"Global Warming" or not? Doesn't matter.

[DarrinS]

A trend is a trend. One doesn't have to be able to give you the exact temperature in Barcelona on February 20th, 2015 to be able to say that the world will be slightly warmer.

What is the trend of the last 10 years?

[Wild Cobra]

When they can get tomorrows, next weeks, next months, or next years forecasts right...I'll start paying attention to these morons who think they know what's gonna happen in the decades to come.

Aint that the truth.

Just because a degree in climatology requires one more course than a degree as a meteorologist, they think they can predict better?

Give me a break.

[Wild Cobra]

When they can get tomorrows, next weeks, next months, or next years' forecast for the stock market, I will start investing.

A trend is a trend. One doesn't have to be able to give you the exact temperature in Barcelona on February 20th, 2015 to be able to say that the world will be slightly warmer.

But like the stock market, nature has natural cycles not influenced by man!

[RandomGuy]

"A trend is a trend"

Stock Markets have trends too. You wanna bet 1 Trillion dollars that the market is gonna keep going down?

But, you'll bet that the earth's warming trend will continue to go up?

As long as your betting your own money, be my guest. Gambling and smoking are two vices I've been known to indulge in myself.

But, don't demand my money to do it with. One should gamble with one own's money.

Well, unless your really sneaky smart, and can get other folks to back your gamble...and give you their money.

And that folks...is what "man made" global warming con men are all about.

What are you gonna give?

Trends are trends, indeed.

There is a danger in the "straight line" assumption, namely that the future will necessarily follow any given trend line.

What the past and present trends can give you, however, is a better idea as to the range of possible outcomes, and some idea as to the probability of their occurance.

Will I bet that the earth's temperature will continue to go up?

Yes.

The weight of evidence to me points that direction.

There is evidence on both sides of this, as WC points out, and the weight of that evidence points to our continued effect on the overall climate.

Until the bulk of peer-reviewed science points to a different conclusion, that is the most probable outcome.

WC will undoubtedly protest this, but still hasn't concretely shown any peer-reviewed papers on the subject, so I must assume that peer-reviewed evidence that supports his theis is somewhat limited.

[RandomGuy]

What is the trend of the last 10 years?

Which is more desirable in order to draw conclusions from, 10 years worth of data, or 50?

[RandomGuy]

"A trend is a trend"

Stock Markets have trends too. You wanna bet 1 Trillion dollars that the market is gonna keep going down?

But, you'll bet that the earth's warming trend will continue to go up?

As long as your betting your own money, be my guest. Gambling and smoking are two vices I've been known to indulge in myself.

But, don't demand my money to do it with. One should gamble with one own's money.

Well, unless your really sneaky smart, and can get other folks to back your gamble...and give you their money.

And that folks...is what "man made" global warming con men are all about.

What are you gonna give?

The argument actually goes just as easily the other way.

Why are you betting my money on the fact that this is false?

If we really are markedly affecting our climate, doing nothing has a definite cost, and one you would force on me with your proposal to do nothing.

That particular line of reasoning doesn't really help clarify the issue, does it?

[Wild Cobra]

Which is more desirable in order to draw conclusions from, 10 years worth of data, or 50?

Neither.

Look at several thousand years past. You'll see there were two points in history that civilizations say far greater warming than today, and it cooled back down.

Then on top of that. It is absolutely clear to those who look at the facts that CO2 does not drive warming. It does slightly steer it, but it is a very small contributor.

[doobs]

You've changed, Earth.

[Winehole23]

You've changed, Earth.

That was truly oracular, doobs.

[DarrinS]

Mr. Gore : Apology Accepted (from right-wing ultra-conservative website, Huffington post )

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/harold..._b_154982.html

You are probably wondering whether President-elect Obama owes the world an apology for his actions regarding global warming. The answer is, not yet. There is one person, however, who does. You have probably guessed his name: Al Gore.

Mr. Gore has stated, regarding climate change, that "the science is in." Well, he is absolutely right about that, except for one tiny thing. It is the biggest whopper ever sold to the public in the history of humankind.

