“There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts:
1. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.
Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics. We have been measuring the atmosphere for decades using radiosondes: weather balloons with thermometers that radio back the temperature as the balloon ascends through the atmosphere. They show no hot spot. Whatsoever…
2. There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming.
3. The satellites that measure the world’s temperature all say that the warming trend ended in 2001, and that the temperature has dropped about 0.6C in the past year (to the temperature of 1980). Land-based temperature readings are corrupted by the “urban heat island” effect: urban areas encroaching on thermometer stations warm the micro-climate around the thermometer, due to vegetation changes, concrete, cars, houses. Satellite data is the only temperature data we can trust, but it only goes back to 1979. NASA reports only land-based data, and reports a modest warming trend and recent cooling. The other three global temperature records use a mix of satellite and land measurements, or satellite only, and they all show no warming since 2001 and a recent cooling.
4. The new ice cores show that in the past six global warmings over the past half a million years, the temperature rises occurred on average 800 years before the accompanying rise in atmospheric carbon. Which says something important about which was cause and which was effect.
None of these points are controversial. The alarmist scientists agree with them, though they would dispute their relevance.”
Read more from David Evans in the article ‘No Smoking Hot Spot’ first published in The Australian here on July 18.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
The EU has long been a complete mess in terms of a coherent carbon mitigation programs, Gordon Brown has steadily screwed the UK right royally and is a dead set goner, the US is deep in, and obsessed-with, an economic meltdown, China and India continue to single mindedly pursue wholesale development and meanwhile the Russkies have been standing off to one side snickering into their vodka at the whole Gilbert and Sullivan opera.
With this as a ‘global backdrop’ the defection of David must have really rankled with the local greenhouse apparatchiki like Luke and ‘related’ persons who post here as proxies for him and others – given that David was so ‘close to home’, so to speak (;-)
Firstly, the last 10 years and now especially the last 12 months, has been a disaster for the IPCC and mainstream climate models, temperature wise. Keenlyside et al. only compounded the dismay. Relevant to Australia is that Central Pacific GCM simulations also took a caning in an exhaustive review which received little attention.
Secondly, the number of actual physical discoveries of various hitherto unknown sources of negative feedback seems to be ‘getting out of hand’. First we had Ramanathan et al with their Asian ‘sooty aerosols’, now Spencer with his SW + LW radiative forcing from the 5 years of CERES measurements, and just coming up, Roberts et al’s discovery using unmanned aerial vehicles that the combination of aerosols and clouds actually significantly increases cloud albedo. All effects not factored into any current GCMs.
Expect to see rising angst amongst the incestuous AGW legionnaires here in Oz over the next 12 months. Naturally, expect to see the level of compensatory dissembling and earnest hyperbole get ramped up accordingly.
All true. However, the level to which the “fact” of AGW has propagated to the policy makers and guy on the street makes all of these points useless. I am not totally without hope that the light of real science and common sense will finally shine through, but each day that light dims just a little bit more (e.g., Al Gore’s speech a couple of days ago).
The only thing going for the sceptics [apart from the facts] is the political difficulty in selling it.
We still have to stand by and observe [and pay for] these crazy mitigation schemes.
But Gilbert and Sullivan is so true!
The world is crying out for a musical commedy on all this.
It would lay ’em in the aisles.
Even the Goons [especially Spike] would tear it to pieces. Jimmy Edwards, Benny Hill, The Two Ronnies.
Where are the dead poets when you need ’em?
“”There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts:”
I can’t ever remember there being a public debate on gravity, but maybe I just missed it somewhere.
“no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming.”
A blatant lie. The IPCC report clearly states why it believes carbon emissions are the source of the warming, based on scientific research. You may disagree, but the attribution of warming has been carefully made.
Steve Short – “With this as a ‘global backdrop’ the defection of David must have really rankled with the local greenhouse apparatchiki like Luke and ‘related’ persons who post here as proxies for him and others – given that David was so ‘close to home’, so to speak (;-)”
Without speaking for Luke I couldn’t care less – whats one less accounting flunky?
“Firstly, the last 10 years and now especially the last 12 months, has been a disaster for the IPCC and mainstream climate models, temperature wise”
Only if you cherry pick the data that you want. As far as the temperature record goes if you take all the data instead of the one that shows what you want there has been a steady rise in temperatures. Also if you look at all the graphs there are many times even in the short instrument record where temperatures have levelled out for a number of years. What are you so little the scientist now that as soon as you some some levelling out you call off global warming.
“Secondly, the number of actual physical discoveries of various hitherto unknown sources of negative feedback seems to be ‘getting out of hand’. First we had Ramanathan et al with their Asian ‘sooty aerosols’, now Spencer with his SW + LW radiative forcing from the 5 years of CERES measurements, and just coming up, Roberts et al’s discovery using unmanned aerial vehicles that the combination of aerosols and clouds actually significantly increases cloud albedo. All effects not factored into any current GCMs.”
So now you are diseminating this particular lie. Are you a climate modeller or geologist? Have you looked deeply at the models or are you just repeating denier crap. As you are a scientist, a fact you keep remining us of, where is your peer reviewed paper on your GCM runs incoporating these new feedbacks and how they affect global warming?
Until then we just need to deal with them by quoting Coby as you, and this article are just recycling debunked arguments. Ten out of ten for environmental responsibility for recycling however -100 for scientific content.
Ender; read pp 131-132 of AR4 and tell us all where the IPCC has worked out the connection between CO2 and temp; then look at FAQ 3.1 for confirmation of IPCC’s lack of reliance on CO2 and utter reliance on H2O for +ve feedback to enable the “enhanced greenhouse” to occur; it is a shameful distortion of ‘science’ and a manifestation of zealotry for anyone to say IPCC has made a case for AGW.
And a question. If there are all these negative feedbacks affecting the climate how does it change? As deniers keep repeating over and over again that the climate does nothing but change and this is just one of them, how does this happen if there enough powerful negative feedbacks like the ones that Steve is ranting on about. How does the climate change at all?
Now you cannot deny that the climate has changed in the past so when the Malankovitch cycles change the solar insolation received by the Earth in a positive way why do not all the negative feedbacks kick in, so we do not see the steep rise from glacial to interglacial?
