CONVINCED CONTRARIAN: Former skeptic Richard Muller has been convinced by his own data analysis, funded by the oil industry, that climate change is real and humans are to blame.
Image: Wikimedia Commons/J mcandrews
Richard Muller's conversion is complete.
The University of California, Berkeley, physicist once doubted the existence of climate change. Now he is convinced it's not only real but man-made, based on the latest results from his controversial review of temperature records.
"Call me a converted skeptic," Muller wrote in an op-ed published yesterday in The New York Times.
According to his Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project, the average temperature on land has risen 1.5 degrees Celsius -- roughly 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit -- since 1753. That warming has tracked closely with the rise in greenhouse gas emissions from human activities, with little apparent contribution from natural factors like changes in solar activity, the group's latest paper concludes.
The researchers analyzed 14.4 million observations of average monthly land temperatures from 44,455 sites around the world, looking back about 100 years further and using five times more data than independent analyses by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NASA and the U.K. Hadley Centre.
"Three years ago I identified problems in previous climate studies that, in my mind, threw doubt on the very existence of global warming," Muller wrote. "Last year, following an intensive research effort involving a dozen scientists, I concluded that global warming was real and that the prior estimates of the rate of warming were correct. I'm now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause."
It is a marked about-face. Muller initially sought to investigate skeptics' claims that flawed data and methods had skewed prior examinations of global temperature trends. His startup kitty included $150,000 from a foundation started by oil billionaire Charles Koch that has supported efforts opposing mainstream climate change science.
'Stronger' results than IPCC
Even after the Berkeley project's initial findings last year agreed with prior analyses by NASA, NOAA and the Hadley Centre, Muller resisted pinning the blame for climate change on man-made greenhouse gas emissions.
"The amount that's due to humans is still open, and there are very big uncertainties in that," he said in November at a Washington, D.C., briefing organized by Democratic lawmakers (ClimateWire, Nov. 15, 2011).
Now Muller says Berkeley Earth's new results "are stronger than those of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change," because they found solar activity had a "negligible" role in warming observed since the 1750s.
In its 2007 report, the IPCC concluded with 90 percent certainty that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions have been the primary factor in Earth's overall temperature rise since 1950. But the U.N. panel said natural causes, including changes in the sun's output, may have been a significant factor before then.
Still, the new findings are not likely to alter the polarized U.S. debate on climate change.
Derision from deniers
Muller's work has been rejected by climate skeptics, including some he once called collaborators. And mainstream climate researchers have greeted the Berkeley Earth research with exasperation, sometimes tinged with amusement (ClimateWire, Oct. 21, 2011).
Tonya Mullins, a spokeswoman for the Charles Koch Foundation, said it "has long supported and will continue to support sound, nonpartisan, scientific research."
"Our grants are designed to promote independent research," she said. "As such, recipients hold full control over their findings. In this support, we strive to benefit society by promoting discovery and informing public policy."
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151 Comments
Add Comment<<In the meantime, the Berkeley Earth group is working to publish its findings, said Elizabeth Muller, Richard Muller's daughter and the project's executive director.>>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSeems to be code for “not peer reviewed but we want to make a fuss about it”.
(OK, so I'm sounding like a broken record here; I've been pitching this stuff all over the place -- but I'm striking while the iron is hot -- there's some good stuff at a link below that I want as many people as possible to see, and with the global-temperature data back in the news cycle, now is as good a time as any for them to see it).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe BEST team will probably have trouble getting their work published due to the "Been there, done that, wore out the t-shirt" effect.
A rehash of material that's been well known/understood for decades generally won't get published unless the authors genuinely "bring something new to the table".
It turns out that computing global-average temperature estimates from surface temperature data is one of those "you can get 99-percent of the results with 1 percent of the work" problems.
It's just not that hard to verify that global-temperature calculations published by NASA/etc. are quite robust.
Process rural vs. urban stations separately, and you get very similar global temperature results. Process raw and adjusted (homogenized) data separately, and you get similar results. (On a global-average scale, much of the "homogenization" processing cancels itself out).
You can even throw out 98-99 percent of the stations and *still* get results that look very similar to the officially published (NASA/etc.) results.
In fact, take fewer than 70 rural stations scattered around the globe, run *raw* data collected from those stations through a straightforward area-weighted averaging procedure, and you will *still* get results that look a lot like NASA's.
See http://tinyurl.com/globaltemperatureresultsV2 for details.
Billionaire Charles Koch funds research to disprove climate change with a scientist on his side with leads to more evidence supporting human created climate change: It seems that the universe has a sense of irony!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLesson learned: Never bet against reality!
Not so I think Krohleder - see here http://realisticbeinggreen.wordpress.com/2012/07/29/beware-the-trojan-horse/
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBest to be extremely careful before trusting a thing Muller says. A new tactic among the New World Order Thought Control troops is turnabout. In opposing climate change, for example, parroting condemnation of arrogance by the minions of the oil industry, the deniers now say it's those who think man can change the envuironment who are arrogant! And, totally side-stepping the issue of the craven greed driving the multi-multi-millionaires who deny climate change, they denounce those promoting it who try for research grants on the subject and accuse them of framing their insistences in order to try to grants.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA majot tactic of the NWO in the recent past, though, has been to pretend solidarity with those who promote the things the NWO doesn't want the people to know, then infiltrtate their ranks with NWO moles and use those thugs to work to ruin the reputation of the alternate beliefs.
There is already a sizable list of cases where it has happened.
A chemtrail forum site I used to belong to was completely compromised. Every moderator was a thug for the "debunkers". Dare say anything criticizing of "debunkers" and they came down hard on you, but the "debunkers" could let loose any verbiage they wanted. They even called on the moderators directly to punish those they didn't like. And, in one case, when a "debunker" made an outlandishly ill informed arror on a subject and I called them on it, they actually went to their moderator pals and were granted the right to change their entry so it was correct! They then attacked me, saying I didn't know what I was talking about, they had been right all along! I had kept photographic prof of the screen with their previous entry, however, and I uploaded it. I didn't hear anymore about the issue, but there wasn't an admission from the crooks in charge, either!
More recently, if you look at the web site Anomalist, the commentor introducing various news items was changed. Where the old one may have had more than a passing interest in the "Electric Universe" theory, the new one takes ghoulish pleasure in introducing each entry with a contemptuous jibe, doing their level best to make every reference to the unconventional sound like lunacy.
And, about a year ago, the supposedly UFO devoted blog, Devoid, on the Sarasota Herald Tribune website began talking about the supposed incident at the Minot, North Dakota Strategic Air Command nuclear weapons storage facility. The blog editor, Billy Cox, was agog in praising "researcher" Tom Tulien who declared that "classical ufology" has been "over for years", which he described as good since they "contaminated and destroyed" their cases. I argued this was unfair if not untrue and I accused Tulien of the same quisling NWO agenda as the other moles. The entire blog turned against me, attacking me. My undermining of their assertions and assaults, however, seems to have been too much for them, since, a few months later, they changed the blog's configuration so it no longer carries records of comments.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd Devoid can be considered to be only a fraction of the tellingly entitled "The Other Side Of Truth", the blog put out by "filmmaker", Paul Kimball. The site consisted of little more than Kimball constantly praising his "films", displaying pictures of himself mugging it up at various places across the globe, and mocking everything about ufology. His transparent quuisling dodge seems to be that he was pretending to try to "improve ufology by keeping it on the straight and narrow". He recently ended his blog, likely because "The Other Side Of Truth" seems to have started to be used to describe Mitt Romney.
It seems only a matter of time before Muller, paid by the Koch brothers to the climate change movement, will "predict" temperatures will reach 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit by 2012 and will be betting 500 ostriches on the outcome.
Someone wake me up when Anthony Watts and Richard Muller publish their separate and irreconcilable studies in a peer reviewed journal; until then I am going to keep watching the clowns fall out of the clown car.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBoth Watts and Muller should take their pads and pencils and place them in their brief cases, close the case and slide out through the crack under the door to hide in the shadows of total disgrace for masquerading as scientists.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd we have a nobel prize winner who last year decided he does not think man has as much effect on global warming.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy favorite part of this is using records from 1753, right. They had such accurate methods of measuring about 1/100000th of the atmosphere in their posh locations in london, new york or paris. Talk about drawing ridiculous conclusions from almost no data.
Personally, I choose to go with the nobel prize winner, Dr. Ivar Giaever, also a physicist.
Na g n o s t ic ,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou read an article that explicitly discusses a scientist who was paid by one of the biggest champions of denial, who then found that his experiments resulted in the same conclusions as all the "leftists and Greens".
And from this you determine that the people Dr. Muller now agrees with are somehow at fault?
Nagnostic Says: ...the facts of the matter would have been settled long ago.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTrent Says: It has been settled long ago. It is just that ignoramuses like you will not admit it. The only muddying going on here is the perturbations of the fossil fuel industry and their ideological dupes.
Trent,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFully agree, though you replied to the wrong denier.
@Priddseren,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow cute! In two paragraphs you have committed an argument from incredulity and an argument from authority. And it is pretty transparent that you did not read the article.
@Marcher,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDarn it. Thanks for the correction.
Where were the temperature stations in 1573 - 44,000 sites - where were they and now - were they global or cherry picked for grant money? Some one built a computer model based on a 100 year period to stretch to over a over hundred year time frame. Where is real SCIENTIFIC PEER REVIEW - lost to Consensus Science - it is the economy stupid = Money.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@Profit is Up,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou lot can not just be bothered to read the article, can you?
Of course he didn't, don't you know facts have a left wing bias?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI can tell you how glad I am the suddenly fake climate skeptics are dismissing Dr. Muller's, et al work because it has not been peer reviewed yet. I AGREE.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have a question though for the fake skeptics. Why is this standard not applied in ALL cases? Hypocrisy, thy name is Anthony Watts and friends.
Take a long distance view of our planet from space, notice how thin the atmosphere is! Remember that since man discover he could control fire and burn whatever for fuel releasing the by-products into that thin envelope, then lie to yourself that we're not causing damage to it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDo you not read the "storys " that other scientists tell us about how the Sun is fusing hydgron in to heilum, and as that happens Mr.Muller, the Sun changes, gets bigger, hotter and more massive but losses density, accordint to "scientists" that is. How is anything we humans are doing efficting that?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou don't have to be a genius to follow the pattern. There was an Ice Age. Then came a period of warming. This happened over and over. Even before there were people. The sea levels were higher at one time. The plains states were a shallow ocean. We don't really know what this planet's "normal" temp is! We know so little. In our search, we seem to find that we know less and less. Fossils taken from the top of Mount Everest, indicate that that spot, was the bottom of the ocean on several different occasions. We only know it for where it is. That is the limit of our science, what is...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisApparently Dr. Muller has come to his senses and does not wish to go down in history as another one of those men who "boxed Galileo's ears".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs the situation progresses and the negative feedback loops become the topic of the day, there is going to be a lot of paid propagandists who work for the oil companies that will be looking for work.
It is one thing to just plain be wrong because of a lack of solid data, but it's quite another to play the cloak and dagger game instigated by big business with real scientists vieing for a place in history as men of vision.
Watts already lost that prize too.
Mutant Buzzar Says: Mr.Muller, the Sun changes, gets bigger, hotter and more massive but losses density, accordint to "scientists" that is. How is anything we humans are doing efficting that?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTrent Says: Hold it. You contend that Richard Muller is saying that humans are affecting the sun? No? You were being facetious in a bad humor sort of way? OK.
If the sun was responsible for the present warming then we should be able to see the out put of the Sun's total irradiance increase. We do not.
