“Gone Fishing” is an expression we use here in Australia to let people know that a business is closed for a period of time while the owner takes a break.
I’m off for a bit – “Gone Fishing”. Cheers,
**************
The photograph is of a pelican near Ingham, North Queensland, taken September 29, 2008.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Hi Jen,
Enjoy your “fishing break.” Are you doing it in the Heartland?
Seems like a good idea Jen.
Hey; we should be outta here too!
Off to NZ at dawn tomorrow.
Cheers all.
Jen, Come and shovel some snow …
Britain may be in the grip of the coldest winter for 30 years and grappling with up to a foot of snow in some places but the extreme weather is entirely consistent with global warming, claim scientists.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/weather/4436934/Snow-is-consistent-with-global-warming-say-scientists.html
Sherlock gavin; or, is that Dr gavin, Watson?
Enjoy!
(We use the same saying here, in the States)
Makes sense to me.
My modelling suggests that SJT will be lonely over the next fortnight so a small assignment might help pass the time.
http://jim.com:80/econ/chap01p1.html
Great!
Gives me a chance to review the rules of the blog. See which ones I broke the most over the last few years. —-
Ah. No sockpuppetry. Does signing my name as Darth Vader and telling Luke that I’m his father count? – Ok guilty on that one.
Ever since the redesign I am at a loss as to what sort of html language stuff it can do.
Before it was simple.
“You can’t do anything.”
Easy to remember.
Now I have to wonder, “Does the blog support blockquote?”
And apparently the answer is , “Yes it does”.
Thanks to SJ, our intrepid html code pioneer.
Here’s something interesting/overlooked from back in January.
The earth’s magnetic field impacts climate: Danish study
And the link.
He shoots. He scores. The crowd goes wild. High-fives for everyone.
I would like to take the credit, but I’m afraid I copied it from Jan Pompe.
<blockquote.“If changes in the magnetic field, which occur independently of the earth’s climate, can be linked to changes in precipitation, then it can only be explained through the magnetic field’s blocking of the cosmetic rays,” he said.
That’s a big ‘if’. We already have a physical basis for CO2 as a climate forcing, which the authors acknowledge.
I was waiting for the rationalization that regional weather that is not warming is still due to AGW.
Thanks, SJT.
Hot?
AGW.
Cold?
AGW.
etc.
The most perfect pseudo religion since Eugenics.
“Cosmetic rays”
WTF???
Who is this retard?
“Cosmetic rays”
This could turn into a very long series of comment postings…
Dude you are harshing my buzz.
Look, it’s a French reporter interviewing a Dutch scientist with some third party expost editor transcribing it into English.
What, you never heard of the cosmetilogical constant?
From the beginning the propaganda machine has targetted children through the use of cute fluffy animals.
Polar bears will drown or not find enough to eat.
Pikas (cute little unassuming mountain habitat rabbits with tiny {for a rabbit} ears) will be forced ever higher to the mountain tops and then die of heat stroke as the perpetual cool turns balmy.
Emperor penguins – say what was supposed to happen to the emperor penguins – never mind (needed another cute fluffy animal for the flow).
Now they are saying global warming will make it impossible for Nemo to find home.
Ocean Acidification Could Leave Clown Fish (Like Nemo) Lost at Sea.
Shameless.
SJT:
“.“If changes in the magnetic field, which occur independently of the earth’s climate, can be linked to changes in precipitation, then it can only be explained through the magnetic field’s blocking of the cosmetic rays,” he said.
That’s a big ‘if’. We already have a physical basis for CO2 as a climate forcing, which the authors acknowledge.”
Magnetic fields only change when the electric current driving them, change. As cosmic rays are essentially charged particles in motion, AKA electricity, then what drives the electric current that forms the geomagnetic field that therefore affects cosmic rays and hence cloud production.
NASA has recently discovered them via the THEMIS mission.
As electrical forces dwarf all other forces known to humanity, one is left wondering why it plays no role in climate science. If it was considered, then there would be no need to asssign surealistic properties to CO2 to explain the known measurements of IR etc.
Meanwhile, with floods to the North, and drought in the South, Australia is having just an average year for rainfall, well within normal bounds.
sjt
just in case you did not know, the rainy season IS normal to the north of A.
Sure for a few, a few mind you, years it was out of whack, as it happened before, and I’m certain it will happen in the future.
The drought in the places where it hasn’t broken, ie. Victoria and SA will also pass.
Alas, what will you say then?
SJT
“Meanwhile, with floods to the North, and drought in the South, Australia is having just an average year for rainfall, well within normal bounds.”
Oh that’s good then, all is normal, nothing to be worried about, no impending climate catatastrophes, no CO2 running unchecked to obiterate humanity,.
Thank God it’s normal.
“As electrical forces dwarf all other forces known to humanity, one is left wondering why it plays no role in climate science. If it was considered, then there would be no need to asssign surealistic properties to CO2 to explain the known measurements of IR etc.”
I was going to reply to this, but your ideas are so lunatic, it’s really not worth bothering.
It’s the Indian Ocean according to new research.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/indian-ocean-is-drought-culprit/2009/02/04/1233423310800.html
SJT: “I was going to reply to this, but your ideas are so lunatic, it’s really not worth bothering.”
Which basically means you have no idea how to counter the idea so you reduce your reply to an ad hominem.
SJT… re electrical forces “I was going to reply to this, but your ideas are so lunatic, it’s really not worth bothering”.
Before you go branding theories as lunatical, maybe you should try informing yourself on the subject. I have spent my entire career in the electronics/electrical field and I am just becoming aware of the impact of electron and protons being emitted on a large scale by the Sun. Just as a comet’s tail is blown perpendicular to it’s trajectory, away from the Sun, by the solar wind, the Earth’s magnetic field is encapsulated by the same solar wind.
The stream of electrons and protons in the solar wind are essentially large-scale electric currents and they induce megavolts of electricity into the Earth’s system. The oncoming wind face is treated as a sheet of metal approaching our magnetic field and the latter induces circular currents into the face. The auroras at both poles are a direct result of electric discharges from this effect, with the red colours being oxygen isotopes.
Louis has pointed out that magentic fields and electric fields cannot exist independently. A magnetic field is the result of the movement of electrons in a conductive medium. Conversely, electric fields are caused by magnetic fielda cutting through a conductive medium. When an electric current runs through a conductor, there is a magnetic field set up perpendicular to the conductor and an electric field is setup perpendicular to the magnetic field. That’s how electric motors work. Essentially, we are surrounded by electric and magnetic fields. We can’t see them because they don’t stimulate our eyes in the way certain electromagnetic mediums do, like light.
As Louis pointed out earlier, the Earth’s magnetic field has been studied mainly as an isolated magnetic system. It’s beginning to look like that was a bad assumption. We have electric currents travelling around the atmosphere in both directions, as well as through the oceans and the ground. So far, no one has investigated the effect those current have on ocean currents and the atmosphere in general.
“Which basically means you have no idea how to counter the idea so you reduce your reply to an ad hominem.”
When do you expect “Planet X” to return?
SJT:
“I was going to reply to this, but your ideas are so lunatic…”
I’ve observed your BS meter is turned way too far down. Try turning the dial up, and adjust the aperture while you’re at it, as the BS you do manage to notice seems rather filtered. 🙂
Thanks janama I heard about this study on our ABC which were fairly impartial obviously because noone had told them they could twist it to a pro-AGW climate effect; Fairfax will set them straight; I like the comment from your link; there has been a -ve dipole in the Indian Ocean causing hot, dry weather in SE Australia for 3 years which has never ever happened before in the climate history; every story is a bad one and the obvious is always ignored; the obvious being the plentiful rain in the rest of Australia. This will be grist for the mill for luke.
Three serious questions.
1. Is there any state of the climate that is not caused by AGW or “climate change”?
2. At what global temperature does this stop?
3. If building an alternative power system is easy why doesn’t the evironmental movement get to and build a power station as an example? We need about 30 stations capable of delivering 1GW 24/7 each. One would be a good start!
I am waiting for an answer.
That photo is a bit like the whole town of Ingham this week.
Wasn’t AGW supposed to cause terminal drought? Maybe that was last week?
http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200902/r335653_1520553.jpg
“During a “negative” Indian Ocean dipole, cooler winds carry moisture in south-eastern Australia. During a “positive” dipole, warmer, dryer winds limit rainfall and contribute to high temperatures. In the past three years there have been successive positive cycles.”
How come, on the rest of the planet, warm water in oceans causes humidity, but in the Indian Ocean it doesn’t? Do the laws of thermodynamics breakdown under the influence of an Indian Ocean dipole?
More investigation is required. Wikilink.
” The positive IOD in 2007 evolved together with La Niña which is a very rare phenomenon that happened only once in the available historical records (in 1967). Also the occurrence of consecutive positive IOD events are extremely rare with only one such precedence within the records (during 1913–14).”
The SMH told me this is an “unprecedented and probably related to climate change” weather cycle, but the Wiki tells me it happened already in 1967 and 1913.
A conundrum.
I’m leaning toward Wiki on this one (kills me to admit), because the SMH stp’ed the whole “cooling winds carry more moisture” thing.
Stp’ed close tag . Sorry.
What gets me is BoM’s statements about record temperatures. So they set a new record for some areas in the small area in the south of south eastern Australia therefore it’s due to global warming. Had it been in the Simpson desert no one would have noticed or cared.
Broome’s highest temp was set in 1959, Townsville’s in 1969 and Albany WA 1933.
Bruce – over the past 3 months all regions of Australia have had average or above average rainfall.
“1. Is there any state of the climate that is not caused by AGW or “climate change”?”
Prolonged global cooling trends over (apparently) at least two decades. Or if there was a significant drop in global temperature (perhaps an anomaly around .2 – .4C) that lasted for several years at least. Politically that should be sufficient, anyway.
Or one could look at this more scientifically:
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2009/surface-temperature-anomalies-almost-outside-2-sigma-confidence-intervals/
But I don’t think this has ever been much about the (actual) science.
Or of course, the opposite could happen…
“2. At what global temperature does this stop?”
See above.
“3. If building an alternative power system is easy why doesn’t the evironmental movement get to and build a power station as an example? We need about 30 stations capable of delivering 1GW 24/7 each”
I suppose if someone complained that emergency rooms in hospitals were inadequate, you would demand that those complaining stop whining and treat the patients themselves?
“I am waiting for an answer.”
Await no more!
“1. Is there any state of the climate that is not caused by AGW or “climate change”?”
The AGW theory is that there will be global warming, not global changes to the way climate works. Climate will do what it does, but, if you read the article, it will add on an extra couple of degrees to a heat wave, for example. When you get to 45C, every degree is significant.
As for Lucia, the models do not claim to model ENSO or other cyclical events. Lucia would have already been told this, but she blithely goes about her business of ignoring the experts. Just as the monster 1998 El Nino spike would have been outside model predictions, so is the recent La Nina event.
SJT:
“As for Lucia, the models do not claim to model ENSO or other cyclical events. Lucia would have already been told this, but she blithely goes about her business of ignoring the experts. Just as the monster 1998 El Nino spike would have been outside model predictions, so is the recent La Nina event.”
Could you point me to where AR4 discusses ENSO and cyclical events? As long as what these experts are saying now, are repeating what they were saying before, I have no problems with your statements. Wherever the evidence leads, I’ll go with that.
Re: your “1998 El Nino” spike–it’s interesting how you can read something contradictory to your viewpoint yet somehow juggle it into preconceived conclusions… The point of Lucia’s comment is that to explain how climate models deviate from actual temperatures, we would have to have experienced an anomaly as high as the 1998 El Nino, which clearly hasn’t happened. The La Nina of last year wasn’t exactly a “super La Nina” by any means. Either her dig went over the top of your head, or you’ve tried to reinterpret what was negative to your world view as something positive to your world view.
Of course it could be that 2008 was just a highly freaky year. As long as we keep seeing temperature increases similar to the January rise, climate models should be back on track by the end of this year. It would require an extraordinary amount of warming to occur though. Should shut up a lot of sceptics if it keeps going up consistently.
Hendrik Tennekes has written this interesting comment about modelling – SJT and his mates have one enormous problem. Enjoy.
“By Atmospheric scientist Dr. Hendrik Tennekes, a scientific pioneer in the development of numerical weather prediction and former director of research at The Netherlands’ Royal National Meteorological Institute, and an internationally recognized expert in atmospheric boundary layer processes.
Roger Pielke Sr. has graciously invited me to add my perspective to his discussion with Gavin Schmidt at RealClimate. If this were not such a serious matter, I would have been amused by Gavin’s lack of knowledge of the differences between weather models and climate models. As it stands, I am appalled. Back to graduate school, Gavin!
A weather model deals with the atmosphere. Slow processes in the oceans, the biosphere, and human activities can be ignored or crudely parameterized. This strategy has been very successful. The dominant fraternity in the meteorological modeling community has appropriated this advantage, and made itself the lead community for climate modeling. Backed by an observational system much more advanced than those in oceanography or other parts of the climate system, they have exploited their lead position for all they can. For them, it is a fortunate coincidence that the dominant synoptic systems in the atmosphere have scales on the order of many hundreds of kilometers, so that the shortcomings of the parameterizations and the observation network, including weather satellite coverage, do not prevent skillful predictions several days ahead.
A climate model, however, has to deal with the entire climate system, which does include the world’s oceans. The oceans constitute a crucial slow component of the climate system. Crucial, because this is where most of the accessible heat in the system is stored. Meteorologists tend to forget that just a few meters of water contain as much heat as the entire atmosphere. Also, the oceans are the main source of the water vapor that makes atmospheric dynamics on our planet both interesting and exceedingly complicated. For these and other reasons, an explicit representation of the oceans should be the core of any self-respecting climate model.
However, the observational systems for the oceans are primitive in comparison with their atmospheric counterparts. Satellites that can keep track of what happens below the surface of the ocean have limited spatial and temporalresolution. Also, the scale of synoptic motions in the ocean is much smaller than that of cyclones in the atmosphere, requiring a spatial resolution in numerical models and in the observation network beyond the capabilities of present observational systems and supercomputers. We cannot observe, for example, the vertical and horizontal structure of temperature, salinity and motion of eddies in the Gulf Stream in real time with sufficient detail, and cannot model them at the detail that is needed because of computer limitations. How, for goodness’ sake, can we then reliably compute their contribution to multi-decadal changes in the meridional transport of heat? Are the crude parameterizations used in practice up to the task of skillfully predicting the physical processes in the ocean several tens of years ahead? I submit they are not.
Since heat storage and heat transport in the oceans are crucial to the dynamics of the climate system, yet cannot be properly observed or modeled, one has to admit that claims about the predictive performance of climate models are built on quicksand. Climate modelers claiming predictive skill decades into the future operate in a fantasy world, where they have to fiddle with the numerous knobs of the parameterizations to produce results that have some semblance of veracity. Firm footing? Forget it!
Gavin Schmidt is not the only meteorologist with an inadequate grasp of the role of the oceans in the climate system. In my weblog of June 24, 2008, I addressed the limited perception that at least one other climate modeler appears to have. A few lines from that essay deserve repeating here. In response to a paper by Tim Palmer of ECMWF, I wrote: “Palmer et al. seem to forget that, though weather forecasting is focused on the rapid succession of atmospheric events, climate forecasting has to focus on the slow evolution of the circulation in the world ocean and slow changes in land use and natural vegetation. In the evolution of the Slow Manifold (to borrow a term coined by Ed Lorenz) the atmosphere acts primarily as stochastic high-frequency noise. If I were still young, I would attempt to build a conceptual climate model based on a deterministic representation of the world ocean and a stochastic representation of synoptic activity in the atmosphere.”
From my perspective it is not a little bit alarming that the current generation of climate models cannot simulate such fundamental phenomena as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. I will not trust any climate model until and unless it can accurately represent the PDO and other slow features of the world ocean circulation. Even then, I would remain skeptical about the potential predictive skill of such a model many tens of years into the future.”
SJT
Given Tennekes summary, may I suggest it is you who lunacises with your fantasy models of climate?
SJT:
“When do you expect “Planet X” to return?”
I have replied to this before SJT, and perhaps you should take Will Nitscke’s advice and do something about your BS meter – like point it towards your targets, not peer down its barrel to determine why it’s not working.
SJT:
“Just as the monster 1998 El Nino spike would have been outside model predictions, so is the recent La Nina event.”
Models of weather, or climate?
May I suggest that these events were outside of model predictions because the basic theory for the climate models is wrong.
Gad, this flying about is a drain sometimes.
Will Nitshke: “climate models should be back on track by the end of this year. It would require an extraordinary amount of warming to occur though. Should shut up a lot of sceptics if it keeps going up consistently”
I doubt it as the climate models don’t have any fundamental grounding in physical fact.
It might behove you to defer to the deliberations of practising scientists familiar with the empirical method, before dismissing our knowledge with glib waffle.
Will and SJT I am still waiting
1. Is there any state of the climate that is not caused by AGW or “climate change”?
Neither of you answered this you answered a question you created. Perhaps I should have expanded this by asking is there anything not caused by it. For instance http://www.terradaily.com/2006/061211182846.nwcc15td.html ginger bread house are in peril. I have also read that AGW causes the Earth to spin faster and slower! Just a factual example of something not caused by AGW will do.
2. At what global temperature does this stop?
Will you have strong opinions on this “see above” is a pathetic answer. To ask in another way you are talking about AGW adversely affecting the weather. What temperature do we need for this to stop? A range or a year in history would do. You must know this otherwise you have no goal.
3. If building an alternative power system is easy why doesn’t the environmental movement get to and build a power station as an example? We need about 30 stations capable of delivering 1GW 24/7 each. One would be a good start!
Will, well yes that is nearly what I was asking, people have set up hospitals precisely for that reason. Greenpeace has funded large endeavours. Many in the environmental movement say it is easy. Put your money where your mouth is do it. Just one such power station as described would do wonders for the cause.
I am still waiting for an answer.
“1. Is there any state of the climate that is not caused by AGW or “climate change”?”
That’s because you are asking the wrong question. The “state” of the climate is always the result of many factors. What is at question here is, what is causing a change in the state of the climate? The climate has changed many times in the past, it will change many times in the future, but it always changes for a reason, that reason is called a ‘forcing’. The known forcings are not considered to be significant enough at present to cause the change of state. CO2, given it’s understood physical properties, is significant enough.
“For instance http://www.terradaily.com/2006/061211182846.nwcc15td.html ginger bread house are in peril. I have also read that AGW causes the Earth to spin faster and slower! Just a factual example of something not caused by AGW will do.”
If you’re going to trawl the media as ‘proof’ of anything, or every scientist’s speculation, you’re going to effectively demonstrate that everything and anything ever discussed by the media and scientists in general, can be shown to be contradictory and stupid. Frankly, this line of argument is painfully stupid, unless your purpose is rhetorical effect rather than intellectual discourse.
““see above” is a pathetic answer.”
Or possibly your question was so vague as to be unanswerable.
“To ask in another way you are talking about AGW adversely affecting the weather. What temperature do we need for this to stop? A range or a year in history would do. You must know this otherwise you have no goal.”
The goal is to mimimize change, therefore the goal would be to stabilise temperature. I’m not commenting on whether this is feasible or not, just pointing out that the answer to your question is not some great mystery.
“Will, well yes that is nearly what I was asking, people have set up hospitals precisely for that reason.”
You’re responding to a different answer now, not the one I provided. I’m happy to engage with you but if you’re going to respond to an imaginary answer, rather than the one I gave, that demonstrates you don’t actually have a good reply, suggesting there is little or no merit to your assertion. Or in other words, I’m still waiting for your answer to my reply.
Will – see my comment on global developments at http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2009/01/no-balance-in-environmental-reporting-at-the-new-york-times-john-coleman/?cp=21#comment-83718
Luke,
OK, you’re making a fairly reasonable point here, as far as I can see. I’m in broad agreement with you on this one.
Brown Pelicans suffering from Frostbite in California.
It’s interesting to me that muttleheads overlooked the more familiar diagnosis, and the weather all around them, in order to indulge the more exotic “toxic algae bloom” theory.
Isn’t it true that toxic algae blooms are a warm weather event?
Might be that tortured search for evidence, any evidence, that can be construde as a climate change coloring their glasses. Should be a name for this phenomina.
When biologists are blinded to the obvious because it contradicts global warming.
How about blinded by frost goggles?
They just can’t admit to themselves that the PDO has shifted. The hopeful thing is these particular scientists can still recognize that there is such a thing as evidence that doesn’t fit climate models, even if they don’t admit it.
Confirmation bias… of sorts. Like nearly everything else in our world, big science is driven by money. Try to determine if the problem has an anthropogenic cause… if so more study is required, and funding is justified. Of course if a problem has an anthropogenic cause, no one would argue that it wouldn’t be a bad thing to establish what is going on so that the problem can be mitigated. However, perhaps one should try to rule out all plausible non-anthropogenic causes first, rather than the other way around.
James – do you really think climate modellers don’t know about the PDO and other decadal /multi-decadal oscillations. Hadley Centre has a major program on it …. lordy me… http://www.ncmrwf.gov.in/Int-conf/conf_09-12_1208/Catherine_Senior.ppt
Indeed comparing models to observations and climate mechanisms is the preoccupation of modellers. You really have no idea.
However – yes PDO change would affect the marine biology of the US west coast. But algae also require nutrients and these can come from terrestrial runoff. Dead zones along the coast seem to be increasing. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/08/15/MNLD12ADSN.DTL
Will and SJT I am still waiting
Is there any state of the climate that is not caused by AGW or “climate change”?
SJT I’m sorry I thought you were trying to convince others of your view. You want to present the answer and I should then frame the question to suit is that what you want?
Will you are starting to descend into abuse if there is any point of you contributing to this
blog you must try to convince others of your view not abuse them. Let us look at this question
another way. I can read that Gingerbread houses collapse,
Earth Slowing Down,
Malaria On the rise and
Al Gore’s Katrina speech
are all about global warming. What does one do accept them all! It seems the argument says anything one can possibly imagine is connected to AGW even when they seem to be total opposites for instance it is making the earth hotter and colder.
At what global temperature does this stop?
Will constantly we are told extreme events are happening now. Stabilising at the current 14 to 14.6 surely will not do. If we are to stop the events we must find out when these did not happen and aim for that. As I said before goals are needed otherwise it becomes a non argument. It becomes a Hansen argument “I don’t like it” Pauline Hansen that is.
If building an alternative power system is easy why doesn’t the environmental movement get to and build a power station as an example? We need about 30 stations capable of delivering 1GW 24/7 each. One would be a good start! If building an alternative power system is easy why doesn’t the environmental movement get to and build a power station as an example? We need about 30 stations capable of delivering 1GW 24/7 each. One would be a good start!
Will you answered this with “I suppose if someone complained that emergency rooms in hospitals were inadequate, you would demand that those complaining stop whining and treat the patients themselves?”
To that I said “well yes that is nearly what I was asking, people have set up hospitals precisely for that reason”.
You hoped to lead the original question in a different direction which did not work so you say “You’re responding to a different answer now, not the one I provided”. I asked the question you are trying to obfuscate. The question is very clear you just do not want to address it. The human race uses large amounts of energy the environmental movement repeatedly says it is easy to replace with alternatives well then if there is any concern about credability show the world how to build one Coal Fired power station replacement.
I am still waiting for an answer.
luke; your list of ‘natural’ disasters, mainly drought-based, is at least presented by you through the prism of an anthropocentric criteria. Increasingly we are seeing a movement away from a criteria of judging human interaction with nature on the basis of benefits and costs to humans, including the principles of “no man is an island” and not despoiling one’s backyard, to a criteria where any encroachment or compromise of pristine nature is not acceptable. That this second criteria is devoid of logic and misanthropic has not yet been adequately appreciated; yet; allow me to illustrate; one of the mantras of the nature first, humanity can wrack off crowd is that the forests of the world are declining under the selfish impact of humans; an historical perspective refutes that;
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e4/Last_glacial_vegetation_map.png
The map shows the paucity of vegetation during the last ice-age; the current state of forestation is many times greater than was present during the ‘natural’ ice-age.
Any list of calamitys must also be balanced with concurrent positive indicators; for instance, what is the state of the Palmer Drought Severity Index?What are the metrics for prosperity and poverty showing? And real measures of environmental health; topsoil loss, availability of potable water, general pollution indices of land and water, GDP, food availability, land productivity; the health of wild-life populations and whether they are being exploited or managed in a measured way? On the basis of the nature first criteria most of these questions would be irrelevant because they automatically contravene the criteria; this is why AGW is insidious; it is allowing, indeed promoting, the priority of nature to the exclusion of human exigencies that are sensible and allow for civilized advance.
DHMO:
“I am still waiting”
I think I know what your problem is. The reason why you never get your “answers” is when you’re given the answer and don’t like it, you pretend you were given some other imaginary answer. Or you decide arbitrarily it doesn’t meet your ‘criteria’. If you don’t like my “abusive tone” then don’t respond childishly…
“Will constantly we are told extreme events are happening now. Stabilising at the current 14 to 14.6 surely will not do.”
That’s because you’re getting your information from idiots (the media, certain environmental activists, dubious (if popular) scientists, etc. The actual AGW science as per the IPCC reports are generally more sober, although certainly not without many problems of their own.
“I said “well yes that is nearly what I was asking, people have set up hospitals precisely for that reason”.”
Yes I know you said that, I can read. But your answer made no sense. And repeating it doesn’t make it more sensible. I pointed out that people complain about waiting times to get into hospital… so if I applied your logic to that situation, then you would demand these ‘whiners’ build more hospitals themselves? Your reply was “people have set up hospitals precisely for that reason”. Huh? If there is no problem why are people complaining about waiting times? Are “the people who have set up hospitals precisely for that reason” the same people complaining or warning about the waiting lists? Seem unlikely… so your response continues to make no sense.
I think part of your problem is you have difficulties with basic reasoning ability… That has to be sorted out before you move onto discussions of science policy…
Cohenite,
I think I understand where you’re coming from, but your position seems to me to be rather philosophical and abstract. Is it really such a bad thing to try to preserve what pristine areas of the environment that we have left, irrespective of the mindset of the persons wishing to do the preserving?
If AGW is ‘wrong’ then it is insidious not because it puts nature before man, but because it draws money and attention away from genuine environmental concerns towards bogus environmental concerns. ‘Yes we’d love to be able to turn that forest into a national park but we need the income, because the carbon sequestration we’re doing is very expensive.” Of course my example is intentionally silly, but governments do need to try to balance budgets or pay of debts.
Personally, I’m not big on any kind of ideology, whether it’s dialectics, neo-Darwinism, dianetics, freudianism, or Gaia Worship, but the human mind naturally tends to fall into these fads so we’re unlikely to ever be rid of them…
Cohenite – AGW does not put nature 1st… sure some marketing appeals to some % of humanity’s love of furry critters… but AGW really is totally selfishly anthropocentric. It is in fact precisely about civilised human advance. Now I’m not talking about if the science is right or wrong, or some green groups having ill-founded intentions or not, but I’m a selfish prick who 1st and foremost wants humanity to look after #1. Every other species does why can;t we.
I just tend to think not rooting the climate puts us #1.
As for diverting funds Will… well if pursuing the recommendations of best practice science is a waste of funds then so be it, no matter how incorrect that decision is in hindsight. We will need those alternative energy sources anyway in many places, and the alternative automobiles especially so…. I just don’t see the negatives.
AGW science aside… I think the economic doom and gloom spread by sceptic alarmists is the BIGGEST furphy of the entire debate! I’m prepared to pay a moderate amount of $$$ even if it turns out we were wrong.
Cohenite: “The map shows the paucity of vegetation during the last ice-age; the current state of forestation is many times greater than was present during the ‘natural’ ice-age. ”
Anything on Wikipedia has to be met with extreme scepticism – that map is unsourced and unattributed.
I would not form any deductions from it at this stage.
Incidentally it might worth raising the issue that is we need to cut CO2 emissions, then inferring from the AGW hypothesis, reducing CO2 must cause an ice age. Is this outcome possible in the current climate models? Who knows because from Hendrik Tenneke’s comments about climate models, those are, at the present state of the theory, incomplete – especially when the geophysics of the earth is totally ignored.
Tenneke’s comments are important but even he has accidentally ignored the magnitude of the problem – while he is correct in identifying the Earth’s oceans and the long term physics of these bodies as the fundamental driver of any climate model, he neglects the more important geophysics of the earth itself in this system.
Tenneke limits his model to, was is essentially a whisper then coating of liquid, on a massive planet whose thermal state is totally ignored. What happens thermally to the oceans is driven by the thermal behaviour of the mass these whisper thin liquids coat. Quite frankly climate science seems to be an aggregation from weather modelling, when all said and done, one should have started from an astronomical perspective and started with the Earth’s physical behaviour as part of the solar system.
I have come to realise from my own very speciliased area of diamond geology that the earth cannot be considered in isolation nor as a closed system – though we grudgingly admit that infrequent meteoritic impacts might have some effect on the biosphere.
But the thermal behaviour of the oceans, and by extrapolation the atmosphere, is fundamentally driven by the thermal behaviour of the earth itself. PDO’s ENSO etc etc, (acronyminate to distraction) are likely driven by geophysical forcings that climate science is ignorant of.
The whole understanding of weather, and thus climate, would change if it were realised that these phenomena are effects of the EM interaction between the earth and the plasma of space. Climate science assumes that all weather, and thus climate, are closed systems. The present interest in cosmic rays (charged particles in motion is electricity) marks the start of the realisation that the earth cannot be assumed to be a closed system.
Unfortunately no amount of contrary fact will persuade the establishment and it will only be on its passing into the mists of history that better ideas explaining natural phenomena will happen.
Some of us in the plasma physics area disagree on whether the paradigm shift will occur in our lifetime, or afterwards. One insists it will be in our lifetimes. I and the other, (his site is the official one) believe it will be after botth of us are dead and pushing daiseys up.
Louis; I sourced that map from here;
http://web.mac.com/sinfonia1/Global_Warming_Politics/A_Hot_Topic_Blog/Entries/2008/5/21_Are_We_Out_Of_Our_Trees.html
I just hope plasma physics has latitude for faster than light travel!
Cohenite – how utterly fantastic – how the hell did you get to “the priority of nature to the exclusion of human exigencies that are sensible and allow for civilized advance” – fark !
My examples were agricultural based – not about the “natural environment”
And as for “natural disasters” – bah phooey – you mean episodic phenomena which are part of natural variability. ANd should understandable and even a bit predictable.
Indeed some of what I put up may simply be La Nina teleconnections (e.g. Kenya)
But the start of multi-year droughts and major trends in major indicators is another matter i.e. Walker circulation, SAM, IOD, STR etc
The reason one would be interested as an agriculturalist or water manager is that changes in the odds from 3 out of 10 bad seasons to 4 or 5 bad is enough to send whole farming systems to the wall.
Want climate problems – you already have them mate !
As for “other indicators” – well pretty well most available freshwater and arable land is exploited. They don’t seem to be making soil at the rate we erode it.
Want a local view – look up the Australian National Land and Water Resources Audit.- you tell me how good our resources are.
http://www.nlwra.gov.au/
PDSI – global trends – latest I have is – can’t imagine latest situation would have improved it much.
http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/adai/papers/Dai_pdsi_paper.pdf
You see Cohenite – given you don’t have to make any climate risk decisions yourself – you’ve never faced the probability distribution moving under your feet. Have you?
Drying out of sub-tropical zone gradually is an AGW prediction, also consequence of the MWP.
And it’s not about “absolute proof” either. It’s about risk management. Absolute proof will be along shortly when the trend clears the noise of ENSO and PDO.
Let’s hope if it is true we can get the genie back into the bottle. Unless you’re one of them that winners.
And the USA wheat belt probably will be – more temperature, more rain, more CO2. Lucky them ! God is a WASP North American after all. Surely? 🙂
Changes in the world’s temperatures reorganise whole circulation systems. This is THE GIG man ! The real gotcha. Who wins. Who loses. And what might the losers do to become winners again?
Water wars?
Anyway following the bouncing modelling effort ball – they’re closing in !
Cohenite: “I just hope plasma physics has latitude for faster than light travel!”
Not really, that is SJT’s area of expertise.
🙂
Cohenite,
Ok, Stottie’s post – take it back.
Whatever, there was a global climate “issue” some 10,000 years Before Present.
This cannot be dated by radiometric or related methods.
One of the difficulties encountered in this area is debating idiots, usually paid by our taxes.
Louis,
You may have come across it before, if not it’s worth a read.
http://www.vortex-world.org/repulsin.htm
It’s a long story, but it all began with Schauberger observing, that the trout in fast flowing mountain streams used hardly any movement to stay in place facing the flow.
(It relates to the force of expelled water, created by water flowing through the specially shaped gills of the fish you will have to look for that bit though, I read it in a book)
AND so on Cohenite….. latest ….
