Test Your Knowledge of Global Warming

[moonshadow]

The correct answer is ZERO degrees.

Furthermore, from 1880 to the present, global temperature has increased only 0.75 deg. C.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2217286/Global-warming-stopped-16-years-ago-reveals-Met-Office-report-quietly-released--chart-prove-it.html

[NIHILIST]

And now this hits the news.......

A preliminary draft of a report by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was leaked to the public this month, and climate skeptics say it contains fresh evidence of 20 years of overstated global warming.

The report -- which is not scheduled for publication until 2014 -- was leaked by someone involved in the IPCC's review process, and is available for download online. Bloggers combing through the report discovered a chart comparing the four temperature models the group has published since 1990. Each has overstated the rise in temperature that Earth actually experienced.

"Temperatures have not risen nearly as much as almost all of the climate models predicted," Roy Spencer, a climatologist at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, told FoxNews.com.

"Their predictions have largely failed, four times in a row... what that means is that it's time for them to re-evaluate," Spencer said.

"It is evidence that CO2 is not nearly as strong a climate driver as the IPCC has been assuming. This is the possibility they do not allow to be considered, because it would end all of their policy-changing goals," he said.

Bob

[dorbel]

Simplistic beyond belief, which broadly sums up Daily Mail reportage actually! To cherry-pick a 14 year segment to support the "global warming has stopped" argument is statistically nonsense. Global temperatures vary all the time in natural cycles, notably solar activity and the El Niño/La Niña cycles and these will, over short periods, mask long term trends.
I recommend http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwnrpwctIh4#t=2m07s , where leading climate denier Dr Pat Michaels speaks to a climate sceptic conference and debunks this particular argument.

[NIHILIST]

Dorbel responds as he usually does, by shooting the messenger.

Bob

[dorbel]

Actually not, the Daily Mail is indeed a risible paper, but the message is the target. It is statistical nonsense!  Jeering at me by obvious misrepresentation is cheap. Address the issues.

[ah_clem]

The oldest trick in the book for misrepresenting data is cherry-picking the endpoints.  the late 90's had a historically high temperatures, so if you put your starting point there, you get no increase.  Of course this is dishonest, but par for the course for "skeptics".

[NIHILIST]

Dorbel admonishes

Address the issues.

I believe I have done this with my post about the latest nonsense out of the UN's oft-discredited climate committee.

and now this.........  A leaked report by a United Nations' group dedicated to climate studies says that heat from the sun may play a larger role than previously thought.


Duhhhhhhhhhh, the sun causing warming ? What a concept !

Bob

[stiefnu]

Imagine for a moment that you are driving along a road.  With you are your nearest and dearest friends and family, and all the possessions you love the most - a case of the most expensive vintage wines, your favourite backgammon board, whatever.  As you come to a bridge, you are confronted by a hundred structural engineers.  Ninety nine of them say "Don't cross that bridge, it isn't safe."  Just one of them holds a different opinion and advises "You'll be fine, don't listen to them, they're just scaremongers".  What, based on a rational assessment of the risks, do you decide to do?

Steve

[NIHILIST]

A bridge is a physical structure, made of concrete and steel. You can touch it, drive on it, and engineers can examine it from all aspects with the most current technology. If 99% of them say the bridge is unsound you'd best take an alternate route. Perhaps most important of all, that community of 99 structural engineers hasn't falsified any of its data to enhance its claims.

Global warming, on the other hand, has no physical, tangible properties of its own. You can't touch it, you can't crate it up, and you can't physically take it into a lab to analyze it at your leisure. The best you can do is look at the results of changing climate and guess what the cause is and what the remedies might be.

The most recent articles quoted in this thread confirm that AGW is NOT an exact science. The fact that 20+ years after the movement started, the Nobel Prize winning UN IPCC grudgingly admits that the sun might exert a greater influence than they earlier calculated. In fact, over the last decade the scientific community and its shills tell us that nothing they, or the rest of the human population, can do  will REVERSE the warming that so terrifies them, but the best they can hope for is to stabilize temperature gains to within 1-3 degrees centigrade.

Bob

[stog]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/aug/25/how-talk-climate-sceptic

is an interesting article US focussed with interesting links

for newcomers see also http://www.fibsboard.com/campaigns/ozone-map-1979-2008/

[NIHILIST]

Stiefnu was good enough to offer up a global warming hypothetical situation, now I'd like to repay the courtesy by offering up one for his consideration.