Even Mr Evans mentions that the CO2 rise lags the change, a fact that we are not 100% sure of, however obviously from the ice core records positive feedbacks overwealm the negative ones to produce the upward change.
What we are simply doing is replicating the rising CO2 at the times of glacial to interglacial. The temperatures then rose OK – where were all the negative feedbacks then?
cohenite – “Ender; read pp 131-132 of AR4 and tell us all where the IPCC has worked out the connection between CO2 and temp”
I see so you would like me to explain AR4 to you! If you have issue with the scientific basis of AR4 then it is incumbent on you to produce a paper explaining in detail where you think the scientists that wrote the papers that were summerised in AR4 are wrong, make it sufficiently rigorous to pass peer review and then with other work convince enough climate scientists that your work is scientific truth.
This is what the scientists that originally proposed global warming in the first place did and you people can do the same.
BTW blogs do not count – they are for people like me – unqualified dabblers.
SJT – “I can’t ever remember there being a public debate on gravity, but maybe I just missed it somewhere.”
Actually there probably was in 1600 or so. The Theory of Gravity goes against the common sense, at the time, notion that heavier objects must fall faster than ligher objects. A comprehensive theory of gravity dispelled this popular myth and showed the scientific truth.
Its just at that time there were not massive corporations making masses of money from falling objects. Also falling objects did not underpin and make possible our entire Western civilisation like fossil fuels do. Thats the problem – the science really is not the problem it is how do we make sure that we make the same amount of money with low carbon emissions as with high emissions. Of course following on from that if we are so locked into the status quo to make the same amount of money from low carbon then the science is of course wrong and there is no need to lower emissions.
Oh and Evans forgot that Al Gore is fat. Make sure that one is in his next article.
People in glasshouses shouldn’t throw flux.
Hmmm – I wonder if we had a good look at the “rocket scientist’s” (see programmer) work of art FULLCAM – what assumptions and corner cutting we might find. Transparent and accessible ? All algorithms accounted for. Reckon this could be a job for Macca and the Spanish Inquisition (err audit).
But yawn really:
(1) been through it on RC
(2) huh
(3) well he would wouldn’t he – anything to get a shorter run of data. Of course we could ask Macca to do an audit on the satellite data too – so abandoned by sceptics for checking (wonder why)
(4) so what?
I guess given he’s so outraged he’ll be giving his salary back to the AGO.
The signs are not good. Past experience shows that environmentalists are clearly right about one thing: the interconnectedness of nature. But those connections are both ill-understood and exceptionally hard to capture mathematically – making attempts to predict the impact of policy decisions the devil’s own job.
Nowhere is this more clear than in the huge effort put into creating reliable computer models of the world’s climate. These attempt to capture the incredibly complex interaction of the oceans, land and atmosphere and thus reveal the impact of various scenarios on global temperatures.
The real problem with computer simulations with the climate is the familiar: “garbage in, garbage out” – or what the experts call ‘model error’. In other words, the reliability of such simulation depends crucially on what’s fed into them. And in the case of climate models the principal source of such error is how they deal with the effect of clouds.
In an ongoing experiment at Oxford University, a mainstream climate model has, and is, being run repeatedly with different values for the effect of clouds and moisture. Worryingly, early results revealed that the impact on the simulation can be dramatic, with forecasts ranging from a staggering
11.5 C increase in global temperatures to a slight cooling.
Now climate modelers may have another, even more important, source of uncertainty to contend with: atmospheric pollution. Research published last week by a team led by Dr Christian Ruckstuhl of the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science in Switzerland found dramatic reductions in industrial pollution achieved by European countries has served to drive temperatures up far more rapidly than by global warming alone.
Dr Ruckstuhl and his colleagues describe the sheer size of the effect as “very surprising”. But with no current climate models taking it into account, anyone using computer simulations to guide policy decisions can only hope this latest schlimmbesserung doesn’t have unforeseen consequences.
“I can’t ever remember there being a public debate on gravity, but maybe I just missed it somewhere.”
It’s still on going, unlike “the science is settled”, there is still open debate on gravity … because the science is not settled. Postulated gravitational waves still have not been detected, the Pioneer anomaly still has not been resolved and that’s older than the current AGW argument. Discrepancies in spacecraft slingshot manoeuvres haven’t been cleared up. Gravity hasn’t been unified with the other atomic forces, after that there is supergravity and M-Theory (‘M’ I think for Murky) and moves well away from any reading I have done on the subjects.
But, the arguments still rage and the science is far from settled.
SJT, perhaps your preconceptions have coloured your attitude in this and other matters.
“But, the arguments still rage and the science is far from settled.”
But where is the “public” debate? The science of gravity is far from settled, if you like, but if I drop something, it will fall down, every time. Science never gets to a final conclusion, it’s a never ending process of discovery. “Settled” in the sense of AGW means that the warming has been attributed to CO2, as best we can do. Given the amount of absolute rubbish brought up in rebuttal of AGW, I think that ‘sceptics’ don’t have much at all to counter that.
Luke
“Hmmm – I wonder if we had a good look at the “rocket scientist’s” (see programmer) work of art FULLCAM ….”
In the process let’s not forget the little matter of David having undergrad. degrees from USyd, and a PhD in elec. eng. from Stanford Uni. and publications in ratio to yours of >20:1. Not to mention having written two books including a good solid math textbook ‘Geometric Fourier Analysis’.
Sort of a cut above your average rangelands technician wouldn’t you say?
Yawn really.
Savo
All these discrepancies in gravity theory are easily explained by the principles of the plasma universe theory. Unfortunately mainstream astrophysics still does not include the role of electric plasma and electricity, hence they continue to have these “problems” with gravity.
Come to think of it, there was a little problem with the highly numerate David Stockwell over at Niche Modeling as well, wasn’t there?
Poor David Stockwell is still trying to get some democratic transparency out CSIRO – just a little hickup of “Intellectual Property Rights”.
Surprised? Canberra? Yawn really. Been there, (got) done by that!
But there does seem to be a little chronic issue with any highly intelligent David’s doesn’t there!