Cause of the widening of the tropical belt since 1958
Jian Lu
National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado, USA
Advanced Study Program, NCAR, Boulder, Colorado, USA
Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies, Calverton, Maryland, USA
Clara Deser
National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado, USA
Thomas Reichler
Department of Meteorology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA
Previous studies have shown that the width of the tropical belt has been increasing since at least the late 1970s based on a variety of metrics. One such metric, the frequency of occurrence of a high-altitude tropopause characteristic of the tropics, is used here to show that the observed widening of the tropics can be accurately replicated by an atmospheric general circulation model forced by the observed evolution of global SST and sea ice distributions as well as the direct radiative effects from both natural and anthropogenic sources. Contrasting this simulation with one forced by the observed SST and sea ice distributions alone reveals that the widening trend can be attributed entirely to direct radiative forcing, in particular those related to greenhouse gases and stratospheric ozone depletion. SST forcing causes no significant change in the width of the tropics, and even a contraction in some seasons.
Received 22 September 2008; accepted 30 December 2008; published 5 February 2009.
Citation: Lu, J., C. Deser, and T. Reichler (2009), Cause of the widening of the tropical belt since 1958, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L03803, doi:10.1029/2008GL036076.
Drought as tropics expand ?
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16516-drought-warning-as-the-tropics-expand.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=climate-change
Cohers – game over- woo hoo !! 🙂
……….. demonstrate that our measure of tropical expansion is
entirely attributable to direct radiative forcing; SST forcing
alone causes no significant change in the width of the
tropics, and even a contraction in some seasons. We
speculate that the SST-forced contraction might result from
the dominance of the upward swing of the Pacific decadal
oscillation (PDO) around 1976–77 [Deser et al., 2004;
Zhang et al., 1997] and/or the multidecadal variation in
Atlantic SSTs [Delworth and Mann, 2000], for the SST
pattern of the positive phase of the PDO resembles that of El
Nino, which is associated with a contraction of the tropics
[Lu et al., 2008].
MattB:
“As for diverting funds Will… well if pursuing the recommendations of best practice science is a waste of funds then so be it…”
I found your qualification amusing. “Best practice science” as if science is like accounting, except the maths is a bit different.
Call me old fashioned, but I think we need to focus on “correct science” rather than “best practice science”. Keep in mind, and I’ve pointed this out many times, around 80% of “best practice” science ultimately produces bullshit, and that fact can be shown empirically through scientific research *done on* scientific work. You do this, in case you’re curious, by going back over the peer reviewed papers that are, say, 10 years or so old, and check which research results turned out to be still considered valid today. There is some very interesting work done in this area, and I suggest it would help you to familiarise yourself with it.
So let’s not rush into what “best practice” science tells us to do today, especially when it’s the type of cutting edge research that will tell us something very different next year, and that is almost guaranteed.
Why Louis, are you suggesting our Will is a tachyon :-)?
However – yes PDO change would affect the marine biology of the US west coast. But algae also require nutrients and these can come from terrestrial runoff. Dead zones along the coast seem to be increasing. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/08/15/MNLD12ADSN.DTL
Speaking of sucking out all the oxygen.
Seems like an incredible waste of money to cap carbon, when it’s nitrogen run off from sewer discharge what’s killing the planckton, fish, coral, crab and whatnot.
The constant attention and need for reporters to link every bad thing to is leading people away from doing the good things with government that actually would benefit the nature.
From your own story,
That was buried down in the “cut if we sell more ad space” part.
Up at the beginning it mentions “scientists place the problem on runoff of chemical fertilizers in rivers and fallout from burning fossil fuels,”
By “fallout from burning fossil fuels” could they be meaning rain? Rain impregnated with CO2; the Devil’s own gas?
Rains like Rosemary’s baby! Keep an umbrella handy. Don’t let the Children get caught out in the fallout.
So you see Perth is really blessed with a lack of fallout.
Luke. me thinks you just made Cohenite’s point re: nature over man with this: “They don’t seem to be making soil at the rate we erode it.”
They? We? The implication of the use of these pronouns is well — personal. Examples of impersonal pronouns are: this, these, that, and those or indefinite pronouns all, some, any, more, most. The use of “they” might be considered marginally OK without the follow-on use of “We.” Clearly you are making a case that the causes are “anthrocentric, when in fact the dynamics are geocentric. Creating soil and erosion go on with and mostly without without mankind’s assistance.
That ole monster against nature, humankind, must be stopped???
BTW, quit using weather events to imply climate; furthermore, why is a growing tropical belt bad? When do we start complaining about the mountains blocking/reducing the moisture on their lee sides?
Luke,
“Cohers – game over- woo hoo !! 🙂
…demonstrate that our measure of tropical expansion is entirely attributable to direct radiative forcing…”
Could you clarify why you so passionately believe that a computer model (mathematical theory expressed in computer software) is actually proof of anything at all? It is no more, and no less, than a theory. Theories are interesting and deserve investigation but they are not “proof” of anything directly in science. (Obviously RealClimate doesn’t share this view, but there are so many logical confusions in many of their assertions it’s hard to know where to begin–but they are not philosophers of science, but working scientists, so that’s to be expected.)
This broad principle applies to every field of research in physics that I am aware of. For example, if a computer model in particle physics postulates the existence of, say, the higgs boson, this does not therefore “prove” the existence of the higgs boson. You actually have to back up the theory with empirical evidence, i.e., make predictions that later on turn out to be true, and in this case you might do that by building a very big enough particle accelerator.
My general impression is that you seem to be deeply confused about the ontology of sound scientific practice. Could you explain what you actually believe a model *proves* in the real world?
Besides that quibble, I have noticed a vast improvement in your posts lately. Many are starting to come across as reasonable, balanced–you’ve even begun to qualify some of your statements and express uncertainty… in other words you’re actually starting to sound convincing. Not that I agree with the conclusions you reach, but that is separate issue…
Cohers –
Multi-year droughts aren’t weather mate !
As for soil generation and “we and they” – tongue in cheek mate – you might think I know about soil loss processes and anthropogenic/natural impact. How many 100 papers would you like mate. Soil loss onto the reef is 5x to 10x pre-European. Interaction of Australian graziers and farmers with a variable climate has produced massive soil loss – surely you’re not a denialist here as well. Would you like some photos of erosion 3 feet deep in one afternoon on crop lands?
Marcus
“You may have come across it before, if not it’s worth a read. http://www.vortex-world.org/repulsin.htm”
This seems like Schauberger’s anecdtotes employed as a forrester last century – I’ll chase it up in any case. It’s stuff like this which pauses one’s blind adherence to received dogma.
Lyall Watson described it as hyperbolic space curved motion, or something like that – according to Watson it’s easily demonstrated using chicken eggs and water at 4 degree Celsius. As a major in sedimentology, this causes me some problems with mainstream theory.
Please continue telling me of these theoretical “inconveniences” – here or elsewhere.
Much appreciated.
luke; the Lu paper reminded me of the Vecchi and Soden paper which modelled a supposed AGW based El Nino effect; the Lu piece takes different tack and suggests there is an AGW effect which runs strongly counter to El Nino; this is similar to Keenlyside and the theory that AGW will be temporarily masked by natural process; Lu says AGW has been mitigated by El Nino; El Nino causes a contraction of the tropical and sub-tropical troposphere; AGW causes an expansion; Lu says the widening by AGW is due to radiative forcing “related to greenhouse gases and stratospheric ozone depletion.” The problem with this is that a cooling stratosphere causes an increase in the jetstream strength due to a steepening of the equator/polar gradient; this in turn shrinks the tropical/sub-tropical/temperate circulation cells and expands the polar cells.This stratosphere contraction raises the tropopause and makes for stronger El Nino [a higher celing = more energy capacity] which possibly explains the ’98 event; it seems, once again, as with the recent Steig and Mann effort, we have pro-AGW scenarios which contradict each other.
Don’t be such a dour bugger Will. I’m razzing Cohers with some good stuff.
You have failed to comprehend how any progress in modern climate science is done. It’s all about observations. The models independently are used to investigate likely causes. There is no tuning here. You can’t “fluke” intelligent analysis of meteorological phenomena. The models have reasonably explained the obs. Not invented them. And left some more questions.
So fuck the Higgs boson and the philosophy of science – this is about real applied science.
But no – I’m totally unreasonable. You won’t get anywhere on here being reasonable. These guys are into denialist religion. So much of time it’s just sparring and mutual insults about Gore or Hansen (like who cares really) till something substantive come along.
Anyway Will – you might explain how you would generate proof of anything in the climate system without use of modelling. Correlations won’t give you physical mechanisms.
Will – nothing is “absolute proof” – but as per many of my drought posts I think an ongoing suite of evidence builds a plausible case for AGW involvement. That’s involvement not 100% !
So over Australia we see laid across ENSO and PDO – the fine tuning of SAM, IOD and STR. Moving things around enough in the right places to cause some havoc. If you want read a previous rant on details – http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/05/30/drought-in-australia/
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/06/08/victoria-rainfall-fall-rain/
Doesn’t mean you need an ETS or carbon tax – but anyone investing in agriculture or water resources infrastructure ought to be fascinated with developments.
Cohenite,
Our Will a tachyon? Probably but a self inflating one as well – otherwise known as geosequestration that is best described as collecting a pigs breath into an airtight bag and then excavating it into its rectum to recycle it.
Here’s the pdf
http://www.inscc.utah.edu/~reichler/publications/papers/Lu_Deser_Reichler_2009.pdf
http://www.inscc.utah.edu/~reichler/publications/papers/Reichler_09_Widening.pdf – fascinating
and enough to keep Cohers going for days here http://www.inscc.utah.edu/~reichler/publications/tjr_pubs.shtml
Will – you might catch up on some modern climate science technique ! 🙂
Luke,
“Don’t be such a dour bugger Will. I’m razzing Cohers with some good stuff.”
Yes, you are… but I’m sure he’ll tear you a new arsehole if you make a slip up…
“You have failed to comprehend how any progress in modern climate science is done. It’s all about observations. So fuck the Higgs boson and the philosophy of science – this is about real applied science.”
I assume you’re either drunk or now taking the piss out of the field of climatology, because if I understand you correctly, you’re basically expressing a notion along the lines of, “screw those particle physicist wankers– they don’t have a clue on how to do REAL science. Watch the climatology boys and learn how it’s done for real.” God help us. (Very effective at getting extra grant money though, that’s to their credit.)
“These guys are into denialist religion.”
Many (most?) are here, yes. At least the posters. Can’t comment on the lurkers, obviously.
“Anyway Will – you might explain how you would generate proof of anything in the climate system without use of modelling. Correlations won’t give you physical mechanisms.”
You make predictions and see if they come true… Like the predictions — oops, sorry I meant to say forecasts, or was that ‘scenarios’ ?, as per AR4. Not rocket science…
“nothing is “absolute proof” ”
Not seeking absolute proof. But I still need a solid circumstantial case to be made.
“If you want read a previous rant on details – http://tamino.wordpress.com”
I find Reading Tamino about as pleasurable as watching a Michael Moore documentary (the 911 one, not the health care one). My head hurts afterwards, trying to sort through the logical tangles…
That was MY comments on Tamino – not his comments dear Will – the comments mate. The comments. Also you’ll enjoy seeing me getting kicked by Shorty on http://landshape.org/enm/recent-article-on-controversial-topic-drought-and-agw/ if you want to update on “the debate so far”. Otherwise ignore.
No I’m not taking on particle physicists – just saying all this philosophical stuff is so vacuous really – let’s talk some current climate papers i.e. “fuck the Higgs boson”.
How good are the models? Try http://www.inscc.utah.edu/~reichler/publications/papers/Reichler_08_BAMS_Performance.pdf
And again you’re retired to the AR4 temperature prediction. Least of our worries perhaps?
ABC News Radio’s poll on climate change.
http://www.abc.net.au/newsradio/
The Choices are Yes, No, It’s a myth, and at 2315 on Friday night, “It’s a myth” was running at 91%.
Luke,
I’ll follow up on your links when it’s not so late. For now:
“No I’m not taking on particle physicists – just saying all this philosophical stuff is so vacuous really – let’s talk some current climate papers i.e. “fuck the Higgs boson”.”
Maybe if you had a broader understanding of how science is done in other fields, you would be in a better position to evaluate the field you have so much love for. BTW, I follow the scientific debates in several different fields concurrently, not just climatology. How things are done or not done, sheds a great deal of light on the practices in other fields. If you don’t have that — practical — knowledge there are lot of things you are going to remain gullible about.
Another take on how good the models are, i.e., comparisons to what’s happening in the ‘real world’. (I note you ducked the question (yet again) on what models actually tell us about the real world. You don’t like all the philosophy and theoretical bullshit, but love the climate models as if they were not the same ‘theoretical bullshit’ you’re dismissive of when it doesn’t suite your position. 🙂
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2009/surface-temperature-anomalies-almost-outside-2-sigma-confidence-intervals/
Ho hum – yes yes yes – I know – but it’s just one test isn’t it. One use. And models don’t have decadal representation so what would you expect …. anyway when it inevitably climbs the denaiers will jump off cliffs … (he bravely asserts)
Or perhaps they’re wrong.
But really far too much emphasis on the global temperature graph. It’s just “a” metric.
And I don’t “love” climate – it’s an input into the wider enviro-biosimulation. Climate not my field either (does it show that much 🙂 ) – just visiting to gather necessary input data. I’m just appalled at the pseudo-sceptics irrational trashing of all process here… it’s wanton – it’s indiscriminate.
Incidentally we use to throw “calculating the mass of the Higgs boson” into conversations as a Blade Runner replicant test.
Graeme Bird,
1986 IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science (Vol. PS-14 No. 6). is a readbale summary of the plasma universe theory. As I am a member of the IEEE I’ll see if I can get an online copy – might take a day or so. Summarises everthing you need to get a basic understanding.
“http://rankexploits.com/musings/2009/surface-temperature-anomalies-almost-outside-2-sigma-confidence-intervals/”
As Luke said, the models can’t predict when an El Nino or La Nina is going to happen, and they can’t predict short term trends. She is demonstrating that testing the models against the short term is a pointless exercise. I’m not a statistician, but I’m guessing a smoothed trendline over ten to thirty years, (the definintion of climate), against the models would be a more realistic test.
Well luke, the Lu paper builds on an interesting history; the progress to the poles of the tropics and sub-tropics is a theory that, before Lu’s paper, was based on tropopause height as this little gerfuffle shows;
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/301/5632/479
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/reprint/sci;303/5665/1771b.pdf
Lu bypasses the issue of height as a proxy for widening by relying on the probability density function [PDF]; the PDF “is computed from the daily temperature data for the ERA40 reanalysis”; this reanalysis has produced this;
http://davidsmith1.files.wordpress.com/2008/01/0111081.jpg
The 1976 GPCS [we always come back to this] did not feature a concurrent pressure shift; so we have a remarkable temperature effect on the troposphere in 1976 which has shaped all temperature trends since and before, but we don’t have a toposphere pressure and heightening effect which can be attributed to the 1976 temperature spike; if tropospheric pressure is not correlated with troposphere temperature than Lu’s conclusion that AGW is causing the expansion of the tropical troposphere through the proxy of PDF cannot be substantiated.
In your opinion Cohers – will you be emailing Lu for us?
and perhaps submitting a challenging letter to GRL? We’re expecting some followup Cohers. No slacking.
How do explain Dai’s PDSI results? Empirical evidence of the consequences.
The many other things going on are listed here –
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/?p=4184&cp=24#comment-83927
how lucky do you have to feel that it’s all just “a coincidence” – at some point you’ll have to wonder … and this science is just going to keep rolling now … all this stuff is linked IMO
And the wind blowing through the GCM junkyard just happens to model the behaviour? Come on !
Hadley closing on the decadal issues now too. With guru Prof Chris Folland visiting Australia in the next month. Hope Stewie Franks is meeting up. 🙂
So instead of AGW being “over” – the science looks like it’s just beginning.
Cohers – have you been responsible and corresponded with Rolf Philipona yet or just relaxing in the knowledge that you know all ? You should be reporting back to us.
Oh and BTW – as usual it’s always what sceptics leave out eh?
Santer et al comprehensively rebutted Pielke’s rebuttal. Naughty Cohers. Smacks hand.
Response to Comment on “Contributions of Anthropogenic and Natural Forcing to Recent Tropopause Height Changes”
B. D. Santer, M. F. Wehner, T. M. L. Wigley, R. Sausen, G. A. Meehl, K. E. Taylor, C. Ammann, J. Arblaster, W. M. Washington, J. S. Boyle, and W. Brüggemann (19 March 2004)
Science 303 (5665), 1771c. [DOI: 10.1126/science.1092441]
If you come hunting always bring two knives….
they have problems with long term trends too.
http://climatesci.org/2008/11/14/are-multi-decadal-climate-forecasts-skillful-2/
http://www.climatesci.org/publications/pdf/maccracken2004.pdf (screen shot of Nature/Vol 429| 17 June 2004, in a rare candid mood)
http://climateresearchnews.com/2008/12/evaluating-near-term-hurricane-loss-prediction-models/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/05/07/climate-models-fail-at-antarctic-warming-predictions/ (this is robust and independant of whatever kinks work out of the Steig kerfuffle – ie climate models predicted temperature increases of 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit (0.75 degrees Celsius) over the past century did not occure )
luke; I’m talking to you; if I wanted to talk to these other fine people I would; and it’s not my opinion; I just did a bit of snooping around, a bit of collation and there you have it; it does seem to be a structural problem with the Lu paper; that his proxy for AGW’s effect on widening doesn’t seem to be related to temperature; I just thought I’d mention it.
Where does this fit? http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Super_SSW.jpg
Super strong stratospheric warming event to bring more cold and snow to 08/09 winter is the title.
Seems like it could be a symptom of Louis Hissink’s plasma universe.
Sorry about being the buttinski.
My post was a rebuttal to ST anyhow.
So cohenite and Luke please continue your combat.
You had just worked your way up to two knives,
and I yeild the floor.
Now the hottest day on record in southeast Australia. Melbourne – has just broken its February record by 2.7C and counting. Currently 46.0C a number never seen before that far south, but currently 47C in rural areas to the west. Will be lucky not to see many deaths today. Chances are that the damages will run into the many 100s of millions.
Suggest the sceptics get writing science papers because the public will want answers and blogs and opinions don’t cut it.
david,
“Will be lucky not to see many deaths today. Chances are that the damages will run into the many 100s of millions.”
FFS, you are almost salivating, get a grip man!
David,
“Suggest the sceptics get writing science papers because the public will want answers and blogs and opinions don’t cut it.”
Given the lead time to prepare a scientific paper, then the peer review process and publication delays, it would probably take at least one year to get a paper into print. By that time the issue will have become history.
It seems publicus moronicus have spoken – the ABC radio poll puts global warming a myth at 90% – so I don’t think the public will want answers, at least not the ones you have prepared for this moment.
david; it is a bit ghoulish of you; check past records please before descending into an end of the world rant;
http://www.abc.net.au/blackfriday/newspapers/390109_a_fierce_heat_over_state.htm?section=1c&sub=a
http://www.abc.net.au/blackfriday/newspapers/390111_a_all_heat_records_broken.htm?section=1c&sub=a
Melbouren hit 113 [45C] and the surrounds 116 [47C] between the 9/1/39 and 11/1/39; 1939 was the tail end of the long El nino period; it seems glib to blame AGW for this one, even though, I admit, we have entered a La Nina period.
luke; I really didn’t think you would use the Santer et al ‘rebuttal’ of the Pielke critique; Santer refers to the NESDIS retrivals as the basis for the NCEP reanalyses; Santer asserts that the NESDIS retrievals [and NCEP reanalyses] “have large biases in the temperature and static stability of the troposphere” as well as in the stratosphere, underestimating the cooling there and overestimating the cooling and missing the warming in the troposphere; this has been well covered in the Fu ‘debate’;
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2004/05/04/assault-from-above/
The rest of the Santer ‘rebuttal’ is a tirade at UAH merging of MSU and radiosonde data; the claim that UAH is the less reliable of the satellites just won’t go away despite the Randall and Herman vindication of UAH accuracy.
In case you missed, the Lu paper uses NCEP reanalyses; so who are you going to believe; Santer or Lu?
“FFS, you are almost salivating, get a grip man!”
The sky is gray with smoke, the wind is blowing a gale, the temperature is 46.
“Suggest the sceptics get writing science papers because the public will want answers and blogs and opinions don’t cut it.”
…..and your opinion, and particular selection of the papers does.
The temperature goes over the known record measure for Feb, which in turn is based upon ONLY 100 years of records, measuring something that has cycles that span well out side that period,with the implication being, that the reason it has gone so high is solely because of those pesky extra molecules of C02- and nothing else.
So I look at the synoptic chart, as I have done for ages and see a high over the Tasman Sea and a low over the Australian Bight, squeezing the air flow tight over the SE area, and have to say to myself that this has been uniquely caused by C02.
Not only that, I can remember the temperature in Adelaide in the early fifties getting to 117F
SJT: “The sky is gray with smoke, the wind is blowing a gale, the temperature is 46.”
Fahrenheit perhaps? If you want to get involved in science matters SJT, it might be useful to known the lingo – 46 is a number, of no meaning when uttered in isolation. And you forgot to tell us how much volume of air is at 46 – because I know from first hand experience I only need to hop in a helicopter, go 500 meters up and it’s cool. Very cool.
Malcolm Hill,
I just looked at Ozforecast (http://ozforecast.com.au/cgi-bin/weather.cgi?station=melbourne) and it’s bucketting rain east of Melbourne.
Biased reporting? Nooooooooo, could not be.
SJT:
“As Luke said, the models can’t predict when an El Nino or La Nina is going to happen, and they can’t predict short term trends. She is demonstrating that testing the models against the short term is a pointless exercise. I’m not a statistician, but I’m guessing a smoothed trendline over ten to thirty years, (the definintion of climate), against the models would be a more realistic test.”
You’re not even making the remotest bit of sense now. El Nino’s and La Nina’s are not events that occur “outside” the climate system that “distort” the underlying “real” climate trend. Their effects are part of the climatological trend. I’m sure you know this as well as I do, so for you to say something like this you are stupid (which I know you are not) or you are being intentionally disingenious.
There are statistical techniques that may be used to determine over shorter time periods if a prediction or forecast is “on track”. You do not have to wait 30 years to find out. That’s absurd. This is about uncontroversial statistical techniques and basic scientific analysis. Of course, how soon you can determine whether a forecast is off track is dependent on where the measurement is, relative to the forecast. If temperatures dropped .1C per year for 30 years in a row, would you say that we could not be “sure” the forecasts/models/scenarios were wrong until 30 years and 1 day later? Clearly that is ridiciolous but the position you seem to be trying to maintain.
Let’s use another example: you’re testing a study on the effectiveness of a new cancer treatment and you want to run the trial for 2 years. This is, say, the “accepted” time period used by this particular scientific community to decide efficacy. What happens if there is a 9% increase in deaths within the first 6 months from heart attacks? Do we stop the trial because the statistics are giving us reasonable grounds for doing so, or would you consider the 6 month time period insufficient grounds for taking action? So you continue the trial?
Frankly, you are extremely unscientific in your mindset on these issues, which in my view makes you hardly any better than some of the cranks who post here. In fact, in some ways, more dangerous, because you pretend to be following good scientific principles but diverge from them as soon as they don’t align with your belief system. You and Luke have a lot in common with the cranks you make fun of, unfortunately.
Malcolm Hill,
The synoptic chart is sort of useful but it does not tell me much about wind directioons etc – the Ozforecase map has lots of vectors from the radar but only within the range for Melbourne.
I doubt we have the hardware etc to show a composite radar image from Eucla to the east coast, let alone the means to compile it all together. This would make a fascinating project – but the heat source is the low in the GAB. Note also that in terms of electric universe theory, lows are powered by electric currents so a powerful, sub cyclone, low would also generate alot of heat by itself.
Not sure how CO2, as a well mixed minor gas, could possess such properties.
And its wise to remember, according to a retired Dutch Meteorologist I corresponded with some time ago, NO ONE knows what the mechanism is to go from a warm ocean to a cyclone (or hurricane). That was a rather startling admission from one of the professionals in meteorology.
In terms of plasma physics we can propose a mechanism that can also be tested in laboratory conditions.
Will: ” I’m sure you know this as well as I do, so for you to say something like this you are stupid (which I know you are not) or you are being intentionally disingenious.”
As one who has had to deal with SJT from the start of this blog, your conclusion is somewhat restricted – you might explore additional reasons for SJT’s senselessness. The truth might be far simpler than what either of us assume.
Will : ” You and Luke have a lot in common with the cranks you make fun of, unfortunately.”
I assume I am one of those cranks, but as this is essentially ad hominem, you are just as stupid as SJT or Luke, if not even more, given the glib superciliousness you possess.
Perhaps keep the ad homs to yourself, unless you have an ego problem and need to up your Google score.
Comment from: SJT February 7th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
“FFS, you are almost salivating, get a grip man!”
The sky is gray with smoke, the wind is blowing a gale, the temperature is 46.
‘—————————
I think I put you on my “don’t bother with” list.
If you are so mentally deficient as not understanding what I meant, ie reminding david, that his rejoicing in the misery was grotesque, than all your other contributions must also be crap, and not worthy of note.
>FFS, you are almost salivating, get a grip man!
Don’t think so. My home came under ember attack and I evacuated the family last night know that the fire dangers indices today were the most extreme ever forecasted in Victoria. I have a fire plan and fire pumps but with conditions worse than we have ever seen before realised this event was impossible to defend against.
Extremes are when climate change matters. This heatwave has been made worse by global warming. The event has been made worse by the longest most severe drought in southern Australia’s history.
Get writing those science papers….
david,
I will eat humble pie and apologise to you most profusely if you prove your situation.
Frankly I don’t believe you.
Read what you wrote in your previous post, I made the comment to!!
I’m not an abusive or belligerent man but I’m also loath to take BS.
David,
under those trying circumstances you havae the presence of mind to report, “under enemy fire”, first hand observations of the catastrophe enveloping your place of domocilility.
Meanwhile thunderstorms are drenching Melbourne’s east regions.
“Meanwhile thunderstorms are drenching Melbourne’s east regions.”
I see a band of rain that is mostly light to moderate passing by to the east of me. We got a few drops, but I think many plants are beyond saving now, including what have been up to now hardy, drought resistant natives.
“You’re not even making the remotest bit of sense now. El Nino’s and La Nina’s are not events that occur “outside” the climate system that “distort” the underlying “real” climate trend. Their effects are part of the climatological trend. I’m sure you know this as well as I do, so for you to say something like this you are stupid (which I know you are not) or you are being intentionally disingenious.”
They are big enough to be able to distort the endpoints, but they are a part of the normal cycle. One question is if climate change is making the El Nino more severe/frequent. The recent research on the Indian Ocean Dipole indicates the warm phase of that is occurring more often.
You seem to forget the Federation drought of 1895 – 1903 that followed closely on the heals of the 1880 – 1888 drought.
Meanwhile Innisfail in northern Queensland is flooding – they had rain almost continuously throughout January associated with a cyclone and everyone rightly is calling disaster YET the record for highest rainfall in Innisfail in January was set in 1900 and still stands, the February record was set in 1891.
You don’t think maybe there is a correlation between drought in southern Australia and rainfall in northern Australia?
This is Australia David, and we have terms for 100 year drought , 100 year flood, it’s written into our insurance contracts.
Says Willy Wonker who just observes but never contributes.
Yes David indeed – the faux-sceptics are finished after this little episode.
Will send them scurrying back to their burrows for a while. Interesting that La Nina didn’t break the drought in southern Australia. I wonder why …
Hey wasn’t Bob on about global cooling just last week?
Luke – the La Nina went positive in July/August and is still only mild.
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/climate/indicator_enso.jsp?c=nino34
Most of Australia has had average or above rainfall over the past 12 months. The only region to miss out is the southern section of the SE.
BTW – over the past 3 months all of Australia has had average or above rainfall!
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/climate/recent.jsp?lt=wzcountry&lc=aus&c=rain_decile&p=3mth
God this is so pathetic.
As though there is no one in Australia who has not had to fight to preserve their home in the face of an advancing. Try being involved in the Ash Wednesday,1983 fire .
When was that one again? 1983.
Well bugger me, thats nearly a quarter of century ago, and a quarter of the time scale they use to measure their record highs. Sort of puts it into perspective.
Isnt it interesting also that back on the 6th February in 1901 in this part of Australia it was a record of 42.3. Beats todays temperature still, despite those pesky Co2 molecules.
“I will eat humble pie and apologise to you most profusely if you prove your situation.
Frankly I don’t believe you.”
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25018722-661,00.html
Denialist scum
David,
“Suggest the sceptics get writing science papers because the public will want answers and blogs and opinions don’t cut it.”
Don’t worry.
Bob Carter will break off from his current world preaching tour and walk with the wooden staff of truth in his right hand to the hill top overlooking Victoria and verily he will face toward Victoria and verily he will raise his arms skyward while pointing the wooden staff of truth across the heat benighted land of Victoria and he will call out in a loud commanding voice, “Global Cooling”!. And verily the people of Victoria with one mind will go down on their knees in gratefulness and worship. Verily!
Comment from: Luke February 7th, 2009 at 9:40 pm
Denialist scum
I’m still trying to get over Will calling me a crank, and then you bust out with this?
If you need any firemen call on the Schwarzeneggar. California is hard up for money, but it won’t matter. California is hard up for AGW propaganda too! Besides we owe you one.
Might as well make the thing work for you.
SJT “One question is if climate change is making the El Nino more severe/frequent”.
You are so caught up in your rhetoric that you are tripping over your words. You have substituted ‘climate change’ for ‘global warming’, haven’t you? How can climate change cause anything? Climate change is a result not a cause. The climate has to be changed by other factors, like a change in heat, which would require a variation in the Sun’s output, geothermal activity, or a problem in the redistribution of heat by oceanic and atmospheric systems.
The basis of the argument is still warming, of a global nature. I supplied you with visual proof that global warming is mathematical hocus pocus, not a reality. Here’s the graphic again:
http://climate.uah.edu/
The warming is highly localized and there’s just about as much cooling. Why is the North Pole warm and the South Pole cool? Is it due to what one wag stated, that the warm air is obviously rising to the top? Or maybe it’s the heat in the warm tropical waters gravitating to the top. That makes about as much sense as your theory that climate change is affecting the El Nino.
Come on, man, take a break from the computer model crap and take a vacation from realclimate. Here’s some good Beck for you to wade through:
http://www.biokurs.de/treibhaus/180CO2_supp.htm
There’s your problem. You say I need to get in touch with reality, so you offer me the fantasy of Beck. Beck is a good example of the rank amateurism that plagues the denialist case.
James Mayeau :”I’m still trying to get over Will calling me a crank, and then you bust out with this? ” (writing of Luke)
Dismissing people as cranks simply tells evryone that Nitschke can’t counter the AGW let along the sceptical arguments. I notice he has his own definition of a crank – but c’est la vie.
But SJT’s understanding of the AGW cause is pretty interesting – another – Steig’s work seems to be amateurish – what SJT has never understood is that Beck summarised all the previously published papers which were ignored by Keeling et al. And as Will, dismissing Beck’s work as amateurish is simply the only way SJT can vent his spleen – he certainly hasn’t indicated he understands the science, or lack of one should say.
I may add Perth in WA is experience very windy conditions – must be due to all the CO2 floating around here – I can’t imagine it could be anything else.
Why do 95% of ABC NewsRadio listeners know that Global Warming is a myth.
http://www.abc.net.au/newsradio/supp/poll/total.htm
Luke,
‘denialist scum’? And I thought we had something special going.
Actually, every time you demonstrate such typical AGW twit-bot communication skills, you only reconfirm what more and more people are seeing: at the end of the day, AGW fuindies, from your fearful leaders to wannabes like you, are just cowardly jerks.
The cynical pattern of AGW tools is so obvious: a weather event comes along and the fear mongers and fear mongered howl that this is “the *proof* of the end times predicted by our prophets”. But as we see elsewhere, the AGW twit-bots are so fear mongered that they cannot even admit they are following the play book of the AGW leadership.
And no matter that the event is not unusual for the part of the world it is taking place in, or that it is no worse than historical events. NOW it is fer sure AGW. How infantile.
Last year, when Australia was having record cold summers, what exactly was that ‘proof’ of?
The great thing is the alarmist wananbes here and nearly everywhere are down to pointing at weather events, pretending they are climate changes, and then making the ridiculous leap that they are anthropo-caused.
What sad excuses for ‘thinking’ go on behind the AGW true believers furrowed, fearful brows.
You remember back awhile when Jen was “gone fishing” the last time, and the blog sort of bloomed up into an open thread with hundreds of posts?
I did a kind of psychological profile of Gavin Schmidt in that thread.
If I could just remember where I misplaced it.
Lord Monckton had just submitted a paper to the AAAS or some such and they had attached a disclaimer…
“But SJT’s understanding of the AGW cause is pretty interesting – another – Steig’s work seems to be amateurish – what SJT has never understood is that Beck summarised all the previously published papers which were ignored by Keeling et al.”
It’s been explained to you before, explaining it to you again really won’t make any difference.
The tests that Beck used were good tests, of the ambient concentration of CO2. In urban areas, where cars drive past, in labs, where people are breating or using equipment, CO2 concentrations can vary dramatically. Eli Rabett had a topic where some scientists drove around a city, testing the concentrations. There were large variations.
Keeling et al knew that this was a problem, so they didn’t ignore those tests, they wanted to find out what the well mixed background level of CO2 is, and created the facility at Mauna Loa. Those measurements are of the well mixed CO2, and have been confirmed by independent sites around the world, including the site at Cape Grim in Australia.