What is wrong with the statement? A brief list:

1. First, the expression "climate change" itself is a redundancy, and contains a lie. Climate has always changed, and always will. There has been no stable period of climate during the Holocene, our own climatic era, which began with the end of the last ice age 12,000 years ago. During the Holocene there have been numerous sub-periods with dramatically varied climate, such as the warm Holocene Optimum (7,000 B.C. to 3,000 B.C., during which humanity began to flourish, and advance technologically), the warm Roman Optimum (200 B.C. to 400 A.D., a time of abundant crops that promoted the empire), the cold Dark Ages (400 A.D. to 900 A.D., during which the Nile River froze, major cities were abandoned, the Roman Empire fell apart, and pestilence and famine were widespread), the Medieval Warm Period (900 A.D. to 1300 A.D., during which agriculture flourished, wealth increased, and dozens of lavish examples of Gothic architecture were created), the Little Ice Age (1300 to 1850, during much of which plague, crop failures, witch burnings, food riots -- and even revolutions, including the French Revolution -- were the rule of thumb), followed by our own time of relative warmth (1850 to present, during which population has increased, technology and medical advances have been astonishing, and agriculture has flourished).

So, no one needs to say the words "climate" and "change" in the same breath -- it is assumed, by anyone with any level of knowledge, that climate changes. That is the redundancy to which I alluded. The lie is the suggestion that climate has ever been stable. Mr. Gore has used a famously inaccurate graph, known as the "Mann Hockey Stick," created by the scientist Michael Mann, showing that the modern rise in temperatures is unprecedented, and that the dramatic changes in climate just described did not take place. They did. One last thought on the expression "climate change": It is a retreat from the earlier expression used by alarmists, "manmade global warming," which was more easily debunked. There are people in Mr. Gore's camp who now use instances of cold temperatures to prove the existence of "climate change," which is absurd, obscene, even.

2. Mr. Gore has gone so far to discourage debate on climate as to refer to those who question his simplistic view of the atmosphere as "flat-Earthers." This, too, is right on target, except for one tiny detail. It is exactly the opposite of the truth.

Indeed, it is Mr. Gore and his brethren who are flat-Earthers. Mr. Gore states, ad nauseum, that carbon dioxide rules climate in frightening and unpredictable, and new, ways. When he shows the hockey stick graph of temperature and plots it against reconstructed C02 levels in An Inconvenient Truth, he says that the two clearly have an obvious correlation. "Their relationship is actually very complicated," he says, "but there is one relationship that is far more powerful than all the others, and it is this: When there is more carbon dioxide, the temperature gets warmer." The word "complicated" here is among the most significant Mr. Gore has uttered on the subject of climate and is, at best, a deliberate act of obfuscation. Why? Because it turns out that there is an 800-year lag between temperature and carbon dioxide, unlike the sense conveyed by Mr. Gore's graph. You are probably wondering by now -- and if you are not, you should be -- which rises first, carbon dioxide or temperature. The answer? Temperature. In every case, the ice-core data shows that temperature rises precede rises in carbon dioxide by, on average, 800 years. In fact, the relationship is not "complicated." When the ocean-atmosphere system warms, the oceans discharge vast quan ies of carbon dioxide in a process known as de-gassing. For this reason, warm and cold years show up on the Mauna Loa C02 measurements even in the short term. For instance, the post-Pinatubo-eruption year of 1993 shows the lowest C02 increase since measurements have been kept. When did the highest C02 increase take place? During the super El Niño year of 1998.

3. What the alarmists now state is that past episodes of warming were not caused by C02 but amplified by it, which is debatable, for many reasons, but, more important, is a far cry from the version of events sold to the public by Mr. Gore.

Meanwhile, the theory that carbon dioxide "drives" climate in any meaningful way is simply wrong and, again, evidence of a "flat-Earth" mentality. Carbon dioxide cannot absorb an unlimited amount of infrared radiation. Why not? Because it only absorbs heat along limited bandwidths, and is already absorbing just about everything it can. That is why plotted on a graph, C02's ability to capture heat follows a logarithmic curve. We are already very near the maximum absorption level. Further, the IPCC Fourth Assessment, like all the ones before it, is based on computer models that presume a positive feedback of atmospheric warming via increased water vapor.

