Discussion > Masstra2014 questions to sceptics.
Chandra
Can you please answer these few simple questions for me?
1. Do you accept there have been periods in the Earth’s climate history when there have been glacial and interglacial periods?
2. Would you accept that the coldest periods of glaciation have been colder than today?
3. Would you accept that the warmest periods of inter-glaciation have been warmer than today?
4. Would you therefore accept, from the coldest of the glacial periods to the warmest of the interglacial periods is natural variation?
5. Would you also agree that all of the above has happened before the industrial revolution?
Now consider the answers you have provided.
NeilC
Dung, I think people should have left it when he/she/it went out on a limb and insulted the English language abilities of the general UK populace.
You won't get many better opportunities to abandon someone who has just shot themself in two or more feet.
michaelhart
If commenters wish to satisfy the psychological needs of someone with with a personality disorder of some kind, they have every right to do so.
splitpin
Hello! As always, please pardon how behind the curve I am, but curious to hear your thoughts regarding Dr. Don Easterbrook and his ideas regarding the roles of the PDO and the grand solar minimum in his prediction that we are entering (have entered already?) a period of global cooling.
Curious as to whether any of you generally agree/disagree with his assumptions. See link below for context behind my question.
Thank you!
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/barbara-hollingsworth/climate-scientist-who-got-it-right-predicts-20-more-years-global
Maestra2014
NeilC, you could have saved yourself a lot of typing by just saying," Skeptical Science myth number 1".
Paul Thomson
> Further up the thread you say "people like me have to depend upon authority." Why?
When I say "People like me" that is not a narrow net. It includes the vast majority of any population. The number of people who are expert in any given specialist domain is small. To think that I could gainsay experts in any of a thousand specialist fields would be either ignorant conceit or agrrogance or Dunning Krugerism is just plain stupid. Hence my choice is either to believe the experts or choose not to believe anything; believing the experts are wrong not a realistic option. That doesn't of course mean that the experts are correct, just that I am in no position to decide. I believe the same applies to everyone here.
I don't know your position, not having seen you commenting before, but I would maintain that most of those who proclaim skepticism are as guilty of relying on authority as I, just different "authorities". Most believe in the wrongness of climate science not on the basis of their own scholarship, which in comparison to any expert is truly negligible, however expert they might be in their own field. Instead their skepticism is based upon the authority of a crowd, the common "knowledge" shared among skeptics that rests on such shaky foundations that none can formulate it into a coherent position that any significant fraction can agree on. And the crowd is of course boosted and encouraged by Watts, Montford, McIntyre, Monkton and a cast of other non-experts none of whom, though they may have their qualities, is any more an expert in climate science that are you or I.
On Don Easterbrook:
http://profmandia.wordpress.com/2011/01/14/don-easterbrooks-academic-dishonesty/
Chandra
Hello Maestra2014
Reference the grand solar minimum, some background:
Sunspots have been measured for hundreds of years and it was observed that they seemed to have a correlation with temperature. When there were less sunspots it was colder and more sunspots coincided with warmth. The trouble was/is that nobody has yet proved how these things are connected/linked.
Just dealing with the observed relationship; low sunspots numbers/low solar activity coincided with two very cold episodes called the Maunder Minimum and the Dalton Minimum and current solar activity is headed in that direction. My personal opinion is that yes we are headed for a cold period (but how cold and for how long I have no idea hehe).
For me the most promising attempt to explain the correlation is from Henrik Svensmark in his book "The Chilling Stars" and in subsequent papers.
Cosmic rays bombard the earth all the time but the strength of this bombardment varies a great deal. The sun's magnetic field (often called the Solar Wind) varies in strength and when it is strong it deflects more cosmic rays away from the Earth. When the Solar Wind is weak then more cosmic rays arrive at The Earth's surface. The strength of the Solar Wind equates to the number of sunspots; few sunspots equals weak Solar Wind and more sunspots equates to a strong Solar Wind.
