Garth Paltridge is an Australian atmospheric physicist with 45 years experience. He worked with CSIRO, the WMO, NOAA, and as Professor and Director of the Institute of Antarctic and Southern Oceans Studies. He has explained why he’s skeptical of the theory of man-made global warming in his book — The Climate Caper: Facts and Fallacies of Global Warming.
A less-than-nobel consensus
Guest Post by Garth Paltridge
We hear that Julia Gillard is happy to have the CSIRO, the Bureau of Meteorology and the Australian Academy of Science on her side while making her arguments for a carbon tax. Well of course she is. She and her predecessor bought them. And bought them but good. Over the last couple of years her Department of Climate Change (the DCC) gave them 27 million dollars in the form of research grants. That pays a fair swag of the salaries of the CSIRO and Bureau climate scientists who make up the majority of all employed climate scientists in Australia.
University climate researchers, while relatively few in number, are vocal enough to be heard in many public forums. Julia has bought them too with another 5.5 million dollars from the same source. That sort of money is handy in the university environment, since it is mostly on top of already assured salaries. Moreover, it is fairly easy to get. Certainly it is much easier than normal university research funds which come mainly from the Australian Research Council – this after a soul-destroying application and peer-review procedure that wipes out 80% of the applications and reduces the individual grant moneys to sub-optimal levels. Julia’s climate money is very different. Among other things it can be put towards such niceties as business-class travel to the many international workshops and conferences that are part of the climate-change industry.
Monopolistic Funding
The bottom line is that virtually all climate research in Australia is funded from one source – namely, the government department which has the specific task of selling to the public the idea that something drastic and expensive has to be done to the structure of society in the name of mitigating climate change. And if you think that government agencies shouldn’t be in the game of social engineering, then you are way behind the times. Over the last two years more than 100 million dollars was distributed by the DCC for exactly that purpose.
So there can be no doubt that climate-research grant recipients know perfectly well that scepticism concerning the climate-change story does very little for their careers. One therefore wonders a bit about the much-vaunted consensus of the global warming establishment regarding climatic doom.
Surely there is no way a whole scientific discipline can be subverted, either consciously or subconsciously, by crass materialism? Well, maybe not in the long term. But if past experience is any guide, the sorting out of a problem of vested scientific interest can take many decades. At the moment, climate scientists are trapped in the coils of a disaster theory sold prematurely to the world at large. They are supporting the theory with long-term forecasts about an atmosphere-ocean system whose behaviour in many respects is inherently unpredictable. On the one hand, public discussion of the uncertainties associated with the ‘main conclusions of the science’ must be discouraged, and on the other there is a need for sufficient uncertainty to justify a continued flow of research funding. In short, they are in a right-royal mess of political correctness.
Scientists are human too!
The average climate scientist is extremely reluctant to go against the tide of official opinion set by the research activists of his field, whatever might be his private thoughts on the matter. Loyalty to colleagues gets in the way, and perhaps also the seductive attraction of a ‘noble cause’. With those sorts of justification, it is much easier for an idealistic scientist to be mindful of the fact that, when Julia buys people, they have to stay bought if they want to continue in the game.
Where is the independent advice?
Surely there are independent scientific establishments whose advice can be trusted by both government and public? Well yes there are – most of the time. The Australian Academy of Science is a prime example. But one has to mumble a bit when talking about the independence of such bodies in the context of climate change. They generally don’t have much in-house expertise on the subject, and when asked for advice, are obliged to put together committees of advisors from the relevant research establishments. It is not too difficult to imagine where the advisors come from. Moreover, it costs money to service a committee. Guess where that comes from.
Would ‘big-oil’ funded research be any less reliable than this?
Garth Paltridge
Other posts tagged: Garth Paltridge.
Garth Paltridge is a Visiting Fellow at the Australian National University and Emeritus Professor and Honorary Research Fellow at the Institute of Antarctic and Southern Oceans Studies (IASOS), University of Tasmania. In his career, he worked as an atmospheric physicist, predominantly with CSIRO and briefly with NOAA , and has published more than 100 books and scientific papers. He published “The Climate Caper: Facts and Fallacies of Global Warming
The good news is, there are a number of people in Australia such as Professor Carter who tell the truth and there is no “funding” of any kind involved at all.
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The problem is worse than Garth Paltridge says because the administrations of scientific institutions have been systematically usurped worldwide; n.b. not only in Australia.
Richard Lindzen details the problem – and names names – in a shocking paper (that is an entertaining read);
ref. Lindzen RS, ‘Climate Science: Is it currently designed to answer questions?’ Physics and Society
(2008).
It can be read as a pdf at
http://arxiv.org/abs/0809.3762
Richard
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Friends:
The link I provided in #2 only provides the abstract and submission history of Lindzen’s excellent paper.
Its full text can be accessed at
http://climatephysics.com/2008/08/31/lindzen-climate-science-is-it-currently-designed-to-answer-questions/
I aologise for any inconvenience my failure to provide a direct link may have caused.
Richard
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Garth Paltridge has quite a few complaints regarding funding – but if he wishes to disagree with climate science, he should present some solid science contradicting the consensus.
By solid science, I mean alternative theory(ies) for the current warming that match the various observed key signs (warming nights, cooling stratosphere, increasing downward LW radiation, decreasing outgoing LW from the top of the atmosphere, etc.) – with supporting data. It would be good if such theories explained why CO2 is not following the understood laws of physics and causing the warming, too – any alternative theory has to account for how the current theory is wrong.
Or, if he wishes to disagree with global warming itself (unlikely, but…) he should indicate why 90% of the glaciers retreating, Arctic/Antarctic/Greenland ice mass decreasing, growth zones migrating towards the poles, multiple temperature records in near-complete agreement showing warming, etc., don’t indicate rising temperatures.
—
He could in fact pull a Galileo maneuver, presenting an alternative theory that contradicts the consensus. Of course, that only works if your alternative theory is correct…
(The troll is back,he is in his first post sliding off topic) CTS
————–
[Garth Paltridge wrote a whole book about the science and the evidence. –JN]
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Like deep throat said, follow the money.
Pointman
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The snake is eating its tail.
In order for the governments to come up with a new and novel tax, they created Global Warming (or hitched onto it as the most likely source of revenue is more accurate). So they pay the shills to continue to preach the gospel hoping that no one sees that the emperor is naked. So as the science is discredited, expect governments to pour MORE money to the shills, not less. They have invested a lot in getting this new tax passed and are reluctant to walk away from what they perceive as the best gravy train since income tax.
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[…] Nova has a guest post from Garth Paltridge, Professor and Director of the Institute of Antarctic and Southern Oceans […]
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Half-time scores:
AGW pseudo science 0 vs Science 15
AGW Politics 142 vs Other Polticians 1
AGW Media 27 vs Other Media 0
Looks like Science has their game under control, but the major league AGW teams appear certain to win their qualifying finals.
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KR:
April 15th, 2011 at 5:43 am
KR you show your ignorance when you ask Paltridge to put up an alternate theory to AGW. Science does not work that way. The proponents of a new theory for an observed phenomenon must provide very strong evidence for that theory to be accepted as fact. Opponents of the new theory need only show that it does not explain the observations any better than the existing theory does. And if they find an example where the claims made in the new theory are not backed up by observations, then that new theory fails completely. Einstein is reputed to have said that he did not care about 100 scientists saying he was wrong, as it would only take 1 of them to prove it, if he was actually wrong.
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Bravo KR.
And while he was at it, the good Professor should have solved string theory, calculated how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, and explained why the chicken crossed the road.
Twit.
The article is about the money behind the one-sided financing of “climate research” in OZ. And that is precisely what the Professor has written about.
If you would like him to write an alternative theory to the preposterous, unscientific “theory” of AGW, might I suggest you politely approach him on the subject, offer to arrange funding for his efforts, and seek assurances from somewhere like “realclimate” or “skepticalscience” that it will be published as an alternative talking point.
You people really are becoming desperate, aren’t you.
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It is so much like those promotions using “door stop average punters” who spruik the virtues of washing detergent when “surprised” by the interviewer. We all are expected to believe it is true, natural & from the heart.
“BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!!!”
This game by the government & its lap-dog institutions is so patronising & insulting it could pass as pathetic humour if the targeted ends of the endeavour were not so frightening , far reaching & just plain wrong.
Go Julia!…just go
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That should have been:-
Go Julia!…just go & not to the UN where it appears to be a favourite lucrative retirement gig
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Ray Boorman and Memoryvault
The reason AGW, CO2 warming, and the rest get funding is because they match the data with a consistent theory. A disprovable (just show that CO2 doesn’t absorb/emit IR, for example) theory consistent with physics and data.
I know Jo Nova makes a great deal on the “tropospheric hot spot”; current data appears to indicate that tropospheric warming exists on the short term, and on the long term (many caveats, I’ll be the first to state that) that radiosondes have historically bad calibrations – more data needed.
But there’s still:
– Increasing CO2
– CO2 physics that indicate increases will warm the planet
– Surface temperature change
– More warming at night than day
– Stratospheric cooling
– Tropopause height increasing
– Ocean heat content increasing
– Downward IR at the surface (increasing)
– Outgoing IR at top of atmosphere (decreasing)
– Isotopic evidence that the extra CO2 is from us
– on and on and on…
All consistent with AGW, and none of the other proposed causes. If I were in the funding agencies, I would certainly be disposed towards science that actually tracks the data.
(Now completely off topic.Do you remember what the topic of this thread is?) CTS
—-
[When in doubt, throw 28 million radiosondes out… we can’t make a simple weather balloon work, but highly complex models are OK. They measure the temperature 10km above the ground better than the thermometers that are up there. — JN]
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What a brilliant start to the day on at least three fronts!
1. Garth’s excellent article clearly spelling out how scientists and others in our previously respected organisations CSIRO and BoM have been bought and subsequently bullied into toeing the Government line. We all know this is exactly what happened in the setting up of the UNIPCC!
2. Financial expert Ross Greenwood this morning on Channel 9 clearly spelling out the effect of previous Govt.greening policies on power prices and showing the drastic effect implementation of the proposed Green/Labor Carbon Tax would have in escalating those prices.
3. The Union’s Paul Howes, after attending at least six recent meetings with workers, threatening to withdraw Union support from the Labor Party if even one of their members loses his job because of the Carbon Tax. This indicates the current Union leadership and their members are finally waking up to the fact they are being screwed by their former leaders Combet, Shorten, Ferguson and others they have voted into Parliament. Several Union leaders are meeting today to apparently further discuss the effects on workers of the Government’s Carbon Tax
For an entree yesterday in the Melbourne Herald Sun, there was Australia’s leading business commentator Terry McCrann’s hilarious but incisive article (“Pssst, want to buy a used tax, only driven around Canberra”)on the unspecified household carbon tax compensation payments announced by Combet and Gillard, claiming “millions of Australian households will be better off under a carbon price”.
Greg Combet, Julia Gillard, Bob Brown, Christine Milne and all the other hangers-on spouting these lines are showing more and more they have adopted some of the methods of Hitler’s former propaganda specialist Dr.Joseph Goebbels:i.e., if you’re going to lie make it a big one and keep repeating it until it is accepted by a gullible public as the truth!
