Climate seminar, Prof Linzen

[carbonhed]

I've read the blurb and think it's incoherent and verging on ranting, and not part of the grown-up science discourse: I'm hardly going to watch the video. Besides you were the one who liked it and said he was talking sense - I simply wondered what bits you thought were particularly sensible. But no worries, I'll just stick with my earlier diagnosis that you just like authority figures telling you that it's OK to infringe on others' property rights for free.

Riiiiiiiiight

[rainman]

Killer evidence about what? If there is ever a peer reviewed paper that shows Climate Change is solely due to anthropogenic reasons then there are any number prepared to publish and alternatives. But so far no such paper has been published.

Well, let's think about it a bit:
- The general consensus (scientific, political and informed observer) is that climate change is a big deal,
- that human activities (those involving fossil fuel combustion, mainly, although deforestation gets an honorary mention) have a significant causative role in this,
- as a result of some fairly well understood science, this will all result in increased climate variability and a generally warming trend,
- this will take place over a long time, affecting generations to come, will impact the whole earth, and is driven by a complicated set of interdependent forces, not completely understood
- and that the impacts this will bring to our civilisation could be major, and include more severe droughts, flooding (yes, both), desertification, ice melts, sea level rise, crop adaptation failure, et al. The planet will be fine, civilisation and society... not so much.

This is likely to be a Bad Thing (maybe Very) for the people that aren't actually doing as much of the emitting as the rest of us, so there's a social justice (or as I prefer, property rights) element too. Policy proposals to address this vary because they are difficult and controversial and involve Changing the Way we Live, or maybe Doing Without Some Things, or worse yet, Admitting We Were Wrong, which as we all know, most people are uncomfortable with.

None of that requires a paper saying it's all entirely completely anthropogenic. And as science is the quest for truth, and its not true that it's an entirely anthropogenic problem, it's unlikely that one will ever be written, either.

Your response falls at about 2.1 on Rainman's Scale of Silly Climate Argument Lines:

1. Bah humbug there is no warming. Increasingly untenable, can safely be ignored by grown-ups.
2. But it's not us, it's the clouds/volcanoes/solar flares/small green aliens. Dangerous because there is a bit of truth in this, of course, but humans are bad at understanding shades of grey and figuring out an appropriate diagnosis and response to complexity.
2.1. It's not Only us, Mom, Jimmy did some of it too.
3. It won't be that bad! A bit of warming sounds OK to me, hur, hur.
3.8. It will be quite bad but solving it be eliminating the causes is the wrong thing to do, we must burn more fossil fuels, ja! aka the Lomborg delusion.
4. Were all fucked anyway, bring it on. (Fatalism is boring, I've seen enough of it in the peak oil world. Doesn't pay the bills).
5. It's a conspiracy I tell you, those scientists are always making shit up. Just sad.
6. It's all relative, find me one expert with a strong view and I'll find you one with the opposite, aka. the John Key delusion. Even sadder, reveals a basic disconnection with science and the search for basic truth. Pointless.

[Jantar]

Well, let's think about it a bit:
- The general consensus (scientific, political and informed observer) is that climate change is a big deal,

Consensus is Politics, it is NEVER science.

- that human activities (those involving fossil fuel combustion, mainly, although deforestation gets an honorary mention) have a significant causative role in this,

Causitive role in Politics? I would agree. But how about climate change? That is what the whole debate is about.

- as a result of some fairly well understood science, this will all result in increased climate variability and a generally warming trend,

It is the science I am asking about. If there is no research supporting your conclusions then it isn't science.

[Usarka]

There were plenty of intelligent well-educated experts who presented evidence against the earth being round......

Time will tell with climate change, but unfortunately if it is true then it's a little more urgent that the literal shape of the planet.

[mashman]

There were plenty of intelligent well-educated experts who presented evidence against the earth being round......

Time will tell with climate change, but unfortunately if it is true then it's a little more urgent that the literal shape of the planet.

