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Comment on How not to save the planet by k scott denison

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steven, while I understand what you are saying, I’m not sure resilience was the word you were looking for.


Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by steven mosher

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Ant,

What is worse is that Santer used some models without volcanic forcing to establish his S/N. As we see in a recent paper the LIA may have been caused by successive volcanoes triggering a change in circulation.
basically, Santers selection of model runs to establish a S/N look conservative to me. that is, I think 17 years is short.

Comment on How not to save the planet by k scott denison

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“That non-zero risk may be much lower than us all being abducted by aliens, one by one, and made into an enormous hamburger….”
>>>>>>>>>>>>
Anteros, that one made me snort so loud there are now several people outside my office wondering what the hell I’m reading, thanks!

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Joshua

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Vaughn -

Where did that quote come from?

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Anteros

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billc -
I think we can avoid confusion with ‘prove’, and ‘disallow’,

I wonder. If 17 passes (just) the 95% confidence level, and you have four cooling periods of 17 years in a century, how do you feel about your model. Do you call it inaccurate?

Purely by chance, your expectations are that you’ll have up to four periods of cooling – assuming the null hypothesis. Isn’t your expectation just that you would expect (for your model to be accurate) 96 or more 17 year periods of warming? That’s all you need?

P.S. Assuming 100, 17 year periods…..

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Theo Goodwin

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In this post, Dr. Curry discusses the uncertainty that attaches to scenarios for future climate that are generated by computer models. I have no criticisms of Dr. Curry’s work on uncertainty. However, any discussion of the uncertainty that is found in the intellectual tools that we apply to climate runs the risk of fostering circular arguments. The risk exists because the uncertainty associated with intellectual tools exists within the context of our larger expectations about climate and the uncertainty that attaches to them.

Surely it is obvious that we do not want to argue that our expectations about climate are uncertain on the grounds that our intellectual tools for addressing climate have uncertainty associated with them. Doing so is truly an Alice in Wonderland proposition: having clear expectations about climate we invent an intellectual tool for addressing climate, find that there is uncertainty associated with it, and then conclude that our expectations about climate are uncertain.

Unfortunately, some climate scientists and many activist groups have embraced exactly this Alice in Wonderland proposition.

In discussions of climate, uncertainty about future climate or what we should do about it has never arisen from the general population. No politician has found himself/herself struggling to meet demands for CO2 mitigation from the general population of truck drivers, farmers, fishermen, manufacturers, or any similar demographic whose life experience gives them privileged access to organized data about climate.

All of our uncertainty about the climate, as opposed to uncertainty about intellectual tools, has its origin in theoretical claims. The exemplar of this source is Al Gore. He did more than any other person to popularize the CAGW mantra that dangerous climate change is upon us or maybe our grandchildren. But all that Gore offers in his movie is his take on theory. The activist groups such as GreenPeace employ the same tactics as Gore. They too offer nothing but theory.

What are the lessons to be learned from all this? There are two. The first is that we must not allow someone to lead us down the primrose path of believing that the uncertainty that attaches to our computer models should lead us to conclude that our very own expectations about the climate should become uncertain. The second lesson is that the uncertainty about climate that is espoused by Al Gore and friends does not arise from hard won practical knowledge of the masses of people who have privileged knowledge about our climate. Rather, the uncertainty that comes from Gore and similar sources is theoretical uncertainty and is the proper topic of Dr. Curry’s work on the uncertainty associated with our intellectual tools for understanding climate.

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Anteros

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SM -
I agree absolutely. I’m off on a tangent with billc and Joshua.

I don’t have any numbers for this, but even with a background warming of, say 1.5C per century, 17 years strikes me as unrealistically short. There’s, as you say the unpredictability of volcanic forcing as well as the periodicity of all the others.
Even if his data spoke, of their own accord, that 17 years was significant, it wasn’t politically astute to make a big deal about it.

Comment on Letter to the dragon slayers by Pete Ridley

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Hi Doug, thanks for your attempt to explain your hypothesis about why the estimated mean temperature of the earth is what it is (and differs from that on other bodies in space, such as the moon). I’m not a scientist but neither are you as far as I can ascertain.