You have a good career, paying you a six-figure salary. You married your high school sweetheart and have three children. Ten years ago you built your dream home on 3 acres of pristine beachfront property on Florida's Atlantic coast. You employ 3 negro servants and 2 security guards who patrol your property carrying assault rifles with 50 round magazines.

One day you answer a knock on your door. You are greeted by 100 climate scientists, 99 of whom tell you that the Earth is warming faster than they anticipated and that within 5 years your property will be at least 50 feet under water as a result of melting glaciers, polar ice, and sno-cones, and you must begin evacuation and relocation plans as soon as possible. One scientist tells you the other 99 are full of sh** and there's no reason for you to follow their advice.

The question is, which moving company do you call, Mayflower or United Van Lines ?


Bob

[stiefnu]

Stiefnu was good enough to offer up a global warming hypothetical situation, now I'd like to repay the courtesy by offering up one for his consideration.

Too bonkers a 'hypothesis' to even begin to answer.  Just two observations; firstly it's probably best to think in terms of climate change, rather than global warming, and secondly that pristine beachfront is really not the place to build.  So much better to leave it pristine, for others to enjoy.

Steve

[NIHILIST]

Actually its not bonkers at all. The global warming movement has been stunningly unsuccessful in its overarching goal of slowing or reversing global warming. Assuming their track record continues and their most dire predictions come to pass, including rising sea levels, coastal areas will be threatened and evacuation and relocation becomes a very real issue.

The hypothetical is no less valid than your bridge example.

Bob

[moonshadow]

I posted the latest global warming data released by the Met  (the UK national weather service) with little commentary except for noting the fact that global temperatures over the last 130 years has increased 0.75 degrees Celsius.

The linked Daily Mail article accurately reported and covered that story, correctly making the observation that the latest global temperatures released by the Met, and which many thought would show a steady increase from the last 6 months, in fact showed a dramatic cooling, so much so that when global warming temperatures were averaged out over the last 16 years, it is factually correct to state that there has been no increase in global warming during that period.

Like Pavlov's dogs,  dorbel and ah_clem reacted in a conditioned reflex to my post and the ringing of the "global warming" bell, mindlessly running around in a frenzy and salivating over food that was not there.

Neither I nor the Daily Mail have claimed global warming has stopped and I intentionally noted in my original post here it is a fact that in the last 130 years, the earth has warmed 0.75 degrees Celsius.  So what part of this do not dorbel and ah_clem understand?

Being true scientists (sarcasm intended) dorbel and ah_clem have a hypothesis that global warming will increase at a certain point in the future and  when it does not increase at that certain point as predicted, rather than develop a new hypothesis or question their "global warming is always increasing" they lie and smear anyone who challenges those assumptions by mischaracterizing them.

dorbel confidently barks in all directions:

Simplistic beyond belief, which broadly sums up Daily Mail reportage actually!To cherry-pick a 14 year segment to support the "global warming has stopped" argument is statistically nonsense.

And Ah_clem joins the Pavlovian yapping:

The oldest trick in the book for misrepresenting data is cherry-picking the endpoints. the late 90's had a historically high temperatures, so if you put your starting point there, you get no increase.  Of course this is dishonest, but par for the course for "skeptics".

This following concluding quote from the Daily Mail article shows just how poor dorbel's and ah_clem's English reading comprehension ability actually is or perhaps like Pavlov's dogs they are salivating over food that is not there because their brains are so conditioned to do so when the bell rings: 

"The most depressing feature  of this debate is that anyone who questions the alarmist, doomsday scenario will automatically be labelled a climate change 'denier', and accused of jeopardising the future of humanity.

So let's be clear. Yes: global warming is real, and some of it at least has been caused by the CO2 emitted by fossil fuels. But the evidence is beginning to suggest that it may be happening much slower than the catastrophists have claimed – a conclusion with enormous policy implications."

This should suffice to show dorbel and ah_clem are not quite telling the truth and that they are greatly disappointed that the last reading of global temperatures did not show an alarming increase.