Beck, of course, has no idea of all of this, apparently. All those who use Beck as an authority also have no idea. Accurate measurements of local levels of CO2 that are going to vary depending on how many people are breathing in the room are good for curiosity value only. It’s like a CO2 version of the UHI effect, except that, unlike climate scientists, the deniers don’t acknowledge it exists or make allowances for it.
Don’t you love this sort of comment “Steig’s work seems to be amateurish” – meaning “well I haven’t read it but I thought I’d say that anyway” …
Gordon – you really are thickhead aren’t you
“Here’s the graphic again:” what don’t you understand about the weighting function for the UAH data being under the surface of Antarctica – i.e. it’s crap
And “That makes about as much sense as your theory that climate change is affecting the El Nino.”
Well being a denialist loser you wouldn’t have read Smith and Power or Vecchi et al would you. On a declining Walker circulation. No that requires a modicum of intelligence. You wouldn’t be curious about the 1991-1995 continuous warm event. Or that before 1976 from 1980 Los Ninos and Las Ninas were in about equal numbers – mean of 2.4 events each/decade, BUT after 1976 few Las Ninas (1.6 /decade) and Los Ninos 3.4/decade – combined with a Walker circulation departing from the centennial trend.
STFU James
Yes SJT – isn’t it amazing once CO2 was sampled in a seriously scientific manner in a well mixed environment that the results are continuous but smooth and regular – same at Cape Grim and South Pole. But with Beck we are asked to believe the numbers jumped all over the place…. but that’s your stupid denialist mind for you. Willing to engage any inconsistent skunk theory for their evil humanity hating purposes.
luke; you are going to blow a gasket; all your diatribes have been looked at;
1 the calibration of UAHMSU ‘under’ the ice is unavoidable because that ice level fluctuates daily; in any event since the ice is warmer than the surrounding air, such a calibration gives a warming bias.
2 Vecchi et al and Power and Smith’s ideas are theoretical and problematic as this study shows;
http://www.azstarnet.com/metro/222800
3 The even mixing of CO2 is problematic as the AQUA and AIRS data shows; your old sparring partner, Steve Short, has also noted the hemispheric divergence with the Nth projected to have a level of atmospheric concentration 100ppm greater than the Sth by 2100.
Come off it Cohenite – you’re getting more shrill as your philosophical position is overrun.
Smith & Power is but one impact of many. So we’re going to take some long term 100,000 climate drift issue and confound it with major trends that have happened in the last 30 years. And what’s this – you’re now “Agreeing” that the poles are melting and quotaing models are me – ….”maaaattteeee”. (but yes is interesting paper eh 🙂 )!?
What Short is on about is hardly Beck and it. When Short starts publishing I might take some more notice.
Here is a little bedtime reading whilst the cat is away.
http://mclean.ch/climate/IPCC.htm
“Steve Short, has also noted the hemispheric divergence with the Nth projected to have a level of atmospheric concentration 100ppm greater than the Sth by 2100”
That can’t happen.
I remember there was a Gordon something or other (Richardson?) who was taking on all comers with his climate changiness. Really good spokesman for the cause.
I sparred with him over tree leaves maintaining their own temperature for a while and then he went away.
If I could just remember the title of that post. Or even the topic.
Jen where are you when I need you? Why hast thou forsaken me?
Ah what the heck. She’s a great girl, and needed a vacation.
I hope she’s gone snorkling on the reefs with Floor Anthony to bring us back wonderful pictures of clown fish, not lost at all, happily swimming in their sea anemone homes.
SJT said “It’s like a CO2 version of the UHI effect, except that, unlike climate scientists, the deniers don’t acknowledge it exists or make allowances for it.”
We know about it.
co2 well mixed or mixed signals? (there’s a satellite map of co2 for you to look at)
Looks like a temperature dependant distribution to me. What do you think?
James; very interesting; that would mean that forested areas in cold areas would have an effect on ambient temperature similar to the UHI effect; a forest heating effect; another reason why the GMST concept is a dud.
I suspect she’ll be dealing with Nemo in one way or another. 🙂
http://users.tpg.com.au/johnsay1/Stuff/nemo.jpg
oooooo – a whole range of 17ppm – hardly Beck is it. LOL !
“James; very interesting; that would mean that forested areas in cold areas would have an effect on ambient temperature similar to the UHI effect; a forest heating effect; another reason why the GMST concept is a dud.”
I guess that means you won’t be referring to the global temperature cooling any more.
“oooooo – a whole range of 17ppm – hardly Beck is it. LOL !”
Were they supposed to be making a point? If so, I don’t know what it is.
SJT: “If so, I don’t know what it is.”
We know, SJT, we know, so don’t fret, but suffice it to say that Jen’s blog has been effectively hijacked by you and Luke and some of the rest of the no named nobodies representing AGW.
That’s funny – I thought it was hijacked by born to rule types such as yourself? How quaint?
Meantime Barry Brook appears to be resiling from the IPCC’s take that Anthro GGs are the main forcing:
“By 2013, however, we’ll be at the top of the solar cycle again, and have added about another +0.1C worth of greenhouse gas temperature forcing and +0.24 of solar forcing compared to 2008. So even if 2013 is a La Niña year, it might still be +0.85C, making it hotter than any year we’ve yet experienced. If it’s a strong El Niño in 2013, it could be +1.2C, putting it way out ahead of 1998 on any metric. Such is the difference between the short-term effect of non-trending forcings (SOI and TSI) and that inexorable warming push the climate system is getting from ongoing accumulation of heat-trapping greenhouse gases.” I am not sure what if anything the final sentence means, but in the first he states that solar forcing is 2.4 times larger than GG forcing. It is not too late for him to advise Wong that her ETS is misdirected and that with a mere $1 billion from each of us on this planet she could reverse the 2.4 times larger solar forcing.
SJ
I’m more interested in finding a temp anomaly map from July 2003, so we can do a side by side with the co2 map. Some of it makes sense from a global warming perspective. Cold Antarctica with a low co2 content. Perhaps co2 is precipitating out as dry ice. Other parts don’t make any sense from an AGW perspective. Take China for instance with a relative lack of co2 over the industrial part of the country, but a large co2 content over the Gobi desert.
And what’s happening with the Pampas of Argentina? And the USA. Red all over except where the people live. It’s like the natural vectors overwhelm the anthropogenic sources…
Oh wait. That’s why I believe what I do. Never mind.
Thank God that Jan found Nemo. I was starting to worry about the little fella.
“We know, SJT, we know, so don’t fret, but suffice it to say that Jen’s blog has been effectively hijacked by you and Luke and some of the rest of the no named nobodies representing AGW.” – Louis Hissink
This coming from someone who feels the need to inflict multiple posts on every topic, often saying nothing at all (the above being a case in point). Last I looked Hissink, this was a democracy and the blog rules welcomed discussion from all parties. If you are feeling threatened by differing views to your own, perhaps it is saying something about you. Play the ball rather than the man- I’m sure the post tally from you would drop satisfactorily from you if you do.
And whilst you are singling out for criticism those whose views differ from yours for not using a name that appeals to your need for control, why not also include Cohenite, Janama, Spangled Drongo, Hunter etc? Stupid question isn’t it?
Tim Curtin – why would brook deny that the sun has an impact on temerature? It would be quite absurd for a leading climate scientist to do that. your interpretation of his sentence is also astonishingly incorrect/manipulative.
The sun has cycles… things warm a bit, they cool a bit., they warm a bit they cool a bit… there are other cycles from other forcings, but behind it all there is the steady rising trend of GHG forcing.
SJT “Beck, of course, has no idea of all of this, apparently. All those who use Beck as an authority also have no idea. Accurate measurements of local levels of CO2 that are going to vary…”
I don’t think you even read Beck. One scientist he cites re the 400+ ppmv in the 1940’s makes everything you’re on about clear. he acknowledged the variations in CO2 due to sunlight, wind, location, altitude, etc. He did hundreds of such tests at various altitudes and averaged them over a year. The average was still over 400 ppmv.
The oceans had been warming between 1920 and 1940. Why is it so hard to accept that outgassing of CO2 from the warming oceans could raise the density as high as it is today? Besides, one recent post links to a global CO2 map from a satellite. Doesn’t look very well-mixed to me. Ranges over about 40 ppmv. Since the pre-Industrial density was calculated from ice cores, that means the trapped CO2, if accurate, was from very cold regions of the Earth. Whose to say that density did not range as high as 350 ppm, or even 400 ppmv, in warmer regions?
Think about something else. How did that CO2 get trapped in the ice? It was either in snowflakes or on the surface when the snowflakes fell. What exactly do we know about the absorption of CO2 into a cold body? And, as Jaworowski implied, what do we know about CO2 trapped under extreme pressure, as you would find under several hundred feet of ice.
There’s no way we should be relying on questionable proxy evidence to determine CO2 densities in the pre Industrial era. On the IPCC diagram in AR4 WG1 Chapter 7, Page 515, Figure 7.3 it points out CO2 fluxes have an error factor of +/- 20%. Applying that same 20% to the pre Industrial level of 270 ppmv, could give a density as high as 324 ppmv. Why is proxy data presented without error bars? There’s no way of determing its accuracy.
SJT “Keeling et al knew that this was a problem, so they didn’t ignore those tests, they wanted to find out what the well mixed background level of CO2 is, and created the facility at Mauna Loa”.
That’s very interesting. They wanted to get away from CO2 emission problems in urban areas, so they planted their CO2 sniffer on one of the world’s most active volcanos. Hmmm. What gases do volcanos emit: water vapour, CO2, SO2…… That makes good sense to me and vindicates Keeling completely.
Back to Beck.
SJT:
“They are big enough to be able to distort the endpoints, but they are a part of the normal cycle. One question is if climate change is making the El Nino more severe/frequent. The recent research on the Indian Ocean Dipole indicates the warm phase of that is occurring more often.”
There is not even a la nina in affect as yet… there is no guarantee there will be one. At best there are “weak el nina” conditions at present, but not enough cool water around long enough to declare one officially. Can you explain how recent weak el nina like conditions, which have been around for only a few months can distort a decade of trend data?
What is your reference for your statement? You’re not just making this stuff up as you go along, right? Where’s the error in the analysis I’ve linked to? I’m happy to listen to anyone who wants to criticise the study and that may well change my mind. But your vague hand waving is not a satisfactory response. How are you going to convince me (or anyone else for that matter) if you or Luke run away, brush off, or laugh at, any serious question you’re not able to answer?
I have the same problem with crank posters. Pin them down on a problem in their argument, and they answer a different question, ignore the question, or change the subject. Hallmark of crank-like behaviour. But you and Luke do exactly the same thing when you can’t answer a reasonable question. The only difference is that the arguments you do put forward are usually not ‘obviously’ absurd from the beginning. Many of them come across as perfectly reasonable. But then when I ask you to explain a problem in a particular argument you’re presenting, you run away.
Of course, none of this is directly relevant to AGW or evaluating the actual science. All it can tell me is that you and Luke have a firm belief system locked in place, but not the technical knowledge of the subject to justify your mindset. Or perhaps you can be bothered to provide some better answers to reasonable questions, and demonstrate to the readership that the above conclusions are not justified.
Has the link moved or has the survey on the public’s perception of global warming been removed from the website?
http://www.abc.net.au/newsradio/supp/poll/past.htm
I’ve emailed News Radio to find out where it went Will.
Trish
“This coming from someone who feels the need to inflict multiple posts on every topic, often saying nothing at all (the above being a case in point). Last I looked Hissink, this was a democracy and the blog rules welcomed discussion from all parties. If you are feeling threatened by differing views to your own, perhaps it is saying something about you. Play the ball rather than the man- I’m sure the post tally from you would drop satisfactorily from you if you do.
And whilst you are singling out for criticism those whose views differ from yours for not using a name that appeals to your need for control, why not also include Cohenite, Janama, Spangled Drongo, Hunter etc? Stupid question isn’t it?”
I mostly play the ball – but you don’t, as do your fellow travellers. Unfortunately I have not inlficted multiple posts ion every topic here – but multiple posts on a particular topic might be an indication of my absence and reflect comments to earlier posts over my absence. I do not sit in front of a computer, day in day out, reading trishy-drivel to react to.
But ‘eavens sake, you loathe me that much to libel me in public? What are you. some leftwing piece of “trish”? Er trash?
“That’s very interesting. They wanted to get away from CO2 emission problems in urban areas, so they planted their CO2 sniffer on one of the world’s most active volcanos. Hmmm. What gases do volcanos emit: water vapour, CO2, SO2…… That makes good sense to me and vindicates Keeling completely.
Did you read what I said? Cape Grim gives similar readings, the satellites give similar readings.
400ppm indicates to me a systemic error on the part of the scientist making the measurements.
Louis – your response is why they call you guys “denialists”. As for playing the ball – hahahahahaha – you’re joking mate. And neither do your faux-sceptics mates. Do bung it on.
Willy Wonker – the reason you don’t understand our answers is because you’re a science flake. We’ve yet to hear anything from you except pop psychological analysis. Mate you are a content free troll. Isn’t it time for you to spin the choccy wheel and pick another victim like Louis. At least Louis has consistent principles.
Luke,
It’s called matching like with like – as head coach you are more qualified than most in ball game rules, or lack of rules.
And I would agree with Will Nitschke’s assessment of both you and quasimodo, sorry, SJT. As for the rest of the trash – why don’t you wait until April when Plimer’s latest books is released? Start storing all the air you can muster because there is a good chance the jolly ship AGW will have sudden lack of sustainable energy.
Oh, how is the press release for the Vic. Fires going – got the wording right yet? Managed to blame it on the sceptics and their coal burning paymasters? That’s what your leader is busy with no?
Luke,
“the reason you don’t understand our answers is because you’re a science flake.”
I think your last response to a question I posed was to say you thought the question was “vacuous”. A fine demonstration of your intelligence, and not really what one would classify as a satisfactory “answer”. Your follow up response, was to post the above insult. These sorts or responses have the opposite of the intended effect. Possibly acquiring a little bit of pop psychology might help you a little? 😉
I could have deconstructed your model response (there are some definite elements of truth in it), for example, by comparing economic models which successfully “hindcast” stock market movements, but have no reliable “forecast” abilities. I could have asked you to clarify why you believe climatological models have special properties not found in other scientific research fields and what evidence you have to back up such claims? As long as you have scientific evidence to back-up your claims, that’s fine.
But it was apparent from your response that you didn’t want to talk “theory” – you just wanted to talk “climate papers.” As if one can do science without theorising! Perhaps you actually believe that climate models are “empirical facts” and not theories, but I doubt it.
“We’ve yet to hear anything from you except pop psychological analysis.”
I’m not the one lecturing the forum on climatology, you are. I’m not a practising scientist, so I’m not going to put forward interpretations of scientific theories like you and some of the other (more obvious) cranks here do…
“Mate you are a content free troll.”
Would you classify a ‘troll’ as someone who:
1. Offers an explanation
2. When asked questions they can’t answer, ignores/insults/or provides hand waving opinions in response.
How exactly does that make you any different from someone like Louis? I stopped reading his posts months ago, because he made Immanuel Velikovsky sound restrained…
“Crank” are not necessarily stupid. Many are highly intelligent (often brilliant), creative, etc. But such a person is generally not very rational. A rational person when provided with a new piece of information does not wave it away or get angry and start insulting the person they are communicating with. Sounds like someone familiar? 🙂
Until you start doing that, you’re not really any different from Louis or Gordon or certain other posters here. I’m not even sure why you bother with the crankier posters–most people can see fairly quickly that their assertions are crazy, or you can simply point out that they are “evaluating” a scientific field in which they have no qualifications or expertise whatsoever. In fact, cranks like Louis and Gordon, the more they rant, the more they do damage to the position they want to defend, just as you do damage to AGW whenever you fly off the handle. I know this should all be about the science, but ultimately the decision to accept or reject AGW is going to be a political one. And interestingly enough, a big part of that “political battle” is likely to be fought on the Internet in forums like this. This is what makes AGW so interesting to observe. Sure, many research fields have ugly fights with scientists entrenched in opposing camps, but AGW has an enormous political component to it, meaning that the non-scientists are going to decide the science.
Will
“How exactly does that make you any different from someone like Louis? I stopped reading his posts months ago, because he made Immanuel Velikovsky sound restrained…”
You have read Velikovsky’s deliberations?
WN
“but ultimately the decision to accept or reject AGW is going to be a political one. ”
If that happens nobody “wins” so to speak.
I’m not convinced about the science of AGW, but if it will be decided on political grounds, as you predict, then there was definitely no science, or only pseudoscience involved in the first place.
Either way, bad news.
Good serve Will – feels good doesn’t it. Well upped !
Well Louis – no I don’t know anyone writing a global warming fire story. And in the current circumstances it would seem ghoulish. However AGW does predict high temperature extremes and a drier southern Australia. So yes it’s what you would predict. This particular event – well it’s consistent but big fires have happened in the past too. Only a future trend will inform us fully.
The level of exposure of blockies living among the bush is now higher of course so more hazard exposure. But don’t think that current events give AGW believers any satisfaction. Just a fear this could become more frequent. What a disturbing thought.
How is it possible that guys like Luke, Louis, SJT, Will, Cohenite and Gordon manage to spend (or should I say waste) so much time on commenting on (or should I say highjacking) this web site. Are they doing any other work or do they have any other hobbies by any chance? They are continuously trying to outsmart each other in a barrage of verbal masturbation. For your information: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=verbal+masturbation defines it as follows (most applicable to them all):
“Describes a person using (or trying but fails) extremely flamboyant, overelaborate, pendantic, overembellished, pompus, language seasoned with a lot of jargon from a certain discipline, sometimes to the extent that it has to be translated or deciphered to be intelligible for the common man; done with the unnecessary need to be meticulously accurate when communicating completely mundane things. May be done with the intent of making others feel inferior and/or himself superior, part of role-playing, humour, being an idiot, (trying to) showing off how smart you are, and as mentioned an unnecessary need to be meticulously accurate. The true verbal masturbators are the pretentious ones who try but utterly fail because they use words they do not understand and use words across a jargon (inconsistency). Verbal masturbation may or may not appear redundant; however the redundancy is from the choice of words used and not necessarily by its meaning.”
Well Chris – being in prison gives you plenty of time. No hobbies. No other interests. No family. This is it Chris. I love it. I actually enjoy all the people here. Especially Louis – he’s great.
But Chris if you’d prefer to be out molesting small rodents – well don’t let us deter you.
“The level of exposure of blockies living among the bush is now higher of course so more hazard exposure. But don’t think that current events give AGW believers any satisfaction. Just a fear this could become more frequent. What a disturbing thought.”
There was some research into this a few years ago. There fires do get worse for some decades, then they stop. The reason they stop is there is nothing left to burn.
Luke,
You want to have a go at specifying what is special about climate models that make them superior to, or at least allows them to avoid having, the same problems as, say, economic, financial or cosmological models?
What I mean is: these types of models are capable of hindcasting well (otherwise they don’t make it into publication, obviously), but on average generally have little or less success at forecasting. Probably the cosmological models do best here. Is there a rational/scientific basis, i.e., a reasonable basis, for believing this? As I mentioned before, I don’t care about “100% proof” of anything. Any sensible person knows you never get that in science.
The last couple of times you’ve sent me links, they’ve been links to papers on computer models (theories). And you seemed to be under the impression that a theory = proof of something or other. Just want to clarify how you can make the transition from one to the other. I’m already a luke warmer, you just need to get me over the line on this. Possibly you can cut and paste links or a previous response you think has already answered this question. I don’t have the time to read everything on these forums, so you may already have answered this for someone.
“You want to have a go at specifying what is special about climate models that make them superior to, or at least allows them to avoid having, the same problems as, say, economic, financial or cosmological models?”
One difference is that financial and economic models have the problem of trying to predict how sentient beings will act. Can you predict irrationality? Climate models predict physical processes that will always act the same way. The climate models do have to model scenarios, though, because we can’t predict how humans will alter their rate of injection of CO2 into the atmosphere.
Chris Schoneveld,
Given I probably spend no more than 15 minutes a day in total commenting here, the term hijacking is a bit of an exaggeration.
Will: “I am already a luke warmer”.
SJT:
“One difference is that financial and economic models have the problem of trying to predict how sentient beings will act. Can you predict irrationality? Climate models predict physical processes that will always act the same way. The climate models do have to model scenarios, though, because we can’t predict how humans will alter their rate of injection of CO2 into the atmosphere.”
Err… that research field is called “social psychology.” I think scientists have even written a book or two on the subject. 😉
Individual behaviour can be erratic, yes. Most people walking past a bridge won’t jump off. A few might. Consider that “weather noise”. Experiments on group behaviour, however, can be replicated consistently. So this is reproducible empirical science. One could think of stock market cycles as similar (vaguely) to climate cycles. There are positive and negative feedbacks (if stock prices go up, they tend to go up further, and visa-versa) and there are even tipping points to consider (stock market crashes). Not a perfect analogy by any means but there enough similarities to make the comparison mildly interesting, rather than to assert the two are completely different in terms of the problems that need to be addressed; which is the fact that many different factors are tangled together. But no, I wouldn’t want to push this too far.
Yes, but can you tell me what our CO2 production rate will be in ten years time? That depends on political movements. In a very short time, a large body of people can change direction in a completely unexpected way that cannot be predicted. “There is nothing so powerful as an idea who’s time has come”.
Maybe. But I expect it would depend on the what the economic model is modelling. If the model is asserting that if GPD growth is w, unemployed is x, and exports = y, then the inflation rate should be z, then this is not much different from a climatological model (conceptually at least). Because there is no obvious dependence in such a model for individual or group behaviour. Although I’d probably agree with you on that point if model was about predicting movements in, say, the stockmarket.
This is just a quick note from Dave in Victoria. In the past few days, we’ve lived through temperatures we’ve never seen before, and seen Victoria slide into being a baking desert.
I want the climate ‘skeptics’ who post on this blog, or maybe Jennifer herself, to explain to me how all this weather is just normal – its just normal that Victoria becomes a baking desert, and not due to manmade climate change. Come on, I’m waiting.
Chris… That’s the name of the guy in the last “gone fishing” thread. You remember he was holding his own against Steve Short and pretty much everyone else here?
Chris Cristopher – something like that.
Hasn’t Jennifer been warning against letting the gumtree forest overgrow becoming a fire hazard since forever?
I wonder to what extent the extreme heat wave and poor rainfall in SE Australia can be attributed to the Indian Ocean Dipole ( see here http://www.jamstec.go.jp/frsgc/research/d1/iod/ )?
An Audubon Society study to be released Tuesday found that more than half of 305 birds species in North America, a hodgepodge that includes robins, gulls, chickadees and owls, are spending the winter about 35 miles farther north than they did 40 years ago.
Birds shifting north; global warming is blaimed
The study “shows a very, very large fraction of the wintering birds are shifting” northward, said Terry Root, a biologist at Stanford University. “We don’t know for a fact that it is warming. But when one keeps finding the same thing over and over … we know it is not just a figment of our imagination.”
Terry Root is a big time global warming political activist. Every one of the conservation committies/groups/orgs she belongs to has the word “policy’ in the title.
So what have we got?
305 bird species – 177 flying north – 76 flying south – 52 stay put –
The biologist is hopping up and down yelling climate change, but she is one of those frost goggle biologists. Meaning it very well could be a figment of her imagination.
Anyhow at least it’s about birds, so it belongs in this thread…
James Mayeau February 10th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
“Hasn’t Jennifer been warning against letting the gumtree forest overgrow becoming a fire hazard since forever?”
The Fires are a result of not having control burns, which have been done for 40,000 years. The criminals are the Greens, who say “no control burns” and the Australian Labor party, who pander to the greens for their preferential votes. (And probably the stupidity of the Australian voting public who do not realise that they can direct their preferences where-ever they want.)
Will we see Bob Brown and the ALP opologise – no.
http://talbyv.blogspot.com/2009/02/australian-bushfires-due-to-agw-not.html
http://talbyv.blogspot.com/2009/02/victoria-bushfires-stoked-by-green-vote.html
But Freya Mathews ( honorary research fellow at the philosophy department of La Trobe University ) tells us if seeing is believing, then it’s time to accept climate change. The SE fires are caused by global warming just as the scientists have been telling us.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/global-warming/scientists-warned-us-this-was-going-to-happen-20090209-82bx.html
“Hasn’t Jennifer been warning against letting the gumtree forest overgrow becoming a fire hazard since forever?”
How do you have a controlled burn of a village?
“The Fires are a result of not having control burns, which have been done for 40,000 years. The criminals are the Greens, who say “no control burns” and the Australian Labor party, who pander to the greens for their preferential votes. (And probably the stupidity of the Australian voting public who do not realise that they can direct their preferences where-ever they want.)”
Fires will always happend, but the ferocity of these fires wouldn’t have been stopped by controlled burns, they were set up by prolonged dryness, low humidity, hot winds and record temperatures.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25026912-2702,00.html
Did you read that? He had done everything right, and it didn’t work. Even with the minimal fuel that stubble provides, the fire was racing through his property.
“How do you have a controlled burn of a village?”
Use a chainsaw.
Dryed out grass is the best kindel. Your friend would have been better served to use a mower, and water his lawn regularly.
Look. I’d love to debate you on this SJ, but it feels ghoulish to talk about.
Let’s give it a week or a month to digest.
I hope none of your folks were hurt in the fire.
James Mayeau;
I’m in the west where it is cool – we were supposed to be sweltering in a heat wave here today according to the radio news, but if this is a heat wave, then I am not impressed.
Thanks for the kind thoughts.
SJT is being ghoulish, as is the ABC’s Lateline program which blamed it all on AGW, because it is official government policy, because SJT as is Luke, being government climate change officers, are merely doing their duty.
Here we go – who’s more ghoulish – a disgusting excuse to attack the greens in the midst of a national disaster.
How did all those horrific bushfires before the modern green movement start.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushfire here’s the list.
Greenies were around in 1939 were they?
What green groups have anti-burn no fire regime policy? Evidence is …?
Wonder where the term fire ecology came from?
Here we go – who’s more ghoulish – a disgusting excuse to attack the greens in the midst of a national disaster.
How did all those horrific bushfires before the modern green movement start.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushfire here’s the list.
Greenies were around in 1939 were they?
What green groups have anti-burn no fire regime policy? Evidence is …?
Wonder where the term fire ecology came from?
“because it is official government policy,”
It’s official government policy to have disastrous bush fires?
QED
NFI
Luke,
Nature Conservation Council of NSW , NSW National Parks Association, National Parks and Wildlife Service of NSW. I’ve sat on Bush fire committee’s and have witnessed first hand the blocking tactics that these groups use to stop or stall fuel reduction burns going ahead.
And for those here expert in heiroglyphics, pondering over SJT’s last delierance, we bid good night.
So Pandanus – are these people self-representing individuals or representing major green organisations?
And why have we had major fires long before the modern green movement?
Here:
“Geoffrey Blainey, in Melbourne’s Herald Sun yesterday, on bushfires that occurred long before global warming:
IN our recorded history, there has been no bushfire as spectacular as February 1851, on the very eve of the first gold rushes. They called it Black Thursday. Half of Victoria seemed to be on fire. A wild northerly was blowing, and it drove such a column of black smoke right across Bass Strait that one town near Devonport was so darkened in mid-afternoon that people actually thought the end of the world had come.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25031227-20261,00.html
Have to agree with Luke, not much of a green movement around in 1851…
““Geoffrey Blainey, in Melbourne’s Herald Sun yesterday, on bushfires that occurred long before global warming:”
Did he talk about the technology they had back then to fight fires, the communications infrastructure, the training and equipment? No?
“Have to agree with luke, not much of a green movement around in 1851”
Not much of an AGW effect either; unless you accept Ruddiman’s thesis.
In regard to these rotten fires; this issue of back-burning is going to get some over-due analysis; here’s a piece against it;
http://www.australianreview.net/digest/2003/02/brandes.html
Here’s a piece for it;
http://www.nafi.com.au/files/newsletter/NAFI%20eNews%20No.18.pdf
IMO; Blainey went downhill after his “Peaks of Lyell”
While on tour in NZ are very saddened by the bushfire news from Aus.
This place too is warm & dry despite the blogs. Most south Island rivers are near empty Queenstown was full of sunbakers yesterday and there is no snow anywhere except for some odd blobs of ice stuck in the peaks.
Local word on the glaciers is they are still receeding but hopefully we will see something today before its too late.
Cheers
BTW images on NZ TV of the aftermarth around Melbourne remind me of the 1967 Hobart bushfire scene with carpets of white fly ash everywhere and a few blackened stems still standing where forests once flourished.
It was too dammed hot!
PS It may help readers to consider this latest fire event in Victoria as a runaway furnace where all organic material is consumed rapidly in the superheated gasses. Impressions of trees “expolding” is a common experience as wittnesses recall the horror of a passing fire front of this magnitude.
Note too; most have never seen anything like it before, even the most experienced bushfire volunteers. That may leave a few others wondering about these “exagerations” but I reckon you have to have been there to know how it was for the victims.
I wonder how much the forest has changed over the years. I have been reading an article from our local historical society that indicates that the forests in my region (upper Clarence) are totally altered from the original forests the first settlers encountered and the change is due to years of logging.
Originally the forests consisted of huge grandfather trees, around 12 to the acre with grassland covering the rest. You could ride a horse up to Tenterfield. Now it’s densely covered with small young gums that burn like mad in the slightest fire. I wonder how much the forests around Melbourne have changed over the years.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25038717-5018722,00.html
janama,
that is a very valid point there. the ecology has changed dramatically. the only natural grass land in victoria, before european arrival, was in the western district. everywhere else in victoria was covered with shrub, open woodland, or forest. much of this has been removed. this has changed the wind dynamics. wind slows down over land because of obstructions (not many things in the way over open water). taking away the trees has increased the wind speed. this is a critical point.
as you mention most of the forests are also in a unnatural condition, uniform in size, canopy closed off, with changed species distribution, eg less acacia. although many have “not seen a chain saw” they most definitely had to deal with hand saws and bullock teams.
the evidence is clear. mountain ash is burning when it should not. add to this the shear number of people making a tree change…..fuel reduction becomes impossible.
so it is climate change, but more specifically it is the micro -climate and ecosystem that has changed . anyone that goes around saying this is due to greenhouse gas emissions is an idiot.
Louis
I’ve gone through the catacombs and deciphered the heiroglyphics
N – No
F – Fxxking
I – Intelligence
Stay tuned – still working on SJT
Taluka
Thanks, and best of luck with SJT but Cohenite and I have made the provisional assessment that SJT is a Turing machine, so anything you can add to this enigma would be welcome.
The following is a good example of a non-sequitur.
“Will Nitschke
Here:
“Geoffrey Blainey, in Melbourne’s Herald Sun yesterday, on bushfires that occurred long before global warming:
IN our recorded history, there has been no bushfire as spectacular as February 1851, on the very eve of the first gold rushes. They called it Black Thursday. Half of Victoria seemed to be on fire. A wild northerly was blowing, and it drove such a column of black smoke right across Bass Strait that one town near Devonport was so darkened in mid-afternoon that people actually thought the end of the world had come.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25031227-20261,00.html
Have to agree with Luke, not much of a green movement around in 1851…”
Luke: “Greenies were around in 1939 were they?
Why is 1939 signfiicant?
The U.S. news is focusing on the fires in Victoria, and I have no idea how the rest of the country is doing. I hope that your community is safe.
I live in Northern California. We do have some wildfires here, but they are a really big problem in the Southern part of the state, which some people compare to parts of Australia. If fire management hasn’t already been thoroughly covered in the earlier postings in your blog, maybe we could talk about that someday.
The Black Friday fires of January 13 1939 in Victoria were considered one of the worst natural bushfires ever until the current event. 71 died, 20,000 sq km, 3700 buildings lost.
Blaming greens for the current event is far too simplistic.
Living among the Australian bush can be dangerous. Especially after a drought 12 years in the making and a record heatwave, with high winds. The perfect storm.
“not much of a green movement around in 1851 or in 1939”
I think it wasn’t much in the way of purposeful “greenie” opposition to forest management in those days, more like lack of foresight or resources or both.
Also we have to remember, that from the time of white settlement the traditional burning stopped, and the settlers did not take up where the aborigines left off.
I think this mentality to fight the fires instead of preventing them getting out of hand in the first place is still with us.
As to some council decisions regarding trees on private properties, even a conservationist would agree, that they are way over the top.
Luke,
These were people representing green organisatioins, as I said in my original post. You may recall the 1997 Sydney fires where the fire coming out of the northwest through Wollomi National Park was stopped at Putty State Forest due to the fuel reduction burn that had been put in some 4-6 months earlier. That HR was approx 7500 hectares, low intensity, very low scorch height and it served its purpose well. The greens on the bush fire committee wern’t interested in Putty so they allowed the burn. In other areas that they had an interest in they would not allow fuel reducion burns to occur. Arson and lightening however often did the job later with far nore dsevestating consequences due to the intensity of those fires, very often burning a larger area than what was planned.
Luke “Living among the Australian bush can be dangerous. Especially after a drought 12 years in the making and a record heatwave, with high winds. The perfect storm.”