Svensmark theorised that cosmic rays entering the atmosphere were capable of causing the creation of molecules large enough to seed the formation of clouds. Low level clouds reflect direct solar radiation and thus cool the Earth and Svensmark believes cosmic rays do cause the creation of low level clouds.
This theory is being tested in the Hadron Collider and early results were favourable but then (strangely) news dried up and we are still waiting.
Dung
Chandra
First a little education for you; Climate Science is not a specialist subject, the number of different fields that contribute to our knowledge of how the climate works is so large that no person can be an expert in all the fields. However the Bishop Hill regulars include highly qualified Chemists, Engineers, Physicists, and Mathematicians (and probably some I have forgotten!).
As a group they are highly intelligent people who have read a great deal and have a good grasp of the whole subject.
Where do you fit in Chandra?
Dung
Thanks, Dung!
Maestra2014
Hi Maestra
I know I've come to this very late in the day but you describe a picture very similar to me.
I even assisted at elections for the Green Party/Door knocking and the like and leafleting on election days.
I began to merely question what I thought of as inconsistencies in the narrative (far too many to list...time etc..) and was horrified at the level of frank totalitarianism that exists within the environmental movement... Me being a simple minded "helper" at that point. Just look at the recent shenannigans with Greenpeace and Patrick Moore to see the stalinistic tendencies.
I have a question if you would please be so kind..
Can you please link to those blogs you commented on as I am always interested in the responses in order to "fortify/immunise" for future discussions I will have with AGW supporters?
Did you comment under the current pseudonym in those blogs? What was the name used if not? It's always interesting to see what catalyses the attack-like responses you got!!!
Thanking you heaps Maestra.
Jonesey
jones
When I discuss matters with a group of people I generally will not go another venue and gossip about them to another set of people. But, that might just be me.
shub
Me neither.
I will confess that maestra's queries appear contrived.
but that's just me...
jones
Hi Jones,
Sorry for being cryptic but my comment was directed at Chandra, not you.
Maestra's queries appear contrived to me too. ;(
shub
Martin A
Your independent approach was tried at Berkeley. BEST was a temperature record derived independently of existing climate scientists. It included a number of sceptic scientists and expertise from many different areas. It even had finance from the Koch brothers.
The result? Despite the hopes of the sceptics it showed the same pattern as the other records.
How did the sceptics respond? They rejected it as obviously wrong, because it did fit their beliefs. The exception was one scientist, who is no longer a sceptic.
Entropic man
Dung
The most recent CLOUD paper came out in October.
http://press.web.cern.ch/press-releases/2013/10/cerns-cloud-experiment-shines-new-light-climate-change
"The CLOUD researchers made two key discoveries. Firstly, they found that minute concentrations of amine vapours combine with sulphuric acid to form aerosol particles at rates similar to those observed in the atmosphere. Then, using a pion beam from the CERN Proton Synchrotron, they found that ionising radiation such as the cosmic radiation that bombards the atmosphere from space has negligible influence on the formation rates of these particular aerosols."
The key word is " negligible". They have learned a lot about nucleation, but nothing to indicate that cosmic radiation is a driver.
Entropic man
EM - of course I know about the Berkeley thing. I'm talking about the whole atmospheric physics thing not the analysis of available temperature records.
I remember when I was a kid and read about the Wilson cloud chamber, it seemed just obvious that cosmic rays could well have some effect in producing real clouds (due to nucleation onto ions - not the creation of funny compounds).
Martin A
Not sure how my queries appear "contrived." I've explained ad nauseum that I am not a scientist, physicist, or engineer by trade, although I am quite successful in my field of choice (which has nothing to do with climate.) Rather than contrived you may mean "simplistic", and I've already conceded that, too. I don't have the background many of you do, and as I have only recently come to the table on all of this, I am certain that I appear quite ignorant compared to the rest. I run in circles where challenging AGW is heresy, so I go elsewhere to ask questions, get feedback, and educate myself. I've not been rude, antagonistic, or in any way unpleasant (at least, not intentionally!) here. Simply trying to figure some things out for myself. So, if it makes anyone feel better (jones and shub) to believe that I am somehow a vicious AGW mole who comes here to fortify my case, and that at a designated-yet-undisclosed point in time I shall reveal my deviousness with a flourish and a cackle, then I'm fairly certain I can't convince you otherwise. I don't have a dog in this fight as it were, so I'm not interested in defending my intentions over and over again. Came to learn, and I have. So, thank you to all who have taken time to post to this thread. With that, I'm going to go back to reading rather than posting. It's a much less frustrating endeavor.
