A long series on climate change

[Cullion]

I don't really feel the CRU people "falsified a conclusion" - they corrected some data. By patching over their model's margin of error with historical data.

It's completely illegitimate do that in the manner they did because they only patched the data in places where it made the case for AGW look bad. They were clearly working with the aim of producing a graph that showed increasing temperatures, rather than just handling the data in an honest manner and no preconceived idea what the graph should look like.

Watch Dr. Muller's talk again.

Likewise, It's inexplicable to me that if I post something like, "It appears the atmosphere is trapping energy" without even linking to anything, you're right on the "piss poor study/piss poor methods/piss poor reasoning/pure conjecture" model. It was a sketch in brief of a falsifiable hypothesis - you asked me for the hypothesis, not the data set of subsequent experimentation. Atmospheric capture IS a testable supporting climate change. Testable means testable, not forgone. You asked for a testable, I gave you one, it's fine if that leads to further discussion, but don't act like the need to eliminate other possible causes means that it's something that doesn't pertain to AGW

Make predictions about future climatic behaviour that we can bet on. You're a gambling man, right ?

And fwiw, I didn't post them, someone else did - but I do agree that atmospheric retention and unique nocturnal heating are significant signs of greenhouse phenomenon. I would appreciate, in particular, if you would tell why you feel surface albedo might account for atmospheric capture.

Because radiation escaping the planet's atmosphere is what was measured, atmospheric capture was inferred as the cause. A change in albedo could explain a change in radiation detected by changing the amount reflected back into space, as could a change in radiation entering the atmosphere (and not just a change in the total energy, but its spectrum).

This is a really complicated system, and the more alarmist science here just constantly seems designed to say 'See I told you! and that's why you need to pay carbon taxes!.

[JohnnyCache]

We've been discussing 3 points that seem to indicate a greenhouse causation:

1. Greater heating at night - the warming seen at night trends higher than warming over all
2. A decrease in radiation emitted despite an increase in temperature - this means energy is staying with the planet. Greater reflection by albedo would not cause a temperature increase while emission went down. Greater solar input should also produce an increase in both factors, not just temp...a reduction in albedo is possible, but the only albedo source I can think of that could be trimmed enough to do that would be the ice caps...are they shrinking? For...some reason?

Now, purely in the context of this thread, I'd consider some buy-in on that, but it's also a presented fact that we see greater warming at the polls vs the tropics, and greater warming in summer than winter.

You seem to strongly feel science at large is ignoring the possibility of non AGW causation, I don't know that I agree.

3. Near-earth temperature increase while higher atmospheric layers cool and slow - this one really, really seems to point at the greenhouse effect to me - it's almost like a layer of something is cutting off the traditional flow of energy to the stratosphere. That's not going to be caused by incoming radiation or surface reflection.

[JohnnyCache]

I don't, fwiw, particularly care about or believe in carbon taxes. I don't think they'll work. I don't like pay to pollute models in general, they don't tilt game theory against offending behavior enough to bother with IMO.

[Cullion]

Total solar input has decreased recently, but the UV component has increased substantially and this is expected to have a greater heating effects on the oceans because a much larger component of UV light penetrates the water rather than being reflected by it. That's one non-AGW explanation for recent changes in Earth's irradiance, which also has an interesting relationship to the temperature record:-

You'll note that the only way a statistically significant warming signal can be obtained since the late 90s is when satellite measurements of ocean temperature are included (and not even all the AGW proponents in the field agree with the way/degree to which this is done).

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... Our observing system is inadequate

As far arctic albedo goes, you'll note that Antarctic ice cover hasn't declined in the same way. The Arctic has a large ridge of sub-sea volcanoes beneath it that recently started erupting and the effects of that are still being studied. They don't talk about the Gakkel ridge much on the news.

to restate: We're talking about the amount of energy being emitted from a complex system of gas with a varying sun shining on it (and recent solar variations map quite well to the specific pattern of temperature change we're seeing, i.e. flat on land but increase in ocean temperature), and an ice-cap with a recently active volcano chain beneath it.

