There IS a problem with global warming... it stopped in 1998

[laptop]

You have been asked repeatedly, bigfish.

What is your motivation for denying human-induced climate change?

I eveh helpfuly provided a hypothesis. You didn't answer that, either.

 

[Crispy]

Bet you £10 the reply is:

You have been asked repeatedly, laptop.

What is your motivation for accepting human-induced climate change?

I eveh helpfuly provided a hypothesis. You didn't answer that, either.

 

[laptop]

Bet you £10 the reply is:

Yes, but I can answer that

Bigfish?

 

[free spirit]

Global Dimming articles...

guardian

wickipedia

Recent reversal of the trend

In 2005 Wild et al. and Pinker et al. found that the "dimming" trend had reversed since about 1990 [4]. It is likely that at least some of this change; particularly over Europe, is due to decreases in pollution. Most governments of developed nations have done more to reduce aerosols released into the atmosphere which help global dimming instead of reducing CO2 emissions.

The Baseline Surface Radiation Network (BSRN) has been collecting surface measurements. BSRN was started in the early 1990s and updated the archives in this time. Analysis of recent data reveals that the surface of the planet has brightened by about 4% in the past decade. The brightening trend is corroborated by other data, including satellite analyses.

Some scientists now consider that the effects of global dimming have masked the effect of global warming to some extent and that resolving global dimming may therefore lead to increases in predictions of future temperature rise. [3].

ah yes, I remember now the whole global dimming phenomena is thought to have been masking many of the worst effects of climate change, something that the acid rain / clean air legislation in the early 90's (? late 80's?) across Europe and the US is actually reducing. Luckily there are shitloads of coal fired power stations being built across china to stabilise global dimming levels otherwise we could be faced with 5-15% more sunlight reaching the earth across higher latitudes compounding the impact of co2 induced global warming.

was that what you were getting at bigfish?

 

[free spirit]

so then bigfish, now that you've unwittingly steered this thread towards the whole global dimming phenomena, the effect of which climate scientists dramatically underestimated through most of the 90's as they didn't take into account the fact that water vapour tends to like to attach itself to small particulates in teh upper atmosphere thereby multiplying the reflective affect of the original particles... this being one of the major reasons why many of the earlier models predicted higher temperatures than we were actually experiencing... could you tell us if this is what you're actually proposing as a solution to climate change?

ie. the business as normal model basically means keep pumping out the co2, keep pumping out the particulates, keep increasing the greenhouse effect but offsetting that with more and more global dimming [not that most business as usual people actually understand this, but in effect this is what they're saying]

You do realise that unless you intend to carry on pumping sufficient particulates into the atmosphere forever to keep up the global dimming effect that this policy is basically storing up massive trouble for the future as the increased greenhouse effect will still be there waiting to trap all that extra sunlight in whenever the global dimming effect is reduced.

anyone remember the orb's little fluffy clouds?

What were the skies like when u were young?
They went on for ever and they when I we lived in Arizona and the skies
always had little fluffy clouds and err.. they were long and clear and there
were lots of stars, at night <snip> You don't see that.

in bigfish's world it's gonna have to get darker and darker for ever and ever if it's not to get hotter and hotter

 

[bigfish]

Shall I tell you why your efforts are little more than bullshit bigfish? You won't answer simple questions. That's the behaviour of the insincere and untrustworthy.

But "the behaviour of the insincere and untrustworthy" is clearly manifest in Michael Mann's IPCC hockey-stick, Jo - which is a scientific fraud plain and simple. So why don't you try berating Mann about his behaviour?

You could also try berating laptop for falsely claiming, above, that Fred Pearce's article was "scrupulously fair" when, in fact, it was nothing of the kind as there are some 240 proxy studies which flatly contradict him and only one that doesn't. How can it be that two highly trained scientist like Fred and laptop know nothing about them, any idea?

 

[bigfish]

You have been asked repeatedly, bigfish...

Now for the third time of asking:

If the Medieval Warm Period was much warmer than it is today -with zero man made CO2 industrial emissions -what is so unusual about the planet warming now, given that the present-day climate appears to be simply a recovery from the cold years of the “Little Ice Age”?

Furthermore, if both the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age were caused by variations in the sun, is it not likely then that the increased solar activity observed in the 20th century accounts for most, if not all, of the claimed 20th century warming?

 

[laptop]

So you're just going to keep on banging away with the same old attempts at personal attacks?

That's not argument, it's a failed indoctrination.

Not surprising, really, since you clearly don't understand climate or climatology: you just wake up and cut and paste something from the propagandists that push the line you have adopted - for reasons you refuse to discuss.

Oddly enough, this last time you woke up at full moon... anyone want to do a time series on bigfish' postings to see whether there's anyting in it after all?

 

[Jo/Joe]

But "the behaviour of the insincere and untrustworthy" is clearly manifest in Michael Mann's IPCC hockey-stick, Jo - which is a scientific fraud plain and simple. So why don't you try berating Mann about his behaviour?

