble to COPY PASTE the precise words used by Gem and still you refuse to see and understand what he said. Sorry can’t help you there. I happen to agree with his basic scenario. It fits. It needs to be said because people deserve to know the whole truth and not PR Spin from all sides of this Lemmings Debate. imo, yit’s you who is missing the point of his Paper http://www.lifeworth.com/deepadaptation.pdf and the website name : LIFE WORTH :)
Victorsays
Ron R.: “We need to look at communities that are living sustainably now and find out how they are doing it.”
Who is this “we”? And what is it, exactly, that you would like to see happen? Are you proposing that the UN set up a commission to study these communities, so it can draw up a set of recommendations, along the lines of the IPCC Reports. Do you have any idea how long that would take? Should the UN then follow up on these recommendations by establishing some sort of international police force to ensure these methods are universally adopted? If not, then what means would you propose to ensure that “we” adopt these methods? And by “we” whom exactly are you referring to? The United States? Europe? Asia? The world population?
In other words: how naive can you get?
As quoted in #154:
“That synthesis leads to a conclusion there will be a near term collapse in society with serious ramifications for the lives of readers.”
“Will be?” Oh my, “WILL BE????” What about Iraq, what about Afghanistan, what about Libya, what about Syria, what about Yugoslavia, what about Zimbabwe, what about Venezuela, — not to mention the collapse of the Soviet Union? Nor the many serious crises now being experienced in countless other corners of the world, including severe shortages of food, water, medicine, etc. My God man, is “climate change” all you can think about? The world is collapsing all around you, for reasons that have nothing to do with climate, but you all (aka “yins,” for BPL’s benefit) don’t seem to care a whit, so long as you can run on about the dire consequences we all face due to an increase in global temperatures of less than 1 degree over the last 100 years. Come down to Earth my friends, look around you, WAKE UP!!!!
Nemesissays
@MA Rodger, #133
Ah yes, I said this in comment #84:
” We’ll learn through sheer pain quickly that these models are INDEED “inherently conservative”. I learned all about these “inherently conservative” models when it comes to mass die-off, especially insect die-off and what have you during decades of research- the system just don’t like real bad news, it does not like doomsday scenarios for a reason:
BLEAK projections undermine the calculated, capitalist optimism of the system.”
So I just said what is true: The capitalist system does not like bleak projections, because it wants to go on forever. Then you said:
” Have I blundered into some nightmare debate of the Marxist dialectic?”
Yeah, I know that trail quite well, heard it a million times. But I am NO MARXIST, NO COMMUNIST. What is this?! Are we still in the f* McCarthy era or what is this? Am I part of some Edgar Hoover trial against me as a communist or what is this?! I critizised CAPITALISM, but I never voted for any communist party, I NEVER VOTED FOR ANY POLITICAL PARTY AT ALL, I despise everyday politics, all forms of politics, I give a shit about politics all together. You can’t imagine how happy I am to have no political power whatsoever, because this way I am only responsible for my own private deeds as a complete nobody, nope else. Did you know? Some denier of climate change once said to me:
” Climate change is RED propaganda.”
Actually I hear that all the time whenever I talk to deniers of climate change^^ Just go to youtube or talk to any denier and you will hear it all the time:
So, you see, I am A- POLITICAL, but that will not stop me from telling you this:
Capitalism failed teriffic for at least half a century in terms of anthropogenic induced climate heating (not to mention overall ecological destruction, social justice ect ect ect.)
Now dream on as you like and talk to me again when you are able to pull off significant proof of global CO2 levels DE- CREASING for at least some months (no, I’m not talking about some funny cunning “deceleration of increase” and shit)… tic tac tic tac tic tac tic tac……
Nemesissays
@MA Rodger
I tell you a neat little story:
I grew up out there in the streets like a wolf, developing wolf (not shep) instinct, I am a surivor. And I came to enjoy funny schools, funny correction homes, funny jobs, funny politics, funny economy, funny media, funny psychology and propaganda techniques like Edward Bernais, S. Freud ect, funny brainf* 24/7, funny juggling in public discurses and the media, the history of the funny oil industry, the military-industrial complex ect. And I thought to myself:
Gnahahaha, there MUST be some sweet little worm hidden in that apple and I will find out how that will turn out.
And I thought to myself:
Harr harr, that gamez won’t work in the long run, there’s too much trickery, too much show business, too much supression, to much brainf*, too much juggling going on. And, viola, there I found the worm:
Ecological depletion, mass die-off and climate heating (among lots of other shit, like beautiful corruption ect ect ect), I found out the Nemesis of it all^^
Yeah, I saw that Fire of Hell more than 30 years ago. And I know dead seriously, there is no escape from Karma, no escape from Nemesis. So here I am, waiting, lurking, scenting, completely trusting in The Laws of Nature, waiting for Empire to fall… tic tac tic tac tic tac….
Carriesays
Before MA Rodger has another dig at me or Nemesis, I will toss this into the bonfire of the vanities first. One of many such papers that go far beyod anything he has or might have to say on the matter.
Dessler & Forster (2018) demonstrate rather convincingly that the likely range for ECS in the period from 2000 to 2017 was 2.4 to 4.6C as opposed to AR5’s cited likely range of 1.5 to 4.5C. Furthermore, it is important to remember that ECS is not a fixed value but rather is projected to increase with continued global warming, this century:
A. E. Dessler and P.M. Forster (07 August 2018), “An estimate of equilibrium climate sensitivity from interannual variability‘, Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres, https://doi.org/10.1029/2018JD028481
iow it really doesn’t matter if there is no major heatwaves or wild fires next summer in the nth hemisphere. The Dice are loaded already and science is already telling where that is going even if all the details are not yet certain by how much or when. But talking about BS that does not matter and ignoring the forest for the trees is not being scientific nor at all reasonable and rational.
nigelj @105,
You were wrong to suggest I am expert on the subject of climate models and how they handle feedbacks. But seeing no “other experts” explaining in-thread “why certain known feedbacks arent included (if they indeed aren’t included), for benefit of lay people, of which I’m more or less one,” I will endeavour to pitch in myself. But I would point to CarbonBrief’s series of articles on climate models, and indeed sections explaining models within the the IPCC AR5 itself.
I also note you reference @150 to a 2014 Guardian article on the political signing-off of AR5’s SPM. Yet the substance of the message from David Wasdell isn’t really about the signing-off which was a pretty trivial matter. It is more to do with Wasdell’s insistence that estimates of slow feedbacks be used when calculating available carbon budgets, something discussed up-thread @32 which there featured the very same David Wasdell (& subsequently @96 which didn’t).
Addressing your question (which followed on from #96) of “why certain known feedbacks aren’t included (if they indeed aren’t included)”? and of course the implications of any such omission: in my understanding, the GCMs do account for most feedbacks in some manner or other. The big exceptions are usually given as “slow feedbacks associated with vegetation changes and ice sheets” (although the fast versions are not ignored) and also “abrupt changes that arise from nonlinearities within the climate system” (as listed in AR5 Ch12 Table 12.4). There are also other relevant feedback issues relating to the model output, for instance the predictions of Arctic sea ice. Perhaps I should also mention the wobbles in jetstreams (or lack of them within them within the models) which led to the “inherently conservative” accusations being wrongly levelled against the models-as-a-whole up-thread @83.
This then presents a big long list of what could be construed as looming disasters which, when put together, simply make a nonsense of IPCC predictions. But it is difficult to set out fully the evidential basis (or lack of it) for such a doom-laden outlook when it is such a big long list. Begin to demonstrate that one or two items on the list do not constitute impending doom would still leave the bulk of the list for doom-sayers to rest their gloomy outlook on.
So in over-view.
Yes, it is surely within the abilities of mankind to create a future doom-laden climate where the AMOC shuts down, Greenland and the WA ice sheets slide into the sea, the polar regions become peppered with multi-Shakhovas of CH4 emissions, the Amazon burns down, etc. But sadly it isn’t enough that the scientific community (aka the IPCC) reassure the doom-sayers that, if AGW mitigation restricts our emissions, this isn’t going to happen because the doom-sayer have convinced themselves that we are off to hell in a handcart.
So a painstaking more-direct item-by-item analysis appears to be required to dissemble the doom-sayers List of Doooom. And given the struggle I have encountered from ‘skyrocketeers’ over the less-than-complex issue of CO2 levels, I’d reckon them doom-sayers will not be easily convinced. So is there a point to embarking on such painstaking analysis? Probably not. But I am tempted to consider a single item from the list, to test the water so to speak.
Carriesays
26 July 2018 a little dated
This year’s northern-hemisphere summer has seen a succession of heatwaves take hold in Europe, Asia, North America and northern Africa.
From heatwave deaths in Japan, Algeria and Canada, to wildfires in Sweden, Greece and California, the extended spells of hot, dry weather have become frontpage news around the world.
Reports of nations (yes, often the Saudis) pushing for watered-down language aren’t new, as the story you cited notes. It’s sad but unsurprising.
It is important to note, though, that the national delegations don’t get to vote on the bodies of the main reports; this political interference is limited to the SPMs, as I understand it.
Seems to me, then, that the real underlying agenda of the CC “movement” is not “fighting climate change” so much as the demand that all of us perform a series of sacrificial acts, to atone for our environmental sins. In other words, we are dealing with a cult.
Oh, good grief! Is paying a fossil carbon fee of $40/ton added to the price of fuels, and receiving a per-capita share of the revenue as a monthly dividend, a ‘sacrificial act’? In the USA, we all pay at least one kind of tax or another already. Was the income tax ‘movement’ a cult?
Like Mr. IAT, Victor came to RC already convinced that AGW was a hoax, launched two centuries ago by unnamed ‘leftist’ European illuminati and sustained to the present day by thousands of trained competitive skeptics around the world. Seems to me, IOW, we’re dealing with an unshakable AGW-denier motivated by a conspiracist delusion. What seems to Victor like ‘the real underlying agenda of the CC “movement”’ is solely a product of his perfervid imagination! Does he lie awake at night for fear of the liberal monsters under his bed?
Victorsays
146 Steven Emmerson says:
Victor@131 wrote:
“I’m not talking now about the validity of “the science” (I’m a skeptic on that score, but I could be wrong),”
SE: You are — according to people who are far more knowledgeable.
V: At least I’m willing to admit I could be wrong. Are you?
“but the sheer insanity of the implication, now so widely touted by so many, that we REALLY NEED TO DO something meaningful NOW to avert the presumed disaster when obviously we can’t — and never could.”
SE: “Please read volumes 2 and 3 of the IPCC report.
You’re kidding, right? I’m not a masochist and refuse to wade through all that academic stuff. Why don’t YOU read it — and tell me what the IPPC thinks we should do about, oh say: air conditioning:
Read this article and tell me what YOU think. Should “we” try to curtail air conditioning? eliminate it? levy a tax on it? How do you think all those millions of people living in high rise apartments or working in sealed-in offices would feel if their ac was shut off? And what about heat waves? Wouldn’t you need ac in a blistering heat wave? Wouldn’t it save lives?
And what does the IPCC think about hot running water, an even greater drain on power resources? I’ve lived in places with no hot water and it wasn’t much of a problem. When I needed to bathe I heated some water on the stove. So no big deal, right? Well tell that to the millions of people who nowadays take that for granted. How do you think the IPCC would handle the need to explain to all these people that from now on their hot water was going to be shut off? How do you think they would react?
And what about cars? My bus service is very limited so I need a car to go shopping, visit friends, etc. And before I was retired my car was essential in getting back and forth to work. I think most of us with cars really need them just as I did, and still do. So how do you think the IPCC plans to inform people like us that we can’t any longer drive our internal combustion autos? And forbids us to buy electric cars unless we can plug them into a solar or wind powered outlet?
What about trucks that haul all sorts of essentials, such as, for example, FOOD????? If you try to curtail trucking you’ll be creating a national emergency for sure.
But no, our all wise climate scientists have it all figured out, they know exactly how we can cut back on fossil fuels in a sufficiently drastic manner as to significantly curtail CO2 emissions to the point that glaciers will stop melting, sea ice will return to the arctic, and heat waves, hurricanes, floods, droughts, forest fires, rising sea levels, etc. will become a thing of the past. I can’t wait to hear what they have in mind. Other than that “price on carbon,” which won’t do a bloody thing.
Each region (1/8 of the earth), now has a line graph, as well as a global warming contour map.
