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Comments 61651 to 61700:

61651. Yvan Dutil at 00:34 AM on 11 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       I don't remember when I became first aware of the global warming question. I have done my degree in astrophysics and it was obvious to me that increasing CO2 will increase the temperature. My first mental shock occurred in 1998, when I was doing my first postdoc in atmospheric remote sensing. I had to use MODTRAN for my job. In MODTRAN, CO2 concentration is a variable, by default it use the pre-industrial concentration of 280 ppm, but I needed the actual value for 1998, which was 365 ppm. This was disturbing. Meanwhile, I became aware of the But, the real eye opener came in November 2005, when I was participating to a Bar des Sciences about the search of extraterrestrial life. At some point in the debate, someone brought the question of the prioritization of resources given the environmental problems including climate changes. At that point a paleontologist took the microphone and climate that climate change was true and totally unnatural. She was followed by a specialist of meteorites, who supported her position. This was shocking for me because they were geologist who are supposed not care about climate change and they were clearly worried and deeply concerned. But the real tipping point was this paper of Gutowski et al. (1998) described in the blog of New Scientist (http://www.newscientist.com/blog/environment/2008_04_01_archive.html). This paper demonstrated that even the homeless have an unsustainable environmental trace due importance of infrastructures in developed countries. Later that year, I became a candidate for the Quebec Green party. With the peak oil, climate change, the general loss of biodiversity and at least another dozen a civilization threatening problems that nobody speak about, my effort are likely to be vain. Nevertheless, I will be able to stake my grand children in the eyes and not be shame to tell them I try to do something.
61652. jzk at 00:32 AM on 11 March 2012
       Lindzen's London Illusions
       Martin Lack@61, Lindzen was halfway through explaining Roe's findings when you interrupted him to "rebut his obfuscation." Could you rebut his and Roe's "obfuscation" here? Thanks!
61653. Paul from VA at 23:45 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       I was probably in the lukewarmer camp for most of my life, accepting that AGW existed, but not that the magnitude was anything to be worried about until November 2009. The catalyst for change? Ironically enough, "Climategate." As a science grad student, it was patently obvious to me that the hacked emails did not show the vast conspiracy alluded to by the right-wing media in the USA. So I wound up reading up on actual climate science from Realclimate and here (and a bit of tamino as well). The most scientifically convincing thing to me was the SkS rebuttal of the "Global warming=UHI" myth. The fact that climate scientists had tried and tested multiple clever ways of ruling out UHI convinced me that one side was making research and the other was making excuses.
61654. chris at 23:41 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       folke_kelm, I am curious about your reference to Jan Veizer and his apparent non-acceptance of plate tectonics. I guess you have first-hand experience that informs your comment on this. It's not really that big a deal but it does give some insight into the nature of knowledge and how one acquires one's world view, and Veizer's an interesting example. In another context he has at various (or the same?) times both supported a view of Earth surface temperature variability in deep time that is (i) contrary to the evidence-base that informs the scientific consensus (he suggests a dominant role for cosmic ray influence on surface temperature), and (ii) entirely consistent with the evidence-based consensus view (i.e. a major role for greenhouse gas variations). I've always assumed that Dr. Veizer likes being controversial, provocative and embracing novel ideas, none of which are bad things! But I do wonder whether he really does doubt the fundamental role of plate tectonics in Earth history, and might not be being a little provocative (e.g. in order to stimulate some insightful thought on the part of his students!). Where this has a deeper importance (and now I am drifting towards the subject of the recent Lindzen Misrepresentation thread), is how a tendency to be scientifically provocative can drift towards something less admirable. I've similarly assumed that Dr. Lindzen's early pronouncements about climate (that increased tropospheric temperatures would cause the upper atmosphere to dry and thus act as a negative feedback; the negative feedback associated with his "Iris hypothesis" etc.), were examples of provocativeness. Unfortunately, if provocative ideas strike a chord with those that have rather less noble agendas, then the support and adulation one may receive from these scientifically dubious quarters, may cause one to become rather too fond of one's ideas even as the evidence accrues against them. At that point "provocativeness" may drift into something less savoury including a tendency to misrepresentation of one's own and other's science in order to maintain a facade of authority... ...this doesn't apply to Dr. Veizer, but it may well do in the case of a very tiny number of elderly scientists who are rather idolised in some quarters for making demonstrably false pronouncements about contemporary climate science that go far beyond being "provocative"...
61655. Lloyd Flack at 23:19 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       Eric, Eventually yes, but will technological changes arrive in time to prevent massive harm. There is a saying "Don't schedule breakthroughs."
