I understand the climate models very well. How do you think the input parameters to the models are derived?
The parametrizations also involve numerical parameters that must be specified as input. Some of these parameters can be measured, at least in principle, while others cannot.
- IPCC AR4 WG1
The values used for parametrization are based on research that begins with measurements. Those measurements have errors - as in any other branch of science - yet those errors are not propagated through the calculations.
Science thus says that climate models cannot do projections more than a few years out, until the combined error exceeds the projection range.
There's no scientific support - whatsoever - for claiming that there's an expectation of weather to keep within 95% of the "confidence intervals". A model is only as good as its inputs - and measurements (en masse) are what those inputs are created from.
This is well known in all other fields of science, where claims of "confidence intervals" based on model runs would rightly get laughed out of all journals. The error bars of your measurements, inherit in all equipment, must be carried forward in all calculations.
For some reason that's not done in climate science. I don't understand why - there's no difference between "climate equipment" and other forms of equipment.
No, it's actually much much worse. Climate scientists create error bars on their projections by running models with different input parameters. They're not using the actual error variables from measurements and propagating the compounded error forwards in the calculations - which is how it's done in every other branch of science.
If you do that, the projections become meaningless just a few years out. The climate system is absolutely nothing like the single variable coin flip.
I'm very worried about the anti-science stance taken in climate discussions just because it doesn't lead to the preconceived result some hope to show (or even effect).
California is experiencing the worst drought (ever, perhaps)
Not according to science.
Through studies of tree rings, sediment and other natural evidence, researchers have documented multiple droughts in California that lasted 10 or 20 years in a row during the past 1,000 years -- compared to the mere three-year duration of the current dry spell. The two most severe megadroughts make the Dust Bowl of the 1930s look tame: a 240-year-long drought that started in 850 and, 50 years after the conclusion of that one, another that stretched at least 180 years.
Yes, the concept of "tipping points" validate the report I linked and refute the original post that all climate effects before have been slow and gradual.
It doesn't in itself mean that anyone is screwed though - it just means that humans throughout the Holocene have already lived through major changes due to such perturbations of the climate.
All effects from global warming are regional, and different in different places. Please see the IPCC reports for more information, they go through this in great detail.
Your comment has nothing to do with the original claim, that rapid changes does not happen. They do - and the cause is completely irrelevant when it comes to how those changes affect vegetation, animal life or humans. Neither is the paper limited to volcanic cooling events, which you claim, which makes me wonder if you've read it. If you didn't read it - then what is the point in writing a reply?
Additionally, if you claim that there's newer research the last 20 years which disproves the paper then please cite that research.
The current temperate change is between 0.01 and 0.02 degrees/year, two orders of magnitude greater than when the ice age ended. The problem isn't so much that temperature is changing but that it's changing so fast. The greater the rate of temperature change the harder adaption will be for both human and natural systems.
I've never been able to figure out the original of those claims - do you know? I can't find any scientific sources for it - on the contrary:
Until a few decades ago it was generally thought that all large-scale global and regional climate changes occurred gradually over a timescale of many centuries or millennia, scarcely perceptible during a human lifetime. The tendency of climate to change relatively suddenly has been one of the most suprising outcomes of the study of earth history, specifically the last 150,000 years (e.g., Taylor et al., 1993). Some and possibly most large climate changes (involving, for example, a regional change in mean annual temperature of several degrees celsius) occurred at most on a timescale of a few centuries, sometimes decades, and perhaps even just a few years. The decadal-timescale transitions would presumably have been quite noticeable to humans living at such times, and may have created difficulties or opportunities (e.g., the possibility of crossing exposed land bridges, before sea level could rise)
Through studies of tree rings, sediment and other natural evidence, researchers have documented multiple droughts in California that lasted 10 or 20 years in a row during the past 1,000 years -- compared to the mere three-year duration of the current dry spell. The two most severe megadroughts make the Dust Bowl of the 1930s look tame: a 240-year-long drought that started in 850 and, 50 years after the conclusion of that one, another that stretched at least 180 years.
Sounds reasonable. No one who's understood the message in either Taleb's "Black Swan" or Kahneman's "Thinking Fast and Slow" would support the scam that is the financial markets.
I can assure you that pretty much everyone* has access to investment vehicles with a larger return than 2%.
By definition it's not possible for everyone to be able to beat inflation.
Having worked in finance
Understandable. Daniel Kahneman has some amusing anecdotes who people who work in finance really don't seem to figure out what it is they're really doing.