The more they pursue that line the better as far as I’m concerned because a rapidly increasing number of people are realising Labor/Green MP’s are becoming totally unbelievable in this area.
(I apologise if this link doesn’t work for the Terry McCrann piece, but try and look it up anyway): heraldsun.com.au/business
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KR- No he doesn’t have to do anything like that. You have to show how his commentary about research funding is wrong.
Even if his post was about Greenhouse Theory, he wouldn’t have to put up an alternative hypothesis.
And if he did put up an alternative theory, your role as a global warming supporter would be to show with evidence where it is wrong.
Get it? No, probably not.
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Ken Stewart @ 14
Yes, this thread is indeed about the funding. The thing is, I’ve yet to see the funding agency that has enough money that they can throw it at science unlikely to work, unlikely to produce results. 70-80% of funding requests get denied at many agencies – the ones that get the $$$ are those that have some plausible chance of producing new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed, in the view of the funding agency reviewers.
Lindzen still gets funding, even though several papers of his have been refuted – he produces science worth considering. Not a bad model to follow.
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If the science of climate change has been settled, then why do we need more climate scientists? And more climate “science” funding?
Perhaps some of those countless millions could be spent on validating the computer models? No cheating, of course…
Cheers,
Speedy
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KR @ 4,12 & 15
I don’t usually feed trolls but if you have something that no-one else knows about, Dr.Roy Spencer’s challenge to the Climate Research community is still open.
“If the science really is that settled, then this challenge should be easy:
Show me one peer-reviewed paper that has ruled out natural, internal climate cycles as the cause of most of the recent warming in the thermometer record.
Studies that have suggested that an increase in the total output of the sun cannot be blamed, do not count…the sun is an external driver. I’m talking about natural, internal variability.
The fact is that the ‘null hypothesis’ of global warming has never been rejected: That natural climate variability can explain everything we see in the climate system.”
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/02/a-challenge-to-the-climate-research-community
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KR@12
All sounds very impressive. If of course natural internal climate variability (Roy Spencer) is enough explain any slight last century rise in global temperature and given that some data indicates that increases in atmospheric CO2 concentrations lag increases in temperature it seems your excitable little crowd may have the cart before the horse.
Now we don’t want anyone to think we rely on arguments from authority (who in their right mind doesn’t) but we really haven’t got a clue who you are. On the other hand Roy Spencer, a highly credentialed scientist has this to say:
“Global warming” refers to the global-average temperature increase that has been observed over the last one hundred years or more. But to many politicians and the public, the term carries the implication that mankind is responsible for that warming. This website describes evidence from my group’s government-funded research that suggests global warming is mostly natural, and that the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.
Believe it or not, very little research has ever been funded to search for natural mechanisms of warming…it has simply been assumed that global warming is manmade. This assumption is rather easy for scientists since we do not have enough accurate global data for a long enough period of time to see whether there are natural warming mechanisms at work.
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OT – I went to the Greens website and entered “Gas Fracking” into the search – no result.
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Keith H @ 17
Spencer’s challenge is interesting, in that he hasn’t proposed a disprovable hypothesis. He might as well be talking about little green men causing climate change.
That said:
Dessler 2010
Swanson 2009
DelSole et al. 2011
and others demonstrate that internal climate variability can account for +/- 0.3C temperature swings. We’ve seen +0.8 in the last 100 years or so; it’s not the internal variability – it’s just not big enough.
If Roy Spencer has actual data to support his hypotheses (rather than saying things like “The ENSO is caused by cloud variability” with no data), he should publish it. Not go the blog/unreviewed book route.
[Paltridge himself explains why Dessler is meaningless Paltridge also published a study showing humidity in the Upper Trop didn’t do what the models predicted. — JN]
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I would give KR a point by point rebuttal, but what is the use.
What the DEVIL is the use???
He would just come back with 17 more of these, and absolutely nothing about his belief system or his tone would change.
I wonder why weak minded individuals are so easily duped by “scientific sounding jargon” spoken with “authority”?
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Brian G Valentine @ 21
I wonder why weak minded individuals are so easily duped by
“scientific sounding jargon”“content free insults” spoken with“authority”“indignation”?Hmmm… I think I’ll follow the data, not the insults.
I have, on occasion, changed my worldview based on solid information presented to me. Have you?
(Why not follow THIS topic instead? A less-than-nobel consensus Guest Post by Garth Paltridge) CTS
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Brian G Valentine @ 21
Incidentally, Brian, I see you’re based in DC. Do you ever get up to Bethesda? If so, I’ll treat you to a beer or two and a discussion. I would love to get a better idea of why you hold your position so strongly.
(You can talk about this topic right here with Brian.A less-than-nobel consensus) CTS
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I am trying to think my way through the physics of the earth/atmospheric system to try and make sense of the ‘climate wars’. There is an claim that I have occasionally heard, but I cannot get my head around the physics behind it. I would appreciate any thoughts or constructive criticism that solves this..
My (simplified) understanding of the ‘greenhouse effect” is as follows;
Imagine a 25W incandescent light-bulb that is painted dark blue, and wrapped up in a mildly insulating cloth. The heat generated by the light bulb represents the energy from the sun that strikes the earth and is converted to long wave radiation. The mildly insulating cloth represents the CO2 and other GHGs that impede the escape of the long wave radiation as it makes its way back out to space. Once everything warms up and reaches steady-state, there is 25W of power being radiated from the outer surface of the cloth. The temperature of the surface of the light bulb is higher than what it would otherwise be if the insulating cloth were not present. The increase in temperature is the consequence of conservation of energy – the rate of energy escaping from the system is the same as the rate of energy input to the system (as energy cannot just ‘disappear’), but a bigger temperature differential is required to maintain the same heat flow through the thermal insulation.
If I add an additional thin layer of insulation to the one that is already there (aka. increase CO2 levels), the temperature inside the insulation I will increase still further. (I realise this ignores phenomena such as ‘saturation’ and the wavelength specific filtering that GHGs perform – but I think for the purposes of my conundrum, the model still holds).
Here is the conundrum.
I have often heard (Flannery/Garnut etc..) the claim that an increase in global temperature will result in ‘more frequent AND more violent’ cyclones/storms etc.. This appears to violate conservation of energy.
I assume that a cyclone is primarily driven by the vapourization energy stored in surface water vapor. This warm, humid air is transported to higher altitudes where the energy can be radiated into space, causing the water vapor to condense and fall back to earth as cooler rain. If the upper atmospheric wind shear is ‘just right’ these columns of rising warm vapor/descending cool rain/air can set up a positive feedback system, causing more humid, warm air to be sucked up etc….and create a cyclone/hurricane. As a consequence, a cyclone dumps a large amount of energy into space – more than the ‘average’ energy outflow of a ‘normal’ non-cyclone day.
After the cyclone, the surface and atmosphere have been cooled.
In order to have another storm of equal intensity, the system has to be ‘recharged’ by solar radiation – which we will assume is incident at a constant rate. As water vapor is the primary source of energy storage for storms (rather than CO2), and as water vapor is ‘abundant’ (over the oceans anyway!) it would seem that the rate of recharge is limited by the incoming rate of solar radiation.
Assuming that a cyclone ‘dumps’ energy into space at a ‘greater than average’ rate, then ‘more frequent AND more intense’ storms would be dumping above-average energy more often. Consequently – to maintain conservation of energy – during the intervals between storms, the atmosphere would need to radiate LESS than it currently does. This seems incompatible with a ‘warmer’ global temperature.
I CAN see how a greenhouse effect could result in more intense storms (as there is a greater temperature differential to drive them).
I CANNOT see how the greenhouse effect could lead to more frequent storms of greater intensity. It seems that ‘more frequent AND more intense’ storms would represent a violation of conservation of energy.
If anyone can help me either;
1) correct my thinking or..
2) confirm that the ‘more frequent and more violent’ storms is just ‘alarmist’ junk science
I would be grateful.
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Yup.
“Polywater”
“Cold Fusion”
“Hormone Interrupters”
“AGW”
All the same, given a pseudo-scientific basis and people are easily duped.
Please put your tin foil hat back on. Aliens are controlling your thoughts via N-rays.
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Brian G Valentine @ 24
Excellent – LOL! I’ll keep that in mind the next time I’m shopping for a tin foil hat.
Seriously – follow the data, folks, not the ideology. Reality is a harsh critic.
(All I see is that you have not been discussing the topic.Could it be because you can’t answer the threads presentation?) CTS
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Off topic. Yesterday I wrote to Combet in relation to the myth that Australians are the highest emitters per capita. Here is one of the links that I sent him to prove my case.
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/383922/carbon_emissions_the_world_in_2010.html
You will observe that all the graphics were reproduced from the World Resources Institute (WRI) Climate Analysis Indicators Tool (CAIT) Brochure for COP-15, Copenhagen (based on CAITv.7.0). Washington, DC: World Resources Institute.
This morning he sent me the links that he referenced to back his assertion.
http://www.garnautreview.org.au/chp7.htm#7_1
http://unfccc.int/national_reports/annex_i_ghg_inventories/national_inventories_submissions/items/4303.php
No mention of the Middle East countries and at first glance it seems to be how would I say? “Creative”.
I haven’t got time to disect these reports and ask the good people here that have time, to go through them and point me to the rubbery aspects of these cough, cough, unbiased documents.
I will respond to Combet on Monday and will forward it to certain Coalition members.
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The sad truth is, all of the “evidence” that “connects” CO2 in the air with “climate” ANYTHING
exists in the space covered by your tin foil hat and not in the external world
Let it go Brian.He can not even stay on the threads topic.Why keep replying his trolling postings? CTS
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KR:
Your only post that addressed the issue of this thread asserted:
No! That is clearly untrue.
If you exclude Lindzen’s excellent papers which you say you reject then the last paper concerning AGW that added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” was published more than 10 years ago.
I know what it was. Do you?
Richard
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KR at #4
KR – there is a theory which is being developed, on a relative shoestring since it is inconvenient to the great CAGW money machine. It is consistent with the data – I use the CET which goes back to 1659 – yes, it is consistent with that over the full dataset. It’s not my theory, but because I’m a working scientist I thought I’d look at how it fits the data. This is easy to do because the data is all available for downloading.
The theory is solar + ocean cycles + low CO2 sensitivity (ie 2XCO2 ~0.5 C or so) modulated by volcanoes. So, the solar effects can be quantified using the solar cycle length as the proxy – SCL correlates very significantly (statistically) with the temperature record. Then the ocean cycles add about 0.27 C swing over a sinusoidal 65 year cycle, which for example contributes that 0.27 C to the last century’s temperature record because the PDO and AMO were at bottom in 1900 and at peak in 2000. That alone is a third of the “warming” that occurred in the 20th Century, and now is a cooling cycle as both cycles trace downwards again over the next 3 decades.
The solar effects are in the process of being experimentally proven in the CERN CLOUD experiment, for which preliminary results appear positive.
I have used all three with the CET to show they are consistent with each other. If you use the SCL correlation with the 65 year cycles and a 2XCO2 of 0.6 C you can match most of the 350 year temperature trend exactly (at least since 1755 when the most reliable SCL dataset starts). That is better than the IPCC GCM’s can hindcast.