61656. Lloyd Flack at 23:08 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       My background is mostly statistics and biology with a good general knowledge of other scientific and mathematics related fields. I first heard about the danger of global warming in the 1970s. The arguments for it looked convincing. It seemed to be physically inevitable. But the question was how much and how quickly. I didn't pay much attention to it at the time. Later I wondered how long a data stretch we would need to tease the signal out of the noise. As an Australian and working a lot of the time on water environmental problems I was very aware of the large natural fluctuations that we had. I thought we would need data over a very long period before the magnitude of the trend could be reliably estimated. I did not realize the magnitude of the trend and I overlooked the fact that global temperatures were what counted and their variability would be much less than that of Australian temperatures. I was also wary about predictions in general especially those from complicated models. Primarily I was interested in other things and did not take the time to look closely at climate science. I was aware that climatologists were becoming more certain that current trends were dangerous and something had to be done. Since unless I have a good reason to believe otherwise I trust the judgment of scientists in their field I thought they were probably right but not having found out much in the way of details I felt no sense of urgency. I was sceptical of those denying the trends and could see the political motivation. What got my attention was when the predictions of the models which had clashed with tropospheric temperature records turned out to be right. The records had a bias. This successful prediction impressed me and gave me much more confidence in then modeling. I started looking up what I could find on climate science. Real Climate was the most useful source. I discovered that modern climate science gave explanations that fit together and were as comprehensive as could reasonably be expected. In particular they made sense of paleoclimate. I found out about the footprints of different sources of warming and how what we had was that expect from greenhouse gases. Also I found that the other things which could have brought about a trend had changed little over the past half century. I found out that the temperature sensitivity could be divided into four components. Two, those of non precipitating greenhouse gases and of water vapour, could have ballpark estimates of the equilibrium sensitivity calculated fairly simply and reliably. Those were nailed down hard and were big enough to be dangerous unless a net negative feedback reduced them a lot. I found out that most of the uncertainty came from other atmospheric feedbacks especially clouds. These were thought to be small positive feedbacks but could be small negative or larger positive feedbacks. The thing is for there not to be a danger these had to be big negative feedbacks and there was no evidence that I could see of this. Then there were the non atmospheric feedbacks, primarily albedo and natural greenhouse gas releases brought about by the heat. There was no way these were going to be anything but positive and substantial even though there was no way to get a good estimate of them. While the estimates of the sensitivity had an annoyingly large range the all roughly coincided. And they had been obtained by a variety of methods. This gave me confidence that the true value was unlikely to be far from the point estimates. I realized that climate change was going to be a major danger to future generations. I was not thinking that it was going to affect us much but that we had a responsibility not to wreck the world for them. Most of the predictions of danger were for fifty or so years down the track. But over the past couple of years especially it has become plain that the danger is hitting earlier than expected. The predictions of the ultimate state have not been changing much. The predictions of the speed of change and consequences have. Ice sheets won't slowly melt in place. They will collapse. We should have expected that from the way that glacials end much more quickly than they start. It looked like extreme weather would be hitting us earlier than expected, like right now. And there are fears of possible methane releases. I don't know how grave these are. Sorry this post has been so long but I think it is too complicated to cover in a shorter post.
61657. chris at 22:53 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       Andy, the essential similarities of the underyling "tenets" of geology with those of evolutionary biology are interesting since the latter also incorporates the fundamental roles of "deep time" and "gradualism" ("uniformitarianism" is rather taken for granted since it's beyond question that the molecular mechanisms of genetics are essentially uniform through time). The major differences (which is hugely relevant to consideration of the climate change and its consequences) are the roles of "catastrophism" and "adaptation" in evolutionary biology. I'm sure that modern courses in Earth sciences now consider the roles of catastrophism since catastrophic events are part of the deep time geological record (even if catastrophic events may be mere "blips" of which the gradualist geological progression is largely indifferent). But these are fundamental to biology as can be seen by the association of major extinctions with corresponding evidence for massive tectonic (or extraterrestrial impact) events, raised temperatures, raised CO2 levels, ocean anoxia etc. So the question is not whether events involving massive alterations in the Earth's atmosphere, surface and oceans do or do not profoundly affect the ability of species to survive (since the evidence shows strongly that they do), but the extent to which the effects on the atmosphere, surface and oceans of the contemporary astonishing release of greenhouse gases are going to pressure the ability of contempory species (including us) to adapt. Perhaps the answer to the problem of educational "bias" on the part of the broad geology community is for Earth science courses to include strong elements of the association between the geological and biological records in deep time, since these are fundamentally intertwined to the extent that causality acts profoundly in both directions. In fact I expect that good Earth science departments do this, and one only has to look at recent(ish) TV series (e.g. the various BBC series presented by Ian Stewart on Earth history) to see that this association is both fascinating and hugely instructive of our present circumstances. In this respect I would strongly recommend Earth Story (presented by Aubury Manning): This is a truly inspiring and instructive account of the interplay of the gological and biological in Earth history and is presented in such a straightforward and scientific manner to make one almost weep with intellectual pleasure!
61658. Hopeful at 21:56 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       Sometimes I have tried to explain this to people confused by the different opinions of scientists they have heard. I have tried to explain that everyone has bias including people with scientific training, sometimes we don't know what we don't know - it is just one of our human limitations/ frailties. Thinking about AGW needs to be based on understandings derived from decades of peer reviewed reseach across multiple fields of science which are summarised for the average citizen by Academies of Science around the world. What can be done to get the media and politicians to be really clear on this, to put aside opinion and concentrate on communicating the evidence-based understandings in regard to AGW.
61659. Rob Painting at 21:06 PM on 10 March 2012
       Oceans Acidifying Faster Today Than in Past 300 Million Years
       Bruce - "Does anyone out there have any idea how to get 7,8, or 9 billion people to voluntarily comply?" People can either change, or the planet will make them change. The laws of physics cannot be repealed. "Is anyone reading this trying to live on less than one ton of Co2?' Perhaps your question should be addressed to those who seek to thwart the move to sustainable forms of energy? Everyone else isn't addicted to the idea of burning fossil fuels for energy.
61660. Eric (skeptic) at 20:49 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       In the near term there is adaptation. Humans are not cattle but some of the same principles apply, http://www.aseanbiotechnology.info/Abstract/21025697.pdf such as cooling, diet and genetic alterations. The long term is 100% speculation. I could equally well argue that technology will allow humans to live comfortably in 130F desert or in high heat indexes or in -70F Antarctica.
61661. Bernard J. at 20:14 PM on 10 March 2012
       James Hansen's Motivation
       If science doesn't move the denialists, perhaps they should consider the escalating cost of action once even they can no longer deny the truth: 1) 3% CO₂ emissions reduction per annum had reduction started in 2005 2) 6% CO₂ emissions reduction per annum if reduction starts in 2013 3) 15% CO₂ emissions reduction per annum if reduction starts in 2022. As Hansen observes, the last is next to impossible - if voluntary control is desired...