Could AGW still be real? Absolutely. But it's really not certain,

When we venture into questions of degree and ask 'if the effect is real, is it small enough to be wiped out by other natural phenomena, or small enough that it's not worth re-engineering our economies so drastically?', I think all the pious certainties dissolve.

You see, what I really object to is the potentially dangerous rush towards economic sanctions when there's still so much to learn about such a complex system, and I do have good evidence when I say that some of the proponents of the AGW hypothesis have serious conflicts of financial and political interest and have engaged in dishonest science.

[W. Rabbit]

The peer review culture of this field has become warped and is no longer trustworthy.

More conspiracy FUD, Cullion. I can appreciate your careful approach to this topic but you have this habit of occasionally falling back on fire and brimstone condemnation of transparent scientists.. I could almost redline each of your posts and some good content would stand out, and the rest I would sanitize because it's detracting from your (economic) argument.

I want to know what makes you think trust has anything to do with good science, when in fact the science is supposed to stand for itself. Johnny pointed out, trust and faith are sometimes the same animal.

Peer review today is infinitely greater than in Einstein/Eddington's day. Transparency is greater. Communication is greater. But still, way back before the internet and satellites, relativity models were proven with field data and everything came together and the physics community went "ooooh". Well...most of them.

If so, then we have nothing to worry about because at the end of this process it won't be possible to hide the truth. Either good, verifiable science will show the AGW is occurring and why, or good verifiable science will show that it's not.

For this to happen, two camps of science would form. A popular claim by scientists like Prof Gray is that they could summon an army of scientists ready to defend THEIR ideas.

So fine....go fucking do it, or shut up.

Talk is very cheap when it comes to science, no matter how scientific the talk sounds.

Until then, charges of conspiracy fall flat on my scientist ears.

[Cullion]

More conspiracy FUD, Cullion. I can appreciate your careful approach to this topic but you have this habit of occasionally falling back on fire and brimstone condemnation. I could almost redline each of your posts and some good content would stand out, and the rest I would sanitize because it's detracting from your (economic) argument.

I want to know what makes you think today is any different from Einstein and Eddington's days.

I want to know what makes you think trust has anything to do with good science, when in fact the science is supposed to stand for itself.

Because key figures in the field have repeatedly colluded in the falsification of results.

Scientists are just as prone to the kind of political biases and financial self-interests that lead them to absurd conclusions and dishonest behaviour as any other human. I don't think things have changed since Einstein's days. If you want a parallel from Einstein's time it would be the dismissal of Relativity as 'perverse Jewish science' by many German physicists.

Except this time many more reasonable people are pulled into believing the questionable premise because the political biases involved aren't anything like as hateful, and the hypothesis itself is much harder to falsify than special or general relativity because it's dealing with statistical properties of an extremely complex system.

The bullshit and fraud are all quite clearly documented though. You can't keep dismissing something as a conspiracy theory when the evidence is available for you to read and you aren't willing to read it.

[Bneterasedmynam]

Shouldn't the point be not to pollute the planet regardless of climate change?? I mean really is it going to matter if it gets hotter if the air is unbreathable and the water is undrinkable?? I think most people concentrate too much on the climate change factor and not enough on the simple logic of not turning the planet into a **** hole. I went to the St. Louis Zoo last weekend and guess what, the arch is blocked out by a giant moutain of garbage.

[Cullion]

Shouldn't the point be not to pollute the planet regardless of climate change?? I mean really is it going to matter if it gets hotter if the air is unbreathable and the water is undrinkable?? I think most people concentrate too much on the climate change factor and not enough on the simple logic of not turning the planet into a **** hole. I went to the St. Louis Zoo last weekend and guess what, the arch is blocked out by a giant moutain of garbage.

There's no reason to assume that somebody who questions the AGW hypothesis thinks we should ignore all forms of pollution. I certainly don't.

But human CO2 emissions in themselves aren't going to poison your water or air.

[W. Rabbit]

Because key figures in the field have repeatedly colluded in the falsification of results.

