Global Warming backdown

[Pliny]

Science can say what it likes: I've been stuck on the ceiling since yesterday !

I agree with the scientists, but the emergence of the internet and of stupid cable news channels has created a new skepticism towards all authority: political, religious and scientific authority among other types.

The power is coming back to the people, so we have to engage with each other in order to ensure that good communication and good compromises happen. In the case of GW, scientists have to find opinion-makers across the political spectrum who are open-minded, honest and reasonable and make them part of the process.

From being on boards like these for 12 years (and MLW for 7 years) I can see that most of the time the truth falls in between the views of the political extremes. In this example, I think the science appears to be sound, but the communication and public engagement has been mishandled and the solutions proposed are not yet realistic enough to be adopted.

With information at our fingertips we can determine BS a lot better. Now we just have to weed through it all. We must primarily question what we have accepted as fact in the past otherwise we are only finding information to prove that what we have already agreed to is true.

I don't think the communication and the engagement in htis example has been mishandled at all. I think there are some serious questions not being answered or not being asked.

[Michael Hardner]

With information at our fingertips we can determine BS a lot better. Now we just have to weed through it all.

Yes, WE can. But can THEY ?

We must primarily question what we have accepted as fact in the past otherwise we are only finding information to prove that what we have already agreed to is true.

I don't think the communication and the engagement in htis example has been mishandled at all. I think there are some serious questions not being answered or not being asked.

There are plenty of questions being asked and there's plenty of doubt. I think that most of the doubt that I hear is unfounded and the questions are stupid. Things like focusing on the word 'trick' in that UEA email.

The serious questions that I have seen posed by skeptics are debated in the literature.

Why aren't you satisfied ?

[waldo]

How could I guess Krugman would be your choice of economist! I had to laugh when you mentioned his name. Some here already know of Krugman's lib-left leanings. I have never agreed with anything Krugman has said. He is the poster boy for centrally planned econometrics and has a Nobel prize to prove it. And Obama has one for creating peace, he is so uniting. As long as you see things his way everything is ok. The Nobel panel likes to award those who appear to see things their way - all scientifically done of course. You deserve one as well.

the reference to this weeks NYT Krugman's article was simply a quick timely comeback to Bush_Cheney... the one-quip trick pony guy who drops a baseless comment vis-a-vis "realistic economics". Don't let Krugman's lengthy article - or his Nobel Prize - hold you back from actually challenging his assertions. His summation around the state of U.S. political will, pretty much nails it as far as the current U.S. (and Canadian) position stands:

... there has to be a real chance that political support for action on climate change will revive.

If it does, the economic analysis will be ready. We know how to limit greenhouse-gas emissions. We have a good sense of the costs — and they’re manageable. All we need now is the political will.

[waldo]

The serious questions that I have seen posed by skeptics are debated in the literature.

Why aren't you satisfied?

Pliny subscribes to the mindset that presupposes "skeptic" positions are not being debated... in the literature.

[Keepitsimple]

A recent writing from Richard Lindzen.....I've included the entire article as it doesn't appear to be syndicated article, but rather a response to a question. Like many sceptics (including me), he accepts Climate Change (of course) and acknowledges that humans play some role in affecting Climate Change.....but what that role is - and to what extent, is still very much in question.

Con: Earth is never in equilibrium

By RICHARD S. LINDZEN Thursday, April 8, 2010

CAMBRIDGE, MASS. EDITORS NOTE: The writer is addressing the question, Is climate change real?

To a significant extent, the issue of climate change revolves around the elevation of the commonplace to the ancient level of ominous omen. In a world where climate change has always been the norm, climate change is now taken as punishment for sinful levels of consumption. In a world where we experience temperature changes of tens of degrees in a single day, we treat changes of a few tenths of a degree in some statistical residue, known as the global mean temperature anomaly (GATA), as portents of disaster.

Earth has had ice ages and warmer periods when alligators were found in Spitzbergen. Ice ages have occurred in a 100,000-year cycle for the last 700,000 years, and there have been previous interglacials that appear to have been warmer than the present despite lower carbon-dioxide levels. More recently, we have had the medieval warm period and the little ice age. During the latter, alpine glaciers advanced to the chagrin of overrun villages. Since the beginning of the 19th century, these glaciers have been retreating. Frankly, we dont fully understand either the advance or the retreat, and, indeed, some alpine glaciers are advancing again.

For small changes in GATA, there is no need for any external cause. Earth is never exactly in equilibrium. The motions of the massive oceans where heat is moved between deep layers and the surface provides variability on time scales from years to centuries. Examples include El Nino, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation, etc. Recent work suggests that this variability is enough to account for all change in the globally averaged temperature anomaly since the 19th century. To be sure, mans emissions of carbon dioxide must have some impact. The question of importance, however, is how much.