The line graph also shows how variable the temperature anomaly is, over time. Compare the 2 most northern regions, and the most southern region, with the other regions.
You may have read the lastest headlines, “Powerful evidence that climate change is altering seasonal temperatures”.
They used satellite data. I have used weather balloon data to look at seaonal changes in the northern and southern hemispheres. You can compare contour maps, which are based on 3 month seasons (DJF, MAM, JJA, SON). Remember, when it is winter in the northern hemisphere, it is summer in the southern hemisphere.
There are line graphs for every contour map. I may re-plot these. I adjusted each seasonal temperature series so that it started at zero. This was meant to make comparision easy. But looking at the line graphs, I think that I should have adjusted the LOESS smooth for each season, to start at zero. This would stop extreme values at the start of a seasonal temperature series, affecting the whole graph. See what you think.
Here are 2 contour maps, showing warming rates in [Jun, Jul, Aug], for the northern and southern hemispheres. Don’t tell anybody, but there was a green coloured pause from 1990 to 2005 in the southern hemisphere.
I have spent a lot of time making my website look good on tablets, and mobiles, as well as desktops. Try it out, and let me know what you think.
Killiansays
Re #154 Fred Magyar said Killian @ 121 says:
Anywho… My point was rather fine-tipped: The paper’s author is confused, and engaging in speaking aloud his suicidal ideations, imo, and that part of your post belongs over on the other thread. Not a criticism, just an observation.
OK, point taken… where exactly in the paper does the author say anything that would lead one to conclude he is having suicidal ideations?
He doesn’t. But he does in the comments when he states mitigation is impossible.
If you tell me there is a gun pointed at your head and there is nothing you can do about it, but I point out all you have to do is duck, and you continue to state you cannot duck because there is no point in ducking, then you are suicidal.
Whether or not you agree with his conclusion, that there will be near term collapse of societies
I don’t disagree. He’s a carpetbagger on the issue, really: Many people pointed this out long before he decided to actually study climate at all. I have said for over ten years there will almost certainly be collapse this century under BAU. But I know its still a choice, and that is what I focus on: Choosing not to give up. Choosing to educate people that it is a choice and that mitigation is possible.
He has decided the opposite. Yet, the math is simple: Simplify and sequester, we can draw down GHGs. Period. Pretending that is not the case is a choice to embrace sui-genocide.
He can duck, but is choosing not to.
it seems to me he is simply proposing that a discussion on how to adapt to such collapse, should it come to pass
Incorrect. He is saying it is inevitable. You need to read the paper more carefully, and the comments where he explicitly states this. I said this before.
Cheers
Killiansays
#155 Carrie said 154 Fred Magyar quotes: “it is premised on the view that social collapse is now inevitable.”
I’m with Gem on that.
That’s what I said he said, so how am I missing anything?
KILLIAN, I even went to the time & trouble to COPY PASTE the precise words used by Gem and still you refuse to see and understand what he said.
If you believe that, you’ve taken your idiot pill today. I am the one debating him, not you. Try again because you are are completely incorrect on this.
From our discussion (which you ridiculously seem to think I do not understand):
in my paper I’m not saying there are solutions, but suggesting ways of reflecting to guide our actions as we navigate collapse… Im as interested in “solutions” for reducing suffering during collapse and possible extinction
Your comprehension can’t deal with this? C’mon… He continues:
None of what I say here is intended, nor should, reduce enthusiasm for local regenerative activity or the broader discussion of a regenerative approach. But its not enough.
Not enough. Pretty clear. Yet, it is enough, with simplicity, and therein lies the suicidal ideation. Add to that, if we do collapse, that hothouse scenario becomes a near-certainty, and there will be precious little adaptation to that, making adaptation-only as a response downright stupid.
But I no longer feel able to speak of “solutions” to climate change, for all the reasons in the paper.
Clear enough for you?
nigeljsays
MA Rodger @160, thanks for the references. I totally hear where you are coming from and fair comments in the main.
It would seem to me that the IPCC and the other sources gives enough detail on what models do and don’t include, and sufficient justification for the exclusions. Perhaps the problem is all this gets a bit lost in the fine print but such is life, its a complex subject.
I posted the Guardian article just for interest. I haven’t followed the Wasdell issue too closely, but he isn’t making much sense to me. I do recall convincing discussion that the warming trend is still slightly under model projections because feedbacks operate more slowly than thought. So doomery is coming, just a little more slowly – but only a little.
One thing I disagree with you on. Imho the “warmist” skyrocketeers and doom sayers on this website do not in the main (with the possible exception of Nemesis) seem to be suggesting its too late to do anything or that they oppose trying. I think it’s more just a combination of frustration with the problem, and concern that even if the really doomy scenarios are incredibly improbable, the scale of them still makes them very important to consider.
However the denialist community certainly sometimes argue that its too late to do anything or too hard, a most frustrating and false narrative.
You say “So a painstaking more-direct item-by-item analysis appears to be required to dissemble the doom-sayers List of Doooom.” It probably is, and whether it does any good god only knows. I have tried a little myself.
I try to be a realist and focus on worst case scenarios that seem genuinely plausible. Claims that climate change could cause human extinction in 30 years do not seem plausible and damage the credibility of science, thus feeding the denialists. In contrast, some of the doomy scenarious, like “hothouse earth” are very plausible, provided the media stick to the facts and describe time frames accurately. They sometimes don’t in order to do create the impression 20 metres of sea level rise is possible this century, to hype and exaggerate. This is no way means we dont have a potentially huge problem, its just the way the media twist things around to sell copy.
And regarding skyrockety projections. People who want to put numbers to trends and projections on CO2 etc need to get the maths and everything else right, it or it becomes confusing. Or please at least state its just a rough estimate or guesstimate. Details matter in this business.
But to finish. Lets not loose sight of the big picture either. There are at least some genuinely plausible and possible very doomy scenarious, and they should be discussed and taken seriously. But as you correctly say, reducing emissions still has a chance stop them or significantly reduce their probability.
Killiansays
Re #149 Killian @127 says he predicted that el nino would cause arctic warming
Fact.
and claims vindication.
Am vindicated. Everyone here disagreed with me, told me it couldn’t because it had already been studied.
You were not here then; the ignorance of the conversation shows.
In fact, Kevin found a couple links showing EN had been studied, but their conclusions were significantly different. They made no claim of affecting low ice extents. One paper found EN increased ice in one area, decreased it in another, thus no real net effect.
Yet, the DATA tell a different tale. Go look at it. August 2015.
He quotes some article at phys.org
“Some” article? How cute! It diminishes good science when it supports the ankles he bites at!
the article makes no reference to el nino
Really? I already said, in the post you are ankle biting:
moisture from the Pacific. Affecting Arctic Sea Ice…
See? No EN inclusion in the article or paper claimed. It is my analysis, not theirs.
But I am so good, I can even predict your ankle-biting comments:
I have little doubt the voices will ring out saying El Nino is not a Northern Pacific event.
Ankle-biting prediction! Have to add that to my CV…
No, but it has a global effect and there is no way the heat and moisture does not affect the Arctic. Zero chance.
and is referring to the hot blob in the north pacific and atlantic.
It does not say that. Be consistent, ankle-biter. Hold yourself to the same standard or you’ll have to bend over and do some self-inflicted ankle biting.
Theres simply no connection to el nino.
See comment on Kevin’s finds. There is a connection, undisputed. The extent of the effect is the question. When you combine the previous papers finding ENSO affects ASI and combine it with this one that Pacific warmth and humidity affect melt, but try to claim EN has no connection, you paint yourself not just an ankle biter, but an ankle biter posting just to bite ankles.
In addition, clearly killian is partly right that el nino warmth probably finds its way to the arctic, but so what? Its uncontroversial
Wait… above you say EN is not included… Uncontroversial? Really? Then why has the consensus been that EN has no overall effect? To claim the opposite of the science is non-controversial?
Why are you contradicting yourself? EN warms the Arctic, but that has no effect? Magic. Wow.
There’s no evidence that el nino is becoming more intense
This is not raised in any of my comments. Straw Man ankles, too?
Stop chasing me around this board twisting the facts to try to get in a nip at my ankles. You’re giving chihuahuas a bad name.
nigeljsays
Carrie @155
“Human CO2 emissions of 10 Gt (C) per year to date are not the only driver of global warming today and will not be the only driver of global warming into the future either. A handful of hundreds of GCMs (future modelling scenarios) consider only some of the feedbacks, but most do not….”
Eh? The CO2 emissions are the source of the feedbacks, so reduce emissions and you reduce the feedbacks.
Of course there are natural emissions from various things, but they tend to be short term and balanced by natural sinks.
Of course some warming is locked in, but thats another matter.
According to the links supplied by MAR the models include most feedbacks. The ones not included are not included for various sensible reasons.
nigeljsays
Victor @156, contrary to your views, it does make sense to study how various traditional societies live sustainably. The benefits for everyone should be obvious to you. And the word “we” can be taken to include all of humanity with no need for your endless pedantry.
And society is not collapsing all around us. There are the usual problems and usual failed states common through history, but most things have been improving for decades. Numerous books have been published quantifying this. Start with The Moral Arc by M Shermer. In no way am I implying there arent problems with inequality etc.
Of course you won’t read it, but other people with some brains in their heads might.
Climate change is the big one, because it’s a huge global scale multi dimensional problem, and its avoidable, or can at least be mitigated if politicians and individuals get their act together and stop making excuses.
nigeljsays
Kevin McKinney @163, good point, however the SPM is probably the only document a lot of people read, particularly politicians!
Victor, #154. I understand your point. Yep, there are A LOT of other issues besides climate change to worry about; they are the inevitable, and utterly predictable confluence of environment and population. Everything coming to a head at once, just as the smallest of tributaries eventually, and inevitably join to become mighty, and unstoppable rivers.
But I fear that loading the basket (or the dice) in this way, full of huge problems, can cause, and is possibly designed by some to cause, obfuscation, to get people to throw up their hands and say ‘there’s nothing we can do, it’s just too big, so I’ll kick the can down the road for another generation’. It’s a cynical tactic that certain conflicted interests use to put off doing anything so things can remain BAU and the dollars can keep rolling in.
Obviously we should tackle ALL of these issues. You’re on a site that happens to be tackling one of them. There are people addressing all those other issues too, however. They are not mutual exclusive. But climate change a particularly big issue since it affects those other issues you mention. Think of everything climate change touches.
About your question implying force to compel the people’s of the world to adopt the changes I mentioned, I don’t believe I said anything like force should be used. I only said that maybe we should question how we got here in the first place and see if we can rethink that. I do, though, suspect that, life being what it is, a universally strong desire to survive, if we don’t do anything about climate change now while we can, change will be forced on us by a future generation desperate to survive. And the world they inherit will be much poorer biodiversity-wise pretty uncomfortable to boot. People may not want to make any changes because it could possibly entail personal hardship now, but I assure you, it will be much, MUCH harder later if we don’t fix it while it’s still somewhat fixable. Waiting just so that certain business interests, just a tiny percentage of the population, can continue to put the planet in their personal bank accounts is sort of a stupid, and a really selfish strategy, don’t you think? It’s akin to watching your house burning, maybe just one or two rooms to start, while you sit in your easy chair, with a vague plan to get up and deal with it at the last moment. It’s also horribly unfair to other life forms on this planet.
Carriesays
Plain Language Summary
Recent decades have seen cooling over the eastern tropical Pacific and Southern Ocean while temperatures rise globally. Climate models indicate that these regional features, and others, are not expected to continue into the future under sustained forcing from atmospheric carbon dioxide increases. This matters, because climate sensitivity depends on the pattern of warming, so if the past has warmed differently from what we expect in the future then climate sensitivity estimated from the historical record may not apply to the future. We investigate this with a suite of climate models and show that climate sensitivity simulated for observed historical climate change is smaller than for long‐term carbon dioxide increases. The results imply that historical energy budget changes only weakly constrain climate sensitivity.
Timothy Andrews et al. (30 July 2018), “Accounting for changing temperature patterns increases historical estimates of climate sensitivity; Geophysical Research Letters, https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL078887
“Read this article and tell me what YOU think. Should “we” try to curtail air conditioning? eliminate it? levy a tax on it? ”
This wouldn’t make sense and it mystifies me why you suggest it. Nobody is suggesting go without air conditioning if you really need it (with the possible exception of you know who). The idea is to produce renewable electricty generation as fast as possible to make the energy clean, not to go back to the stome age at warp speed.