4. This mechanism has never been shown to exist. Indeed, increased temperature leads to increased evaporation of the oceans, which leads to increased cloud cover (one cooling effect) and increased precipitation (a bigger cooling effect). Within certain bounds, in other words, the ocean-atmosphere system has a very effective self-regulating tendency. By the way, water vapor is far more prevalent, and relevant, in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide -- a trace gas. Water vapor's absorption spectrum also overlays that of carbon dioxide. They cannot both absorb the same energy! The relative might of water vapor and relative weakness of carbon dioxide is exemplified by the extraordinary cooling experienced each night in desert regions, where water in the atmosphere is nearly non-existent.

If not carbon dioxide, what does "drive" climate? I am glad you are wondering about that. In the short term, it is ocean cycles, principally the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the "super cycle" of which cooling La Niñas and warming El Niños are parts. Having been in its warm phase, in which El Niños predominate, for the 30 years ending in late 2006, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation switched to its cool phase, in which La Niñas predominate.
Since that time, already, a number of interesting things have taken place. One La Niña lowered temperatures around the globe for about half of the year just ended, and another La Niña shows evidence of beginning in the equatorial Pacific waters. During the last twelve months, many interesting cold-weather events happened to occur: record snow in the European Alps, China, New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, the Pacific Northwest, Alaska, the Rockies, the upper Midwest, Las Vegas, Houston, and New Orleans. There was also, for the first time in at least 100 years, snow in Baghdad.

Concurrent with the switchover of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation to its cool phase the Sun has entered a period of deep slumber. The number of sunspots for 2008 was the second lowest of any year since 1901. That matters less because of fluctuations in the amount of heat generated by the massive star in our near proximity (although there are some fluctuations that may have some measurable effect on global temperatures) and more because of a process best described by the Danish physicist Henrik Svensmark in his complex, but elegant, work The Chilling Stars. In the book, the modern Galileo, for he is nothing less, establishes that cosmic rays from deep space seed clouds over Earth's oceans. Regulating the number of cosmic rays reaching Earth's atmosphere is the solar wind; when it is strong, we get fewer cosmic rays. When it is weak, we get more. As NASA has corroborated, the number of cosmic rays passing through our atmosphere is at the maximum level since measurements have been taken, and show no signs of diminishing. The result: the seeding of what some have taken to calling "Svensmark clouds," low dense clouds, principally over the oceans, that reflect sunlight back to space before it can have its warming effect on whatever is below.

Svensmark has proven, in the minds of most who have given his work a full hearing, that it is this very process that produced the episodes of cooling (and, inversely, warming) of our own era and past eras. The clearest instance of the process, by far, is that of the Maunder Minimum, which refers to a period from 1650 to 1700, during which the Sun had not a single spot on its face. Temperatures around the globe plummeted, with quite adverse effects: crop failures (remember the witch burnings in Europe and Massachusetts?), famine, and societal stress.

Many solar physicists anticipate that the slumbering Sun of early 2009 is likely to continue for at least two solar cycles, or about the next 25 years. Whether the Grand Solar Minimum, if it comes to pass, is as serious as the Maunder Minimum is not knowable, at present. Major solar minima (and maxima, such as the one during the second half of the 20th century) have also been shown to correlate with significant volcanic eruptions. These are likely the result of solar magnetic flux affecting geomagnetic flux, which affects the distribution of magma in Earth's molten iron core and under its thin mantle. So, let us say, just for the sake of argument, that such an eruption takes place over the course of the next two decades. Like all major eruptions, this one will have a temporary cooling effect on global temperatures, perhaps a large one. The larger the eruption, the greater the effect. History shows that periods of cold are far more stressful to humanity than periods of warm. Would the eruption and consequent cooling be a climate-modifier that exists outside of nature, somehow? Who is the "flat-Earther" now?

What about heat escaping from volcanic vents in the ocean floor? What about the destruction of warming, upper-atmosphere ozone by cosmic rays? I could go on, but space is short. Again, who is the "flat-Earther" here?