Total Solar Irradiance:
http://lasp.colorado.edu/sorce/data/tsi_data.htm
We can also make predictions about what a solar induced warming would look like. Can you name any?
"...There was an Ice Age. Then came a period of warming. This happened over and over..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnother denier that doesn't understand the concept of time. Every time I hear that same argument, like a broken record, I think of someone who never did their homework in school and always had an excuse.
"<<In the meantime, the Berkeley Earth group is working to publish its findings, said Elizabeth Muller, Richard Muller's daughter and the project's executive director.>>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSeems to be code for “not peer reviewed but we want to make a fuss about it”.
The "Best" paper was rejected in peer review and he was asked to resubmit a new paper. We don't know about Watts paper, but documented surface station problems, will have to be addressed or we are all whistling dixie.
Btw: Richard Muller was never a skeptic of AGW. He WAS, however, disgusted with Al Gore and the terrible misspeak of the Inconvenient truth. That just makes him sensible, not a AGW skeptic.
Almost all skeptics, I know, acknowledge our current warm period/cycle. Causation has always been the contentious issue and remains current. Watts's paper puts a more realistic number on the rate. If it holds... it is great news for the world... isn't it? GK
GK,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSeems your writing is code for "neither paper is peer reviewed but I am a denier, so I support the non-peer reviewed paper I happen to like."
What we have here is two scientists doing research outside their area of expertise, one found that the views of about 98% of relevant experts hold, the other found the opposite. As such, I would go with the opinion of the relevant experts, rather than a politically motivated denier like Watts.
"What we have here is two scientists doing research outside their area of expertise"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFair enough (although disputable), but nothing you have said changes documented problems. It won't just go away.
"but documented surface station problems, will have to be addressed or we are all whistling dixie." stands! GK
"but nothing you have said changes documented problems. It won't just go away."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust as nothing you have said changes the findings of pretty much every climatologist studying the issue. It just won't go away, no matter how many deniers attack the researchers and the research.
Honestly, I would prefer Watts to be correct, just as I would prefer the Frasier Institute to be correct when it claimed the dangers associated with smoking were just junk science propagated by left/marxist/socialsits looking to control peoples lives. But, like most things, I go with generally accepted scientific fact.
"Just as nothing you have said changes the findings of pretty much every climatologist studying the issue."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo... I would say every climatologist is carefully reading Watts's paper draft, as we speak. Right now, it is the peer review, the rest are waiting for. Read the draft at WUWT and you too, will wrestle with the conundrum, of extrapolating globally. It mostly gets worse, as you leave the US stations for foreign stations. Popcorn time! GK
Yeah, and if anti-war liberals had just shut up and let Bush bomb Iraq in peace, we could have avoided the Iraq war.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this???
This article has already one major benefit: all those climate deniers who beg to be accepted as proper skeptics came out in force to scream treason without the slightest sign of prior cognitive activity. Already my funny moment of the week.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNot a single one of them has tried to analyze this article objectively. Instead, as soon as they realized that a former denier had been convinced by his own research that climate change was human-made their brains exploded.
All those cute, little deniers always begging for proofs they could understand, always refusing evidence from "the other side", and now one of theirs is talking in a way they understand, presenting the type of evidence they always wanted. And they need tetanus shots?
As one of the scientists quoted says, it might take Muller a while to catch up, still one must credit him for having the honesty to accept the results of his research even if it means to admit he was wrong in the past. Admitting to having been wrong is never easy, and it takes mental integrity. No wonder the deniers foam at the mouth when they look into the mirror Muller holds up and realize they don't have that quality.
I am curious as to the Koch brothers. Will they now put their money where their mouth is or live to rue the day?
In the one case they can advance to social benefactors on the scale of their fortune, in the other case they will become known forever as intellectual hypocrites and social parasites only interested in making money even if it kills the planet. Which one will it be? The implications are quite interesting.
The denier cake goes to no one's surprise of course to dear old prizzie. He quotes a single nobelprize winner who lost his marbles a few years ago, which, as percentages go, is acceptable in his age category. Then he refuses old records because they are not accurate enough for his taste while he has in the past himself used old records to prove that climate change is cyclical. "Talk about drawing ridiculous conclusions from almost no data". One logical fallacy after the other...no wonder he likes Giaever.
Give Muller his credit, he deserves it. And additional respect for having the cojones to face his own results. And the public. And his sponsors. Quite a number of people I know whom I doubt would have the balls to face that kind of music.
While watching him on Maddow I couldn't shake the feeling there was more to the story; Koch brothers wouldn't just let this happen; they WILL get their money's worth from this investment. Then, at the end of the interview he segued from his area of expertise to offer his opinion on a solution. BINGO! Fracking for natural gas is the answer he tells us...so; the Brothers are using this to get their industry positively framed as the public tide on climate change turns---Sure it's real and WE'VE got the answer. "can't beat 'em? join 'em"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thistnoble: like any convert he will show a tendency to suddenly know more ways to salvation than the pope. I'd say, let him. At least he now has the roadmap more or less the right way up. It's a start.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you take it on that scale Mutant, you are absolutely right !
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGiven the massive size of this third rock from the sun, why bother with the infinitely small amount of biological material that sits on it's surface ?!
One down and a few thousand Repblicans to go and maybe, just maybe we can focus on solutions instead of the politics of obstruction.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"I would say every climatologist is carefully reading Watts's paper draft, as we speak."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy would any educated climatologist care what Watts, who is no more then a 'has been' meteorologist, has to say about anything? Watt's whole agenda is only about driving advertisers to his blog site. He does this by stirring up controversy, not engaging in real science research.
Watts is like the Rush Limbaugh of climate science. People who already know whats happening don't bother listening to Rush or Watts. What's the point? The people who really do listen to these hot air bags do so because they want to reinforce their own political beliefs, which are essentially the same as religious beliefs. It's a feel good thing and rather then admitting that there is real problems we all must face, it's easier to just stick their head in the sand and say it is all a bunch of baloney.
The problem with this kind of reasoning is that real issues that need solutions get muddled in side shows of little or no importance except to a few big corporations that could not exist without the lies. The fracking industry is a perfect example. They need the water to make money just like Nestles needs lobbyists to take away private property water rights in order to profit on bottled water (which they charge more for then gasoline!). The frackers just make up a bunch of phoney data that shows fracking does not destroy water supplies. The drought is a non-issue to them. They can legislate their way around other peoples water. The water supplies that were polluted they blame on bad well casings. Well, who drilled the wells in the first place? Then they say there is no proof that CO2 is a greenhouse gas just like they said their was no proof that lead in the fuel was a problem decades ago.
The real question becomes, "Who are you going to trust?". A blogger with no degree in the field that is trying to drive traffic to his site, or an international consortium of scientists who all have doctorates in the science Watt's is blogging about?
The Minnesotans for Global Warming people have tried to inject a little humor into the situation. Those that enjoy a good laugh can share at:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYup_vNcoEs&feature=player_embedded
Those with no sense of humor, should stay away from the link. GK
flea says: "Why would any educated climatologist care what Watts has to say...".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTry to find a climatologist to-day who has not read the draft. While you are doing that... ask the rest why they have read this paper... so soon. Let us know what they say. GK
You are nit picking Singing Flea :)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisg. karst: you got that wrong - singing flea asks a question to which you either reply with an intelligent counter or you disprove him by citing one single climatologist who takes Watts seriously. You don't even need to cite one who read the draft, a single confirmed climatologist who would respect Watts' opinion on anything climatological would be enough. If you can't even do that your comment is meaningless. Then your post is simply an absurd attempt to elevate Watts to somebody in climate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI see you and carlyle are on the same side. Some people are ashamed of nothing.
Here are three right off the top of my head. You really should read more carefully.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRoy W. Spencer is a climatologist and a Principal Research Scientist for the University of Alabama in Huntsville, as well as the U.S. Science Team Leader for the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR-E) on NASA’s Aqua satellite. He has served as senior scientist for climate studies at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
John Christy, A native of Fresno, California, Christy received a B.A. in Mathematics (1973) from the California State University, Fresno, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Atmospheric Sciences (1984, 1987) from the University of Illinois.
Richard Lindzen, American atmospheric physicist,He has published more than 200 scientific papers and books.[1] He was a lead author of Chapter 7, 'Physical Climate Processes and Feedbacks,' of the IPCC Third Assessment Report on climate change.Lindzen has given estimates of the Earth's climate sensitivity to be 0.5°C based on ERBE data. These estimates have been criticized by other researchers. Lindzen addressed these criticisms in a 2011 paper, still showing the models exaggerating climate sensitivity.
Your turn, name a few who haven't read the paper... I think I can hear crickets... Do you honestly believe Mann and Hansen, haven't read every single word of AW's paper. Critical thinking is not as difficult as you make it appear. GK
The strutting self-importance of the anti-science morons is in full display on this thread. We have one poster who thinks that the world's climatologists are hanging on every word from a retired radio weather announcer with a proven track record of mendacity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think we should start thinking of Anthony Watts and friends in terms of the porn industry. They need to keep UP the appearance of having a case so they commit every dirty trick known to the propagandist. Watts and his minions are the fluffer of the denialist scene.
"The strutting self-importance of the anti-science morons is in full display on this thread."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd we all would like for you (anti-science moron?) to address the paper's findings instead of blathering about someone's underwear drawer. You don't like his research... we all get it by now... you can stop the argumentum ad hominem. Rhetoric seems to be the mainstay with y'all. GK
@G. Karst. I do wish you would learn the difference between a insult and an ad hominem. I have offered no critique of Anthony Watts "paper" because it is not a paper. It is blog article fluffed up to fantastic heights by mobs ditto heads. Get back to me when he and Muller get published.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisG. Karst Says: Rhetoric seems to be the mainstay with y'all.
Trent Says: Projection. When will you clowns learn that a blog posting is NOT science?
Ad hominem:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The phrase now chiefly describes an argument based on the failings of an adversary rather than on the merits of the case"
Monkeys do it by throwing feces at their opponents. Some humans do it by hurling insults (lowest form of AH).
Either way: "Ad hominem attacks on one's opponent are a tried-and-true strategy for people who have a case that is weak." Once again... I think I'm done with this topic. GK
Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/ad-hominem#ixzz22E0lk68N
Yo, Karst. I have not offered ANY critiques of Anthony Watts blog article. So it is not a logical fallacy. You clowns (insult) need to get a grip on rational thought. Like I said. Ring me when Anthony and Muller publish.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere is another well respected scientist, Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. who supports the Watts paper:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrom 1971 to 1974 he worked as a research scientist at the NOAA Experimental Meteorology Lab, from 1974 to 1981 he was an associate professor at the University of Virginia, served the primary academic position of his career as a professor at Colorado State University from 1981 to 2006, was deputy of Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere at Colorado State University from 1985 to 1988, from 1999 to 2006 was Colorado State Climatologist, at Duke University was a research professor from 2003 to 2006, and was a visiting professor at the University of Arizona from October–December 2004. Since 2005, Pielke has served as Senior Research Scientist at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at UC-Boulder and an emeritus professor of the Department of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University. He retired from CSU and in post-retirement is a CIRES researcher.
'Anthony has led what is a critically important assessment of the issue of station quality. Indeed, this type of analysis should have been performed by Tom Karl and Tom Peterson at NCDC, Jim Hansen at GISS and Phil Jones at the University of East Anglia (and Richard Muller). However, they apparently liked their answers and did not want to test the robustness of their findings.
In direct contradiction to Richard Muller’s BEST study, the new Watts et al 2012 paper has very effectively shown that a substantive warm bias exists even in the mean temperature trends. This type of bias certainly exists throughout the Global Historical Climate Network, as well as what Anthony has documented for the US Historical Climate Reference Network.'