The high CO2 sensitivity theory is wrong, and time and time again does not fit the data. The solar effect theory does fit the data, and furthermore the predictions made a few years ago are indeed showing they are correct too – in the downwards cycle of the AMO and after long solar cycles you get accentuated cooling in the northern hemisphere – guess what happened the last two northern winters. Yes “children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” as Dr Viner of the CRU said.
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Keith
The Union’s Paul Howes, after attending at least six recent meetings with workers, threatening to withdraw Union support from the Labor Party if even one of their members loses his job because of the Carbon Tax. This indicates the current Union leadership and their members are finally waking up to the fact they are being screwed by their former leaders Combet, Shorten, Ferguson and others they have voted into Parliament. Several Union leaders are meeting today to apparently further discuss the effects on workers of the Government’s Carbon Tax
There is a revolt of the union rank and file membership against the carbon dioxide tax. The union leaderships are being despatched from those meetings with a clear message. NO TAX. Howse et al are engaging in some political theatre with the not one job lost mantra. However there is a potential fault line in the factions of the ALP that could splinter the ALP parliamentary party and trigger a challenge to Gillard. The right wing NSW and Victorian factions have been notably quiet on the issue of the tax to save the world in a thousand years. Combet has been handed a poisoned chalice (he represents an electorate with coal miners that swung strongly against the ALP in the recent NSW elections)and will be the convenient fall guy if this thing implodes with the ALP constituentcies. Gillard is eminently disposable by the right wing. She is from the left (these terms are purely ALP relative), has no moral authority due to the back stabbing of Rudd and is in the position entirely due to the support of the Victorian and NSW right wing factions. The pressure for the tax is being driven inside the ALP by the Albanese faction that has most to lose to the Greens in the inner city elecorates. Particularly the odious Albanese who is vulnerable in his own seat. Alabanese is not saving the world. He is engaged in something far more important. Saving his own career. The ALP is most sensitive to the campaign against the carbon dioxide tax in its heartland electorates. And the pressure is on. The next months both pre and immeadiately post budget will determine politically tha fate of the tax. The ALP under a new Prime Minister have an out clause. Its called Bob Brown. They can claim that the tax collapsed due to the extremism of the Greens. Gillard is already setting the scenario with her landing a few jabs on Brownies whiskers. The Greens performed poorly in the recent Victorian and NSW elections and their capacity to greenmail the ALP may be beginning to wane. Also by triangulating the Greens and the Libs the ALP will be able to portray itself as a party of the middle ground. If the polls continue to show Gillard struggling expect a challenge. And step forward Bill Shorten the man who has a ventriloquist act called Paul Howse. These are interesting times. Like Napolean at Austerlitz we are fighting in a fog but so are they.
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Anyway, the Republican political party in the USA is getting round to stopping the “buy yourself a ‘climatologist’ with Government grants and support your favourite tax and renewable energy program” carousel.
I am confident that Australia will reach the same point soon enough.
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Janama – your post #19 is a great insight to your ideological bias.
hint… have you tried searching for the term “fracking” on any other party websites:)
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So where is the EVIDENCE that all these scientists are being subservient to the money trail? For god’s sake men and women of the CSIRO and Universities – SPEAK UP NOW PLEASE IF THIS IS A FRAUD!!!! WHERE IS YOUR DIGNITY!!! IF YOU DISSENT SHOUT IT OUT LOUD!!!
Seriously I’m all ears.
[See most of the last 478 posts…. ]
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Bruce of Newcastle @ 29
Good to see a working scientist contributing to this discussion. Especially after seeing Penny Wong on this week’s Q&A brush aside the comments of a young lady who bravely admitted to being a an open-minded scientist.
Is John Nicol on the right track with his explanation of the low CO2 sensitivity?
While the ocean cycles play a part as a temperature driver how about CO2,acidification, coral and implications for fisheries? Is this the elephant in the room?
Pleased to see the Svensmark/Calder “Chilling Stars” book featured alongside your comment!
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CTS / moderator – “All I see is that you have not been discussing the topic.”
Fair enough, CTS, I have gone a fair distance from it. However, in @12 and @15 my comments were directly on topic.
Funding agencies have limited funds, and have to parcel them out to science that, in the reviewers viewpoint, will lead to advances in knowledge. That’s how science works – adding on, bit by bit, to the knowledge, the data, the generalizations that add up to theories and laws of science. Subject to the reviewers? Yep. But the reviewers are held to a fairly strict standard – if the papers/research/grants they fund are falsifiable junk (a huge embarrassment), the funding agencies get new reviewers!
Paltridge complains about not getting funding for contrary views – reasonable enough. But he has to keep in mind that contrary views have to be strong enough to be plausible, or they won’t get funding.
Here in the US, over the previous adminstration and the Bush administration before it, government funded science got a lot of pressure to avoid AGW and the entire global warming question. Yet there were still plenty of papers published on the topic, advancement of knowledge, and the contrarians have not gotten a lot of funding – because hypotheses other than AGW simply don’t hold up against the data.
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KR in 4,
I offer you one study which could explain all of your questions
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/shindell_05/
This link explains why there is a cooling stratosphere, it claims there is an increase in water vapour, CO2 is mentioned once but the coolingis not attributed to it.
As we all know WV is the most powerful GHG which may explain the decrease in OLR and of course this wouls also explain the warmer nights outside of UHI effect.
Now all you have to do to win the prize is connect this with increasing CO2 and then explain why your theory fails to match the 15 years lack of warming.
Take your time
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You obviously haven’t participated in the funding rat race. The “funding agency reviewers” are mostly scientists who are also being funded by the agency. No chance of a clique forming there, is there?
“New interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” is almost certain to step on the toes of a number of the currently funded scientists, who are doing “me too” grants. The proposals they are likely to approve are those which confirm their existing prejudices.
If you are really interested in finding out how this actually works out, read the “Climategate” emails.
I suspect, however, that you are no more interested in reading anything that challenges your pre-conceived views than the Climate Scientists are in having anything funded that challenges theirs.
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Richard S Courtney @ 28 – “…then the last paper concerning AGW that added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” was published more than 10 years ago. I know what it was. Do you?”
Richard, given the many many papers per year that are published in the field (thousand+ over the last 10 years???), I have absolutely no clue what you are referring to.
I can think of dozens that have introduced interesting new ideas, viewpoints, data sets, interrelationships, etc., to the climate science in that time period. Without some idea of the criteria (other than “interpretable as against AGW”) that you’re using, I would not venture a guess.
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Hang on a second there KR,
This is the abstract from
Contributions of Stratospheric Water Vapor to Decadal Changes in the Rate of Global Warming
Susan Solomon1, Karen H. Rosenlof1, Robert W. Portmann1, John S. Daniel1, Sean M. Davis1,2, Todd J. Sanford1,2 and Gian-Kasper Plattner3
Stratospheric water vapor concentrations decreased by about 10% after the year 2000. Here we show that this acted to slow the rate of increase in global surface temperature over 2000–2009 by about 25% compared to that which would have occurred due only to carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. More limited data suggest that stratospheric water vapor probably increased between 1980 and 2000, which would have enhanced the decadal rate of surface warming during the 1990s by about 30% as compared to estimates neglecting this change. These findings show that stratospheric water vapor is an important driver of decadal global surface climate change.
Hmmmm so lets recap, NASA claim the stratosphere cooled due to an increase in WV from the 1970’s until 2000 due to the increase in WV and the IPCC theory is that WV will increase due to increasing CO2.
However since 2000 stratospheric WV has decreased even though CO2 levels have continued to increase. I would say that your little theory has just been falsified, care to come up with another explanation as to why CO2 could possibly cause WV to increase and then decrease?
This is about the time you start running around in ever decreasing circles screaming DENIER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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I like the paragraph in Lindzen’s paper (refered to earlier).
“In brief, we have the new paradigm where simulation and programs have replaced theory and observation, where government largely determines the nature of scientific activity, and where the primary role of professional societies is the lobbying of the government for special advantage.”
This is echoed again here..
http://joannenova.com.au/2011/03/prof-vincent-courtillot-speaks-with-clarity/
As for alternative theories; they will need to be tested in the same manner that many are trying to ensure the current CAGW theory needs to be. So far, all I see is a LOT of money being spent on ‘potential”. Very little actual evidence. The latest new scientist artcile (the usual CAGW supporter) is now even running article that cast doubt over impact of CO2. It refered to the vapour trails from jets are now so common and widespread that the effect (from H2O) exceeds the CO2 effect….go figure!.
I’d much rather collective tax funded money spent on real, currrent, imminent issues like cheap power clean water, medical research, food, the needy, etc. Councils can work on not permitting low level ocean-side real-estate if they like, or to ensure the developers or buyers hold some insurance/disclaimer for their freedom of choice.
We need to adapt to this planet nwe live on – not try to control it. This controling behaviour is simply gross arrogance in people I thought were smart, but instead are vergin on narcissistic. As humans we are not as special as many say we are. Mother earth does not treat us any differently than any other living thing. It just is and we just “are”, as much as any other species finding a niche.
We will probably be gone quicker than the dinosours – once this interglacial passes. Enjoy – while it lasts.
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crakar24 @ 36
An interesting reference on stratospheric effects, but I’m not seeing a contradiction. Given quotes in that article such as:
“Climate models indicate that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane may enhance the transport of air from the lower atmosphere up into the stratosphere.”
“Though not fully understood, the increased transport of water vapor to the stratosphere seems to have been caused at least partially by human activities.”
“The net change from stratospheric water and ozone was thus +0.17 K,roughly 33% of the observed increase. Given large uncertainties in climate forcings from clouds and aerosols [Hansen et al., 1998],suc h a large value is not inconsistent with current understanding.”
It’s a pretty clear description of feedbacks from AGW.
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I await patiently for your response to post 39 or are you too busy running around in ever decreasing circles?
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Matt b @32 – The liberal party returned various articles on gas and coal seam mining etc. The labor party NONE. The Greens did come up with a reference to Fracking in Redfern in Sydney.
My point is that the Greens don’t appear to be heading up the opposition to the Gas Fracking which is a major concern in my area in the Casino/Clarence and in central Queensland. They are so busy pushing their social agendas they’ve forgotten about the environment.
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crakar24 @ 39
From your reference in @39:
“It is therefore not clear whether the stratospheric water vapor changes represent a feedback to global average climate change or a source of decadal variability.”
Looks interesting, ‘tho not conclusive either way, but I will look forward to more info on this.
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BobC @ 37 – “You obviously haven’t participated in the funding rat race. The “funding agency reviewers” are mostly scientists who are also being funded by the agency. No chance of a clique forming there, is there?”
I have, actually. One really really big issue – reviewers are not paid to review. It’s considered an honor (and to some extent a time sink) to be asked to review papers; you get asked to do it again if you (a) provide constructive criticism of the papers/proposals, (b) do it in a timely fashion, (c) weed out obvious junk – repeats of previous work, ideas that are contradicted by the evidence, or that lack intellectual support for the hypotheses.
