Bad scientists: you have given bad info on global warming

[Shaihulud]

CO2 absorbs radiant energy and changes it to "heat". We could perform this experiment and prove this readily of course. Increased level of CO2 in the enviroment would logically means increased temperature.

If by your argument you wish to change the subject to human causation of global warming, we have not even started the discussion yet!

 

[carlosMM]

Well well, look who's back in the global warming argument.


So? The connection between the two doesn't show which is the cause and which is the result. I know everybody in here is going to assume it's CO2 causing higher temperatures, but what if it's the other way round? What if it's higher temperature that causes higher CO2 emissions....?

correlation≠causation

What makes these models more valid than other ones?

I do remember 10 years ago when global warming was a hypothesis, that it has become a generally accepted fact in recent times is due to scientific concensus. Increased level of greenhouse gases like CO2 have a warming effect on the enviroment, it is a direct causation and not a correlation. It could be argued (if anyone would care to) that the increased level of CO2 gases are not a result of human factor, but not that global temperatre is on the trend rising.

Can you actually prove that? Almost all of the "proof" you've seen in your life is proof of correlation--not proof of cause.

I can even explain how higher temperature can cause higher CO2 levels (as opposed to the other way round). Here's how: before humans and cars and factories existed, what was the primary source of CO2 for plants to inhale? Animals exhaling. And what do animals do when it's cold? They become less active, or they hibernate. They don't have any choice in the matter--because when it's cold there's less food for animals to eat. Less food, less energy. So they become less active, and consume less oxygen, thereby producing less CO2. Hence: animals exhale less CO2 when it's cold, and more when it's warm.

So, no. While CO2 and temperature are connected, I see no reason to believe that the one causes the other (though it is possible). If you want me to believe it, you have to prove it. Proof of correlation, again, is not enough; you must prove that it's specifically CO2 that specifically causes a rise in temperature, and not a rise in temperature that causes higher CO2 levels.

Have no illusions, this is all old news to me. The most frustrating part, for me, is when I explain that current events violate the allegation that CO2 is causing global warming. Because today's high levels of CO2 haven't caused gigantic amounts of warming. The CO2 blanket has nearly doubled (and other greenhouse gases have more than doubled!). If the alarmists' claims are true, we should already have seen massive amounts of warming, and we have not. But whenever I point this out, some stupid knucklehead claims it takes half a century to happen, thereby rendering their claims untestable. For a scientific claim to be valid, it must be testable.

There are no gremlins in your fridge.

The usual suspects spouting the usual strawman arguments.

first of all, the correlation between CO2 (and methane) and temperature is decidedly more complex than you pretend science pretends. However, aside from the correlation we have a mechanism that directly links the two. So this is not about a mere correlation.

Secondly, models incorporate increasing amounts of data, are refined to ever smaller discrete units (where applicable), and thus have better resolutions. They also include more and more weaker feedbacks etc., so that their resolution is much better. Which is why hindcasting is by now working very well. The forecasts, however, have not changed qualitatively, but only narrowed the range of warming-to-be-expected.

Lastly, the greenhosue effect is easy to test. Easily understood experiment shown here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8394168.stm

@BasketCase: there's so much wrong with your scenario that I don't even know where to begin.
- you admit to a doubling of athmospheric CO2. Care to calculate the number of animals you'd need for your model to work? Hint: a few billion trillion cattle may be in the right neighborhood - covering the entire surface of the planet two deep....
- we know quite well how much coal, oil and gas was burned, and how large all deforested areas are. So we know how much fossil CO2 was added, and how much was taken out of current sequestration. You totally ignore that the numebrs correlate nicely with the rise in athmospheric CO2, if the currently active sinks are taken into account. Care to explain what happens when the sinks run "full"?
- I remember well that you wrote many posts about global cooling here on CFC. We know that int he phase of massive industrial pollution during and after WWII this effect was strong, countering the greenhouse effect. So we have less warming that the greenhosue effect alone would provide, but we have massively reduced pollution, and thus turned the global cooling effect from global dimming way down. Thus, we will get this warming now. OOPS!

here's some stuff for you
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWJeqgG3Tl8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-NQPolcYoIc


@Shaihulud: a decade ago anthropogenic global warming was a well-stablished and well-explained fact. Even 20 years ago. All that has happened is that the already soldered-shut coffin has been hit with a nail gun a million times. Models have been improved, measurements have been improved, crazy, far-fetched alternatives debunked.

 

[Truronian]

correlation≠causation

There is a mechanism by which CO₂ concentration affects temperature, hence causation.

 

[El_Machinae]

Hi! I attend the primary literature on this topic regularly! I do this because I figure when most of the media is telling us about a problem, but doesn't explain it very well, then people should go and figure out the issue themselves. The media is intended for low-education consumption, not actual understanding .

sadly, it is not what most people will hope when they read the title: that science has exaggerated or invented man-made climate change. To the contrary, because usually only fast feedbacks, such as water vapor and sea ice, are included in climate models, the sensitivity to CO2 change may have been massively underestimated! That means way more warming in the longer run than currently predicted by the IPCC.

