It was because of global warming from an Ice Age that humans managed to get our of Africa.
Well, thank goodness it's happening again! I missed my flight out of Nairobi.
If that never happened we'd be stuck in Africa due to uninhabitable deserts blocking the path north and the rest of the world would be ruled by the Neanderthals.
And Neanderthals were probably in denial about the danger posed by change right up to the final moments. Thankfully, their mindset lives on in you.
You dismiss the remarks made by "non-scientists" yet want us to believe you when you say you have a theory as to the mysterious mechanisms whereby anthropogenic emissions don't warm the atmosphere, but "naturally occurring" CO2 does.
Have you any sense at all of how ridiculous that is?
After nearly twenty years of hearing constant claims to be on the verge of revealing why climate science has got it wrong, constant retractions previous assertions "it's not warming! it's the sun! it's warming but it's something else... look over there! It's a vast conspiracy!" really, who in their right mind has not already dismissed the claims of the denialists and conspiracy theorists?
Is there anything you can show us that would convince us to take you seriously? anything? any clues as to the mysterious mechanisms whereby anthropogenic emissions don't warm the atmosphere, but "naturally occurring" CO2 does?
The current state of our understanding of the climate doesn't support the claims being made. The fact that a number of those claims have fallen is further evidence that it needs further study not immediate action.
Which claims are you referring to? Do you mean the claims of the so-called contrarians (e.g. Judith Curry) that climate sensitivity to CO2 is 0 C/(W/m2)? Or Roy Spencer's claim of a cloud iris effect counteracting a greater sensitivity?
If so, you are right - observations have disproven these claims.
If not, we will need to know the specifics of the claims to judge the veracity of your own claim.
Fourier proposed an IDEA, based on flawed assumptions and resulting flawed calculations. I am not "blaming" Fourier... such was the state of science at the time. But modern science would not arrive at his conclusions, given the same raw data.
Summary Fourier was right.
Tyndall showed that gases can warm by absorbing radiation, and cool by emitting it. I have no criticism of Tyndall's work.
Summary Tyndall was right. There is no known refutation of Tyndall that would cause us to doubt that CO2 and other greenhouse gases are a driver for climate change.
Arrhenius attempted to quantify it. He came up with some potentially useful calculations but they were based on indirect observation and yet more assumptions. (I.e., he assumed CO2 and water were what were retaining heat in the atmosphere).
Summary Arrhenius was right.
Kurt Angstrom rebutted Arrhenius' work. Angstrom's rebuttal was basically shouted down; I know of no actual refutation of Angstrom's criticisms.
Summary You heard that someone said something criticising some part of Arrhenius' work. This person was then "shouted down" which I assume means "proven wrong" pending further evidence.
Summary of Summary You can't detail any evidence refuting Arrhenius' early work on quantifying the sensitivity of climate to CO2 and othe greenhouse gases, and probably you yourself don't believe there is a problem with it, but can't say so publicly.
Hopefully you didn't suppose that I meant that the greenhouse gas theory was somehow fully formed in the 1820s - because if so your supposition was wrong.
He proposed the theoretical foundation, Tyndall demonstrated the mechanism by his work with radiative absorption - Arrhenius quantified it.
If the aim of the conspiracy theorists is to disprove AGW they need to disprove the work of these giants.
Greenland has experienced (like Antarctica) some very heavy snowfalls in the past few years, which increases the thickness of the glaciers. Glacial flow is fairly well understood, as the glacier gets thicker it causes faster movement.
An observant person might note that the fact that is now snowing in places where it was previously too cold to snow is actually an indication of change, not an argument against it.
The calving of large glaciers is often touted by [scientists] as proof of their claims, but this phenomenon does not actually support the [scientists] position at all.
You are mistaken. Climatologists don't claim that glacial calving is proof of AGW - this proof lies in the observations and theories of Tyndall, Fourier, Arrhenius et al.
