David Evans explains the skeptics case (YouTube)

Last week we finished some YouTube versions explaining the skeptical case. These grew out of the interview we did with Nick Minchin and Anna Rose for the  ABC documentary I Can Change Your Mind. They are what we would have said, if we’d been editing the documentary :).

In the interview we were on a mission to show the evidence the ABC won’t show — and of course, true to form, the ABC did exactly that, and didn’t show it. As David often points out, the mainstream media have never shown this data anywhere in the world, ever, even though it is extremely relevant, from mankind’s best and latest instruments, from impeccable sources, and is publicly available. Not to mention that billions of dollars of public policies depend on getting this right either.

This is a strictly no-budget approach to organize the message for those on the web who prefer to see video’s rather than read papers. Here are three YouTube’s by David Evans, thanks to Barry Corke (for the filming and editing). I hear that one I did will be ready sometime.

A little background. When the documentary interview happened in our kitchen, we noticed something interesting. We felt the film crew, a producer and two camera people (dressed trendy, mainly in black, straight from Ultimo central casting) arrived expecting to find paid hacks, or slow moving ideologues who struggled to get a grip. It’s not that they said that of course, they were pro’s. But they had been hearing for years how we are evil shills for big tobacco and oil interests who were cynically only in it for the money. We stress they were professional and polite, and this isn’t in any way a complaint about them, but it was a distinct sense we had.

Then the interview happened. For two hours we presented evidence, determined to show graphs from respectable sources like NASA, photographs of actual thermometers, and had answers to absolutely everything and then some with details of scientific stuff like feedbacks and clouds. I took the predictable ad homs about funding, and turned the tables completely — we were the unfunded volunteers working for professional and patriotic duty against a wall of billions of dollars, while they lost data, hid methods, and called us names. I suppose they noticed we were a tad passionate, not cynical shills. Meanwhile Anna Rose came armed with print outs from DeSmog or Exxon secrets or some such and clearly had no idea of the science beyond the rudimentary: CO2 is a greenhouse gas, CO2 levels are rising, and it’s getting warmer, so how can you be a skeptic? (What’s a feedback?) She lived and breathed the postmodern view of science (climate scientists are the new Pope).

Sometime during this process the documentary crew started treating us with respect. After the interview, they even wanted to speak to us, not just the perfunctory things the situation demanded. We felt we had … changed their minds. Ok, we don’t hold any illusions it lasted long, and I suspect many audio and camera guys are closet skeptics to start with. Once they were back in ABC world among their friends and People Who Know Best, we are confident they went back to viewing us as untermenschen deceiving scum. But  just for a moment there, some minds were changed.

The skeptical cameraman recording it all for us, Barry Corke, had a good view of the whole proceedings because once he set up his cameras he just sat back and watched. We asked him afterwards, and he had noticed the same phenomenon. And that’s where the idea of these YouTubes was born — if it worked on battled hardened culture warriors working for the ABC, perhaps the public might like to hear what we said?

No, this isn’t footage from the ABC documentary I Can Change Your Mind — that’s a very large file, and we are trying to condense it so it can appear in a complete but manageable form. Soon.

David explains  The Skeptic’s Case:

The Science Part I  (or here)

The Science Part II (or here)

Then there’s the Politics (or here) — see article Climate Coup — The Politics

UPDATE: Second video link fixed.

9.1 out of 10 based on 143 ratings

359 comments to David Evans explains the skeptics case (YouTube)

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    Peter Whale

    Excellent presentation should be mandatory viewing for all politicians and all schools. This should be given as much publicity as possible. Well done David Evans and Jo.

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      I agree. Thanks, David, for speaking candidly about global vlimate change.

      With kind regards,
      Oliver K. Manuel

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      • #

        David,

        Our host, Jo Nova, reported the amazing 30-year timeline of events leading to the Climategate documents and emails that surfaced in Nov 2009.

        We now have reliable evidence that events leading to Climategate actually started 64 years earlier as one of two response to the “nuclear fires” that consumed Hiroshima and marked the end of the Second World War on 6 Aug 1945.

        1. Society benefited from publicly reported decisions to:

        _a.) Unite Nations
        _b.) Reduce Nationalism and Racism
        _c.) Avoid the Threat of Nuclear War

        2. Society and many fields of science were greatly damaged by secret decisions to obscure information on the source of energy that triggers “nuclear fires” in the cores of:

        _a.) Heavy atoms like Uranium
        _b.) Some planets like Jupiter
        _c.) Ordinary Sun-like stars
        _d.) Galaxies like our Milky Way

        World leaders became rulers rather than servants of the public in hiding the source of energy that sustains our lives, controls Earth’s ever-changing climate, and powers the expansion of the universe as compact nuclear matter is transformed into expanded atomic matter.

        One key to this great mystery was reported in the autobiography of Sir Fred Hoyle, “Home Is Where the Wind Blows” [University Science Books, Mill Valley, CA, 1994] 441 pages.

        In describing a conversation with Sir Arthur Eddington on a spring day in 1940, he reports:

        “We both believed that the Sun was made mostly of iron, . . .” (page 153)

        “The high-iron solution continued to reign supreme in the interim (at any rate, in the astronomical circles to which I was privy) until after the Second World War, . . .” (page 153)

        The other key to this mystery was reported by the late Professor Paul Kazuo Kuroda – formerly the faculty member at the Imperial University of Tokyo who was sent to Hiroshima to investigate its destruction on 6 Aug 1945 – in the Introduction to [“The Origin of the Chemical Elements and the Oklo Phenomenon” [Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 1982] 165 pages.

        “One day in August 1945, while standing in the ruins of Hiroshima, I became overwhelmed by the power of nuclear energy. The sight before my eyes was just like the end of the world, but I also felt that the beginning of the world may have been just like this.” (page 2)

        The beginning of the world was indeed like the event that consumed Hiroshima on 6 Aug 1945, as finally published this month in the Apeiron Journal 19, 123-150 (April 2012) http://tinyurl.com/7t5ojrn

        The supernova birth of the solar system had been studiously avoided since first revealed by the decay products of short-lived radioactive elements in the Earth and in meteorites in 1960.

        http://redshift.vif.com/JournalFiles/V19NO2pdf/V19N2MAN.pdf

        With kind regards,
        Oliver K. Manuel
        Former NASA Principal
        Investigator for Apollo
        http://www.omatumr.com
        http://omanuel.wordpress.com/about/
        http://omanuel.wordpress.com/about/#comment-31

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    • #
      Nick

      For gaaaawwwdds sake I wish I was richer!!

      All I can do is show this to the Kids, and between you and me, I know their sick of it, but don’t tell ’em I know they’re sick of it. LOL 🙂

      Friends and family avoid the subject. Little do they know that leaves me time to gather information, arm myself with references and plan for the next opportunity to go “off the handle” 🙂

      How in the hell do we get this stuff out there, to the point where a politician is afraid to do anything associated with belief based decision making?

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      • #
        Brian H

        Write the pols and let them know you’re passing the above vids and articles to all your friends and relatives, and that you know of many others doing the same. Sign off with, “Word of mouth trumps advertising”!

        If you dare. The Oz Troothy Squad is on the job!

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  • #
    Juliar

    Coincidentally, I just came across the first video and watched it a couple of hours before this post was made. 😀

    I am still interested in a response from Jo and/or David about the claims made by Robert Mueller who said in the documentary that the land weather station data was still correct even though it was near those other weather stations.

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  • #
    Joe V.

    I just found a transcript at the ABC sit. It makes very interesting reading. Is it of the full thing ? I’ve not been able to see the ABC transmission.

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  • #
    Compadre

    A must see as Peter said. Jo it needs to be given a sticky for a long time, well done.

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    Siliggy

    At the beginning of the first video Dr Evans notes that “Electrical Engineering” is the field of knowledge that knows most about how feedback works. I would add that because this is very true many of the dumb mistakes climate scientists make about feedback are obvious to many in the electrical and electronic trades. For example anyone who has spent time repairing the once common as mud VHS VCR needed to be able no just to understand but also to quickly and affordably diagnose problems with many different types of nested feedback loops built into the one machine and all working together. The incredibly complex yet common machine used many different types of feedback loop technology. I bet that these climate alarmists had no idea that normaly humble TV repairers all over the planet were laughing hysterically at some of their stupid claims.

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    • #

      I respect David Evans knowledge but there are a few things such as heat and mass transfer that other engineers may have a better understanding (and far better understanding than any climate scientist). Feedback (which requires good measurement) is a very important consideration in process control which is a speciality of chemical engineers.

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      Kevin Moore

      Is there an understandable explanation of “feedback” for normal people?

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        Kevin Moore

        I get the gist of this –

        http://sites:google.com/site/globalwarmingquestions/or4feed

        Hypothetical positive feedback

        The IPCC ‘projections’ for temperature rise over this century, given in Table SPM3 on page 13 of the SPM, range up to a scary 6.4 degrees. The associated text says “Assessed upper ranges for temperature projections are larger than in the TAR (see Table SPM.3) mainly because the broader range of models now available suggests stronger climate-carbon cycle feedbacks.” Such a projection seems far-fetched, given the 20th Century temperature rise of around 0.6 degrees, and the established logarithmic effect of carbon dioxide, meaning that more carbon dioxide has less effect.

        So where do these unlikely projections come from? Page 12 claims that “Water vapour changes represent the largest feedback affecting climate sensitivity and are now better understood than in the TAR. Cloud feedbacks remain the largest source of uncertainty”. This is based on computer modeled “positive feedbacks” from increased water vapor and clouds, specifically designed to increase the impact of anthropogenic greenhouse gases on temperatures by several times the values supported by theoretical physics or by the actual 20th century temperature record (which provides no evidence of such “positive feedbacks”).

        Part of the argument for this feedback is that warmer temperatures lead to more evaporation and hence more water vapour, another greenhouse gas. But we have already seen that there is no increase in water vapour.

        What does the IPCC mean by “Cloud feedbacks remain the largest source of uncertainty”? Here it is necessary to interpret the IPCC code and read between the lines, or look up the relevant section of the main report, section 8.6.3.2 on p. 635. Here it is indirectly acknowledged that cloud feedback is negative, since warming leads to more evaporation, more cloud formation and hence more reflection of sunlight. Another mechanism whereby water vapour feedback is negative was discussed by Lindzen (1990) Some coolness concerning global warming, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 71: 288-299.
        In general, in nature, negative feedbacks are far more common than positive ones. Negative feedback gives stability of a system to external perturbations, while positive feedback leads to instability and exponential growth. If there was a positive feedback mechanism between carbon dioxide, temperature and water vapour, as hypothesised by the IPCC, it would have led to large fluctuations in the past.

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        • #
          Kevin Moore

          This may be of interest –

          http://www.seafriends.org.nz/issues/global/climate2.htm

          “When water vapour exists in air at 2%, it adds 0.02 x 0.5 = 1% to the air’s heat capacity, which is negligible. However, by changing phase from vapour to cloud, it releases a latent heat of 0.02 x 540 = 10.8 (cal), equivalent to 10.8 / 0.5 = 22 degrees of warming. Water vapour is thus a considerable player in the transfer of heat through the atmosphere.

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          • #
            Rereke Whakaaro

            Water vapour is thus a considerable player in the transfer of heat through the atmosphere.

            It is the major player – far worse than CO2.

            “But clouds are, like, so obviously not man-made, duh.” So the heat transference is ignored by the catastrophists because it doesn’t fit their agenda.

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          Rereke Whakaaro

          Is there an understandable explanation of “feedback” for normal people?

          Plug a microphone into the AUX jack on your stereo, and then hold the mike in front of a speaker – that screech you hear is audio feedback.

          If you hit a bell it makes a ringing tone. Any given bell always makes the same tone – the principle of church bells. If you set a sound system to output that same tone, the bell will start to ring in sympathy – also feedback. But in music, we say that the bell resonates, but it is the same thing.

          All systems from a simple bell to a complex sound system have at least one resonant frequency where the note continues at the same frequency for as long as energy is supplied – positive feedback. Bad sound systems (and bells) have more than one resonant frequency.

          Non-resonant frequencies die away much faster than resonant frequencies, so much more energy is required to maintain that particular sound. That is negative feedback.

          Finally, if you hit a bloke down the pub, he will probably hit you back – feedback, but not as we know it 🙂

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          • #
            Siliggy

            Rereke.
            I disagree!

            “Non-resonant frequencies die away much faster than resonant frequencies, so much more energy is required to maintain that particular sound. That is negative feedback.”

            No that is loss. While measurement and negative feedback could be used to solve this loss problem the “much more” could also be provided by an equal an opposite frequency and phase response in the energy supply. Such a system has no feedback and no apparent resonance.

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          • #
            Kevin Moore

            So by convection heat rises. How then when it hits the greenhouse gas wall in the sky does it feedback to the ground?

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          • #
            Rereke Whakaaro

            Sliggy

            No that is loss.

            Yep, Quite right. My bad – doing several things at once, and none very well. Never learn, think faster than I can type, can type at 100 wpm on a good day, so leave fingers on autopilot, and occasionally make a dick of myself. (And no, I am not going to quantify “occasionally”)

            The point I was really trying to make was that feedback and resonance are actually the same thing. So for feedback to work – for the bell to sound in relation to a tone from a sound system – the sound has to be at the resonant frequency of the bell, or some harmonic or sub-harmonic thereof. A harmonic being the original frequency multiplied by an integer.

            So Kevin, would you say that the resonant frequency of a CO2 molecule was the same, or a harmonic or subharmonic of the resonant frequency of “the gas wall in the sky”? And if it were, then specifically because the resonant frequency of both the CO2 molecule and “the glass wall in the sky” were the same, or similar, the resonant energy of the CO2 molecule would pass straight through the “glass wall in the sky”, and wander off into space, looking for another party to attend.

            On the other hand, if the “glass wall in the sky” had a different resonant frequency, then the “glass wall in the sky” would simply sit there looking indifferent, and the CO2 module would morosely turn away having lost a lot of its energy trying to get through the “glass wall in the sky” in the first place. I bit like getting past a belligerent bouncer, who doesn’t want you to leave until the cops turn up.

            I don’t see much feedback in either of these scenarios, and I have to say that the “party watching satellites” don’t either.

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          • #
            Siliggy

            Rereke While you graciously declared “No that is loss” to be correct my statement implied knowledge of the system you had in mind. Knowledge I did not have. There are ways you could have been correct. That would be if the source of the energy has more energy available and the loss can cause it to be used. In this case, there is feedback causing a change back in the supply.
            One example could be an electrical source that sees the loss as a lower resistance. If the supply has a low output impedance (is able to provide more current) then the loss has caused more power to be used. So you would be correct as feedback did occur!
            Another example would be a mechanical drive perhaps even running from fuel that has torque to spare. The increased loss would cause more fuel to be used, which again is feedback.
            Your statement

            “feedback and resonance are actually the same thing.”

            requires some modification though.
            Feedback is simply a path back to and altering the source. Like any path it can have both resonant and non resonant components. In electrical/electronic engineering we break the resonant components of a path (feedback or not) down further into equivalent positive and negative reactive components. This equates to capacitive and inductive components. The non-resonant feedback effects are counted as resistive rather than capacitive or inductive.
            This then produces two dimensions that can be displayed on paper as plus and minus non reactive components on one plane and plus and minus reactive components on the other plane.
            In the stability analysis video below (post 5.2.2), you see him switch between polar and rectangular notation. The reactive components of the feedback are counted as up and down or 90 and 270 degrees. The non-reactive parts are counted as left and right or 180 and 0 degrees.
            The dead giveaways that he has learned this stuff partly from the science/maths schools of thought instead of just from the electro fields is the use of “i” for the imaginary up down reactive part. Scientists and mathematicians use “i”. We use “j”. He should get a rap over the knuckles for using “db” instead of “dB”. We use “b” for magnetic stuff.

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      • #
        Siliggy

        Is there an understandable explanation of “feedback” for normal people?

        Yes but…
        Kevin the point of my post was to show that although there are simple parts of feedback theory there are a few other factors that us electrical/electronics people look at.
        See how you go with this. It helped to remind me how much i have forgotten so do not ask me to explain it right now!:
        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynI9Zif105k

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      • #

        Kevin Moore, The best I can do is the quote about Feedback Control-“In a feedback control loop, the controlled variable (eg temperature) is compared to a set point R, with the difference, deviation, or error e acted upon by the controller to move m (the manipulated variable eg fuel) in such a way to minimize the error. This is specifically negative feedback, in that an increase in the deviation moves m (the manipulated variable) to decrease the deviation.” (eg temperature below set point will call for more fuel so deviation is reduced and set point regained). The controller in a control loop has tuning parameters related to proportional, integral, derivative, lag, deadtime, and sampling functions. Only people who understand the process can finely tune the parameters.
        In climate, an example of negative feedback could be more radiation from the sun (eg when the earth moves closer to the sun in its elliptical orbit), this means more heat absorbed by the ocean, this in turn can lead to more evaporation which will cause more clouds, and then the clouds reflect (and absorb) the sun’s radiation leading to reduced radiant energy be absorbed by the oceans below the cloud. The latter is simplistic. No one understands cloud formation but it has been found by measurements that cloud cover varies within a small range and that changes continuing for a period of time (ie years) can significantly affect the climate over cyclical periods of time.
        As I said before the alarmist pseudo “climate scientists” have no understanding of heat and mass transfer (eg evaporation & condensation)

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        • #
          Kevin Moore

          Cement a friend,

          I have read a bit about the properties of water and latent heat. Apparently water vapour [steam] retains the heat which formed it until released as condensation. If that condensation forms clouds how then can the rule that hot air rises be reversed? In what way can there be “feedback” to ground?

          http://sites:google.com/site/globalwarmingquestions/or4feed

          What does the IPCC mean by “Cloud feedbacks remain the largest source of uncertainty”? Here it is necessary to interpret the IPCC code and read between the lines, or look up the relevant section of the main report, section 8.6.3.2 on p. 635. Here it is indirectly acknowledged that cloud feedback is negative, since warming leads to more evaporation, more cloud formation and hence more reflection of sunlight. Another mechanism whereby water vapour feedback is negative was discussed by Lindzen (1990) Some coolness concerning global warming, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 71: 288-299.

          http://www.seafriends.org.nz/issues/global/climate2.htm

          “When water vapour exists in air at 2%, it adds 0.02 x 0.5 = 1% to the air’s heat capacity, which is negligible. However, by changing phase from vapour to cloud, it releases a latent heat of 0.02 x 540 = 10.8 (cal), equivalent to 10.8 / 0.5 = 22 degrees of warming. Water vapour is thus a considerable player in the transfer of heat through the atmosphere.

          00

          • #

            Kevin, Your first quote is OK but little the IPCC writes has any scientific backing.
            Your second quote is wrong. Maybe, you should look at how cyclones form. That might get you in the right train of thinking.

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      • #
        Brian H

        If you (CO2) punch a professional boxer (H2O) in the face, he’ll knock you colder’n a mackerel. Instant negative feedback.

        If a bully (government funder) punches a coward (grant-seeking academic climate scientist) in the mouth, he’ll cry and beg for mercy (promise to prove CO2 rulez). This excites the bully who will proceed to pound the coward into a pulp (utterly destroy his integrity). Run-away positive feedback.

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    • #

      More generally, David Evans follows other skeptics in drawing on their knowledge in other areas to critcize the climate consensus.
      Contrary to this, has you noticed that a Phd in the climate orthodoxy enables one to understand statistics better than the statisticians, economics better than the economists, public policy better than the policy-makers and political theory greater than the sages. There are even climate groupies who claim to analyze Christianity better than the theologians, or define the word “skeptic” better than the consensus of language experts at the Oxford English Dictionary.

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    • #
      Laurie Williams

      Well said. For many decades FM radio receivers have been running on analogue phase lock loop feedback. Plenty of negative feedbacks, and associated damping, in systems that people use every day, including car engine management.

      Ever noticed that people who actually have the ability to understand systems and structures and the functional relationships behind them don’t tend to get into politics?

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  • #
    CHIP

    I watched the ABC-documentary with Anna Rose yesterday and I couldn’t quite believe that she put forward the argument that acting on human CO2-emissons was the right think to do because CO2 could possibly destroy the planet. Her own words. I don’t blame Jo for cracking up on the spot. I didn’t have time to watch the whole video but I must say that she did strike me as someone who was suffering from a psychological imbalance due to a surfeit of positive emotion and a deficient of critical reason. She doesn’t seem to have made certain of your facts about man-made global warming before choosing to believe in it. Oh, and brilliant presentation, by the way.

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    • #
      Kinkykeith

      Perceptive summary Chip

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      Laurie Williams

      You are right about emotion and reason. Lefties always put emotion before reason – or to put it another way they are incapable of reason, either because emotion blocks it or because they lack the basic logical thinking ability. If they did not have that fault they would not have been lefties to start with.

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    CHIP

    That should be “her facts”.

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  • #
    Sonny

    Ever wanted to prove that there has been no global warming in the last decade? Here is how.

    Step 1:

    download the “global tempaerature anomoly data from our very own loved and trusted Austrlian BOM

    http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/global/timeseries.cgi

    Step 2:

    Warning this step involves perfomring basic analysis in Microsoft Excel. Sorry Phil Jones. (insider joke – read climategate emails)

    Step 3:

    Calculate the 5 year running average.

    example:

    1994(AVG) = (1990(Temp) + 1991(Temp) + 1992(Temp) + 1993(Temp) + 1994(Temp) / 5
    0.16 = (0.25 + 0.21 + 0.07 + 0.1 + 0.17) / 5

    Pretty simple and uncontroversial? This is “end point averaging”.

    ANYWAY, lets have a look at the results from 1990 to 2011.

    Year Temp 5yr AVG (end point)
    1990 0.25 —-
    1991 0.21 —-
    1992 0.07 —-
    1993 0.1 —-
    1994 0.17 0.16
    1995 0.28 0.17
    1996 0.14 0.15
    1997 0.35 0.21
    1998 0.53 0.29
    1999 0.31 0.32
    2000 0.28 0.32
    2001 0.41 0.38
    2002 0.46 0.40
    2003 0.47 0.39
    2004 0.45 0.41
    2005 0.48 0.45
    2006 0.43 0.46
    2007 0.4 0.45
    2008 0.33 0.42
    2009 0.44 0.42
    2010 0.47 0.41
    2011 0.34 0.40

    The last decade is the period from 2002 to 2011. Here is the data.

    Year Temp 5yr AVG (end point)
    2002 0.46 0.40
    2003 0.47 0.39
    2004 0.45 0.41
    2005 0.48 0.45
    2006 0.43 0.46
    2007 0.4 0.45
    2008 0.33 0.42
    2009 0.44 0.42
    2010 0.47 0.41
    2011 0.34 0.40

    Look at the 5 year running average for 2002 to 2011…

    Thats right… The BOM data shows unequivically that there has been no global warming in the past decade.

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    • #
      Sonny

      Let me add one extra comment for the benefit of “chris”.

      The 5 year running average from 2006 to 2011 actually shows… Umm… Cooling.
      Because it’s only 0.06 degrees (I.e noise) I judiciously decided not to conclude that we are experiencing global cooling. Nevertheless, this data from the BOM which is the most authoritative Australian data we have on climate change, and is readily and easily downloaded by the public shows…

      The world has experienced global cooling for the last seven years by 0.06 degrees.

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      • #
        Sonny

        35 likes now. Not one single alarmist on this website has anything to say regarding this post? Even though it disproved outright the claims on skeptical science that “we are still warming”? Even though it disproved the CSIRO’s statements that we are still warming?

        Is this the ultimate body blow to the alarmist case? No one prepared to even discuss it?

        Where’s Ross, Matt B, Matt B, Catamon? Why are they so quiet about this?

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  • #
    Lawrie

    Jo,

    You have probably hit on the right methodology to get the message to a bigger audience. We are effectively barred from the airwaves and few people read papers anyway; other than the latest scandals or falls in the property market. Even fabulous blogs such as this one have a limited audience and even there only one topic at a time is covered. A short film similar to the one Topher is putting together on free speech might be the breakthrough we need. Topher raised $25000 plus for his venture so as to present a professional piece. Maybe putting climate updates such as the CLOUD experiment to air as they occur could provide the information that is so sadly lacking in the MSM. If we can’t go through them we should just go round them.I’m always willing to help in such an important endeavour.

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    Sonny

    Jo and David,

    Congratulations and Thankyou for your tireless and increasingly effective work! These videos are truly great and will help change the minds of many Australians who have, through no fault of their own, been brainwashed by government lies.

    Well done!

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  • #
    Juergen

    He is right with the comment of “Arguably a class of parasites enriching themselves at the expense of producers”.
    Change that to “A class of parasites enriching themselves at the expense of the little people”.
    Can I claim back my carbon tax?

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      Rereke Whakaaro

      Juergen,

      You make a good point.

      The “parasitic class” would treat the “producer class” as near-equals.

      But reality would indicated that the “parasitic class” have nothing but contempt for the “little people”.

      “Can I claim back my carbon tax?”

      Very unlikely, “it would take too much time and effort, and it would cost far too much to remove the tax.” Seriously, that is a real quote, and not one of my throw-away lines.

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    mikemUK

    We shouldn’t be too harsh with this woman, Anna Rose, she is after all but a naive ‘believer’.

    On the other hand, earlier this year in a pre-recorded BBC documentary our very own Sir Paul Nurse, Nobel Laureate (genetics), PRESIDENT of the ROYAL SOCIETY no less, swallowed a totally absurd claim by a US volcanologist about manmade carbon emissions without a blush; similarly, the programme producers had ample time to edit and remove this falsehood before broadcast but were apparently too thick/ignorant/partisan to notice.

    I understand the volcanologist later publicly acknowledged his ‘howler’, but am unaware of any such action by either Nurse or the BBC.

    It’s the big fish we need to watch out for, not so much the minnows!

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      Joe V.

      On the reticence in withdrawing / correcting false information. Once it’s been broadcast it’s had the desired effect. The impressionable have been exposed to it.
      Isn’t that’s what broadcasting’s about ?
      Certainly in the Movement builder
      Anna Rose’s program, the presumption was thoroughly on the ‘skeptics” needing help. ( or at least the ones that aren’t ‘nasty, incorrigible ‘deniers’).

      Is it true Anna Rose , founder of Australian Youth Climate Coalition, is closely related to a founder of Get Up! ?

      The ex Soviet Union was very big on its Youth movements too.

      Rent-a-Movement at Movements-R-Us.com

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        mareeS

        Joe V., I believe Anna Rose is Simon Sheikh’s missus, or partner or whatever. I did think about ventriloquists and dummies, but only for a moment, because that would be cruel.

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          Jaymez

          It also didn’t help that known Climate and population alarmist Dick Smith was one of the producers of the show, “I can change your mind’. His plan from the start would have been to change people’s minds to his way of thinking.

          Here’s what Dick Smith says on his own web site: “In September 2009, my youngest daughter, Jenny, phoned me and said, “dad, they are all talking about human induced climate change, and they’re all going off to Copenhagen. Why don’t they talk about the ‘elephant in the room’”. I said, “Jenny, what’s that?”. She said, “population!”.

          The instant she said the word, it was almost as if a light was turned on in my head. Within seconds I realised how stupid I had been. Here we were talking about problems which are facing our planet, but people weren’t talking about the most obvious problem – too many people.

          On the same site it is noted Dick Smith was notified by Professor Paul Ehrlich at Stanford University that Smith had been appointed to the position of Consulting Professor in the Center for Conservation Biology at Stanford University. This is the same Paul Ehrlich who predicted a coming ice age due to greenhouse gases as early as 1968, and all through the 70’s. In a 1986 book he predicted at least 1 Billion people would die from starvation by 2020.Due to the planets inability to feed them due to climate change and over population. In the 80’s he jumped the coming ice-age ship and jumped on the global warming gravy train. Can you imagine what type of retarded, ham strung, world economy we would have now, had Ehrlich’s warnings, and his co-author and current chief scientific adviser to Obama, John Holdren, been followed? So that’s the type of camp the shows’ producer Dick Smith is in.

