There’s no longer any serious debate among climate scientists about either the reality of global warming or about the fact that its substantially caused by human activity, but, as 500+ comments on my previous post on this topic show, neither the judgement of the overwhelming majority of climate scientists, nor the evidence that led them to that judgement, has had much effect on the denialists[1].
And the Australian media are doing a terrible job in covering the issue. I’ve seen at least half a dozen pieces this year claiming that the whole issue is a fraud cooked up by left-wing greenies, and January isn’t over yet.
The latest is from Peter Walsh in the Oz. Walsh is still banging on about the satellite data, and the Medieval Warm Period, suggesting that his reading, if any, in the last few years has been confined to publications emanating from the right-wing parallel universe. But that hasn’t stopped the Australian from running him, and a string of others.
If an issue like genetically modified food, or the dangers of mobile phones was treated in this way, with alarmist cranks being given hectares of column space, most of those who sympathise with Walsh would be outraged and rightly so.
Walsh does make one valid point however, saying. “If your case is immaculate, why feed lies into it?” To which, I can only respond, “If the cap fits …”
fn1. At this point, the term “sceptic” is no longer remotely applicable. Only dogmatic commitment to a long-held position (or an ideological or financial motive for distorting the evidence) can explain continued rejection of the evidence.
John Quiggin 
Avaroo, the last paragraph on the NASA web page reads :
As Greenhouse gases will spread uniformly around the globe, it is not clear to me why it would make any significant difference how far away from major cities these areas are, except, possibly for the global dimming effect as a result of soot particles, which woud have the reverse effect.
This doesn’t appear to address my straightforward proposition that significantly changing the chemical composition of our atmosphere will almost certainly cause changes in its weather patterns. How accurately we can predict them is another question.
The only rational course of action for humankind to take from now on is to attempt to reduce the rate that we are changing our biosphere, and, in time, as far as possible, reverse the changes that we have made to our biosphere.
Assuming that humans all dropped dead from a disease 300 years ago then what would be the current climate trend according to the best climate models? Would things be cooling down or warming up or staying static?
“This doesn’t appear to address my straightforward proposition that significantly changing the chemical composition of our atmosphere will almost certainly cause changes in its weather patterns.”
Certainly the information I posted on the history of hurricanes in the US DOES address your point. And the NASA link says that warming is not due to pollution from urban areas, which would be where the pollution originates in large part. If anything, the NASA link REFUTES your point.
“Indeed. The problem is the science is saying conflicting things.”
Dogz those best qualified, up to date and with the backing of the worlds leading scientific institutions -the same ones that govs get their scientific advice from-have taken that into consideration, it’s only the sceptics and their file draw and political bias who make more of this than they should.
Avaroo,
I have no idea what you were attempting to ‘prove’ with the page listing hurricanes around the US and resultant deaths.
Had you noticed that between 1900 and 1987 (88 years), there were 24 hurricanes that authors of this page found noteworthy, and that from 1988 until 2005 (18 years), there were 13, including three in 2005?
This gives, a frequency of 0.27 hurricanes per year from 1900 until 1987 and 0.82 from 1988 untill 2005.
If we consider the three hurricanes in 2005 an aberration and (hopefully) not indicative of a trend, then we still get 0.71 hurricanes per year from 1988 until 2004.
So, could you please enlighten us as to exactly what conclusions you were able to draw from these statistics?
“I have no idea what you were attempting to ‘prove’ with the page listing hurricanes around the US and resultant deaths.”
Well, here’s what you said. “However, if, instead of rising average temperatures, we end up ‘only’ with our weather wildly fluctuating between greater extremes of cold and hot, not to mention floods, droughts, Hurricane Katrina etc, then we should count ourselves extremely lucky. ”
Katrina does NOT represent wildly fluctuating weather extremes based on the history of hurricanes in the US. We’ve had far more deadly hurricanes 100 years ago, when there were fewer people in the US. Had those happened today, imagine how many MORE people would have died.
And then we can look at the history of flooding too if you like.
Beirut Lebanon 551, tsunami (tens of thousands of dead)
Holland 1228, 100,000 dead
Lisbon 1755 tsunami, 30,000 dead
India 1775, tsunami, 60,000 dead
Japan, 1826, tsunami, 26,000 dead
Indonesia, 1883, tsunami, 36,000 dead
your wildly fluctuating claim looks weak for flooding also.
Terje,
I think that, if all humans had dropped dead 300 years ago, there would be a lot less climate modelling going on now.