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2012/07/29/comments-on-the-game-changer-new-paper-an-area-and-distance-weighted-analysis-of-the-impacts-of-station-exposure-on-the-u-s-historical-climatology-network-temperatures-and-temperature-trends-by-w/
G. Karst: "Here are three right off the top of my head."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat would have been a possible reply to La Pulga. And right off the top of your head also? so cool "ggg"
But what is your reply worth?
"You really should read more carefully."
I did, which is why I asked clarification of your comment. And then a discordant alarm went off.
So I searched the net for two minutes:
- Roy Spencer (Alabama U.?): known for always screwing up data; creationist, believes in Intelligent Design; enough already;
- John Christy (same U.);
Spencer and Christy = team famous for messing up a ton of satellite data and trying to cover it up.
Also, (ah, wiki...), Christy admitted a few years ago in court that he had somehow managed to misunderstand certain climate data and said then "... this was six years ago. And the question was about what I thought six years ago." A quite diplomatic way of saying that he couldn't uphold his previous opinion in the face of evidence. (Alabama U. = sponsors = job = ?)
Example given as typical for Christy is his "California Central Valley irrigation Report" which claimed the opposite effect of what everybody and his dog knew. As a result he was then blasted by anyone in sight, even the industry.
- Richard Lindzen: intelligent and stubborn, knows his data but takes his beliefs for truths; which from what little I learned has always been his problem because he believes that knowing data = truth; will he ever consider the possibility that data is only the foundation of knowledge. Still, Lindzen I would have accepted in a line-up.
So we have one creationist, one guy who has problems adding two and two, and one who is respected but starts to doubt himself? That's the best you can do? THAT'S IT? What a JOKE!
You want to hit me with contrarian scientists you gotta do better than that. For example, if I was you here's what I would do: browse the latest climatologists' survey and note the five percent who don't believe in AGW and you got yourself a half-way serious list instead of these two jokers and this one lonely, self-doubting data nerd.
Of course, if I was me, in retaliation I'd hit you over the head with the 95% who support climate warming, even better, the 85% who support that this change is human-made.
Since you can foresee the outcome... but it was fun while you lasted.
"reply with an intelligent counter or you disprove him by citing one single climatologist who takes Watts seriously. You don't even need to cite one who read the draft, a single confirmed climatologist who would respect Watts' opinion on anything climatological would be enough."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour words - not mine. You asked for 1... I gave you 4, and their qualifications. You couldn't come up with even one. Nada, zip. So on with the Ad hominem attacks, Ad Infinitum. GK
The matter of the fact is, this article is not so much about climatology but about what the deniers consider a war and where the frontline is.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMuller is seen as a traitor by the deniers. Why? Because he was trying to do his job correctly? They lambast him because he's been what they always demand, a proper researcher?
And instead of wondering if they could possibly learn something from him, who knows more about the climate than all of the deniers here, they blast him as if he was a general who deserted his troops. What kind of an understanding of scientific work is that? Is that how deniers understand academia? Modern Galileo blasters, champions of the non-sequitur, arguing from ignorance and incredulity.
If at least the deniers could name a single half decent climatologist who went from warmist to denier, they could then pretend that Muller went the wrong way as proved by that example and I could vaguely understand their desperation. But this?
The deniers go to enormous lengths to pull whatever quality science journeyman on their side in the hope of giving their generally groundless beliefs at least an air of weight. How desperate are they then if they see a scientist as traitor? Climate change a religious war? The deniers here disqualify themselves beyond redemption from any say in the matter as they refuse to pay the simplest, most basic respect to what seems an honest scientist for the only reason that he left their church. What's religious fundamentalism got to do with science?
Muller has already filled an important purpose. He has unmasked their last strategy, that they would respect science if it came from "one of them", as a lie. They cannot and will not differentiate between belief and science. But they still fail to acknowledge that they have nothing left to stand on. As a result, all deniers here failed their definitely last chance at qualifying for being taken seriously. Disqualified, all.
Their very last, desperate attack has failed. The war is over, they lost.
Let's move on.
The matter of the fact is, this article is not so much about climatology but about what the deniers consider a war and where the frontline is.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMuller is seen as a traitor by the deniers. Why? Because he was trying to do his job correctly? They lambast him because he's been what they always demand, a proper researcher?
And instead of wondering if they could possibly learn something from him, who knows more about the climate than all of the deniers here, they blast him as if he was a general who deserted his troops. What kind of an understanding of scientific work is that? Is that how deniers understand academia? Modern Galileo blasters, champions of the non-sequitur, arguing from ignorance and incredulity.
If at least the deniers could name a single half decent climatologist who went from warmist to denier, they could then pretend that Muller went the wrong way as proved by that example and I could vaguely understand their desperation. But this?
The deniers go to enormous lengths to pull whatever quality science journeyman on their side in the hope of giving their generally groundless beliefs at least an air of weight. How desperate are they then if they see a scientist as traitor? Climate change a religious war? The deniers here disqualify themselves beyond redemption from any say in the matter as they refuse to pay the simplest, most basic respect to what seems an honest scientist for the only reason that he left their church. What's religious fundamentalism got to do with science?
Muller has already filled an important purpose. He has unmasked their last strategy, that they would respect science if it came from "one of them", as a lie. They cannot and will not differentiate between belief and science. But they still fail to acknowledge that they have nothing left to stand on. As a result, all deniers here failed their definitely last chance at qualifying for being taken seriously. Disqualified, all.
Their very last, desperate attack has failed. The war is over, they lost.
Let's move on.
poster of comment nr 50: read comment nr 49 before your feet attempt suicide.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI just realize that for some reason comment nr 51 appears twice. Ok then, both sides a copy. <g>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishave a nice summer all
(climatically wishful thinking but you get the idea)
Re: “According to his Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project, the average temperature on land has risen 1.5 degrees Celsius -- roughly 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit -- since 1753.”
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAn average temperature increase of 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit since 1753 doesn’t seem to me to be particularly Earth-shattering.
Re: “I'm now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause.”
It would seem not everyone agrees:
Global warming in the twenty-first century: An alternative scenario
http://www.pnas.org/content/97/18/9875.long
Abstract
A common view is that the current global warming rate will continue or accelerate. But we argue that rapid warming in recent decades has been driven mainly by non-CO2 greenhouse gases (GHGs), such as chlorofluorocarbons, CH4, and N2O, not by the products of fossil fuel burning, CO2 and aerosols, the positive and negative climate forcings of which are partially offsetting. The growth rate of non-CO2 GHGs has declined in the past decade. If sources of CH4 and O3 precursors were reduced in the future, the change in climate forcing by non-CO2 GHGs in the next 50 years could be near zero. Combined with a reduction of black carbon emissions and plausible success in slowing CO2 emissions, this reduction of non-CO2 GHGs could lead to a decline in the rate of global warming, reducing the danger of dramatic climate change. Such a focus on air pollution has practical benefits that unite the interests of developed and developing countries. However, assessment of ongoing and future climate change requires composition-specific long-term global monitoring of aerosol properties.
It is common sense to be sceptical of the claim that humans are causing global warming when the planet has been warmer before humans were present. Has the earth been cooler in the past with the same CO2 concentration? If SCIAM is truly inpartial, then we will see an article about a researcher who has switched to the 'denier' camp.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlain science will show the truth no matter how much money the deniers throw at it. It will become obvious to them, no matter how much vested interest (Koch brothers, Rienhart etc) fund dodgy research.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSome of them (many who continue to comment here) will take a little longer to open their eyes to reality.
Go Science!
Bill Crofut Says: Re: “I'm now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause.”
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt would seem not everyone agrees:
Global warming in the twenty-first century: An alternative scenario http://www.pnas.org/content/97/18/9875.long
Trent Says: It is pretty clear you have no clue what that paper is talking about. From the same paper:
"CLIMATE FORCING BY CO2 IS THE LARGEST FORCING, but it does not dwarf the others (Fig. 1). Forcing by CH4 (0.7 W/m2) is half as large as that of CO2, and the total forcing by non-CO2 GHGs (1.4 W/m2) equals that of CO2. Moreover, in comparing forcings due to different activities, we must note that the fossil fuels producing most of the CO2 are also the main source of aerosols, especially sulfates, black carbon, and organic aerosols."
*Capitalized for the hard of learning.
@Scepticalofsciam,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow does the fact that it has been warmer in the past before humans existed preclude humans being responsible now? Why is logic never a strong point with you clowns?
g. karst: I accept your challenge simply to put your feet out of their misery:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"You asked for 1 (AGW-denying scientist reading/supporting the Watts character)... I gave you 4, and their qualifications."
As I said, you should have read comment nr 49 before posting your comment nr 50. Or are you the masochistic type?
Your first two I tore up because they are below any scientific standards. The third? If I was you I wouldn't be too sure if he still counts as a straightforward denier. Still, I'll be fair and give you that one. So it's 2 to me, 1 to you. One point left. Let's weigh this one double, winner takes all. Loser leaves town, ok?
So to finish me off, you hit me with - Roger Pielke.
YOU CITE ROGER PIELKE AS A CLIMATE DENIER? <plonk, falling off chair> ohmagawd, man, you make even Sarah Palin look like an intellectual giant.
What were you thinking? Do you understand the mental process? It would have been so simple to look up the man on wiki but even that is too much for your thinkbox?
You know copy+paste? Understand contextual editing? Here goes:
"Pielke has indeed criticized the IPCC for its conclusions regarding CO2 and global warming and accused it of selectively choosing data to support a selective view of the science."
(My note: as long as the data the IPCC chose is correct, verified and integer, I can live with it although I tend slightly towards Pielke's point of view myself. Regardless of which it is Pielke's qualified prerogative to point at this aspect he would have handled differently. But this does not alter his scientific conviction about climate change in itself as we see in the next paragraph. Here then is what the person you present as the archetypical climate-denying scientist has to say about AGW (the caps are mine):
"Pielke has a somewhat nuanced position on climate change, which is sometimes taken for skepticism, a label that he EXPLICITLY renounces.
He has said: 'THE EVIDENCE OF A HUMAN FINGERPRINT ON THE GLOBAL AND REGIONAL CLIMATE IS INCONTROVERTIBLE AS CLEARLY ILLUSTRATED IN THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL REPORT AND IN OUR RESEARCH PAPERS."
And despite the man's own and clear words you still list him as your ultimate proof that even serious scientists deny AGW? Pielke was your trumpcard???
You are the guy who told me that I "really should read more carefully." Get a life.
Now I know what you are, you know what you are, everybody here now knows what you are. End of story. Come back when you've come to your senses. Start from scratch. Start with yourself.
I won't respond to fools. If you knew anything about the climate science community, you wouldn't have to look any of these people up. They are all well known.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are two Roger Pielke(s) in the community. Both well known (to everybody but you). There is Roger Pielke Sr. and also his son Roger Pielke Jr. I didn't call either a "denier", but cited Roger Pielke Sr. NOT Jr. I could have cited Jr also (as he has read the paper and posted). Both are serious and heavyweights. You will waste no more of my time on this thread. GK
You need to do much more "googling". GK
What's your point?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour entire argument seems to be that respected scientists have been reading a paper published by Watts. I'm sure he's not the first denier whose work they have read, and I'll bet everything I own he won't be the last. This proves nothing except that respected scientists are willing and able to do their job and review papers submitted by various researchers.