A sort of David and Golum situation…..
oooo – the old appeal to authority. You seem to like doing that lately. Why don’t you tell us how good you are once again too. We’d all like another dose I’m sure.
Well there are many cleverer people programming GCMs which you would pour scorn on – so doesn’t wash.
Are you an expert on FULLCAM Steve. Could it be another blackbox GCM. Reckon it needs a good Macca like audit to check it all out – what might we find?
Fourier analysis – oooooo – wow – that’s really helpful when you have no data or parameters. So you can stick your power spectrum. Wonder how Fourier analysis helps with woody debris – but a rangeland technician might know – or even have some data.
Steve – you’re not very practical are you – I’m still ROTFLing after your helpful ideas on EC and water policy.
So now we’re “listening” to this self-proclaimed rocket scientist. oooooo Wow !
SJT,
Poor choice of ananogy. Even dills like you and me don’t need to commit financial suicide over gravity.
But the smarties are happy to do it over AGW on little or no evidence.
Spanglers – I would have thought economic suicide is most unlikely and pretty alarmist.
But I would have thought the position for you guys is pretty clear.
Simply a matter of communicating the inadequacies of the science to the public – and Steve has told us how good the opposition is here – intelligent, articulate, good looking and well dressed to take that message – so get the Federal opposition to run full tilt against climate change policy. Or you could have a Senate based anti-enviro – anti-climate change niche party.
You guys have political options well open to you.
So what’s stopping you using it.
Dare I suggest it’s because 70% of public opinion is on Rudd’s side (for now).
Luke – “But yawn really: (1) been through it on RC”
Did you really buy that crap? Using satellite data to make radiosonde adjustments? Using wind speed?!? And RAOBCORE 1.4? We get recommended adjustments that are typically of the same order of magnitude as the underlying trend.
They specifically mention that most of the biases are that of cooling. A bit like the UHI effect is mostly heating? Seems like they jump all over the cooling biases while performing simple hand waving gestures on the warming biases. Not surprised.
some posts point to the IPCC for evidence of global warming being caused by man made greenhouse gases.
The IPCC summary for decision (sorry policy)makers uses the word evidence just three times. The most relevant reference is on page 9 “The ability of coupled climate models to simulate the observed temperature evolution on each of six continents provides stronger evidence of human influence on climate than was available in the TAR.”
Dr Evan’s article states:
“Computer models and theoretical calculations are not evidence, they are just theory.”
The public debate is continuously going on through scientists academics students et al conducting experiments then building hypothesis, knocking them down and rebuilding them. The robust ones develop into theories and the strongest become Laws. Theories must be repeatable and provable to be accepted. I only see an AGW hypothesis.
The ‘public debate’ isn’t some village meeting where a show of hands carries the day. To hope truth or proof will come from that is an almost charming but symplistic outlook. It is like believing the judicial system is always right because 12 jurors argeed (or at least agreed they want to get out of the jury room more quickly).
I have a feeling SJT that you do not wish to engage in a debate, you simply want a forum.
I’ll stop now.
Luke,
“But I would have thought the position for you guys is pretty clear.”
Ya mean like, nuclear power, science debates, holding decisions until we have more certainty etc?
With a frothy-mouthed govt and a weak opposition all on a ride to glory at the the peoples expense with no solution possible I can’t see too clear just at the moment.
I wouldn’t be offended if you pointed it out.
If the Rudd govt do what they say it WILL be economic suicide but worse, it will become enviro-suicide soon after.
“I have a feeling SJT that you do not wish to engage in a debate, you simply want a forum. ”
You are entirely wrong. I’m all for debate, but what seems to pass for the anti-agw agrument here is mostly ignorance and conspiracy theories.
Well spanglers as I’m now typecast as a govt plant on a mission (or maybe a “contractor” ooooo”. So be careful I might be messing with your mind.
I would not have thought you’d be at nuclear power as an option unless the need to do something about CO2 was strong in your mind. Coal simply being cheaper and less complex.
Debates are fine but the usual time format means it’s a waste of time – you’d need about 2 days to think it through and debate the fine points.
But to your point – Jen through her connections with a raft of very intelligent people nationally and internationally could organise something. Perhaps the Australian Environment Foundation could go political? (Gee better renew my membership eh). And chase the senate balance of power – it’s either that or line up the wishy-washy opposition.
But to me the opposition want to portray “oh yes we’re reasonable – we all “believe” in anthropogenic climate change (even though they don’t) – but we’ll like to fiddle around without doing anything” i.e. it’s all image for the voters.
So that’s my tease – but serious one – don’t be victims – get organised, get professional and get political. But seriously, the current sceptic presentation looks redneck and rabid. Would you want these dudes around for dinner? Won’t attract the voters. Looks irrational.
Looks like Ivan will be up for the bouncer position eh 🙂
Where’s the AEF senate party?
Yes Jennifer,David Evans was an AGW believer but now the facts have changed ,it will not deter the momentum of this political ideology has too much at stake.The Rudd Govt are locked into this ideology and risk political oblivion if AGW is a lie.
BTW Steve when you are through insulting people perhaps you can take a crack at the question I posed.
If there are all these negative feedbacks affecting the climate how does it change?
Ender: “If there are all these negative feedbacks affecting the climate how does it change?”
Ask gavin if a voltage follower, that has 100% negative voltage feed back, works and follows the input voltage.
It really is a silly question.
Ender
You might better spend your time trying to understand what weather is, since climate is weather averaged over 30 years by definition.
So what causes weather?
Climate changes; Milankovitch, solar, same thing, huge geomorphological events, both over geological time, continental drift, and shorter periods, volcanoes; internal radiative effects cannot change climate; Stewart and Miskolczi;
Weather changes; LTE intereactions; a LTE will change over the minimum unit of time; there is a >1 probability that a LTE will pass through the same LTE measured moment in any sufficient period of time; the LTE time function is therefore a curve and may be expressed parametrically; since all definable LTE’s will follow equivalent curves there will be a balance between any similarly time-defined LTE’s; the parametric expression of a LTE will be nominally, but actually not autocorrelative because, while the curve may be retraced, any LTE, per unit of time will not be identical because the LTE determinants/indices will never be identical. An averaging of LTE’s is, therefore, a nonsense, as each LTE has unique determinants intrinsically and comparatively; it is the dynamic and perpetual differences between each LTE’s determinants which causes weather; each LTE seeks to homogenise its own and each other’s determinants even when thermal and radiative balance is maintained; regionalism, on every scale, is paramount, the average global temperature is spurious, as is the greenhouse concept which relies on it.
