Global warming and environmental catastrophe: science or myth?

[carlosMM]

Carlos, what are those "tobacco apologists" you're talking about? In the media, newspapers & so on it's years that i see only anti-tobacco advocates repeating their mantra. It takes a lot to find on the net some dissenting voices, and the most reliable i found (forces.org) is not sponsored by tobacco money.

check the links I gave on Seitz&Co - then follow some of the links on that site. They have internal memos, court files etc. about some tobacco stuff - quite dirty stuff actually. It all stems from the time in the late 60s and 70s and 80s when people like those 'respected' Mr. Seitz were hired by the tobacco companies to fight the evidence that tobacco causes physical harm - they did quite well, blowing smoke, lying through their teeth and spending money - some illegally (a lot actually).
One section of one internal paper(http://tobaccodocuments.org/landman/37575.html) is even headed:

The Maintainance of the Deadly Dilusion of The Open Controversy

yes indeed...... the tactics used to sell more tobacco are the same ones used today to deny GW. Scary, hu?

 

[Gothmog]

BasketCase wrote

While the majority of scientists do seem to say "I believe global warming is proven fact", I've seen so many of them say "however, it's very difficult to prove" that I don't think they should be saying it's proven fact.

From the OED
consensus
1. Phys. General agreement or concord of different parts or organs of the body in effecting a given purpose; sympathy. Hence transf. of the members or parts of any system of things.

(note that 'transf.' is an abreviation for transferred sense)

legal definitions
1. A mutually acceptable agreement that takes into consideration the interests of all concerned parties. An agreement reached through consensus may not satisfy each participant’s interests equally or receive a similar level of support from all participants.

2. Consensus is reached when all members of a review panel are willing to accept a decision or position as being the most reasonable one that the group as a whole will support.

Definition in a social context:
1. Substantial agreement.

2. A group decision that everyone in the group agrees to support.

3. The point at which agencies and the public offer their agreement with recommendations or findings. Although unanimous consensus is seldom achieved, continuous coordination throughout the study process is expected to garner support from most agencies and much of the public.


So there is consensus among the scientific community, as exemplified by the policy statements I link to above. There is a tiny, but vocal, minority that don't feel that humans are significantly altering climate. As Carlos points out these are mostly funded by interest groups. But consensus among scientists does exist.

@tRicky
Too much uncertainty for what?

 

[tR1cKy]

@tRicky
Too much uncertainty for what?

Too much uncertainity about the consequences (exp. the long-term ones) on the climate as a whole and to the effects on both the nature and the human society.

I meant how the climate will change (both globally and regionally), what will be the magnitude of the phenomenon, how the ecosystem will change in consequence of that, how the human society will be affected & so on.

EDIT: @Carlos: i'll read the links (no time now). Anyway, it seems to me quite a thing of the past. Today Philip Morris and the antis are almost hand on hand. Ok, it's just corporate interest: PM finds it more profitable than fighting in the courts. It's the mass of smokers that pay the MSA bill after all.

 

[Gothmog]

Again, your sentence is incomplete.

Too much uncertainty about how the climate will change... for what?

Bottom line though seems to be that you accept the theory of anthropogenic climate change (aka global warming) and encourage additional research into its possible effects. Fair to say?

 

[tR1cKy]

Too much uncertainty about how the climate will change... for what?

Can't explain better than this. Your question doesn't help much

Bottom line though seems to be that you accept the theory of anthropogenic climate change (aka global warming) and encourage additional research into its possible effects. Fair to say?

Yes. It's necessary to know if GW is something we can live with (without much concerns), or, if not, what changes must we enact on our society to keep it under control. Further research is necessary. (edit: probably this is a reply to your question)

 

[Gothmog]

This could be a language barrier.

You say there is too much uncertainty.

There must be some criteria by which you are measuring how much uncertainty is acceptable.

So:

Too much uncertainty to enact the Kyoto Protocal.

Too much uncertainty to admit that climate change is a problem.

Too much uncertainty to admit that climate change is a potential problem.

Too much uncertainty to make changing our behavior in any way a viable option.

Too much uncertainty to make the possibility of a potential cost worth considering.


Also, let's say that we can never know for sure. That is we are up against a Lorenz type limit in a coupled non-linear system, just like we can't predict the weather out past a certain future time. Wouldn't it be prudent to do a risk analysis on the problem, for example a probability based cost benefit analysis?

 

[tR1cKy]

Hmm, i'll try to reply as the best i can - actually, it's a good english exercise for me, you never know a foreign language well enough.

Let's start this way: i consider today's warming trend real and mainly caused by human activity. It is causing a small, but noticeable, alteration on the global climate. We don't know yet with sufficient certainty what this alteration will cause in the short and mid term, but it's something that should raise at least some concern. A changement is happening, and it's visible.