With regards to the Wikipedia article claiming a historical 0.0-0.2mm range over the last 2000 years that probably needs to be updated with more recent research.
Thewell-preserved biological remains on the sh tank wall allow us to estimate anRSL rise of 40 ±10 cm at Frejus since Roman times
400 / 2000 = 0.2mm average per year over the last 2000 years. (And as documented in this paper there are other papers that claim higher numbers)
The warming data clearly indicates that rate of temperature of last 50 years is far higher than any other period in history
Why do you believe that? It's not even true for the last 150 years - even less so if we include the rest of the Holocene.
Q: Do you agree that according to the global temperature record used by the IPCC, the rates of global warming from 1860-1880, 1910-1940 and 1975-1998 were identical?
A: So, in answer to the question, the warming rates for all 4 periods are similar and not statistically significantly different from each other. - Phil Jones, director of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU)
Until a few decades ago it was generally thought that all large-scale global and regional climate changes occurred gradually over a timescale of many centuries or millennia, scarcely perceptible during a human lifetime. The tendency of climate to change relatively suddenly has been one of the most suprising outcomes of the study of earth history, specifically the last 150,000 years (e.g., Taylor et al., 1993). Some and possibly most large climate changes (involving, for example, a regional change in mean annual temperature of several degrees celsius) occurred at most on a timescale of a few centuries, sometimes decades, and perhaps even just a few years. The decadal-timescale transitions would presumably have been quite noticeable to humans living at such times, and may have created difficulties or opportunities (e.g., the possibility of crossing exposed land bridges, before sea level could rise)
This is nowhere near the worst drought in California's recorded history.
Through studies of tree rings, sediment and other natural evidence, researchers have documented multiple droughts in California that lasted 10 or 20 years in a row during the past 1,000 years -- compared to the mere three-year duration of the current dry spell. The two most severe megadroughts make the Dust Bowl of the 1930s look tame: a 240-year-long drought that started in 850 and, 50 years after the conclusion of that one, another that stretched at least 180 years.
I guess most of us (yes, I'm Swedish) find it much more plausible that the decision came after the court having told the prosecutor that she did not fulfil the reasonability requirement for handling the investigation.
That happened this Tuesday.
På tisdagen bestämde Högsta domstolen att Riksåklagaren ska skicka in en svarsskrivelse i målet. Riksåklagaren ska där förklara hur utredningsarbetet ska fortsätta – speciellt när det gäller frågan om proportionalitetsprincipen. Enligt principen ska olika intressen vägas mot varandra och åtgärder ska inte gå utöver det som är nödvändigt med hänsyn till ändamålet. Det kan till exempel gälla samhällets krav på säkerhet mot individens rätt till integritet.
The Toba catastrophe theory suggests that a bottleneck of the human population occurred about 70,000 years ago, reducing the total human population to around 15,000 individuals
If it's so easy to use that people will actually _use_ strong encryption (end2end - who cares if there are central servers passing on the encrypted data) then yes - why not?
I fully agree with Moxie - and I'm hoping to get a lot of people to move from Skype to Wire. It might only be end2end encrypted for voice calls - not the text/group chats - but it's a lot _better_ than the alternatives, with a UI that has a chance of getting wide adoption.
More of the world's communication will be secured. That's progress.
Yes, I've used Redphone. No strange setup process needed for the calls to be secure. That's what we're discussing, right?
The first time you start up RedPhone, the app prompts you to register your phone number by tapping a button. And then you're done; that's it. RedPhone doesn't ask for passwords, logins, or even for users to create an account. The app is designed with privacy in mind, so it requires as little from you as it can.
Slashdot Mirror
How?
I'm less concerned about the number and more concerned about the rate. normally these kinds changes take several magnitudes longer.
We have no idea whether the rate is unusual. There are no proxies with that resolution available.
(But why let science stand in the way of a good scare story?)
I understand the climate models very well. How do you think the input parameters to the models are derived?
The parametrizations also involve numerical parameters that must be specified as input. Some of these parameters can be measured, at least in principle, while others cannot.
- IPCC AR4 WG1
The values used for parametrization are based on research that begins with measurements. Those measurements have errors - as in any other branch of science - yet those errors are not propagated through the calculations.
Science thus says that climate models cannot do projections more than a few years out, until the combined error exceeds the projection range.
There's no scientific support - whatsoever - for claiming that there's an expectation of weather to keep within 95% of the "confidence intervals". A model is only as good as its inputs - and measurements (en masse) are what those inputs are created from.
