1) The problem is that those hypothetical 9 out of 10 financial advisors work together, are funded by similar interests and are suggesting the same courses of action that another 9 out of 10 financial advisors gave you in the 1970s that turned out to be bollocks then.

Also, we have almost the same situation in real life, and that's how we have so many Keynesians, despite the fact that Keynes ideas are critically flawed and implementation of Keynesian economics (as they are used today) invariably results in failure.  More quantitative easing, anyone?

2) Historically, the root causes are something else.  The correlation between CO2 and higher temperature often follows rather than leads, so the actual impact of CO2 increase is unknown - because the politicization of the theory has rendered any questioning of the orthodoxy null.

3) Quite possibly, but we cannot know to what degree, because the corrective measures to "save us" have already been decided on.  And to go back to 1), they are the same measures put forth back when it was global cooling in the 1970s.  Which sometimes it is today, because warming isn't necessarily happening, but change is... thus any weather patterns become "evidence" of climate change and the need to "DO SOMETHING NOW" by allowing authorities more power.

Good links.  It boggles my mind how anybody could read the actual behind-the-doors creation of the "hockey stick" and other debunked global warming theories and still believe in it.  It's like believing in aliens, or the moon landing "hoax".  No matter how much evidence is provided to disprove the belief (or lack of evidence to support it), the believers still cling to them.

Based on the graph posted by the OP, that should be expected given the relative low temperatures during the little ice age.  Tell me, based on your indisputable science, is that runaway warming or simply a recovery from a low period?



 

dude.

that shit doesn't matter.

we have to start living in caves or the world will end later.  

or, you can buy carbon offset credits so you can live comfortably.

Thats what Al Gore (Peace Be Upon Him) does.

Not sure if this is a joke post but, no, that is all untrue.  If you would actually do some research, you would know that.

By the way, this is the result of random data passed into Mann's algorithm to blend temperature data together:

Did you really write that?

We've got a couple of solar powered rovers still active there.

Duh.

Oh-forgot about the two Viking landers in '76 and their radioisotope generators....



Nick

A simple touchstone to determine the actual worth of what Rodent has to say about climate change ... find out how he feels about nuclear power.

1) I've read that some scientists in the 1970s predicted a new ice age, but I don't know if it was 9 out of 10. Is there a historical poll available somewhere? If it was 3 out of 10, would that change your opinion? Scientists have historically been wrong about all sorts of things, but that doesn't specifically bother me one way or another on issues we face today.

 

2) I agree that the actual impact of CO2 increase is unknown -- having built some predictive models myself (in unrelated fields), I've blown through enough of my own 95% confidence intervals to know that modeling has its limits. In this particular case, I understand that there's some circularity in the causation (i.e., higher CO2 can cause higher temperature, but higher temperature can cause higher CO2 in certain circumstances, etc.), which makes any model difficult to fit. However, the question of whether CO2 increase has an impact at all, and, if so, the direction of that impact, doesn't seem to be unknown anymore.


3) I think this is the crux of the issue. While the spectrum of opinion on climate change is very broad -- from people on one end who take everything scientists say with blind faith, and people on the other end who think that scientists are 100% motivated by greed instead of truth, and everything in-between -- you could broadly classify people into either "believers" or "skeptics." The climate change "mitigation" that's commonly proposed, whether it's requiring people to use solar panels or drive electric cars, etc., has a high cost. Generally, before making high-cost choices, one should do a cost-benefit analysis. Believers generally believe that the probability of near-apocalypse is so high that the benefit is effectively infinite, and so any cost is justifiable (particularly those paid by others). Skeptics generally believe that the benefit has not been conclusively shown to be different from zero, so, at this point at least, nothing is worth any cost. Personally, while I do not believe that the benefit is effectively infinite, I do think that the benefit has been conclusively shown to be more than zero. Unfortunately. the current state of climate science does not produce models that are sophisticated enough to model the benefits with much granularity, and the current state of economic science (such as it is) does not produce models that are sophisticated enough to model the costs with much granularity either.

http://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/why-did-earth%E2%80%99s-surface-temperature-stop-rising-past-decade



Of course that was El Nino or something.


