Monckton caught making things up. Yet again

Gavin Schmidt has caught Christopher Monckton in yet another fabrication. Monckton published graphs that purport to show that temperatures and CO2 concentrations haven’t followed IPCC projections, but the IPCC projections Monckton plots are fictional. Schmidt graphs the actual projections, and surprise, surprise they give a very different picture.

And in comments there, Igor Samoylenko writes

With his latest shenanigans in the US, Monkton managed to catch the attention of Private Eye (a satirical current affairs magazine in the UK).

In the latest issue 1235, they noted several things (quite apart from his dodgy science).

One is his reference to himself as “a member of the Upper House of the United Kingdom legislature” in a letter to two American senators. He is not of course and never has been. As Private Eye notes: “Since inheriting the title, Christopher has stood at a “by-election” for a hereditary Tory seat in the Lords, following the death of Lord Mowbray and Stourton two years ago. He received precisely zero votes.”

The other thing Private Eye notes is his logo, which he is using on his graphs and letters – a portcullis topped with a crown, bearing a striking resemblance to the insignia of the House of Parliament. This is also very dodgy indeed as the official parliamentary guide states very clearly that “the usage of the crowned portcullis was formally authorised by Her Majesty the Queen for the two Houses unambiguously to use the device and thus to regulate its use by the others. The emblem should not be used for purposes to which such authentication is inappropriate, or where there is a risk that its use might wrongly be regarded, or represented as having the authority of the House”.

Compare Monckton’s logo (left) with Parliament’s (right).

He’s replaced the royal crown with a viscount’s coronet, produced a logo that would only be appropriate if he was a Viscount with a seat in the House of Lords.

See also his testimony to a US Congress Committee:

I bring fraternal greetings from the Mother of Parliaments to the Congress of your “athletic democracy”.

He again implies he has a seat in Parliament. Which he doesn’t.

Comments

#1 cce
May 11, 2009

Barton,

Read 93.
#2 Dr Dave
May 11, 2009

Dash,

The UK alone produces about 40,000 graduates with a science degree each year (i.e. about 400,000 per decade). Imagine how many that represents once all of Europe, Canada, Australia, Asia, S, America, etc are included.

In that context, 32,000 signatories worldwide is actually rather pathetic, representing a tiny proportion of potential signers.
#3 Dash RIPROCK III
May 11, 2009

Dr. Dave, I’ve yet to see a petition urging politicians to move forward with a Kyoto style agreement that has more signatures. The science is not settled. 9,000 of those who signed had earned their doctorate. A little respect for them please. The science has never been close to being settled. Even if there were a consensus it wouldn’t mean a thing. Google global cooling, flat-earth, or sun revolves around the earth for more detail.

Speaking of global cooling, you might want to try to find one of the scientists from the 70s that supported it in order to get advice on how to back away gracefully and save your career once it becomes even more obvious the planet isn’t going to cooperate the computer models.
#4 Dash RIPROCK III
May 11, 2009

Barton,

You’re still ticked that Hansen did make that comment.
Unless you don’t trust the Guardian either.

Dash
#5 Dash RIPROCK III
May 11, 2009

CCE, I guess you missed Obama’s comment that under his cap and trade policy, people could build coal plants if they wanted to but it’s going to bankrupt them” and his other comment that electricity rates “would necessarily skyrocket.” Who needs talk radio when Obama is doing a good job of ringing the alarm bells himself? I’m posting the video links since Barton, Dhogaza and Chris will accuse me of making it up if I don’t post my source.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wzNUZVv0A0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMwBbl6RoIs&feature=related

Can’t wait to hear I lied about this one. I’m sure you’ll come up with something.
#6 Dash RIRPROCK III
May 11, 2009

Barton,

You wrote: “The variations in temperature for the last 130 years correlate closely (r = 0.86) with the variations in CO2.”

You do understand that correlation does not establish cause and effect? Just thought I’d point that out before Jeff the Senior Scientist did.

Dash
#7 Ian Forrester
May 11, 2009

Dash, you can’t seriously be saying “correlation does not establish cause and effect?” You do realize that that it is scientifically proven (over 100 years ago) that the carbon dioxide molecule absorbs infra red radiation at very specific wavelengths, which in turn causes the molecules to become excited which leads to warming of the air?

You just make yourself look very stupid by regurgitating the nonsense posted on denier web sites.
#8 Anonymous
May 11, 2009

Dash:

Speaking of global cooling, you might want to try to find one of the scientists from the 70s that supported it

Assuming there is such a scientist. On the other hand this might be just another one of Dash’s bare-faced lies like saying someone said “We’re all going to die”.

By the way, just because you tell the truth sometimes doesn’t mean you don’t tell lies. Or don’t you have the intelligence to understand that?
#9 Former Skeptic
May 11, 2009

Anybody – and I mean ANYBODY – who still uses the “1970′s global cooling scientific consensus” as a talking point against AGW after this Bulletin of the AMS article was published last September (see http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2008/09/now_out_in_bams_the_myth_of_th.php) forfeits all credibility. Especially if he/she fails to acknowledge the error.

Stop lying, Dash.
#10 Chris O'Neill
May 11, 2009

Dash:

his other comment that electricity rates

from coal

“would necessarily skyrocket.”

Can’t wait to hear I lied about this one.

Just a quotation out of context this time.
#11 dhogaza
May 11, 2009

Hansen actually said:

“We cannot now afford to put off change any longer. We have to get on a new path within this new administration. We have only four years left for Obama to set an example to the rest of the world. America must take the lead.”

Four years to take the lead and to start doing what’s necessary to forestall catastrophic warming.

Not four years to “save the world”, i.e. accomplish all that’s needed.

The difference between the two is a bit subtle for the likes of Dash.
#12 cce
May 11, 2009

Obama said that coal without carbon capture and sequestration would bankrupt those companies. There is no way that AGW will be held in check unless emissions from coal are either sequestered, or if the coal plants themselves are elminated. Those are the two choices the coal industry has, and everyone (except for “skeptics” reading from their talking points) understand this.

If the coal industry gets off of its ass and actually demonstrates the feasibility of CCS, then it will compete. If it can’t do that, then someone else will provide that electricity and the money will go to them instead.

And yes, the cost of carbon intensive energy will increase, which is entirely the point. That money doesn’t evaporate into nothing. The majority ill go back to public in the form of some kind of dividend, either through lower payroll taxes or a monthly deposit a’la the Alaska Permanent Fund. The remainder will go into energy R&D.

The studies that have looked into these things have found that the net cost will be minimal, shaving only a fraction of GDP every year.

Start here:
http://www.mckinsey.com/clientservice/ccsi/greenhousegas.asp

Contrast that with the value of the snowpack that feeds the Colorado River basin throughout the summer. Or the cost of ever towering levies around every major coastal city, and/or the eventual abandonment of those cities. What’s Florida worth as a piece of real estate? Trillions, I dare say.
#13 Dash RIPROCK III
May 11, 2009

I’m saying that a correlation in and of itself does not establish cause and effect.

I’m sure your familiar with the concept of a spurious relationship. Better not take a chance. Ok Ian, let’s say that someone presented you with a study that indicated that there was a strong correlation between the number of churches in a community and the number of murders. Obviously the underlying cause of both would be population. No cause and effect between churches and murders. Do you get it now Ian? In the comment you referenced, I was merely making the point that correlation doesn’t necessarily establish cause and effect.
#14 Ian Forrester
May 12, 2009

Dash, are you so stupid that you are denying that there is a cause for warming? That cause is the radiative properties of carbon dioxide, a well established property.

Good grief, how can you be so stupid, can it be deliberate? Some people have no shame, they knowingly broadcast lies that will cause untold suffering to future generations. You are despicable, you and your dishonest cohorts such as the discount Monk are pathetic examples of the human race.
#15 Dr Dave
May 12, 2009

In 2006 there were over 45,000 PhD degrees awarded in the USA alone. In the UK there were 16,500. Again, 9,200 from the global pool is hardly a substantial proportion of the potential signatories. How many actually have a PhD in a relevant discipline, and thus are qualified to comment?

On the other hand, the Doran and Zimmerman (2009) survey of >3,000 earth scientists, more than 90% of whom had PhDs, found that 82% answered yes to the following question: “Do you think human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures?”
#16 Robster, FCD
May 12, 2009

Dash, as others have pointed out, “Sod off” was directed towards the upper class twit of the year, Monckton.