A generally accepted answer is that a doubling of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (it turns out that one gets the same value for a doubling regardless of what value one starts from) would perturb the energy balance of Earth about 2 percent, and this would produce about 2 degrees Fahrenheit warming in the absence of feedbacks. The observed warming over the past century, even if it were all due to increases in carbon dioxide, would not imply any greater warming.

However, current climate models do predict that a doubling of carbon dioxide might produce more warming: from 3.6 degrees F to 9 degrees F or more. They do so because within these models the far more important radiative substances, water vapor and clouds, act to greatly amplify whatever an increase in carbon dioxide might do. This is known as positive feedback. Thus, if adding carbon dioxide reduces the ability of the earth system to cool by emitting thermal radiation to space, the positive feedbacks will further reduce this ability.

It is again acknowledged that such processes are poorly handled in current models, and there is substantial evidence that the feedbacks may actually be negative rather than positive. Citing but one example, 2.5 billion years ago the suns brightness was 20 percent to 30 percent less than it is today (compared to the 2 percent change in energy balance associated with a doubling of carbon-dioxide levels) yet the oceans were unfrozen and the temperatures appear to have been similar to todays.

This was referred to by Carl Sagan as the Early Faint Sun Paradox. For 30 years, there has been an unsuccessful search for a greenhouse gas resolution of the paradox, but it turns out that a modest negative feedback from clouds is entirely adequate. With the positive feedback in current models, the resolution would be essentially impossible.

Interestingly, according to the U.N.s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the greenhouse forcing from manmade gases is already about 86 percent of what one expects from a doubling of carbon dioxide (with about half coming from methane, nitrous oxide, freons, and ozone). Thus, these models should show much more warming than has been observed. The reason they dont is that they have arbitrarily removed the difference and attributed this to essentially unknown aerosols.

The IPCC claim that most of the recent warming (since the 1950s) is due to man assumed that current models adequately accounted for natural internal variability. The failure of these models to anticipate the fact that there has been no statistically significant warming for the past 14 years or so contradicts this assumption. This has been acknowledged by major modeling groups in England and Germany.

However, the modelers chose not to stress this. Rather they suggested that the models could be further corrected, and that warming would resume by 2009, 2013, or even 2030.

Global warming enthusiasts have responded to the absence of warming in recent years by arguing that the past decade has been the warmest on record. We are still speaking of tenths of a degree, and the records themselves have come into question. Since we are, according to these records, in a relatively warm period, it is not surprising that the past decade was the warmest on record. This in no way contradicts the absence of increasing temperatures for over a decade.

Given that the evidence (and I have noted only a few of many pieces of evidence) suggests that anthropogenic warming has been greatly exaggerated, so too is the basis for alarm. However, the case for alarm would still be weak even if anthropogenic global warming were significant. Polar bears, arctic summer sea ice, regional droughts and floods, coral bleaching, hurricanes, alpine glaciers, malaria, etc., all depend not on GATA but on a huge number of regional variables including temperature, humidity, cloud cover, precipitation, and direction and magnitude of wind and the state of the ocean.

The fact that some models suggest changes in alarming phenomena will accompany global warming does not logically imply that changes in these phenomena imply global warming. This is not to say that disasters will not occur; they always have occurred, and this will not change in the future. Fighting global warming with symbolic gestures will certainly not change this. However, history tells us that greater wealth and development can profoundly increase our resilience.

One may ask why there has been the astounding upsurge in alarmism in the past four years. When an issue like global warming is around for more than 20 years, numerous agendas are developed to exploit the issue. The interests of the environmental movement in acquiring more power, influence and donations are reasonably clear. So, too, are the interests of bureaucrats for whom control of carbon dioxide is a dream come true. After all, carbon dioxide is a product of breathing itself.

Politicians can see the possibility of taxation that will be cheerfully accepted to save Earth. Nations see how to exploit this issue in order to gain competitive advantages. So do private firms. The case of Enron (a now bankrupt Texas energy firm) is illustrative. Before disintegrating in a pyrotechnic display of unscrupulous manipulation, Enron was one of the most intense lobbyists for Kyoto. It had hoped to become a trading firm dealing in carbon-emission rights. This was no small hope. These rights are likely to amount to trillions of dollars, and the commissions will run into many billions.

It is probably no accident that Al Gore himself is associated with such activities. The sale of indulgences is already in full swing with organizations selling offsets to ones carbon footprint while sometimes acknowledging that the offsets are irrelevant. The possibilities for corruption are immense.

Finally, there are the well-meaning individuals who believe that in accepting the alarmist view of climate change, they are displaying intelligence and virtue. For them, psychic welfare is at stake.

Clearly, the possibility that warming may have ceased could provoke a sense of urgency. For those committed to the more venal agendas, the need to act soon, before the public appreciates the situation, is real indeed. However, the need to courageously resist hysteria is equally clear. Wasting resources on symbolically fighting ever-present climate change is no substitute for prudence.