Additionally, when you start off by saying you won't respond to someone, then spring into a long list of ad hominem attacks against that person, you forfeit credibility and the right to expect others to take you seriously. Either respond or don't.
g. karst, loser:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this<If you knew anything about the climate science community, you wouldn't have to look any of these people up. They are all well known.>
Are you telling me that you listed the two jokers Spencer and Christy, and also Lindzen and Pielke, including all their bio and work details, from memory?
I just checked this minute, you copy/pasted those details word for word from wikipedia. You are a plagiator of the most despicable sort, stealing big chunks of other people's text without giving the source, passing it as your own. People have been sentenced in court for this kind of theft. You have proven yourself to be a liar and a thief.
<There are two Roger Pielke(s) in the community. Both well known (to everybody but you).>
Yes. Reread your own comment Nr 48 where you write:
<Here is another well respected scientist, Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. who supports the Watts paper:>
And I quoted Pielke SENIOR's OWN WORDS where he expressly confirms his scientifically founded opinion that present climate change is man-made to rebuke your claim. I quote the very man you cite and you pretend I have confused him with someone else?
Pielke has provided Watts with data. General and accepted practice amongst researchers. He also agrees, and I pop this up for the circumstance, that siting and proper installation of weather stations is important and that this has been neglected in the (USA) past and has biased the data.
BUT it is generally understood, and Pielke says so himself, I will quote that further down, that this is NOT changing the overall basis or agreement on climate change. IOW it has somewhat tainted some of the data, but not invalidated the conclusion. Pielke Sr is perfectly right asking for better weather station management, and anyone will agree with him or Watts on this. But it does not validate Watts stand on AGW at all. Why can't someone who is generally wrong not be right occasionally? Why would someone occasionally right be considered right on everything?
I debunk the rest of your post in the next comment.
G. Karst:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo ensure that I describe Pielke's stand on AGW correctly I went to:
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/
where he introduces the Watts paper by saying:
<First, however, to make sure that my perspective on climate is properly understood:
1) There has been global warming over the last several decades. The ocean is the component of the climate system that is best suited for quantifying climate system heat change;
2) The human addition to CO2 into the atmosphere is a first-order climate forcing>
Do you understand plain English?
And to save your face you pretend that I may have confused the Senior with the Junior?
BTW I do quite agree with the Junior's opinion on the speed at which climate change can be influenced and what present socio-political management can achieve. (We differ on how we would go about the solution. I believe that a fundamental paradigmatic shift is needed and that the official, scientific and political, approaches all lack common sense. There is one approach I would fully support if it was applied to climate change, I translated its text, but it is based on a thought model from a very different field and I don't know if I am entitled to mention/quote it here as its final version is still in the works.)
So what do we have? Everything you said has been proven wrong, large chunks of your posts to have been stolen, half your witnesses to be ridiculous and the others misquoted. You have two creationists, one discreet numbers scientist and one guy who knows his stuff but whom you misinterprete on purpose or from lack of mental ability.
What you could have done if you had half a brain is quote this from Pielke:
"Muller's climate work is based on his minimal knowledge of a field he is not an expert in. He proves that a scientist, regardless of how good he is in his own field, should tread very carefully when he goes outside it"
or something to that effect. And I fully agree with him.
Except that Pielke, as scientists are prone to do, has not thought how this is seen by the people outside. He is sinning from carelessness worse than a few wrongly sited weather stations with statements like this where he plays into the hands of climate-change deniers. It is ivory tower negligence at its most typical.
You see, I agree in essence with Pielke but I refuse the way he put it. He is not doing climate a service by babbling in public as if he was around the breakfast table. I find he could have expressed himself a bit more like comment nr 34.
Now get, git.
Ah, we bloddy foreigners, using our non-US vocabulary 'à tort et à travers'...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this<"git" is mild bad language with origins in British English for a silly, incompetent, stupid, annoying, senile elderly or childish person.>
Well, yes, exactly what I wanted to say. Not ad hominem, as the standard expression here goes, simply an objective, even if 'leger de main' characterization of someone from proof provided by the described himself.
Org Pielke quote:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Muller's latest BEST claims are, in my view, an embarrassment. He makes far-reaching conclusions based on his sparse knowledge of the uncertainties in multi-decadal land surface temperature record. His comments show what occurs when a scientist, with excellent research credentials within their area of scientific expertise, go outside of their area of knowledge"
He'd tell me that in private we'd know what to think. Same as the personal East-Anglia mails.
But don't shoot the foot you're standing on in public unless you want every climate change denier in the world to quote you as "reputed anti-climate-change climatologist" for the rest of your life.
Or be paraded on Watts' anti-AGW blog as his staunchest supporter.
Scientists and public communication... left-brain giants, right-brain dwarfs. <g>
Bozo had an unfounded belief that no one working in climate science had a clue. Bozo makes a big noise about it for years. Bozo finally does his first bit of research in the field, and what he proves is he is the one who didn't have a clue.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is big news?
No, I was simply responding to the ridiculous claim that no qualified climatologist would read Watts's paper, when in fact all of them are presently engaged in it's reading and analysis. You guys seem to be incapable of following a thread. I did exactly what I was challenged to do.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHowever, the flea and jctyler were unable to come up with one climatologist who hasn't read the paper. So their statement has been completely falsified.
It should be easier for you to follow now, as I'm sure flea and jctyler will continue to fill this page with rhetoric and drivel, for all to see and wonder. Lacking any references or data... what else can they do? Carry on. GK
Btw: Just in case there are those who are confused by Pielke SR's position, I will repeat his on point citation:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this'Anthony has led what is a critically important assessment of the issue of station quality. Indeed, this type of analysis should have been performed by Tom Karl and Tom Peterson at NCDC, Jim Hansen at GISS and Phil Jones at the University of East Anglia (and Richard Muller). However, they apparently liked their answers and did not want to test the robustness of their findings.
In direct contradiction to Richard Muller’s BEST study, the new Watts et al 2012 paper has very effectively shown that a substantive warm bias exists even in the mean temperature trends. This type of bias certainly exists throughout the Global Historical Climate Network, as well as what Anthony has documented for the US Historical Climate Reference Network.'
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2012/07/29/comments-on-the-game-changer-new-paper-an-area-and-distance-weighted-analysis-of-the-impacts-of-station-exposure-on-the-u-s-historical-climatology-network-temperatures-and-temperature-trends-by-w/
Trent1492 (comment 58),
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou may very well be correct in stating my ignorance of the content of the body of the paper, but not the content of the abstract. For those of us who suffer the malady of learning impairment, are you insinuating the text of the body of the paper contradicts the abstract?
G. Karst:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"I was simply responding to the ridiculous claim that no qualified climatologist would read Watts's paper, when in fact all of them are presently engaged in it's reading and analysis."
Blabla. Of course every climatologist reads everything that is published by an accredited scientist on climate change. They even read Muller's work while many more or less subtly believe the same thing David_Lewis said in comment 67.
Although, and I'd like to stress this, I give Muller credit for having the honesty to change his mind and admit so publicly, which is an honesty many other academic deniers do not have.
What you EXPRESSLY implied is that climatologists read Watts' paper like the long-awaited gospel that will finally bury AGW. THAT is what you wanted to get across, THAT was your message. And THAT message is bunk. That's watts up.
Keep wiggling.
flea says: "Why would any educated climatologist care what Watts has to say...".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI replied:
"Try to find a climatologist to-day who has not read the draft. While you are doing that... ask the rest why they have read this paper... so soon. Let us know what they say." GK
jctyler then threw down his michael jackson glove:
g. karst: you got that wrong - singing flea asks a question to which you either reply with an intelligent counter or you disprove him by citing one single climatologist who takes Watts seriously.
It only takes an ability to read, to identify the "losers" here. I don't like the word loser. Y'all are just naive and misinformed, as I clearly demonstrated. When you acquire the ability to follow a thread and back up your nonsense, we will talk again. Until, then... "talk to the hand". Maybe y'all will do better on the next thread, but I don't see how. GK
G. Karst:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thismaking sure you don't wiggle free from your own trap:
<Try to find a climatologist to-day who has not read the draft. While you are doing that... ask the rest why they have read this paper... so soon.>
... I'm reading between the dots and the lines...
or as Trent put it: "We have one poster who thinks that the world's climatologists are hanging on every word from a retired radio weather announcer with a proven track record of mendacity."
Which is exactly what you tried to convey.
Then you mention Christy and Spencer. The space between the lines gets bigger... creationism ... anti-AGW... Watts... Garstig Karstig...
Later on you cite Pielke who leaned out a bit too far and is right now hitting his head against every telephone pole on the railroad. Allright, he is a perfectionist but even he knows that data can be corrected once the mistakes are known (weeding out the top and bottom, high and low, applying correction algos, excluding skewed regional data for the overall picture, that kind of stuff). He should have realized that the Watts report on the weather stations is nothing but a large-scale technical maintenance report not influencing the fundamentals of the outcome. Also, sea stations are generally run by pros, and even they make mistakes, land stations often by amateurs, so yes, he is used to better read-outs, but to then go and expose himself to be used by the creationist/anti-AGW lobby in support of Watts' ridiculous claims that a number of lopsided weather stations will in the end explain why AGW is a hoax? What was the Senior thinking? Angling to become the Watson of climatology?
But then it's easy for me to rant, no one knows only half my blunders...
jctyler says:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"But then it's easy for me to rant, no one knows only half my blunders... "
Wrong again! Everything you have said is a blunder and everyone is quite aware of it. Rant on, after being soundly defeated, you thrash about like a wounded chimpanzee. I doubt anybody is paying any attention to your tactics. Gosh... this is fun. GK
G. Karst:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, I asked you to cite one single climatologist who takes Watts seriously, meaning "Watts" as the anti-AGW crusader, not Watts as the "Watts weather station technical maintenance" reporter.
Pielke is saying that Watts' technical report on certain weather stations is well done. Does that mean that Pielke is taking Watts seriously? Are you saying that Pielke is backing Watts in his anti-AGW drive? You are implying it.
Some things are mutually exclusive, for example saying to be a "climatologist" and "supporting Watts".
That would be like supporting creationism and wanting to be taken seriously as a biologist.
Which does not mean that Watts' research on the state of certain regional weather stations is incorrect, it simply means that Watts cannot be taken seriously as or by a climatologist.
Consider yourself slapped with my Jacko glove as an expression of my truest esteem.
kdfrancis: post intelligent comments, links, facts, quotes, data, evidence, whatever, but don't try to poop on people passing under your branch, they might carry a monkey blaster.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere, a banana, now back up into your hide-out.
Clueless - Both Pielke(s) are contributors at WUWT. They both appreciate the wide readership at WUWT. With 128,000,000 views... why wouldn't they?? Can't you be correct on ANYTHING?? If you want your blunders to remain "half known"... STOP making blunders. Better yet - use your pie hole for eating pie. GK
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Pielkes contribute to the Watts thingie? Didn't know that. I stand corrected, so contrary to what I believed they are not to be considered... WAIT A MINUTE. You've been lying and cheating before, therefore:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBack up your statement by an unequivocal link to where it says that both Pielkes are "contributors at WUWT" and proof that "They both appreciate the wide readership at WUWT".
I want to see proof.
@Bill Crofut,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suggest you read the title of the work you cite. Contemplate the use of the word SCENARIO. That may help explain any discrepancy that you perceive. I must say, I am amused that you think that James Hansen thinks that CO2 is not a major contributor to global warming. Save yourself some embarrassment and do a Google search on him. No, how about you just download a C.V of his scientific publication:
James Hansen, C.V [PDF]
http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/hansencv_201201.pdf
Trent:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisyou're told Hansen is disregarding CO2, I'm told the Pielkes have become climate change sceptics, Muller becomes a warmist, Watts says the little weather stations are all jinxed... why do I have this vague feeling that some jokers at National Lampoon are pulling our legs?
