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Global Warming Debunker Debunked
Earlier this month we ran an article linking Christopher Monckton's attempt to discredit global warming. The submitter asked plaintively, "Can anyone out there go through this piece and tell me why it might be wrong?" George Monbiot has now done so. From the article: "This is a dazzling debunking of climate change science. It is also wildly wrong... In keeping with most of the articles about climate change in [the Sunday Telegraph], it is a mixture of cherry-picking, downright misrepresentation, and pseudo-scientific gibberish. But it has the virtue of being incomprehensible to anyone who is not an atmospheric physicist... As for James Hansen, he did not tell the US Congress that temperatures would rise by 0.3C by the end of the past century. He presented three possible scenarios to the US Senate — high, medium, and low. Both the high and low scenarios, he explained, were unlikely to materialise. The middle one was 'the most plausible.' As it happens, the middle scenario was almost exactly right. He did not claim, under any scenario, that sea levels would rise by several feet by 2000." And on the political front, the only major ally for Pres. Bush's stand on global warming, Australia's Prime Minister John Howard, is now willing to look at carbon trading.
From the Financial Times, July 7 2006:
"I recognise the surface of the earth is warmer and that an increase in greenhouse gases caused by humans is contributing to the problem," he said during a visit to Denmark en route to Gleneagles.
technically slashdot is exactly the place to pretend you know shit about stuff you don't - the whole commentary for this story will prove this.
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The first article did NOT make an argument. Instead it attempted to convince everyone he was correct by saying how X,Y and Z arguments are false. But there are 100's of arguments for global warming. OF COURSE some of them are false.
The first article was a poorly thought out piece of crap, because it did NOT do what science must do: present disprovable data. Instead it simply disproved a small portion of other people's arguments.
That is called Cherry Picking. It is a stupid way to argue, I can use it to prove anything.
Here: Some people (my 3 year old nephew) claim that Communists killed Jesus. This is patently false, because Jesus was killed and ressurected years before Communism was invented. Others (my 10 year old niece) claim that Communists killed their father. I have here a signed affadaivit that her father is alive and well, and living with a 19 year old stripper in Miami. Finally, some people (my insane neighbor), claim that Communists are poisoning our water supply with fluride, but I have here ten studies, all double blind, showing that Fluride is not harmfull in the quantities placed in our water.
Therefore Communists do not kill people.
This is EXACTLY what the first article did. It picked a VERY few articles, that may or may not have been false, and attacked them. This is called Cherry Picking. Such a methodology is foolish and proves nothing.
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I've been following global warming for a long time now doing a lot research on the side for the last couple of years. Here are some facts about global warming. Some of which you hear and don't hear from the main stream media: 1.) The world appears to be getting warmer with many computer models showing an increase in global temperature. 2.) Tying a trend to warmer temperatures based on older data from the early 1900's is suspect at best. Good, reliable, accurate scientific equipment that measures the temperature wasn't readily available until recently (late 1900's). 3.) Apparently, the Earth magnetic field has decreased by 10% in the last 150 years (source: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/earth_magnet ic_031212.html). I'm an electrical engineer and during my studies in particle physics, I learned that a particles velocity can be affected by magnetic fields. I keep hearing about the increased activity of our Sun and believe it's possible that more of the Sun's radiation is penetrating the Earth's magnetic field due to it being weaker. If more radiation hits the Earth and the Sun is spewing out more heat, shouldn't that also increase the overall temperature of the Earth and can global warming be attributed to this?
4.) Jupitor is experiencing the same climate change that Earth is. (source: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/060504_red_j r.html [space.com])
5.) Mars is experiencing the same climate change that Earth is. (source: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/ mars_snow_011206-1.html and http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=410901&in_page_id=1770)
How can you explain the recent same climate changes on different planets? I doubt it's all those cars being driven there.
Is it possible that the warmer temperatures that Earth is experiencing are caused by cyclical natural phenomena? What about glaciers in Greenland that have been shrinking for 100 years (source: http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/08/21/060821191 826.o0mynclv.html [breitbart.com])? Also, how do you explain huge ice ages on Earth? Were thse caused by huge carbon emissions or was it a small natural climate cycle that just happens? Were those climate changes, which are no doubt more extreme than what's going on now, caused by the combustion engine?
You failed to mention that the article he debunked asserted that there was a global conspiracy headed by the UN to promote the concept fo global warming in order to establish a world government. Is that really the domain of serious science? Hmmm?
Your nephew is an idiot. The Jewish high priests were definitely Capitalists.
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Further -- the Monbiot article says that "climate sensitivity is an equilibrium concept" -- meaning that CO2 release precedes its effects by several decades. Nice, but the original (Monckton) article claimed that the problem was that warming preceded CO2 rise, which means Monbiot didn't really rebut him. There are many, many specific claims in the original article (and the linked-to PDF is even more detailed); Monbiot tackles very few of them adequately. Rather than slamming a journalist for lack of sufficient credentials, he should be congratulated for attempting to meet the scientists halfway by speaking their own language, and set right where he needs to be set right. The truth has nothing to fear from polemic.