I for one, don’t think you are lying. I actually think you don’t have a strong enough handle on the information to know truth from fiction, which is a necessary capacity to be able to lie. For evidence, you repeat the ridiculous global cooling meme, and are plainly ignorant of the fact that Mann’s hockey stick has been independently verified by other researchers using different models based on different data sets. When that happens, it is extremely likely that this is a correct or near correct hypothesis. Also, when corrected for errors pointed out, the graph didn’t change appreciably. It has survived tests and come through stronger than before.

You are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts. Problem is, your opinions are heavily filtering the information you take in, and as such, your arguments are functionally post-modernist.

Since some scientists disagree, no objective truth can exist in your worldview. Since consensus has been wrong before, no consensus can be correct in your mind, unless it is one you agree with, that is. Not a feature of the post modernist, but rather of an immature goof, you bandy about one list, while claiming that all others are worthless, demanding that we respect your bunch of PhDs, while denigrating those in opposition to you. Of course, you don’t even seem to get that the list means nothing without the backing of evidence.

You can deny that the building is on fire all you like, and decry alarmism, but a scientist and a skeptic, when presented with evidence, put down their fiddle and evacuate. Perhaps you are sitting in one of Earth’s exit rows, but I have yet to find one.

If you had evidence to support your claims, you would present it, but instead, you hunt for anomalies in the data, provide weak and long demonstrated false claims and rely on a long line of logical fallacies.

It wasn’t the flat earthers who demonstrated that the world was round. It wasn’t the heliocentrists that demonstrated that terra circles sol, and not the other way around. It hasn’t been the creationists who demonstrated that the Piltdown man fossil was a hoax. For every Galileo that bucks the trend and demonstrates that strongly held beliefs are incorrect by applying the scientific method and the judicious use of evidence, there are a thousand pretenders to the name, full of sound and fury, but their data lacks significance.
#17 Robster, FCD
May 12, 2009

Dash, one last point. Correlation does not prove causation, but that does not mean that correlation disproves causation. Rather it suggests that there may be something worthwhile to study. If, upon study, it turns out that there is something there, we refine our study further to make sure that there is not a spurious correlation. Different people examine the same problem using different methods. We check each other’s work. If multiple lines of evidence support an idea, it is probably correct. If one line disputes it, we need to improve our understanding of the phenomenon. Are we wrong, or is this an interesting variable to toss into a new hypothesis?

If you bother looking into the global cooling meme, you will fine that rather than disproving the AGW theory, it actually enriches it. Go ahead. Educate yourself. Don’t just wallow in ideological minitruth.
#18 timwells
May 12, 2009

The whole problem is,is that there is NO global catastrophe happening.There isn’t even the signs of one developing.Where’s the fire,I ask?? A warmer planet with more CO2 will be a great benefit for humankind.Relax.
#19 timwells
May 12, 2009

The whole problem is,is that there is NO global catastrophe happening.There isn’t even the signs of one developing.Where’s the fire,I ask?? A warmer planet with more CO2 will be a great benefit for humankind.Relax.
#20 Jeff Harvey
May 12, 2009

“A warmer planet with more CO2 will be a great benefit for humankind”.

So says one Tim Wells, lacking any kind of understanding of rapid warming on complex adaptive systems that have already been simplified by humans in a range of other ways. Tim’s statement, is, of course, utter nonsense, devoid of any empirical support whatsoever. The fact is that, along with other anthropogenic stresses, we can expect fraying and unraveling food webs, ecosystems to break down and a rapid increase in local (and global) extinction rates. Along with this there will be a concomitant reduction in the quality and reliability of critical ecosystem services, meaning that there will be huge social and economic costs. Tim’s views are those a layman who think that its enough to cross our fingers and hope for the best. Sadly, this kind of simplistic view is all-too-common.
#21 timwells
May 12, 2009

Jeff,…. “rapid warming…”
No,neither the rate nor the scale of warming is unusual.
As for the rest of your post….
1]”…we can expect…”
2]”Along with this there will be…”
3]”…meaning that there will be…”
ALL future tense.Look outside,the sky is still up there.
#22 Jeff Harvey
May 12, 2009

Tim,

Please tell me what qualifications you have to make rash, simple remarks. If the planet’s ecological systems were ravaged, the sky would still be there.

The temporal rate of warming is much greater than usual at a global scale and particularly at a regional scale. The planet’s climate control system is highly deterministic and it would take a major forcing to shift it at the rate that it has warmed since 1980. Already there are clear signs climate change is affecting phenological interrelationships in natural systems (e.g. migratory birds and their prime food sources; multitrophic interactions; predator-prey-plant interactions). The empirical literature is accumulating studies showing that trophic interactions are being disrupted, and that the populations of some species are in freefall. The prognosis is not good, given that humans have simplified nature in a wide range of other ways. You are saying that the current experiment – for that is what it is – is fine so let’s continue. Your views are those I would expect of someone who doesn’t have a clue as to the underlying science and who has been living in an artificial urban environment for far too long.

With no disrespect, the planet does not exist merely to serve the needs of Homo sapiens. We are as dependent, perhaps more so, on a range of vital services that emerge over variable spatio-temporal scales from natural systems. At the same time, climate change, along with habitat loss, various forms of pollution, biological homogenization etc. are is challenging natural systems in ways that that have not experienced in perhaps many millions of years. Given that nature sustains us, it does not take much logic to conclude that perhaps we ought to change course. I say this speaking as a senior scientist. On what qualifications do you base your ‘all is fine’ worldview, other to look out of the window and cross your fingers? Have you spent any time recently studying complex adaptive systems and the organisms in them? A patient can have cancer and not know it. The analogy is appropriate.
#23 Robster, FCD
May 12, 2009

Jeff, don’t forget the effect that warming is having on plant life, especially the change in spring growth patterns. Small changes in spring greening can and are beginning to have effects on the food web worldwide.

We are living in one of the planet’s major extinctions, and this time it is human caused. The human race needs to restrain its more damaging effects or the comfortable life that we enjoy will simply not be available to us.

Beyond that, efficiency is good for our economy. Why do you hate America?
#24 Robster, FCD
May 12, 2009

Apologies to Jeff, the why do you hate America question is directed towards oil producing dictatorship loving Tim and Dash.
#25 timwells
May 12, 2009

So let me get this straight Jeff.You want to know what qualifications I have so you can use an argument based on “Authority”.Is that right?Sorry pal,no can do,so lets talk reality.
1]Warming?1910 to 1940 was the same rate and scale as 1975 to 1998.
2]Species?They come and go due to natural AND human activty.There is no evidence that CO2 is the cause.
3]You are still just putting out scary future scenarios.
4]And with no disrespect Jeff,the planet DOES exist merely to serve the needs of Homo Sapiens.
#26 Barton Paul Levenson
May 12, 2009

Dash writes:

9,000 of those who signed had earned their doctorate. A little respect for them please.

A doctorate in a different field means absolutely nothing. Shockley’s doctorate in physics did not make him an authority on IQ and race, nor did Dawkins’s doctorate in biology make him an authority on sociology.

The science has never been close to being settled.

On AGW the broad outlines are pretty much settled.

Even if there were a consensus it wouldn’t mean a thing. Google global cooling, flat-earth, or sun revolves around the earth for more detail.

There was never a scientific consensus behind global cooling the way there is now on global warming. Please read:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=94

And the rest of your argument seems to be, “people believed things in the past that were wrong, so they must be wrong now, as well.” Sure. When they believed the Earth was flat, they were wrong, and when they believed the Earth was a sphere, they were wrong. But if you think they were just as wrong when they believed the Earth was a sphere, then you’re wronger than both of them put together. Science does advance.

Speaking of global cooling, you might want to try to find one of the scientists from the 70s that supported it in order to get advice on how to back away gracefully and save your career once it becomes even more obvious the planet isn’t going to cooperate the computer models.

See above.

You’re still ticked that Hansen did make that comment. Unless you don’t trust the Guardian either.

No, apparently I was wrong about that and you were write. Hansen did make such a comment. He was not saying, however, that it was going to happen overnight, or even within our lifetimes. Apparently the 246 foot figure refers to what you’d get if the entire cryosphere melted.
#27 Barton Paul Levenson
May 12, 2009

Dash writes:

You wrote: “The variations in temperature for the last 130 years correlate closely (r = 0.86) with the variations in CO2.”

You do understand that correlation does not establish cause and effect?

Of course I do. But since the theory predicted the correlation, the presence of the correlation is a nice bit of confirmation.