61662. folke_kelm at 20:06 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       Nice to read a post from really geological point of view. It is very easy for e geoscientist to have an optimistic bias. We geologists are educated to think in geological times. We know, that humans are not at all able to "destroy the earth". If we speak with people who are not educated this way, we often forget, that we have a totally different point of view, and often we are not able to see our own shortcomings and our own bias. I have a very optimistic point of view myself, reagrding to geological times. It does not matter what we do with the earth if we take some 10 million of years from now. I had to learn that we are not speaking about earth history but about human civilisation, and that is a totally different thing. Further you maust have in mind, that just in the geosciences there has been a tremendous advancement in knowledge over the past 20 years. When i was at university from 1982 to 1989 there were still many teachers not accepting plate tectonics. I have met two of these people during my own student time and later, (one of them Jan Veizer, he is still out there). Geology as science has gone through a paradigm shift from describing science to experimental an d more exact science like physics and chemistry. During my education mathematics was not included in geology. Now it is a required part of the basic education world over. You must have in mind, that there are many teachers still at work, who have grown up in the old world of geology and unfortunately stuck in their conception of the world, still teaching it to the students, and you must always have in mind that students only are humans, often not able to overcome their adopted conception. This is, why so many geologists reject the theory of global warming due CO2.
61663. MA Rodger at 20:03 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       I would agree with AndyS's poor view of Gore's "Inconvient Truth" which I feel only preaches to the converted & doesn't reach across to the 'disbelievers'. Then a film had a similar counter-productive input into my own 'conversion'. In common with those that watched it with me, I found Channel 4's "The Greenhuose Conspiracy," (a 1990 precursor of "The Great Global Warming Swindle") entirely unconvincing. Its message of a mythical AGW that was nothing to worry about was so poor that it converted a roomful of potential skeptics into the exact opposite.
61664. Martin Lack at 18:57 PM on 10 March 2012
       Lindzen's London Illusions
       #60 A brilliant slide-by-slide de-bunk posted by John P.Reisman over on Real Climate has prompted me to clarify myself further: Whilst I am extremely grateful to John P. Reisman for taking the time to detail all of this so clearly, I am bound to indulge in a little bit of “I told you so”. For the benefit of those who may have skated-over any or all of my previous comments, with reference to the video of the Q&A session (very kindly posted by Repealtheact.org onto my Blog), let me explain: 1. I was there. 2. I saw the whole thing. 3. I could not believe what Lindzen was doing. 4. I blew my chance to ask a question by seeking to correct Lindzen’s obfuscation of the Milankovitch CO2/Temperature time lag; and why it is now the other way around for anthropogenic climate disruption. 5. I believe Lindzen deliberately interrupted to me to stop me talking. 6. I attempted to rebut his obfuscation and was silenced by Lord Monckton. 7. Lindzen can apologise and re-insert as many graphs as he likes; but he is merely digging himself an ever-bigger hole (IMHO). 8. Lindzen has even now re-inserted the “missing” graph of Keeling v Temp., the screenshot image of which I have on my blog along with the following caption: “If you stretched the temperature axis far enough, they would have correlated perfectly. Therefore, this [not now] ‘missing’ graph neither proves nor disproves anything.” 9. This implies that Lindzen doesn’t even appreciate why it is so meaningless and misleading. 10. This is why I was so gobsmacked by the whole thing. It was either complete incompetence or transparently disingenuous.
       Response:

       [DB] Fixed link (the link was right but you were missing the "r" in "href").

       Preview, preview, preview...  :)

61665. Norman at 18:54 PM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       Tom Curtis @65 Thank you for understanding my point. I do greatly appreciate that effort. I would concede to your point except it does not seem to be established in the data provided. I can't link to my excel sheet but I did enlarge the Munic Re graph to the point where 2" = 200 counts on the Munich Re chart. Then to the nearest 16th it determined the actual Munich Re count. Here is my data. Left column is earthquake number (from USGS web page) starting at 1980 and ending at 2011. The right column is a close approximation of actual Munich Re numbers given in the OT chart of natural catastrophes. 119.... 83.3 103.... 66.64 95.... 74.97 140.... 108.29 99.... 66.64 124.... 83.3 95.... 99.96 123.... 91.63 101.... 99.96 86.... 116.62 127.... 141.61 112.... 108.29 179.... 116.62 149.... 124.95 159.... 116.62 203.... 133.28 164.... 133.28 136.... 166.6 129.... 141.61 134.... 141.61 173.... 166.6 142.... 99.96 143.... 116.62 155.... 99.96 159.... 108.29 151.... 108.29 153.... 124.95 196.... 124.95 180.... 116.62 161.... 99.96 175.... 108.29 205.... 91.63 When I make a line graph of the two number sets in Excel I do not see a correlation between the two lines. It is not a change in belief that is needed. It is a change in information source. One that has no basis in populaton or property values. An indepentdent variable. Actual tornado counts, actual earthaquake numbers, actual counted numbers of hurricanes, actual floods, actual droughts. I am mainly requesting information that has no bias and let the information determine the reality without any potential for bias. I still do not understand why this request is met with hostility or accusations of dishonesty or intentional misleading of potential visitors to this web site. The Munich Re report uses property and population in their determination of catastrophe. It seems possible that they are lumping all catastrophe categories together in this graph, from the smallest to largest so it is possible that a person killed by a lightning strike is given the same weight as a massive flood, hurricane or earthquake. All are equally counted as one catastrophe. This approach does not seem logical, reasonable or informative. The only acceptable scientific approach to see if events are increasing is to give actual numbers and then determine if those numbers are indeed increasing. I do not see why this request is considered "trolling" bad or inappropriate for this scientifically based web site. If it is can anyone provide an explanation as to why this constitutes unacceptable behavior?