As dorbel and ah_clem are unhappy that the latest global warming data is so low and temperatures did not rise as many had predicted they have attempted to smear the Daily Mail by accusing them of dishonesty and in dorbel's grandiose and foolish words,  label their reporting "simplistic beyond belief."

Remember, both dorbel and ah_clem have claimed the Daily Mail, as well as myself, have said that global warming has stopped and that we are, to use ah_clems slur, "dishonest skeptics", when in matter of fact I acknowledge global temperatures have risen 0.75 degrees Celsius in the last 130 years and the Daily Mail reporter actually goes a step further and states "global warming is real."

So dorbel and ah_clem are not telling the truth.

And they are not upset that for the last 16 years global warming has not increased, they are upset that the last set of numbers show no increase and so are desperately hoping the next global warming numbers show a dramatic increase. Of course this is probably not true, but the obvious question I have is how many billions in government funding will they lose for their pet projects if their is no increase in the coming years?

Both dorbel and ah_clem, in a typical Pavlovian conditioned response to the stimuli of "global warming",  also salivated and ran barking around looking for the purported but not existent cherry picking of global warming data. 

From dorbel this nonsensical gem:

. . . . To cherry-pick a 14 year segment to support the "global warming has stopped" argument is statistically nonsense.

And ah_clem opines:

The oldest trick in the book for misrepresenting data is cherry-picking the endpoints.

In this particular instance where for the past 16 years there has been no increase in global warming and these comprise the last 2 endpoints, the last endpoint being still open ended, it is impossible, by definition, to cherry pick anything because the last end point is still open.

If in the next 10 or 20 years there still has been no increase in global warming, dorbel and ah_clem will still be barking about cherry picking endpoints while praying every year for a record global heat wave so they can finally get lucky and claim there actually is an endpoint.

Global warming alarmist ah_clem, in a spectacular display of self-evisceration, is determined to throw himself upon his sword:

. . . the late 90's had a historically high temperatures, so if you put your starting point there, you get no increase.  Of course this is dishonest, but par for the course for "skeptics".

ah_clem suffers from the same reading comprehension disorder that has affected dorbel and snidely tells us the Daily Mail article, and ostensibly myself as well, are being dishonest because of the high temperatures in the 90's which he thinks are not being mentioned, while all along the Daily Mail has been straightforward with the data, taking into account the high temperatures in the late 1990's,  explaining precisely what has transpired:

"The new figures mean that the 'pause' in global warming has now lasted for about the same time as the previous period when temperatures rose, 1980 to 1996.
The new data, compiled from more than 3,000 measuring points on land and sea, was issued  quietly on the internet, without any media fanfare, and, until today, it has not been reported.
This stands in sharp contrast  to the release of the previous  figures six months ago, which went only to the end of 2010 – a very warm year.
Ending the data then means it is possible to show a slight warming trend since 1997, but 2011 and the first eight months of 2012 were much cooler, and thus this trend is erased."

Since ah_clem charges that being dishonest is par for the course for "skeptics", which presumably means anyone that is not a Pavlovian salivating global warming alarmist dog, it is only fitting that he now commit intellectual seppukku after issue a formal apology for besmirching the honor of the Daily Mail and myself.

What is baffling to me is how does a 1900 backgammon player suddenly start thinking like a 1300 novice.

[moonshadow]

This is an interesting illustration, but it has flaws that render it false and inapplicable.

Imagine for a moment that you are driving along a road.  With you are your nearest and dearest friends and family, and all the possessions you love the most - a case of the most expensive vintage wines, your favourite backgammon board, whatever.  As you come to a bridge, you are confronted by a hundred structural engineers.  Ninety nine of them say "Don't cross that bridge, it isn't safe."  Just one of them holds a different opinion and advises "You'll be fine, don't listen to them, they're just scaremongers".  What, based on a rational assessment of the risks, do you decide to do?

Steve

This is a false equivalency because the science of structural engineering is well established, the variables are farily well known, understood and extremely predictable. On the other hand,  climate science, which is extremely complex, there are many variables that interact in ways we do not yet fully understand and it is highly unpredictable.

The fact is the computer models used to predict future global warming are greatly flawed, as evidenced by the recent Met Office global temperature data that many of the scientists had predicted would be much higher.
From the Daily Mail article:

Professor Judith Curry, who is the head of the climate science department at America's prestigious Georgia Tech university, told The Mail on Sunday that it was clear that the computer models used to predict future warming were 'deeply flawed'.