I'm not sure what it is about Climatology that makes people think that ignorance can substitute for knowledge. Does this muddled thinking work, say, when you go to the bank "I'm skeptical of alarmist bankers claims that my account is overdrawn"?
He is probably referencing the paper by Hansen that you recently referenced:
These short-term global fluctuations are associated principally with natural oscillations of tropical Pacific sea surface
temperatures summarized in the Nino index in the lower part of the figure.
Care to elucidate what these falsehoods were? Are you saying the sequence I described (That is, some denialists mistook a certificate that Michael Mann had on display for a Nobel peace prize, claimed it was fake, only later to find it wasn't a Nobel Peace prize, but a real certificate he really received from the IPCC, thanking him for his contributions to winning the Nobel Peace Prize) did not actually occur?
[ No response]
I take it then that you accept this actually happened?
No, he was not.
Thus it is incorrect to refer to any IPCC official, or scientist who worked on IPCC reports, as a Nobel laureate or Nobel Prize winner.
The above quote is from the IPCC official statement on the matter: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/nobel/N... [www.ipcc.ch]
To freshen your memory - this is the exact statement still available in a post by Mann on his own Facebook page:
Dr. Mann is a climate scientist whose research has focused on global warming. In 2007, along with Vice President Al Gore and his colleagues of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
Regardless of your ranting, the allegation that Dr Mann was/is being deceptive by his reference to winning the Nobel peace prize was tested in a court of law and found to be false. Opposing counsel admitted it was false and had no substance, leaving nobody of any significance arguing that it had substance. Oddly, on such matters I'm inclined to stick with legal judgements rather than the word of some random guy on the internet, particularly since I already pointed this out to you, and you studiously chose to ignore it.
Likely Mann is leaving that statement on his facebook page because it really annoys the denialists, it gets them frothing from their slack jaws and mouth breathing even harder than usual. Good for him. I'd do the same thing in his place.
Perhaps I would, but you'll never know, since skeptical science is not Mann's site. Not sure why you are immigrating to the land of speculation.
How about famed pro-AGW NASA scientist James Hansen who is on record as confirming the stall in temperatures [wattsupwiththat.com]?
Whoops. Your mistake. Turns out in the actual paper written by Hansen (rather than a misquote by that idiot Watts) there is no indication of an actual stall in temperature rise, he is just addressing the myth that there is a stall, and explaining the reason for the slowdown. Serves you right for getting your information from a blog (a blog written by a paid employee of the Heartland institute) rather than from a scientist.
In order for denialist theory to be right (i.e. the warming is attributable to a natural cause) the observed warming trend would have to be zero. This means not going back to the temperature in 2012, but going back to the temperature in 1901. So tell me, how long until the warming trend reverses itself? How long until we return to the average temperature from 1901?
You asked for links, I provided them. I don't have anything to prove. Nevertheless those links demonstrate that your claim that no-one previously demonstrated the fallacy of the 'falsifiable hypothesis' argument for the benefit of the fallacies originator - there it is right there. So much for Pielke and his hopes of becoming famous by distorting Popper into fallacy.
You're just bashing some other people for not providing facts.
Yep. If you make assertions, but can't prove them, then you can expect some flack for not doing so. I fail to see why this would be a surprise.
You're not stating WHAT falsifies the models.
No need. The other poster claimed that the model in question was falsified - how the model was falsified was his affair, rather than mine. Perhaps he misunderstood what models are for, and perhaps his method of falsification is bunk. Perhaps you, also, misunderstand the purpose of climate models. His ignorance (or yours) is really nothing to do with me. If you say that some model can't be falsified, it is your job to demonstrate sufficient knowledge of the topic at hand to prove your assertion.
For instance, it was claimed in NOAA that 15 years of "an observed absence of warming" is a very rare event (around 5% chance of happening). They've since changed their mind, claiming such events are more common than they originally said.
Which (if true) means what, exactly? NOAA is an organisation, not a model. You did know that right?