       Moderator Response: [JH] You raise issues, those issues are responded to, and you ignore those repsonses. You are either playing a game with us, or you have blinders on. Either way, you are exhausting our patience.
61666. climatesight at 18:02 PM on 10 March 2012
       Changing Climates, Changing Minds: The Personal
       Andy, this is a FABULOUS piece. It is so eloquently written and well thought out. My own story of discovery is much less remarkable. Going through grade school I vaguely knew there was some problem called global warming, but almost nothing else. I was lucky enough to have my first real introduction to the subject from a climate scientist at one of the local universities, during a day long environmental workshop for high school students that I went to on a whim. His presentation was, in retrospect, a total life changer for me (given how much of my time I spend on climate science, and the fact that I am beginning a career in the field). I remember that my thoughts on the presentation were not "we're all going to die" as much as "wow, this research is really interesting!" The very fact that oxygen isotopes could be used as proxy data for temperature sort of blew my mind. Previously I had enjoyed science in school, but mostly because it was so nicely organized and I have always enjoyed classification (apparently my mum first suspected I would be a scientist when she noticed me sorting the contents of my Christmas stocking into categories). This was the first area of applied science, however, that really appealed to me. Previously I had always liked theory and concepts more than applications - ie, the periodic table over chemistry labs, even if explosions were involved. So I approached climate change like a scientist, rather than an activist, from the very beginning, and have more or less remained that way since. I think the only obvious psychological influence on my position was the fact that I was brought up to trust experts like doctors and scientists. The credibility spectrum, in a very crude form, was present in my mind at a very young age :) Kate http://climatesight.org
61667. jyyh at 17:48 PM on 10 March 2012
       Peter Sinclair interview with Michael Mann
       Thanks much Tom Curtis, this got me searching for the vertical profiles for CO2 in the troposphere as well, it turns out they change pretty much with seasons, as should be expected for the biosphere uptake/release: Some of the middle/upper tropospheric level variation is probably due clouds (CO2 gets dissolved in cloud droplets). The level of stratospheric high concentration might be the one level where CO2 can freeze?
61668. Rob Honeycutt at 17:11 PM on 10 March 2012
       James Hansen's Motivation
       Best talk I've seen Hansen give. And I totally dig the hat.
61669. Tom Curtis at 15:28 PM on 10 March 2012
       Peter Sinclair interview with Michael Mann
       jyyh @10, with regard to the stratosphere, Bischof et al 1985 write:

       "Although many measurements of the abundance of CO2 in the troposphere have been made, knowledge of its stratospheric abundances and variability is sparse. Here we report mid-latitude vertical profiles of CO2, up to 35 km, measured in 1979, 1982 and 1984 by analysing cryogenically collected balloon samples supplemented by air samples taken aboard aircraft. CO2 mixing ratios are not constant with altitude but rather decrease by ~7 p.p.m.v. (parts per 106 by volume) from the tropopause to the mid-stratosphere. The growth rate of the atmospheric CO2 abundance caused by anthropogenic emission, which varies between 1.0 and 1.5 p.p.m.v. yr–1 at ground level1, is also observed at all stratospheric heights up to 35 km. The shape of the profiles suggests that excess CO2 above 20 km enters the stratosphere through tropical upwelling rather than mid-latitude diffusion. The time lag of this height region with respect to the tropospheric CO2 level is ~5 yr."

       These results have been confirmed by Daube et al, 2002: Original caption:

       "Fig. 7. (a) CO2 and (b) N2O from the ER-2 (light crosses) and OMS (dark filled circles) intercomparison flights of 23 Jan 2001. ER-2 data are shown only for the descent into Kiruna, Sweden, since that occurred at the same time the balloon was ascending from Esrange. The profiles were separated by 1.25°–3.75° lat and 1°–3° lon, with the largest separation at the highest altitudes"

       You may also want to see Carlotti et al, 2007 for a more detailed picture. The pools of "CO2 on the ground" have come from the overturning of volcanic lakes, which brings the bottom water with a very high concentration of CO2 to the surface and releases it to the atmosphere in a cool form. Direct volcanic emissions of CO2 to the atmosphere are unlikely to form volcanic pools IMO because the gas will be warm, and hence rise.
61670. Composer99 at 15:26 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       MattJ, as a matter of taxonomical convention, the one instance of Homo sapiens in the article, if written correctly, would be written as I have done in this comment. Minor nitpick of a nitpick...
61671. jyyh at 14:42 PM on 10 March 2012
       Peter Sinclair interview with Michael Mann
       Isn't it so the normal evaporation of water drives the convection? Airborne H2O hits the the CO2 near the ground and drives it to tropopause levels. I mean there really has been some (temporary), observed pools of CO2(g) (and other gases) on some vulcanic locations where the mixing of the atmosphere (by wind) has been suspended (temporarily). I do not know how CO2 mixes in the stratosphere or does it get mixed there as mixed up as in troposphere since there's so much less water vapor up there. Other planets have less airborne ice crystals in their atmophere so their weathers are more predictable, no?