Ah! No! - we have been down that road, and it takes 10 pages, just to see you thrash around like a chimpanzee. Go search the blog... you might learn something, but it requires something you don't possess... critical thinking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere is the link: http://wattsupwiththat.com/ just in case, you don't know how to navigate the internet yet.
Btw: where is your "lying and cheating" reference, so that we can all get aboard your kindergarten choo choo. Have I been wasting time with a child? If so, I apologize, but you should have told me you were only 12 yrs old. GK
Just because scientist/climatologist will post at WUWT, hardly makes one a warmist nor a skeptic. I think everyone has abandoned your silliness. Even flea has fled your ridiculous statements.
@JC Tyler,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, these guys are clowns and g. Karst is a dissembler and a first class ideologue who refuses to allow facts and logic to get in the way. Yet, I should point out that the Pielkes are well known contrarians. Do not worry you can not be expected to all the persona of this little drama.
That being said I want to point out to great posts where Pielke Sr, has had his hinney handed to him by the folks at Skeptical Science. First he complains they are not addressing all the science issues that he is raising and they obligingly do address it and he runs.
Pielke Sr. and SkS Dialogue Final Summary:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/pielke-sr-sks-dialogue-final-summary.html
Be sure you read articles #1,#3 and #4. The comments in each of these post are both fun and informative. Please note that at one point they get Pielke Sr to admit to the need for a reduction in carbon emissions. Do not go telling the Watts bot aka G. Karst that though it may make him have a stroke.
Speaking of Pielke Sr, like any good rat he is deserting the sinking ship that is Anthony Watts latest opus. After proclaiming the Watts paper a "Game Changer" he now says:
"UPDATE: There has been discussion as to whether the Time of Observation Bias (TOB) could affect the conclusions reached in Watts et al (2012). This is a valid concern. Thus the “Game Changing” finding of whether the trends are actually different for well- and poorly-sited locations is tenative until it is shown whether or not TOB alters the conclusions."
This sound you hear is Anthony Watts paper exploding in his face. But hold it. Another denier McIntyre a listed co-author is scurrying of this ailing boat too:
Steve Mcintrye: I was only on the paper a short time and I overlooked an important issue, which Anthony had paid insufficient attention to. I should have known better – my bad. I’m very annoyed at myself.
And:
Steve Mcintyre: Steve: allowing for a TOBS adjustment is reasonable enough. When max min are read daily, if they are read in late afternoon near the daily maximum, a hot day can end up contributing to the maxima for two consecutive days and the cooler next day not counted. The adjustment is made relative to theoretical midnight readings.
Source: http://climateaudit.org/2012/07/31/surface-stations/#comments
That sucking sound you are hearing is anyone's credibility associated with this travesty of a paper going down the drain.
Trent:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAt least your rhetoric has a few facts to respond to. See... it's not so hard.
The TOB (Time of Observation Bias)is a headache that has plagued every temperature data set - assembled to-date. Everyone is working hard to eliminate the time of recording problem. I doubt any of the data-sets have got it complete.
However, AW et al, seem to think they will have it nailed in time for peer review. Like I said - If the paper is validated, in any way, it is good news for humanity. It simply means there is more time to nail down the SCIENCE of Climate. Man is making progress and we will crack this nut... if fanatical ideology doesn't derail us... GK
G. Karst Says: The TOB (Time of Observation Bias)is a headache that has plagued every temperature data set - assembled to-date. Everyone is working hard to eliminate the time of recording problem. I doubt any of the data-sets have got it complete.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTrent Says: The presumption here is that TOB is some insurmountable problem in which all temperatures are thus suspect. That is nonsense. If you have doubts that the data is unreliable show it using PEER REVIEWED literature.
G. Karst Says: However, AW et al, seem to think they will have it nailed in time for peer review.
Trent Says: Did you read my post at all? Tony the Tiger does not address TOBS at all. That is why the guy who was asked to take a look at the paper and is listed as a co-author says, "I was only on the paper a short time and I overlooked an important issue, which Anthony had paid insufficient attention to. I should have known better – my bad." That quote is from the self styled Auditor himself. Does the phrase "overlooked an important issue" mean anything to you? Does it speak of addressing the issue?
Anthony Watts, himself says the same thing, "Some valid criticisms have been made related to the issue of the TOBS data." As in not addressed. Derp.
G. Karst: It simply means there is more time to nail down the SCIENCE of Climate
Trent: I am amazed that you have conflated your personal self-imposed ignorance with the state of knowledge that exist in the scientific community.
About a year ago Ivar Giaver wrote an article in a major Norwegian Newspaper about his view on global warming. Much of this was pure rubbish, like when he wrote that the correlation between CO2 and temperature was very week. You just have to plot the temperature versus the CO2 concentration to see that the correlation is very strong. I wrote about this in my blog, where you can find this graph.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://dyadeblog.wordpress.com/2011/06/30/nobelprisvinner-og-klimaguru/
Unfortuanately my blog is in Norwegian, but you can find a Google Translation (which of course is not perfect) here:
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=no&sl=no&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdyadeblog.wordpress.com%2F2011%2F06%2F30%2Fnobelprisvinner-og-klimaguru%2F
Sorry ,Richard Muller no one seems convinced and therefore no one seems to agree with you. And, Lauren Morello and Climate Wire, we forgive you, for you know not what you are talking about. Try and write better fairy tales; story writers that you are.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSorry, Richard Muller, no one seems to be convinced and therefore no one seems to agree with you. And,Lauren Morello and Climate Wire,we forgive you, for you know not what you are talking about .Try to write better fairy tales ; story tellers that you are.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSeriously, you keep promising not to respond, right before responding.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI thought deniers were supposed to be consistent?
G. Karst: no we have not been down that road as you always avoid the dark alley to which you point at the start. You simply link to a page where two articles from Pielke Jr are reprinted by permission, there are also a few excerpts and quotes from the dad's own site but you may have missed them, and you conclude that this makes father and son contributors? Wow! According to your standards, I am a long-time contributor to SciAm. I must include that in my bio. Anyway, these two articles could have appeared anywhere. In fact they have. Or did Pielke Jr really write those originally for Watts? Could you check and report back?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAny decent blog or site lists its contributors. Where is the Watts listing? The only mention I find is on Watts' own page saying that he is the editor and primary contributor and that other contributors have included skeptics such as Roger Pielke Senior and Pielke Jr. Whatever that little sentence really means...
Which is quite a contrast to what the Pielkes say about themselves, that they are not climate skeptics but only skeptical of climate work they find incomplete or erroneous. Funny, no?
So, instead of your unsafely fabricated proof, I want to read where both Pielkes say clearly that they are indeed contributors to the Watts thing so that I could confront them with their statements on their own sites. AGW believers supporting an AGW-denier, that sort of thing.
Maybe old man Pielke is slowly losing his cerebral muscle's tone. Is he drifting towards self-overestimation, doped by his son's permanent approval? I don't know, but I hope to have reason enough to believe that he is still doing a great job when it comes to sifting through data and making the right connections.
As about the son, I do like some of Pielke Jr's approaches to certain problematic topics. But I did laugh my butt off when he dropped his pants about the Gleick incident for example, trying to piss with the big dogs. Although I would have found it more honest if he had apologized for the garbage he blogged at the start of it.
So, why is it that everytime you quote a link it backfires?
And do you still believe that naming two creationists from Alabama as two of your main climatological references was a good idea?
Second last, what is your affiliation with the Watts site?
Last, did you ever notice that each time you try to be funny you are ridiculous?
Git goin'
Jc Tyler: So, why is it that everytime you quote a link it backfires?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTrent Says: I have had that experience with him too. He kept posting graphs on sea level that did not show what he claimed.
Trent1492 (comment 79),
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTry following your own advice; try reading the Abstract; then, try (just this once) answering my question.
Hmmm, I guess, I'll have to revise my statement to:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf the paper is validated, in any way, it is good news for humanity, EXCEPT for the fanatical ideologists, who will be very unhappy, standing rather exposed... sort of like... y'all. GK
@ Bill Crofut,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour question has been answered. You just do not like the answer. He is talking about scenarios. Take this passage from the summary:
"Our analysis of climate forcings suggests, as a strategy to slow global warming, an alternative scenario focused on reducing non-CO2 GHGs and black carbon (soot) aerosols. Investments in technology to improve energy efficiency and develop nonfossil energy sources are also needed to slow the growth of CO2 emissions and expand future policy options."
Again this entire paper concerns itself with how to reduce climate forcings other than dealing with CO2 in order to get quick results. Why is you refuse to even look at Hansen's C.V.
And G. Karst refuses to acknowledge the fact that fellow contrarians have found a major problem with Watts "paper". Typical.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTrent: yes, they are natural contrarians, especially the old man. It's part of what made him a such a good researcher when young. Does that make him an AGW denier? I don't think so, rather an asset if controlled IMO. It often makes him a crackpot, a pain in the butt, a sore loser, but I don't really see anything wrong with the occasional intelligent natural dissenter even if suffering from a little subtle mental arrogance from occasional mental tunnel vision. Maybe he shows first signs of old-age stubborness? He's definitely had the wind blow in his face harder and more often than he is used to, self-esteem cracking finely at the edges, something he never experienced before. But that's all breakfast talk.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat I like about him what he achieves by dissenting. When someone asked if greenhouse gas was the single most important factor in climate warming, Pielke could have refuted warming at all or in part and gases in particular if he was a denier. Instead he said that in his opinion, which I quite share, that he does believe in the data proving AGW, the gases do play a great role indeed but that there there are other equally important human influences messing up the climate, that these are all too easily overlooked and that the IPCC had done a lousy job by underrating these influences. And I quite agree.
What I miss in both the IPCC and Pielke's work is the human greed and political incompetence factors. Of course that would be a tricky issue for both. Still, I believe that these two factors must be a MAIN aspect of any proper climate policy paper. I've seen a thought model that includes these and the result looked ugly. <g> I've also seen one which is entirely "build" with a mechanical engineer's logic and what it does it puts facts in the right place one step after the other. And the mathematical result of that is shock. Says his model works because it's a Turing machine applied to the climate. Complete nutter. <g>
Pielke son may not have yet cut the intellectual cord to his dad. Still, he's young and he's got two healthy feet for target practice and all that. He's got two problems, one is an identity problem, and the other is applause from the wrong side. No wonder with a dad like his and friends like Ghastly Karstee. But what do I know?
I didn't know that SkepticalScience/Pielke thing you link to. Why did nobody tell me? MOST appreciated, great read.
G. Karst:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this<If the paper is validated, in any way, it is good news for humanity. It simply means there is more time to nail down the SCIENCE of Climate.>
It would NOT be good news for humanity because Murphy's law is clear:
"If given more time, industry will pollute longer."
That's why the industry loves people like you, they pay for your and websites and cars (and creationist bull), in exchange you provide them with time and excuses.
Sometimes I believe you take me for an idiot because I make an effort not to use your high-falutin fake science vocabulary. Maybe you're simply not used to foreigners. How about me kacking you full of European scientists and references of at least US top quality and of which you never heard before? Your country is NOT the leader in climate research, your country is the world's by far worst polluter. So NTM.
Are you only aware that this is all about nombrilistic US science and US science and research? What do you know about climate researchers in Latin countries, Germany, France, Africa? Nothing. To the average European, whose education would count already as top class in your neck of the woods, you are the archetypical know-nothing, full of doodah USamerican climate dumbwit. Fortunately, we are also aware that you do not only represent a minority but a fast dwindling one. Better learn Spanish fast with the other neuron.
read "Sod NTM", those millions the US pump into military observation instead of climate observation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBTW, I've just checked Trent's info that "the rats are leaving the Wattanic". Cool. Old man Pielke may have smelled the rat poop right in time to save himself from becoming the Watson of climatology. How he could have let himself sink that far... as I said, he's had some strong winds in his face lately and it must leave him questioning a lot of things, amongst others where he stands really today.
