I love the illustration. I’m in financial services. The story we always told was how the price of butter in Bangladesh predicted the future return of the S&P 500.

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2007/09/20/butter-in-bangladesh-predicts-the-stock-market.aspx

You’re right it’s easy to build an in sample model that accurately describes the sample. The real test is how it does out of sample. Can it make a prediction and have that prediction hold up to the scrutiny of observation? It doesn’t happen in the complex multi-factor world of securities markets. Is climate so much simpler that the models can work there? I haven’t seen any evidence yet that suggests it’s so.

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Damn! And here I was sitting on a bunch of cheap stocks! I should have moved my money!

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Matt,
You rock. Though I personally am pretty sure that even sudden climate changes won’t have a profound impact on much. “Consider the lilies of the field. God clothes them and takes care of them,…” explains why it takes so much work to garden and keep the li’l buggers alive (I myself am not a gardener, but I live with them), yet they do fine out in the wild, “… and yet not even Solomon in all his glory was dressed as richly as these.” (Yes, I know, I just quoted the Bible on a science forum. And to those who disagree with such practices, maybe its YOUR turn not to have such a narrow mind.) And I’ve always been a little skeptical on “alternate energy sources” of any kind. Especially since we’ve discovered we can find oil just about anywhere. (Not only do we have bacteria that can manufacture it, we have plenty of proof (look it up on ScienceDaily) that rocks make it ABIOTICALLY. )

Sadly, I think much more than just money-grabbing socialism (ironic, ain’t it, that socialists seek more money than capitalists?) is going on. Its idolatry. Bow down to money. Bow down to politicians. Bow down to Al Gore. Bow down to your saviors. Bow down to the ecosystem. Bow down to mother nature. These people who say these things say they are “progressive,” that they bring “progress,” but could it merely be that they are progressing backwards? Can’t it be that we, having come out of the wilderness and seeing the bright light of truth have gone running back into the forest of bewilderment, greediness, pervertedness, deceitfulness, and hostility? (Note that “Babylon,” whose name was given to that nation by the Hebrew, sounds a lot like the Hebrew word for “confusion.”)

We’ve built our towers to the stars, and found a God who we have found will not give us godhood, will not give us power, but has instead set forth a destroyer to smash our idols, smash our towers, smash our dreams and ambitions, and we have become so frightened of him, that we fall screaming from our loftiness into the black cold despair of our tribal ancestors, and into the clutches of monsters like Obama, FDR, Mao (admittedly, the former two are better than the latter), the usual (Hitler, Stalin, etc.) found on your list of dictators, the Caesars (ALL of them), etc..

And He has decreed that “those who fall from Me shall lie down in Sheol and shall never rise again.” People will rather die than give up their idols.

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I’m not a climatologist, but I have written simulations, and have studied physics and complexity theory fairly intensely. And after my experience writing simulations of complex systems, I don’t even want to hear what anybodys climate model has to say, or how much peer review there has been. I don’t care about a missing hot spot or any such. I already know that models can go wrong in ways that we least suspect. And the earth is just too damn big and complicated to promise any decent climate simulation, let alone value asessment… especially on a long term basis.

How is plant, ocean and algea life going to respond and evolve in response to extra carbon as air-carbon concentration is obviously important in that arena? A hard one to guess, but for certain, plants will be looking for ways to make good use of that extra carbon available. What is mankinds future set of energy options? No one knows. http://www.nanosolar.com/ if that web site is not a fraud, then coal may already be on its way towards obsoletion. And I’m surprised I didn’t see this next link while scanning along. http://www.solarpowerrocks.com/solar-trends/a-sick-graph-iraq-war-spending-vs-spending-on-renewable-energy/

I.e. for the expense of the iraq war, we could have likely solved our reliance on foreign oil problem.

Human nature is not a constant, the nature of plants is not a constant. The nature of bacteria and algea is not a constant. Measurement instruments are not as reliable as we would like them to be and neither are physics models. The entire system is chaotic, meaning that its unpredictable, and that the smallest event could have a most incredible impact in the future.

The ecology is damn f-ing intelligent, and it will respond to that carbon in ways none of us ever dreamt of. Trying to predict this whole system with a computer is like trying to dig up mount everest with a spoon. Furthermore, value systems are a problem in and of themselves. Who can prove that a warmer earth is worse than a cooler earth? Can’t be done, especially since we don’t know just how much warmer we’re talking about, or how much time would be involved, and especially since value systems are inherently centric and subjective in nature. More heat might suck for New York when the water rises, but it might really kick ass for Russia and Canada when their frozen wasteland suddenly boils over with life and vibrance.

People will find ways to cool themselves. They will go to cooler climates. They will move to higher ground. Trying to act now in extremely expensive ways in order to stop an unpredictable problem that may not be a real threat, or might actually end up being a solution to some other problem is just wrong.

Everything that happens in this whole system impacts everything else in unforseen ways, for good and for bad. For locally valued good and somewhere else valued bad. If the U.S. can be liable for others damaged by global warming, I say it can demand money from those favored by it… If it can ever be proven as fact to begin with, which I highly doubt could happen any time soon. Maybe we should be taxing everyone elses use of technology coming from here since it benefits them. .. Its not really realistic to create a cash flow avenue to compensate for every mutual benefit or damage happening in society is it? And then whatever happened to survival of the fittest? Taking from the strong and giving to the weak might be an act of fairness…. or it might be a serious detriment to the gene pool.

