Uncertainties are always mentioned in the scientific papers. They are often left out in main stream journalism in the interest of simplifying the reporting.
What are your expectations base on?
Accurately modeling climate phenomena over the next few decades.
That's a non-answer. The answer has to be based on the physical limitations of the field you are studying.
They never just look at the real world temperature records or precipitation records and say "Let's tweak this to make it fit the curve better."
Yes, of course they do. That's the sort of thing I'm complaining about. Papers with titles about adjusting radiative forcing parameters to account for real world temperatures and whatnot.
Perhaps you have some real examples of this. I'd be interested in seeing them but I doubt they say what you think they say.
Climate models are projecting 30 year trends so it takes that long to totally test them
It used to be "10 years", but the 10-year predictions missed. Then it was "15 years", but the 15-year predictions missed. Now it's "give me money for my whole career, and I promise I'll be right in the end". Pardon my skepticism.
The standard period of 30 years for climate statistics was defined by the World Meteorological Organization a long time ago. Climate modelling has always worked on that basis. Again, can you show examples global climate models that explicitly used 10 or 15 year year projections?
The prospect of climate catastrophe stems from the actual measured IR absorption characteristics of greenhouse gases. The models are merely trying to understand the distribution of the effects. There is no assumption involved in the positive feedback of water vapor. The amount of water vapor in the atmosphere is controlled by temperature. If non-condensing greenhouse gases such as CO2 cause a bump in the temperature the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere has to rise. Simple physics that has nothing to do with modelling. I don't find Matt Ridley very convincing.
Quantum theory is largely statistical in nature. Is that not a hard science? Climate science it based on real measurable phenomena. If you think the statistical analysis that climatologists do is wrong you're free to do your own statistical analysis of the hard data that goes into the statistics and prove them wrong. Good luck.
It's worth noting a pattern of "adjusting" the data that predominately favors the leading theories. That's some seriously questionable stuff in an field. Fortunately for the climate change guys, you can just ignore the ground station data entirely and still have a reasonable conversation about this stuff.
That's still judging the adjustments on your perception of bias by the scientists. Read and understand the papers that describe the reasons and means for the adjustments. Then we can have a reasonable conversation.
I'm far, far more concerned with constant tuning of the models to meet the data then vice versa. That may sound backwards, but ask anyone who's made a model to predict the stock market based on fitting his model to all historical data how that worked out. Descriptive power is not a significant reason to expect predictive power from a hypothesis (necessary, but very far from sufficient). And every time you tinker, you reset the clock on knowing if you have any predictive power.
It takes many years to test the predictive power of a climate model. 15? 20? Depends on who you ask, but the better part of a career. The models from 15 years ago failed pretty hard, prediction-wise. We're a long way from anyone having the right to be arrogant about this stuff, and every time someone adjusts their model to make it match observations, that's one more model reset, one less chance to move from hand-wavy descriptivism to a tested theory.
It sounds as if you think climate models are merely numerical exercises in curve fitting rather than models of the actual physical interactions that occur in the climate. The tuning that occurs is adjustments to the physics involved. They never just look at the real world temperature records or precipitation records and say "Let's tweak this to make it fit the curve better." Climate models are projecting 30 year trends so it takes that long to totally test them. You don't need to worry about the adjustments to models because you still have the projections the model made that can be compared to what happened over the 30 year period. So far models are accurate within the expectations the modelers have for them.
The beautiful thing about hard sciences such as climatology is that they are based on real physical phenomena. It's all out there for anyone to discover. All you have to do is find a better explanation than the climate scientists to overturn the existing theory.
As far as I can see government mandated universal health care coverage has worked well in nearly all of the countries it's been implemented in with better outcomes and less cost than we have in the US. Can you name any countries where that isn't true?
There were a few who predicted it (Dean Baker comes to mind) but nobody wanted to listen to them. Like you I could see the crash coming a couple of years before it happened (maybe because I did listen to them).
Unless you've read the papers on why they make the adjustments and what they do to make the adjustments you're just making shit up to fit your worldview. Something you could probably do is get the raw data and the adjusted data and compare them. You'll find the difference isn't that large.
The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (notice it includes aeronautics in the name). The scope of their charter is a bit broader than you think it is. From the Wikipedia article:
The original 1958 act charged the new Agency with conducting the aeronautical and space activities of the United States "so as to contribute materially to one or more of the following objectives:"
* Expansion of human knowledge of the Earth, the atmosphere and space * Improvement of aeronautical and space vehicles * Development and operation of vehicles for space flight * Establishment of long-range studies of aeronautical and space activities for peaceful and scientific purposes * Preservation of the role of the United States as a leader in aeronautical and space science technology * The making available to agencies directly concerned with national defense of discoveries that have military value or significance * Cooperation by the United States with other nations in the peaceful application of space research * Effective utilization of scientific and engineering resources of the United States in order to avoid unnecessary duplication of effort, facilities, and equipment
In 2012, a ninth objective was added: "The preservation of the United States preeminent position in aeronautics and space through research and technology development related to associated manufacturing processes."