AGW theory doesn’t rest on climate correlations. It rests on radiation theory. Please review the full set of bullet points I made above.
#28 Barton Paul Levenson
May 12, 2009

Tim Wells posts:

The whole problem is,is that there is NO global catastrophe happening.There isn’t even the signs of one developing.Where’s the fire,I ask??

Temperature is rising, droughts are increasing, there is more violent weather along coastlines, and glaciers and ice caps are melting. Have you been watching the news?

A warmer planet with more CO2 will be a great benefit for humankind.Relax.

Global warming will lead to more droughts in continental interiors (ask the Australians, who have lost a third of their agriculture production just in the past few years due to drought). It will lead to more violent weather along coastlines (ask the inhabitants of New Orleans). It will remove glaciers which one billion people in Asia and Latin America depend on for fresh water, which will create a “climate refugee” problem like nothing Earth has ever seen. And in the long run it will make trillions of dollars worth of infrastructure tied up in coastal cities disappear from the economy as those cities become uninhabitable.
#29 timwells
May 12, 2009

1]Temperature is rising slowly.
2]Droughts show no long term increase.
3]no increase in violent weather.
4]Ice caps recovering 2008,2009.
None of these events can be attributed to an increase in CO2.
The second part of your post is worthless speculation and scare mongering.One thing is certain-increased CO2 will green the planet and feed the world.
#30 Barton Paul Levenson
May 12, 2009

Tim Wells posts:

The whole problem is,is that there is NO global catastrophe happening.There isn’t even the signs of one developing.Where’s the fire,I ask??

Temperature is rising, droughts are increasing, there is more violent weather along coastlines, and glaciers and ice caps are melting. Have you been watching the news?

A warmer planet with more CO2 will be a great benefit for humankind.Relax.

Global warming will lead to more droughts in continental interiors (ask the Australians, who have lost a third of their agriculture production just in the past few years due to drought). It will lead to more violent weather along coastlines (ask the inhabitants of New Orleans). It will remove glaciers which one billion people in Asia and Latin America depend on for fresh water, which will create a “climate refugee” problem like nothing Earth has ever seen. And in the long run it will make trillions of dollars worth of infrastructure tied up in coastal cities disappear from the economy as those cities become uninhabitable.
#31 Jeff Harvey
May 12, 2009

Tim writes, “[Species] come and go due to natural AND human activty. There is no evidence that CO2 is the cause”.

First of all, the current extinction rate is 100 to 10,000 times the natural background rate. Given that species and genetically distinct populations are the working parts of our global ecological life-support systems, this kind of ecological deficit cannot go on unchecked forever. You write as if humans are exempt from natural laws and constraints. I’ve got news for you “pal” – no species depends more on natural systems or on the services emerging freely from them than humans do. So the next time you shrug your shoulders and ignorantly exclaim that “Extinction is natural, so why worry?” I suggest that you think a bit deeper as to the social, economic and environmental consequences. They are profound already and will only get worse as natural capital depletes further. With respect to C02 and warming, this is a serious threat to natural systems in concert with the other processes I mentioned in my previous posting. Our species has paved, ploughed, dammed, dredged, slashed and burned, logged, biologically homogenized, polluted, fragmented, and chemically altered much of the biosphere. There have been and will continue to be ecological consequences from all of this.

3]”You are still just putting out scary future scenarios”.

No, I am saying what we already know. Your first response to my last post proved what I knew to be true: you do not have a scientific background (i.e. you are a layman). Just because you don’t apparently read the primary literature in no way supports any of your simple arguments.

4]”And with no disrespect Jeff, the planet DOES exist merely to serve the needs of Homo Sapiens”.

Really? Who taught you this arrogant b*s? Besides, given that our existence hinges on conditions that emerge from complex adatpive natural systems, it does not seem very prudent to experiment on them does it? Your point is utterly devoid of logic.

As far as authority is concerned, as I said above your response shows that you haven’t apparently got any aside from reading a few web sites and contrarian literature in books. Its clear that we stand on very uneven intellectual ground then. Thanks for making that clear.
#32 Bud
May 12, 2009

“When they believed the Earth was flat, they were wrong, and when they believed the Earth was a sphere, they were wrong. But if you think they were just as wrong when they believed the Earth was a sphere, then you’re wronger than both of them put together. Science does advance.”

Isaac Asimov makes this point in “The Relativity of Wrong”. Well worth as read for anyone who hasn’t.

http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
#33 Robster, FCD
May 12, 2009

Timmeh,

You know, when you make an absolutist statement such as there have been no animals that have gone extinct due to global warming, you should google it before you hit post.

Harlequin frogs, which are a group of very important indicator species, are dying off due to a fungus that seasonal changes once kept in check.

Australia’s lemuroid ringtail possum is probably gone, too. This time, it is entirely due to global warming changing their limited habitat to the point that it was no longer livable.

Thats just a quick search… I could go looking more if you like. Heh.
#34 san quintin
May 12, 2009

Dear All
The more I hear stupid sceptics like Dash and Timwells the more I think they are just here to waste time. All of their points have been answered and rebutted comprehensively….almost none of them have any science backgrounds (let alone PhDs in relevant subjects). Why don’t we just ignore them? I know that baiting them is fun, but there is no substantive debate that we can have any more. The science is pretty well as settled as it’s going to be in a complex subject like climate change. We will probably never have a handle on climate projections at the local scale, and we don’t know all the impacts but all the large scale projections are robust.

Isn’t it a bit like arguing with children? Let’s be honest…the people that matter (majority of politicians, industrialists, planners, financial and insurance markets etc) are all signed up to AGW. Just because some flat-earthers like Dash and Timwells aren’t is irrelevant.
#35 John Mashey
May 12, 2009

Back to Monckton. Courtes of Dash, we have:
Monckton’s talk in TX, April 28.
y
#36 stewart
May 12, 2009

Can we also rename the argument from authority? It’s the argument from UNRELATED authority. My Ph.D. gives me no special qualifications in climate science unless I’ve demonstrated those qualifications in my work or studies. Some (timwells, for example) want to use this to eliminate actual authority, so pulling stuff from their posterior is equivalent to actually knowing something about the topic. If you think so, perhaps you want to apply for one of those huge grants that keep your local climatologists in their sports cars.
timwells – ignorance is NOT a qualification.
(and with apologies to our esteemed host, what is it about cranks and the name Tim? It’s almost as bad as Jason)
#37 Dash RIPROCK III
May 12, 2009

Barton, you might want to think about the New Orleans statement. I know Gore believes hurricanes should be measured by the amount of damage they cause instead of what category they fall in, but that’s not the way to do it. In fact, given Gore’s method, a hurricane destroying the exact number of homes in 1903 is much weaker than a hurricane (the same category) destroying the exact number of homes in 2009.

Certainly you understand that Katrina was only a category three hurricane. We have gotten better at putting more expensive real estate in hurricanes paths, but the hurricanes are neither more numerous nor more severe. I’ll let San Quintin explain what happened in 2006 if he can.

You might also note that our ability of detecting hurricanes has improved. Many non-land-falling hurricanes that form then fizzle would at one point in our history not have been detected. Now they’re detected and counted. More hurricanes being counted is a result of better detection not more hurricanes.

For a small fraction of what the United States will invest in an attempt to solve a non-problem (AGW) New Orleans could be prepared to easily withstand a cat 5 hurricane.

Do I need to quote Christopher Landsea or Kerry Emanuel here or are you already familiar with them. With regard to Emanuel, I’m referring to more recent quotes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Landsea

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerry_Emanuel

I’m sure San Quintin will try to claim that neither of them has the proper credentials.
#38 Dash RIPROCK III
May 12, 2009

San Quintin,
I feel the same way about you people.
Anyone who can’t see through the lies in An Inconvenient Truth for example is a complete idiot. Anyone who can’t see that Al Gore pushes that nonsense because he has set himself up to be the world’s first green billionaire if cap and trade become a reality in the U.S. is also an idiot.

San Quintin writes:
….almost none of them have any science backgrounds (let alone PhDs in relevant subjects). Kind of sounds like the UN IPCC doesn’t it? Let’s see Pachauri was originally a railroad engineer. His science degree is honorary. Al Gore has no credentials at all. The media of course loves him because of the opportunity he provides them to sell advertising packaged around his fear mongering sound bites.

What a hypocrite you are San Quintin. A complete hypocrite satisfied to apply your criteria to those on the opposite side of the argument from you but not those who agree with you. Content to plug your ears and not listen to facts that contradict your devotion to the sick religion otherwise known as anthropogenic global warming THEORY.