61672. Tom Curtis at 14:23 PM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       muoncounter @64, I agree with the point you are making. In fact I made the same point rather forcefully in my post 56. Never-the-less, we need to tackle the argument Norman is actually making rather than the one he appears to be making. The facts are simple: 1) The error rate in detecting magnitude 6 plus earthquakes is very low; 2) The number of magnitude 6 plus earthquakes varies from year to year with a long term average of about 150 earthquakes per year; 3) The 1980's where unusually quiet, with an average of 108.5 earthquakes per year; 4) The 1990's where not unusual in any way, with an average of 149.2 earthquakes per year; 5) The 2000's where slightly more active than usual, with an average of 161.1 earthquakes per year; 6) This real change in the number of earthquakes does not represent a statistically significant trend showing there is no reason to expect its continuation or apocalyptic climax in 2012 (your point); but 7) It is, however, a real change in the number of earthquakes between the 1980s and the most recent decade (Norman's point). However, where it gets bizarre is that Norman argues that this fact (7) proves the Munich Re data is unreliable. As it is a crucial point, I will quote his argument verbatum:

       "Earthquake numbers are critical to the discussion as they are used (assumed to be relatively flat which is not the case) to prove that population growth and property values are not the reason Munich Re shows increasing catastrophes caused by Climate and weather related effects. My point is that large (prone to cause damage if near population centers and unless the greater number of quakes in the 2000 decade just all happened to occur outside the bounds of civilization as compared to 1980 decade or even the 1990 decade, but the number of deaths does not support this conclusion as they have increased at a dramatic rate). If whatever system Munich Re is using to determine a catastrophe can't pick up a noticeable increase in large earthquake number, it should be evident that this system is not valid in determining event numbers but I keep seeing the same graph used as evidence of increasing bad weather related events. If it can't match earthquake number to reality (provided by the USGS) why would I believe it is a valid portrayal of increasing bad climate or weather related phenomena. "

       What is bizarre is that the system used by Munich Re did pick up a large increase in earthquake numbers. Specifically, the graph in the OP showing the increase in relative trends shows an increase in geophysical events from 1980 to 2011 of about 50%, closely approximating to the 54% increase in magnitude 6 plus earthquakes over the same period. Having pinned his argument on this point, having it so clearly refuted we should now be able to expect Norman to conclude that the Munich Re data does indeed show an increase in damaging weather related events. Of course, we both know from long experience that no such change of believe will occur.
61673. Doug Hutcheson at 13:47 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       muoncounter @ 13:10 PM, what will the Inhofe's of this world do when the climatic changes become undeniable? When the CO₂ levels hit 500ppm, when the wheat fields become barren, when the sea level rises, when the Arctic is ice free, when human population becomes unsustainable, will they say "It's not us, it's God and He knows what is good for us"? Wilful blindness in legislators does not make for good legislation.
61674. KeefeandAmanda at 13:45 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       Do we not need to see some researchers come up with a global heat index history of the planet of the last half-century or the last century, to go along with the actual global temperature history? And with this, also a comparison of daytime and nighttime global heat indexes to go along with the same for actual global daytime and nighttime temperatures. (Is it not so that the global nighttime heat index going up faster than the global daytime heat index would be as powerful as the global nighttime temperature going up faster than the global daytime temperature as evidence for a powerful increase in greenhouse gas activity? No other method of heating can cause these diurnal range decreases that have occurred as they have occurred.) The heat index measure (temperature and relative humidity) may be much more important than mere temperature as we go forward. That is, with ever-increasing global water vapor, since eventually it's harder to get temperatures as high when there is more and more water in the atmosphere compared to when it's dry, should we not expect eventually a slowdown in actual global temperature increases but no slowdown in global heat index increases? And the heat index is much more relevant to survivability for animals like birds and mammals - see the warnings of such studies as that study published by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS): "An adaptability limit to climate change due to heat stress" http://www.pnas.org/content/107/21/9552.full This NAS research says that even with just an eventual 5 degree C global temperature increase down the road (they looked at both a 5 degree C and 10 degree C increase), smaller and then larger parts of the planet will become uninhabitable because of non-survivable summertime heat indexes. (They are talking heat indexes not seen for tens of millions of years, before modern birds and mammals evolved and covered the planet as it cooled over those millions of years.) A 5 degree C increase would stress human civilization to a breaking point. And if an eventual 10 degree C global temperature increase happens somewhere down the road, half the planet would probably become a dead zone in terms of bird and mammalian life, and present civilization could not survive. One reason for this last point is simple - the land mass that would be left as habitable could not support the many billions population that will obtain this century. There would have to be a reduction of many billions. Just think the implications through. See what the researchers themselves say about their own research in terms of the heat indexes, directly and indirectly: http://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/research/2010/100504HuberLimits.html Quote: ""The wet-bulb limit is basically the point at which one would overheat even if they were naked in the shade, soaking wet and standing in front of a large fan," Sherwood said. "Although we are very unlikely to reach such temperatures this century, they could happen in the next."" http://www.gaia-movement-usa.org/?q=node/46 Quote: ""Most people are more familiar with the heat index, or the feels-like temperature they see on the weather report. The wet-bulb temperatures we are talking about would have a feels-like, or heat-index, temperature of between 170 to 196 degrees Fahrenheit," Huber said. In line with this NAS-published research: By this online heat index calculator http://www.hpc.ncep.noaa.gov/html/heatindex.shtml a temperature of 100 degrees F with a relative humidity of 75 percent gives a heat index of 150 degrees F, and a temperature of 105 degrees F with a relative humidity of 75 percent gives a heat index of 176 degrees F. The former would kill many humans and other modern birds and mammals within hours, and the latter (the lower range of a wet bulb temperature of 95 degrees F) would kill all humans and probably all other modern birds and mammals within hours. (Don't dismiss this. Don't forget that air conditioning can go out and power failures can occur, and so on.) Do we not need to care about the future of our planet and the life on it, and care what heat indexes the middle parts of our planet will be experiencing throughout the next couple or few short centuries during summertime heat waves, as the globe accumulates more and more heat energy?