Don't be bothered by the political interests of those claiming Manbearpig will kill us all.  Don't bother being critical of "scientists" who hide data and call those critical of them Nazis.  Don't consider the points of those who've read about or lived through times when similar scares (overpopulation, global cooling, etc.) have been foisted upon the public by self-appointed authorities with similar demands.

Go back and read books like EcoScience and you'll find they're full of wonderful ideas from the same people who now bring you global warming climate change.

Your statement does not stand because it presumes that warming is bad while ignoring the fact that cooling is worse.



For the past two million years, ice age cycles have been occuring on 100,000 year intervals.  These intervals typically have 90,000 years of ice and 10,000 years of relative warmth like we have now.



During the last ice age, New York City was under a mile of ice.



Feeding 6 billion people might be a problem.



In general, pursing safer and more efficient nuclear power and better technologies is good.



The best thing to do would be to cut the funding for climate science to a reasonable level and divert the funds to nuclear power and space exploration where real results are produced.
 

?? How I "feel" about nuclear power is irrelevant. How I "feel" about climate change is irrelevant. The "worth" of what I have to say about either is exactly what you're paying for it. Don't listen to me, listen to people who are smart enough to study glaciation from outer space.

But since you asked, it's obvious that nuclear power will have to be a part of any realistic effort to reduce CO2 emissions. Is that what you're looking for?

No.

Annual CO2 emissions from human combustion of hydrocarbons are 100x that of annual volcanic releases.

1) Scientists being wrong in the past doesn't necessarily bother me either.  Scientists with demands that something must be done immediately without further debate and without any deliberation on the issue, and scientists that engage in fraudulent work while calling those critical of their work Nazis does bother me.

2) Climate modeling is a pretty large endeavor.  There may be other factors at play.  SCOTUS ruled that CO2 is a greenhouse gas so the government can regulate your exhalations... that's a problem.

3) I don't think they're motivated by entirely by greed, I think the global warming believers are motivated by faith and belief that what they're doing is right and must be done.  They're zealous in their belief and have lost objectivity - they push for demands, not for research.  They lie about research, cover it up, and engage in campaigns of slander against those who question them.  Again, the term "climate change denier" was intentionally chosen to mirror "Holocaust denier" because they feel their enemies are as bad as the Nazis and that they are the only guardians of truth and light against people who would otherwise burn the world down.

Even assuming that the worst predictions of the Manbearpig faithful are correct (aside from the ones that say we'd already have burned to death or the host that have been shown to be false by history), the mitigating factors they demand are pointless.  Like Joe Biden said about building coal plants - we won't build them, but who cares if the Chinese do?

If we're to assume that global warming will burn us all up, we have a moral imperative to go to war with China to stop their reckless exploitation of the world.  We also need to keep the third world from industrializing in order to prevent more CO2 from being created (this is proposed through subsidies).

And of course there's also water vapor, which is a major greenhouse gas... I'm not sure who we're supposed to hate for that.


The problem is, once again, that the demands of climate-change believers are just watermelon environmentalism (green on the outside, red on the inside).  It's global transfers of wealth, destruction of the free west, destruction of traditional American and western ways of living, and greater authority for those in power.


But other solutions are rarely supported.  Efficiency that would lead to less pollution is something that would drive industry freely to begin with.  Rather than crushing entire industries in order to acheive environmental economic social justice, restrictions could be raised on things that actually are beneficial.  One example often cited is the use of diesel-electric motors for passenger vehicles, or compact diesels for passenger vehicles.  No one really wants to fill up their tank for $40 when they could for $10.  The corresponding reduction of resource use would ostensibly benefit the environment - even if one disbelieves in any AGW - it's still beneficial from a reduced pollution output viewpoint.

Yet rather than assist such ideas, there are winners and losers being chosen and money being taken from taxpayers and thrown into the hands of those who are connected and shilling for global warming; not just businesses but organizations, too.  The demands have already been chosen as the solution.