You could also try berating laptop for falsely claiming, above, that Fred Pearce's article was "scrupulously fair" when, in fact, it was nothing of the kind as there are some 240 proxy studies which flatly contradict him and only one that doesn't. How can it be that two highly trained scientist like Fred and laptop know nothing about them, any idea?

Again, you avoid the question.

 

[bigfish]

So you're just going to keep on banging away with the same old attempts at personal attacks?

I would like you to answer the questions I have put to you on 3 separate occasions. Why wont you answer them?

... you clearly don't understand climate or climatology...

I see, once again, that you are attempting to pass yourself off as some kind of "expert" on climate and climatology - which is more than a little suspicious if you ask me, bearing in mind that by describing Fred's article as "scrupulously fair" you reveal a profound ignorance of more than 240 studies contradicting his statement.

Presumably you have access to a library - so how can it be that a Balliol trained 'expert' like you knows nothing at all about any of these other studies?

Personally, I strongly suspect you're not really all you claim to be. In fact, you appear more and more to be a self-aggrandizing fraud - a fraud cast from the same mould as Michael Mann.

 

[bigfish]

Again, you avoid the question.

Surely you don't expect me to give credence to your loaded questions by answering them do you?

 

[Jo/Joe]

They are perfectly reasonable questions to ask. Your motives are suspect, so you don't want to answer them.

 

[Crispy]

For instance:

My motives for believing in the consensus view on global warming are my belief in the (on average) honesty of scientists, the peer review process, and the suspect backgrounds of many of the deniers.

There, that wasn't too hard. I can be completely honest about my motives. Can you?

 

[bigfish]

For instance: My motives for believing in the consensus view on global warming are my belief in the (on average) honesty of scientists, the peer review process, and the suspect backgrounds of many of the deniers.

So where does that leave you now that the IPCC Hockey-Stick has been exposed as a FAKE and its lead author unmasked as a charlatan?

As for peer review, how did it come to pass that Michael Mann was allowed to peer review his own papers? Any idea?

If the evidence for anthroprogenic global warming is as compelling as you and the rest of the greenshirts seem to imagine, why did Mann find it necessary to "tune" his climate-model to mine for Hockey-Stick shapes in the first place?

As for "the consensus view on global warming" you pay homage too - there isn't one. See, for example, the testimony of Richard S. Lindzen, a participant in the proceedings of the IPCC, given before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on 2 May 2001.

As it turns out, much of what informed scientists agree upon is barely quantitative at all:
* that global mean temperature has probably increased over the past century,

* that CO2 in the atmosphere has increased over the same period,

* that the added CO2 is more likely to have caused global mean temperature to increase rather than decrease, and

* that man, like the butterfly, has some impact on climate.

Such statements have little relevance to policy, unless quantification shows significance.

The media and advocacy groups have, however, taken this agreement to mean that the same scientists must also agree that global warming “will lead to rising sea waters, droughts and agriculture disasters in the future if unchecked” (CNN). According to Deb Callahan, president of the League of Conservation Voters, “Science clearly shows that we are experiencing devastating impacts because of carbon dioxide pollution.” (Carbon dioxide, as a ‘pollutant’ is rather singular in that it is a natural product of respiration, non-toxic, and essential for life.) The accompanying cartoon suggests implications for severe weather, the ecosystem, and presumably plague, floods and droughts (as well as the profound politicization of the issue). Scientists who do not agree with the catastrophe scenarios are assumed to disagree with the basic statements. This is not only untrue, but absurdly stupid.

Indeed, the whole issue of consensus and skeptics is a bit of a red herring. If, as the news media regularly report, global warming is the increase in temperature caused by man’s emissions of CO2 that will give rise to rising sea levels, floods, droughts, weather extremes of all sorts, plagues, species elimination, and so on, then it is safe to say that global warming consists in so many aspects, that widespread agreement on all of them would be suspect ab initio. If it truly existed, it would be evidence of a thoroughly debased field. In truth, neither the full text of the IPCC documents nor even the summaries claim any such agreement.
...
t has become common to deal with the science by referring to the IPCC ‘scientific consensus.’ Claiming the agreement of thousands of scientists is certainly easier than trying to understand the issue or to respond to scientific questions; it also effectively intimidates most citizens.

PDF: http://eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/Testimony/Senate2001.pdf

 

[Fruitloop]

That is, like, so fucking weak.

 

[Fuchs66]

Hmm this is an argument that goes round and round and round ad infinitum...
I personally have not yet been convinced by either side, however.....

There are some other extremely good reasons to cut down on anthropogenic emissions that do effect us, even if not on the global scale of a possible Greenhouse effect and if there is a chance of the GH effect being present why the fuck not err on the side of caution?
Not bothering to read all of this thread mainly due to my opening point.

 

[bigfish]

Nature Starts a Blog

http://landshape.org/enm/?p=98

Stung by a string of controversies, corrections and frauds, and inspired we hope by the work of science bloggers in reinstating a culture of broad scientific debate, Nature magazine has instituted a what it calls a 'Peer Review Trial'.