Maestra2014
Maestra, if you had been here during BBD's posting days you would understand the misgivings you see here, but a blog is not any different from walking down the street to the shopping center and shouting out an opinion. Someone will always object, so just ignore the misgivings posts and carry one asking. Of course in 9 months time you will have either disproved or confirmed the suspicions ;) and we can have an argument about who was right and who was wrong in predicting if you would turn or not.
Breath of Fresh Air
Martin A
A lot of the physics you want to redo came into climate science from elsewhere.
For example, the first serious calculation of infrared emission spectra was done during the development of IR-guided air-to-air missiles. Bill McLean started this in 1947.
Last I heard, Sidewinders still work.
Entropic man
maestra,
nothing personal there, friend. I was just airing out what I felt. You shouldn't let it affect you.
shub
EM - I appreciate that your comments are always pleasantly put, even when responding to my teasing you about your tendency to talk down to people and my criticisms of your tendency to post stuff you have looked up in wikipedia a few minutes previously as if you were an authority on the subject.
Also I think we benefit significantly from the occasional challenging or thought provoking comment that you post. I think it's a shame that those nuggets of yours are diluted by the larger volume of dross that you also post. The dross means we skip over much of what you post and so probably miss some of the occasional nuggets.
On the need to re-do climate science, rightly or wrongly, I get the impression that you are purposely misunderstanding what I said. But you often quote the F = 5.35 ln (C /Co) formula as if it were as well established - and means something as precisely defined - as the Shockley diode equation, which, when inverted, has much the same form. So perhaps you genuinely don't get what I'm on about.
"the first serious calculation of infrared emission spectra was done during the development of IR-guided air-to-air missiles"
Come on EM - you are up to your tricks again.
I don't have references to hand but I know that detailed IR spectroscopy was done as soon as electronic measurement methods were available - years before development of the first heat-seeking missiles.
And any fule kno that, to home on the hot tailpipe of a jet engine, you don't need measurements (still less 'calculations') of gaseous emission spectra.
In any case IR technology was in use long before heat-seeking missiles - years back I worked with the guy who had developed the CV144 IR image converter cell at EMI during WW2. ( Interesting stuff to hear about - the activation of the electron emitting surface involved chemistry antagonistic to that of the phosphor.)
http://www.decadecounter.com/vta/articleview.php?item=310
Martin A
Martin A
Wilson Cloud Chamber something I remember from school as well. Also had the now why didn't someone think of that sooner when I first read about the theory many,many years later.
The cloud chamber impressed me on two levels, the simple way of creating "clouds" and the vapour trails which appeared in the chamber. The memory of many other experiments have faded over the years and only a few remain vivid. Oil Drop, Michelson-Morley, Newton's rings and Gravitational Constant amongst those few. But I did really enjoy the Physics classes, I think the teacher had a lot to do with that.
SandyS
maestra
Here are my thoughts (the questions differ slightly)
After following the climate discussions for many months, I find that the term CAGW (Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming) brings together the four issues that keep coming up.
1. Is there warming around us?
2. Is the warming global (everywhere)?
3. Is warming caused by human activity?
4. Is warming catastrophic now or likely to become so?
Here’s my take of the state of the discussion:
1. The instrumental records show a pattern of warming, with accelerating and decelerating phases. The amount of warming depends upon the time periods selected for comparisons. The measurements of warmings are in decimals of degrees, with error ranges of a size to significantly impact on the results. The records have been subjected to various adjustments for various reasons, and not all of these have been verified to prove the adjusted numbers are more reliable. Many people accept that we are in a modern warming period, though there are uncertainties with the measurements. No additional warming has occurred this century, and this lack of warming may signify future cooling.
