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Climate May Be Less Sensitive To CO2 Than Previously Thought
a_hanso writes "A new study suggests that the effects of rising levels of carbon dioxide on temperature may be less significant than previously thought. 'The new models predict that given a doubling in CO2 levels from pre-industrial levels, the Earth's surface temperatures will rise by 1.7 to 2.6 degrees C. That is a much tighter range than suggested by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 2007 report, which suggested a rise of between 2 to 4.5 degrees C."
we are saved!
Not having RTFA, all this does is give a little more time to deal with the issues. We will be on a rising curve for atmospheric CO2 levels for the foreseeable future, so all the bad things will happen, but just on a more leisurely schedule.
...let the rational, even-handed and emotionally detached debate begin!
We should be switching to nuclear anyway, it's not about global warming, it's about the eventuality of the end of the age of oil. It will happen so it's better to be thinking about it now.
You can't handle the truth.
Causes my levels to rise
Confirming that anthropogenic CO2 does affect climate and proposing that the multiplier is slightly less than what others have suggested. Yawn.
I doubt that any previous report have said that the temperature will rise at least.
Any scientist who doesn't want to look like a fool would be sure to state as much as or something similiar to indicate that there is an element of uncertainty. The bastardization from "There is a slight possibility that this may happen." to "ZOMG ZOMG!! WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!" is usually done by politicians or journalists that haven't learned the meaning of words like "can" and "may".
Denier: Ah hah! Told you all! Told you all!
Warmist: World is still getting warmer, which means we will all die
Skeptic: These are all extrapolations which are barely worth the paper they are written on
Denier: We need to stop with the environmental programs, they are killing the economy
Warmist: We need to stop polluting, the world is in jeopardy
Denier: It will cost trillion to "save" the world, and it might not even be saved. Anyone who wants to spend that kind of money on a crapshoot is an idiot
Warmist: Can we afford to take a chance? Our choice is trillions now, or quadrillions later. If you don't agree with me, then you are an idiot.
Skeptic: Anybody who wants to take drastic action on the currently available data is an idiot.
Did you hear how Mother Earth is creating a new island in the canaries?
She's got it in for us, I swear. Nothing like putting a blowtorch in the hidden depths of your oceans to screw with those gnats on the surface: "They think they're so important, I'll show them."
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
Its good news, sort of. Of course we still have to deal with the anti-climate change conspiracy theorists who believe that all the scientists in the world are in on a secret conspiracy to falsely convince us there is such a thing as global warming. They will only spin the study as proof that climate change is still a hoax.
On a more rational note, a rise of 1.7 to 2.6 degrees Celsius is still not good. However, it is much better than a rise of between 2 and 4.5 degrees C.
who prays for Satan? Who in 18 centuries has had the humanity to pray for the 1 sinner that needed it most? ~Mark Twain
It's also a 66% confidence projection using a new climate model that has undergone peer review but probably not much other discussion in the community. It's interesting, but hardly definitive.
There are hundreds of things changing the temperature contantly and it's very hard to isolate the changes CO2 caused.
This is the kind of thing that tends to get the skeptics -- and those the GW proponents call "deniers" -- going.
Clearly, the process has problems; the data isn't as nailed down as many claim; the temperature rises not as predicted; the models flawed; the entire thing politicized to a notable degree. It certainly all seems worthy of paying attention to, when taken together.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
and in other news
Yet Another Global Warming Sham
It's an interesting piece of work. There are two issues to bear in mind:
- They are calculating climate sensitivity at the last glacial maximum. Climate sensitivity varies with temperature, so the sensitivity now may not be the same as the sensitivity at the LGM. It is entirely possible that both this study, and all the studies which put a higher value on current sensitivity, are both correct.
- Even their most likely value of 2.3C only gives us about 15 years extra breathing space to sort out our emissions.
- The UVic model they use is rather simplistic, and I'm not sure it reproduces 20thC climate that well. It would be interesting to see this work repeated with a model ensemble.
Also, so does every gasoline and diesel fueled generator in the world, and that's probably a pretty hefty number.
See the thing is, if the gasoline and diesel burned in individual vehicles was instead burned in power plants, and fed to the vehicles as electricity, there would be a lot less consumption of gasoline and diesel overall, because those larger generation systems are a lot more efficient at getting power to the wheels, even given transmission line losses, charging losses, etc.
And, if the vehicles are electric, they become power-agnostic: you can "burn" anything.... oil, coal, nuclear, sunshine, hydro, congresscritters, and the cars don't have to change at all.
Ok, clearly, burning congresscritters would really be polluting, but the other stuff...