You're perfectly free to do your own statistical analysis. The data is available. But I know you won't. You probably don't have the knowledge to do it in the first place and you'd rather just sit back and sling mud about something you're not qualified to judge.
Science generally starts with the big picture and works its way down to the details. In the big picture we know that CO2 is one of the greenhouse gases, we know that humans are the primary cause of the rise in CO2 levels in the atmosphere and that the Earth's temperature would be around 0 degrees F (-18 C) without the effects of greenhouse gases. Those are all pretty much settled. This satellite is filling in the details.
CO2, a greenhouse gas, is tied to climate change but is also expected and always-present part of our atmosphere. Why do we need satellite to know this?
That's generally what science does. Get the big picture first then start digging for the details. This is digging for the details.
Scientists did use the SurfaceStations.org list. They compared the poorly placed stations with the well placed stations and found that the poorly placed stations actually had a slightly lower warming trend compared to the well placed stations. Seems like the adjustments for the urban heat island effect are effective.
The next glaciation wouldn't have started for several thousand years. The best thing for human sustainability is to maintain the climate as it has been for the past several thousand years. Then if CO2 started dropping toward 250 ppm it would be easy to burn some coal to bring it back up.
A lot of the changes that are occurring won't be reversible, at least on any human time scale. But we can keep things from getting worse than they are already bound to get if we do something. The problem isn't really that climate change is occurring but how fast it is occurring (which still seems slow relative to the time scales that most humans are used to dealing with). If you could take the changes that are occurring in two centuries and spread them out over two millenia it wouldn't be that hard to adapt to them. But I think we will be hard pressed to adapt at the speed at which they are and will be happening.
Yes, Jupiter's barycenter is outside of the Sun but that is the only object orbiting the Sun that can be said about. I guess the accurate way of saying that is that objects orbit around the center of mass of the two objects (of course that is complicated by the presence of other objects).
True but climate doesn't change for some magical reason. There are physical reasons behind climate changing. That's one of the things climate scientists are studying. If you want to counter their views on the subject you need to present some actual physical evidence for something different causing the changes.
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Uncertainties are always mentioned in the scientific papers. They are often left out in main stream journalism in the interest of simplifying the reporting.
What are your expectations base on?
Accurately modeling climate phenomena over the next few decades.
That's a non-answer. The answer has to be based on the physical limitations of the field you are studying.
Of course there are explanations of why the adjustments are made. Just because you're too lazy to seek them out doesn't mean they don't exist.
They never just look at the real world temperature records or precipitation records and say "Let's tweak this to make it fit the curve better."
Yes, of course they do. That's the sort of thing I'm complaining about. Papers with titles about adjusting radiative forcing parameters to account for real world temperatures and whatnot.
Perhaps you have some real examples of this. I'd be interested in seeing them but I doubt they say what you think they say.
Climate models are projecting 30 year trends so it takes that long to totally test them
It used to be "10 years", but the 10-year predictions missed. Then it was "15 years", but the 15-year predictions missed. Now it's "give me money for my whole career, and I promise I'll be right in the end". Pardon my skepticism.
The standard period of 30 years for climate statistics was defined by the World Meteorological Organization a long time ago. Climate modelling has always worked on that basis. Again, can you show examples global climate models that explicitly used 10 or 15 year year projections?
My expectations count more to me than the modelers' expectations. They aren't accurate to within my expectations.
Scientists expectations are based on their knowledge of the uncertainty they have to deal with. What are your expectations base on?
The prospect of climate catastrophe stems from the actual measured IR absorption characteristics of greenhouse gases. The models are merely trying to understand the distribution of the effects. There is no assumption involved in the positive feedback of water vapor. The amount of water vapor in the atmosphere is controlled by temperature. If non-condensing greenhouse gases such as CO2 cause a bump in the temperature the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere has to rise. Simple physics that has nothing to do with modelling. I don't find Matt Ridley very convincing.
Quantum theory is largely statistical in nature. Is that not a hard science? Climate science it based on real measurable phenomena. If you think the statistical analysis that climatologists do is wrong you're free to do your own statistical analysis of the hard data that goes into the statistics and prove them wrong. Good luck.
It's worth noting a pattern of "adjusting" the data that predominately favors the leading theories. That's some seriously questionable stuff in an field. Fortunately for the climate change guys, you can just ignore the ground station data entirely and still have a reasonable conversation about this stuff.
That's still judging the adjustments on your perception of bias by the scientists. Read and understand the papers that describe the reasons and means for the adjustments. Then we can have a reasonable conversation.
I'm far, far more concerned with constant tuning of the models to meet the data then vice versa. That may sound backwards, but ask anyone who's made a model to predict the stock market based on fitting his model to all historical data how that worked out. Descriptive power is not a significant reason to expect predictive power from a hypothesis (necessary, but very far from sufficient). And every time you tinker, you reset the clock on knowing if you have any predictive power.