Especially when the basics are wrong.
Ocean heat is not as sensitive to ‘chaotic fluctuations’ as the atmosphere. It has been asserted that global temperature trends from year to year cannot be used to reliably measure global warming for this reason, except over very long periods of time. However, for the Earth to be heating up according to AGW theory, the heat must be going somewhere, which must mean the oceans.
Hence, ocean temperature trends may be a much more consistent measure of AGW.
Does anyone see a problem with the analysis in this review:
http://climatesci.org/2009/02/09/update-on-a-comparison-of-upper-ocean-heat-content-changes-with-the-giss-model-predictions/
I missed the part where he gave evidence that the heat content of the ocean had not changed for five years?
Will; I’ll bite; what’s wrong with the Pielke analysis of Hansen’s/IPCC’s ocean heating models? Bear in mind this little graph;
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/reponse-to-el-nino3.jpg
There is no effective lag between SST and GMST; something confirmed by Trenberth et al; the ocean as the repository of the missing heating for AGW’s purposes is a dud.
http://fire.pppl.gov/GCC_Levitus_Barnett.pdf
This paper shows heat content doing what temperature does over the long term, it dips and rises, but the long term trend is up. Why would Pielke cherry pick such a short period of time as five years and base his reputation on that?
Ah, little Will; wind up your key and the usual predictable dross comes out; not Levitus and Barnett! Barnett sought to vindicate Levitus using the Parallel Climate Model; the PCM was based on CO2 forcing assumptions with no other external forcings except sulfate aerosols; but the aerosol cooling effect has hemispheric contradictions; anyway here is a longer SST set of data;
http://www.warwickhughes.com/sst/
And here is the current situation;
http://earth.rice.edu/mtpe/hydro/hydrosphere/latest/avhrr_sst/avhrr_ssta.html
So much for warming.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/10/wildfires-due-to-global-warming.html
Lubos provides a ready answer to refute the more hysterical letter writers as they inevitably pop up the Age. Link between wildfire and global warming – not according to statistics.
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2007/11/after-the-%e2%80%98top-island%e2%80%99-fire-in-the-barmah-red-gum-forest/
In this post, our hostess gives a good visual of the higher fuel loads that result from forest mismanagement in the wake of a crown fire.
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2008/02/blue-gums-in-grose-valley-healthy-after-back-burning/
And in this post, Jen shows the visual results of a properly managed forest, prescribed burn regime.
Here is some data that was passed to me a few days ago……
“Hi All,
Wilson Tuckey has already resorted to lay blame of the bush fires to protecting forests and has used this disaster to promote the logging industry. I do not think that we should get into this debate necessarily, however, there are some points that may be of interest when the ‘finger-pointing’ begins.
1) Much of the fire burnt most intensively through dry forest with euc species such as Euc radiata and Euc dives. These trees have no market value for the logging industry and usually no logging takes place in them. On the Modis fire satellite image, the fire appears to have burnt these forests most intensively, whereas the wetter forests are patchy. The towns of Marysville, Kinglake and St Andrews are surrounded by these drier forest types, so it is not surprising that we see the highest levels of devastation in these areas.
2) These fires burnt very aggressively in plantations. The Churchill fire mostly burnt through plantation areas managed by Hancock Victorian Plantations and its subsidiaries. These plantations are obviously intensively managed with wood production as their primary purpose, yet these burned very intensively.
3) Around Whittlesea, Wallan and East Kilmore, the much of these fires burnt through long grass on farmland. The argument of forest protection around these areas is irrelevant, given that these areas are cleared farmlands and had very little forest areas upwind on Saturday.
4) The fire on Mt Riddle is an interesting case. This fire was ignited by a lightning strike and has burnt the northern slope. At the beginning of last year, the DSE/Parks Victoria lit a large control burn on this slope, of which it even scorched the crowns of the eucs. This control burn has not prevented the ignition and spread of this fire into Healesville and surrounding forest.
5) Many of these fires have started on either private land or non-forest areas (ie the fire that burned over Mount Disappointment). The only fire at this stage to have started in National Park was the Mt Riddle Fire. The Mt Disappointment/Whittlesea fire raced over in a SE direction into the protected Wallaby Creek catchment.
6) Large fire breaks had been cut through Mt Disappointment bounding the Wallaby Creek water catchment. It could be argued that this is ‘active management’ by the logging industry, given that the breaks were cut by the contractors. Yet they were useless in preventing the fire from spreading from the state forest into the protected Wallaby Creek catchment.
7) It is suspected that the fires west of Mt Disappointment and Yarra Glen, along with Churchill, were deliberately lit. This is a case of managing ‘people’ rather than forests. Authorities need to clamp down on arsonists and when convicted, they are put on a police register for life, similar to sex offenders. When high fire danger days are predicted, these ‘registered people’ need to be directly monitored by the police.
8) These fires are being intensified by a rapidly changing climate. Scientific models developed by the CSIRO have predicted that high fire danger days are going to increase dramatically with increased greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere. In addition, it should be noted that scientific studies around the world indicate that highly disturbed ecosystems will be more vulnerable to the climate crisis than less disturbed ones. “
Up until the last paragraph a very interesting post Jeremy.
“2) These fires burnt very aggressively in plantations. The Churchill fire mostly burnt through plantation areas managed by Hancock Victorian Plantations and its subsidiaries. These plantations are obviously intensively managed with wood production as their primary purpose, yet these burned very intensively.”
the pines are no worse than the natives as far as fire goes, except for the fact they extract far more nutrient from the soil compared with the native (they still think they’re in europe). a few generations and the land is stuffed.
“These fires are being intensified by a rapidly changing climate. Scientific models developed by the CSIRO have predicted that high fire danger days are going to increase dramatically with increased greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere….”
remember there are many CSIRO scientists that research topics that far from reality. many do good work, but some of it is just plain retarded. you only have to look at some of the research they are trying to commercialize………most of it is far from practical. lol. speculation has its limits. just because you have a theory and you are from the famous CSIRO doesn’t make you right, or famous.
it gives me a sick feeling that these scientists try and capitalise on the bushfire tragedy.
there is a hidden message that these people are paying for their carbon sins. we here nothing about the truth. THEY SHOULDN’T BE ALLOWED TO LIVE THERE. you can’t blame the council or greenies for not letting you cut down a few trees around the house, you can, however, blame the government for allowing these dangerous subdivisions to exist.
But in the end people probably wanted to live in these communities because of what they look like. i.e. native bushland attributes. History shows us that episodically – these systems are far from safe.
Another example – there are many urban sub-divisions around Brisbane built on land that had water at roof level in 1974 floods.
Is it government’s job to tell people they can’t do this? As everyone loves river views/frontages.
And people like living in the bush too.
Perhaps anyone building in such environments should have to acknowledge (formally?) they know and accept the risks.
“Is it government’s job to tell people they can’t do this?”
yes.
im not blaming Brumby or Rudd personally, but it is their system.
“These fires are being intensified by a rapidly changing climate. Scientific models developed by the CSIRO have predicted that high fire danger days are going to increase dramatically with increased greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere.” As Jeremy C put it and as ecoman dismissed without bothering to check the evidence. The evidence to date is clear enough. It does not make sense to question whether climate change has had an impact on fires. The question is only how much, given the climate has already changed. First check out the evidence as in “Bushfire Weather in Southeast Australia: Recent Trends and Projected Climate Change Impacts” ( Lucas et al 2007). At Bendigo for example the Forest Fire Danger Index for summer is up by about one half over the last few decades. The trend is partly increased temperature, partly decreased rainfall. The temperature trend is climate changed, and the rainfall trend maybe?. So maybe the next decade is more problematic. In any case fire risk and insurance premiums are not about proof, but about risk.
“Is it government’s job to tell people they can’t do this?”
Very true, Luke.
It’s also the govts job to keep the memory alive via historical records and what are the sensible solutions to these horrific past problems.
Instead, nowdays they often penalise people severely who try to provide their own solutions because thet know govts have lost the plot.
It’s not just the green agenda that is influencing govts, it is often big development dollars.
It’s a pity that the royal commission doesn’t include floods as well as fires.
im very skeptical of any scientists that goes around saying australia’s is climate is getting worse, antarctica is melting, sea level 20 ft by next year.
as time passes there will be a longer time series, not just a crappy 150 years for australia
you think thats a long time?, can you say with any confidence this is climate change- in other words not climate variability?
if only eucalyptus could talk. in a few months the bushfire areas will be teeming with new life. go and have a look at the grampians
any scientist going around saying “the climate is changing, just look at my 150 years of data” is a retard.
yet this is what we get
Cohenite wrote:
“Will; I’ll bite; what’s wrong with the Pielke analysis of Hansen’s/IPCC’s ocean heating models?”
I’m not sure why everyone seems to imply my questions are trick questions, as opposed to being simply questions.
“Bear in mind this little graph;
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/reponse-to-el-nino3.jpg
There is no effective lag between SST and GMST; something confirmed by Trenberth et al; the ocean as the repository of the missing heating for AGW’s purposes is a dud.”
I think your graphs may be misleading because the discussion in the paper I linked to was in reference to the upper 700 metres of heat content, yet all the information you’re quoting is about sea surface temperatures. Surely we don’t have a history of ocean temperatures within the first 700 metres dating back 50 or 100 years…
SJT:
“This paper shows heat content doing what temperature does over the long term, it dips and rises, but the long term trend is up. Why would Pielke cherry pick such a short period of time as five years and base his reputation on that?”
I don’t see the point of criticising Pielke’s article on this point when he discusses this very point in the article. You have no other criticism to make other than to agree with Pielke’s own discussion of the short time scale? Anyway, I think the point is that Hansen’s climate models make very specific predictions about heat content rise, which are not being found. If there is “cherry picking” it’s much less of a problem, on the basis that heat content changes very slowly over time, relative to the atmosphere and is therefore not subject to the same chaotic fluctuations. That is the argument anyway. Your criticism needs to address that point, otherwise you’re talking past the argument presented. Does the average warmth of the oceans up to 700 metres in depth change significantly from year to year? If so, you may be onto something. If not, you’re just being critical because you don’t like the conclusion.
I can forgive Jen the assumption that the rest of us worldwide have never heard the term ‘gone fishing’. In the same way, I can forgive the Australian AGW types who think bushfires only occur in Australia. Being in Canada, till this year, I’d never heard of a bushfire in Australia, but California bushfires were seemingly an annual event. A few years ago, no one related them to global warming.
Guess what, we get forrest fires here in British Columbia nearly every summer, and that’s been an annual event the past 50 years at least. Where did this connection to global warming arise? The fires always happen in dry, hot areas, in the interior of our province. Many of them are started by lightning, and like you guys in Oz, we have nuts who start them either intentionally or by slobs who flick cigarette butts out the window of a travelling car.
When I was working in northern Alberta a few years ago, they had major fires in the tundra regions, which is approaching the Arctic. Lightning is fearsome in that part of the world, hailing down stones the size of billiard balls. There was tremendous damage a few years ago in Edmonton, where those large iceballs dented everyone’s cars and metal window awnings. They even had a major tornado go right through the middle of Edmonton.
The lightning from severe storms, or just lightning, can break a tree completely apart and start it burning. That’s what starts most fires up here, not global warming.
Ecoman opines
“im very skeptical of any scientists that goes around saying australia’s is climate is getting worse etc”. Must be getting better then. So-called sceptics that keep on echoing without bothering to check the facts give the sceptic word a bad name. They need to be rebadged as sciolists.
bazza,
what type of selective evolutionary pressure would be required to shape a tree species such as the eucalyptus?
mmmmmm
a landscape of extremes? very dry, very wet, fires, extreme heat, very poor fertility.
sound familiar?
no your right its getting worse, all the river red gums are dying, and a weir or dam every 100 km along the river has got nothing to do with it. its all about the carbon in the atmosphere.
“They need to be rebadged as sciolists.”
One would definitely have to be a sciolist to use a word like sciolist.
Here’s a reprint of a post from Anthony Watt’s blog.
PeterW (21:19:48) :
I live a few hundred meters from the edge of a national park in Victoria. Every fire season I slash the paddock between me and the park in the hope the bare ground will stop or slow a fire before it gets to my house.
I’ve lived here for over ten years now and the thousands of hectares of park have not had one single cool burn so it is choked with deadfall, bark and leaf litter. The local park administration is too busy chasing gold fossickers and people riding horses or mountain bikes out of the park to bother conducting controlled burns.
Last Saturday temperatures soared to 45C with a northerly wind gusting over 90 kilometres an hour – the park is directly to my north so I was extremely apprehensive as I worked in my home office whilst listening to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s excellent fire commentary.
It’s a bit like the blitz – the radio station broadcasts warnings which start with a siren sound then a voice saying things like “…all residents in the Kinglake area are advised a large wildfire is burning towards the town – those who choose to leave their homes must do so now, those who choose to remain and defend their homes must stay where they are and not leave the area until the fire front has passed…” etc etc etc.
I heard the calls for assistance from people in the midst of the biggest fires as they rang the radio station to tell their stories. “…house gone, wife and daughter burnt to death…”, “…all my sheep are dead, house gone, family killed in car trying to escape…” – it became worse and worse as the afternoon dragged on.
As I worked I kept an ear out for the name of my district amongst the growing list of areas affected by fire and then I heard it “…all residents be advised a large fire is burning across hills to the north and properties in areas to the south are likely to be subject to ember attack…”
I popped outside as I had been doing regularly during the day to see a huge column of smoke had suddenly appeared behind the hills near our property blotting out the northern horizon and the smell of burning beginning to fill the air.
I stood straining against the burning wind for 20 minutes or so watching and waiting – my fire pump was primed and hoses laid out, gutters blocked, air conditioners turned off and I was dressed in heavy cotton work clothes ready to attack spot fires which would have been ignited by burning embers flying in front of the main fire.
Then suddenly the northerly stopped as if someone had shut a door and a period of calm engulfed the valley for a few moments before a new wind storm sprang up from the south – the temperature dropped more than 15 degrees instantly and the large column of smoke was pushed back away from my property.
The danger was over for the moment.
Towns to the east suffered enormous losses with several small communities losing every building and all their infrastructure – no water, gas, sewerage, power or phone lines left – just smouldering heaps of corrugated iron and cars with the glass in their windows melted and congealed on the ground next to them.
When I first moved to Victoria in February 1983 I was pressed into fighting the ‘Ash Wednesday’ fires which occurred in similar weather conditions.
After the main fire roared passed the town my group was defending I saw many dessicated charred people dead in their cars or lying in paddocks where they had tried to run from the fires – it must be a horrible death and this year it has happened again to many more.
After the Ash Wednesday disaster great advances were made in the command and control of emergency services and better equipment was purchased for fire-fighters, but the ‘green malaise’ has afflicted local government and national and state park administration.
No matter how many shiny fire engines are supplied, if state forests continue to be mismanaged and if planning restrictions on clearing bush from near houses are not rescinded it will happen again and again.
It’s cool today, perhaps 18C with a strong south east wind carrying a smoke haze from fires 250 kilometres away – the radio features talk of politics and ‘stimulus packages’ but still I hear regular crosses to reporters in far off valleys describing wild fires and warning residents of towns to be ready to flee.
The forested hills to my north are still primed and ready to burn – the slightest spark is all that is needed and the weather forecast for next week includes temperatures in the high thirties with dry thunderstorms and gusty northerlies.
I’d better keep the pump primed…
Will N says; “Surely we don’t have a history of ocean temperature within the first 700 metres dating back 50 or 100 years.”
There is an adequate proxy; thermocline variation due to upwelling variation associated with PDO phase shifts; this was the mechanism responsible for the 1976 climate shift which in turn was responsible for the bulk of the post 1976 temperature increase; alternative anthropogenic explanations for this phenomenon such as postulated by Cai [ aerosols] and Vecchi [weakening of the Walker circulation] are unconvincing because the climate change is abrupt whereas a CO2 effect would be accumulative; in addition the upwelling cessation ceased in 1998 when CO2 levels had increased between 1976-1998. The upwelling variation involves water from all depths and has been dealt with in papers by Wijffels and Meyers, Guildersen and Schrag and McPhaden and Zhang. The upwelling effect and its immediate flow-on effect on GMST clearly establishes that the Hansen ocean sink does not exist.
Cohenite:
If ‘thermocline variation’ is an adequate proxy and data on this has been around for 50-100 years, do you have a temperature reconstruction of the entire heat content of the upper ocean for this period of time? Excuse my scepticism, but people often tell me one thing on this subject, but when you look into the details, you find something else.
SJT:
“This paper shows heat content doing what temperature does over the long term, it dips and rises, but the long term trend is up. Why would Pielke cherry pick such a short period of time as five years and base his reputation on that?”
I want to comment on SJT’s remark again, because it’s possibly the silliest comment I’ve read this week.
Let me just summarise the key points concerning this:
* The oceans are the primary repositories for the Earth’s total heat energy content
* The atmosphere and surface layers of the ocean do fluctuate significantly from time period to time period because heat is circulating around the system. This does not alter the total heat build up in the system, however. (AGW requires an energy imbalance, which means more heat is entering than leaving.)
* According to AGW the total heat energy content of the climate system must be rising steadily, even if it is hotter or colder in certain regions at certain times.
* Pielke is referring to the total heat content of the ocean, which is not subject to the chaotic fluctuations in the same way the atmosphere is (this is possibly your primary confusion)
* The heat must be in the climate system for AGW to be true. Total ocean content cannot warm or cool in line with the upper atmosphere – that sort of behaviour would actually disproves AGW. (One may not be able to use historical records to disprove AGW as Cohenite is attempting, as AGW proponents have argued that CO2 was not as significant a factor in climate in the past, as it will be in the future.)
* Hansen, J., L. Nazarenko, R. Ruedy, Mki. Sato, J. Willis, A. Del Genio, D. Koch, A. Lacis, K. Lo, S. Menon, T. Novakov, Ju. Perlwitz, G. Russell, G.A. Schmidt, and N. Tausnev, “CONFIRMED” that AGW was in agreement with ocean heating for a 10 year time period when the oceans were heating steadily. Note: not a 30 year period.
* While Pielke only looks at a 6 year period of no warming, he correctly points out that for the system to ‘catch up’ and match model forecasts, warming for the remaining 4 years must be at more than double the rate predicted by the models. Let’s be fair now, if Hansen, Schmidt et al, are happy to assert that 10 years of ocean warming CONFIRM AGW, then 10 years of non-warming must also disprove AGW.
I see only two ways AGW can be salvaged given the above analysis. Argo, etc., measurements must be in error, or we do not yet understand how to correctly measure total upper ocean heat content. This is of course not out of the question.
James, I live in a similar situation between 2 nat parks and I slash once a month all year round. I have decided in that situation to light up the np and do my own back-burning. If it gets past me it’ll wipe out many others. Gotta make your own arrangements.
Will N; we don’t need a complete temperature reconstruction of the upper ocean; if PDO phase shifts are the major cause of GMST variation, all we need is a history of those phase shifts;
http://www.climate-skeptic.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/09/18/pdo.gif
Cohenite,
What remains problematical are the physical causations of the PDO, ENSO, etc oscillations and cycles – quite clearly climate science doesn’t know but have managed to document the effects well.
Henrik Tenneke has elsewhere deliberated on the difference between weather and climate models, and taken RC operatives to task for their crass ignorance on this. However, I would suggest that the PDO and similar cycles are driven by underlying thermal fluctuations of the earth itself.
Remember that climate science totally ignores the earth itself (in a geological sense). When the oceans that Tenneke correctly, (as do others) identifies as the principal component of any climate model, then the physical behaviour of a whisper thin coating of water over a massive planet has to be understood in terms of the geophysical behaviour of that planet.
Naive interlopers in this debate might offer the opinion that geological events are not relevant at the climate scale – I would suggest this view ignores the obvious eruptions of volcanoes at climatically significant intervals. That a solar connection can be demonstarted with a well know cycle of 22 years taht is less than the arbitrarily defined climate cycle of 30 years, cannot be disputed. Some of us are now realising that volcanic activity might be linked to this colar cycle, and hence geophysical phenomena of a similar time scale.
This suggests that there are significant geophysical fluctuations affecting the thermal state of the earth, and thus as signficant forcings to climate.
Climate science ignores all geological/geophysical factors/ They cannot predict when the next volcanic eruption might occur (nor do we in the geosciences) but volcanic eruptions are a signficant input to climate.
Ignoring the geological input to climate science will be soon discovered to be a serious omission.
I’m still trying to engage Ecoman on his belief
“im very skeptical of any scientists that goes around saying australia’s is climate is getting worse.. etc”.
He has come back with a few red herrings off-message but has not bothered to comment on the relevant evidence, I repeat, in particular in “Bushfire Weather in Southeast Australia: Recent Trends and Projected Climate Change Impacts” ( Lucas et al 2007). At Bendigo for example the Forest Fire Danger Index for summer is up by about one half over the last few decades. The trend is partly increased temperature, partly decreased rainfall. The temperature trend is climate changed, and the rainfall trend maybe?. So maybe the next decade is more problematic. In any case fire risk and insurance premiums are not about proof, but about risk.
Typos – strangely carefully typed posts here sometimes get mangled.
C’est la vie.
Louis repents;
“Typos – strangely carefully typed posts here sometimes get mangled”.
Hang in , Louis. Posting is like tipping – best done early and often, and who knows with enough typos they might even make sense.
By the way, when is the next peak of the volcanic cycle, and will that help predict the PDO, given it is mainly observed in the rear view mirror so far.
OK you can’t blame the greenies on this: “Firies demand global warming action !”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/12/2489847.htm
Link to Bazza’s reference: http://www.bushfirecrc.com/research/downloads/climate-institute-report-september-2007.pdf
from the Bushfire CRC http://www.bushfirecrc.com/ – wonder if they’ll get refunded – Howard killed off most of the public good CRCs …
Luke,
I am not the only one noticing that you AGW extremists are using apocalyptic hype:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/11/climate-change-misleading-claims
And I am impressed at how fast you are backing down about the fires. There may be some humanity behind that mask after all.
Drongo As long as you only take out one persons worth of the public land, I got no problem with it. Stuffs supposed to grow back anyway. Besides you are one of mother natures sons, hence whatever arrangements you make are a natural occurance.
here’s a perfect example of where it all went wrong. This is a letter to the editor in today’s SMH.
Well that’s your problem isn’t it?
Vicky Pope’s message is precise. And in both directions.
But that would require having a sensible non-looney conversation with the likes of yourself. I doubt a balanced conversation will ever be possible. The reason – you’re ranting political extremists who have always missed the message.
As for “backing down” about the fires – huh? On the one hand major fires have happened before e.g. 1939, but the sheer intensity of this event fuelled by record temperatures and a drought 12 years in the making is what the AGW scenarios indicate. Above the fire fighters organisation is concerned about climate change – not me, you or the greenies (or Gore/Hansen for that matter). I was taken aback by this.
Want absolute proof of AGW involvement – well if you’d like the community to hang around 50 years to get the trend data we’ll tell you.
This event has brought out the very best in us – but also some of the worst – the dithering on a warning system – that you lot would have said was “alarmist” hitherto. Expensive leftist stuff I’m sure you’d say. Let the market decide – hahahaha. http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25047619-601,00.html
But also other depressing news about scam artists, profiteers and arsonists. And an organised anti-national park , pro-logging movement all so quick to stick the boot in the greens. And deep greens needing some urgent fire ecology education.
Listen to Vicky Pope. Important to neither overstate nor understate the science message.
Do you think you’re understating or overstating the science message hunter?
Luke,
The first step in backing down is for the perp to declare that ‘everyone does it’.
Hadley is one of the worst of the alarmist orgs out there.
Will they go through and systematically annotate their prior work to correct for alarmism and extremism? Will they point out where people on their side have been extreme? Will they point out where skeptics are reasonable in their concerns regarding AGW, or all skeptics still, as some like to call them, despicable nazi scum?
As for the fire tragedies- I believe the evidence is that fires were quite common in Australia in the pre-British times. Years of stopping as many fires as possible, with the resulting increase in fuel, has predictable and deadly results.
It should go without saying that the proximity of a tree whose oil is explosively volatile to things that you do not want to burn up is risk seeking behavior.
As to the precautionary fallacy about not affording to wait, I think that the credibility of enviro and climate extremists in policy has gone up in smoke.
Reduce, mitigate, restore. Mitigate against natural processes. Not shut down in a panic and spend scarce resources on remedies proposed by the people who profit from the models they sell.
I wouldn’t use that defence in court though.
Luke:
You wrote:
“fuelled by record temperatures and a drought 12 years in the making is what the AGW scenarios indicate.”
What if there was a 12 year drought but it rained a few days before the fire? Not enough to break the drought, but enough to put some moisture back in the system bushland… (These things happen.)
What if there was no drought but there was a dry run of a month before the fires?
I mean, does brush and timber have a “memory” of the previous 12 year dry period?
Let’s say we took a few pieces of brush and timber, one from a non-drought effected region and one from a drought affected region. Let’s say we then left both in the sun without rain for a further 90 days in low humidity. If we then took those samples and measured the moisture in a laboratory, would the timber that’s been exposed to 12 years of drought be more bush fire prone?
Cohenite wrote:
“Will N; we don’t need a complete temperature reconstruction of the upper ocean; if PDO phase shifts are the major cause of GMST variation, all we need is a history of those phase shifts;”
Even if everything you say is correct:
(1) There is a consistent upward trend evident. These phase shifts seem to correlate well with PDO, but there are step-ups happening and they need to be explained. (Maybe the steps are artifacts of changes in measurement techniques, maybe not.)
(2) Pielke was making the point that we need to be measuring the stable upper ocean heat content, not the chaotic cycles of the atmosphere (for more accurate AGW measurement), but you’ve just switched the discussion back to the atmosphere…
Will N; step-ups;
http://mclean.ch/climate/Aust_temps_alt_view.pdf
http://i38.tinypic.com/16aa03o.jpg
As for the stable upper ocean heat content check the ARGO homepage.
The inability of AGW to explain away the absence of ocean heat will only make things much harder for the AGW promoters, and they know it.
Expect a full court, hysterical fear drive to set in place some repressive energy scam ASAP.
Your mind is very interesting Hunter – so the AGW establishment decides to deploy a global network of 1,000s of floats to maintain its “conspiracy” on AGW and then will invent hysteria to hide the results which are published in the public domain. Maaaaaaaaaatttteeeeee…… have another whiff on the hooch.
Willy N – slide 14 – http://www.clw.csiro.au/conferences/GICC/franks.pdf – just show me the temperature correlation over 400 years. And if it goes up – why hasn’t it come down?
As for “well it could have rained” – yep and many times it may have – but it’s all about extremes, probabilities and trends eh? And yes it does some time well cure native vegetation. I think you need to do some research on curing indices – try the bushfire CRC above.
“As for “backing down” about the fires – huh? On the one hand major fires have happened before e.g. 1939, but the sheer intensity of this event fuelled by record temperatures and a drought 12 years in the making is what the AGW scenarios indicate…..”
Clearly you have excelled yourself in idiocy. Forest fires of this magnitude are proof that the rainfall IS NOT going away. Since it is the advent of a wet winter and/or spring which builds the fuel. And then this needs to be combined with a hot dry period in the summer. So thats the end of your moronic argument right there.
And its more than clear that it is environmentalism that murdered these people. Not industrial CO2 release but environmentalism. Thats the undeniable fact of the matter.
Make no mistake about it. The environmentalist movement murdered these people. By taking autonomy away from the landowner, making people have to apply to the council to do anything with their land, and discouraging them with utter lies and scare stories, they relentlessly set up this murder like they were kids dazzling pilots with a laser light. Everyone who has experienced these outside interferences with their property will tell you the same story here. The councils, influenced by environmentalism, stop people acting to control their own environment as represented by their property.
Its very clear that your crowd will not listen to reason and therefore are not going to stop killing. This we know. But tell me? Is this stupid question day?
“Willy N – slide 14 – http://www.clw.csiro.au/conferences/GICC/franks.pdf – just show me the temperature correlation over 400 years. And if it goes up – why hasn’t it come down?”
No-one mentioned this was stupid question day. Obviously we were climbing back out of the little ice age. Since our earth is currently configured for a one-way cooling bias, when we have a Wolf minimum ie an extended period of weak solar activity, we can be thrown into cold and dry conditions and it can take centuries to get out of this mess. This is what we face in the very near future.
“There is no effective lag between SST and GMST; something confirmed by Trenberth et al; the ocean as the repository of the missing heating for AGW’s purposes is a dud.””
Are upper level SST the same as total upper ocean heat content?
“I mean, does brush and timber have a “memory” of the previous 12 year dry period?”
To an extent it does, the technical term is ‘dessication’.
That is part of the reason we have dams so low, when it does rain, there is much reduced runoff due to the water being absorbed into the ground because it is so dry. I noticed a lot of dead vegetation is created by drought as well, if it’s dead or dying, rain won’t help much.
Luke,
The 1939 fires consumner much of Victoria and burnt for well over 6 weeks. Back Friday was not an isolated event during that fire season but the result of many fires merging and windshifts turning fire flanks into fire fronts. Winf shifts were also responsible for the destruction caused by the Ash Wednesday fires.
Wather wise most of the 50+ year temperature records that were broken this summer were set in 1939. Many of the shorter records were set in 1969 and the early 1980’s. Periods that are all associated with major bush fires in the south east of Australia. Couple a blocking high pressure system in the Tasman Sea with UHI and temperature records will be set. Don’t forget that Australia’s population has more than doubled since 1970 with a commensurate level of growth in the size of our cities and rural communities. I’m not sure what it was in 1939 but I’d suggest that UHI was not particularly relevent back then. As opposed to the records set in Melbourne this summer.
“Are upper level SST the same as total upper ocean heat content?”
Should read,
Are SST, that is the sea surface temperatures, the sameas the upper level ocean heat content, which is not just the surface?
Without the typo’s this time….
The 1939 fires consumned much of Victoria and burnt for well over 6 weeks. Black Friday was not an isolated event during that fire season but the result of many fires merging and windshifts turning fire flanks into fire fronts. Wind shifts were also responsible for the destruction caused by the Ash Wednesday fires.
Weather wise most of the 50+ year temperature records that were broken this summer were set in 1939. Many of the shorter records were set in 1969 and the early 1980’s. Periods that are all associated with major bush fires in the south east of Australia. Couple a blocking high pressure system in the Tasman Sea with UHI and temperature records will be set. Don’t forget that Australia’s population has more than doubled since 1970 with a commensurate level of growth in the size of our cities and rural communities. I’m not sure what it was in 1939 but I’d suggest that UHI was not particularly relevent back then. As opposed to the records set in Melbourne this summer.
It’s interesting to read direct contradictions… possibly the MET office could do a better job of coordinating updates to their website:
“Recent warming cannot be explained by the Sun or natural factors alone”
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/guide/bigpicture/fact4.html
Then this quote:
“Despite global warming there could be further colder-than-average winters in the years ahead as the climate cools naturally, the Met Office believes. Mr Britton said that the last 10-year assessment – carried out in 2004 – suggested a decade where global warming would be held back by a natural cooling trend. But beyond 2014 the climate will resume its warming trend, he said.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/weather/4534358/Snow-Britain-Further-snow-and-ice-forecast-for-rest-of-the-winter.html
Possibly if the MET Office knew that “natural trends” (which cannot explain warming but have no problems explaining cooling) since 2004 would lead to a decade of cooling, they might have updated their website as above, or not predicted record warming for 2007:
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2007/pr20070104.html
Obvious contradictions that are easily googled and linked to, gives the bad impression that they are making it up as they go along. It’s presumably a big organisation, so contradictory voices are not out of the question. Still, what they are saying now makes no sense to me… they are shooting themselves in the feet…
I also thought the official line was that there was no cooling, only a “lack of warming”.
Will and Graeme,
Re 400 years of rising temps.
http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&q=akasofu&meta=http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&q=akasofu&meta=
The audubon bird count news release from the other day left out a bit of key information. This fellow says here they forgot to tell us the number of birds and how the population increased over the last 40 years.
Population increases among the indiviual bird species topped those with population declines by a margin of more than 2-to-1.
Isn’t this a familiar story? Supposed scientists leaving out or downplaying information, that tends to undercut their “urgently recommended” climate change policy recomendations.
“Obvious contradictions that are easily googled and linked to, gives the bad impression that they are making it up as they go along. It’s presumably a big organisation, so contradictory voices are not out of the question. Still, what they are saying now makes no sense to me… they are shooting themselves in the feet…”
Year to year is still a big ask, since models can’t provide that resolution. They can see why it didn’t warm, La Nina, but they can’t predict how an El Nino or La Nina will behave, or when they will turn up.
Will – your last post surprises me as you are usually pretty solid in terms of dissecting contradictions etc.
The 1st point – “warming cannont be explained by natural forces alone”
Is not contradicted at all by the 2nd ““Despite global warming there could be further colder-than-average winters in the years ahead””
your comment “natural forces” (which cannot explain warming but have no problems explaining cooling) ”
– well the magnitide of natural forces warming is known, and was less than the actual warming, and now the magnitude of natural cooling is known and is working against the unnatural warming”
I honestly don;t see a problem in any of the Met’s stuff yet.