EVs make great sense. manufacturing them such that they serve us well in the roles we like to use them... we're not quite there. Soon, though, clearly.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
...Warmists actually publicly acknowledge the existence of hard ice core and geological data which shows a steady level of atmospheric CO2 over the last 15 million years which kinda trumps their six-month data spans - the data also shows midtide sea levels back then over a hundred feet higher than they are now.
Can I throw in a bit of an incitement to mutiny here and suggest that we do two things:
1. Carry on as is as far as fossil fuels are concerned, maybe without the bombing of indigenes to the stone age (I heard Afghans excitedly twittering "Ooh, upgrade!!" just then, I swear)?
2. Use the time we have with our love affair with the black gold (it is limited, the Earth's crust is only 15 miles thick hence can only hold so much oil) to create a renewable energy infrastructure - so when it does run out we have a reliable fallback rather than having to resort to the utter waste of biomass inherent with resource wars?
Just a suggestion. I'll be round later for my Peace Prize.
Operation Guillotine is in effect.
Given that the aristocracy, jointly with some mad scientists and military giants of the world, has managed to shred the magnetosphere, pummel the ionosphere and strip OUR Earth's defenses from the Sun with now heightened solar disturbances predicted to cataclysmically hit us next year and scorch the earth we all love or at least most of us love. Thanks for the memories.
2-4 degrees (f) does not seem like a big deal, but think of how you feels when your internal body temperature goes from (f) 98.6, to 101 degrees.
much like everyone else here you have never heard of the methane feedback loop.
Hey, AGW people? Here's the bottom line. Read this carefully. Let it nourish your thought processes. You want to know why the general public hasn't panicked and fallen behind you in your crusade? Here it is.
Lets say we have many, many skilled scientists working on not one, but DOZENS of models that are constantly being refined and tinkered with. This has been going on for DECADES. They feed these models with thousands and thousands of hard, verifiable data points -- measurements from buoys, satellites, even ships at sea with calibrated instruments. Temperatures, pressures, atmospheric readings, all get poured into these models with loving care and infinite attention to detail. When using the models, another team of specialists carefully takes the average of these models, based on experience, to make cautious predictions.
They're called Hurricane Models. And even after DECADES of refinement, they still can't reliably predict the path of a storm past 3-5 days. They still can't reliably predict hurricane intensity AT ALL.
And you want us to believe that you can predict, WITH GREAT CONFIDENCE, that the Earth will be 10 degrees warming in so many years because of what mankind is doing?
"Oh, well, that's different," screams the AGW crowd. Maybe. But it does show the limitations of science, does it not? I appreciate everything that the hurricane forecasters have accomplished. They've saved a lot of lives. But there's a good, hard example of the limitations of ANY model that seeks to predict the behavior of a huge, complex, chaotic system.
What I'm desperately tired of is binary thinking: EITHER one believes the prevailing, dire theories about AGW and wants to take emergency action, OR one is an uniformed, reactionary dunderhead. (Or even worse, a Republican -- which I am NOT, by the way).
The question isn't whether the Earth is warming. I honestly don't know, but let's say it has. It's a long leap from that assertion to insisting that my barbeque grill is what's causing it. (More binary thinking: either you agree with us in all particulars, or you're no different from a Young Earth Creationist.) I need to be SURE before I repent and take the grill to the landfill. You haven't convinced me.
And here's the point: I AGREE that we need to reduce carbon emissions. Whether they're causing global warming or not, I'm tired of breathing stinky air in Birmingham, AL, if nothing else. (There's the "personal interest" angle.) Let's crush the stranglehold of Big Oil and find some real, green alternatives.
But I AM NOT going to allow anyone to wreck the global economy to achieve this. We can do it slowly and steadily, with planning and forethought. I'm not going to allow my government to enact some byzantine, "carbon credit" scheme that is, at the end of the day, just another boondoggle that lines the pockets of important contributors.
So: there you go, AGW proponents. Read it and learn, or begin with the condescending, sneering replies about how uninformed I am. It's really this simple: when your "scientists" finally achieve the ability to tell me, with at least 90% accuracy, that it will rain in my neighborhood next week, I *might* believe your claims about what's going to happen in the next century.
I think I'm being quite reasonable. :)
Cogito, igitur comedam pizza.
2-4 degrees (f) does not seem like a big deal, but think of how you feels when your internal body temperature goes from (f) 98.6, to 101 degrees.
Are you saying that global warming will not impact reptiles?
... which apparently is a completely new thing in the history of the earth since it's never been a problem before even though the average temperature of the earth has been a lot higher than now.
In fact, anything that I remember from the 90's put peak oil around now, and oil lasting until somewhen around 2050.