A carbon tax (levy) applies to the producers of fossil fuels, not homeowners and their electric appliances. To reduce your carbon footprint, do it intelligenty in ways that don’t cause you huge problems. There are many obvious ways, and some even save you money.
Astringentsays
Victor @165, has moved on from denying that there is any warming, through denying that it’s anything to do with us, has now moved on to denying that we can do anything about it, and in his latest post most of that is an appeal to the ‘but I’m comfortable now’ argument.
Now I am lucky to have been born a pampered baby-boomer, I haven’t had to go to war, I have had the fortune to have health, money and freedom. But my parents lived through the second world war. Fuel was rationed, food was rationed, lumps of hot metal and high explosive were lobbed in their general direction almost every day and night. And apparently that created the ‘greatest generation’ ever. So even if we did decide as a society to spend more on mitigating climate change than we do paying people to chase a ball around an acre of grass I somehow doubt that it would harm us in the long term. Economic collapse and climate refugee and resource appropriation driven war would.
Nemesis @114,157&158
So we can conclude from your various attempts at responding to my comment @111 (which was for a short while numbered #104) that the reason you dismiss climate models as being “inherently conservative for political/economical reasons” is not because you are a marxist as you are not a marxist. Indeed you appear to find such a possibility outrageous (at second-time of commenting). Your reason for dismissing the climate models is instead because you are a lurking anti-captitalist anarchist. Thus, presumably, you see the authority handed down to the IPCC makes it but a neo-colonialist capitalist running dog of its slave-driving political masters. (Note that neo-cons also dismiss the IPCC but for being servants of the leftie conniving/misguided fake-news-spouting woolly-liberal political elite.)
Of course, if any of these controversial viewpoints had the slightest merit, it would make discussion of the science a bit silly as presumably the science would be simply repeating what its political masters want it to say and thus be quite meaningless. So I do not understand you presence here except that sadly “there is no escape from Karma, no escape from Nemesis.”
And given your presence on these comment threads, if you require to see “global CO2 levels DE- CREASING for at least some months” before you accept future comment from me, if then I deem such comment is required, I will have to resort to talking about you rather than to you as “global CO2 levels” will be continuing to rise for decades yet. There is no escape from that until emissions are halved (& even that would be temporary). But it will come, hopefully while you are still “waiting for Empire to fall… tic tac tic tac tic tac.”
Thomas-aka-Carrie @159,
You describe Dessler & Forster (2018) as being “One of many such papers that go far beyod anything he (that is MA Rodger) has or might have to say on the matter.”
What nonsense!!
All Dessler & Forster are saying is that they are estimating ECS as being back to where it was in AR4. The inclusion of ECS values less than 2ºC in AR5 was always controversial. Nothing in Dessler & Forster goes beyond anything I “might have to say on the matter.”
The emboldened comment that you enfold in your reference to Dessler & Forster (2018) (“Furthermore, it is important to remember that ECS is not a fixed value but rather is projected to increase with continued global warming, this century”) does not appear in the pre-print version of the paper. So where is the origin of this comment? What level of ECS increase is being discussed and under what level of AGW?
And as you apparently accuse me of “talking about BS that does not matter and ignoring the forest for the trees (which) is not being scientific nor at all reasonable and rational,” perhaps you can be “reasonable & rational” for once and expand on this accusation, perhaps by listing some of the “many papers that go far beyond anything he (that is MA Rodger) has or might have to say on the matter.” Hopefully you will be able to list papers that back up your brave words and are not misfiring repeats of the one paper (Dessler & Forster 2018) you have referenced so far.
V 165: Other than that “price on carbon,” which won’t do a bloody thing.
BPL: Yes it will. Not only do you need a course in introductory statistics, you need one in introductory economics. Thing taxed gets produced in lesser quantity, because you’ve raised the price of production. Econ 101.
GISTEMP has reported for July 2018 with an anomaly of +0.78ºC, slightly up on June’s +0.76ºC and the third coolest anomaly for the year so far. (Previous 2018 months range from +0.91ºC to +0.76ºC.)
It is the 3rd warmest July in GISTEMP (for the satellite TLT records, July was 4th in UAH & 3rd in RSS) below 1st-placed July 2016 (+0.81ºC) & 2nd-placed July 2017 (+0.80ºC) with a bit more of a gap down to =4th placed July 2015 & 2011 (+0.71ºC). July 2018 is the =44th warmest anomaly on the full all-month GISTEMP record.
V: At least I’m willing to admit I could be wrong.
Really? I honestly hadn’t noticed. Are there any caveats attached to that statement?
SE: “Please read volumes 2 and 3 of the IPCC report.
You’re kidding, right? I’m not a masochist and refuse to wade through all that academic stuff.
Really, aren’t you a bit curious? You’re not actually obliged to read every last word, after all.
…tell me what the IPPC thinks we should do about, oh say: air conditioning…
That bit was sad/funny, as after asking SE to tell you, you proceeded essentially to tell him what you *imagined* the IPCC might, or should, say. The irony was only heightened by the fact that you had just refused, in the previous paragraph, to take the slightest interest in what the IPCC actually *does* say.
But I do hope you had fun building all those straw men–I guess everyone needs a hobby.
At least I’m willing to admit I could be wrong. Are you?
Non sequitur. I’m a scientist who accepts the current scientific consensus. I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for that consensus to change.
Should “we” try to curtail air conditioning?
And what does the IPCC think about hot running water…?
And what about cars?
What about trucks…?
If you are truly interested in such issues, then please read volumes 2 and 3 of the IPCC report.
Nemesissays
Literally turning a blind eye on what’s going on in the arctic:
” The US satellites currently in orbit are already past their expiry date, with some already cutting out. When these satellites fail completely, Arctic researchers warn, the ongoing scientific record keeping will come to an abrupt end, with no funding and no time left to replace the aging infrastructure.
“It is unfortunate and disturbing that right at the time we’re seeing sea ice cover in rapid transition, we’re in danger of losing some of our key capabilities to observe what’s happening and understand it,” says Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
For all intents and purposes, Arctic scientists – and the world – could very soon be blind to the tumultuous changes happening in the Arctic until 2022 or 2023, with no viable international systems coming on board in time to completely fill in the coverage gap.
The fault for the failure lies with a US Congress hostile to funding climate change research. Major cuts were made to the DMSP satellites when Obama was in office, and the situation is unlikely to improve under the Trump administration. In his proposed “skinny” budget released in March, and again in his more detailed proposed budget this week, President Trump called for cuts to NASA satellite missions, including NOAA’s next two polar orbiting satellites…”
Sigh. The government agencies, under the guidance of the “nothing is happening, what me worry?” administration policy, are now proposing inviting affluent high rollers to gamble with coastal property, and maybe cash out before the coastline goes underwater.
===================
======================
… The plan FEMA is now considering would continue the current programs, with one significant change: owners of homes damaged repeatedly by floods would be able to sell their homes to the government — as they can do now — but keep ownership of the land and then turn around and rebuild on the same flood-prone parcel, which is now prohibited.
Not only does this fail to address the problem of repeat flooding; it also raises the possibility that homeowners who live on prime parcels — along coastlines, for instance — could then turn around and sell their property for more money, pocketing a windfall at taxpayer expense. In essence, it would be a government subsidy for high-value redevelopment in areas that shouldn’t be rebuilt at all.
Joel Scata, an attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, noted in a comment to FEMA that with these proposed changes, a property owner could “redevelop the property themselves, leveraging the public funding provided by FEMA to build a larger or more luxurious home that could then be ‘flipped’ to the highest bidder….
=========================
Nemesissays
@MA Rodger, #178
” Your reason for dismissing the climate models is instead because you are a lurking anti-captitalist anarchist.”
My dear, you still don’t get it:
I am an a- political anarchist. If I were anti-capitalist then I would demand to end capitalism. But I never did that, did I? No, I didn’t 38=> Obviously you can not imagine how much A- political I really am. I understand that as you have been educated in the conventional way Empire educates :) You need to climb the stairway to heaven (or was it hell?) way higher to see the pan-o-rama I see:
Capitalism vs communism vs socialism vs globalism vs nationalism vs democrats vs republicans vs… (make your choice) is a game, a show, a tragic-comedia, a movie for kids, a funny little game for sheps, not for wolves.
See, I am a lone wolf, I don’t demand to stop capitalism or whatever shit, personally(!) I DON’T CARE about the final outcome of the global mess I did not create, I am long gone 38=> Death is certain for everyone, that’s the beauty of death, it does not care about your political opinions, it does not care about any opinion at all. I tell you my lifelong mantra:
” Spitting blood clears up reality
and dream alike.”
– Sunao
You will learn that too just like everyone else. Tic tac tic tac tic tac…
Nemesissays
@MA Rodger et al
MOST people think, the capitalist system will solve the problem of climate heating and they are quick to insult everyone who dares to disagree as “Communist” or “Marxist” or “Leftist” or “Socialist” or “Anti- Capitalist”. That’s what the funny republicans and the funny democrats in the USA and elsewhere have in common. These people don’t realize, that real existant communism was really sick, but communism will look like kindergarden compared to the final outcome of capitalism.
No matter if I look at global public debts, corruption on a massive scale, industrialized, chemicalized and economically profitoptimized food production, crumbling infrastructures (in no way prepared for global climate heating), dying oceans, dying wildlife, mass extinction of insects, growing global economic injustice, the looming freshwater crisis, rising nationalism, rising international global conflicts, I can see the sign on the wall just everywhere. And you will realize soon:
Denying that the economic system is the ultimate global Killer is worse than denying anthropogenic induced climate heating.
See, Mr. MA Rodger, personally I give a complete f* about the Karma of ANY political point of view, I give a complete f* about your Karma or anyone elses Karma, I do care for my personal Karma only. See, I got nothing to lose, no children, absolutely nothing- so why should I demand to stop capitalism or whatever political/economical system at all? Just let the powers that be do whatever they want, they’ll do it anyway, it’s their Karma, not mine. I’m just enjoying the show, the cosmic drama as a complete nobody, that’s all. So there’s absolutely no need to attack a completely a- political nobody like me by political insults, makes no sense, it’s boring.
keep ownership of the land and then turn around and rebuild on the same flood-prone parcel
This raises a question I’ve been wondering about for a while. As sea level rises, for coastal property, a lot of infrastructure not designed for submersion in salt water is going to be getting wet.
Is anyone thinking ahead to cleaning out the oil tanks, septic tanks, landfills full of plastic, and suchlike crap that shouldn’t be let wash into the ocean? Maybe a bounty for property owners who clean up their leavings so the new intertidal or shallow water becomes suitable for raising oysters or lobsters or softshell crabs or edible seaweed or baby fish?
nigeljsays
Killian @170, you aren’t making much sense. Obviously el nino warmth finds its way to the arctic. Like I said thats old science, so you get no points for stating or predicting the obvious.
Maybe I missinterpreted you. That would not be hard given the muddled state of your writing. And I think you should look up “narcissism” on wikipedia.
nigeljsays
Carrie @155, I just want to add a comment on positive feedbacks. Of course positive feedbacks could reach tipping points where they can’t be stopped, or not entirely stopped. Perhaps this is what you meant? Examples might be the arctic ice issue, methane feedbacks, and the destabilisaion in the antarctic and the amazon rain forest issue.
However the evidence suggests we arent at those tipping points yet, so there still an opportunity to avoid them, or some of them at least:
Hank Roberts @185 yes that sea level rise policy is insane. I’m starting to wonder if all the drugs smoked by people in their youth are starting to finally catch up with them :)
Nemesissays
I dedicate this to MA Rodger:
” The heat is on for 4 more years: Extreme temperatures expected through 2022″
Every day another dozen or so papers are being published the far majority of which keep on indicating the exact same things no matter the climate domain they are addressing.
Marine heatwaves will become more frequent & extreme with continued global warming
“The largest changes are projected to occur in the western tropical Pacific and Arctic oceans. Today, 87 per cent of MHWs are attributable to human-induced warming, with this ratio increasing to nearly 100 per cent under any global warming scenario exceeding 2 degrees Celsius. Our results suggest that MHWs will become very frequent and extreme under global warming, probably pushing marine organisms and ecosystems to the limits of their resilience and even beyond, which could cause irreversible changes.”