Luke, frothing at the mouth, sees red after Louis seems to imply that “Climate” may be associated with ww-wwwe-wweeaather. Ugh!
Louis, a totally unfair approach. No need to goad! Please don’t mix the definition of climate with weather. Wait! That’s what the IPCC did!
I will repeat my view on this! Controlling “CLIMATE” is controlling the weather. How’s that worked out so far?
“I will repeat my view on this! Controlling “CLIMATE” is controlling the weather. How’s that worked out so far?”
I haven’t seen anyone say we can control the climate, other than deniers saying that people want to.
Due to the unforseen side effects of burning fossil fuels, temperature is rising. All that is being attempted is a limit to the burning of fossil fuels to limit this change. No more than that.
Gee if we had this many people concerned about global food supplies we might have a chance of solving a real problem. I have no qualms, nor do I feel guilty, making money out of this ignorance. Am joining the long list of investors buying commodities (food) and driving the costs of living for everyone into the realm of pain. Some lessons are learned the hard way (the lesson here would be don’t waste time argueing on insignificant issues when more perilous issues loom). Just wait until meat and dairy prices double, and maybe triple. Then you’ll appreciate the wrath of food price inflation. The greenhouse debate IMO is a very effective diversion away from more
‘perplexing issues’, ie generally global issues that could halve the value of your house and investments in say the next 5 years! I’d have thought with the amount of brain capacity here we’d be looking at the brain drain this debate encourages as highly amusing. Think I’ll buy some cotton and feeder cattle tommorrow, sugar is not far off booming either …
“Expect to see rising angst amongst the incestuous AGW legionnaires here in Oz over the next 12 months. Naturally, expect to see the level of compensatory dissembling and earnest hyperbole get ramped up accordingly.”
You haven’t got a clue, have you?
Aaron, just remember bubbles burst. Be careful with your investments. Otherwise, I agree. Never miss an opportunity to make a profit.
SJT, Luke, Ender…. AGW is a Hypothesis. It is not proven by any means…. You seem to confuse an accepted physical property of CO2, with that of the hypothetical effects or non-effects that Anthropogenic sourced CO2 may have on the global climate, as per the AGW Hypothesis.
Now with ALL hypothesises, the onus is upon the presenting scientist/s to prove the Hypothesis…. Not the other way round.
It appears to me that if AGW computor models were supposed to predict a warming rate of the Tropical Troposphere faster than that of the surface record. That when this ‘signature’ rise was found to be lacking in the observational record, one would have to deduce that something is amiss with the Hypothesis…..
I am also highly sceptical of a surface temperature record that was never designed to be interpolated at a resolution of hundredths of a degree, which it is now “adjusted” to be so.
The Hypothesis of AGW seems to me to be broken.
J Hansford with all scales of justice you need to weigh up the evidence properly – like most sceptics you’ve decided to only use 1% of the evidence. If you want to be objective do the full case not just what appeals to you.
But as RC recently discussed they’re actually not sure on troposphere story.
And be sceptical of the surface temperature record – but that is why it probably looks like the satellite record in trend. Come on !
J.Hansford. at July 21, 2008 03:56 AM;
I agree 100%, the onus is on the proposers of a theory not on the skeptics. Further, a theory proposer should welcome skeptical arguments so they can be sure they are right. Didn’t Einstein go out of his way to search for holes in his theory?
I surmise that many non-technical folks see the stonewalling by ACO2GW theorists alone as enough “evidence” for them to conclude that it is a non-issue that is perhaps influenced by non-technical issues or deficient science. It amazes me that ACO2GW theorists aren’t going out of their way to debate, share data, etc. We know they say they believe their data, but don’t they see that the stonewalling alone has the potential to sink their ship? Even if they don’t see it as stonewalling, the reality is that it appears to be the case to many in the public, so why don’t marketing consultants that may support them, tell them to start sharing? I suppose they may have better polling data than I that says that the public does not see any stonewalling…
Those non-technical folks then think that we should move on and spend our limited resources on things we have evidence for such as benefits of reducing air and water pollution. Not reduction of a beneficial gas.
Also, I read somewhere that the Global Circulation Models (GCMs) assume a certain level of CO2 driven forcing and plug it in as an input. This amazes me. I would have thought that that CO2 induced forcing would be an output.
This would only be sensical, if there was a sound physical rationale for using such a CO2 warming forcing. I understand that a portion of this forcing is based on the established physics of the radiation absorption curve for CO2, but that only supports a small degree of warming. They then leap to an assumption that water vapor will magnify the warming and do not address any of the complex water vapor related considerations like clouds and variations in relative humidity. This is an area where they need to open up on.
Last topic; Wikipedia needs to disallow one-sided editing of Global warming info, and I imagine there are many other topics slanted by interested editors.
“Also, I read somewhere” – yes well that’s a well balanced scientific approach.
“This is an area where they need to open up on.” – have you done the most minimal bit of personal investigation?
Jan Pompe – “Ask gavin if a voltage follower, that has 100% negative voltage feed back, works and follows the input voltage.”
Not really as Steve Short has implied that negative feedbacks keep the climate more or less constant. What he is saying is more like a voltage regulator not a voltage follower.
It is not a silly question as the climate has changed in the past and if there is a regulator in the climate, as Steve has implied, strong enough to resist our greenhouse changes then it should have been strong enough to resist other changes as well such as the Malankovitch cycles.
What about the missing hot spot, must be more of that RIRO again?