I believe (although I’ll readily admit it’s my personal opinion – I’m not an editor) that (c) is where most papers die, although primarily because they are repeats of previous work.
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CTS / moderator
My apologies about the posts post @35 – I’m trying to respond to direct questions.
Back to funding – I’ve been involved in funding reviews and proposals. If they don’t look like they will add to the body of knowledge, well, it’s a limited pot of money.
In direct feedback to interesting questions, however – a paper or work presenting novel facts or theories, that is congruent with the data, is likely to get published. Such a work will get reprint requests, new subscriptions, lead to additional funding to follow up on the new ideas, on and on and on. It’s a pretty direct reward for interesting work, even if it’s junk – look at the $$$ that went into cold fusion (referring to @24) until it totally ran aground on facts.
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Sorry, last post should have referred to @26, not @24.
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Yep. They sacked most people who were skeptical, but they didn’t sack all of them.
Science without debate is propaganda. Point me to the budget for people paid to audit the IPCC, NOAA, the BOM, CSIRO? Show me how much money was paid to people to find holes in the “theory”?
Sure, and the climategate emails were all faked weren’t they? And you call us the deniers? Any “committee” system is corruptible. Peer review is merely two unpaid anonymous friends who tick a box. You really expect to convince us by claiming “the evidence” matters while you tell us to “trust” human institutions?
#4 When you say Garth needs to put some evidence forwards…. Garth Paltridge wrote a whole book about the science and the evidence. It’s linked twice in the article above.
#13: You think the hot spot is not missing? You ask us to be congruent with the data, but when the data is not congruent with your religion you just ignore it.
“When in doubt, throw 28 million radiosondes out… ”
So we can’t make a simple weather balloon work, but highly complex models are OK? They measure the temperature 10km above the ground better than the thermometers that are up there. Really?
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No, no, no KR you cannot simply stick your fingers in your ears and magic this away.
You stated quite clearly in earlier posts that Lindzen cannot explain certain issues so now it is your turn to explain things.
Your theory dictates that atmospheric WV will increase as a +ve feed back to increasing CO2 levels and you stated quite clearly a cooling stratosphere was evidence of this. NASA claim it has cooled due to increasing WV levels and I have just shown you empirical evidence that WV in the stratosphere is decreasing and has done so since around 2000.
So what you need to do now is explain how increasing CO2 caused the increase in stratospheric WV and thus a cooling and how even more CO2 has caused the direct opposite.
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Austrade is another department that has had to toe the “climate change” line.
In 2004-2007, I had excellent helpful advice from Austrade for an invention I was developing for overseas.
In 2008 I had cause to seek Austrade advice again and out of curiosity I asked, would my product have the same interest from Austrade now as it had received in the past. The answer was “no” – it would have more of a chance of getting Austrade’s time if it had some connection to Climate Change.
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KR @ 21:
Certainly you mean “like yourself” or perhaps better “as in do as I say not as I do”?
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A German Duke, from memory the Duke of Hanover, said that these professors can be bought like whores.
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Len, I’m not sure…..Do you think they cost that much????
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Janama “The Greens did come up with a reference to Fracking in Redfern in Sydney.” see that’s not what you said in 20. You said “OT – I went to the Greens website and entered “Gas Fracking” into the search – no result.” which now youve bothered to look was ckearky a fakse statement.
(These post numbers constantly changing is doing my head in… is it some sort of moderation delay some posts must have?)
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Joanne Nova @ 50
(CTS – again, sorry, direct response)
So many things to respond to! I’ll give it a try, but I will not attempt to state anything I haven’t looked at personally – I think that would be unreasonable.
—
“Yep. They sacked most people who were skeptical, but they didn’t sack all of them.
Science without debate is propaganda. Point me to the budget for people paid to audit the IPCC, NOAA, the BOM, CSIRO? Show me how much money was paid to people to find holes in the “theory”? … Sure, and the climategate emails were all faked weren’t they?”
There were, as I understand it, four separate extensive reviews of the IPCC after “Climategate”? None of them found any serious issues with the science the IPCC assembled (not generated), although (as I recall) two found that the IPCC did not respond promptly or clearly to FOI requests.
Are there any reviews by anyone with access to the data and some semblance of impartiality that disagree with those conclusions? I’ve read a great many of those (carefully picked) quotes from the emails myself.
—
“When you say Garth needs to put some evidence forwards…. Garth Paltridge wrote a whole book about the science and the evidence. It’s linked twice in the article above. “
Looking at that, from Amazon:
“He leads us through the inherent problems of the climate modeling process, as well as the uncertainties associated with economic forecasts of climatic doom. Paltridge uncovers the conscious and subconscious forces that hide skepticism within the scientific community from the public eye and submit governments to a scientific and technological elite-an elite that achieves its ends by manipulating the public through fear of climate change, creating the world’s greatest example of a religion for the politically correct. “ (emphasis added)
So: Conspiracy theory? Gah, please – I would believe stupidity, that’s always present, but a concerted conspiracy theory? That’s like herding cats, just not possible. What ends, to what profit? Especially compared to the profits of the fossil fuel industry, which stands to lose megabucks if the status quo changes?
I do have first hand evidence about industrial manipulations of publicly funded science, by the way – my brother was an apologist/denier (sorry, moderators, his terms, not mine) re: second-hand smoking for a major US tobacco company for years. He was paid to make stuff up, to disparage science, etc., all in the name of the holy $$$. As he put it, handing me a copy of Thank You for Smoking – “I am this man. This is my job.” He never liked it when I would ask “So, what does a soul go for these days?”
—
Hot spot:
Trenberth 2006, Santer 2005 for the short term – hot spot detected, Tichner 2008, Haimberger 2008, Sherwood 2008 – updates to radiosonde data show warming, previous results adjusted due to poor calibrations.
If you don’t agree with the current calibrations, then find someone willing to put out a paper with evidence showing it. Or, perhaps, accept the work that has been done?
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Joanne Nova @ 50
Regarding the tropospheric hot spot, also see Vinnikov 2003 – “Our analysis shows a trend of +0.22° to 0.26°C per 10 years, consistent with the global warming trend derived from surface meteorological stations.”
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len: “…these professors can be bought like whores.”
Shouldn’t that be “cheap whores”?
For a mere few billion dollars from government paymasters, the CAGW climate scientists have increasingly supported the takeover and destruction of technological civilization and the enslavement of the entire human population of the earth.
However, using the comparison of cheap whores might be insulting to all the honest and honorable prostitutes out there. Unlike the CAGW climate scientists, they don’t expect their customers to use and pay for their services at the point of of a government gun. Their customers have a choice and they rightfully expect to be paid for services rendered. The CAGW climate scientists don’t want us to have a choice. We are to pay, they are to play, and we are to return to a dark ages life style without so much as an objection or a question.
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KR, Santer has been sighting phantoms ever since he graduated from East Anglia University. It has been the nature of his job to see phantoms. No phantoms = no meaning to his life’s work.
Anyway, CO2 has been a constituent of the atmosphere since the Earth had an oxidising atmosphere.
If water vapour “feedback” is a genuine phenomenon, then what has prevented the atmosphere having saturated aeons ago? There is no way this effect cannot have been cumulative over that period. None.
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KR says at 57:
Are you naive? Profit is in the eye of the taker. Politicians are the epitome of takers. Just who is is the conspiracy nut here? Big Oil is behind it all aren’t they?
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Some people who post here have obviously not heard that
“Vehemence and veracity are seldom synonymous”
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[…] Professor points out, it’s a less-than-nobel consensus Garth Paltridge is an Australian atmospheric physicist with 45 years experience. He worked with CSIRO, the WMO, NOAA, and as Professor and Director of the Institute of Antarctic and Southern Oceans Studies. He has explained why he’s skeptical of the theory of man-made global warming in his book – The Climate Caper: Facts and Fallacies of Global Warming. Here he explains how a scientific “consensus” can be bought. There’s more than one good reason why argument-from-authority is a fallacy. — Jo […]
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Brian G Valentine @ 60 – “If water vapour “feedback” is a genuine phenomenon, then what has prevented the atmosphere having saturated aeons ago?”
A “runaway” feedback? Seriously? Brian, I’ve Googled you, you have an education, why are you promoting this nonsense?
A feedback always damps out if the gain is < 1.0, which is satisfied by any physical system. The only exceptions are electronic amplifiers with high gain, which damp out when they hit the voltage/amperage limits of the circuit.
Real physical systems are limited to <1.0 gain due to energy limits, a scalar amplification (positive or negative) of the initial forcing. No proposed feedback (even state changes such as ice-ball Earth/Holocene Earth shifts) are proposed as that. You should know better – please don't promulgate such foolishness.
—
I'm not taking Santer as the be-all end-all; I prefer to look at the entire literature, weight the contributions and evidence, and consider the replies/comments upon them. Santer is only one of a number (5-6?) papers I've read directly on this topic.
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Sorry, I keep forgetting that the Earth came into existence 200 years ago when the CO2 was 250 ppm and has only one hundred years of possible continued existence.
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Thus it follows we nave nothing more to worry about or discuss regarding importance of this matter.
Next pseudo problem to dismiss:
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John Watt at #36
Sorry John, I haven’t (until just now) read anything of John Nicol’s. If you are referring to his 2008 paper, it (I’ve only read the conclusion section) seems to be saying that CO2 is saturated. I don’t know whether that is true or not. My gut instinct is that saturation is the basis for the log relationship of CO2, and log curves never hit zero. I should mention that when I used the term “2XCO2” I meant the sensitivity of all GG’s net of feedbacks, of which CO2 is presumably the biggest. I used the Mauna Loa CO2 data for the fitting exercise, and that works fine for 0.6 C (relative to an assumed 280 ppmv preindustrial baseline).
My view about acidification (as a chemist) is there are effects and there are effects. If you think of corals or molluscs, we know they have a hard time getting enough carbonate from the ocean because of the polarisation layer effect – the [HCO3-a] near their absorption membranes is depleted compared to the bulk ocean, due to limitations of osmotic diffusion. This effect is well known to electrochemists & has a significant impact on cell voltages. So when you increase CO2 the pH falls by the log of the concentration, but the activity of HCO3-a ion rises linearly with pCO2. If I were a mollusc I’d say yum, more bicarbonate! Because of the polarisation layer effect I think carbonate shelled animals will actually do better with high pCO2 because the dissolution reaction should be proportional to the proton activity but shell growth process more than proportional to the bicarbonate activity. However I haven’t read any detailed studies and I’m not the one who has to breathe the fizzy mineral water, so you can take this with a grain of sodium bicarbonate.
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Mark D. @ 61 – “Politicians are the epitome of takers.”
My experience with governments is that they cannot find their nether end with any number of other peoples hands. Let alone maintain a conspiracy across multiple decades and 10’s of thousands of participants. If you feel so, you have more confidence in government capabilities than I do!
Conspiracy and coordination requires small numbers of conspirators to maintain it, not masses of folks, especially lots of low paid union employees.
Enough – I won’t speculate on conspiracies/cabals. I’ll stick to testable data, thank you.