.
James,
I note that you have not answered my question as to why you seem to feel a much more radical response is needed. In the past, you have advocated a huge drop in the planet’s (human) population and a virtual depopulation of our cities. Plainly, these steps go far beyond PrQ’s stated position. Why the difference?
Big Freeze to Sweep over China
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/01/02/060102044332.yp07id4u.html
Records Fall as Northeast Temperatures Plummet
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WEATHER/01/10/cold.snap.ap/
Tony Thomas’s message of January 26 2006, reminds me of a ‘managerial decision making processes’, which goes like this: The solution to a problem is to introduce a new and bigger problem, chosen in such a way that the ‘decision maker’ can be reasonably certain that either no solution exists or, if a solution exists, it is outside the decision making power of those to whom it is delegated for implementation as a solution for the initial problem. The substitution of problems involves ‘communications’ – verbal and written’. The word ‘problem’ appears nowhere. Words like ‘challenges’ and ‘issues’ are used instead. If successful (ie not stopped in round one), the outcome of this ‘communication process’ is that the unresolved actual problems accumulate to an extent that they constitute a challenge even to the best of problem solvers or, depending on the ‘organization’, a source of income for a liquidator.
A plea for clarity —
People on this list, as well as elsewhere, are badly conflating two ideas — global warming, and anthropogenic global warming.
For example, people are saying things like that the warmest years have been in the last ten years (likely true), and that this proves that humans are changing the climate (an unrelated claim that does not follow from the fact that the world is warming).
Near as anyone can tell, the world has been warming since the Maunder Minimum, about 300 years ago. In any period of this 300 years, since overall the world has been warming, you will find it likely that the warmest years are in the recent past. That’s how it is in a warming world, the recent years will be warmer than a decade or a century ago.
However, all this shows is that the world is warming — it does not show that humans are (or are not) the cause.
So, my plea for clarity — in your postings, please consider, and indicate, whether you are talking about warming, or human induced (anthropogenic) warming. They are very different things. A warming world does not mean that humans are (or are not) warming it. Since the world has been warming for 300 years, a warming earth does not provide evidence in either direction.
w.
PS — I loved the posts about anyone over 70 not being credible, and how they shouldn’t be allowed to play in your playground … but heck, if that’s the case, why not just flat out kill them? I mean, if people over 70 are so useless that we shouldn’t even give them a chance to talk, much less listen to them, it’s just a waste of good food and space keeping them alive …
Fairly typical of the AGW line, though … just figure out some class to put your opponents into (over 70 years old, belong to the Lavoisier group, in the wrong political party, made an arithmetical mistake 26 posts ago, once questioned the party line, etc.) that allows you to ignore what they are saying on the basis of who is saying it.
As usual, however, Steve Munn has it wrong when he claims I’m over 70. Which is good, because he’s been wrong about every other assumption he’s made about me so far, and I’d sure hate to see him break his winning streak by actually guessing something right …
PPS — have you guys mentioned to your grandparents that they’re full of sh*t because they’re over 70, and so you’re not going to even give them a chance to speak? I mean, I’d hate to think you weren’t being even-handed in your condemnation of age …
Bob Foster,
Why are you providing the information you are providing. What is its practical usefulness? What is the problem to which the information is supposed to be relevant?
“Ours is not a self-contained climate”. Did anybody state “our climate is ‘self-contained’ “? What would it mean anyway? What are you trying to say?
Andrew,
I had been intending to respond, but perhaps, elsewhere, on a blog I hope to set up for myself, in the not-too-distant future.
I feel that, if we leave it too late, there may well be a terrible unplanned stampede into the countryside, when, as I believe is certain, our whole astonishingly complex and energy-intensive system of food production and distribution breaks down as a result of a sudden surge in the price of oil.
At that point in time people now crowded into high rises find that they are no longer able to obtain food and essentials from their local supermarket or greengrocer, and find that there i s insufficient land on which to grow their own.
Such a collapse could easily be triggered by another Hurricane Katrina or a political military crisis in the Middle East or Latin America. A highly plausible scenario for this collapse is to be found in an article “Domino Effect and Interdependencies” of 17 Feb 2005 (also to be found here).
I believe that we can prepare ourselves to ensure that such a crisis does not cause widespread starvation and killing in two complementary ways:
A far-sighted government would understand the dangers we face, and begin taking measures, including the above, to prepare our society to confront this crisis.