To go back to 1), objective research would sway me.  I agree with you that scientists have been wrong, and that also doesn't necessarily bother me... what does is when they're repeatedly wrong and the demands are always the same.  "It's cold!  We need more power to control how people live!  There's too many people!  We need to control how people live!  It's hot!  We need to control how people live!"

By the way, remember when people in charge demanded we "DO SOMETHING" without actual scientific evidence decades ago and the government came up with the idea that we should limit our fat and cholesterol intake? Most people accepted that as scientific "consensus" when there was none, and if you didn't believe the lie you were ridiculed and people pointed out how you were going to have a heart attack any time you ate bacon.  

Just now, around 40 years later (after research study after research study disproving the original hypothesis), are they finally admitting it was all a farce and still people won't accept it - they were so convinced fat is bad for you it would take an act of God to change their minds.

this is a big problem here in GD, because most posters derive their opinion of the science from whether or not it agrees with their politics.  if something agrees with me, it's objective and fair.  if it disagrees with me, it must be agenda-driven pseudoscience.  most people here will dig critically into every tiny detail of a climate scientist's arguments, publication history, and personal life.  strangely though, this critical rigor is never applied to skeptics.  in the other recent AGW thread, one poster triumphantly posted a historical temperature graph created by a guy who believes in chemtrails.  

so how are you going to judge the objectivity of the research?

That seems to be a typical argument by pro-warming believers.  "Oh, you don't believe my sources (Algore)? Then I don't believe yours!" (which in my experience means "I won't even read/consider your sources")

I have studied this tremendously over the last couple of decades.  I have read the evidence both for and against.  There is a common theme that comes up over and over - the pro-AGW crowd is consistently misrepresenting data, withholding data, exaggerating data, making false claims, and relying on predictions and estimates that are based on said fudged data.  

There is a reason we are being urged to "do something!" very quickly, because as time goes on it becomes evident how much of a farce this all really is.

 
No, what they are saying is the truth. It doesn't make it correct.

I've only seen one very small part of the puzzle first hand, and it was mountain of knowledge to try to absorb.  Thus, I'm always taken aback by those who can make sweeping and definitive statements based on some article written about some other story about someone who did something to process a data set.

the countervailing problem is that there is very little actual research being done in the "against" category.  oh, there is a ton of criticism, but that's not research.  one of the few 'against' guys doing real research is scafetta, and his work is taken very seriously, even though it runs against mainstream AGW thought.

so who are the 'against' researchers that you're studying, what are their research questions/methods, and what do their climate data indicate?

This fight ceased being about climate change a long time ago.

I asked, because there are people that argue as fervently as you do, who point to all the science about global climate change, and then in the next breath, they decry the science of nuclear power production, and pin their hopes on "green energy" instead.  If the global climate change people were as honest with science as you wish us to be, then they would throw Al Gore, & Darryl Hannah et.al out the airlock and admit green energy is a plaything for the rich environmentalist. The only hope for sufficient  24/365 baseload power production is Nuclear.

There are some other salient truths to this debate.

--> Most of the effects of climate change can be boiled down to "What effect does this have on mankind?"  Rising sea levels, rainfall pattern changes, and the overwhelming majority of the rest of the climate change 'calamities' only really effect humans. The Earth, as a chaotic life support system, really doesn't give a damn about rise or fall of temperatures, as it has all happened before.
BTW: You do understand that olde planet Earth is a chaotic life support system, right??

--> As you said: The "normal" temperature is one in which there is no permanent ice anywhere on the planet, including the poles. This is a non-ice age condition, which earth has been in for the majority of its existence. Earth is currently in an ice age and has been without interruption for the past @2.7 million years.
You words, not mine, and the point of why my I'm not freaked out by climate change.  And to add: here has historically been much more CO2 in our atmosphere than exists today. For example, during the Jurassic Period average CO2 concentrations were about 4.7 times higher than today. Life on Earth not only survived, it thrived.