But let's not forget coal, all that fuel that isn't mature enough to be called coal (several names here), current vegetation, and all that methane traped deep in the ocean.
Rethinking email
Don't worry about this report. The AGW camp will find that it was sponsored by some oil company or an American think tank sponsored by some oil company and completely ignore it. AGW is more than just a scientific debate, it's religious one complete with zealots on either side controlling the arguments and pocketbooks of those in power.
I'm not an extremist, but I always look at this sudden change of minds with skepticism.
The only 'sudden change of mind' is your little marble rattling around in your skull. This is just another attempt to refine the models. Even a cursory reading of the the majority of the literature gives you the understanding that there are bunch of variables that we understand and can quantify only minimally. This is just another attempt to improve the model.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Please, specify what kind of consuption you think we'll suffer when we can't supply it. Agregating all kinds of consuption into that abstract thing called "demand" is just hand waving (and wrong).
Rethinking email
One paper. One SINGLE paper comes out and it's absolutely right.
8,000 papers before are always absolutely wrong.
How does that happen?
When the one single paper says what the deniers want to believe.
PS we currently have warming that is over 2.0C per doubling, and the current warming rate matches a model sensitivity of 3.4C per doubling of CO2.
So, a factor of 2 equals to "slightly less"? That's a big "slightly less" to me...
I second what you're (sarcastically) saying. Why even bother studying this? It has reached religion status on both sides and the facts don't seem to matter much any more.
Interview here. It gives some perspective on the claims people are making and discusses the strengths and weaknesses of the study.
The manuscript is freely available here.
Please mod parent "-1 troll" ...
Maybe I'm missing something, but why are the people who don't agree with anthropogenic global warming theory throwing a party over this story? It's about a new climate model that, if it's accurate, says CO2 emissions may raise temperatures slightly less than previously thought. 2/3 of the predicted temperature range lies within the range predicted by the IPCC in 2007. The very best interpretation of this data from a "skeptic" point of view is that AGW is even better supported with evidence, with only the exact impact being refined. This definitely doesn't look to me like evidence that AGW theory is alarmist, un-scientific FUD.
So we're back to the argument, "Nobody can reliably predict the outcome of a single spin of a roulette wheel, so it is crazy to think that anybody can predict the average of thousands of spins!"
And meanwhile, the casinos continue to make money.
Strong candidate for the single dumbest argument against global warming.
Both CO2 levels and temperature increase are functions of time. Saying the temperature increase will be 2 or 4C doesn't make any sense without saying within which time period. More importantly, the real measure of CO2 effect should be the time when this additional CO2 ends its influence on the climate - e.g. by being absorbed or decomposed.
Depending on a model, this process of natural recycling takes up to 250 years under current conditions. However, at higher CO2 levels and higher temperatures, the efficiency of the recycling drops off. All the while, the excess CO2 cummulatively affects energy capture and retention.
Even if we stop burning coal and driving cars immediately and completely, CO2 produced so far will affect the climate for the next 200 years.
There are solutions though. There are also techniques for harvesting CO2 from the air - although this is energy intensive (e.g. must be solar powered to make sense). Or we can restore and expand nature's own way of balancing CO2 - forrests in the tropical regions that are mercilessly and constantly being eroded for farmland.
But most importantly, we must start controlling increases in population. The sure-fire method of drawing population increase to reasonable numbers is empowering women and education.
Of course, none of this will happen, at least not in this generation. And as the world is being taken over by all manner of religious lunacy the outlook isn't too bright.
There aren't scientists on both sides if the argument... There are scientists on one side, and pro capital propaganda machines on the other, some masquerading as scientists but not applying scientific method.
Ah, one of those are you. Yes, there are scientists on both sides, as well as politicians, and pro capital propaganda machines masquerading as *green* organizations.
As to scientific method, the very foundation of scientific method is skepticism. Scientists come up with a theory and then other scientists immediately try to poke holes in it. Yet, the climate change group immediately demonize anyone that points to the flaws rather than finding ways to get better data.
So...where is the warming that your scientists have been saying that we were supposed to have for the past 25 years when even their own data (the stuff they don't hide) shows at best the temperature holding steady and at worst (for them) growing a bit cooler? Yes. Yes. I know. The record blizzards and cooler temerpatures are the result of warming. Up is down. Red is blue, yada yada yada.
Here are further comments from the author: http://newscience.planet3.org/2011/11/24/interview-with-nathan-urban-on-his-new-paper-climate-sensitivity-estimated-from-temperature-reconstructions-of-the-last-glacial-maximum/
Q: Given all these caveats, how robust are the results of your study?