The time of awareness, my friend, is a pain in the gut. <g>
Plot the temperature rise against the increase in lawyers and you'll find a similarly positive correlation. Lawyers are to blame for GW.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisG. Karst:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWith all your hot air I forgot your very first fundamental blunder.
Caerbannog had already destroyed the basis of the Watts thing in sufficient detail in comment nr 2 when you arrived with:
<It mostly gets worse, as you leave the US stations for foreign stations.>
If the US had the rigor of Western European weather station installation, maintenance and reading and the work ethics of the people doing the work, Watts would not have an excuse or basis for his nonsense.
Even the volunteers I saw in Northern Africa or places you'd consider primitive, even when they had nothing but a hut and a little plot, they'd take pride in being at their weather station right on time, proceeding as agreed and entering their data sometimes for months before somebody would come by and copy the log. Every day, seven days a week, year in, year out.
And in your country, the one you see as "leading the world", you can't even install them properly, let alone get enough people sufficiently educated to get proper readings?
You're an arrogant, ignorant, xenophobic twit.
Trent re comment 82: a few details bothered me, but they cleared. Could be that we already considered Pielke on the way back to his senses when you still considered him firmly rooted in mistakes. It may have taken him a while but in the end he found the error, probably blushed for a few days, then went through the pain and pointed the finger at the very thing that had fooled him. Possibly another proof that embarrassing news may sometimes travel faster far away because they are not blocked by the social circumstances in one's own country.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe world needs people who follow their opinion, if only to make sure no stone remains unturned. As long as they have the honesty to admit when they blundered. Look at the Higgs' folly, a colossal blunder, yet, what results its search has produced.<g>
So unless something really cool comes along I guess I call it a day here. Been a pleasure as always to meet you and the others again.
And last, some thanks mumbled, all right then, with respect, to G. Karst and his buddies for the challenge and whithout whom I would not have learned another ton of little, silly things that one day may come in rather handy.
Have fun
"Try to find a climatologist to-day who has not read the draft."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI take it you consider yourself among the chosen few who are real climate scientists. Those who have transcended the mediocre that comprise 95% of the group.
Fortunately, I am not one of the group, as I have never made the claim that I was a trained climatologist. I am however a master at reading the BS meter and when I first went to have a look-see myself at WUWT I noticed two things before I read even one article. The first was the motto, "The world's most viewed site on global warming and climate change", which is obviously BS for anyone that ever heard of NOAA, NASA, and USGS just to name a few.
The second was a qualification in the form of a banner that reads, "Two time winner...Best Science Blog...2011 2012 bloggies".
If there is anything that is more preposterous then bloggers rating a science blog I'd like to know what it is. Talk about peer reviewed.LOL
Any time I read any article linked to any blog that I am participating in, I always check the source and sponsors of the site. When I see references like the Heartland Institute (on a political site) or commendation from a guy who wrote a book that denies climate change or worse yet a reference from the weekly standard (which is a totally biased right wing anti-science rag in league with the Heartland Institute) on a science site, I already know that what they consider valid content stinks like a month old pile of dirty laundry.
The icing on the cake of mistrust was when I looked at the graphs the site was attempting to pass off as intelligent observation that showed exactly the opposite of the argument the writer was trying to demonstrate. The opposite truth was just as obvious as the nose on Barbra Streisand's face.
If the writer themselves can't see the ridiculous conclusions they were trying to pass off as science, what about the rest of the blog?
I never got past the front page. There is far more qualified junk online to debunk.
jctyler, you replied to kdfrancis.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDid you not notice that kdfrancis signed his messaged "GK?"
kdfrancis is G. Karst.
Изменение процессов в ядре Земли(тремор и необычный звук зафиксирован в видероликах по всему миру а также этот процесс зафиксирован учёными) приводит к изменению формы Земли(шар,эллипсоид,геоид),что изменяет альбедо Земли.Главным образом на глобальное изменение климата и резкие,необычные изменения погоды влияет изменение формы Земли от которой зависит освещение и отражение солнечными лучами.Антропогенный фактор является ускорителем этого процесса.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisApparently, Richard Muller considers temperature measurements as an accurate measure of climate change. But R.M. is wrong because clouds affect climate more than temperature does. We now have fewer clouds. This change is not due to humans. The oceans are capturing less heat, and so we have fewer clouds transporting moisture from the equator to the Earth’s poles. Less moisture at the poles results in glaciers shrinking since they have less snow. Artic ice is disappearing due to a drought in the Artic.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisApparently, R. M. has ignored the fact that the Earth’s climate resists change. Most systems resist change. Simply using temperature as a measure of change is wrong since the Earth is cooling more at the equator and warming at the poles. The average seems to be “warming” but is in fact a “cooling” trend since most people live closer to the equator.
La Pulga: big applause
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCramer: spot on - hat off
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisR. Blakely: thank you - good summary - copied for reference into the folder that contains US sky observation the three days following 9/11 and basics on global dimming
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe reason why I'm commenting one more time en route to a few days off is to deflect a serious US heatwave blowing my way.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI believe from observation that the climate debate in the US is too polarized. Learn to differentiate. Second opinions in one's own side should be welcomed as conducive to progress. If one pours one's convinction in concrete it is hard to progress.
About Pielke:
He is AGW, so am I.
Pielke believes certain US data are underrepresented and others overrepresented by IPCC; I somewhat agree.
Watts says US weather stations are disproving certain IPCC data, thus proving him right on IPCC; I've heard of their poor installation and management, but this is bull (see caerbannog comment nr2)
Because Watts corroborates his POV on US land data
Pielke develops tunnel vision; cooperates with Watts; akin to Stiglitz working with National Enquirer; Pielke loses substantial credit within the community.
Pielke's first big mistake is that he should have applied to Watts what he says now about Muller, be wary of researchers from outside the field.
Still bashes everything in sight because he can't differentiate between one scientist's testimony in a hearing and an official report destined for a larger public.
At the same time uses his forgotten bull detector talent and finds that Watts is wrong.
Is now in a terrible bind, ego seriously cracked, loss of direction, professional standing slipping seriously, increasingly cold-shouldered by former colleagues, starts to see Watts for what he is but too stubborn to give up.
Muller's first POV was wrong, he didn't understand enough about the data. Now Muller does his own research, for which by Pielke's standards he is not competent, and concludes that AGW is true. Muller gets respect for honesty and having done his best with what he has and having the courage to admit former POV to be wrong. Pielke foams. In his view, the wrong guy is now on the right side and he, the right guy, is on the wrong side. Pielke's world is upside down.
Pielke attacks Muller. Another mistake. Doesn't have the right because he didn't apply his Muller reasoning to Watts or else he could not have cooperated with the latter.
He was fine until his stubborness made him forego his own standards of honesty and integrity and to never let personal pride interfere with data.
It will take him years to come to grips with what can only be termed Pielke's folly.
Watts, as incompetent as he is, has destroyed another reputation.
Rething your life.
Rething? Jeez, I need a vacation badly... <g>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTrent1492 (comment 93),
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisChalk it up to my inability to perceive what you seem able to perceive, but scenarios and suggestions do not answer my question. You’re correct in your assessment of my dislike for the answer you’ve given, but not for the reason you suppose. My dislike is for an answer that is not an answer to my question. Why do you refuse to provide a simple yes or no to my question?
Knyaz: are you saying that Earth has tinnitus?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt seems most of you are missing the point.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisClimatic debate here IN SA has always sounded like a rerun of the ridiculous, folksy Creationist debate (Creationists should not be debated with, but patted on the head and told There, There, in a kind, reassuring manner.). We are talking about measurable facts here, not partisan politics or philosophical religious views, which can of course have no solution and become infantile after the thousandth rude rebuke.
The opinion of one dude is relevant, but hardly pivotal.
I have argued over the last year that, within our debate, credible sources (any government agency or major university, but not blogs) be cited; I usually recommend solid sources that any honest (I said honest) skeptic can accept as serious:
NASA:
http://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/
NOAA:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/indicators/
US Navy:
http://greenfleet.dodlive.mil/climate-change/arctic-and-maritime-security/
Royal Society
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1934.toc
What is settling the debate is the massive piling of physical facts, such as the opening of the Northwest Passage for the first time in history (the one Lewis and Clark spent their lives looking for) – and the Northeast Passage in Siberia as well; the diminishing of the polar and most other icecaps at a fast rate; all the freak storms that are hitting all over and unprecedented heat waves in the temperate zone. Obviously, eventually every scientist, a few decades later every layman, a few million years after that even contrarians, are going to have to acknowledge the simple facts.
Solutions ?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTransportation:
We must develop post-oil logistics while there is still oil, or there will be a real crisis when it goes scarce. Better sooner than later. If we can save some oil reserves for the future, this is a smart thing for our descendants; forever is a long time.
Green Power:
Geothermal – MIT has been doing a lot of good work on Enhanced Geothermal Systems (3-10km), deep stimulated geothermal, which seems to be more than enough for US needs. And ultra-deep geothermal (10-15km) will work just ANYWHERE.
Thorium Nuclear – is almost non-polluting and avoids the plutonium proliferation issue conventional uranium has. The reason all nations keep conventional nuclear is to stockpile plutonium, with which a high school student with an instruction sheet can build a tactical warhead.
Wind & Solar and whatnot and all the million small investors – the most brilliant invention is no more than a good start. R&D has to be a systematic effort. The mainstream industry solves its many technical problems how? Large R&D departments, but also something called JIP – Joint Industry Projects. Several completing companies team up to fund research and split the results by region. Cottage Green industries of the world, unite! All you have to lose are your glitches!
Re "The first was the motto, "The world's most viewed site on global warming and climate change", which is obviously BS for anyone that ever heard of NOAA, NASA, and USGS just to name a few. "
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBeg to differ, this claim of Watts might very well be true. Likewise, it might be true that MacDonald's is the most frequented restaurant, but it would be a mistake to infer that means they have the best food, in the same way that Watts is mistaken when he implies most popular means most accurate.
Watts said he would accept the results of Muller whether or not they agreed with Watts' prior position; he has not. Watts' first published paper, of which he was a co-author found that the well-sited and poorly sited trends were "nearly identical", but that did not stop him from continuing to claim that the temperature trend was a result of an UHI effect. He has recently made public a paper that even one of the co-authors has said is fundamentally flawed. One way is that he confounds a known time-of-observation bias with his hypothesized UHI effect, and then makes the claim that the bias is caused by UHI, but even at that, the bias is not strong enough to account for the observed warming.
Muller went into his research looking to prove that other temperature records had gotten something significantly wrong; he found and reported that his results are much the same as the prior results.
I will continue to pay attention to Muller and I will continue to not pay much attention to Watts.
kdfrancis is G. Karst.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat was my comment attributed to kdfrancis. I don't know who kdfrancis is or why SciAm gave him my comment. Some sort of glitch, I reckon. That is one of the reasons I initial all my comments. Thanks for the heads up. GK
Dear Skeptics,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe world climate is clearly cyclical and even somewhat erratic. This also means it is somewhat fragile.