I had a look at your article “How the IPCC got it wrong: Why the “Greenhouse Effect” is physically impossible” (http://climate-change-theory.com/) and am puzzled as to why you declared at the start “see this article first ” and linked to “That Bogus Greenhouse Gas Whatchamacallit Effect” by John O’Sullivan.

John O’Sullivan is no more a scientists than I am although he does seem to think that associating himself with others who have some understanding of some aspects of science and engineering makes him some kind of expert. Several of his fellow-“slayers” are no more scientists than you or I. He’s even fooled the O’Sullivan Clan blog administrator Gary Sullivan into thinking that “The world’s leading global warming theory debunker is an O’Sullivan” (http://www.osullivanclan.com/halloffamegalleryiv.html). I became aware of that ludicrous entry (see my comment of 15th November http://judithcurry.com/2011/10/15/letter-to-the-dragon-slayers/#comment-138807) and I have repeatedly pointed out to Gary that he should reconsider whether or not John has earned a place alongside such respected O’Sullivans as the John O’Sullivan two entries above John the “slayer”.

Since you appear to have so much faith in John and his “Slayers” I have to wondered if I should spend time considering your arguments. In that article of John’s that you link to he quotes the following statement made by Latour “ .. solar radiation t is rather hot, about 120°C .. ”. As a retired electrical, radio and electronics engineer that statement leaves me stone cold (pardon the pun). During my years of designing telecommunications systems, including those involving the transmission and reception (emission and absorption) of electromagnetic radiation (radio waves) I never encountered the concept of e/m radiation having a temperature – “energy/power”, yes, “direction” yes, “polarisation” yes, but “temperature” – no.

You appear to have only “ .. B.Sc (Physics), B.A.(Econ), Dip.Bus.Admin.. ” (http://earth-climate.com/) yet give the impression of considering yourself to be more knowledgeable about physics and the impact of CO2 and other IR absorbing gases on the temperature of the earth/atmosphere system than are physicists who are better qualified than you and specialise in climate physics. For example there is atmospheric physicist Professor Grant Petty, Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, University of Wisconsin-Madison and author of the excellent text book “A First Course in Atmospheric Radiation” (http://www.sundogpublishing.com/AtmosRad/Excerpts/index.html). Professor Petty participated in numerous E-mail exchanges with the “Slayers” during the final quarter of 2011 trying to enlighten them on the physics of atmospheric radiation. I am more inclined to heed the arguments of a recognised specialist like Professor Petty than yours and even less inclined to heed the arguments of John O’Sullivan and his few remaining “Slayers”.

Never mind, you declare that “ .. The Physicists are right .. ” and you have clearly studied some physics at some stage so can no doubt explain how an e/m wave can have a temperature. I expect that at least some of the staff in the Physics Department of the University of Tennessee at Knoxville are knowledgeable about physics and they state that “ .. Temperature is a measure of the random motion (or energy) of a group of particles .. ” (http://electron9.phys.utk.edu/phys136d/modules/m2/temperature.htm), which is just what I learnt when I studied physics those many many years ago. Something else that I learnt is that e/m waves travel through a vacuum, which perhaps explains how we receive energy from the Sun (or do you disagree with that too?). If that physics is correct then I puzzle over how e/m waves can be considered to have a temperature (that’s the waves themselves, not the material from which they are emitted or into which they are absorbed).

It appears to me from what I have read of your articles and comments that you will fully understand the point that I am making about e/m radiation and temperature. If you can spare the time away from your scientific research perhaps you’d be so kind as to explain why you made no criticism of the Latour/O’Sullivan argument.

Your first comment leads me to think that you fully support the “Slayers”. If so then I have to assume that you have not read their “Slaying the Sky Dragon”, or at least not very critically. In your article “Why the “Greenhouse Effect” is physically impossible” (http://climate-change-theory.com/) you mention Professors Claes Johnson and Nasif Nahl but are you aware that they, like others, have now dissociated themselves from “the Slayers”?

You make use of the good old vacuum flask to help explain your argument and it is interesting that “Slayer” group co-founder Hans Schreuder does that a lot in his contribution to “Slaying the Sky Dragon”. For example in Chapter 13 he tells us that “ .. The insulation of the vacuum of space in which earth and its atmosphere finds itself acts like the most perfect insulator, just like the vacuum flask. .. ” (see Page 196 – USA version). I could spend ages pointing out what I see as flaws in the arguments that he and other “slayers” present but to be honest, I simply can’t be bothered. I have notebook full of them. Here’s a hint – that shiny surface of the vacuum flask.