AND THEN there is the 2007 forecast – where the Met has looked at the natural cooling and the unnatural warming (with the cooling winning out a bit), and then factored in the predicted El Nino to make it a hot year, but that event was a bit of a fizzer in the end.
Seriously those logical steps all make sense to me, and I’m surprised they don’t to you?
And don;t forget they are weather forecasters… THEY ARE making it up as they go along.
Lol I should have not written that post without full attention as it is not the best flowing piece of work:) Sorry. somewhere half way down I say “actual” warming, – that refes to the pre 2001 whenever when it stopped(ish) warming.
SJT:
“Year to year is still a big ask, since models can’t provide that resolution. They can see why it didn’t warm, La Nina, but they can’t predict how an El Nino or La Nina will behave, or when they will turn up.”
I understand but El Nino’s/La Nina’s don’t have 10 year runs. The MET scientist is talking about how they predicted a 10 year cooling period ‘way back’ in 2004. I wonder if this is a misquote. Quite possible, the media is not known for it’s accuracy.
MattB wrote:
“The 1st point – “warming cannont be explained by natural forces alone”
Is not contradicted at all by the 2nd ““Despite global warming there could be further colder-than-average winters in the years ahead””
No it isn’t. But I wasn’t referring to that. Rather the 10 year cooling cycle/trend that the MET Office has apparently “predicted”.
“- well the magnitide of natural forces warming is known, and was less than the actual warming, and now the magnitude of natural cooling is known and is working against the unnatural warming”
Not sure what you mean by ‘the magnitude of natural cooling is known”. Yes it’s known la nina’s and el nino’s cause short term heating/cooling trends that run for a year or so. But this is a 10 year cooling trend the MET office scientist is talking about. What’s causing this? Can’t be simply a la nina’s. We’ve had no volcanic eruptions. Yes sun spots are down, but the relationship between sun spots and cooling is at best a speculation. Has there been a significant drop in solar radiance that will cool the planet for 10 years? Yes we know there are 11 year cycles, but they didn’t effect global warming of the previous 20 years. So what is this “natural trend” that causes cooling exactly?
“AND THEN there is the 2007 forecast – where the Met has looked at the natural cooling and the unnatural warming (with the cooling winning out a bit), and then factored in the predicted El Nino to make it a hot year, but that event was a bit of a fizzer in the end.”
Yes I think you have a valid point there.
“Seriously those logical steps all make sense to me, and I’m surprised they don’t to you?”
Hope I’ve clarified where the logical problem is.
Sorry -, where’s this 10 year cooling trend? stasis at best.
From back up the thread.
Pls don’t try the UHI ruse.
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2009/02/10/australia-51/#comments
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/current/statements/scs17c.pdf
david // February 10, 2009 at 5:42 am
There is little to no evidence of an urban heat island affect in summer maximum temperatures in Melbourne and indeed recent events suggest perhaps a reverse effect. The city is surrounded by low mountains which give rise to very hazy conditions in summer (ie smog). The recent event was more remarkable outside of Melbourne itself.
As for Bird-brain’s rantings – what would you expect an unelectable extremist to say. Funny though.
The sheer fact that these fire areas are divided into large housing estates makes control burns more difficult and landowners anxious. Hunter – you should realise that pre-European settlement that these forests were continually patch burnt by low intensity fires set by the indigenous inhabitants. The current rural land use pattern is very different.
Now back to “cooling trends”….
Luke:
“Sorry -, where’s this 10 year cooling trend? stasis at best.”
I’m just reporting what the MET office scientist has (supposedly) been telling the press. Seems someone needs to get the MET office, Tamino and the CSIRO in a room together and let them thrash out if there is warming, cooling or stasis.
Cohenite:
“step-ups;
http://mclean.ch/climate/Aust_temps_alt_view.pdf
http://i38.tinypic.com/16aa03o.jpg”
And what exactly has any of these links got to do with upper ocean temperature trends, i.e., first 700 metres?
“As for the stable upper ocean heat content check the ARGO homepage.”
While I recognise that no AGW supporter is pointing to ARGO as supporting AGW, meaning that it is essentially evidence against AGW (hence the silence), ARGO has only been around since 1999 and there are no doubt further kinks in measurement processes and data analysis that may need to be ironed out. But having said all that, I still don’t see how this is relevant to the topic of *long term temperature trends* in the upper ocean.
Will I’ve been using this link http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/02/08/how-hot-should-it-have-really-been-over-the-last-5-years/ ….
1st graph shows Total Solar Irradience down over that kind of timeframe (well 5-6 years anyway).
I think that is differnt to sunpots… hmm I’ll have to check but not now.
MattB,
Interesting link… Bazza copes a bit of crap off the sceptics doesn’t he?
Irradience is down but it’s one of those things that’s not likely to stay down for too long (unless we’re going to enter an unusual period of solar activity which no one can predict). I’m also sceptical that Baz can disentangle all these overlapping forcings from multiple entangled correlations…
Anyway, if there are long periods of ‘chaotic’ ocean cycling that can cause global cooling and we are going through a low period of irradience, and these cycles now overlap, they will overwhelm any kind of AGW signal in the short run. That would be a PR catastrophe for AGW… my general impression from reading AR4 was that future la nina’s would be relatively weak and only have marginal future effects on temperature, not decadal scale suppressive cooling activity…
Or to put it another way, if this was all well understood by the climatological community years ago, this information needed to be communicated to the public years ago, not written up as web blog’s like Barry’s in Feb 09, long after such things have started to happen. PR catastrophe…
Luke, so you reckon that the change in Melbourne’s land use is making it cooler?
I think David is having a lend of himself.
In spite of all the dramas not much has changed.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2009/01/daily-monitoring-of-global-average-temperatures/
without going back to the link… I think it was showing a very basic version of a model… not actually a certified official model itself… just showing the way different things are taken in to account. I should be less lazy and have a look for 5 mins but hey the cricket is on:)
Look will I’ll leave it to others to explain why this was not explained back whenever;) AS I typed the above it did cross my mind as to why no one in the AGW camp had developed a PR strategy to cope with the cooling since they all knew it was coming up;) … my best reasoning in favour of said camp is that some of the things that have a cooling influence are difficult to predict… but in “hindsight” you can factor them in and see if what the model spits out matches recorded data. That is not manipulative… I think, as such a method would still expose errors in the CO2 forcing assumption.
solar irradiance is not expected to stay down, and the solar cycle is what leads many to predict say 2013-14 to be hot hot hot again as CO2 forcing has trundled along, but the rest of the planets align so to speak creating a peak… and if there were an El nino around there then hot hot hot hot.
Incidentally did you see this at Deltoid: http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2009/02/the_economists_consensus_on_gl.php
And will on Barry – a AGW expert/believing pro nuclear scientist cops it form all sides I reckon:)
But ntl, Obama has but 4 years to sort it out.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123445142846577623.html
MattB, I suppose economists are not as polarised as scientists but when there is such a wide range of dodgy solutions, I don’t hear too many supporting the only one that currently works, ie nuclear.
Be good to hear some nuclear consensus.
trouble is the nuclear we have is not the nuclear that we need. the bravenewclimate stuff on IFR is interesting.
I haven’t noticed that we’ve got ANY nuclear and we’ve got plenty of thorium.
If the kids in US can build Gen 4 thorium reactors in their backyards, it cant be too difficult.
Spanglers – I think you’ll David a serious chappy – you need to read him “precisely” – strangely he may know a few things.
Anyway whatever is happening with the “lack of warming” or “stasis” I suggest that the sceptics will be the last to help figure it out.
What have you got – interdecadal influences, cloud feedbacks, solar ?? There may be many more “states” than we know e.g. 1991-95 back to back El Nino series (or “warm events” for purists)
“Will – your last post surprises me as you are usually pretty solid in terms of dissecting contradictions etc.
The 1st point – “warming cannont be explained by natural forces alone”
Is not contradicted at all by the 2nd ““Despite global warming there could be further colder-than-average winters in the years ahead””
NOT CONTRADICTED? Well thats marvellous. No evidence is in favour of these lies that you’ve been stooged, pimped and violated by… But some of the evidence out there DOES NOT CONTRADICT this racket.
Great show dummy. No data in support. But some data DOESN’T contradict.
Get yourself some actual evidence idiot. Or you might consider repenting now that a wave of bodies have piled up thanks to the environmentalist movement.
Name two of the bodies Bird – go on ! I WANT EVIDENCE
“In spite of all the dramas not much has changed.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2009/01/daily-monitoring-of-global-average-temperatures/”
Whoah, conspiracy theory time.
“This web page should be used as only a rough guide, because there are some data adjustments made before we officially post the UAH monthly updated data. (I post a plot of those data here.)”
DATA ADJUSTMENTS! WTF?
“Is not contradicted at all by the 2nd ““Despite global warming there could be further colder-than-average winters in the years ahead””
NOT CONTRADICTED? Well thats marvellous. No evidence is in favour of these lies that you’ve been stooged, pimped and violated by… But some of the evidence out there DOES NOT CONTRADICT this racket.”
As a scientist pointed out, the heat records are outnumbering the cold records two or three to one. Any system over time will get a record, when the numbers are going one way over the other, I think there is a message there.
“This web page should be used as only a rough guide, because there are some data adjustments made before we officially post the UAH monthly updated data. (I post a plot of those data here.)”
“DATA ADJUSTMENTS! WTF?”
You know – those things that are never mentioned at GISS, HADCRU, NOAA.
Problably why you are so shocked to see it. A scientist with ethics is a rare commodity in the climate sciences.
At the end of the day, just flip a coin. If its Heads, its global warming, if its Tails, its global cooling.
Since the ocean has a memory, flip the coin 2 million times. Shock horror! The Heads and Tails NEVER cancel out.
“As a scientist pointed out, the heat records are outnumbering the cold records two or three to one. Any system over time will get a record, when the numbers are going one way over the other, I think there is a message there.”
You are a moron mate. You are a blockhead. Thats nonsense but supposing it was true. It would prove absolutely nothing you twit because we already know we are cooling
You are such an idiot SJT. What an unbelievable dummy and liar you are. A made up pretend incompetent scientist, allegedly bullshitting about something else other than actual cumulative warming. The unscientist unnamed. The database unknown. You are a complete blockhead. You ought to be publicly horse-whipped and you public sector redundancy package revoked.
Birdy – now mate – I WANT EVIDENCE that it’s cooling? Evidence is what.
You’ve already failed to name just two of “pile of bodies”
If you don’t TELL US you’re going to Ball’s Pyramid.
SJT “there are some data adjustments made before we officially post the UAH monthly updated data”
If you took a minute to understand the collection of real data from the atmosphere rather than the synthesized, virtual data from computer models, you might begin to understand that the collection of any data requires normalization of the instruments. The AMSU units pick up multi-layer radiation from oxygen molecules and data adjustment is required to focus on the surface layer of the troposphere. Furthermore, the satellite orbits vary as well as the time of day, latitude/longitude, etc. at which the readings are made.
Everything we know about the universe, including the theoretical Big Bang, comes from adjusted data from radiotelescopes. There’s no way scientists can simply point a radiotelescope into the sky and collect data. The universe moves in a relative manner to the Earth, as Einstein pointed out, and gathering data from gas spectra in stars and in the universe, requires copious amounts of adjustment.
I don’t know why you are so sensitive to satellite data adjustment when the AGW/modeler crowd do it all the time. Models are adjusted to the extreme to make them fit the real data produced from the satellites.
Rest easy, SJT. Spencer is an expert on ASMU data acquisition, having been honoured by NASA in that respect. Even the likes of Trenberth, a known AGW activists, can only cherry-pick fractions of a degree C in error. The satellite data corroborates closely with radiosonde data in certain parts of the globe. What are the chances of that if there is appreciable error?
“Rest easy, SJT. Spencer is an expert on ASMU data acquisition, having been honoured by NASA in that respect. Even the likes of Trenberth, a known AGW activists, can only cherry-pick fractions of a degree C in error. The satellite data corroborates closely with radiosonde data in certain parts of the globe. What are the chances of that if there is appreciable error?”
Sarcasm seems to go right over the heads of everyone here. Of course they adjust the data, all data has to be adjusted. When GISS is adjusted, it’s a conspiracy, when Spencer does it, of course he does, that’s normal. When Spencer is wrong, it’s an error of less than 1C, when McIntyre finds his ‘Y2K’ bug in GISS, it’s earth shattering, but all he detected was an error even smaller than UAH.
All the usual ruse arguments from Gordon. Spencer is that good (not) that someone else had to sort out his data for him ! What are the chances there is appreciable error – LOL !
Rest very uneasy/
For anyone interested here is the comment I left on Barry Brook’s blog on why his attempt to attribute recent global cooling (or stasis – need to keep Luke happy) to well understood natural variability in the short term, doesn’t actually work… (Thanks to MattB for the link.)
***
Interesting tap dancing in the analysis you’re attempting here…
But the most obvious problem with your analysis is that the SOI (Southern Oscillation Index) is not actually a forcing like CO2, solar irradiance, etc. It’s an ‘abstraction’ based on temperature measurements of a part of the climate system over a specified period of time. If you’re trying to correlate the SOI with lower or warmer temperature… I mean of course it will… what do you expect?
You can’t use the SOI as an *explanation* for global cooling (whether long or short term) because it is essentially a *climate measurement*. All you’re really saying is that cooling is a result of part of the climate causing the climate to cool. Or more simply, a cooling climate is causing the climate to cool. Which is of course circular.
Yes, solar irradiance is a factor, and nobody reasonable (whether an AGW promoter or a sceptic) denies that, so you are not stating anything out of the ordinary with this point either.
So in summary I think you’re still left with the problem of suggesting that the cooling climate is a product of a forcing (irradiance) and ‘natural climate variability’. This won’t make the sceptics happy because if you’re ultimately falling back on ‘natural climate variability’ to explain decadal cooling, then they are going to point out that the same argument can be used to explain warming over decadal time scales as well. Why is CO2 needed?
Now, I do want to point out that I do believe CO2 should have a plausible effect on the climate system over time. I’m just pointing out why your above analysis has some fairly serious logical flaws and doesn’t solve the problem you’re trying to make it solve.
I have been reading the textbook ‘Fundamentals of Atmospheric Radiation’ by Bohren and Clothiaux. I feel this book is required reading for any layman who thinks he/she knows anything about radiation or back-radiation due to GHGs in the atmosphere.
In the beginning of the book, they explain the photon and that’s mind boggling in itself. They also emphasize that much of this theory is based on statistical analysis, going back to Planck. No one knows the reality of gases as particles and the only way to study them is through the averaging of theoretical kinetic energies in each particle. In much the same way, photons have been idealized as if they are gases in a container. That is the basis of a cavity resonator, the basis of a blackbody source.
The photon was introduced because the electromagnetic radiation it represents has no mass. So, a photon has momentum but no mass. Traditionally, momentum is mv (mass x velocity) and one can only imagine how the concept of a photon was arrived at with momentum when it has no mass. I am trying to say that the entire theory of atmospheric radiation is highly theoretical, although much of the theory of photons can be backed by laboratory experiment.
Then again, Richard Feynman admitted no one understood how such theories work. It would appear that quantum mechanics, the basis for the study of electromagnetic radiation via photons, works despite itself. It appears to my layman brain that QM is based on classical mechanics theory, with wave equations derived from that theory mathematically, especially statistically. The theory of the interaction of sub-atomic particles is so convoluted that broad assumptions have been derived to explain it.
Planck made it clear that any surface affecting photons had to be large with respect to the size of the photon, which is a small fraction of the size of an electron. Yet, certain climate scientists have no problem speaking of CO2 as a blanket surrounding the planet, which absorbs photons of IR from the surface. No such blanket exists, only individual atoms and molecules, yet photon theory is liberally applied as if the CO2 collectively forms a surface. Since CO2 accounts for 0.03% of atmospheric gases, that blanket must be threadbare with huge holes in it. The only way you can talk about photons vs. the CO2 molecule is on a one-to-one basis. It makes no sense to speak of CO2 molecules collectively since they are so far apart.
G&T mention that specifically in their paper. They reference the number of CO2 molecules in a small region of space and call the notion nonsense.
In the textbook I cited above, water vapour is described as an inconsequential gas in the atmosphere due to its rarity. Yet, it is at least 60% richer than CO2. The textbook also calls the blanket theory nonsense, having marginally more respect for the back-radiation theory. At that, they pan the latter theory as unclear. The back-radiation theory fails to account for scattering of radiation by nitrogen and oxygen, which account for 95%+ of the atmospheric gases. The AGW blanket theory makes it appear as if CO2 forms a continuous blanket around the Earth, with no other gases present.
The truth appears to be that certain climate scientists, especially modelers, have taken a great licence with basic physics. They have made assumptions they had no right to make.
Will – The SOI is a normalised index of the pressure difference betwen Darwin and Tahiti, partially owing to the long sequence of measurement over two important parts of the globe. It may or may not correlate with temperature at specific locations. Why would you say the last decade has “cooled” – where’s your statistics. Some would say it’s slightly warmed.
Why is CO2 needed – well it’s an argument for the mathematics and climate science isn’t it – i.e. can you get enough forcing to describe the magnitude of the long term movements seen. There would be nothing wrong with a long term CO2 forcing overlaying ENSO, PDO and sunspots – why does the argument have to be exclusive and “this OR that”.
Would you expect the pattern to be simple i.e. look at the last 100 years as a guide. Wiggles around a lot but seemingly and inevitably upwards?
But as I have said before – you have 400 years of PDO data – where’s the analysis of a great correlation with temperature.
Of course it doesn’t have to be decadal variation either – might be cloud feedbacks?
For heavens sake Gordon – the so-called “theoretical” back-radiation is measurable !! Move on…
Luke,
I’m sure you’re right about David [he would certainly be more erudite than me] but that doesn’t prevent the problem of not knowing everything.
Gordon,
“Fundamentals of Atmospheric Radiation” sounds like good stuff but that QM is sure beyond me. As I wander’d lonely as a cloud this morning in the forest doing my Sunday bird species count, a large tree fell nearby and pondering on QM, I wonderer whether that would have happened if I hadn’t heard it.
“If a man speaks and no woman hears him, is he still wrong?”
Luke:
“Why would you say the last decade has “cooled” – where’s your statistics. Some would say it’s slightly warmed.”
Depends on your start and end points, so one could argue it’s been cooling, it’s in stasis, or it’s warmed slightly as you’ve indicated. I’m not really too bothered on which position you want to adopt here. I suppose the more interesting question for me is why Baz needed to write an article trying to explain away the ‘lack of expected warming’ as per model forecasts.
“Why is CO2 needed – well it’s an argument for the mathematics and climate science isn’t it – i.e. can you get enough forcing to describe the magnitude of the long term movements seen. There would be nothing wrong with a long term CO2 forcing overlaying ENSO, PDO and sunspots – why does the argument have to be exclusive and “this OR that”.”
I wouldn’t want to suggest my position is that it must be “either OR”. I was just drawing attention to the fact that the CO2 signal is small relative to other forcings, and there is a lot of error to consider both in the measurement data available, and in our knowledge of the contributions each forcing plays in the interplay of climate effects.
“But as I have said before – you have 400 years of PDO data – where’s the analysis of a great correlation with temperature.”
As you said, I don’t think it’s that simple either.
“Yet, certain climate scientists have no problem speaking of CO2 as a blanket surrounding the planet, which absorbs photons of IR from the surface. No such blanket exists,”
It’s called an analogy, it doesn’t mean there is literally a barrier made of some material. It’s ‘like’ there was a blanket.
Of course anything that reduces the amount of short wave – solar irradiance or albedo would also feedback on the CO2 forcing – the greenhouse forcing doesn’t exist without the Sun.
Sunday Profile
http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2008/12/05/2438750.htm
MONICA ATTARD: Okay, a very final question, Gina Rinehart. Your views, very briefly, on the Federal Government’s plans to introduce carbon trading.
GINA RINEHART: I think this has to be done very, very carefully, with full consideration of our economy. I think that’s one of the strongest points I’d like to say. The other point is there is still a lot of, let’s see, what shall I call it, sensationalism and uncertainty in relation to the scientific evidence. I mean some evidence is saying all that’s happening is that, you know, our climate is warming, therefore we’ve got to look into these – do these sorts of things and there’s other evidence still out there that says, well look the Arctic Circle is actually getting more ice and things like, well they’ve just had very cold winters recently in the Northern Hemisphere. I think there is a lot of uncertainty about how hardcore the science really is, but there’s been a lot of media sensationalism making people frightened about it and concerned about it, therefore the politicians must act irrespective of consequence and I think we’ve got to be a lot more careful about acting on some of this sensationalist stuff, if you know we’re going to be also hurting our own economy.
MONICA ATTARD: Okay, a very final question, Gina Rinehart. Your views, very briefly, on the Federal Government’s plans to introduce carbon trading.
GINA RINEHART: I think this has to be done very, very carefully, with full consideration of our economy. I think that’s one of the strongest points I’d like to say. The other point is there is still a lot of, let’s see, what shall I call it, sensationalism and uncertainty in relation to the scientific evidence. I mean some evidence is saying all that’s happening is that, you know, our climate is warming, therefore we’ve got to look into these – do these sorts of things and there’s other evidence still out there that says, well look the Arctic Circle is actually getting more ice and things like, well they’ve just had very cold winters recently in the Northern Hemisphere. I think there is a lot of uncertainty about how hardcore the science really is, but there’s been a lot of media sensationalism making people frightened about it and concerned about it, therefore the politicians must act irrespective of consequence and I think we’ve got to be a lot more careful about acting on some of this sensationalist stuff, if you know we’re going to be also hurting our own economy.
Some incobvenient facts:
Solar radiation at the surface of Venus is allegedly 10-15 watts/m2. For the earth it is 340 watts/m2.
Venus is hotter than Earth from a greenhouse effect?
Please explain.
MAttB,
Yes,Tom Blees has some great ideas and a very positive attitude. He provides common ground for both sides of the debate and we should all read his book.
At $34 per kilowatt even I could afford to place an order for a 1 KVA IFR module. [In a lead lined box, of course.]
“well look the Arctic Circle is actually getting more ice ”
Wrong
“Please explain.”
I could, but it would be a waste of time.
Louis – I have something for you.
While brousing the magazine rack, I happened on the latest edition of Astronomy Magazine. In one of the news blurbs they mentioned some results of an experiment regarding Enceladus, the geyser spouting moon of Saturn. Due to the calculated maximum (2005) and minimum (2007) torque put on the moon, NASA had predicted when it would be expelling the most material if the geysers were powered by tidal flexing. They went into the archive of footage and compared the two dates and found that the moon erupted almost two times as much material in 2007 as in 2005. Exactly the opposite of their prediction.
Here’s the Cassini press release (//saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/cassinifeatures/20081126/).
I’m leaving out the h t t p: on these links because I want to get them all through.
The preliminary analysis from Cassini’s Ion and Neutral Mass Spectrometer used to “sniff” the vapor during it’s dive though the plume shows it to be very comet like (//www.esa.int/esaSC/SEMHFYQ03EF_index_1.html#subhead2), which is another shock to the tidal flexing theory. If the geysers were shooting from a crack that reached down to a subsurface ocean, there should be salt water, but there isn’t.
This all points toward a surface feature.
Now what’s the mechanism? I found a clue on the Thunderbolt’s blog.
By studying Jupiter with the Hubble telescope it was discovered that Io, Ganymede, and Europa, leave a glowing “footprint” in the planet’s aurora. (//hubblesite.org/newscenter/archive/releases/2000/38)
A team from the University of Liège in Belgium discovered the spot from the geologically active moon Io has a counterpart in the aurora of the other pole. They theorize that an electrical current passes clean through Jupiter, emerging on the other side before it rejoins Io to complete the curcuit. (//www.universetoday.com/2008/03/18/new-unexpected-spots-found-on-jupiter/)
Now have a look at the aurora of Saturn.
(//hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/solar/sataur.html) It’s an indistinct blue oval in the first two groups of pictures, but when the color is changed from blue to red in the third picture fine details emerge. What was once a blue glow becomes three red concentric traces matching the three “tiger stripes” of Enceladus’ geyser formations.
Well gee Louis – dat’s a hard un – duh – maybe it’s because you’ve left out most of the energy balance. NEXT !
“well look the Arctic Circle is actually getting more ice ”
Wrong
sure is – but don’t you find it interesting that the head of Australia’s largest mining company, with personal wealth of $2.4 billion and who would have access to some of the world’s leading scientific advisers is unsure about AGW? Surely if the science was as settled as you constantly claim she would class it as settled, yet she obviously does not.
Jennifer,
Just what are the fishing limits in Australia?
SJT re theoretical CO2 blanket “It’s called an analogy, it doesn’t mean there is literally a barrier made of some material. It’s ‘like’ there was a blanket”.
Once again, you missed the point, in your rush to criticize.
When does an analogy become an outright lie? The AGW theory is treating the atmospheric CO2 ‘as if’ it is a surface…like a blanket, or a mirror. Arthur Smith said as much in his critique of the G&T paper. The model of that blanket is one of reflection from a thin surface rather than a vast bulk of gas. There is no such surface in the atmosphere from which photons of surface IR can be back-radiated. It must happen on a one-to-one basis: a photon is absorbed by a CO2 molecule, and a CO2 molecule emits a photon.
As G&T point out, that describes a blackbody radiation which is highly unlikely at the room temperature environment of the atmosphere. Blackbody radiation is better described in the hot environment of a star, where thermal forces affect the energy levels of atoms. The absorption/emission using Kirchoff’s Law assumes a thin layer, with all absorbed energy being re-emitted, otherwise the gas body must heat up to create a thermal balance. Satellites are revealing no such warming. Re-emission, or back-radiation, suggests no increase in temperature for the absorbing gas. That condition is called Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium (LTE).
When you combine what G&T are saying with what Bohren said in the Fundamentals of Atmospheric Radiation, the effect of radiation in the atmosphere is far more complicated than what it is made out to be. G&T say:
“In particular, from the viewpoint of theoretical physics the radiative approach, which uses physical laws such as Planck’s law and Stefan-Boltzmann’s law that only have a limited range of validity that definitely does not cover the atmospheric problem, must be highly questioned. For instance in many calculations climatologists perform calculations where idealized black surfaces e.g. representing a CO2 layer and the ground, respectively, radiate against each other. In reality, we must consider a bulk problem, in which at concentrations of 300 ppmv at normal state….8.0e+6 (8 million) CO2 molecules are distributed within a cube….with edge length 10 microns, a typical wavelength of the relevant infrared radiation. In this context an application of the formulas of cavity radiation is sheer nonsense”.
In case you missed what they are saying, which I’m sure you did (as well as Luke the Shnook), the calculations done by certain climate scientists for back-radiation and subsequent surface warming, is sheer nonsense. Here’s a better translation: CO2 is not warming the surface or the atmosphere.
SJT “When Spencer is wrong, it’s an error of less than 1C, when McIntyre finds his ‘Y2K’ bug in GISS, it’s earth shattering, but all he detected was an error even smaller than UAH”.
A degree?? It was more like 1/10th C. In case you hadn’t noticed, the peak non-El Nino atmospheric average is no more that 0.25 C above the expected temperature (whatever ‘expected’ means). The significance of McIntyre’s find was not the measliness of the find, it was the motley crew trying to pass one over on us. The activists Hansen, Schmidt et al were trying to rewrite the record in an attempt to make it appear as though 1998 was the high point of global warming. Even though the temperature was due to an El Nino, and should have been thrown out, it was passed off deviously as evidence of extreme warming.
Of course, once they were caught, they were careful to note that 1998 was almost as hot as 1934 (in the States), but they failed to point out the obvious: why was it so hot in 1934?
They tried it again in October 2008, and if McIntyre hadn’t caught the error, they likely would have adjusted all the temperatures from that point on to reflect their error.
Energy balance as tabulated by Al Gore’s press agent, Jimmy “coal trains are death trains” Hansen.
Numbers only a government syncophant could invest confidence in.
Right now there is a controversy brewing about the upcoming census in America. The reason? President Obama wants to negate 200 years of tradition by bringing the census under the direct control of the White House. It’s important because Democrat states like Illinois, Minnesota, Massachusettes, and California, have been bleeding population as high handed generational democrat controlled state houses and their policies have driven businesses and families away.
A thing that directly relates to the global warming debate, the population trend is moving away from cold states in favor of warmer climates. Texas Florida and and Arizona are going to gain seats in the congress while northern states lose congressmen (California bucks this trend, but that is due to especially gross and long term democratic misrule coupled to AGW zealotry by the weak governor). Thats the way it’s always been in the USA.
People move to warm places leaving behind the cold.
Only a nimrod or someone standing to gain financially would believe or make believe that the world getting warmer were somehow bad.
Another thing Obama wants to do away with is the direct count. Instead of counting heads he wants to use surveys and statistical estimates to ‘guess’ what the real population of key cold climate democrat districts are. The more estimation, the more opportunity for gerrymandering and a way is open to possibly cheat Michigan back into keeping that undeserved seat in congress.
Dear Gordon – your theory is irrelevant – back-radiation is MEASURED. The end.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008GL036350.shtml
James – well when the SW runs out of water they’ll all wanna go home? Go read Brian Fagan’s book doofus and report back. http://www.amazon.com/Great-Warming-Climate-Change-Civilizations/dp/1596913924
James
Thanks for that – the electrical connection is slowly being noticed.
Luke,
you haven’t answered the question at all =- just another of your inane distractions.
Incidentally talking about energy balances, Venus produces 15% more radiation than it receives from the sun.
Louis – you come back with some serious references to substantiate your dubious Venusian position. If you knew about energy balance you would not have asked your first question – would you?
Luke,
Answer the question please, and don’t answer a question with a question.
No – we’ve had enough of your unreferenced unsubstantiated personal assertions. Put up a proper case that isn’t Hissink pers comm.
The Nov. 13 1980 issue of New Scientist contained an article
entitled “The mystery of Venus’ internal heat”, which read as
follows:
“Two years surveillance by the Pioneer Venus orbiter seems to
show that Venus is radiating away more energy than it receives
from the sun. If this surprising result is confirmed, it
means that the planet itself is producing far more heat than
the earth does.
F.W. Taylor of the Clarendon Laboratory at Oxford presented
these measurements at a Royal Society meeting last week.
Venus surface temperature is higher than any other in the
solar system, at 480 C. The generally accepted theory is that
sunlight is absorbed at Venus’ surface, and re-radiated as
infrared. The later is absorbed in the atmosphere, which thus
acts as a blanket, keeping the planet hot. It is similar to
the way a greenhouse keeps warm.
Pioneer has shown that there is enough carbon dioxide and the
tiny proportion of water vapor needed to make the greenhouse
effect work — just. If this is the whole story, the total
amount of radiation emitted back into space, after its journey
up through the atmospheric blanket must be exactly equal to
that absorbed from sunlight (otherwise the surface temperature
would be continuously changing).
But Taylor found that Venus radiates 15 percent more energy
than it receives. To keep the surface temperature constant,
Venus must be producing this extra heat from within.
All the inner planets, including earth, produce internal heat
from radioactive elements within their rocks. But Taylor’s
observations of Venus would mean that the planet is producing
almost 10,000 times more heat than the earth, and it is
inconceivable according to present theories of planetary
formation, that Venus should have thousands of times more of
the radioactive elements than Earth does. At last weeks
meeting, Taylor’s suggestion met with skepticism – not to say
sheer disbelief – from other planetary scientists.
Taylor himself has no explanation for his result. He simply
points out that the discrepancy seemed at first to be simply
experimental error – but with more precise measurements, it
refused to go away. More measurements are needed before
astronomers accept the result, and most planetary scientists
are obviously expecting – and hoping – that the embarrassing
extra heat will disappear on further investigation.
Good boy. But doesn’t Venus have a subadiabatic troposphere profile which is unlikely to explain a volcanic source (assuming this is where you’re heading).
Luke,
You have no idea whereI am heading – your are simply a scientific ignoramus.
“Incidentally talking about energy balances, Venus produces 15% more radiation than it receives from the sun.”
If that is proven then thats pretty much brings the electric universe theory further up in the lead. What else could explain such a thing? Energy would have to be streaming in in one form and being converted before radiating out, or else the internal planetary heat generation would have to be truly massive.
In any case I’m won over since I’ve seen all the pictures. The false-colour pictures. And the electric field nature of whats going on in the sun becomes undeniable.
Surely the next thing to see is if Earth has any discrepancy in this regard. Is there any suspected discrepancy in this regard Louis.
🙂
Classic
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Holy cow – I just realised that Louis is actually quoting from a 1980 “NEW” Scientist – hahahahahahahahahaha ….
And now we have the unelectable member for Dobell attempting to engage in an “intellectual” conversation ….. hahahahahaha – gimp meets gimp
Luke,
Are asserting that the new Science article has been proven incorrect, or are you just unable to engage on the topic?
Lukes idiocy may seem funny. But I’ve just been engaged at a site where basically everyone is an idiot just like Luke. Everyone a fascist. I was trying to tell them that the arsonists, the lightning, and the fallen power lines were ignition sources. That they lit the fires. But it was the environmentalist movement that did the killing. They wouldn’t buy any part of that argument. But just like Luke they didn’t have a serious counter-argument.