It isn't round, it's an ellipsoid or spheroid, but not round

... and it's a little more argument than we really need either way.

[Woodman]

Great post Rainman, you put in words exactly how i see it.

Jantar, what do you think is happening to the planet re climate change and why? Your gut feeling .

[rainman]

Consensus is Politics, it is NEVER science.

What a ludicrously naive position that is. You're conflating science with absolute truth, rather than with a human process that seeks truth, and is therefore entangled with philosophy, sociology, politics and more. I suggest you read Kuhn (and his peers, and for that matter his principal critics) as a good start. After that you should try some Feyerabend for (un)balance...

Causitive role in Politics? I would agree. But how about climate change? That is what the whole debate is about.

So, let's get cards on the table. What is your principal climate hypothesis in one or two logically consistent and clear sentences?

[mashman]

- that human activities (those involving fossil fuel combustion, mainly, although deforestation gets an honorary mention)

I've had a wee hunt in regards to a question I've had for a while and haven't found anything on the subject. Granted my internet searching is useless but... We all know that trees produce oxygen, the bigger the tree the more they produce and conversely the more carbon dioxide they can hold. So I would have thought, without being able to find any evidence, that 2 things would be self evident... less oxygen being produced and less carbon dioxide being removed from the environment, which in turn would lead to higher co2 levels. I'm trying to find evidence/research on those levels as I don't imagine that they are negligible. Does such research exist?

[Jantar]

...
So, let's get cards on the table. What is your principal climate hypothesis in one or two logically consistent and clear sentences?

That is simple:

Climate is the average of weather and may be seasonal. annual, decadal or longer term depending on which cycle is being compared. It is driven principally by the sun. It is moderated by albedo, temperature sinks and greenhouse gasses.

[Jantar]

What a ludicrously naive position that is. You're conflating science with absolute truth, rather than with a human process that seeks truth, and is therefore entangled with philosophy, sociology, politics and more. I suggest you read Kuhn (and his peers, and for that matter his principal critics) as a good start. After that you should try some Feyerabend for (un)balance... ....

I'm afraid that you are one who conflating science and a human process.

I'm not familiar with Feyerabend, but Kuhn does not make any claim that science can be carried out by concensus. My recollection of his work (I'm sure I have his book on scientific revolutions or similar here somewhere, but can't find it just now) deals more with showing how scientific knowledge develops. From memory he also argues against concensus as being science, and showed how paradigm shifts in knowledge occured against consensus.

[carbonhed]

So, let's get cards on the table. What is your principal climate hypothesis in one or two logically consistent and clear sentences?

That the earths climate is always changing.

That there is a greenhouse effect.

That a doubling of C02 should lead to approx 1C rise in global mean temp. A 1C rise in temp along with increased C02 will result in improved rates of photosynthesis and longer growing seasons. The biosphere will blossom.

To turn the 1C rise in temp into something scary requires the use of amplifying factors called feedbacks. The higher the rate of feedback the more unstable the worlds climate until ultimately we get a runaway global warming event and we turn into Venus. Just like a guitar too close to an amp. So we used to get scare stories about tipping points and blah diddy blah blah blah. Not so much nowadays because somebody pointed out that the Earth has had much higher levels of C02 in the past and if the climate was biased towards that kind of instability... we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Climate modelers use feedback factors of between 3 and 5 to predict future trends. Here's a graph showing Jim Hansens predictions from 1988 plotted against actual temps :-



And again from 1990 the IPCC's predictions :-



It's over twenty years now and nature simply isn't cooperating.

We've been measuring the ocean heat content with a large network of automated buoys (called Argo) since 2003. Here's the results so far.



Zippo.