I may come back to you on the points that you make but let me leave you with this. I have no disagreement that all that a vacuum flask does is reduce the rate of cooling of its hot contents, but the vacuum flask does not normally have energy flowing into it, does it. If it had what do you think would happen to the temperature of the contents?

It seems to me that most of the “Slayers” cannot think beyond heat transfer and consider heat to be the only form of energy that needs to be taken into consideration. Maybe I am not the only one of us here who “ .. shows a lack of understanding .. ”.

I do agree with you on one thing, “ .. What matters is who is applying correct physics, mathematics or whatever, Nothing else matters .. ”. The difficulty for thee and me is to decide who is achieving this.

BTW, can you provide a link to any of your physics papers (not articles or comments on blogs but peer-reviewed papers in respected scientific journals)?

Best regards, Pete Ridley


Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Anteros

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Well said Theo, but I think that there is much deafness about!

I like the idea that another name for CAGW is a ‘worry’. Worries have a weight and an energy many orders of magnitude greater than the energy in a piece of reasoning – however clear, and robust and persuasive.

I think that’s true even for those of us that make an effort to allow reason it’s due weight. Do the demagogues of the world stand in front of the millions with little chunks of succinct reasoning? Methinks not!

And you nail it with Al Gore and his…..his what? What ammo’ did he use? pictures! Lots of big glossy pictures!……of Polar bears!……and graphs [in red] going through the roof!!

Once people have that worry in place, they can’t [usually] be reasoned out of it – because it wasn’t reason that put it there in the first place!

I think it is a great blessing that most people somehow connected with the physical world and its realities – especially climate – are reasonably immune to the kind of tub-thumping emotionalism that easily moitivates the more disconnected urban desk-sitters. And they are less prone to make a monster out of the name of a gas that they have never seen harm anyone. Thank God for people whose feet are on the ground!

Comment on How not to save the planet by hunter

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hastur,
So you reject the idea held by may AGW believers that we are facing dangerous climate change?

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by ceteris non paribus

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Is it possible, as Andy Lacis claimed on a previous thread, to estimate how much surface temperatures change by only looking at the way energy in transmitted through the atmnposphere by radiation?

Of course this is possible – it’s been done.

I think the question you really mean to ask is: “Are radiation-only processes sufficient to make sound scientific predictions?”

The answer to this question is highly dependent on what you want to predict. Since the earth is currently gaining more energy than it is losing, and since it cannot conduct or convect energy away into space, global energy budget considerations entail that the mean temperature of the earth (its effective global temperature, as viewed from space) must increase.

This article is relevant – but, unfortunately, the main text is behind a pay-wall.

JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 114, D17107, 14 PP., 2009, D. M. Murphy, et al.

Chemical Sciences Division, Earth System Research Laboratory, NOAA, Boulder, Colorado, USA


We examine the Earth’s energy balance since 1950, identifying results that can be obtained without using global climate models. Important terms that can be constrained using only measurements and radiative transfer models are ocean heat content, radiative forcing by long-lived trace gases, and radiative forcing from volcanic eruptions. We explicitly consider the emission of energy by a warming Earth by using correlations between surface temperature and satellite radiant flux data and show that this term is already quite significant. About 20% of the integrated positive forcing by greenhouse gases and solar radiation since 1950 has been radiated to space. Only about 10% of the positive forcing (about 1/3 of the net forcing) has gone into heating the Earth, almost all into the oceans. About 20% of the positive forcing has been balanced by volcanic aerosols, and the remaining 50% is mainly attributable to tropospheric aerosols. After accounting for the measured terms, the residual forcing between 1970 and 2000 due to direct and indirect forcing by aerosols as well as semidirect forcing from greenhouse gases and any unknown mechanism can be estimated as −1.1 ± 0.4 W m−2 (1σ). This is consistent with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s best estimates but rules out very large negative forcings from aerosol indirect effects. Further, the data imply an increase from the 1950s to the 1980s followed by constant or slightly declining aerosol forcing into the 1990s, consistent with estimates of trends in global sulfate emissions. An apparent increase in residual forcing in the late 1990s is discussed.