As larger sections of our population begin to understand that our current wasteful patterns of conusmption are unsustainable, many will be easily persuaded to move out from their crowded high-rises in order to establish communities on land, outside the current settled areas, which is suitable for permaculture.
This may not be altogether easy given the aridness of our continent and it’s low soil fertility, but we probably face no other choice.
This is a view I did not hold as little as 15 months ago, because, although I considered myself to be a strong environmentalist, I shared some of your technological optimism, if not your politics. I held out hope for what David Holmgren has termed a ‘techno-green’ future in which we could indefinitely consume quantities of energy which are roughly of the order of magnitude we consume today.
However, after I had the opportunity to sit through some very confronting and unsettling talks by both Sheila Newman and David Holmgren at the Greenhouse at the Woodford Folk Festival in December 2004, my views have altered considerably.
I would be glad to be proven wrong. However, even if my predictions are proven wrong in the short term, I am certain that if we don’t soon cease our exponential growth in population and consumption, the most dire predictions of global environmental catastrophe will be completely borne out.
“Ours is not a self-contained climate�. Did anybody state “our climate is ’self-contained’ “? What would it mean anyway? What are you trying to say?
It’s called a straw-man argument.
Avaroo,
With each successive post you further reveal your ignorance of the topic we are discussing as well as your inability to comprehend information in the documents which you, yourself, have referred us to.
Don’t you understand that tsunamis have nothing whatsoever to do with climate? Didn’t you know that tsunamis are caused by seismic shifts on the sea floor and not by the state of our atmosphere?
James,
I cannot see a scenario in the article posted – merely some statements on the importance of oil to our economy. There is no (as far as I can see) scenario there.
I am, as you know, confident that you will be proven wrong, but I am also confident that the exponential growth in population we have seen over the last 200 years will not continue – not for the reasons you would perhaps identify, but for the same reasons we have seen growth level off and start to retreat in much of the developed West – as people gain control over their lives they are much less prone to have large families in the hope that at least one of the kids will live to have children and care for them in their old age.
I have not yet seen, however, what limits there may be to economic growth. There may be no limits that cannot be overcome, but I believe that, should these limits exist, we are not near to approaching them. I do believe there will be problems along the way, and AGW may be one of them, but I cannot see a catastrophe approaching.
What I do not agree with, and will argue strongly against, is the proposition that there needs to be strong government action to enforce these outcomes. Persuasion, discussion, social pressure and simple economics will give a much better outcome than the big, stupid, stick that is the invariable outcome of government action.
Willis says: “Since the world has been warming for 300 years, a warming earth does not provide evidence in either direction.”
Willis again flaunts his talent for wanton hypocrisy. Such a calculation could only have been made by using some type of modelling. Yet when it suits him Willis monotonously chants, like a witch-doctor at a voodoo dance, that models are not evidence.
p.s. Willis- you are over 70 in spirit, if not in chronology. Have you thought about joining the Lavoisier Society? I’m sure they would make you feel right at home.
Andrew,
Where was I advocating a big stick?
I was advocating strong government leadership, which I believe is obviously and scandalously lacking at almost level of government in Australia, today. Showing strong leadership is not the same thing as resorting to a big stick.
Clearly, it will have to be a combination of grass roots political activity and leadership from above. A government capable of giving this leadership is unlikley to come from above, without the majority of public opinion having come to have reached the conclusion that radical changes are necessary.
Anyhow, you asked me to explain why I hold my views and I believe I have, and have also dealt with some of what I believe to be your misconceptions.
I intend, for now, to largely leave it to others to form their own opinions.
One other thing : I stongly contest your view that “people (are) gain(ing) control over their lives.” To me, it is obvious that the reverse is true for, at least, a large and growing minority of our society, as I have written about elsewhere.
Bob Foster, I’m still interested to know if you’re suggesting that we should rely on the work of an astrologer as evidence against AGW.
JS, if you haven’t already, you should join the Mormon church. Mormons are required to maintain a year’s stockpile of food at home to see them through the coming Armageddon. Plus, with their 10% tithe policy, they have assets in the tens of billions and they own vast tracts of some of the best farming land on most continents on earth. You’ll be set.
Matthew 24:7. Apart from the divers places (wtf??), looks like you’re onto something JS.
I’ll be back soon. Just checking what Nostradamus has to say on the subject…..
So? Kepler was an astrologer too!