I state for the record SQ that it is you who behaves like the flat-earther, the moon landing denier, the once scientific elite that believed the sun revolved around the earth.

Anyone who thinks the science is settle is also an idiot. Once again, that includes you S. Quintin. I can’t wait to watch those who sold their souls for a little grant money try to crawl away from their predictions and save what’s left of their careers once the truth is even more obvious than it is now.

As for the people on board, one important group isn’t. The general public can sniff the B.S.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/environment/energy_update

Those in power better start reflecting the opinion of the general public or they will not be in power for long. Democrats seem to be waking up. Did you see this one coming SQ?
http://www.politico.com/arena/perm/Dana_Perino_BBA4A76A-EA58-43F2-AA5D-CDE731EA9524.html and Democrats jumping ship on climate bill:

Your most famous cheerleader is terrified of Lord Monckton. Gore has a yellow stripe down his back a mile wide. What a coward. You might also note that even Littlemore (DeSmogBlog) admits Monckton kicked his butt. As long as Gore runs from Monckton, the general public will note him to be a man with no confidence at all that the science is on his side.
#39 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Barton wrote:
No, apparently I was wrong about that and you were write. Hansen did make such a comment. He was not saying, however, that it was going to happen overnight, or even within our lifetimes. Apparently the 246 foot figure refers to what you’d get if the entire cryosphere melted.

Barton, I’m not trying to rub your nose in the fact that you were unaware of this comment. I too had to issue a correction regarding the time line.

I’m merely trying to point out that Hansen and Gore seem to enjoy alarmism and the attention it brings them. Certtainly you didn’t approve of Gore’s sea level rising by 20 feet remark.
#40 Majorajam
May 13, 2009

Katrina was a cat 5.

This is quite the specticle here. I mean, Dash Riprock? U guys can’t possibly not have better things to do with your time than leading this sterile offspring of horse and mule to water. Surely there is a pair of old shoes in the closet with some crusted crevaces that need tending. Or grass that needs to be watched growing. This is to say nothing of the fact that many of u appear to be scientists whose time and expertise are an order of magnitude more valuable than most. Really, u owe it to society if not all that is holy to ignore this cautionary tale.
#41 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Katrina was a cat 3. Look it up.

Major, you really seem like more of a minor to me.
I’m sorry, but is someone called MajorJam actually laughing at my blogger name? Too Funny!
#42 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Monckton catches more Gore lies:
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/originals/monckton_on_gore.html
#43 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Hot Off The Presses:

Chuck It Yet Again Schmidt by
Lord Christopher Monckton, The Third Visount of Brenchley

http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/commentaries_essays/chuck_it_yet_again_schmidt.html
#44 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Let’s try it again:

http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/commentaries_essays/chuck_it_yet_again_schmidt.html
#45 Chris O'Neill
May 13, 2009

Dash on yet another series of trolls:

Chuck It Yet Again Schmidt by Lord Christopher Monckton

Don’t you ever pay attention? We already know this person is a liar as was shown at the beginning of this very thread. You must think we’re as stupid as you are to care what he says.
#46 timwells
May 13, 2009

Chris,have you read the link?Or are you afraid of what it might say?
#47 timwells
May 13, 2009

Stewart,with all due respect you do not understand what the “authority” issue is.The number of degrees a person holds does not change scientific fact!And trying to shore up the strength of ones case by refering to “qualifications” only suggests intellectual weakness.
#48 san quintin
May 13, 2009

Dash.
You’re good at setting up strawmen. I don’t accept the science behind AGW because Gore or Pachauri say so. Neither do they! They accept it because thousands of scientists over the past century have showed them that there is a problem. Neither do I accept it because grant money is available (you clearly haven’t ever tried to obtain a research grant. If you had you would realise that it isn’t so simple!)

I’m a scientist and accept AGW because the science is clear. You can shout and scream as much as you like but until you provide an alternative theory with as much explanatory power as AGW you are irrelevant. Sceptics have had decades to do this and have failed. Half of the experts you cite either aren’t credible scientists (does Courtney have a PhD?…for that matter do you?) or in unrelated fields (Bellamy?).

I know that some people find it terribly upsetting that climate change is likely to overturn their neoliberal, free-market world view but this doesn’t invalidate 160 years of careful science.

As I said in my post, it’s very entertaining watching you thrash around in this debate, but your clear lack of comprehension means that you have failed to engage with the science. The message from scientists is clear: engage with us by doing science. That means publishing in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. You will have to show (amongst other things) that:
CO2 is less effective as a GHG than we thought
Climate sensitivity is low
Given the above you will need to explain an alternative mechanism for glacial/interglacial transitions
Scientists from half a dozen disciplines (physics, maths, chemistry, palaeoclimatology etc) have somehow got this all wrong.

Until you do this your views are pointless.
#49 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Chris O’Neill,

You really are the weak link among the alarmists here.
I guess every group needs a lackey.
This article by Monckton addresses some of the questions
originally brought up by Schmidt.

Most of your posts have contained the word liar. How old are you? You argue like a naive college student.

If you want to look for errors, try viewing Gore’s film. It will keep you busy for some time.

BTW, you suggested in a previous post that I took Obama out of context. I would challenge you to put that Skyrocketing costs line into what you believe is the proper context, a context that does not make Obama look bad on this one. Can’t wait to read what you come up with. Hey save time, just call me a liar. Despite the video clip, tell me he never said it. Then call me a liar one more time for good measure. That seems to be the extent of the insults thou has wit enough to cast. I usually don’t borrow part of a famous line, but I figured “hey, what are the odds of Chris recognizing it?”
#50 san quintin
May 13, 2009

Hmmm…looks like posts are getting a bit mangled. Mine should have had a list at the end, or at least semi-colons.
#51 timwells
May 13, 2009

San quintin,are you sure that you are a scientist?With a statement like….”You will have to show that CO2 is less effective as a GHG than we thought….”
San buddy,science does not work by proving negatives.It works the other way.Like this-
1]AGW theorists are the ones who have to show the effectiveness of CO2 as a GHG.[and they have not]
2]AGW theorists are the ones who have to validate their estimates of climate sensitivity.[and they have not]
3]Glacial/interglacial transitions have not been proven to be due to CO2.
The burden of proof lies with the prosecution,not the defence.
#52 san quintin
May 13, 2009

Timwells
You said:
1]AGW theorists are the ones who have to show the effectiveness of CO2 as a GHG.[and they have not] 2]AGW theorists are the ones who have to validate their estimates of climate sensitivity.[and they have not] 3]Glacial/interglacial transitions have not been proven to be due to CO2.

If you can show how we are wrong on these then you are going to make yourself very famous indeed. If you can overturn (1) then you will also probably win the Nobel Prize for Physics by rewriting 100 years of physics. Why don’t you do this?
#53 timwells
May 13, 2009

Hey Robster,can you read OK?I only ask because you have wildly mis-quoted me.Did I actually say …no animals have gone extinct because of global warming…”??If you want to talk about waht I really said,then post your correction.Smarten up my son!
#54 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

San Quintin, Talk about cherry-picking. I provide a list of names and you pull two of them off the list and attack…LOL So typical.

Isn’t it interesting that you post didn’t contain one piece of proof. Just a bunch of inaccurate general statements.
160 Years of careful science my ____. You mean GIGO computer models and incomplete surface data don’t you.

I’m sure you have a very good explanation as to why the first UN IPCC report contained a graph which clearly acknowledged the existence of a medieval warm period, but was removed from all later reports. Given your impressive credentials you can explain in an instant why red noise pumped into Mann’s model spit out a hockey stick every time.
That hot spot predicted by the computer models really is there, we’re just not looking hard enough right? Cooling in the seventies took place during a time when CO2 continued to rise, I’m sure you’ve got that covered too. The Northwest Passage has been open at least twice before during the last 105 years. Man survived. Polar Bears did too. This time around, polar bears will be wiped out. Four have died already if you haven’t seen AIT. Scary stuff isn’t it San.
Here’s a list of nearly 600 articles citing things caused by AIG. None of these things happened before AIG kicked in right San?
http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm

I’m not going to prove a negative. If you’re really a scientists, you should understand that. Offer up what you believe are the major pieces of evidence supporting AIG and I’ll gladly point out the error of you thinking on each one. Then you can return back to your colleagues red-faced and explain how you managed to get your butt kicked by a non-scientist.
#55 timwells
May 13, 2009

San,
1]How much[what percentage]of the warming from 1910 to 1940 was due to CO2?Please quote your source.
2]How much[what percentage]of the warming from 1975 to 1998 was due to CO2?Please quote your source.
#56 Jeff Harvey
May 13, 2009

San Quintin, thanks for your thoughtful posts. One thing is for certain – Tim Wells and Dash Riprock are NOT scientists. Its likely that both rarely if ever read the primary literature, don’t attend conferences where these issues are debated and argued, and don’t have relevant qualifications. Like many armchair ‘experts’, they think that reading a few contrarian web sites that distort science to promote a pre-determined worldview and political agenda gives them enough information to qualify them as being ‘informed’.

