CFACT interviews global warming fanatics at the UN climate meeting in Bonn, Germany.
The question: "Are you aware that there hasn't been any global warming for the past 15 years?"
The question: "Are you aware that there hasn't been any global warming for the past 15 years?"
In my profession we call this 'tunnel vision'. The inability to see the forest for the trees. In this case a centimetre of the bark on the trunk of a single tree.
ReplyDeletePublicity stunts are good for a show, not so much for an intelligent discussion.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of the pause, one need not be a warming fanatic to understand that a pause is not equivalent to a stop. Judith Curry, not an AGW fanatic, has recently published a paper entitled Role for Eurasian Arctic shelf sea ice in a secularly varying hemispheric climate signal during the 20th century. She and her colleague Marsha Wyatt model the temperature anomaly of the Northern hemisphere as the commonly accepted linear warming trend + variations (see Sec. 2.2 Methods). The variations are modeled as an oscillation propagating around the globe (a stadium wave) and have a zero mean. Which means that the variation part comes and goes.
In other words, a pause is not a stop. The ups and downs of natural cycles are superimposed on an overall warming trend. Sometimes natural variations enhance the warming trend (1980s and 1990s), sometimes they counter it (2000s). Fixating on the last 15 years is a myopic tactic. CFACT (which receives funding from Exxon) is of course not myopic. They are lying bastards.
Hoo
Hoots: "[A] pause is not a stop"."
ReplyDeleteOne of the more ridiculous strawmen is whether we are seeing a "pause" or a "stop". When you hear someone say that, just laugh at them.
Inspection of any of several versions of what are widely believed to be accurate representations of the planetary climate history over several million years, there have always been "pauses", but climate dynamics have never "stopped", thank God. Of course, some "pauses" have lasted many, many years (if those reconstructed data can be believed).
So everybody knows it's not going to "stop". Everybody, except some climate loons, know that the temperature increase has slowed considerably. The issue is not whether it has "stopped", the main issue for most people is...
the computer simulations are wrong.
Which is quite different from the main issue for climate loons, which is whether it's "significant" in terms of persuading them from their global goal. Which is to turn the global energy economy over to the Left. If the tempeature trend took a swan dive, I'm sure the "climate change" lobby would find different reasons to seize the global energy economy.
And by the way, Sourcewatch.org does report that CFACT recieved funding from Exxon. They report $5000 in 1997 and 1998.
Of course, Greenpeace makes its own typically ludicrous claims that some climate gullitards choose to believe. Perhaps the Greenpeace activists' stint in a Murmansk jail will help order their thoughts. Some have complained of human rights abuses, such as forced to have Russian cellmates and the lack of no-smoking cells. :-)
And by the way, I think the oil companies should give groups like CFACT millions more to help them effectively compete with the millions in funding received by the climate loons from left-wing government bureaucrats.
DeleteA layman: One of the more ridiculous strawmen is whether we are seeing a "pause" or a "stop". When you hear someone say that, just laugh at them.
DeleteA professor of climate studies: Further, addressing these questions requires an unambiguous definition of ‘warming’, ‘stopped’, and ‘paused’. ’Warming’ means a rate of change of temperature that is greater than zero. Here I define “stopped” to mean a rate of change of temperature that is less than or equal to zero. Here I define “pause” to mean a rate of increase of temperature that is less than 0.17 – 0.2 C/decade.
The layman is admiral. The professor is Judith Curry. Whose opinion should I find more weighty? Hmmm, that's a tough one.
Hoo
The simulations are wrong.
DeleteNo rabbit trails today, kid.
LOL. Grandpa ridicules the difference between a pause and a stop. Grandpa steps into deep shit. Grandpa angry!
DeleteHoo
Grandpa says angrily, "The simulations are wrong!"
DeleteNurse is clearly not paying attention to Grandpa. What a crappy day.
DeleteHoo
The simulations are wrong.
DeleteIs there a difference between a pause and a stop, Grandpa?
DeleteHoo
Of course, child. But Hoo cares? Anyway, I disagree with Curry. I think a "pause" is 0.16 – 0.25 C/decade.
DeleteAnd the climate simulations are still wrong.
