BBD: "No, that's not what the Trenberth, Willis, Pielke Snr conversation says *at all*. There is disagreement over the exact amount of increase in OHC over ~50 years."

I suggest you read it again, you've obviously scanned the exchange what they're discussing is the "missing" heat, while OHC is going up as Peilke says:

"However, from 2005 onwards, as you confirm today in your e-mails, the upper ocean is well sampled since then and there is relatively little accumulation of heat over this time period deeper in the ocean."

Dr. Trenberth: "Josh

It is simply that there are many OHC estimates and although they all seem to have a slow down in warming in recent years they are all different. Indeed not accounting for a global warming signal in the analysis is a general flaw (assuming stationarity) and how one interpolates in space and time. Regardless of the details of vs et al. they do show a signal from below 700 m, right?"

Dr. Willis: "Finally, I do not think that any of the techniques used by various groups should be supressing the global warming signal in the data over the period from 2005 to the present. As I mentioned above, the Argo data coverage during this period is such that any reasonable interpolation technique should do. Capturing the trend over 50 years, however, is another story."

Which part of the agreement in slowdown in OHC between arch-warmist Trenberth and his colleagues are you failing to understand?

The expected heat isn't there, but I bet you know that. So Trenberth is arguing that:

1. The data is wrong;
2. The techniques for measuring are wrong;
3. It is hiding in the deep ocean and it dodged the Argo network on its way down there.

You put up a graph showing OHC increase and making out it was somehow ominous when the real story is that the accumulated heat in the oceans is a couple of percent of what it should be, and you know it, at least you should know it, unless your parrotting the responses to FAQs on a certain website.

The earth has warmed, the OHC has failed to warm at the rate expected, Trenberth is telling us this is "intelligent" heat that can dodge our best efforts at finding it, Occam is telling us it probably left the earth's atmosphere and is no longer the system and BBD is trying to pretend that the OHC has gone up enough to prove AGW. Of the three I call it as: (1) A man on the edge of his sanity as his beliefs are confounded by the facts, who famously said that because the observations didn't match his models the data were wrong; (2) a logical explanation and (3) misinformation.

btw India was well on it's way to Eurasia at the start of the Eocene, which begs the question why the movmement of India hadn't released the CO2 millions of years previously?

Ho hum.

geronimo

You are still misrepresenting the debate over OHC.

You said:

There is clearly no consensus among the consensusists that the OHC has risen

Which is misleading, so I corrected you:

No, that's not what the Trenberth, Willis, Pielke Snr conversation says *at all*. There is disagreement over the exact amount of increase in OHC over ~50 years.

Now you are being tricksy:

Which part of the agreement in slowdown in OHC between arch-warmist Trenberth and his colleagues are you failing to understand?

But all you have done is reinforce the main point: OHC has been rising for *decades*. The rather trivial argument here is about a slowing of the rate of increase since 2005. You might want to consider the effect of negative aerosol forcing here.

On your final point:

btw India was well on it's way to Eurasia at the start of the Eocene, which begs the question why the movmement of India hadn't released the CO2 millions of years previously?

Go and *look* at the Zachos curve. You will see ~10Ma of warming from the late Paleocene to the peak Eocene hothouse at ~50Ma. You have now demonstrated in several ways, that you are out of your depth on this topic, which is fine - I'm happy to explain. What irritates me is the evident intellectual laziness (you haven't read HS12, looked properly at the Zachos curve, or tried to understand the context of the tectonic forcing) coupled with this endless, reflexive denial.

Take a hint: do some reading. I didn't find all this stuff out sitting on my backside tapping out smart-arsed comments on blogs. Nor did I get *any* of it from SkS. That said, SkS is useful and informative: I commend it to you as a resource.

Mike

Although nothing I link to makes the least difference, I wouldn't want you to get bored. Hence the weekly specials. I still fail to see where the SkS jibe engages with reality though. A certain amount of bluffing has indeed been exposed during this conversation, but it wasn't me doing it :-)

"A certain amount of bluffing has indeed been exposed during this conversation, but it wasn't me doing it :-)"

"If he was made of chocolate he'd eat himself." anon but you said it BBD.

Here we have a person who came on this site and represented him/herself as a sceptic. Then, after months of acting this role, pulled off his mask and declared he'd been converted by the evidence. Not only that, his reading is so widespread that he can quote chapter and verse a denunciation of any point put by us deniers, using papers by third rate academics, to reinforce his points.

I'm not sure what BBD sees his role his here, but I for one am glad to have him here. He serves two useful purposes, it stops us being an echo chamber, and for sure we need that, and he brings John Cook to many of us who find that particular site too rabid to stomach. I'm not sure why he denies that, I've followed many of the links provided and find SS at the end of them, nothing to be ashamed of, it's difficult to keep up with the scientific literature, and if you need to cherry pick your sources it's reasonable to rely on others to do it for you.