DRs list is just one example of scraping the barrel. Once I start to see the ‘usual suspects’ crop up – names like Courtney, Bellamy etc. – then I cringe. People like Inhofe, Barton and others in the US Senate recieve huge donations from corporations anxious to promote denial, and they will look under any rocks they can find names to join them in promoting it.

As I have said before, anyone who writes utter claptrap such as “And with no disrespect Jeff, the planet DOES exist merely to serve the needs of Homo Sapiens” in no way should be taken seriously. These are the words of a layman. If the planet’s systems were exclusively functioning to support Homo sapiens, then we can draw two conclusions: (1) Our species is doing a pretty lousy job of managing the global commons because we are simplifying nature at an astonishing rate and thereby reducing the ability of the planet’s life-support systems to support us; (2) The maintenance of biodiversity and a healthy functioning biosphere requires input from trillions of individual organisms representing billions of populations and millions of species. Humans exist because these biological processes PERMIT it; they do not function to solely support a single species of bipedal primate; no, these systems generate conditions that permit humans to exist and to persist. This distinction is not a subtle one.
#57 Tim Lambert
May 13, 2009

Dash, please stay on topic. This thread is for discussion of Monckton’s dishonesty. I appreciate your providing us with links to more examples of Monckton’s dishonesty. But please refrain from dumping here random stuff that you think the scientists got wrong. (Especially since it has all been refuted here before.) If you want to bring up something new, you can use an Open Thread.
#58 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Tim,

Since the article from Monckton is new, I doubt you’ve refuted any of it before.

I’ll gladly start an open thread in the future after taking care of one last piece of business.

Dash
#59 Jeff Harvey
May 13, 2009

“Then you can return back to your colleagues red-faced and explain how you managed to get your butt kicked by a non-scientist”.

That’ll be the day. In your dreams, pal.

Here is some advice. 1. Read the entire IPCC last draft. 2. Log into ther Web of Science and then go through any number of the many peer-reviewed journals, – rather than to sit on your lazy butt reading non-peer-reviewed web sites. Your strategy is “because I ain’t read it, it ain’t true”. 3. Read the Global Ecosystem Assessment (2006). The entire thing.

Unlike the contrarians here, I am a busy scientist and I do science. Its not my job here to do your reading for you or to provide lengthy lists. The references are available – thousands of them – in journals like Nature, Science, PNAS, Global Change Biology, Ecology Letters, Ecosystems, Climate Science, Ecology, Journal of Animal Ecology, Journal of Ecology, Proceedings of the Royal Scoiety B, Ecological Monographs, Functional Ecology et al. Many of them look at biological indicators of warming. Others look at the human fingerprint which is all over the current warming episode.
#60 timwells
May 13, 2009

Have you read that link article Tim?
#61 Dash RIPROCK III
May 13, 2009

Yes Jeff, once again you’ve shown how one sided you are. The deniers are all about money and Gore who is poised to be the first green billionaire is in it for the science and for saving the world. How willing you are to speculate about financial incentive among the deniers while avoiding the obvious money trail evident with the alarmists. Like San Quintin, a total hypocrite. BTW, there has been nothing thoughtful about his posts.

You know Jeff, I’m not sure you’re worthy of shining Bjorn Lomborg’s shoes.
#62 timwells
May 13, 2009

Hey Jeff,why are “dash and tim” not scientists??Is it because we ask for proof that CO2 has caused the warming from 1975 to 1998?That seems to be the question that you keep avoiding.I refuse to tell you my qualifications because the facts are what matter.You seem to desperately want to argue your case based on how many pieces of paper you have on your wall.How about you lower yourself down to our level and discuss a specific question such as…”What is the single piece of evidence[NOT THEORY] that demostrates that antrpogenic CO2 is responsible for the warming of the late 20th Century.” Your serve Jeff.
#63 san quintin
May 13, 2009

Timwells
Produce a formal attribution study that demonstrates CO2 isn’t the major forcing for the last couple of decades. Once you’ve done this, then get the results published in a mainstream science journal. Then we’ll have a look.
#64 Jeff Harvey
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells,

The ball is in your court. The IPCC document is the most rigidily peer-reviwed document in scientific history. SQ nails it in his last post. Its you and your ilk who ar bucking the scientific consensus. Its you who need to go through the literature – not me. This is because it overwhelmingly supports the AGW theory.

Dash does what the contrarians do best: suggest they are mangling science to promote a political agenda (which is true, true, true) then watch them create an army of straw men.

As for Bjron Lomborg, Dash, you can wallow in your ignorance. Why does Lomborg appeal to guys like you? First of all, he targets an audience who don’t understand much about environmental science or but are anxious to think that everything is not only going to be fine, but will actually get better. Lomborg doesn’t aim his views at scientists in his book because he is well aware that we will demolish his one-dimensional arguments that mostly exclude the natural economy. No, just like Elmer Gantry, Lomborg aims his book at people who know just a little bit less than he does (Dash, this means people like you). That is the secret. Most people living in the rich world with our enormous ecological deficits do not like hearing bad news, more so since our overconsumptive lifestyles are what is driving ecological destruction on a vast scale. Moreover, there are those, mostly on the libertarian far right (which includes commerical elites) that like the way things are and these will promote people like Lomborg.

I debated Lomborg here in 2002 and from all accounts I hammered him. It was easy – how hard is it to debate a guy who doesn’t really understand what ecosystem services are, who cherry picks studies while ignoring many others with different conclusions, who mangles area-extinction models and who misquotes scientists to distort the meanings of what they said? I was invited twice to Denmark, once to give a keynote lecture at Lomborg’s own University (Aarhus) and once to give the last but one talk at a conference on climate change in Copenhagen. Lomborg did not show up at my first talk (but his student’s did) and he backed out of the second at the last minute, which pissed off the organizers. I do not fear him or his ‘science’. Dash, laypeople like you can lap it all up.
#65 timwells
May 13, 2009

San,you have got a serious problem mate if you believe what you just wrote.Science is NOT about proving negatives. The onus of proof is the other way round,we all know it,and you are just running away.Science links cause and effect.AGW believers say that CO2 is the cause and warming is the effect.PLease now produce a formal attribution study that demonstrates that CO2 IS the major forcing for the last couple of decades.
#66 timwells
May 13, 2009

OK San,lets try another angle.I dont know of any studies that demonstrate that CO2 is NOT the major forcing of the last couple of decades.So lets assume that there are none.What does that leave us with?Does that therefore “prove” that CO2 IS the major forcing of the last couple of decades?No,ofcourse it doesn’t.What is needed is positive attribution,not negative attribution to prove the AGW theory.This is how science is done.
#67 timwells
May 13, 2009

Jeff,your posts are full of an awful lot of ideology but again no real facts.Tell me this,why,if you have read the IPCC document,cant you answer my simple question about the evidence for CO2?
#68 san quintin
May 13, 2009

Timwells.
Read Chapter 9 of AR4.
#69 timwells
May 13, 2009

So San,what specifically in Chapter 9 of AR4 impressed you the most in regard to Co2 warming attribution?
#70 san quintin
May 13, 2009

Timwells.
No climate attribution can recreat the warming of the last few decades without having GHG as a major component. Natural forcing doesn’t achieve this. We also know that CO2 is a GHG…we know from the palaeo record that the climate is sensitive to changes in the forcings. We know that atmospheric CO2 concentrations are the highest for 650ka and probably for over 20Ma. We know that elevated CO2 should produce warming. We know warming is happening. We know that all the recent rise in atmospheric CO2 is anthropogenic.

Given these facts, how do you explain the recent warming? What do you think will happen once we get to 550ppm? What do you think will be the impact of this on ice sheets, permafrost, coral reefs, biodiversity?
#71 DavidK
May 13, 2009

Dash
How about we have a closer look at your list?

