Deltoid

Tim,

It needs to be said: thanks for bringing these gems to our attention. There's little on TV or radio to match them for sheer comic lunacy. I think that even the late, great, Spike Milligan would've struggled to top them.

self-confessed genocidalists Prince Philip and Prince Charles, along with their lap dog Al Gore

Comedy gold!

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 16, 2009 2:42 PM

every thing he said is insane.

the paper looks like a pretty, hm, special publication.

Posted by: sod | June 16, 2009 3:08 PM

Does anyone know much about his grandfather, the first Viscount Monckton? The Wiki article says

Monckton served as advisor to Edward VIII during the abdication crisis, having been his Attorney-General since 1932

That doesn't sound like part of the effort by anti-fascists to crush the Hitler project in Britain, does it?

It references 'The life of Viscount Monckton of Brenchley' by Frederick Winston Furneaux-Smith.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 16, 2009 3:37 PM

Didn't Monckton do a drive by a while ago? Put up a smokescreen and left rapidly before anyone could ask him unpleasant questions about his lies and distortions.

Posted by: guthrie | June 16, 2009 4:50 PM

7 guthrie,

Yes, but Munchkin never has any intention of answering direct questions. He just likes to make a pompous, borderline-psychotic announcement and disappear.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 16, 2009 5:24 PM

re: #7 guthrie

Recent drive-by: yes, see the thread containing why Texas is not Scotland, even when a peer visits.

Posted by: John Mashey | June 16, 2009 6:17 PM

DavidCOG

I thought the Observer interview with Monckton was being kind even though the writer obviously thought Monckton was barking.

TrueSceptic, I think if Spike was still alive he would give up at Monckton and go hide at his parents house in Woy Woy. BTW what was the Goon show character voiced by Sellers who was real smooth and always cooking up surreal scams, his sidekick was Moriarty voiced by Milligan. Now that goon Show character fits Monckton like a glove.

But, let me suggest an ever greater pinnacle of absurdity. Imagine if the four denialists that walked with Fielding into Penny Wong's office the other day had been replaced by Monckton. Just imagine it, can you imagine the look on Wong's face after 5, nay 2 minutes of Monckton.

Ahhh just remembered, the character was called GrypePipe Thin, I think. Monckton down to a t.

Posted by: Jeremy C | June 16, 2009 6:25 PM

13 Jeremy,

Yes, but Grytpype-Thynne sounded suave, no matter how mad the scheme. Munchkin sounds mad, no matter how suave he tries to seem.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 16, 2009 6:35 PM

14 guthrie,

But if global warming is a fraud, how can it get warmer anywhere? It's been cooling since 2002, dontcha know?

I wish I could get the hang of this doublethink.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 16, 2009 6:41 PM

16 Grendel,

As I said earlier, if he weren't mentally ill, I'd demand that he eats that tablespoonful (or 2) of DDT in public.

That applies to all the DDT liars/deniers who claim that DDT is not toxic to humans.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 16, 2009 6:45 PM

This is pure madness. Everyone knows that the British Royal Family are in fact alien shape changing lizards.

So is Boxcar Willie and George W Bush.

Posted by: albi | June 16, 2009 7:16 PM

21 albi,

Of course. AGW is just one of many tricks the Illuminati use to control us. It all makes sense now.

For anyone who thinks Icke is being unfairly ridiculed, go to his website and decide for yourself.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 16, 2009 7:45 PM

re: #14 guthrie

[Off-topic humor...]

(Sorry, I couldn't resist, knowing you lived there :-)).

I was supposed to play at St. Andrews on a visit about 10 years ago. The rains were already torrential, which didn't stop some Scots colleagues of mine, although we wimp Californians begged off.

Although, now that I think of it... Some of my ancestors were Scots, but they accepted Pennsylvania weather, BUT:

a) The SF Bay Area generally has a mild climate. One of the rainiest places (40-80"/year, and even gets snow occasionally, compared to the ~30" that most of us in the hills here get) is a little town called:

Bonny Doon

b) Some of the fiercest weather I've ever seen in New Zealand was in the South of the South Island, facing the Southern Ocean, not noted for its balmy qualities. It has towns like:

Invercargill

Dunedin

Glengarry

Balclutha

These face the Southern Ocean, not known for its mildness.

c) This seems like a pattern, perhaps:

when Scots emigrate, do they look around the world for wet&cool? :-)

Posted by: John Mashey | June 16, 2009 8:36 PM

when Scots emigrate, do they look around the world for wet&cool?

No, sometimes they go for wet and frigid - look at the 19th-century Scottish settlements in the Northwest Territories, ie. the Red River Colony. Unimprovable climate - floods all spring, clouds of mosquitoes in what there is of the summer, and then a winter of really Martian hostility. Even hardened Canadians quail at the thought of Portage and Main on a January night. The balmier Scottish colonies in the Dominion are places like Nova Scotia, whcih is north of Maine, which I am given to believe is considered to be one of the colder states in the Union.

Posted by: Lars | June 16, 2009 9:32 PM

There are basically two types of people in this world.

Those who know little and know that they know little. And those who know little and don't know that they know little.

The climate skeptics belong to the first group, and the AGW believers to the latter group.

Posted by: Ray | June 16, 2009 10:35 PM

I know several Nobel physicists, some additional members of the US National Academy of Sciences, and various other climate researchers. I see such people a few times/month.

Oddly, they all accept AGW.

I have met people who:

a) Had never read a climate book by a real climate scientist.

b) Had never read a climate article in a credible peer-reviewed journal.

c) Had never attended a lecture by a real climate scientist or even ever met one.

d) When urged to do any of the above, and given recommendations, said they already knew enough, although they would not explain their sources.

e) And certainly knew, with utter certainty, that AGW was a hoax.

See Dunning-Kruger Effect: even truly severe afflictions can be cured, if someone so desires. (Of course, most DK-afflictees do not so desire).

Posted by: John Mashey | June 16, 2009 10:53 PM

Earth's weather is controlled by our nearest star, the Sun. Nothing mankind can do will affect global warming, since it is not an effect of mankind's actions. If Earth is really undergoing a continuing warming event, there are factors that will come into play that may not be expected. I see no remarks anywhere about these factors. The first factor is evaporation, a cooling process. As Earth heats up, evaporation will increase. The second factor follows evaporation. The most effective "greenhouse gas" is water vapor. As water vapor increases, the greenhouse effect will increase. Water vapor at altitude will crystallize into snow to descend to earth. An Ice Age will begin. No matter what Monckton says, or what global warming adherents spout, nothing can be done to stop the process. Only the Sun can put a halt to global warming.

Posted by: Radiorick | June 16, 2009 11:22 PM

There are basically two types of people in this world. Those who know little and know that they know little. And those who know little and don't know that they know little.

By the way Ray, which of these groups do Larouchites fit into? Considering your comment was in a thread motivated by a Larouchite publication, you could make it relevant by saying how it applies to Larouchites.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 16, 2009 11:40 PM

As Earth heats up, ... An Ice Age will begin.

I love it.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 16, 2009 11:58 PM

Radiorick's Fifth Law of Thermodynamics:

"The Laws of Thermodynamics zero to three are hereby repealed, and the Fourth Law of Thermodynamics will be instantly repealed the minute it is elucidated".

Posted by: Bernard J. | June 17, 2009 1:28 AM

From the interview: "But why does this fail, even if they [the greens] are eventually granted the authoritarian powers that would be necessary to enforce the sterilization of the male population, or to enforce a one-child policy?"

Oh no, the greens want to hurt our willies!

(Obs! Irony)

Posted by: Lars Karlsson | June 17, 2009 2:35 AM

when Scots emigrate, do they look around the world for wet&cool? :-)

There's actually a Billy Connolly routine about that... When the first Scots colonists landed in New England, they met a chap who said "Come on guys, I know a place where it's even colder," and they all moved to Nova Scotia.

Even Scotland is getting too warm now. If this keeps up, I'm going to have to move to Scandinavia.

Posted by: Dunc | June 17, 2009 4:53 AM

Jeremy C writes:

what was the Goon show character voiced by Sellers who was real smooth and always cooking up surreal scams, his sidekick was Moriarty voiced by Milligan.

Gritpipe-Thynne.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 17, 2009 7:12 AM

"But why does this fail, even if they [the greens] are eventually granted the authoritarian powers that would be necessary to enforce the sterilization of the male population...

Oh gawd, can his understanding of population biology be any more absent?!

Where one male is capacble of easily fertilising more than one female, it is the females in the population who dictate the rate of increase/decline. In these instances males are little more than decoration, and even removing a significant proportion of them will have little effect on reproductive rates - it would just result in a smaller group with large smiles on their faces. A vast majority of males would need to be targeted before reproductive rates nose-dived, and I doubt that even in the most fevered of conspiracy theories Monckton could ascribe this sort of wholesale intent to "the Greens".

Of course, Monckton probably assumes that monogamy and fidelity would be the order of the day, but he obviously has no idea of the power of the reproductive drive, nor of the fallibility of human scruples.

There are much more efficient ways of lowering reproductive rates that "sterilising the males".

Posted by: Bernard J, | June 17, 2009 8:06 AM

Radiorick.

A question...

If Earth is really undergoing a continuing warming event, there are factors that will come into play that may not be expected. I see no remarks anywhere about these factors. The first factor is evaporation, a cooling process. As Earth heats up, evaporation will increase.

What happens to the energy represented by the heat of vaporisation that causes the "cooling process" of evaporation?

Eh?

Posted by: Bernard J. | June 17, 2009 9:06 AM

"No amount of reasoning will cause you to have any doubts. " - Ray

Ray, we have doubts,and we are very open to reasoning.

However, cherry-picking data, re-stating long disproven theories, quoting hyper-marginal figures with kooky ideas, misunderstanding basic science and arguing from mistaken assumptions, do not qualify as 'reasoning'.

Posted by: Michael | June 17, 2009 9:51 AM

"No amount of reasoning will cause you to have any doubts. " - Ray

Ray, we have doubts,and we are very open to reasoning.

However, cherry-picking data, re-stating long disproven theories, quoting hyper-marginal figures with kooky ideas, misunderstanding basic science and arguing from mistaken assumptions, do not qualify as 'reasoning'.

Posted by: Michael | June 17, 2009 10:09 AM

If someone who is not a climatologist, like Professor Plimer or Monckton, expresses doubt about the significance of man-made CO2 emissions to climate change, he is dismissed on the grounds he is not a climatologist and therefore cannot know what he is talking about.

A lie. He's roundly and robustly dismissed because his understanding is wrong, the papers he cites don't support his position, the figures have been cherry-picked, the evidence is incorrect/out of date/fraudulent etc etc etc. Plimer has been systematically taken apart on the science, not on personality or background.

As you should be able to see from this definition, a sceptic is definitely not someone who is convinced he is right, as you claim in your post.

Indeed. And yet so many of those that proclaim themselves "skeptics" are skeptical only of one particular viewpoint, and blindly accepting of anything that contradicts that.

Perhaps such adherents could consider labelling themselves as something other than "skeptics" - as you've quite correctly pointed out, they're clearly wrong in doing so.

Posted by: Dave | June 17, 2009 10:21 AM

Ray: You make the argument "I call myself a sceptic. This is what the dictionary says under 'sceptic'. Therefore I win. QED", and then you wonder why people don't take you seriously? Well, you've convinced me, global warming is a religion/scam/hoax/conspiracy (delete as appropriate).

Oh, wait, no, you're full of it. Words aren't always used according to their dictionary definition, and 'AGW sceptic' has come to mean, in common usage, someone who does not 'believe' in AGW. And the fact is that, if you look around on the web especially, most AGW 'sceptics' do not take a position of "I'm not sure what's happening" but one of "AGW is WRONG and climate scientists are LYING for financial gain, oh and Al Gore is fat!", backed up by various extremely spurious scientific arguments and no evidence of genuine 'scepticism' (i.e. doubting their own position) as per the definition you quote. Look at the Monckton quotes - he's not saying "climate scientists might be wrong", he's just outright saying they're wrong, and then making some completely evidence-free assertions about how much damage and suffering greenhouse gas reductions will cause.

But since you're a real sceptic, unlike all of us True Believers, I assume you're as sceptical of, say, Monckton's and Plimer's claims as you are of any pro-AGW claims? You have carefully scrutinized the evidence for what they're saying, you have read anti-AGW blogs and posted critical questions in their comments, as befits a true independent thinker? Oh.

Posted by: Julius | June 17, 2009 10:25 AM

A thought experiment:

You - a layman - go to see your doctor for a regular checkup despite feeling healthy. Thanks to the advances in modern medicine, he diagnoses you with cancer that, if left untreated, will be fatal. He recommends a course of chemotherapy.

Do you:

a) Accept his diagnosis, as an expert in his field, with years of rigorous evidence backing up the efficacy of the treatment, and begin the course of chemo at the earliest opportunity.

b) Proclaim yourself skeptical of his diagnosis, and seek a second opinion - after all, you feel fine, and what do these so-called "experts" know?

If you answered b), you go and see another doctor. He comes to the same conclusion as the first.

Do you:

a) Accept his diagnosis, as an expert in his field, with years of rigorous evidence backing up the efficacy of the treatment, and begin the course of chemo at the earliest opportunity.

b) Proclaim yourself skeptical of his diagnosis, and try to find some evidence that would contradict his closed-minded quasi-religious stance?

If you answered b), you go on the internet and download some material that indicates that cancer does not exist, or if it does it is part of a government conspiracy to force people to spend money on unnecessary treatment, or that cancer has probably happened to people with no ill effects for thousands of years and is actually beneficial. Armed with this contradictory literature, you demand your doctor rethink his diagnosis. Your doctor patiently explains everything that is wrong and incorrect with your information, and reiterates the seriousness of your condition.