Just following on from my earlier post as to why the concept of an av temp if deficient, as is the AGW greenhouse idea, as is AGW itself; Jennifer had a recent post where she linked this paper;
http://climatesci.colorado.edu/publications/pdf/R-321.pdf
From the paper;
“The radiative temperature of the Earth is used by the IPCC and CCSP to represent the portion of the radiation emitted at the top of the atmosphere which originates at the Earth’s surface. However, the outgoing long wave radiation is proportional to the fourth power of T [T4], from Stefan-Boltzman’s Law, not temperature by itself. A 1C increase in the polar latitudes in the winter, for example, would have much less of an effect on the change of long wave emission than a 1C increase in the tropics. The spatial distribution matters, but the important distinction has been ignored. A more appropriate measure of radiatively signicicant surface changes would be to evaluate the change of the global average of T4 with time.”
Motl has done this here;
http://motls.blogspot.com/2008/05/average-temperature-vs-average.html
“The difference between the av value of the 4th power of temp is something different than the 4th power of the av temp!”
Motl calculates this difference as being 9W/m2. I would suggest that is the energy available to the combined LTE’s at the smallest unit of time to enable radiative and thermal balance adjustments (weather) to be achieved; when internal radiative and thermal imbalances occur that figure may increase or decrease marginally, with slight regional based weather variations ( and or outward radiative emissive compensations), but the global balance will not be distrubed.
1- Wrong. The greenhouse signature is a warming troposphere and a cooling stratosphere. This fingerprint has been observed for some time.
2 – Wrong. We’ve observed changes in the spectrum corresponding to CO2 at the top of the atmosphere. i.e,. CO2 abosorbing more energy
3 – Wrong. Long term satellite and surface measurements all show a warming. UHI effects’s are removed from all datasets. “Recent” (i.e., 1 year) cooling has been due to the biggest La Nina in 20 years.
4- Wrong. Temperature rises due to changes in long term orbital paramaters of the earth start a warming, feedbacks which release or stop absorption of CO2 amplify that warming far beyond what orbital params alone could do. Its actually a warning of what increasing CO2 can cause.
On reflection, the 9W/m2 will not change, but the almost infinite permutations of weather variables which have produced that figure will change.
AB; you are wrong I’m afraid; I must dash now, but I’ll come back to your points, 3 is especially problematic, and 2 seems to ignore divergence of Maxwellian and Planck temperatures at low pressures; do you have links for your assertion that the greenhouse signature of a tropical, troposphere hotspot has been observed?
Luke,
I thought this was a blog, not a scientific paper. I’m trying to learn as I go, and I thought others, you included, might help discuss the issue about CO2 forcing as an input to vice an output from the GCMs. From the tone of your response, I could surmise that you may be able to discuss that point with some degree of rationale, but have determined not to for whatever reason.
On the 2nd point “”This is an area where they need to open up on.” – have you done the most minimal bit of personal investigation?””, I’m not clear on your meaning. Are you saying that they don’t need to open up, but I need to search my soul? They are proposing to rock the world, so I say the burden is on them.
I am an amateur, but that doesn’t mean I must accept without question. I come at this with an intense personal interest in the importance and value of the environment. I spent my summers either on a boat or trapsing through the woods, fishing whenever and wherever I could. I was physically connected to nature. I also lived through the tremendous improvement in water quality since the 1960’s, especially in one of the area rivers and saw the benefit of clean water regulations 1st hand. I still wonder why we swam in that river and ate as many fish as we did, but you don’t know what you don’t know.
I also was an excellent student of math/science and what pulls me into the Anthropogenic CO2 Global Warming discussion is that I did K-E Turbulent flow modeling in grad school in 1980-81. I have not pursued it since then, so I am very rusty. As I have gotten older I have become much more interested in legal and public policy issues especially in the degree to which sound science and reason influence public policy.
In the late 80’s early 90’s I was in agreement with the proposed CO2 reduction actions, even with the indicated small amount of uncertainty although I hadn’t read much more than a couple magazine (paper) articles. In the last 3-4 years as the volume of material on the web has grown and the issue has magnified in the public arena, I have been engrossed in this topic and come to the clear conclusion that there is no foundation to any more than a small A-CO2 induced warming (which seems to be a good thing).
While I am adamant about sane environmental protection, I am also adamant that we were given the gift of reason for a reason. The science I grew up with is being either hijacked or practiced poorly. This has angered me most because they are playing with the heartstrings of many environmental loving folks who can’t follow the science and must, appropriately trust the science being told to them…thus the sarcasm in many of posts.
Massive carbon limiting actions violate scientific and environmental reason. They will likely damage the environment by diverting financial (and other) resources away from real (on-going) environmental improvement to reduce fossil fuel NOx, SOx, HG, and particulate pollution. Can you imagine how much cleaner the air in China would be if they put western standard scrubber technology in their coal plants? I’m sorry, but wasting money trying to sequester CO2 is insane! And it’s nuts even if the ACO2GW theory is real, because adaptation is more practical and doable, but that’s another discussion.
There are so many natural drivers such as ocean circulation patterns, sun cycles, perhaps cosmic rays that correlate to climate variations and that are begging to be understood. Climate science should be focusing on understanding those relationships so we can perhaps project regional decadal variations that can be used to influence regional policies for fisheries, farming, water use, etc.
Yes you got my goat, but I’m an amateur at blogging, so am probably too sensitive.
Regarding your posts, they also come across as somewhat angry. I’d be interested in any “personal investigation” that you may have done on this topic.
Cheers. I’ve got to get away from the computer and eat something. My son is bugging me.
cohenite – “Motl calculates this difference as being 9W/m2”
However he failed to show that this elementary mistake is being made in any of the climate models. In the previous discussion on this you also failed to come up with any examples of where the calculation is done incorrectly.
cohenite: The assertion was that the “hotspot” is a greenhouse signature – it isn’t; you can get it by warming of the tropical surface by any means, and hence the latent heat release above. For radiation at the top of the atmosphere – see Harries et al., (2001) in Nature. Hope this helps you.
ender; I don’t think you are on the same planet; the example of the elementary mistake is in the paper I link to in my immediate post above.
AB; the ‘hotspot’ is an integral part of IPCC greenhouse ‘theory’; it has failed to materialise as McIntyre shows;
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=3161
If you’re really keen you could look at Lindzen’s work on tropical irises.
