Is Global Warming Unstoppable?

First, thank you for the great post.

Second, I agree that probably no one has read all of the literature. I sure haven't. I just know that I've read a decent amount, and I've also read most things I can find that counter anthropogenic global warming. There are two specific topics that I've been struggling to find papers about, and once I have those I will feel like I have a relatively decent understanding of the entire issue.

Third, you mentioned a post of mine got deleted. Is this true? If so, I'd love to point out a post of Shawn Clark's post here that demonstrates his combativeness, direct name calling and use of bad language in a single post. On the next page he makes another similar post. I am not pointing this out for you, nor am I claiming to be perfect, I'm pointing this out to show that it seems some of the moderators may be a bit biased.

Fourth, I agree with you that computer climate models lead to a wide variety of predictions. We use climate models to determine the relative amounts that anthropogenic causes and natural causes contribute to our warming. So computer climate models are what we have used to arrive at the conclusion that anthropogenic causes are greater than natural causes for the warming we observed from 1980-2000ish. I assume I don't have to post a list of the most common criticisms of computer climate models. This is why I agreed with the person who attacked you for making the statement that "global warming is based on repeatable experiments that lead to conclusive results." That statement is completely untrue. I know that you made a mistake when writing it, and I just needed it redacted because it is a gross piece of misinformation, and as we all agree the perpetuation of misinformation leads to the decline of our understanding.

Combining the inherit inaccuracies of computer climate models with the good probability of poor input data due to ClimateGate renders me useless in accepting their output as legitimate.

Lastly I'm copying and pasting a post into this thread from the thread that got closed after Shawn Clark became so combative. I thought it was an interesting observation. Nothing to disprove AGW, but just some interesting things to think about. This is completely unrelated to your post.

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I have found that humans have likely contributed somewhat to the warming we experienced from 1980-1998/2001. But I do not believe that anthropogenic production of GHGs was the driving force for warming in that time period. I think we are not leading a sustainable lifestyle and that we should curb our emissions slowly over time. But am I not a hand-waver that runs around screaming about global warming, melting ice, and save the polar bears. I like to actually read and figure this stuff out.

We have experienced warming trends since 1850 that are similar to the one we see from 1980-1998/2001, and those are attributed to natural causes. I find it hard to believe that we have to attribute our most recent warming (again, 1980 - 1998/2001) to anthropogenic causes when science is fine attributing the rest of the warming since 1850 to natural causes.

1860-1880 - Warming, with little to no CO2 production - Note that at this point we are coming out of the little ice age and solar activity is on the rise. Science credits this to natural warming.
1880-1910 - Cooling, despite rising CO2 production
1910-1940 - Warming, still with relatively low amounts of CO2, still attributed by science to natural warming
1940-1980 - Cooling, despite rising levels of CO2
1980-2000ish - Warming with high levels of CO2, but levels of CO2 that are still very low compared to the history of the earth
2000ish-now - Cooling, despite rising levels of CO2

Below I have plotted these warming periods. Disclaimer: this is nothing scientific. It is merely setting start and stop points for generally agreed upon periods of warming and cooling, and showing the slope of warming during that time (the slope corresponds with the rate of warming). You can reproduce this graph yourself, and feel free to play around with the stop time (1998, 2000, 2010, etc) for our most recent warming.

 

May comment later, but several series of posts were pulled last night, I suspect that they were far enough off topic, some of mine were included. The conversation strayed into the difference between a republic and a democracy amongst other things.

As for Shawn's posts, I agree they probably cross the line, but I understand his passion and therefore his frustration. No one that I know has posted MORE useful information about doing things to help the environment, from new furnace technology, to solar panels, to ways to save water etc. He has been constantly ridiculed by certain posters time and time again for his passion, including to the point of commenting on the fact that his parents live with him, as though that was some comment on his character! So I understand why he may cross the line now and again,, I do as well.

There is more than enough vitriol and bile to go around, and neither side has a lock on over stepping bounds, but Shawn's words and opinions are indeed mild compared to some that I have see directed against him (and others including myself!) The difference is we don't go crying to the Mods when we get offended, even though perhaps we should!)

Gotta go, more later,,, maybe!

 

I haven't been here very long, but I've read over a few of Shawn Clark's posts in this forum where he discusses the things you mention. And I agree, he is a great source of information on energy and resource conservation. Perhaps that why he got so upset when someone was poking a hole in his beliefs? I don't know. Ah well.