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As a scientist working in a related field I find this desire to polarise the whole thing utterly exasperating. For whatever reason, mainstream scientific opinion gets lumped on one side of this divide, and the other side is left fixated on fringe opinions from a tiny minority of dissenters on one wing of the science. The media then jump into the fray with their desire for "balance" and give these fringe dwellers equal airtime and column space with the mainstream, in doing so manufacturing a series of debates which are not really there.
If you want balance, and you want to put the opinions of a handful of scientists on one extreme of the argument into it, then leave the vast majority of us in the middle out of it and go find the same level of extremism on the other side. Those who argue that we're in danger of imminent collapse of both the East Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, or who talk alarmingly of extreme "runaway greenhouse" feedbacks, for instance.
Alternatively of course you could all just stop fixating on tiny minorities of fringe scientific opinion. There is plenty of genuine debate going on and opportunity for journalistic and political "balance" in covering it - but it is simply no longer over such big picture questions as "is the climate warming now?" or "are human emissions largely responsible for this warming?"
Newsflash: Methodology is EVERYTHING in science. If your methodology is bad, your data is less than bad - it is misleading. Hence why so much revolves around whether people followed proper methodology when presenting their data.
The reason that the "save the rainforests" is quieter now is because people are actually doing something about it.
Finally, this entire "you have to present both sides of a story" has to stop. Now. This is not a game show where you get to choose which door to open. There is a public debate on an important topic, and that debate needs to happen in public. That's true. However, debating something in public does not mean that you simply pick a side you like and then clamor that everyone needs to listen to you "because all sides need to be heard". It means debating the theory, the data, the methodology, investigating problems and striving towards finding the most reasonable answer or theory. Granted, most news stories don't get this either, but that doesn't mean that we can't tell them to stop being idiots about the way they present science debates.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
From the Arrhenius link which you provided:
.005 degree rise? If the latter, do we really need to be worried about it?
As Arrhenius predicted, both carbon dioxide levels and temperatures increased from 1900-1999. However, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased much more quickly than he expected, but the Earth hasn't warmed as much as he thought it would. (Graphs by Robert Simmon, based on data from NOAA and the Goddard Institute for Space Studies)
You'll be hard pressed to find anyone who believes that carbon emissions have no effect at all on the global temperature. What's in debate is just how much effect they have. Will a tripling in global carbon emissions cause a 5 degree rise, or only a
That's the kind of questions which lead to questioning of the overall global warming theory, because they've never been successfully answered. And that's why questions about climate change on Mars and Venus become relevant - because if the temperature is changing on those planets then it's quite possible that carbon dioxide is an almost insignificant factor in the temperature rise which OUR planet is experiencing, and that the major cause is the sun.
Hell, for all we know, the rise in CO2 might be the symptom instead of the cause of global warming. Granted, it's unlikely, but how do we know for sure? Has anyone measured CO2 levels on mars and venus? So far the only proof we have that co2 is linked to global warming is that any time in the past when temperatures have gone up, so has CO2. How can we prove which one is the cause, and which one a symptom? And if we can't even prove that, how in the world can we possibly expect to determine exactly how much effect CO2 has on temperature?
The real problem with many of these articles 'debunking' global warming is that they have no real intent to disprove the science behind global warming, rather they have the goal of creating confusion and the appearance of controversy with a net result of inaction and a continuation of the status quo. This is why virtually all 'debunking' publications occur in the mainstream media whereas the actual science continues where it always has, in academia, away from the public eye.
One can only speculate on the motives of these 'debunkers'. Obviously there are those who profit mightily and so have a powerful interest in the status quo. Next, there are skeptics who will never accept anything, no matter the evidence or risk of inaction. As near as I can tell, their only goal is to drag as many people as possible to their side. Finally, as an Albertan, I see many other people who have been frightened by the economic doom and gloom emanating from certain quarters. These people will not accept Climate change because they see it as an attack on them and their livelihood. They don't want to change how they live so they choose only to believe what will enable them to continue as they are. The first two groups of people can never be convinced so we shouldn't really bother trying, rather we must be mindful of their effects on legitimate debate. The third, and far largest group, can be convinced once they realize that combating climate change is not just a problem but can be an opportunity; an opportunity to reinvent society and unleash innovation! Certainly, once you accept the science behind climate change most rational people must acknowledge a moral imperative to our fellow human beings to combat this issue.
1) This is why people prefer global climate change rather than global warming, because it gives people who read only headlines the wrong idea. What that article refers to is thermohaline inversion and the stopping of the Atlantic conveyor belt, which is responsible for a good chunk of the nice coastal temperatures in Europe. For more details, and just because I can, I'll point you to alink that is in the same article you just quoted.
2) The Clean Air act is supposedly responsible for this nice little event. As for whether this would be able to affect the global climate in the level that we're seeing it, I'll refer you to this link.