Carriesays
171 nigelj says:
14 Aug 2018 at 9:23 PM
Carrie @155
“Human CO2 emissions of 10 Gt (C) per year to date are not the only driver of global warming today and will not be the only driver of global warming into the future either. A handful of hundreds of GCMs (future modelling scenarios) consider only some of the feedbacks, but most do not….”
Eh? The CO2 emissions are the source of the feedbacks, so reduce emissions and you reduce the feedbacks.
Show me your supporting scientific evidence / data where present and future emissions are reduced below 10 Gt C. Substantial claims require substantial evidence. Hope isn’t evidence.
Of course there are natural emissions from various things, but they tend to be short term and balanced by natural sinks.
Show me your supporting evidence this is true now and into the future. Scientific evidence in published papers by climate experts would be preferred to your simplistic opinions.
Of course some warming is locked in, but thats another matter.
How much is locked in? It is not another matter it is an integral part of the matter now and into the future. Show your math/evidence that proves it;s not an issue to drive present and future warming feedback. Scientific refs please. Substantial claims require substantial evidence. Guesses by amateurs isn’t evidence
According to the links supplied by MAR the models include most feedbacks. The ones not included are not included for various sensible reasons.
Show me. Which models? What “most feedbacks” are included in which papers? Show me the papers not including which feedbacks are excluded for sensible reasons .. why are they “sensible” define that in the specific context of those papers.
Con’t: are you getting the gist of this yet? Your comment says nothing, shows nothing and proves nothing. It’s a nothing meaningless comment in toto. Another vapid opinion in cyberspace no better than a Victor-like comment.
Then do show me how these kinds of events are already included as FEEDBACKS in all those MODELS in the Paper references you falsely claim to be relying upon above and BELIEVE are true and correct – MA Rodger is not a climate scientist, he is not a published climate scientists and he is NOT an expert in the filed. So why do you believe him? I do not. He has already proven he is not unbiased, is not credible to me and is not competent in this field as a reliable source.
Substantial claims require substantial evidence. Hope and beliefs are not evidence. Try harder, and choose your credible experts wisely.
Carriesays
179 MARodger-aka-Clown says nothing of importance. People form their own opinions about what is and who is a reliable credible expert source for accurate analysis of global warming dynamics now and into the future.
Carriesays
Nemesis & Nigel & a few others might find the following useful.
Arctic understanding limited by patchy field work, scientist says. Areas of Canadian Arctic poorly sampled, could mean faulty assumptions about rate of climate change https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/arctic-study-understanding-limited-climate-change-1.4781405
“Metcalfe’s research suggests scientists are oversampling locations warming slowly, while places warming much more rapidly, such as the Canadian Arctic, may be releasing stored carbon at a greater rate and in a greater quantity than assumed. Metcalfe says this could mean scientists are underestimating the global impact of warming in the Arctic.”
The findings of the linked article imply that policymakers would be wise to apply a high factor of safety when evaluating the policy implications of consensus ice sheet model projections such as those cited in AR5:
Dolan AM; De Boer B; Bernales J; Hill DJ; Haywood AM (2018) High climate model dependency of Pliocene Antarctic ice-sheet predictions, Nature Communications, 9, doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-05179-4 http://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-05179-4
Open-access paper “Wildfire as a major driver of recent permafrost thaw in boreal peatlands” https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-05457-1
quote: “Permafrost vulnerability to climate change may be underestimated unless effects of wildfire are considered. Here we assess impacts of wildfire on soil thermal regime and rate of thermokarst bog expansion resulting from complete permafrost thaw in western Canadian permafrost peatlands. Effects of wildfire on permafrost peatlands last for 30 years and include a warmer and deeper active layer, and spatial expansion of continuously thawed soil layers (taliks). These impacts on the soil thermal regime are associated with a tripled rate of thermokarst bog expansion along permafrost edges. Our results suggest that wildfire is directly responsible for 2200 ± 1500 km2 (95% CI) of thermokarst bog development in the study region over the last 30 years, representing ~25% of all thermokarst bog expansion during this period. With increasing fire frequency under a warming climate, this study emphasizes the need to consider wildfires when projecting future circumpolar permafrost thaw.”
These scientists suggest that as we continue on a BAU pathway, nitrous oxide feedbacks may become more important than current consensus climate models account for: Title: “Back to the future of climate change” https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/08/180809125546.htm
Extract: “”The suggestion of a nitrous oxide feedback on climate warming adds a new layer of intrigue to this discussion and highlights the role a changing nitrogen cycle might have on our future Earth.… “Indeed, there are gaps in our understanding between the model worlds and the fossil worlds. The past enables us to test and hone models on which future projections are based. It also helps us determine what processes are missing from our current Earth system models,” he says. “These things combined help us understand and prepare for what is on the horizon.”
I believe I’ve already made myself clear, but judging from the responses to my most recent posts on this thread, the message hasn’t really gotten through. Let me clarify:
I am NOT arguing that it’s too late to do anything meaningful to “fight climate change.” Nor am I arguing that any of the measures that have been recommended as means of mitigating climate change are necessarily futile, in themselves — in fact I approve of most of them, and especially approve of efforts to develop alternative energy sources, such as solar, wind, etc. Just about everything that’s been suggested (aside from “climate engineering” and CO2 sequestration) represents a healthy response to serious environmental, social and economic concerns.
What I AM saying is that the very idea that all the people and all the nations of the world can somehow come together in some vaguely Utopian sense to “fight climate change” in a manner that can actually make a difference (assuming the enormity of the alleged threat) is a huge chimera that could never be achieved, and that the impossibility of achieving it should be obvious to anyone with an ounce of critical thinking ability, not to mention common sense. It’s not just that the desired solution is impossible, it’s that the very notion that it MIGHT be possible borders on insanity. Which tells me that those trying so hard to convince the world that we desperately need to “do something before it’s too late” are not only wrong, but far worse: they are arguing in bad faith. Because they HAVE to know, and have to have always known, that such efforts would be an exercise in futility.
We’re being told that CO2 levels have to be reduced by such and such a percentage by such and such a date, but no one has a clue as to how that could be achieved, short of a major worldwide revolution followed by the imposition of universal martial law so onerous that no society anywhere would be willing to accept it. Nor does anyone have a clue as to what the effect on the climate would be if such a revolution WERE possible and the required reductions achieved.
It’s not simply that I advocate “doing nothing” in the face of an imminent threat, nor do I have any desire to maintain the status quo (I happen to be a Socialist). It’s just that I refuse to go along with what looks more and more to me like the sort of doomsday cult that demands more and more sacrifice with no clear understanding of whether such sacrifice will matter. While earlier cults took their authority from “the Gods,” this one takes its authority from “the Science.” In both cases, cult members are expected to follow the directives of those who represent the ultimate authority, the high priests who continually assure us that they alone know the Truth and must be obeyed or else we will all perish.
As I see it, the bad faith exhibited by these priests with respect to the extreme demands they are making reflects back on their “science” as a whole, making the skeptical position regarding the climatic effects of fossil fuels even stronger than ever. I have no problem “doing nothing” because I have no faith in anything the alarmists have to say and see no need to “do something” when I see nothing to be alarmed about.
I added climate feedbacks to by my semigray climate model and found it extended my CHZ from 0.976-1.040 AU to 0.949-1.141 AU, coincidentally very similar to that of Kasting et al. 1993 (0.95-1.15 AU). The point being that you can reproduce how climate feedbacks extend the size of the habitable zone even without doing sophisticated radiative-convective modeling.
Is there any journal that would be interested in printing such a minor result? Astrobiology is definitely not.
Never was there a topic fitting more squarely under “unforced variations.” There’s a new paper that begs for assessment here at RC–it outlines a novel method of probabilistic interannual forecasting of GMST and SST (representing what the authors term a “severe truncation” of the phase space, i.e., only that one parameter is considered.) Also–and give chutzpah points here–they state that this method depends upon 4 assumptions, none of which are strictly true (though they think all 4 are ‘close enough’, as evidenced by assessed hindcast skill).
Perhaps gratingly, they use the “p” word–that’s “pause” for casual readers–in connection with the “post-1998 decade”, and claim skillful hindcasting of it. To be completely clear, they are attempting to model variability via machine learning, so the implication would be that they attribute the so-called pause to internal variability, too.
Intriguing, but a lot of it is over my head, so I–and probably a lot of folks–would be very interested in more expert reactions.
Hi I have come across this explanation for a feedback not included in climate models.
“The ocean is estimated to absorb 93% of the extra energy trapped by greenhouse gases. Recent work suggests that, as the ocean warms, the surface will become stratified, so that there will be less mixing of surface water with colder, deeper water. This means that the 93% figure will drop, and atmospheric warming will surge. But, it gets worse.”
My understanding is ocean stratification is old science it has long been accounted for in models, that the energy transfer is due to short wave light heating the ocean and the increase in IR warming the skin layer and slowing the release of that heat (there is a real climate post on this) but I have never heard that the stratification will significantly slow the amount of excess energy being absorbed by the oceans in anything like the near term so that more goes into the atmosphere. I understood the ocean is a very deep heat sink that will take longer to come into balance than the atmosphere. Have I made a significant misunderstanding. Apols if this is off topic for this thread.
“Hardly ever do I hear much of anything containing specifics regarding exactly WHAT is to be done.”
One thing might be to re-examine how we got here. For instance, on August 1st we ran into overshoot globally, the point when the Earth officially ran out of the sustainable resources that would be needed to replenish our consumption for 2018. Now we’re living on borrowed resources from the future, with each year the planet running out earlier. The first world leads the way here with A LOT more consumption than we are entitled to population-wise.
https://www.footprintnetwork.org/our-work/earth-overshoot-day/
One way this happens is just based on our family habits, which have been carefully manipulated by business for decades. Our worth, we’re led to believe from grade school on, isn’t actually based in our personhoods, no, it’s in our being consumers. This means that people amount to little more than walking wallets in the minds of corporations. Thus, we’re counted in terms of “per capita” and given numbers as ultimate identification instead of names.
If we were to reassess some of the subtle propaganda we’ve been fed we could find solutions. In third world countries, for example, countries that, out of necessity are forced to live more sustainably environmentally-speaking, families tend to remain together, with several generations living in the same structure.
In the US, on the other hand, especially since the 1950s, people have been conditioned to feel that when they turn 18, or when they marry, they should move out and find their own homes. This has led to a boom in the construction industry, so of course they love it, but it has meant an unnecessary multiplication on the harvest of natural resources. From the virgin land needed to put all those homes and communities on, to the lumber needed to actually build those new homes, to all the resources needed to fill those homes with the same stuff that could likely be found in the parent’s home, etc. If we were to push for families to stay together longer, it would not only make for the use of lots less resources, but might even make for happier, closer families and even less lonely elders (providing that everyone is game).
We need to look at communities that are living sustainably now and find out how they are doing it. Maybe we can start with the countries in green here:
http://data.footprintnetwork.org/#/
They aren’t all living in poverty.
V 131: Scientists as intelligent as Michael Mann and James Hansen should have realized from the start that, if “the science” they endorse is as incontrovertible as they’ve claimed, the ONLY really effective option would have been to shut down the world economy in a manner that would have been (and currently remains) totally unacceptable, for reasons political, economic, social and also practical.
BPL: Fallacy of bifurcation. Your either-or choice is unnecessary; other options were available and still are.
V 132: Seems to me, then, that the real underlying agenda of the CC “movement” is not “fighting climate change” so much as the demand that all of us perform a series of sacrificial acts, to atone for our environmental sins. In other words, we are dealing with a cult.
BPL: Seems to me you are dealing with a straw man.
Killian @ 121 says:
OK, point taken. So if examining this topic is truly OT on this thread then I don’t want to go too far down the rabbit hole with it here but I will just make one last comment for the sake of making it easier to follow the the logic of my thoughts without having to jump to another thread.
The first point is really a direct question to you, where exactly in the paper does the author say anything that would lead one to conclude he is having suicidal ideations?
Whether or not you agree with his conclusion, that there will be near term collapse of societies, it seems to me he is simply proposing that a discussion on how to adapt to such collapse, should it come to pass, is something that should be addressed. To be clear, I assume that even you would agree that there is a non zero percent chance, that we might see collapsing societies within this century, should we continue on a business as usual path with greenhouse gas emissions. There is certainly scientific evidence discussed in the literature which he cites that might lead one to be concerned about feedbacks and tipping points that may or may not have already been passed.