The ocean-atmosphere system is not a simple one that can be "ruled" by a trace atmospheric gas. It is a complex, chaotic system, largely modulated by solar effects (both direct and indirect), as shown by the Little Ice Age.

To be told, as I have been, by Mr. Gore, again and again, that carbon dioxide is a grave threat to humankind is not just annoying, by the way, although it is that! To re-tool our economies in an effort to suppress carbon dioxide and its imaginary effect on climate, when other, graver problems exist is, simply put, wrong. Particulate pollution, such as that causing the Asian brown cloud, is a real problem. Two billion people on Earth living without electricity, in darkened huts and hovels polluted by charcoal smoke, is a real problem.

So, let us indeed start a Manhattan Project-like mission to create alternative sources of energy. And, in the meantime, let us neither cripple our own economy by mislabeling carbon dioxide a pollutant nor discourage development in the Third World, where suffering continues unabated, day after day.

Again, Mr. Gore, I accept your apology.

And, Mr. Obama, though I voted for you for a thousand times a thousand reasons, I hope never to need one from you.

P.S. One of the last, desperate canards proposed by climate alarmists is that of the polar ice caps. Look at the "terrible," "unprecedented" melting in the Arctic in the summer of 2007, they say. Well, the ice in the Arctic basin has always melted and refrozen, and always will. Any researcher who wants to find a single molecule of ice that has been there longer than 30 years is going to have a hard job, because the ice has always been melted from above (by the midnight Sun of summer) and below (by relatively warm ocean currents, possibly amplified by volcanic venting) -- and on the sides, again by warm currents. Scientists in the alarmist camp have taken to referring to "old ice," but, again, this is a misrepresentation of what takes place in the Arctic.

More to the point, 2007 happened also to be the time of maximum historic sea ice in Antarctica. (There are many credible sources of this information, such as the following website maintained by the University of Illinois-Urbana: http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosph...anom.south.jpg). Why, I ask, has Mr. Gore not chosen to mention the record growth of sea ice around Antarctica? If the record melting in the Arctic is significant, then the record sea ice growth around Antarctica is, too, I say. If one is insignificant, then the other one is, too.

For failing to mention the 2007 Antarctic maximum sea ice record a single time, I also accept your apology, Mr. Gore. By the way, your contention that the Arctic basin will be "ice free" in summer within five years (which you said last month in Germany), is one of the most demonstrably false comments you have dared to make. Thank you for that!

[RandomGuy]

Mr. Gore : Apology Accepted (from right-wing ultra-conservative website, Huffington post )

You did not answer my question.

That's ok.

I will answer it for you.

The answer is: 50 years is better for determining overall trends, and, if available, even longer periods.

Go back too far, say tens of millions to hundreds of millions of years and the data actually starts to mean less, because the climate is a complex system, and conditions in the past, such as continent placement, biosphere, and so forth were too different to draw meaningful conclusions.

The other question that your happy fun graph immediately brought to mind:

What was the effect of CO2 in that period?

Nothing about the AGW theory says that you can't have cooling trends. To suggest otherwise is either to deliberately mislead, or demonstrate a lack of udnerstanding of the issue.

Were you attempting to be misleading?

Or did you, for whatever reason, forget to include enough context to be intellectually honest about the graph? If so, why?

[RandomGuy]

Neither.

Look at several thousand years past. You'll see there were two points in history that civilizations say far greater warming than today, and it cooled back down.

Then on top of that. It is absolutely clear to those who look at the facts that CO2 does not drive warming. It does slightly steer it, but it is a very small contributor.

What were the swings on concentration of CO2 in those periods in percentage terms?

[doobs]

Mr. Gore : Apology Accepted (from right-wing ultra-conservative website, Huffington post )

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/harold..._b_154982.html

He must be silenced . . .

Arianna Huffington has put out the following message:

Harold Ambler reached out to me about posting a critical piece on Al Gore and the environment. We are always open to posts that present opinions contrary to HuffPost's editorial view -- and have welcomed many conservative voices, such as David Frum, Tony Blankley, Michael Smerconish, Bob Barr, Joe Scarborough, Jim Talent, etc., to the site. We have featured also countless posts from the leading lights of the Green movement, including Robert Redford, Laurie David, Carl Pope, Van Jones, David Roberts, and many others -- and I myself have written extensively about the global warming crisis, and have been highly critical of those who refuse to acknowledge the overwhelming scientific evidence.