By the way, check out this document:

http://www.heartland.org/publications/NIPCC report/PDFs/NIPCC Final.pdf

At the end is a list of signers for a petition that reads:

It is signed by 31,478 Americans with university degrees in science, including 9,029 with PhDs. In Ph.D. scientist signers alone, the project already includes 15 times more scientists than are seriously involved in the United Nations' IPCC process.

 

That petition has been thoroughly debunked:

Kevin Grandia | The 30,000 Global Warming Petition is Easily-Debunked Propaganda

"0.1% of Signers Have a Background in Climatology"

 

It's only debunked in the eyes of the blind.

(Let's not forget the head of the IPCC is a railroad engineer.)

 

Climatology (39)

 

Man you gotta be hurting huh? Post after post you get shot down.

 

You see, this is what pisses us off and gets us so upset, if that is not redundant!

"It is signed by 31,478 Americans with university degrees in science, including 9,029 with PhDs. In Ph.D. scientist signers alone, the project already includes 15 times more scientists than are seriously involved in the United Nations' IPCC process."

Just because it is signed by 31,478 American's with university degrees doesn't make is true! Even if you include 9,029 PHDs! Besides there are lots more people involved in climate science than just those that " are seriously involved in the UN IPPC process"

It is not the numbers that matter, but to some great extent the credentials of those behind the numbers, and how they come to be informed (or not informed) as to the truth.

As I noted before, with reference 97% of climate scientist agree that awg is real. These are people who on balance know more about the issue than any of us!

The number of Scientists that agree that awg is happening is lowest amongst petroleum geologists, people by training and experience one might expect to not have the level of knowledge that a ice core geologist might have for example.

References like yours are disseminated to make it "appear" that the number of people who disagree with the conclusions of the majority climate scientific opinion is in some sense bigger and more important than it is!

How for example does your ~31k of BS holders and ~9k of PHD holders compare with BS/PHD holders in total. First, I suggest that your premise is bias on it's face, and second inference is also wrong. I would feel the same way if you took a poll of BS holders and it said X% believe this or that. As I have said all too often, these are not issues that should be subjected to "belief" or Poll results!

If you didn't seem so reasonable a few posts back, I would suggest that you are at best contributing to the deliberate obfuscation campaign or at worst riling people up in an attempt to lose the conversation in the noise.

As has been suggested above, the results have been debunked

PS I believe there are still chapters of the "Flat Earth Society" around!

 

Ah, you're finally catching on. Likewise, just because something is supported by whatever percent of people from whatever article you Google-ed doesn't make it true either. What makes things true is facts. You know, those things you always fail to present in an argument. I've yet to have anyone contradict a fact that I've written here. You guys attack everything except the facts!

You don't understand statistics and polling do you? The survey you frequently quote only surveyed 77 climatologists. 97% of the climatologists THEY SURVEYED agreed that AGW is real. You can't possibly think they surveyed every single climatologist in the world huh? They only surveyed 77 of them. The link to the blogspot that you are getting your info from gave the details of the poll. Also, since we have no names of the climatologists in that survey we have no way of knowing if any of them are real climatologists, or if they have any publications, etc.

Additionally, it's a fallacy to think that only a climatologist would be able to understand the issues at hand. Climatology relies heavily on physics and mathematics. Have you noticed that most of the data presented in climatology papers rely heavily on statistics? (assuming of course that you've ever read a scientific paper - nothing you've ever posted here supports that you have even a basic understanding of climate science.) And physics is used when programming computer models, you know, those computer models which you said were notoriously inaccurate, which are the same computer models that basically all of global warming is hinged upon.

By the way: Steve McIntyre is a statistician and he has caught errors in climatology papers by Mann, he serves as a reviewer, he has publications (ie GRL), and his papers are referenced in the IPCC report. It is absolutely ridiculous to think only a "climatologist" could understand the science.

This paper shows signatures from 3,803 atmosphere, earth, and environmental scientists, 935 computer and math scientists (to do the statistics and program computer models), and 5,810 physicists. The rest of the numbers, and the application of other science to the field of climatology has been posted previously by me.

LOL! I AGREE 100% WITH YOU THAT THE PEOPLE WITH THE LOWEST LEVEL OF KNOWLEDGE AGREE THAT AGW IS HAPPENING!

Er, these papers are published because a vast number of scientists disagree with anthropogenic global warming.