—
Gah, off topic again. Present a testable idea, supported by the data, and you will get papers, grants, and attention until/unless you are proven incorrect. That holds for Polywater, cold fusion, HIV vaccines, any health craze mentionable – although not perpetual motion, as the various Patent Offices have ruled that out without a working example.
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Brian G Valentine @ 65 – “Thus it follows we (n)ave nothing more to worry about or discuss regarding importance of this matter. “
Really? A factor of 2-4 amplification of forcings (such as CO2) is nothing to worry about?
Such a cheerful world you live in…
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Bruce of Newcastle @ 66
You might find Talmage and Gobler 2010 interesting. They look at the effects on various organisms of various CO2/acidification levels.
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As certain people have been paid to find evidence of AGW, so I am paid, by the US Department of Energy of the USA, to debunk junk.
This is true. That is my job, I see twenty or more crank ideas per week that I am called upon to shine the light of reality.
I’m not paid per se to debunk AGW, although I have rested my case with the DOE about AGW. What DOE does with this is out of my hands.
I will say that AGW has, over the past 20 years, been the most persistent of junk science that I have run against.
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Matt b – today I tried “fracking gas” which returned a result as opposed to “gas fracking” I tried before. I stand by my original point that the Greens aren’t out there leading the charge against the coal seam fracking industry, they have too many social reforms to get into.
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Brian G Valentine @ 70 – “…to debunk junk.
This is true. That is my job, I see twenty or more crank ideas per week that I am called upon to shine the light of reality. “
Excellent. I do much the same in my job. I cannot consider you entirely unbiased, particularly given some of your public presentations, but filtering is part of many aspects of life.
Including funding. You have to go with what is worth the money.
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I’m disappointed with your detective skills,
you didn’t produce my police record.
HA hah ha good night from Arlington, Virginia USA.
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Oh, really? In what capacity? I have my doubts, based on your next few comments:
Wow, that’s a revelation, given that peer reviewers have never been paid in the multi-century history of scientific journals. Either you are amazingly ignorant, or you think we are.
Actually, once you agree to do it, you get put on a list that is hard to get off of, unless you change your email or start refusing requests. That’s if you’re honest — those with an axe to grind or a score to settle are all too eager to get the opportunity. (Again, read the Climategate emails.)
I’ve had proposals trashed by reviewers who, 6 months later, incorporated elements of my proposal in their own. (Yes, you can often figure out who they are, especially in a small field.) Perhaps this will come as a shock to you, but scientists are not more ethical than the general population. (My personal opinion is that they are, in general, less ethical — mostly because there is rarely any sanction for not keeping your word in the academic world.)
This is mostly irrelevant: For a journal, the editor wants to avoid publishing something that is going to embarrass the journal or cause a fight — he or she wants to know that the authors haven’t neglected to cite relevant previous work (especially in the case of still-living authors who might write angry letters), haven’t made any obvious mathematical or logical mistakes, and haven’t drawn conclusions that aren’t supported by the work (although that last one seems to have been waived for many AGW papers.)
Funding agencies are somewhat different — the principal wants to know how likely the proposal is to work, generate usable results, get done in the time/money allotted, etc.
“Constructive criticism” is mostly irrelevant. Often, it is an ego trip for the reviewer — “If you include what I think is important, I’ll give you a good review.” (I can easily imagine you doing this.)
OK, you got that one right – Editors have deadlines. One out of three.
This is so wrong, it’s hard to know where to start. First, this is just a rationalization for gate-keeping — don’t let anything through that contradicts or questions previous work, especially your previous work. This attitude can easily be seen in the Climategate emails. Second, it is not generally possible for a reviewer to honestly decide if a reviewed paper is correct — that takes replication, and that would really be a time sink.
People who misuse the review process by imposing their own prejudices are one reason that “new and interesting” papers rarely get published (like Nature turning down the paper on the first laser).
Wrong — Almost no papers are turned down because they are “repeats of previous work”, because — get this — scientists can read, and are generally knowledgeable about the literature in their field.
You try to present yourself as an expert, KR, but most of what you do seems to be cut and paste — just another form of “argument from authority”.
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it’s taken a week for anyone in the MSM to even mention the Ben Cubby SMH dodgy shift2neutral story, and then it’s telling us all will be well:
14 April: Ninemsn: Julian Drape: Call for crackdown on ‘dodgy’ carbon sinks
One of Australia’s leading carbon sink companies says there needs to be better regulation of the offset market so dodgy operators can’t claim to be tackling climate change when they’re not.
It’s been reported that Sydney-based company shift2neutral may not have actually saved a single tree despite selling offset certificates to companies, schools and sporting organisations…
But Mr Grant (CO2 chief executive Andrew Grant) said carbon farming in Australia is “fundamentally a net good”.
Fears it could lead to productive farming land being replaced by commercial carbon sinks were unfounded, he said.
“You’re dealing with low-cost land in marginal areas of regional Australia that have been over-cleared.”…
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8237125/Call-crackdown-dodgy-carb
Cubby does a followup re a school in Sydney, yet i don’t see this article in the SMH, only in the Wodonga, Victoria Border Mail!!!
14 April: Border Mail: Ben Cubby: School deceived by carbon neutral scheme
A SYDNEY school thought to have become the first in the world to go ”carbon neutral” by saving a Malaysian rainforest from logging appears to have been deceived by carbon offset company shift2neutral.
Oakhill College in Castle Hill announced the deal to protect a forest in Sarawak last year, and students were photographed with certificates supplied by shift2neutral…
Oakhill College told the Herald it was deeply concerned but so far had been unable to contact Mr Goldsworthy to attempt to verify the school’s carbon neutral status.
”Our approach has always been to be open with the parent and student body and we will continue to be,” said a school spokesman, Steve Molloy…
In addition to selling carbon offsets, Mr Goldsworthy has business interests in weight loss and beauty products and the sale of ”active hydrogen water”, via a company called Yukis Water.
The company’s website claims that drinking its hydrogen-enriched water neutralises ”excess active oxygen” in the human body.
http://www.bordermail.com.au/news/national/national/general/school-deceived-by-carbon-neutral-scheme/2133715.aspx
nice the way these schemes get EXPANDED at will!
15 April: Reuters: New Zealand spot carbon price slips
New Zealand carbon prices drifted lower over the previous week, pressured by a weaker exchange rate and faltering prices for U.N. carbon offsets…
“Moribund would be one word to describe the New Zealand carbon market this week,” said Nigel Brunel, a broker with OM Financial, who added the market was split between trading spot units and short-dated forwards…
The New Zealand market, the only national emissions trading scheme outside the European Union, was initially marred by a lack of supply.
But it has been ramping up since July 1 last year when the scheme was expanded to include energy producers, industry and the transport sector, which account for about half of the country’s emissions.
Under transition measures, emitters such as power generators and refiners have the option of paying a fixed NZ$25 until January 2013 or buying from the market. Under the measures, emitters only have to surrender one permit for every two units of emissions…
http://in.reuters.com/article/2011/04/15/newzealand-carbon-market-idINL3E7FF00F20110415
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Here is a brief anecdote
Quite a few years ago I was invited to sit in on a series of lectures given by candidates to a university lecturing position as part of the interview. The first was a Russian geochemist with a very interesting research project but poor English skills, The second was Australian who would be a brilliant and charismatic lecturer. I asked the professor running the interviews how much emphasis would be placed on the new lecturer being able to be understood by the students. None said the professor – There is really only one candidate here, the Canadian. He brings $5 million in grant money – I can hire 25 staff with that. The research topic of the Canadian was “Snow Ball Earth” and he had access to climate change research money. Thus from where I sat, it appeared that yet another institution was captured by the grant system.
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Straw man argument, KR. You seem to be completely innocent of any knowledge of how communities of interest are formed.
Here’s how it works:
Governments (among other things) extract money from people by threat of force and spend it on things that people in government decide. This attracts those who like power and the exercise of force. Scientists who claim that some future crisis requires government to exert more power are preferentially funded by governments that are staffed by people attracted to the exercise of power.
This is especially true in governments where the exercise of power is constrained by law or custom, to the irritation of those attracted to the exercise of power.
There is a reason why the governments of totalitarian states are uninterested in AGW — they already have near total power.
Eisenhower warned of this in his Farewell address to the Nation, in 1969:
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Bob C @39
The Climategate emails is available as a PDF at:
http://www.lavoisier.com.au/articles/greenhouse-science/climate-change/climategate-emails.pdf
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Apart from some minor details, the summary of AR4 (2007) bears a startling resemblance to that of FAR (1990).
The guessed attribution of human GHGs to the greenhouse effect is just as vague and there is no refinement to the temperature or sea level projections.
Twenty years and billions upon billions of dollars have achieved virtually no progress — lack of progress is a symptom of pseudoscience.
In 1990, there was no empirical evidence that human CO2 was the main climate driver (as they admit in FAR) and there still isn’t.
Time to stop funding this nonsense.
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KR at #70
Thanks for the link, interesting paper. The pH’s of the 280 and 1500 ppmv experiments are about the same as the natural variation from tropics to 70 north, 500 m vertically and day vs night. I suspect the issue is not the pH but the solubility of calcium carbonate (ie Ksp), which rises with bicarbonate concentration. This hasn’t anything to do with the pH, except indirectly. Fortunately the slow rate of change of pCO2 should be such that most molluscs will adapt, since there was a decline, but not a catastrophic one (ie 1500 ppm appears species survivable, uncomfortably, for even unadapted clams).
For this though it doesn’t seem necessary to commit unilateral economic suicide with a carbon tax which will not actually change the pCO2 in the atmosphere, in order to not actually reduce pressure on shellfish which would be better and more cheaply helped by lowering fertiliser runoff, ceasing bottom trawling etc. I’m sure for example a straightforward adaptation management project would be a lot cheaper, and even be successful too.
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KR:
The worldwide annual expenditure on AGW-related research has been running at over US$5 billion (that is ‘billion’ with B) but the most recent paper concerning AGW that added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” was published over 10 years ago.
That +US$50 billion of wasted AGW-gravy train-funding could have been spent on research to erradicate malaria.
And your wriggling about this will not do. However, it proves that you knew you were stating a falsehood in your only post that addressed the issue of this thread.
In that post you asserted that Paltridge’s factual account (above) is wrong because, you claimed, the basis of AGW-related research funding is:
At #30 I refuted that saying:
At #40 you have replied saying:
THEY ARE THE CRITERIA YOU DEFINED, YOU TWIT!
The criteria are
a paper concerning AGW that added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed”.
If you did know if one such paper published more recently tham 10 years ago you would have cited it then boasted that you had bested me. But you compounded your falsehood about funding by falsely claiming there are “dozens” of such papers while demonstrating you know of none because you do not cite one.
And the last paper concerning AGW that added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” is NOT “interpretable as against AGW”. In fact, it changed the view of AGW held by James Hansen (Head of NASA GISS and ‘warmist’ zealot) and that is a big clue as to the paper.
You know nothing about the funding, administration, conduct and findings of climate science. And your several posts on this blog prove you know nothing about them.
I will allow another 12 hours to permit your colleagues at ‘troll command’ to see if they can determine the most recent paper concerning AGW paper concerning AGW that added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed”. Then I will cite it.