From the abstract:
Second and my final comment here on this particular topic: Simply citing a paper that purports to see a need for the reframing of the conversation about implications of possible collapse of societies, due to the impacts of climate change is not, imho, the same thing, as discussing the nuts and bolts of any particular adaptation strategy. Which would be an example of what I have interpreted as being OT in this thread, at least up until now.
I.E. if we were to discuss the hows and whys of implementing permaculture practices or a large scale WWII like war effort, involving the implementation of distributed solar PV, in order to prevent ecological and societal collapse.
154 Fred Magyar quotes: “it is premised on the view that social collapse is now inevitable.”
I’m with Gem on that. I will add that international cooperation breakdown and then collapse is also inevitable. Isn’t it obvious? For most no it’s not, not yet.
Meanwhile MA Rodger @133 in asking: “Do you believe it possible that humanity will continue with its CO2 emissions at roughly 10Gt(C)/year for the rest of this century? shows he is missing the forest for the trees and cannot see the Elephant in the room despite all the scientific papers that have endlessly told him so.
Human CO2 emissions of 10 Gt (C) per year to date are not the only driver of global warming today and will not be the only driver of global warming into the future either. Some papers address these issues most of them do not. A handful of hundreds of GCMs (future modelling scenarios) consider only some of the feedbacks, but most do not, at least not at the mass scale implications of those feedbacks when the global temperatures are plus 1.5C, 2C, or 2.5C, or 3.4C as ref’d in the discussion with Nemesis.
This is self-evident for those capable of seeing the big picture over time into the future and who have been able to both keep up to date and to connect the dots of the SYNERGISTIC EVIDENCE & the KNOWLEDGE contained in individual climate science papers COMBINED plus in the context of what is said (and NOT said) in the various IPCC chapter reports especially in AR5 and SRM.
Ya can lead a horse to water but you cannot make them drink. :-)
KILLIAN, I even went to the time & trouble to COPY PASTE the precise words used by Gem and still you refuse to see and understand what he said. Sorry can’t help you there. I happen to agree with his basic scenario. It fits. It needs to be said because people deserve to know the whole truth and not PR Spin from all sides of this Lemmings Debate. imo, yit’s you who is missing the point of his Paper http://www.lifeworth.com/deepadaptation.pdf and the website name : LIFE WORTH :)
Ron R.: “We need to look at communities that are living sustainably now and find out how they are doing it.”
Who is this “we”? And what is it, exactly, that you would like to see happen? Are you proposing that the UN set up a commission to study these communities, so it can draw up a set of recommendations, along the lines of the IPCC Reports. Do you have any idea how long that would take? Should the UN then follow up on these recommendations by establishing some sort of international police force to ensure these methods are universally adopted? If not, then what means would you propose to ensure that “we” adopt these methods? And by “we” whom exactly are you referring to? The United States? Europe? Asia? The world population?
In other words: how naive can you get?
As quoted in #154:
“That synthesis leads to a conclusion there will be a near term collapse in society with serious ramifications for the lives of readers.”
“Will be?” Oh my, “WILL BE????” What about Iraq, what about Afghanistan, what about Libya, what about Syria, what about Yugoslavia, what about Zimbabwe, what about Venezuela, — not to mention the collapse of the Soviet Union? Nor the many serious crises now being experienced in countless other corners of the world, including severe shortages of food, water, medicine, etc. My God man, is “climate change” all you can think about? The world is collapsing all around you, for reasons that have nothing to do with climate, but you all (aka “yins,” for BPL’s benefit) don’t seem to care a whit, so long as you can run on about the dire consequences we all face due to an increase in global temperatures of less than 1 degree over the last 100 years. Come down to Earth my friends, look around you, WAKE UP!!!!
@MA Rodger, #133
Ah yes, I said this in comment #84:
” We’ll learn through sheer pain quickly that these models are INDEED “inherently conservative”. I learned all about these “inherently conservative” models when it comes to mass die-off, especially insect die-off and what have you during decades of research- the system just don’t like real bad news, it does not like doomsday scenarios for a reason:
BLEAK projections undermine the calculated, capitalist optimism of the system.”
So I just said what is true: The capitalist system does not like bleak projections, because it wants to go on forever. Then you said:
” Have I blundered into some nightmare debate of the Marxist dialectic?”
Yeah, I know that trail quite well, heard it a million times. But I am NO MARXIST, NO COMMUNIST. What is this?! Are we still in the f* McCarthy era or what is this? Am I part of some Edgar Hoover trial against me as a communist or what is this?! I critizised CAPITALISM, but I never voted for any communist party, I NEVER VOTED FOR ANY POLITICAL PARTY AT ALL, I despise everyday politics, all forms of politics, I give a shit about politics all together. You can’t imagine how happy I am to have no political power whatsoever, because this way I am only responsible for my own private deeds as a complete nobody, nope else. Did you know? Some denier of climate change once said to me:
” Climate change is RED propaganda.”
Actually I hear that all the time whenever I talk to deniers of climate change^^ Just go to youtube or talk to any denier and you will hear it all the time:
” Climate change is Marxist, Leftist, Sozialist propaganda”. That’s quite funny, isn’t it?! Btw, there is some specific political group who always pulled out that funny “communist” mace too- I leave it to your imagination and historical knowledge what political (and religious group, omg) I’m talking about^^
Have some fun with beautiful fasces btw: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/eb/1943D_Mercury_Dime_reverse.jpg/220px-1943D_Mercury_Dime_reverse.jpg
So, you see, I am A- POLITICAL, but that will not stop me from telling you this:
Capitalism failed teriffic for at least half a century in terms of anthropogenic induced climate heating (not to mention overall ecological destruction, social justice ect ect ect.)
Now dream on as you like and talk to me again when you are able to pull off significant proof of global CO2 levels DE- CREASING for at least some months (no, I’m not talking about some funny cunning “deceleration of increase” and shit)… tic tac tic tac tic tac tic tac……
@MA Rodger
I tell you a neat little story:
I grew up out there in the streets like a wolf, developing wolf (not shep) instinct, I am a surivor. And I came to enjoy funny schools, funny correction homes, funny jobs, funny politics, funny economy, funny media, funny psychology and propaganda techniques like Edward Bernais, S. Freud ect, funny brainf* 24/7, funny juggling in public discurses and the media, the history of the funny oil industry, the military-industrial complex ect. And I thought to myself:
Gnahahaha, there MUST be some sweet little worm hidden in that apple and I will find out how that will turn out.
And I thought to myself:
Harr harr, that gamez won’t work in the long run, there’s too much trickery, too much show business, too much supression, to much brainf*, too much juggling going on. And, viola, there I found the worm:
Ecological depletion, mass die-off and climate heating (among lots of other shit, like beautiful corruption ect ect ect), I found out the Nemesis of it all^^
Yeah, I saw that Fire of Hell more than 30 years ago. And I know dead seriously, there is no escape from Karma, no escape from Nemesis. So here I am, waiting, lurking, scenting, completely trusting in The Laws of Nature, waiting for Empire to fall… tic tac tic tac tic tac….
Before MA Rodger has another dig at me or Nemesis, I will toss this into the bonfire of the vanities first. One of many such papers that go far beyod anything he has or might have to say on the matter.
Dessler & Forster (2018) demonstrate rather convincingly that the likely range for ECS in the period from 2000 to 2017 was 2.4 to 4.6C as opposed to AR5’s cited likely range of 1.5 to 4.5C. Furthermore, it is important to remember that ECS is not a fixed value but rather is projected to increase with continued global warming, this century:
A. E. Dessler and P.M. Forster (07 August 2018), “An estimate of equilibrium climate sensitivity from interannual variability‘, Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres, https://doi.org/10.1029/2018JD028481
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2018JD028481?campaign=wolacceptedarticle
iow it really doesn’t matter if there is no major heatwaves or wild fires next summer in the nth hemisphere. The Dice are loaded already and science is already telling where that is going even if all the details are not yet certain by how much or when. But talking about BS that does not matter and ignoring the forest for the trees is not being scientific nor at all reasonable and rational.
nigelj @105,
You were wrong to suggest I am expert on the subject of climate models and how they handle feedbacks. But seeing no “other experts” explaining in-thread “why certain known feedbacks arent included (if they indeed aren’t included), for benefit of lay people, of which I’m more or less one,” I will endeavour to pitch in myself. But I would point to CarbonBrief’s series of articles on climate models, and indeed sections explaining models within the the IPCC AR5 itself.
I also note you reference @150 to a 2014 Guardian article on the political signing-off of AR5’s SPM. Yet the substance of the message from David Wasdell isn’t really about the signing-off which was a pretty trivial matter. It is more to do with Wasdell’s insistence that estimates of slow feedbacks be used when calculating available carbon budgets, something discussed up-thread @32 which there featured the very same David Wasdell (& subsequently @96 which didn’t).
Addressing your question (which followed on from #96) of “why certain known feedbacks aren’t included (if they indeed aren’t included)”? and of course the implications of any such omission: in my understanding, the GCMs do account for most feedbacks in some manner or other. The big exceptions are usually given as “slow feedbacks associated with vegetation changes and ice sheets” (although the fast versions are not ignored) and also “abrupt changes that arise from nonlinearities within the climate system” (as listed in AR5 Ch12 Table 12.4). There are also other relevant feedback issues relating to the model output, for instance the predictions of Arctic sea ice. Perhaps I should also mention the wobbles in jetstreams (or lack of them within them within the models) which led to the “inherently conservative” accusations being wrongly levelled against the models-as-a-whole up-thread @83.
This then presents a big long list of what could be construed as looming disasters which, when put together, simply make a nonsense of IPCC predictions. But it is difficult to set out fully the evidential basis (or lack of it) for such a doom-laden outlook when it is such a big long list. Begin to demonstrate that one or two items on the list do not constitute impending doom would still leave the bulk of the list for doom-sayers to rest their gloomy outlook on.
So in over-view.
Yes, it is surely within the abilities of mankind to create a future doom-laden climate where the AMOC shuts down, Greenland and the WA ice sheets slide into the sea, the polar regions become peppered with multi-Shakhovas of CH4 emissions, the Amazon burns down, etc. But sadly it isn’t enough that the scientific community (aka the IPCC) reassure the doom-sayers that, if AGW mitigation restricts our emissions, this isn’t going to happen because the doom-sayer have convinced themselves that we are off to hell in a handcart.
So a painstaking more-direct item-by-item analysis appears to be required to dissemble the doom-sayers List of Doooom. And given the struggle I have encountered from ‘skyrocketeers’ over the less-than-complex issue of CO2 levels, I’d reckon them doom-sayers will not be easily convinced. So is there a point to embarking on such painstaking analysis? Probably not. But I am tempted to consider a single item from the list, to test the water so to speak.
26 July 2018 a little dated
This year’s northern-hemisphere summer has seen a succession of heatwaves take hold in Europe, Asia, North America and northern Africa.
From heatwave deaths in Japan, Algeria and Canada, to wildfires in Sweden, Greece and California, the extended spells of hot, dry weather have become frontpage news around the world.
Carbon Brief looks back at how the media has reported the extreme weather and how the coverage has – or has not – referenced climate change.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/media-reaction-2018-summer-heatwaves-and-climate-change
Recent Global CO2
May 2018: 408.97 ppm +2.60 ppm
May 2017: 406.37 ppm
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/global.html
Recent Monthly Average Mauna Loa CO2
July 2018: 408.71 ppm +1.64 ppm
July 2017: 407.07 ppm
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/index.html
#150, nigel–
Reports of nations (yes, often the Saudis) pushing for watered-down language aren’t new, as the story you cited notes. It’s sad but unsurprising.
It is important to note, though, that the national delegations don’t get to vote on the bodies of the main reports; this political interference is limited to the SPMs, as I understand it.
Victor:
Oh, good grief! Is paying a fossil carbon fee of $40/ton added to the price of fuels, and receiving a per-capita share of the revenue as a monthly dividend, a ‘sacrificial act’? In the USA, we all pay at least one kind of tax or another already. Was the income tax ‘movement’ a cult?
Like Mr. IAT, Victor came to RC already convinced that AGW was a hoax, launched two centuries ago by unnamed ‘leftist’ European illuminati and sustained to the present day by thousands of trained competitive skeptics around the world. Seems to me, IOW, we’re dealing with an unshakable AGW-denier motivated by a conspiracist delusion. What seems to Victor like ‘the real underlying agenda of the CC “movement”’ is solely a product of his perfervid imagination! Does he lie awake at night for fear of the liberal monsters under his bed?