The Arctic is thawing and has started releasing methane, from peat permafrost on land (as predicted) and vast amounts from hydrates in shallow seafloors (this was really unexpected and caught the scientists by surprise, see, they only know the minimum, our ignorance will always be larger than our knowledge, so we best be prudent) in such amounts that effective GHG emissions have already doubled today, accelerating the warming twice (“250,000 t/y in Alaska alone” – Walther Anthony), and a sudden release of a vast amount could happen anytime (“A release of up to 50 Gt of predicted amount of hydrate storage [is] highly possible for abrupt release at any time” - Shakhova and Semiletov), increasing world atmospheric methane by a factor of twelve.
See now, over most of the world’s history the world average temperature oscillated between the 12ºC to 15ºC range, the Cool ages, as Today’ Quaternary, the Silurian and the Permian, and the 22ºC to 28ºC range, the Warm ages, as in the Cambrian, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous - time of the giant insects due not to temperatures but high oxygen levels – and more recently the Triassic, early Jurassic and late Cretaceous, the age of the dinosaurs, and the Eocene. From the Eocene temperature has cooled steadily until the recent ice ages. On a very broad average the climate is cooling when compared to a billion years ago; we know the Sun tends to gradually warm in time (it will become too warm in 1.5 billion years, but we still have Mars, Europa or Ganymede, Titan or Rhea, Tritan… provide we don’t screw up) so what is cooling the planet is perhaps only the CO2-absorbing
We have every condition in place to trigger a large-scale 10ºC shift to the World Tropic, a very rough ride if done suddenly (the last time the hydrate was suddenly released was the Permian extinction).
So that is what concerns us.
Sorry
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this“...so what is cooling the planet is perhaps only the CO2-absorbing plant life.”
Sorry # 2
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this“...so what is cooling the planet is perhaps only the CO2-absorbing plant life.” This is on the billion–year scale. On a small scale the main main positive (runaway) feedback loop is the Albedo: white ice reflects almost all of the sunshine, and the main negative (self-regulatory, such as abound in living beings) feedback loop is the Cloud cover: warm weather usually, if it is not too dry, produces more clouds which then cool an area.
Now we have a new player, a larger-scale positive (runaway) feedback loop, the Arctic Methane, probably first sequestered in the Azolla Event in the Eocene when the current cooling started, which has the power to make a large shift.
@Chris G,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRight you are about Watts saying he would accept Richard Muller's results. Here is the link to the text:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/03/06/briggs-on-berkeleys-best-plus-my-thoughts-from-my-visit-there/
Some excerpts from the article:
"But here’s the thing: I have no certainty nor expectations in the results. Like them, I have no idea whether it will show more warming, about the same, no change, or cooling in the land surface temperature record they are analyzing. Neither do they, as they have not run the full data set, only small test runs on certain areas to evaluate the code. However, I can say that having examined the method, on the surface it seems to be a novel approach that handles many of the issues that have been raised."
So he claims to have looked at Muller's methods and approves.
Next:
"And, I’m prepared to accept whatever result they produce, even if it proves my premise wrong. I’m taking this bold step because the method has promise."
Caught in the net of his own weaving. Poetic.
WUWT is a fabrication supported by the likes of Fox News, The Times and Rupert Murdoch. Anyone who hasn't figured that out yet isn't paying attention.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat said, I can only say after the manipulation and bastardization of the truth that Murdoch has just recently been accused of and resulting in him possibly being forced out of play on the global news market, any sites that were party to that dis-information service are guilty too.
I am sure this doesn't matter to half the country, (we all know what half) but on the subject of AGW this means that at least half the country is wrong. I would go as far as to say dead wrong. Until we all come to our senses and put a stop to the dis-information services, who's only motive is profit, we are doomed to decades more of bickering, false ideals and crooked politics. By then it will be too late.
It is one thing to have freedom of the press but when it becomes a political tool for special interests like WUWT and then they call themselves unbiased scientists (and above peer review), we all must pay the price for the indecisiveness that will plague the 21st century for eternity.
All I can do is exercise my freedom to post my opinion, but at least I do so with a clear conscience. I know the scam. For decades now it has been to manipulate the masses into believing that success is making money and all the rest who just want to enjoy their life and their property are in the corporate world's way. This is why we have companies and government entities that use the law to take our mineral, air and water rights away and claim it as their own. Next they will find a way to tax solar power when the oil tap runs dry. As water gets more scarce corporations will claim what is rightfully ours, put in a plastic bottle and sell, it back to us at an outrageous price.
...and no, my argument is not about taxing CO2, it is all about reducing humans influence on the balance of nature that has brought us all this wondrous biosphere; planet Earth.
I don't feel sorry for the people that sat back and let it happen. I do pray for the ones who will get mowed over in the process and I will always curse the the people that are too brainwashed by special interests and perpetuate this deceit.
There is virtue in conservation. It has now become obvious to me that it is vital to life itself. That should be topic of discussion, not whether or not we actually have a problem.
Mark656515: superb - got bored with last winter's strategy, deniers are a humourless bunch - this will be my new guideline
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisG. Karst on kdfrancis...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe only thing that comes to mind is the Jon Lovitz's quarter-century old SNL catch phrase, "Yeah, that's the ticket. [It was a SciAm glitch.]"
Gotta be careful as a denier. Karst: you have unwittingly sold yourself out, literally.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnyone know who the real kdfrancis is then?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAlso, I start to feel very frustrated by my enormously limiting kitchensink English now that English-native pros have started to comment competently and in a most interesting manner two leagues above me. Most appreciated and looking forward to more.
The real kdfrancis is a GKarst gaffe. A google search only shows the one comment on SciAm by kdfrancis (site:scientificamerican.com kdfrancis) and that's the one where KD signs it as GK. GK is also definitely postman1 -- postman1 is always thanking GK for his brilliance.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would bet that GK has many aliases on this site, he just goofed on this one. Maybe geojellyroll, pokerplyer, priddseren, ... The Heritage Foundation doesn't need to fund that many trolls.
Chris G:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAbout Watts' brag to be "The world's most viewed site on global warming and climate change" where you consider in all fairness that this Watts claim might be true.
A Euro POV?
Watts' site may well be quite popular in the US with deniers and visited by people wanting to know what the hype is all about or laugh at Watts' latest sottises, but believe me, outside the US no one knows who or what Watts is and he would be a laughing stock everywhere I've been. I believe that if his site was really that visited he'd be most proud to publish the figures. And if those figures were certified his place would be swamped with advertising. And he would gladly take every cent he'd be offered. Seen the zillion ads on his site? I personally believe he is rather overrated, both in influence and visitors, not to mention that a good part of his visitors may very well be curious warmists.
OTOH in Europe everybody with a computer has at least once if not ten times visited NASA and even NOAA from climate links here so these two alone probably have millions of viewers from everywhere outside the US, which Watts very definitely has not.
Then, everybody I know who subscribes to SciAm also knows the three or four major US climate sites. Also, denier sites are rare in Europe because perceived as ultra crap so why would we go for the Watts thingie?
I'd say that if one multiplied foreign visitors to the SciAm by any number between 500 and 1000 one might get an idea of the numbers of non-US NASA visitors.
Once one remembers that the world is a far bigger place than only an area between Mexico and Canada, all US numbers become "relative".
Watts is definitely NOT the world's most viewed site on global warming and climate change, very probably not for the commercial reasons I cited above in the US and definitely not in the world.
BTW, in Europe such claims as his are regularly challenged in court by watchdogs and citizens groups. He would have to prove the claim or be sentenced to rephrase it, generally by adding "possibly". With the effect you can imagine.
<Likewise, it might be true that MacDonald's is the most frequented restaurant>
MacDonald's is not a restaurant. It can therefore never be counted in any most frequented restaurants list.
I don't go there because their wares are too unhealthy. They are generally also more expensive than local (real)restaurants, I don't believe in erratic eating times anyway and so I see no reason to go there but plenty not to, amongst others because they are one of the big world-wide polluters.
Your judgment relating to WUWT stats is right up there with your judgment on everything to do with the AGW debate. Facts do not matter with you. Just remember, despite all the experts, it was the child that pointed out that the Emperor had no clothes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWUWT has a very large following in Australia too by the way. Aussies are onto the scam. We can not wait for the next election to throw our socialist warmist scare mongers & their carbon tax out on the ears. Even their internal polling shows that in many states they will not win a single seat. Just like this whole Socialist Green scam, the socialists gained government based on lies, solemnly promising not to introduce a carbon tax days before the past election, only to ditch their promise within weeks. We do not like liars & scammers & are itching to show them. Watch this space.
of course, carlee, of course - now put that thermometer back where the nurse inserted it
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt truly is amazing how much garbage can spew from one persons mouth. As with all of your statements, conclusions are reached with no supporting evidence. This is why nobody listens to baseless alarmism anymore. Like everything else you project, facts and science, has very little to do, with what you would like to be true.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf there is a real kdfrancis out there - that is one more person who knows what an idiot you are. Ironically, by the numbers, he/she is probably a fellow warmist.
Must you live up to the TV Seinfeld character?
Look inward for more answers. GK
The fact here is that G. Karst is kdfrancis. G. Karst even admitted to posting the kdfrancis comment. There is no SciAm "glitch." There is no history of this type of "glitch" in all postings to this forum. G. Karst obviously is not a computer programmer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGK's reply with an ad hominem says the rest.
Socialist? Why is it that anyone with an opinion other then yours is labeled a socialist? That's like calling the Chinese communists. I got news for you Carlyle, China is now more capitalist then America. Socialists believe in structured government that benefits everyone. That sure as hell isn't happening in China or America for that matter. You neo-cons need to get a life. The whole world is not out to get you, you are out to get the whole world.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTake a big guess why Romney (your man for president) won't show his tax returns. Do you really believe it is because he is just exercising his right to privacy? The man is a pathological liar and the only reason he won't prove his self declared innocence in his financial matters is because it would guarantee that even his lame supporters on the right would find out he has dodged his taxes and made his fortune selling out America to foreign interests.
Let's not label people as something you can't back up just because it appeals to the dumber half of today's netizens.
<solutions>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScientists wonder about theories, politicians wonder about elections.
When I need solutions I'd always also ask an engineer or rely on what is defined by my dictionary as "sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts" such as this one
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfiZPXsQvrQ
an approach fully absent from the whole climate debate.
The drawback is that most engineers by the nature of their talent don't believe in climate change. In their view, how can something as necessarily logical and therefore natural as mechanics be at the source of planetary destruction?
But if you are interested, I've contributed lightly (translation) to a no-nonsense idea (in draft version) by an engineering mind who noted that an essential tool was missing in the whole discussion. If you were interested, I could ask for permission, put together a summary and post it online somewhere.
In reference to #132, you are making some very broad assumptions here. Engineers are only too often motivated by the same thing as politicians; money. I would hardly consider giving the world atomic bombs or soldier robots (drones)as sound and prudent. They are far to easy to misuse. Of course history will be the judge, but suffice it to say that if and when man destroys the planet, it will be at the hands of not so sound and prudent engineers. Oil company engineers are doing a bang up job of that already.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this<Engineers are only too often motivated by the same thing as politicians; money.>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFully agree. Many people are. Or do you believe that CERN is manned by idealistic volunteers?
<I would hardly consider giving the world atomic bombs or soldier robots (drones) as sound and prudent.>
Disagree about the first. Those were devised by scientists, engineers were asked how to built them. Drones were built by model builders, military diverted the idea.
<They are far to easy to misuse.>
Sure. Give them a toolbox and tell them to build something, a tank or a racing car. But the same is true of scientists, ask them what device can devastate an area most efficiently and they will invent defoliage. My point was, get the right people for the right job. If you are in the middle of the desert, it's no good having a theoretical physicist head the caravan.
<Of course history will be the judge, but suffice it to say that if and when man destroys the planet, it will be at the hands of not so sound and prudent engineers.>
Since when are engineers running governments?