As to UHI effects being adjusted for in GISS data and IPCC modelling; a quick google of Anthony Watt’s work on the recording defects of temp sites puts that to rest; McIntyre has spent a number of posts critiquing GISS adjustments of data; and Koutsoyiannis has shown whatever adjustments IPCC models are making isn’t working. A good example of how BOM ‘adjusts’ data for UHI effects is here;
http://www.warwickhughes.com/climate/gissbom.htm
I would like to see a link to support your claim about upper atmosphere CO2 absorbance; at those levels there is not enough atmosphere pressure to collisionally deexcite the CO2 which will emit out of the atmosphere and have a cooling effect. Your inference (?) that CO2 levels follow temp is indisputable; but the positive forcing influence on temp of that increasing CO2 has not even been accepted by IPCC (see AR4 FAQ 3.1), in fact a recent peer-reviewed paper by Chilingar, Khilyuk and Sorokhtin (hats off to Louis) shows that increases in CO2 provide a cooling, which would make it a -ve feedback comprehended by Miscolczi’s paper.
AB: In Harries (2001) he said:
“A recent comparison between data taken by two different satellite instruments, the Interferometric Monitor of Greenhouse Gases (IMG) that flew in 1997 and the Infrared Interferometer Spectrometer (IRIS) that flew in 1970, showed evidence of a change in the clear-sky greenhouse radiative forcing due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations between those years.”
http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&issn=1520-0442&volume=016&issue=22&page=3820&ct=1&SESSID=c77dfc4874e5f3592aa7131cffb3b4f5
The phrase “evidence of a change in the clear-sky greenhouse radiative forcing” is a much weaker claim than the previous “experimental evidence for a significant increase in the Earth’s greenhouse effect”. After all, they did not perform an experiment in the usually understood sense, nor did they directly measure the Earth’s greenhouse effect, which relates to radiation across the whole infrared spectrum, from the surface to top of atmosphere.
However, by 2004, in Griggs and Harries (2004) Harries had considerably watered-down his message and said this:
“The results suggest that while the sampling pattern of the IRIS instrument is sufficiently well distributed and dense to generate monthly regional mean brightness temperatures that are within 1.5 K of the true all-sky values, the IMG sampling is too sparse and yields results that differ from the true case by up to 6.0 K. Under cloud-free conditions the agreement with the true field for both instruments improves to within a few tenths of a kelvin. Comparisons with the observed IMG–IRIS difference spectra show that these uncertainties due to sampling presently limit the conclusions that can be drawn about climatically significant feedback processes.”
http://www.ggy.bris.ac.uk/staff/personal/JennyGriggs/paper_3.pdf
In addition, in this latter paper comparing three satellites spectra, an increase in methane was found even between observations when methane was not increasing. They also highlight an inaccuracy in the MODTRAN spectroscopic model.
This suggests the only really significant result of Harries et al. 2001 at all, the deepened methane line, could have been an artifact.
Pete – my apologies for bolshiness – learned behaviour taught by my friendly sceptic tutors here.
To your points: (a) CO2 sensitivity is not a dial on GCMs – CO2 forcing is calculated from a radiation physics model (b) is you google on clouds and GCMs you will see major work on developing cloud schemes. Similarly lots of work on water vapour. A brief view perhaps here http://www.skepticalscience.com/Evaporating-the-water-vapor-argument.html
It’s not like there is no interest or no work on these areas. Clouds are well acknowledged to be difficult.
So assuming that science is ignoring these aspects is not a robust position.
Jan’s Q (way above) re a “voltage follower” i.e. a theoretical op amp that has 100% negative voltage feed back applied, IMO the clue is its instability under load
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operational_amplifier_applications
And that reminds me of issues in practical circuit design like isolation between stages and “decoupling” in noisy environments but that’s barking up the wrong tree.
Anyone interested in the top down approach probably starts here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_electrodynamics
optical isolators are the easy bit in tapings and measurements.
“Now with ALL hypothesises, the onus is upon the presenting scientist/s to prove the Hypothesis…. Not the other way round.”
Read the IPCC report, attribution of warming. They spend a lot of time doing exactly what you ask for.
Actually, in the good old days, physicists were divided into theoreticians and experimentalists. Theoreticians presented their theories, and then the experimentalists stepped in to either prove or disprove them in the laboratory. In today’s climate science, it is of course impossible to replicate the entire planetary atmosphere in the laboratory, so we let the atmosphere itself become the laboratory, and wait until nature ( now the “experimentalist”, we presume ) to run it’s course.
Already the predictions of the late 1980’s ( remember, back then the year 2000 was the “tipping point” ) have run their course, and of course have proven to be dead wrong in view of the current observed climate. Perhaps we should start asking the UN IPCC to “prove” their own theories, as Gavin suggests. This would involve the use of crystal balls and other future-predicting technology which would allow a much faster response instead of just sitting around waiting to see if New York ends up under water.
cohenite – “ender; I don’t think you are on the same planet; the example of the elementary mistake is in the paper I link to in my immediate post above.”
I am on the planet Earth, you know the one that is heating up due to CO2, not sure what planet you are on however it must be better than this one.
Motl has detailed an elementary mistake that COULD be made however has given no evidence that this elementary mistake IS being made in any of the computer models or anyone that has done this level of work.
You have failed to produce any evidence to show that mistakes are being made. This is the conclusion:
“There are two basic lessons to be learned from this exercise:
1. The impact of nonlinearities shouldn’t be neglected and climatology should carefully observe the evolution of the differences between climate zones; seasons; weather variations; regional changes of albedo; day-and-night differences.
2. In the calculations of forcings, it is not the arithmetic average of temperatures that should be substituted but rather the fourth root of the arithmetic average of the fourth powers of the (absolute) temperatures. In this way, the bulk of the problems discussed in the previous point – and in this whole article – can be circumvented.
And that’s the memo. ”
Nowhere in the article is any reference to any work in the peer reviewed literature underpinning AGW where this mistake has been identified.
Interesting new paper in Climate Dynamics:
http://climatesci.org/2008/07/21/oceanic-influences-on-recent-continental-warming-an-important-new-research-paper-compo-and-sardeshmukh-2008/
The gist: “Atmospheric model simulations with prescribed observed ocean temperature changes but no GHG forcings can produce most of the warming/cooling trends of the past 40 years. The contribution of various natural and anthropogenic influences on the oceans is still being studied but misrepresentations of natural oceanic variability has been made in the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report.”