146 Steven Emmerson says:
Victor@131 wrote:
“I’m not talking now about the validity of “the science” (I’m a skeptic on that score, but I could be wrong),”
SE: You are — according to people who are far more knowledgeable.
V: At least I’m willing to admit I could be wrong. Are you?
“but the sheer insanity of the implication, now so widely touted by so many, that we REALLY NEED TO DO something meaningful NOW to avert the presumed disaster when obviously we can’t — and never could.”
SE: “Please read volumes 2 and 3 of the IPCC report.
You’re kidding, right? I’m not a masochist and refuse to wade through all that academic stuff. Why don’t YOU read it — and tell me what the IPPC thinks we should do about, oh say: air conditioning:
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/aug/14/how-air-conditioning-created-modern-city
Read this article and tell me what YOU think. Should “we” try to curtail air conditioning? eliminate it? levy a tax on it? How do you think all those millions of people living in high rise apartments or working in sealed-in offices would feel if their ac was shut off? And what about heat waves? Wouldn’t you need ac in a blistering heat wave? Wouldn’t it save lives?
And what does the IPCC think about hot running water, an even greater drain on power resources? I’ve lived in places with no hot water and it wasn’t much of a problem. When I needed to bathe I heated some water on the stove. So no big deal, right? Well tell that to the millions of people who nowadays take that for granted. How do you think the IPCC would handle the need to explain to all these people that from now on their hot water was going to be shut off? How do you think they would react?
And what about cars? My bus service is very limited so I need a car to go shopping, visit friends, etc. And before I was retired my car was essential in getting back and forth to work. I think most of us with cars really need them just as I did, and still do. So how do you think the IPCC plans to inform people like us that we can’t any longer drive our internal combustion autos? And forbids us to buy electric cars unless we can plug them into a solar or wind powered outlet?
What about trucks that haul all sorts of essentials, such as, for example, FOOD????? If you try to curtail trucking you’ll be creating a national emergency for sure.
But no, our all wise climate scientists have it all figured out, they know exactly how we can cut back on fossil fuels in a sufficiently drastic manner as to significantly curtail CO2 emissions to the point that glaciers will stop melting, sea ice will return to the arctic, and heat waves, hurricanes, floods, droughts, forest fires, rising sea levels, etc. will become a thing of the past. I can’t wait to hear what they have in mind. Other than that “price on carbon,” which won’t do a bloody thing.
There are 2 updates to my website this week.
1) Regional Warming.
Each region (1/8 of the earth), now has a line graph, as well as a global warming contour map.
The line graph also shows how variable the temperature anomaly is, over time. Compare the 2 most northern regions, and the most southern region, with the other regions.
https://agree-to-disagree.com/new-regional-warming
2) A new web page on Seasonal Warming.
You may have read the lastest headlines, “Powerful evidence that climate change is altering seasonal temperatures”.
They used satellite data. I have used weather balloon data to look at seaonal changes in the northern and southern hemispheres. You can compare contour maps, which are based on 3 month seasons (DJF, MAM, JJA, SON). Remember, when it is winter in the northern hemisphere, it is summer in the southern hemisphere.
There are line graphs for every contour map. I may re-plot these. I adjusted each seasonal temperature series so that it started at zero. This was meant to make comparision easy. But looking at the line graphs, I think that I should have adjusted the LOESS smooth for each season, to start at zero. This would stop extreme values at the start of a seasonal temperature series, affecting the whole graph. See what you think.
https://agree-to-disagree.com/seasonal-warming
Here are 2 contour maps, showing warming rates in [Jun, Jul, Aug], for the northern and southern hemispheres. Don’t tell anybody, but there was a green coloured pause from 1990 to 2005 in the southern hemisphere.
https://agree-to-disagree.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Graph-9-and-11.png
I have spent a lot of time making my website look good on tablets, and mobiles, as well as desktops. Try it out, and let me know what you think.
Re #154 Fred Magyar said Killian @ 121 says:
Anywho… My point was rather fine-tipped: The paper’s author is confused, and engaging in speaking aloud his suicidal ideations, imo, and that part of your post belongs over on the other thread. Not a criticism, just an observation.
OK, point taken… where exactly in the paper does the author say anything that would lead one to conclude he is having suicidal ideations?
He doesn’t. But he does in the comments when he states mitigation is impossible.
If you tell me there is a gun pointed at your head and there is nothing you can do about it, but I point out all you have to do is duck, and you continue to state you cannot duck because there is no point in ducking, then you are suicidal.
Whether or not you agree with his conclusion, that there will be near term collapse of societies
I don’t disagree. He’s a carpetbagger on the issue, really: Many people pointed this out long before he decided to actually study climate at all. I have said for over ten years there will almost certainly be collapse this century under BAU. But I know its still a choice, and that is what I focus on: Choosing not to give up. Choosing to educate people that it is a choice and that mitigation is possible.
He has decided the opposite. Yet, the math is simple: Simplify and sequester, we can draw down GHGs. Period. Pretending that is not the case is a choice to embrace sui-genocide.
He can duck, but is choosing not to.
it seems to me he is simply proposing that a discussion on how to adapt to such collapse, should it come to pass
Incorrect. He is saying it is inevitable. You need to read the paper more carefully, and the comments where he explicitly states this. I said this before.
Cheers
#155 Carrie said 154 Fred Magyar quotes: “it is premised on the view that social collapse is now inevitable.”
I’m with Gem on that.
That’s what I said he said, so how am I missing anything?
KILLIAN, I even went to the time & trouble to COPY PASTE the precise words used by Gem and still you refuse to see and understand what he said.
If you believe that, you’ve taken your idiot pill today. I am the one debating him, not you. Try again because you are are completely incorrect on this.
From our discussion (which you ridiculously seem to think I do not understand):
Your comprehension can’t deal with this? C’mon… He continues:
Not enough. Pretty clear. Yet, it is enough, with simplicity, and therein lies the suicidal ideation. Add to that, if we do collapse, that hothouse scenario becomes a near-certainty, and there will be precious little adaptation to that, making adaptation-only as a response downright stupid.
Clear enough for you?
MA Rodger @160, thanks for the references. I totally hear where you are coming from and fair comments in the main.
It would seem to me that the IPCC and the other sources gives enough detail on what models do and don’t include, and sufficient justification for the exclusions. Perhaps the problem is all this gets a bit lost in the fine print but such is life, its a complex subject.
I posted the Guardian article just for interest. I haven’t followed the Wasdell issue too closely, but he isn’t making much sense to me. I do recall convincing discussion that the warming trend is still slightly under model projections because feedbacks operate more slowly than thought. So doomery is coming, just a little more slowly – but only a little.
One thing I disagree with you on. Imho the “warmist” skyrocketeers and doom sayers on this website do not in the main (with the possible exception of Nemesis) seem to be suggesting its too late to do anything or that they oppose trying. I think it’s more just a combination of frustration with the problem, and concern that even if the really doomy scenarios are incredibly improbable, the scale of them still makes them very important to consider.
However the denialist community certainly sometimes argue that its too late to do anything or too hard, a most frustrating and false narrative.
You say “So a painstaking more-direct item-by-item analysis appears to be required to dissemble the doom-sayers List of Doooom.” It probably is, and whether it does any good god only knows. I have tried a little myself.
I try to be a realist and focus on worst case scenarios that seem genuinely plausible. Claims that climate change could cause human extinction in 30 years do not seem plausible and damage the credibility of science, thus feeding the denialists. In contrast, some of the doomy scenarious, like “hothouse earth” are very plausible, provided the media stick to the facts and describe time frames accurately. They sometimes don’t in order to do create the impression 20 metres of sea level rise is possible this century, to hype and exaggerate. This is no way means we dont have a potentially huge problem, its just the way the media twist things around to sell copy.
And regarding skyrockety projections. People who want to put numbers to trends and projections on CO2 etc need to get the maths and everything else right, it or it becomes confusing. Or please at least state its just a rough estimate or guesstimate. Details matter in this business.
But to finish. Lets not loose sight of the big picture either. There are at least some genuinely plausible and possible very doomy scenarious, and they should be discussed and taken seriously. But as you correctly say, reducing emissions still has a chance stop them or significantly reduce their probability.
Re #149 Killian @127 says he predicted that el nino would cause arctic warming
Fact.
and claims vindication.
Am vindicated. Everyone here disagreed with me, told me it couldn’t because it had already been studied.
You were not here then; the ignorance of the conversation shows.
In fact, Kevin found a couple links showing EN had been studied, but their conclusions were significantly different. They made no claim of affecting low ice extents. One paper found EN increased ice in one area, decreased it in another, thus no real net effect.
Yet, the DATA tell a different tale. Go look at it. August 2015.
He quotes some article at phys.org
“Some” article? How cute! It diminishes good science when it supports the ankles he bites at!
the article makes no reference to el nino
Really? I already said, in the post you are ankle biting:
See? No EN inclusion in the article or paper claimed. It is my analysis, not theirs.
But I am so good, I can even predict your ankle-biting comments:
Ankle-biting prediction! Have to add that to my CV…
It does not say that. Be consistent, ankle-biter. Hold yourself to the same standard or you’ll have to bend over and do some self-inflicted ankle biting.
Carrie @155
“Human CO2 emissions of 10 Gt (C) per year to date are not the only driver of global warming today and will not be the only driver of global warming into the future either. A handful of hundreds of GCMs (future modelling scenarios) consider only some of the feedbacks, but most do not….”
Eh? The CO2 emissions are the source of the feedbacks, so reduce emissions and you reduce the feedbacks.
Of course there are natural emissions from various things, but they tend to be short term and balanced by natural sinks.
Of course some warming is locked in, but thats another matter.
According to the links supplied by MAR the models include most feedbacks. The ones not included are not included for various sensible reasons.
Victor @156, contrary to your views, it does make sense to study how various traditional societies live sustainably. The benefits for everyone should be obvious to you. And the word “we” can be taken to include all of humanity with no need for your endless pedantry.
And society is not collapsing all around us. There are the usual problems and usual failed states common through history, but most things have been improving for decades. Numerous books have been published quantifying this. Start with The Moral Arc by M Shermer. In no way am I implying there arent problems with inequality etc.
Of course you won’t read it, but other people with some brains in their heads might.
Climate change is the big one, because it’s a huge global scale multi dimensional problem, and its avoidable, or can at least be mitigated if politicians and individuals get their act together and stop making excuses.
Kevin McKinney @163, good point, however the SPM is probably the only document a lot of people read, particularly politicians!
Victor, #154. I understand your point. Yep, there are A LOT of other issues besides climate change to worry about; they are the inevitable, and utterly predictable confluence of environment and population. Everything coming to a head at once, just as the smallest of tributaries eventually, and inevitably join to become mighty, and unstoppable rivers.
But I fear that loading the basket (or the dice) in this way, full of huge problems, can cause, and is possibly designed by some to cause, obfuscation, to get people to throw up their hands and say ‘there’s nothing we can do, it’s just too big, so I’ll kick the can down the road for another generation’. It’s a cynical tactic that certain conflicted interests use to put off doing anything so things can remain BAU and the dollars can keep rolling in.
Obviously we should tackle ALL of these issues. You’re on a site that happens to be tackling one of them. There are people addressing all those other issues too, however. They are not mutual exclusive. But climate change a particularly big issue since it affects those other issues you mention. Think of everything climate change touches.
About your question implying force to compel the people’s of the world to adopt the changes I mentioned, I don’t believe I said anything like force should be used. I only said that maybe we should question how we got here in the first place and see if we can rethink that. I do, though, suspect that, life being what it is, a universally strong desire to survive, if we don’t do anything about climate change now while we can, change will be forced on us by a future generation desperate to survive. And the world they inherit will be much poorer biodiversity-wise pretty uncomfortable to boot. People may not want to make any changes because it could possibly entail personal hardship now, but I assure you, it will be much, MUCH harder later if we don’t fix it while it’s still somewhat fixable. Waiting just so that certain business interests, just a tiny percentage of the population, can continue to put the planet in their personal bank accounts is sort of a stupid, and a really selfish strategy, don’t you think? It’s akin to watching your house burning, maybe just one or two rooms to start, while you sit in your easy chair, with a vague plan to get up and deal with it at the last moment. It’s also horribly unfair to other life forms on this planet.