In Nature’s peer review trial, lasting for three months, authors can choose to have their submissions posted on a preprint server for open comments, in parallel with the conventional peer review process. Anyone in the field may then post comments, provided they are prepared to identify themselves.
...
I wish them all the best, but credit should go where it is due. Without science bloggers and participants donating their time to finding flaws in exisiting peer reviewed articles — such examples in Nature as the takedown of South Korean human stem-cell researcher Hwang, and corrections of Mann’s false statistics supporting the hockeystick graph of climate history by McIntyre — the process of reform would not have begun.

... Some very interesting articles critical of existing peer review in the forum raise points already made on this blog. There is much to be concerned with about the level of verification and due diligence in climate science, biodiversity and other areas, and Nature is taking some positive steps, drawing on the wisdom of the blogosphere.

 

[bigfish]

Hockey Stick Shortened?

"We have 25 or so years invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?"
-- Phil Jones in a reply to climate skeptic Warwick Hughes in February 2005 as confirmed and reported by climatologist Hans Vans Storch at a National Academy of Sciences hearing March 2 on "Scientific Efforts to reconstruct surface temperature records over the last 1,000 to 2,000 years."

"Getting caught is the mother of invention."
-- Robert Byrne

"People say that in politics, it's not the crime, it's the cover-up. What that saying ignores is that most of the time, the cover-up works just fine."
-- George Carlin

The most gratifying thing about the National Academy of Science panel report last week into the science behind Michael Mann's past temperature reconstructions - the iconic "hockey stick" isn't what the mainstream media have been reporting -- the panel's declaration that the last 25 years of the 20th Century were the warmest in 400 years. After all, 400 years ago was 1600, and as the panel noted that was in the midst of a 350 year period from 1500 to 1850 where "a wide variety of evidence" supports the finding of a "Little Ice Age." So wouldn't you expect some period coming out of an ice to be warmer than any period during the Ice Age?

The important thing the panel did was to take a much-needed slap at the attitude expressed by Jones quoted above, which had become dangerously prevalent in some of the climate science community.

The panel told scientists that they should strive to provide data and "that a clear explanation of analytical methods is mandatory" and that "paleoclimate research would benefit if individual researchers, professional societies, journal editors, and funding agencies continued to improve their efforts to ensure that ... existing open access practices are followed."

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=062706E

 

[bigfish]

VZG Statement on NAS Panel

Von Storch, Zorita and Gonzalez-Raucen have issued the following statement on the NAS Panel Report:

We welcome the National Research Council’s Report, which clarifies that the discussion about the technical qualities of the hockeystick-methodology is insignificant for the overall conclusion that the presently ongoing warming is likely related to elevated greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere. We are pleased to read that the NRC shares our view that the methodology behind the hockeystick is questionable. We stick to our view that the methodology was not sufficiently described when published and independently tested thereafter.

1) We welcome the conclusion of the analysis by the NRC committee, which separates between two issues, namely firstly the claim that the last few decades (the last decade, the year 1998) were unprecedented in their warmth compared to a previous time horizon, and secondly the certainty we place into the published estimates of temperature variations in the past 1000-2000 years.

2) The assessment that the last few decades have exhibit a warming likely beyond the range of natural variations has been made on a variety of scientific findings, of which the Mann et al study was possibly the most publicly “sold” one, but other studies have provided better evidence (detection and attribution studies).

3) We share the assessment of the NRC committee that the evidence for unprecedented warming of a single decade or even a single year in times prior to 1500, or so, is stretching the scientific evidence too far. However, this was the key claim made in the contested 1998-Nature and 1999-GRL-papers by Mann et al.

4) With respect to methods, the committee is showing reservations concerning the methodology of Mann et al.. The committee notes explicitly on pages 91 and 111 that the method has no validation (CE) skill significantly different from zero. In the past, however, it has always been claimed that the method has a significant nonzero validation skill. Methods without a validation skill are usually considered useless.

5) Other independent efforts (e.g., inversion of borehole temperatures) to reconstruct past temperatures find different temperature ranges albeit qualitative agreement. These quantitative differences underline the methodological limitation of the Mann et al approach, which are described in the sections 9 and 11 of the NRC report.

6) We welcome the major conclusion of the report that further scientific efforts are needed to sort out a variety of problems with respect to methods and data; also the uncertainty must be assessed in a more objective manner. Thus, the public perception that the hockeystick as truthfully describing the temperature history was definitely false.

7) We find it disappointing that the method of Mann et al. was not sufficiently described in the original publication, and thus not peer-reviewed prior to publication, and that no serious efforts were made to allow independent researchers to check the performance of the methods and of the data used.

http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=716

 

[Crispy]

The lack of replies to this thread is actually indicative of the fact that we have all been convinced by your fabulous sources and are now preparing the nooses in which we will snuff out our raging self-hate.

 

[laptop]

are now preparing the nooses in which we will snuff out our raging self-hate.

Nah, it's too warm. Can't be bothered.