Well, OK that’s not all of their conclusions but it is a significant one.
“Already the predictions of the late 1980’s ( remember, back then the year 2000 was the “tipping point” ) have run their course, and of course have proven to be dead wrong in view of the current observed climate. Perhaps we should start asking the UN IPCC to “prove” their own theories, as Gavin suggests. This would involve the use of crystal balls and other future-predicting technology which would allow a much faster response instead of just sitting around waiting to see if New York ends up under water.”
It was a tipping point in the sense that if we stopped increasing CO2 at that point, the climate change would have been mostly contained. The time lag in such a large system is significant. It’s a lot longer than doing a U turn with an aircraft carrier. Maybe you should read up some more.
“Well, OK that’s not all of their conclusions but it is a significant one.”
It’s a stupid one. Pielke just gets dumber and dumber. Of course the oceans are important, that’s why they feature in GCMs.
From the abstract.
“. The oceans may themselves have warmed from a combination of natural and anthropogenic influences.””
In other words, they haven’t even bothered to investigate that aspect of the situation. The paper is a complete waste of time.
SJT – “Pielke just gets dumber and dumber.”
Its not his paper doofus. And you seem to disregard one of the major conclusions and that of many other papers that have demonstrated that natural variability has been underestimated.
SJT – “In other words, they haven’t even bothered to investigate that aspect of the situation.”
If you read any further, they have. But a single paper can’t investigate every causation.
Your contribution to the blog is a waste of time. At least Luke’s arguments make more sense.
SJT – “It was a tipping point in the sense that if we stopped increasing CO2 at that point, the climate change would have been mostly contained. The time lag in such a large system is significant. It’s a lot longer than doing a U turn with an aircraft carrier. Maybe you should read up some more.”
So how’s ocean heat content going lately? Got any volcanos to explain that one? I predict a U-turn alright, and its called no significant warming for another couple decades. You should read up some more.
ender; the paper is not the motl link but the one I quoted from about the relativity between a SB temperature increase of 1C at the poles compared to a 1C increase in the tropics. This is a measure of LTE disparity which produces weather; Motl calculates the total energy at any given minimum moment which is available between the disparate LTE’s to maintain equilibrium; internal radiative effects like variations in atmospheric CO2 are catered for by that available energy; the slight heating which has been apparent over the last century is entirely solar as Tilo’s graph shows; regional differences have been due to PDO and equivalant, phase shifts; IPCC simply has not considered these points, which is why they are consistently wrong. Anyway CO2 cannot heat as this paper shows;
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15567030701568727
“Its not his paper doofus. And you seem to disregard one of the major conclusions and that of many other papers that have demonstrated that natural variability has been underestimated.”
Pielke is the saying how important it is. It’s so important that the scientists have been modelling the oceans effect on climate for 20 years now, IIRC. That’s how far ahead of him they are.
Thanks for that cohenite, I think I know how to make some easy money.
Write up a piece of nonsense that deniers want hear.
Charge for people to read it.
SJT; it’s just occurred to me that you never deal with the science that’s presented to you; I mean the SB temperature connection is irrefutable; it is absolutely scientifically correct for Pielke to make the observation he has; it is plain; but it has been totally ignored by IPCC; and all you can proffer is a bit of derision.
SJT – “Pielke is the saying how important it is. It’s so important that the scientists have been modelling the oceans effect on climate for 20 years now, IIRC. That’s how far ahead of him they are.”
You have no idea what you’re talking about. To say that the authors don’t already know what current ocean models are capable of is silly, and to presume that the work has already been done is ludicrous. What are you basing these factual statements of yours on?
SJT, you’d be better writing silly news releases, much more appeal:
http://www.sundaymirror.co.uk/news/sunday/2008/07/20/plight-of-the-p-p-p-penguins-98487-20655117/
SJT
“Now with ALL hypothesises, the onus is upon the presenting scientist/s to prove the Hypothesis…. Not the other way round.”
Arrhenius inverted the burden of proof in his paper on CO2 causing ice ages. This theory germinated the subsequent CO2 global warming theory by the elder Keeling.
As I have said often, AGW is pseudoscience because its fundamental assumption has never been proven by its originator, Arhennius.
So AGW theory fails your own demand that its proposer prove it to be correct.
English translation of Arhennius’s paragraph (Paper published in 1906) in which he inverts the burden of proof:
“This statement could lead to the impression, that I had claimed that a reduction of the concentration of carbonic acid in the atmosphere of 20% would be sufficient to cause ice-age temperatures, i.e. to lower the Europe’s average temperature about four to five degrees C. To keep such an idea from spreading, I would like to point out that according to the old calculation a reduction of carbonic acid of 50% would cause the temperature to fall for 4 (1897) or, respectively, 3:2 (1901) degrees.
“The opinion that a decrease of carbonic acid in the air can explain ice-age temperatures is not proved wrong until it is shown, that the total disappearance of carbonic acid from the atmosphere would not be sufficient to cause a lowering of temperatures about four to five degrees.”
It is now easy to estimate how low the temperature would fall, if the …”.
Probably explains why Berger couldn’t get models to onset glaciation with solar forcing alone – you need CO2 low too. Otherwise not cold enough Louis. Off you go now. Carefully does it.
Luke,
Arhhenius never proved his theory. So go back to your Enid Blyton alma mater and demand they retrain you in proper science, not the gobbledygook you spruik here.
And then counsel SJT as to why he is guilty of hypocrisy, or is it double standards since SJT is but a humble code programmer.
No subsequent scientists have.
That’s right, no scientist has proven Arhhenius’s hypothesis, so the statement CO2 causes global warming is empirically unverified.
Measurement of the earth system has, however, comprehensively falsified it.
SO yoru efforts here are purely political and masked by a scientific veneer.