This question doesn't make any sense. It shows you obviously don't understand polling. Do you really think they polled every single PhD (not PHD) and BS holder in America? Also it shows your failure of reading. Again. It's 31,000 total, 9,000 of those are PhDs.

Biased in what way? You mean that they are biased because they disagree with your beliefs? And what inference is wrong? You mean that they disagree with global warming? How can you possibly argue that. They signed a petition saying they disagreed with it.

LOL again - then why do you keep quoting 97%?

Icarus, you are truly a walking contradiction.

 

Maybe because of this actually published study:

 

Ever wonder why Wikipedia would have an article posted one day and then it disappered the next - even though it was posted by a respected scientist, an expert in his or her field? Ever wonder why this happened over and over again to articles that disagreed with the AGW agenda? Well, I have mentioned the 'gatekeeper' at Wiki, one William Connelley (one of the 9 founders of Alric's favorite blog, RealClimate) before and here is a fuller explication of how one person can control the information accessed by many millions and skew it into one direction. This is one BUSY guy!

What dedication!



...All told, Connolley created or rewrote 5,428 unique Wikipedia articles. His control over Wikipedia was greater still, however, through the role he obtained at Wikipedia as a website administrator, which allowed him to act with virtual impunity. When Connolley didn’t like the subject of a certain article, he removed it — more than 500 articles of various descriptions disappeared at his hand. When he disapproved of the arguments that others were making, he often had them barred — over 2,000 Wikipedia contributors who ran afoul of him found themselves blocked from making further contributions. Acolytes whose writing conformed to Connolley’s global warming views, in contrast, were rewarded with Wikipedia’s blessings. In these ways, Connolley turned Wikipedia into the missionary wing of the global warming movement.
The Medieval Warm Period disappeared, as did criticism of the global warming orthodoxy. With the release of the Climategate Emails, the disappearing trick has been exposed. The glorious Medieval Warm Period will remain in the history books, perhaps with an asterisk to describe how a band of zealots once tried to make it disappear.

Lawrence Solomon: Wikipedia?s climate doctor

Read it all.

 

Well I can see that NevadaPrius has devolved to the yelling that is so common amongst his friends.

Let's look at this from a completely non science base, intuitive view.

A quick travel through google/wiki comes up with some base line numbers, that (except for the total flat earth/ the world is only 6000 years old types) most rational people would accept as true.

First, in the year 1800, there were a total of ~900,000,000 million people on the planet, that .9 billion. In the year 2006 there are estimated to be ~6,700,000,000, that 6.7 billion, a seven fold increase in ~200 years. Can we agree on that?

In the year 2006 it is estimated that the ~ 8.4 Giga tonnes of CO2 was released into the air just by burning fossil fuels. Add to that the estimate from deforestation and you add in another ~27gt, making a total of ~35 gt per annum at current course and speed.

In the year ~1800 the total carbon emissions by humans was almost too small to be quantified, and was probably net/net carbon neutral, but let;s assume that the number was 1 gt.

So in 200 years, we have seen a 7 fold increase in the population, AND at least a 35 fold increase in CO2 emissions. This is not just 35 fold increase this year, but 35% this year, say 34.5% last year 34% the year before,, you get the idea. The TOTAL amount of CO2 since the start of the industrial revolution is staggering both as a total tonnage but as a percentage of concentration.

While the earth has tremendous capacity to heal itself, even the strongest awg deniers must admit that at some point, there must be a limit.

My point is this. We live in a terrarium, that is in essence a closed system. Intuitively one has to at least CONSIDER the possibility that CO2 emissions have some negative effect on that closed system. If one can at all conceive of a greenhouse, and under stand that if you increase the insulating value of the glass by adding double pane glass, you will net/net increase the average temperature inside the green house. Clearly even the most ardent denier realizes that CO2 (along with other gases) is an effective insulating blanket, keeping a significant amount of solar heat inside over the course of a year. Add to the R-value of that blanket, and there MUST be some corresponding increase in temperature, UNLESS one can prove that the insulating effect is more than counteracted by the shading/reflective effect of the same gas. Clearly, in this scenario, you can argue the degree to which this is going to have an effect, but you cannot argue that it isn't going to happen.

I know the deniers like to suggest that the earth is such a big place, such that man can't possibly put out enough crap to make a difference. If that were the case, why do such things as "round up" which are introduced into the environment in much smaller quantities annually show up in the fatty tissues of animal thousands of KMs away from the nearest spraying of the chemical?