A key signature of all the models is the tropical troposheric hotspot. With extra heat and water vapour at these latitudes there should be an increase in those spectacular tropical thunderstorms. These transport energy upwards and heat the atmosphere in a region about 10k up that should be even more pronounced than surface heating. We've been measuring these temperatures using radio sondes since the 1960's. Here's a comparison of the model predictions and actual data :-



For me this is the the money shot. This is the DNA and fingerprint of global warming and there's not even a flicker of a doubt. It's not happening.

Climate models predict that as the Earth warms less heat is radiated to space because of the greenhouse effect. We've been mesauring the radiation emitted from the Earth for the last two decades using satellites and the opposite is true. The models trap heat too aggressively their amplification rates are too high.

Personally I think the Earths climate is biased towards stability and usually a lot colder than it is now. The feedbacks are low or even slightly negative. I also think that every cent of the billions upon billions piled upon billions that has been spent on this hysterical charade has been stolen from our future generations and ended up in the pockets of the usual suspects and strengthened the global beauracracies that we'll come to fear in the future.

All of this has been purloined mercilessly and with scant regard for thanks because I need a lie down but WUWT and Dr David M.W. Evans are your friends.

[Jantar]

I read that paper by Dr Evans. Also available in pdf at http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/guest...ptics-case.pdf

It is a good summary of wht the models are wrong. I would still like to see a warmist hypophesis so that we can see why thay make such wild claims.

[Jantar]

Great post Rainman, you put in words exactly how i see it.

Jantar, what do you think is happening to the planet re climate change and why? Your gut feeling .

Sorry Woodman, I didn't see this post when I was responding earlier.

I am currently researching this subject in some detail. I hope to have two papers published later this year, one early next year and a major one that is still around 6 years away. Although I'm looking more at a Climate/hydrological link temperature does come into it.

My research so far is indicating that what we are seeing is part of a long term cycle. I'm not looking so much at the causes of any cycles, but more the effects. However the mere fact that there are cycles does show that CO2 is not a major driver. I will not claim that increasing CO2 has no effect, but so far I'm picking that it's only 10 -20% of what the IPCC claim.

As far as New Zealand is concerned we appear to be affected by 2 cycles, the PDO (long term) and SAM (short term). Other parts of the world are affected by other cycles. Over the past 30 years most cycles have been in a warming mode, but now the majority are negative. I will put my head on the line here and predict 12 -18 years ov cooler world temperatures, drier conditions in the lower South Island and wetter in the north east.

[rainman]

That is simple:

Climate is the average of weather and may be seasonal. annual, decadal or longer term depending on which cycle is being compared. It is driven principally by the sun. It is moderated by albedo, temperature sinks and greenhouse gasses.

Thanks. Do you think that the climate is different today (well, recently, not literally today) to the way it has been in the long term? Or do you think that all presently observed phenomena are in line with well-understood trends and the cycles that you have posited? In other words, is this business as usual, or is something different going on that needs explaining?

Edit: Just have to go cook tea and slap a few servers into shape, I'll get back to the science question later.

[Jantar]

My opinion is that climate is always different today to the way it has been in the long term. There are many cycles, some understood, some still being investigated (which is one of the strands of my own research).

Do I think that all presently observed phenomena are in line with well-understood trends and the cycles? No I don't, for the simple reason that not all trends and cycles are fully understood. Many are still being studied, and that is how science works.

I am not prepared to state a testable hypothesis in this regard for all observed phenomena, and I don't know of anyone who is. So for the last part of your question, climate change IS business as usual. The climate has always changed, and it always will. Mankind can best be served by investicating all causes and all cycles so that we can best adapt to changing conditions.

It would be a huge mistake to plan for one type of climate based on the past 30 years trends when the drivers of that climate have changed and we are heading in a totally different direction. One example of this is when Dr David Viner – Climate Research Unit claimed "... within a few years winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event....Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said.

Based on that the major british airports reduced their investment on snow clearing machinery, and many British counties reduced the number of snowplows and let their stockpiles of grit get low. Well, we all know what happened in 2010.