Well, to be fair, sixteen degrees looks to be the stable level, after everything has equalised. That can take a long time to reach and I really doubt that CO2 is any type of primary driver in that scenario (or, at least, in the timeframes we should be worrying about). I think it's better to continue to monitor the primary forcings to make our predictions. Honestly, 300 years out, the economy is going to be so different that I don't think that AGW concerns matter. We've either halted extinctions (which we've failed to do) or we haven't. We're going to be off-coal or not. We've either become space-borne or collapsed.

James Lovelock (?) is saying that we're going to move towards a new equilibrium and that it's unstoppable. I tend to agree, but I don't want to get the timeframes wrong.

Reading articles produced by this so-called science of climatology is a waste of time.

o ok, thank you for telling us the utility of your opinion right away. Good thing they've updates the horoscope, so we have an alternate mechanism for making predictions.

[http://www.seanbonner.com/blog/archives/piratesarecool.jpg
correlation≠causation

Hopefully, if enough people jump on this, we'll nip this fallacy in the bud. Well, it's not so much of a fallacy as a red herring. We HAVE a mechanism by which CO2 increases temperature. It's incontrovertible. We also have the long-term trend that was generated after the prediction was made

Who gives a crap about Global warming when your out of a job? Worrying about it has been pre-empted by other more pressing matters.

People were saying this
a) before the economic crisis, when a lot of 'righties' thought the economy was good and
b) when they had stable, crisis-proof jobs (e.g., government or funded contracts)

I think that their apathy was driven by other things: partisanship or selfishness or laziness . Additionally, this is one of the reasons for government, to help enact long-term thinking. While individual jobs are important, it's important to not coddle the people who want it to be an excuse. Like, you know, educated adults with stable employment.



Finally. It was 20 years ago that the scientists had enough information to convince the politicians to care. For 20 years, the "adults" had enough information available to realise that some steps should be taken. And, for the last 20 years, the warming trend has been obvious. BUT, there are cycles within cycles to watch out for. Just like the seasonal temperature cycle adds noise to the day/night temperature trend, cycles like the Pacific Decadal Oscillation can cause noise that makes simply looking at the temperature gauge foolish.

The science, the economics, and the ethics of this matter are pretty obvious and easy to explain. The denialists are wrong on the science, or the ethics, or the economics.

 

[Bordz]

Look as far as i am concerned people tend to deny climate change because tjey do not want to admit there is a problem with their lifestyle. Unfortunately this is exactly what is wrong with the freemarket system, it only emphasises financial growth where a success of a society is measured soley by its financial wealth

As such denying climate change is a political agenda (mostly for the right) and proved to be such at copenhagen (last year?) where from what i understand it was the larger economies refused to any binding deal (coincidentaly it also started Kevin Rudds descent to loosing the pm ship).

Regardless of whether you believe man made climate change is real or is just occuring naturally (the Intelligent design version of climate change in my opinion) we have a means to stop it from occuring to maintain the status quo but this seems to be beyond most people.

 

[Cutlass]

Who gives a crap about Global warming when your out of a job? Worrying about it has been pre-empted by other more pressing matters.

So Republicans keep ruining things, like the economy, to distract people from considering the future?

 

[amadeus]

The usual suspects spouting the usual strawman arguments.

Asking why one prediction is better than another is setting up a strawman argument? I call bull turds on this one -- show your evidence.

 

[carlosMM]

Asking why one prediction is better than another is setting up a strawman argument? I call bull turds on this one -- show your evidence.

I wasn't saying that this question was a strawman - please re-read my above post. I answered to several people, and it should be obvious even to you that not every one of my sentences is addressed at each and every one of you.

Think, McFly, think!

in other news, you asked, I answered. Read the linked sources before you whine.

 

[amadeus]

I wasn't saying that this question was a strawman - please re-read my above post.

What makes these models more valid than other ones?

The usual suspects spouting the usual strawman arguments.

OK, I read it. Your comment about strawman posts follows almost immediately your quoting mine.

 

[ArneHD]

Can you actually prove that? Almost all of the "proof" you've seen in your life is proof of correlation--not proof of cause.

I can even explain how higher temperature can cause higher CO2 levels (as opposed to the other way round). Here's how: before humans and cars and factories existed, what was the primary source of CO2 for plants to inhale? Animals exhaling. And what do animals do when it's cold? They become less active, or they hibernate. They don't have any choice in the matter--because when it's cold there's less food for animals to eat. Less food, less energy. So they become less active, and consume less oxygen, thereby producing less CO2. Hence: animals exhale less CO2 when it's cold, and more when it's warm.

So, no. While CO2 and temperature are connected, I see no reason to believe that the one causes the other (though it is possible). If you want me to believe it, you have to prove it. Proof of correlation, again, is not enough; you must prove that it's specifically CO2 that specifically causes a rise in temperature, and not a rise in temperature that causes higher CO2 levels.