61675. Doug Hutcheson at 13:32 PM on 10 March 2012
       James Hansen's Motivation
       This should be compulsory viewing in every high school. Watch the talk, then research the supporting evidence for every statement made. Making students do the search of the literature themselves might drive the facts home.
61676. Rob Painting at 13:29 PM on 10 March 2012
       Lindzen's Junk Science
       jzk - see Lindzen Illusions top left-hand corner of the SkS page.
61677. owl905 at 13:26 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       Following on points by william-19 and Chemware-22: the hit on our living standards is exposure one. It's already adding to taxes and insurance premiums (extreme events rising in number and rising faster in damages). Weather pattern instability is already increasing. So the second hit will be on aqua&agriculture - basically, the things that can't move and that driver producers out of business. Any idea that the damage stops if the pollution is stopped is expecting a runaway train to stop at the flip of a switch. While the species can survive, it will become impossible to support 7 billion-plus inhabitants; the forecast of double that by mid-century shows hit three - population upheavals and crisis. It took politics, religion, civil war, AND drought - to produce the South Sudan Drought.
61678. Jose_X at 13:26 PM on 10 March 2012
       Interactive mythbusting in Lane Cove
       We could play devil's advocate and come up with tens, hundreds, .. of questions that would not have been addressed at a short presentation. People who have already considered some of these aren't going to change their minds without going down that list to some degree. Those who might be convinced on the spot might develop doubt later on as some of these questions surface. Many people will not "change sides" until they can go back and first remove a fair amount of the doubts they acquired from numerous websites. This is why this comprehensive website is great and why a presentation (or even interactive gathering of at most an hour or two) might be only marginably successful if the goal and focus in it largely becomes to get skeptics to change their minds within the short time period of the presentation. Let me ask, how many of you here "changed your minds" in a few hours and solved the doubt for good? I would agree that a primary goal of the presentation should be to motivate people to pursue this topic further if they have questions (eg, by visiting this website). Passing on that motivation would be very useful. Those who agree should also know they have this website to use to help others. BTW, "debunking 3 myths" is catchy and can be used to draw an audience (and interactivity and feedback during the presentation are great). As an aside (and indirectly also a positive review of much of what this website covers): One debunking/motivational technique I like is to raise doubts about "skeptics". Scientists put a lot of burden on proving x and y, but we don't see that serious effort on skeptic sites. If we could easily present a convincing, comprehensive, cohesive answer in the way science demands, then scientific papers would also be simple and hardly rely on mathematics or not come with extensive reference sections. ["If anyone believes the papers are easy to read, then you should be reading them."] The fact is that it is easy to raise doubt yet hard to cover all loose ends in addressing that doubt. Impress this idea upon people.. that without reading lots of formal literature and gory details, in the end they are necessarily going to rely on faith.. faith in scientists who offer cohesion and lots of research ["Did you know there are hundreds of papers written every x days?"] or else in skeptic amateurs who ignore that detail. As a stat, show them how most who do go in depth end up coming out convinced (show the 97% agreement and how this number drops as knowledge decreases). .. We should be skeptical about skeptical websites online. Are the websites using data that is accurate? Are they explaining all the context? Are they accurately representing the state of the science? Are they conducting experiments or are they making things up? Etc. Turn the tables on skeptics to prove a little of their ideas in a rigorous fashion. Explain how its easy to create doubt but hard to prove anything or even come out with a theory that is consistent with the rest of reality and established science and engineering. ..Note: Monckton excels at giving the impression everything he says is backed by reams of precise mathematics... Now, to address the fact that there is skeptic math out there (eg, as that indirectly referenced by Monckton), I think this website should continue to debunk such skeptic papers and website arguments that have prominence. It should be easy to find the rebuttal to almost any skeptic "peer-reviewed" paper even if the peer-review is very weak and the paper is professionally ignored. Except for legit papers, just the fact a rebuttal exists goes far in limited debates (eg, to counter Monckton and similar speakers). Legit papers that don't dispel anything about AGW and which are used as padding on such skeptic lists should be so marked so as not to count in a tally against AGW. .. It's important to note that the goal of the IPCC is to present risk management scientific information. AGW may never be "proven" in various uses of that word, but there can certainly be overwhelming evidence behind it. The IPCC's goal is to define probabilities, much as is done in the insurance industry and by people managing risks every day. This should be made clear. In a public debate, I wouldn't want to get pinned (a) trying to show climate science has proven AGW or otherwise (b) offer only silence to allegations it hasn't. The answer is on risk management and abundance of evidence for or against. And speaking of debates with Monckton: challenge Monckton to agree that all claims will be listed at the end of the debate (or else don't count) and a followup will be done, first where each side lists references in support of their claims, and then where the other side can offer it's rebuttal.. and then the counter-rebuttals, etc, on some official debate webpage run by a neutral party.
61679. jzk at 13:23 PM on 10 March 2012
       Lindzen's Junk Science
       dana1981@18, Could you list them?
61680. muoncounter at 13:10 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       While this article deals with Texas Gov. RPerry's delusions, it is worth noting Oklahoma senator James Inhofe's latest take: Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) appeared on Voice of Christian Youth America’s radio program Crosstalk with Vic Eliason yesterday to promote his new book The Greatest Hoax: How the Global Warming Conspiracy Threatens Your Future, where he repeated his frequent claim that human influenced climate change is impossible because “God’s still up there.” Inhofe cited Genesis 8:22 to claim that it is “outrageous” and arrogant for people to believe human beings are “able to change what He is doing in the climate.” If you have difficulty believing your eyes, you can listen to the great man making his case.