Do you:

a) Accept his diagnosis, as an expert in his field, with years of rigorous evidence backing up the efficacy of the treatment, and begin the course of chemo at the earliest opportunity.

b) Insist his elitist response has merely reaffirmed that you were correct to doubt his integrity in the first place, and as such you remain skeptical of his diagnosis, modern medicine in general, and seek a second opinion from an alternative source.

If you answered b), you go and see a holistic nutritionist. He says your energy is out of balance and that you need to eat raisins and avocado for a week.

Do you:

a) Proclaim yourself skeptical of his diagnosis, as it is contrary to all previous expert opinion on your condition, and no evidence exists in scientific literature about the existence or balance of bodily "energy", or the effectiveness of dietary changes in improving said energy.

b) Accept his diagnosis, because it sounds better than the others, and fits with your worldview that so-called experts represent a self-interested cabal marginalising anyone that dares contradict their orthodoxy.

If you answered all b), congratulations - you're now ready to go out and fight for truth, justice and the "skeptical" way.

Posted by: Dave | June 17, 2009 11:01 AM

Where one male is capacble of easily fertilising more than one female, it is the females in the population who dictate the rate of increase/decline. In these instances males are little more than decoration, and even removing a significant proportion of them will have little effect on reproductive rates - it would just result in a smaller group with large smiles on their faces. A vast majority of males would need to be targeted before reproductive rates nose-dived...

I'd expect a Viscount to hunt stags (just to keep up appearances, if nothing else) and to understand why they hunt stags, and why doing so doesn't cause the deer population to crash ...

Posted by: dhogaza | June 17, 2009 11:38 AM

Dave @59:

You get my vote for post of the year so far on Deltoid. That made my day :)

Posted by: Former Skeptic | June 17, 2009 1:30 PM

64 Ed,

Lord Munchkin is a brazen liar, highly delusional, or, most likely, somewhere between the 2. No one could tell such lies and expect no one to notice without also being delusional.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 17, 2009 2:25 PM

Regarding Roy Spencer:

1) Just publishing an article, even peer-reviewed, doesn't make it true, it has to stand up to repeated scrutiny. Peer-review just says "We don't find anything absurdly wrong, and it might be interesting." See howto learn about science.

2) Spencer & Christy's satellite analysis work at UAH long contradicted the groundstations, the ocean heat content measurements, and also the other major satellite analysis, RSS. Some radiosonde data agreed with UAH.

2) Turns out, UHA was badly wrong, including some serious bugs in their code (sign reversal of diurnal drift), and their newer reanalyses look more consistent with the rest. Also, the radiosonde data was found to have problems with spurious cooling. UAH is still a little lower, and maybe they have a better approximation than RSS, but based on following this for years, and reading actual papers, a rational observer would tend to bet on RSS.

3) Sometimes a scientist will get committed to a position based on some data or their analysis thereof, and the data turns out to be bad, or their analysis in error, and they even agree to that (as Spencer & Christy have). Good scientists change their minds, but some (and even sometimes otherwise good ones) then spend a lot of energy trying to show they weren't so wrong. Fred Hoyle hung on to steady-state cosmology long after the evidence for big-bang was very strong.

4) Hence, if Spencer publishes good work, people will look at it, but his track record hasn't been so good of late.

4) Spencer has been involved with Tech Central Station, Heartland Institute, George C. Marshall Institute, entities that do not do science, but certainly do anti-science. He writes (in his book) about avoiding hurt to the poor, but then helps Heartland.

The latter has taken money for decades from cigarette companies, whose business plans depend utterly on addicting children while their brains are developing, and of course, in practice, this much more strongly affects poor/lesser-educated people. Somehow, Spencer manages to ignore this.

5) Finally, of course, Spencer is a vocal creationist, which might seem orthogonal, but it doesn't argue well for his ability to keep belief systems from overriding actual science.

Belief in one flavor of anti-science doesn't necessarily imply belief in other flavors, but it doesn't help one's credibility.

Posted by: John Mashey | June 17, 2009 3:16 PM

68 Ed,

That's one reason I don't use my real name.

All the same, I find him funny. Try The Extended Bird for the full effect.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 17, 2009 7:43 PM

Has Monckton ever demonstrated the lack of toxicity in two tablespoons of DDT by eating them himself?

What do you think caused the mental condition he so obviously exhibits?

Posted by: QrazyQat | June 17, 2009 9:16 PM

Of course I can't answer in detail all the refutations to my definition of 'skeptic'. It would take far too long, and I have practical matters to attend to, such as the slashing of all the tall grass on my block before the fire season arrives.

On this blog I feel like Daniel being thrown into the Lion's den.

However, there are a few bizarre responses to my position of skepticism which I should address. Someone brought in the analogy of a doctor diagnosing one as having cancer which may need chemotherapy treatment.

This is a totally inappropriate analogy. The diagnosis and treatment of cancer is a science that has been tested time and time again. There's strong experimental evidence for the accuracy of the diagnosis and the efficacy of the treatment.

Since doctors and specialists are fallable just like the rest of us, it's always advisable to get a second or third opinion. However, whatever the consensus of opinion, there's still a risk that recommended procedures will not have the desired effect. Doctors, especially in the USA, pay very high insurance premiums to cover themselves for mistakes.

When it comes to climate change, caused by anthropogenic influences or not, we simply don't have the benefit of true and tried experimental results. A more appropriate analogy would be the long-term effects of diet and exercise.

One might equate a reduction in CO2 emissions as equivalent to eating a sprig of broccoli every day. Broccoli apparently contains anti-carcinogens. Could one therefore claim if one were to eat a portion of broccoli every day one would never get cancer?

Can one claim that, if one exercises every day one will live longer? One can claim that full cream milk and eggs will raise one's cholestral level, whilst ignoring the counter-balance of HDL, and the counterbalance of plain exercise.

The fundamental problem of dietary effects on our health, longevity and well-being, is that we can't apply the proper scientific procedures of 'fasifiability'. We simply can't get people to relive their lives with a different diet in order to be sure what effect a different diet will have.

There are so many, many influences that affect our health and well-being, we simply can't always isolate the effects of one change in diet, except perhaps when it's extreme, such as an excessive intake of alcohol.

It is likewise with climate change. Climate is always changing, for better or for worse, with or without anthropogenic C02 emmissions. Trying to isolate the specific contibution of man-made gasses is like trying to gauge the effect of a sprig of broccoli added to one's daily diet.

Posted by: Ray | June 18, 2009 3:31 AM

Ray, would I be correct in saying your position is that it is, and always will be, impossible to know what causes the climate to change?

Posted by: Gaz | June 18, 2009 3:56 AM

I'm beginning to believe that you AGW adherents just don't understand the fundamental principles that underly all science. Refutability, falsifiability, experimental evidence and feedback.

An example that springs to mind is the Apollo 11 landing on the moon. There was some uncertainty as to the thickness of the interstellar dust on the moon. Certain calculations on the eath had estimated that the thickness of dust on the moon might be several metres deep, which would be a problem for any moon landing.

In fact, the dust thickness was minimal. This experimental feedback caused a reassessment of the scientific formulas that had previously been in place. This is how science works.

With climate change predictions, there's little possibility of such a feed-back because the time scales are so great. So it's mostly guesswork. Don't you guys realise this?

Posted by: Ray | June 18, 2009 4:30 AM

Ray:

1. The loose dust on the Moon is very thin. The regolith is several meters thick. BTW, we knew about the relative depths as soon as Surveyor landed on the Moon in 1959, a decade before Apollo 11.

2. There is good climate data back to about 1850 and proxy data for well before that. There is, in fact, an entire field called "paleoclimatology." So it's not "guesswork" at all.

Will you for God's sake crack a book before pontificating about a subject you've apparently never studied?

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 18, 2009 4:36 AM

Of course I can't answer in detail all the refutations to my definition of 'skeptic'.

I don't think anyone's refuted anything as basic as the definition of "skeptic" so much as the honesty/accuracy of applying said term to the vast majority of anti-AGW proponents that label themselves as "skeptics", largely due to the high degreee of selectivity commonly on display (ie. skeptical only of one specific viewpoint, and accepting of anything that appears to oppose it). This is particularly egregious because the implication is that those that do accept AGW (ie. virtually all climate scientists) are derelict in not showing sufficient skepticism - an implication that is inaccurate, and insulting, but is nevertheless there.

On this blog I feel like Daniel being thrown into the Lion's den.

Appeals for sympathy will get you nowhere. Especially as you practically hurled yourself into the lions den, rolled around in barbecue sauce and called the lions a bunch of idiots (metaphorically) :D.

This is a totally inappropriate analogy. The diagnosis and treatment of cancer is a science that has been tested time and time again. There's strong experimental evidence for the accuracy of the diagnosis and the efficacy of the treatment.

Aside from the fact that you're wrong to imply that there is a lack of experimental evidence for AGW (as has been pointed out in another response), it's an entirely appropriate analogy and in fixating on the medical aspect you missed the point I was trying to get across. The issue is the flagrant abuse of the term skeptical as used by someone with a highly selective and prejudiced opinion, as coupled with an inherent mistrust of a majority (evidence-based) view as elitist.

A more appropriate analogy would be the long-term effects of diet and exercise.

Well if you prefer... take my post above, and replace all occurences of "cancer" with "heart disease", and "chemotherapy" with "improved diet and exercise". Does that change the point in any way at all?

It is likewise with climate change. Climate is always changing, for better or for worse, with or without anthropogenic C02 emmissions. Trying to isolate the specific contibution of man-made gasses is like trying to gauge the effect of a sprig of broccoli added to one's daily diet.

Okay, you just compared testing the efficacy of lifestyle changes on a large population in clinical trials, with the long-term study of climate, without any real justification for doing so beyond your assertion that they are both subject to many factors.

Plus your "extra sprig of broccoli" analogy isn't correct because you can't really quantify the effect of dietary "anti-carcinogens" in the human body except statistically in a large population, whereas you can measure the effect of increased concentrations of CO2. It would be better (but still wrong) to think in terms of a single M&M added to the diet weekly (ie. a monotonically increasing input of M&Ms). That way you'd be increasing the fat/sugar intake in a minute way every week, such that we can measure the fat deposits remaining in your body. Of course, fat can come from other sources, and in the short term, fluctuations thanks to varied diet/exercise would overwhelm the contribution of that little extra M&M. However, we'd have an understood scientific basis for anticipating a long-term trend towards obesity, and while effects would not be measurable initially, over a lifetime you'd get pretty fat.

But then, Al Gore is fat, so AGW is false. Damn, I invalidated my own argument... :)

Posted by: Dave | June 18, 2009 4:51 AM

True Sceptic,

Many, many thanks for the Bird posting and link. As one of belonging to the select group who has been screamed at online by our little tweeter, hmmm that makes me part of, perhaps, 50% of the human race, I am amazed at Birdy's wide influence. The killer for me in your link was Bird's own post - I take it that was him. BTW Jo Nova writes approvingly of Bird......!

Are we sure Bird is not a modern day but offensive version of Ern Malley? - sorry to all non Australians on this site for the obscure historcal reference.

Posted by: Jeremy C | June 18, 2009 5:08 AM

Ray says : "This is a totally inappropriate analogy. The diagnosis and treatment of cancer is a science that has been tested time and time again. There's strong experimental evidence for the accuracy of the diagnosis and the efficacy of the treatment."

And the effect of CO2 on radiation is even better tested. Has better evidence. Gas laws too. And radiative equations. Quantum physics for the line-by-line radiative model not as much as the above two, but more than cancer treatment. And all the other physics that goes into climate models. So why are you so skeptical over it and not the cancer/doctor thingy? Posted by: Mark | June 18, 2009 3:50 AM

Why? Because there are so many variables. Climate science is like Economics, described as the dismal science. Why? Because its impossible to take into consideration all the factors that may impinge upon the calculations. Climate is a chaotic scenario. We're simply out of our depth.

Posted by: Ray | June 18, 2009 5:26 AM

"Climate is a chaotic scenario. We're simply out of our depth."

So we cannot say summer is warmer than winter?

When you want to go to a warm summer holiday destination, you pick the Artic Winter because you can't say what the weather is going to be like because it's all chaotic?

Must be "exciting" living in your household...

Posted by: Mark | June 18, 2009 5:47 AM

"Especially as you practically hurled yourself into the lions den, rolled around in barbecue sauce and called the lions a bunch of idiots (metaphorically) :D."

Nah, more like kicked the biggest one in the family jewels.

Posted by: Mark | June 18, 2009 5:53 AM

"Especially as you practically hurled yourself into the lions den, rolled around in barbecue sauce and called the lions a bunch of idiots (metaphorically) :D."

Nah, more like kicked the biggest one in the family jewels.

"It would be better (but still wrong) to think in terms of a single M&M added to the diet weekly (ie. a monotonically increasing input of M&Ms)."

No, you'd have to put one M&M in on day 1, 2 M&M's in on day2, 3 on day 3 and so on.

Now, nobody will tell you one M&M is bad for you, but do you think that maybe some day the number of M&M's you're eating is going to get unhealthy?

Now remember that CO2 resides for centuries to millenia and we're adding to that noticeably each year.

Posted by: Mark | June 18, 2009 6:08 AM

Ray:

When it comes to climate change, caused by anthropogenic influences or not, we simply don't have the benefit of true and tried experimental results.

It is utterly untrue that we don't have observations of climate change. (Experiments are just a way of setting up observations that don't occur naturally.) For a start, the obvious example is 20th century warming. James Annan wrote a paper summarizing the various observations that can be used to estimate climate sensitivity. (Summary of the paper here.) The other two main observations are the difference between the relatively stable climate before 20th century warming and the stable climate at the time of the last glacial maximum, and the effect on global temperature of volcanic eruptions. Annan shows how these observed climate sensitivities can be combined with each other to obtain a result with less uncertainty.

Anti-climate science credulists like Ray like to pretend that the only source of information about climate sensitivity is computer-calculated models but they're not interested in the facts.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 18, 2009 6:32 AM

"Climate is a chaotic scenario. We're simply out of our depth." - Ray

Let me correct you Ray.

