Be careful. The past can be interpolated. The future is always an extrapolation.
Comment on What can we learn from climate models? Part II by Sean2
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Comment on What can we learn from climate models? Part II by NW
Ouch.
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Comment on What can we learn from climate models? Part II by Sean2
But……but……but…….
If the displays are beautiful with nice crisp colors, then the models must be right.
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Comment on Lindzen’s Seminar at the House of Commons by Alex Harvey
Fred,
People from the consensus side of the argument interpret Lindzen’s statement as an accusation of fraud, or something close to it. I do not read it that way.
Lindzen is actually quoted as saying,
“The higher sensitivity of existing models is made consistent with observed warming by invoking unknown additional negative forcings from aerosols and solar variability as arbitrary adjustments.”
You have paraphrased this as,
“…aerosol forcing is adjusted to make model projections match observed trends.”
If you look carefully, that’s not an accurate paraphrase.
I would compare Lindzen’s state with one of Kiehl’s statements,
“models with low climate sensitivity require a relatively higher total anthropogenic forcing than models with higher climate sensitivity.”
So what does Kiehl mean by “require”? I think it is either a physical requirement or an arbitrary requirement. No one is suggesting that there is a physical reason why forcing and sensitivity should compensate; so without such a reason you are left with only a few other possibilities – sheer chance, which would be extraordinary; and an unconscious tuning in response to expectations of the model developers – which is less extraordinary.
I also note you find the tuning argument implausible because climate sensitivity is an emergent property of the models. Sometimes the forcing is too. So, I would direct you to a paragraph from Huybers:
“Covariance could also arise through conditioning the models. A dice game illustrates how this might work. Assume two 6-sided dice that are fair so that no correlation is expected between the values obtained from successive throws. But if throws are only accepted when the
dice sum to 7, for example, then a perfect anticorrelation will exist between acceptable pairs (i.e., 1–6, 2–5, etc.). Now introduce a 12-sided die and require the three dice to sum to 14. An expected cross-correlation of 20.7 then exists between realizations of the 12-sided die and each of the 6-sided die, whereas the values of the two 6-sided dice have no expected correlation between them. The summation rule forces the 6-sided dice to compensate for the
greater range of the 12-sided die. This illustrates how placing constraints on the output of a system can introduce covariance between the individual components. Note that this covariance can be introduced, albeit not diagnosed, without ever actually observing the individual values.”
In the case of climate models, models may have only been accepted only when they reproduced aspects of the historical climate – in particular the surface temperature record. (Or, indeed, if their sensitivity lay outside the Charney range of 1.5 – 4.5 K.)
(By the way, I put my own view more fully at Michel Crucifix’s blog -
http://mcrucifix.blogspot.com.au/2012/02/ahem-few-clarifications.html.)
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by Girma
UK’s Hadley Centre for Climate Research recently noted that their model did not appropriately deal with natural internal variability thus demolishing the basis for the IPCC’s iconic attribution (Smith et al, 2007).
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Comment on Lindzen’s Seminar at the House of Commons by Vaughan Pratt
The problem with your graph (http://bit.ly/zQMoq7) is that your smoothed curve is off from the 1940s peak by more than half of the 1970-2000 warming,
You raise an excellent point there, Girma. The discrepancy you refer to is a result of my graph filtering out the solar and ENSO cycles and all other phenomena cycling faster than that, namely all periodicities from 21 years on down. My apologies for not including what was removed in my analysis.
Let’s take a look at the most relevant omitted phenomena now.
The solar cycle has two components, the Hale or magnetic component, with a periodicity of 21 years, and the Total Solar Insolation component, whose periodicity is 11 years. You can see these two components here. They match up remarkably accurately with the “butterfly diagram” a few paragraphs down in this article.
Using the standard numbering system for solar cycles, cycle 17 peaked in 1940, and is moreover the strongest TSI peak in the last century and a half, just barely beating out peak 13 in 1900. Notice that the odd TSI peaks coincide more or less with the Hale peaks, most accurately for strong TSI peaks.
If you add the Hale and TSI peaks for solar cycle 17 you get an additional 0.12 C. This completely accounts for the discrepancy that’s bothering you.
and it does not show the recent plateau
Girma, please refer to the above graph again. Notice that cycle 23, another odd cycle like 17, is perfectly synchronized with its corresponding Hale peak in 2000. The Hale and TSI cycles in combination plummeted as strongly as they did between 1940 and 1950, another strong downturn that was not merely flat in HADCRUT3VGL but decreased substantially!
Had CO2 not entered the picture between 1940 and 2000 to offset the solar cycles, what you’re calling a “recent plateau” would have been a dramatic decline as strong as that from 1940 to 1950!
It contradicts with the observed data so it does not have any predictive capability.
Again my apologies for omitting the Hale and TSI cycles, without which your objection is very insightful.
Regarding your two concluding paragraphs, I’m having great difficulty following their logic. If you could express them simply as a sum of the relevant phenomena I’m sure I’d find them easier to understand.