          As for ABC bias programming with the catalyst segment on dying heat stressed trees leading into ‘I can change your mind’ then followed by the Alarmist stacked panel and audience in Q&A, what is to be expected?

          The imbalance towards climate alarmism was heartily supported by the ABC, in which resides a skewed population of catastrophic human caused climate change believers. Something which has been denied, but when the ABC Chairman Maurice Newman told 250 leading ABC journalists, programme managers and staffers that the media had suffered from ‘group think’ on the Climate Change issue and should be more balanced, there was a heated exchange and a walk out lead by Jonathon Holmes. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/media/climate-balance-urged-at-abc/story-e6frg996-1225839329115

          The current ABC Managing director Mark Scott on the other hand has made no secret that he sees his job is to align the ABC with wider Government Policy – in other words, the ABC’s managing director see’s the organisation as a propaganda arm of Government. This of course leads to the promotion and employment of ‘believers’ rather than ‘sceptics’. I’m not saying Mark Scott is a believer or not, he just knows who his employer is, as evidenced by this observation, “Senate Estimates has become a double act, with the minister for communications, Stephen Conroy, acting like Snowy to Scott’s Tintin – a snappy and loyal terrier.” See: http://www.themonthly.com.au/mark-scott-embarks-another-five-year-term-second-life-margaret-simons-3471

          The timing of this programme was no coincidence in that it is just a couple of months before the introduction of the Carbon tax in Australia. We can expect to see more attempts by the Government through the ABC and the heavily funded academics and scientists to sway public opinion in favour of the Carbon Tax. But don’t expect to see any high quality scientific debates!
          http://www.abc.net.au/tv/changeyourmind/ and http://www.australianclimatemadness.com/2012/04/youth-and-naivete-no-match-for-maturity-and-experience/ and http://joannenova.com.au/2012/04/the-intellectual-vacuum-shows-how-weak-the-alarmists-are-in-trying-to-silence-skeptics/

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            Kinkykeith

            Jaymez

            A lot of good material there .

            Thanks for the summary.

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            Brian H

            For a concise and definitive destruction of that whole concept, go thru the vids and text on the site OverPopulation is a Myth.

            And read this: Demographers Shocked!

            Countries with very low birthrates–like Japan’s 1.21 children per woman–are in demographic collapse because each new generation is little more than half the size of the one that preceded it. At this rate, it would take only four generations to reduce the size of population to 10 percent of its initial size. To offset this decline and restore the population to its initial numbers [in one generation], each woman would need to have 20 children!

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        Popeye

        Joe V

        Yes – you ARE correct – Anna Rose is married to Simon Sheik the Director of Getup.

        That shouldn’t surprise anyone but I don’t care less about their private lives (they thoroughly deserve each other)- I just want to know WHERE THEY GET THEIR MONEY FROM AND WHO PAYS THEIR WAGES???

        Anyone have any idea – I do know Getup is mostly funded by government and the Unions but I don’t know about Youth Climate Coalition??

        Cheers,

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          Dave

          .
          Popeye,

          Wotif you wanted to buy camping supplies in Nepal?
          But that’s where I’d look to camp!

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          Joe V.

          Thanks Popeye.

          It’s not their private lives I care about.

          A couple getting together & generating ‘Movements‘ though.
          Each with their own movements and clearly with aspirations of generating more.

          If it was just their own children that would be bad enough , but it’s the entire youth of Aus they are after.

          That is scary !

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            Popeye

            Joe V

            Sorry mate – I wasn’t inferring anything in relation to your thoughts on their private lives – just expressing my own.

            Totally concur that they need to leave our young innocents out of their plan!! (Thanks for the link – very interesting). I recall the Hitler Youth was a MASTER PLAN to indoctrinate the children. And just on that, there are STILL many of those who were brain washed during that era that still believe in the master race even today after all these years!! Very sad NOT to be able to have your own free thoughts for an entire lifetime.

            Cheers,

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    Michael

    Jo,

    You appear to have posted the “politics” video in duplicate and not the “science part ii”. Part i was so devastating that I would like to see part ii.

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    The Black Adder

    Congrats David and Jo.

    Once again you guys are kicking goals!!

    This should get more hits than KONY2012 and then we might get somewhere…

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    Andrew

    Have not yet seen the video links (I have a lousy connection) but I have read your papers covering same. Excellent work. Very clear and very well put.

    Great work David. Shout it from the rooftops!

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    Matt Bennett

    Couldn’t watch more than 5 mins – utterly riddled with errors and misleading statements. David, have you ever thought of reading a general book on planetary climate calculations and applied methods? I’d highly recommend Ray Pierrehumbert’s “Principles of Planetary Climate” …. You might be embarrassed to see how little you really understand this area of science.

    Errors in just the first few minutes:
    (i) electrical engineering is NOT the most relevant degree for dealing with climate systems (try ‘open systems’ thermodynamics with a major in fluid dynamics for starters)
    (ii) scientists do NOT just use climate models to estimate warming (they use many methods, including empirical ones which include ALL feedbacks inherently)
    (iii) the climate models HAVE changed dramatically in the last 30 years
    (iv) CO2 is NOT the ‘only’ source of warming in models
    (v) models decidedly do NOT omit the many and varied natural forcings. Study of the natural forcings and how they interact could arguably be labelled as THE main work of climate scientists.

    And on, and on…. I certainly salute your ego in asserting you know more about this than all working climate scientists put together and are seeing things they’ve missed over the last few decades. Wow.

    [ED]

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      Brett_McS

      There are no degrees in “‘open systems’ thermodynamics”. B.osT.? The actual degree would be Mechanical Engineering, Physics or …. Electrical Engineering.

      If CO2 is not the only source of warming in models, then what are the other sources? Or would that be admitting too much? Oh, that’s right, it’s cow farts. Carry on.

      Other many and varied natural forcings … such as cosmic rays?

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        Matt Bennett

        You don’t say, Brett? I had no idea the degree wasn’t actually called that….. Wow, is that the best you can do?

        Other sources of warming in current climate models include: NO2, CH4, halocarbons, water vapour, insolation changes, land use changes (not to mention feedbacks from albedo changes, high clouds and, though poorly constrained, biological changes).

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          Brett_McS

          Yes, they take everything into account right down to land usage changes and biology … and yet for some reason they keep getting it so wrong!

          These models are classic open systems, where the missing (negative!) feedback is actual real measurements. Because, after all, doing real measurements is messy and so much less fun than playing with computer models – and could have nasty consequences, like showing that CO2 isn’t actually an important factor in climate change. And we can’t have that, can we? That would be embarrassing.

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          Brian H

          Yeah, they’re in there — dialed down so they can’t actually affect the output much. And significant solar influences are simply discounted. The water vapour effects, as David indicates, are even wrong in sign in the models. Most of the complexity in them is just smoke and mirrors. Willis Eschenbach was able to replicate the results of a major GCM with a single linear equation, encompassing a half-dozen variables, IIRC. The rest is apparently “tuned” to wipe itself out.

          Garbage. Very, very, expensive, dangerous garbage. As any statistician, modeller, forecaster, or computer science pro will aver. Loudly.

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        Kinkykeith

        Brett

        You could also mention the Metallurgy Degree which has it all including modeling of systems that are CO2 producers.

        Many of us were caught out by the dishonesty of the Climate Scientists claims of having modeled the atmosphere.

        We all assumed that the news-media had simply misreported the detail and got CO mixed up with CO2 and that the models only represented a small element of the atmospheric behavior NOT THE ENTIRE THING.

        Anyone with true knowledge of modeling knows that you cannot model the whole thing. There are so many physical, chemical, astronomical, geological, industrial and population interactions in the atmosphere that to make claim to having modeled it is FARCICAL.

        The time delays and cyclical interactions of many of the processes in the biosphere make a FULL MODEL absolutely impossible.

        The fact is that : There are NO Models as claimed.

        By definition, a model must be shown to work. The Models are simply works in progress.

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      memoryvault

      .
      You people are so full of it Matt Bennett.

      (i) electrical engineering is NOT the most relevant degree for dealing with climate systems (try ‘open systems’ thermodynamics with a major in fluid dynamics for starters)

      How about we just start with observable fact. CO2 continues to go up, temperatures don’t.
      CAGW Epic fail QED.

      (ii) scientists do NOT just use climate models to estimate warming (they use many methods, including empirical ones which include ALL feedbacks inherently)

      And yet, for at least the last decade, there has been no warming.

      (iii) the climate models HAVE changed dramatically in the last 30 years

      Yes, and despite that, they are STILL no more accurate than they were 30 years ago.

      (iv) CO2 is NOT the ‘only’ source of warming in models

      No – just about every gas that can be attributable to Man is included there. You know, all the ones we can be made to feel guilty about and taxed for. But curiously water vapour – which accounts for 60 to 95% OF THE SO-CALLED “GREENHOUSE EFFECT” is excluded – because we simply can’t calculate its effect (or maybe cos we can’t tax it).

      (v) models decidedly do NOT omit the many and varied natural forcings. Study of the natural forcings and how they interact could arguably be labelled as THE main work of climate scientists.

      This is so much BS it is laughable. Up until two years ago we were being told natural forcings were inconsequential and didn’t count, compared to CAGW-induced CO2 caused global warming.

      It was only less than two years ago when nature stubbornly refused to cooperate with “CO2 induced global warming” that the high priests of your religion allowed “natural forcings” to even be introduced into the equation to explain the continued failure of their predictions.

      You are a sad joke, Matt Bennett.

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        Matt Bennett

        MV, you understand so little it’s laughable.

        Scientists have never said natural forcings are inconsequential – for goodness sake, they alone have moved us in and out of ice ages without any help from humans. It’s just that under CURRENT circumstances, (and that could all change tmw with a good volcanic belch) their effect is swamped by an orders of magnitude more rapid release of ancient trapped sunlight. Do you even understand this?

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          memoryvault

          .
          Max Bennett you are becoming tedious.

          Would you like me to drag up the actual 1988 quote from James Hansen to the Senate Select Committee (the one one where they left all the windows open all night during a heat wave so the air-conditioning would fail), to the effect that CO2 influence on the climate would swamp all natural forcings by the year 2000?

          I’ll do it if in return you promise to forever more ban yourself from this site and save the rest of us from your religiously motivated posts.

          The rest of us are interested in learning – not in being converted to a cult.

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            Matt Bennett

            Sheesh, MV did you even read what I wrote above. I didn’t say anything about Hansen and swamping of forcings. I said natural forcings are not INCONSEQUENTIAL ie they’re very important and their are details included in all good climate models. Now, as it happens, it is also true that (barring a sudden decent volcano) natural forcings ARE currently being overidden by anthropogenic CO2 release, in a big way. Hence the longterm rising global temp graph (you have seen the 1880-2012 latest release chart?)

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            mikemUK

            mv – and anyone else interested. who may not have heard about it yet.

            On the “Tallbloke” blog (UK) on 26/4, a piece about the latest CERN ‘cloud’ experiments and their hope to publish in time for inclusion in AR5.

            I anticipate that this will further upset MB and his fellow believers!

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        Matt Bennett

        MV, water vapor leaves the air within days, it’s a feedback. As if they’re going to tax it! Sheesh, the illogical fallacies spouted by you mob is mind-blowing. Even CH4 doesn’t spend too long in the atmosphere – the surplus CO2, however, takes CENTURIES to wash through the system. Hence the concern.

        Until we started digging up the trapped Cretaceous sunlight and throwing it back into the atmosphere, the carbon moving into and out of the atmosphere was at near equilibrium, on short timescales. On millennial scales it went up and down with glacial cycles and on geological timescales it’s either locked up in rocks by slow weathering or very slowly released back through volcanoes or melting of clathrates. Whenever it hasn’t been released slowly (eg End Permian) huge losses of biological diversity have resulted. (ie mass extinctions – the sixth great event in this series appears now underway, although we may have some chance to curtail it) M

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          memoryvault

          the surplus CO2, however, takes CENTURIES to wash through the system. Hence the concern.

          Unlike you, Max Bennett, I actually READ the peer-reviewed scientific papers on these subjects. Here is my count on the subject to hand:

          ONE paper which supports the “centuries to go through the system” hypothesis (naturally the one the IPCC supports).

          FIVE papers which support a timeframe of less than 100 years but more than a decade.

          37 papers which support a timeframe of between 3 and 10 years.

          A general consensus outside of the rarefied atmosphere of “climate science” that residence time is between 3 and 3.8 years. These are the values us mere engineers use to calculate risk values with regards to power stations and the like.

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            Matt Bennett

            I’m heading to bed. I’m sorry MV, you’re welcome to your own opinion but not your own facts.

            ‘general consensus outside of the rarefied atmosphere of “climate science” ‘

            What rarefied air!? You think thousands of climate scientists working on different aspects of earth’s atmospheric systems get together and INVENT figures and collude on what to tell the IPCC? If you’re going to question well-established and carefully constrained variables such as residency times – I’m out.

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            Kinkykeith

            Adding to that; you only have to look at how fast your lawn grows and see untended paddocks over-run to work out that the wait period for acclimatisation to additional CO2 is only a few years.

            Basic chemistry tells us that an increase in an essential reagent that is in short supply will have the effect of allowing greater use of that reagent ie CO2 will almost never be in excess supply for the photosynthesis reactions and create new plant matter to equilibrate with the new level of CO2.

            Translation: dont worry – CO2 is good for us.

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            Warren

            MV,CO2 from most fossil fuels has been outside the active ‘fast’ carbon cycle for millions of years. Now it is anthropogenically emitted to the atmosphere in huge amounts,from which it enters the ‘fast’ carbon cycle for what can be many rounds of temporary sequestration,often returning to the atmosphere, until it is ultimately permanently resequestered by deep ocean sinking,tectonic burial and carbonate weathering -which is what Matt means by ‘centuries to wash through..’

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          Kevin Moore

          Matt Bennett,

          Until we started digging up the trapped Cretaceous sunlight and throwing it back into the atmosphere, the carbon moving into and out of the atmosphere was at near equilibrium, on short timescales.

          How many dinosaurs would it have taken to make all of the coal and oil dug up out of the ground? What is the origin of ‘natural gas’?

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          Kevin Moore

          Matt Bennett,

          The following quote is taken from your perspective. Could you please clear some questions up for me?

          http://globalwarmingfacts.newideass.info/tag/climate/page/6/

          One way that the Earth gets hotter is due to an increase in the atmosphere of gases that result in the greenhouse effect. The brief explanation of the greenhouse effect is that the wavelength of energy arriving on the Earth’s surface through the atmosphere is shorter than that reflected back towards space – a simple law of physics. Some gases in the atmosphere let the shorter waves through but block the longer wavelengths, so the energy is bounced back down to Earth, trapped, effectively heating things up.

          If the heat is trapped then how are ‘things’ heating up?

          Or is the description above of a literal greenhouse, which instead of glass, has walls of ‘greenhouse gases’ which block convection?

          If convection in the atmosphere is blocked,how long would it take for life to be unsustainable?

          Can you explain the mechanism by which heat “is bounced back down to earth”?

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          Ross

          Martin Maybe you can tell me why your climate scientist mates in NZ insist on methane being included in the ETS if it is not such a problem. If it wasn’t for methane NZ would probably be selling carbon credits to Aussie under the stupid scheme that is meant to save the world.(ie. for NZ methane is by far the biggest GHG they take into account)

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      J.H.

      Then why do they keep citing the models in the media for then Mr Bennett?… and why are those models so wrong in any place. Stop duckin’ the pertinent question….

      Anyway, where is this empirical data that you say that the scientists are using. It would be exactly the same data that Dr Evens is using…. You say something but you don’t back it up with anything Matt. Where are these “many methods” that you speak of?… Yer not gonna go bristlecone or Yamal series on me are ya? Please don’t teleconnect the rain in Maine to Spain. It ain’t science.

      Why do you make criticisms and slurs about Dr Evans presentations Matt, without one skerick of evidence to counter his very measured and scientifically literate argument?…. All you say is “models decidedly do NOT omit the many and varied natural forcings. Study of the natural forcings and how they interact could arguably be labelled as THE main work of climate scientists.”…. Well then quote them and explain yourself. Don’t be shy.

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        Matt Bennett

        JH – study some ice core science. We have REAL literal CO2 measurements from the past, like little time capsules telling us precise previous gas concentrations and correlated with past global temps and sea levels. These are NOT proxies, they are literal measurements of ancient air. Now, empirically constrained within these measurements are all the Earth’s real feedbacks – the temp trace is what actually happened, it’s not a model. So we can see the limits within which land temps, sea temps, sea levels, CO2 concentrations actually move between in real life – all feedbacks included.

        Try reading that book I mentioned to David above, it’s fascinating how much work’s been done on this stuff. M

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          memoryvault

          These are NOT proxies,

          You really don’t have a clue, do you?

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            Matt Bennett

            Are you kidding MV – do you know what a proxy is? It’s a stand-in variable used for its relationship with another variable that’s not directly measurable. Ie tree ring width for temp/rainfall etc.

            Ice core gas measurements, after the firnification process has closed off the bubble (about 120-200 years) are literal measurements of ancient air. They’re not proxies. What do you think the gas measurement is a proxy for? Itself? Loopy…

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            Sonny

            Speaking of proxies, I l

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            Matt Bennett

            I noticed MV remains stunningly silent once he realized his MASSIVE error of thinking gas concentrations in ppm or ppb are “proxies”. Hmmmmm…

            Wonder if this tells us a little bit about his average grasp of the rest of the science in which he accuses working professionals of incompetance. Breathtaking!

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          Kinkykeith

          Hi MB

          Your little time capsules are up to 400,000 years old: are subjected to pressure, continued chemical degradation (clathrate formation) diffusion and intrusion from surrounds. Hardly a stable chemical sample.

          You may get relative values but absolutely NOT absolute values.

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            Matt Bennett

            Hi Keith,

            Actually they can be much older than that! Scientists are hoping to extract their first million year old air sample before the decade’s out. CO2 is stable, non radioactive and of fixed concentration post-firnification. Otherwise it would be pointless measuring the long ice core records. At lower depths beyond a km or two there is certainly some ice deformation which needs to be modeled but the air can’t go anywhere. So, I’m sorry to say, they ARE absolute values being measured in this case.

            See: “Glacial Geology” (Bennett & Glasser 2009)
            or “Field Techniques in Glacial Geology and Glacial Geomorphology” (Hubbard & Glasser 2005).

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          CHIP

          “the surplus CO2, however, takes CENTURIES to wash through the system. Hence the concern”.

          This isn’t true. The surplus of CO2 from anthropogenic emissions should not take centuries to be taken up by natural sources. Henry’s law, which governs the dissolution of gases in liquids, ordains that about 50 times as much CO2 will be dissolved in the oceans as remains in the atmosphere as an addition to the resident CO2 greenhouse and equilibration between atmospheric CO2 and oceanic DIC is about 3/4’s. However the IPCC ignore Henry’s law. They don’t even mention it in AR4-2007, which is odd considering it is well-accepted physical law of chemistry and has been confirmed by hundreds of experiments since 1803. Anthropogenic CO2 emissions are currently 29 gigatonnes/year. Therefore the annual anthropogenic CO2 contribution to the atmospheric CO2 greenhouse amounts to only 0.58ppmv or 0.076ppmv.

          ntil we started digging up the trapped Cretaceous sunlight and throwing it back into the atmosphere, the carbon moving into and out of the atmosphere was at near equilibrium, on short timescales.

          I think it would be a mistake in assuming that the ice-core data is a valid estimate of paleo-atmospheric CO2-levels. There are so many problems with the ice-core. It has been shown through various ways that the ice-core data probably underestimates paleo-atmospheric CO2. For instance, the ice-core data suffers from what’s called ‘fractionation processes’ such as gravitational compression which forces CO2 up from the ice into the atmosphere and the original ice-core measurements showed atmospheric CO2 as high as 2350ppmv, although these were deleted. Stomata data and chemical measurements both show more variability than the ice-core and would suggest that the current CO2 level is not unusual or ‘unprecedented’ in any way.

          tural forcings ARE currently being overidden by anthropogenic CO2 release

          Only according to the models. But not in the real-world. Svensmark, for example, has offered an alternative hypothesis for which he has discovered that a good chunk of the temperature can be explained readily by cosmic rays.

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            CHIP

            Sorry, that should read: “0.58 gigatonnes”.

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            Matt Bennett

            Wow CHIP, your misunderstanding of the climate system as understood by mainstream science is breathtaking. For example, the residency times issue is not even about individual atoms, which, yes on average, are taken out of the atmosphere in a couple of years. It’s about the residency of the ‘surplus’ CO2 and how long before things are back to semi-equilibrium. (I say ‘semi’ because on longer timescales, things are never in true equilibrium on a planet with life). Then this:

            “I think it would be a mistake in assuming that the ice-core data is a valid estimate of paleo-atmospheric CO2-levels.”

            I mean, wow! Had you thought of telling the scientists whose life work it is to analyze these ice cores that, gee wiz, CHIP said you’re wrong! He knows, not sure how, that what you’re doing is wrong and, as chemists, you don’t know about the chemistry of you life’s work – so blinded by orthodoxy you are! Talk about arrogant, I find most people who utter such inane drivel don’t even understand how science works in the first place. Tick.

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            Winston

            Matt Bennett,
            Clearly you define a “lack of understanding” as anything which disagrees with your stated position. I suppose it would have been very galling being a Piltdown man advocate, a phrenology expert, or a Lamarkian if you dedicated your life to its study. Science discards failed hypotheses all the time, that is how it is meant to work. Sympathy for those experts up blind alleys doesn’t enter into it.

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            Brian H

            @Winston;
            Feynman: Science IS belief in the ignorance of experts.

            My theory: from beyond the grave, Richard (and the gods) are maddening climate scientists into a state which demonstrates the truth of his adage for the ages!

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          Ross

          I thought the Vostok ice core data and the research done on it suggests CO2 changes follow temperature changes

          http://www.co2science.org/articles/V6/N26/EDIT.php

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          Kinkykeith

          So here we have Matt B and DAL and others pretending to be scientists; so let’s see our climate scientists at work on the following Scenario.

          The UN IPCC, in collaboration with Get-Up and the Australian Conservation Foundation, has decided to become proactive in reducing greenhouse gas emissions from humans who expire huge amounts of CO2 and so bring us closer to Catastrophic Global Warming.

          Their original idea of reducing the number of humans was considered too extreme and they have settled on a development programme to find a way to breed humans who are only half the height of the current CO2 emitters.

          It is considered that the standard adult male is now 1.8 metres tall, weighing 70 kg and the new breed which will be ready for 2020 is to be 0.9 metres in height.

          Here is a question for all scientists; let’s see if Matt can answer this, but I bet someone else beats him to the correct answer.

          Question. How much mass will the new breed have?
          a. 42.4 kg
          b. 9.3 kg
          c. 25.8 kg
          d. 16.7 kg
          e. 35.0 kg
          f. 39.6 kg

          Go Matt – This is basic modelling 101.

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            Kinkykeith

            Well.

            Matt B has been stunningly silent at the sharp end of the business.

            Are you an accountant Matt and cant find the answer on SkS?

            Go Matt

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            John Brookes

            That would be b, 9.3 kg, provided the smaller humans dimensions all scaled the same was as his height.

            Or is there a trick to this?

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            Kinkykeith

            JB

            Just got home.

            You are correct and have my undying admiration; at least for the rest of the day.

            Congrats for being first. Well done.

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            Winston

            Of course, with increased surface area to volume ratio of this particular “human”/hominid, it would be entirely more susceptible to “extreme” temperatures – when hot due to increased susceptibility to dehydration with such a wider area per unit volume to lose moisture, and with cold due to increased heat loss across the proportionately increased skin surface to lower core temperature more rapidly. It’s a homeostatic nightmare.

            If one believes at all in evolutionary theory, have any of these supposed scientists thought that if it were advantageous to be this size, that humans through natural selection would have evolved accordingly? Apparently, we are all to be guided by “science” graduates of Dr Moreau’s class at the Frankenstein Polytechnica. These people are pathological!

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            Dave

            .
            John has already modified his brain size to 1/8 of original size through GAIA technology (Atrophy Induced Flannery Disease) – that’s why he asked:

            is there a trick to this

            because using himself as an example he will only weigh 8.75 kilos at 0.9 meters tall!

            Mattyb, Catamongst, etc etc must also be under the 70kg human average because of brain reduction as a result of AIFD (see above)!

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            Kinkykeith

            Hi Winston

            I think you know that I made up the bit about the sponsors of this exercise but is been suggested in the past, probably as a joke as is the case here.

            Your outline of the dangers of being ” small” makes me glad I’m about the same as the original prototype.

            ps Long tall dark skin is ideal for dealing with Hot Climates.
            Short, white people go well in the cold – they hold their heat better.

            🙂

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            Kinkykeith

            Well done Dave,

            I see you used the cube of the length whereas JB and I estimated depth and breadth of tissue to suit the height of 1.8.

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            Winston

            KK,
            I did know you were joking.
            Just an addendum-
            Perhaps being the globe being densely populated by small, white hominids in sufficient quantities may also help contribute to increased albedo, helping to counteract CAGW. They do say “populate or perish”! Makes about as much sense as anything else being proposed in this scientific French farce we find ourselves in.

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            MattB

            you gents have too much faith in models. empirical evidence tells me that (http://www.medindia.net/patients/calculators/height-weight-chart-Result.asp) a 90cm tall human child at present weighs about 13kgs. But that is a 3 year old child. With some muscle development as a 90cm adult I’d expect a 90cm tall human adult to weigh more than that.

            I can tell you that Verne Troyer, who played Mini-Me in the Austen Powers movies is 81cm tall and weighs about 25kgs.

            Emperical data is what it’s all about Kinky.

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            Kinkykeith

            And here MattB weighs in just in time to illustrate the problem beautifully.

            The “Climate Modelers” claim to understand “everything” when in truth all they want is to entrain the minds and bank accounts of the average taxpayer.

            This exercise shows was set up to test the scientific ability of a couple of “Real Climate Science Advocats” educated at the University of the ABC. From the opposing side JB was first to “get it” right and shows he knows something about modelling.

            There was complete silence from the other Matt and DAL but now MattB shows the “Climate Science Method”: just look it up on the net, no need for all those years of study at University.

            As Dave and JB know the answer is somewhere between 8.75 and 9.33 kg.

            MattB has struck out.

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            MattB

            No kinky keith I’m afraid you are wrong. 90cm adult humans do not weigh between 8.75 and 9.33kg – and there are enough of them around to measure what they do weigh. I gave you an example of a shorter adult human who weighs 25kg and is certainly not almost 3 times overweight. The trouble with a “scaled down” human of 8.75 – 9.33kg is that their brains would be too small… they would not be humans but monkeys. Why would you try and model what a 90cm adult would weigh when we actually KNOW what they weigh courtesy of there being quite a few of them.

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            Brian H

            MattB is right for another reason: the body proportions of short people are far different from current standard models. The hypothetical new breed is perhaps imagined as an exact downsizing of every body part the same, but that’s not what small humans (e.g., pygmies) look like.

            Dwarves and midgets have very short legs in proportion to torso size, so their average mass/inch of height is much higher.

            You also might like to Google the “Hobbits” (homo florensiensis).

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            Kinkykeith

            for BrianH and MattB

            The whole point of the exercise was to get some blowhards to quickly show their understanding of Scientific Method.

            In typical warmer fashion they resorted to a “web search” for mass of a human 90 cms when the requirements were:
            1. Read the question
            2. Demonstrate your skill by calculating the answer.
            3. Write down the answer.