Climate change is all about humans, and what happens to humans, and human coastal cities, and human agriculture and human migrations etc ad naseum.  If there were a lot less of us, humans could pull back from the coastal areas, rearrange some populations, and adapt our agriculture.  
For your information, my Father walked across the Mississippi as a boy in 1936. Last time it was frozen completely shore to shore in Missouri.  With a historical perspective, I honestly appreciate a warming climate over, say,  the 1350 to about 1850 period, when the Mississippi froze solid for months at a time!!  Global cooling / ice ages are far more disruptive / destructive.

Check these out

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/when-the-earth-froze-174847631/

Documentary - Snowball Earth BBC Horizon: http://youtu.be/cU23qH6O5cE

You're quoting the wrong guy, amigo.

I agree wholeheartedly about Al Gore, but can we compromise about Darryl Hannah? Like, I still fantasize about her. But I'd be willing to make it hurt.

There are scientists with their own models that conflict with the ones pushed by the global warming crowd, there are scientists that disagree with how certain climate science works compared to the global warming crowd (and like the pro-AGW sources, this is mostly their own opinion).  A person can make convincing arguments either way, but remember we've been lead to believe that global warming is true based on the data.

There are people who examine the raw data (like McIntyre and McKitrick) used as the basis for proving that warming exists. Without data showing warming, it doesn't matter what anybody's opinion is.  If it's not warming, it's not warming.

If the raw data that was used to "prove" the Earth is warming is then examined by someone else and is shown to have been manipulated compared to the readings reported by the actual weather stations, that's not opinion, that is fact.  If someone is shown to have aggregated data in a way that creates a hockey stick where there is no hockey stick, again, fact not opinion.  As time goes on more and more people are getting access to the raw data and finding that the officially published results are not what the data shows.

Thing is, the climate "scientist" who hides data, uses fuzzy math, hides behind his credentials imparted by an institution that agrees with his conclusion and overall engages in the kind of research that other fields are not know for - is arguing for the immediate necessity of change, along with the IPCC and the UN pushing their politics.  Again, his solution is the same as the last giant scare was; and always leads to the same collectivist control solutions.

The skeptic, whether someone well-credentialed and respected in his field (sometimes climate, sometimes geology, sometimes statistics, sometimes an amateur who simply reads data out there) or not is someone whose main point is "hold on a minute, this doesn't seem right, let's not restructure our world based on something that is pretty damned vague".

I don't think I've seen skeptics demanding geoengineering (which has been advocated by global warmers - and not infrequently), but rather being terrified thereof.  Heck, that might even mean the otherwise kooky chemtrails guy has a point.

The demand for radical change - and the demand for authority to inflict that radical change - means that the onus is on them to prove the point, and do so without resorting to chicanery, deception, or bullying... all of which has been done.



Aye, there's the rub...

...because:



It would require climate "scientists" to basically change their character as human beings, be open, answer questions no matter how foolish or from what source, and act as people who want to share information rather than people trying to hide it.

But the people attracted to the idea of pushing for environmental justice/social justice/hope and change based on global warming are not the kind of people inclined to be open about it - because it's not about science for them.

They don't have patience, they have a cause.  They can omit things in their data because they feel that's right and something must be done.  They watch each other's back because they are the keepers of truth and the saviors of an undeserving humanity.


Remember, if you question global warming climate change, you support and helped create ISIS.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/charles-b-strozier/how-climate-change-helped_b_5903170.html

-

It'd really require total transparency, publishing all data from raw to worked data, publishing original reports without modification, and basically... being scientists rather than advocates.

For example, this guy "who can be dismissed out of hand" by true believers went to the raw data from NASA and provided links to research stations where data changed wildly after updates:
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2015/01/20/massive-tampering-with-temperatures-in-south-america/

Instant global warming:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/show_station.cgi?id=308860860004&dt=1&ds=1
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/show_station.cgi?id=308860860000&dt=1&ds=14

What's weird is when you look at other recording areas adjusted for changes that don't look like that at all:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/show_station.cgi?id=425724660010&dt=1&ds=01
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/show_station.cgi?id=425724660010&dt=1&ds=14

M&M primarily do methodological critique, not climate research.  that is, their research questions usually pertain to other researchers and analyses, not to climate itself.  i fully agree that there have been a shitload of methodological issues, but these problems demonstrate nothing about climate itself--merely that some research (a lot, even) has been wrongly done.

you said that you have studied this "tremendously".  what climate researchers have you studied?