Peilke, Trenberth and Willis were discussing the missing heat. It's missing you see and Trenberth is worried because he wants AGW to be catastrophic. Our resident misinformer had told us that OHC was rising, so it should the world has been warming for 200 years, but the heat that it should have retained isn't there, that was the discussion, Willis was saying they'd got the right data and methods and Trenberth was saying none of the studies was reliable, hence BBD's wasn't reliable. We're not playing poker, although I know enough about that game to not to bluff, we're discussing the words of an exchange, in private, between three climate scientists who are trying to understand why the OHC hasn't risen in line with expectations. Meanwhile BBD tells us that OHC is rising and that proves AGW.

Having told us that the movement of India toward Eurasia was the cause of CO2 being released from the oceans and not explained why it hadn't happened during the millions of years that movement had been taking place before the beginning of the Eocene. Bluffing? Someone is, and you may be right, but I'm only asking questions.

Here we have a person who came on this site and represented him/herself as a sceptic. Then, after months of acting this role, pulled off his mask and declared he'd been converted by the evidence. Not only that, his reading is so widespread that he can quote chapter and verse a denunciation of any point put by us deniers, using papers by third rate academics, to reinforce his points.

Translation:

Short version: sour grapes.

Long version: here's someone who bothered to check the facts and read some of the primary literature instead of restricting himself to the largely unpublished and unpublishable nonsense bandied about by 'sceptics'. Here's someone who, though initially sceptical, subsequently realised that they had been *fooled* by the misrepresentations of 'sceptics', which are egregious and omnipresent. For example, referring to one of the world's pre-eminent climate scientists as a 'third-rate academic'. Or misrepresenting my dawning realisation that there was no scientific case for 'scepticism' whatsoever as a calculated act of deception.

Bluffing? Someone is, and you may be right, but I'm only asking questions.

And ignoring the answers. Not to mention insinuating that I am either ignorant or mistaken or both when it is painfully apparent that the information deficit lies with you.

As I said earlier, read. But first, clear all the rubbish out of your head. Otherwise even reading cannot help.

"And ignoring the answers."

Didn't you use that before with rhoda when she was running rings round you? I'm flattered because I'm not in her league. Let's get this straight again:

India was well on it's way to Eurasia long before the beginning of the Eocene, so why didn't the CO2 you're obsessed with occur before the end of the PETM and the beginning of the Eocene.

There is an increase in OHC, but nowhere near what it should be so the heat is going somewhere: Trenberth says it's hiding in the deep ocean, that the data is wrong, that the methods of handling the data are wrong. More level heads say it's not there it's gone out of the system.

I call it this way, you pretended to be a sceptic and then pretended to recant because you'd read the literature. So, I'm wrong, or right. Either way that's the way you've behaved, nobody who started out sceptical would present their case with the open contempt you do for sceptics. Ignorant I may be, but arrogant I hope I'm not.

geronimo

"And ignoring the answers."

India was well on it's way to Eurasia long before the beginning of the Eocene, so why didn't the CO2 you're obsessed with occur before the end of the PETM and the beginning of the Eocene.

See:

Aug 8, 2012 at 7:11 PM:

Go and *look* at the Zachos curve. You will see ~10Ma of warming from the late Paleocene to the peak Eocene hothouse at ~50Ma.

Here's a pretty picture to jog the memory. What would be even better is if you re-read the response at Aug 4, 2012 at 11:47 PM, which you will find near the bottom of page 4 of this thread.

There is an increase in OHC, but nowhere near what it should be so the heat is going somewhere: Trenberth says it's hiding in the deep ocean, that the data is wrong, that the methods of handling the data are wrong. More level heads say it's not there it's gone out of the system.

The increase in OHC is broadly visible, despite proper scientific debate about the ~50yr trend. That the rate of increase since 2005 has slowed is not in doubt. The causes are the subject of real scientific debate: is heat mixing down into the deep ocean (below 2000m) faster than expected and how would we know for sure with the very sparse measurements available? Is negative sulphate aerosol forcing higher than expected? Are these both factors in what we are seeing?

Etc.

And I never pretended to be a sceptic. I was and remain one.

And I never pretended to be a sceptic. I was and remain one.

Aug 11, 2012 at 12:35 AM | BBD>>>>>>

That must be the most schizoid comment I've ever read on this blog.

Thank you Philip for clarifying that. I thought I'd get some stick for daring to self-identify as a sceptic in the normally accepted sense.

It might be illuminating to find out exactly what BBD is sceptical of - because it's not AGW (which is of course the subject of all his posts)

Based on my conservations with BBD on this blog, here are some things I think he is sceptical about.