            The “Scaled Mass of the 70 kg figure is 8.75 or more accurately 9.33 kg.

            The exercise to prove that Climate Environmental “Engineers?” like MattB? are not real Engineers.

            It was successful and showed that Climate Scientists couldn’t model a new dress let alone the entire Earthian atmosphere. (sorry Bob)

            JB and Dave both provided correct answers

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            MattB

            Oh so you are changing the question to make me wrong. It is only a few posts up but it seems I have to quote your question to you:
            “It is considered that the standard adult male is now 1.8 metres tall, weighing 70 kg and the new breed which will be ready for 2020 is to be 0.9 metres in height.

            Here is a question for all scientists; let’s see if Matt can answer this, but I bet someone else beats him to the correct answer.

            Question. How much mass will the new breed have?”

            You did NOT ASK what the scaled mass of a 90cm tall human would be. You asked for the mass of a shorter human. There are many “correct” answers depending on assumptions made. I have given a correct answer.

            It seems to me that JB and Dave correctly scaled the mass, but misread the question and fell in to the intentional trap.

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            MattB

            Seriously – I’ve applied the scientific method (ie based on measurable reality) and you’ve gone with an engineering answer based on a total lack of understanding of the real world. You’re a self-parody. You’re backing what you would otherwise consider a completely IPCC approach.

            “Sir I care not that there are many 90cm tall men who weight 20-25kgs, my engineering and maths tells me they must weigh 9kgs. I said good day sir.”

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            Dave

            .
            MattyB, MattyB – what can the MattyB??

            So, so serious all over the Get-up Groups original suggestion to shrink people!
            How about you submit your findings to Getup!

            They give you a little Gold CO2 badges of encouragment for correct answers!! 🙂

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      Sonny

      Ahhh Matt stop sweating the small stuff! Prove that Dr Evans MAJOR CONCLUSIONS are incorrect rather than trying to distract from the key issues.

      1. air temperature rise overestimated in models since turn of the century. (lower infact than scenario in which we achieve drastic CO2 cuts.
      (see my proof above that there is no global warming in past decade based on BOM data.

      2. Sea level rise massively overestimated.

      3. Sea level temperature rise overestimated.

      4. Hot spot non existent. (disproves water vapor feedback assumption that amplifies CO2 warming)

      5. Outgoing radiation increases with a hotter surface temperatures (disproved models assumptions)

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        Sonny

        As far as these climate models go, you can polish a turd but it’s still a piece of shit.
        Climate modeling is needed as a kind of “virtual reality” to include in policy reports to governments to make global warming look much more dangerous than it really is.
        If a catastrophe was evident in the data itself the models would be far less important to the climastrologists. Dr Evans shows that retrospectively, the climate models whose major factor is CO2 with H20 feedbacks got it pathetically wrong.

        The problem is that government policy is still based on these climate models. Whether they have made cosmetic improvements in the last 30 years or not, you can polish a turd but it’s still a piece of shit.

        Climate Scientists Sonny

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      handjive

      @Matt Bennett
      April 28, 2012 at 9:50 pm

      Thanks for all your unsubstantiated pointing to ‘errors’.
      Obviously you are well educated, with a greater knowledge of climate, and, this reader, for one, is humbled you chose to imbue your vast knowledge before needing sleep like us lesser, ignorant beings.

      Truely, we’re not worthy.

      You claim in your ‘points of errors’:

      (iii) the climate models HAVE changed dramatically in the last 30 years

      This link from January 2011, says these factors are not modelled in gcm’s.
      Note: This is not a ‘scientific site’ like the ones you visit, but the climate scientists are people you would be familiar with, being all informed and stuff.

      To save you some precious sleep time , I’ve collated some of the known factors not included in your ‘dramatically’ changed/improved(?) ‘over the last 30 years climate models’:

      * the global carbon cycle
      * We can’t simulate individual cumulus clouds
      * The same applies to aerosols (“We don’t have the observations and don’t have the theory,” says Gleckler.
      (The best they can do on this point is to simulate the net effect of all the clouds or aerosols in a grid box, a process known as “parameterization.”)

      * Sometimes, modelers don’t understand a process well enough to include it at all, even if they know it could be important.
      One example is a caveat that appears on that 2007 IPCC chart. The projected range of sea-level rise…

      * The last generation of NCAR models,” says Hurrell, “had no ice sheet dynamics at all.

      * What the models don’t try to do is to match the timing of short-term climate variations we’ve experienced.

      * But they won’t necessarily show the specific flattening of global warming we’ve observed during the past decade —

      * Because the atmosphere is chaotic, anything less than perfect knowledge of today’s conditions (which is impossible, given that observations are always imperfect) will make the forecast useless after about two weeks.

      * Even when models reproduce the past reasonably well, however, it doesn’t guarantee that they’re equally reliable at projecting the future.

      * That’s in part because some changes in climate are non-linear, which is to say that a small nudge can produce an unexpectedly large result.

      Good luck with those dramatically improved climate models.
      Maybe Ray Pierrehumbert’s “Principles of Planetary Climate” can help you repudiate those points/quotes.
      Apologies if this intrudes on your sleep time.

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      Ross James

      Matt Bennett,

      What a breath taking refreshing post. At last some common sense prevails amongst repeated and parroted misinformation.

      Ross J.

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        Mick Buckley

        This is only the second thread I’ve looked at on this site, having come here because of the ABC ‘change your mind’ program. The program mentioned confirmation bias and I wondered if confirmation bias might be clouding my thinking on the climate change issue.
        I took a fairly detailed look at David Evans’s graph on the ‘ABC biased … Nick Minchin owed an apology’ thread and convinced myself that David had misrepresented the IPCC. This was disappointing since all it took was to download the IPCC report and read the Policymakers Summary.

        I’m not sure how to approach this thread. To me the David Evans video seems to be so full of errors that I have no idea where to start. And given the tsunami of responses to Matt Bennett’s post I’m not sure if I have the time and energy to participate here.

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          Dave

          .
          Mick Buckley? Are you related to Matt buckles Under Pressure?

          Anyway back to your comment –

          I’m not sure how to approach this thread

          Answer – DON’T!

          Another question (compliments of KK) are you only 0.9 meters tall also?

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          Winston

          Mick,
          This would be the same IPCC summary of policymakers which skims over the details within the document highlighting the uncertainties and qualifying statements of the scientists involved?

          Like Matt Bennett, you seem long on sweeping statements and short on specifics. While everyone is entitled to their opinion, it is appropriate to take exception to specific facts presented erroneously rather than broadly state it is “misleading”, “full of errors”, or other generalizations designed to detract from the presentation without evidentiary support.

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            Mick Buckley

            Take a look at my comments on the ‘Nick Minchin owed an apology’ thread.

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            Winston

            Taking you at face value, Mick
            The question David is attempting to answer is the validity and accuracy of projections from the 1990 IPCC report forwards, not the accuracy of the hind-casting backwards, which your linked graph seems to have little relationship to reality in either direction. I would suggest you look at this link, http://climateaudit.org/2007/12/01/tuning-gcms/, to see why incorporating dodgy hindcast projections would be inappropriate in assessing the validity of the models predictive ability, given that various models with widely different sensitivities hindcast similarly because of unwarranted fudging of other variables to retrofit the data. Sort of like picking the Melbourne Cup winner on the first Wednesday in November!

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            Mick Buckley

            Winston, thanks for that link. Interesting as it may be I don’t think this is relevant to the point I’m making over on the other thread. The point at issue is the accuracy of the IPCC’s 1990 predictions, given that twenty odd years have now passed. It’s not a discussion about how models were/are tuned.

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            Winston

            But Mick,
            You are suggesting that Dr Evans is misleading by not including hindcasting by the IPCC, which incorporates fudge factors as the Kiehl paper analysis shows. Hence the predictive nature of the models post the 1990 IPCC paper can only realistically incorporate post 1990 data (hence 1990 start point) otherwise it incorporates model inputs which vary aerosols according to retrofitted guesstimates,not realistic data. See Richard Courtney’s comment re his peer reviewed paper on WUWT at the link – http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/29/tisdale-on-the-17-year-itch-yes-there-is-a-santer-clause/#comment-971070

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            Brian H

            The same summary that was written at the same time as the mitigation WG 2 report which it was supposed to respond to, which was written at the same time as the WG 1 report which was to first determine if there was anything to mitigate, and which had limitations, caveats, and disclaimers retroactively edited or reversed by the WG 3 political editors without the consent of the scientists? In the interest of presenting an unambiguous message to the politicians and media? That executive summary?

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          Kinkykeith

          Hi mick

          If you’ve read “the IPCC report and … the Policymakers Summary” you have it all .

          Why come here.

          Unless there is a nagging suspicion you have been taken for ride by all the politicians, lawyers and economists posing as Enviro Wizards.

          Most of us here have methodically worked our own way through the mass of information and misinformation to arrive at our understanding of the AGW problem.

          If you don’t have at least a basic science Degree you should leave AGW alone or you will wind up a victim of the type of very convincing propaganda you see on the abc.

          Most victims don’t even know they are victims and remain manipulated victims for the whole of their lives.

          Search and learn.

          🙂

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            Mick Buckley

            “Unless there is a nagging suspicion you have been taken for ride”

            Yes, I think that’s why I came here. I’m interested in the idea of Confirmation Bias, which I think can apply to anybody.

            I’m reasonably science literate, but definitely not a climate science expert. I’m surprised it was so easy for me to discover David Evans was misrepresenting the IPCC. But I’d like to think I’m open minded. There are lots of people contributing here, what do you know that the published scientists don’t?

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            Sonny

            I know that government funded science will always be subservient to politics.

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          Mark D.

          And given the tsunami of responses to Matt Bennett’s post I’m not sure if I have the time and energy to participate here.

          You mean we should have let the boorish rude ass post his crap freely without response?

          If you’re short on time, perhaps you should use what you have left to read some of the other threads.

          Confirmation bias? Yes you have some. Stick around though, we need more MB’s around here.

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          Mick Buckley at 16.6.1 says…

          I took a fairly detailed look at David Evans’s graph on the ‘ABC biased … Nick Minchin owed an apology’ thread and convinced myself that David had misrepresented the IPCC.

          See my reply to you at that thread and the evidence at the link I provided.
          I also asked for your evidence that Dr Evans is wrong. If you are unable to provide that evidence, I expect you will sincerely apologise to Dr Evans for accusing him of misrepresenting the IPCC.

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          Matt Bennett

          Hi Mick,

          You’ve nailed it, this is the place to come for a special look into confirmation bias. This site is a trove of uneducated, ill-informed, misunderstood nonsense that acts like a huge echo chamber in which its members can huff and puff each other up without having to contend with reality. Years ago, when I was unsure of what was behind all this AGW business, I found the RealClimate website to be invaluable in connecting me to real working climate scientists and inform me on the way they go about solving these problems. It took quite a while to get a grasp of the basics, however, having a degree in applied science, I at least knew how real science works.

          Today, however, if you find any particular single [snip] point to be intriguing, I suggest you pop over to Skeptical Science’s website and find out the truth about that particular point, as best it can currently be understood (science is a work in progress!). You WILL see a pattern to the contrarian way of thinking. Someone told me about it around six months ago but I only had a good browse of it last week. It’s an incredible resource and there’s a lot of hard work goes into keeping it updated. Oh, and [SNIP] HATE it because it leaves them with their pants down completely. (witness above Memory Vault’s assertion that ice core gas concentrations are ‘proxies’ – hahahaha) Good luck. M

          [Steeeeerrrriiike 3 (and 4 for good measure?). THIS IS YOUR FINAL WARNING! NO MORE USE OF THE ‘D’ WORD. permanent moderation will result] ED

          —————————

          MAtty, hows that pants down feeling after this post http://joannenova.com.au/2012/05/the-ipcc-1990-far-predictions-were-wrong and my responses? – Jo

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            Winston

            Nice try.

            Do you wear nice pleated skirts and shake pom-poms while doing all that cheerleading for SkS and Real Climate. You forgot to put – “This is a paid political announcement on behalf of Get Up Australia, Gavin Schmidt and James Hansen”.

            Clearly you and “Mick” just happened to coincidently appear together to back each other up in a mutual admiration society, “accidently on purpose” no doubt- and Mick still hasn’t pointed out the other “full of errors” that he was alluding to in Dr Evans’ post, and Baa Humbug and myself pointed out legitimate reasons why Mick’s quibble re 1990 starting point was not misleading, was irrelevant and misguided- but hey- just make the facts up to suit your story- fire off your ad homs and provide us with more unsubstantiated arm waving. It smacks of desperation.

            Not “Good luck”…….Good riddance.

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            Mick Buckley

            Hi Matt, thanks for your reply. Yes, I have been astonished at the gulf in perspective between myself and those with whom I have had brief exchanges here. From where I’m sitting it looks like confirmation bias on the other side. And I suppose from where the other side is sitting they see confirmation bias in me.

            I’m not completely sure that I am free from confirmation bias, which is why I came here. So far, I haven’t seen anything that has made me think “oh yes, they’re right and the climate science is wrong”, but who knows, maybe my confirmation bias is preventing that.

            Perhaps we need to appeal to the Man on the Clapham Omnibus to adjudicate. Which reminds me of the book “Poles Apart” by New Zealand businessman Gareth Morgan. A wealthy and well educated person with little climate knowledge he spent a year or so visiting the leading lights on each side of the debate and then wrote a book about how the experiences formed his position on the issue.

            Thanks for the pointers to RealClimate and SkepticalScience. I’ve seen both of those sites. The “Most Used Climate Myths” section at SkS is interesting. Taken together the myths seem like a inconsistent hotch-potch of denials and diminutions. Anyone who simultaneously argued all of them would find it difficult to be taken seriously – e.g “It’s cooling” and “It’s cosmic rays” seem to be mutually exclusive. Looking at the list could give an impression that people on the skeptic side will throw anything at climate science in the hope that something will stick. I’ve only very recently come across memoryvault, Baa Humbug and others on this site and though I haven’t agreed with them I think they are sincere and I’m sure they would say that their arguments are logical and consistent.

            This leads me to wonder if anyone has been able to articulate the most preferred set of skeptical beliefs. I also wonder what happens on skeptical blogs when someone who has just been arguing for example “It’s cooling” comes across someone else who is arguing an incompatible meme such as “It’s cosmic rays”. Do they split into factions or unite in opposition to climate science?

            I have followed the Watt’s Up With That blog a little bit including the period when the BEST data set was published. Anthony Watts had championed their approach, saying he would stand by the BEST results whatever they were. His inability to subsequently accept their evidence, shattering as it was to his beliefs, left me thinking that for him logic, consistency, science and evidence could be ingored when necessary.

            Anyway I think I’ll spend a bit more time here. I’ve learnt a lot already and I thank the site owners and the other contributors for that.

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          Matt Bennett

          I know how you feel! Just don’t appeal to logic and reason around here, or attempt to get people to actually understand peer-reviewed science. Most don’t even understand how real world peer-review works let alone respect its products. And when I say ‘respect’, I certainly don’t mean treated as if handed down by infallible gods – I mean if it’s something you disagree with, you have to PROVE them wrong with actual evidence presented in THOSE SAME JOURNALS! It’s a bit harder than blogging and its carefully noted that Dave Evans hasn’t managed to get his mangled graphs published in Nature or Science. There’s a reason for that – that’s all I’d ask those of you on the side-lines to note.

          He should stick to engineering, who knows, he might even be good at that….

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            Matt Bennett

            Calm, Winston, calm. That’s it.

            Now, have you tried reading anything at SkS, they do have a ‘beginner’ explanation levels for most posts. Highly recommend it.

            And when you’re done cheer-leading for David & Jo, remind them to flick a draft of their ground-breaking work to both Nature AND Science – they both treasure the opportunity to trump one another with ground-breaking research (and Dave’s assertions break A LOT of ground) You could even be famous by association. In short, put up, or shut up.

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            Winston

            Matt,
            You are not very subtle, nor is your argument compelling, nor are you even remotely convincing. You have however succeeded royally in being pompous, patronizing and yet vacuous all at the same time. Neat trick! You can multitask.

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            Mick Buckley

            I also fail to see that expertise in electrical engineering is any kind of preparation for climate science. It won’t hurt of course, but I don’t think it’s something to stress at the very start of a climate change presentation.

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            Sonny

            Skeptical science has a two cute penguins looking at a sapling grow through the ice as their website header. Can anyone detect propaganda aimed at children?

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            Laurie Williams

            Matt, re “if it’s something you disagree with, you have to PROVE them wrong with actual evidence presented in THOSE SAME JOURNALS” – no, because of potential for bias in selection of information for inclusion in a journal, whichever side of an argument that bias may be supporting.

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            Brian of Moorabbin

            I also fail to see that expertise in electrical engineering is any kind of preparation for climate science.

            Electrical engineering has more relevance to the study of “climate science” than Palaentology does… and yet who is it that gets paid big $$$ by the Gillard government to spruik AGW?

            o_O

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          Laurie Williams

          Mick, although I think that the direction that you seem to be taking in relation to AGW is not really right, I suggest that provided that you continue to state your thoughts in a clear and nonaggressive way, as you have, you do continue to read Jo’s material and engage in discussion on it.

          Mutual selfcongratulation societies are not the results of open minds or conductive to maintenance of them.

          From a bloke who put a large amount of time into reading about the arguments on this matter and formed the belief, around 3 years ago, that AGW is a hoax, not so much a giant conspiracy (although many influential smaller ones operate in that industry) but, as Lindzen put it, populated by “opportunistic” scientists.

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        Sonny

        Sorry you consider the BOM misinformation. Perhaps you should take this up with them?

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    Brett_McS

    I look forward to the time when Jo and David are given their rightful place in history (taught in schools!) as Australian heroes. A real “David, Jo and Goliath” story, centred around the kitchen table that saw the counter-counter-revolution planned out over morning coffee, or perhaps while watching a sunset or two over the golden West Australian beaches (I’m winging it here).

    A few years ago I would have assumed that if that were to occur it would only be when we were all safely dead, but perhaps things are turning around a bit more quickly than the Titanic did, 100 years ago…

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    TerjeP

    Great stuff.

    Video 2 as shown in this article above is the wrong video. This needs to be fixed with an edit. If you click the like called “here” just above that video you get the correct content.

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    Andrew McRae

    Awww, a tale of climate harmony that softened the stoniest catastrophists.

    It is great to see this digestible summary that ties together the important facets succinctly. Videos like this deserve a spot in the CAGW skeptic’s short list of recommendations for fence-sitters.

    The film follows a main character who has a complicated relationship with carbon and is still recovering from the death of his LIA. He unravels a web of deception and negotiates several hurdles to avert an economic disaster. Cameo appearances by ERBE as Evans’ assistant and Hansen as a henchman both add experience to an already stunning cast. It’s four and a half stars out of five from me. What did you think, Margaret?

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    J.H.

    Dr Evans does a good sober job in his presentation. Good stuff….. As for the ABC debate? When the facts change, I’ll change me mind. Last time I looked they were as Dr Evans described and that makes the AGW hypothesis junk science.

    (video two is a repeat of video 3 btw, might want to fix that.)

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    Sorry, I gather video II was not right. The second video is fixed now. Part II. — Jo

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    Loki

    OT
    But it does link in with the I Can Change Your Mind posts
    This was found at WUWT
    http://wmbriggs.com/blog/?p=5548

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    John Sutherland

    Great work David & Jo!

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    […] case with regard to global warming/climate change can find three short videos outlining the case here. This was presented to a film crew from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation making a […]

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    Jaymez

    I Can Change Your Mind?
    I watched this ‘documentary’ (see references below), with a great deal of frustration. I thought there was going to be an attempt to prove a direct link between Human CO2 emissions and catastrophic climate change. But no such evidence was presented. In fact co-host Anna Rose’s approach, and that of many alarmists, seemed to me to be the same approach fundamentalist religious believers have. That is:

    – God must exist because otherwise we can’t explain how the universe was created or why we are here.

    – Forget about the science, are you prepared to risk eternal damnation just because you can’t find any
    proof God exists?

    – Surely the large majority of the world’s population which believe in God (Allah, or whatever other name
    you want to use), can’t be wrong?

    What Anna Rose and her ‘experts’ showed is that since Industrialisation the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased from 280 parts per million to 392 parts per million. (Though there is some scientific debate about the starting figure and the measurements in Hawaii have only been made for the past 50 years so they assumed a start point). That is 0.0392% of the atmosphere. They also demonstrated that average global temperatures are higher now, than since the start of industrialisation. Putting aside the fact that industrialisation and therefore large human CO2 emissions conveniently commenced at the end of The Little Ice Age and therefore we would expect global temperatures to have risen, the programme showed no scientific proof that the two (global temperature and CO2) are linked.

    There are plenty of scientific questions about the measurement of global average temperature, and even the measurement of atmospheric CO2. There are plenty of alternate theories which have nothing to do with humans, as to why Climate varies – many more important drivers than CO2. There are even much greater sources of atmospheric CO2 than humans (humans only create some 3% of the CO2 emitted into the atmosphere annually), but did the programme cover any of this? No it didn’t! Those bits were edited out to make it seem the obvious questions are:

    – Can CO2 warm the atmosphere?
    – Has atmospheric CO2 increased?
    – Do humans produce CO2 from their activities?
    – Has temperature increased?
    – If we add some positive feedback mechanisms to the climate models and ignore any negative feedback
    mechanisms can we predict dangerous climate change?

    The answer is YES to all these questions, therefore humans are causing dangerous climate change and we need to stop burning fossil fuels.

    Their case is that simplistic and that unscientific. In a court of law it is called circumstantial evidence and conjecture and would not lead to a conviction. Yet evangelists like Anna Rose whose blind faith is quite scary, would have us turn our economy and lifestyles upside down based on this weak circumstantial evidence.

    I could similarly demonstrate that bricks and concrete retain the day’s warmth into the night and therefore increases the average global temperature records. I could also demonstrate that since industrialisation the amount of bricks and concrete has increased at a historically unprecedented rate. I could therefore conclude that bricks and concrete are causing global warming and all we need to do to fix climate change is to go back to straw huts and mud tracks.

    While billions of dollars of funding worldwide have been thrown at ‘proving’ the answer to the above questions, very little has been spent on looking at dozens of other climate drivers, or assessing whether the globe would be better or worse off at different levels of global average temperatures if we do find we can control global average temperature. Yet despite the lack of funding, there are still dedicated, well qualified scientists who have managed to swim against the tide and show that there is plenty of reason to be sceptical about the theory of dangerous anthropogenic global warming. See: http://www.populartechnology.net/2009/10/peer-reviewed-papers-supporting.html

    But the producers avoided, or cut any attempt to cover the sceptical side in the show, preferring to focus on Nick Minchin’s unsophisticated scepticism and pushing the angle that many sceptics are simply concerned about the economic impact of curbing CO2 emissions. This is just stupid. I have children and grand-children. Do alarmists really think that I’d be happy to condemn them to a frying planet in order to protect my current lifestyle?

    There is no doubt that the producers of ‘I can change your mind’, which included only known climate alarmists Dick Smith and his mate, set out to tilt the scales of the debate. Dick Smith is also known for his fierce stance on controlling the population, believing that Australia is already over populated (http://dicksmithpopulation.com/). This puts Dick Smith in the company of Stanford’s Professor Paul Ehrlich who since the 60’s has variously predicted a new Ice Age, and Billions of people dying from Starvation, and now catastrophic climate change!

    The imbalance towards climate alarmism was heartily supported by the ABC, in which resides a skewed population of catastrophic human caused climate change believers. Something which has been denied, but when the ABC Chairman Maurice Newman told 250 leading ABC journalists, programme managers and staffers that the media had suffered from ‘group think’ on the Climate Change issue and should be more balanced, there was a heated exchange and a walk out lead by Jonathon Holmes. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/media/climate-balance-urged-at-abc/story-e6frg996-1225839329115

    The current ABC Managing director Mark Scott on the other hand has made no secret that he sees his job is to align the ABC with wider Government Policy – in other words, the ABC’s managing director see’s the organisation as a propaganda arm of Government. This of course leads to the promotion and employment of ‘believers’ rather than ‘sceptics’. I’m not saying Mark Scott is a believer or not, he just knows who his employer is, as evidenced by this observation, “Senate Estimates has become a double act, with the minister for communications, Stephen Conroy, acting like Snowy to Scott’s Tintin – a snappy and loyal terrier.” <strong>See: http://www.themonthly.com.au/mark-scott-embarks-another-five-year-term-second-life-margaret-simons-3471

    The ABC’s bias started before the show began with the last segment on ‘Catalyst’ showing heat stressed trees dying all around the world, and ended with a Q&A programme with a panel containing only two sceptics, and four climate alarmists (including the host Tony Jones). To make the imbalance even worse, the ABC had a number of alarmist scientists (with microphones) in the audience so Jones could throw to them to give the alarmists the last word.

    The poor quality of their scientific debate is demonstrated here where scientist Mathew England is caught out in an outright lie claiming the IPCC Climate models have been accurate: http://joannenova.com.au/2012/04/abc-biased-scientist-matthew-england-outrageous-error-or-dishonest-nick-minchin-owed-an-apology/

    The Catalyst programme deliberately doesn’t tell you that tree die back is a natural phenomenon which happens without human CO2 emissions. Climate change is natural – who would have guessed! What happened to the Sahara forests? The wooded areas around Egypt’s pyramids? The forests of the Siberian tundra? The fertile lands of the Incas and Mayans? What it also didn’t highlight is that warming (as with cooling), may stress certain tree species, but it encourages others. The tree line in Canada and Russia is forever changing. Deciduous trees replacing conifers and vice versa depending on whether the climate is warming or cooling.

    Catalysts also failed to mention that warming is on balance invariably better for plant life than cooling. That’s why our abundant biomass on the earth is in the tropics not the arctic. That’s why the tree line on mountains peters out as the atmosphere gets colder with altitude. It also follows, that animals, including humans, prefer a warmer climate and that a slight warming of the world would make more of the world habitable, by animals and humans. Animals in the arctic and cold climates tend to migrate south or hibernate during the winter when there is a shortage of food. Warmer climates provide on balance a much more accommodating environment for animals and humans.

    Who ever heard of people moving to a colder climate for their health. Or moving to a colder climate for retirement?

    The timing of this programme was no coincidence in that it is just a couple of months before the introduction of the Carbon tax in Australia. We can expect to see more attempts by the Government through the ABC and the heavily funded academics and scientists to sway public opinion in favour of the Carbon Tax.

    But don’t expect to see any high quality scientific debates!

    http://www.abc.net.au/tv/changeyourmind/ and http://www.australianclimatemadness.com/2012/04/youth-and-naivete-no-match-for-maturity-and-experience/ and http://joannenova.com.au/2012/04/the-intellectual-vacuum-shows-how-weak-the-alarmists-are-in-trying-to-silence-skeptics/

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      Len

      God and Allah are not the same. Allah is the Arabian moon god.

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      Andrew McRae

      That is some great info there Jaymez. It just gets slimier the more you dig.

      Dick Smith is the Tricky Dicky of this outfit.

      Digging into what else “Smith & Nasht” has done lately, we find this gem:

      Synopsis: The Hive seeks to explore and test the hidden codes of cooperation: whether the collective ‘hive mind’ of humanity can collaborate for the greater good, or whether we will be doomed by self-interest.

      Hmm, could be a false dilemma. How about a third option: being saved by self interest!
      I mean seriously, the guy got rich from starting his eponymous electronics chain, Australian Geographic, Dick Smith Foods, and speculating in the Sydney property development market. He is a walking example of how self interest can lead to benefits for others too.

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    Jaymez

    Great job with the videos. A nice source to send around.Thanks for your work on the programme too.