Its not really funny is it. I mean people like Luke have basically murdered these people by taking autonomy away from the property-owner, forcing people to get permission to kill their own trees on their own land, and lying to them about CO2 making them feel bad about cutting down trees and procrastinating on the matter. And these people are fully unrepentant and impossible to reason with. They are in contempt of the victims and would not be willing to return autonomy to the landowner even in retrospect.
Hence the movement has killed and will kill again. The exact same attitude was evidence for decades in the DDT-bureaucratisation holocaust. And we still aren’t allowed to manufacture DDT in very many places which of course means the price is far higher than it has to be. So nothing will stop these guys from killing. That 200million+ people live with Malaria and that 2-3 million people were dying with malaria every year for decades did not move these people.
Any hope that the problem will be solved once the weather gets cold misunderstands what we are up against. When the weather goes cold it won’t be bringing any more or less evidence to matters that they had before. And we cannot expect these people to back off when that happens. And one of the reasons we know this already is that the weather has already turned cold and that didn’t change anything.
The only way we can solve this matter is through a full-blown witch-hunt where the penalty is for the public servant to lose his job. That is to say the only way we can deal with this problem and stop more hard-to-predict killings perpetrated by this movement is to get up the momentum for mass-sackings. Luke isn’t going to suddenly see reason. Not unless he’s down at the casual-work place trying to pick up the pieces of his useless life.
“James – well when the SW runs out of water they’ll all wanna go home?”
From Luke’s lips to God’s ear? Big storm moves into Calif.; snow closes I-5
The National Weather Service posted winter storm warnings Monday for the Sierra Nevada and issued flood advisories from the San Francisco Bay area south to the Los Angeles region.
Thanks Luke. I had no idea you were in so good with the Man upstairs.
Can we do this again next week?
Why should we listen to someone who has disgraced himself and his party at a national election with one of the worst campaigns in history.
Someone with no original thoughts who just recycles neocon bilge.
A free market “genius” who (wait for it) relies on shift work.
Bird have you apologised to your party and the good people of Dobell for wasting their time?
Mate – your credibility is in tatters. Everyone is laughing at you. How do you stand it?
But I had to laugh even more – BIRD SAYS “a full blown witch hunt” hahahahahahahahaa
SO YOU ADMIT TO WITCH HUNTS – YOU little goose-stepping Nazi !
Why don’t you admit to fabricating evidence too?
How about we bring back banishment into exile – and the majority – which isn’t you mate – sends you to Ball’s Pyramid.
James – How’s the water supply going in California hippie?
Hunter – Louis has posted a random article. There is no point to his post. No assertion. So we await his point – he’s probably – hahahahahahaha – looking up his 1960s reference collection of Popular Science to find it. hahahahahahaha
We need a real witch-hunt. We have to get the phrase out there early on so that people get used to the idea that its only about mass-sackings from the public service.
Luke “Dear Gordon – your theory is irrelevant – back-radiation is MEASURED. The end.”
Thanks for pointing me to a link I’d have to pay for. I’m sure you paid to read the entire article because I did not. Instead, I lifted this from the abstract:
“Here we analyse shortwave and longwave surface forcings measured in Switzerland and Northern Germany and relate them to humidity- and temperature increases through the radiation- and energy budget”.
So that’s your proof of the amount of CO2 back-radiation. What instruments were used? I presume each photon measured came marked, “this photon is from anthropogenic CO2”. How did they distinguish the photons from CO2 radiation and the overlapping radiation from direct solar IR radiation?
One of the authors of your article is Philipona. Here’s an article critiquing his methodology:
http://www.warwickhughes.com/papers/philipona05.htm
referenced from here:
http://www.warwickhughes.com/papers/revgg.htm
Here’s the comment about Philipona’s methodology:
“I have been surprised to find that the Philipona et al conclusions are so strongly influenced by their choice of the 1995-2002 period . Classic cherrypicking.
Sounds to me, Lukey, like you are googling for rebuttals without understanding what is being said or how the data was obtained. You have inadvertantly cited an IPCC hot dog who probably subscribes to the realclimate journal.
Meanwhile, why don’t you take another look at this graph:
http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/
Show me where the back-radiation shows up and which part comes from water vapour convection, which part is water vapour radiation and which part is from CO2 back-radiation warming the atmosphere. This is a scan of 95% of the planet. The lower troposphere has warmed maybe 2/10th C, on average. Where is your warming from back-radiation? For all we know, that warming comes from the oceans or the Sun.
Luke…THINK…’2/10ths C’. You might as well say the atmosphere has not warmed at all.
Slightly at a tangent, you-all might be interested in the letter I have sent to Chris Field in response to his widely (ABC, BBC, Reuters, AFP, Canberra Times, The Australia) reported claims about AGW being even worse than claimed by him et al in IPCC 2007.
I am recruiting co-signatories for follow-up letter to Stanford and said media, any offers?
“Dear Dr Field
You were widely reported yesterday and today by Reuters and AFP as claiming that “The climate is heating up far faster than scientists had predicted, spurred by sharp increases in greenhouse gas emissions from developing countries like China and India…The consequence of that is we are basically looking now at a future climate that is beyond anything that we’ve considered seriously, the actual trajectory of climate change is more serious [than any of the IPCC’s climate predictions] We now have data showing that from 2000 to 2007, greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected, primarily because developing countries, like China and India, saw a huge surge in electric power generation, almost all of it based on coal,” you apparently said (the full text is appended below).
If correctly reported you are guilty of severe economy with the truth. Whilst right that emissions grew rapidly from 2000 until 2007, you have been seriously misleading by failing to mention first, that anthropogenic global warming is dependent first and foremost on the atmospheric concentration of CO2 [CO2], and not on the level of emissions per se, as despite 3 percent growth of emissions from January 2008 to January 2009, the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide grew by less than 0.4 percent, that being the average rate of growth of [CO2] since 1958, which means that despite the inferences you wished the world to draw, there has been NO sustained increase in the rate of growth of [CO2] since 1958 despite ongoing growth in emissions of as much as 3% p.a.*.
Secondly, you wilfully failed to mention that absorption of those emissions by the oceanic and terrestrial biospheres grew about as fast as the emissions. Ironically, your own co-authors in some of your most recent papers (Canadell, Raupach) have assembled data that show how absorption of atmospheric carbon dioxide doubled from an annual average of 2.45 billion tonnes of carbon a year from 1958 to 1963, to over 5 GtC from 2003 to 2007.**
As a result, from 1958 to 2007 over 56 percent of total emissions over that period of 331 billion tonnes was absorbed by our biospheres, in the form of the carbohydrates that are the basic feedstock for humanity, as embodied in fish, cereals, livestock, fruit, coffee, grapes, and other tree crops (eg palm oil). Without CO2 there would be no food, and reducing its present atmospheric level has been frequently proven to result in lower yields of all that feedstock (that being the corollary of the well-attested, in thousands of papers, fertilization effect of enhanced [CO2]). Your exaggeration (by over 700 percent) of the rate of increase of atmospheric carbon dioxide relative to the growth of emissions, combined with your wilful disregard of the positive side of the annual global carbon budget through your focus only on emissions, amounts to gross academic and scientific misconduct since your own work in the IPCC AR4 WG1 gives the lie to your present claims. I and some of my colleagues intend to make appropriate representations to the authorities of the University of Stanford, Reuters, AFP, and the IPCC unless we see an immediate retraction of your misleading claims reported by Reuters/AFP.
· http://www.esrl.noaa.gov.gmd/ccgg/trends/
· http://www.globalcarbonproject.org/
Kind regards
Tim Curtin”
Utter drivel Gordon – Hughes comments on Philipona were simply rubbish and I introduced the material there anyway – Philipona was actually aghast at the level of uninformed silliness. The back radiation is there (at night) just as you’d expect. Don’t worry about ruses regarding solar during the day which have been analysed anyway. Your whole carry-on about this issue is preposterous. Go and tell Davos they don’t know how to measure radiation. I mean really – do you really fancy yourself as a player in this field. http://www.pmodwrc.ch/ ROTFL !!!
But don’t mind me – it’s fun to watch you go on and on. Keep ignorant and keep digging a bigger hole. Doesn’t worry me.
As for Timmy “amounts to gross academic and scientific misconduct since your own work ” – what a wank .
Publish yourself you pretentious clown ! I mean really Timmy – do you actually think you’re important with something to say?
Tim Curtin
I’ll sign it. Not because it makes sense, I’m not in the position to tell if or how much co2 is breathed in by primary production. It’s just that Luke has been so continuously wrong, with even his pronouncements on dry weather in the American southwest resulting in drought breaking rainstorms, if he is against it, it must be right.
Luke if you are not busy sometime we should go to the horse races, then you can tell me which horse doesn’t stand a chance.
Tim
The absorption does not keep up with the production. That has been measured, independently, around the globe. What is the point of your letter?
James – your sheer unending stupidity knows no bounds – if the USA SW just received some rain – errr – so what?
We’ve been over Timmy Tantrum’s hand selecting what he wants from the literature before – e.g. assuming agronomic and genetic improvemnts = CO2 fertilisation. Ignoring “real world” FACE experimental results. Ignoring differential C3/C4 effects. Ignoring frost sensitivity to additional CO2 – all so tedious and undergraduate.
Tim; I wish you well with your letter to Field; why don’t you send your letter to Leon and he can collect signatures through TCS.
luke; you are shameless, although I don’t blame you recycling Philipona who is the great white hope of AGW; but you haven’t replied to my observation in respect of his 2009 paper that the increase in LDR is based on an assumption of increased humidity [which is contradicted by NOAA records from 1949] and a cloud effect which balances the cloud caused decline in SNR with an increase in cloud produced LDR.
The increase in CO2 over the last 150 years amounts to a 0.008% change in the atmospheres composition, how the hell is that going to affect anything?
“The increase in CO2 over the last 150 years amounts to a 0.008% change in the atmospheres composition, how the hell is that going to affect anything?”
Argument from ignorance.
Irrelevant Cohenite – we’re discussing a concept much simpler than that.
If you have any issues with Rolf’s papers – stop being disingenuous and email him yourself. A vast amount of questions last time all of which were answered.
Ignorance is bliss, like the 99.9999% of the globe that has never ‘actually’ had a temperature reading. Forgive our ‘ignorance’ if we don’t know what is going on there.
SJT: “The absorption does not keep up with the production. That has been measured, independently, around the globe. What is the point of your letter?”
Where are the citations to peer reviewed papers?
SJT: “Argument from ignorance.”
Ultra Ditto
Well TG – dat’s why you have satellites (NEXT !)
Cohenite – the essential point is bback radiation is measured on clear sky nights to about what theory suggests. On that very simple point Gordon’s entire argument just vaporises.
Don’t worry about CO2, water vapour, enhanced greenhouse effect etc for now…. let’s just dispense with the silly bits first.
It’s like denying the existence of platypi and someone suddenly dumps one on your desk. Bit of a problem for the no-platypus theory.
lets give it a test.
Luke, here’s the field for the Barbara Fritchie Handicap at Laural Park;
Access Fee;
By the Light;
Dream Rush;
Fascinatin’ Rhythm;
Rose for You;
Royal Michelle;
and Seventh Street.
Pick me a loser, Luke. Who do you think will come in dead last?
SJT said :”The absorption does not keep up with the production. That has been measured, independently, around the globe. What is the point of your letter?”
You are wrong. The absorption has grown by on average 56+% of the production of emissions since 1958, and by about 60% last year. As a result, while “production” of emissions has grown by 2-3% p.a. since 1958, the atmospheric concentration (aka [CO2])has on average grown by only 0.4% p.a. since 1958, slightly less last year.
Thus my point is that Field is guilty of self-serving and fraudulent alarmism, there has been in effect NO acceleration of the growth of [CO2] since 1958, despite his claims to the media. In effect he is not better than Bernie Madoff, making false claims for his hoped for future personal benefit (eg reappointment to the IPCC) . I think you may be a truthful person, unlike Luke, can you confirm that, unlike him?
Was that the same astounding level of CO2 maths shown at http://bravenewclimate.com/2008/08/15/spot-the-recycled-denial-i-prof-wj-collins/ ……….. yes ….
and how is that Nature paper going?
or perhaps your PUBLISHED detailed rebuttal of http://www.biogeosciences.net/5/1601/2008/bg-5-1601-2008.pdf
“You are wrong.”
No, I am right. While the amount of CO2 absorbed is a significant amount, this was already known and is within estimates. The CO2 we are adding to the atmosphere is still increase the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, it is not all being absorbed.
“The absorption has grown by on average 56+% of the production of emissions” is wrong. If it was correct, we would be seeing CO2 concentrations going down, not up.
Luke “The back radiation is there (at night) just as you’d expect”.
You’re buddy SJT is always asking for sources of peer-reviewed literature, although he seldom supplies them himself. I don’t care if the evidence is peer-reviewed, just point me to a free source that explains:
a)what proporation of the back-radiation comes from anthropogenic CO2.
b)why the satellites don’t pick up the warming
c)why the planet has had no average warming for a decade
d)why the warming in the atmosphere has never exceeded an average of 0.25 C in 30 years, even through the so-called warmest years this planet has ever seen (smirk).
Sorry, your rhetorical bombast doesn’t cut it for me as a reliable source.
SJY: As Luke won’t can’t help you, the atmospheric concentration has indeed been increasing, by 44% of emissions on average, but that equates to only a 0.4% p.a. increase in the existing stock of [CO2]. Anyone can make a mistake, as you just did, rely on Luke to be there on Judgment Day to remind you of yours.
Luke “Irrelevant Cohenite – we’re discussing a concept much simpler than that”.
The thing that’s amazing is that you have no comprehension whatsoever as to what is being discussed. If it’s so simple, why do scientists have so much trouble with it? The only one’s who don’t seem to see the problems are those like your AGW source, Philipona.
“b)why the satellites don’t pick up the warming”
Satellites can’t pick up the radiation that’s going down to the earths surface, AFAIK. They are up above it. There is an instrument that can do this, but for the life of me I can’t remember it’s name.
Gordon – it’s not an “AGW source” – the AGW bit is incidental – your comment about back radiation – well measured in the real world – is just plain dumb.
So if the back radiation is there – whether it comes from water vapour or CO2 – mate it’s there !
And CO2 would have a similar effect to other greenhouse gases.
Why don’t you toddle off and do the smallest amount of serious research instead of sprouting crap.
a)what proportion of the back-radiation comes from anthropogenic CO2. – oh a couple of watts/m2
b)why the satellites don’t pick up the warming – err they do !! – put a linear regression through the time series
c)why the planet has had no average warming for a decade – who says it hasn’t? cherry plucking sceptics …
d)why the warming in the atmosphere has never exceeded an average of 0.25 C in 30 years, even through the so-called warmest years this planet has ever seen (smirk). – why would it? and it isn’t the warmest the planet’s ever been. If it was – 6 billion humans wouldn’t be here (smirk)
Really really dumbo stuff Gordon….
Luke
What was the point of linking Barry Brooks smear job on Tim Collins?
I followed each of the links that Brooks supposes are a damning indictment of Prof Tim.
All you get are inuendos from cranks like desmog, ( here’s one that should illustrait the depth of the desmog depravity for Jen’s readers – http://www.desmogblog.com/climate-scientists-warn-more-come-down-under ) and an attempt to recycle the “wind as thermometer” (an idea he stole from Roger Pielke, without attribution btw – Gavin is compiling quite the history of theft of intellectual property “http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=5093” ) and “ban all the flatscreens” (Why is it that realclimate never mentions the chemicals expelled by solar panel manufacturing?) arguments from RC.
I think you are trying to weasle out of picking me a loser (winner) in the Laural Park race.
Quit stalling.
Pick one.
Access Fee;
By the Light;
Dream Rush;
Fascinatin’ Rhythm;
Rose for You;
Royal Michelle;
and Seventh Street.
You don’t have to worry about it making me richer. The race already ran.
What smear? Simply the issue has been well ventilated before.
BTW I’ll pick a horse when you stop being a wanker.
Luke: (Ken Day) ” BTW I’ll pick a horse when you stop being a wanker”.
Smearing inhis usual manner.
SJT
“b)why the satellites don’t pick up the warming”
Satellites can’t pick up the radiation that’s going down to the earths surface, AFAIK. They are up above it. There is an instrument that can do this, but for the life of me I can’t remember it’s name.”
Which is why you are an idiot.
“What smear? Simply the issue has been well ventilated before.”
What issue would that be? Barry is a bit vague even in his linkage. “Teach yourself to spot the recycled denialism” he says.
Then he avoids pointing out any recycled denialism. Instead he spends a paragraph explaining that he won’t be pointing to any specific issues in his newly launched series of posts dedicated to pointing out the “pieces”, “For people without the time to study the science of climate change in detail.” Because it’s too much bother for our self appointed teacher to “constructing a new argument each time [or even the first time since, he said in the beginning this post is the first in a series – J] which, point-by-point, shows why their claims are not supported by the evidence.”
Gee thanks, Barry!
See how if I were to have written it I wouldn’t leave it up to the reader to wonder what “recycled denialism” is. I would have presented an example of my meaning.
Take the first instance of hyperlink as explanation. Barry highlights Tim Collin’s assertion that climate skeptics are good people and redirects his readers to desmog blog’s attack on Tim Ball.
What has that got to do with the definition of “recycled denialism”? How does this help “people without the time to study the climate change science position in detail” to recognize “arguments against the mainstream science position that can seem reasonable”?
This doesn’t help your side.
For one, the target audience ie; people without the time to think about the issue, are forced to waste the single identified commodity they are in short supply of, chasing undefined meanings across multiple hyperlinks.. Two if the target audience does happen to follow Barry’s suggestions through to their logical conclusion, they will discover that a visit to just one Tim Ball article contains more scientific analysis then is provided by their original visit to BarryBrooks and his recommended side destination of desmog blog combined.
Luke, that link is crap writing, even by alarmist standards. It is ultimately cause defeating t(the AGW cause) and antagonistic to the reader. Your promotion of it is another datum of evidence predicting that when/if you ever pick the last place horse, it is statisticly likely (better then the 7 to 1 odds the number of horses in the field suggests) that you will pick me out the winner.
Luke said;
“Well TG – dat’s why you have satellites (NEXT !)”
Satellites are satellites, they are not temperature readings for 99% of the globes atmosphere , those temperature readings do not exist. Please manufacture me some more temperature readings so we know what they are.
Well looks like James will be wating a while given he’s not reforming.
TG – mate you’re gonna be unpopular here with the sceptics – so you’re rejecting a continuous spatial coverage by satellites eh? OK – fair nuff – your mates here will be making you march down the back on demos though with that attitude.
James,
You’ll be hard pressed to get Luke to acknowledge simple facts like BB’s dubiosity let alone provide you with a winner.
BB’s latest: “attributive fingerprints” of biological systems advancing in relation to climate change.
Someone needs to tell him [I can’t, I’m banned] that bio systems respond to WEATHER, not climate, if they are going to survive.
[ Mother robin says to newly hatched chicks, ” I know I laid you lot a little early because of the Bureau’s reports so now you’ll just have to ignore the ice and snow for a while”].
David Karoly has been saying on RC that the Forest Fire Danger Index at the recent Vic fires was nearly twice [190:100] the level that would have applied during the Black Friday fires of 1939.
On checking this FFDI it seems that the number doesn’t change regardless of fuel load.
Whether the fuel load is 1 or 25 it remains the same index number.
Also, the longer the drought, the higher the index yet it should be apparrent that 12 years drought would not present the combustible fuel that 11 good seasons and 1 years drought would produce.
SJT “Satellites can’t pick up the radiation that’s going down to the earths surface, AFAIK”.
SJT…My point was that the satellites are showing a trend of 0.04 C over 10 years (UAH figures), and the Spencer graph shows the maximum warming average visually to be around 0.25 C, if you ignore the 1998 El Nino. I was trying to get through to Luke that not only is it virtually impossible to distinguish anthropogenic CO2 back-radiation from the background radiation, there just isn’t a whole lot of it from all sources. Of course, I’m stepping outside my own argument that an average global figure is meaningless.
The satellites pick up microwave radiation from oxygen molecules and I think Spencer said they are not sensitive enough to detect back-radiation. I am sure there are detectors that pick up IR at night, as Luke claims, but how do they separate anthropogenic CO2 IR from the rest? CO2 radiates strongest at about 10 microns but that radiation is predominantly from the naturally produced CO2. Water vapour radiates in the range as well and it has a much larger effect. Even if the nght is cloudless, there is still water vapour there.
The other problem is determining exactly how much of the warming effect comes from radiation. Philipona admitted it is not possible to measure radiation from higher alitudes. In fact, it would seem impossible to determine exactly where the radiation is coming from. If they are measuring near-surface air, which later rises, or is blown to a higher alitude, to condense and release heat, one can hardly claim the radiation from that air is meaningful. It’s the convection that carries that heat energy and Lindzen as well as Spencer are claiming the warming comes from that transport system, not from radiation.
Luke “Really really dumbo stuff Gordon…”
I take critiques from you as affirmation that I’m on the right track.
As far as toddling off to do my own research, there’s no point. I have a few of the lads, like Richard Lindzen and Roy Spencer, doing that for me. Of course, you’ve got the mathematician Gavin Schmidt working for you, and it sounds like it.
Tim Curtin “the atmospheric concentration has indeed been increasing, by 44% of emissions on average, but that equates to only a 0.4% p.a.”
Spencer uses 0.6% p.a. for anthropogenic CO2 as follows:
Taking the IPCC 2007 CO2 density of 380 ppmv, that is 380 molecules CO2 per million molecules of air or 38 molecules CO2 per 100,000 molecules of air. Mulitply 38 molecules by 0.6% = 0.006 x 38 = 0.228 molecules of anthropogenic CO2 added to 100,000 molecules of air each year. Can’t have a fractional molecule, can we? Multiply by 5 to get nearly 1 molecule of CO2 added to 100,000 molecules of air EVERY FIVE YEARS.
The IPCC admits in AR4 (WG1, chapter 7, page 515, figure 7.3) that CO2 fluxes have an error of +/- 20%. So let’s use your 4% which makes it 0.004 x 38 molecules CO2 = 0.152 molecules of CO2 added to 100,00 of air per year. You’d need about 7 years to add 1 molecule of CO2 to 100,000 molecules of air. I like that better and it falls within the IPCC error range.
Of course, Luke’s instruments will be able to detect the addition of that 1 molecule to the 100,000 of air, at night, every five or seven years. One molecule of CO2 must put out one heck of a blast of heat. Mind you, you’d have to be right on the spot every 5 to 7 years to catch it.
Luke,
This sounds like manufacturing to me even if it is a pretty good concoction “put a linear regression through the time series”.
“so you’re rejecting a continuous spatial coverage by satellites eh?”
I am sure you can show me some peer reviewed papers indicating that satellites show warming and conversely others can produce some that indicate cooling. What is missing is some peer reviewed papers indicating that nobody knows what is happening, as is the case. It is convenient not to know what the observations are , especially if your theory needs to predict future observations.
TG “What is missing is some peer reviewed papers indicating that nobody knows what is happening, as is the case”.
We know they can’t admit that or they’d lose their funding. Preaching AGW theory is easy money. I mean, where else could a mathematician like Gavin Schmidt enjoy his current prestige? He even publishes papers as a climate scientist, yet a real climate scientist like Roy Spencer, who has a degree in the associated field of meteorology, has trouble getting a paper published.
Another scientist with a degree in climate science, Patrick Michaels, was run out of his job as the state climatologist for Virginia, in the States. Michaels is one of the few skeptics who claims CO2 is warming the atmosphere. Same thing happened to a couple of other climatologists in Washington State, and I believe Oregon. They lost their jobs for being skeptical. Michaels asked one scientific journal why he got so many hassles when trying to publish. They told him his work was held to a higher degree of scrutiny than the work of other scientists.
That’s modern peer review at work for you. If you’re skeptical of AGW theory, your chances of getting published diminish with your degree of skepticism. The same crap has been going on in the field of HIV/AIDS research for 25 years. People like Luke, who clamour for peer review, don’t understand what a scam it has become and how it is used to prop up pseudo-science that gets the funding.
Gordon,
Shouldn’t you be posting the crap you write at http://www.cranks-and-lunatics.org ?
I read this bushfire item in full coming home on on the plane yesterday. 200 comments don’t mean much to the victims either.
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/preaching_over_the_dead/
Given Victoria is still covered in smoke haze, opinons are a few cents a dozen and its sad to see our Bushfire CRC doing chook raffles to keep going.
Canbera Times readers can see the article by Megan Doherty today. More sober is our editorial
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/news/opinion/editorial/general/professionals-are-needed-at-the-front/1438093.aspx
Shouldnt you alarmanistas be just a tad worried as to the ethics and competence of the UN.
If it is so demonstrably corrupt in this domain whats the chances of it being clean as whistle with the IPCC set up.
http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm/frm/32207/sec_id/32207
Oh thats right, it already has made a mess of that as well.
Now this will give vexatious bloggerants the chance to post more crap, and meet their quotas for the month.
Hey everyone, especially luke, little will and the other warmists, it’s not before time;
http://www.climatesceptics.com.au/
My prediction (based on solid hindcasting) is it’s going to be about as successful as the global warming alarmist party did in the last electron.
Which I recall may have got even less votes than the shooter’s party and the legalise marijuana party…
Well will – you are dreaming (tell’m their dreaming, son)
Surely, there was no Alarmist Party at the last election? Can you pick it out from here?
http://australianpolitics.com/parties/others/
At last, a party that will truly serve the populace.
Hey, Will
That should have been (tell them they’re dreaming, son)
The hope of a NEW party made me light headed for a moment!
Good Luck with it, cohenite.
OK Gordon – “I have Spencer and Lindzen doing that for me”
And so your basis for doing that is that it appeals to your POV. Why be exclusive. Specner can’t get published – and you imply it’s a conspiracy – don’t you find it strange that he hasn’t shared the reviewers comments with us? Why not? If it’s a conspiracy surely they’ll be insubstantial.
Look Gordon – scientists are knocked back on publication continually. Sometimes certain papers take lots of work to get through. But it appeals to your fantasy to fuel the notion of a conspiracy – I have an acquaintance who thinks he has a lunar and greenhouse relationship. Got paper one through to publishing but not paper two. He doesn’t think it’s a conspiracy. Just tough game.
Lindzen’s big idea – the iris – hasn’t turned out – so why exclude all the other scientists out there? Because it’s all a BIG conspiracy – ooooooo – oooooo. Come on mate !
As for back radiation – so we’ve now gone from none to show me the anthropogenic CO2 differential. So Gordon Google radiometers, net, long wave, night, energy budget,
There’s a mammoth amount of work in this area.
And yes of course the downward radiation on clear nights comes from a combination of water vapour, CO2, CH4, NOx, CFCs, ozone, sulfur hexafluoride, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons, CO, HCl, and even nitrogen trifluoride from plasma TVs. Oxygen, nitrogen and argon and not GHGs.
Yes finding out the anthropogenic component is a science challenge – modelling of the components is essential – Philipona has had a go through a series of papers – where he has has had to contend with water vapour feedback, altitude, and changing solar radiation (through aerosol reduction – “brightening”). So he has apportioned and modelled the components and got an effect. We’re only talking a few watts/m2 here.
SO your eensy weensy mocking is just so frigging stupid – it’s a physics calculation which makes a small difference to the energy balance. Of course there’s only a few watts/m2 in an ice age too. So beware what you’re on about.
BUT it’s hardly a debate about back radiation not existing. Which is where you’ve come from !!! The primodial denialist slime pits.
Otherwise get Davos Centre to explain to you what they’re measuring – and all the others in that field of research !!
I can send you the relevant papers if you are at all interested. And I then suggest you question the author for all your little nitpicks (Seriously).
TG – well you can get as many data sets as you’d like from http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/ and analyse away. Try some simple regressions. My take is that all different data sets basically give you the same broad story –
What we do know is that if you take 3 independent data sets – the Hadley 1850 till current surface temperature series, sea surface temperature (SST) series, and night marine air temperature series (NMAT) – they all give you the same basic pattern – with the land warming more than the oceans since 1990s as predicted.
If you do an EOF analysis on the global pattern of warming in the oceans – EOF1 which is the centennial warming trend gives 56% of the low frequency SST variance and 71% of the NMAT low frequency variance. EOF2 is the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation with 10% and 8% and the third EOF3 is the AMO with 8% and 7%.
The place has obviously warmed. The satellite series mirror the wiggles of the GISS and CRU data sets for the shorter period they’re available.
Furthermore you need to get 15 years of no warming at all to get anywhere near significance – all the modern GCMs produce periods of no warming. There is still warming in the current period.
La Nina, IPO/PDO and solar cycle all tune the effect. A really big El Nino will soon enough prove the point.
Cohers – zzzzzz – email me and I’ll share some great new stuff with you.
Hey Cohers – don’t get too close to these guys. They might self-ignite.
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Leon_Ashby Anyway one of Mottys’ mates so you’ll get a good upping. But hey I love these guys – they’re not pussy – at least they come in the front door – well they normally just kick it in. Nothing like a bit of biffo.
Anyway if Leon could cut down a few trees he’d be happier.
Nothing like getting on the D9 for a bit of recreational tillage – away from the nagging wife (sorry Mrs Cohers) and horrid kiddies. And sitting astride a bloody big D9 is better than viagra for the over 50s.
But they’ll just be recycling the same old denialist shit. Will appeal to the party faithful – but hey they didn’t vote for Rudd anyway – Ruddsta knows that – so do you think anyone is really listening. Even Turnbull is on about a carbon tax. You should get Graeme Bird involved- I reckon Birdy could be a big help to their campaign.
I reckon get really really angry and start ranting and salivating. Threats are good too ! Abuse – mass sackings…. all good stuff.
“James,
You’ll be hard pressed to get Luke to acknowledge simple facts like BB’s dubiosity let alone provide you with a winner.
BB’s latest: “attributive fingerprints” of biological systems advancing in relation to climate change.”
Drongo,
For Luke some wankers are more equal then others.
Comment from: Luke February 19th, 2009 at 6:50 pm
Comment from: Luke February 19th, 2009 at 7:03 pm
A good dollup of recycled alarmism followed by another stellar example of green hypocrisy.
Look how he’s treating poor Leon Ashby. And Ashby was only bending over backwards, risking life and property, to meet the zealots half way. That’s Leon’s “crime”.
Well it kept his hands off the joystick for a good half hour. Mother Skywalker will be pleased.
Probably back at it now though.
Thanks for playing James – yes indeed fish species and corals are all moving in the Australasian region. http://www.abc.net.au/rn/scienceshow/stories/2007/2119476.htm And what was that Nature paper now … http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7193/full/nature06937.html ah yes ….
Taluka Byvalnian wrote:
“Well will – you are dreaming…”
Interesting mental system of reverse logic you have going there (if you’re ignorant of something, accuse the other person of being stupid) 😉
http://www.news.com.au/perthnow/story/0,21598,22490553-948,00.html
Although I doubt many people heard of it…
Will Nitschke: “as the global warming alarmist party did in the last electron. ”
I assume that was Philip Adams’ and Karl’s efforts?
And “electron” is hardly a typo but possibly a freudian slip – too many Ecce’s perhaps.
There’s luke typing with one hand again.
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/climate/indicator_sst.jsp?c=ssta
Maybe those sea urchins are heading south for the Tasman summer.
I sort of like him better this way.
From the letters page of today’s Age:
“WHAT is the difference between an arsonist and a person who refuses to limit greenhouse gas emissions?”
From Daniel:
“One lights fires, the other fights liars. ”
Rock on, Daniel.
Luke,
As Brisbane was built from the dead coral of past ages of Moreton Bay, dredged by Darra Cement for about a century, d’you think this might indicate that we’ve seen it all before?
And I wonder if that Nature story has the one about the mountain pygmy possums? or Motty’s favourite, the NQ albino possums?
Luke uses nature as a source….hahahahah
In 2001 data from surveyor showed global warming on Mars.
The media wasn’t interested but we bloggers heard about it, and mocked the global warmers with it.
Finally, the Media’s darling couldn’t take anymore mocking, so they posted a “debunking” of global warming on Mars, October 5, 2005. http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=192
This put the media/government nexus of prefessional AGW alarmism in a tight situation. Their policy up until this time had been to ignore global warming of the other planets, but their other policy had been to direct any who questioned the scientific basis of global warming toward Real Climate to search haphazard for the answers from their paid shill.
What to do? Realclimate had debunked something that the nexus was forbidden from reporting. Global Surveyor was rocking the boat.
How about kill the witness?
http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2006/11/mars_global_sur.html
Then besmirch his character.
SPACE.com — Dust Storms Fuel Global Warming on MarsApr 4, 2007 … Shifting sandstorms on Mars might be contributing to a recent bout of global warming on the planet that is shrinking the southern polar …
Old news… Some might call it recycled.
Enter winter 08-09. After a constant bombardment of summer headlines trumpeting the impending doom of the Arctic sea ice coupled with government entities demanding we act now to, it must have been with some trepidation that the Media/Government nexus viewed the record ice build up this fall. //wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/03/arctic-sea-ice-increases-at-record-rate/
Satellite was rocking the boat again. What to do?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/18/nsidc-satellite-sea-ice-sensor-has-catastrophic-failure-data-faulty-for-the-last-45-days/
History repeating itself?