I think our lower climate sensitivity estimate will hold up, provided the reconstructed LGM temperature data on which it is based hold up. Our finding of a warmer LGM will prove controversial among the scientific community and the data will be subject to much scrutiny. It remains to be seen whether this temperature data is consistent with everything else we know about that period of time (its climate, its vegetation, the size of its ice sheets, etc.).
I am less confident that our narrow uncertainty range really does exclude climate sensitivities above 3 C. This is something that could be overturned by future work. It certainly would stimulate a lot of rethinking among scientists if the result isn’t overturned. I can’t say I’m rooting strongly for either outcome, though. I’d be pleased to see our findings confirmed, but if they’re disproven, I’ll learn something from the way in which they are disproven, and this will improve my own research. Who knows, maybe I will disprove them myself.
Q: Can you briefly summarize which aspects of the study you and you coauthors contributed to?
I developed and conducted the statistical data-model comparison, in collaboration with lead author Andreas Schmittner. This corresponds to Figure 3 of the paper and most of sections 5, 6, and 7 of the supporting online material. Andreas designed and carried out the model simulations. Other coauthors worked on the temperature reconstructions, the assumptions about dust forcings, etc. I can’t tell you the exact partitioning of responsibility because I entered this project relatively late, after all the proxy reconstructions and model simulations had been completed.
Q: Your paper got a lot of positive attention from climate skeptic blogs like “Watts Up With That?”. What’s your reaction to all that?
I haven’t followed these blogs too closely, but I skimmed the comments on a few that were pointed out to me. The responses I saw were fairly predictable, veering from uncritical acceptance of our findings, to uncritical dismissal of any study that involves computer models or proxy data. But some comments did seem to find an appropriate middle ground of, well, skepticism.
The data is pretty sound, and only those who don't know the difference continue to act like it is the data, not their ignorance, that doesn't make sense.
When all of the surgeons say to use aseptic technique, the nurse who doesn't understand the microbial infections are expected to follow anyway and spend some personal effor at learning why if they don't understand. I defer to the best minds, as you do. The difference being that you only do it when they agree with you and you hold to miniscule, yet exaggerated doubt, when they don't.
I understand science, and as a stem cell scientist, I have learned through my experience that the best scientists are the most likely to be right, and also that major consensus has serious validity. Also, as an infrmed and aware citizen, it is clear that capital interests have major power over information and perception. Some humility and realism would serve you well.
you can mod this up or down, it wont matter. what does matter is how reliable our predictions are. in a perfect world we would know exactly what the weather would be everyday but even with our gobs and gobs of data we still cant tell what the weather will be. sure, we have "70% chance of showers" but what about the weather in a month? no idea at all. i think it's incredibly arrogant to think we can tell what the earth is doing when we have so little data. even thousands of years of data is a blip and cant be used to reliably predict how the earth will be in the next 10 years.
in all honesty, i think this panicking over global climate is going to be looked on the same was as we view the Red Scare.
i do reserve the right to be completely wrong.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Since this contradicts every other study ever conducted, I have to ask. Who paid for the study?
Methane may have been a factor in the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum.
Just worth clarifying for those who might not understand the difference (not referring to OP). It is the quality of the science itself, not the SCIENTISTS, that matters.
People buy cars as electrical power generators? Really, I thought their purpose was to drive from Point A to Point B, and headlights etc were only to aid in that task or make it more comfortable.
Forget global warming. Read this article on the acidification of the ocean by CO2 absorption:
http://discovermagazine.com/2008/jul/16-ocean-acidification-a-global-case-of-osteoporosis
CO2 is a far greater hazard to the ocean than the atmosphere.
So...when the best minds of the world (scientists mind you) thought the world was flat and the consensus was exactly that, you'd be wrong. Consensus is not a fact, as you should know as a scientist. And even the best minds can be wrong. Witness Albert Einstein on entanglement.
While consensus may make you feel better to be part of a group, it is not a valid scientific argument - as you should know.
The facts and corroborating and overlapping data that supports the AGW consensus is far wider, deeper, validated, and significant than the postulations about the shape of the earth.
And since you are comparing one 'consensus' that was found false, to how many scientific consensus' that are still right; your argument even now still look like a person who exaggerates miniscule doubt as a means to attempt to say your argument has any significance. It doesn't.
As you should know, each and every one of those scientists who AGREE in the consensus, has thousands upon thousands of hours of real experience in the field that you have little knowledge of. And when they come to an agreement, it isn't just their numbers in consensus that have serious implication, but the validity and qualifications of each individual and how much more likely each and every one of them is more likely to be right than you, or I, or any news pundit.... Or the one or two climate scientists who were nobodies that became famous by challenging what in their field is obvious. It turned out recently that one of those three was paid by big oil to disagree.