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    Jake

    Good clip, sadly I somehow can’t get the other video’s mentioned at this stage.
    While it does do a great job in pointing out that the models are not duplicated by Nature, obviously someone forgot to give her Al’s book so she knew what to comply with, in my opinion David’s opening line that CO2 does cause warming and explaining how by creating a blanket will not cause many to change their mind. What he basically is saying is that CO2 assists in warming.
    So the model is wrong. Who cares?
    What I missed in what I saw is the historical data, the influence of the solar cycles etc.
    The other video’s might show all that of course, but no believer will ever be convinced by the argument that the model is not in line with the data while also saying that CO2 causes warming and how. For a believer it confirms their belief- CO2 causes warming.
    That there is more heat going out should not be a surprise, the warmer it gets under the blanket the more heat will be radiated. Normal dynamics.
    Again, so what if the model is wrong. bloody computers.
    In my opinion showing the data against the models and then showing it against the historical evidence of solar, ocean etc cycles will do more to show people that what we are faced with is nothing more than natural.
    Show that the amount of manmade CO2 is next to nothing compared to what nature itself throws out. It is only when you confront people with this sort of stuff that they might actually stop and think it all through.
    Show that all the other disaster predictions are wrong, most people are simply scared for the disasters. If it was not for the disaster predictions most believers would be quite happy with a slightly warmer climate. And none of these have followed the models and predictions.
    If anything an overall warmer climate should bring about less wind related events. As they found in the MWP.
    Malaria is often used as a scare tactic, no one mentions that malaria was not eradicated from Europe until after the last war, in other words Europe is within that type of mosquito’s natural range.

    However I am sure that the air quality in China’s large cities will benefit from a reduced coal burning exercise. London’s air is much better now compared to the 70’s.
    So it is not completely without benefits to reduce fossil burning or at least putting scrubbers and filters in the smoke stacks.

    But warming it causes not.

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    Prof Stephen Falken

    Hi Punters!

    It may come as a surprise but what these climate science guys are doing is continually trying to disprove the theory that man made global warming exists. That’s the scientific method. They’re not out there trying to prove the theory of climate change – they are trying to disprove it!

    You throw your evidence supported theories out in the literature, from whence they are prodded, poked, tested, retested, squeezed, bumped, boiled and bashed in an attempt to make them fall over! If they survive – and only if they survive – then they are allowed to stand *for now*, perhaps alongside other alternative theories, until they get hammered and tested again. The hope is one by one they get knocked over, and we have one that remains standing, a theory to explain what we see in the natural world! Until if and when heaven forbid it too gets knocked over!

    And this whole made made climate change thing *has* been hammered – unbelievably hard, time and time again. And both theories (is there climate change and is it man made) still stand – on a large foundation of evidence. The points raised by the layman Dr Evans do not even begin to come close to the punishment that this theory has been subjected to on a continual basis!

    To suggest that scientists are out to prove a theory correct shows you don’t really understand what science is, or how scientific theories are formed! Despite what people may tell you they don’t get put together down the local MP’s office. (Although they may begin at a pub)

    I’m a scientist in another (related) field, but I can tell you that the reason I know anthropogenic climate change is a pretty good theory is that I know what a massive hiding this theory has been subjected to, the huge weight of evidence it stands on, and the fact that all of the other theories explaining observed climate change have been knocked over via the scientific method (and none have been resurrected as of yet)!

    Rather than accuse the overwhelming majority of scientists working in this field of bias, how about some recognition to how their theories are actually FORMED and TESTED – before you wheel out electrical engineers and Earls of Monckton!

    Science – it works! You can keep your political side debates out of it thank you.

    ——————-

    Note from Jo – “falken” whoever he is, has not provided anything that confirms his name or title. I thought universities could do better than hotmail emails. Jo

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      Rereke Whakaaro

      Professor Falken,

      A significant proportion of the folks who are regulars here are aware of the scientific method. Some like yourself, practice it every day. Many of us are qualified in multiple fields – and sometimes with a wide range of professional interests in addition to core fields of study.

      The regulars are here because they do not like, nor agree with some of the non-scientific behaviour that has been exhibited by certain members of the “Climate Science” fraternity. Behaviour like impersonating another person to obtain private papers by false pretences, for example. Or colluding with others to “adjust data” that did not fit with the theory. Or refusing a legitimate request for a copy of the data and methods on the grounds that, the recipient will “… just find errors in them”, or threatening to sue people who publicly disagree with with them.

      I thoroughly agree with your position in regard to science and scientists. But some of us on this blog do not consider the current practice of “Climate Science” to be a science at all, since they seem to be very selective in how they interrelate with atmospheric physics, or oceanography, or any of the solar sciences, all or any of which would surely have an influence on the Earth’s atmosphere and atmospheric dynamics.

      At best, and in spite of their qualifications and appointments, many of us simply see “Climate Scientists” as technicians tweaking computer models to get them to work, and “adjusting the data” in order to get the results they expect, “according to the text book” – undergraduate behaviour.

      I suggest you have a look at the Climategate files to understand our concern regarding the level of “science” involved, and the reason why I, for one, always enclose “Climate Science” in inverted commas.

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      Dear Professor Stephen Falken

      YOU’RE A TROLL AND [snip]

      Stephen Falken was a character based on Stephen Hawking in WAR GAMES (1983 starring Matthew Broderick).

      If climate science followed the scientific method, climategate emails would not have existed.

      If climate science followed the scientific method, the IPCC SAR would not have fraudulently included the infamous “A Discernable Human Influence on Climate” claim.

      If climate science followed the scientific method, the claim of Himalayan Glaciers disappearing by 2035 would not have seen the light of day.

      If climate science followed the scientific method, sighting 4 dead polar bears from an airplane would not have ended up a peer reviewed published paper claiming proof of melting ice killing polar bears.

      Need I go on?

      You’re no professor. You’re just another of the many many braindead lemming trolls we’ve had come through here. NOT ONE HAS PRODUCED EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT THE ALARMIST CLAIM THAT CO2 IS CAUSING CATASTROPHIC HEATING OF THE PLANET.

      Did you really think your scam would work Falken? You poor sap.

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        Tom

        Thank you for that service, Baa. Hard to find good help these days when it comes to fumigating trolls that infest the public interest and make it easier for governments to misappropriate people’s money.

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        Rereke Whakaaro

        There, and I was trying to set him/her up with soft words … can a guy have no fun on a Sunday?

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        Ross

        Baa H — the idiot obviously did not read Jo’s previous thread and her comments about how the internet hinders the spreading of their propoganda
        (ie. they will always be found out). Maybe Jo should put a few words to that effect on the banner at the top of this site.

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      KeithH

      Nice try “Professor” but the “Hi Punters” opening did not give any confidence that you were in any way “professional”!
      As to your statement: “To suggest that scientists are out to prove a theory correct shows you don’t really understand what science is, or how scientific theories are formed!”

      On the contrary, to prove a theory correct is exactly why the UNIPCC was set up as shown below and this is what has politically corrupted the whole process from the start!

      United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

      ARTICLE 1:
      DEFINITIONS

      For the purposes of this Convention:

      1. “Adverse effects of climate change” means changes in the physical environment or biota resulting from climate change which have significant deleterious effects on the composition, resilience or productivity of natural and managed ecosystems or on the operation of socio-economic systems or on human health and welfare.

      2. “Climate change” means a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods.

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        Sonny

        Keith H

        So “climate change” is defined by the UN as being caused by humans.

        Therefore historical shifts in temperature and climate not caused by mankind are not “climate change”.

        Therefore the UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) is really the (Intergovernmwntal Panel on a change in climate which is attributed to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere.)

        This is why I always repeat the line “science is subservient to politics”. The UN had already convicted “human activity” as the culprit and then Set up the IPCC as the scientific propoganda arm to “find the evidence”.

        This is not the scientific method. This is not even science.

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      Jake

      I suggest that you were not even alive when the first politically backed organization was set up in the late 70’s. At a time when we were still looking down the barrel of the next ice age there was already political appetite for the AGW theory. The WMO was born, the brainchild of politicians, and it’s leadership filled with people who backed the theory, not one who would not buy that theory was selected, funny to say that some who were yelling ice age also now believed in man made warming and came on board. Supposedly, evidence may be too strong a word, those selected to come on board were asked if they felt that AGW was possible, yes was a job, no was out the door in the cold, and it was cold in those days we were still heading for the ice age. Remember?
      No data to suggest this AGW was the case and Arhenius’s theory was, already, time and again disproven by nature.
      What did they base it on? They all knew that the solar cycle was changing and it would get warmer. The politicians needed this for a reason. Is it not funny that this organization also came to be based in the UK?
      Still nothing to suggest that man has much to do with the little warming evident today, and most if not all of the last 14 years of that can be attributed to UHI, the satellite records are rather different then the land based ones as I am sure you well know.
      Anyway, a little later a trained chemist turned politician came to the top of the scene. Lord Monckton should know the name, he served in that time. Why are, relatively, a lot of politicians and advisers of that era such vocal “deniers”? Were you already alive at that stage?
      The politicians got involved from before day one. That should have been enough warning for all to suggest that it was not science.
      Politicians do not get involved in any scientific theories and if they are not until well proven, meaning years after a theory is first uttered as it is political suicide and they do so want to be re elected. And even then it first starts with a back bencher not in government, just to see how it will fly. The wonky theories get uttered by expendable members, if it turns bogus the party can afford to loose that person. The more solid theories or ideas get backing from one with political promise.
      That is politics. This one was accepted before there was one ounce of proof, worse the proof never came.
      Scientist do not prove the correctness of their theory? What planet are you on? All and any theory gets torn apart, as is this one, if there is not enough data to support it and the scientist that utters the theory HAS to prove it. And that is the problem, the data to support the theory was not there, and still is not, it was a computer model. Ok, the models were wrong but, after all, there was some warming. It does not necessarily disprove the theory but it certainly does not prove it. There is certainly more, much more, evidence to suggest that it is natural and those back in the 70’s new that quite well. Those of today know it for certain. Lovelock’s backdown the other day, so cleverly worded, is quite possibly more proof then anything anyone can ever write here. Have you noticed how quiet the mainstream papers are, not one reported it and I check 10 international ones daily. This one has to be let down real gently to avoid dramatic political fall out.
      The only reason it all survives for now is because of “the will of the west”. More then one government will fall if this is not handled very carefully.
      No need to go into the political reasons, everyone will have a different opinion.
      But there is good news for you, whoever you are. The earth will not perish. Not now not ever, well not because of CO2 anyway.
      The radio active waste of the rare earth mineral extraction to be turned into windmills etc is likely to do a lot more environmental damage then fossil fuel burning ever will.

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      Brian H

      “it still stands”? Well, it still gets funded, if that’s what you mean. But if by “stands” you mean it continues to make accurate “projections”, then you are simply a liar. It hasn’t, doesn’t, can’t, and won’t.

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    Rod Stuart

    Great job David and Jo. This thing need to go viral on the ‘net. BTW who is this dumbass Falken? No doubt gorging himself with his snout well buried in the feed trough our tax dollars.

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    Minister for Enlightenment

    Brillant

    Every Australian owes David and Jo an immense debt of gratitude.

    Thank you.

    All that is left is to effect a change of goverment…and the sooner the better

    BTW… isnt it interesting that the Finkelstein review of the media, initiated by this idiot Labour Govt, is proposing even greater controls on our freedoms of speech…and will/may include controls over the internet.

    These controls may involve restraints that will make it so that videos and anlysis such as Davids, may be taken down and not heard

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      Owen Morgan

      “Every Australian owes David and Jo an immense debt of gratitude.”

      And a lot of us outside Australia are extremely grateful, too.

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    […] Last week we finished some YouTube versions explaining the skeptical case. These grew out of the interview we did with Nick Minchin and Anna Rose for the   I Can Change Your Mind. They are what we would have said, if we’d been editing the documentary …more here Keep reading  → […]

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    pat

    just gone online and about to watch delingpole on bolt, so will watch later, but remember this one i posted recently:

    18 April: Gold Coast City Council won’t pay the carbon tax if I am mayor, says Tom Tate
    http://www.news.com.au/money/money-matters/gold-coast-city-council-wont-pay-the-carbon-tax-if-i-am-mayor-says-tom-tate/story-e6frfmd9-1226332838659

    well, he won:

    28 April: Tom Tate declares victory in mayor race
    http://www.goldcoast.com.au/article/2012/04/28/411355_city-council-election.html

    abbott supported Tate, so let’s see if Tate holds to his promise:

    20 April: Abbott backs Tate’s carbon tax stand
    http://www.goldcoast.com.au/article/2012/04/20/409205_city-council-election.html

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    KeithH

    Having read the relatively full audio transcript of your encounter with Anna Rose, I’m left with feelings of sadness and anger. Sadness that so many our young people seem to have been brainwashed into such an irrational terrified state about their future and alleged “inevitable” destruction of the planet if we don’t “do something” about carbon dioxide.

    Anger that the Hansens,Flannerys, Karolys and other alarmist scientists together with the Gillards, Combets, Browns, Milnes and other self-serving scientifically illiterate politicians egged on by Bankers, financiers, scammers and associated carpet-baggers have so successfully peddled this pseudo-scientific garbage to the detriment of all humanity.

    I do feel real pity for Anna to have been sent like a lamb to the slaughter armed only with a closed mind, no evidence and some really pathetic “arguments”.

    On a dispassionate basis, as a sceptic of CAGW I hope she becomes another pet of the ABC and is given considerable exposure. She could become as valuable to the sceptic case as Tim Flannery, David Karoly, Lewandowsky, Pitman and other “experts” regularly trotted out by “our” ABC!

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    Chris Black

    I have noticed alot on this site you and your posters say qualifications mean nothing but right from the beginning of this video he makes a big point to the people in order they know he has no less then 6 degrees … It is disingenuous as the degree/s he holds are not relevant to the field yet he is trying to discredit qualified scientists or scientific organizations with qualifications in this very field…

    The other point that needs clearing up of his latest video is the so called missing hotspot theory back in 2008 this was fully debunked he was also given a series of corrections but he still goes on about a missing hot spot and chose to ignore these why is that and why is the hot spot relevant if you do not use the corrections given to you

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      memoryvault

      It is disingenuous as the degree/s he holds are not relevant to the field

      Yeah – totally unqualified.
      That’s why he was a bigwig at the Department of Climate Change (under their former name) for years.

      The other point that needs clearing up of his latest video is the so called missing hotspot theory

      Back before it was shown not to exist, the Tropospheric Tropical Flop Spot was touted by the IPCC and the theory’s proponents as both the “indelible fingerprint” and the “smoking gun” of anthropogenic global warming. Their terms, not mine.

      It was only when it was shown not to exist that it suddenly became “irrelevant”.

      The real problem for folks like you, Chris Black, is that you really think we are as ignorant as you think we are.

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      Sonny

      Degrees or more importantly education are obviously relevant in this debate.

      Our problem is that the warmists have used the status “climate scientist” as a symbol of authority to supress the opinions of scientists who do not identify themselves as “climate scientists” yet still have relevant education and experience (e.g. Dr Evans is an electrical engineer who worked as a carbon modeler for the government)

      We have given examples previously of “climate scientists” in the media who have far less relevant education yet are in positions of great influence.

      As for your hot spot argument… The answer to your question is detailed but I assure you it has been covered in previous posts. To me it is far less important than comparing the temperature projections based on climate models with actual temperatures.

      The major problem facing alarmists is that for global warming theory to be vindicated, we need to start seeing global warming again.

      Why has there been no global warming inthe past decade?

      If there has been no global warming in the past decade why are we restructuring our economy on the basis of stopping global warming?

      but they do not in and of themselves imply intellectual authority

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        Chris Black

        The hotspot argument he is still using was debunked here back in 2008 and David was given the correct adjustments to use… Is that true

        http://bravenewclimate.com/2008/08/10/dr-david-evans-born-again-alarmist/

        Also nothing being released from any of the top scientific organization shows any cooling HadCrut 3 from 2010 HadCrut 4 just released recently all show climate is still warming at the projected rate .. the cooling over last decade is a total lie / fabrication no REAL data from any REAL organization what so ever to back that up statement up …

        And Sonny the “only” problem with the entire global warming argument / debate is IF we all listen to the likes of you Jo , David as you say we should and YOU lot are wrong there is no comeback clause , there will be no reverse switch we can trip to make it all better , you will not compensate people for the extra we have to pay or what we have to do from not acting sooner…

        You have no irrefutable proof of any of your claims but are willing to stake the lives of future generations on it but will be the first to run away from blame when / if you are wrong ..

        Common Sense says alongside basic science says prevention is better then cure .. stopping something occurring or reducing it’s impact is better then fixing it afterwards

        As the other way we have spent a few dollars and cleaned up some pollution and reduced emissions , got come clean tech in the process no harm done unlike the path you want people to take

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          Chris, thanks for that own goal. That’s Sherwood 2008 you are referring too, one of the most egregious examples of how desperate warmists are to “find” the hot spot. Sherwood changed the color-scale on that graph to deceive you. The color of zero is deep orange. The hot spot they found is too low, but it’s only there because of the fraud in the color scale.

          The corruption in the ranks of top climate scientists is inexcusable.

          http://joannenova.com.au/2010/07/sherwood-2008-where-you-can-find-a-hot-spot-at-zero-degrees/

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            Sonny

            It’s hilarious Jo!

            When will these over enthusiastic captain planet type clones realize that they do more harm to their cause by speaking than remaining silent.

            Get the hint Chris? You are well out of your depth!

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            Chris Black

            But regardless of colours on a chart and it wasn’t a own goal it was a question based on his own video that uses that .. This is not a sport to see who lives who dies , who’s right who is wrong like you make out that is the sicken part of the debate…

            But it was your RED HERRING i suppose because the rest of what i asked was left unanswered eg.. Basic Scientific Principal is all about prevention is better then cure stopping something occurring or reducing it’s impact is better then fixing it afterwards…

            As said the “only” problem with the entire global warming argument / debate is IF we all listen to the likes of Jo , David , Who ever as you say we should and YOU lot are WRONG there is no comeback clause , there will be no reverse switch we can trip to make it all better , you will not compensate people for the extra we have to pay or what we have to do from not acting sooner…

            You have no irrefutable proof of any of your claims but are willing to stake the lives of future generations on it but you will be the first to run away from the blame when / if you are wrong ..

            You say there is corruption in the ranks of top climate scientists but never addressed the what if your side is wrong .. Plenty of corruption exist there as well fudged data , fake charts but we just have to take your word for it..

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            Sonny

            The only problem Chris is that you are looking for someone to “listen to”.
            Why don’t you try formulate your own opinion? It’s way more fun than rattling off the “precautionary principal” like a mindless drone. No offense.

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          No Fixed Address

          Chris,
          I’m reading this Sunday morning and I must confess you gave me the best laugh I’ve had in a long time.

          Do you have your own website. I would love to read more of your humorous comments.

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          Sonny

          Chris,

          No global warming in the last decade. Why don’t you just deal with it! Stop lying!

          Please refer to comment 8. I have performed a pro bono analysis of global temperature based on the Australian BOM data using a 5 year running average method.

          (SNIPPED) CTS

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            Chris Black

            Very Mature suck on eggs comment sort of loses the argument

            So the basis of the whole global warming debate is based on your excel spreadsheet , Yet the top scientific organizations in the world who do this use super computers…

            Yes YOU have performed that analysis of the global temps but not being a scientist myself i would not trust that data / equation at all … If i want to get heart surgery i do not go see my local green grocer or carpenter i go see people who have expertise in that exact area ..same applies to that equation and how it is put together..

            As said above Sonny HadCrut 4 came out recently and is inline with the previous temps done in HasCrut 3 in 2010 .. Also a old 1981 Hansen chart was found the other day and his predictions for temps back then forecasting 30 yrs are almost spot on for what is recorded now due to SCIENCE

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            Sonny

            (Snipped the namecalling) CTS

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            Sonny

            (Snipped the namecalling again) CTS

            (I want you to stop your namecalling and either make substantive replies or leave Chris Black alone) CTS

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            Sonny

            Sorry moderators. I will simply leave Chris alone.

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            Chris Black

            Sonny

            The only problem Chris is that you are looking for someone to “listen to”.
            Why don’t you try formulate your own opinion? It’s way more fun than rattling off the “precautionary principal” like a mindless drone. No offense.

            I have formulated mine… as you can easily have your own OPINION but you certainly cant have your own FACT … That there is the very essence of science , replicate , review , repeat .. eg.. It has been done more then once by more then one person to ensure it is indeed correct which is why i wont use the equation of yours..

            The “precautionary principal” applies and should because you might be very well wrong on your OPINION of global warming / climate change but should the rest of the world or even Aust stake their lifestyle or livings off what Jo or David or whoever say on a blog …

            What if they are indeed WRONG that is a minefield … new laws coming in soon via a media watchdog could open up a hornets nest for legal cases just on this debate and people sued for printing non factual information etc..

            That is why i asked What If they are wrong there is no comeback or reverse switch as said

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            Sonny

            Self snipped.

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            Dave

            .
            Chris, you state:

            but should the rest of the world or even Aust stake their lifestyle or livings off what Jo or David or whoever say on a blog

            Your income & lifestyle then is dependent on the introduction of the CO2 Tax in July Chris?

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            Brett_McS

            The “Precautionary Principle” is logically void. Any decision, or its opposite, can be formulated in terms supported by the Precautionary Principle: The cost/danger of doing something can be put against the cost/danger of doing nothing, and vice versa.

            Of itself the Precautionary Principle provides no guidance as to which path to take.

            As to Climate Change, the cost of trying to prevent climate change is many, many times the cost of adapting to it.

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          Chris Black

          @Brett_McS

          The cost/danger of doing something can be put against the cost/danger of doing nothing, and vice versa.

          As to Climate Change, the cost of trying to prevent climate change is many, many times the cost of adapting to it.

          You have no idea as to the cost to the public of any of that just made up wishy washy rubbish argument nul of any facts..

          We have a cost on the table for the carbon price it is 0.7% levied on 500 polluters eg.. SFA when compared to the GST which had a 6-7 % on the entire economy and it had no compensation we wont even know about the carbon price apart from Abbott and LNP protests…

          The cost of adapting is the biggest lie as we don’t know what the temps will actually get too in the end .. But 4 ,5 , 6 degrees Celsius above temps we get now will cost a lot more then a measly $10 – $20 a week .. It is not prevention it is stopping it getting any worse…

          The cost to you and others is of no concern crocodile tears argument , same as you have no real concerns about adaption for future generations it is wholly and solely about about regime change for you because you hope in some way it will all get scrapped so costs not even relevant .. Falls into the not in my backyard or i don’t want to pay for the damage i have done scenario.. Selfish Funded Retirees , Baby Boomers types but they will be the first to scream out when they are impacted..

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            Brett_McS

            You seem to be suggesting that the Carbon Tax is going to stop temperature changes of the order of 4,5 or 6 degrees? Even its most zealous proponents admit it won’t effect more than a tiny fraction of a degree over many decades. Oh, but then we must do more, eh?

            So the Australian economy goes down the shute and future generations are left to cope with a mini-ice age with unreliable electricity (“no new coal plants!, no nukes!”) and a broken down transportation system.

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          Chris, if you don’t like a point scoring type discussion don’t come here telling us we know nothing. Ask, be polite, and we will be too. Yes, any reference to Sherwood 2008 as a serious paper is an own goal. You said David Evans was debunked, and linked to a post that discussed that paper. Either you care about rigorous science and graphs that use standardised scales or you think that kind of cheating is OK. Which is it?

          As for the precautionary principle, bunkum. Try this on for precautionary: you want to risk killing children in order to reduce global CO2 levels and keep the planet what 0.01C cooler?

          We can’t afford to make cheap energy more expensive unless the costs outweigh the benefits. If electricity and fuel cost more, economies slow, which means jobs go, food costs more, the poor are hit the worst, someone has to do without and it won’t be wealthy inner-city selfish greens. If we waste money stuffing a harmless gas underground thats money we could have spent curing childhood cancer or blindness in Ethiopia. With job losses or less disposable income in some social brackets, suicide and divorce will increase, lifespans will decrease. In other words people will die younger or sooner than they would have. In really poor countries kids will go without medicines or fresh food. Somewhere, children under five will die because you are too lazy to make a cost-benefit analysis on the odds of CO2 causing damage and the futility of limiting CO2. The money wasted on solar panels could have given entire third world nations clean water. The wealth created with clean cheap energy could help prevent precious rainforests being razed to provide firewood that isn’t as good as coal fired power. Do you want me to go on? There is a finely tuned machine of 7 billion people doing the best they can damn well do to live the best life they can manage and you want to mess with that machine because 3 dozen guys with big computer simulations made a prophesy the world will end?

          And you have the gall to pretend we don’t care about the poor, the plants or the children? We are doing everything we can to stop death and disease, to give our children a future of freedom and health.

          We just looked at all the data and came to a different conclusion to you.

          Take your planetary insurance scheme and try to sell it on the street.

          If insurance is always a no-brainer, why aren’t you calling for a global asteroid protection shield. What if you are wrong? You can’t unwind that 3km rock that smacked into Chad. Billions will die crops will fail, extinctions are inevitable.

          Risk is not a YES NO answer. It’s a question of what is worth doing compared to every other option we have. We can’t save the world from everything Chris, we have to pick the threats that matter the most.

          Give us some evidence.

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            Sonny

            Very very well put Jo.
            It should make any sane person very sad to think of the wasted billions pissed away on rubbish science.

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            Chris Black

            @ Brett no one suggestion the tax will stop temps (understand NO ONE)

            What they are saying is we need to stop temps getting there by making polluters pay .. Abbott’s Direct Action makes consumers pay $1300 per head not the polluters and the money raided doesn’t go towards any new tech that will produce clean energy…

            No economy going down the shute – No mini ice age furfies that is the crazy talk … Right out there with Paper Aristocracies and Agenda 21 rubbish conspiracy theorists

            @ Jo

            No one is risking children apart from those that refuse to act .. By putting clean energy , green tech in place which is the main thing the carbon price does is at least making it a healthier place less pollution then what we have now … And if the newer cleaner power sources do keep temps under tripping points all the better …

            This same argument was had by the same types of people over sewer systems due to health concerns .. The libs / well off whinged the costs would be to much and the same things would happen to economy or jobs it NEVER did..

            And you have the gall to pretend we don’t care about the poor, the plants or the children? We are doing everything we can to stop death and disease, to give our children a future of freedom and health.

            But you are not doing everything , you are actually promoting doing nothing or promoting regime change so they can do nothing but the health benefits alone of reducing pollutions is worth it…

            Risk is a Yes / No but insurance companies have already said yes to climate change being real and factored it in .. they have assessed the risk and decided it is worth thinking off

            But you still have the wishy washy answers on IF you are wrong .. What ever brand of science you preach isn’t 100% foolproof or near it so there is a good chance you will be wrong and no escape caluse

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            Sonny

            Chris,
            I have copied and pasted your comment in my archive which I have labelled:
            “the purile ramblings of indoctrinated souls”.

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      Ross

      Chris , lets take your argument to another situation. There are a number of qualified “climate scientists” who don’t agree with AGW ( and they have peer reviewed papers that are published).
      There was a TV program on Australian TV this week where a young lawyer tried to criticise these climate scientists.
      See it works both ways if you want to try that stupid argument.

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      MattB

      I’ve got to say Chris, and remember I’m on your side for the most part, that David Evans’ qualifications are most certainly relevant to climate science. The don’t make him right or wrong but he clearly has a clue when it comes to a lot of the mathematics involved. That said even Darth Vader had a fair handle on The Force;)

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        Sonny

        For the most part I agree with your comment. It would make fairly little sense to dispute the qualifications of someone with 6 degrees who used to work in government modeling carbon cycles. David freely admits that he uses to be an alarmist. He changed his mind when the data stopped fitting the theory. He really is a whistleblower on the scientific corruption and lies that were required to keep the carbon gravy train chugging along. You don’t just give up a billion dollar industry because of a few inconvenient facts… That’s not how human nature works.