Lets wait and see if the character assassins show up.
Spanglers – and so?
James – You’re showing me a SST map for a “DAY” – you’re a moron ! Instead of trolling for trash why don’t you attempt to learn something?
Tadzikistan produces devastating rebuttal – gurgle …. zzzz ….
Dark Jedi,
If you want considerations from me, you know the price of admission.
Access Fee;
By the Light;
Dream Rush;
Fascinatin’ Rhythm;
Rose for You;
Royal Michelle;
and Seventh Street.
Pick me a last place horse.
Oh and say something about southwestern US drought.
🙂
““Gone Fishing” is an expression we use here in Australia to let people know that a business is closed for a period of time while the owner takes a break.”
I think it was actually an expression they used on the Bugs Bunny show when I watched it as a child.
Spanglers – and so?
That this simply indicates that the GBR has moved up and down the east coast in correlation with CC.
And all those endangered animal stories because of AGW should be filed under “Polar Bears”.
Say – do any of you have something you would like to say to Jim Hansen?
He’s promoting civil disobedience against coal for March 2 in Washington DC through a website. Here’s the comment forum. http://www.capitolclimateaction.com/?page_id=282/logistics/west-coast-climate-action/#p37
I thought for sure there woud be a realclimate style moderator, but there isn’t. My post went straight up on the board.
Luke…. re Lindzen and Spencer…”And so your basis for doing that is that it appeals to your POV”.
No…my POV was formed from studying their work. I follow the work of Lindzen because he is a professor at MIT, has 40 years experience studying the atmosphere and is one of the world’s authorities on it, having published over 200 books and papers. Spencer also has a degree in meteorology, which is a study of the atmosphere. He worked for NASA and received a medal from them for his work in the atmosphere. Above all, I value their work because it makes ultimate sense.
I simply cannot understand why people take computer modelers like James Hansen and Gavin Schmidt seriously. Hansen is an astrophysicist to begin with and Schmidt is purely a mathematician. Hansen has been wrong time after time with his model-based predictions. He admitted that in 1998 after making three predictions in 1988, none of which came to pass. I don’t know how anyone could stand by with a straight face and talk about climate disasters and tipping points when direct observation is making a lie of those model-based arguments.
I’ve got a good one for you. I was watching a movie in which Steven Schneider was interviewed for the AGW perspective on global warming. He’s the one who claims it is OK to lie to people about global warming if necessary. He’s also a biologist who works as a modeler. In the 1970’s, he was predicting global cooling. Anyway, he said something to the effect that he sometimes finds it necessary to ignore direct observation when his models tell him otherwise.
John Christy, Roy Spencer’s partner, claims the same thing. He took his satellite data sets to a modeler, trying to be helpful. The modeler got mad at him, telling him he didn’t care, that his model was right and the satellite data was wrong.
It’s people like you who are willing to accept the words of those guys on sheer faith alone. Why you line up behind the modelers is perplexing to me based on the immaturity of the science alone. It would be fascinating to get into your mind to see where the scientific logic goes askew. Then again, I’d be afraid of what else I might find, like an empty space. Then I’d have to look really closely to see where the strings that move your limbs are attached, and where the batteries are inserted.
maybe there’s a lack of a Nothing Box Gordon. 🙂
Luke “BUT it’s hardly a debate about back radiation not existing. Which is where you’ve come from !!! The primodial denialist slime pits”.
I have never claimed their is no such thing as back-radiation, even if that term is somewhat dodgy. I have used the work of G&T and the textbook Fundamentals of Atmospheric Radiation to question the extent of back-radiation and whether it plays a significant role in global warming. My POV is that the physics behind radiation is far too complicated for us to claim we know how much of it is due to anthropogenic CO2 and how much of it contributes to warming. We don’t know, that’s all I’m saying.
The thrust of my argument is that global warming is not caused by anthropogenic CO2, although that source may play a minute role. My POV, although it doesn’t amount to a hill of beans, is that radiation is a minor warming element. As G&T said, there is no physics to back that notion. Even Spencer points out that the AGW theory is largely based on a mathematical analogy.
What I’m trying to argue with you, although you have installed yourself as the expert, is that no quantification is available for exactly how much warming is due to anthropogenic CO2. The figures are guessed at based on mathematical modeling. The IPCC has admitted that CO2 fluxes are only guessed at, with a +/- 20 % error margin. The rest of the IPCC opinion is based on probabilities, not fact. If I am reading them correctly, the AGW theorists claims that CO2 accounts for about 1.0 C of the warming, out of a theoretical 33 C greenhouse warming.
Do you think it’s a coincidence that 1/33 is 0.03%, almost the identical percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere? You don’t think someone saw that and figured the contribution of CO2 to the warming was proportional to it’s percentage in the atmosphere. Modelers are famous for working backwards to a conclusion.
The 33 C of greenhouse warming is purely hypothetical. No one knows for sure what the temperature of this planet would be without an atmosphere, and based on that, it is purely a guess that the 15 C mean global temperature is from greenhouse gases. We have no idea what temperature we began with at the surface, after all the volcanic eruptions quietened down. We have no idea what role the oceans and internal heat from the Earth is playing in the current warming.
It’s the fact that you are so immersed in the anthropogenic warming theory that bothers me. If there’s one thing I have learned from my cursory experience in science it’s to keep my mind open. As much as I dislike the notion, I am forced to keep my mind open to the possibility that the AGW theory is correct. I’ll use rhetoric to make it appear as if the theory is rubbish but I know once I accept that as a belief that I am no longer thinking scientifically. I don’t know for sure that the theory is incorrect, I just have an educated hunch that it is wrong.
Linus Pauling might have earned himself a third Nobel Prize for the discovery of the shape of the DNA molecule. He was certainly light years ahead of Watson and Crick, who are credited with the discovery. In fact, he helped them understand what they had found. It was the McCarthyist brainwashing that prevented him getting to England to consult with an X-Ray crystallographer that probably did him in. The US government withheld his passport because he expressed skepticism at their claim that nuclear radiation was harmful. They tried to brand him a Commie.
Ultimately it was his own stubbornness that cost him most. He refused to leave his line of thought about DNA and that prevented him visualizing the molecule’s shape. Once it became apparent that he had erred, he didn’t sulk and go into denial, he laughed at his own stupidity. To me, that’s what separates a great scientist from an also-ran. People like Pauling have no time for egotrips, if they are wrong, they admit it.
It’s becoming more apparent with each year that Hansen is wrong. I am not holding my breath that he or his AGW buddies will ever own up to that. Those people are more like the closed-minded McCarthyists, who prevented Pauling having a passport because he was skeptical. I see people like Hansen and the realclimate crew as biased, scientific bigots, who really don’t understand quite what they are on about.
That’s why I drift towards scientists like Lindzen and Spencer. Lindzen, in particular, is an eloquent speaker and writer. If you want to see the difference, get a hold of the debate between him and Stephen Rahmstorf of realclimate. Rahmstorf bases much of his theory on rhetoric, even though he’s a physicist. When I hear a scientist using emotion as the basis of his arguments, I know he is grasping at straws. However, it was the arrogance of Rahmstorf taking on someone with Lindzen’s experience that bothered me most.
G&T, German scientists like Rahmstorf, summed it up adequately. They said the theories of Rahmstorf on back-radiation are wrong. Put simply, you can’t add energies from different systems to get a net energy flow. Heat is energy due to thermal agitation of atoms, and when you talk about heat flow, you are talking about that flow between different energy potentials in a closed system. When you bring solar radiation into the question, and claim the net energy flow (not heat flow) from the surface to the atmosphere is positive, thus meeting the laws of thermodynamics, according to G&T, you don’t know what you’re talking about.
That’s the biggest argument against your back-radiation. That radiation is supposed to warm the surface beyond the temperature it is warmed by solar radiation, thus releasing more water vapour as a feedback. That is a direct contravention of the laws of thermodynamics, yet people like Rahmstorf get around that impossibility using convenient math.
Just defining what is a closed system and what is not is virtually impossible. When solar energy warms the surface with broad spectrum energy, the surface radiates in a narrower IR band. It is now the source and it heats the GHG’s in the atmosphere. Those in turn are supposed to back-radiate to the surface and you have a cooler body radiating against a warmer body. In that system alone, Clausius made it clear that a cooler body cannot warm a warmer body (that warmed it) to a temperature higher than the warming body.
Rahmstorf et al seem to be implying that the back-radiation can be added to the solar radiation, on a one-to-one basis, to get a surface temperature that is warmer than the surface would be due to solar radiation alone. Even the author in the textbook ‘Fundamentals of Atmospheric Radiation’ was dubious about that claim, and he wasn’t oposed to the AGW theory. He thought the back-radiation theory was just a bit odd and the alternate theory that the GHGs were acting as a blanket was pure nonsense.
If Rahmstorf et al are going to make such claims, shouldn’t they have quantities of heat that can be verified? As G&T said, if CO2 had the ability to store and radiate heat in the quantities used in the AGW theory, it would be a new super-insulator. No such abilities have been demonstrated for CO2 in a lab.
“That’s the biggest argument against your back-radiation. That radiation is supposed to warm the surface beyond the temperature it is warmed by solar radiation, thus releasing more water vapour as a feedback. That is a direct contravention of the laws of thermodynamics, yet people like Rahmstorf get around that impossibility using convenient math.”
No, it doesn’t warm the surface beyond the solar radiation, and it doesn’t contravene the laws of thermodynamics in any way.
The atmosphere is nearly transparent to the incoming radiation from the sun. It is very short in wavelength.
But it is not transparent to some of the frequencies that are re-radiated from the earth, because what comes out is not just short wavelengths, but a mix. (This is where albedo is a factor). These longer wavelengths are absorbed and re-emitted in a random direction, some of it goes back down to earth. It does not violate thermodynamics, because eventually all the radiation will escape to space. The only effect is to slow down it’s passage to space, not stop it. This effectively warms the earth.
Think of it as a faulty trapdoor. It lets in radiation easily, and lets it back out not so easily, but it does let it out.
This happens due to the change in frequency the energy experiences from being absorbed and re-emmitted by the surface of the earth.
sjt
trapdoors even, my God!
never heard a bigger load of rubbish, what on earth are you on about?
(or more relevant maybe, what on earth are you on?)
Gordon
“As G&T said, if CO2 had the ability to store and radiate heat in the quantities used in the AGW theory, it would be a new super-insulator. No such abilities have been demonstrated for CO2 in a lab.”
Super-insulator – why would you think that? Gordon why do you continue to attempt to describe things not as they are? This is fanciful stuff.
Surely it’s about “net” energy budget. Why do deserts get so cold at night – clear, cloudless, dry skies letting radiation escape more easily into space; why do cloudy nights have warmer minima in general – more radiation kept in. WHy does Eli’s aluminium foil covered light bulb get hotter?
There is no “insulation” effect from CO2 – this is simply about radiation budget. I can send you the whole Philipona series if you email me. Then I encourage you to email them and point out where they’re wrong. The effect from anthropogenic CO2 isn’t large – but neither is the radiation budget to get an ice age.
The reason the degrees of warming sensitivity is problematic is because the overall impact on biosphere feedbacks, clouds, cryosphere, and exactly how water vapour reacts is complex. Not to mention whole circulation systems changes.
Why are you obsessed with a few global warming “personalities” like Hansen and Schmidt – surely there are 100s of other papers and scientists to choose from. Why – simply because it suits the denialist mythology.
Actually how often do you hear the pro-AGW people here even quoting Hansen?
Frankly if I were looking for issues it would be clouds, biosphere feedbacks and decadal climate variability.
I was told yesterday by a serious climate scientist that the current “stasis” in temperature growth is actually quite unremarkable and often occurs in GCM runs.
Indeed the real fascinating stuff is yet to come – which is the impact of AGW on the IPO and AMO. And resolving if there will be an impact on El Nino. And it was most refreshing to hear both the downside and upside arguments. Very rare – and unseen here on blog….
Also when the models and supercomputers get powerful enough to resolve at 20km resolution we get into a new era of ocean/atmosphere physics.
Gordon your rush to beat everything down is as blinding as the AGW rush to push an alarmist view. You should take your sources material much more widely.
Why do you think Spencer has not revealed the comments by reviewers which have “prevented” his publication? Embarrassing perhaps?
“Luke” typed: “As G&T said, if CO2 had the ability to store and radiate heat in the quantities used in the AGW theory, it would be a new super-insulator. No such abilities have been demonstrated for CO2 in a lab.”
Super-insulator – why would you think that? Gordon why do you continue to attempt to describe things not as they are? This is fanciful stuff.
Gordon
“As G&T said, if CO2 had the ability to store and radiate heat in the quantities used in the AGW theory, it would be a new super-insulator. No such abilities have been demonstrated for CO2 in a lab.”
Ken, maybe your understanding of basic physics is limited to the Enid Blyton University you got your BSc. (Hons) from. In any case the QLD state government deficit reported in the news might be more important than pouring your pee over shackled sceptics?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/5day.shtml?world=1577 Five day forecast in C for Tombouctou, Mali.
This is the desert. In the mid winter. The average daily low for the week is 18.4 Celsius.
Sounds cold to me but I’m used to Fahrenheit.
Sixty five degrees!?! That’s just about cool enough to sleep without the a/c.
Jimmy Carter ask America to set our thermostat at 68 back during the energy crisis.
This desert isn’t so cold at night.
Let’s try another. The Kalahari? Why not.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/5day.shtml?world=1600 Windhoek, Namibia.
The average daily low for the week is 17.5 degrees. And this is kind of weird. Namibia is on the other side of the equator so this is mid summer – plus Namibia is socked in with rainstorm for the whole week. Which means that the humidity is at the saturation point.
Why is it that the dry Sahara in winter is warmer, then the wet Kalahari in summer?
“This is the desert. In the mid winter. The average daily low for the week is 18.4 Celsius.
Sounds cold to me but I’m used to Fahrenheit.
Sixty five degrees!?! That’s just about cool enough to sleep without the a/c. ”
Luke talks about night time temperatures, you talk about day time temperatures. Right…….
“Luke talks about night time temperatures, you talk about day time temperatures. Right…….”
SJ,
Not so. Click the link (it won’t bite – it’s the Beeb). Those are average low (nightime) temperatures for the week.
These guys aren’t coming up with any evidence. They are just liars. Reasonable people are keeping this controversy in the air by pretending or by wrongly imagining that the global warming crowd aren’t all compulsive liars. But they are compulsive liars. And the only way we can break this spell is to all speak to them with this in mind.
Luke said;
“The effect from anthropogenic CO2 isn’t large” [it is negligible]
“The reason the degrees of warming sensitivity is problematic is because the overall impact on biosphere feedbacks, clouds, cryosphere, and exactly how water vapour reacts is complex. Not to mention whole circulation systems changes.”
“Frankly if I were looking for issues it would be clouds, biosphere feedbacks and decadal climate variability.”
Even Luke has now admitted he doesn’t know what is happening. It is convenient not to know what the observations are , especially if your theory needs to predict future observations.
AGW is fiction and Lukes real name is Charles Lutwidge Dodgson.
TG – I’m sorry you’re limited to numbers below 10 – the case for AGW is most comprehensive. I’m discussing decadal behaviour and issues of some uncertainty. Do try to keep up.
If the effect from anthropogenic CO2 was large you’d be roasted ! Again illustrates the decrepitude of the pseudo-sceptic mind.
and James is giving us a weather report …. LOL !
SJT “The atmosphere is nearly transparent to the incoming radiation from the sun. It is very short in wavelength”.
Why don’t you look at the radiation spectrum of solar energy. There is more energy in the IR band of solar radiation than in the shorter wave visual energy band. That means the atmosphere is not transparent to solar radiation. I held my nose and went to wikipedia because I can’t post the textbook material I have:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Solar_Spectrum.png
taken from here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_radiation
Right beside the smaller solar spectrum that I enlarged, you’ll see this:
“The spectrum of the Sun’s solar radiation is close to that of a black body with a temperature of about 5,800 K. About half that lies in the visible short-wave part of the electromagnetic spectrum and the other half mostly in the near-infrared part. Some also lies in the ultraviolet part of the spectrum”.
So, the Sun is warming the atmosphere with IR on the way in. Have you ever seen that acknowledged in AGW theory? How much is water vapour and CO2 warmed directly by incoming solar IR?
“It does not violate thermodynamics, because eventually all the radiation will escape to space. The only effect is to slow down it’s passage to space, not stop it. This effectively warms the earth”.
Talk about taking liberties with physics. In the textbook Fundamentals of Atmospheric Radiation, the authors have this to say about your theory:
“….the notion that the atmosphere traps radiation is at best a bad metaphor, at worst downright silly…”
The authors are Craig Bohren and E. E. Clothiaux. Bohren is a retired professor in the meteorology department of Penn State University. Clothiaux is a Ph. D in physics and he is currently an assistant professor at the Pennsylvania State University, where his interests are ground- and satellite-based remote sensing of clouds with an emphasis on trying to understand the impact of clouds on the radiation budget of the Earth.
BTW, Penn State employs Michael Mann as well. Maybe he should drop over and chat with the boys in the meteorology department instead of hanging out with mathematicians and computer programmers at realclimate.
The problem with your simplified theory is that heat cannot escape vertically in the tropics because the atmosphere there is opaque to heat radiation. The heat is transported north and south to higher latitudes by convection where it is released. The AGW theory conveniently forgot that phenomena in it’s simple analogies.
Furthermore, the AGW theory is based purely on the notion that radiation is responsible for heat transfer and dismisses the effect of convection. In that light, your theory of a trapdoor makes no sense. If the surface is radiating heat and the atmosphere is back-radiating that heat, it makes no sense to talk about a delaying mechanism or a trapping mechanism. Even computer models use water vapour as a feedback, and there can be no feedback if CO2 is not aiding the production of more water vapour. Feedback requires a mechanism to make it positive and that mechanism in AGW theory is CO2 back-radiation.
Here’s the link to Stephen Wilde again:
http://co2sceptics.com/news.php?id=1487
His hot water bottle theory makes a lot more sense than the greenhouse theory and he’s a meteorologists too boot. He describes the effect of convection as opposed to radiation and he makes an excellent point about the atmosphere that most people seem to be missing. Nitrogen and oxygen, which account for 97%+ of atmospheric gases, largely define the temperature of the atmosphere. Where did they get the heat? They get it by convection from the ocean surface. We know that satellites measure microwave radiation from oxygen to derive an atmospheric average, not CO2.
It’s pretty obvious that the oceans are acting as a heat reservoir and that they release the heat that causes global warming.
SJT “Think of it as a faulty trapdoor”.
Why do I want to do that? I’m trying to understand the physics, not an analogy. It’s through the use of those inane analogies that the AGW theory has profilerated. People are starting to question the science behind the AGW theory and things are not adding up.
SJT “This happens due to the change in frequency the energy experiences from being absorbed and re-emmitted by the surface of the earth”.
This is where the confusion lies. Exactly what is going on? Solar energy is not merely changing frequency and re-radiating from the surface. The incoming energy is spread over a continuous spectrum of frequencies and it warms the Earth’s surface as well as the atmosphere. The ultra-violet and visible frequencies may be invisible to the atmosphere but the IR is not. In fact, energy from the Sun interacts with atmospheric oxygen at some levels. Satellites pick up microwave energy (high-frequency IR) from O2 molecules in the atmosphere.
When the surface is warmed, it radiates according to it’s temperature, which is low compared to solar energy. However, the surface is not a solid surface at those energy frequencies. The energy interacts with atoms and molecules near the surface. That’s why the surface radiates in the IR, it’s due to vibrations in the molecules that make up the surface. The surface radiation is relatively broad-spectrum and GHG’s intercept only discrete bands of that IR. You’re going to have a real tough time explaining how that IR is slowed down or stored by GHGs, especially CO2, which absorbs with a peak at 10 microns. Water vapour absorbs a much wider spectrum of IR.
The point I’m trying to make is that the theory is very complex and not well understood. Much of the theory is based on a statistical analysis of gases since there’s no way to measure the kinetic energy of a single molecule or atom in a cloud of gas. Photons are treated statistically in the same way as gas molecules. It is meaningless to speak of a single photon, so they are treated statistically. Trying to cover a theory as complex as global warming using a simple model is totally inadequate for me. Furthermore, visualizing CO2 molecules as absorbing and emitting photons in the simplistic models of the IPCC seems really bizarre.
Anyway, your theory is the one not in favour. The other theory is that GHGs absorb photons of IR and re-radiate that energy to the surface. In the textbook Fundamentals of Atmospheric Radiation, at least three chapters are devoted to the absorption and emission of photons, as well as the scattering of photons. As much as the AGW theorists would like to have us believe it, photons don’t pass right through the nitrogen and oxygen molecules that make up 97% of the atmosphere. They are scattered by those gases where scattering is their direction of propagation.
If you consider an ordinary mirror, we are taught that electromagnetic radiation (light) is reflected on the mirror surface if it strikes at the correct angle. That’s not what actually happens. The EM, which is still a phenomenon that is not at all understood, interacts with atoms near the surface which scatters the light. In universities, students are taught to think of reality via mathematical equations. Feynman lamented the fact that most students don’t get exposed to the reality…what is actually going on. It’s quite possible that most of the scientists reviewing for the IPCC haven’t the foggiest notion how reality works, hence their adherence to an overly simplified model such as the greenhouse theory. They arrive at their theories simply by crunching numbers, with little thought given to whether the numbers make sense or not.
I don’t have the background to query the theories seriously, but people like G&T do. The only critique I’ve seen of their work is a cherry-picked rebuttal by Arthur Smith. At that, he used a model as the basis for his proof, not physics. I think that’s sad considering he was trained as a physicist.
“dismisses the effect of convection. I”
What utter utter crap !
Give it away Gordon – it’s starting to get embarrassing. You have to be joking….
You have made no attempt to check out your utter crap with serious radiation physicists and have less than any idea about modelling of climate. Wallow in your supreme ignorance.
Luke “Super-insulator – why would you think that? Gordon why do you continue to attempt to describe things not as they are? This is fanciful stuff”.
One of your high priests at realclimate, Gavin Schmidt, quoted a study that showed CO2 was 10% to 25% responsible for greenhouse warming. A gas, that accounts for 0.03% of all atmospheric gases has that much effect. Right!! That means CO2 is acting as a medium that can store and redistribute heat to a level ranging from 10% to 25%.
Why are we not using that technology in home heating? All we’d need is a big tank of CO2 in a clear container. We could set up a radiant heat source in front of it and the CO2 would absorb IR from the heat source, store it, and recirculate it to the room so that we could realize a 10% to 25% improvement in efficiency. Alternately, we could just fill our walls with CO2 and it would act as a super-insulator, by trapping heat and reflecting it back. To make sure none got outside, we could line the inside of the outside wall with aluminum to reflect the heat.
Perfect world, eh? Why do you suppose that system isn’t used? Because CO2 does not have those properties. It can absorb and radiate IR, but not nearly to that extent.
Meanwhile, Lindzen, with 40 years experience in atmospheric physics, claims the total effect of all GHGs, except for water vapour, account for no more than 3% of greenhouse warming. He bases that on the fact that it is largely convection that transports heat in the atmosphere, not radiation. Meterologists know that, it is the computer modelers who seem to be confused about it. Even if you allow 2% warming for CO2, the anthropogenic contribution to atmospheric CO2 is only 3% of that 2%.
That 2% is 0.66C of the 33 C of greenhouse warming and the anthropogenic contribution is about 0.02 C, not the 1 C claimed by AGW advocates. Even if you got generous and gave CO2 a 10% contribution, that is 3.3 C for ALL CO2. The anthropogenic contribution would be 3% of that or 0.03 x 3.3 C = 0.1 C, not the 1.0 C claimed by the AWGers.
Gordon – you’re all over the place – firstly no back radiation – now we seem to be OK with that. No greenhouse effect – but water vapour can be a greenhouse gas. “oooo oooo but it’s only 0.40% Gordon” – “how come it has such a BIG effect !!!”
well if water vapour can be – so can others (molecular configuration willing).
Which is it Gordon – a merry dance – flitting from concept to concept. And I had to belly laugh – fill our walls with CO2 – they’re not exposed to radiation – then expect them to act like a greenhouse layer -ignore the local convection effects. Mate – give it away …
Utterly utterly stupid … but that’s the denialist mind. Hey have we mentioned Hansen today?
Luke “Surely it’s about “net” energy budget”.
This a good point. I think you should focus more on points like this. I’m still trying to unravel the mysteries myself. G&T make this point:
***The renowned German climatologist Rahmstorf has claimed that greenhouse effect does not contradict the the second law of thermodynamics:
“Some `sceptics’ state that the greenhouse effect cannot work since (according to the second law of thermodynamics) no radiative energy can be transferred from a colder body (the atmosphere) to a warmer one (the surface).
However, the second law is not violated by the greenhouse effect, of course, since, during the radiative exchange, in both directions the net energy flows from the warmth to the cold.”
G&T -> Rahmstorf’s reference to the second law of thermodynamics is plainly wrong. The second law is a statement about heat, not about energy. Furthermore the author introduces an obscure notion of “net energy flow”. The relevant quantity is the “net heat flow”, which, of course, is the sum of the upward and the downward heat flow within a fixed system, here the atmospheric system. It is inadmissible to apply the second law for the upward and downward heat separately redefining the thermodynamic system on the fly.***
I’m still trying to work out the details of this statement. The interpretation of the 2nd law by Clausius clearly states that heat cannot flow from a cooler body to a warmer body that heated it so as to raise the temperature of the warming body to a higher temperature than it was when it heated the cooler body. Rahmstorf is talking about a ‘net energy flow’ but the 2nd law talks specifically about a net heat flow. It seems to me that Rahmstorf is bringing the solar radiation into the equation to get his net energy flow, which he claims is positive.
Whereas that may seem kosher mathematically, there are issues to be clarified. Rahmstorf slips in the heat due to convection. As Stephen Wilde points out in his Hot Water Bottle Theory, the majority gases of nitrogen and oxygen in the atmophere get their heat from somewhere and they are not IR absorbers. Satellites are measuring the microwave radiation from O2, not from GHGs. What warmed the O2 and N2? Now we have a complication in the energy budget.
As G&T point out, heat can only be summed in a closed system. That means you can only add the heat generated by the surface (higher kinetic energy source) to the heat generated by the atmosphere (lower kinetic energy source) as back-radiation. This is no longer about straight mathematics, it’s about energies from different sources and different frequencies being added to each other. Not only that, one energy is from a broad spectrum source and the other is from a discrete spectrum source of various GHGs that radiate differently.
Luke “Gordon – you’re all over the place – firstly no back radiation – now we seem to be OK with that. No greenhouse effect – but water vapour can be a greenhouse gas”.
Is that an answer, or a ploy? If you have read my previous posts, you’ll know that I have always acknowledged back-radiation and a warming effect. I have questioned the extent of the back-radiation, especially from the measly amount of anthropogenic CO2 in our vast atmosphere. I question the use of the term ‘greenhouse effect’ because the atmosphere behaves nothing like a greenhouse and that simplified model only serves to confuse the issue.
I use the term GHG strictly for communication purposes, much the same as I use references to yesterday and tomorrow, even though both are illusions. The IPCC even plays that game. Listening to them, one might get the impression global warming was caused solely by anthropogenic CO2. They never mention water vapour unless they have to. They grudgingly admit in the fine print that anthropogenic CO2 is only a small fraction of natural CO2 and that CO2 fluxes have an error of +/- 20%. But, hey, what’s accuracy when your trying to spin a yarn? It never seems to bother them that a minute amount of anthropogenic CO2 could cause such bother.
“Why are you obsessed with a few global warming “personalities” like Hansen and Schmidt – surely there are 100s of other papers and scientists to choose from. Why – simply because it suits the denialist mythology.
Actually how often do you hear the pro-AGW people here even quoting Hansen?”
Strange, I’ve been quoting Hansen all week. He is the featured criminal at http://www.capitolclimateaction.com/ – the mass civil disobedience at the coal-fired Capitol power plant in Washington DC.
I think Luke, much like his hero, mistake a paucity for abundance, in warming evidence as well as quotable utterances.
Jimmy is a one note fanatic who doesn’t deserve the position of trust he has aquired. His presence undermines GISS and by extention the whole of NASA. Look at the pathetic bastard on the video. He’s Homer Simpson on ice.
His influence has even corrupted the polar ice observing satellites.
Did you know that the sensor used to tabulate the Arctic ice, so that all those dishonest medias can claim the ice is melting at alarming rates, measures melt pools on top of ice slabs as open ocean?
I didn’t until I heard it directly from the designer of the sensor ( //wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/20/sea-ice-sensor-degradation-hits-cryosphere-today/ – Richard C. Savage (20:04:55) : in the comment section).
These are things which a real scientist, one deserving of trust, would make clear rather then filling children’s heads with “coal trains are death”. Isn’t it strange that these same sensors never make the same mistake when say recording melt waters on Greenland? Your favored boy is a scumbag. plain and simple.
If it weren’t for the necessity of correcting his omnipresent mistakes, cons, and failures, his work would be forgotten by history, as it will be soon anyways, regardless of media mendacity.
Hansen should thank us. If he wasn’t a complete fool he would realize that what we do here might save more people from the result of his lies, removing that guilt from his shoulders. Perhaps we are saving his grave from endless desecrations.
Gavin Shmidt is just a symptom of the Hansen sickness that pervades NASA. Lance the boil and you will get rid of the puss.
James
Why are you obsessed with a few global warming “personalities” like Hansen and Schmidt – surely there are 100s of other papers and scientists to choose from. Why – simply because it suits the denialist mythology.
Actually how often do you hear the pro-AGW people here even quoting Hansen?
“They grudgingly admit” – no you continually gratuitously add rhetoric
So Gordon – how many watts difference in the energy budget to give an ice age?
Luke said;
“- but water vapour can be a greenhouse gas. “oooo oooo but it’s only 0.40% Gordon” – “how come it has such a BIG effect !!!””
Isn’t WV on average around 1.0000%? Carbon is about 0.0385%
The IPCC state that water vapour contributes contributes 30-70% of the Greenhouse effect and carbon contributes 9–26%.
By volume carbon is not a third of waters volume, yet its contribution to the GHE is miraculously amplified to a third of waters by the IPCC.
How come Luke?
Carbon has gone from approximately 0.0314% of the atmosphere in 1960 to about 0.0385% today. (according to the Scripps CO2 Program). Yet 95% of carbon going into the atmosphere comes from sources other than anthropological activities. In other words the rise in CO2 is 95% caused by something else.
Level of stupidity alert – TG accounts for half the ledger. “Yet 95% of carbon going into the atmosphere comes from sources other than anthropological activities” yes and how much is also absorbed – off you go now and try to stay upright. Think net !
“Level of stupidity alert”
I don’t know about that, more like ‘recycling’ dead and buried AGW great white hopes alert; luke you know the amopunt of ACO2 remaining in the atmosphere is miniscule; you can calculate it by reference to DOE Table 3 p 26
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/FTPROOT/environment/057304.pdf
Fig 7.3 of AR4 is also helpful. The isotopic distinction is a dead end as Segalstad and our Steve Short show, so the only sane conclusion is that ACO2 is of no consequence.
BTW Dessler and by inference Philipona is getting a bit of a work-out at Niche;
http://landshape.org/enm/propagation-of-uncertainty-through-dessler/#more-1790
Enjoy!
Luke said;
“how much is also absorbed”
Only 5% comes from anthropological activities so prove to me that MORE than 5% of what’s absorbed comes from anthropological activities. (Do not tell me that the level is going up, that’s “why is it so” Professor Luke Sumner Miller)
Also show me a controlled experiment that quantifies the contribution carbon makes to the Greenhouse effect ( or any other gas for that matter)
Luke you fraud. Stop screwing around. If you have the evidence COME OUT WITH IT and relate it to a specific hypothesis. Either do that or go away and kill yourself. Now just do it. Stop talking AROUND the subject and just do it. Just do it. And if you cannot do it admit you are wrong and retract and either kill yourself or start full-time abuse of the notion of a cap-and-kill or a carbon-tax. These are abominations.
“Why do you think Spencer has not revealed the comments by reviewers which have “prevented” his publication? Embarrassing perhaps?”
Luke,
I took the liberty of asking Roy Spenser just that very question and he replied that he would have to check whether revealing those comments violates any rules of those journals, he was prepared to do it but that it would take time to excerpt. [He must not have them].
He then went on to say:
“But what is the point of going through all of this trouble anyway, when even the papers we do publish are ignored? For instance, Spencer & Braswell, Nov. 2008 J. of Climate, showed that satellite estimates of feedback — which have always suggested less climate sensitivity than the IPCC models — are themselves biased toward high sensitivity. This should be a major wakeup call that something is wrong, and even Piers Forster, a reviewer of that paper, said that is was an important finding that climate modelers should be made aware of.
“Or, how about adjusting climate models so they produce the strongly negative tropical feedback we found in Spencer et al., 2007 GRL, and then see how much global warming those models produce?
“There is sufficient published work out there…but it is simply being ignored.
“Critics of researchers like me will always find something to object to…it is never ending. We eventually will get the follow-on work published…but then people like Luke will move on to other objections, for instance: “Well, this climate expert over here says Spencer is wrong”.