This is the problem...the kind of things that would falsify these models are glossed over...the model is changed, the goalposts are moved, and suddenly there's a new standard for falsification. It doesn't matter if the old papers/predictions turn out incorrect/off.
I see that once again you have lapsed into broad generalities. Which model was updated post publication and the published predictions modified secretly to reflect the actual observed climate shift?
Name the model and the person who modified it.
They merely call it "science", adjust the sliders/confidence, and reiterate their 100% certainty that they'll be 100% right going forward.
I've never once heard a climate scientist predict a result and ascribe 100% certainty to it.
This kind of hyperbole is exactly why your argument rings hollow.
So I ask you again for a falsifiable hypothesis.
You're mistaken. You didn't ask me for a falsifiable hypothesis. You said there wasn't one.
Mann referred to himself as a Nobel prize recipient - which the IPCC has stated he's not allowed to do. Why are you posting obvious falsehoods in his defence throughout this thread?
Care to elucidate what these falsehoods were? Are you saying the sequence I described (That is, some denialists mistook a certificate that Michael Mann had on display for a Nobel peace prize, claimed it was fake, only later to find it wasn't a Nobel Peace prize, but a real certificate he really received from the IPCC, thanking him for his contributions to winning the Nobel Peace Prize) did not actually occur?
Dr. Mann is a climate scientist whose research has focused on global warming. In 2007, along with Vice President Al Gore and his colleagues of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
He WAS awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Vice President Al Gore and his colleagues of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
It is one thing to engage in discussion about debatable topics. It is quite another to attempt to discredit consistently validated scientific research through the professional and personal defamation of a Nobel prize recipient.
Presumably this was written by a legal counsel, not by Mann himself. Perhaps he had an opportunity to correct the wording and didn't, when he should have. Perhaps not.
Notably, this piece of paper, which appears to the heart of your concern, was tested via an appeal against the lawsuit in question. The appeal was thrown out, because Steyns lawyers admitted it had no substance: see here.
Accordingly, your own argument is spurious and without substance.
PS: I'm also a "Nobel laureate" if Mann is:
A peace prize made possible by the people has now been passed on to the people. The EU won the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize, but the European Parliament believes this honour belongs to everyone. During a special ceremony in Strasbourg, the prize was symbolically handed over to 20 citizens of different ages and nationalities to represent the people of Europe.
The best worldwide dataset we have (the satellite data that Dr. Spencer uses) doesn't show the heating (where modern climate theory says it should happen the strongest - mid-troposphere).
Is it claimed that Dr. Mann won the Nobel Prize in that book?
You don't need to read a book to find that out. He did contribute to the winning of a Nobel peace prize. He received a certificate from the IPCC thanking him for his contributions. Various people, desperate people, thought this certificate was the Nobel peace prize, they never asked him, he never claimed it was. They made up a story about him faking the certificate - he didn't fake it, it was real. Much embarrassment was heaped upon Anthony Watts, and other worthies, including our favourite Lord-who-is-not-a-Lord Monkton, for these spurious and quickly debunked claims.
He never made any claim to have been a Nobel Laureate. He did win a Nobel peace prize, as one of many who shared the prize. He never claimed anything that was false, this was a rumour made up by a number of people who apparently can't read or otherwise lack basic comprehension skills.
I wonder where the good Dr got his data from? Oh there it is! Turns out that he selectively chose 2 datasets for mid tropospheric temperatures in the tropics and then compared the data from those to GCM predictions for the whole surface (including polar regions) and for across the entire column.
Whoops.
He admits in the comments below after this is exposed that in fact the polar regions are expected to warm faster than the tropics (hard not to, since we've observed it) and thus, temperature rises in the polar regions will be higher then the projections of the models, but handwaves this away. No, Roy, this is what maths is for. Don't handwave.
Steyn didn't assert that Mann is a fraud, but rather that Mann "tortured" the data. You may recall that Principal Component Analysis was used on a limited and secretly-adjusted data set to come up with the alarming "hockey stick" chart.