<Oil company engineers are doing a bang up job of that already.>
Sure but it seems you look at this from a strange POV. Engineers build the platforms but it's hardly the engineers who authorize them or order them. Don't blame the soldier for the general.
Engineers are not great philosophers or innate scientists but if I needed a practical solution I would turn to engineers. Scientists want to go to the North pole, live there for a while and collect data? The real-life, practical, material success of that operation will depend on engineers and a whole bunch of people with common sense. I would not ask these to draw conclusions from the drilling and climate balloons but I would definitely listen to them about what tools and equipment I'd need. But let scientists do that and you will end up with a container full of frozen pizzas and two trucks with summer tyres. If I want results, I need the right tools. And tools are devised by engineers according to the specs defined by scientists. It's the same here. Scientists have the numbers, politicians run their mouths, but this guy looked at the "expedition" and asked a few hands-on questions to which, strangely enough, the egg-heads didn't have a single answers. And that's how he got interested in the debate. Not because he's a climate nut or the savior type, simply because from his engineering point of view, one of the basic tools was missing and the ones needing the tool didn't even hat the right specs.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHi there Carlyle!
“Socialist warmists”? Yup, them Darned Hippies… Nevertheless, one must acknowledge vast progress from “there is simply nothing going on” and “since when did a perfectly natural process become bad news for the environment?” to complaining against ineffective government, through. Wonder where our ol’ pal David Russell is, miss him in the room.
Don’t really care so much about Muller, what really catches my eye is insurmountable physical evidence, I mean, what point would there be in lying about the Northwest Passage having opened.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJctyler, Mon Amis
J'aime les ours aussi! Certainly do post all good ideas and summarize them here! And we could use new Solution forums, too.
Engineers ARE the equivalent of soldiers in technology; they need engineering physicists to tell them what to do, physicists to tell engineering physicists what needs to be done, and the plebiscited public opinion, or philosophers, or expert committees of government development planners - or, in the absence of all of the above, squinty-eyed executives - to tell physicists what would be desirable to do.
It would basically be our responsibility to eventually enable a forum transition from this nearly avian bickering to at least some solution seeking; we’re just too used to bicker, and it really is so much fun. This is, for instance, ever-so-wistfully wished for in: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/plugged-in/2012/07/31/new-beginning-for-the-climate-change-discussion.
Because time after time your spokespersons berate big business & Republicans as the ogres. Also I was referring to the Australian political situation where our federal Government is a coalition between Labor & The Greens. Both these parties are unambiguously socialist left. Need any more reasons?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWho is denying it? It is the causes that are in dispute & the extent to which humans are responsible. Also all the false claims about the consequences. Remember a few years ago climate scientists were claiming the Arctic would be ice free this summer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor Christ’s sake, Carlyle, it does not really matter whether the Arctic will finish thawing this year or in 20 years, as soon as it does, all the hydrate methane will be out and we will have a new age of the dinosaurs (with our current fauna), which we could adapt to, but – and this is the point – not after the 40 My it took to cool from Eocene to Ice Age but in swift transition, the last of which, associated to sudden hydrate release, caused the Permian Extinction (killing 95% fauna; the Dino Meteor extinction killed only 75% - it seems to wreck havoc on sea acidity). And I am not going to start with the sea level rise, which could eventually reach 80m or 250m – we do not know which, but if I were building new cities that would be something I would really like to know.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisToday arctic methane has already doubled world GHG output (250,000 t/y Alaska – Walther Anthony), so why would it stop thawing now.
At this point I do not care anymore about pointing fingers; if anyone cares, blame obviously accrues mostly to Big Oil, and also somewhat to the Spoiled Public.
But this is not an anti-anyone thing. The latest figures I have are US: 16% and China: 23% current world GHG output, so China is to blame more than the US today for GHG pollution. We obviously need some kind of ‘World’ thing, and there is now no more reason for the US not to take part in (“lead”, if a 4-year-old must have it thus) and demand a greater joint green effort from China, the new big climatic blunderer.
What I care about is acting now to invest in clean tech like it were the Space Race again, so we can have everything we need in place for any transition we may need to get underway, including post-oil logistics, urban relocation if necessary and urban storm infrastructure in any case, and desalinization / irrigation drought proofing systems, for agriculture but also because the main natural climatic negative (self-regulatory, as are common in living beings) feedback loop are basically Cloud Formation, which requires humidity to work, and Plant Life, which also which requires humidity to work.
For Christ’s sake, Carlyle, it does not really matter whether the Arctic will finish thawing this year or in 20 years, as soon as it does, all the hydrate methane will be out and we will have a new age of the dinosaurs (with our current fauna), which we could adapt to, but – and this is the point – not after the 40 My it took to cool from Eocene to Ice Age but in swift transition, the last of which, associated to sudden hydrate release, caused the Permian Extinction (killing 95% fauna; the Dino Meteor extinction killed only 75% - it seems to wreck havoc on sea acidity). And I am not going to start with the sea level rise, which could eventually reach 80m or 250m – we do not know which, but if I were building new cities that would be something I would really like to know.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisToday arctic methane has already doubled world GHG output (250,000 t/y Alaska – Walther Anthony), so why would it stop thawing now.
At this point I do not care anymore about pointing fingers; if anyone cares, blame obviously accrues mostly to Big Oil, and also somewhat to the Spoiled Public.
But this is not an anti-anyone thing. The latest figures I have are US: 16% and China: 23% current world GHG output, so China is to blame more than the US today for GHG pollution. We obviously need some kind of ‘World’ thing, and there is now no more reason for the US not to take part in (“lead”, if a 4-year-old must have it thus) and demand a greater joint green effort from China, the new big climatic blunderer.
What I care about is acting now to invest in clean tech like it were the Space Race again, so we can have everything we need in place for any transition we may need to get underway, including post-oil logistics, urban relocation if necessary and urban storm infrastructure in any case, and desalinization / irrigation drought proofing systems, for agriculture but also because the main natural climatic negative (self-regulatory, as are common in living beings) feedback loop are basically Cloud Formation, which requires humidity to work, and Plant Life, which also which requires humidity to work.
I promised David not to promote certain other forms of remediation, but one remediation measure that could be done and is safe and clean would be to re-bury the hydrate fountains (basically spots in the large shallow part of the Arctic Sea) under sand, perhaps the lower portion mixed with liquid air for a quick hard crusting. Hydrate stability is pressure x temperature controlled, so the sand’s weight maybe could do it, or maybe sand with rocks, rocky sand. All each unit would take is a barge for sand pumping and making liquid air, a dozen bulkers bringing the sand in, a pontoon somewhere filling the bulkers, and a few scout rafts mapping the terrain up front.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisright then, I'll see what I can do. Would be a bit long to post it as a comment here. If I'm given permission I'll put a summary together.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBTW, seen that the US are the world's second largest polluter, I recommend this article
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f4837046-d67b-11e1-ba60-00144feabdc0.html#axzz22fjuNM48
it's been translated into German as "The US must lead the world again" and is perceived as one single enormous piece of *%ç&.
US exceptionalism (= arrogance pure and simple) comes in handy of course to explain why Ms Rice believes that the US' massively wasteful way of life takes priority over thousands of Southern Africans dying yearly as a result of US pollution.
But then, one thing explaining the other, she is not exactly a warmist.
"Because time after time your spokespersons berate big business & Republicans as the ogres."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Your spokespersons"? I speak for myself. Apparently you don't as a matter of habit. Nobody as confused about reality as yourself comes up with that nonsense using original thought. It's a peer pressure thing I suspect.
Frankly I find it very unamerican to cast out half the population because of their political beliefs, which is what I often hear from the right. One of their most cherished cliches is "go live in Russia' or some other socialist country. You don't see the liberals saying that because they believe if freedom of beliefs, obviously far more then the right does. How about we change just change this country instead? Isn't that what freedom of beliefs and democracy is all about? Why is that your definition of unamerican?
I often criticize the right as being uneducated, one sided and narcissistic, however I really do believe in peace for all men and that can only be accomplished by compromise and liberal policies that accept people in spite of political, racial and religious differences. Yes, even Muslims, Jews and athiests.
Liberals label conservatives as often ignorant, greedy and self centered, but conservatives label liberals as mentally ill people who can only survive on conservatives money and need to be exterminated like a parasitic insect.
The fact is that both sides are wrong, but you will never hear a conservative admit that or change their opinion even in the face of overwhelming evidence.
I don't really fall into any labeled definition.I don't believe abortion is moral. I don't collect any welfare at all. I work for my money. I pay my taxes and I don't smoke, drink or do drugs. Why do you conservatives insist on labeling me as one who does?
I do believe in socialism in some matters and I am not afraid to admit it. Why do you hate people because they think helping each other achieve success, especially in matters as necessary in life as environmental science? What do you really fear? A loss of income? What about quality of life? Is that a secondary goal in your life?
I can't help but wonder how conservatives can enjoy life when they despise half the people around them and think money is the solution to all their problems even if it means hurting everyone else around them. I often wonder why the Christian right even bother going to church. Is it guilt or just a social ladder to them? It sure isn't to practice the teachings of Jesus Christ.
This hate from the right wing is getting old.
Pot. Kettle.Black.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat in the flea's comment makes you believe that he is a weed-smoking, watch-stealing Afro-American? You're so right-wing cliché sometimes. Or not taken your pills yet? Ah, only the brown ones!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBTW, yes, the flea is righter than he may know. It takes a certain predisposition to be a certain type of political right, the type of which is quite dominant in the US.
"Pot. Kettle.Black."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf that's the best you can do, then I'm rubber, you're glue. It's the kind of response that you would understand.
>>I often wonder why the Christian right even bother going to church. Is it guilt or just a social ladder to them? It sure isn't to practice the teachings of Jesus Christ. <<
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRight you are! ;)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut I’d give Carlyle a break. He’s the only literate Climate Skeptic in the room, if he quits we’ll have no one to debate with. I actually quite enjoy debating with him, because he usually forwards arguments instead of just calling people names like a dimwit elementary student, so we have something substantial to tackle.
<Carlyle ... the only literate Climate Skeptic>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this?
<he usually forwards arguments>
That would be news to me. Last winter he kept posting one link after the other that disproved what he was saying. When shown up, he'd resort to personal opinions on commenters, but unfortunately he doesn't have the wit to do that intelligently. He's more the stubborn, humorless type.
<instead of just calling people names like a dimwit elementary student>
Oh, he did worse than that. I would of course not miss up the opportunity and we had some neat exchanges. On the laughing score he then did as well as with his "facts".
That is not to say that I don't respect him, it's just that the Carlyle you describe would be a different one than the one I knew. OTOH he may have moved on and learned a few things. Give him another year and he might even start to understand data and how to read a chart.
(Honestly? I believe he got himself another nick under which he is the same, but that as Carlyle he tries to polish his act. Well, I'll applaud that. Whatever helps the debate...)
Nevertheless, yes, he is among the best the skeptics have to offer. And that is the part I like best. <trying to keep a straight face>
Carlyle,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAlways the last refuge of the incompetent, whining about name calling as you call everyone else a "socialist warmist scaremonger", yeah, you're really and truly above name calling.
Just go double up on the dosage already.
carlyle, priddzie, geojelly, postman, karst: in the last weeks we have all read even the most sceptic scientists' opinions and admission that the present US agricultural is very probably due to AGW, the food markets are about to explode, farmers start to bankrupt by the hundreds, and not a single word from any of you? been running your mouths for years and suddenly you disappear? not honorable in arguement, not honorable in defeat? sore (climate) losers you are, all of you
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this