Hoo cares, Grandpa.
DeleteDo you take take back your assertion that the difference between a pause and a stop is "one of the more ridiculous strawmen?"
Hoo
Graphs? Computer models?
DeleteHere's one for all to enjoy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBthYU6UxP8
No one ever argued that there was "no difference" between a pause and a stop. That is another strawman. You're rackin' 'em up today.
DeleteThe issue is not whether there is a difference between "pause" and "stop". That is a strawman. The issue is...
the climate simulations are wrong either way.
So you acknowledge that a pause in the global warming does not indicate that the warming has stopped? Just so I understand your position, Grandpa.
DeleteHoo
No one can confidently predict what will happen in 5 years, a decade, or certainly a century, because the simulations are wrong. At this point, it's a matter of faith. I'm an agnostic.
Delete@ Boo Hoo
DeleteYou seem upset because people aren't unquestioning dolts like you.
LOL
Chris
Grandpa, you are wriggling like a worm on a hook. I am not asking you to make a prediction for the exact temperature a decade from now. I am asking you a very simple question: Do you agree that a pause in global warming does not indicate that the warming has stopped?
DeleteYou don't need to launch into a tirade, just give a short yes/no answer. It shouldn't be that hard.
Hoo
Here's a 1970's take on climate change.
Deletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_861us8D9M
I wonder what 2025 will produce in the way of predictions?
Crus, I don't have time to watch the video (it's long). Can you provide a synopsis?
DeleteHoo
I agree that a pause indicates the simulations are wrong. I have no expectations about the eventual trajectory of the temperature.
DeleteSorry if you don't like that answer. It's the only one that reflects my thinking.
There is nothing to like or dislike. You are answering a different question.
DeleteTry again, Grandpa.
Hoo
I neither agree nor disagree. I don't know. Is that simple enough for you?
DeleteYou don't know whether a pause is different from a stop? Even after Judith Curry defined it in a clear and unambiguous way?
DeleteI think you have reading comprehension problems, Grandpa.
Hoo
I've already answered that question. Go back a few comments.
DeleteNo, you didn't. First you ridiculed it. Then you ran away.
DeleteSo, would it be a yes or a no? Judith Curry clearly thinks that yes, there is a difference. Grandpa Boggs can't seem to make up his mind.
Hoo
Hoo,
DeleteThe video is a campy, but very fun 1970's TV show about mysteries etc hosted by Leonard Nimoy (Mr Spock). This specific episode was about climatological models drawn from data that suggested we where about to enter a 'new ice age'.
Being a young man during that period I remember the theory quite well. It was quite popular.
The reason I posted it is to illustrate how there is an industry based on climate change hysteria.
For my own part, I do not see a 'pause' as a 'stop' either. As to which way the cycle will flow, I would suggest examining natural cycles. If the predictions from those cycles suggest we still have a period of warming before cooling begins anew, I would suggest, further, we adapt to and prepare for those changes instead of attempting to 'stop' them.
You should check it out when you get a chance, Hoo. Even if only for a retro-TV entertainment value.
It was a fun old show.
Hoots: "Is there a difference between a pause and a stop...?"
DeleteGrandpa: "Of course, child."
There. See? That wasn't so hard, was it?
And it's not that I don't "seem" to be making up my mind, my mind is actually not made up. It may be made up at some point in the future when the actual data come in (if I live that long), but I can't predict when that will occur.
Thanks, Crus. I doubt that the video has more than just retro-entertainment values, but I will check it out when I can.
DeleteNatural variation is of course being studied. Check out Judith Curry's paper (linked above). Even she (not an enthusiastic warmer) models natural variations as being superimposed on an upward temperature trend.
Something for you to ponder.
Hoo
Finally, Grandpa concedes that a pause in global warming does not indicate a stop in global warming. Applause!
DeleteHoo
Concede? Where did I say otherwise?
DeleteAnd BTW, you linked to a blog post. not a paper. There is a difference. Do you have a link to a paper?
DeleteOh, you said otherwise first:
DeleteHoots: "[A] pause is not a stop"."