I'm not sure about "alarming" - perhaps you've let your fear get the better of you. A good description would be "accurate" since the modelling accurately reflected what happened to the climate in the years succeeding.
It's pretty much indisputable that there was significant warming from like 1930-1996, but very little since then in spite of more or less linear increases in CO2 concentrations since like 1850.
And if we do not artificially split the period 1930-2013 into 2 chunks for no reason, we can see a clear interdecadal signal from CO2 induced warming - as predicted by Fourier, Arrhenius etc. If we artificially selected a region, say 1980-1996, we can see a significant warming trend somewhat above the long term trend predicted by GCM models, and then if we selected the period 1996-2013 we can see a definite warming trend, somewhat below the long term trend predict by GCM models. The data is so clear that the climate scientists were able to reduce the uncertainty (per AR5) of long term predictions of CO2 forced warming.
The actual source code is this, from briffa_Sep98_d.pro http://wattsupwiththat.com/200... [wattsupwiththat.com] - you can decide for yourself whether this is "torture" or not, and whether this particular debate should be squelched:
;
; Apply a VERY ARTIFICAL correction for decline!!
;
yrloc=[1400,findgen(19)*5.+1904]
valadj=[0.,0.,0.,0.,0.,-0.1,-0.25,-0.3,0.,-0.1,0.3,0.8,1.2,1.7,2.5,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6]*0.75 ; fudge factor
if n_elements(yrloc) ne n_elements(valadj) then message,'Oooops!'
yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,timey)
Looks pretty innocuous. Perhaps you either (a) Posted the wrong section of the model (b) Misunderstood the meaning of the comment "Apply a very artificial correction for decline" per the quite embarrassing mistakes made by some conspiracy theorists with respect to the word "decline" used in the CRU emails.
And he is on record as saying that what Mann has done is 'rubbish'.
I see. Are you able to provide a link to this record?
Mann modified the technique to ensure that graphical analysis would suppress any variation in the bulk of the graph, while driving the final data high - a hockey-stick, in other words. Jolliffe could see no other reason for introducing this modification beyond producing hockey-stick output.
This is the output that turned out, in the end, to be correct?
You'd be surprised how many people believe in a deity that is relatively undefined - especially in the West, where it is common for a large portion of people, when surveyed, to claim to believe in God, but not associate with any particular religion. I understand that in my country some 80% of people say they believe in a deity of some sort - within that statistic there are many conceptions of what this deity is like. That's life in a post modern world.
In any case, I think we were talking about not so much the deity that people believe in, but the deity that atheists tell us does not exist. This is not specific instances of a deity as described by the bible or other text, with well defined attributes. It is any deity at all - it is the generalised deity.
This is why I consider myself a strong agnostic. I believe the existence of god/gods is unknowable in principle.
I have no truck with that position. Agnostics can validly claim to have no belief with respect to the existence of a deity/deities.
would, however, defend the atheists who define themselves as having a lack of belief in god, because there are many of such.
Rather than 'many' I would say 'all' - but that description is incomplete. Atheists also believe there is no deity (or deities).
People like to spin it as 'atheists categorically state there is no god' because that's an easily ridiculed strawman.
Are there atheists, who, when asked, would say that there is a deity or deities? I guess Dawkins says that 'there probably is no God', itself a philosophically troubling position because the term 'probably' invokes the notion of a way to test or measure that probability, which is the same error as pretending that there is a test for the existence of a deity or deities. Also, I guess there might be some atheists whos would say there might be a God, just not the one people believe in - which is again, pretty indefensible logically.
Atheism. Do you know what it means? Lacking a belief in god or gods.
Atheists lack belief in a god or gods, but that doesn't mean that Atheism is defined as a lack of belief. Otherwise agnostics would be atheists - and they aren't. In this context belief and knowledge are the same.
Consider the question: Is there a god or gods?
- An agnostic would say I don't know. Agnostics lack belief that there is a god, and lack the belief that there is no god.
- An atheists would say no. Atheists lack belief in a god, and believe there is none.