2. Global averages have been produced and they show a warming trend. These are averages of anomalies, since the actual temperatures vary greatly according to both place and time. Again the selection of the baseline (normal) for comparison affects the results. There is great diversity of warming and cooling patterns around the average; for example, at least 1/3 of US land surface stations showed cooling trends over the same period that the average was rising. Also, patterns in the mostly oceanic Southern Hemisphere (SH) are quite different and the average lower than the NH, where most of the land is. Often, two microclimates differ significantly even when a few KM apart, so that the selection of stations affects greatly the results. This issue is open to debate and is currently subject to extensive investigation.
3. Human activity directly impacts the environment and climate through land and water use: the effects of urban settlements, forest clearing, water extraction, damming of rivers, etc. appear to cause changes and often warming the places where they occur. The major debate is over the claim that burning of fossil fuels causes global warming by the increasing presence of CO2 in the atmosphere. Many issues are involved: Does rising CO2 cause rising temperatures, or the other way around? How much do emissions from humans affect the atmosphere considering the much larger exchanges between natural CO2 sources and sinks? How much does the radiative effect of 400ppm CO2 affect the climate, considering the effects of convection, evapotranspiration, multi-decadal ocean heat oscillations, cloud patterns, among other factors?
4. How dangerous is the present pattern of climate change, defined by IPCC as manmade global warming? The extent of human contribution to observed warming is uncertain. Even so, the modern warming period was preceded by the Medieval, the Roman, and the Minoan warming periods–each was cooler than the previous, and all of them warmer than the present. The last 1.5C of warming has been a boon to human agriculture and civilization, and the next 1.5C is likely to also be beneficial. Yet numerous studies are funded to examine any and all negative consequences that could result from increases in temperature. The funding monopoly dedicated to climate change ensures a steady drumbeat of warnings. The public’s concern is required for governments to impose carbon-pricing regimes as the proposed means of reducing CO2 emissions. Many doubt whether these regimes will reduce either CO2 or warming. Some believe that natural forces are already beginning to cool the climate, in spite of emissions. This is a battle for public opinion waged daily in the media and the blogger sphere.
Ron C.
Hi maestra
Apologies from me too. I am being even handed in clearly stating "appear". There is the quality of the "leading question" to your style which makes one wonder what is really being sought but that, I suspect, is just an unwarranted paranoia on my part as it may simply be a reflection of your linguistic style (you're not a lawyer or psychologist of some stripe by any chance?...Don't expect you to answer that question..your business).
I would, however, still be grateful for links to the sites you mentioned getting frustrated on as I really am interested in the responses you stated you were on the receiving end of. In other words, were you subject to the same degree of suspicion there?
In which case a change of approach may be of benefit?
I dunno. Please do send those links and I can analyse further the tone/content etc...Helps me too actually for future conflicts of this sort!
Thanks heaps mate.
By the way, if I may press you to make one observation I would hope you have noticed that divergent views or even outright oppositional views are (generally) not suppressed within the "sceptic" blogsphere. I did notice that very quickly. I dare say there are a few but most certainly not in the broad mainstream. Compare and contrast to the editorial line taken by journals such as the UK Guardian which operates (literally) a Stalinistic approach to dissent or Greenpeace which goes even further in the handling of dissent (up to and including political violence).
For the record maestra, I will give you credit for not responding in a sharper manner.. Very controlled indeed in fact.
Send those links mate. Cheers.
jones
SandyS - Yes we had a good physics teacher too. He could see I was bored and said "A - if you are bored find what Millikan's experiment was and see if you can reproduce it". That's your oil drop expt, right?
Martin A
splitpin
The point is that Chandra is only here to be disruptive and he does a great job. He did that with my Shale gas discussion and now he has done the same to this one (there have been many). The Bish always says "don't feed the troll" however sometimes the disruption starts with reasonable statements which people engage with. Later you realise he has done it again. I do not know if there is an officual process for getting someone banned but Chandra should be first in the queue.