One of the more ridiculous strawmen is whether we are seeing a "pause" or a "stop". When you hear someone say that, just laugh at them.
Turns out, it's not a laughing matter. There is a distinction. There currently is a pause in warming, and most people agree on that. Your friends at CFACT interpret it to say that global warming has stopped. Well, the latter does not follow from the former, as you now understand.
Look on the bright side, Grandpa. You have learned something today!
Hoo
There is a distinction,and it's still a laughing matter, and I'm still laughing. Because the real issue is (continuing the quote you truncated):
DeleteThe issue is not whether it has "stopped", the main issue for most people is...
the computer simulations are wrong.
It may be a laughing matter for a layman like yourself, Grandpa, but clearly isn't for an expert like Judith Curry. She takes great care to distinguish between the two.
DeleteHoo
Grandpa: And BTW, you linked to a blog post. not a paper. There is a difference. Do you have a link to a paper?
DeleteI did link to Curry's paper in my very first comment. I am not sure reading the paper will do you any good because you can't make heads or tails of the terminology. Here is a press release (written by Curry and her coauthor). An excerpt:
The paper’s authors, Marcia Wyatt and Judith Curry, point to the so-called ‘stadium-wave’ signal that propagates like the cheer at sporting events whereby sections of sports fans seated in a stadium stand and sit as a ‘wave’ propagates through the audience. In like manner, the ‘stadium wave’ climate signal propagates across the Northern Hemisphere through a network of ocean, ice, and atmospheric circulation regimes that self-organize into a collective tempo.
The stadium wave hypothesis provides a plausible explanation for the hiatus in warming and helps explain why climate models did not predict this hiatus. Further, the new hypothesis suggests how long the hiatus might last.
A pause. A hiatus. Not a stop.
Hoo
It is a laughing matter.
DeleteAnd your link opens an unpublished manuscript.
Laughing to an idiot. Not to an expert.
DeleteAnyway, what I linked to is called a preprint, not an unpublished manuscript. Because it has actually been published: M. G. Wyatt and J. A. Curry, Climate Dynamics (2013), doi:10.1007/s00382-013-1950-2.
I linked to a preprint because you likely don't have access to specialized journals.
Hoo
Then she should have changed the "submitted to" text.
DeleteAnd I'm still laughing.
The real issue, for most people, is:
the climate simulations are wrong.
Maybe she has a fix, and maybe she doesn't. She doesn't say she does in her manuscript. What she said was "the stadium-wave hypothesis holds promise". That's all. The climate simulations that are wrong "held promise". Unfulfilled promise.
Don't wet your pants yet.
That's beside the point. That simulations can't predict the exact temperature does not mean there is no systematic warming. Even a skeptical scientist like Curry models climate in terms of a long-term warming trend (which unquestionably exists) and short-term oscillations. The latter sometimes enhance the former (1980s and 1990s) and sometimes cancel it (2000s).
DeleteThere is no question if the overall warming will resume, the question is when. This train has left the station. "Agnostics" like Grandpa are either poorly informed or are liars.
Hoo
Hoo, a pause is when something stops but will start again at a later date. That may happen, but it hasn't happened yet. The later resurgence of warming that you are assuming is not yet in evidence and the scientist in you should not be willing to take it on faith. Right now all we know is that global warming has stopped, and that's what we should call it.
DeleteJQ
There is no question if the overall warming will resume, the question is when.
DeleteWhy? Because the computer models said so? Th computer models are always wrong and none of them predicted the current "pause."
Ben
No, not because of computer models. There are observational data going back more than a century. These data show oscillations on top of a warming trend. Sometimes oscillations mask the warming trend (1940s to 1960s), at other times they accelerate it (1980s through 1990s). The warming from the extra CO2 has not gone away.
DeleteHoo
Hoots: "There is no question if the overall warming will resume, the question is when."
DeleteWell, duh. When is the big question. Perhaps after a short pause, a very long pause, perhaps after a period of cooling. Neither warming nor cooling can go on forever, so your comment is, well... stupid.
Hoots: "There are observational data going back more than a century."
DeleteMORE THAN A CENTURY??????
Are you kidding? Like, before iPhones were even invented?