Dan(o),
Hans is not the genitive of Han. That would be Han’s
OTOH the the genitive of Hans is Hans’
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive_case
Hans
And it was under the Clinton administration wasn’t it, with Al Gore as chief negociator…
Here is an interesting time series spectral analysis
L.B. Klyashtorin & A.A. Lyubushin, 2003, On the Coherence between Dynamics of the World Fuel Consumption and Global Temperature Anomaly, Energy & Environment Vol 14 No. 6 p773-783
But then it’s E&E isn’t, so it wouldn’t count.
I am not into astrology. And clearly most astrologers don’t even believe their own guff. However I would be careful whos thinking you dismiss merely on the basis that they tinker with strange beliefs about supernatural phenomena. Isaac Newton, who some regard as the greatest scientist ever, was into Astrology in a huge way. And many reputable scientists believe that we are at this very moment being observed by a supreme being.
I agree though it is not at all clear what Bob Foster is on about and his comment is meaningless unless he backs it up with some intelligent explaination.
John Houghton is a Christian
http://www.jri.org.uk/brief/christianchallenge.htm
John,
Perhaps some gazing at the lates Nature papers might be of interest?
The National Science Foundation (http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=105765)
‘But then it’s E&E isn’t, so it wouldn’t count.’
Got it in one, Hans!
And the abstract is enough to tell me that this paper wouldn’t have got up at any reputable journal. It’s just a fancy restatement of the tired contrarian talking point that global temperatures declined in the middle part of the 20th century (aerosols, anyone?)
By the way, given that E&E purports to be a social science journal, why is Boehmer-Christiansen publishing climate science papers (apart from the fact that no-one else would take them).
Dogz
Apt moniker you have there, the way you bark at noises with such little regard for any understanding of what they might actually be saying.
You make empty and irrelevant use of an extremely narrow illustration to ridicule JS’s soundly presented reference to the fragility of modern production and delivery systems. This reminds me quite clearly of the small mutt down the road yapping pointlessly at life as it passes by. Does it think itself clever to make such empty noise or does it simply need to remind itself of its own existence as a balance against its innate sense of lacking of any useful input?
And the quote from St. Matthew? Where did that come from in this discussion? Not from JS. Why implicate attribution to him?
Mate, stick with Nostradamus. Please.
Aerosols: The Bryson and Schneider legacy.
Yes I remember well the nuclear winter scare in the 70’s. So far that the CIA made a study of the adverse effects of a cooling.
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/Public.htm
There are several problems with aerosol cooling:
They are not well-mixed
The climatic parameters vary extremely from author to author, so no central value could be given in IPCC TAR.
There is no historic observation of concentrations, only of emissions.
Aerosol production peaked in the 70’s in the US and Europe, and declined thereafter.
So aerosols act as a perfect fudge factor for climate models.
http://catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/F/fudge-factor.html
Andrew
We obviously differ on what constitutes a “scenario�, but let’s not nitpick.
Your notion that most of the west has stopped growing its population is empirically wrong. The US, Canada, Australia and UK are all growing their populations quite steadily.
Misconceptions of no growth would most likely stem from apparently low rates of domestic fertility in these nations. Still positive mind you, and Govt’s in at least Oz and the US are trying to actively contrive increase to that statistic.
The growth within these nations is coming substantively from high immigration rates. Occurring steadily at 1 or 1.5%, as it is happening as a minimum in these nations, total net population growth is quite definitively exponential in its character. It means a doubling of population in from 70 to 46 years respectively.
This increase is quite catastrophic in terms of global and local natural resource depletion as it factors upon the most extreme end of global per/capita consumption. It means at least a doubling over one lifetime of populations that politically expect living standards, vis a vis per capita consumption, to rise as the raison d’etre of daily life. The very same raison d’etre that fuels your belief as you contend, without any factual substance, that growth can continue indefinitely.
So in 70 years time we can expect the English speaking nations to at least double the resources that they now demand each and every day to ‘satisfy’ their growth driven mentalities. Against a backdrop of today’s already fading resource profiles in key sectors ( energy, groundwater, surface water, fisheries, soil, etc) this looks like a suspect aim.
Add to this the rapidly emerging Asian economies and their attendant populations.
You think growth can continue? On what planet was your arithmetic book compiled?
And then you say that Govt. should not enforce outcomes.
They formally commit us to GDP growth, they drive population growth via publicly funded immigration and domestic fertility policies, they subsidise the fossil fuel energy sector, private automobile industry, the property development sector, etc., and you are fine with all of this. I’m quite sure that you laud all of it.Yet you are also adamant that the Government should not enforce outcomes.