3) Nice little effort at cherry-picking your events. For an actual event, you can go to Greenland and see how their farming efforts are a little easier now. However, the bad events far outweigh any positives we've gotten so far, primarily because it takes time to profit from change. Until we learn to take advantage of what Global Climate Change can do for us, we'll have seniors dying in droves from heat waves, pipelines and houses buckling due to vanishing permafrost and crops dying in areas that are getting too hot for comfort.
4) Since this is the same exact point as in 2) (complete with link to article that has the same quote), I'll refer you to the link I posted there. Besides, that article is a complete light weight when it comes to determining how much more light has reached the earth, its causes (which, btw, include reduced albedo, which is a side-effect of Global Climate Change) or its impact on what we're seeing.
Try again.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Most of what you say is true. Up to the "and not vice-versa" part. Bzzzt! Faulty logic! The first part of your statement is true (CO2 can lag temperature changes), but you present nothing to prove the vice-versa (CO2 can't be a driver) part.
Sure, in the past CO2 has lagged temperature. However, that doesn't mean that it hasn't sustained climate changes as a positive feedback. What it does mean is that CO2 has often not been the driver for climate change events. Until now.
We are generating lots of CO2. A small amount relative to natural fluxes, but enough to . Can anyone provide a plausible alternative hypothesis for current conditions?
CO2 acts as a greenhouse gas. This is basic physics. What's not so basic are all of the other feedbacks, positive and negative- water vapor, ice cover, and so forth. That's where the action is. Let's talk about that. But to get caught up talking about whether we are responsible for increases in CO2, and whether or not CO2 is a greenhouse gas, is just a colossal waste of time. It's basic frickin physics and chemistry. It's the fluid dynamics that makes everything so hard to resolve.
To recap:
Climate varies naturally. That doesn't mean it can't be affected unnaturally.
Historically, CO2 concentrations have lagged temperature changes (b/c yes, Virginia, there are other factors that affect climate). That does not disprove that you can drive climate change with CO2; it just hasn't been tried often.
All else equal, higher CO2 = higher temperatures. Basic physics. The problem is the all else equal part.
Humans are trying an interesting experiment. What happens if we try to force climate change with CO2?
Why does everyone here think that they are smarter than climate scientists?
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You miss the point. Global warming is sold as a religion, which is why the instinct to say "I believe..." is so strong. It's presented as established science fact, when it's really highly dependent on a lot of assumptions and guesswork. Not that there's anything wrong with that--our climate is not a simple system that we can easily model. However it doesn't take too much thinking to come up with plausible alternative reasons for the phenomena we see.
Example: it's been asserted many times that there's been a rise in temperatures that coincide with the industrial revolution. Now why is that? Could it be because that temperatures were being measured where people were, rather than where people were not? It's reasonably clear that human concentration in urban areas increase local temperatures. We weren't taking temperature readings in the 1800s because we were worried about the Earth. We wanted to know about the local weather.
A simple thought experiment such as that starts to bring the data into question. If pressed, the climatologist may get frustrated because, in their mind, they've already accounted for that, but the full answer isn't simple to express. So what you get is, basically, "trust me, I'm a scientist", which is bollocks. For one, wearing the moniker "scientist" doesn't make you right; and two, if you're a scientist make some testable predictions. The ones mentioned in the original article sure didn't come true. That makes it bad science. The goal is not to make testable predictions, the goal is to convince people to act now. That's a religion. Or marketing. Either or, it's not science.
You say you want to expose people to the debates, but that's the last thing that's going on. People who wander off the human-caused global warming reservation are not treated as skeptics, they're treated as heretics. Anti-science heretics, with suspicious agendas.
Note I say this as a person who is supportive of some of the aims of the global warming activists. I think we do need to de-emphasize our easy-motoring lifestyle and to support more mass-transit systems. I think part of the reason we got where we are is because of intrusive and expansive government killing the incentive for people to remain in urban centers and driving the middle class out to the suburbs, and I find it daft that the proposed solution to the problem is invariably more intrusive and expansive government, this time on a global scale. It's crazy.
Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
And now onto policy. Uncertainty yields inaction. That's quite a gamble. What happens if you wait too long?
That's a nice strawman, that we have to go to war to reduce CO2 emissions. It's especially funny that you talk about turning 'global politics upside down', like the status quo hasn't had any of that (see: Middle East oil). The cost of (low carbon) energy independence, fully accounted, might not be so high.
I agree that China and India are huge factors in the CO2 game. Especially considering their economic growth and coal reserves. Kyoto doesn't cut it. Agreed. One interesting issue here is fairness. In the U.S. we've generated a lot of wealth by burning fossil fuels; hardly seems fair to make the rest of the world cap their emissions at a fraction of our per capita emissions. But that's a challenge, not a deal-killer.
I would submit that we can address our CO2 problems without "massive global economic disruption," but that's another debate for another time. I need to ride my bike home and play with my kids.
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