"Science is complex and difficult. I'm simply out of my depth."

Posted by: Michael | June 18, 2009 6:42 AM

Warning all, don't follow the link in [#69 TrueSkeptic], don't don't don't...I did - aarrrgh! :shock: Too much, TrueSkeptic, too much for the soul to bear. Need a lie-down to recover.

It's unlikely that Monckton = Bird, which in itself is scary as that means there is not just one, but two such...aarh...eccentric individuals upon the planet.

Posted by: Donald Oats | June 18, 2009 7:29 AM

"Climate science is like Economics." - Ray

Not so much. Climate is physically deterministic. Economics is determined by the vagaries of human decision making.

"Climate is a chaotic scenario. We're simply out of our depth." - Ray

Weather is chaotic. Chaos Theory was developed by studying the weather. Climate is the averaging of the strange attractor bound chaotic states of weather. Similarly the toss of a single coin is chaotic, but averaging the repeated tossing of the coin allows us to predict the fairness of that coin.

It is true that there might well be emergent weather states that we will only realize as the climate is driven to a higher energy state. That we can't predict such catastrophic changes, I find less than reassuring.

Posted by: luminous beauty | June 18, 2009 9:03 AM

UAH is still a little lower, and maybe they have a better approximation than RSS, but based on following this for years, and reading actual papers, a rational observer would tend to bet on RSS.

Well, RSS didn't start generating their product until 2004 (roughly, AFAICT), and if I'm not mistaken, since the RSS guys were heavily involved in uncovering the series of errors that led UAH to conclude that global temps were cooling, not warming, they began doing so because the UAH product had so many problems.

It still potentially has problems. DeepClimate has a discussion of a strange annual cycle in the UAH product that is the source of the divergence of UAH from RSS, GISS, etc. I've linked to his latest post on the subject, and it references two earlier discussions (with links to the original Tamino posts that trigged the discussion).

Posted by: dhogaza | June 18, 2009 11:24 AM

Climate is a chaotic scenario. We're simply out of our depth.

Which is why we should ignore what we do know, refuse to listen to experts, and pretend that willful ignorance is bliss. 'Cause obviously, when you have a "chaotic scenario," the only sensible thing to do is assume that everything will turn out fine.

Posted by: Phila | June 18, 2009 12:10 PM

A summary of Ray's argument: "I don't understand these things therefore no one else can. QED they don't exist."