The system is just too damned complex. These little climate models…. if I don’t laugh.. they are just a tiny spec of the whole picture, and even if internally accurate, subject to external variables that are unpredictable, most of which we seem to be ignoring in public. In fact, the whole picture is so big and detailed, that neither the public nor our political leaders even has enough time to even read a realistic asessment of every significant issue…

Look, if you wanna save the world, help alternative energy technology reach fruition or promote advances in the human culture systematic or some such effort that we can be more certain will be a benefit. Things like cap and trade are just bullshit. Stop wallowing around in an endless ocean of complexity we will never ever get on top of, I don’t care how many scientists we throw at it. This kind of decision simply can not be made with reliable positive benefits without a lot more hard data. We are going to have to wait for the climate to show us what its going to do.

Thank God for whatever he/she is/isn’t and accept that our lives can end as abruptly as they began with nearly as little personal power over the one as the other. (believe me.. this is something I know very personally.. suddenly lost my wife to cancer, and a few years later, nearly died of digestion/nerve malfunction out of the blue myself. No one had a clue or even suspected where they should be researching… it just happened.) We could spend trillions of dollars on global warming only to be struck by a meteor, a disease, or thermonuclear war. I’d say disease is a far larger threat than global warming. Dump your time and money there instead…

And if you are for depopulation like so many leftists, what the hell do you care about any of these potential major threats? They all promote your agenda anyways. Leftists who want to depopulate the planet should be ushering in global warming and the ocean overshooting its bounds… except for one thing… Damnit, they can’t make money and grow government by telling people not to worry.

Worry worry worry, act now, there is a demon beyond the horizon and only I can save you from it if you give me your money. You can’t see it, but I can. Its the devil, its his demons, its the wrath of God, its global warming, its sure economic destruction happening next month, no, its the y2k bug. The president can save you. No, its the pope, .. no, its all social pyramids.. social pyramids save people and people are helpless on their own. They are stupid. They would do everything wrong without experts and without taxes. New yorkers won’t build buildings somewhere else because the water level is going up. They won’t even see see that water. They’ll try to build skyscrapers in 5o feet of ocean water.

Berievement counsellors know just how damaging fear can be. When your brain starts to fear and worry, your body goes into an excited state. It stops solving the problems it needs to solve and waits in readiness for the brain to say jump. The blood leaves the digestive tract and goes to the muscles. Your food sits there and rots and damages the digestive tract. Day after day, month after month, year after year the damage etches away at your healthy system. It has been said that grieving for a lost loved one can cause as much damage to your body as 20 years of smoking cigarettes. And I testify to you of my own experience, it is the truth. Fear is a fine thing for short periods, but at length, it will drain us of the strength we need to deal with the things we know are real.

Lets not waste huge quantities of strength before we know that it has to be done. If some scientists want to do research, I am all for that, but making large scale economic shifts could very easily cause more harm than good.

Yes, I am a skeptic. I have written simulations. I have learned that logic systems don’t hold a candle to the bad-ass complexity of the real reality. Just a tiny spec of reality can calculate a complex fractal lichtenberg figure as an optimazation to the value system of thermodynamic statistics in far less than the wink of an eye. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lichtenberg_figure

Our computers will never follow the whole big beastie. Just be patient… wait for the data to come in. Don’t jump all over hell like chicken little. The data will get here. Just wait. Most likely, climate changes will be slow, and people will have time to respond to them in a billion different ways with billions of adjustments that hit the nail right on the head instead of one or a few big knee-jerk wastes.

The only real threat to be concerned with for now is large, sudden, unexpected climate changes. I believe that this possibility should be the real direction for public discussion. The theory about the ocean currents dying of fresh water infusion. Stuff like that.. Does anyone have good things to say about this kind of issue, because I’m a little clueless here, and its my only concern in this direction.

Matt

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Your understanding of modern “education” (read: “indoctrination”) is, unfortunately, appropriate. While the problem is not universal, it is pervasive enough to present a grave danger unless parents (or the students themselves) take on the responsibility to self-educate. Thankfully, today’s internet provides an opportunity for balance, though wading through the nonsense (even knowing enough to discern nonsense from sense) can be daunting.

Best,

Bob

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I do not claim to know everything since many, many facts/truths remain locked behind closed doors, whether it is history, or science, I know, we are NOT given all the information out there. That is just basic Dictatorship 101: “Do NOT help the enemy” and the enemy is the raising of intellect via education; we have today, ‘edu’indoctrination and it is sick.

Even the ‘wonderful’ Henry Ford recognized that piecemeal serves profits best. Wouldn’t want a united workforce (as in unions–well, unions are corrupt today as well), or a workforce that may create competition if they ever left YOUR company. Manipulation occurs DAILY upon the masses and MSM is the destroyer of life… along with Public Ownership of companies

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We’re still waiting for the scientific study that discerns the human impact (not assumes it). It’s been several decades since James Hansen, et al, proclaimed humans responsible for “climate change” yet we have absolutely no scientific evidence nor any plausible theory to either explain how or discern the human component using established scientific procedures.

Greenhouse gases and their impact on climate change are poorly understood and their impact is generally blown way out of proportion to what both historical evidence and basic science tell us.

Warmists rely on ignorance and deceit to “convince” people to be afraid of “catastrophic” global warming.

The Associated Press just printed yet another propaganda piece in the form of a “story” of the decade’s climate change issue. They blatantly claim that polar ice over the past three years is dramatically being lost … when, in fact, the minimum Arctic summer ice extent has grown substantially for the past two years and is thicker than originally thought and the vast bulk of the Antarctic continues to cool.

As long as “news” media continue to propagandize, there will be people who buy the lies. But, in the end, Truth will win out.

Bob

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