It takes many years to test the predictive power of a climate model. 15? 20? Depends on who you ask, but the better part of a career. The models from 15 years ago failed pretty hard, prediction-wise. We're a long way from anyone having the right to be arrogant about this stuff, and every time someone adjusts their model to make it match observations, that's one more model reset, one less chance to move from hand-wavy descriptivism to a tested theory.
It sounds as if you think climate models are merely numerical exercises in curve fitting rather than models of the actual physical interactions that occur in the climate. The tuning that occurs is adjustments to the physics involved. They never just look at the real world temperature records or precipitation records and say "Let's tweak this to make it fit the curve better." Climate models are projecting 30 year trends so it takes that long to totally test them. You don't need to worry about the adjustments to models because you still have the projections the model made that can be compared to what happened over the 30 year period. So far models are accurate within the expectations the modelers have for them.
Neither is being heterosexual.
The beautiful thing about hard sciences such as climatology is that they are based on real physical phenomena. It's all out there for anyone to discover. All you have to do is find a better explanation than the climate scientists to overturn the existing theory.
As far as I can see government mandated universal health care coverage has worked well in nearly all of the countries it's been implemented in with better outcomes and less cost than we have in the US. Can you name any countries where that isn't true?
There were a few who predicted it (Dean Baker comes to mind) but nobody wanted to listen to them. Like you I could see the crash coming a couple of years before it happened (maybe because I did listen to them).
Unless you've read the papers on why they make the adjustments and what they do to make the adjustments you're just making shit up to fit your worldview. Something you could probably do is get the raw data and the adjusted data and compare them. You'll find the difference isn't that large.
The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (notice it includes aeronautics in the name). The scope of their charter is a bit broader than you think it is. From the Wikipedia article:
The original 1958 act charged the new Agency with conducting the aeronautical and space activities of the United States "so as to contribute materially to one or more of the following objectives:"
* Expansion of human knowledge of the Earth, the atmosphere and space
* Improvement of aeronautical and space vehicles
* Development and operation of vehicles for space flight
* Establishment of long-range studies of aeronautical and space activities for peaceful and scientific purposes
* Preservation of the role of the United States as a leader in aeronautical and space science technology
* The making available to agencies directly concerned with national defense of discoveries that have military value or significance
* Cooperation by the United States with other nations in the peaceful application of space research
* Effective utilization of scientific and engineering resources of the United States in order to avoid unnecessary duplication of effort, facilities, and equipment
In 2012, a ninth objective was added: "The preservation of the United States preeminent position in aeronautics and space through research and technology development related to associated manufacturing processes."
Observing the Earth from space is part of NASA's mission and always has been (after they started launching satellites).
All the money in the world won't insulate you from the effects in the long run. It didn't cure Steve Jobs pancreatic cancer.
You're perfectly free to do your own statistical analysis. The data is available. But I know you won't. You probably don't have the knowledge to do it in the first place and you'd rather just sit back and sling mud about something you're not qualified to judge.
Science generally starts with the big picture and works its way down to the details. In the big picture we know that CO2 is one of the greenhouse gases, we know that humans are the primary cause of the rise in CO2 levels in the atmosphere and that the Earth's temperature would be around 0 degrees F (-18 C) without the effects of greenhouse gases. Those are all pretty much settled. This satellite is filling in the details.
CO2, a greenhouse gas, is tied to climate change but is also expected and always-present part of our atmosphere. Why do we need satellite to know this?
That's generally what science does. Get the big picture first then start digging for the details. This is digging for the details.
Scientists did use the SurfaceStations.org list. They compared the poorly placed stations with the well placed stations and found that the poorly placed stations actually had a slightly lower warming trend compared to the well placed stations. Seems like the adjustments for the urban heat island effect are effective.
You're analysis is incomplete if you don't include all the natural sinks of CO2 as well.
The next glaciation wouldn't have started for several thousand years. The best thing for human sustainability is to maintain the climate as it has been for the past several thousand years. Then if CO2 started dropping toward 250 ppm it would be easy to burn some coal to bring it back up.
A lot of the changes that are occurring won't be reversible, at least on any human time scale. But we can keep things from getting worse than they are already bound to get if we do something. The problem isn't really that climate change is occurring but how fast it is occurring (which still seems slow relative to the time scales that most humans are used to dealing with). If you could take the changes that are occurring in two centuries and spread them out over two millenia it wouldn't be that hard to adapt to them. But I think we will be hard pressed to adapt at the speed at which they are and will be happening.
More likely they used a relatively simple energy balance calculation but computers were no doubt involved. Just not regular climate models.
Yes, Jupiter's barycenter is outside of the Sun but that is the only object orbiting the Sun that can be said about. I guess the accurate way of saying that is that objects orbit around the center of mass of the two objects (of course that is complicated by the presence of other objects).
True but climate doesn't change for some magical reason. There are physical reasons behind climate changing. That's one of the things climate scientists are studying. If you want to counter their views on the subject you need to present some actual physical evidence for something different causing the changes.