Good god, do you think much at all about anything that you contend?
Maybe, as you have already indicated, it is all mostly belief?
Please have a close look at the very simple arithmetic that is vitally at work as our world shrinks. It transcends the conveniences of socio-economic belief. As Huxley said, “facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored�.
Dogz,
Earlier in this thread, you make the absurd claim to have been a pretty good scientist; golly gee, isn’t that up to your peers to decide? Michael Fumento claims to be a very qualified journalist, and we all know what a load of nonsense that is. On the science claim, based on the number of peer-reviewed papers I have published, I might make the same claim (to be a really good scientist), but then again, the proof of the pudding is in the eating and I leave it up to my peers to evaluate the quality of my research.
As for Hans, he defends E & E because that is about the only journal that will publish his research. I don’t see a lot of peer-reviewed papers coming from him; like Lomborg, I think he has one that is on the ISI Web of Science. But this is hardly exceptional: most of the contrarians have pretty pathetic publishing records, and are dependent on contrarian rags like ’21st Century Science and Technology’ and “E & E’ to disseminate their nonsense. Neithers publication appears on the Science Citation Index, because this index is a measure of the scientific quality of the work. Hans may defend E & E as a social science journal, but it tries also to dabble in environmental science, where its shoddiness beomes apparent.
To the topic at hand, climate scientist David Viner at UEA (UK) had it spot on when he described the evolutionary biology of the contrarian mob. Fifteen years ago, they claimed that global warming was a ‘doomsday myth’ perpetrated by a few scientists desperate for attention. More recently, there was a period of uncertainty, then many of the denialists began to acknowledge the reality of climate change, but came up with a new reasoning: it was natural, due in large part to solar forcing. More recently, some of the sceptics like Lomborg, Bailey and Michaels have come off the fence and now reluctantly accept the anthropogenic influence, but then state that the rate is negligible and that humans will adapt without any mitigating measures being necessary. In every case, the bottom line is that WE SHOULD NOT CHANGE ANYTHING. RETAIN THE STATUS QUO.
Lastly, Hans makes the totally ridiculous assumption that the current rate of warming has had net positive effects on the environment. This vacuous remark is made from a point of complete ignorance. Many, if not most of the effects of anthropogenic global change are hard to predict because of the variable lag times between cause and effect. For example, habitat loss does not result in instantaneous extinction, but instead species and populations ‘relax’ towards a new equilibrium that may or may not be sustainable and stable. Similarly, with climate change, ecosystems are now being confronted with a new challenge based on rates of change that have not been experienced in hundreds of thousands of years. These systems have already been greatly simplified by a myriad of human disturbances (urban and agricultural conversion, invasive species, other forms of pollution etc.). The ability of these systems, and the species that make them up, to adapt to these changes (indvidually and in synergy) is very poorly understood, but there will be many losers. Unfortuneately, many of these effects will not manifest themselves for years, perhaps many decades, by which time a huge range of ecosytem services (conditions that make the planet habitable for humans based on the combined biological activities of plants and animals over variable spatial and temporal scales) will be threatened. But the sceptics rarely, if ever, discuss these points, probably because few understand the relationship between biological diversity and human well-being. Scientists like Pat Michaels are pretty clueless on the subject, so what can we expect from those sceptics who have no formal training in environmental science? Ecosystems and biomes are complex adaptive systems that function non-linearly: the loss or addition of one small component can reverberate through the system and have profound and far-reaching effects. There are many examples of this in the invasive species literature. What we can say with certainty is that climate change will radically alter food webs and that this will have strong effects on their resilience and on the way the systems function. I am fed up with people arguing that human-caused global warming is a good thing without a shred of empirical evidence in nature.
Great post Jeff.
I’ll give an example of why biodiversity is at such a great risk due to AGW. Australia has 819 Eucalypt species of which over 200 exist in temperature zones spanning 1 degree C and more than 300 exist in temperature zones spanning 2 degree C. In the past they could migrate with changes in climate, but human habitation has fragmented the species into isolated pockets and therefore migration will prove exceedingly difficult. (see Tim Flannery’s “The Weather Makers, p.179)
So much for Willis’s ignorant claim that most species will grow better with warmer conditions.