You attacked the fact I mentioned consensus, and pretended that none of the science/facts that led to it existed when you challenged my point. Your argument is bullshit, as is your attempt to make insignificance look significant.
I thought the science was complete? Now, the complete science is turned on it's head? Is it possible the self-proclaimed experts who said the discussion was over were possibly wrong? How could that be? They were the EXPERTS!
This is why I've called bunk all along. There's way, way too much emotion on this issue, especially from the climatologists who claim their research is perfect, and complete. The "Deniers" just don't have a leg to stand on! Right...
Consensus is not scientific fact. Period.
If I say that based on all available data that all geese are white and everyone agrees with me, but one black goose if found, my theory is bullshit. All your attempts to justify consensus is significant. Yes, there are supporting data points that support your point(s). Soyou've found a bunch of white geese. There are other scientists (including the ones that actually support your seeming perspective) that have data that conflicts with those points (black geese). The climate has too many variables and it is too wound up with politics for me believe either your perspective or the opposing one. Yes, either side since I've not concluded one way or the other based on the facts that I've been able to discern.
Just because someone is an "expert" and says something I do not check my brain at the door - that is a great way to be scammed. No thank you. So I also use my own evidence to weigh what I've heard. For example, with all the talk about melting ice caps and glaciers and the resulting rising sea levels, I should be able to see evidence in my own home, on the Gulf of Mexico. Yet, I see nothing. Unless there is a geologic rise on my beach that is exactly the same as the ocean level rise over the past forty years of my residence, there is no sea level rise. If all that ice is melting but the seas are not rising, then where is the water? Evian bottles? No. I conclude that either the ice melting is bullshit or it is being refrozen somewhere else. Either way, that seems to indicate that global warming is bullshit - consensus notwithstanding.
That quite succinctly sums up the entire FRAUD of 'man made global warming'...
And LOL again - as usual, the Slashdot crowd follow 'the party line' but are incapable of explaining WHY...
You wouldn't know a rational debate if it grabbed your junk.
(/sarcasm)
The problem is that there is huge amounts of money on both sides. "Green" technology is inefficient and requires large government subsidies. The subsidies have been shown to be heavily correlated to political influence (eg, 10% of all green tech subsidy applications were approved while 67% of those approved had board members who were top Obama fund raisers).
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
The effects of CO2 can be studied in lab conditions. The effects of any one factors are nowhere near as important to the whole picture as the question whether the entire conglomeration of effects creates an irreversible warming trend. Time-local trends are mostly irrelevant in a study of long-term effects. The world has been both warmer and colder. Which means there are natural factors which create warming and cooling cycles (on the scale of hundredth of thousands of years). What kicks in the natural cooling cycle? Are there effects which cause buffering of warming and cooling trends? Any study of a few variables presented as creating long-term world-wide trends is very dubious.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
The medicines you take and products you buy are largely less safe, by comparison of safety and fact based significance, and yet I'm positive you've made little or no effort find out.
Your 'science' only applies when it is convenient, and your points are based on exaggerated doubt. Please quit masquerading as a person of facts.
On another thought, let me be clear and real with you. You will be ignored until you can demonstrate a realistic understanding of what "significance" means. All you've done so far is argue the contrary like some pedantic and immature buffoon. People get sick of repeating clear facts and arguments to irrational 'tards that make no effort at learning or understanding the topic they discuss, or even the words they use.
Regarding: "Buy solar, you're supporting terrorists, that sort of bullshit."
I think most normal people didn't want to end it like this, so what I'm saying next is unfair to them, but the case could be made that some of the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks were Saudis, and yes, that is where a lot of oil comes from.
Also the meme that the USA does everything it does for getting oil is not helping.
Of course, both arguments are more or less bullshit, but not more shitty than calling everyone who is concerned about a serious issue a "shill" or "nutjob".
Are they credible, objective? Or paid political loons?
Also, don't forget IT IS GETTING WARMER - this is not a theory, the planet is heating up - this has been proved without a shadow of a doubt. Its only the cause which has been debated, and if CO2 is less of a problem than assumed then our problem is bigger not smaller, because then we are further from finding a way out of the problem.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
We are just doomed a little later.
If this research is more accurate than previous studies then the climate change is progressing slower as expected. That is great news, as we wasted so much time. If the previous estimates are correct we are in big trouble. According to the new study we will be in big trouble a little later or if we act fast we still could make it and only face medium trouble.