But have all of them? Most of them? Again this is implying that the few big bad apples are somehow hypnotizing the minds of thousands of other no-name (but worthy) scientists into "believing". That's the theme I keep getting from your line of reasoning.

From what I know of the IPCC's project, the "many eyes" approach was taken specifically so that whatever results were produced would be transparent to the world. And so far, the IPCC's reports have been transparent. They've fixed mistakes. They've responded to errors. They've investigated reports of mishandling.

One bad scientist, one bad experiment, or one bad graph doesn't spoil the bunch. That was Professor Muller's argument too.

Isn't that why repeatability is so important in science?

So what Prof Dipshit lied/fudged/got it wrong/fucked up....if no one can reproduce his results, forget he ever published them.
That's essentially the story of cold fusion research. Plenty of credible scientists as well as fraudulent ones have published cold fusion results/claims, and they were still all wrong.

Except this time many more reasonable people are pulled into believing the questionable premise because the political biases involved aren't anything like as hateful, and the hypothesis itself is much harder to falsify than special or general relativity because it's dealing with statistical properties of an extremely complex system.

True, relativity is an elegant formula, and the earth's physical properties are both random and deterministic...not an easy fish to fry by any means.

But then you used the words "believing the questionable premise".

Tell me why that isn't doublespeak for saying "scientists are taking AGW on faith alone".

To me that sounds like a huge generalization.

The bullshit and fraud are all quite clearly documented though. You can't keep dismissing something as a conspiracy theory when the evidence is available for you to read and you aren't willing to read it.

Or put the classic way: "just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you."

What about reading them and dismissing them as inconsequential? That's what I've done and so have thousands of scientists actively involved in AWG research who watched and said "wow they fucked up, I better get my numbers right".

Fraud though? I'm not convinced the "evidence" available amounts to widespread fraud...again that's throwing the baby out with the bathwater (something Prof Murray explicitly spoke about NOT wanting to do with good AWG science...he set up Berkeley so that he could "do right" what he thought had been done very poorly and unscientifically).

But human CO2 emissions in themselves aren't going to poison your water or air.

Of course not. CO2 is also not the only greenhouse gas.

[Cullion]

But have all of them? Most of them? Again this is implying that the few big bad apples are somehow hypnotizing the minds of thousands of other no-name (but worthy) scientists into "believing". That's the theme I keep getting from your line of reasoning.

You believe it. You say you're a scientist. But by your own admission earlier in the thread you haven't even read the evidence.

From what I know of the IPCC's project, the "many eyes" approach was taken specifically so that whatever results were produced would be transparent to the world. And so far, the IPCC's reports have been transparent. They've fixed mistakes. They've responded to errors. They've investigated reports of mishandling.

This was Rajendra Pachauri's response to the Hadley CRU leak

Today Pachauri reversed course and instead launched a defense of the climate scientists that have been accused of collusion, modification and deletion of data and a host of other offenses. He said that he felt the scientists “are being unfairly targeted.” Pachauri said, “The persons who have worked on this report, and those who unfortunately have been victims of this terrible and illegal act, are outstanding scientists, and have contributed enormously over the 20, 21 years of the existence of the IPCC.”

Pachauri stated that his only concern was finding out who was behind it, not if there are any problems with the science behind the manmade climate change theory or the scientists that formulated it. "I think this is an illegal act. The only issue that has to be dealt with as far as this occurrence is concerned is to find out who is behind it," he said.

In regards to a potential investigation, the climate chief said the agency would look at the event, “just to see if there are any lessons for us that we might want to take onboard. We are determining how best to do that. But I want to clarify that this is not an investigation.”

No investigation.

Rajendra Pachauri's not a climatologist by the way. He's a railway engineer turned economist. That's who is in charge of the IPCC.

One bad scientist, one bad experiment, or one bad graph doesn't spoil the bunch. That was Professor Muller's argument too.

It's not one bad scientist. There are lots of names in those emails. Why don't you go and look?

Isn't that why repeatability is so important in science?

Yes. Do you know how many people have actually tried to repeat the CRU's results by analysing their raw data?

Do you?

Name them.