How a out the fact that 20k years ago, north america was covered in ice? We have been warming up ever since

I'm afraid that Einstein is dead, and the people who call themselves scientists are bottle-washers with indulged egos. They sold their souls to the ruling class to provide the magic of science as an excuse to the Malthusians who want to keep their lifestyles at our expense.

This is just propaganda.  Lies that a few good, but foolish, people believe, and the rest are cynical exploiters and manipulators.

No scientist can look at the data and make decisions that affect the life and death of millions with any remaining integrity.

Self interest won out.

not to trivialize everything else you wrote, but this is the answer to my question: transparency = objectivity.  i don't disagree--if you want me to believe your conclusions, show me how you got there.  i bang this drum constantly in my department.

but here's the question--do we apply this to every scientific issue that touches on policy?  for example, when someone tells you that a particular nuclear powerplant is safe, do you flatly reject those findings if you do not have access to every measurement that the researcher took, and every step of his method?  

what's remarkable is that this is exactly what marxists say about scientific modernity.  i'm not calling you a marxist, but the overlap of ideas is ironic.

to be clearer, the postmodernist, poststructuralist viewpoint is that western science is a tool that originally intended to describe the physical world, but has been harnessed in order to construct and perpetuate a class of political elites, based on a logic of self-interest.

In before the "You get more radiation from eating a banana" folks

It's not about climate control.

It's about people control.

It's a pathetic mechanism for the government to control and tax everything.

I'm willing to believe that the climate is changing, but I struggle to believe in AGW when NASA can't even decide if or how much our nearest star impacts earth's climate.

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2013/08jan_sunclimate/

How can that giant fusion reaction that has locked earth in its orbit not be a, if not the, primary factor in climate change (up or down)?

You've made an excellent point.  I can't think of any field where this is the case.

Ok, on second thought, I can think a couple of cases where that was done.  And it's pointless.

if you seriously believe that scientists don't agree that insolation is the primary driver of climate, i worry that you're getting your climate information from social media websites.

Uh, has someone told you that isn't? It's almost, like, a star that supplies all the energy for the solar system.

Did you read what I wrote and follow the link, or were the previous three pages not an argument about whether or not humans are causing climate change?

Let's try again: How is man made climate change justified when the output of the sun (the source of insolation) varies over time?
Serious question. Educate my stupid social media reading brain.

Everyone that says humans are causing global warming?
Example: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2011/apr/06/sun-cause-climate-change

Has the sun been completely ruled out of being a factor in "climate change" and I didn't get the memo?

My first question is, how do we know with any certainty, WHAT the temperature was 10,000 years ago?  

"I don't even know if I believe in global warming.  I don't disbelieve, but I need a little more information. it would appear that the crux of the problem is, over the last century, the temperature has gone up a couple of degrees. eh maybe, maybe not. Excuse me for not trusting temperature figures from the year 1905. They're still shitting outside in the woods, but I'm supposed to believe they had a strangle hold on the Fahrenheit of the earth's magma. I'm sure that was an accurate reading. -  Dennis Miller

You should read the paper, the full paper.  I'm not trying to be snarky, quite the opposite.  I have a strong background in thermal radiation, including good familiarity with NASA's ERBE/CERES satellite radiation measurement programs - I used to be side by side with the folks that did the radiation detector design/analysis - but, even with all of this, I'm not in a good position to summarize this stuff.

Global warming climate change doesn't just "touch" on policy.

It's not a minor factor in localized debate.  It's about redistribution of wealth on a global scale.

Also, the question you're asking about a power plant is deeper than that, because global warming believers are asking us to tear down our current way of life in order to save the world (based on questionable ideas) while ignoring that other nations will not comply and thus we're still damned to their global warming climate changing apocalypse anyway.  Again, what I mentioned about China, and the argument "let them build coal plants over there".