It’s really pointless for me to add to the conversation when I have to follow Jeff Harvey, but what the heck, I can try:
Jeff, when you say I am fed up with people arguing that human-caused global warming is a good thing without a shred of empirical evidence in nature , so is everyone else. This is what the denialists/contrarians want. Our job is to play ‘whack-a-mole’ and keep hitting their BS on the head when it pops up in the next place. I’ll turn their tactics back on them, you can be the Enlightenment voice. But we can’t be fed up.
Best,
D
“Don’t you understand that tsunamis have nothing whatsoever to do with climate?”
I believe you were the one who brought up flooding, James.
“Your notion that most of the west has stopped growing its population is empirically wrong. The US, Canada, Australia and UK are all growing their populations quite steadily. ”
But that’s pretty much it. Losing population, it’s an enormous problem in Europe.
“I have not yet seen, however, what limits there may be to economic growth. There may be no limits that cannot be overcome, but I believe that, should these limits exist, we are not near to approaching them.”
Andrew so you don’t think India or China reaching the Wests level of affluence will be a problem?
Maybe have a look at that Club of Rome rethink I posted earlier, others have raised similar concerns, some more extreme like Ted Trainer but many still think unless you have access to another 3 or 4 Earths it will create real problems.
I wondered whether that would make near earth asteroid cost effective as even if we wemnt on a global efficiency drive the woudln’t be enough to satisfy a 1st world China or India.
Greg Wood:
I was quoting Matthew as supporting evidence for JS’s position, hence the blockquote. I attributed it to Matthew, not JS. Lighten up dude – it was satire.
Jeff Harvey:
Yep. They did. But I wouldn’t pay any attention to that claim, judge me on my commentary.
I will come to astrology in a separate post. But first, let’s see what IPCC tells us on the science of climate change in the Summary for Policymakers of the Working Group I (ie science) volume “Climate change 2001: the scientific basis” of its Third Assessmnt Report (TAR).
First, just a reminder about science vs consensus. This report represents the consensus view of the scientific community. In confirmation, let me quote the start of the statement organised by the president of the Royal Society (former Bob May of Sydney University, now The Lord May of Oxford) and signed by 17 Academies around the world including Australia’s Academy of Sciences. It was published as an Editorial in Science on 18 May 2001:
“The work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change represents the consensus of the international scientific community on climate change science. We recognize the IPCC as the world’s most reliable source of information on climate change and its causes; and we endorse its method of achieving this consensus.”
IPCC makes two crucial points. Both are directly in contradiction to the available observational evidence. Hence both are utterly unscientific – and the fact that they represent the “consensus” should be no justification for mis-using science. My own relevant specialty is palaeoclimatology, and perhaps I should therefore confine my comment to the first. But no; I will do them both.
Figure 1(b) “the past 1000 years” in the Summary for Policymakers is the icon of TAR. This “hockeystick” graph of Northern Hemisphere temperature shows 900 years of gentle cooling with only minor fluctuations (handle), followed by 100 years of abrupt warming (blade). The Mediaeval Warm Period and subsequent Little Ice Age cool periods didn’t happen. IPCC’s “consensus” has set at naught 30 years of palaeoclimatological study, and hundreds of observation-based and peer-reviewed papers published in reputable scientific journals.
But it gets worse. Figure 4 of the same TAR Summary for Policymakers “Simulated annual mean global surface temperatures” has as Fig 4 (a) “NATURAL” a band showing that, without human intervention, global temperature would have been cooler in 1970-2000 than back in 1860-80. More than all the warming in the last 100 years (refer back to the hockeystick blade) is therefore human-caused.
The notes under this amazing graph say;
“The simulations represented by the band in (a) were done with only natural forcings: solar variation and volcanic activity.” (IPCC eschews the main solar influences – electromagnetic and inertial – and only includes little-varying insolation.) It’s called “clapping the telescope to your blind eye”.
Figure 4(b) is all anthropogenic, and a third Figure combines the two – and fits observed temperature change like a glove. The notes below continue:
“These results show that the forcings included are sufficient to explain the observed changes …”
How did IPCC get this match? Easy! It eliminated more than all natural warming – to give more room for its over-predicting models. Then, it further reduced this overprediction by invoking the cooling effect of anthropogenic aerosols – with just the right cooling to make models and observations agree.