Dr Kiminori Itoh, in his own words says:

I would like to briefly introduce myself. I finished my PhD course (Industrial Chemistry) at The University of Tokyo in 1978. From 1978 to 1989, I worked for Professors Honda and Fujishima at The Unversity of Tokyo as Assistant Professor and also Lecturer.

They are famous in the field of photoelectrochemistry, with which most climate scientists are not familiar with. In this field, my greatest contribution is the development of optical waveguide spectroscopy for solid surfaces, for which I received awarded from relevant academic societies. From 1989 to now I have been working at Yokohama National University, mostly in the field of environmental metrology including optical biochemical sensing and theoretical as well as experimental biodiversity measurements. For instance, we have recently developed extremely highly sensitive gas sensing systems and two-dimensional DNA electrophoresis methods.

My interest in the global warming issue started when I had a lecture on environmental metrology in 1995 or so. I was rather surprised at that time to know how this issue was ambiguous unlike stories that conventional news or opinions tell us. For instance, I wondered why the effect of solar changes had been neglected by most climatologists, when I saw in Science a Letter article from the Danish Meteorological Institute in 1997. I also felt it was dangerous that the Japanese society was going to increase nuclear power plants to decrease carbon dioxide, and thought that I had to do something for this situation.

Since then, I have written (or participated in) four books (in Japanese, unfortunately) on this issue including the present one. I also took a patent on sunspot number anticipation, and did some contribution to the IPCC AR4 as an expert reviewer. This is no doubt surprising for an environmental physical chemist like me. I am now even feeling that my original expertise, metrology, was all along close to meteorology; that is, “meteorology” is formed by putting “eo” inside “metrology.”

Dash maaate, this guy publishes things like;

“Computer simulations of seasonal outbreak and diurnal vertical migration of cyanobacteria”

and;

“Mathematical modelling of colony formation in algal blooms: phenotypic plasticity in cyanobacteria.”

I’m sure even you can see the ‘disconnect’. On 2nd thoughts … probably not.

Would any other regular like to pick a name on the Dash-Trash list and enlighten us?
#72 timwells
May 13, 2009

San the problem is,is that we dont have a really good handle on most of the forcings or on the terrestrial and solar influences.The science is still very much in the knowledge accumulation phase.We dont know much about the quanta of CO2 ‘s effect,or about aerosols[positive or negative],or about clouds,or about variations in solar activity.Eg We dont really know why we are going through a cooling phase just now.
Lets go through your statements.
“No climate attribution can recreate the warming….without GHG…”
Well this based on computer modelling which may or may not have value.This however still does not positively identify CO2 as the causitive agent-the reason being that we still dont have a full under standing of the processes involved.Warming has occurred but the primary cause is yet to be identified.
“elevated CO2 should produce warming”
Yes,it should,but how much has always been the sticking point.We still dont know what the NET effect is.We had CO2 levels many times higher during cold periods and vice versa.
“rise in atmospheric CO2 is anthropogenic”
Yes it is mainly.
The recent warming?Well it appears to be in 30 year cycles and probably due to variation in solar activity.Increased GHG’s would also have played a part,but how much is not accurately known.
550ppm??Well that should give us about a 1C rise in temperatures-not a problem at all.Infact the increase in agricultural productivity from CO2 enrichment will be a bonus for the worlds food supply.
Ice sheets,permafrost??Icesheets take centuries to melt and 1C will not adversely affect permafrost areas.
#73 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

1]Temperature is rising slowly.

Sure, but faster than we’ve ever known it to rise before. Fast enough to do us a lot of damage. That’s as fast as it needs to be.

2]Droughts show no long term increase.

Are you sure? What does the FAO say? I’d check before making a statement like that.

3]no increase in violent weather.

Are you sure? What does the WMO say? I’d check before making a statement like that.

4]Ice caps recovering 2008,2009.

Are two years enough to make a trend? Are you sure? I’d check before making a statement like that.

None of these events can be attributed to an increase in CO2. The second part of your post is worthless speculation and scare mongering.One thing is certain-increased CO2 will green the planet and feed the world.

No, increased CO2 will increase drought to the point where human agriculture may collapse.
#74 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Dash rants:

Anyone who can’t see through the lies in An Inconvenient Truth for example is a complete idiot.

What lies? Specify.

Anyone who can’t see that Al Gore pushes that nonsense because he has set himself up to be the world’s first green billionaire if cap and trade become a reality in the U.S. is also an idiot.

How has he done that? Specify.

San Quintin writes: ….almost none of them have any science backgrounds (let alone PhDs in relevant subjects). Kind of sounds like the UN IPCC doesn’t it? Let’s see Pachauri was originally a railroad engineer. His science degree is honorary.

The IPCC was summarizing the peer-reviewed science literature. They didn’t do the research themselves, they merely put it together. All the people they cited were people who knew what they were talking about, which was not true for the Oregon Petition.

Al Gore has no credentials at all.

Al Gore was one of Roger Revelle’s students in the ’60s. Do you know who Revelle was? Do you know what he did?

you. Content to plug your ears and not listen to facts that contradict your devotion to the sick religion otherwise known as anthropogenic global warming THEORY.

THEORY is the highest level a body of scientific knowledge can attain. Thus atomic theory, quantum theory, theories of relativity. It doesn’t mean “guess.” The old creationist argument “Evolution is just a THEORY!” just betrays the scientific illiteracy of those who use it. Ditto for climate deniers like yourself.

Anyone who thinks the science is settle [sic] is also an idiot.

As far as the broad outlines of AGW go? The science is settled. Are there details still not known? Sure there are. No one ever said otherwise. But some things are well known. The Earth does go around the sun, things do get shorter as they go faster, and CO2 is a greenhouse gas.

Once again, that includes you S. Quintin. I can’t wait to watch those who sold their souls for a little grant money try to crawl away from their predictions and save what’s left of their careers once the truth is even more obvious than it is now.

Thou shalt not bear false witness.

Your most famous cheerleader is terrified of Lord Monckton.

Nobody on Earth is terrified of Lord Monckton.

Gore has a yellow stripe down his back a mile wide.

He served in Viet Nam. Did Monckton?

What a coward. You might also note that even Littlemore (DeSmogBlog) admits Monckton kicked his butt. As long as Gore runs from Monckton, the general public will note him to be a man with no confidence at all that the science is on his side.

He doesn’t debate Monckton for the same reason most biologists refuse to debate creationists–such debates don’t mean anything, and scientific issues aren’t settled by rhetoric. It’s also not a good idea to give crackpots like Monckton or Duane Gish a platform. They get enough exposure already.
#75 DavidK
May 13, 2009

Well, Dash has/had a denia(list) somewhere here.
#76 Jeff Harvey
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells,

As I said, why should I do your homework for you? Have you read the IPCC report? It is you who are bucking the prevailing scientific view on the subject, not me. I am a population ecologist and I have research to do. Once you’ve read the IPCC report in its entirety then respond. Given that the denialists like to snipe away from the sidelines and don’t apparently publish much, its no wonder that the vast majority of scientists ignore them.

You write as if you are an expert on climate science. How many climate scientists have you actually spoken to? Have you been to any conferences or workshops in this field? What gives you the impression that you know more than thousands of scientists who have spent years studying their fields of research?
#77 timwells
May 13, 2009

Barton,temperatures have not risen “faster than we have ever known it to rise before” I am sorry but that is absolute rubbish.1910 to 1940 was the same slope and scale as 1975 to 1998.Older thermometer records show even greater slopes and scales.Temperatures have now flattened and even dropped.
Please tell us what the FAO and WMO say about points 2] and 3].
Your last statement is once again just futuristic scare stories.Read the language…
‘increased CO2 will increase..’
‘human agriculture may collapse.’
#78 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

1]AGW theorists are the ones who have to show the effectiveness of CO2 as a GHG.[and they have not]

That CO2 is a greenhouse gas was first demonstrated in the lab by John Tyndall in 1859. Every similar experiment since has confirmed it. There is no doubt about it at all.

2]AGW theorists are the ones who have to validate their estimates of climate sensitivity.[and they have not]

Unless you assume 2xCO2 is about 3 degrees, you can’t account for the ice ages or other paleoclimates.

3]Glacial/interglacial transitions have not been proven to be due to CO2.