When Ambler sent his post, I forwarded it to one of our associate blog editors to evaluate, not having read it. I get literally hundreds of posts a week submitted like this and obviously can't read them all -- which is why we have an editorial process in place. The associate blog editor published the post. It was an error in judgment. I would not have posted it. Although HuffPost welcomes a vigorous debate on many subjects, I am a firm believer that there are not two sides to every issue, and that on some issues the jury is no longer out. The climate crisis is one of these issues.

[Winehole23]

Well, they already published it, so Arianna's talking out of both sides of her mouth.

[Winehole23]

But yeah, that's a diktat.

[Winehole23]

I find the dogma refreshing. Just declare your bias.

[doobs]

I find the dogma refreshing. Just declare your bias.

Well, we're not discussing whether the earth is flat or round, or whether two plus two equals four. We're discussing man-made global warming. There's certainly room for debate, so it cracks me up (in a sad way) that many so-called "liberals" are so rigid in their views and want to shut people up. They pride themselves on supposedly being rational and skeptical and willing to ask tough questions---but when it comes to environmentalism (which is their religion) or Al Gore (who is one of their high prophets) they lose their damn minds.

[Winehole23]

It's still refreshing.

Why pretend the stand is rationally taken? Just declare the controversy over. If you can't be just, be arbitrary.

Faith based versus faith based.

Many bear the thyrsus, but few are the bacchantes.

[RandomGuy]

I find the dogma refreshing. Just declare your bias.

That's the thing that chaps my hide about this thread.

I really don't have much to say either way. From what I understand, the bulk of the science points in one direction, and I am inclined to go along with the consensus, because, as I have said repeatedly, I don't have the time to really dig into it.

But

I end up having to sort of play devils advocate with people who are very obviously biased in one direction, who seem to labor under the mistaken impression that I am some dogmatic hack on the subject. It's irritating.

[DarrinS]

You did not answer my question.

That's ok.

I will answer it for you.

The answer is: 50 years is better for determining overall trends, and, if available, even longer periods.

Go back too far, say tens of millions to hundreds of millions of years and the data actually starts to mean less, because the climate is a complex system, and conditions in the past, such as continent placement, biosphere, and so forth were too different to draw meaningful conclusions.

The other question that your happy fun graph immediately brought to mind:

What was the effect of CO2 in that period?

Nothing about the AGW theory says that you can't have cooling trends. To suggest otherwise is either to deliberately mislead, or demonstrate a lack of udnerstanding of the issue.

Were you attempting to be misleading?

Or did you, for whatever reason, forget to include enough context to be intellectually honest about the graph? If so, why?

Well, CO2 was rising between 1940 and 1970, so why did the average temperature decline during that period?



By the way, the hottest year in history was 1934, not 1998 (after the "hockey stick" was thoroughly debunked and NASA corrected their data). You'll probably remember the hockey stick graph because it has been featured so prominantly in IPCC reports as well as the giant graph in Al Gore's science fiction thriller.

[DarrinS]

I really don't have much to say either way. From what I understand, the bulk of the science points in one direction, and I am inclined to go along with the consensus, because, as I have said repeatedly, I don't have the time to really dig into it.

Can you give me some QUAN ATIVE figures on this so-called consensus? If you REALLY look into it, you'll be surprised.

[DarrinS]

[Winehole23]

Single snapshots aren't statistically significant. Or was that your point?

[2centsworth]

Single snapshots aren't statistically significant. Or was that your point?

and you picked just one of his posts to make your point.

[Winehole23]

and you picked just one of his posts to make your point.

The thread is a be th. Jeez. Can't I say something about just one of DarrinS's persistent themes?

He keeps posting daily temperatures as if that meant something. I'd like him to explain why. If he already explained it, I forgot and I'm too lazy to check, ok?

If you know the answer, please share it with me, 2cents.

Why be content to raise your leg on the conversation, when you can correct it?