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        justjoshin

        fair analogy, considering he converted back from the dark side to slay the Emperor. Using his powers of climate modelling for good instead of evil, after years working for the Department of Carbon Tax Climate Change.

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      Brian H

      Ah, yes, the “qualified climate scientist” wheeze.

      Since there is no such degree, historically (a few come-lately-gravy-train-hopping-colleges may now have cobbled together something), the “real” climate scientists are … those who self-defined the pseudo-science at the CRU, like Jones et al. None of whom have degrees any more relevant than Evans.

      I think it was Dr. Clark (?) who made the point that climate science actually encompasses about 100 professional specialties, of which he claimed to be expert in one, and conversant with perhaps 2 more. NO ONE is or could be master of them all, and the clique of 22 or so in the Hokey Team only cover a half-dozen. And they’re not even particularly good at those.

      What a crock!

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      Laurie Williams

      Check out Flannery’s qualifications. And his experience through his working life.

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    memoryvault

    .
    The day of reckoning moves ever closer.

    Craig Thomson just announced his resignation from the Labor Party and will sit on the cross-benches.

    I think it would be fairly safe to postulate he is one step away from being charged with something, and is falling on his sword to try and protect the Gillard gubmint from further fallout.

    A tad too little a tad too late, methinks.

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      pattoh

      Just seen JG making her anns about Thomson & Slipper.

      Imagine if someone has the balls to poke a microphone in her face after those comments & ask her about the Wilson /AWU business or the Hiener affair.

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    Say,

    I’m sure you all knew this about Anna Rose, but just in case some of you missed it.

    Surely it would be disingenuous of me to suggest that the 29 year old Rose would have gotten her husband Simon Sheikh, with all his pull to line her up for this ABC program, just to publicise her book, Madlands: A Journey to Change the Mind of a Climate Sceptic.

    In an earlier life, Anna worked with the National Union of Students, coordinating the Australian Student Environment Network, organising University students at over 37 campuses. She was also a former editor of Australia’s largest student paper and is a regular speaker, blogger and opinion writer on climate and energy issues. She also spent some time in the United States, studying at Cornell law school, working with the Energy Action Coalition, and volunteering on the Obama campaign in the New Hampshire Primary, prior to his election as President.

    She also represented young Australians at the Secretary General’s Special Conference on Climate Change at the United Nations in New York

    Anna is a member of the Environment Minister’s Advisory Council on Environmental Education and advises several State and Federal Government departments on incorporating a global perspective into schooling and curriculum.

    Her work has also included communications strategy on the successful Make History Melbourne campaign to elect Adam Bandt, Australia’s first Green to be elected to the lower house in a general election. Rose also coordinated web and social media strategy for Independent Lord Mayor of Sydney Clover Moore.

    Again, surely this wasn’t just a ploy to get her more noticed just to support sales of her book, because, let me ballpark here.

    Nothing was going to … ‘Change (HER) Mind.’

    This next bit is also a couple of days old, and is from Lewandowsky, but I just love the way that HE talks about the need for debate, and in the same article suggests leanings to his own views anyway.

    Also, you just have to love the image they have used here showing that foul, disgusting, filmed in light so it looks black, awful, polluting ….. er, steam!!!

    Will they never learn?

    Sceptics must start warming to the reality of climate science

    Tony.

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      Sonny

      Wow Tony thanks !

      Looks like this woman has an entire career riding on the continued existence of “climate change” as defined by the UN.
      Do you think that perhaps she has vested interests that are compromising her intellectual curiosity?
      Does this apply to other alarmists as well? Do they also have careers that are so tied down to “climate change” that they would want to supress any information that would endanger their future prosperity and status?

      It really makes you think doesn’t it?

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      Thumbnail

      After about 15 minutes of watching the preamble to the QandA show, my husband turned to me and said “she has that ‘god glint’ in her eyes“. I nearly fell off the sofa laughing. She does have that manic glint in her eyes when she is talking about catastrophic climate change. Jo, you did well to have this grub in your private home.

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      MattB

      “Surely it would be disingenuous of me to suggest that the 29 year old Rose would have gotten her husband Simon Sheikh, with all his pull to line her up for this ABC program, just to publicise her book, Madlands: A Journey to Change the Mind of a Climate Sceptic.”

      But the book is about the tour with Minchin which required the TV show to even exist, so it is a tough sell to suggest she only wanted to do the show to publicise the book. The book could not exist without the show.

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        Joe V.

        It’s not unusual to milk a mainstream TV emission for all it’s worth.
        This was about attempting to dupe the tired and lethargic audience back to the warmist cause, under the guise of ”balance”.

        A bold but catastrophic move in this case as it turned out, incidentally, but that’s btw.

        The program, the book, the blog hype surrounding it, they’re all just different media for getting the notion out there.

        It wasn’t just to publicise her book, it’s true.

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    Rick Bradford

    The folks still pushing the AGW barrow remind me rather of the Mud Men of PNG, whose legend states that being completely slathered in mud made their enemies fear them as spirits.

    Similarly, the AGW crowd completely slather themselves in CO2-based catastrophes, hoping to scare the populace into rewarding them with more funding and ego-boosting awards.

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      Kinkykeith

      RB

      Metink planti pus pus long simon long anna.

      Crazi tumas.

      🙂

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        Dave

        .
        Two pla lik lik rats no got eye – missus long master rausum long long!

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          Kinkykeith

          Thanks for the correction Dave.

          I was last there for a 4 week visit in 1969 so am a bit rusty.

          The bosses wife is giving his two thingamejigs, that are like eyeless rats, a good long workout?

          🙂

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    Frank

    Wonderful presentation. A terrific job. This is what ABC-TV should have presented if they were indeed serious about balanced reporting. I hope all politicians and legislators see your very insightful presentation. Our greatest threat is from these eco-zealots interested in forming some kind of global government and ushering in a new age of Tyranny. Thank God for the Internet otherwise we’d all be living in fear! Bravo to sceptics everywhere!

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    Deanism

    One of the advantages of digital video recorders and cheap mass storage is that you can keep copies of popular ABC presentations regarding global warmi…., oops sorry – climate change predictions. As the years slowly roll by, it is interesting and amusing to check back on what the predictions claimed compared to what actually happened. It is also interesting to notice how the ABC’s favorite scientists are allowed to change their stories without challenge from Aunty.

    It’s one thing to be concerned about CO2 and warn about it, but to exaggerate the dangers only damages the reputation of science once the truth comes out. The climate ‘believers’ remind me of the worst end of religious belief where the argument goes “Everything written in the Bible is true because the Bible says so, and because the Bible is 100% true then this must also be true”. These people choose to live in a world where their belief is sustained by refusing to allow doubt. In the same way, the climate inquisition seem to think that by ignoring data that shows flaws in their belief, their belief will rein supreme.

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      Sonny

      What’s worse is THEY write the bible as they go along.
      It’s why they constantly shift goalposts, lower their temperature “projections” then say –

      “We told you all along the world is not cooling. If we adjust the data by removing all the natural factors you can still see that the world is still warming alarmingly, and you should continue to fund our work through your taxes”.

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    Mike Flynn

    Hi,

    Somebody correct me if I’m wrong.

    The maximum radiative transfer of energy between bodies occurs in a vacuum.

    Claiming that reducing the amount of energy reaching a body (eg by interposing CO2 in the radiative path) will result in an increase in temperature, is preposterous nonsense!

    Thank you.

    Live well and prosper.

    Mike Flynn.

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    pat

    don’t call for “greater compensation” Mr. Baird. call for the repeal of the carbon dioxide tax, drop the Coalition’s emissions trading scheme, and demand a Frederal election now:

    29 April: Ninemsn: Carbon tax to hit NSW schools, hospitals
    The carbon tax will cost NSW public hospitals $120,000 a year each on average and public schools $9100 a year, the state government says.
    NSW Treasurer Mike Baird said the state’s 220 public hospitals and 2177 government-run schools will face a combined bill of over $46 million a year once the carbon tax starts on July 1.
    The figures are based on electricity usage and indirect costs calculated by the NSW Treasury.
    “This latest advice provides a breakdown of the very real impact this tax will have on essential services that people rely on each day,” Mr Baird said in a statement…
    Mr Baird called for greater compensation for the state.
    “The Commonwealth is compensating Victoria for the impact of the carbon tax to the tune of $2 billion, and yet NSW is not getting anything,” he added.
    http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8458927/carbon-tax-to-hit-nsw-schools-hospitals

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    pat

    lots to read in here:

    27 April: Reuters: David Fogarty: Australia carbon tax clouds power picture, adds risks
    * CO2 price meant to help drive power sector investment
    * Yet political uncertainty, costs raise risks
    * Renewables, weak demand delay new baseload plants
    (Additional reporting by James Grubel in Canberra, John Arbouw of PFI and Peter Hinton in Sydney; Editing by Ed Davies)
    Generators and analysts see the CO2 tax as unlikely to displace existing coal-fired power stations soon, and they could remain viable unless carbon prices surge towards A$100 a tonne.
    “The carbon price has got to be a very big number for gas to become cheaper than coal,” Philip St. Baker, CEO of electricity generator and retailer ERM Power, told Reuters…
    http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/27/australia-power-idUSL3E8FN1VX20120427

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    pat

    27 April: Reuters: EU carbon ends steady, volume ebbs ahead of holiday
    * EU carbon permits end virtually flat
    * Volume likely to dip next week
    * EU-wide carbon registry to open in June
    “There is no incentive for market participants to move in either direction,” said a trader at an environmental commodities brokerage, adding volume is likely to decline next week.
    “Some people will be on holiday and it will be the end of the compliance period,” the trader said, referring to power utilities which generally need to buy CO2 permits to comply with the EU emissions trading scheme…
    An EU-wide emissions registry will open in June, but accounts at existing EU member state registries will be inaccessible for two weeks prior to the open, the European Commission said on Friday.
    As a result, none of the 30,000 registry account holders will be able to transfer emissions units during that period, meaning Europe’s spot carbon market will effectively be closed. More details and the exact timetable will be released on May 3.
    Traders said the temporary closure would have little impact on the market, because they could still buy and sell carbon permits on the forward market.
    In the United Nations-backed carbon market, prices of certified emission reductions for December delivery slumped 1 percent to close at 3.81 euros a tonne…
    http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/27/markets-europe-carbon-idUSL6E8FR99220120427

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      Brian H

      CO2-phobes and their money are soon scammed.

      I’ve got a hypothetical temperate rainforest I’ll plant here soon if funded, so send me a few hundred million for the carbon credits I’ll have if I get the money and eventually get around to planting the forest. Kay?

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    No Fixed Address

    Dear Joanne and David,

    Thank you for the videos, and I confess I haven’t even watched them all, but you have part answered a question that arose for me after reading your post on the ABC ‘mockumentry’.

    And the question that arose was “is it possible to make a documentary that allows the people ‘interviewed’ by the abc to actually tell their facts and reasoning?”

    Your cheque is in the mail.

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    Michael Larkin

    Dr Evans,

    Thank you for your first two videos – as layman, I found them concise and very helpful when it comes to the science. I only wish that they could somehow get global MSM coverage. I will certainly be investigating your web site as a result.

    As regards the political video, I feel sceptics should be taking the high road and concentrating on the science. If they indulge in the politics, people who might otherwise be open to the science might start wondering if there isn’t some underlying political agenda that is muddying the water, just as there appears to be on the alarmist side.

    I know and you know that the science alone is enough to put a big dent in alarmism. My view would be to scrap the third video and let people make up their own minds about what the first two say about the politics.

    Just my twopence worth.

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      Juliar

      I do agree, but I think people have become initially mistrusting of the CAGW doctrine because of the politics behind all of this and it does explain some of the motives behind how they could be so wrong. People think that because they are scientists, they have a PhD therefore they must be right. Remember, Science is the belief in experts. So, the Politics exposes many of these people ulterior motives and therefore their science can be exposed.

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      Brian H

      Sorry, the “Qui bono?” questions must always be asked. For a very parallel big-bux issue, check out “Lies, Damned Lies, and Medical Research“.

      One of the reasons real sciences look for high-sigma rejections of the Null Hypothesis (99.9% or higher) is to guard against conscious and unconscious “cheating”. Climate Science is thrilled to get 95%. This is mush, not worth the recycled toilet paper it’s written on.

      Status is the #1 human motivation. Status and power needs almost drove Newton over the brink (see his disputes with Leibnitz about the invention of calculus, etc.) Ignore them at your peril.

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    […] and financial motivations of the other side all day. Where the debate needs to focus on is the science and the data. An attempt at a psychoanalysis does not count as “deconstructing” the […]

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    CHIP

    It won’t let me reply to Matt’s post above. So I’ll do it here.

    “For example, the residency times issue is not even about individual atoms, which, yes on average, are taken out of the atmosphere in a couple of years. It’s about the residency of the ‘surplus’ CO2 and how long before things are back to semi-equilibrium”.

    You misunderstand. I’m not saying that anthropogenic CO2 cannot increase the atmospheric CO2 level because of its short residence-time. I’m saying that Henry’s law precludes the possibility of anthropogenic CO2 increasing the atmospheric CO2 level significantly. That’s all. I thought I made that obvious in the above post? Sorry if I didn’t. Henry’s law states that the concentration of a gas in liquid is directly proportional to the gas in the air above the solvent. Henry’s law sets a fixed partitioning ratio between atmospheric CO2 and DIC of 1:50 respectively at the Earth’s average surface temperature. This is why there exists 50 times as much CO2 in the oceans than the atmosphere. This means that if you increased the partial pressure of CO2 in the atmosphere you create a disequilibrium in the partitioning ratio and thereby force more CO2 down to the oceans in order to restore equilibrium. The IPCC ignore Henry’s law and instead apply the Revelle Factor which has never been empirically substantiated. Oh, and in my above post it should read “3/4’s of a year”. It would be handy if there was an edit-button.

    mean, wow! Had you thought of telling the scientists whose life work it is to analyze these ice cores that, gee wiz, CHIP said you’re wrong!

    Scientists who have analysed the ice-core data have found them to be unreliable. I touch upon some of the problems with the ice-core data here if you’re interested. Of course you don’t have to reply with an argument, you could just keep saying I’m wrong without ever elaborating why and arguing from authority, but that would get sort of tedious.

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      Chris Black

      Sorry Chip you reply Matt regarding valid testing methods which are extremely accurate with a link to a blog that uses WUWT graphs who is a well known skeptic ..

      How about some FACTS

      Richard Alley Ice Core Lab Denver

      400,000 yrs of co2 , temps correlation

      http://youtu.be/O4BJDwI8zSk

      Your argument is absolute bat poo crazy stuff as it cost far more to actually get a ice core out then it does testing it … the machines are highly accurate regardless of your opinion

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        Kinkykeith

        CB

        Nobody is contesting the accuracy of tee testing equipment.

        What is at issue is the degradation and distortion of the sample.

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        CHIP

        “Sorry Chip you reply Matt regarding valid testing methods which are extremely accurate with a link to a blog that uses WUWT graphs who is a well known skeptic”.

        Even though I link to WUWT I clearly state that the paper and graph in question comes from Beck 2007. What does WUWT have to do with anything? Why bring it up? The question of whether his web-site is a ‘sceptic site’ is irrelevant to the validity of Beck’s paper.

        How about some FACTS. Richard Alley Ice Core Lab Denve. 400,000 yrs of co2 , temps correlation”

        You seem terribly confused to me. I’m not arguing that there is no correlation between CO2 and temperature in the ice-core record, just that the ice-core data underestimates CO2’s true values. However, I must say that I found Alley’s video uninformative. On the contrary, those ice-core records appear to provide evidence only for the opposite effect to what Alley is saying, showing temperature lagging behind CO2 both during interglacials and glacials.

        Your argument is absolute bat poo crazy stuff”.

        What argument? That the ice-core data probably underestimates past CO2 values? Care to explain specifically what about my argument is ‘bat poo crazy’ without appealing to authority?

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    In reply to Matt Bennett’s comment:

    The chart in the link is composed of FIVE decades of published research showing short resident times for CO2 molecules.

    LINK

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      MattB

      we’ve been through this before… the short residence time of a specific CO2 molecule is a completely different matter to the ability of the 3% of emissions that are anthropogenic to raise atm CO2 levels. Nearly every CO2 molecule that is taken in to the ocean is replace immediately by a CO2 molecule leaving the ocean and heading in to the atmosphere.

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        John Brookes

        Awwww come on MattB, if they couldn’t recycle dud arguments, where would they be?

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          allen mcmahon

          Bearing in mind that you invariably link to SKS or Tamino you are certainly an expert on recycled garbage.

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        Winston

        By all means, Matt, explain why the IPCC has totally different CO2 residence times figures to everybody else- I thought you guys were all warm and fuzzy about “consensus science”. Belongs in the same basket as “democratic knowledge” a la Wikipedia.

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        BobC

        MattB
        April 29, 2012 at 11:39 pm · Reply
        we’ve been through this before… the short residence time of a specific CO2 molecule is a completely different matter to the ability of the 3% of emissions that are anthropogenic to raise atm CO2 levels. Nearly every CO2 molecule that is taken in to the ocean is replace immediately by a CO2 molecule leaving the ocean and heading in to the atmosphere.
        [my emphasis]

        The only question in my mind is: “Are you a fool or a knave?”

        True, this question has been covered many times before, and you still are as ignorant as you started. (Matt Bennett is equally ignorant, but he just got here, so I can’t comment on his ability to learn.)

        Let’s start with a simple model, then go to actual measurements. (This puts us way beyond the IPCC and government-funded climate scientists, who never try to validate their models.)

        *************************

        Simple Model
        Consider just the oceans, the atmosphere, and Henry’s Law.
        According to the IPCC, the oceans contain 50 times as much CO2 as the atmosphere.
        According to Henry’s Law, the rate at which CO2 will go from the atmosphere to the ocean is proportional to the concentration in the atmosphere alone. (The temperature-dependent proportionality constant accounts for the mobility of the molecules.)
        Also according to Henry’s Law, the rate at which CO2 moves from the ocean to the atmosphere is proportional to the concentration of CO2 in the ocean alone.

        (This is a classic linear system: The rates are linear functions of the concentrations. Linear Sysems Theory is the branch of knowledge that studies such systems.)

        At equilibrium, the rates each way are equal. Now suppose we suddenly double the atmospheric CO2 concentration. Initially, the rate from the atmosphere to the ocean will double (because the atmospheric concentration has doubled), but (also initially) the rate from the ocean to the atmosphere will remain the same (because, initially, the concentration of CO2 in the ocean hasn’t been changed). Hence, there will be a net transfer of CO2 from the atmosphere to the ocean. This will continue until the concentrations again reach equilibrium, with 1/50 of the excess CO2 remaining in the atmosphere and the rest residing in the oceans.
        Note also that the rate at which equilibrium is re-established is determined by the the same transfer rates that determine the molecular exchange and hence the molecular lifetime in the atmosphere. The claim that these rates are completely different things is false. The faster these transfer rates (the shorter the CO2 molecular lifetime), the faster equilibrium is re-established.

        The 2% remaining the the atmosphere (after an atmospheric doubling has relaxed) might remain for an extended time, as it is only affected by processes that remove CO2 from the entire system.

        *****************************

        But, what about the real world? There is a lot of stuff going on in the carbon cycle other than solubility transfers between the oceans and the atmosphere (although that is a major component). What we would like to do is to engineer a doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere, then measure the system as it returns to equilibrium.

        It turns out we have done just that.

        But first, an aside on isotopes and tracer measurements:
        Carbon atoms come in 3 main isotopes, each differing only in the number of neutrons in the nucleus:

        Carbon-12 –(12)C — with 6 protons and 6 neutrons in the nucleus and circled by 6 electrons. Atomic weight ~12.

        Carbon-13 –(13)C — 6 protons, 7 neutrons, 6 electrons. Atomic wt ~13.

        Carbon-14 –(14)C — 6 protons, 8 neurons, 6 electrons. Atomic wt ~14.

        (12)C and (13)C are stable — (14)C has a half-life of ~5,700 years and decays into nitrogen (7 protons, 7 neutrons) when one of its neutrons turns into a proton after emitting an electron and an anti-neutrino. Compounds (including CO2) made with each of these isotopes of carbon has nearly identical physical and chemical characteristics. (If this weren’t so, then Carbon-14 Dating wouldn’t work.)

        CO2 in the air is composed of approximately 99% (12)C, 1% (13)C, and 0.0000000001% (14)C.

        In linear systems (such as the CO2 exchange between the atmosphere and ocean) the rate of each isotope of carbon (in CO2 molecules) is a function of the concentration of only that isotope, and is independent of the concentration of the other isotopes. This can be seen by a simple example:
        Suppose there were NO (13)C in the atmosphere — then, obviously, there could be NO (13)C going from the atmosphere to the ocean.

        Suppose we doubled the concentrations of both (12)CO2 and (13)CO2 in the atmosphere — then the rate at which the concentration spikes of each isotope returned to equilibrium would be independent of each other, but would be very similar, due to the similarity in chemical and physical properties of the two isotopes. This is the principle of tracer measurements.

        ***********************

        Actual measurements
        It’s not conveniently possible to suddenly double either (12)CO2 or even (13)CO2 atmospheric concentrations, but (14)C is another matter, and in fact has been done by atmospheric a-bomb tests that ceased in 1964. The graph of (14)CO2 concentrations since then shows a relaxation-to-equilibrium time constant of ~ 8 years.

        Let’s be sure we are measuring the desired quantity, which is the RETURN to equilibrium after a CO2 concentration spike:

        1) The tracer must be in equilibrium (in all relevant parts of the system) before the concentration spike. This is the case, as otherwise Radiocarbon Dating wouldn’t work. CHECK

        2) The perturbation must be short, and ended before measuring the return to equilibrium. This is true also, as a-bomb testing only started in 1945, rose to a cresendo just before being completely abandoned in 1964 due to the test-ban treaty. CHECK

        Hence, the half-life of an atmospheric CO2 increase must be very close to the measured half-life of the (14)CO2 spike of 8 years.

        CHECKMATE for the IPCC’s unverified, fanciful carbon cycle models.

        (Other interesting data from these measurements is the 2-3 year mixing lag between hemispheres, and the fact that the current data limits the long-term residual to < 3% of the spike — not too far from the 2% in our simple model.)

        This is, of course, just one of many areas where the climate models fail hugely to match measured reality.

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          MattB

          You are treating 14C as an atom that the carbon cycle can somehow differentiate from all the other C in CO2 in the atmosphere. You are confusing the impact of increasing 14C levels – which just means that a CO2 absorbed by Ocean from atmosphere is more likely than before to be 14C, however any released the other way is no more likely to be 14C than before… hence 14C concs drop in the atmosphere. but relative levels of 14C dropping does NOT imply that the overall CO2 conc is dropping at the same rate. I’m sorry but they are completely different things nomatter how you try to fool the lapdogs by doing clever things like bolding random science laws that you want to misinterpret.

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            BobC

            MattB
            April 30, 2012 at 2:34 pm · Reply
            You are treating 14C as an atom that the carbon cycle can somehow differentiate from all the other C in CO2 in the atmosphere.

            Why am I not surprised that you have gotten it exactly backwards?

            The usefulness of 14C as a tracer is that it CAN’T be differentiated by the processes in the carbon cycle (hence flows through that cycle the same as 12C and 13C) but CAN be identified by Human measurements.

            It is also useful that it is rare enough that we can engineer large changes in its atmospheric concentration.

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            BobC

            Oh, and MattB: The links to explanations of scientific principles are for folks who want to explore further and expand their knowledge.

            The ‘explanation’ of the difference between residence lifetimes and concentration lifetimes by propaganda site SS is basically a bunch of “what if’s” based on carbon cycle models that can’t reproduce the measured data.

            The basic problem is that people like you insist on believing unverified models that confirm your prejudices, rather than empirical data that challenges them.

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            MattB

            here’s a nice little piece on this between Freeman Dyson and Lord Robert May. http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2008/oct/09/how-long-will-they-stay/?pagination=false

            While they disagree it is clear that Dyson supports the shorter (12 year) lifetime of an individual CO2 molecule as well as the longer (approx 100 year). For the shorter timeframe Dyson: “I am talking about residence without replacement.” and “His residence time measures the rate at which the total amount would diminish if we stopped burning fossil fuels. My residence time measures the rate at which the total amount would diminish if we replaced all plants by carbon-eaters which do not reemit the carbon dioxide that they absorb.”

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            MattB

            “Oh, and MattB: The links to explanations of scientific principles are for folks who want to explore further and expand their knowledge.”

            lol mate it’s Henry’s Law. It’s not advanced quantum physics.

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          Howie

          BobC, Excellent observation and explanation and the science is solid. Of course the warmistas will counter with their usual nonsense.

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        Brian H

        No; Henry’s Law says that of every 51 CO2 molecules added to the atmosphere from ANY source, 50 of them (under current temperatures and conditions) end up in the ocean. And stay there until the temperature changes or the partial pressure of the gas above the water changes.

        Your 1 in => 1 out applies only AFTER equilibrium is achieved. Obviously, during the process of adding CO2, equilibrium has not yet happened. Sorta by definition, doncha know?

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          MattB

          I didn’t say 1 in 1 out… I said “nearly”. The question is how long does it take to return to equilibrium which BobC mistakenly thinks is 8 or so years as he doesn’t understand Henry’s Law

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            BobC

            MattB
            April 30, 2012 at 2:36 pm · Reply
            I didn’t say 1 in 1 out… I said “nearly”. The question is how long does it take to return to equilibrium which BobC mistakenly thinks is 8 or so years as he doesn’t understand Henry’s Law

            I call. Tell us what your understanding of Henry’s Law is, MattB. We eagerly await your wisdom.

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            MattB

            Your understanding of Henry’s law is the same as mine until your conclusion “Hence, the half-life of an atmospheric CO2 increase must be very close to the measured half-life of the (14)CO2 spike of 8 years.”

            When in fact the two are comnpletely unrelated.

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            MattB

            But I admit I could be wrong, you could well understand Henry’s law 100%. If this is the case you are simply choosing to wilfully misrepresent it. So sorry for questioning your intelligence, I’ll just question your honesty and integrity instead, and propose that your assumption is that the drones are too stupid to figure out you are lying to them. They are pretty much the two options as I see them.

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            BobC

            I think, MattB, that it is you who are too stupid to explain Henry’s Law.

            I might change my opinion if you demonstrate that you can come up with a reasoned argument instead of your usual blatant assertions.

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            MattB

            Your decision to ignore reasoned argument is not the same as me not providing it.

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            MattB

            On the topic of “blatant assertions”, may I remind you that the following blatant assertion is where you are getting it wrong:

            “Hence, the half-life of an atmospheric CO2 increase must be very close to the measured half-life of the (14)CO2 spike of 8 years.”

            There is no hence.

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 1, 2012 at 2:43 pm
            Hey BoBC the following is a comment cut and paste from Lubos’ blog:
            “Henry’s Law can’t be applied the way you have when the gas reacts with the solvent as CO2 does with water. When CO2 dissolves in water it forms carbonic acid which dissociates into bicarbonate ion, carbonate ion and hydrogen ions. Analysis of the resulting chemical equilibria and buffers gives an expression called the Revelle factor. Typical values for sea water range between 9 and 14, a value of 10 means that a change of 10% in atmospheric pCO2 is needed to change the total CO2 content of sea water by 1% at equilibrium.”

            Any thoughts?

            Henry’s Law is a simple consequence of the atomic nature of matter and statistics:

            1) Any CO2 molecule in water has a chance of escaping the surface into the air. The chance is dependent on it’s mobility, which is a function of temperature and the characteristics of water.
            2) Likewise, any CO2 molecule in air (above water) has a chance of entering the water — again dependent on it’s mobility. Since air is much less dense than water, the molecules move further per unit time and the chance is correspondingly greater.