Even if you think the entire climate science community is corrupt/lies/make stuff up/is conspiritorial, how can you argue simple intuition?

I may not be the smartest guy in the room, I make no pretense about that, but I am reasonably sure about some fundamental cause and effects that I see in my daily life. I cannot state with absolute certainty that the sun will rise in the east tomorrow, but I can be pretty comfortable in my betting on it.

I am not willing to bet my children's children's children's future on the denial, especially for a few pieces of silver! You ask why folks like me and Shawn get upset. The reason we get upset is because we care about more than ourselves. If I felt that the deniers came to this honestly and with good intentions, I would respect them more, but time and again, they prove themselves to be motivated by self interest,,,, primarily they are unwilling to pay for any change in the status quo.

Funny thing is,, I am almost 60 so I not going to be around all that much longer,,, and I don't even have kids! So what is my ulterior motive?

 

A few things. Your debunker writes a blog. For someone who decries posting blog entries...

Secondly, the writer seems to have some difficulty with mathematics. He thinks the numbers he adds up equal .5% of 30000. I'm sure you can do the math yourself to see he might just be a little bit off.

Thirdly, Nevada does a pretty good number on you.

Finally, does Micnael E. Mann have a degree in 'climatology'? No. Have you checked into the areas of expertise of your other heros?

Dr. Michael E. Mann received his undergraduate degrees in Physics and Applied Math from the University of California at Berkeley, an M.S. degree in Physics from Yale University, and a Ph.D. in Geology & Geophysics from Yale University. Gee, he could work for an oil company with those credentials. But, they probably require some semblance of integrity and rectitude.

 

Yikes! I hadn't even thought to look up Mann! I guess according to Alric and Icarus we can discount every study Mann has done. It looks like his colleagues already thought poorly of him:

(I loved when I read that the head of the IPCC has a degree in railroad engineering.)

We can also see Briffa distancing himself professionally (and possibly from his deceptiveness) from Mann

Edit: Icarus, maybe you should change your famous quote to "97% of climatologists think Mike Mann is a buffoon"

 

NP et al,

Please don't presume to speak for me!

 

I am sure you are a good person who wants the best for your children's childrens's children's future ... even if you don't have any kids!

But leaving that aside for a moment, the whole basis of AGW rests on the crucial assertion that the CO2 (all the huge quantities of it) that man emits from all sources WILL result in global catastrophe. I keep harping on this because it is THE ONLY thing that some people want to blame enough that they INSIST we must cut it. They INSIST that taxing it will make a difference, even though it has been shown again and again that this will only make everything more expensive without making a significant difference in temperature reduction. It will, of course, vastly increase the power and wealth of the taxing agencies (governments) and those trading 'carbon credits'.

A little thought will reveal that buying or selling carbon credits has zero effect on the AMOUNT of CO2 produced, it just moves money around from place to place and enriches the middle men who in actuality have zero effect on the environment and are completely uselss. You can bet that corporations, always interested in the bottom line, will be there finding a way to take advantage of these not-so-new ideas as well.

There is no empirical scientific evidence that even wildly increased CO2 levels will produce enough warming to overcome natural climate oscillations. Sorry, it's just not there.

So, there is much to be gained in the AGW myth, but it isn't going to stop weed killers from getting in the water table or sulfur from being spewed into the atmosphere or whatever might REALLY be deleterious for the environment. Why waste resources for imagined catastrophes when we can point to plenty of problems that need solving?

We see the dictator Robert Mugabi at COP15 with his hand out demanding reparations from the wealthy nations (for imagined damages) while he is allowed to continue the destruction of his whole country in a very real sense. The U.N. has displaced priorities indeed.

You seem to want to cast all AGW skeptics in the negative light of self-interest or greed. I think you'll find plenty who are just as interested in the environment as are you. They just want to attack the real problems, not the imaginary ones.

 

I just wanted to point out how monumentally important this quote is. It's 100% true and yet everyone ignores this point.

 

Well, I'll leave you hard-core chatters for a while. I'm off to my favorite pub to igmore the doctor's orders to cut down on the carbs.

I don't get the NFL channel and must watch the Cowboys do the impossible and attempt to knock the Saints from the unbeaten ranks.

I really don't give a hoot about the Cowboys, but want the Dolphins' unbeaten record (1972) to remain intact.

See ya.

 

Climatologists and common sense disagree with the above posts.

 

Huh? Are you feeling well? I'm genuinely conderned.

Off Topic. The Cowboys did it!