This is well known in all other fields of science, where claims of "confidence intervals" based on model runs would rightly get laughed out of all journals. The error bars of your measurements, inherit in all equipment, must be carried forward in all calculations.
For some reason that's not done in climate science. I don't understand why - there's no difference between "climate equipment" and other forms of equipment.
No, it's actually much much worse. Climate scientists create error bars on their projections by running models with different input parameters. They're not using the actual error variables from measurements and propagating the compounded error forwards in the calculations - which is how it's done in every other branch of science.
If you do that, the projections become meaningless just a few years out. The climate system is absolutely nothing like the single variable coin flip.
I'm very worried about the anti-science stance taken in climate discussions just because it doesn't lead to the preconceived result some hope to show (or even effect).
California is experiencing the worst drought (ever, perhaps)
Not according to science.
Through studies of tree rings, sediment and other natural evidence, researchers have documented multiple droughts in California that lasted 10 or 20 years in a row during the past 1,000 years -- compared to the mere three-year duration of the current dry spell. The two most severe megadroughts make the Dust Bowl of the 1930s look tame: a 240-year-long drought that started in 850 and, 50 years after the conclusion of that one, another that stretched at least 180 years.
http://www.mercurynews.com/sci...
Which of course makes me wonder why so many people feel it's important to claim otherwise.
Yes, the concept of "tipping points" validate the report I linked and refute the original post that all climate effects before have been slow and gradual.
It doesn't in itself mean that anyone is screwed though - it just means that humans throughout the Holocene have already lived through major changes due to such perturbations of the climate.
There's also plenty of written records of this - a collection can be found here: http://www.breadandbutterscien...
No, the events described aren't just cooling events. Please re-read the report.
All effects from global warming are regional, and different in different places. Please see the IPCC reports for more information, they go through this in great detail.
Your comment has nothing to do with the original claim, that rapid changes does not happen. They do - and the cause is completely irrelevant when it comes to how those changes affect vegetation, animal life or humans. Neither is the paper limited to volcanic cooling events, which you claim, which makes me wonder if you've read it. If you didn't read it - then what is the point in writing a reply?
Additionally, if you claim that there's newer research the last 20 years which disproves the paper then please cite that research.
The current temperate change is between 0.01 and 0.02 degrees/year, two orders of magnitude greater than when the ice age ended. The problem isn't so much that temperature is changing but that it's changing so fast. The greater the rate of temperature change the harder adaption will be for both human and natural systems.
I've never been able to figure out the original of those claims - do you know? I can't find any scientific sources for it - on the contrary:
Until a few decades ago it was generally thought that all large-scale global and regional climate changes occurred gradually over a timescale of many centuries or millennia, scarcely perceptible during a human lifetime. The tendency of climate to change relatively suddenly has been one of the most suprising outcomes of the study of earth history, specifically the last 150,000 years (e.g., Taylor et al., 1993). Some and possibly most large climate changes (involving, for example, a regional change in mean annual temperature of several degrees celsius) occurred at most on a timescale of a few centuries, sometimes decades, and perhaps even just a few years. The decadal-timescale transitions would presumably have been quite noticeable to humans living at such times, and may have created difficulties or opportunities (e.g., the possibility of crossing exposed land bridges, before sea level could rise)
http://www.esd.ornl.gov/projec...
Through studies of tree rings, sediment and other natural evidence, researchers have documented multiple droughts in California that lasted 10 or 20 years in a row during the past 1,000 years -- compared to the mere three-year duration of the current dry spell. The two most severe megadroughts make the Dust Bowl of the 1930s look tame: a 240-year-long drought that started in 850 and, 50 years after the conclusion of that one, another that stretched at least 180 years.
http://www.mercurynews.com/sci...
(The source seems to be E.R Cook et.al, Earth-Science reviews)
Extreme weather in documented history over the last 2000 years:
http://www.breadandbutterscien...
We're not even close to seeing larger deviations than before in recorded history.
Thought experiment: Everyone beats inflation. That causes inflation.
Sounds reasonable. No one who's understood the message in either Taleb's "Black Swan" or Kahneman's "Thinking Fast and Slow" would support the scam that is the financial markets.
Yes. My point is that for someone to beat inflation someone else mustn't.
It's that simple.
I can assure you that pretty much everyone* has access to investment vehicles with a larger return than 2%.
By definition it's not possible for everyone to be able to beat inflation.