Dude, that's like FOREVER!!!
Grandpa,
DeleteYou pretend that the uncertainty is way bigger than it is. We aren't talking centuries here. Natural variability can mask the warming trend on the scale of a decade or two (cf. 1940-1960). Then it comes back with a vengeance.
Hoo
Direct temperature records go back to the late 1800s. Proxies go much farther than that.
DeleteHoo
A VENGEANCE!
DeleteOoooooh. Sounds bad. I better put my house on stilts.
Proxies. Like, um... cherry picked tree rings? Are we back to dendromancy?
DeleteYou've gone silly, Hoots. Bye.
One proxy a trend does not make. It's another matter when multiple proxies agree.
DeleteYou are off your rocker, Grandpa.
Hoo
Grandpa: Ooooooh. Sounds bad. I better put my house on stilts.
DeleteSorry, your nursing home stays where it is. No point in moving as you'll be dead by 2020.
Hoo
Hoo: Here's another esteemed expert, Dr. Kevin Trenberth:"The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t."
DeleteI'll listen to the experts on this one.
The Torch
Hoo: please stop telling me to accept this theory on faith. I want evidence. You have none so now you're making ridiculous promises that the warming is coming...20 years from now!
DeleteObviously this global warming sham is your religion. Which is fine, just stop imposing your religious beliefs on me.
The Torch
Torch,
DeleteYou might want to start by examining the instrumental temperature record, which is available from 1880 to 2013. When you have familiarized yourself with it, let me know and we can discuss it.
Hoo
Okay sure. But I still won't take your theory on faith and I don't appreciate you forcing your religion on me.
DeleteThe Torch
So you've been blathering about the subject not knowing much about the actual data, Torch? Can't say I'm surprised.
DeleteHoo
Blathering? No.
DeleteWe're talking about the future of warming, not the past. You want me to take it on faith that we're seventeen years into a thirty-seven year pause. I said I'll believe it when I see it. Don't expect me to take it on faith. Twenty years from now, when your evidence finally arrives, your theory will be vindicated. In the meantime, it's just an unproven theory.
This global warming nonsense really is unfalsifiable. No matter what happens, it proves you're right. Warming proves warming. No warming proves warming too. It's just taking a coffee break. It will be back at a date so far in the future that no one will remember the prediction if you turn out to be wrong. Please tell me what would prove that your theory is bunk.
Like I said, I completely support your free exercise of the global warming religion. Just stop trying to impose it on me.
The Torch
Hoo: Look me up in the year 2033. Then we can discuss this.
DeleteThe Torch
Have you looked at the data yet, Torch? Do you need help locating it?
DeleteHoo
On another, related, issue, here are a few figures that may illuminate the heated (sorry!) nature of the argument:
ReplyDeleteAs required by law, the White House delivered to Congress a report stating in Fiscal Year 2013, which ended on September 30, the US government spent $22,195,000,000 on climate change matters.
--- WUWT
That's a lot of hockey sticks.
Those figures draw perspective on the one-way accusations aimed at climate heretics' funding by of Exxon/Mobil et al. The oil and gas companies should be trebling and quadrupling their support.
Grandpa,
DeleteDid you run away from the simple question I asked or are you still pondering how to answer it?
Hoo
Attention hungry today?
DeleteRelax, kid. You aren't my main priority.
Yet you answer every single comment of mine. How come, Grandpa? Am I your favorite grandchild?
DeleteHoo
Not The Favorite. I don't have one. But you're in the Top Five, for sure!
DeleteI am so pleased to hear that, Grandpa! May I visit you in the nursing home? I can smuggle some dirty magazines.
DeleteHoo
What does it say about humanity that these apparently highly educated people can be such unthinking sheep? It's scary when the obvious facts fly in the face of your worldview and you stick to your worldview anyway, and you do it with a religious dogmatism that not only denies reality, but doesn't care what the facts are and won't even be bothered to consider them. To hell with facts. Facts be damned -- full speed ahead no matter who it hurts. Ban DDT -- kill millions. Who cares? Make energy too expensive to use -- thousands freeze to death and the economy is destroyed. Who cares? There'll be fewer polluters exhaling that poison carbon dioxide. Insanity!