Yes yes zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
SJT,
I guess you haven’t been paying attention. There is a lot of debate over gravity. Does it propagate at light speed. Is it instantaneous. Somewhere in between?? Is it deflected by anything…
Dude, real science is always questioning and reevaluating. In case you haven’t noticed with your head in the sand, there is still a debate as to whether light speed really is fixed or whether it is changing.
Just like the climate arguments. First it was is it happening at all. Then it was, and still is, how much. Now it is also what is causing it and for how long.
The more we discover about something the more questions it generates that need answers.
Anytime you hear the science is settled argument you should do the same as when you hear “We’re from the Government and we are here to HELP!!” Grab your wallet and RUN while laughing your rear off!!!!!
On the gravity side of things… sure there is debate, but but we still design our entire planet around 9.81m/s^2. That is the level the climate science is settled at.
If science is never settled, then do we never make policy about anything? Of course not – we make policy according to mainstream science, in the belief that science is true to itself and is hapy to adjust to new evidence… which I think it has shown itself to be for hundreds of years.
On the balance of evidence I don;t think you can fault Rudd’s approach. Sure the issue of acting alone is interesting, but it is acutally not related to core climate science.
If you think acting to stop global warming is bad, then you are simply anti-science. But if you think that we should not be researching hard in every area in which there is uncertainty, and if in time the weight of science starts to suggest GW is not really a problem you still think we should reduce emissions, well then you’d also be anti science.
To the AGW propogandists: I’m sorry but you’ve only yourselves to blame for not allowing un- biased/evenly funded research science to run its course!
The Greens are Going Crazy
By Alan Caruba (07/27/08)
It’s hard to ignore the fact that the Greens are going crazy, not just in the United States, but around the world. They are increasingly frantic over the opposition being voiced against global warming, one of the greatest hoaxes in modern history.
The Greens have bet everything on global warming as the reason for giving up the use of long established sources of energy such as oil, coal and natural gas. The object has been to slow everything the modern world calls progress.
In India, a spokesman for that nation of one billion people has flatly refused to accept the global warming hoax. China shows no sign of yielding to the global warming lies. The greatest agricultural and mercantile economy to have ever existed, the United States of America continues to thwart its own growth by yielding to the lies.
Recently the Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, said that “coal makes us sick. Oil makes us sick. It’s global warming. It’s ruining our country. It’s ruining our world.”
No, what makes us sick is listening to such preposterous lies. A Rasmussen telephone survey taken after Sen. Reid’s absurd statement found that 52% of voters surveyed rejected his views about coal and oil, double the amount of those who agreed.
What is troublesome, however, is that the same survey found the voters evenly divided on whether global warming exists or poses a threat. Fully 47% of those surveyed believe that human activity affects the climate. Both candidates for President are publicly committed to the global warming hoax by varying degrees.
Despite an intense, decades-long propaganda campaign, coupled with indoctrination in our nation’s schools, the truth is beginning to emerge.
In March, an international conference on climate change organized by The Heartland Institute brought together over 500 of the world’s leading climatologists, meteorologists, economists and others for three days of seminars and presentations that completely refuted the pronouncements of the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and disputed the lies of Al Gore’s famed “documentary.”
As recently as July 8, the Space and Science Research Center held a news conference in which it stated that the warming that has occurred since the end of the Little Ice Age in 1850 was completely natural, i.e., had nothing to do with human or industrial activity.
More significantly, the Center went on record saying that, “After an exhaustive review of a substantial body of climate research, and in conjunction with the obvious and compelling new evidence that exists, it is time that the world community acknowledges that the Earth has begun the next climate change.” The current warming period is not only at an end, but a distinct cooling cycle has begun and will bring “predominantly colder global temperatures for many years into the future.”
Just how crazed has the environmental movement become? On July 7 it was announced that Argentine scientists have been strapping plastic tanks to the backs of cows to collect and measure how much methane gas they produce.
Methane, like carbon dioxide, is a minor component of the Earth’s atmosphere. Methane is also released from swamps, landfills and other sources. If it and CO2 played a significant role in determining the world’s climate, it would be a cause for concern, but it is the Sun that primarily drives the Earth’s climate cycles. Solar activity has gone quiet in recent years as fewer and fewer sunspots, magnetic storms, have been seen.
To maintain the global warming hoax, thousands of events and natural phenomena have been blamed on it. A recent example is the floods in America’s mid-West. The National Wildlife Federation released a statement on July 1 blaming global warming.
Climate experts at The Heartland Institute were quick to respond. Dr. Joseph D’Aleo, Executive Director of the International Climate and Environmental Change Assessment Project, said, “Alarmists have adopted the can’t-lose position that all extremes of weather—cold, warm, wet, or dry—are all due to global warming”, adding that, “The record snows, severe weather, and heavy rainfall have been the result of rapid cooling in the northern tier of the United States and Canada, not global warming.”
Early in July, Bret Stephens, writing in The Wall Street Journal, called global warming “a mass hysteria phenomenon”, noting that “NASA now begrudgingly confirms that the hottest year on record in the continental 48 was not 1998, as previously believed, but 1934, and that six of the 10 hottest years since 1880 antedate 1954. Data from 3,000 scientific robots in the world’s oceans show there has been slight cooling in the past five years…”
The global warming hoax has never been about the climate. It is about competing economic theories. “Socialism may have failed as an economic theory,” wrote Stephens, “but global warming alarmism, with its dire warnings about the consequences of industry and consumerism, is equally a rebuke to capitalism.”
The United States Senate refused to consider the UN Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change that requires massive reductions in carbon dioxide emissions based solely on the global warming hoax, but other nations did sign on. None have ever met their obligation to limit CO2 emissions, nor need they have bothered.
At the recent G8 conference an international agreement to cut CO2 emissions was given serious consideration despite the fact that the Earth is now a decade into a cooling cycle likely to last several decades or longer. The impact of this proposal on the lives of ordinary citizens will prove needlessly costly. Proposals in some nations for various taxes based on global warming are a form of fraud.
The sensible refusal by leaders in emerging economies such as China and India would make it impossible for any limitations on carbon emissions by Western nations to have any impact, even if such reductions had anything to do with the realities of the Earth’s climate.
The only thing that can be predicted with certainty is that the Greens will become increasingly unhinged and crazed by the failure of the global warming hoax.