- A theist would say yes. Theists believe there is a God. They lack the belief that there isn't.
Slashdot Mirror
Nope, I've just becoming more and more suspicious that Global Warming isn't science at all.
Should your paranoid suspicions be of any interest to us? Why?
It looks more to me these days like religion. It's got its apocalypse, its satans, its prophets and saviors.
Are your bizarre delusions of any importance outside your own psychoses?
It was because of global warming from an Ice Age that humans managed to get our of Africa.
Well, thank goodness it's happening again! I missed my flight out of Nairobi.
If that never happened we'd be stuck in Africa due to uninhabitable deserts blocking the path north and the rest of the world would be ruled by the Neanderthals.
And Neanderthals were probably in denial about the danger posed by change right up to the final moments. Thankfully, their mindset lives on in you.
Have you any sense at all of how ridiculous that is?
Is there anything you can show us that would convince us to take you seriously? anything? any clues as to the mysterious mechanisms whereby anthropogenic emissions don't warm the atmosphere, but "naturally occurring" CO2 does?
No?
The current state of our understanding of the climate doesn't support the claims being made. The fact that a number of those claims have fallen is further evidence that it needs further study not immediate action.
Which claims are you referring to? Do you mean the claims of the so-called contrarians (e.g. Judith Curry) that climate sensitivity to CO2 is 0 C/(W/m2)? Or Roy Spencer's claim of a cloud iris effect counteracting a greater sensitivity?
If so, you are right - observations have disproven these claims.
If not, we will need to know the specifics of the claims to judge the veracity of your own claim.
Fourier proposed an IDEA, based on flawed assumptions and resulting flawed calculations. I am not "blaming" Fourier... such was the state of science at the time. But modern science would not arrive at his conclusions, given the same raw data.
Summary Fourier was right.
Tyndall showed that gases can warm by absorbing radiation, and cool by emitting it. I have no criticism of Tyndall's work.
Summary Tyndall was right. There is no known refutation of Tyndall that would cause us to doubt that CO2 and other greenhouse gases are a driver for climate change.
Arrhenius attempted to quantify it. He came up with some potentially useful calculations but they were based on indirect observation and yet more assumptions. (I.e., he assumed CO2 and water were what were retaining heat in the atmosphere).
Summary Arrhenius was right.
Kurt Angstrom rebutted Arrhenius' work. Angstrom's rebuttal was basically shouted down; I know of no actual refutation of Angstrom's criticisms.
Summary You heard that someone said something criticising some part of Arrhenius' work. This person was then "shouted down" which I assume means "proven wrong" pending further evidence. Summary of Summary You can't detail any evidence refuting Arrhenius' early work on quantifying the sensitivity of climate to CO2 and othe greenhouse gases, and probably you yourself don't believe there is a problem with it, but can't say so publicly.
He proposed the theoretical foundation, Tyndall demonstrated the mechanism by his work with radiative absorption - Arrhenius quantified it.
If the aim of the conspiracy theorists is to disprove AGW they need to disprove the work of these giants.
Greenland has experienced (like Antarctica) some very heavy snowfalls in the past few years, which increases the thickness of the glaciers. Glacial flow is fairly well understood, as the glacier gets thicker it causes faster movement.
An observant person might note that the fact that is now snowing in places where it was previously too cold to snow is actually an indication of change, not an argument against it.
The calving of large glaciers is often touted by [scientists] as proof of their claims, but this phenomenon does not actually support the [scientists] position at all.
You are mistaken. Climatologists don't claim that glacial calving is proof of AGW - this proof lies in the observations and theories of Tyndall, Fourier, Arrhenius et al.
I'm not sure what it is about Climatology that makes people think that ignorance can substitute for knowledge. Does this muddled thinking work, say, when you go to the bank "I'm skeptical of alarmist bankers claims that my account is overdrawn"?
These short-term global fluctuations are associated principally with natural oscillations of tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures summarized in the Nino index in the lower part of the figure.