Richard S. Lindzen is the Alfred P. Sloan professor of atmospheric science at MIT. Readers may send him e-mail at rlindzenmit.edu.

Link: http://gazettextra.com/news/2010/apr/08/con-earth-never-equilibrium/

Edited April 9, 2010 by Keepitsimple

[Michael Hardner]

Pliny subscribes to the mindset that presupposes "skeptic" positions are not being debated... in the literature.

I'm trying to understand what other forums could be out there besides general media - including FOX and slightly better derivations - and the Scientific publications.

[Michael Hardner]

A recent writing from Richard Lindzen.....I've included the entire article as it doesn't appear to be syndicated article, but rather a response to a question. Like many sceptics (including me), he accepts Climate Change (of course) and acknowledges that humans play some role in affecting Climate Change.....but what that role is - and to what extent, is still very much in question.

Link: http://gazettextra.com/news/2010/apr/08/con-earth-never-equilibrium/

Thank you, KiS, for posting this. Lindzen is among the respected skeptics so it's a good idea to keep on top of his latest thinking. It seems to me that tenths of a degree of warming are still almost warming, and another warm year could make the warming for the last 15 years significant.

If warming is happening, even slow warming, it doesn't seem that the politics is every going to keep up with it. The earth will have to be on fire before some (not you) will acknowledge the need to act.

At that point, my only hope would be that the implications to us of the wait-and-see approach will include us deciding those who are impacted by GW.

[Pliny]

A recent writing from Richard Lindzen.....I've included the entire article as it doesn't appear to be syndicated article, but rather a response to a question. Like many sceptics (including me), he accepts Climate Change (of course) and acknowledges that humans play some role in affecting Climate Change.....but what that role is - and to what extent, is still very much in question.

Link: http://gazettextra.com/news/2010/apr/08/con-earth-never-equilibrium/

This is precisely true and the crux of the matter.

Waldo seems to emphasize the A ("anthropogenic") part of global warming. What part is "A" and what part is the natural cyclic pattern is what needs to be determined. Ok Global warming may be a fact, and as a matter of fact, the average mean temperature has increased over the last century by 1 degree.

What has been dispelled by the failure of models to predict or forecast the future pattern of climate change in the last decade is that the warming is anthropogenic at all.

All that is necessary is to keep our environment clean and we can work together to do that. We don't need massive transfers of wealth from first world countries to third world countries and other political initiatives that have absolutely nothing to do with climate change and everything to do with political correctness.

[Pliny]

At that point, my only hope would be that the implications to us of the wait-and-see approach will include us deciding those who are impacted by GW.

Wait and see? what the "h" are you talking about? Let's start looking after our environment by keeping the government, and all it's scientific BS out of it.

[waldo]

Lindzen is among the respected skeptics

says who?

[waldo]

This is precisely true and the crux of the matter.

Waldo seems to emphasize the A ("anthropogenic") part of global warming. What part is "A" and what part is the natural cyclic pattern is what needs to be determined. Ok Global warming may be a fact, and as a matter of fact, the average mean temperature has increased over the last century by 1 degree.

What has been dispelled by the failure of models to predict or forecast the future pattern of climate change in the last decade is that the warming is anthropogenic at all.

All that is necessary is to keep our environment clean and we can work together to do that. We don't need massive transfers of wealth from first world countries to third world countries and other political initiatives that have absolutely nothing to do with climate change and everything to do with political correctness.

Pliny... should one be surprised you (and Simple) subscribe to the Dick Lindzen school of "don't worry, be happy... there's no problem here"?

care to support your statement concerning model projections? We've certainly danced this tune in earlier MLW threads, but don't let that stop you from actually qualifying your bluster and bringing forward the first offered MLW substantiation that speaks to an overall lack of model robustness in hindcast & projection... c'mon... go for it.

there's certainly no shortage of historical refutations to past Lindzen claims/positions; however, the easiest way to bust your bubble over Lindzen is to look into his most recent widely publicized folly that directly reflects on your false model results premise, with pointed reference to climate sensitivity:

-

NYT's Dot Earth

presents details of the first rebuttal to Lindzen's most recent claim/position (targeting models)... including commentary from Lindzen acknowledging his errors.

-

RealClimate has quest commentary from the rebuttal authors

providing in-depth details on the problems with the Lindzen paper/analysis.

-

This blog also covers the Lindzen rebuttal

while offering a few key snarc comments on past Lindzen involvements... which certainly would be an interesting tangential discussion on their own.

Pliny... perhaps you could offer comment on why the denialsphere so trumpeted this latest Lindzen folly... yet has remained oh so quiet on its first published refutation?

[Michael Hardner]

says who?