It's plausible to think that, in the long term, the planet will stabilize itself in a new equilibrium status, but it's the non-equilibrium status of today that we should worry about. In my opinion, since we are dealing with a serious thing like man-made alteration of global climate, it's good policy to enact some preemptive measures to minimize the risk, even if it's not certain how this alteration will impact on us, and how much it will hurt. Doing nothing in the hope that nothing will happen is too risky.

I'm not much into the Kyoto protocol, not sufficient enough to judge the merits of the thing. I know that there's some fierce debate around it. Some people argue that it's too costly for the benefit that it should bring to the planet. In other words, the skeptics say that the alteration on the global climate will be so little that it will become an unnecessary burden on those nations that choose to ratify it. For what i know, the USA government has not agreed on it.

Using my common sense, i think that reducing the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is something worth doing, even at some expense. We need to be cautious with the climate, even if we don't know yet how it will change if we don't do nothing. Kyoto will also help in reducing the global pollution, and a world less polluted than today is something that (IMO) we all would cheer.

For the same reason, my opinion is that further study is necessary on the matter. We need to know more. We need more data, better models... something that would allow us to do more accurate prediction on what will be the climate change in the following decades. It's costly, but it's money well spent.

A thing that it's somewhat overlooked, but IMO is essential to consider, is that if the climate changes would go out of control, we (as humanity) would be compelled to spend huge amount of resources to restore the world in an acceptable state, and this expense would be far greater that enacting the Kyoto protocol today and spend money today for further research.

 

[Gothmog]

We agree almost exactly.

Some form of international agreement is necessary to avoid a 'tragedy of the commons' type situation. Kyoto has some major flaws, but nothing unfixable.

I would mention that there are many 'equilibrium states' of the global climate that would not be condusive to improving the human condition. For example 'snowball earth' :http://www-eps.harvard.edu/people/faculty/hoffman/snowball_paper.html

 

[Urederra]

Urederra, though you obviously never read anything I post I'll keep trying for a bit longer.

I read them, but my time is not unlimited, you know, so I answer when I have time and feel like to. I skim over the other posters name-calling posts, thought, I am not interested in name-calling.

Here is a plot from a reference I have tried to get you to look at three times now, the recent (Feb 2005) work by A. Moberg as published in Nature:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/recon.gif

You will note both the medieval warm period (which indeed was a local phenomena according to most reputable work in the area, no one denies it existed) and the little ice age. The little ice age is certainly more pronounced than in the Mann work but the medieval warm period is within 0.2 degrees and well within the error bars even at one sigma. The reasons for that are discussed in the paper if you are interested. Basically the new work emphasized inland temperature records and also used a very new wavelet analysis for temperature reconstruction that allows temperature records of different sampling and averaging frequencies to be combined more readily.

Yeah, now I can see the medieval warm period as well as the little ice age.

You will note the same 0.5 degree warming, and the same hockey stick pattern.

Sorry, but I cannot agree with that. Are you trying to convince me that this graph…

and this graph… (Edit: I look only from the year 1000, since mann´s graph stats on the year 1000)

have the same hockey stick pattern? Before and after being broken, maybe. I look at the Moberg graph (Edit: As I said, from the year 1000) and what I see is a sinusoidal curve, rather than a hockey stick. Something similar than this:

although less pronounced. Now I can see the Medieval Warm period in the Moberg graph, also I can see the little ice age, as you said, (coincident with the Maunder minimun, BTW, which marks a period of known low solar activity). The problem is that Moberg graph hasn’t got the hockey stick pattern.

And how does the CO2 levels fit with the Moberg graph?. Very badly indeed. It doesn’t fit in the last 100 years (remember the 1950 1970 cold period) and it doesn’t fit in the previous 900 years where the CO2 levels haven’t changed but the temperatures have fluctuated.

Of course CO2 levels fitted with Mann’s graph, but in Mann’s graph you don’t see the medieval warm period and the little ice age is almost inexistent. Mann’s graph does not fit with the historical facts we know about the harsh winters during the 16th and 17th centuries. And there weren’t local phenomena, although there were more documented on Europe for obvious reasons. In Ethiopia and Mauritania, permanent snow was reported on mountain peaks at levels where it does not occur today. Timbuktu was flooded at least 13 times by the Niger River; there are no records of similar flooding before or since. In China, warm weather crops, such as oranges, were abandoned in Jiangxi Province, where they had been grown for centuries. In North America, the early European settlers also reported exceptionally severe winters. For example, in 1607-8 ice persisted on Lake Superior until June. They weren't phenomena that only happened in Europe and Greenland.