HTH
Care to elucidate what these falsehoods were? Are you saying the sequence I described (That is, some denialists mistook a certificate that Michael Mann had on display for a Nobel peace prize, claimed it was fake, only later to find it wasn't a Nobel Peace prize, but a real certificate he really received from the IPCC, thanking him for his contributions to winning the Nobel Peace Prize) did not actually occur?
[ No response]
I take it then that you accept this actually happened?
No, he was not. Thus it is incorrect to refer to any IPCC official, or scientist who worked on IPCC reports, as a Nobel laureate or Nobel Prize winner. The above quote is from the IPCC official statement on the matter: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/nobel/N... [www.ipcc.ch] To freshen your memory - this is the exact statement still available in a post by Mann on his own Facebook page: Dr. Mann is a climate scientist whose research has focused on global warming. In 2007, along with Vice President Al Gore and his colleagues of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
Regardless of your ranting, the allegation that Dr Mann was/is being deceptive by his reference to winning the Nobel peace prize was tested in a court of law and found to be false. Opposing counsel admitted it was false and had no substance, leaving nobody of any significance arguing that it had substance. Oddly, on such matters I'm inclined to stick with legal judgements rather than the word of some random guy on the internet, particularly since I already pointed this out to you, and you studiously chose to ignore it.
Likely Mann is leaving that statement on his facebook page because it really annoys the denialists, it gets them frothing from their slack jaws and mouth breathing even harder than usual. Good for him. I'd do the same thing in his place.
So you'll believe Mann's site.
Perhaps I would, but you'll never know, since skeptical science is not Mann's site. Not sure why you are immigrating to the land of speculation.
How about famed pro-AGW NASA scientist James Hansen who is on record as confirming the stall in temperatures [wattsupwiththat.com]?
Whoops. Your mistake. Turns out in the actual paper written by Hansen (rather than a misquote by that idiot Watts) there is no indication of an actual stall in temperature rise, he is just addressing the myth that there is a stall, and explaining the reason for the slowdown. Serves you right for getting your information from a blog (a blog written by a paid employee of the Heartland institute) rather than from a scientist. In order for denialist theory to be right (i.e. the warming is attributable to a natural cause) the observed warming trend would have to be zero. This means not going back to the temperature in 2012, but going back to the temperature in 1901. So tell me, how long until the warming trend reverses itself? How long until we return to the average temperature from 1901?
I don't see what those links prove.
You asked for links, I provided them. I don't have anything to prove. Nevertheless those links demonstrate that your claim that no-one previously demonstrated the fallacy of the 'falsifiable hypothesis' argument for the benefit of the fallacies originator - there it is right there. So much for Pielke and his hopes of becoming famous by distorting Popper into fallacy.
You're just bashing some other people for not providing facts.
Yep. If you make assertions, but can't prove them, then you can expect some flack for not doing so. I fail to see why this would be a surprise.
You're not stating WHAT falsifies the models.
No need. The other poster claimed that the model in question was falsified - how the model was falsified was his affair, rather than mine. Perhaps he misunderstood what models are for, and perhaps his method of falsification is bunk. Perhaps you, also, misunderstand the purpose of climate models. His ignorance (or yours) is really nothing to do with me. If you say that some model can't be falsified, it is your job to demonstrate sufficient knowledge of the topic at hand to prove your assertion.
For instance, it was claimed in NOAA that 15 years of "an observed absence of warming" is a very rare event (around 5% chance of happening). They've since changed their mind, claiming such events are more common than they originally said.
Which (if true) means what, exactly? NOAA is an organisation, not a model. You did know that right?
This is the problem...the kind of things that would falsify these models are glossed over...the model is changed, the goalposts are moved, and suddenly there's a new standard for falsification. It doesn't matter if the old papers/predictions turn out incorrect/off.
I see that once again you have lapsed into broad generalities. Which model was updated post publication and the published predictions modified secretly to reflect the actual observed climate shift?
Name the model and the person who modified it.