61681. Jim Eager at 13:07 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       MattJ, the Eemian interglacial, the peak near 120,000 before present, *was* slightly warmer than the Holocene by ~1-2C, CO2 was slightly higher than pre-industrial Holocene CO2 (~300 vs ~280), and sea level was ~4-6 meters higher as well. But the current CO2 level of ~390 ppm is higher than at any time since the mid-Pliocene, when it was 2-3C warmer than today and sea level was ~25 meters higher.
61682. muoncounter at 12:59 PM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       Tom C, A different look comes from Figure 3b in Engdahl (your second graph here is Figure 3a). The decadal averages of earthquake number (M>= 6.5) is very flat since 1940. We note a slight increase in the number of earthquakes ... in the 1940-1960 period. Nothing noted about the even slighter bump in the 1990s. If this was a real increase with some sort of underlying physical cause, we would see a corresponding increase in M>= 7 numbers. We do not. I note that Googling 'increasing earthquake numbers since 1980' lead to lots of 'Mayan apocalypse' and 'end-of-times' websites. However, this geology blog is well worth the read: So, if we modify our graph to show an error bar of 2 standard deviations, you’ll notice that every result since 1990 fits inside this model! Simply put, there is absolutely nothing strange happening. In fact, thanks to this normal curve you can basically predict, with a 99.7% chance of success, that an earthquake of equal / greater than M6.0 will occur somewhere around the world within the next 3.5 days. Please, let's end this distraction into armchair seismology.
61683. MattJ at 12:48 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       The article is a good article, true, but there are a couple small points that if addressed would make it even better, and that by a lot. 1) Homo Sapiens should be capitalized throughout 2) the text would be a lot easier to follow if it did not appear to contradict the graph: just eyeballing the graph, it looks like the highest temperature WAS the peak near 120,000 before present, while the text gives an earlier date for a higher one. this suggest 3) the diagram would be greatly improved if there was some indication of the vertical temperature scale. 4) lose the sarcastic line about what Perry would prefer. That really does not help make the case at all. We all know Perry is a Creationist too.
61684. MattJ at 12:43 PM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       @19 Yes, we will survive as a species, but our near descendants will live in such misery, they will wish we had not survived. And those cultures that still practice ancestor worship (think China) will replace it with ancestor cursing if they preserve just enough scientific knowledge to understand why they are suffering so.
61685. jzk at 12:22 PM on 10 March 2012
       CO2 lags temperature
       Your article states "CO2 amplifies the warming which cannot be explained by orbital cycles alone." How do you square that with Roe, G. (2006), In defense of Milankovitch, Geophys. Res. Lett., 33, L24703, doi:10.1029/2006GL027817 "In other words, variations in melting precede variations in CO2. Thus, the relatively small amplitude of the CO2 radiative forcing and the absence of a lead over dV/dt both suggest that CO2 variations play a relatively weak role in driving changes in global ice volume compared to insolation variations." and "Furthermore, variations in atmospheric CO2 appear to lag the rate of change of global ice volume. This implies only a secondary role for CO2 – variations in which produce a weaker radiative forcing than the orbitally-induced changes in summertime insolation – in driving changes in global ice volume." Thanks!
61686. Chemware at 11:39 AM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       "Humans survived past climate changes". Well, no, not really. Our "cousins" the Neanderthals didn't survive the last ice age.
61687. Tom Curtis at 11:06 AM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       JH inline @58 and @59, if a poster is identified as trolling, there should be no question of feeding them as their posting privileges should have been removed. However, while their posting privileges have not been removed, the correct policy for posters who care about truth and our future is to rebut their nonsense when it appears. It is intolerable that we should have a moderation policy that is both unable to silence trolls, but does silence the rebutals of the the myths they spread.
       Moderator Response: [JH] The current Comments Policy does not explicitly state that trolling is bannable offense. If you want to chase Norman's tail, that is your perrogative.
61688. Tom Curtis at 11:02 AM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       muoncounter @61, the previously linked (@57) Engdahl and Villsenor indicate that the centennial catalog is complete for magnitude 5.5 plus earthquakes from 1964 forward. Therefore the approximately 50% increase in magnitude 6 plus earthquakes since 1980 as shown by the USGS is almost certainly accurate. It is not statistically significant in that it does not show significant long term deviation from the centenial average of 150 earthquakes per year, but it is a real difference between the (historically low) number of earthquakes in the 1980s. What remains a mystery is why Norman thinks an approximately 50% increase in magnitude 6 plus earthquakes since the 1980s proves the inaccuracy of the 50% increase in geophysical catastrophes as recorded by Munich Re over the same period.
61689. muoncounter at 10:57 AM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       Lucas Verma#17: "During the Holocene Climatic Optimum... for the Northern Hemisphere, longer more intense summers and the same duration but more intense winters.... southern summers and winters were more moderate." Do you have any references to support this? "Were winters ten degrees colder and summers ten degrees hotter..." Do you see a mechanism that results in this combination?
61690. muoncounter at 10:48 AM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       Norman#58: Thanks for correcting my error; 2011 does indeed total 205 mag 6 or greater earthquakes. However, the question of statistical significance still stands. In addition, your position is based on half an hour with a spreadsheet and is without any published references. Until you can answer the challenge of finding some literature that supports your position, it remains unsubstantiated. There are factors that might explain your perceived trend: As others have pointed out, the impact on the numbers of improved detection systems worldwide is something professional seismologists are able to quantify. This post is about floods, droughts and impacts of climate change. Geophysical catastrophes are a sidebar. Until you produce suitable references, your excursion into armchair seismology has little weight and can be construed as an attempt to hijack this thread.