Why is this a problem? The answer is because it only works when modelled at the global scale. Most observed warming has been in the NORTHERN hemisphere (particularly Siberia and Alaska/Yukon in winter), which is the hemisphere releasing 90% of the cooling aerosols. Anthropogenic CO2 has an average atmospheric residence time of fifty years or more, and it shouldn’t matter from which hemisphere it originates. But these cooling aerosols have a residence time of days, and there is little chance for them to influence the (cooler) Southern Hemispere. If presented on a hemispheric basis, therefore, what IPCC has globally-averaged would be quickly seen as empirically disprooved. I don’t know what this key building-brick of the scientific consensus should be called. But could you call it “science”?
Dogz
It wasn’t satire, it was self-amusement.
Why would you think that whimsically jerking off all over the work of a serious poster would be funny to anyone but yourself?
Judge you on your commentary?
Done.
Hi Jeff,
Same old song: “Hans Erren doesn’t publish peer reviewed.” (So he must be wrong/so we can ignore him)
SO WHAT, I am a geophysicist aware of the limitations of geophysics. Dare to comment on aerosol uncertainties?
Greg, please take your medication before you hurt someone.
Jeff, thanks for your thought provoking posting. Could we have a cite for your claim that
I ask because:
Jones et. al. show that the rate of temperature change from 1910-1940 was the same as the current rate of change. http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/trends/temp/jonescru/graphics/nhshglobe.jpg
The GISS dataset says that temperature change from 1910-1940 was slightly greater than the current rate of change.
The CET temperature data, which starts in 1659, shows the fastest rate of change from 1700-1734.
The Armagh data (which start in 1796) show the fastest rise around 1815.
The Greenland Ice Core data, from
GISP2 Ice Core Temperature and Accumulation
IGBP PAGES/World Data Center for Paleoclimatology
Data Contribution Series #2004-013.
NOAA/NGDC Paleoclimatology Program, Boulder CO, USA.
shows rates of change up to 4°C per century during the Holocene, and as high as 11° per century during the last interglacial.
What data supports your claim that current rates of change are unprecedented in hundreds of thousands of years?
w.
Steve, is it impossible for you to post without gratuitous unpleasant comments? You say:
Steve, start by checking out the CET temperature series, which shows England warming for 300 years. Then check the other European temperature records of the same time. Then read the contemporary accounts of the years around 1700 from around the world, which report cold weather. Then look at the host of proxy measurements from around the planet showing that the cold in 1700 was a world-wide phenomenon.
It is generally accepted by serious researchers that the Earth was at its recent coolest during the Maunder Minimum, around 1710, during a period called the “Little Ice Age”, and that it has been warming during the 300 years since then.
See, that wasn’t hard, was it? And not a model in sight. Now that’s what I believe, and if you don’t believe it, fine. If so, then call up some citations and prove me wrong. Research it, we can discuss it.
But in the meantime, you can stuff your “wanton hypocrisy” up your ass and learn some adult manners before you come back to play with the grownups. Your constant petty childish personal attacks on everyone you disagree with are sophomoric and boring, and totally inappropriate for a scientific discussion. Put on some clothes and reappear when you’re dressed for the occasion, your public nakedness is unappealing.
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When I think you are wrong, I ask for a citation.
When you think I’m wrong, you attack me personally, in the crudest, vilest, nastiest terms you can think of.
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A couple of questions:
a) What’s up with that? What on earth do you think I ever did that deserves your ugliness?
b) Do you think it makes your position look stronger when you continually engage in your pusillanimous, puerile attacks?
You are a coward who called me a liar, and then was too chickensh*t to either say what you thought I lied about, or to apologize. You turn my stomach.
w.
PS – John, I apologize for the personal nature of part of this posting, but Steve’s pointless attacks show no sign of ending. Surely he can post about the Little Ice Age without the vitriol.
Avaroo
Dismissing those western countries as being “pretty much it� is a fairly gross dismissal.
The fact very clearly remains that ‘the west’ has not generically stopped growing its population.
The fact beneath this particular continuance that is highly disconcerting is that the economies of these english-speaking immigrant settler states are pivotally based upon the commodification and development of land. There is powerful political pressure within these states to maintain an escalating and ever-extending capital value to land and the resources associated with its development. Population increase is the most simple means of keeping this form of economic pump primed. It is an especially malignant stream of economic growth to pump from.
The population decline you point to in Europe is notably different to the circumstance unravelling in the “New World� colonies. It stems directly from a culturally different view of land and heritage. And it is not the universal problem you make it out to be.