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by GaryM
There is some truth to that. If you accept all of the worst case scenarios of CAGW, and all of the assumptions about tipping points and catastrophes, and all of the assumptions that the Earth’s climate would not self regulate as cloud formation and other unquantified and unknown processes responded to any warming, and you assume that mankind will suddenly become stupid and stop adapting to climate, then the thermageddon that might conceivably result would not be immediately reversible.
On the other hand, maybe only tens of millions of people would die (mostly in third world countries of course) before even progressives begin to realize that decarbonizing the global economy was a really dumb idea. So if we don’t throw the bums out in 2012, there are always later elections.
The central problem is that we know for a certainty that progressives screw up every economy they get their hands on. And the chances of thermageddon are probably about the same as a massive asteroid hit. Not that anybody on the planet is actually capable of computing the actual risk of CAGW
So on the whole, I think I will vote for not engaging in the willful and certain destruction of the economy, and take the miniscule risk that we will fry before we get smashed by an asteroid.
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Comment on Lindzen’s Seminar at the House of Commons by Bruce Friesen
Just for fun, I looked again at Slide 4, and I do not see the term “IPCC” on that slide.
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Comment on Lindzen’s Seminar at the House of Commons by Vaughan Pratt
It is sort of creepy how implying Earth could be like Venus sticks around, no matter the differences that make it impossible.
Hunter, if there’s any difference that makes it impossible, I’m all ears. In an earlier comment I pointed out that if Venus were removed to Earth’s orbit it’s temperature would not decrease, not even slowly!
As for “creepy,” I’m with you 100% there!
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by Rattus Norvegicus
Not.
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Comment on What can we learn from climate models? Part II by robin
what an excellent comment. +1
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Comment on Lindzen’s Seminar at the House of Commons by Girma
Pete Ridley
Thanks for this post.
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by kch
Care to explain why?
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by Faustino
The last time I passed Brown’s office, on the Hobart waterfront, I took the opportunity to boo loudly. Didn’t change the world, but I enjoyed it.
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by Ken Coffman
Yes, must read.
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by Faustino
On the questions of government action and responsibility which often arise, herewith Judith Sloan (a good economist) in the Weekend Australian:
“In what was an important speech delivered at the Press Club at the end of January, Tony Abbott favourably quoted Abraham Lincoln – “government should do for people what they can’t do for themselves and no more”.
This proposition is a very good starting point for any government, because to do more is to undermine the self-reliance of individuals and families, to undercut the rewards from work and to crowd out business activity.
In practice, however, there are different views on what people can’t do for themselves. Lincoln helpfully listed what he thought people can’t do for themselves – roads, bridges, police, law-enforcement, providing for “the helpless” and schools are the items on his list. It is a view of limited government in which the provision of true public goods is its dominant role.
Fast forward a century and a half, the prevailing view of the role of governments is that there are very many areas in which people cannot look after themselves, or only with significant government assistance. And a confected depiction of market failure has led to calls on the public purse and regulatory favouritism which are nothing more than unjustified hand-outs to noisy rent-seekers in particular industries.”
Well said to another Judith.
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by capt. dallas 0.8 +/-0.2
Patchy, Patchy watch the glaciers grow.
There was one quote missing that I always found interesting,
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/55556/title/IPCCs_Himalayan_glacier_mistake_not_an_accident
“We thought if we could highlight it (glacier melt by 2035) it will impact policy makers and politicians and encourage them to take some concrete action.”
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by Venter
Andrew Adams,
Better understand what you talk about before posting If it was released by an insider it is a whisteblowing leak as it exposes fraudulent behaviour by people on Government funded projects, on official time and e-mails. If you have any doubt, consult a lawyer.
If it is a hack, by all means bring the hacker to justice, if you have evidence. I doubt it is a hack. The way the mails were stored and released and put in order shows clearly somebody who was n insider.
And Heartland correspondence showed no smoking gun That’s why the fake memo was produced.
But go ahead, build strawmen and show how weak your position is. The AFW movement is collapsing by the behaviour of it’s own proponents and supporters.
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Comment on Week in review 3/2/12 by capt. dallas 0.8 +/-0.2
It must be pretty frustrating for people wanting to do real science to be mixed up in this mess. Since the Stieg et. al 2009 still gets a prominent consideration in the zero draft at least, that tends to divert attention from the GMT that still has the Antarctic warming at a healthy clip. Since Al Gore visited the Antarctic recently, I would imagine that Antarctic cooling is probably accelerating 
I would be willing to bet a few quatloons, that if the Antarctic temperatures were correct, the GMT would be slightly negative for the past >17years. Anyone know how to get a hold of Harry?
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Comment on What can we learn from climate models? Part II by Jim D
Yes, skeptics, please look at Paleoclimate for a clue. The last time CO2 was over 500 ppm was the Cretaceous, and it was over 1000 ppm in the Jurassic. Was it warmer then? Were sea levels higher? This is the question you need to answer for yourself. It is another strand of evidence independent of GCMs and simple energy balance models.
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