They merely call it "science", adjust the sliders/confidence, and reiterate their 100% certainty that they'll be 100% right going forward.
I've never once heard a climate scientist predict a result and ascribe 100% certainty to it.
This kind of hyperbole is exactly why your argument rings hollow.
So I ask you again for a falsifiable hypothesis.
You're mistaken. You didn't ask me for a falsifiable hypothesis. You said there wasn't one.
Now prove it.
See here.
Mann referred to himself as a Nobel prize recipient - which the IPCC has stated he's not allowed to do. Why are you posting obvious falsehoods in his defence throughout this thread?
Care to elucidate what these falsehoods were? Are you saying the sequence I described (That is, some denialists mistook a certificate that Michael Mann had on display for a Nobel peace prize, claimed it was fake, only later to find it wasn't a Nobel Peace prize, but a real certificate he really received from the IPCC, thanking him for his contributions to winning the Nobel Peace Prize) did not actually occur?
Dr. Mann is a climate scientist whose research has focused on global warming. In 2007, along with Vice President Al Gore and his colleagues of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
https://www.facebook.com/Micha... [facebook.com]
He WAS awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Vice President Al Gore and his colleagues of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
It is one thing to engage in discussion about debatable topics. It is quite another to attempt to discredit consistently validated scientific research through the professional and personal defamation of a Nobel prize recipient.
http://legaltimes.typepad.com/... [typepad.com]
Presumably this was written by a legal counsel, not by Mann himself. Perhaps he had an opportunity to correct the wording and didn't, when he should have. Perhaps not.
Notably, this piece of paper, which appears to the heart of your concern, was tested via an appeal against the lawsuit in question. The appeal was thrown out, because Steyns lawyers admitted it had no substance: see here.
Accordingly, your own argument is spurious and without substance.
PS: I'm also a "Nobel laureate" if Mann is:
A peace prize made possible by the people has now been passed on to the people. The EU won the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize, but the European Parliament believes this honour belongs to everyone. During a special ceremony in Strasbourg, the prize was symbolically handed over to 20 citizens of different ages and nationalities to represent the people of Europe.
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/... [europa.eu]
Well, this is a matter of discussion between yourself and the Nobel Peace Prize committee.
Yet we are still in a global temperature stall.
false.
and not a single model comes close to predicting it.
false
The best worldwide dataset we have (the satellite data that Dr. Spencer uses) doesn't show the heating (where modern climate theory says it should happen the strongest - mid-troposphere).
false.
No data confirms the models.
false Sensing a trend here?
So which do you believe?
Oh gee, dunno.
I like how you've linked to a site that calls itself 'Canada Free Press', but is, in fact, a blog for spruiking canada's fossil fuel industry!
Is it claimed that Dr. Mann won the Nobel Prize in that book?
You don't need to read a book to find that out. He did contribute to the winning of a Nobel peace prize. He received a certificate from the IPCC thanking him for his contributions. Various people, desperate people, thought this certificate was the Nobel peace prize, they never asked him, he never claimed it was. They made up a story about him faking the certificate - he didn't fake it, it was real. Much embarrassment was heaped upon Anthony Watts, and other worthies, including our favourite Lord-who-is-not-a-Lord Monkton, for these spurious and quickly debunked claims.
He never made any claim to have been a Nobel Laureate. He did win a Nobel peace prize, as one of many who shared the prize. He never claimed anything that was false, this was a rumour made up by a number of people who apparently can't read or otherwise lack basic comprehension skills.
Whoops.
He admits in the comments below after this is exposed that in fact the polar regions are expected to warm faster than the tropics (hard not to, since we've observed it) and thus, temperature rises in the polar regions will be higher then the projections of the models, but handwaves this away. No, Roy, this is what maths is for. Don't handwave.
Steyn didn't assert that Mann is a fraud, but rather that Mann "tortured" the data. You may recall that Principal Component Analysis was used on a limited and secretly-adjusted data set to come up with the alarming "hockey stick" chart.