61691. Tom Curtis at 10:17 AM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       Norman @59, you are correct. I have not been following your posts as I find you to be a dishonest time waster. Never-the-less, you have acknowledged that there is no overall trend, so my previous post was beside the point, and the accusation of cherry picking was inaccurate I would say I apologize for that, except the accusation is inaccurate as to its basis, but not wrong. If your point is explicitly to criticize the Munich Re graph, there is no justification for your using a data base of hazards to criticize a data base of catastrophes. This is particularly the case in that the USGS provides several data bases of catastrophes which you could have consulted. You could have, for example, looked at the number of earthquakes causing 1000 or more deaths, which show half decade figures as follows: 1980-84: 6 1985-89: 5 1990-94: 5 1995-99: 9 2000-05: 4 2005-09: 4 2010- April 2011: 3 Hardly evidence of a rising trend. You might also have tabulated the significant earthquakes, not all of which are magnitude 6 plus, but of which there are a lot less than the 6 plus earthquakes. You may find a rising trend there, or you may not. Given that you have so vehemently argued in other threads that the Munich Re data is irrelevant because it measures catastrophes, not hazards, it is inexcusable (and very selective) for you to not make this distinction when you criticize their data now. What is more, and perhaps more important, is the fact that Munich Re show a 50% increase in geophysical catastrophes over the period since 1980. How then, can you by pointing at data which shows a 50% increase in earthquakes over the same period call their data into question? What is your argument here? That the rise in Munich Re's geophysical catastrophes matches the rise in earthquakes and therefore it must be inaccurate? Is that seriously your argument? Finally, Munich Re's data is based on insurance data and newspaper reports. It is known to understate catastrophes in areas with low take up of European (and US) insurance such as Asia, South America, and particularly Africa for that reason. This does not mean the trends they show are not representative, particularly as similar trends are shown in areas with high population density and extensive insurance take up over a prolonged period (such as Germany).
61692. Rob Honeycutt at 10:05 AM on 10 March 2012
       Peter Sinclair interview with Michael Mann
       One would think that if you were invited to conduct an inquiry at the invitation of a Congressman that you'd at least attempt to bring someone - at least one person - with some understanding of climate systems. Maybe that's just me. I remember back in the day when C Everett Koop was asked by President Reagan to do a study on the health effects on women who had had abortions. The expectation being that, if there were post-procedural impacts there might be reason to ban abortions. Koop, who was appointed by Reagan, stated that the results of the data did not support the position. There's a pretty good wiki account of this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Everett_Koop
61693. chriskoz at 09:42 AM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       Thanks John Russell @7 four giving us verbal strength in dealing with denialists. There is a saying "don't cut the branch on which you're sitting", invented I guess by loppers. It's becoming obvious that the "civilisation" is doing that by mining and burning fosils and altering the carbon cycle in unprecedented manner. The problem of altering carbon cycle with consequence of AGW is just one example. Another is land use change, forest destruction, chemical contamination, which all contribute to alteration of environment and ongoing mass species extinction. Overuse of DDT was one example. Coal Seam Gas mining is another emerging example (both chemical contamination and carbon cycle alteration is involved here). Until the economical balance of so called "civilisation & proggress" does not include the environmental sustainability, mankind will continue "cutting the branch on which it's sitting"
61694. JP40 at 09:31 AM on 10 March 2012
       We've been through climate changes before
       An impact powerful enough to vaporize all the world's oceans would do it, but I don't think it is possible to do it just with co2, and civilization would collapse long before. I think civilization could collapse as soon as 2100. Most major cities around the world are close to sea level.
61695. shoyemore at 09:27 AM on 10 March 2012
       Peter Sinclair interview with Michael Mann
       Michael Mann seems to becoming more feisty and combative by the day. It is as if his shackles have been ripped off. Here's hoping we see and hear more from him.
61696. Norman at 09:20 AM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       Tom Curtis @ 56 I do not think you have read my previous posts based upon this comment. "Indeed, it is quite droll of you to cherry pick a short period which gives the appearance of a rising trend when no such rise can be seen in centenial records:" I think you are a very intelligent person but I do not think you have followed my line of thought at all or understand the point I was making with the earthquake data. So to get you in the loop. The Munich Re graph in the OT starts at 1980. I am not trying to make a conclusion that earthquake numbers are overall rising. (note the not). I was pointing out a simple fact that the Munich Re chart was showing a decline or at least a flatline geophysical related catastrophes. But from 1980 to 2011 the frequency of 6+ magnitude (considered strong and will damage populated areas if they strike there) has increased. If you actually read some of my posts you will have seen this. Please read post 41 and you will see me address this very issue you are bringing up.
       Moderator Response: [JH] Please do not feed this troll.
61697. Norman at 09:11 AM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       muoncounter @55 You did not look at the date on your source, it only goes to August 2011, it is not the full year. Completed list of 6+ earthquakes in 2011. 185+19+1=205
       Moderator Response: [JH] Please do not feed this troll.
61698. Composer99 at 09:07 AM on 10 March 2012
       Peter Sinclair interview with Michael Mann
       Kevin C: The fact that we haven't all asphyxiated is pretty good evidence that CO2 is well-mixed in the atmosphere, and even the science-ignorant such as myself can figure that one out. :)
61699. Composer99 at 09:05 AM on 10 March 2012
       Peter Sinclair interview with Michael Mann
       Caveat to the above: The number of total & 5-star reviews is as of the time of the posting of the above comment.
61700. Tom Curtis at 09:02 AM on 10 March 2012
       A Sunburnt Country
       Sorry, I forgot to include the link to Engdahl and Villsenor in my previous post.

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