            The mobility factor is what determines the constant in Henry’s law for a particular media (water or air).

            The important point about the above statements is this:

            The probability that a CO2 molecule in air enters the surface of the water is completely independent of the numbers of CO2 molecules already in the water. The numbers of CO2 molecules going into the water from the air is dependent on the number of CO2 molecules already in the air. (The rate is the number of molecules times the probably that any one molecule will enter in a given time.)

            Likewise, the probability that a CO2 molecule in water will escape the surface into the air is independent of the number of CO2 molecules already in the air. (Think about it physically: What could possibly inform a CO2 molecule racing towards the surface that there are already a lot of CO2 molecules in the air above? Nothing.)

            The fact that the rates out of a media are proportional to the concentration in that media is what drives the move to equilibrium, as shown in our discrete models. (Note that the probabilities — 20%/year and 0.4%/year — remained constant throughout the simulation, but equilibrium was still reached.)

            Now, the hypothetical Revelle Factor proposes (in defiance of atomic theory and common sense) that by chemically destroying CO2 molecules in the water, you increase the rate at which CO2 molecules leave the water. (Remember, by the atomic theory, you can’t affect the rate at which CO2 is going from the air into the water by anything you do to the water — you can only change the probability of a molecule to leave the water.)

            Attempts to measure the Revelle Factor have failed. Now the IPCC postulates that the Revelle Factor will sometime in the near future prevent more CO2 from being stored in the oceans, thus precipitating a catastrophe.

            Ya Sure, Ya Betcha.

            (Can’t find the link right now, but I’ve seen the argument that, if you take the Revelle Factor seriously, then you must conclude that it is impossible to produce carbonated beverages.)

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            MattB

            Bob I don’t see it is unreasonable to consider that the #CO2 molecules available to leave the water is reduced as CO2 is altered to Carbonate… thus reducing the rate CO2 leaves the oceans, thus meaning the oceans can store more. By some factor unrealated to Henry’s Law that chemichal mechanism will become less able to convert CO2, thus meaning that more CO2 stays as CO2 in the water and thus more CO2 leaves water to atmosphere, meaning that at some stage in the future CO2 added to the atmosphere is more likely to stay there than move in to the ocean (nett movement).

            Correct me if I’m wrong but Henry’s constants are experimentally derived not “theoretical”, thus account for the real world where some CO2 in water would be carbonate… thus at some stage in the future the Henry’s constant for CO2 and water would change?

            So it is not that by converting to carbonate you increase the rate CO2 leaves the ocean to the atmosphere, as that is counter intuitive, it is that the conversion of CO2 to Carbonate has its limits.

            Again thinking aloud… that limit would surely limit ocean acidification?

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            MattB

            Bob – while this is true “The probability that a CO2 molecule in air enters the surface of the water is completely independent of the numbers of CO2 molecules already in the water. The numbers of CO2 molecules going into the water from the air is dependent on the number of CO2 molecules already in the air.” it is the net exchange that depends on both concentrations, so the net transfer of CO2 from air to Water (or vice versa eg when you open a can of drink) depends on both.

            Also your comment “the probability that a CO2 molecule in water will escape the surface into the air is independent of the number of CO2 molecules already in the air.” kinda implies that a bottle of coke would bubble just as much when the lid is closed, as how is the CO2 in the coke to know how much CO2 is in the air above?

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 2, 2012 at 12:14 pm
            Bob – while this is true “The probability that a CO2 molecule in air enters the surface of the water is completely independent of the numbers of CO2 molecules already in the water. The numbers of CO2 molecules going into the water from the air is dependent on the number of CO2 molecules already in the air.” it is the net exchange that depends on both concentrations, so the net transfer of CO2 from air to Water (or vice versa eg when you open a can of drink) depends on both.

            Correct. That was represented in the models by transfering a fixed percentage of molecules out of each reservoir at each time step. The number of molecules in the other reservoir didn’t enter into that calculation.

            Also your comment “the probability that a CO2 molecule in water will escape the surface into the air is independent of the number of CO2 molecules already in the air.” kinda implies that a bottle of coke would bubble just as much when the lid is closed, as how is the CO2 in the coke to know how much CO2 is in the air above?

            Close, but no cigar (You’re certainly probing though.)
            The bubbles form because of the release of pressure when you open the can or bottle. Henry’s coefficient IS a function of pressure, so the sudden reduction of pressure causes the solubility to suddenly change (reduce) and the bubbles are the CO2 coming out of solution. The CO2 in the coke only ‘knows’ that the pressure has been reduced — it doesn’t know what is above the surface creating that pressure.

            Since the solubility of CO2 in water goes up steeply with both increasing pressure and decreasing temperature (why you don’t want to open a warm coke), this implies that the oceans below a few hundred feet of depth can store much more CO2 than the surface waters (being colder and under higher pressure). This also implies that there is a gradient of solubility that will cause CO2 to preferentially diffuse downwards (towards the direction where it is more soluble). Since deep ocean water is not saturated with CO2 (it doesn’t foam when brought to the surface (like an opened coke), this also implies that the oceans are a nearly infinite (compared to the atmosphere) sink for CO2 (although perhaps over a long time period).

            I haven’t seen any discussions of this in the literature, for some reason. Maybe one of my assumptions is wrong.

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 2, 2012 at 12:03 pm
            Bob I don’t see it is unreasonable to consider that the #CO2 molecules available to leave the water is reduced as CO2 is altered to Carbonate… thus reducing the rate CO2 leaves the oceans, thus meaning the oceans can store more. By some factor unrealated to Henry’s Law that chemichal mechanism will become less able to convert CO2, thus meaning that more CO2 stays as CO2 in the water and thus more CO2 leaves water to atmosphere, meaning that at some stage in the future CO2 added to the atmosphere is more likely to stay there than move in to the ocean (nett movement).

            Best explanation (guess) I’ve heard so far. Currently, though, it’s not happening, according to empirical measurements. Also, ocean waters are far from saturated. My guess is that this effect won’t be very important until we reach the levels of CO2 seen in the Paleozoic era (10-15,000 ppm).

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            BobC

            I misspoke above — Henry’s coefficient (in the equilibrium statement of the law) is the ratio of the (partial) pressure of a gas at a liquid interface with the concentration of that gas dissolved in the liquid. So, the coefficient doesn’t change with pressure, but the amount of dissolved gas does.

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            MattB

            I must say BobC it appears to me that we both really DO understand Henry’s Law (at least enough for this discussion)! The quibbling is about related issues.

            The “ocean saturation” comment is true, however the mixing is slow, so the effective volume of ocean available is much less than the total volume of the ocean. This is a key factor I believe in the opinion that the timescales of removing added CO2 from the atmosphere “may” be longer than the simple 100 odd years maths would otherwise suggest. Yes I know I’m on dangerous ground round here not saying maths suggests 4-5 years.

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 2, 2012 at 1:32 pm

            The “ocean saturation” comment is true, however the mixing is slow, so the effective volume of ocean available is much less than the total volume of the ocean. This is a key factor I believe in the opinion that the timescales of removing added CO2 from the atmosphere “may” be longer than the simple 100 odd years maths would otherwise suggest. Yes I know I’m on dangerous ground round here not saying maths suggests 4-5 years.

            Being, as I said previously, ‘a suspicious bastard’, I would not be convinced of any particular lifetime or recovery time based on theoretical models. What convinces me that the time for the atmosphere to recover from an influx of CO2 is short are the 36 empirical data studies of the question — particularly the classic Bomb Spike tracer measurement.

            Data always trumps models, in my world view.

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          MattB

          Analogy time. I have 100 ping pong balls in one pot (yes yes for Bob’s benefit I’m releating). and a million in another pot. Pot 1 is the atmosphere. Pot 2 is the Ocean.

          Every year (equilibrium) 20 balls swap places.

          I introduce 5 red balls. Now 21 balls move from Pot 1 to 2, and 20 move back (system responds to equilibrium)>

          THere are clearly two different times of interest.

          i) The time X it takes for 50% of the red balls to be in the ocean.
          ii) The time Y it takes for the atmosphere to only have 100 balls again.

          Do you see where this is going BobC. You are measuring Time X and thinking it is the same as Time Y.

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            CHIP

            I introduce 5 red balls. Now 21 balls move from Pot 1 to 2, and 20 move back (system responds to equilibrium)

            Bob isn’t missing anything. Bob does an excellent job of explaining things although I feel his explanation may be too technical for some here. You seem like an intelligent enough person Matt so I see no reason as to why you shouldn’t be able to grasp Henry’s law. As noted above, Henry’s law ordains a fixed ‘partitioning ratio’ of about 1:50 between the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere and the amount dissolved in the oceans at equilibrium and at current ocean temperature. This implies that only about 2% of human CO2 emissions can stay in the atmosphere to be added to the CO2 greenhouse while the other 98% must be absorbed into the oceans. The arithmetic is straightforward and Henry’s law has been around since 1803 and has been countlessly verified by hundreds of scientists since. And equilibration between CO2 in the atmosphere and dissolved CO2 is very quick also. Take a carbonated drink as an example. Leave the top off a carbonated drink and within hours it goes completely flat and reaches a new equilibrium with the partial pressure of CO2 within the room. According to Bert Bolin the equilibrium between atmospheric CO2 and dissolved CO2 is about ¾’s of a year. The IPCC’s claim to know, by scientific observation, that the world is warming due to human CO2-emissions, is therefore empty and false and in conflict with real science.

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            MattB

            my god man I have a frigging physics degree. I’m no physics genius but I understand sodding Henry’s law!

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            Mark D.

            A degree in Frigging Physics? Must be a new specialty. Perhaps in climate sciences?

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            BobC

            MattB
            April 30, 2012 at 3:35 pm · Reply
            Analogy time. I have 100 ping pong balls in one pot (yes yes for Bob’s benefit I’m releating). and a million in another pot. Pot 1 is the atmosphere. Pot 2 is the Ocean.

            Every year (equilibrium) 20 balls swap places.

            I introduce 5 red balls. Now 21 balls move from Pot 1 to 2, and 20 move back (system responds to equilibrium)>

            THere are clearly two different times of interest.

            i) The time X it takes for 50% of the red balls to be in the ocean.
            ii) The time Y it takes for the atmosphere to only have 100 balls again.

            Do you see where this is going BobC.

            Yes, I do — but it’s obvious that you don’t, so let’s just explicitly write out a few years worth of changes.

            But first:
            1) To make the analogy match the atmosphere/ocean ratio of 1/50, I’ll use 5000 balls in the ocean, instead of 1 million.
            2) To make it more smooth, I’ll allow hundredth’s (1/100) of a ball to be transfered — to get back to an integer approximation, just replace each ball with a hundred ones.

            At Equilibrium:
            100 (white) balls in the atmosphere, 20% of which (20) are transfered to the ocean each year.
            5000 (white) balls in the ocean, 0.4% of which (20) are transfered to the atmosphere each year.
            (The rates, 20% and 0.4%, are set by Henry’s Law and remain constant in this model — Henry’s coefficient is not a function of concentrations.)

            After the 20 (red) ball impulse — well mixed into the atmosphere:

            At year 0:
            Atmosphere has 120 balls (100 white, 20 red)
            Ocean has 5000 balls (white)

            Transfer from atmosphere to ocean: 120*.2 = 24 balls. On average, 100*.2 = 20 will be white, 20*.2 = 4 will be red.

            Transfer from ocean to atmosphere: 5000*.004 = 20 balls. All are white, since there are no red balls in the ocean at the start.

            So, at Year 1:
            Atmosphere has 120-24+20 = 116 balls (100 white, 16 red).
            Ocean has 5000+24-20 = 5004 balls (5000 white, 4 red).

            Transfer from atmosphere to ocean: 116*.2 = 23.2 balls. On average, 100*.2 = 20 will be white, 16*.2 = 3.2 will be red.

            Transfer from ocean to atmosphere: 5004*.004 = 20.02 balls. On averate 5000*.004 = 20 will be white, 4*.004 = .02 will be red (we are rounding to the nearest 1/100th).

            So, at Year 2:
            Atmosphere has 116-23.2+20.02 = 112.82 balls (100 white, 12.82 red).
            Ocean has 5004+23.2-20.02 = 5007.18 balls (5000 white, 7.18 red).

            Transfer from atmosphere to ocean: 112.82*.2 = 22.56 balls. On average, 100*.2 = 20 will be white, 12.82*.2 = 2.56 will be red.

            Transfer from ocean to atmosphere: 5007.18*.004 = 20.03 balls. On averate 5000*.004 = 20 will be white, 7.18*.004 = .03 will be red.

            So, at year 3:
            Atmosphere has 112.82-22.56+20.03 = 110.29 balls (100 white, 10.29 red).
            Ocean has 5007.18+22.56-20.03 = 5009.71 balls (5000 white, 9.71 red).

            Are you starting to see a pattern here MattB? The number of white balls remains constant while the red balls are progressively shifted into the ocean. The shift rate starts out at the molecular exchange rate, but is reduced by the red balls coming back from the ocean as time progresses.

            Here is the first 10 years of the model (I carried about 10 decimals in the calculations and just rounded the output, so there is a slight difference with the above numbers):

            year tot-atmos tot-ocean red-atmos red-ocean
            0.00 120.00 5000.00 20.00 0.00
            1.00 116.00 5004.00 16.00 4.00
            2.00 112.82 5007.18 12.82 7.18
            3.00 110.28 5009.72 10.28 9.72
            4.00 108.26 5011.74 8.26 11.74
            5.00 106.66 5013.34 6.66 13.34
            6.00 105.38 5014.62 5.38 14.62
            7.00 104.36 5015.64 4.36 15.64
            8.00 103.55 5016.45 3.55 16.45
            9.00 102.91 5017.09 2.91 17.09
            10.00 102.39 5017.61 2.39 17.61

            Note that the half life of both the number of red balls in the atmosphere, and the total concentration impulse in the atmosphere is ~3 years. The total concentration results would be the same if we assumed that we introduced 20 white balls instead of red ones — the fact that we can get the same result by just looking at the red balls illustrates the mechanism of tracer measurements.

            Here is the model output after 30 years:

            30.00 100.41 5019.59 0.41 19.59
            31.00 100.41 5019.59 0.41 19.59
            32.00 100.41 5019.59 0.41 19.59
            33.00 100.40 5019.60 0.40 19.60
            34.00 100.40 5019.60 0.40 19.60
            35.00 100.40 5019.60 0.40 19.60

            Note that the residual concentration in the atmosphere is stabilizing at about 1/50 of the initial impulse, as predicted by Henry’s Law.

            So your model, MattB, confirms what I said in post #48.1.3 — you just weren’t able to see it.

            *******************************
            FYI: Here is the Matlab code that produced the above output:

            %Discrete Henry’s Law
            %
            DisplayRates = 0;

            Atmos = 100;
            Ocean = 5000;
            RateA = 20/Atmos;
            RateO = 20/Ocean;
            %
            RedAtmos = 20;
            RedOcean = 0;
            %
            %Discrete loop
            Atmos = Atmos + RedAtmos;
            Ocean = Ocean + RedOcean;
            %
            if DisplayRates == 0
            disp([‘ year tot-atmos tot-ocean red-atmos red-ocean’]);
            str = sprintf(‘%11.2f’,[0 Atmos Ocean RedAtmos RedOcean] );
            disp(str);
            else
            disp(‘ year DeltaAtmos DeltaOcean DeltaRedA DeltaRedO’)
            end
            %
            for ii = 1:100
            DeltaAtmos = RateO*Ocean – RateA*Atmos;
            DeltaOcean = RateA*Atmos – RateO*Ocean;
            %
            DeltaRedAtmos = RateO*RedOcean – RateA*RedAtmos;
            DeltaRedOcean = RateA*RedAtmos – RateO*RedOcean;
            %
            Atmos = Atmos + DeltaAtmos;
            Ocean = Ocean + DeltaOcean;
            %
            RedAtmos = RedAtmos + DeltaRedAtmos;
            RedOcean = RedOcean + DeltaRedOcean;
            %
            if DisplayRates == 0
            str = sprintf(‘%11.2f’,[ii Atmos Ocean RedAtmos RedOcean]);
            else
            str = sprintf(‘%11.2f’,[ii DeltaAtmos DeltaOcean DeltaRedAtmos DeltaRedOcean] );
            end
            disp(str)
            %
            end

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            BobC

            Sorry MattB, I misread your comment:

            MattB
            April 30, 2012 at 3:35 pm ·THere are clearly two different times of interest.

            i) The time X it takes for 50% of the red balls to be in the ocean.
            ii) The time Y it takes for the atmosphere to only have 100 balls again.

            Do you see where this is going BobC. You are measuring Time X and thinking it is the same as Time Y.

            Your confusion is worse than I assumed — My model (and yours, as I explained at 48.1.4.2.4) implies that the time, X, it takes for 50% of the red balls to be in the ocean is the same as the time it takes for 50% of the total increase to be transfered from the atmosphere to the ocean. This is the basic principle of tracer measurements, and both our models support it.

            The time, Y, that “it takes for the atmosphere to only have 100 balls again” is infinity in both our models — they are relaxing exponentially back to the state where the excess CO2 is divided between the atmosphere and the ocean according to their respective capacities. In the real world, this is 2% left in the atmosphere, and 98% in the ocean. The Bomb Spike Data supports this, as well (especially the recent measurements).

            Neither model has any mechanism to remove CO2 from both the atmosphere and the ocean, so neither can ever even approach the initial conditions before the impulse.

            Of course, if anthropogenic emissions are 98% removed from the atmosphere in 10-20 years, then we might be able to double the atmospheric concentration of CO2 in 3000 – 4000 years. According to the Peak Oil advocates, we will run out of carbon-based fuels LONG before then.

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            BobC

            BTY MattB, I gave you a ‘thumbs-up’ on your analogy. Even though you confused the half-life time with the time for an exponential curve to reach its asymtote (infinity), it represents a significant step up in your argumentation level.

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            MattB

            That’s quite nice work I must admit BobC. Look my basic model does not account for a changing rate of transfer over time, and yes it would be infinity to actually return to the original concs as you state it is not possible to remove matter in the model (in reality other process could remove the CO2 but they are not in the model)

            If you have another look at my model however you can see that the fact I added 5, and had the transfer rate as 20% of the total 100 balls then tragically the numbers I used do in fact give about 5 years for the red balls to be gone too but that is really as in my haste I picked a dud ratio of balls and mythical transfer rate that coincidently give the same answer…

            Lets say I only added 1 ball. Well it would take 1 year for there to again be only 100 balls in the atmosphere, but 3-5 years (probably) to remove the red ball (14C) as there is only 20% chance of that ball being removed in any given year. So in that example it is actually quicker to remove all the extra CO2 but the tracer would lag.

            If I’d added 100 balls then it would take 100 years for there to be 100 balls in the atmosphere pot again, but with 20 balls a year turnover then it would only take about 10 years for nearly all the red balls to be gone (probably). So you can see here the tracer would say “no red balls left” much sooner than you could say “atmospheric/ocean C02 levels are in equilibrium).

            So I’ve demonstrated that the two rates are different (or not necessarily the same) – you just picked up that the numbers I flicked out there in my hypothetical indeed give the same answer – an unfortunate coincidence on my part! But at least they’ve served a useful purpose to progress the discussion.

            I must emphasise here that this residence time issue says nothing about AGW in terms of feedbacks, hotspots or a range of other issues of debate at this site, and that even if one day I consider the evidence and conclude that indeed AGW is not a problem we should be concerning ourselves with, I’d still be 100% certain you are incorrect about the residence time of additional CO2 in the atmosphere.

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            MattB

            MarkD my speciality is Flippant Physics actually;)

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            MattB

            Hey BoBC the following is a comment cut and paste from Lubos’ blog:
            “Henry’s Law can’t be applied the way you have when the gas reacts with the solvent as CO2 does with water. When CO2 dissolves in water it forms carbonic acid which dissociates into bicarbonate ion, carbonate ion and hydrogen ions. Analysis of the resulting chemical equilibria and buffers gives an expression called the Revelle factor. Typical values for sea water range between 9 and 14, a value of 10 means that a change of 10% in atmospheric pCO2 is needed to change the total CO2 content of sea water by 1% at equilibrium.”

            Any thoughts?

            (Please post the link) CTS

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            MattB

            And I think the point is that Motl is saying that Archer is wrong because the ocean never gets full of CO2 as Henry’s law is in charge. But the issue is that is possibly does get full of CO2 as carbonate? Or at least that the fact that CO2 is held in the ocean as both carbonate and as CO2 means that you can’t use Henry’s law when determining the split between atmosphere and ocean. It is a shame Motl didn;t reply as he ovten does… I note this piece is 5 years old.

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 1, 2012 at 1:51 pm

            Lets say I only added 1 ball. Well it would take 1 year for there to again be only 100 balls in the atmosphere, but 3-5 years (probably) to remove the red ball (14C) as there is only 20% chance of that ball being removed in any given year. So in that example it is actually quicker to remove all the extra CO2 but the tracer would lag.

            If I’d added 100 balls then it would take 100 years for there to be 100 balls in the atmosphere pot again, but with 20 balls a year turnover then it would only take about 10 years for nearly all the red balls to be gone (probably). So you can see here the tracer would say “no red balls left” much sooner than you could say “atmospheric/ocean C02 levels are in equilibrium).

            Agreed — but you are only describing the characteristics of a too-discrete model. Indeed, if you only added one ball, then there would be a 20% chance each year that that ball would be removed from the atmosphere, leaving none left. That model would only apply to an atmosphere in which only one excess CO2 molecule was introduced.

            The reason I used “fractional balls” in my model is to hold off the “statistical noise” caused by too few balls, so that the model would better approximate the atmosphere-ocean, where the number of 14CO2 molecules is so large, ~3×10^36, that the probablility of all of them being removed (by a statistical fluke) is infintesimal — it wouldn’t happen in the lifetime of the Universe.

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            BobC

            Hit the wrong ‘Reply’ button.

            My response to MattB’s comment #48.1.4.2.9 is at 48.1.4.1.7

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            MattB

            bob just noticed your model misses the annual CO2 cycle of the vegetation.

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 2, 2012 at 2:48 pm
            bob just noticed your model misses the annual CO2 cycle of the vegetation.

            Well;

            1) It was actually your model — I just changed a few parameters.

            2) You want a lot for 90 minutes work 😉

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            MattB

            indeed. the nasa carbon cycle I linked to earlier however has the cycle to plants as 50% of the cycle to oceans… which is a significant number. You could tweak your model go on… it is not an insignificant number of red balls. I have enjoyed this discussion though Bob.

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            Gee Aye

            Yes, interesting discussion made more entertaining for us juveniles by your choice of the colour red,

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        Matt Bennett

        It’s useless, MattB, it really is. They see NO difference between opinion/poorly formulated conjecture and a lifetime of carefully considered and calibrated and peer-reviewed work. I am in contact with the actual ice core specialists who extract, store and analyze Australia’s extraordinary longterm Antarctic ice core records. I can assure you, they have a VASTLY greater understanding on the limitations of their work than CHIP will ever be able to make up and they are now approaching 30-35 different useful, measurable variables in each core sample. (including atomic isotopes of ice, gas concentration in bubbles, trace minerals, dust etc)

        As I said above CHIP, don’t give me a WUWT link, give me a paper in a top peer-reviewed journal, which of course you can’t. If there ever is one, it’ll probably come from these experts I’m talking about as they refine and improve their methods and update the world’s other glaciologists.

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          Sonny

          Look at this for the alarmists in action. Engaging us in meaningless arguments about residency times for CO2 in the atmosphere, when the real issue is that the earth is no longer warming, and the H20 feedback assumption is wrong.
          Stop sweating the small stuff! Look at how skeptical science has linked to fraudulent papers that have to “adjust” the data to show warming.

          http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-cooling-intermediate.htm

          Essentially they are saying “no the earth is not cooling because If we remove Enso, volcanic and solar fluctuations we get a nice rising trend! These guys are so brazen and godly that they think they can just re-write history and perform magic tricks DESPITE REALITY.

          They use “multiple linear regression to filter out the “exogeneous effects” of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), and solar and volcanic activity to find that the undelying global surface and lower atmosphere warming trends have remained very steady in recent years.

          Not only are they manipulating reality to further their own agenda, they cannot even spell “exogenous”!

          Just take one minute to actually think about this! The world has not been warming for over a decade!! Skeptics claim that natural factors dominate climate shifts over and above any anthropogenic factors.

          And here we have the “climate scientists” claiming that it is still warming, and it’s still CO2’s fault NOT based on the pure data but rather based on their fraudulent craftily ADJUSTEDMENTS of the real data to exclude the natural factors which are overpowering
          CO2?!

          Don’t you dare even suggest that this is remotely scientific or remotely ethical. This is so obviously a SCAM.

          This is ridiculous!

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            Sonny

            And why do they have cute penguins in their website header? Is that so we know that they are the good guy on side with all the cute cuddly animals that will be at risk from climate change?
            Trying to indoctrinate our children with cute animals and impressive sounding science “multiple linear regressions” filtering out the “exogeneous factors”?

            Translation?

            Statistical chicanery to hide the decline – look at the cute penguin.

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          Peter Lang

          Matt Bennett,

          If you know a bit about ice core measurements, can you point me to a link that summarises (in a way suitable for ‘intelligent, interested, non specialists’) the following information:

          1. the time intervals for temperature measurements for ice cores over the past 15,000 years (I understand they have precision as close as three readings per year for Greenland ice cores)?

          2. What is the most rapid rate of warming over periods of 1, 2, 5, 10 and 20 years? (I understand the rates of warming have been experienced in the past that are even higher than has been experienced at any time over the past 100 years. Is that correct?

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            BobC

            Peter Lang

            April 30, 2012 at 11:48 pm · Reply
            Matt Bennett,

            2. What is the most rapid rate of warming over periods of 1, 2, 5, 10 and 20 years? (I understand the rates of warming have been experienced in the past that are even higher than has been experienced at any time over the past 100 years. Is that correct?

            Matt is unlikely to answer, but here is an interesting graph of temperature changes on the Greenland icecap over the last 5000 years from the GISP2 icecore.

            Note that the current change is unremarkable, even when you extend the graph upward for another 0.5 degree to match the current thermometer record.Current “climate change” seems even more insignificant when you look at the entire 50,000 year record.

            When I post the first graph as evidence that previous warm periods (the Medieval Warm Period, the Roman Warm Period, the Holocene Optimum, etc.) were in fact warmer than today, the response is often, “but that’s not global, it’s just one geographic spot”.

            The answer is that the GISP2 ice core is undeniable evidence that these periods were warmer than today on the Greenland icecap. This can be repeated with hundreds of temperature proxies from all over the world — for example, this record of temperatures in the Sargasso Sea.

            And, of course, this data also illustrates that many temperature changes in the past have been faster, and of greater range (both up and down) than the completely unremarkable 0.5 – 1 degree change over the last 100 years.

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            Peter Lang

            Hi Bob C, thank you for this. I was actually looking for the rates of temperature change over the periods I mentioned rather than the actual temperatures. The reason I ask for the rates, is because we often have people saying “oh, it’s not the actual temperature that is the issue, its is the rate of warming. The rate of warming has been unprecedented”. I understand that is not correct. I understand that the rate of warming over years and decades in the past has been as faster, perhaps much faster, than has occurred over any decade or 3 year period over the past century. As you hint, life is concerned with rate of change where it lives, not on the average rate of change over the whole planet. If life has enjoyed rapid warming in local areas in the past, I don’t see the problem with the projected rate of warming even if it does turn out to be what the climatologists project.

            I was hoping any self proclaimed specialist of ice cores could point me to a link on this.