I'm not sure about "alarming" - perhaps you've let your fear get the better of you. A good description would be "accurate" since the modelling accurately reflected what happened to the climate in the years succeeding.
It's pretty much indisputable that there was significant warming from like 1930-1996, but very little since then in spite of more or less linear increases in CO2 concentrations since like 1850.
And if we do not artificially split the period 1930-2013 into 2 chunks for no reason, we can see a clear interdecadal signal from CO2 induced warming - as predicted by Fourier, Arrhenius etc. If we artificially selected a region, say 1980-1996, we can see a significant warming trend somewhat above the long term trend predicted by GCM models, and then if we selected the period 1996-2013 we can see a definite warming trend, somewhat below the long term trend predict by GCM models. The data is so clear that the climate scientists were able to reduce the uncertainty (per AR5) of long term predictions of CO2 forced warming.
The actual source code is this, from briffa_Sep98_d.pro http://wattsupwiththat.com/200... [wattsupwiththat.com] - you can decide for yourself whether this is "torture" or not, and whether this particular debate should be squelched: ; ; Apply a VERY ARTIFICAL correction for decline!! ; yrloc=[1400,findgen(19)*5.+1904] valadj=[0.,0.,0.,0.,0.,-0.1,-0.25,-0.3,0.,-0.1,0.3,0.8,1.2,1.7,2.5,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6]*0.75 ; fudge factor if n_elements(yrloc) ne n_elements(valadj) then message,'Oooops!' yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,timey)
Looks pretty innocuous. Perhaps you either (a) Posted the wrong section of the model (b) Misunderstood the meaning of the comment "Apply a very artificial correction for decline" per the quite embarrassing mistakes made by some conspiracy theorists with respect to the word "decline" used in the CRU emails.
I would say that they both stand to lose personal credibility - is credibility not important for radio stars?
And he is on record as saying that what Mann has done is 'rubbish'.
I see. Are you able to provide a link to this record?
Mann modified the technique to ensure that graphical analysis would suppress any variation in the bulk of the graph, while driving the final data high - a hockey-stick, in other words. Jolliffe could see no other reason for introducing this modification beyond producing hockey-stick output.
This is the output that turned out, in the end, to be correct?
That output?
Curious.
In any case, I think we were talking about not so much the deity that people believe in, but the deity that atheists tell us does not exist. This is not specific instances of a deity as described by the bible or other text, with well defined attributes. It is any deity at all - it is the generalised deity.
This is why I consider myself a strong agnostic. I believe the existence of god/gods is unknowable in principle.
I have no truck with that position. Agnostics can validly claim to have no belief with respect to the existence of a deity/deities.
would, however, defend the atheists who define themselves as having a lack of belief in god, because there are many of such.
Rather than 'many' I would say 'all' - but that description is incomplete. Atheists also believe there is no deity (or deities).
People like to spin it as 'atheists categorically state there is no god' because that's an easily ridiculed strawman.
Are there atheists, who, when asked, would say that there is a deity or deities? I guess Dawkins says that 'there probably is no God', itself a philosophically troubling position because the term 'probably' invokes the notion of a way to test or measure that probability, which is the same error as pretending that there is a test for the existence of a deity or deities. Also, I guess there might be some atheists whos would say there might be a God, just not the one people believe in - which is again, pretty indefensible logically.
http://science.slashdot.org/co...
And this one:
http://science.slashdot.org/co...
Atheism. Do you know what it means? Lacking a belief in god or gods.
Atheists lack belief in a god or gods, but that doesn't mean that Atheism is defined as a lack of belief. Otherwise agnostics would be atheists - and they aren't. In this context belief and knowledge are the same.
Consider the question: Is there a god or gods?
- An agnostic would say I don't know. Agnostics lack belief that there is a god, and lack the belief that there is no god.
- An atheists would say no. Atheists lack belief in a god, and believe there is none.
- A theist would say yes. Theists believe there is a God. They lack the belief that there isn't.