I honestly do not understand why anti climate change honchos gloat over that news. It is like visiting the doctor and he tell you that his last diagnosis was a little too drastic and he has good news: You will not die next week, but in two weeks. So celebrate!
A fact's significance depends on a whole host of other facts and what its significance is.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
This sounds like one of the crackpot theories that the Nazis believed in.
Glaciation is FAR from global in scope during all the ice ages since the extinction of the dinosaurs. Extensive areas of land remain unaffected. The were no "mystery civilizations" whose existence was erased by glaciation.
And your whole theory of racial distinctions arising and then disappearing is totally unsupported by DNA analysis.
Climate is an interpretation ... not measurable ... not an observable!
A very moot debate. No beginning. No middle. No end. Nothingness.
So. Climate Science is a Science of Nothing. So All possibilities are
allowed. All possibilities no matter how absurd.
A Science of the absurd.
I am glad I am not a Climate Scientist and not a practioner of the absurd.
+-+={}
Actually, your example is quite poor: A casino can predict the long term trends of a roulette wheel with better than 2% accuracy. Climatologists wish they could say the same about the climate - but even this report has a variance of 1.35 to 4.65 C - a range of 340%.
The single biggest problem (aside from the politics of creating winners and losers in the climate game) with getting people onboard is that an honest skeptic would have very serious misgivings about basing public policy on a discipline with such poor predictive power. Climate science delivers only marginally better predictability than economics, or the stock market. Arm chair intellectuals often make the assumption that because other sciences can very accurately predict the outcome (e.g. physics, chemistry, etc...) of an experiment, that climate science can as well, and that's simply not the case. Climatology is still a nascent science, and still has a long way to go before they can deliver the certainty required of public policy decisions. It's not that it won't get there, just that it's not there yet.
And when you add in the politicization of the science - that the Democrats wanted to enact a scheme of carbon credits which would enrich the rich at the expense of the poor - even ardent believers would have had a difficult time enacting effective policy change. The entire global warming movement was denied by the Republicans, and turned into a get-rich-scheme by the Democrats, making effective change impossible. It was not the Republicans and their denials that kept change from coming about, but the Democrats who sought to use it as a means of increasing their power and the profits of their corporate donors.
BTW, I remember hearing that global temperatures would rise by decade's end by 2 C back around the turn of the century. Well, that's come and gone, and all we've got is about 0.5 C warmer over the last century. Not only did their predictions fail on their immediate premise, they failed to take into account the 100 year cycle - and should have predicted not a rise in temperature, but rather, a lessening of cooling - which did in fact happen.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Assuming that this new data is dead accurate, as we have already doubled pre-industrial levels of CO2 (from under 200 ppm to nearly 400 ppm today), and temperature has already risen 1-degree Celsius over the past 100 years, we can expect to see 1.6 degrees Celsius (2.9 degrees Fahrenheit) increase in average temperature across the biosphere in our lifetimes, presuming we immediately stop adding extra carbon to the atmosphere. Last time that kind of change happened we had an ice age. Of course that happened over a few million years, not a few hundred. I guess melting the polar caps, raising the sea levels, and killing off 1/10th of the species on the planet isn't too bad a price to pay for the fun we have with monster trucks. Hey, I'll be dead by the time the glaciers hit California again anyway, guess your kids will deal with it. Then again I could be wrong. I hear they have been scientifically measuring evaporation around the planet for hundreds of years, and that since 1950 we have seen a large decrease in sea level radiation due to particulate matter in the upper atmosphere reflecting and absorbing then radiating energy into space. Kind of a global sun-screen from industrial carbon pollution and agricultural land use. Imagine how much more temperature rise we would have in the seas if that solar radiation hadn't been blocked? ... I wonder if this study accounted for that?
Hmmm... but that says nothing about the Ocean Acidification that is taking place, upsetting the balance of life in our oceans globally. There is just so much we don't know. Better just keep on doing what we have been doing until we can see an unquestionable result, kind of like a global chemistry experiment.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_in_Earth's_atmosphere
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming
If this wasn't a political issue, everyone would conclude we do not have enough data to predict the future. There is data that suggests global temp is rising, but can we really do much to stop it. More research is important, because so much of the existing data has been tainted to support a political agenda. It became hard to miss the political angle of global warming developing, as soon as we started to see name calling, it became obvious.
Hardly good news if the best case scenario is 1.7 instead of 2.0
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
*Sigh* Casinos make money on roulette wheel's because it's easy to predict where the wheel WON'T stop (35/36 chance of being right), but impossible to predict where it WILL stop (1/36 chance). The global warming crowd thinks they can predict where the wheel will stop because they aren't familiar with basic laws of statistics. The deniers understand that you can't make such a prediction. Clearly the roulette wheel is a good example of how the numbers are on the side of the deniers.