Which is evidence of nothing other than the Dunning Kruger pandemic.

~~~

Jeremy C:

I thought the Observer interview with Monckton was being kind even though the writer obviously thought Monckton was barking.

I thought it skewered him rather stylishly. The journo doesn't come across as a vicious bully, and Monckton hoists himself with several of his own petards. And it's a dangerous game to play in Olde England when you're up against a litigious little monkey like Monckton whose got the archaic British libel laws at his disposal.

Posted by: DavidCOG | June 18, 2009 4:21 PM

76 Ray,

*With climate change predictions, there's little possibility of such a feed-back because the time scales are so great. So it's mostly guesswork. Don't you guys realise this?"

What we realise is that you have no idea what you are talking about and of how understanding of complex natural systems is obtained.

Care to support your claim of "mostly guesswork"?

I refer you to the fallacies of the Argument From Ignorance and the Argument From Incredulity.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 18, 2009 6:03 PM

97 Donald,

You obviously do not know of Louis Hissink. Despite being a geologist, his ideas on science (and politics) are much the same as GMB's. He's more polite, that's all.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 18, 2009 7:46 PM

An interesting example came up recently with Bill Gaede, largely doing a rewrite on modern physics in an incredibly satisfying way. And all via YouTube.

This is a Bird quote. I learned something from it. Blogscience, which surpassed Old Science in importance a couple of years ago, has in turn been superceded by ... YouTube Science!

It's an exciting age we live in.

Posted by: dhogaza | June 18, 2009 8:43 PM

TwitterScience ... 140 characters at a time.

Shit! Of course!

"E=mc^2" fits with a lot of "neener-neener I'm the smartest phys in the world!" stuff.

Clearly, if twitter would've been enough for Einstein, Twitter-science should rule the world!

Posted by: dhogaza | June 19, 2009 12:04 AM

The UnOz today has a neato (not) article from the chaperones of Steve Fielding. If these guys continue on the path they are, well kiss goodbye to scientific processes whenever a scientific discovery or theory has political implications. We Ozzies are importing the "Raygun"-ite approach to science; I believe the expression most apt here is that we are poisoning the well. Unfortunately there is only one well and we all drink from it.

In this day and age, who would want to be a scientist? All the public argument is off-putting, I would imagine, to the youth trying to pick their university degree.

Especially disappointing is the manner in which people who apply a sceptical approach to science, but fail to test whether their sceptical point of view on a given problem is warranted. With that step missing, they are doing the equivalent of voting without first thinking through how their vote may affect their lives.

Personally, I chose a maths science degree as my first choice; science was my passion so it was a simple decision for me at that time. So I endep up doing a lot of pure and applied mathematics, and physics as part of a BSc (Ma.) Hon. [NOTE: Ma. means mathematical sciences, not masters], then later on a grad dip in IT/software engineering, and some finance at Securities Institute (just something to do, it wasn't high powered or anything). Even back then it was a bit of a struggle to pay my way, and that was before HECS ramped up. In the current day I doubt that the choice of a science degree is a wise one, I hate to say. Yet, without at least some exposure to the analytic approach of science, the day might arrive when society draws the curtins on science. We have already drawn them in a bit: we openly accept homeopathy, crystal healing, and myriad other items as "complementary medicine", to the extent that some doctors will encourage patients to give it a try.

For me a maths science degree was the correct choice but that choice was made in a different environment to the current one. A number of consequences flowed from that choice though, especially regarding total earnings.

Posted by: Donald Oats | June 19, 2009 12:34 AM

It is utterly untrue that we don't have observations of climate change. (Experiments are just a way of setting up observations that don't occur naturally.) For a start, the obvious example is 20th century warming. James Annan wrote a paper summarizing the various observations that can be used to estimate climate sensitivity. (Summary of the paper here.) The other two main observations are the difference between the relatively stable climate before 20th century warming and the stable climate at the time of the last glacial maximum, and the effect on global temperature of volcanic eruptions. Annan shows how these observed climate sensitivities can be combined with each other to obtain a result with less uncertainty.

Anti-climate science credulists like Ray like to pretend that the only source of information about climate sensitivity is computer-calculated models but they're not interested in the facts. Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 18, 2009 6:32 AM

Chris,

I'm not pretending anything. I've spent all my life surrounded by fairly sophisticated scientific devices, or items of technology designed and built from a specialised understanding of scientific principles in many disiplines.

I have great confidence in all of these devices; motor cars, TVs, hi fi amplifiers, computers, blu-ray players, digital cameras etc.

I'm not at all skeptical that my plasma TV will work when I turn it on, or that my compact flash card will record data about the picture I've just taken after pressing the shutter.

Furthermore, I don't need to spend hundreds of hours reading about the science and technology that produces such items in order to have confidence in them, because I know that the science at the basis of such technology has been tested continuously over many decades.

There's a continuous feed-back between theory and practice. The proof of the pudding is in the eating.

This is not the situation with climate science.

To get back to the medical analogy, climate science is like being offered a new drug for your cancer (or whatever) that has never been tested even on rats, mice or monkeys, never mind humans.

When the doctor tells you that there's a wide consensus amongst the scientists who developed the drug, that it will work and that it will have no undesirable side-effects, do you say, "That's fine then. As long as there's a good consensus amongst the guys in the lab that the drug will work, I'll take it."

Or do you perhaps express a degree of skepticism?

The latest reports I hear on the radio and TV is that the climatologists already appear to have got it wrong. The global warming and melting of ice etc is happening at a greater rate than predicted.

Of course, I realise that most AGW adherents on this blog will probably automatically assume that the climatologists have simply underestimated the effects of anthropogenic CO2 emissions.

As a skeptic, I think it may be possible that they've underestimated the non-anthropogenic effects, the natural climate variability, and that they simply don't fully understand the processes.

Posted by: Ray | June 19, 2009 11:31 AM

The latest reports I hear on the radio and TV is that the climatologists already appear to have got it wrong. The global warming and melting of ice etc is happening at a greater rate than predicted.

This is denialism at work. Denialists are screaming that we're experiencing global cooling, which disproves AGW, or that it's warming faster then predicted, which disproves AGW, while ignoring the fact that long-term trends are matching actual model projects when uncertainty (error bars) are taken into consideration.

Etc etc. Doesn't matter what the data is, it disproves AGW.

Ray's no skeptic, he's a denialist, out and out.

Posted by: dhogaza | June 19, 2009 11:51 AM

I'm taking a short summer course on vector calculus and differential forms. Were I to explore the proofs looking for contradictions of every theorem before accepting that the theorems in the book are with very high certainty correct, I wouldn't have the time to get through this course with an 'A'.

Posted by: MarkusR | June 19, 2009 1:59 PM

Please, can people avoid whacking Ray unnecessarily.

We don't know he gets his info from TV.

I'm continuing to research the origin&flow of ideas, and since Ray's differ strongly from people I usually talk to, I've asked him nicely to tell us where he gets his.

a) He may well have sources unknown-to-me, that will cause me to revisit my views or at least hard questions. If so, I will learn something.

b) He may have unknown sources, that will not cause me to change my views, but will shed light on the information of flows. If so, I will be alerted to some new ones.

c) His sources may be long-familiar ones. If so, I will at least have another sample.

d) And possibly, the dialog may encourage him to read something from which he might learn.

So, if Ray is still around, really, I am interested in any answers to #120.

Posted by: John Mashey | June 19, 2009 9:25 PM

Dirk,

Thanks for you post. It helps to be reminded of such things from time to time.

Posted by: Observa | June 19, 2009 9:50 PM

I think Chris's response right at the end there is why Ray isn't real.

If Ray were genuine he would have been less certain we should do nothing and we knew nothing if he'd also believe "it may be POSSIBLE...".

However, an astroturfer would use "it may be POSSIBLE..." so that

a) they can't be told that's wrong b) they look like they're being "even handed"

and won't sweat that that doesn't mean we know nothing and should do nothing until it's a lot later.

Posted by: Mark | June 20, 2009 6:42 AM

Over in Mahohasy world...

... Cohenite says that he is still working on the problem BernardJ set him.

I'd imagine the brains trust argument is going something like this...

Cohenite: OK, anyone know how to do regressions? Louis: statistics? That's a leftist plot to install a UN led one-world government. Janama: Add the numbers and divide by ENSO. Cohenite: No,I think that should be PDO. If you don't account for decadal stochastic influences in the series, it will be wrong, just like AGW. I just read a really great paper on it in a leading climate research journal, E&E. Janama: surely the MWP makes those numbers incorrect? Louis: don't forget the plasma... Janama: the numbers are actually just a model, probably a computer model, so they're definitely wrong. And the oceans are cooling. Drongo: yep, no sea level rise and the globe has been cooling since 1998. Forget statistical analysis, you just need common sense to analyse the numbers - and common sense says that the earth is cooling. Cohenite: OK, does anyone know what a regression is?.....I'll see if there is a paper by Quirk and Mclean on this. Janama: do the numbers model the clouds? If they don't, it's all wrong....and models are wrong anyway. Louis: forget the numbers, it's a letist-UN plot to destabilise the currency. Cohenite: OK guys let's take a break.....some important news, a new chapter of the Climate Sceptics is opening in Nigeria. However, they need some start-up financial support, but they will be able to repay us quickly once they are up and running....they've kindy provided their bank acct detauils. All in favour say 'Aye'... All: Aye!

Posted by: Michael | June 20, 2009 11:19 AM

Michael, it was hilarious, even in the less readable form.

Best post of the thread.

Except you didn't make it up, did you? That's a cut-and-paste straight from Marohasy's blog, isn't it?

Posted by: dhogaza | June 20, 2009 12:41 PM

131 dhogaza,

It's the Marohasy Bog ;)

Michael's posts (129-130) are just too much like the real thing, aren't they? :D

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 20, 2009 4:13 PM

I'll try to answer some of the derisive remarks made about my attitude of scepticism, without taking the longer route of addressing each individual post.

As a skeptic, of course I'm skeptical about some of the views expressed by Plimer et al. I'm not into the right/wrong, black/white scenario that many posters on this blog seem to suscribe to.

The foundation of all skepticism in science is an understanding, rightly or wrongly, that the argument, theory or prediction being made is not proven by standard scientific methodolgy, as expressed by philosophers of the scientific method such as Karl Popper.

Plimer and Monckton's arguments are also not proven, and therefore any true skeptic should be skeptical also of their conclusions on this issue of AGW.

It could be said that the true denialists here are the AGW adherents who are in a state of denial about the uncertainty of the science which has been summarised in the IPCC reports, an uncertainty which it seems clear to me is being covered up and downplayed for political purposes.

One thing that many people seem to hate is uncertainty. It's probably the main reason why religions are so popular. Religions offer certainty in relation to matters that cannot be proved, such as 'life after death'. Living with uncertainty seems difficult and intolerable for many people. The certainty of a lie would seem to be preferrable than the uncertainty of a truth, for many.

Now it's true we have a huge dilemma regarding the uncertainty of the role that mand-made CO2 emmisions may have on our climate. It's not possible to construct exact, real-world, miniature replicas of our planet with climate and observe what happens as we increase CO2 to excessive levels, then decrease it to pre-industrial levels and observe the variety of positive and negative feedback that may take place with regard to severity of storms and frequency of droughts etc. It seems we have to rely upon computer modelling. That does not inspire much certainty in my opinion.

Evidence for such lack of certainty can be found in recent comments from the climatologists themselves who have contributed to the IPCC reports. Consider the following comments from Professor Chris Field, of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

"Global warming is likely to accelerate at a much faster pace and cause more environmental damage than previously anticipated. There's a vicious-cycle component to both the tundra-thawing and the tropical forest feedbacks, but the IPCC fourth assessment didn't consider either of them in detail. That's basically because they weren't well understood at the time."

Do you see here already an admission that the IPCC predictions in the past have been inaccurate due to a lack of understanding? The question arises, to the skeptical mind, what else do the climatologists not understand?

Is it possible at the end of the next 10 year period there will be an inexplicable cooling and re-freezing of the tundra which will have to be explained by another lack of understanding, such as; 'the role of negative feedback was not well understood at the time'?

Now I understand that a lot of you black and white bloggers can think only of two approaches to this dilemma. We either do something, or we do nothing.

Let me use the sinking of the Titanic as an analogy. There was a certain hubris that the ship was unsinkable. The capacity of the lifeboats was extremely limited, sufficient for only a third of the total number of passengers (sufficient only for the First Class passengers). However, the lifeboat capacity was within the regulation of the times. The ship is unsinkable so no worries.

How should we manage the uncertainty of climate change? Should we kid ourselves about the nature of the uncertainty and try to build an unsinkable Titanic, or should we ensure that we have adequate lifeboat capacity?

Well, clearly we should do both if we have the resources, but before we attempt to build an unsinkable ship, we should ensures that we have adequate lifeboat capacity.

For the benefit of those who are struggling with the analogy, adequate lifeboat capacity means accepting that disasters are inevitable and taking measures to protect ourselves in the event of such disasters.

Posted by: Ray | June 20, 2009 11:21 PM

Do you see here already an admission that the IPCC predictions in the past have been inaccurate due to a lack of understanding? The question arises, to the skeptical mind, what else do the climatologists not understand?

Is it possible at the end of the next 10 year period there will be an inexplicable cooling and re-freezing of the tundra which will have to be explained by another lack of understanding, such as; 'the role of negative feedback was not well understood at the time'?

Ray: You flatter yourself if you think you are a skeptic. A true skeptic would think 'What else has been overlooked?' not 'Perhaps it will all work out fine.'

Posted by: Richard Simons | June 21, 2009 12:46 AM

As a skeptic,

You just don't get it. No one gets to call themselves a skeptic. It's like someone telling others they're honest. Believe it not liars have been known to tell others that they're honest. Your whole attitude smacks of hubris and arrogance.

of course I'm skeptical about some of the views expressed by Plimer et al.

If you're not skeptical about Plimer's use of Beck's graph or Plimer's belief of an iron-based Sun or a whole host of other things then you are not a skeptic.

It seems we have to rely upon computer modelling.

No Ray, you are totally, utterly wrong. We do not have to rely upon computer modelling AT ALL to know it is VERY likely that the world will warm up a serious amount as a consequence of the amount of GHGs we are generating. What happened to you when I pointed out James Annan's paper that showed that using just observations gives a 95% confidence range for climate sensitivity of 1.7 deg C to 4.9 deg C per CO2 doubling with a most likely value of 2.9 deg C? Computer models just reduce this range to 2.0 deg C to 4.5 deg C so computer models don't make much difference to our expectations.

So sure, there is a 2.5% chance of less than 1.7 deg C ultimate warming from a doubling of CO2 IF WE COMPLETELY IGNORE COMPUTER MODELS. So the question Ray, is do we get on the plane with a 97.5% chance of crashing? Or are you going to ignore that question?

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 21, 2009 1:00 AM

The skeptic does not contend that CO2 will not have serious consequences.

The skeptic argues the case is not proven.

For all I know, we're all doomed whatever we do. I recall James Lovelock during an interview claiming it's probably already too late.

If it is too late, then we'd be completely silly to spend our valuable and limited resources trying to fight the impossible. We'd be much better off trying to mitigate the effects of the impending disasters, which means of course, not reconstructing cities like New Orleans which are below sea level.

James Lovelock is completely in favour of all-out development of atomic power as our best chance of averting total calamity.

If it's already too late, or close to being too late, then a 20% reduction in CO2 emissions is just pissing in the wind.

Posted by: Ray | June 21, 2009 1:43 AM

re: Ray #135

Sigh. Is it impossible to get answers to my few simple, non-derisive questions from #120? Maybe just list your top 3-5 favorite climate science books from your bookshelf?

re: quote from Chris Field:

The interested reader might check the original Stanford press release from which Chris's quote is taken. Is Ray's interpretation appropriate?

Posted by: John Mashey | June 21, 2009 2:26 AM

Shorter Ray:

I know that my verbiage is more precise than all the computer models in the world, and I know that mitigation is more expensive than adaptation. Why? I just know!

Therefore, the computer models are wrong! Don't trust the computer models!

Well, you shouldn't trust me either. But you should trust my common sense. EINSTEIN!!!

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 21, 2009 3:43 AM

No Ray. The predictions are posed in terms of confidence levels. Suggesting that if predictions fall out side these confidence levels, then they are all wrong, suggets that you don't understand this. Posted by: Michael | June 21, 2009 4:52 AM