Plain Language Summary
Recent decades have seen cooling over the eastern tropical Pacific and Southern Ocean while temperatures rise globally. Climate models indicate that these regional features, and others, are not expected to continue into the future under sustained forcing from atmospheric carbon dioxide increases. This matters, because climate sensitivity depends on the pattern of warming, so if the past has warmed differently from what we expect in the future then climate sensitivity estimated from the historical record may not apply to the future. We investigate this with a suite of climate models and show that climate sensitivity simulated for observed historical climate change is smaller than for long‐term carbon dioxide increases. The results imply that historical energy budget changes only weakly constrain climate sensitivity.
Timothy Andrews et al. (30 July 2018), “Accounting for changing temperature patterns increases historical estimates of climate sensitivity; Geophysical Research Letters, https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL078887
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2018GL078887
Victor @165
“Read this article and tell me what YOU think. Should “we” try to curtail air conditioning? eliminate it? levy a tax on it? ”
This wouldn’t make sense and it mystifies me why you suggest it. Nobody is suggesting go without air conditioning if you really need it (with the possible exception of you know who). The idea is to produce renewable electricty generation as fast as possible to make the energy clean, not to go back to the stome age at warp speed.
A carbon tax (levy) applies to the producers of fossil fuels, not homeowners and their electric appliances. To reduce your carbon footprint, do it intelligenty in ways that don’t cause you huge problems. There are many obvious ways, and some even save you money.
Victor @165, has moved on from denying that there is any warming, through denying that it’s anything to do with us, has now moved on to denying that we can do anything about it, and in his latest post most of that is an appeal to the ‘but I’m comfortable now’ argument.
Now I am lucky to have been born a pampered baby-boomer, I haven’t had to go to war, I have had the fortune to have health, money and freedom. But my parents lived through the second world war. Fuel was rationed, food was rationed, lumps of hot metal and high explosive were lobbed in their general direction almost every day and night. And apparently that created the ‘greatest generation’ ever. So even if we did decide as a society to spend more on mitigating climate change than we do paying people to chase a ball around an acre of grass I somehow doubt that it would harm us in the long term. Economic collapse and climate refugee and resource appropriation driven war would.
Nemesis @114,157&158
So we can conclude from your various attempts at responding to my comment @111 (which was for a short while numbered #104) that the reason you dismiss climate models as being “inherently conservative for political/economical reasons” is not because you are a marxist as you are not a marxist. Indeed you appear to find such a possibility outrageous (at second-time of commenting). Your reason for dismissing the climate models is instead because you are a lurking anti-captitalist anarchist. Thus, presumably, you see the authority handed down to the IPCC makes it but a neo-colonialist capitalist running dog of its slave-driving political masters. (Note that neo-cons also dismiss the IPCC but for being servants of the leftie conniving/misguided fake-news-spouting woolly-liberal political elite.)
Of course, if any of these controversial viewpoints had the slightest merit, it would make discussion of the science a bit silly as presumably the science would be simply repeating what its political masters want it to say and thus be quite meaningless. So I do not understand you presence here except that sadly “there is no escape from Karma, no escape from Nemesis.”
And given your presence on these comment threads, if you require to see “global CO2 levels DE- CREASING for at least some months” before you accept future comment from me, if then I deem such comment is required, I will have to resort to talking about you rather than to you as “global CO2 levels” will be continuing to rise for decades yet. There is no escape from that until emissions are halved (& even that would be temporary). But it will come, hopefully while you are still “waiting for Empire to fall… tic tac tic tac tic tac.”
Thomas-aka-Carrie @159,
You describe Dessler & Forster (2018) as being “One of many such papers that go far beyod anything he (that is MA Rodger) has or might have to say on the matter.”
What nonsense!!
All Dessler & Forster are saying is that they are estimating ECS as being back to where it was in AR4. The inclusion of ECS values less than 2ºC in AR5 was always controversial. Nothing in Dessler & Forster goes beyond anything I “might have to say on the matter.”
The emboldened comment that you enfold in your reference to Dessler & Forster (2018) (“Furthermore, it is important to remember that ECS is not a fixed value but rather is projected to increase with continued global warming, this century”) does not appear in the pre-print version of the paper. So where is the origin of this comment? What level of ECS increase is being discussed and under what level of AGW?
And as you apparently accuse me of “talking about BS that does not matter and ignoring the forest for the trees (which) is not being scientific nor at all reasonable and rational,” perhaps you can be “reasonable & rational” for once and expand on this accusation, perhaps by listing some of the “many papers that go far beyond anything he (that is MA Rodger) has or might have to say on the matter.” Hopefully you will be able to list papers that back up your brave words and are not misfiring repeats of the one paper (Dessler & Forster 2018) you have referenced so far.
V 165: Other than that “price on carbon,” which won’t do a bloody thing.
BPL: Yes it will. Not only do you need a course in introductory statistics, you need one in introductory economics. Thing taxed gets produced in lesser quantity, because you’ve raised the price of production. Econ 101.
GISTEMP has reported for July 2018 with an anomaly of +0.78ºC, slightly up on June’s +0.76ºC and the third coolest anomaly for the year so far. (Previous 2018 months range from +0.91ºC to +0.76ºC.)
It is the 3rd warmest July in GISTEMP (for the satellite TLT records, July was 4th in UAH & 3rd in RSS) below 1st-placed July 2016 (+0.81ºC) & 2nd-placed July 2017 (+0.80ºC) with a bit more of a gap down to =4th placed July 2015 & 2011 (+0.71ºC). July 2018 is the =44th warmest anomaly on the full all-month GISTEMP record.
In the GISTEMP year-to-date table below, 2018 sits 3rd.
Table ranked by average of Jan-to-July anomalies.
2016 .. +1.06ºC … … … +0.99ºC … … … 1st
2017 .. +0.93ºC … … … +0.90ºC … … … 2nd
2018 .. +0.82ºC
2015 .. +0.80ºC … … … +0.87ºC … … … 3rd
2010 .. +0.75ºC … … … +0.70ºC … … … 5th
2007 .. +0.70ºC … … … +0.64ºC … … … 8th
1998 .. +0.70ºC … … … +0.62ºC … … … 11th
2014 .. +0.69ºC … … … +0.73ºC … … … 4th
2002 .. +0.68ºC … … … +0.63ºC … … … 10th
2005 .. +0.65ºC … … … +0.67ºC … … … 6th
2009 .. +0.60ºC … … … +0.63ºC … … … 9th
Victor, #165–
Really? I honestly hadn’t noticed. Are there any caveats attached to that statement?
Really, aren’t you a bit curious? You’re not actually obliged to read every last word, after all.
That bit was sad/funny, as after asking SE to tell you, you proceeded essentially to tell him what you *imagined* the IPCC might, or should, say. The irony was only heightened by the fact that you had just refused, in the previous paragraph, to take the slightest interest in what the IPCC actually *does* say.
But I do hope you had fun building all those straw men–I guess everyone needs a hobby.
Victor@165 wrote:
Non sequitur. I’m a scientist who accepts the current scientific consensus. I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for that consensus to change.
If you are truly interested in such issues, then please read volumes 2 and 3 of the IPCC report.
Literally turning a blind eye on what’s going on in the arctic:
” The US satellites currently in orbit are already past their expiry date, with some already cutting out. When these satellites fail completely, Arctic researchers warn, the ongoing scientific record keeping will come to an abrupt end, with no funding and no time left to replace the aging infrastructure.
“It is unfortunate and disturbing that right at the time we’re seeing sea ice cover in rapid transition, we’re in danger of losing some of our key capabilities to observe what’s happening and understand it,” says Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
For all intents and purposes, Arctic scientists – and the world – could very soon be blind to the tumultuous changes happening in the Arctic until 2022 or 2023, with no viable international systems coming on board in time to completely fill in the coverage gap.
The fault for the failure lies with a US Congress hostile to funding climate change research. Major cuts were made to the DMSP satellites when Obama was in office, and the situation is unlikely to improve under the Trump administration. In his proposed “skinny” budget released in March, and again in his more detailed proposed budget this week, President Trump called for cuts to NASA satellite missions, including NOAA’s next two polar orbiting satellites…”
https://thewire.in/environment/arctic-sea-ice-shows-record-decline-scientists-prepare-go-blind
Don’t worry about that, we do not need to see what’s going on in the arctic, as we will FEEL it for sure 8)
Sigh. The government agencies, under the guidance of the “nothing is happening, what me worry?” administration policy, are now proposing inviting affluent high rollers to gamble with coastal property, and maybe cash out before the coastline goes underwater.
===================
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/15/opinion/fema-flooding-development-buyout.html
======================
… The plan FEMA is now considering would continue the current programs, with one significant change: owners of homes damaged repeatedly by floods would be able to sell their homes to the government — as they can do now — but keep ownership of the land and then turn around and rebuild on the same flood-prone parcel, which is now prohibited.
Not only does this fail to address the problem of repeat flooding; it also raises the possibility that homeowners who live on prime parcels — along coastlines, for instance — could then turn around and sell their property for more money, pocketing a windfall at taxpayer expense. In essence, it would be a government subsidy for high-value redevelopment in areas that shouldn’t be rebuilt at all.
Joel Scata, an attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, noted in a comment to FEMA that with these proposed changes, a property owner could “redevelop the property themselves, leveraging the public funding provided by FEMA to build a larger or more luxurious home that could then be ‘flipped’ to the highest bidder….
=========================
@MA Rodger, #178
” Your reason for dismissing the climate models is instead because you are a lurking anti-captitalist anarchist.”
My dear, you still don’t get it:
I am an a- political anarchist. If I were anti-capitalist then I would demand to end capitalism. But I never did that, did I? No, I didn’t 38=> Obviously you can not imagine how much A- political I really am. I understand that as you have been educated in the conventional way Empire educates :) You need to climb the stairway to heaven (or was it hell?) way higher to see the pan-o-rama I see:
Capitalism vs communism vs socialism vs globalism vs nationalism vs democrats vs republicans vs… (make your choice) is a game, a show, a tragic-comedia, a movie for kids, a funny little game for sheps, not for wolves.
See, I am a lone wolf, I don’t demand to stop capitalism or whatever shit, personally(!) I DON’T CARE about the final outcome of the global mess I did not create, I am long gone 38=> Death is certain for everyone, that’s the beauty of death, it does not care about your political opinions, it does not care about any opinion at all. I tell you my lifelong mantra:
” Spitting blood clears up reality
and dream alike.”
– Sunao
You will learn that too just like everyone else. Tic tac tic tac tic tac…
@MA Rodger et al
MOST people think, the capitalist system will solve the problem of climate heating and they are quick to insult everyone who dares to disagree as “Communist” or “Marxist” or “Leftist” or “Socialist” or “Anti- Capitalist”. That’s what the funny republicans and the funny democrats in the USA and elsewhere have in common. These people don’t realize, that real existant communism was really sick, but communism will look like kindergarden compared to the final outcome of capitalism.
No matter if I look at global public debts, corruption on a massive scale, industrialized, chemicalized and economically profitoptimized food production, crumbling infrastructures (in no way prepared for global climate heating), dying oceans, dying wildlife, mass extinction of insects, growing global economic injustice, the looming freshwater crisis, rising nationalism, rising international global conflicts, I can see the sign on the wall just everywhere. And you will realize soon:
Denying that the economic system is the ultimate global Killer is worse than denying anthropogenic induced climate heating.
See, Mr. MA Rodger, personally I give a complete f* about the Karma of ANY political point of view, I give a complete f* about your Karma or anyone elses Karma, I do care for my personal Karma only. See, I got nothing to lose, no children, absolutely nothing- so why should I demand to stop capitalism or whatever political/economical system at all? Just let the powers that be do whatever they want, they’ll do it anyway, it’s their Karma, not mine. I’m just enjoying the show, the cosmic drama as a complete nobody, that’s all. So there’s absolutely no need to attack a completely a- political nobody like me by political insults, makes no sense, it’s boring.
This raises a question I’ve been wondering about for a while. As sea level rises, for coastal property, a lot of infrastructure not designed for submersion in salt water is going to be getting wet.
Is anyone thinking ahead to cleaning out the oil tanks, septic tanks, landfills full of plastic, and suchlike crap that shouldn’t be let wash into the ocean? Maybe a bounty for property owners who clean up their leavings so the new intertidal or shallow water becomes suitable for raising oysters or lobsters or softshell crabs or edible seaweed or baby fish?