The problem is that the IPCC took Mann’s graph to tell us that there is a strong relation between CO2 levels and global mean temperature, when this is not true. And why is Mann’s graph so faulty? Why did he only took a single tree to reconstruct the temperatures of the first 2 centuries in his graph? Maybe because other trees he studied gave him results that didn’t fit Ruddiman theories (they work in the same group, I remind you) Or maybe he was lousy and though that one single tree should be enough. He was also so lousy with the maths that other two non weather scientists, McIntyre and McKtrick proved him wrong. One way or another, this guy cannot be a reviewer of the journal “Science”. A journal like science receives lots of papers but only publishes a few, the ones that pass through many filters. Mann is one of the filters and the other weather scientists knows that, so they try to write their papers according to Mann’s likings, so they can pass Mann’s filter. In science if you don’t publish you perish, so is better for those weather scientists to agree with Science’s weather reviewer. It is sad that Science had such a lousy/cheating man as part of its staff. No wonder Moberg et al. have published in Nature. They know that they never could have passed Mann’s filter. Hopefully, Mann’s days as a top dog scientist are counted. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4693855.stm

Mars is not relevant, again we don't have data anywhere close to what we do for earth. The ice cap changes are basicaly anecdotal. …snip… I also agree that the sun is important and have posted many more references that show the true magnitude of the known connections.

Mars is relevant since it is less complex than Earth and could help us to understand a bit more how the climate works. In this case we show that the annual average size of the mars ice caps are shrinking, and that happened just when the sun is being very active, maybe the ‘true’ magnitude of the known connections has been underestimated or there are unknown connections. Mars and Earth weather changes follow similar patterns. Both of them have been suffering an increase of temperatures and that coincides with a period of increased sun activity.

For there to be a link to magnetic activity it would have to involve cosmic rays, this is an area of research I am actively involved in actually. Problem is there is no known mechanism of action for this link, though we are searching for one. That's one of the basic tenants of science, there must be a mechanism of action.

Good luck with your research. I hope you find the mechanism of action. You can kick Mann's ass out of Science if you succeed. Don’t try to publish it in Science, try Nature instead

I will try to answer other issues in following posts, but my time is not unlimited, My spare time is limited, and although I like to read CFC and reply the posts, these weather ones take me a lot of time.

 

[carlosMM]

@Carlos: i'll read the links (no time now). Anyway, it seems to me quite a thing of the past. Today Philip Morris and the antis are almost hand on hand. Ok, it's just corporate interest: PM finds it more profitable than fighting in the courts. It's the mass of smokers that pay the MSA bill after all.

Indeed - big business has admitted a lot, and tries to stay in busniess by legal and honest means now.
If you check the websites of Shell, Exxon, BP etc, you'll find that the same is true for them - they admit GW is heavily influenced by fossil fuel use and try to stay in business not only by necessity but by offering alternative solutions to our energy demands.

It is just the same 'scientists' and the same methods in both cases that were initially used to DENY the problem.

 

[carlosMM]

quick and dirty, Urederra:

copied and scaled the part of the second graph to roughly the same x,y, axis relations of the first, superimposed it.

here ya go:

seems to me they are quite close to each other!

 

[Urederra]

quick and dirty, Urederra:

copied and scaled the part of the second graph to roughly the same x,y, axis relations of the first, superimposed it.

here ya go:

seems to me they are quite close to each other!

Quicker. No, it doesn't. The image is not properly downloaded, at least for me, but anyway. The Nature 2005 graph doesn´t look like a hockey stick. Or it reflects the medieval warm period and the subsequent little ice age or is flat. It cannot be both ways.

 

[carlosMM]

Quicker. No, it doesn't.

well then, get the raw data and run it through SPSS and show me they do not correlate
expert (gothmog) said they do, prove him wrong then.

 

[Urederra]

well then, get the raw data and run it through SPSS and show me they do not correlate
expert (gothmog) said they do, prove him wrong then.

I don´t need to. Mann´s graph is flat from 1000 to 1900, The Nature graph is wavy, because it reflects the MWP and the LIA.

 

[carlosMM]

I don´t need to. Mann´s graph is flat from 1000 to 1900, The Nature graph is wavy, because it reflects the MWP and the LIA.

sorry, but your definition of 'flat' is a bit weird.....

please copy and edit the graphs to show where you think they differ!

 

[Urederra]

this is flat, from 1000 to 1900...

and this is wavy...

that one doesn´t look like a hockey stick to me.

It is not so difficult to understand. Isn't it?

 

[carlosMM]

please, can you draw a flat line on this and show me?????

can't, can you? It wiggles a LOT, doesn't it?

so all depends on what ckind of polynome you interpolate inot it...

as I showed above, the curves are extremely similar, the curve you post ehre as 'flat' is far from flat. Or is your understanding of maths so bad that you fail to see that?

 

[carlosMM]

just to show you how wrong you are:

 

[Urederra]

Sorry but the this blue line...

and the red line in your last graph are not the same...

 

[Urederra]

please, can you draw a flat line on this and show me?????

I don´t need to, it is already done... can you see it?

it is dashed, it is straight and with a very small negative slope. It says so in the leyend. (the last one, where it says - . - linear trend (AD 1000 - 1850)