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            BobC

            Hi Peter,

            You can download the numerical data at the GISP2 icecore site. (I just went there and HERE is the data in text format.) You should be able to get the rates by taking the difference of each data point with the next point — you can do that in Excel (although I would probably use Matlab). Just copy the text file to your computer, remove everything but the data, and import it into your analysis program of choice.

            When differencing the temperatures, you want to be careful that the time lag between data points doesn’t change. It probably does (data is usually more spread out as you go back in time, due to ice compression), so you should divide the difference in temperatures by the time difference. For example, if the temperature record is T1,T2,T3,… and the time of each reading (in thousands of years before present in this dataset) is D1,D2,D3,…, you would get the rate in degrees / thousand years by taking (T2-T1)/(D2-D1), (T3-T2)/(D3-D2), etc.

            A short discussion of this ice core data can be found on WUWT HERE.

            Other proxy data can be found by looking around NOAA’s website and the papers on paleotemperatures at various sites. A good one is the C3 Headlines Charts Pages. With each chart they have a “Source Here” button that takes you to the data.

            The rate of warming has been unprecedented”. I understand that is not correct.

            Indeed you will find that nothing about the current warming is unprecedented — not the rate, the extent, or the peak.

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            BobC

            Peter;

            Here is an interesting page on the Environmental Protection Agency’s website. While they naturally tend to spin toward the AGW theory (they feature a mild version of Mann’s ‘Hockey Stick’ graph, for example) they also have links to a number of papers on past temperatures.

            They reference some studies that concluded that past global temperatures had changed as rapidly as 14 to 28 degrees F (8 to 15 deg C) in as little as “over several decades during and after the most recent ice age”(!) — implying that such rates have happened during the interglacial we are currently in.
            What a precedent — Now, THAT’S climate change!

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            MattB

            Peter – I used to have discussions about this with a Biologist/Ecologist I worked with and her PhD had been interested in fragmentation etc and the concerns she had were that where in the past species were free to migrate etc as needs be (if animals) or as nature dictated (seeds etc) there were now significant barriers in the way as nature is often confined to “parks” that had no linkages. Also agriculture itself may have nowhere to migrate to… Ok in australia we have a lot of room but smaller states can;t exactly just move north for example… ok they can but not without a war or something).

            You also need to not just consider whether the planet has been through simnilar rates of change in the past and survived (which it seems to have done just fine) but also compare the start and end points and see what survived and what didn’t (the record suggests that periods of significant change coincide with periods of mass extinction for example).

            My position is that it is wise to not voluntarily send the planet through significant change if we can avoid it. At best it will cost a lot of $$$ to adapt.

            So anyway, not that I have ANY references, my understanding is that a rapid change would indeed be bad, but of course that has nothing to do with whether there will be a rapid change.

            I tend to read “unprecedented” to mean “unprecedented in the period of history that matter to humans and most other species alive on the planet at present”.

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            Peter Lang

            Bob C, Thank you again. I’ll down load the data and see what I can determine.

            I read a year ago about the high rates of warming that had been found in some sections of the Greenland ice cores. Then I asked some questions of ‘WebHubTelescope’ (WHT) an alarmist blogger on Judith Curry’s web site. He provided the following link to his work (refer to Figure 23): http://theoilconundrum.blogspot.com.au/2011/11/multiscale-variance-analysis-and.html

            He was reluctant to answer my question specifically. I’ll post below the content of one of my comments (I never got a clear answer)

            I understand very little of the detail. But, if I look at your Figure 19 here:
            http://theoilconundrum.blogspot.com/2011/11/multiscale-variance-analysis-and.html
            I like the look of past 10,000 years much better than the preceding 100,000 years. But I don’t like the downward trend in the past 10,000 years. I am much more worried about cooling than warming. If we are helping to reduce the probability of cooling and perhaps get a bit more warming, then I can’t see the problem. After all, the planet is in a Coldhouse phase, and well below the average temperature of the past 600 million years (there has been no polar ice caps for 75% of that time). When the planet is warmer life thrives, when colder life struggles. So why are we so concerned about a little warming?

            BTW, I think I understand the point you make with the Figure 22c and 23c. My interpretation of Figure 23c (two points at bottom right of chart) is that a warming rate in warm times of 0.2 K/year and 0.225 K/year is equally likely; the probability is a bit above 0.001 (or about once in every 500 to 1000 years). Correct me if I am wrong,

            But why do these points have a higher probability in Figure 23c than in 23a? (I presume they are the same points? Or am I misunderstanding the chart?)

            In other words, in the past, warming has been at the rate of around 2 C per decade. So why are we so conceerned about a projected warming of 2C, 3C or 4C over a period of 100 years?

            Here is another of my comments (this time to ‘Jim in SC’):

            Thank you for the interesting paper. http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/rrusso/gly6932/Steffensen_etal_Science08.pdf
            It did answer my question, (and so has WHT’s comment, which I will reply to separately below).

            This is the bit I was after:

            “The δ18O warming transition at 14.7 ka b2k is the most rapid and occurs within a remarkable 3 years while the warming transition at 11.7 ka b2k lasts 60 years; both correspond to warming of more than 10K (6, 19).”

            The rate is about 3 K/year for the first warming (in cold times) and 0.17 K/year in the second warming (in warmer times).

            I interpret the trend to suggest that the change is more likely to be slower next time (since we are even warmer than when the second rapid warming occurred).

            It seems to me that the Greenland ice cores reveal some very rapid rates of warming in the past – far faster than anything we’ve experienced in the past centrury or so.

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            Peter Lang

            MattB, @ May 1, 2012 at 12:57 pm

            Your comment seems to be more hand waving and scaremongering. It’s not science. It’s ‘anti-science’.

            Most of your comment refers to habitat destruction, not the effects of CO2 or warming. Cooling is the real risk, not warming. The planet is in a cooling phase, so anything we do to reduce the risk of cooling is good by me. I don’t see an issue with warming.

            The problem with the scaremongering is rapidly being exposed. The message in these two excellent articles should be taken seriously:

            “The corruption of the Royal Society in the Climate Emergency”
            http://enthusiasmscepticismscience.wordpress.com/2012/03/15/the-corruption-of-the-royal-society-in-the-climate-emergency/

            and
            “Madrid 1995: Was this the tipping point in the Corruption of Climate Science”
            http://enthusiasmscepticismscience.wordpress.com/2012/04/21/madrid-1995-was-this-the-tipping-point-in-the-corruption-of-climate-science/#more-616

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            Peter Lang

            BobC,

            Thank you for the link to the US EPA page. http://epa.gov/climatechange/science/pastcc.html . Regarding this bit:

            Rates of Change
            Studies of the Earth’s previous climate suggest periods of stability as well as periods of rapid change. Recent climate research suggests:

            • Interglacial climates (such as the present) tend to be more stable than cooler, glacial climates. For example, the climate during the current and previous interglacials (known as the Holocene and Eemian interglacials) has been more stable than the most recent glacial period (known as the Last Glacial Maximum). This glacial period was characterized by a long string of widespread, large and abrupt climate changes (NRC, 2002).
            • Abrupt or rapid climate changes tend to frequently accompany transitions between glacial and interglacial periods (and vice versa). For example, a significant part of the Northern Hemisphere (particularly around Greenland) may have experienced warming rates of 14-28ºF over several decades during and after the most recent ice age (IPCC, 2007).

            While abrupt climate changes have occurred throughout the Earth’s history, human civilization arose during a period of relative climate stability.

            My take from this:

            1. Warming rates of 14-28F over several decades have occurred in the past. [and life loved it. Greenland greened :)]. These rates are much faster than anything we’ve experienced.

            2. Cold is bad (suffer, suffer :(). Warm is good. Warmer is better. So why are we so concerned about a bit more warming? The Precautionary Principle says we should get all the warming we can to try to keep us out of the next cooling (trending towards the next ice age) for as long as we can.

            3. We are dreaming if we think we can control any of this – especially with an Australian only CO2 tax and ETS.

            4. The last sentence in the quote above is misleading (Alarmist spin). The message should be – “warmer is better. Live thrives when warmer, struggles when colder.”

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            Peter Lang

            BobC

            Thank you for the link to the GISP2 ice core data. This is old Alley data, first published in about 2000 and updated in 2004. This data has readings at about 10 to 100 years apart. However, I understand there is more recent ice core data from Greenland where they have readings as close as three per year. I’d like to know what is the maximum rate of warming over 1, 3, 5, 10, 20 years from that data. Have you seen an authoritative source where that is reported?

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            MattB

            science or anti science… handwaving… mostly describes your last comment to me sorry Peter. I was simply relaying some information from a former work colleague whose speciality is species fragmentation.

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          CHIP

          “As I said above CHIP, don’t give me a WUWT link, give me a paper in a top peer-reviewed journal”.

          I sourced the graph to WUWT so I don’t take credit for it. As mentioned above, the graph in question comes from Beck 2007 as I state on my blog. This digressive preoccupation with WUWT is getting quite tedious, you know. If you want to check Beck’s paper for yourself you can do so by simply typing “Beck 2007” into Google. I must say, I find it amusing how you demand that the paper be in a ‘top peer-reviewed journal’. Didn’t you know that the IPCC’s AR4-2007 report which is touted as the ‘Gold Standard’ of science and peer-review is a mix of articles from Greenpeace, NGO-pronouncements, and magazine articles, and even misrepresents scientists by deleting their contributions and changing their context. Sorry, but what you CAGW-advocates are doing is not real science.

          “They see NO difference between opinion/poorly formulated conjectures”.

          What conjectures have I made? I have even used Henry’s law to show mathematically how the ice-core probably underestimates true values. Do you think Henry’s law is conjectural? Do you think Stomata-data is poorly formulated conjecture? Are 90,000 chemical measurements of atmospheric CO2 conjectural? Are direct measurements of the surface-snow showing the snow underestimating CO2 in the air conjectural? Pray tell me, if you can, what exactly is conjectural about anything I have said? If you won’t engage with my arguments then this discussion cannot move forward.

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            MattB

            “This digressive preoccupation with WUWT is getting quite tedious, you know.”

            But it is ok to dismiss skeptical science and real climate without fail?

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 1, 2012 at 12:59 pm
            “This digressive preoccupation with WUWT is getting quite tedious, you know.”

            But it is ok to dismiss skeptical science and real climate without fail?

            There’s this thing about getting a reputation as a liar … people stop believing you.

            Anthony has been careful to keep his site within the norms of honest discourse — something you can’t say for John Cook and the crew at Real Climate.

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          BobC

          Really, Matt Bennett — the ONLY argument you have is “Argument from Authority”, which is a logical fallacy. It’s getting tiresome.

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    As a beancounter, who likes to reconcile figures might I ask a question?

    The sea level data from ENVISAT presented in Science 1 at 9 min shows the sea level rise of 0.33mm per annum. The University of Colorado has a nice graph showing a rise of 3.1mm per annum. Further, the Envisat site says

    ..two decades worth of radar altimetry data tracks a slight but steady increase in sea level of 3 mm per year.

    NB, note the emphasis on steady rise. Whether 3 or 30cm per century, there is nothing alarming in the figures.

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      Sonny

      It’s not alarming because your brain is functioning.

      You must remember that the public’s most stirring vision of sea level rise due to global warming was from Al Bore’s Inconvenient Truth in which predicted sea level rise could be many meters and wipe out the coastal areas of American Cities.

      And the brainwashing has continued since then. Thankfully the public is starting to twig which is why on ABC’s poll more than half of the respondents are “dismissive” of global warming.

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    AbysmalSpectator

    A great trio of videos that get right to the heart of the skeptic case in a way that just about anyone can understand. Well done!

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    Thank you David and Jo for putting together this excellent short video series. I have been religiously (pardon the pun for you greenies) following the climate debate since the late 90s. Like everybody who is half intelligent and who approaches it with an open mind, I quickly came to the conclusion that global warming is simply a giant fraud.

    These YouTube clips should be shown to all high school students studying climate change. As a teacher myself I will be doing my bit to make sure they get out there.

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      Sonny

      Great to see that not all teachers are helping the government brainwash our children. Thankyou!

      Like everybody who is half intelligent and who approaches it with an open mind, I quickly came to the conclusion that global warming is simply a giant fraud.

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      MattB

      “Like everybody who is half intelligent and who approaches it with an open mind, I quickly came to the conclusion that global warming is simply a giant fraud.”

      Hopefully you teach music or something not related to science.

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        crakar24

        My son was forced to endure Saint Al of the Gore’s infotainment program so i gave him the facts MattB. After the teacher had finished regurgitating his government produced lines my son stood and said “but is it true that etc, etc ,etc” the teacher responded by saying “look i am just told to tell you this stuff whether you believe it or not is up to you”.

        And that MattB is the tragic depth of dispair our education system has been driven to by you and your cronies, oh and remember my son attends a private school so one can only imagine how bad it is on the other side of the tracks.

        You ought to be ashamed of what you have done.

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        Kevin Moore

        MattB,

        Music not related to science – I don’t think so.

        http://www.svpvril.com/musicuni.html

        Musical intervals are the distances between pitches (relative frequencies). An interval is the amount of change (Delta) between the pitches. The frequencies can be set up as algebraic variables set to a given difference in quantity just like symbolic notes on a staff. See chart #3. It would then be easy to determine the resultant secondary frequencies and modes from this fundamental number by using the decimal values given above or simply marking another note symbol a musical third, fifth, etc. accurately representing a harmonic naturally derived. In other words: when given a vibrating plate of these dimensions and characteristics it would be a simply matter to predict its vibrational behavior using these musical intervals and understandings. An in-depth, left-brain, time-consuming and expensive analysis would not be required.

        Thus we can see our theory as stated earlier is accurate in its concept, execution and in the information it yields. Proving then, it really is a Musical Universe! which is both created and evolved from its vibratory root of One demonstrating there is no conflict between concepts of a created universe and theories supporting material evolution. Both these concepts work hand in hand to manifest, choreograph and present the spectacle of beauty, structure, dynamics, utility and love seen all around us. Genesis records God as having said Light into Being but perhaps it would be more accurate to say God sang Light into Being as the prelude to our Cosmic dance?

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          MattB

          lol – crackpots. One thing is certain – indeed all animals are alive because of a root – possibly vibratory.

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        BobC

        Yeah, we wouldn’t want someone who is intelligent and has an open mind teaching science!

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        BobC

        Didn’t realize my comment would be so far down. This makes more sense:

        MattB
        May 1, 2012 at 3:20 pm · Reply
        “Like everybody who is half intelligent and who approaches it with an open mind, I quickly came to the conclusion that global warming is simply a giant fraud.”

        Hopefully you teach music or something not related to science.

        Yeah, we wouldn’t want someone who is intelligent and has an open mind teaching science!

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          MattB

          “quickly came to the conclusion that global warming is simply a giant fraud” doesn’t sound like an open mind to me. And doesn’t sound like science.

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 2, 2012 at 11:23 am · Reply
            “quickly came to the conclusion that global warming is simply a giant fraud” doesn’t sound like an open mind to me. And doesn’t sound like science

            Depends on the quality of the evidence each way, and how much attention one pays to it. It took Jo 17 years to pay attention. I’m a suspicious bastard (screwed too many times by taking stuff in the ‘peer-reviewed’ literature at face value), so I started out skeptical.

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    gbees

    Obama is regulating CO2 through the EPA …. he made CO2 a pollutant to be regulated …. that’s his way around it …..

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    Thank you had change my mind and prospective regarding the global warming wrong forecast.
    I like our leader of the world to watch your presentation.
    Thank you to care for others.
    God bless you.Ciao

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    CHIP

    my god man I have a frigging physics degree.

    You have a physics degree? I’m gobsmacked.

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      MattB

      And an engineering one – shocking isn’t it.

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        Kinkykeith

        Not to be disparaging, but what is an Environmental Engineer.

        Doesn’t seem to include any modelling which is the backbone of the CAGW Scam.

        Is an “Environmental Engineer” a “Real” engineer?

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          MattB

          It was basically a civil engineering degree splintered off to really focus on fluid dynamics, at my uni anyway. There was a lot of modelling actually, but it was modelling of estuaries, lakes etc… stratification, eutrophication, effected of engineering interventions, artificial surf reefs, marinas, groynes. Plus wastewater treatment etc. That was the main focus anyway. Modelling that could be reconciled in relatively short time scales with reality.

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            Kinkykeith

            OK

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            BobC

            MattB
            May 2, 2012 at 11:21 am · Reply

            Modelling that could be reconciled in relatively short time scales with reality.

            That’s the correct use of models — tie them to reality as often as possible. Models always leave out most of reality, and the only way to determine that you have included the important parts is validation.

            ( “Assume a spherical cow” — start of mythic undergraduate physics problem.)

            GCMs started out as a way of modeling the weather. When the weather stubbornly refused to be predicted beyond 7 – 10 days, they went looking for other sources of funding. Predicting stuff 50 – 100 years ahead seemed safe (if unlikely to be correct), but people kept expecting near term validation. People are like that.

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      MattB

      To be honest I was pretty crap at physics once we went in to the quantum stuff – the maths was beyond me. I’m not claiming to be some physics guru.

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        BobC

        The math in quantum theory isn’t any worse than fluid dynamics. The problems many people have with it are:

        1) The physicists who developed quantum theory had little experience with useful stuff like fluid dynamics, so they invented their own notation. You have to essentially learn a new language to discover that the math is the same.

        2) The concepts in quantum theory are mind-bogglingly bizzare. People are still arguing about what it really means. It is easy to get sidetracked into metaphysics and lose sight of the fact that the math is just standard waves and matrices.

        The only really weird math I’ve run into in Quantum Mechanics is Feynman’s Path Integral formulation. It results in bizzarely complex integrals that one is tempted to believe that only Feynman could solve for practical applications. Fortunately for engineers who only need concrete results (as opposed to theoretical physicists who don’t actually solve the damned things), it can be shown that you will always get the same answer by using standard wave equations or matrices that are susceptible to numerical solution. However, it did kick off a completely new branch of Quantum Metaphysics (attempts to decide what it really means), as well as apparently facilitating the launching of theoretical physics into the data-free fairy-land it currently inhabits.

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          MattB

          You are right about the concepts. With fluid mechanics well I touch fluids every day, and thus you can visualise and come to terms with what the maths is doing/saying. With no physical basis to the physics at that level I found increasingly like I could be in an arabic class the total lack of comprehension I had of what I was copying form the blackboard. I did the physics 1st then the engineering… if I’d gone the other way then I could have taken my enviro engineering passion and made the physics work for me and who knows you could all be slagging off Hansen & MattB 2010 lol;)

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    Since discovering that Anna Rose has a degree in Law, it’s been niggling me that those who’ve studied law may well have a different perception of what is evidence to those who’ve studied and used physical science.

    When communicating an idea, it’s important to recognize that part of the audience could have a different idea of the meanings of words. I legislation, there are invariably boring pages of “definitions” of terminology used within the Bill.

    I think it would be valuable to provide a short introduction of what is evidence in science; and what is not.

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    Ross James

    Climate scientist gives a good pro AGW view of a temporal pause in the warming as cyclic the Pacific Ocean La Nina returns to El Nino.

    This addresses the many mistakes David Evans has made of his statistical analysis claim of CO2 warming as the first cause not likely to be any significance.

    David’s own model calculations are incorrect assertions based on the wrong focus of the data that ignores known historic trends of the data.

    Climate Abyss: Weather and climate issues with John Nielsen-Gammon

    http://blog.chron.com/climateabyss/2012/04/about-the-lack-of-warming/

    Ross J.

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      Mark D.

      Ross, don’t you have a problem with blaming short term weather events (la Nina and El Nino) for the slowing or stopping of global temperature rise and then arguing at other times that there is a slow climate response (ie hidden heat) due to climate “inertia”?

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        Ross James

        Mark D.

        http://blog.chron.com/climateabyss/2012/04/about-the-lack-of-warming/

        Carefully consider the dampening effect and how this was calculated by David Evans in deriving his sensitivity.

        We have to consider how complex climate sequesters the over riding rise in temperatures due to greenhouse increases.

        What David has done is show the fact of dampening. What is incorrectly asserted is that this dampening effect shows the true trend over time. If the dampening effect of La Nina “resets” global warming temperatures we have to calculate by just how much.

        It appears the the effect is around .2 degree. This is not enough to offset the rise in global temperatures.

        What is also not realised is the temporal cooling effect of La Nina’s does not bring down the net positive effect of Global Warming. What is also not realised is that increasing temperatures will amplify via feedbacks that maybe negative at the moment but go into positive feedbacks of climate in the future. This is one of those unknown – by how much?

        1. La Nina minimums do not offset the drive forcing of CO2 with net loss.
        2. La Nina minimums are always higher then the last La Ninas.
        3. We will reach a point in temporal equalising where La Nina minimums will be higher then 1998 EL Nino driven temperature!
        4. The higher minimum will “test” the 1998 high when passed by a future La Nina that the true sensitivity of climate to CO2 is real and high.
        5. It is estimated that over the next decade the effect of a La Nina will then not offset a higher threshold – not cease, bring down or prove that global warming will not be serious threat.

        I accept the present flat line temporal condition of global cooler temperatures. If this flat line goes into a dive in temperatures then the effect of CO2 over a century will be likely minimal. If temperatures climb to newer increased temporal equilibrium even in times of super La Ninas then Spencer along with other mildests like David Evans are going to have to admit they were incorrect with their sensitivity calculations based on their cherry pick outs of temporal extreme conditions. The dog wag of temporal climate temps prove nothing and undermine their assertions. This pattern of offsets – negative and positives exists since the 1979 measurements began accurately. But it is only -.2 +.2 degree Celcius influence over a decade dependent on a El Nino or LA Nina cycles. CO2’s fingerprint are the warming over riding trends.

        Temperatures once again are rising beyond the temporal drop (See Roy Spencer’s web site). They are increasing as El Nino conditions return. But it is the TREND that is important when we offset (negative with positive) and resultant net rises. If we still climb in temps then it obvious that the fingerprint exists of something in our climate is causing the warming. This then becomes the smoking gun – the proof.

        Of course once La Ninas return and those minimums are higher then previous La Nina minimums it is then very easy to calculate a “corrected” climate sensitivity as being higher. What I find that confounds even the most hardened skeptics is the thinking of temperature as a RESET button that they cannot find in all the data – no matter what your base line starting point is.

        BOTTOM LINE: David Evans has picked a LOW point in a La Nina cycle (2011/2012) to prove low climate sensitivity – this is quite an incorrect assertion to make. This is “dog wag” maths.

        Can you see this or this still a blur to you? It is what warmest have been trying to tell skeptics since the last wave handing of wrongly asserted global cooling articles.

        Where do you think the extra heat goes in La Nina cycles? -.2
        Where do you think the extra heat comes from in EL Nina cycles? +.2

        Past decade fits nicely with the long-term upward trend of 0.16 C/decade shown by all three time series

        Over a hundred year period – then based on present estimates of KNOWN DATA this extrapolates out to 1.6 Celsius+ (20th century) without incorporating unknown POSITIVE feedbacks. One example less snow cover & sea ice.

        Can the increase over decade go up – it can. (.16 , .18, .2 ?)

        2 degrees – is that a big deal? Well try this basic experiment. Increase the 4 degrees in your fridge to 6 degrees and see the result over one week.

        Ross J.

        ——————

        Ross, David used the most recent data he could get. Your accusations of cherry picking are a bore. The extra heat in PDO cycles comes from the surface waters and alternately goes to the stored cold water in the oceans that cover 70% of the planet. The extra heat saved up by CO2 in the atmosphere is mostly lost to space — Jo

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          Peter Lang

          Ross James,

          2 degrees – is that a big deal?

          Good question. Does it matter if the planet warms by 3 C and/or sea level rise by 0.5 m over a period of 100 years? Does it even matter much if it happens in steps? It seems most of the reasonable (i.e. not alarmist and not politically partisan) estimates of the economic damage of warming are negligible. Some estimate that 1 C of warming would be net beneficial. It seems that 3 C will have negligible economic cost, but the proposed mitigation policies will have huge cost.

          Where can we find reliable, non partisan, proper estimates of the damage costs of warming, given we will adapt as we always have? Such estimates need to properly take into account that infrastructure is continually being turned over and replaced.

          This (alarmist site) http://www.realclimateeconomics.org/benefits_damage_valuation.html says that the damage to Australian cities of a 0.5 m sea level rise would be negligible. The damages would be mainly felt by Asian cities (mostly China and India. So, if China and India are the one who would suffer, doesn’t it make sense that they would be leading the charge to implement mitigation strategies if they felt that was the best way to spend their $$$? The fact they are strongly opposed to wasting money of climate mitigation should send a clear signal to the alarmists: a) they don’t understand, b) there priorities are wrong and c) they are arrogantly trying to tell others what is in their best interests.

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          Peter Lang

          Are global warming mitrigation policies deadlier than global warming?

          http://thegwpf.org/images/stories/gwpf-reports/goklany-public_health.pdf

          Contents:

          Where Does Global Warming Rank as a Public Health Risk Today?

          Which Is the Greater Health Risk – Poverty or Global Warming?

          What is the Contribution of Extreme Weather Events to Total Mortality?

          Are Deaths from Extreme Weather Events Increasing?

          Would Future Health Risks from Global Warming Outweigh Other Health Risks?

          Which Would Improve Public Health More – Adaptation or Mitigation?

          Are Global Warming Policies Deadlier than Global Warming?

          Executive Summary headings:

          Global Warming Does Not Currently Rank Among the Top Public Health Threats

          The Contribution of Much-Publicized Extreme Weather Events to Global Mortality is Negligible, and Declining.

          Poverty is a Much Larger Public Health Threat than Global Warming

          Other Factors Will Outweigh Warming as a Public Health Risk in the Foreseeable Future

          Either Focused Adaptation or Economic Development Would Provide Greater Health Benefits at Lower Costs than Mitigation

          Emission Reduction Policies May Add to Death and Disease

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    jonathan frodsham

    David, thank you for that 3 part presentation. I really enjoyed it. This should be shown in all the schools. You and Jo are doing a wonderful job, thank god for people like you two. Again I thank you :-))

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    RobbieB

    Excellent presentations by David, I assume you are sending to Anna Rose for feedback?

    One question I would really appreciate an answer to. I am currently half way through James Delingpole’s excellent book – I have the Watermelons version. In this he states that the planet has not warmed since 1998, I have often seen this stated in other sceptic material. This didn’t come through in David’s presentation, or is it an apples and oranges situation.

    ———————
    REPLY: Robbie, it’s a complex point. 1998 was a major El Nino, so it was the hottest in satellite records, and the world has not warmed since then, but the super high temperatures then was due to the El Nino, not to CO2. So it’s not an ideal point to pick even though it’s true. you’ll be accused of cherry picking. Phil Jones has said there was no statistically significant warming since about 1996, though I think it became statistically significant (for a month or two) during the last el nino. People can argue the toss and chase you down rabbit holes. I prefer to say the world hasnt warmed as the models predicted, or point out it’s been warming for 300 years. – Jo

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      Sonny

      Hi RobbieB,

      It is absolutely true that there has been no global warming for more than a decade.
      You don’t need to pick 1998. Better to pick 2002 which was unremarkable in terms of devations from the mean.
      Look up the BOM. They have “global temp anomaly” data you you can download and analyze. I have done so and concluded that there has been no net warming over the last decade. (comment #8).
      Once you’ve had a look go on over to skeptical science and look at their tab “it’s not cooling” and you will see the warmists in action – manipulating the data and breaking laws of reason.
      You see the fact that there has been no warming is EXTREMELY INCONVENIENT for scientists who are wedded to the theory of global warming.

      What did they do?

      1. Claim that the entire earth system including the oceans are still warming…
      2. Adjust te data to remove “exogenous” factors (you know like ENSO)
      3. Claim that particulates from Chinese coal power stations are stopping the warming.
      4. Move focus away from global warming to “climate change”

      Basically anything to keep the funding going.