-Roy”
Sums it up pretty well for me — particularly, of course, those GCMs……
Spangle,
Hat tip.
Utter utter bunk Spanglers – his paper was shit – the simple answer. Can’t share the reviewers comments – woo hoo – what a load of crap. And you believed him – more fool you …
Cohers – yes I noticed – but why not involve Rolf as you have Mizowhats – anything but engage the author eh? Anyway I note Stockwell was summarily dispatched as a weener by the AMM reviewers. Truck I laughed. Short needs to get his finger out and publish otherwise it’s all just noise on the wire. Ho hum.
Bird – you be at the Corones Hotel next Saturday night and tell me to my face. It will the last thing you remember fat boy.
Spanglers – a result with MJO in the tropics does not imply a general finding.
TG – Philipona’s papers ( a series in GRL) – go Google son.
Luke,
Well, maybe you know what those reviewer’s findings are, but then, if you are just assuming…..
Maybe you can tell us your assumptions of the reviewer’s comments of Steig et al.
Spanglers – he’s bunging it on. If he thinks it’s a conspiracy you simply tell the world what the reviewers’ problems were. If you don’t you’re just a whinger. Lots of people have papers knocked back. It’s all just sooo convenient to bung on the conspiracy bullshit.
Probably coz the IPO is only EOF 2 !! LOLZ !
Luke, you’re lashing out at every interlocutor like a meth head in a bar fight. You should chill out and work on your exit strategy from this hole you’re digging yourself into. Now straighten yourself up and try to be nice before Jennifer gets back.
Jimmock February 22nd, 2009 at 6:26 pm
I’m afraid you are right Jimmock, his replays becoming more and more hysterical, and abusing despite, or maybe because of, the well thought out responses from others.
Need new topic!!!
“the well thought out responses from others.” hahahahahahaha – good one !
I prophesise the imminent return of the Jenny. Her hypotheses have failed – no chain reactions – no self sustaining. She is desperately needed back to be the grand mastermind recycler. Three weeks gone, and her diminishing band of acolytes have exhausted their usual recycles. It just goes to show an AGW sceptic campaign of counterknowledge has a half-life of about a week. Their random recycles have easily been countered by the few contributors who have bothered to acquaint themselves in an unbiased way with the evidence.
“and James is giving us a weather report …. LOL !”
I suppose he wants 30 years of wet Kalahari summer nights being colder then dry Sahara winter nights.
How about picking that horse just for grins and giggles?
Obviously Marcus and Jimmock are enamoured with high quality posts here from the likes of James. The boys are simply swooning. They’re probably also over the moon with Bird-Brian’s twittering.
So James Mayonnaise gives us a FORECAST of A WEEK’s WEATHER at a location not in the Kalahari desert itself as evidence of the Kalahari desert temperatures in general. Google what Windhoek looks like doofus.
And another FORECAST for A WEEK for Mali which is on the Saharan desert fringe.
What a denialist numb-nuts.
http://books.google.com.au/books?id=AxS61HR4_dwC&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=desert++temperature+dirunal+range&source=bl&ots=vxbIpQWsIx&sig=XVrk9RbuMqHdyRDXH89P4Q6gM44&hl=en&ei=JLuhSci9Ipz87AOWsqHGCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=3&ct=result
Check out the long term diurnal range in the desert. Fig 3.19c
How about you pick your bum for grins and giggles.
T G “Isn’t WV on average around 1.0000%? Carbon is about 0.0385% …The IPCC state that water vapour contributes contributes 30-70% of the Greenhouse effect and carbon contributes 9–26%”.
From what I’ve read, water vapour can range up to 3%, depending on the humidity. Anyway, the warming effect of water vapour does not come from its ability to absorb IR, it comes from it ability to rise when warmed. Water vapour warms by means of convection, not radiation. Even though it represents in the neighbourhood of 1% of the atmosphere, it is constantly replenished through evapouration from the oceans and land surface.
Clouds are another matter altogether, formed from water droplets rather than the smaller molecules of vapour. Clouds form, however, after the warmed vapour rises on it own accord and condenses. This is where the IPCC is so full of crap. They have relied far too heavily on computer model theory formed by mathematicians and astronomers, a theory which is totally based on radiative heat transfer.
The IPCC assertion that CO2 accounts for 9% to 25% of so-called greenhouse warming is absolute nonsense according to G&T, as well as Lindzen, who feels water vapour (including clouds) accounts for 97% of greenhouse warming. Computer modelers are full of crap when it comes to their understanding of meteorology or atmospheric physics.
To compound their ignorance, they just don’t want to know. When John Christy of UAH took satellite data to one modeler, he claimed arrogantly that his model was right and the satellite data wrong. Gavin Schmidt, a mathematician, claimed Richard Lindzen, a meteorology professor at MIT, with 40 years experience and over 200 books and papers in the field, was old-school, while Schmidt’s models were ready for textbooks.
Out of the 4000 scientists who are IPCC reviewers, only a few hundred have actual degrees in climate science. This is a major problem. Schmidt refers to himself as a computer scientist even though he has no degree in that field. There are geologists, astronomers and biologists calling themselves climate scientists for no other reason than they are associated in some capacity with climate studies. That is highly misleading and leads to the nonsense coming from the IPCC that CO2 has such an inordinate ability to warm the atmosphere.
cohenite “…luke you know the amount of ACO2 remaining in the atmosphere is miniscule; you can calculate it by reference to DOE Table 3 p 26….”
You actually don’t need any more than the page before figure 7.3 (AR4, WG1, Chapter 7, p. 514). It states in plain English that ACO2 is only a few percent of gross natural fluxes. I find it is a waste of time refering activists like Luke to such a direct reference, however. Once a belief system is ingrained in certain people, they are not going to budge, The sad part is that a belief is simply an ingrained thought with an attached emotion. The intelligence available in awareness allows anyone to see past a belief…if he/she wants to, that is.
spangled drongo “I took the liberty of asking Roy Spenser just that very question …”
Good initiative there, spangled. I have been in touch with both Roy and John Christy. Both are very helpful, although I am sure they are quite busy. On his webpage, Spencer refers to the Journal of Climate:
http://climate.uvic.ca/jclim/jclim.html
Take a look at the who’s who on this page and you’ll see why he can’t get published.
1) Chief Editor – Andrew Weaver – Canada’s answer to James Hansen. On his University of Victoria webpage, he makes the disclaimer that his weather predictions cannot be guaranteed. Yet, he is willing to make ridiculous climate predictions.
http://www.victoriaweather.ca/
see bottom of page under ‘disclaimer’
2)Editors Emeretus – Michael E Mann – good grief, it’s the realclimate connection.
Wait, there’s more….
3)Associate Editors – Gavin Schmidt
Man, I’m getting sick of this garbage. Luke, you are not just a shnook, you’re a stupid idiot. The Journal of Climate is influenced by the activists at realclimate, and you are questioning why Spencer can’t get published.
What is a mathematician and a geologist doing on a climate journal. Get serious.
It’s time we started writing to Weaver and expressing our disgust.
email address for Andrew Weaver at Journal of Climate: jcled@uvic.ca
I’m writing to him and I urge anyone with an ounce of interest in real science to do the same.
Well Bazza – correct again – like a robot -Gordon has just moved the chocolate wheel one notch and given today’s sermon. I guess Jimmock and Marcus will be in awe at the sheer quality of these posts so to say again would be seen in a nagative light (errr go the denialists – relax in the knowledge that your “contribution” adds 0.000000 every day to the science effort)
And if Gordon thinks I’m an “activist” – well he’d have to be the world’s best devotee to inactivism.
And it’s interesting that it seems Gordon only has two fringe dwellers to support his “case” – LOLZ !
One who now “can’t be published” – COZ COZ COZ there’s a BIG CONSPIRACY – oooooooo – ooooooo
“as well as Lindzen, who feels water vapour (including clouds) accounts for 97% of greenhouse warming.” HE FEELS – HE FEELS – well shit – why bother with science !!
So Gordon – have to rung up Lindzen and upped him for believing in a “greenhouse effect” – your words matey – you’ve been banging on that there isn’t one for months. Hey Jimmock and Marcvus – is that the quality you were talking about or is it just my meth contorted mind working?
Luke “Why are you obsessed with a few global warming “personalities” like Hansen and Schmidt -”
Because Hansen started the hysteria in 1988, cheered on by Al Gore, and he is the most quoted AGW personality. Schmidt is his boy wonder at NASA GISS and runs the activist journal at realclimate. Btween them, they are by far the most influential peddlars of the AGW theory.
Other AGW personalities, such as Kevin Trenberth, are far more measured in their opinions, even though he tends toward the political. Trenberth, a real climate scientist with a degree in the field, admits the science is not settled and that computer models are not yet reliable. He is an AGW advocate, however, and highly influential in the IPCC. He seems to have lead the attack on the satellite data even though Christy studied under him as a grad student.
Hansen is an astrophysicist who relies on computer models. If he had the background in atmospheric physics of Lindzen, Spencer, Christy or Singer, I could take him more seriously. Since he doesn’t, and his claims are outrageous and taken seriously by many people, I feel it is essential to expose the shortcomings in his arguments. That goes double for Schmidt, a mathematician with essentially no training in physics or climate science.
What you don’t seem to understand is that anyone can be a computer modeler, even a pure computer programmer like William Connolley of realclimate and wikipedia. You don’t need a background in physics or climate science. You just have to be able to program a computer or understand the application of mathematics to programming. That’s why computer modeling is so immature: the real climate scientists don’t normally do it. They are too busy studying weather systems and why they happen, like Lindzen.
Luke “So Gordon – have to rung up Lindzen and upped him for believing in a “greenhouse effect”
If you were not so busy kissing up to the high priests over at RC, you might open up your mind and read some Lindzen. I don’t need to get in touch, but I have and he has graciously replied. He has already covered your question in one of his papers:
http://eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/153_Regulation.pdf
Here’s an excerpt:
“The simple picture of the greenhouse mechanism is seriously oversimplified. Many of us were taught in elementary school that heat is transported by radiation, convection, and conduction. The above representation only refers to radiative transfer. As it turns out, if there were only radiative heat transfer, the greenhouse effect would warm the Earth to about seventy-seven degrees centigrade rather than to fifteen degrees centigrade. In fact, the greenhouse effect is only about 25 percent of what it would be in a pure radiative situation. The reason for this is the presence of convection (heat transport by air motions), which bypasses much of the radiative absorption”.
My note: maybe that explains the heat on Venus.
See…it pays to read. I did not know that the planet would be 77 C with purely radiative transfer. Then he goes on to say:
“The surface of the Earth is cooled in large measure by air currents (in various forms including deep clouds) that carry heat upward and poleward. One consequence of this picture is that it is the greenhouse gases well above the Earth’s surface that are of primary importance in determining the temperature of the Earth. That is especially important for water vapor, whose density decreases by about a factor of 1,000 between the surface and ten kilometers above the surface. Another consequence is that one cannot even calculate the temperature of the Earth without models that accurately reproduce the motions of the atmosphere. Indeed, present models have large errors here–on the order of 50 percent. Not surprisingly, those models are unable to calculate correctly either the present average temperature of the Earth or the temperature ranges from the equator to the poles. Rather, the models are adjusted or “tuned” to get those quantities approximately right”.
The only claims I have made is that the atmosphere does not replicate a greenhouse. SJT argued that the greenhouse was just an analogy, but as Lindzen claims, it is oversimplified. There is far more going on than what is accounted for in the ridiculously simplified IPCC model-based presentation.
According to this blogger we are making Jen redundant
http://opiniondominion.blogspot.com/2009/02/redundant-blogger.html
But according to this blogger we are not maintaining traffic
http://greenfyre.wordpress.com/2009/02/20/climate-denier-science-bought-and-paid-for/
He wishes climate change skeptics would go away?
So an op-ed in a Cato comic is now “a paper” eh? Jeez Gordon.
Are you actually trying to bluff us (and yourself) that climate models don’t do convection !! Wow
In fact how could you do modern climatology without modelling?
Think you need to stop reading Cato comics.
Luke “So an op-ed in a Cato comic is now “a paper” eh? Jeez Gordon”.
Anything from Lindzen makes sense. The guy’s too good, been around too long. You don’t get to be a professor at MIT unless you’re a top-notch scientist. He’s having trouble getting published too, which is no small wonder with the likes of Schmidt and Mann sitting as editors on climate journals. Peer review has taken a nose dive and if you want the truth, you have to dig for it.
Anyway is that the only criticism of everything I had to say…an ad hom of Lindzen? I must finally be getting through to you.
Is that cinch too tight Luke? Want I should loosen the saddle?
I know you’re terrified of picking the wrong horse, but I never expected it would compel you into a trip to the library.
(dude, just between you, me and the wall, your book report is a little vague – not that I’m meaning to send you on another trip – I’m just saying)
One thing though. If co2 works the way the IPCC claims, the diurnal extremes should progressively tightened up under low humidity desert conditions – because co2 traps that outgoing nighttime heat. Should see it tighten incrementally from one decade to the next. In fact it would be a good test for climate sensitivity to co2. The tighening of diurnal desert extremes.
But you aren’t interested in Mali weather.
OK never mind.
Jen has been busy.
look here: http://www.listentous.org.au
Nice dodge Gordon – but “Are you actually trying to bluff us (and yourself) that climate models don’t do convection !! ”
James – I just have to smile. Don’t think that the greenhouse effect might work day and night over deserts? LOL
“There is far more going on than what is accounted for in the ridiculously simplified IPCC model-based presentation.”
Yes, but you do agree there is a “greenhouse” effect, (although it doesn’t work like a greenhouse).
Dennis
Thanks for the update on our lovely host’s extra curricular activities. Nice to know she is out and about, (frankly I was beginning to worry.)
Happy to amuse you , Luke. The point in measuring to find the effect of something specific, is to make it as simple as possible, removing as many variables as possible. With GISS Hadcru and the satellites the main problem is they’re measuring water vapor’s greenhouse effect -which drowns out (literally) the signal of co2. If you want to measure the co2 warming you go where it’s dry.
Antarctica is the dryest place – and it’s in a 20 year cooling trend.
Thanks for playing Luke.
Are you still smiling?
I am gone for a few days and Luke is still dodging the fact that Hansen is the AGW team captain?
What a hoot.
Almost like he knows Hansen is full of it, but still wants the lovelies that come from promoting apocalyptic used bull fodder.
It is untenable to disown Hansen, the IPCC Schmidt Mann and Gore and still pretend that AGW is real. Either they are right or they are wrong. If one is weak in his faith and is unwilling to accept the full apocalyptic looming catastrophe as promoted by Hansen & pals, but sitll snarkily spam away in support of AGW, then what kind of poser are you?
Well James that’s why the Antarctic mid-troposphere is warming faster than anywhere else on Earth.
Hunter – bereft of a single new thought continues to behave like a dog returning to its vomit.
Luke,
“Well James that’s why the Antarctic mid-troposphere is warming faster than anywhere else on Earth.”
And the tropics? And the Arctic? The claim is that lower troposphere temperature trend amplification as compared to ground temperatures based on computer models predict an amplification factor at various timescales of about 1.3 times in the tropics and 1.2 times globally. Has this occurred?
If it has occurred as per model predictions I’d expect AGW believers to be crowing from the tree tops about it. It would be a very good confirmation of the models because it makes a specific prediction that would be unlikely to happen by chance.
The problem with stating that “region X” is warming/cooling in the troposphere or anywhere else, is that (1) it’s cherry picking if other regions on the planet predicted to do the same aren’t, and (2) long term temperature trends are never stable, there is always warming or cooling detected over time, so your argument has to be stronger than a 50-50 coin flip.
If there is good science behind what you’re saying perhaps you can point me in the direction of it?
Hunter,
Even the MET Office has recently gone on record distancing themselves from ‘alarmists’ who are attempting to associate specific whether events with AGW, or are predicting significant AGW in the short term (Hansen, et al).
(Although the Met Office would therefore seem to be distancing themselves somewhat from the Met Office.)
This is a complex issue, to say it all resolves around Hansen strikes me as rather implausible… He’s just a scientist that has fallen in love with his own theories–regrettably a common occurrence I’ve seen in many other research fields–scientists are only human after all. Hansen is not “the” problem. It’s that the media and so many others seek to listen to him uncritically, that creates problems. But don’t worry, who’ll be laughing last when that super el nino strikes in 2009? I mean, 2010? 😉
Will – take my eyes off you for a moment and you’ve dropped back to uniformism. You expect the same effect everywhere. Look at the existing climate system – e.g El Nino – means some places get drought, some get flood, some warmer, some cooler. So perturbations to the energy budget may be resolved in interesting ways. Averages may be up overall but your mileage may vary depending on location. A slowing thermohaline system might a colder Europe for example.
So that’s why you need models – you can’t resolve this stuff on the back on an envelope.
“Well James that’s why the Antarctic mid-troposphere is warming faster than anywhere else on Earth.”
Luke, you seem to know more about what is going on down there than Joanne Simpson.
http://climatesci.org/2008/02/27/trmm-tropical-rainfall-measuring-mission-data-set-potential-in-climate-controversy-by-joanne-simpson-private-citizen/
“The major lack for TRMM data use in testing climate theories is latitude limitation. Global warming impacts appear much more severe in polar latitudes than in tropical regions. The best news is that the Global Precipitation Mission (GPM) is on schedule for a 2013 launch.”
Well the tropics haven’t back up your theory. What are you going to do in 2013 when your fraud is exposed?
Does anybody know of a new study in press or newly released showing a refinement of the estimated co2 sensitivity down to between 1-2 degrees Celcius?
Because the AP just released this tub of bilge. Global warming danger threat increased
Misleading headline of course. The main thrust is that weather will kill us all at much lower increases of temperature then the IPCC had previously believed. But the only revelation in the story is that instead of expecting a temp rise of 1-3.5 C from a doubling of co2 now the IPCC seems to be doing a revision of the climate sensitivity, lopping off that extra 1.5 degrees C.
Luke,
“You expect the same effect everywhere. Look at the existing climate system – e.g El Nino – means some places get drought, some get flood, some warmer, some cooler…”
What kind of ludicrous bullshit answer is that? You’re not even pretending to do science now.
Can it be measured or not? Plausible answers might include:
(1) No, there is no evidence that model predictions are conforming to empirical data
(2) We don’t have sufficient sensitivity and/or historical data to make such measurements to the required accuracy (yet)
(3) I don’t know. (Although since constantly “educating” everyone about AGW you should find out the answers to basic questions first.)
Some idiotic babbling about how we can only “look to the models” to tell us what’s happening in the real world is bizarre, even for you.
You’re just as loopy and anti-science as the crazies you waste so much time arguing with. Amazing!
TG – obviously does not stand for Too Good does it. Sounds like you came down in the last shower sunshine. Big changes in the tropics including Walker circulation already. D tryo to read something other than bilge comics eh?
Walker circulation – mate it already has changed !
Weakening of the Walker Circulation and apparent dominance of El Niño both reach record levels, but has ENSO really changed? http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2007/2007GL030854.shtml
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/05/060503171511.htm
Vecchi, G. A., B. J. Soden, A. T. Wittenberg, I. M. Held, A. Leetmaa, and M. J. Harrison, 2006: Weakening of tropical Pacific atmospheric circulation due to anthropogenic forcing. Nature, 441(7089), 73-76.
Vecchi, G. A., and B. J. Soden, 2007: Global warming and the weakening of the tropical circulation. Journal of Climate, 20(17), 4316-4340.
SSTs changing in tropics?
Recent intensification of tropical climate variability in the Indian Ocean. http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v1/n12/abs/ngeo357.html
Unprecedented recent warming of surface temperatures in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v2/n1/abs/ngeo390.html
Tropics expanding?
Lu, J., C. Deser, and T. Reichler (2009): Cause of the widening of the tropical belt since 1958
Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L03803, doi:10.1029/2008GL036076
Hunter might note researchers other than Hansen !!
James – as much as it goes against my every instinct to encourage you – most sceptics would probably give at least 1C for CO2 alone. Anything above involves some feedbacks.
I think James Annan is still at 3C
http://julesandjames.blogspot.com/2006/03/climate-sensitivity-is-3c.html
http://www.jamstec.go.jp/frsgc/research/d5/jdannan/
Willy wonks – I’m not your research assistant. I’m not going to waste time on you with your endless exception type questions. AGW evidence isn’t perfect. There’s a good body of evidence. You have to weigh it up.
You could start by reading some of the references I’ve listed instead of expecting a custom precis of each paper for your delectation. So how about stop doing the G Bird impersonation and doing reading.
And of course you have to look to the models and the models need to look to the observations. How else do you really think this science is going to advance?
Luke,
Mate, you’re a joke. I am no expert in this research field and I know more about this topic than you do and I assure you, that’s not saying much.
Once again a scatter gun of irrelevant links just like Cohenite… Two sides of the same coin?
What about the Santer paper? Or papers by Douglas, Christy, or Karl? I.e., papers that actually discuss the question posed…? How about ANY indication at all that you have *any clue* about what you rant on about?
How many hours to do you spend writing crap expressing your point of view here? Maybe you could spend half that time actually *learning* stuff first, then come back and educate the unwashed..
My theory is that you’re just another pseudo-intellectual anti-science crank, kissing the arses of those you view as more intelligent than yourself. (The climatologists.) This would make a nice complement to the goof balls you constantly argue with (you know the ones who read one popular science book on climatology, then think they are such geniuses, that they can correct the work of qualified atmospheric physicists…)
They should lock all of you up in an insane asylum… preferably the same room, lol. You can then go around in circles with each other forever. Might make a good sequel to Jean-Paul Sartre’s In Camera. lol. 😉
Back home again after a 2nd round of sampling the local sea foods from our southern coastlines. The lack of familiar fish in mainland supermarkets has caused me to consider the decline of coastal species for some decades.
Given the continued productivity of Australian wild fisheries has been a topic here often enough I endeavour to take lots of pictures of who is still landing the catch for Australian consumption. My concern regarding the margins leads to a lot of other issues including climate change. I suggest no other global region is more obviously bothered by the extra heat from AGW.
Not on theme but it’s rather interesting to read up on recent posts here. Will; “I am no expert in this research field and I know more about this topic than you do and I assure you, that’s not saying much”
I reckon most continue to quote someone else’s hard work. Few are based on personal observations. For instance I spent much of today photographing the horizon from the window of several 737 aircraft while in flight and concluded we have never seen such smoke cover over vast areas for so many days.
From the ground, much of SE Australia, Tasmania, and the South Island of NZ have never been so dry all at once. Vast areas in S E Aus have been burnt recently, starting with the Canberra series of fires in 2003. Today I saw again half the big fires running through Victoria with smoke persisting through to Canberra and probably well into the Tasman as it was last Wednesday. These fires cause significant water vapour clouds too.
http://www.theage.com.au/national/firefighters-hurt-in-battle-to-save-citys-fringe-20090223-8fwn.html
Back to fishing: We saw some curious modern art on the bow of the Steve Irwin and had a brief chat to Paul about his next venture, apparently to deal with some shark poaching round the Galapagos Is.
http://www.themercury.com.au/article/2009/02/21/56935_todays-news.html
So Will Nitschke has theories even on Luke who is clearly obsessed with evidence.
‘My theory is that you’re just another pseudo-intellectual anti-science crank’.
But that reeks of intuition to me. I just read an interesting book review about decision making and it made a bleeding obvious point about trusting your intuition in subjects where you had experience and using the other more logic-seeking side of your brain where you dont. If anyone has an example of a blog more in violation of that simple observation, pray tell.
Meanwhile I have a little theory of my own, based sadly on intuition, along the lines that luke has invented some of the highly improbable opponents he belts the shine out of. Really Graeme Bird could not be real – otherwise our species deserves its fates. But Luke needs to develop more plausible opponents, maybe inject a bit of logic and manners into Will. Machiavelli recognised that you are only as good as your opponents aspire you to be.
Back to Earth info on the Victorian Situation for others catching up.
http://blogs.abc.net.au/victoria/2009/02/latest-fires-ac.html?program=melbourne_bushfires
Going by the Canberra experience it’s going to take years for our authorities to mop up, if they ever do.
Back in Tassie there is still a legacy from the 1967 Hobart fire season. Forests burnt then and burnt since don’t look the same. So they look more ragged on every visit. I can say the same about the hills beyond Melbourne’s Dandenong Ranges.
From the air, these places look like darkened islands in a sea of yellow, grass and lack of it desert like between the ridges allow fire fronts to speed through.
From high above the sea, our margins seem quite fragile too as the largest of beaches almost disappear. At estuary level it’s the roots that are constantly undermined with the earth being virtually sucked out. While watching the ducks swimming by up close, one is likely to fall in. Every tussock round the edge is a trap.
There are now over 1,000 signatures on Jen’s petition
http://www.listentous.org.au
Willy – good bit of biffo from you – I’m sure you enjoyed that.
I quite enjoy Cohenite’s references actually – you have to read between the lines. He’s marketing to a more sophisticated audience.
But alas I’m sorry I was ignoring you – my response was to TG on the tropics “not changing” and James on “sensitivity” updates.
So I’m sorry I didn’t get into troposphere hot spots for you. I didn’t really have anything to add on http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2008/05/tropical-tropopshere-ii/ and the Nature Geoscience paper by Allen and Sherwood. All just so uncertain.
But Willy wonks – do you have to rely on me – you can lead off old son and make some points. You’re a big boy ! Extol away old son …
Anyway the Antarctica paper was a test – the authors never claimed AGW even though one was Stoat himself! Just pulling James’ chain in reverse. http://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=3&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.scar.org%2Fresearchgroups%2Fphysicalscience%2FTurnerScience2006new.pdf&ei=efGjSb7xH8-_kAXWufmyBQ&usg=AFQjCNHo0N47ldkumWv1C51–d-yodVxyg&sig2=ceJ-ivHo3l5C10zVsHxN_w LOLZ !! A joke mate.
“There are now over 1,000 signatures on Jen’s petition”
Will, I don’t see your name on the petition. Why not?
And what’s up with rootin for the horse during the last rodeo?
And what’s up complaining on the dirt under my fingernails and the dust on my jeans, when you never climbed your fat ass off the fence?
Something else. I don’t appreciate some dandied up dude, who is so afraid of being “wrong” that he’ll never climb down into the arena, putting the whip to a horse I just rode the rough off of.
It has the smell of cowardice.
The consensus has decided to blaim global warming for the perils of California Brown Pelicans anyway, despite there not being a toxic algae angle.
Climate change might have fooled thousands of California brown pelicans, who stayed north later than usual last year and encountered harsh winter storms on their trip south, researchers now believe.
It’s the diagnosis that covers all ills.
Luke “Nice dodge Gordon – but “Are you actually trying to bluff us (and yourself) that climate models don’t do convection !! ”
No…what I’m saying is that people who do modeling haven’t got a clue how the atmosphere works. Otherwise, the models would be in lock-step with the satellites. Lindzen, Christy and Spencer are trying to tell the modelers what’s going on but nobody seems to be home.
Pure assertion – why do believe these guys except for the fact that they’re vocal and support your POV?
Gordon – modern climatologists are modellers.
SJT “Yes, but you do agree there is a “greenhouse” effect, (although it doesn’t work like a greenhouse)”.
Given that I think I know what you’re getting at, I don’t know. It’s apparent that something is warming the Earth beyond the temperature it would be if it was just a big, dry rock orbiting the Sun. The fact that the Earth seems to have been influenced by extreme heat from its interior at one time, that it has vast oceans and that it has a complex atmosphere, kind of leaves the question open, don’t you think?
G&T are claiming there is no evidence for a greenhouse effect in physics literature and Lindzen is claiming there’s something wrong with the radiative transfer theory, which is the basis of the greenhouse effect. Both Spencer and Lindzen are claiming the heating process that raises the mean temperature from a theoretical -19 C to a +15 C is a result of a complex warming/cooling/precipitation system. That makes sense to me and doesn’t involve greenhouse theory. Although Linzen seems to concede to a certain amount of greenhouse action, he doesn’t think that GHGs beside water vapour contribute much (3%).
Questions have been raised as to whther the -19 C was actually the initial temperature. With heavy volcanic activity in prehistoric times, possibly under the oceans as well, the oceans could have been raised to a much higher temperture without a greenhouse effect. Whose to say the atmosphere and warm oceans aren’t a result of heat from internal processes? I have no idea…I’m offering the kind of conjecture that leaves the greenhouse effect a question for me rather than an answer.
A good question raised by Stephen Wilde is what warmed the nitrogen and oxygen, that account for 97% of the atmosphere? I realize the AGW crowd will claim the warming came from GHGs, but did it? Was it as Wilde claims, that the oceans warmed those gases by convection?
I’m not trying to vector off into zaniness, I seriously don’t know if the GFE has anything serious to offer considering that radiation does not seem to be a viable warming process in the atmosphere. If you include convection as the major warming transport, then you could claim some veracity for GHE, but without radiation, it doesn’t seem to add up. Real greenhouses warm through convection and a lack of air circulation. The atmosphere has that circulation, accounting for its heat transport, so there goes another plank in the GHE platform. If the atmosphere behaves like a greenhouse, somebody left it’s barn doors open.
So Gordon – heat from below in the oceans – yet the profile is one of heat penetrating not “upwelling”.
Does AGW theory suddenly not believe in convection?
James Mayeau “Antarctica is the dryest place – and it’s in a 20 year cooling trend”.
Let me explain, for Luke’s benefit, why that is so. You see, Luke, warm air rises and so does warm water. Obviously, all the warm air and warm water are rising to the North Pole, and that’s why the Arctic is warming and the Antarctic is cooling.
To add a smiley or not? If I don’t the RC and Deltoid boys will take me seriously. What the heck.
Will Nitschke re Antarctic cooling “If there is good science behind what you’re saying perhaps you can point me in the direction of it”?
http://climate.uah.edu/
James Mayeau…don’t have a source for your question but I did note the involvement of Stephen Schneider in the study. He’s the same Schneider who once suggested that a scientist had to decide between lying and not lying when it came to press releases.
Schneider is a biologist who is also a modeler. Tell me what a biologist could possibly know about the atmosphere. If he is part of the study that claims CO2 annual emissions have risen to 3.5% per year since the 1990’s, then I’m going to call him a liar whether I get prosecuted or not. That’s a 390% increase in a decade and the only way that could happen is through an outright lie or because the oceans outgassed it. It certainly has nothing to do with anthropogenic CO2. Besides, if the CO2 has risen 390% where’s the warming to go along with it?
I don’t trust Schneider. He made the ludicrous claim once that he had to ignore real data if his model told him otherwise. This guy is dangerous and it’s time we started prosecuting people like him for misleading the public.
Will Nitschke…sorry, I misread your comment re Antarctica and posted my link in a hurry, being on my way out the door. Obviously I did not read your reply correctly, an admission which will no doubt lend fodder to others who think I do that all the time. 🙂
“Gordon – modern climatologists are modellers.”
Yair, Luke. Like that lot in your last link. Stoat and Co.
The Radiosondes did not agree with the GCMs so it’s put down to climate variability.
Can’t doubt the GCMs!
“It’s the diagnosis that covers all ills.”
James,
I would have thought those pelicans were caught by weather, not climate, change.
File it under “Polar Bears”.
Gordon, you were again in too much of a rush, so wrong in detail with your wildly nonsensical calculation even if right in principle. The facts are as follows:
1. The annual average compound rate of growth of total CO2 emissions from the level at mid-1998 to that at mid-2007 was 2.09% p.a. The largest % increase in any one year was 4.55 from mid-2003 to mid-2004, but from mid-1997 to mid-1999 there were successive years of negative growth, due partly to El Nino and partly to the Asian financial crisis and resulting recessions.
2. The increase in emissions from mid-97 to mid-07 was just 23%, not 390%.
3. It is likely that there will be negative growth of emissions this year because of the GFC, already evident in the low growth of [CO2] at Mauna Loa from Jan ’08 to Jan ’09. Unfortunately Obama has surrounded himself with equal nitwits Steve Chu and John Holdren, both Stanfordians and both mates of Schneider’s; they probably learnt their mastery of compound growth rates from Allen Stanford if not Bernie Madoff.
It remains true as you said that Schneider is not a reliable source on any issue.
Tim Curtin “Gordon, you were again in too much of a rush, so wrong in detail with your wildly nonsensical calculation even if right in principle. The facts are as follows:”
Tim…I was basing my figures on the article, which claimed CO2 emissions had risen from a p.a. rate of 0.9 in the late 1900s to a p.a. in the early 2000s of 3.5%. I assumed they were talking about anthropogenic CO2 since the normal average increase p.a. for ACO2 is roughly 0.6%, accordng to Spencer. I was willing to allow them 0.9, but not 3.5% since that would be an inference typical of Schneider, and from a model.
I have no issues with natural CO2 changing dramatically but not ACO2. That’s why I raised the question of ocean outgassing, perhaps related to the 1998 El Nino.
Luke “Pure assertion – why do believe these guys except for the fact that they’re vocal and support your POV”?
I’ve answered that one for you before. All of them (Lindzen, etc.) are legitimate atmospheric physicists working in the field and doing direct observation. Those working in modeling environments, like Santer, Wigley, Hansen, etc. are working primarily with models and are showing their lack of understanding by programming the models badly.