ReplyDeleteHats off to veterans Joey, KW, and CrusadeRex, but most especially to Dr. Egnor. I still can't believe you joined the service in the bad old days of the early 1970s. You and I are about the same age; I know how it was. I was trying to stay far, far away from the military in 1973.
ReplyDeleteJQ
Thanks, JQ.
DeleteIt was not so long ago for myself.
This remembrance day is a pretty raw one.
Yeah, hat's off to all vets this veterans' day.
DeleteThe Torch
The latest party line is that the unforeseen "pause" will end sometime in the 2030's. How we can foresee the end of the "pause" when we didn't foresee the "pause" itself is anyone's guess.
ReplyDeleteComputer models, you know. Computer models.
So I guess we'll have to wait 20 years to find out if this Judith Curry is right. Until then, the jury is still out. No one has to believe your theory based on some evidence that you promise us will arrive 20 years in the future.
So stop shaking me down for money, micromanaging my lifestyle, and destroying my economy. Thank you and good night.
The Torch
What's the point of shaking you for money when you ain't got any, torch?
DeleteHoo
I didn't know you were privy to my tax return. You on Lois Lerner's email list?
DeleteI don't know what your comment is meant to imply, other than that I must be poor, which is an admission that poor people are not mind-numbed Democrats.
The Torch
No, Torch, I get my data directly from the NSA.
DeleteAs to the poor not voting universally Democrats, that's not exactly news to me. I've been to West Virginia.
Hoo
Oh, the NSA spying scandal. Very funny. Your classism is less funny.
DeleteYou don't know how much money I make and I'm not going to tell you. I don't know how much money you make and I'm not going to ask. However, I seem to remember that you said you're a professor, so you probably make six figures. So you're just another rich, douchey liberal. I, on the other hand, am just a middle class guy. In your mind, your money makes you right and me wrong.
The Torch
Touchy, Torch?
DeleteI'm just giving you the taste of your own medicine. Perhaps you might recall that it was a Republican presidential candidate who made a point about 47 percent of Americans. You know, the ones who do not pay taxes and therefore would not vote for him no matter what. It is conservatives who equate the poor with the freeloaders and work to dismantle the social net.
Hoo
I agree with the Torch.
ReplyDeleteTo call the recent stoppage of global warming a pause carries an implicit assumption--that it will begin again at some later time. Science can't be based upon evidence that we predict will arrive at a later date. That's like saying that everyone should believe in Bigfoot because we expect to find conclusive proof of its existence within a decade or two. When the proof gets here, then we'll believe you but not before.
You know what this reminds me of? The elusive "gay gene" that scientists have been searching for decades. Just believe in the theory, we'll find the evidence later.
These people just hate science, that's all.
TRISH
Trish,
DeleteThe Gay Gene doesn't exist. That was just a beat-up by journalists.
Anyway. Just claiming that homosexuality is innate (because sexual preference is established by puberty) means that it's genetic is just silly. The concordance rate of homosexuality in identical twins is 20%. If it was genetic, and in particular due to a single gene, it should be close to 100%.
Whereas, sexual preference is due to variations in brain structure. The way the brain develops in utero with a chaotic laying down of neurons, formation of synapses, and paring back of neurons and synapses not used. Slight genetic modifications across neurons due to transposons (jumping genes) intervening in regulatory regions. Different life experiences resulting in neuroplasticity.
What makes you think 'these people just hate science, that's all'? Bigfoot is excluded because there's no evidence for its existence. AGW isn't excluded by the 'pause' (which is only in the lower atmosphere - talking about a global warming pause is misleading, because it doesn't include the warming oceans and the melting ice caps) because we have evidence of previous pauses in a generally upward trend. And we have a mechanism by which we know how increasing CO2 levels cause warming.
TRISH: To call the recent stoppage of global warming a pause carries an implicit assumption--that it will begin again at some later time.
ReplyDeleteAmazingly, TRISH, this is how scientists view the temperature anomaly. Including Judith Curry, who is no exactly a "warming fanatic." Have you seen the instrumental temperature record of the last 130 years? If you have not then click on that link and take a look. There are surely ups and downs, but the ups clearly dominate. The slope of the long-term warming trend is higher than anything that we have seen in reconstructions of past climate. That should give you some pause.