Read his credentials - he's not a blogger, but a climate scientist who was part of IPCC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen

[waldo]

Read his credentials - he's not a blogger, but a climate scientist who was part of IPCC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen

anyone with time invested around the AGW climate change debate recognizes who Lindzen is... we had an earlier MLW thread that included the MIT sponsored debate between Emanuel, Layzer, Prinn, Ansolabehere and Lindzen. His early non-climate related work has carried him - certainly, nothing he's contributed in presumed opposition to the theory of AGW climate change has gained him the "respect" you accord... he's been wrong on water vapour, he's been wrong on climate sensitivity, he's been wrong on model robustness, etc. His latest paper/position that I referenced clearly highlights the dismissive ranking Lindzen deserves. To me, a real respect should also include a measure of his outside ties and past engagements, particularly those related to Big Tobacco, Big Oil, and Conservative Think Tanks... and with those, there is little credibility to assign Lindzen accredited respect.

[Michael Hardner]

Well, if you don`t respect him - then what skeptical scientists do you respect ?

[Shady]

Well, if you don`t respect him - then what skeptical scientists do you respect?

Waldo doesn't respect any of them. His mind is completely closed. To him there is no possibility of not believing 100% is AGW. That's why I refer to him as a religious zealot. Because their mindsets are the same. He's almost child-like.

[Michael Hardner]

Waldo doesn't respect any of them. His mind is completely closed. To him there is no possibility of not believing 100% is AGW. That's why I refer to him as a religious zealot. Because their mindsets are the same. He's almost child-like.

Well if he admires Phil Jones, then perhaps he ascribes to Jones`s statement that the science isn`t settled ?

Edited April 10, 2010 by Michael Hardner

[waldo]

Hey non-entity Shady... buddy... I go away for a few days and you take such liberties - have a peak at that ice-extent decline trend pic I linked to - hey buddy?

but, hey now! Are you back to answer the latest in your continuing list of unanswered challenges... unanswered questions? C'mon, I'm still waiting - do you need another teaser?

gentle reminder #5: c'mon Shady, the unanswered questions won't go away. Besides, why do you bother... why do you continue... after all, you boasted your linked to article was, as you stated, "all you need"! Here Shady - let's not forget these summary posts that are still waiting for you, here and here - hey? Don't scurry away, now! Would you like another teaser?

[waldo]

Well, if you don`t respect him - then what skeptical scientists do you respect ?

you props em up... we knocks em down! But we could have some real fun here - let's have the local MLW denier camp (attempt to) champion their best! I'm sure the intellectually dishonest, non-entity Shady is just chomping at the bit. Hee Haw!

[Michael Hardner]

you props em up... we knocks em down! But we could have some real fun here - let's have the local MLW denier camp (attempt to) champion their best! I'm sure the intellectually dishonest, non-entity Shady is just chomping at the bit. Hee Haw!

I'm just asking a question.

[Keepitsimple]

I'm just asking a question.

Good luck Michael....he never answers direct questions.

[waldo]

hey Simple - sorry to burst your Lindzen bubble

why not indulge Michael Hardner and bring forward your full denier/skeptic rogues gallery lineup. Like I said, "you props em up... we shoots em down"

[Michael Hardner]

hey Simple - sorry to burst your Lindzen bubble

why not indulge Michael Hardner and bring forward your full denier/skeptic rogues gallery lineup. Like I said, "you props em up... we shoots em down"

Well certainly there are some reputable scientists who are skeptical ?

[wyly]

Well certainly there are some reputable scientists who are skeptical ?

so out of the dozen or so you can scrounge up, how many are climatologists, how many of those have any research/ peer-reviewed work, and of those who have done that actually dispute AGW and not the projections...and then compare that to the huge number on the otherside of the debate...

[Shady]

Hey waldo! Remember when this was suppose to be a fact as well! Looks like your opinions are the only thing that really stinks now!

Cows absolved of causing global warming

Klaus Butterbach-Bahl, of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany, carried out the study in Inner Mongolia in China. He found that grassland produced more nitrous oxide during the spring thaw when sheep or cattle have not been grazing. This is because the greenhouse gas, also known as laughing gas, is released by microbes in the soil. When the grass is long snow settles keeping the microbes warm and providing water, however when the grass is cut short by animals the ground freezes and the microbes die.

Dr Butterbach-Bahl said the study overturned assumptions about grazing goats and cattle

Link

Another day, another global warming myth shot down. Does it ever stop?!

[Guest TrueMetis]

Hey waldo! Remember when this was suppose to be a fact as well! Looks like your opinions are the only thing that really stinks now!

Another day, another global warming myth shot down. Does it ever stop?!

Eventually there has got to be some action against your intellectually dishonest bullshit.

But Dr Butterbach-Bahl pointed out that the study did not take into account the methane produced by the livestock or the carbon dioxide produced if soil erodes.