No, the trigger is Milankovic Cycles. But the differences in energy delivered are not enough to account for the known swings in temperature. You need CO2 as an amplifier.
#79 Jeff Harvey
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells,

You also do not appear to read very well. You write, “In fact the increase in agricultural productivity from CO2 enrichment will be a bonus for the worlds food supply”. This garbage was comprehensively debunked on the recent Tim Curtin threads (it was one of his silly views as well).

Increased primary productivity depends on a whole suite of biotic and abiotic parameters over variable scales of space and time. These include soil chemistry and biota, pollinators, other multitrophic interactions, plant biology and ecology, edpaphic factors such as precipitation regimes et al. It won’t be possible to turn vast swathes of boral forests on acid soils into an agricultural utopia as temperatures rise.

I KNOW someone is a complete neophyte in the field when they have to dredge up this dead turkey.
#80 san quintin
May 13, 2009

Timwell said: “we dont have a really good handle on most of the forcings or on the terrestrial and solar influences”. We have a very good idea….we know that solar forcing can affect climate but there is no evidence that the effect is any where near big enough to drive recent T increases.

“We dont know much about the quanta of CO2 ‘s effect,or about aerosols[positive or negative],or about clouds,or about variations in solar activity”. Ditto above…the majority of solar physicists disagree with you. There are uncertainties re clouds, but none big enough to change the overall puicture.

“We dont really know why we are going through a cooling phase just now”. Ever heard of weather? At the moment it’s a cold, wet May day. Two weeks ago (earlier in the year!) we had lovely warm sunshine. Does this mean that the sun isn’t the most important factor in seasonal variations? Even if the climate cooled considerably, it still wouldn’t invalidate the fact that CO2 is a GHG. Only new insights in science can do that…not weather.

“(Climate attribution) is based on computer modelling which may or may not have value” How would you do an attribution study then? I’m intrigued. I have written a number of papers on the problems of climate models….but they are still the best tool we have and robust at the large scale.

“This however still does not positively identify CO2 as the causitive agent-the reason being that we still dont have a full under standing of the processes involved”. Cluthching at straws here….a classic do-nothing position. We also don’t know exactly how smoking causes lung cancer, but do know enough to make policy.

“The recent warming?Well it appears to be in 30 year cycles and probably due to variation in solar activity”. So you’ve done an attribution study showing this have you? Well publish the results then…we’d love to see this.

“550ppm??Well that should give us about a 1C rise in temperatures-not a problem at all”. Really? Then how can you have low sensitivity and Quaternary ice sheets?

“Infact the increase in agricultural productivity from CO2 enrichment will be a bonus for the worlds food supply”. Most people who work on this disagree with you. Have you published this?

“Ice sheets,permafrost??Icesheets take centuries to melt and 1C will not adversely affect permafrost areas”. You know this do you? Our understanding of sea level rise in the past shows that it can be very rapid…ice sheets are unstable once they interact with the sea.
#81 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Dash writes:

160 Years of careful science my __. You mean GIGO computer models and incomplete surface data don’t you.

The theory of global warming was first advanced by Svante Arrhenius in a paper in 1896. I’m pretty sure he didn’t use computer models. Neither did G.S. Callendar in 1938.

red noise pumped into Mann’s model spit out a hockey stick every time.

With the curve 1/16th the magnitude of the one he actually published, yes. And dozens of independent studies since then have also produced “hockey stick” type curves. Attacking Mann’s paper is kind of a waste of time. It was the first paper of it’s kind, and the science has advanced since then–but it has never disproved Mann et al.’s original contention.

Cooling in the seventies took place during a time when CO2 continued to rise,

There was cooling about 1940-1970, not “in the seventies.” It was most likely due to the huge increase in industrial aerosols created by expanding industry before pollution controls became widespread.
#82 timwells
May 13, 2009

OK Barton,so show us the math that proves your claim about CO2 being needed as an amplifier.Because everytime I ask for these numbers all I get is more theoretical mumbo-jumbo.You have put the claim out there Barton,so now show us your math.
#83 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

Hey Jeff,why are “dash and tim” not scientists??

Well, if you actually have a science degree, like Jeff or myself, it becomes pretty obvious. Denigrating AGW because it’s a “THEORY” is something no scientist would ever do, because scientists are taught a specific definition of “theory” that doesn’t equate to the pop meaning of “educated guess.” Nor would a scientist deny basic scientific facts like CO2 being a greenhouse gas–at least not a scientist who knew anything about radiative transfer or quantum mechanics or climatology or planetary astronomy.
#84 timwells
May 13, 2009

So Jeff,C3 and C4 cereals dont have greater yields in CO2 enhanced environments?They also dont need as much water?Is that right?
#85 Bernard J.
May 13, 2009

San,you have got a serious problem mate if you believe what you just wrote.Science is NOT about proving negatives.

It amuses me to see someone who is patently not scientifically trained make a statement such as this.

Whilst ‘science’ cannot ever ‘prove’ a positive (instead, ‘science’ can support an hypothesis), it can ‘prove’ (refute) a negative (i.e.hypothesis).

To illustrate, if I have an hypothesis that my magic beans will cure all Denialists of their ignorance, and I conduct a clinical trial that demonstrates that 95% of Denialists are just as ignorance after the course of magic bean treatment, I have “proved a negative”.

It is interesting to see the pseudoscientific description of scientific methodology, promulgated by timwells at post #151, taken up so quickly (26 minutes later) and inadvisedly by Mark G at #154.

Timwells bleats furiously about appeals to authority at post #162, but by doing so he demonstrates that he confuses such appeals with demonstrations of bona fides, a perfectly valid request in these circumstances; and to this end both he and Mark G have demonstrated that they lack these very bona fides when is comes to commenting on matters of science.

Mark G, I have a question for you. Given that you intend to go to the June meeting at the Annenberg Conference Center, will you endeavour to put your refutations to the scientists during the question times of their presentations, and faithfully record their responses, for example with digital voice records of the exchanges?

Better still, you could organise meetings with the scientists with whom you disagree, and organise both you and the other parties to each record the exchanges, including documentation of the supporting material and references.

It’s all well and good for you to throw ambit claims around, but how about you demonstrate how they stack up in the real world of science, against those of the scientists whom you so disparage, but whom you seem not to engage in any reviewable forum?

You are situated on the doorstep of a sizable nexus of such scientists – show us what you are really made of.

Oh, and how is your critique of [Pierrehumbert's](http://geosci.uchicago.edu/~rtp1/ClimateBook/ClimateBook.html) text coming along?
#86 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

AGW believers say that CO2 is the cause and warming is the effect.PLease now produce a formal attribution study that demonstrates that CO2 IS the major forcing for the last couple of decades.

1. CO2 is a greenhouse gas (Tyndall 1859).
2. CO2 is rising (Keeling et al. 1958).
3. The new CO2 is mostly from burning fossil fuels (Suess 1955, Suess and Revelle 1957).
4. Temperature is rising (NASA GISS, Hadley Centre CRU, UAH, RSS, etc., etc.).
5. The changes in temperature correlate closely (r = 0.86) with the changes in CO2.

What more do you want? Which of the above points do you disagree with, and why?
#87 timwells
May 13, 2009

Barton,I am sorry my friend but I am beginning to think you may a screw loose.Where in all of my post did I say that CO2 is not a green house gas???Wake up my boy!!
And here we are back to the qualifications issue.So answer me this.If,just for argument sake,I said that I have a degree in applied chemistry with a specialty in Human metabolism.Would that then “qualify” me to express an opinion on this blog?
#88 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

To point out the importance of working in the right field, DavidK quotes one of Dash’s “qualified” deniers, Itoh Kiminori. It would of course just be an ad hominem to say, “Sumimasen ga, Itoh-san wa bakayaro des’.” So I’ll just take a look at what he says:

I wondered why the effect of solar changes had been neglected by most climatologists,

Maybe because there has been no trend in solar output for 50 years, whereas global warming turned up sharply in the last 30? And, BTW, there have been plenty of solar-climate studies. Itoh-san just doesn’t appear to have read the relevant literature.

I also took a patent on sunspot number anticipation,

That must be interesting. Perhaps the Japanese patent office is like ours, which once issued a patent for a perpetual motion machine. (To be fair to the patent office, they now have an automatic rule excluding machines which violate conservation of energy.)

and did some contribution to the IPCC AR4 as an expert reviewer.

Anyone can be an “expert reviewer” of the IPCC AR4 report. All you have to do is request a copy. This is a qualification that is calculated to impress a lay audience, but has no real meaning. Disingenuous.