Michael,

I've never suggested anyone's views or predictions are all wrong. I wrote they appeared to be inaccurate due to a lack of understanding of certain issues and processes, according to Chris Field.

Posted by: Ray | June 21, 2009 5:59 AM

Shorter Ray:

I'm not suggesting that anyone's predictions are all wrong. I'm just suggesting that we should throw all the predictions away, which isn't the same thing.

Also, I just know that mitigation is more expensive than adaptation.

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 21, 2009 6:25 AM

So, if you can't see the obvious screaming absurdity of Plimer et al's arguments, then you simply do not have sufficient knowledge to justify being sensibly skeptical. At this point you should either trust the experts or start learning about the subject. Regards, Dirk. Posted by: Dirk Hartog | June 21, 2009 2:15 AM

I do trust the experts, and I assure you if all the experts were to agree on this issue, it's very unlikely I'd be questioning the case for AGW.

I'm questioning it, not because I have any special knowledge on climate matters, but because I smell a rat.

I sense a process of intimidation, censorship and ridicule which discourages dissenters. If I were employed as a climatologist and had serious doubts about the interpretation of the data being gathered by my organisation, I would certainly not go public with my views if I wanted to retain my job.

My guess is, quite a few climatologists privately hold serious doubts about the role of man-made CO2 emissions, but see no point served in sacrificing their carreers.

I'm afraid I can only trust what makes sense to me, and that's all I could expect of anyone.

If I visit the doctor who prescribes an antibiotic for some infection he has diagnosed, I generally don't say, "Wait a while. I'll read a few books on the immune system and see how this antibiotic is manufactured and how it's supposed to work. If I'm confident the science is sound, I'll return for the prescription."

However, if the doctor prescribes a drug which is in the news with reports of serious side-effects which are beginning to be noticed and with calls from certain quarters that the drug should be banned , I would question why the doctor was prescribing such a drug.

When academics who have been considered sane enough to be the head of a university department, and other highly qualified individuals with a Ph.D in meteorology, for example, express a dissenting viewpoint about AGW and are pilloried and ridiculed for doing so, I can use my intelligence to discern there's something more than the bare science at issue.

Posted by: Ray | June 21, 2009 6:38 AM

Sorry, I lost the quote there. It was Ray's Einstein quote:

<<>>

Which, of course, was said in a context of arguing against the reality of quantum uncertainty.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 21, 2009 6:39 AM

Shorter Ray:

It doesn't matter that Plimer's and Monckton's arguments are transparently stupid! If they're mocked, it's merely an indication that there's a huge worldwide Marxist Warmist New World Order conspiracy!

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 21, 2009 6:48 AM

Ray:

My guess is, quite a few climatologists privately hold serious doubts about the role of man-made CO2 emissions, but see no point served in sacrificing their carreers.

NZ scientist Jim Salinger sacrificed his career for being a mainstream scientist.

In the US Rep Paul Broun is trying to stop funding of climate science and climate programs. eg. censorship of mainstream science.

The call for censorship is largely from right wing conspiracy theorists.

Posted by: Paul UK | June 21, 2009 6:59 AM

Okay, I'm an idiot. (Cheers from the skeptics. "He admitted it! Ha!") I was using the wrong HTML quote syntax.

Here's Ray's Einstein quote:

As Einstein said, don't trust any theory that cannot be explained in ordinary language.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 21, 2009 7:06 AM

Re: Ray #151

I do trust the experts, and I assure you if all the experts were to agree on this issue, it's very unlikely I'd be questioning the case for AGW.

Are there any experts that disagree with AGW? The vocal anti-AGW "experts" are either unqualified, haven't published in the field, are paid by industry groups, or have "gone emeritus". And sometimes all of these simultaneously.

I sense a process of intimidation, censorship and ridicule which discourages dissenters. If I were employed as a climatologist and had serious doubts about the interpretation of the data being gathered by my organisation, I would certainly not go public with my views if I wanted to retain my job.

That is absolutely not how things work. There have been numerous cases of errors in data being found by experts employed within the relevant organisations. There is a constant process of evaluating data products and comparing with models, theory, and other data sets.

My guess is, quite a few climatologists privately hold serious doubts about the role of man-made CO2 emissions, but see no point served in sacrificing their careers.

If an expert climatologist could disprove AGW they would rush to publish the proof. This would be the highlight of their career and they would be in the running for a Nobel Prize. Seriously. This talk of "sacrificing their careers" is just a misunderstanding of how science works. Science really is about searching for the truth. If a PhD student or a young postdoc found a serious problem with a crucial data set, they wouldn't be scared of losing their job, they would be excited to be the first person to find it.

When academics who have been considered sane enough to be the head of a university department,

That isn't enough. Plenty of ex-heads of University departments "go emeritus". What you have to look for is evidence of recent relevant publications in top journals in the field - that is what being an expert is all about. It rules out Plimer, Carter, etc.

and other highly qualified individuals with a Ph.D in meteorology,

That doesn't include Kininmonth, by the way, he doesn't have a PhD. Hasn't published anything either. Nor has Evans. Nor Monckton.

Can you name any "expert" who disagrees with AGW? Can you give a single cogent argument against AGW from any source whatsoever?

...express a dissenting viewpoint about AGW and are pilloried and ridiculed for doing so,

The most inflammatory language is coming from the dissenters. Have you read what Plimer has written in The Australian? He claims that there have been no scientific criticisms of his book. In fact, there have been numerous reviews by relevant scientists, and they are uniformly critical of the science in the book.

Posted by: Dirk Hartog | June 21, 2009 8:06 AM

Shorter Ray:

1. I never said we should ignore all the science. I'm only saying that we shouldn't trust any of the science. This of course means we should ignore all the science, but if you reach that conclusion, it's your fault, not mine!
2. I know that mitigation is more costly than adaptation. Don't take my word for it -- however, anyone who disagrees with me obviously hates poor people.
3. Monckton's being mocked, therefore he must have a point.

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 21, 2009 8:41 AM

"I've never written or implied that climate science, or any science, should be ignored because our understanding is not complete. Where did you get that idea from?

Some of you guys have some very odd reasoning." - Ray

Ray, I think it comes from this,

"vidence for such lack of certainty can be found in recent comments from the climatologists themselves who have contributed to the IPCC reports. Consider the following comments from Professor Chris Field, of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). .... Do you see here already an admission that the IPCC predictions in the past have been inaccurate due to a lack of understanding? The question arises, to the skeptical mind, what else do the climatologists not understand?"

That you confuse expressions of probability with "a lack of understanding" and being "inaccurate", claims which are themselves an inaccurate description and show a very clear lack of understanding. Your implication is that anything less than 100% certainty is wrong. Well, you're wrong.

Posted by: Michael | June 21, 2009 8:45 AM

Roy Spencer who believes that the earth is young, that dinosaur records are wrong?

THAT Dr Roy Spencer?

Ah, well, obviously a learned scientist...

With friends like him, Pielke doesn't need enemies.

Posted by: Mark | June 21, 2009 8:52 AM

Re: Ray #164,

For some relevant comments on Spencer, re-read John Mashey's comments above in #67.

The particular page on the website you link to is saying something uncontroversial about the greenhouse effect.

From reading a few pages on the site, it is clear that Spencer believes that almost all climate change is simply due to natural chaotic processes. He doesn't need the sun or any other external forcing agent (e.g., cosmic rays) to change the climate. This puts him way out on a limb with respect to the other anti-AGW people. If Spencer is right, then not only are all the expert climatologists wrong, but all the Plimers, Moncktons, etc are wrong too.

I will leave it to experts to make any additional comments on Spencer's research.

Call be a skeptic, but I'm not inclined to trust the opinion of Spencer when he has said "I finally became convinced that the theory of creation actually had a much better scientific basis than the theory of evolution" (Wikipedia).

Posted by: Dirk Hartog | June 21, 2009 9:26 AM

Ray sez:

Yes. Check out the site of Roy Spencer Ph.D.

Roy Spencer is an "intelligent design" creationist (or a "cdesign proponentsist" as they prefer to be known). This alone should lead you to apply a skeptical approach. You seem happy to do that for mainstream scientists. He may be a damn fine satellite met, but I've seem him do some, really , really stupid things in the past. Behold the idiocy:

http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/07/28/spencers-folly/

Ray sez:

I sense a process of intimidation, censorship and ridicule which discourages dissenters...

Your sense is, I'm afraid, not worth a great deal. Saying something doesn't make it true, and without some evidence of wrong doing on behalf of the global climate science community (which, BTW, is not some monolithic structure. We're out there in our various fields and sub-fields, attending different conferences, publishing in different journals, getting into nasty arguments at presentations and hitting bars in different cities) I'm more than happy to pass this point off as another Monckton inspired bizzarre conspriacy theory. James Hansen's little run in with the Bush Jr. administration ought to convince you that if any censorship has occurred, it may not be in the direction you seem to think.

I also "sense" a process of intimidation and sensorship and, (overwhelmingly) ridicule towards HIV -> AIDS denialists. Likewise cdesign proponentsists. Are their views to be given weighting simply because they are ridiculed by mainstream scientists?

Here's an alarming thought. What ever ridicule has occured of AGW denialists, at least some of it may have been well earned. I refer you to Roy Spencer's idiocy I linked to above.

The theoretical underpinnings of global warming have been around for a long time... dating back to Fourier. Numerous laboratory experiments, field observations, and (oh noes!) models have confirmed much of our theory regarding the climate system. AGW is built upon bedrocks of quantum mechanics, hydrodynamics and thermodynamics.

If you really want to find about this stuff, I really recommend Spencer Weart's "the discovery of global warming". I found it a great read.

Posted by: ChrisC | June 21, 2009 11:14 AM

123 John, 124 Dirk,

I refrained from saying this earlier but subsequent posts have confirmed what I thought.

Because someone writes well and is polite, that does not make them any less wrong but you seem to be saying that we should cut them extra slack. I'm sorry but I see this as a form of snobbery.

We have seen the inevitable CT claims and links to Roy Spencer's site. Tell me why post 62 does not apply in this case.

As for asking which books have been read, that is missing the point IMO. The real question should be: given that you (Ray) have no real knowledge of the subject, why do you, for no good reason choose to believe the denialist nonsense and ignore the mainstream consensus, or at least say, "I don't know where to find the truth, please help".

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 21, 2009 2:14 PM

Ray sez:

I sense a process of intimidation, censorship and ridicule which discourages dissenters...

Worse for Ray is that you see lots of intimidation, censorship and ridicule to discourage the AGW proposals.

See Shrub's dismissal of any senior staff who said that maybe Global Warming was right.

See the incessant ad-hom against an entire group, INSISTING that they are all lying to defraud the public just to get a grant.

And when someone brings them up short, they cry and complain about how bad done by they are and how this proves there's a conspiracy against them.

Poor dears.

Posted by: Mark | June 21, 2009 2:45 PM

My guess is, quite a few climatologists privately hold serious doubts about the role of man-made CO2 emissions, but see no point served in sacrificing their carreers.

Ray's ripped this page out of the creationist playbook in regard to why biologists accept evolution.

I sense a process of intimidation, censorship and ridicule which discourages dissenters. If I were employed as a climatologist and had serious doubts about the interpretation of the data being gathered by my organisation, I would certainly not go public with my views if I wanted to retain my job.

No one is trying to get Spencer fired.

On the other hand, there's an active effort underway, led by Anthony Watts, to get James Hansen fired from NASA.

There were written requests to Naomi Oreskes employer asking that she be fired after she published her work showing the widespread consensus among climatologists that AGW is true.

McIntyre tried to get Lonnie Thompson (of ice core fame) disciplined by his university.

Ray is either ignorant or lying.

Posted by: dhogaza | June 21, 2009 4:52 PM

re: #177 dhogaza

And to add to the list:

a) The mid-1990s personal attack on Ben Santer.

b) Barton's hassling of Mann, as commented on by Don Kennedy.

c) And then there was Fred Singer's threatened lawsuit against Naomi Oreskes/Science magazine for her review of Mooney book.

Posted by: John Mashey | June 21, 2009 5:28 PM

176 John,

OK, I conflated your post with Dirk's but you did say Please, can people avoid whacking Ray unnecessarily. We don't know he gets his info from TV. I'm continuing to research the origin&flow of ideas, and since Ray's differ strongly from people I usually talk to, I've asked him nicely to tell us where he gets his. I just think that not everyone gets the same "nice" treatment.

Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 21, 2009 7:13 PM

Yep. Shorter Ray: I win, I've trolled them for days and caught everyone but that Mashey fellow, who I'm ignoring.

Posted by: Hank Roberts | June 21, 2009 7:56 PM

One for John Mashey: in studying where people get their information, I think it may well be worth looking at the available pictures, as well as text.

There are always some folks who just don't read, but do like to look at pictures, and who draw their conclusions. Ahem.

I've started making a habit of checking "Images" whenever I'm doing a Google or Scholar search.

And so far, the first few pages of image results for climate-related searches -- very consistently -- are like this example:

http://images.google.com/images?tab=si&sa=N&q=GISP+dust+sunspot+count

Posted by: Hank Roberts | June 21, 2009 8:39 PM

As for asking which books have been read, that is missing the point IMO. The real question should be: given that you (Ray) have no real knowledge of the subject, why do you, for no good reason choose to believe the denialist nonsense and ignore the mainstream consensus, or at least say, "I don't know where to find the truth, please help". Posted by: TrueSceptic | June 21, 2009 2:14 PM

I believe neither the denialists nor the AGW aherents. I tend to believe only scientific principles that have been tested and verified time and time again.

The strength of my believe in such principles is proportional to the strength, repeatability and consistency of the verification process, and the efficacy and flawless working of the technological products resulting from such scientific principles.

Got it!

You would agree that Isaac Newton was one of the greatest scientists of all time, wouldn't you? Or, would you like to discredit his scientific theories on the grounds that he was a very religious man, believing in a fairly literal interpretation of the Bible.

Here's what he wrote towards the end of his life. Something for you to contemplate upon.

"I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I appear to have been but a little boy, playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself, in now and then finding a smooth pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."

Posted by: Ray | June 21, 2009 9:16 PM

"I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I appear to have been but a little boy, playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself, in now and then finding a smooth pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."

A wonderful quote, and one I think you'll find nearly all scientists familiar with.

Let's say that in some alternate universe, Isaac Newton discovered a physical law that seemed to strongly predict a massive worldwide catastrophe.

After he discussed this with the brightest minds of his age at the Royal Society, and answered the toughest objections they could muster, the entire Society became convinced that he was right, and a serious crisis was likely to occur.

Should he tell the King? Should he pray? Or should he go on collecting pebbles?

Posted by: theo | June 21, 2009 10:02 PM

re: 179:

a) The mid-1990s personal attack on Ben Santer.

Interesting to see the links in this article to the astro-turf organizations the Science & Environmental Policy Project and the Global Climate Coalition. It takes a long time for their influence on people like Ray to fade away.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 12:38 AM

Let's say that in some alternate universe, Isaac Newton discovered a physical law that seemed to strongly predict a massive worldwide catastrophe.

After he discussed this with the brightest minds of his age at the Royal Society, and answered the toughest objections they could muster, the entire Society became convinced that he was right, and a serious crisis was likely to occur. Should he tell the King? Should he pray? Or should he go on collecting pebbles? Posted by: theo | June 21, 2009 10:02 PM

He'd probably have a nervous break-down. Isaac Newton believed in God and the Devil. After formulating his laws of motion and gravity, he recognised that there was a huge conundrum regarding the stars and planets.

If every 'body' exerted a force of attraction on every other 'body', in proportionto their mass and inversely proportional to the square of their distance apart, it follows that the entire universe should gradually collapse upon itself.

Newton believed it was the hand of God that prevented this happening. God kept the universe in balance.

Newton would likely have considered any notion than man could control the climate of the planet as being totally absurd, even heretical.

Posted by: Ray | June 22, 2009 2:07 AM

I tend to believe only scientific principles that have been tested and verified time and time again.

I suspect that there are plenty of things you believe happily, without question, that are less tested and verified than AGW.