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    Trish

    The power to tax is the power to destroy.
    Daniel Webster, and later, John Marshall in the Supreme Court case, McCulloch v. Maryland

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    KR

    BobC

    I see you’re still pushing the residence time/lifetime issue, and your (mis)interpretations.

    Carbon-14 bomb measures clearly show residence time and residence time adjustments. However, since carbon-14 bomb spikes do not change total CO2 concentration appreciably, meaning parts per million of atmospheric levels, they tell us nothing about such concentration adjustments.

    Those are driven by the Revelle factor for bicarbonate chemistry for short term changes, thermohaline circulation and the biological pump for mid-term mixing to take bicarbonate into the deeper ocean. And finally, silicate weathering.

    Each of these has various time-scales and limitations – the first 1000 years of a major CO2 pulse (such as what we’ve released into the atmosphere) dominated by oceanic CO2 dissolution, equilibrating over a few hundred years, but with a substantial fraction of that CO2 concentration remaining in the atmosphere at equilibration, as oceanic acidity poses a limit.

    Reduction to pre-Industrial levels, assuming we cease to put CO2 into the atmosphere, will take multiple millenia as the biological pump and weathering finally remove CO2 from both the ocean and atmospheric compartments. I would again refer you to Archer 2009 for a good summary, as well as to the references made in that paper for more discussion.

    Again – carbon-14 spikes are an excellent measure of molecular residence times under ocean/atmosphere exchanges. But because they do not change CO2 composition as a percentage of the atmosphere, they don’t measure concentration lifetime changes.

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      CHIP

      ‘Carbon-14 bomb measures clearly show residence time and residence time adjustments’.

      I’d have to agree with this. I don’t think that the bomb C14-measurements can prove we have not increased the atmospheric CO2 level by 40%. The bomb C14-measurements are a measure of atmospheric residence time. The same measurements have been done with the C12/C13 ratio. The C12/C13 ratio is conventionally expressed as δ13C. The atmospheric CO2 mass is in equilibrium with HCO3 (bicarbonate) and CaCO3 (carbonate calcium) at a δ13C permil value of -7 and anthropogenic (including biogenic) CO2 when in equilibrium has a δ13C permil value of -26. Assuming that humans increased the atmospheric CO2 content from 280ppmv in 1850 to approximately 351ppmv (about 25%) in 1988 this gives us a permil value of -11.75 (i.e. 25% of -26 and 75% of -7). In 1988 Keeling measured a permil value of -7.807 implying that the maximum amount of anthropogenic CO2 residing in the atmosphere (including biogenic CO2) was about 4%, leaving the other 96% as natural.

      Of course though, the IPCC is far too clever to leave itself open to critical testing like this and the weight of empirical evidence suggesting that the atmospheric residence time is very short so they argue that this CO2 is merely being swapped with dissolved CO2 in the oceans. Because the human CO2 is being swapped with non-human CO2 molecules in the oceans it allows the human CO2 in the atmosphere to decrease at the same rate as natural CO2 while at the same time allowing the CO2 level because of human-activity. And that is very convenient from the IPCC’s point of view because it means that it can never be proven wrong by observations of how fast human CO2 is removed from the atmosphere. There is only one way that they can be proven to be incorrect. And that’s by disproving the Revelle Factor. This is problematic because the amount of CO2 which remains in the atmosphere upon equilibrium (after swapping with oceanic DIC) has not been established evidentially and is a matter of dispute at the present time. Please type into Google ‘The Revelle Factor vs. Henry’s law’. If the Revelle Factor were true making carbonated drinks would be a physical impossibility.

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        MattB

        “If the Revelle Factor were true making carbonated drinks would be a physical impossibility.”

        Why?

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          CHIP

          According to the Revelle Factor as PCO2 increases due to anthropogenic emissions, it decreases PH and CO32, and as that decreases the Revelle Factor increases, which further diminishes the oceans ability to absorb more CO2. Put another way, the more anthropogenic CO2 that gets absorbed by the oceans the higher the value of the Revelle Factor becomes and the less anthropogenic CO2 the oceans are able to absorb over time. But this does not make sense because the PCO2 of carbonated drinks is much higher than what’s found in the oceans and atmosphere. It is true that the oceans must have a finite capacity, because they are finite structures themselves, but their capacity is vast and is greater than a million times the amount presently residing in the atmospheric greenhouse as demonstrated by the existence of carbonated drinks. Carbonated drinks have no problem absorbing the vast majority of CO2 (this is what gives them their fizzy taste) so why can’t the oceans? The Revelle Factor doesn’t differentiate between CO2 in the oceans and fresh water. It holds for all CO2 dissolved in water. I just don’t see how the Revelle Factor can be true, especially when it flies in the teeth of Henry’s law. You say you understand Henry’s law MattB, but I’m thinking you probably don’t, because if you did understand it, we wouldn’t be discussing this right now.

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      BobC

      KR
      May 3, 2012 at 7:57 am · Reply
      BobC

      Again – carbon-14 spikes are an excellent measure of molecular residence times under ocean/atmosphere exchanges. But because they do not change CO2 composition as a percentage of the atmosphere [and thus invoke the Revelle Factor], they don’t measure concentration lifetime changes.

      Once again, KR seeks to deny the clear implications physical data on the basis of unverified theory (indeed, falsified theory – see CHIP’s post #60.1.1.1)

      This is a common tactic of the alarmists: What works in every other physical system (i.e., tracer measurements) doesn’t work for anything that would disagree with the AGW religion because they have special models that say it doesn’t — never verified, of course.

      It’s like a miracle — Henry’s Law has to quit working (for the oceans alone, it seems — Coke and PepsiCO have dispensations) just in the nick of time to prevent anthropogenic CO2 from being removed. Of course, the fact that this interference with the return-to-equilibrium mechanism would leave clear indications in the prehistorical record is never investigated — that might produce inconvenient results that would then need another miracle to explain.

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        KR

        BobC

        Did the carbon-14 spikes from atomic testing appreciably change the concentration of CO2 as an atmospheric constituent? No, they did not.

        Hence the carbon-14 data only provide information on CO2 exchange with the oceans and biosphere – molecular exchanges of individual molecules. They do not provide direct information on movement of carbon out of the ocean and atmospheric compartments into longer term sequestration, on changes in atmospheric concentrations.

        From Solomon et al 2009:

        Longevity of an Atmospheric CO2 Perturbation. As has long been known, the removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere involves multiple processes including rapid exchange with the land biosphere and the surface layer of the ocean through air–sea exchange and much slower penetration to the ocean interior that is dependent upon the buffering effect of ocean chemistry along with vertical transport (9–12). On the time scale of a millennium addressed here, the CO2 equilibrates largely between the atmosphere and the ocean and, depending on associated increases in acidity and in ocean warming (i.e., an increase in the Revelle or ‘‘buffer’’ factor, see below), typically 20% of the added tonnes of CO2 remain in the atmosphere while 80% are mixed into the ocean. Carbon isotope studies provide important observational constraints on these processes and time constants. On multimillenium and longer time scales, geochemical and geological processes could restore atmospheric carbon dioxide to its preindustrial values (10, 11), but are not included here.

        Now, if you feel you have disproven Revelle’s work (“the hypothetical Revelle Factor”, as you put it), our knowledge of ocean circulation, and the ocean chemistry involved in CO2 absorption, by all means publish your work, correct those scientists who (oddly enough) believe what the evidence shows. Or point out where this has been done.

        Because otherwise – You are just hand-waving, making stuff up. And I will take your assertions with all the weight they thus deserve.

        CHIP – Sodas hold additional CO2 because they are under pressure, under a nearly pure CO2 atmosphere. Open your soda, wait a while, and see how much CO2 is in your now flat soda…

        After that, I would strongly suggest you take a few chemistry classes.

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          BobC

          KR
          May 4, 2012 at 11:43 pm · Reply

          From Solomon et al 2009:

          Not surprising you would reference Susan Soloman’s “landmark” paper on CO2 lifetimes: She references exactly NO empirical measurement studies of CO2 lifetimes whatsoever — her conclusions are based entirely on carbon cycle models which have never been verified (and can’t even reproduce the measured data). Obviously, she is someone who shares your magical view of reality — that it’s determined by our thoughts and theories, not by observed fact.

          Now, if you feel you have disproven Revelle’s work (“the hypothetical Revelle Factor”, as you put it), our knowledge of ocean circulation, and the ocean chemistry involved in CO2 absorption, by all means publish your work, correct those scientists who (oddly enough) believe what the evidence shows. Or point out where this has been done.

          Ordinarily, one would expect that it would be the task of those who champion a proposed hypothesis to prove it is true — not the responsibility of others to prove it is false. But, we’re talking about “Climate Science” here, after all.
          I refer you to my post, #60.3, where I reference a review of experimental data showing the non-existence of the Revelle Factor up to a CO2 partial pressure 2,500,000 times greater than today’s.

          I notice you don’t provide any references to the “evidence” you claim supports the Revelle Factor — why don’t you do that? (Try not to just post unsupported theoretical papers again.)

          Because otherwise – You are just hand-waving, making stuff up. And I will take your assertions with all the weight they thus deserve.

          It is you (and Soloman, who shares your belief that facts about the world are determined by unverified theories and models) who are guilty of “hand-waving” and “making stuff up”.

          Sodas hold additional CO2 because they are under pressure, under a nearly pure CO2 atmosphere. Open your soda, wait a while, and see how much CO2 is in your now flat soda…

          I think you need to review Henry’s Law which relates the partial pressure of a gas at a gas-liquid interface to the concentration in the liquid — since you obviously think that your statement (which is trivially explained by Henry’s Law) is some kind of evidence against it.

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            KR

            BobC

            I refer you to my post, #60.3, where I reference a review of experimental data showing the non-existence of the Revelle Factor up to a CO2 partial pressure 2,500,000 times greater than today’s.

            Carroll and Mather are using a derivation of Henry’s law, and their conclusion of “At the conditions under investigation, a pressure range of 80-90 bar, a temperature range of 20–35 °C and a CO2 gas phase concentration range of 1.3-1.7 mol% the pH of the water is ca. 4.” is hardly encouraging.

            Bomb-spike carbon-14 measurements are (as I discussed above) excellent indicators of residence time for individual molecules, and the exchange of CO2. But they don’t measure total CO2 concentration, percentage of the atmosphere. And therefore do not measure concentration drawdowns.

            For actual seawater chemistry, I would refer you to publications such as Egleston et al 2010Revelle revisited: Buffer factors that quantify the response of ocean chemistry to changes in DIC and alkalinity, and Frankignoulle 1994 A complete set of buffer factors for acid/base C02 system in seawater.

            If you think (as you have asserted) the Revelle factor is “hypothetical”, or “unverified”, I suggest you speak to some of the people who have spent time confirming it. Experimentally.

            Argument by insult, argument by assertion, and inappropriate references on your part – well, they do not change the science. Drawdown times for the CO2 we’ve already put into the atmosphere is on the order of a millenia.

            Adieu.

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            Kinkykeith

            AHHHHH KR

            Another University of the ABC voices opinion.

            “Drawdown times for the CO2 we’ve already put into the atmosphere is on the order of a millenia. ”

            Sounds great.

            Only problem is there are many peer reviewed assessments of this situation that place the time needed to develop counterbalancing and permanent natural sequestration (read trees grass, soil based organisms etc) as between two and three years.

            Common sense observations of plant growth confirm this anyhow.

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            Kinkykeith

            Good work KR.

            I notice MattB gave you a tick.

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            BobC

            KR
            May 5, 2012 at 1:30 am

            Carroll and Mather are using a derivation of Henry’s law, and their conclusion of “At the conditions under investigation, a pressure range of 80-90 bar, a temperature range of 20–35 °C and a CO2 gas phase concentration range of 1.3-1.7 mol% the pH of the water is ca. 4.” is hardly encouraging.

            Wow, so you mean that when CO2 pressure gets to 80 or 90 times atmospheric pressure (levels of Venus) then we might have a problem with ocean acidification? Why would you be discouraged by that? Are you expecting it to get higher?

            Bomb-spike carbon-14 measurements are (as I discussed above) excellent indicators of residence time for individual molecules, and the exchange of CO2. But they don’t measure total CO2 concentration, percentage of the atmosphere. And therefore do not measure concentration drawdowns.

            Look, we get it that you don’t understand Henry’s Law or tracer measurements. Simply repeating that without a logical argument isn’t going to convince us of anything. If you’re used to being taken as an expert, understand that you need to back that up here with at least some logical argument.

            For actual seawater chemistry, I would refer you to publications such as Egleston et al 2010 – Revelle revisited: Buffer factors that quantify the response of ocean chemistry to changes in DIC and alkalinity, and Frankignoulle 1994 A complete set of buffer factors for acid/base C02 system in seawater.

            If you think (as you have asserted) the Revelle factor is “hypothetical”, or “unverified”, I suggest you speak to some of the people who have spent time confirming it. Experimentally.

            Well, the Frankignoulle link is pretty clear about the experimental evidence. All of his tables of results (on pages 7, 10, 24, 28, 33, 37, and 41) as well as his conclusions (pages 46 – 48) show that doubling the pCO2 from the present level, 384 micro-atmospheres, to 793 micro-atmospheres (actually 2.065 times) results in increasing the dissolved concentration of CO2 in the seawater by exactly the same ratio (2.065 times).

            Sounds like they confirmed Henry’s Law — not the Revelle Factor.

            ************************

            Argument by insult

            You mean like this?

            I would strongly suggest you take a few chemistry classes.

            ************************

            argument by assertion

            You mean like this?

            Drawdown
            times for the CO2 we’ve already put into the atmosphere is on the order of a millenia.

            ************************

            and inappropriate references on your part

            You mean like Frankignoulle, which you imply experimentally verifies the Revelle Factor, but which actually experimentally verifies Henry’s Law?

            ************************

            – well, they do not change the science.

            Agreed. Nor does your use of these techniques create facts where none exist.

            Adieu.

            Good riddance. Your insistance on being treated as an expert, without any supporting evidence, is getting tiresome. Your inability to see that it doesn’t fly here has lost whatever humor value it once had.

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          CHIP

          After that, I would strongly suggest you take a few chemistry classes.

          As for taking chemistry classes, I am very willing to do that. Which parts of chemistry do you think I need to learn and why?

          CHIP – Sodas hold additional CO2 because they are under pressure, under a nearly pure CO2 atmosphere.

          It’s true that a soda drink can hold more CO2 in the water under pressure but the point here is, how much CO2 can the water hold in relation to the air under the bottle-cap? And the answer is, rather unsurprisingly, about 50 times in accordance with the 1:50 ‘partitioning ratio’. If the Revelle Factor were true, the water at this high pressure would not be able to hold very much CO2. Most of the CO2 would reside in the air under the bottle-cap. Of course removing the bottle-cap would result in you creating a disequilibrium in the 1:50 ‘partitioning ratio’ thereby forcing more CO2 into the atmosphere where again, equilibrium between DIC and atmospheric CO2 would be established, in a very short space of time until 50 times the CO2 resides in the water. Like MattB, I don’t think you understand Henry’s law, KR.

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      BobC

      KR
      May 3, 2012 at 7:57 am · Reply
      BobC

      I see you’re still pushing the residence time/lifetime issue, and your (mis)interpretations.

      Carbon-14 bomb measures clearly show residence time and residence time adjustments. However, since carbon-14 bomb spikes do not change total CO2 concentration appreciably, meaning parts per million of atmospheric levels, they tell us nothing about such concentration adjustments.

      [My emphasis — apparently KR believes that the Revelle Factor is now modifying Henry’s Law and preventing the oceans from absorbing as much CO2 as Henry’s Law would suggest.]

      So sorry for your fantasy models about the Revelle Factor — actual studies (a review of experimental data by Carroll and Mather, “The System Carbon Dioxide-Water and the Krichevsky-Kasarnovsky Equation,” Journal of Solution Chemistry, vol. 21, pp. 607-621, 1992. (discussion here), shows that Henry’s Law applies to CO2 and water up to a CO2 partial pressure of 100 MPa (Mega-Pascals) — or about 1000 times atmospheric pressure.

      I guess Coke and PepsiCo don’t need that dispensation from Cardinal AlGore after all — carbonated beverages CAN be made 🙂

      Since current CO2 levels are ~ 40 Pa (or about 2.5 millionths — 2.5×10^-6) of the level for which Henry’s Law remains valid, the hypothetical ‘Revelle Factor’ can’t kick in until we increase the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere by a factor of 2,500,000 — or about 10 times more than exists on Venus. Up until then, the Bomb Spike measurement does indeed give an accurate measurement for the rate at which the atmosphere recovers from an increase of CO2 — with a half-life of ~8 years.

      Inconveniently, this limits Human contributions to atmospheric CO2 to about 4 – 5%. This is also the limit of what we can effect by limiting the use of carbon-based fuels.

      *******************************

      Really KR; When are you going to learn (if ever) that facts about the world are established by actual physical measurement, not by unverified theories — even if they fit with your prejudices. Perhaps you need to brush up on Empiricism, the philosophy championed by Francis Bacon that facts can only be established by observation, which is largely responsible for the huge advancement in science over the last 400 years.

      Of course, anyone who believes in empiricism can’t be funded as a climate scientist today, as nearly the entire field is dependent on unverified (even falsified) models.

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    CHIP

    That should read: “allowing the CO2 level to increase because of human-activity”.

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    Those “predictions” are “projections” and while climatologists often conflate the two concepts, predictions are falsifiable but projections are not.

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      Gee Aye

      A true and simple statement. I might steal that one.

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        MattB

        Be careful, as the dictionary does not agree:
        Collins dictionary:
        “Projection:
        6. a prediction based on known evidence and observations”

        so of course a projection can be shown to be wrong.

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          Gee Aye

          thanks MattB… a citation would be useful for your pasting and a corresponding scientific dictionary citation of relevant interest just to see if they differ.

          Unfortunately words in the public realm and the private realm of scientists don’t always correspond. I can see how the definition you’ve given and the one I understand are not in conflict but, nonetheless, that dictionary definition is adding confusion.

          I’m happy to concede that the confusion is in addition to that caused by the practitioners (i.e. scientists not correctly applying the accepted definition) and is maybe caused by multiple different definitions from reputable sources (dictionaries etc) that different people/groups/ideologies are using…err… differently.

          As an aside I never said that a projection can’t be shown to be wrong but often (i.e. very very often as millions or billions of them might be tested where only one real whorl outcome is ever right), they will be wrong as a matter of course. TRhis is a trivial observation.

          A prediction is the guess (plus error estimates) that a scientist is asking or (if they want their citation index to increase) begging to be tested by others.

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    BobC

    KR, in multiple posts:
    Bomb-spike carbon-14 measurements are (as I discussed above) excellent indicators of residence time for individual molecules, and the exchange of CO2. But they don’t measure total CO2 concentration, percentage of the atmosphere. And therefore do not measure concentration drawdowns.

    Look KR; You can’t really expect people are going to believe this if all you do is just keep repeating it without any supporting logic. It just makes you look like a “true believer” who doesn’t even know why you believe it yourself.

    Heres a challenge for you:
    Why don’t you take MattB’s model (which I explicitly develop in 48.1.4.2.4, including the software code), and modify it to show your claim. Then we can look at the code and see what you are claiming must happen. This can then be compared to experimental and observational data.

    The model as it stands, is based on Henry’s Law, which experimental data shows holds for CO2 partial pressures far in excess of any the Earth has ever experienced. It also uses approximately the same molecular exchange rate that the IPCC agrees to, and shows that it is this exchange rate that controls the return to equilibrium from an injection of excess CO2, as long as Henry’s Law remains valid.

    Show us the modification of the model that represents your claims. Let’s get explicit and see just what you are claiming, and how it holds up to experimental evidence.

    If MattB can do it, so can you.

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      KR

      BobC

      Given that CO2 drawdown will be the product of a number of factors (amount of CO2 released, ocean exchange in the top 100 meters or so, ocean mixing, CaCO3 reactions, silicate weathering, land biosphere takeup, positive and negative feedbacks, etc., all of which are dependent on ongoing concentration times), I believe that a toy model will only give toy results – not very useful.

      I would recommend you to a good review article, Archer and Brovkin 2008, which looks at a number of different models encompassing some of that complexity in the current literature – their assumptions, parameters, limitations, etc.

      Now, if you believe that Archer and other experts are completely off (which is, I think, a good summary of your previous comments), I suggest you publish something, or more simply just contact him ((he’s reachable on the web, and he’s very approachable) and express your reasoning. I would be very curious as to the outcome of such a conversation.

      Current literature and data indicate a fast exchange with surface waters, multi-century mixing with ocean deep layers, and multi-millennial CaCO3 chemistry to reduce the CO2 we have already released. It will take thousands of years for the amount of CO2 we’ve already released to be removed from the atmosphere and oceans, let alone what happens over the next century or so of our emissions.

      You have made a lot of assertions that “it just isn’t so!”, that the oceans will quickly take care of the emissions we’ve released (a reasonable view ~75-100 years ago, but not now), but you have not backed up your assertions. Go talk to the experts – I think you will find it educational.

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        BobC

        KR
        May 7, 2012 at 2:02 am ·
        Given that CO2 drawdown will be the product of a number of factors (amount of CO2 released, ocean exchange in the top 100 meters or so, ocean mixing, CaCO3 reactions, silicate weathering, land biosphere takeup, positive and negative feedbacks, etc., all of which are dependent on ongoing concentration times), I believe that a toy model will only give toy results – not very useful.

        The fact that you cannot create a “toy model” that illustrates your claims simply shows that your claims are contradictory and impossible (or perhaps it is just beyond your intellectual reach). I have a great deal of experience with modeling reality, and it is always possible to simplify a model such that it shows a particular facet of reality. No model ever is complete w.r.t. reality, which is why they should always be verified using all the empirical data available — a step that NO CO2 cycle model in the pro-AGW literature has yet to attempt.

        I’ve demonstrated that if Henry’s Law is operating w.r.t. the exchange between the atmosphere and ocean at current (and reasonable future) CO2 concentrations, then the majority (98%) of anthropogenic emissions will be rapidly removed from the atmosphere.

        The C14 Bomb Spike data is completely consistent with this hypothesis, and determines the recovery half-life to be ~8 years.

        I’ve pointed you to experimental data that shows that, indeed, Henry’s law is followed w.r.t. CO2 and ocean water (with some modifications at very high partial pressures) to CO2 pressures millions of times what has ever existed on Earth.

        I’ve demonstrated to MattB that the model he devised to prove me wrong, instead proves me right.

        I’ve also invited you to give us a model showing how CO2 lifetimes could possibly be “hundreds to thousands” of years that was also consistent with the empirical data. (BTY, none of the published CO2 cycle models have been able to do this.)

        Of course, since your only argument is the logical fallacy of “appeal to authority”, I’m not surprised that your reply to my invitation is simply more of the same.

        I would recommend you to a good review article, Archer and Brovkin 2008, which looks at a number of different models encompassing some of that complexity in the current literature – their assumptions, parameters, limitations, etc.

        Once again, you refer me to a paper that simply summarizes the results of other models, none of which can reproduce (or even mention) the empirical data (a list of studies).

        I find it inconceivable that you are truly incapable of seeing that this is simple advocacy, not science — but maybe I overestimate you.

        Having been published in reviewed journals, and reviewed many papers myself, I find your insistence on the infallability of peer review to be stunningly ignorant. If, indeed, peer review guarenteed correctness, then there would never be disagreements between papers. Here, for example, is a collection of 900+ published, peer-reviewed papers that dispute various parts of the AGW hypothesis.

        Since you don’t seem to be capable of logical deduction yourself (i.e., you can’t actually answer any of the arguments in this post), why don’t you try to find a single peer-reviewed paper with a model that both shows long CO2 atmospheric lifetimes and is able to reproduce the C14 bomb spike data. Don’t bother with handwaving spin from RealClimate or Skeptical Science — find a single paper.

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        BobC

        KR

        May 7, 2012 at 2:02 am · Reply
        BobC

        Now, if you believe that Archer and other experts are completely off (which is, I think, a good summary of your previous comments), I suggest you publish something, or more simply just contact him ((he’s reachable on the web, and he’s very approachable) and express your reasoning. I would be very curious as to the outcome of such a conversation.

        Already had a conversation (email) with Gavin Schmidt on the same subject:

        He also couldn’t describe a CO2 cycle model that could both reproduce the bomb spike data and produce long atmospheric lifetimes for a significant part of the anthropogenic emissions (that is, >>2%).

        Like you, he simply repeated the claim that the models were right and I just didn’t understand what I was talking about. (He also used the “what else could it be?” argument, much to my amazement.) When I pointed out that I was perfectly willing to explain numerical models that reproduced the bomb spike data, but he apparently couldn’t come up with one that didn’t contradict his position, he left the converstion in a huff (kind of like you keep threatening to).

        People like Archer and Schmidt have their careers, livelyhoods, and reputations tied to the truth of the AGW hypothesis, to the point that they are simply advocates and lobbiests and are not doing real science.

        (If they were doing real science, they wouldn’t ignore valid data just because it contradicted their preferred explanation.)

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          BobC

          A short summary of the above post would be:

          A model of reality that cannot reproduce known data within its domain is wrong.

          If you can’t understand that, you have nothing useful to say about the subject.

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    The three videos are very good, conveying the message precisely.
    I have placed links to this article in my climate pages. Thanks Dr. Evans, Jo and the others that made this possible.

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    Safetyguy66

    So here we are having a sensible conversation on possible alternative theories on AGW. On QA the other night it was hard to find a single person who would subscribe to the presentation David has put together as anything other than conspiracy theorist nonsense, that can be easily dissmissed by virtue of the fact that David once spoke to someone who used to smoke.

    Where are the so called scientists who have unthinkingly bought into the myth, linking us to more indisputable facts and figures to show David is 100% wrong ??

    Why is it, the second you start producing graphs and maths these people either walk away, or accuse you of being funded by oil and tobacco ?

    I dont recall in 10 years of following this debate seeing an interaction between a warmist and a skeptic that didnt end with the warmist turning the debate away from science and into personal attacks. That in itself is what kept me skeptical. It always felt like the majority had something they didnt want me to know.

    Thank heavens I kept an open mind because it seems the facts are finally starting to bust through the models.

    Thanks David and Jo. Please dont stop.

    And Anna whatshername…. disgrace to her side of the debate. Smug, over emotional teen angst looking for a cause.

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    Ben

    JoNova. Loved Dr. Evan’s presentation on Anthony’s 24 hour Live TV event. Please tell him.

    A couple reasons why that format seems to be a better format than the videos you have here.

    A) The WUWT presentation focuses visually on the Screen information. It is very good. It should be the focal point. Dr. Evans did a great job speaking in the WUWT presentation. He got his points across very well.

    B) Dr. Evan’s WUWT presentation was MUCH easier to hear than the presentation you have here. The audio is much more distant sounding on this site. It is important to have clear audio, especially if you want a larger group to hear what he is saying, as the presentation is projected up onto a screen for them to see better.

    C) Having Dr. Evans in the presentation might be OK for many people, but frankly it’s so important to focus on the points he is making, I believe that his voice over the slides is much more powerful. (ie the format used with the WUWT TV presentation) Not that he isn’t a great looking guy. It’s just important to clearly get the points across to people who need to stay focused on the points he is making. Switching away from the slides is an unnecessary distraction, when there is so much info people are trying to absorb from the screen shots.

    D) I hope you and/or Anthony will create YouTubes of Dr. Evan’s WUWT speech, or recreate it in basically the same format. It was fantastic.

    E) I see trying to download his presentation onto a computer and then using it with group presentations and perhaps also for some schools presentations.

    Thank you both for the work you’ve been doing. Outstanding work. Much appreciated.
    Thank you for considering getting out the information in this fashion, so that the important messages can reach more people.

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