Hoo
Hoo,
DeleteThis is precisely the problem, you see. It is why people like myself are highly sceptical of the claims made by the climate gurus.
Reconstructions, predictions etc.
We do not know. We cannot know.
Now, I understand the point you folks are attempting to make, that we may not know until it is too late to do anything about it (if, indeed man plays a role in this)- or in fact it may already be too late. But that is a bet. A bet with livelihoods of BILLIONS.
In fact, in many cases it could mean their very lives!
Further, that bet is being placed by the very same sort of people (the gurus) who have used the earth's cycles to promote everything from emissions regulations to human sacrifice (in both the ancient and modern forms).
So, you must understand, the scepticism is not about being stupid, brainwashed, or ignorant. Rather it is about being once (actually 1000X) bitten and twice shy.
Add to that the incredible wealth being amassed by some of these characters (Al Gore, for example) peddling films and flying around in jets, and incidences of admittedly falsified data and you have a recipe for wide spread scepticism.
I am all for reducing pollutants of all sorts. But we need to find a way to make transition that is not devastating to the economies of the first world in some faux gesture of fairness. We also need to consider the cost of 'upgrading' the client, proxy, and 'undeveloped' nations - so that we avert a massive humanitarian disaster.
I don't have a clue how that could be done. I have read a lot of hare brained suggestions over the last few years....
But I do know what it CANNOT be:
Anti-Human
Restrictive of hard won freedoms
Anti-Industry (ie JOBS)
Unbalanced against the very nations making at least a TOKEN effort at change
Geo Engineering.
All of the above mentioned aspects poison the well of any effort to combat these issues.
I am not a scientist. I will freely admit that. But, I do pay the wages of them with the taxes taken from my meagre pay for risking my life. I expect these doomsayers to come up with something more than the black predictions and restrictive nonsense they have so far. Not just about the air, but also about the material wastes, the poison we are pumping into the waters of the world, and the horrific abuses of the energy cartels.
Time for these eggheads to put on their thinking caps and give us clean, free (or very cheap) energy - and stop telling us to do with less while they grow in influence and wealth.
You get where I am coming from?
If I behaved like these men did in a military capacity I would be DEAD.
I know it is an uphill battle and may be all for naught, but that does not make it impossible or unattainable.
Crus,
DeleteLet me make a couple of points.
One, you should cleanly separate science from policy. Lots of people on the Right don't want to spend any money to mitigate the effects of global warming. This is unwise, but it is at least debatable. What I really dislike about the Right is that they preemptively go all-out against science. Well poisoning might be effective for a short-term gain, but it will backfire big time later on. The tobacco companies used to employ the exact same tactics. With their shenanigans exposed, people wouldn't touch them with a ten-foot pole. You are less prone to the lumping of science and policy, but you do this nonetheless on occasion. The latest comment is an example.
Two, you are right about the presence of uncertainty. Given the inherent complexity of the scientific problem (lots of factors, some unpredictable in principle: chaos in dynamics), we won't have a perfect capability for predicting the natural variations. That said, the average temperature is not just going up and down. It is going up more than it is going down. Has been for 130 years. Look at the instrumental temperature record. It's uncontroversial (although lots of conservatives would like to declare otherwise). There is good reason why the temperatures should be going up: the extra CO2 being pumped into the atmosphere. One can argue about how much the temperatures should be rising, but not whether they should be. Take Richard Lindzen of MIT, whom the skeptics like to parade as their ally. He does not deny that the temperatures should be rising, he only argues that they should be rising not as fast because there will be fewer clouds than there are now. Whether the cloud thinning would entirely offset the rise of the CO2 is not clear: his theories are full of holes and the rise of temperature over the last 130 years suggests that the effects of the clouds is not enough to prevent the warming.
As a military man, you surely understand that sometimes there is a need to act even when we don't have 100 percent certainty. We may agree or disagree about the need to act, but let's make sure not to shoot the intelligence guy in the process.
Hoo