Also, you seem to believe that everyone is required to conform to your personal level of ignorance in order to be a realist: since you're unconvinced about AGW, you expect everyone else to be, too.

But the plain fact is, some people know more about the climate than you do. And this doesn't mean they lack humility, or are zealots. They may know very well what they don't know, and be open to disconfirming evidence, while still knowing far more than you. That being the case, your stance seems rather arrogant.

Posted by: Phila | June 22, 2009 2:51 AM

Ray:

Isaac Newton believed in God and the Devil. After formulating his laws of motion and gravity, he recognised that there was a huge conundrum regarding the stars and planets. If every 'body' exerted a force of attraction on every other 'body', in proportionto their mass and inversely proportional to the square of their distance apart, it follows that the entire universe should gradually collapse upon itself.

If you say so Ray.

Newton believed it was the hand of God that prevented this happening. God kept the universe in balance.

What an incredible ignoramus you are Ray. No wonder you get sucked in by climate science denialism. It was Newton who showed that his law of gravitation AND his laws of motion TOGETHER were responsible for keeping the planets in their orbits.

Newton would likely have considered any notion than man could control the climate of the planet as being totally absurd, even heretical.

Sure if you say so Ray. You're no skeptic Ray. Any genuine skeptic would drop Beck's graph faster than the time it takes to say, "what a load of crap". All you can do is make excuses for how you're oh so skeptical when it suits you. I'm sorry Ray, but genuine skeptics don't get to choose when they are skeptical and when they are gullible.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 4:10 AM

Ray:

In situations where uncertainty prevails, it's best to take the Middle Way. Don't go to extremes. Try not to increase CO2 emissions, nor to reduce them in panic mode.

This tells us absolutely nothing about the likely consequences of our actions.

The best chance of keeping CO2 emissions the same is to set modest reduction targets like 15% or 20% by 2020. It's extremely unlikely that such reduction targets will be met, but quite likely that there'll be at least no increase. In order to save face, the government can fudge the figures and pretend that the target has at least 'almost' been met, although in practice emissions will have remained the same, world-wide.

Thanks for the worthless platitude.

Is that useful enough for you?

It showed us that you're an ignoramus who's not very good at getting the point but we already knew that so it wasn't useful at all.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 4:40 AM

Ray posts:

Can you name any "expert" who disagrees with AGW? Can you give a single cogent argument against AGW from any source whatsoever? Posted by: Dirk Hartog | June 21, 2009 8:06 AM Yes. Check out the site of Roy Spencer Ph.D.

Check out my demonstration that Roy Spencer is a liar:

http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Spencer.html

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 22, 2009 6:31 AM

further re 202, Isaac Newton in his later years was SERIOUSLY into Alchemy.

Just goes to show that just because you did great work in the past doesn't mean all your work in the future is going to be great or even mediocre...

Posted by: Mark | June 22, 2009 7:22 AM

What an incredible ignoramus you are Ray. No wonder you get sucked in by climate science denialism. It was Newton who showed that his law of gravitation AND his laws of motion TOGETHER were responsible for keeping the planets in their orbits. Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 4:10 AM

Dear me! You've certainly lost credibility on this issue, Chris O'Neill. Are you a teenager still at school? You seem to have the know-it-all attitude of a teenager.

It's common knowledge that Newton's concept of a static universe was deeply flawed.

It's true that the motion of the moon around the earth, and the earth around the sun, can be explained by Newton's laws of both gravity and motion, but I'm talking about the universe, including the stars.

It was very apparent to Newton that a finite number of stars would eventually collapse to the centre of the universe through the force of gravity.

Newton had no satisfactory explanation for why this hadn't already or wouldn't eventually happen.

Here's what Stephen Hawking had to say on the matter during a speech in 1988 which you can find at http://www.ralentz.com/old/astro/hawking-1.html.

As you may or may not know, Stephen Hawking occupied until recently the same chair as Isaac Newton, the Lucasion Professorship of Mathematics at Cambridge, arguably the most famous academic chair in the world. Is he an ignoramus too?

"Another difficulty with the idea of a static universe, was that according to Newton's Law of Gravity, each star in the universe ought to be attracted towards every other star. So how could they stay at a constant distance from each other. Wouldn't they all fall together. Newton was aware of this problem about the stars attracting each other. In a letter to Richard Bentley, a leading philosopher of the time, he agreed that a finite collection of stars could not remain motionless: they would all fall together, to some central point. However, he argued that an infinite collection of stars, would not fall together: for there would not be any central point for them to fall to. This argument is an example of the pitfalls that one can encounter when one talks about infinite systems. By using different ways to add up the forces on each star, from the infinite number of other stars in the universe, one can get different answers to the question: can they remain at constant distance from each other. We now know that the correct proceedure, is to consider the case of a finite region of stars. One then adds more stars, distributed roughly uniformly outside the region. A finite collection of stars will fall together. According to Newton's Law of Gravity, adding more stars outside the region, will not stop the collapse. Thus, an infinite collection of stars, can not remain in a motionless state. If they are not moving relative to each other at one time, the attraction between them, will cause them to start falling towards each other. Alternatively, they can be moving away from each other, with gravity slowing down the velocity of recession."

"Despite these difficulties with the idea of a static and unchanging universe, no one in the seventeenth, eighteenth, nineteenth or early twentieth centuries, suggested that the universe might be evolving with time. Newton and Einstein, both missed the chance of predicting, that the universe should be either contracting, or expanding. One can not really hold it against Newton, because he was two hundred and fifty years before the observational discovery of the expansion of the universe. But Einstein should have known better. Yet when he formulated the General Theory of Relativity to reconcile Newton's theory with his own Special Theory of Relativity, he added a so-called, 'cosmological constant'. This had a repulsive gravitational effect, which could balance the attractive effect of the matter in the universe. In this way, it was possible to have a static model of the universe."

Einstein later said: "The cosmological constant was the greatest mistake of my life." That was after observations of distant galaxies, by Edwin Hubble in the 1920's, had shown that they were moving away from us, with velocities that were roughly proportional to their distance from us. In other words, the universe is not static, as had been previously thought: it is expanding. The distance between galaxies is increasing with time.

What more can I say! You might also be interested in the following excerpt from Wikipedia on Newton's religious views. He apparently calculated that the world would end in 2060. If you are a teenager, you might live to see it.

Though he is better known for his love of science, the Bible was Sir Isaac Newton's greatest passion. He devoted more time to the study of Scripture than to science, and he said, "I have a fundamental belief in the Bible as the Word of God, written by those who were inspired. I study the Bible daily."[8] He spent a great deal of time trying to discover hidden messages within the Bible. After 1690, Newton wrote a number of religious tracts dealing with the literal interpretation of the Bible. In a manuscript Newton wrote in 1704 in which he describes his attempts to extract scientific information from the Bible, he estimated that the world would end no earlier than 2060.

I think we could say that Isaac Newton's strange religious views did not prevent him from doing some brilliant science, so in this respect I don't see why Roy Spencer's religious views should invalidate his opinions on climate change.

Posted by: Ray | June 22, 2009 9:46 AM

If I visit the doctor who prescribes an antibiotic for some infection he has diagnosed, I generally don't say, "Wait a while. I'll read a few books on the immune system and see how this antibiotic is manufactured and how it's supposed to work. If I'm confident the science is sound, I'll return for the prescription." However, if the doctor prescribes a drug which is in the news with reports of serious side-effects which are beginning to be noticed and with calls from certain quarters that the drug should be banned , I would question why the doctor was prescribing such a drug.

Interesting analogy.

Because, you see, people who focus on the possible adverse consequences of medications are at an elevated risk of the nocebo effect. If they do not have a nuanced and properly guided explanation of the 'science' behind the medication, their expectations overpower their capacity for an appropriate biological response.

Similarly, many AGW denialists and contrarians focus on the caveats provided by climatologists, physicists, and other scientists, throw in their own ideologies and motivations, and manifest these in an internal narrative that overpowers (at least, to their own perceptions) the objective truth of the science.

The result of this voodoo vulnerability is the nocebo version of scientific understanding.

In situations where uncertainty prevails, it's best to take the Middle Way. Don't go to extremes. Try not to increase CO2 emissions, nor to reduce them in panic mode.

Everyone else is having fun with this, so I'll have my turn too.

So, imagine a situation where one's society maintains a slavery system, and there is debate amongst the citizenry about the morality of having slaves. Is the answer here to "take the Middle Way. Don't go to extremes.", and halve the average number of slaves allowed per citizen?

Or consider the CFC impact on the ozone layer. Some people disputed the science - and some still do! Should we simply have made refrigeration units half their previous size?

Sometimes there is no real choice, except where those in denial manufacture one in their minds.

Posted by: Bernard J. | June 22, 2009 10:13 AM

@Ray #205:

At #193 you said:

If every 'body' exerted a force of attraction on every other 'body', in proportionto their mass and inversely proportional to the square of their distance apart, it follows that the entire universe should gradually collapse upon itself. Newton believed it was the hand of God that prevented this happening. God kept the universe in balance.

Then at post #205, you quoted Stephen Hawking talking about Newton:

In a letter to Richard Bentley, a leading philosopher of the time, he agreed that a finite collection of stars could not remain motionless: they would all fall together, to some central point. However, he argued that an infinite collection of stars, would not fall together: for there would not be any central point for them to fall to.

Do you understand that it's not unreasonable to see some contradiction between these two accounts of Newton's position?

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 22, 2009 1:17 PM

Ray:

Are you a teenager still at school? You seem to have the know-it-all attitude of a teenager.

Looks like you don't like being caught out Ray.

It's true that the motion of the moon around the earth, and the earth around the sun, can be explained by Newton's laws of both gravity and motion, but I'm talking about the universe, including the stars.

This is what you actually said:

After formulating his laws of motion and gravity, he recognised that there was a huge conundrum regarding the stars AND PLANETS.

He wasn't talking about the planets.

what use is that in deciding whether we crank up the CO2 in the atmosphere or try to keep it down? I think I can tell you. It's completely useless. Let us know when you have something to say is not absolutely useless.

In situations where uncertainty prevails, it's best to take the Middle Way. Don't go to extremes. Try not to increase CO2 emissions, nor to reduce them in panic mode.

This provides zero information as to what we should do and amounts to cranking up the CO2 in the atmosphere. It amounts to deciding on the course of action while ignoring any source of information whatsoever. We can do better than ignoring all sources of information without running an experiment with the earth. By the way, it is not necessary to ignore observations that don't come from experiments to be a skeptic. It is however, necessary to be able to realize the defects in Beck's graph to be a skeptic, something you don't appear to have done.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 1:42 PM

Why does Ray think that "doing nothing" is "Keep Pumping Out CO2"?

Pumping out CO2 IS DOING SOMETHING.

So how about NOT doing it?

Nah, he wants to make up whatever statement will at that time make his delusionary religion in The Free Market (or the belief that Environmentalists All Hate Us, whatever) correct.

Nothing about truth, justice or the american way. Just HIS way.

Posted by: Mark | June 22, 2009 2:26 PM

This is what you actually said:

After formulating his laws of motion and gravity, he recognised that there was a huge conundrum regarding the stars AND PLANETS.

He wasn't talking about the planets. Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 1:42 PM

Dear me! You think the planets will continue orbiting the stars as they crash into each other? You think the planets are outside the universe?

In situations where uncertainty prevails, it's best to take the Middle Way. Don't go to extremes. Try not to increase CO2 emissions, nor to reduce them in panic mode.

This provides zero information as to what we should do and amounts to cranking up the CO2 in the atmosphere.

Being obviously older and so much wiser than you, I've given you a prediction of what I think will likely happen. Attempts to reduce the rate of CO2 emissions will results in a realistic scenario of no increase in the rate of emissions, in practice, taking into account all the cheating that will occur.

The total amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, in terms of ppm, will continue to rise for the forseeable future as we insist on economic growth. Measures to plant new forests, reduce deforestation etc, will of course slow that rate of increase of CO2.

Hopefully, if and as alternative energy sources become more efficient, the actual of CO2 emissions will begin to decrease more rapidly, after 10 or 20 years, whilst we are still able to maintain a reasonable economic growth due to the efficiency of the clean energy plants.

If the more alarmist predictions of the AGW adherents prove to be correct and Roy Spencer et al prove to be wrong, then clearly we're stuffed.

I see no possibility of being able to avoid climatic catastrophe. None whatsoever.

But we can protect ourselves from the ravages of storm and drought, provided we have the energy resources to do so.

Posted by: Ray | June 22, 2009 6:54 PM

If the more alarmist predictions of the AGW adherents prove to be correct and Roy Spencer et al prove to be wrong, then clearly we're stuffed.

Roy Spencer's been wrong many times before.

Go read about the history of the satellite temperature record, and how the proud claim by UAH a decade ago that "the world is cooling, not warming", that "the satellite record proves cooling and is far more reliable than the ground station record", and that they provided "the wooden stake through heart of AGW".

Go see how that turned out. And, no, I'm not doing your homework for you. This is the chance to prove that you're a climate skeptic, not a flat-out denialist.

Anyone THAT wrong for THOSE reasons ought not to be presumed to be correct when they claim to have proven all the rest of climate science to be wrong, too.

Posted by: dhogaza | June 22, 2009 9:11 PM

Who says the stars would crash into each other? Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 11:36 PM

Newton's law of gravity do, as applied to a static universe. Haven't you heard? The universe is expanding. Newton didn't know this. He was unable to provide a rational explanation as to why the stars would not collaps onto each other in his model of the universe, so he invoked the powers of God.

In fact, he did attempt a sort of rational explanation by suggesting that the universe was infinite and contained an infinite number of stars. But the flaw in such a proposal was obvious. If the universe were to contain an infinite number of stars, then every part of the nightsky would be convered by starlight. There would be no black areas at all. This is clearly not the case. This was known as Olber's paradox.

If you take the trouble to read the extract from Stephen Hawking's speech I posted earlier, you will see that, even when we ignore the Olber's paradox, the presence of an infinite number of stars in an ifinitely large universe would still not prevent the stars from collapsing upon themselves due to the force of gravity.

Even ignoring the host of other problems that Ray ignores, just because cities can pay for the energy it takes to desalinate their water supply, it doesn't mean farming can afford to do the same even at the existing cost of energy. Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 22, 2009 11:36 PM

The abilitly to adapt to change is a fundamental principle of Darwinian evolution. As the climate changes, the farmer has to change the type of crop he grows. You don't attempt to grow rice where water is scarce.

I'm all in favour of bold ideas. Tow icebergs from the antarctic. Build huge flood-mitigation dams in areas that are prone to flooding. Build 2000KM concrete water pipes from one end of the state to the other. Build refrigeration windmills that use their energy to condense water vapour from the atmosphere. Build atomic power stations for the sole purpose of operating gigantic desalination plants.

If you have the energy supplies, you are limited only by your imagination.

Posted by: Ray | June 23, 2009 5:08 AM

Also, Ray, even in a static universe, Newton knew that the planets went round the sun.

Now, if that centripetal acceleration is equal to the gravitational attraction, what's the net effect on Earth?

None?

Isn't that a static universe?

But also doesn't have Earth crashing into the sun.

Do you think that maybe Newton knew about Newton's Laws of Motion? At least as well as he knew Newton's Law of Gravitation?

(this is why I used Andromeda, it's not orbiting us)

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 5:20 AM

Ray writes:

I think we could say that Isaac Newton's strange religious views did not prevent him from doing some brilliant science, so in this respect I don't see why Roy Spencer's religious views should invalidate his opinions on climate change.

It's not his religious beliefs we object to. It's his assuming that they allow him to put aside well-validated science in favor of pseudoscience. Creationism is an alternative theory of biology aimed at discrediting evolution; by noting that Spencer is a creationist, we point out that he is a devotee of bad science. The fact that his motivations are religious have nothing to do with it. I happen to share Spencer's religious beliefs, but I'm still appalled at his creationism and think it reflects badly on his ability to do good science.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 23, 2009 7:07 AM