1/ That the greenhouse effect is incorrect.
2/ That wind turbines will provide the UK's energy needs.
3/ That internal variability explains all of the observed variations in temperature.

Aug 12, 2012 at 8:08 AM | Philip Richens>>>>

Your observations suggest BBD is PRO AGW, not sceptical of it, as is what is understood by the (non pejorative) term 'sceptic' when applied to the global warming debate.

He praises the outpourings of his hero Hansen - the arch priest of AGW.

He finds whatever statistics he can to argue with those here who argue against AGW (ie who take a sceptical stance).

And what exactly do you mean by "internal variability"?

Let's wait for BBD to give us his own definition of 'sceptic' regarding the discussions he has with us about AGW.

shub

Again and again we return to your misconceptions. Forcing change does not require millions of years to have climatologically significant effects. Otherwise, how do we explain known climate behaviour such as the MWP and the LIA, or the abrupt cooling after major volcanic eruptions? Your position derives from unphysical nonsense:

Yes, CO2 is plausibly a driver of climate change. But also yes, this appears to apply for the long timescales chosen, i.e., tens of millions of years. The 10 W/m2 is a figure that represents a cumulative effect - a number that is meaningless at timescales of human comprehensibility - which is what the climate debate is centred around.

But what is offered by warmies is: CO2 is the dominant driver, because Hansen said so in his paper. The claim is shorn of caveats, its context and its applicability.

Scepticism requires diligent weighing of the evidence. Not wholesale rejection of the majority of evidence because it fails to confirm a deeply held bias. That is why I'm a sceptic and you are not. Your entire comment above eloquently confirms this.

Philip Richens

I've been assuming that you are the same person with whom I've enjoyed long exchanges in comments here in the past, when you signed simply as 'Philip'. Is this right, or am I confusing you with someone else?

I ask because if you are that same Philip, then you know that my objection to the 'internalists' such as Spencer and Koutsoyiannis is twofold.

First, I don't believe in perpetual motion machines, but this is effectively what they propose for the climate system. Conservation of energy is ignored. If random variability causes warming (say by altering global cloud cover for a year) then OLR *increases* and the climate system soon cools down again. The tendency is towards inertia unless the change in forcing is sustained.

Second, neither has come close to demonstrating that their ideas have any real substance. I particularly recall Koutsoyiannis' abrupt disappearance from comments here when I asked him to account for the role of RF by GHGs in his views on climate variability, including glacial terminations.

Philip

No need to apologise; there was no real confusion but perhaps a little uncertainty ;-)

As I mentioned there, random walks arise in the simplest energy balance models, which plainly do satisfy conservation of energy. To make your argument against random walks stick, you need to somehow demonstrate that similar mechanisms can not also apply to longer term effects, involving albedo and deep ocean. To make the argument about conservation of energy convincing, you would need to provide a strong case that small persistent changes in albedo cannot and do not happen.

I was under the impression that random walks in simple EBMs were short-lived and net to zero over time, but perhaps I am mistaken?

The argument that random walks can't create long term trends is based on three things:

1/ Conservation of energy is dominant on longer time-scales because the climate system tends towards equilibrium unless under sustained forcing because of increased OLR

2/ Persistent changes in albedo require an energetic explanation precluded by (1) - unless the forcing is sustained

3/ The global ocean is warming, not cooling, as one would expect if there was a net energy transfer from an oceanic reservoir to the atmosphere, with concomitant increase in OLR and so radiation to space (1)

The final point is, as ever, what happens to the increased RF from CO2? This is especially relevant to (1) and (3) when considering best evidence for AGW. We can argue whether climate is self-propelling against all evidence to the contrary, but what about the elephant?

If I recall correctly, you were very rude to him (which is something you always chide others about when they give Richard or other IPCC scientists a hard time!).

I was scrupulously polite to him when he joined the thread. And never mind the difference in perspective on aspects of his publishing history. He and I both know that there is an elephant, which is perhaps why he left when I asked about it.

Are you happy with the list of items I suggested @ 8:08 AM?

[Things that BBD is sceptical about:]

1/ That the greenhouse effect is incorrect.
2/ That wind turbines will provide the UK's energy needs.
3/ That internal variability explains all of the observed variations in temperature.

To be clear about (1), I understand you to mean that I am sceptical that the greenhouse effect is incorrectly described by climate science.

In that case, then yes, I'm happy :-)

Badly worded above, sorry. This is better, but still not ideal:

1/ Conservation of energy is dominant over longer time-scales because warming increases OLR and the climate system cools unless under sustained forcing

2/ Persistent changes in albedo require an energetic explanation precluded by (1) unless the forcing is sustained

3/ The global ocean is warming, not cooling. Conservation of energy requires the ocean to cool if there is a net energy transfer from it to the atmosphere (1)