Richard
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@Bruce of Newcastle:
April 15th, 2011 at 1:55 pm
John Watt at #36
Carbonate shelled animals first evolved when CO2 levels were over 4000ppm. So their is zero danger of them suffering from ocean acidifcation. The massive chalk deposits of the Cretaceous coincide with CO2 levels of 1600ppm.
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BTW calcium carbonate has retrograde solubility ie it becomes less soluble as the temperature increases. The healthiest corals grow in the warmest waters eg the Red Sea.
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Lionel Griffith @59
An interesting thread and I agree with your “cheap Whore” comment. Two things about cheap whores: They aren’t very good at what they do and they usually die poor of some disease you wouldn’t like to have. Your analogy is most apt.
10
Ever-so slightly off-topic, but you might be interested in just a glimmer of common sense occurring in the UK on the matter of so-called ‘renewables’..
There was to be a truly massive ‘feed in’ tariff for solar farms (this is the UK, remember..!) – but as of this summer the government is cutting it by 75% for all but domestic (i.e. rooftop) scale installations.
Squeals of protest from the get-rich-quick brigade – clearly not in the least interested in how ‘green’ were their projects – just how much tax-payer money they could screw out of the government. Goverment muttering about paying ‘compensation’ – but you can imagine how well THAT proposal has gone down with the likes of Chris Booker and James Delingpole and the rest of us on the sceptic side of the subject. You makes an investment – you takes the risk…
10
KR,
Four(4)investigations into the IPCC? Care to point me towards them or are you getting confused?
I truly would like to know!
10
KR
You might have bitten off more than you might chew……
10
O/T sorry, but just reported on SBS news.
Ben Quilty has just won the Archibald prize. (OK congrats for that…BUT…)
Presenter: “Ben Quilty is taking advantage of a platform to speak out about Climate Change.”
Quilty: “I still find it bizarre that we still have people in this country that deny that climate change has anything to do with humans. It’s like denying Aboriginals a vote, or denying women should have a job.”
So Quilty and SBS, you think that an artist’s impression is relevant to a scientific issue?
Well I guess, on reflection, pretty computer graphs by computer climate models are little more than an artist’s impressions of a surreal reality.
It truly sickens me, the depths to which the AGW mob will go to promote their religion.
SBS = Silly Bloody Station
10
@ scaper…: #29
“Off topic. Yesterday I wrote to Combet… I haven’t got time to disect these reports and ask the good people here that have time, to go through them and point me to the rubbery aspects of these cough, cough, unbiased documents”
OK, before I get into this, because it is Heavy Duty, there are two things that EVERYONE on this site SHOULD READ.
1. The Updated CO2-e WORLD EMISSIONS CHART.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jan/31/world-carbon-dioxide-emissions-country-data-co2#data
2. What we are going to get SCREWED for when we change CO2-e Accounting systems.
http://ageis.climatechange.gov.au/Chart_KP.aspx?OD_ID=16332396071&TypeID=1
(You can play with this Department of Climate Change, graphing tool, and get some amazing trends – like we halved our emissions in 2 years)
START: Per Capita
CO2-e on a Per Capita basis is the biggest load of Crap I have ever heard, and here is the proof:
Australia
Area: 7.69 million square kilometers
Population: 22 million
Emits 576 million Tonnes CO2-e (Decrease of 1.8% – 2008 to 2009)
(28 Tonnes CO2-e per capita)
(75 Tonnes CO2-e per sq Km)
China
Area: 9.6 million square kilometers
Population: 1,340 million
Emits 7,710 million Tonnes CO2-e (Increase of 13.3% – 2008 to 2009)
(6 Tonnes CO2-e per capita)
(803 Tonnes CO2-e per sq Km)
Gibraltar
Area of under 7 square kilometers
Population: 29,000
Emits: 4.38 million Tonnes CO2-e
(152 Tonnes CO2-e per capita)
Gibraltar is a tiny Rock, with a population one third of the size of Tony Windsor’s or Rob Oakshits, electorate and it is the HIGHEST PER CAPITA EMMITER on the PLANET.
The Australian Government actally LOST, the equivalent of Gibraltars total CO2-e emissions, between their 2010 and 2009 CO2-e Accounts. (In 2009, their 2009 figure was 544 MT CO2-e – In 2010 their 2009 figure was 548 MT CO2-e. Wish I could try that trick on the ATO)
Using PER CAPITA, as a measurement of emissions (Which Kyoto and UNFCCC DO NOT) would mean that each and every Australian would be hit HARDER, financially, than any other OECD Nation, for CO2-e abatement. (They have the most to reduce individually – per capita)
SOLUTION:
Adopt Kevin Rudd’s ‘Big Australia’ Policy.
Double our Population = HALF our PER CAPITA emissions – Thats how stupid this measurement is.
START: Garnaut (ref: The DCC graph Combet sent you)
His figures are out of date (2006), use an incorrect start year (1990 not 2000) and is typical of the FUDGED and SMUDGED Accounting you get from this type of Intellectual Pygmie.
(UNFCCC Document Number FCCC/SB/2011/INF.1
Australia will unconditionally reduce its emissions by 5 per cent compared with 2000 levels by 2020)
START: Goverment CO2-e Accounts
1. They choose between two different Accounting systems, at random, for whichever one will give them the best figures for their purpose. (Kyoto and UNFCCC)
2. They seem incapable of putting the same CO2-e figures, for any one year. in any two of their own publications.
3. They also seem incapable of using the correct Start Year for Kyoto, and will use any date span that best suits their purpose and message.
4. I give you their own text, from their CO2-e Accounts – It is a revelation.
“5.5.1 Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis
Emissions projections are inherently uncertain, involving judgments about the future of the global and national economy, policy actions affecting emissions, technological innovation and other human behaviour….”
CONCLUSION:
I used to coach Baseball, I thought I had a ‘Dream Team’ when we won the Championship, maybe I was wrong, maybe we were just playing a bunch of lame, useless Donkeys like the ALP.
I have Loads More info if you need it scaper.
10
KR@21
Have you in fact read your references to Dessler 2010,
Swanson 2009 and *DelSole et al. 2011?
The illogical Dessler has been adequately rebutted by Spencer. The latter two papers are full of conjecture and references to the inadequacy of the models to properly account for natural internal climate variability. Relying on statistical methods to massage the data is more a mathematical game than understanding how the climate system works. In other words their hiding behind the maths approach encourages the reader to take amongst other things the “calculated” figure for the longer term contribution to temperature from NCV with a grain of salt.
The problem with some academics is that they are still wet behind the ears and fondly imagine they understand how our complex and chaotic climate system works because of their facility with modeling and the mathematics. A trap for beginners.
Spencer, though he has a long history as a leading climate scientist, doesn’t fall for that hubris and like the data massagers has his own explanations for the causes of “Global Warming” whilst being fully aware of how much Climate Science doesn’t yet know about cause and effect in the Earth’s climate system. Neither is he in the wider ideological camp of the professional warmists. One could then have more faith in a disinterested scientist’s opinions than with the opinions of those committed to an ideological position.
*Michael K. Tippett
International Research Institute for Climate and Society, Palisades, New York
Notice with this contributor, your third reference, how climate is linked with society. Climate thus is code for CACC . Here then is a committed warmist which means a few extra grains of salt needed with his highly likely bias that may in turn have influenced the paper’s conclusions.
10
KR @ 68, don’t be confused! you were the one suggesting conspiracy at #57. You also predictably made the Warmist “official” propaganda slur with the attempted tie to tobacco.
Now the first part of 68 you say:
So we have something in common! Precisely why we should not trust the IPCC, or any other attempt by politicians (Gore comes to mind) to use pseudo science for political gain.
10
KR:
You asserted that Paltridge’s factual account (above) is wrong because, you claimed, the basis of AGW-related research funding is:
At #30 I refuted that saying:
At #40 you gave a ridiculous response saying you did not understand the meaning of the criteria which you had stipulated; i.e. added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed”.
At #82 I pressed you on the matter and I said;
I write to fulfil that promise.
The paper is:
Jacobson MZ, “Strong radiative heating due to the mixing state of black carbon in atmospheric aerosols”, Nature, v409, 695-697 (Feb. 2001)
“New” data.
Jacobson’s paper provided “new” data which showed that sulphate aerosol released from ‘dirty’ burning of fossil fuels combines with ‘black carbon’ (i.e. soot) that is released from the same sources and at the same time as the aerosol.
This data is important because the aerosol alone causes strong negative radiative forcing but the aerosol/soot combination causes strong positive forcing.
“Interesting” information
This “new” data is “interesting” because it indicates – and it did induce – a reversal of the understanding of the temporal pattern of global temperature over the twentieth century.
The global temperature cooled from ~1940 to about ~1970. At the time this cooling induced the ‘global cooling’ scare which was morphed into the ‘global warming’ scare when global temperature had started to again rise after 1970. And the cooling from sulphate aerosol was then used as an excuse for the cooling that had occurred from ~1940 to ~1970: it was asserted – with no supporting evidence – that the warming from CO2 had been masked by the sulphate cooling’.
But Jackobson’s study (which has since been confirmed by several other studies) showed that soot combines with anthropogenic aerosol in the air and the combination provides strong greenhouse warming. So, the aerosol should have increased global warming (GW), not reduced it as the aerosol excuse assumed.
The globally averaged warming (i.e. radiative forcing potential) from the soot/aerosol is calculated to be powerful (0.55 Wm^-2) and is between the potentials of carbon dioxide (1.56 Wm^–2) and methane (0.47 Wm^-2) that IPCC had claimed to be the two major trace greenhouse gases.
This forced the AGW-promoting ‘scientists’ (sic) to abandon the aerosol excuse and to replace it with arm-waving about “natural variability”. But members of the cult of AGW have not caught up (Jacobson’s seminal paper was published only a little more than a decade ago) and they still try to use the aerosol excuse when the cooling from ~1940 to about ~1970 is mentioned.
“Relevant to the problems addressed”
The “new” and “pertinent” data is “relevant to the problems addressed” by e.g. the Kyoto Protocol and all other policies intended to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as a method to reduce AGW.
The Kyoto Protocol attempted to constrain emissions of six GHGs but not soot. Jacobson’s paper and the subsequent confirmatory studies were too late for soot to be thought important. But the soot/aerosol combination is the second most powerful anthropogenic emission of GHG.
So, some AGW-promoting ‘scientists’ (sic), notably James Hansen, Head of NASA GISS, argue that constraining soot emissions is a more important objective than constraining carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. This is because
(a) it is easier to clean soot from flues than to capture CO2 from flues
and
(b) soot stays in the air for only weeks but they think CO2 stays in the air for decades so soot capture would have a more immediate effect.
No published paper concerning AGW has added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” since Jacobson’s. This is not surprising: Jacobson’s paper destroyed the fictional narrative of aerosol cooling and additional novel information could prove equally embarrassing to the cause of AGW.
Richard
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BobC @ 75
My note on reviewers not being paid was in reference to previous comments by several posters that implied there was money (and hence financial pressure) involved in the reviews. A lot of papers get rejected because they are trivial repeats of previous works, or lack any references newer than a decade (no recent work), or show procedural, math, statistics, or evidentiary issues. You don’t need to repeat the work to determine that a “2+2 = 6.9” statement is incorrect, for example.