Mark, I appreciate your intent, but actually, the Andromeda galaxy DOES crash into the Milky Way on a time scale of a few billion years.

I know, BPL.

Yet somehow this hasn't happened yet.

Therefore Ray's inane ravings about how all the stars would crash in to us is really quite stupid. Andromeda (home of billions of stars) IS.

Veerrrryyyy sssslloooowwwwlllyyyy.

Heck, Barnard's star is whistling towards us at a rate of knots. It'll miss by quite a long way in human terms, but galactically, very close indeed.

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 7:52 AM

Monckton has been outclassed and trumped by the Professors Stanley Feldman and Vincent Marks:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1194589/Turkey-Twizzlers-GOOD-polar-bears-ARENT-dying-out.html

They have written a 'Guiness Book' of denialist facts. All neatly collated into one volume called "Global Warming And Other Bollocks: The Truth About All Those Science Scare Stories"

Posted by: Paul (UK) | June 23, 2009 10:13 AM

"A static (ie without expansion) Newtonian (absent dark energy or any other relativistic effects) universe will over time collapse under the effect of gravitation."

Uh, an orbit has the gravitational acceleration pulling it into the orbited planet EQUAL to the cetripetal one pulling it out.

How will gravity make it fall in?

Pictsies?

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 10:31 AM

@Mark #229:

Uh, an orbit has the gravitational acceleration pulling it into the orbited planet EQUAL to the cetripetal one pulling it out. How will gravity make it fall in? Pictsies?

Add a third body.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 23, 2009 11:36 AM

Uh, an orbit has the gravitational acceleration pulling it into the orbited planet EQUAL to the cetripetal one pulling it out. How will gravity make it fall in? Pictsies?

Add a third body.

Posted by: Robin Levett

Uh, Mars has two moons. The Sun has 8 planets.

The earth has HUNDREDS of satellites.

They all seem to want to stay up.

If you're on about the three-body problem, what happens is that the TOTAL energy remains. So if one body pulls another closer to it, another body will be further away from the CoG and will speed up.

If the bodies deviate too much from a separate orbital, this is liable to see one body thrown out.

As they think may have happened in the dim past of the Solar System (and may well happen again to Mars in the dim future).

So, no, gravity isn't making them fall in. If they are separate enough for the three-body-problem not to be a problem, they won't fall in.

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 11:57 AM

@Mark:

Just time for a quick comment now, a longer one later perhaps.

In the meantime could you clarify something; is your point that a universe consisting of a two (or n) body solar system won't collapse, and therefore the proposition that a static universe will collapse is wrong in that case; or that this is generalisable so that the proposition is wrong in every case?

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 23, 2009 1:33 PM

In the meantime could you clarify something; is your point that a universe consisting of a two (or n) body solar system won't collapse,

Nope, such a system if it were distant enough would be unable to meet.

Their orbits may be parabolic.

Tell you what, why not write a quick program with two masses 10000 units apart and of 1 units in size. Give them some mass and calculate their attraction toward each other. Give each a random small amount of kinetic energy (to simulate the real situation where you haven't got perfectly stationary objects and cannot make it fit to the n'th decimal place).

Run the simulation of their movements under self attraction.

They won't hit each other.

If they are in orbit around a common centre, they will never hit each other DEFINITE.

Well, not in the lifetime of the protons they are made of.

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 2:04 PM

Heck, what am I talking about. In the Newtonian universe, it's all clockwork.

There's no gravity waves that remove energy from a rotating binary system.

And the orbit of Pluto and all the other planets will NEVER move out of their orbits.

In a Newtonian Universe.

Later on, some people come up with chaos theory and how it applies to complex problems, but that's after Newton.

And so doesn't count.

So the categorical answer to Robin's qquestion is: No, they will NEVER fall in and collide.

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 2:35 PM

So your position is that however many bodies there are in the Universe, and whatever their starting position or velocity, that universe will never collapse?

Posted by: Robin Levett

In the clockwork universe of Newton's time, yes.

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 4:43 PM

@Mark #241:

...Hell - 2 bodies of equal mass, nil velocity, arbitrary distance - that universe won't collapse?

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 23, 2009 4:53 PM

Oh shit, time to batten down the hatches and prepare to be boarded:

Hansen arrested in coal mining protest

see lead thread at http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/

Posted by: Jim Eager | June 23, 2009 5:23 PM

...Hell - 2 bodies of equal mass, nil velocity, arbitrary distance - that universe won't collapse?

In the impossible event of nil velocity? Yes.

But as mentioned before, that's impossible.

It's as likely the two masses will never meet because the Great Green Arkleseizure will eat one on it's way past to get its hankie.

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 5:38 PM

You seriously make that claim?

Yes. According to the clockwork universe that Newton knew about, they would make an orbital if their kinetic energy were less than the gravitational potential energy well they were sitting in. If their kinetic energy were higher, they would have escape velocity (you have heard of that, haven't you? It's about 11kps for earth, IIRC).

You know what "escape" means, don't you?

And if they were not bound (i.e. KE higher than PE) then even in a current universal model they would not strike each other.

Do you have some problem with this?

Would you like me to go through the maths?

Maybe Tim could help.

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 6:13 PM

PS the reason why Rocket Science is "Rocket Science" is because it's REALLY HARD to make one object in space hit another object in space when it's even only millions of miles away and you don't have to worry about the thing you're sending moving everything else around).

It gets a little bit easier if you have a jet, but stars don't come with many of them attached. And where you'd put the steering wheel and the fluffy dice is anyone's guess...

Posted by: Mark | June 23, 2009 6:26 PM

@Mark:

Still trying to find my jaw - it's on the floor here somewhere, I'm sure it didn't enter orbit when it dropped. Nor is there a golf ball still in orbit around the Moon.

Is there any place in your physics for a concept such as "orbital velocity"?

Rocket science, by the way, is easy; chuck something out the back and you move forward - it's rocket engineering that's difficult.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 24, 2009 2:59 AM

When you find your brain, consider this example.

Replace the earth with a black hole of the same weight. It's REAL small, so they are separated by a long distance compared to the size of the objects. This makes it germane to our scenario. Your jaw drops RIGHT OFF your face at this. Literally off.

It falls down. But as it falls, conservation of angular momentum means that it's 24-hour spin around the earth's centre of mass gets faster and faster as it falls.

Which means it flys PAST the black-hole earth.

It then describes a highly elliptical orbit with one focus being the black-hole earth and it's outer orbit maximum from that focus being where your jaw was before it dropped. About 6,000 km.

Posted by: Mark | June 24, 2009 4:26 AM

Robin.

This is what was asked about:

A static (ie without expansion) Newtonian (absent dark energy or any other relativistic effects) universe will over time collapse under the effect of gravitation.

And the answer is "no".

There aren't many stars sitting on the earth's pole, so why you think this is proof that the answer should have been "yes" eludes me.

Sitting on the pole of the earth (or on the equator) you are very close already. Read back and you'll see:

If they are separate enough for the three-body-problem not to be a problem, they won't fall in.

and

Nope, such a system if it were distant enough would be unable to meet.

See a common thread? Distance. Distance compared to the size of the objects. Check up on what limits on the Ideal Gas Laws there are and why they turn up: The Ideal Gas Law assumes that they are so small that they only undergo one collision at a time and that they occupy no space themselves in the volume. Increase the density of particles and this starts to break down.

Next: Read up on Conservation Of Angular Momentum. You seem to have missed out on that in your post.

Posted by: Mark | June 24, 2009 9:53 AM

@Mark @258:

Your failure to understand the relevant physics is clearly demonstrated by this post.

I gave you your best option - a circular orbit; it keeps the minimum distance of the orbiting body from the orbited body at a maximum. A highly elliptical orbit with the same energy as the circular orbit would have the orbiting body closer, at closest approach, than the circular orbit. (BTW - I even gave you all the gravitational potential energy, even though not all of it would have been converted at 1 cm above the centre of the black hole.)

It is true that no orbit is truly circular about the orbited body, because both bodies orbit around the centre of mass of the system; but for the system under discussion (jawbone/Earth), the difference between the centre of mass of the system and of the Earth is insignificant, even on the millimetric scales we were using.

You made the claim that "any two bodies (alone in a universe) of arbitrary non-zero mass and initial (non-zero) velocity and position will either enter a stable orbit around the centre of mass of the system or will diverge forever?" That is the foundation of your claim that Newton, Einstein and Hawking (and the rest of the cosmological community) are wrong about whether a static Newtonian universe would collapse. The case of divergence forever is irrelevant - that is an "expanding" universe.

I have demonstrated that an arbitrary mass at rest (or even with a tangential velocity of 1,600km/hr) one Earth radius from an Earth-mass black hole will fall into that black hole - it will not - cannot - orbit. It has insufficient gravitational potential energy to do so - as does the stellar material that powers Sagittarius A*?

Smaller size (as opposed to mass) of objects is irrelevant, as is greater separation. They just make the universe last longer, they don't stop it collapsing.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 24, 2009 10:40 AM

@Mark:

Go ahead - tell me the angular momentum (with respect to Earth) of an object at the Pole.

Again - tell me how angular momentum will give my jaw (even if it starts with a tangential velocity of 1600km/hr) the KE necessary to remain in orbit around the Earth as black hole. I'll wait. Conservation of energy considerations say it can't - that's what my post was about.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 24, 2009 10:55 AM

Actually, it's a bit more complicated, since the pole isn't at the centre of the earth, but it isn't zero, so you aren't 10m from the CoG, but 10m from a point 6000km from the CoG.

And getting a star at 4 light years within 10m of the polar axis is going to be quite some trick...

(remember: we don't have many stars 4Ly away, and none of them are over either pole)

Posted by: Mark | June 24, 2009 11:22 AM

@Mark:

Again - tell me how angular momentum will give my jaw (even if it starts with a tangential velocity of 1600km/hr) the KE necessary to remain in orbit around the Earth as black hole. I'll wait. Conservation of energy considerations say it can't - that's what my post was about.

You answered neither part of my post #261; but while you made an attempt at answering the first part, you totally ignored this part.

You are aware, are you not, that angular momentum of a two-body system can be conserved through a collision between those bodies; the merged bodies will simply speed up or slow down their rate of spin to conserve momentum.

This is a serious question, Mark; to what level have you ever been taught any physics?

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 24, 2009 12:26 PM

You are aware, are you not, that angular momentum of a two-body system can be conserved through a collision between those bodies;

Yes. I even mentioned it. That sort of collision would be an inelastic collision. you may be able to see those words if you search on this page.

M'kay?

But that DOES rather require that the two bodies ACTUALLY HIT. Now you seem to believe there is no problem hitting a 9cm object from 100m or even 6,000,000m, so this may be where you're going wrong.

Try that trick. See if you can.

Posted by: Mark | June 24, 2009 12:39 PM

Former Skeptic | June 24, 2009 1:20 PM

Ray started it, and his thesis is that Newton did something or other, therefore AGW is wrong.

Robin doesn't understand what he does not understand. This is not a good start to wisdom...

Posted by: Mark | June 24, 2009 1:37 PM

Robin Levett

I have no doubt I could drop a golf ball onto it from an arbitrary distance. It might spiral around a little, but it would eventually hit. It's like dropping the ball down a funnel with the target at the bottom.

What does this have to do with Newtonian physics?

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 24, 2009 6:28 PM

Maybe Robin is starting a new meme: the Chewbacca OFFENCE.

Posted by: Mark | June 24, 2009 6:54 PM

Immediately his credibility was attacked on the basis that he is a creationist. Not only that, his creationist views were ridiculously distorted and confused with those of certain Christian fundamentalists who believe the earth is young and Dinosaurs walked with man.

Spencer's an OEC not a YEC, but he's still a C.

Roy is simply concerned that there's a lack of fossil records to demonstrate conclusively the process of one species evolving into another.

Roy's a liar. Cretinists have been making this claim for well over a century now. Repeating it endlessly doesn't make it true. We continuously add to the fossil record, which is full of transitional forms.

if the theory of evolution is true, we might expect to find some hominoid species in some remote forest, somewhere, that is more intelligent than a chimpanzee but not quite fully human.

Gack. What else can be said?

Posted by: dhogaza | June 24, 2009 8:59 PM

I can't bring myself to comment on this, either. What a waste ...

One survey I came across indicated, from a poll, that 7 percent of 'eminent' scientist in America believe in God, and 40% of 'less eminent' scientist believe in God. On that basis, Roy Spencer is not excluded from the echelons of eminence on the grounds of his belief in 'intelligent design'.

Ray - this is an extraordinarily stupid statement. Please don't come back until you can tell us why this is true.

Posted by: dhogaza | June 24, 2009 9:01 PM

Robin Levett:

The combined motions downward and rotationally produce a net spiral.

I can recall that all of the orbits produced by Newton's laws were conic sections. A spiral is not a conic section AFAIK.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 24, 2009 11:29 PM

@Chris:

I can recall that all of the orbits produced by Newton's laws were conic sections. A spiral is not a conic section AFAIK.

Indeed; but since my point is that my jaw will not enter a (stable) Newtonian orbit, because it cannot acquire enough kinetic energy (by conversion from gravitational potential energy) to counterbalance the inward gravitational force...

I'm willing to be corrected, if I can be shown where I'm wrong, but Mark seems remarkably unwilling to do this.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 25, 2009 2:45 AM

I see in this blog a terrible confusion about the nature of skepticism. Some posters seem to think that in order to be skeptical you need to be fluent in the priciples of advanced mathematics, or some other discipline, or very talented and have degrees in many disciplines.

Not true! Skepticism can result whenever something that is claimed by so-called experts, does not gel with one's own knowledge and experience. An example might be the opinion of one's local doctor that jogging is harmful (that is, an opinion from the doctor rather than a personal diagnosis).

Doctors may get quite a few visits from joggers who have injured themselves by excessive jogging in order to lose weight. The data needs to be interpreted. People who are overweight and not used to exercise, may harm themselves if they take up jogging too vigorously. Again, use your nous. Let common sense prevail.

When people try to bamboozle you about a general issue with mathematics that you don't understand, be skeptical. I'm reminded of a story about an investment corporation whose chief executive officer badgered his employees about their reluctance to invest in Enron. It went something like this: "I told you to investigate the possibility of investing in Enron over a month ago. They're making money hand over fist. What's happening?"

Answer: "Dear Lord and Master, we have investigated the possibility of investing in Enron, but we simply can't understand how they are making their profits. You have instructed us to never trust a company if we can not understand how they are making their profits."

Some time later Enron collapsed.

This principle is valuable for everyone. If it can't be explained, it may be humbug and bullshit. Don't trust it.

Okay! Back to Monckton's interview, the subject of the thread. You all will have gathered by now that I largely agree with Monckton's views. Why?

Because I understand the fundamental role of energy costs in our societies. All past civilisations that were great were great because they could harness energy supplies. Ancient civilisations, such as the Greeks and the Romans, employed slave labour, and spoils of war. That's being 'energy efficient'. Labour merely for the cost of very basic food and lodging is why China has a huge trade surplus and why we, in the West, are benifiting from low-cost products. By Western standards, China employs slave labour. We criticise the fact and rail against it, but we still buy their products.

When I see TV ads in Australia urging people to switch off their lights and buy 'energy-saving' bulbs that use up to 1/5th of the power of a conventional bulb but cost 10x as much, I begin to be skeptical.

First of all, if I economise on my electricity bill, and everyone economises on their electricity usage, it's quite possible that an extra coal-fired power station may not have to be be built, for home power usage, and therefore less C02 emissions arte produced. Wow! What a nice rosy feeling! We've achieved something simply by economising on our electricty bill.

Let's look at the reality.

Everyone's heard of the adage, "Look after the pennies and the pounds will take care of themselves". Minimising wastage and being efficient are standard practices for any businees and any person who seeks to become wealthy.

Does the average person work out how long their $10 energy saving bulb lasts, compared with a 50 cents conventional bulb? Do we even have official statistics on this issue? Does the average person work out what the total cost of their solar hot water heater is over a 15 year period, including maintaince costs and 'booster' costs?