Mass media, due to the unique preferences of its global owners, generically heralds this slowdown as a serious concern as it does retard the progress of the grosser, more instantaneous economic growth mechanisms. Population stabilisation does require some vital restructuring and some intelligent policy making, especially when it follows on after the significant growth booms experienced post WW2. however, such transition to more stable population conditions offers to place these nations in far better domestic positions to handle looming challenges such as climate change and energy depletion, than they would be in if they just burgeoned on regardless.
If only us cowboys out on the range could understand that the real value of land is not based upon the speed at which it can be cut up and sold to the highest bidder. That in fact the real value of land is decimated by that behaviour. We could then be in a mental condition to look at limiting the number of mouths as the volume of finite resources available to put into each one begins to decline. We could stop having to believe in the ineffable magic of increased demand directly resolving resources shortage. But we would need an effective culture to do that. Where do we get one from? TV? A dire crisis perhaps? A tricky one that.
Greg,
Far from taking your medicine, perhaps in th elight of your previous gratuitous sexual comment we should ask PrQ to moderate you.
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Nevertheless, I will answer both your and James’ points.
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James,
On the rest I think we are mostly rehashing old ground, so I will leave it there. Just one point – I did not say that you were advocating a big stick – it is just my belief and experience that, when a government gets involved the big stick will invariably come out. Governments tend to believe that something should either be compulsory or banned. I was not intending to imply that you had advocated that.
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Greg,
Perhaps a quick look at a dictionary on the question of what constitutes a scenario would be a good idea – heaven forbid we should nitpick, but I am still waiting to see a scenario that backs up James’ case.
On the West – the only real growth in population (except in the US) is by transference from other areas. The net effect of the current population of the West (to use a convenient shorthand) is negative. As the new citizens join the country they soon (typically one generation) drop their birth rate to match those of their adoptive country. The effect of the migration is therefore to reduce overall global population in the long term. Japan is a fine example – on current trends and without immigration, Japan will be depopulated within 800 years.
On the question of resourses – I would suggest a quick look at a book on economics rather than mathematics. If resourses are being depleted then their price goes up – a simple enough rule. The prices of the basic commodities used for industrial production have been, almost without exception, dropping in either absolute of inflation adjusted terms for most of the last century, interrupted only by the occasional war.
Oil is an exception, as I am sure James would hasten to point out – it is finite in nature – but we have had this argument before. IMHO, long before it runs out it will cease to matter, as firewood did centuries ago. I happen to believe that humanity is inventive enough to solve the problems that come our way. If you do not – fair enough, but I believe a good study on human history backs up my case.
BTW, why do you think I “laud” that sort of government intervention? Perhaps a quick read of a few of my other comments on this and other threads, rather than leaping in in ignorance and doing a bit of strawman creation would be useful. Hang around, read and learn before leaping in. You may learn something – but I would not hold my breath.
“The fact very clearly remains that ‘the west’ has not generically stopped growing its population.”
Much of the west has done exactly that. It’s a crisis in some western nations.
“The population decline you point to in Europe is notably different to the circumstance unravelling in the “New Worldâ€? colonies. ”
No shit, Sherlock
“It stems directly from a culturally different view of land and heritage.”
Actually, it stems from peole just not having children.
“And it is not the universal problem you make it out to be. ”
In much of Europe it is.
If I may, willis, ecosystems are undergoing rates of change…etc. Not climate.
Ecosystems do not change at the rates we are observing now, unless adapting to/recovering from disturbance.
I’m sure Jeff can explain better’n me if’n he comes back, but I’ll give ‘er a go if you want more clarification.
Best,
D
avaroo,
Don’t you think it’s about time you stopped digging yourself further into that hole you have already dug yourself into?
Yes, I did raise the increasing incidence of flooding as an example of the erratic weather patterns which are almost certainly the consequence of greater quantities of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.
And, yes, I have to admit that it never occurred to me that it would be necessary when I talked about floods that I needed to spell out that I was referring only to floods caused by rain falling out of the sky, and not the other kind of ‘flood’ of coastal regions being inundated by the large waves that result from undersea earthquakes.
I had assumed that it was understood by all that the frequency of earthquakes, whether they occur under the ocean or on dry land, had no bearing on the discussion global warming.
Avaroo, just so that others participating in this discussion can judge, for themselves, whether you are capable of attaining a primary school level of scientific literacy, please just answer the following question, YES or NO :
“Yes, I did raise the increasing incidence of flooding as an example of the erratic weather patterns which are almost certainly the consequence of greater quantities of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.”
Then you have no cause to complain.
You also have no cause to be unpleasant either. It does not a thing for your case, other than to undermine it.