Having worked in finance
Understandable. Daniel Kahneman has some amusing anecdotes who people who work in finance really don't seem to figure out what it is they're really doing.
With regards to the Wikipedia article claiming a historical 0.0-0.2mm range over the last 2000 years that probably needs to be updated with more recent research.
Thewell-preserved biological remains on the sh tank wall allow us to estimate anRSL rise of 40 ±10 cm at Frejus since Roman times
400 / 2000 = 0.2mm average per year over the last 2000 years. (And as documented in this paper there are other papers that claim higher numbers)
http://www.academia.edu/344003...éjus_France
(Slashdot seems to make a mess out of the hyphen in the link - the paper can be found as doi 10.1002/gea.21444 )
It's trivial to secretly record someone using a mobile phone - I can hold it in my hand, down by my waist, at an angle.
It's extremely difficult recording someone secretly using a head mount camera. I must look directly at them the whole time.
The warming data clearly indicates that rate of temperature of last 50 years is far higher than any other period in history
Why do you believe that? It's not even true for the last 150 years - even less so if we include the rest of the Holocene.
Q: Do you agree that according to the global temperature record used by the IPCC, the rates of global warming from 1860-1880, 1910-1940 and 1975-1998 were identical?
A: So, in answer to the question, the warming rates for all 4 periods are similar and not statistically significantly different from each other.
- Phil Jones, director of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/851...
Until a few decades ago it was generally thought that all large-scale global and regional climate changes occurred gradually over a timescale of many centuries or millennia, scarcely perceptible during a human lifetime. The tendency of climate to change relatively suddenly has been one of the most suprising outcomes of the study of earth history, specifically the last 150,000 years (e.g., Taylor et al., 1993). Some and possibly most large climate changes (involving, for example, a regional change in mean annual temperature of several degrees celsius) occurred at most on a timescale of a few centuries, sometimes decades, and perhaps even just a few years. The decadal-timescale transitions would presumably have been quite noticeable to humans living at such times, and may have created difficulties or opportunities (e.g., the possibility of crossing exposed land bridges, before sea level could rise)
http://www.esd.ornl.gov/projec...
(This post does not question AGW. It does question strange statements regarding our current climate that have no scientific basis)
This is nowhere near the worst drought in California's recorded history.
Through studies of tree rings, sediment and other natural evidence, researchers have documented multiple droughts in California that lasted 10 or 20 years in a row during the past 1,000 years -- compared to the mere three-year duration of the current dry spell. The two most severe megadroughts make the Dust Bowl of the 1930s look tame: a 240-year-long drought that started in 850 and, 50 years after the conclusion of that one, another that stretched at least 180 years.
Unless, of course, those proxies are unreliable.
http://www.mercurynews.com/sci...
I guess most of us (yes, I'm Swedish) find it much more plausible that the decision came after the court having told the prosecutor that she did not fulfil the reasonability requirement for handling the investigation.
That happened this Tuesday.
På tisdagen bestämde Högsta domstolen att Riksåklagaren ska skicka in en svarsskrivelse i målet. Riksåklagaren ska där förklara hur utredningsarbetet ska fortsätta – speciellt när det gäller frågan om proportionalitetsprincipen.
Enligt principen ska olika intressen vägas mot varandra och åtgärder ska inte gå utöver det som är nödvändigt med hänsyn till ändamålet. Det kan till exempel gälla samhällets krav på säkerhet mot individens rätt till integritet.
http://www.expressen.se/nyhete...
Marianne Ny had no choice after this but to finally do what Swedish prosecutors do all the time - question people abroad.
(Looking at your post history on the subject of Assange your bias is extremely visible)
The Toba catastrophe theory suggests that a bottleneck of the human population occurred about 70,000 years ago, reducing the total human population to around 15,000 individuals
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
If it's so easy to use that people will actually _use_ strong encryption (end2end - who cares if there are central servers passing on the encrypted data) then yes - why not?
I fully agree with Moxie - and I'm hoping to get a lot of people to move from Skype to Wire. It might only be end2end encrypted for voice calls - not the text/group chats - but it's a lot _better_ than the alternatives, with a UI that has a chance of getting wide adoption.
More of the world's communication will be secured. That's progress.
Yes, I've used Redphone. No strange setup process needed for the calls to be secure. That's what we're discussing, right?
The first time you start up RedPhone, the app prompts you to register your phone number by tapping a button. And then you're done; that's it. RedPhone doesn't ask for passwords, logins, or even for users to create an account. The app is designed with privacy in mind, so it requires as little from you as it can.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/...