Comment on Letter to the dragon slayers by James

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Repected “peer reviewed jounrnals” in climate science? Cast your eyes beyond entitlement.

http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2012/01/30/1000-scientists-and-counting-boycott-elsevier-journal-publishing/

Maybe you, are here to create,“ .. a lack of understanding .. ”. We expect more of you than that.

“more knowledgeable about physics and the impact of CO2 and other IR absorbing gases on the temperature of the earth/atmosphere system than are physicists who are better qualified than you and specialise in climate physics.”

We have been hoodwinked by climate scientists whose expertise, is no more than an appeal to authority. It is a lazy, incorrect, path of reasoning.

You ask one of them this simple question.
How does Physics model greenhouses, when it hotter on the outside?

They cannot answer that very simple question Sir, it is from a child………

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Jim Cripwell

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billc writes “I think Lacis is wrong in that assertion and he basically admitted it.”

Thank you for the response, Bill, but if Andy Lacis is wrong (and I am convinced he is), then there is no way, using proper physics, that “Adding GHG increases the IR flux received at the surface” (to use out hostess’s phrase), can be translated into a change in surface temperature. It simply cannot be done. And if it cannot be done, then there is absolutely no basis whatsoever for any value of climate sensitivity. We simply have no idea whatsoever what number to ascribe to climate sensitivity. It is not that there is uncertainly as the what the number is. It is that physics cannot tell us anything about the number at all.

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Jim Cripwell

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certeris non paribus writes “Since the earth is currently gaining more energy than it is losing, and since it cannot conduct or convect energy away into space, global energy budget considerations entail that the mean temperature of the earth (its effective global temperature, as viewed from space) must increase.”

Do you have a reference that proves that this is true? From what I have read as to what Roy Spencer claims, this is simply not true.

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by ceteris non paribus

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Surely it is obvious that we do not want to argue that our expectations about climate are uncertain on the grounds that our intellectual tools for addressing climate have uncertainty associated with them.

How else would you propose to acknowledge and estimate the uncertainty in our knowledge? Our expectations SHOULD be uncertain to just the degree that our “intellectual tools” (i.e. scientific theories) allow. Anything else is just guessing. Our “intellectual tools” are the only thing we’ve got to gauge uncertainty – other than subjective opinion.

You are, of course, free to be as certain as you wish about the climate – but the climate is under no obligation whatsoever to live up to your confident expectations of it.

BTW – Al Gore is a distraction.
He’s not a scientist any more than Christopher Monckton is, and his opinions are just as irrelevant.


Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Wagathon

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I’ve heard for years that where there is challenge there is opportunity. How about ice skate rentals on the Thames? Ice fishing in in Paris anyone? Studded tires tear up roads so…invest in asphalt repair? How about new digital thermometers that spec out for recording temperatures below -40°F it’s a shame that records in AK pegged out -79°F because the battery froze)?

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Joshua

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Anteros -

There are two issues:

One is the clarity issue. What are the actual arguments that people make.

The second is the distortion issue: are there people who milk distortions of the arguments of climate scientists for the purpose of a partisan agenda. I’m not making any specific assertions there – but to avoid giving any credibility to distortions, it is important for people to characterize the arguments of others accurately.

I was brought back to this comment from Matt because kim told me it was so good; and now I’m trying to understand if he sees the argument of Santer et. al. differently than my understanding.

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by curryja

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which text is missing? I am travelling today, at an airport, slow to respond and fix things. I will try to figure it out

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Anteros

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Joshua -

FWIW I think Matt is right. He is just saying (or reminding) that the 17 years is the 95% level – it isn’t some kind of sacrosanct definitive proof – it’s just a statistical expectation.
You could get statistical significance from 15 years or 13 – but you wouldn’t expect it more than 19 out of 20 times like you would with 17 years.

Comment on Climate scenarios: 2015-2050 by Joshua

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I was wondering when we were going to have the first weather post over at WUWT this winter. Sure enough – it happened as soon as there was some abnormally cold weather in the U.S. Funny how there weren’t posts about the unusually warm weather many places in the U.S. this winter.

Coincidence. I’m sure.

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