I’ll admit that being on editors reviewer lists can be a huge time-sink, akin to magazine sales lists or the local proselytizers circuit, but you can always tell them “No – no time”.
BobC @ 78
What I’m referring to with my statement that governments cannot find their own nether ends is that a conspiracy running for multiple decades with thousands of people could not be kept secret. There should be documentation, evidence, recordings, on and on and on – where is it?
I’ve seen surveys on political/administrative/funding pressure on climate scientists; it definitely happens, although infrequently. But it’s about 2 to 1 incidents where scientists are asked to suppress AGW findings versus emphasize them.
Pete H @ 87
Four investigations into “Climategate” and the CRU? My apologies, I was incorrect, here’s a link to six (6) reports into the CRU plus two (2) additional (preliminary and final from a single board) into M. Mann regarding the emails. These found poor CRU responses to FOI data requests, but no scientific malfeasance regarding the scientists, reports, contents, or conclusions.
Richard S Courtney @ 82
The reason I have no idea which paper (single, one) you were referring to is that there have been lots of papers over the last decade that are relevant works on AGW with new information, such as von Schuckmann 2009 showing ocean heating down to 2000 meters, the numerous updates on Greenland ice melt (Jiang 2010) and the newer GRACE data tracking it, etc.
With regard to the Jacobson 2001 paper, it looks quite interesting, I had not read it before. I’ll point out, though, that this particular paper (along with three others of his) are referenced in the IPCC report (search for his name) – they were taken into consideration. Quite a lot of work was incorporated regarding satellite measures of optical depth into the atmosphere (a direct measurement), this was apparently an area of considerable research effort since the previous IPCC report. I don’t consider myself an expert on aerosols, either direct albedo or indirect cloud formation effects, so I can’t comment further on that topic. But it certainly wasn’t ignored!
Llew Jones @ 91
I’ve actually read the email exchanges between Dessler and Spencer, as well as looking at the papers and Spencer’s response. I’m not impressed; Spencer is invoking a negative cloud feedback with no explanation, no physics behind why that would occur, and has stated that it drives the ENSO, rather than ENSO -> surface temps -> cloud cover, as everyone else views the issue.
—
Later, folks – I have to go get some work done at the pesky day job.
10
Nice job of not really addressing my points, KR, while simply repeating yours. I don’t know what kind of folks you’re used to talking to, but that is not a debate tactic that is likely to work well here.
Talk about a “trivial repeat” — no matter how many times you simply proclaim:
The fact remains that, in a 30 year career, I have yet to see ONE example of this — because, as I said, scientists can read, and tend to know what has been done in their fields.
(Well, OK — a couple of years ago I saw a paper that should have been rejected for this: Some physicists published the “first ever observation” of a phenomena (in Physical Review) that a company I was working at had been commercializing for 12 years. There were at least a dozen papers on it in the engineering journals, but apparently Physicists don’t read engineering journals. When we politely brought it to their attention, they were not appologetic, but instead got quite pissed off. Go figure — must be like Statisticians pointing out blockhead errors to Climate Scientists.)
We can hope you’re not being paid for critical thinking.
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bananabender at #83
Yes, I’m aware shellfish have been fine at very high pCO2’s in past eras. The issue is whether the current lot can adapt fast enough to rising pCO2. As I said up-post they don’t need to adapt to rising temperature, since low CO2 climate sensitivity fits the data best.
As it happened I’m a week behind reading New Scientist (I usually skip the climate bits as they cause nausea), last week had an article on rapid evolution of fish. In as little as a decade a whole population can adapt to a completely different environment. The main example given was of armoured sticklebacks migrating to a fresh water lake and then adapting to lose all their armour (which is interesting since it parallels the pCO2 issue – the fish find it harder to grow armour for the same chemical reason shellfish find it harder to grow shells). So after a decade or less the fish are all fine in their new home.
I think this will be the case for most carbonate shelled creatures too, but that does not eliminate environmental pressure on the populations. But we’re getting better at helping, and it doesn’t cost much – the Tassie Devil program is only a few million, nowhere near the $trillions that useless CO2 reduction programs will cost, or even the $20 odd billion from the disgusting carbon tax.
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KR:
Your response in #94 to my series of posts culminating in #93 is a classic fail, but it provides a good example of your continuing to wriggle.
Firstly, as is usual when you have been shown to be wrong, you attempt to change the subject.
The issue was not and is not – as you suggest –
I was referring to.
The issue was and is your silly assertion that Paltridge’s analysis (above) is wrong because, you claimed, AGW research funding is decided on the basis of
I said this was clearly false because the most recent paper that published “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” was published over 10 years ago”.
I will not yet again repeat your silly responses to that, but at #82 I wrote
And I said I would cite the paper I know to be the most recent which fits your criteria after another 12hours.
Your response to that was nothing.
You had claimed there are “dozens” of papers that fit your criteria but you did not cite any.
So, at #93 I cited the paper which is more than 10 years aold and is the most recent paper containing “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” and I explained how it fits your criteria.
Your response is at #94. And lame is an understatement of that response.
The paper I was referring to is only important in so far as you cannot cite another more recent paper which fits your criteria. So, if as you say
Then you did not respond because you knew I had disproved your assertion.
But you try to obfuscate saying;
Do those papers fit your criteria? No, they do not.
Do you explain how you think those papers fit your criteria? No, you do not.
It seems that you plucked them from the internet and cited them as a smokescreen for the fact that I had disproved your assertion.
Then you try to segue onto discussion of Jacobson’s paper (a classic ‘warmist’ ploy: when the argument is lost then try to change the subject in hope that others will not notice the argument has been lost).
But that segue is a ‘foot in the mouth’. You say
Firstly, I never said anything concerning the IPCC, whether or not Jacobson’s work was considered in the the IPCC’s AR4, or whether it was ignored. On the contrary, I explained that it was NOT ignored, saying:
Furthermore, there was no mention of Jacobson’s work in the drafts of the AR4. The mentions that you cite were added because I (yes, me) insisted on their inclusion in several of my peer review comments for the IPCC, for example, these two
And
KR, your marks out of 10? I give you minus 5.
Richard
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KR – you should know [snip, you should stop baiting] ED
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scaper…:#28
April 15th, 2011 at 9:59 am
Scaper you may like to point out to Combet that Australias emissions are dominated by Coal powered generators as stated in the Garnaut report he provided you.
You may then like to point out that the OECD nations are home to 351 (as of 2006) Nuclear power plants. (the rest of the world has another 92 as of 2006)
Source
from
http://home.iprimus.com.au/nielsens/Images/nureactors.jpg
You may also then like to ask him why his party, the Labor Party, has for decades consistently opposed the construction of Nuclear power plants in Australia. Ask him if he is comfortable with his rank hypocrisy and his dishonesty in comparing Australias per capita emissions with that of nations who have embraced nuclear for decades.
You may also like to point out to the rank hypocrite that North Korea has one of the lowest per capita emissions in the world and ask him does he approve of North Koreas emissions reductions success and does he have any aspirations to emulate them.
Send him a dictionary definition of the words Hypocrisy and Misleading.
And send that liar my regards.
10
KR is singing songs he learned about AGW on the TV etc. but he is off key
Not that it matters, the regurgitation of junk science with some of the “facts and figgeres” goofed up has the same value as the genu-wine junk article
10
I think that this, more than any single paper or data set, should have set the alarm bells ringing long ago. For all of the money thrown at “climate science” the lack of positive outcomes attributed to a warming world is simply astounding. We are supposed to believe that warming has no positive benefits? Surely, on a level playing field, there should be a significant number of papers along the lines of “..less life killing Ice is a good thing for life because..”.
KR: I can’t believe that you held up Sherwood 2008 as some kind of rebuttal. If there was ever a single paper paving my road to “scepticism” that would be it. Never mind the “novel” techniques to dump actual temperature readings, the anomaly colour scheme alone should get some kind of prize.
10
#98 was I wrong. Richard knows there is only 1 such paper that satisfies his criteria. He says it himself.
10
MattB:
I think your post at #102 takes the prize for most stupid comment of the decade.
The criteria were NOT mine: they were stipulated by KR.
My point was that the most recent paper which fits KR’s criteria was published more than 10 years ago.
You are claiming that there has only ever been one paper which fits KR’s criteria.
Let me offer you some advice: try to think before you post a comment.
Richard
10
No No Richard – we are not in disagreement. Your criteria = KR’s criteria adapted by yourself to be from approximately 10+ years ago (i.e. since just before that paper was released.”
I mean I’m not wrong am I – you don’t think any paper since that paper satisfies the criteria? You know all the other papers and have dismissed them.
10
MattB:
Not content with having made the probably most stupid comment of the decade at #102, you attempt to make an even more stupid one at #104.
I accepted KR’s criteria without any dispute and no “modification”.
Neither he nor you has indicated – or can indicate – any “modification” of any kind to KR’s criteria that I made, inferred and/or suggested. You have not made such an indication and you cannot because I made none.
KR made a daft comment and I proved it was wrong.
Your attempts to suggest otherwise only serve to draw attention to the fact that KR has been clearly shown to have been wrong.
With “friends” like you KR does not need any enemiesa.
Richard
10
KR,
You seem to believe that CO2 has magical properties, like many scientists who took the radiative forcing properties as gospel. Oddly enough a scientist south of the border down Mexico way was a believer. He decided without this magic pudding funding to research the effect of CO2 and quantify it through experiment for the global warming effort.
Recently he finished his experiments a firm sceptic in fact he disproved it conclusively. To his amazement he found that CO2 +5% water vapour in nitrogen some what like our atmosphere with incoming radiation actually cooled the world. He found that adding O2 to the mix cooled it even more. This scientist started out a believer and just recently totally falsified AGW.
This man will be a hero to the world, I give you no link just a hint, he works at a university find him yourself and try and disprove his real scientific findings. [ He jointly did this with a American whom published a reasonably famous book about global warming] But I give you too many clues.
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Richard S Courtney @ 105
‘I accepted KR’s criteria without any dispute and no “modification”.’
Actually, Richard, it’s your criteria, as per @30:
“If you exclude Lindzen’s excellent papers which you say you reject then the last paper concerning AGW that added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” was published more than 10 years ago.
I know what it was. Do you?
Richard”
I replied that there have been lots of interesting, relevant papers published, and listed a few that came to mind within the last few years. As I expected and predicted, you came back (eventually) with a single 10 year old paper that you claimed invalidated the entire AGW theory. A paper that is included in the references of the IPCC (whether on a skeptics impetus or not) and hence part of the literature discussed.
And then you accuse me of being incorrect??? On that basis of criteria you presented and then did not fulfill?
10
KR~:
Your post at #
10
It helps to be reminded that it was Carl Sagan who invoked a runaway greenhouse effect to counter Velikovksy’s proposal that Venus might be hot because it was, according to our ancestors, formed within human memory. James Hansen did his post doctoral work on Venus’ and it was this error by Sagan that has led to the present day obsession over CO2.