Current climate computer models are not reliable. They are deeply flawed.

[NIHILIST]

I just stumbled on this article at realclearpolitics.com. Very timely considering the current thread.

James Lovelock is most famous for coming up with the Gaia Theory, which like Global Warming, emerged as a mistaken observation based on surveys of other planets, but he has also been a peculiarly rational figure at times.

Lovelock has warned about Global Warming, but he has also advocated against Green Energy and for nuclear power and fracking, arguing that only nuclear power could provide an alternative energy source that would stop Global Warming. This is a somewhat rational position that doesn't sit well with the fanatical Green Movement which hates nuclear power for reasons of dogma, not science.

And he has even questioned Global Warming, "The problem is we don't know what the climate is doing. We thought we knew 20 years ago. That led to some alarmist books – mine included – because it looked clear-cut, but it hasn't happened. The climate is doing its usual tricks. There's nothing much really happening yet. We were supposed to be halfway toward a frying world now."

Most of all James Lovelock hates green energy wind towers and now finds himself battling one in his own backyard and has written, "I am an environmentalist and founder member of the Greens but I bow my head in shame at the thought that our original good intentions should have been so misunderstood and misapplied. We never intended a fundamentalist Green movement that rejected all energy sources other than renewable, nor did we expect the Greens to cast aside our priceless ecological heritage because of their failure to understand that the needs of the Earth are not separable from human needs. We need take care that the spinning windmills do not become like the statues on Easter Island, monuments of a failed civilisation."

Those are words that the Greens might want to begin taking to heart.

[stog]

Gaia is a wonderful short book i would recommend to all; it is certainly much much more than

a mistaken observation based on surveys of other planets

. if you want to paraphrase it, i would suggest that Gaia is a book that alerted us to the fact that our earth is governed by the same laws of homeostasis that govern the living creatures that reside on the planet, but that this earth's reactions, including climate change, may not suit life for us humans, if severe homeostatic change is enforced on it (for example by external meteor strike or by man's increased industrial/chemical activity on the planet). The book reminds us that this planet does not exist solely for humans....

it is as i said a short book and one well worth reading for the detail.

Mr Lovelock is indeed a worthy, honest and truly learned fellow and many people agree with his stance against wind turbines, and if more alternate energy sources can't be found in time (or consumption reduced), then nuclear is a true option, but it is a flawed energy source at present, as we do not know how to safely 'contain' it or deal with its waste.

we are faced with pressure on creating storage for spent fuel in our own Lakeland area at present, and it is a terribly vexed question.

[NIHILIST]

I believe it was in the wake of the Japanese nuclear disaster that I first learned of Thorium. It is apparently abundant in nature, and can be used as a nuclear fuel without the waste implications of uranium. It has been known about for decades except, apparently, by me, but has only recently been considered for use by some nations. India's is apparently the best known.

With so many aging nukes facing de-commission it would seem that thorium replacements or retrofits should move front and center in the dialog.

One of the power companies in the Tampa bay area is facing massive repairs and a $ 3 billion cost that is currently being paid for by its customers even though the plant is currently out of commission and wont come online for years.

I don't recall any public discussion of thorium as a replacement which should piss off the rate-payers enormously.

If nukes are, in fact, the only major power source that doesn't contribute to global warming, and there is no waste issue, it should be front and center in all energy considerations.

Bob

[NIHILIST]

I was very impressed with Mr. Lovelock's eloquence and open-mindedness on the issue.

In two sentences he sums up my attitudes, suspicions, and skepticism of the entire Global Warming industry.

"I am an environmentalist and founder member of the Greens but I bow my head in shame at the thought that our original good intentions should have been so misunderstood and misapplied. We never intended a fundamentalist Green movement that rejected all energy sources other than renewable, nor did we expect the Greens to cast aside our priceless ecological heritage because of their failure to understand that the needs of the Earth are not separable from human needs.

Bob

[stog]

He also reminds us that this Planet will continue with or without humans (whereas we humans cannot continue without our Earth)
Our careful and considered stewardship of environment for our future generations is paramount, if we wish to avoid the Earth having to massively re-balance in homeostatic terms, that results in an inclement and hostile environment