Killian @170, you aren’t making much sense. Obviously el nino warmth finds its way to the arctic. Like I said thats old science, so you get no points for stating or predicting the obvious.
Maybe I missinterpreted you. That would not be hard given the muddled state of your writing. And I think you should look up “narcissism” on wikipedia.
Carrie @155, I just want to add a comment on positive feedbacks. Of course positive feedbacks could reach tipping points where they can’t be stopped, or not entirely stopped. Perhaps this is what you meant? Examples might be the arctic ice issue, methane feedbacks, and the destabilisaion in the antarctic and the amazon rain forest issue.
However the evidence suggests we arent at those tipping points yet, so there still an opportunity to avoid them, or some of them at least:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/aug/15/humans-are-pushing-the-earth-closer-to-a-climate-cliff
Hank Roberts @185 yes that sea level rise policy is insane. I’m starting to wonder if all the drugs smoked by people in their youth are starting to finally catch up with them :)
I dedicate this to MA Rodger:
” The heat is on for 4 more years: Extreme temperatures expected through 2022″
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/techandscience/the-heat-is-on-for-4-more-years-extreme-temperatures-expected-through-2022/ar-BBLWs0h
Tic tac tic tac tic tac….
Every day another dozen or so papers are being published the far majority of which keep on indicating the exact same things no matter the climate domain they are addressing.
Marine heatwaves will become more frequent & extreme with continued global warming
Thomas L. Frölicher, Erich M. Fischer & Nicolas Gruber (2018), “Marine heatwaves under global warming”, Nature, volume 560, pages360–364, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-018-0383-9
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0383-9
“The largest changes are projected to occur in the western tropical Pacific and Arctic oceans. Today, 87 per cent of MHWs are attributable to human-induced warming, with this ratio increasing to nearly 100 per cent under any global warming scenario exceeding 2 degrees Celsius. Our results suggest that MHWs will become very frequent and extreme under global warming, probably pushing marine organisms and ecosystems to the limits of their resilience and even beyond, which could cause irreversible changes.”
171 nigelj says:
14 Aug 2018 at 9:23 PM
Carrie @155
“Human CO2 emissions of 10 Gt (C) per year to date are not the only driver of global warming today and will not be the only driver of global warming into the future either. A handful of hundreds of GCMs (future modelling scenarios) consider only some of the feedbacks, but most do not….”
Eh? The CO2 emissions are the source of the feedbacks, so reduce emissions and you reduce the feedbacks.
Show me your supporting scientific evidence / data where present and future emissions are reduced below 10 Gt C. Substantial claims require substantial evidence. Hope isn’t evidence.
Of course there are natural emissions from various things, but they tend to be short term and balanced by natural sinks.
Show me your supporting evidence this is true now and into the future. Scientific evidence in published papers by climate experts would be preferred to your simplistic opinions.
Of course some warming is locked in, but thats another matter.
How much is locked in? It is not another matter it is an integral part of the matter now and into the future. Show your math/evidence that proves it;s not an issue to drive present and future warming feedback. Scientific refs please. Substantial claims require substantial evidence. Guesses by amateurs isn’t evidence
According to the links supplied by MAR the models include most feedbacks. The ones not included are not included for various sensible reasons.
Show me. Which models? What “most feedbacks” are included in which papers? Show me the papers not including which feedbacks are excluded for sensible reasons .. why are they “sensible” define that in the specific context of those papers.
Con’t: are you getting the gist of this yet? Your comment says nothing, shows nothing and proves nothing. It’s a nothing meaningless comment in toto. Another vapid opinion in cyberspace no better than a Victor-like comment.
Now here’s a challenge for you – which of those papers ref’d by MA Rodger or anyone ever included the 2.5 gigatons more carbon boost in natural emissions from only 3 distinct equatorial locations as noted here at NASA. None of that was part of the 10GtC of human GHG emissions per year.
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-pinpoints-cause-of-earth-s-recent-record-carbon-dioxide-spike
Then do show me how these kinds of events are already included as FEEDBACKS in all those MODELS in the Paper references you falsely claim to be relying upon above and BELIEVE are true and correct – MA Rodger is not a climate scientist, he is not a published climate scientists and he is NOT an expert in the filed. So why do you believe him? I do not. He has already proven he is not unbiased, is not credible to me and is not competent in this field as a reliable source.
Substantial claims require substantial evidence. Hope and beliefs are not evidence. Try harder, and choose your credible experts wisely.
179 MARodger-aka-Clown says nothing of importance. People form their own opinions about what is and who is a reliable credible expert source for accurate analysis of global warming dynamics now and into the future.
Nemesis & Nigel & a few others might find the following useful.
The linked reference indicates that prior estimates of effective ECS based on energy budgets were too low:
Timothy Andrews et al. (30 July 2018), “Accounting for changing temperature patterns increases historical estimates of climate sensitivity; Geophysical Research Letters, https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL078887
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2018GL078887
Arctic understanding limited by patchy field work, scientist says. Areas of Canadian Arctic poorly sampled, could mean faulty assumptions about rate of climate change
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/arctic-study-understanding-limited-climate-change-1.4781405
“Metcalfe’s research suggests scientists are oversampling locations warming slowly, while places warming much more rapidly, such as the Canadian Arctic, may be releasing stored carbon at a greater rate and in a greater quantity than assumed. Metcalfe says this could mean scientists are underestimating the global impact of warming in the Arctic.”
The findings of the linked article imply that policymakers would be wise to apply a high factor of safety when evaluating the policy implications of consensus ice sheet model projections such as those cited in AR5:
Dolan AM; De Boer B; Bernales J; Hill DJ; Haywood AM (2018) High climate model dependency of Pliocene Antarctic ice-sheet predictions, Nature Communications, 9, doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-05179-4
http://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-05179-4
Open-access paper “Wildfire as a major driver of recent permafrost thaw in boreal peatlands”
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-05457-1
quote: “Permafrost vulnerability to climate change may be underestimated unless effects of wildfire are considered. Here we assess impacts of wildfire on soil thermal regime and rate of thermokarst bog expansion resulting from complete permafrost thaw in western Canadian permafrost peatlands. Effects of wildfire on permafrost peatlands last for 30 years and include a warmer and deeper active layer, and spatial expansion of continuously thawed soil layers (taliks). These impacts on the soil thermal regime are associated with a tripled rate of thermokarst bog expansion along permafrost edges. Our results suggest that wildfire is directly responsible for 2200 ± 1500 km2 (95% CI) of thermokarst bog development in the study region over the last 30 years, representing ~25% of all thermokarst bog expansion during this period. With increasing fire frequency under a warming climate, this study emphasizes the need to consider wildfires when projecting future circumpolar permafrost thaw.”
These scientists suggest that as we continue on a BAU pathway, nitrous oxide feedbacks may become more important than current consensus climate models account for: Title: “Back to the future of climate change”
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/08/180809125546.htm
Extract: “”The suggestion of a nitrous oxide feedback on climate warming adds a new layer of intrigue to this discussion and highlights the role a changing nitrogen cycle might have on our future Earth.… “Indeed, there are gaps in our understanding between the model worlds and the fossil worlds. The past enables us to test and hone models on which future projections are based. It also helps us determine what processes are missing from our current Earth system models,” he says. “These things combined help us understand and prepare for what is on the horizon.”
NASA even – Consensus climate models do not account for the fact that with continued global warming the Arctic carbon cycle is accelerating: Title : “Arctic carbon cycle is speeding up”
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2776/arctic-carbon-cycle-is-speeding-up/
Meanwhile the southern hemisphere active Wild Fire season has already begun before the end of winter. Look it up. El Nino is2018/2019 still iffy but if it does form then look forward to more events such as this by NASA
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-pinpoints-cause-of-earth-s-recent-record-carbon-dioxide-spike
I believe I’ve already made myself clear, but judging from the responses to my most recent posts on this thread, the message hasn’t really gotten through. Let me clarify:
I am NOT arguing that it’s too late to do anything meaningful to “fight climate change.” Nor am I arguing that any of the measures that have been recommended as means of mitigating climate change are necessarily futile, in themselves — in fact I approve of most of them, and especially approve of efforts to develop alternative energy sources, such as solar, wind, etc. Just about everything that’s been suggested (aside from “climate engineering” and CO2 sequestration) represents a healthy response to serious environmental, social and economic concerns.
What I AM saying is that the very idea that all the people and all the nations of the world can somehow come together in some vaguely Utopian sense to “fight climate change” in a manner that can actually make a difference (assuming the enormity of the alleged threat) is a huge chimera that could never be achieved, and that the impossibility of achieving it should be obvious to anyone with an ounce of critical thinking ability, not to mention common sense. It’s not just that the desired solution is impossible, it’s that the very notion that it MIGHT be possible borders on insanity. Which tells me that those trying so hard to convince the world that we desperately need to “do something before it’s too late” are not only wrong, but far worse: they are arguing in bad faith. Because they HAVE to know, and have to have always known, that such efforts would be an exercise in futility.
We’re being told that CO2 levels have to be reduced by such and such a percentage by such and such a date, but no one has a clue as to how that could be achieved, short of a major worldwide revolution followed by the imposition of universal martial law so onerous that no society anywhere would be willing to accept it. Nor does anyone have a clue as to what the effect on the climate would be if such a revolution WERE possible and the required reductions achieved.
It’s not simply that I advocate “doing nothing” in the face of an imminent threat, nor do I have any desire to maintain the status quo (I happen to be a Socialist). It’s just that I refuse to go along with what looks more and more to me like the sort of doomsday cult that demands more and more sacrifice with no clear understanding of whether such sacrifice will matter. While earlier cults took their authority from “the Gods,” this one takes its authority from “the Science.” In both cases, cult members are expected to follow the directives of those who represent the ultimate authority, the high priests who continually assure us that they alone know the Truth and must be obeyed or else we will all perish.
As I see it, the bad faith exhibited by these priests with respect to the extreme demands they are making reflects back on their “science” as a whole, making the skeptical position regarding the climatic effects of fossil fuels even stronger than ever. I have no problem “doing nothing” because I have no faith in anything the alarmists have to say and see no need to “do something” when I see nothing to be alarmed about.
Gavin et al.,
I added climate feedbacks to by my semigray climate model and found it extended my CHZ from 0.976-1.040 AU to 0.949-1.141 AU, coincidentally very similar to that of Kasting et al. 1993 (0.95-1.15 AU). The point being that you can reproduce how climate feedbacks extend the size of the habitable zone even without doing sophisticated radiative-convective modeling.
Is there any journal that would be interested in printing such a minor result? Astrobiology is definitely not.
Never was there a topic fitting more squarely under “unforced variations.” There’s a new paper that begs for assessment here at RC–it outlines a novel method of probabilistic interannual forecasting of GMST and SST (representing what the authors term a “severe truncation” of the phase space, i.e., only that one parameter is considered.) Also–and give chutzpah points here–they state that this method depends upon 4 assumptions, none of which are strictly true (though they think all 4 are ‘close enough’, as evidenced by assessed hindcast skill).
Perhaps gratingly, they use the “p” word–that’s “pause” for casual readers–in connection with the “post-1998 decade”, and claim skillful hindcasting of it. To be completely clear, they are attempting to model variability via machine learning, so the implication would be that they attribute the so-called pause to internal variability, too.
Intriguing, but a lot of it is over my head, so I–and probably a lot of folks–would be very interested in more expert reactions.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-05442-8
Hi I have come across this explanation for a feedback not included in climate models.
“The ocean is estimated to absorb 93% of the extra energy trapped by greenhouse gases. Recent work suggests that, as the ocean warms, the surface will become stratified, so that there will be less mixing of surface water with colder, deeper water. This means that the 93% figure will drop, and atmospheric warming will surge. But, it gets worse.”
My understanding is ocean stratification is old science it has long been accounted for in models, that the energy transfer is due to short wave light heating the ocean and the increase in IR warming the skin layer and slowing the release of that heat (there is a real climate post on this) but I have never heard that the stratification will significantly slow the amount of excess energy being absorbed by the oceans in anything like the near term so that more goes into the atmosphere. I understood the ocean is a very deep heat sink that will take longer to come into balance than the atmosphere. Have I made a significant misunderstanding. Apols if this is off topic for this thread.