It’s established that whenever Velikovsky made a prediction, all have been now verified in his favour. This does not mean at all that everything Velikovsky wrote was accurate, but his suggestion that there is another force operating in the cosmos, electromagnetism, in addition to gravity, has been verified and forms the basis of the Plasma Universe theory as published under the auspices of the IEEE.
A greenhouse gas effect is necessary when the standard model is strictly Newtonian in the absence of plasma. Add plasma to the model and the need for a greenhouse gas effect disappears. A greenhouse gas effect is simply Victorian era gas-light physics. We have made some progress since then.
10
KR:
Your post at #107 is a series of blatant and silly lies.
You stated the criteria; not me.
My post at #30 was quoting your words at #16 which said in full:
I accepted those criteria and showed they are wrong.
You claim:
That is another falsehood.
As my post at #97 said:
You still have not explained how you think those papers provide “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed”. They do NOT: they add to and/or attempt to modify existing data.
And your greatest lie is when you assert:
I HAVE MADE NO SUCH CLAIM; NOT HERE NOT ANYWHERE AND AT NO TIME.
On the contrary, at #93 I explained how it has been adopted by so-called climate ‘scientists’ – notably James Hansen – who promote the global warming scare.
And,importantly, your use of the word “eventually” is (deliberately?)misleading. I gave you two successive periods of 12 hours in which to find a more recent paper than the one from 10 years ago which I am certain is the most recent which fits your criteria.
You failed to respond to those challenges.
Then, not content with those whoppers, you say that Jacobson’s paper was mentioned in the IPCC AR4 (as I explained, it was added into the AR4 at my insistance and with threat of a greater scandal than ‘Himalayagatye if it were not included).
The inclusion of that paper in the AR4 has no relevance of any kind to the fact that it was the most recent paper pertaining to AGW which fits your criteria. And it was published more than 10 years ago which proves your assertion was – and is – plain wrong.
Now your ferrago of lies may satisfy MattB and those who inhabit ‘warmist’ web sites, but the people who frequent this site are literate so they can read the above thread and see the facts for themselves.
Richard
10
Richard S Courtney @ 110
Well, Richard, you have clearly expressed that the only work you consider new, interesting, and relevant is work that contradicts AGW. I’m afraid my definition is a little bit more inclusive – work that expands our knowledge of our world and what’s happening in it.
I think that anyone reading this thread can recognize that. To me, it’s simply blatant confirmation bias on your part; rejecting data that disagrees with your opinions.
And (to close the circle with the initial topic) if that is your criteria for accepting papers, data, and other scientific works, I certainly don’t want you anywhere near funding decisions.
With that, I think I’m done with this thread. Richard has proven (to me, at least) his biases, and I was quite correct in predicting the kind of paper and the slant on it he would provide.
Funding decisions certainly shouldn’t be made by people with confirmation bias; that is an issue to be considered. But folks like Richard don’t impress me as better decision makers in that regard.
10
KR:
Your post at #111 is another lie.
I cited a paper that has been adopted by climate ‘scientists’ (sic) who promote AGW. And your response is to say:
The only possible explanations of this are
(a) you are an inveterate liar
or
(b) you are unable to read
or
(c) you are an inveterate liar who is unable to read.
Clearly, you are capable of discrediting yourself without any help from so I see no purpose in wasting more time on you.
Richard
10
Re: Richard S Courtney @ 112
Let’s enter the Way-Back Machine. Various emphases added:
—
KR @ 111
“Well, Richard, you have clearly expressed that the only work you consider new, interesting, and relevant is work that contradicts AGW.”
—
Richard @ 112
“I cited a paper that has been adopted by climate ‘scientists’ (sic) who promote AGW. And your response is to say:
Richard, you have clearly expressed that the only work you consider new, interesting, and relevant is work that contradicts AGW.
The only possible explanations of this are
(a) you are an inveterate liar
or
(b) you are unable to read
or
(c) you are an inveterate liar who is unable to read.”
—
However:
Richard @ 93
“No published paper concerning AGW has added “new, interesting data relevant to the problems addressed” since Jacobson’s. This is not surprising: Jacobson’s paper destroyed the fictional narrative of aerosol cooling and additional novel information could prove equally embarrassing to the cause of AGW.
Richard”
—
Richard – you are insulting, argumentative – and contradicting yourself. As I said before; I have no desire to see you anywhere near any funding decisions, as your mind is made up, d**n the facts. I stated that interesting relevant work adds to our knowledge, you clearly state that the only interesting relevant work is that which confirms your biases.
I am saddened that the moderation criteria for this blog do not cover the gratuitous insults that have been presented.
[You mean perhaps that your comments were permitted in the first place? Defend your position and don’t blame the blog or the volunteers that keep egregious misbehavior at bay. “Gratuitous insults” might be in the eye of the beholder.] ED
10
Moderator / ED
I’m referring to language such as “…you are an inveterate liar who is unable to read.”.
While I am no saint, I do my best to speak to ideas, to arguments, to what is presented, not to ad hominem attacks. I will gladly point out self-contradictory statements as above, for example – but I don’t call people names thinking that I’ve made anything like a rational, supported argument.
[Take a deep breath and then address what you feel is wrong one point at a time. Mr. Courtney is not one to engage in or support lying and if you are so inclined then it must be a misunderstanding. Work it out. I don’t have the wages or time to be the judge] ED
P.S. let me point out that KR is anonymous Richard S. Courtney does not hide his identity.
10
I have asked what must be hindreds of thousands of alarmists from Mann & the Rotal Society down to the audiences on blogs and newspapers to name 2 scientists who aren’t ultimately paid by the state and who support the catastrophiuc warming claim. So far not one has been able to do so.
That is clear statistical proof not only that there is no “consensus” but that warming alarmism is 100% a government funded scare story.
Note that the Royal Society gets £45 million annually from the government.
10
KR:
My post at #112 is clear, accurate and factual.
If you have any other explanation then state it. Otherwise, apologise then go away.
Richard
10
AGW can’t be disproved, but KR demonstrates that it can be proven in the following manner
Amplification + repetition + feigned indignation + accusations of gratuitous insults whilst delivering them
= junk science validity.
In fact, this is the only way to prove AGW is real – and the pattern has been repeated ad nauseam by people who should have known better, too!
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Found this which looks a good read by a team of mostly scientists/physicists and engineers only supported by their book writing. Free for academics and educators.
http://slayingtheskydragon.com/
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Did you know how many people you have to buy to get a Nobel Peace Prize? A committee of 5! So if anyone wonders how Gore got a Nobel Peace Prize, someone should look at the money train to the Nobel Peace Prize Committee…..
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It’s easier to win a Nobel Peace prize than you think!
Al Groper paid a special visit to the Swedish royal family to give them a private viewing of his blockbuster hit, “An Inconvenient Police Report,” in an attempt to woo these people into being more Socialist activists than they already are. Al should have known that he couldn’t make them more Socialist if he tried.
Al also billed these people for his own self-invited travel on Al’s private jet plane.
I don’t blame him, I’d do the same thing
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Brian G Valentine #120
It’s easier to win a Nobel Peace prize than you think!
Obviously – If Obama and Gore have one each – then they are now WORTHLESS in the “Rest of the Worlds” eyes.
Even the ‘Club of Rome’ elite would shun them now.
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@Brian G Valentine #120
Sorry Brian – Just read the Tag (‘easier’).
I’m not saying anything – you all need to click this tag yourself.
Nice One Mate.
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The “buying” of the science started a long time before Gillard and Combet.
Our CSIRO was a marvellous organisation which helped keep Australian industry and science at the forefront of the world.
Then in 1986 the Hawke government changed the management structure of the CSIRO, appointing their own mates to run it, with Neville Wran, national president of the ALP, as chairman.
Since that time the science coming from the CSIRO has been tainted by partisan politics. Who remembers the monstrous lie: “Cows are Australian’s biggest source of greenhouse gases”, which wasn’t just headlines of the day, but taught in our schools.
This hijacking of the CSIRO by the ALP came just a couple of years before the establishment of the IPCC.
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I have a report from either the CSIRO or BOM, I think it was the latter, that stated the amount of sea level rises expected in Australia by 2050. Yeah, a huge 177mm. What’s that in inches.
And a Cancun, according to Lord Monckton, they did follow what they could do about AGW. They signed up as did Australia to provide
100 BILLION by 2020 to the UN Green Climate Change Fund. Administered by them of course. Social engineering at its best.
But reading about the Bangkok conference, I think it isn’t going too well. Good. Bangkok is one of the most polluted cities in the world, and has been for over 30 years.
Cancum is suffering erosion of their man made beaches, having cleared everything away to stabilise the sea front. And we are going to pay for their bad environmental planning?
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Louis H at 109. From what I can remember of Carl Sagan, he said, that global warming preceded an ice age, and burning fossil fuels will hasten one.
It is true, that when Arctic glaciers or sea ice melts it has in
past (like thousands of years ago) introduced fresh water into the
Arctic oceans that alters the warm Gulf Stream current that keeps the Northern Hemisphere warmer and therefore they begin to freeze again. However, that was before the Panama Canal was built. I don’t know if that could stop this from happening again or whether it is actually causing the Gulf Stream to change course.
The biggest fear for the Northern Hemisphere is another mini or full blown ice again (the latter will take a long time to develop).
So doing anything thought to hasten this obviously will be alarming, as a mini ice age suffered between 800-1300s AD will spell worse conditions than a warming will.
A full blown glacial period will effect the Southern Hemisphere too. But not as dramatically. But it has only been in the last 10k years we have seen the increase (before human intervention) of tropical rain forests and monsoons in the Top End. Aborigines managed well, and changed their life styles and hunting methodology to cope, including fishing and using the coastal areas more. (Sea levels dropped during a glacial period of course to make it harder to acquire a fishing economy). Same as in Europe, the Mediterranean
was a mass of lakes and swamps. And of course France was joined
to Britain, but not many people lived in Britain then. And PMG
was joined to Australia. Cooling of the climate will do more damage to our populations than heating up will. I suppose I am
preaching to the converted. But you are not telling me that scientists don’t know this too. And the Northern Hemisphere is facing in possibly the not too distant future, a climate change that will definitely change their ability to survive?
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KR and MattB, don’t through your Ugg boots away yet. Even Penny Wong
stated on TV during the election night in August, asked whether the dropping of the ETS did anything to do with the lack of labor support.
She said No That there was a growing argument within the community that the planet was cooling. Sure then before this she and PM Gillard announced there would be no carbon tax in her term.
I wonder if the Independents would have supported them in a hung parliament if they had suddenly announced ‘Yes we are going to reintroduce the ETS one day or carbon tax’. Seems in that likelihood they were still hoping that public opinion was still supporting AGW if they did. Obviously they didn’t think so, eh?
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[…] caused a bit of a kerfuffle when he posted a link to Jo Nova who had a guest post by Garth Paltridge. This what Rafe selected from the Paltridge post. We hear that Julia Gillard is […]
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[…] claimed impartiality of the organizations’ making the case for AGW and the carbon tax: Ref:http://joannenova.com.au/2011/04/professor-points-out-its-a-less-than-nobel-consensus/#more-14384 Guest Post by Garth […]
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