This is no doubt surprising for an environmental physical chemist like me. I am now even feeling that my original expertise, metrology, was all along close to meteorology; that is, “meteorology” is formed by putting “eo” inside “metrology.”

No, Doc, working in a field, A, with a name that sounds like the name of another field, B, does not really give you any expertise in field B.
#89 timwells
May 13, 2009

Barton,the only point under scrutiny is number 5.As we both know,correlation does not mean causation.There is also a strong correlation for temp and solar cycle intensity AND an even stronger correlation for temp and solar cycle length.By the way what are the start and end dates for your correlation analysis?
#90 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

The recent warming?Well it appears to be in 30 year cycles and probably due to variation in solar activity.

I regressed temperature anomaly on ln CO2, dust veil index, and four different possible measures of solar activity (TSI, sunspot number, years since minimum, and years since maximum, one at a time for the latter four to avoid multicolinearity). Ln CO2 accounted for 76% of the variance and DVI for another 2%. None of the solar measurements was statistically significant. Sunspot number came closest, but only at t = 1.4. So it’s not “probably due to variation in solar activity” at all.
#91 Majorajam
May 13, 2009

Dash Riprock the turd, Katrina achieved category 5 status, as did the strongest ever recorded Atlantic hurricane the same season. I’ve little doubt that in your mind that nothing exists outside US sovereign dry land, but science is less inclined to see it that way.

It looks like the inmate coup d’etat is at full swing at this asylum. On a thread that catches Monckton out impersonating a member of the House of Lords, something that would humiliate anyone with an ounce of shame and trouble any third party with an ounce of intellectual honesty, we have a shameless non sequitur Monckton appearance and Monckton worship. Meanwhile the two stooges parroting the latter nonsense together with some of the oldest and most inane denialism continue to have takers. This thread should be retitled ‘The sound of one denialist synapse firing, or how I learned to love the killfile’.
#92 stewart
May 13, 2009

Back tot the topic for a second.
Monckton lies, is delusional, or both. Those who quote Monckton approvingly are lying, delusional, or ignorant. See above. I hope its ignorant, as that’s curable. Lying can also be cured by changing the contingencies.
timwells, with all due respect, some people and organizations are authorities, because they actually have the knowledge and do the work in the area. (Where are you – what does your local science academy say about AGW?) The attempt to counter them by the argument from stupidity is not successful, although it may lead to temporary feelings of superiority among the ignoranti.Google scholar is your friend. And science DOES work by proving negatives – it’s a gigantic mechanism for squeezing out error, one bit at a time. Conveniently, what’s left can be taken for provisional truth. Oh, and insert ad hominem insult here.
#93 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

OK Barton,so show us the math that proves your claim about CO2 being needed as an amplifier.

Surely. Try here:

Royer D.L., R.A. Berner, I.P. Montanez, N.J. Tabor, and D.J. Beerling 2004. “CO2 as a Primary Driver of Phanerozoic Climate.” GSA Today 14, 4-10.

Or just go to Google Scholar and type in “ice ages carbon dioxide amplifier.” I get over 8,000 hits.
#94 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

If,just for argument sake,I said that I have a degree in applied chemistry with a specialty in Human metabolism.Would that then “qualify” me to express an opinion on this blog?

Anyone can express an opinion on a blog. But whether their opinion carries any weight depends on whether they’ve studied the subject in question or not. No, I don’t think an applied chemist would have anything to say about climate science that couldn’t be said by anything else. They just don’t teach climatology in chemistry classes, to my knowledge. Not any of the ones I’ve taken, anyway.

Look, you don’t have to remain ignorant about climatology and global warming. You can get yourself up to speed pretty quickly if you put some effort into it. You could start with some good non-quantitative overviews:

Weart, Spencer 2003. The Discovery of Global Warming.
Philander, S. George 1998. Is the Temperature Rising?

Then go on to some quantitative texts and (this is very important) work the problems:

Houghton, John T. 2002. The Physics of Atmospheres.
Petty, Grant W. 2006. A First Course in Atmospheric Radiation.
Hartmann, Dennis L. 1994. Global Physical Climatology.

That should give you a good basic overview. To get up to speed on the AGW issue itself, you could do worse than to read the individual issue threads on RealClimate. Ignore the ones about policy or debunking ignorant climate deniers, just read the ones about the science.
#95 timwells
May 13, 2009

Bernard J,you just nailed it for us sceptics!
To your “illustration”… Your hypothesis is about the CURE by the USE of magic beams,but your problem is that you have come to a premature conclusion.IE,that the magic beams did not perform the cure.However you have STARTED your trial with the ASSUMPTION that your magic beams both EXIST and will have some EFFICACY.If it has been established that the beams do exist AND have some clinical effect,then your final conclusion may have some merit.Until such time,you cannot link the beams and denialists ignorance.
And in a strange way this is what the global warming debate is about.AGW believers START with the asumption that CO2 is a major driver of climate/temp and then interpret all evidence based on that assumption.We sceptics do not believe that CO2 is a major driver and we would love to see the emperical evidence that it is.
#96 Barton Paul Levenson
May 13, 2009

Tim Wells writes:

Barton,the only point under scrutiny is number 5.As we both know,correlation does not mean causation.

Quite right. But if you have a theory beforehand that predicts such a correlation, and you then find that it appears, that’s nice confirmation.

There is also a strong correlation for temp and solar cycle intensity AND an even stronger correlation for temp and solar cycle length.

I haven’t found either when I looked.

By the way what are the start and end dates for your correlation analysis?

The one on my web site about it is 1880-2007 (N = 128):

http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Correlation.html
#97 timwells
May 13, 2009

Barton,I am sorry but I really dont trust Hansen’s numbers for the temperature.I will check for others.
#98 Bernard J.
May 13, 2009

So Jeff,C3 and C4 cereals dont have greater yields in They also dont need as much water?Is that right?

If the “CO₂ enhanced environments” are also hotter and drier as a consequence of AGW, ecological competition and non-CO₂ physiological constraintsare bad news for C3 metabolisers.

There’s no such thing as a free lunch.
#99 Jeff Harvey
May 13, 2009

“We sceptics do not believe that CO2 is a major driver and we would love to see the emperical evidence that it is”.

“We sceptics” are a small coterie of ostensibly right wing individuals most of whom are not scientists and are on the academic fringe.

As climate scientist David Viner said some years ago, in the late 1980s and early 1990s the climate change denialists said that AGW was a ‘doomsday myth’. Most have shifted since then, saying that change is occurring or that it is ‘natural’ and the result of forcings that have little or nothing to do with atmospheric concetrations of C02 (C02 has been considered a major factor in forcing climate since the late 1800s, but Tim Wells, being a layman, ignores that).

Mark my words: as the empirical evidence grows further in support of AGW, the deniers will shift their arguments again, and say that it is too late to do anything except to try and adapt (Michaels is starting to go in this direction). Otherwise they will start saying (as Tim W and Tim C have done) that in an enhanced C02 world the planet will become a green paradise. In every scenario, nothing is done to address the problen: it is business as usual.

As for the empirical evidence, Tim’s strategy is simple: do not read the primary literature, and then claim that, since he hasn’t read anything, its up to those defending the science of AGW to come to him with the answers. Until then, he will crow that there is ‘no proof’. I’ve seen this tactic used by contrarians in denying a range of other environmental problems and their consequences: biodiversity loss, acid rain, habitat fragmentation, invasive species, pollution. Without 100% unequivocol proof they claim that the problem does not exist. I am used to this kind of stalling tactic, as I have had to debate contrarians who rely on it.

Well, Tim, I have news for you: science rarely provides 100% proof for any process, and this is even more true in a highly non-linear field such as ecology. The fact is that we do know enough now to broadly accept that humans are forcing climate. Humans are by now a global force: we have drastically altered biogeochemical cycles that operate over vast spatio-temporal scales, we have certainly had profound effects on local climatic conditions and on primary productivity and freshwater flows. Why is it so inconceivable that we are not a major factor in affecting the planet’s climate control system?
#100 Bernard J.
May 13, 2009

Timwells at #195.

I’m sorry to disabuse you of the ‘triumph’ of your twist on the establishment of an hypothesis and of its testing, but your comment is a contextual red herring.

Plenty of valid hypotheses are tested and proved negative as I (and stewart at #192) described, and this is sufficient to put paid to your incorrect statement that “[s]cience is NOT about proving negatives”.

I can see though that if you are claiming qualification in science, it is an embarrassing statement to have made.

Just get over it and move on.