Have no illusions, this is all old news to me. The most frustrating part, for me, is when I explain that current events violate the allegation that CO2 is causing global warming. Because today's high levels of CO2 haven't caused gigantic amounts of warming. The CO2 blanket has nearly doubled (and other greenhouse gases have more than doubled!). If the alarmists' claims are true, we should already have seen massive amounts of warming, and we have not. But whenever I point this out, some stupid knucklehead claims it takes half a century to happen, thereby rendering their claims untestable. For a scientific claim to be valid, it must be testable.

There are no gremlins in your fridge.

BasketCase: Here is a simple introduction to climate science: Don't be alarmed by the picture of Al Gore, his first sentence is "I am not here to relate the latest pronouncements by Al Gore":


Link to video.

 

[MobBoss]

So Republicans keep ruining things, like the economy, to distract people from considering the future?

Yup, thats right. It is oh so constructive to simply blame republicans for everything from global warming on down. Please continue!

But in doing so, try not to lament so much about divisiveness in other threads, mmmkay? 'Cause this is just part of why such division exists..i.e. finger pointing.

 

[Cutlass]

Yup, thats right. It is oh so constructive to simply blame republicans for everything from global warming on down. Please continue!

But in doing so, try not to lament so much about divisiveness in other threads, mmmkay? 'Cause this is just part of why such division exists..i.e. finger pointing.

Some fingers deserve to be pointed. If people don't want fingers pointed at them, they should try to deserve it less.

 

[carlosMM]

OK, I read it. Your comment about strawman posts follows almost immediately your quoting mine.

and as I pointed out, I quoted several people, and not all my sentences apply to each and every quoted post. I group-quoted, and you'll have to live with that.

 

[carlosMM]

Yup, thats right. It is oh so constructive to simply blame republicans for everything from global warming on down. Please continue!

Well, we can continue if you ant to, because it is after all the Republicans who associate themselves with and constantly cite the same old liars and frauds - Monckton comes to mind, but also the ex-tobacco-denialist crowd. And hey, isn't is the Rep-friendly Think Tanks who are loudest in climate change denial?


You work hard to screw something up for your own profit, you get the blame when it is screwed up. Live with that, or help fix it.

 

[El_Machinae]

Anyway, the OP is not so much of a short-term prediction. What they're doing is clarifying the history of GHGs on Earth. The mechanisms by which Earth was 16 degrees hotter are clearly not completely understood, because our prediction regarding CO2 forcings don't get us there.

So, to answer amadeus' question, this evidence is a way of telling us that the models aren't complete. That said, we kinda knew that already, and all of our models have focused on the 'century to millenia' timeframes, and not the longer timeframes required to totally reset the homeostatic mechanisms of the planet.

 

[carlosMM]

Anyway, the OP is not so much of a short-term prediction. What they're doing is clarifying the history of GHGs on Earth. The mechanisms by which Earth was 16 degrees hotter are clearly not completely understood, because our prediction regarding CO2 forcings don't get us there.

So, to answer amadeus' question, this evidence is a way of telling us that the models aren't complete. That said, we kinda knew that already, and all of our models have focused on the 'century to millenia' timeframes, and not the longer timeframes required to totally reset the homeostatic mechanisms of the planet.

post on this:
http://climateprogress.org/2007/10/...’-climate-sensitivity-of-6°c-for-doubled-co2/

 

[countrygrl]

Yup, thats right. It is oh so constructive to simply blame republicans for everything from global warming on down. Please continue!

But in doing so, try not to lament so much about divisiveness in other threads, mmmkay? 'Cause this is just part of why such division exists..i.e. finger pointing.

Q: What have Republicans ever done to slow down or stop global warming?

A: Nothing.

 

[El_Machinae]

It's the same with the Conservatives in Canada. Directly obstructionist in the government, and directly obfuscatory in the public.

 

[civ_king]

There is a mechanism by which CO₂ concentration affects temperature, hence causation.

I know, I just want to post that image again

Anyway, the OP is not so much of a short-term prediction. What they're doing is clarifying the history of GHGs on Earth. The mechanisms by which Earth was 16 degrees hotter are clearly not completely understood, because our prediction regarding CO2 forcings don't get us there.

So, to answer amadeus' question, this evidence is a way of telling us that the models aren't complete. That said, we kinda knew that already, and all of our models have focused on the 'century to millenia' timeframes, and not the longer timeframes required to totally reset the homeostatic mechanisms of the planet.

Please good sir, when saying a temperature list if it is °F or °C


I'm just slightly skeptical about a 29°F temperature increase. The weather doesn't seem to become hotter or colder just weirder, which I assume is why some call it global weirding.

 

[classical_hero]

Why is global warming such a bad thing? In the past we have had Ice ages that were very destructive but I have never seen anything in the past say that when temperatures are warmer that bad things have happened?