I don't flatly reject findings, but when there are questions that come up about a topic constantly, and the response is "you're a holocaust denier" - again, that's why they use "denier" - to make their enemies into Nazis - then the criticism is being flatly rejected.  We've seen in this thread that unless you're a climatologist who's part of the consensus, your opinion "must be dismissed out of hand" - and elaborate tricks are made to ignore when people outside the climate believers look at the same data.  There's a willful ignorance require to reject it.  If you're not a member of the clergy, you can't understand the scripture.

To reconnect with your nuke plant idea... the thing is the global warmers climate changers are demanding that plant be torn down, not built.  The skeptics are those who support the status quo, and support not changing the status quo without evidence that there will be an improvement.  The one demanding the change is arguing the plant isn't safe and must be closed to save everyone for teh childrenz!!!

If the global warmers hadn't engaged in campaigns of deception and bullshit to push for the same conclusions and same actions they had last time there was a manufactured crisis (again, overpopulation and global cooling as two examples), skeptics also wouldn't be demanding to see all their work.

Oh, and if you don't agree about reducing your carbon emissions to save the planet based on the "science" that must not be questioned... no pressure.

hard to trust a group of scientists who have been caught numerous times making shit up and then continuously being wrong about their overblown predictions.



 

Yes, that would be difficult. What group of scientists is that?

^

 

these are different questions--i was answering your first.  everyone in the climate community acknowledges that incoming solar radiation is a primary driver of climate variability.  once this insolation hits the atmosphere, other factors come into play, but these are all based on the interactions between the planet and that radiation.  as a trivial example, painting all land cover black would have a powerful climate effect aside from variability in insolation.  painting everything white would have the opposite effect.  but this painting activity would also have second order effects that would alter the climate further (and not necessarily in the same direction).

the primary question is this: to what degree does human activity affect this interaction between the planet and the radiation?  if you want to make a dark room brighter, you can switch to a bigger lightbulb, or you can keep the same lightbulb and cover the walls with mirrors.

if you want to really understand where climate scientists are coming from, go to your kitchen, fill a cookie sheet with ~1/4" of water, and carry it around the room.  obviously, the water will start sloshing back and forth--the instability of your hands creates instability in the water.  this is the influence of radiation on climate.  after a while, things start to change around.  the instability of the water begins to create instability of your hands--a feedback.  keep walking, and it's quite possible that the interaction between these two kinds of instability might cause the water to get really unstable and slosh onto the floor.  this is the 'climate catastrophe' that alarmists are constantly warning us about.

so the primary cause is the movement of your hands--the variability of insolation.  this is where everything starts.  

the important scientific question is what happens next, and whether humans are changing things to such a degree that the system becomes more unstable, or becomes stable in harmful ways.  to go back to a previous example, if we painted all the land white, we would be reflecting a ton of radiation back out into space, making the atmosphere cooler.  ocean ice would then grow in extent, further increasing the cooling effect.

there is no question--none whatsoever--that humans can alter microclimate.  the question is whether or not the aggregation of all these microclimate changes can alter climate on a planetary scale.  deniers say it's impossible.  skeptics and a few climate scientists say it's possible, but unlikely.  some climate scientists say that it's likely, and others say that it is a demonstrated fact.  political media most often occupy one or the other extreme.  there is almost no middle ground in pop culture, because pop culture isn't particularly interested in science.  they want someone to tell them what to think, and they'll blindly agree with whichever political cause they find most congenial.

that's why these discussions--on either end of the spectrum--always devolve to competing accusations of political agenda.  the vast majority of people base their scientific beliefs on political views, rather than basing their political views on science.

FIFY

I downloaded it and skimmed it. It seems to me that every time someone admits they don't have all the answers they have to stop and genuflect at the alter of AGW before continuing.  





I'm sure there's some great/honest science going on, and I don't understand half of it, but the tone strikes me as if everyone knows the "right" answer and won't go down paths that might lead away from AWG, even when they flat out admit the research is full of gaps.