More evidence that global warming is wrong. The models are always being proven wrong, and personally I think they make far too many assumptions to be accurate.
The casino is betting on each spin of the wheel just like the customer. Predicting where a wheel won't stop still doesn't help a casino predict whether it will win the next spin, any more than it helps the gambler. Bot both the casino and the customer can predict the long-term average trend. The difference between the casino and the gambler is like the difference between the climate scientist and the AGW skeptic; the casino is betting on a long term trend calculated based upon the best scientific and mathematical understanding of physics and statistics; the gambler is betting against it.
Oh, "you remember hearing" that predictions would rise 2C by the end of the century? Where, pray tell? Some guy in a bar, maybe? Slashdot does permit posting of links to citations. All of the IPCC reports are freely available online. So why not spend a couple of minutes to support your claim with actual evidence--if it exists. And while you are at it, why don't you link to the scientific evidence for a "100 year cycle?"
The obvious flaw in the logic of climate change alarmists is that they have the relationship between carbon and warming BACKWARDS. Why? Well, look at the moon!
It is the same distance from the sun that earth is, and gets the same amount of solar radiation (barring a few charged particles turned away by our magnetic field). BUT the mean temperature at the equator of the moon at noon is about 200 degrees Fahrenheit. The moon is warmer BECAUSE it has no atmosphere. If the carbon in the earth's atmosphere is reflecting heat, it is reflecting it OUTWARDS. So, you might ask, why are carbon levels and temperature rise so well correlated?? Because the sun-fueled warming is causing an increase in activity in soil bacteria, and is creating more CO2. WARMING is CAUSING CO2, not the other way around!
I always love how people compare industries with millions of dollars on the line with industries with tens or hundeds of billions as if the political influence were identical.
It's like comparing the gravitational influence of Earth and Jupiter and saying they're equally huge planets.
Pug
An Invisible Entity of Vast Power whose existence must be taken on faith alone: Liberal Media
You can download the climate data from the NOAA. If there isn't a 100 year cycle, we are (or were, around the turn of the century) in a global cooling phase, and global warming is completely false. Just as global temperatures dropped worldwide around the year 1900, they also dropped around 2000. I actually did a limited amount of statistics with the datasets available a few years ago when the climategate emails broke.
And the 2 year figure is from a global warming pundit I happen to run into. But it demonstrates the broader point: that even the pundits got it wrong, and the politicization of the issue by Al Gore, etc... did not help the cause. And reports like this are hardly convincing - its long on accusations and very short on specifics. It seems as if they expect the reader to conclude that guilt by association is a convincing argument, or that an organization lobbying in its own interests is a cause for suspicion. What the report manages to convey, rather convincingly, is that the union of concerned scientists feels it is on the losing end of a propaganda war with big oil. Which may be true, but is hardly relevant when someone is trying to determine if global warming is happening in the first place. The fact that the UCS downplays the significance of the climategate emails doesn't help, either, but rather illustrates they have a double standard - one for Big Oil, and another for scientists.
From the mouths of babes comes this little gem:
The growing empirical evidence of climate change that is consistent with model projections, and other recent advances in the understanding of climate science have led to increased confidence in the use of global circulation models to project future climate change, but predicting the future remains inherently risky.
Such a disclaimer does not inspire confidence. Yes, I understand you have a computer model which predicts temperature, but with such a disclaimer, it's practically useless. An engineer who issued such a disclaimer for bridges he designed or appliances ("Well, we can't guarantee it won't burst into flames...") would be lucky to be employed at all.
And it only goes downhill from there. Every single climate change prediction following the disclaimer is qualified with words like "possible" or "could". They can't even say what will happen, only what "could". Real science starts with a falsifiable hypothesis, and they're doing their best to avoid any predictions which could later be shown false.
I don't like fossil fuels for a whole host of reasons having nothing to do with global warming (polllution, economic security, etc...), but it seems as if scientists don't fully grasp the gravity of their statements - or perhaps want to distance themselves from any liability that reliance on such statements might bring about. They seem oblivious to the challenges faced by those genuinely wanting to bring about change, or the cost of doing so. You can't simply flush 339 billion dollars of revenue (Exxon Mobil) down the toilet without causing massive disruptions in the ability of people today to feed themselves. It seems as if they live in some fairy land where one can produce their own electricity and fuel their cars from carbon-neutral sources. Even though I have the technical know-how to do something of this nature, I have neither the time, nor the money, to do so. Worse, it's illegal in the US for individuals to make their own fuel, and neither the Democrats nor the Republicans are interested in the sort of regulatory change that could bring this about - that is, if we had the money in the first place.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
There is no statistically significant evidence that the modern warming is part of any kind of cycle, nor is there any natural mechanism that could produce a 100 year cycle. There is also no statistically significant evidence that warming stopped in 2000. Moreover, statistical analysis of climate models tells us that the expected warming trend is too small to be reliably detected on anything less than a multidecade climate scale, so such a claim makes no sense.
So now it's some unnamed pundit who predicted a 2C warming by now, which amounts to much the same thing as some guy in a bar--these days, a pundit is a guy who is not an expert but plays one on TV. It certainly was not Al Gore who made such a prediction, despite your ritual invocation of his name. He's more accurate than most so-called pundits in reporting the science, but he's no scientist. If you want to criticize the science, don't you owe it to yourself to look into what the actual scienctists are saying? I refer you again to the IPCC reports.
And yes, scientists qualify their knowledge in terms of probability rather than engaging in the false certainty common in other fields. An engineer will not tell you that a bridge will "probably" stand up. The engineers were quite confident in the soundness of the Tacoma Narrows bridge and the unsinkability of the Titanic. Scientists recognize that any prediction of the future caries some degree of uncertainty. You will find quantification of the degree of certainty in the IPCC reports
Someone should really go tell those people this science is settled and that there is consensus. There's no room for doubt or skepticism in this kind of scientific debate.
Well, there goes global warming. This is what I really dislike about the AGW pundits - when the temperature goes down for a few years, they'll say "It's just part of a natural ${X} year cycle, and doesn't affect the overall, long term climate..." but when you point out that average temperatures have both risen and fallen in the last 150 years, they'll tell you there's no such thing as a 100 year cycle, as you've just done.
I could honestly care less, but you should at least understand that I've heard supposedly well-informed people argue both points, and both thought they were defending global warming theories. I got the notion of a 100 year cycle from AGW pundits, and the trend shows up in even rudimentary statistical analysis of NOAA data. Perhaps there's no formal explanation for it yet, or perhaps it's considered just a fluke (hey, 1.5 cycles is hardly conclusive), but I don't have the time to do the more rigorous analysis of the numbers (i.e. weighting the observations for the surface area covered by each station, etc...).
When I'm asked if I believe in global warming (as if it were a religion, but I digress...), I have to say "probably", simply because even those who do understand the science, who are supposed experts in their field, are very guarded about their predictions. When you combine this with the fact that it's hard to find the actual models they're using (many simply don't publish their code, as was the case with the IPCC), it's very hard to convince a skeptic that this isn't some scheme cooked up for the benefit of the wealthy. Consider this page where 10 of the 23 models from the IPCC report do not make their code available for free download. Those that do often have a restrictive license, and only 1 (one) gives access to their code repository.
You do understand that this - regardless of the actual merit of the science - makes it appear as if scientists are trying to hide something. I can understand keeping secrets when working in the business world, but the science upon which public policy is must be of a higher integrity and produced through a more open process than the one IPCC is using. If the IPCC cannot explain - or rather, will not explain - the issue in terms the average voter can understand, they should not expect public policy to follow their recommendations. Conspiring to block FOIA requests and discrediting those with dissenting opinions is not the mark of one with altruistic motives. It's almost as if they're saying, "Trust us, we're scientists..."
Particularly when it comes to science, a pundit is generally a guy who isn't a scientist, but plays one on TV. If you want to criticize the media, then by all means talk about the pundits. But if you are concerned about what science really says about what's going on, read the original science.
Temperatures fluctuate up and down. But that doesn't make a cycle, which requires a reproducible periodicity. People's eyes tend to fool them, and they see imaginary cycles, which is why science long ago developed unbiased statistical tests for cycles, which are not vulnerable to the human eye's proclivity to see patterns even when they don't exist. So statistically, there is no 100 year cycle. Which isn't surprising, because there is no plausible mechanism to create one. Even a "natural" cycle requires some sort of physical mechanism. Moreover, to reliably detect a cycle, you need enough data to cover multiple complete cycles. So anybody who tells you that they can detect a 100 year cycle in 150 years of data is either fooling themselves or trying to fool you.
A huge amount of climate science data and models is publicly available, more than in almost any other field of science. Even when the actual code is not available, the algorithms are published, so any decent programmer can reproduce the models. As any scientist will tell you, if you want to check somebody's work, it's better to write your own code from the original algorithms than to borrow their code, because if you use their code, you are liable to inherit their bugs.