The fundamental economic reality here is extremely nebulous. If you do succeed in reducing your electricity bill by awareness of wastage and switching lights off at every opportunity, you'll have money to spare at the end of the year. Let's say $400 off your annual electricity bill.

What do you do with that $400 saving? Well, you could give it to a bank which invests in a new coal-fired power station in China, or you could buy a digital camera which requires the same amount of dirty energy you've just saved. Back to square one.

Posted by: Ray | June 25, 2009 3:25 AM

Indeed; but since my point is that my jaw will not enter a (stable) Newtonian orbit, because it cannot acquire enough kinetic energy (by conversion from gravitational potential energy) to counterbalance the inward gravitational force...

FFS. You ARE an idiot. Grade A++

Force and energy are different things.

Energy = force x distance.

So if you're running a circular orbit, there is not distance travelled (you have to use the distance in the direction of the force) then there's no energy gained or lost.

So there's no need to counterbalance gravitational FORCE by ENERGY, because they're DIFFERENT.

And a spiral (like you get when rolling a marble down a funnel) happens ONLY because it's losing energy through friction and air resistance (well, some deformation of the funnel too, probably).

Posted by: Mark | June 25, 2009 4:45 AM

PS what's this "so called experts" thing?

What is it that lets you say whether someone is an expert or merely a "so called expert"?

And surely Plimer, Pielke (Jr and Sr), Monkton (DEFINITELY), Lindzen and so on are all heavily in that "so called expert" category?

I mean, especially monkton. You treat his works as if he knows what he's doing (is an expert) but he isn't. He hasn't even trained for it!

Posted by: Mark | June 25, 2009 4:53 AM

@Mark:

FFS. You ARE an idiot. Grade A++ Force and energy are different things. Energy = force x distance. So if you're running a circular orbit, there is not distance travelled (you have to use the distance in the direction of the force) then there's no energy gained or lost. So there's no need to counterbalance gravitational FORCE by ENERGY, because they're DIFFERENT. And a spiral (like you get when rolling a marble down a funnel) happens ONLY because it's losing energy through friction and air resistance (well, some deformation of the funnel too, probably).

Thanks for the endorsement.

I do realise that force and energy are two different things - it's a pity that you can't follow my shorthand.

Force acting on a mass produces acceleration in the direction of the force. Gravitational force acting on a mass will accelerate the mass towards it. If the mass has velocity, it is convenient to consider that that velocity will produce a notional "centrifugal force" acting on the object countering the effect of gravitational force. That is the convenient way that we started out this discussion, by reference to centrifugal force.

Where the bodies in the gravitational system are of sufficiently different mass (as with the jaw-Earth system we are talking about here) it is also convenient to consider the heavier as fixed, and the lighter as moving with respect to it.

If the notional centrifugal force is greater than the gravitational force - that is the velocity of the lighter mass is sufficiently high - then the lighter mass will escape the gravitational field.

If the notional centrifugal force is less than that such that it is exactly the same as the gravitational force, then the mass will enter an elliptical orbit (although the balance between the forces may vary along the orbit as the lighter mass's orbital speed varies in accordance with Kepler's laws, the effect of the forces balances out over the course of the orbit). The mass' orbit has an energy associated with it - the sum of the mass's KE and PE at any point along the orbit will remain the same. The mass' PE at the orbit's apogee is converted to KE at the perigee, and then back to PE as the mass climbs back to apogee, as a result of the gravitational acceleration applied to the mass.

If the notional centrifugal force is less than gravitational force, I say that the mass will not enter an orbit, but will continue to fall in the direction of the gravitational force until it eventually encounters the surface of the body producing it. Its original tangential velocity will however cause it to continue to rotate around that body, producing a (segment of) a spiral.

The mass's KE varies with the square of its velocity. The velocity produces the notional centrifugal force. We know the PE of a mass at a given height above the central body; and (if we know its velocity) its KE at that point. The sum of those energies sets the maximum orbital speed that the mass can reach, being the square root of (that sum divided by the mass). That in turn sets the maximum notional centrifugal force acting upon the mass. It is in that sense that I refer to energy as counterbalancing gravitational force.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 25, 2009 6:30 AM

@Mark:

Well that's no form of shorthand that means anything other than what you want it to mean. Making it quite hard to understand for anyone not you.

Well, the steps in the logic are all there in my earlier posts.

More later.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 25, 2009 7:13 AM

Well, the steps in the logic are all there in my earlier posts.

In shorthand?

More later.

No, please. You're an idiot and haven't a clue. You're trying to get me to wrestle you in mud and I'm getting dirty and you're getting excited.

And I bet you haven't tried to drop a golf ball in a bowl from dour stories up, have you...

Posted by: Mark | June 25, 2009 7:36 AM

Ray defends Roy thusly:

Roy is simply concerned that there's a lack of fossil records to demonstrate conclusively the process of one species evolving into another.

In that case, Roy is simply ignoring the evidence and what it tells us. So now we have Ray the global-warming denialist citing Roy the evolution-denialist as an "authority." Which puts us well past "skepticism," and on to "kicking an obvious idiot to the curb."

Posted by: Raging Bee | June 25, 2009 8:59 AM

Ray @283 :

Not true! Skepticism can result whenever something that is claimed by so-called experts, does not gel with one's own knowledge and experience.

Damn that satnav and its relativistic corrections - I have no direct experience of relativity, and I don't understand the mathematics behind it, ergo I should be skeptical that such a thing could ever work.

When people try to bamboozle you about a general issue with mathematics that you don't understand, be skeptical.

Remember this people. Maths is hereby outlawed in all scientific endeavours. Any attempt to explain it means you are automatically invalidating your own argument, and have no credibility. The lowest common demoninator wins.

Okay! Back to Monckton's interview, the subject of the thread. You all will have gathered by now that I largely agree with Monckton's views. Why?

And then you proceeded to talk about... random stuff? Saving money and buying cameras? Is this what you propose to replace the maths with - spurious anecdotal nonsense?

Plus, I don't quite understand how you arrived at that $400 figure, I really didn't follow the maths. I'm sure you know that means that I can immediately disgregard everything you said.

Thank you.

Posted by: Dave | June 25, 2009 10:43 AM

@Mark #298:

At #228 I said:

A static (ie without expansion) Newtonian (absent dark energy or any other relativistic effects) universe will over time collapse under the effect of gravitation. It doesn't matter what bits of matter within that universe are orbiting about which other bits - given time, it will collapse. Ray is right on this point - but wrong on everything else.

Ray had quoted Newton on the claim that such a universe would collapse, and Newton's fudge of an infinite universe; and Hawking explaining that that fudge doesn't save the static Newtonian universe from collapse (he deals with this in Brief History too). Einstein added the cosmological constant to save a static relativistic universe from collapse.

You responded (#221):

Uh, an orbit has the gravitational acceleration pulling it into the orbited planet EQUAL to the cetripetal one pulling it out. How will gravity make it fall in? Pictsies?

and then (#241) in response to my question:

So your position is that however many bodies there are in the Universe, and whatever their starting position or velocity, that universe will never collapse?

You said:

In the clockwork universe of Newton's time, yes.

You can perhaps take the time between now and my next post to explain how all of that differs from my comment:

Your original claim was that Newton, Einstein and Hawking were wrong in their view that a static Newtonian universe would collapse.

It was Chris that introduced the two body system, and you that claimed that the outcome was generalisable.

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 25, 2009 11:18 AM

By the way, one part of Hawking's "Origin of the Universe" speech says:

Thus, an infinite collection of stars, can not remain in a MOTIONLESS state. IF THEY ARE NOT MOVING RELATIVE TO EACH OTHER at one time, the attraction between them, will cause them to start falling towards each other.

So the point was they can't be motionless relative to each other AND not fall together. Newton's mistake was to believe there was a condition for which the stars could be motionless relative to each other AND not fall together. This was his infinite number of stars hypothesis.

By the way 2, I think Hawking was just using Newton's hypothesis as part of an introduction to the concept of an expanding universe.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 25, 2009 11:45 AM

You said:

In the clockwork universe of Newton's time, yes.

You can perhaps take the time between now and my next post to explain how all of that differs from my comment:

Your original claim was that Newton, Einstein and Hawking were wrong in their view that a static Newtonian universe would collapse.

Yes. I can. The clockwork universe had no chaos. therefore it was predictable. Positions could be assigned with indefinite accuracy at one point and the result was deterministic.

Like clockwork.

This has nothing to do with your second statement.

And that's the difference.

It was Chris that introduced the two body system, and you that claimed that the outcome was generalisable.

So you didn't post #243

@Mark #241:

...Hell - 2 bodies of equal mass, nil velocity, arbitrary distance - that universe won't collapse?

Posted by: Robin Levett | June 23, 2009 4:53 PM

?

Posted by: Mark | June 25, 2009 12:02 PM

Of course I did - but after Chris's post #232, and indeed your #229.

So what does Chris having posted it have to do with anything.

You posted it.

And I answered.

Posted by: Mark | June 25, 2009 12:22 PM

Arthur, thank you. Pure comedy gold (from Monckton's "Twisted Science" at SPPI):

So it is that the intellectual descendents of Goebbels are chained to the work-benches of their spin-factories, churning out an interminable series of colorful fantasies, each repeating and magnifying its predecessor, yet all having no point of contact with reality or truth.

Best laugh I've had all week!

Posted by: Gareth | June 25, 2009 7:25 PM

Seems that we have censorship in place on this site.

Posted by: Ray | June 25, 2009 11:09 PM

I'd like to add that I'm very pleased that the Australian senator, Steve Fielding, has opposed the Rudd government's carbon trading scheme.

I think it's very revealing that Steve Fielding is probably one of the few members in the senate who has a degree in engineering.

Most politicians have qualifications in art, law, economics, even politics. Few have qualifications in science. Penny Wong has a degree in arts and law. She's probably very unqualified to have an opinion on scientific methodology. She relies upon consensus. The majority is right.

Anyone who knows anything about science must surely realise that the majority is not necessarily right, perhaps even rarely right.

Posted by: Ray | June 25, 2009 11:37 PM

re: #312 MAB (and anyone else)

I'm curious:

a) Does Monckton have a history of leading efforts to help the poor of the world?
Anyone have any references?

OR

b) Is this a recent passion, i.e., of the form: "We can't limit CO2 or the poor of the world will suffer?"

Given Monckton's well-known political associations, I conjecture b) may be possible, but if so, he's late to the game, and much less sophisticated than Lomborg.

Posted by: John Mashey | June 26, 2009 1:28 AM

Ray sez:

Okay! Back to Monckton's interview, the subject of the thread. You all will have gathered by now that I largely agree with Monckton's views. Why? Because I understand the fundamental role of energy costs in our societies...(blah blah blah)

So what you're saying is that you disagree with the notion that green house gases accumulating in the atmosphere will cause the average temperature of the planet to rise due to the fact that these gases are opaque to outgoing thermal radiation because.... you don't like the potential consequences of such a theory being true?

Have I got that right?

If I do have that right... geeze Louise...

Do you see any relation, at all, between the fact that you don't want to use fluorescent light bulbs and have some notion of "economic reality" and the fundamental physics of radiation in the atmosphere?

I'm loath to use the word dumb around here, as it's generally counter productive... but...

Oh well, I suppose that if you polled 1000 climate change deniers, you'd probably find 90% of them formed their opinion on global warming for the same reason.

Posted by: ChrisC | June 26, 2009 3:22 AM

John Mashey:

a) Does Monckton have a history of leading efforts to help the poor of the world?

I don't know about Monckton, but as far as the Heartland Institute is concerned,

1. The poor = very pitiful people who must be taken care of.
2. People who are already essentially net tax consumers = lazy welfare-junkie bums who should simply be ignored.
3. People who don't pay taxes = AAAAAAARGH!!!!! DIRTY HIPPIEZ!!!!!!

It's all in the framing. My friends.

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 26, 2009 7:50 AM

Ray in response to your unassailable arguments , I’d make three short points:

1) Firstly, how many planets are needed to provide the ‘Wests’ consumption rates for the entire population? (Please insert straw-man argument here accusing me of not caring for the most disadvantaged).

2) Secondly, The answer to the above question should lead a humane fair minded person, to questioning if perhaps we in the west need to reduce the amount of consumption and pollution in order to allow a Fair shake of the sauce bottle for the least advantaged. (Please insert debunked and autistic trickle-down economics argument here).

3) Thirdly, the rich paying more to internalize (pay closer to the) real costs the costs of consumption and pollution, will reduce the externalized cost burden we foist on the most disadvantaged (bottom billion). Hence this is a vital step for providing better opportunity and justice for the least advantaged. (Please find some rationalization to change the topic here). Posted by: MAB | June 25, 2009 11:45 PM

Dear me! We're talking about a serious issue here and all you can do is make fun of it. Shame on you!

Poverty is no fun. Such people are disenfranchised, have no power, influnece or say in their destiny. They are desperate; at their wit's end, and you want to raise energy costs!

Well, expect a third world war, you dopes.

Posted by: Ray | June 26, 2009 8:29 AM

(Please insert straw-man argument here accusing me of not caring for the most disadvantaged).

Poverty is no fun. Such people are disenfranchised, have no power, influnece or say in their destiny. They are desperate; at their wit's end, and you want to raise energy costs!

He's good at following the cue, isn't he.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | June 26, 2009 9:17 AM

Poverty is no fun. Such people are disenfranchised, have no power, influnece or say in their destiny. They are desperate; at their wit's end, and you want to raise energy costs!

So what we need is to tax the rich to pay for solar power. And tax the rich again to replace the few trains that aren't electric to electric locomotives. And tax them a little more to get the bus fleet and the transport trucks changed to carbon-neutral fuels or electric engines.

This will then remove all the CO2 requirements for the poor, apart from those rich enough to afford their own cars. And they can hardly be thought of as being at their wits end.

It's the obvious conclusion of Ray's saintly stance on the poor.

And those changes will have a trickle-up power to the rich: their workers won't need increased payments, since all their needs to travel are now renewable-sourced and moving transport of food off to cheaper electric vehicles (being unchanged by oil price rises) reduces the cost of the very basic necessities that make the greatest change to the relative affluence of the poor.

It also makes the food sourced by the rich people cheaper.

Posted by: Mark | June 26, 2009 9:36 AM

Jeff, get with the program, when people say "it's the population", it's ALWAYS someone else who they're talking about.

Never them.

Posted by: Mark | June 26, 2009 10:45 AM

So what you're saying is that you disagree with the notion that green house gases accumulating in the atmosphere will cause the average temperature of the planet to rise due to the fact that these gases are opaque to outgoing thermal radiation because.... you don't like the potential consequences of such a theory being true? Posted by: ChrisC | June 26, 2009 3:22 AM

Completley untrue, but I understand your confusion. There are many greenhouse gases that may increase or decrease for many reasons and causes that may be interrelated. For example, we have situations of positive feedback and negative feedback. In negative feedback, an increased warming causes increased evaporation of the lakes and oceans, which in turn causes increased cloud cover over our planet, which in turn reduces the amount of heat radiation reaching the earth's surface, which in turn causes a slight cooling effect to counteract the predicted warming.

Since I don't have a Ph.D in meteorology, I can't argue in detail the merits and the pros and cons of such arguments. However, as a skeptic, I see a degree of uncertainty about such matters.

There would appear to be other issues such as a tendency for plants to grow more profusely as a result of an increase in CO2, thus sucking more CO2 from the atmosphere and mitigating the effects of our contribution to the atmospheric increase in CO2. There are natural balances that tend to 'kick in'.

It just seems to me that the disastrous consequences of our anthropogenic contribution to the amount of carbon in our atmosphere, are not certain and are not inevitable. That's my honest opinion, qualified or not.

However, I do know from direct experience and knowledge of history, that there are some very real and serious catastrophes that beset our planet, that are absolutely awful and real and certain, and which I would describe as being far worse that a category 4 cyclone or a 10 year drought.

They are the terrible tragedies and obscenities of war and the desperate plight of the genuinely poor who have to scramble over rubbish tips in search of something of the slightest value to sustain them.

Posted by: Ray | June 27, 2009 10:21 AM

Weirdo Ray, if you're a skeptic, why aren't you skeptical of your ideas?

In negative feedback, an increased warming causes increased evaporation of the lakes and oceans, which in turn causes increased cloud cover over our plane

Is that so? Here's a thought experiment.

If it's a clear night, is it warmer or colder than the same night the next day but with clouds?

Ray has not checked AT ALL whether clouds are ever a positive feedback.

This, in case anyone is wondering if Ray has something, is how you can tell he has nothing.

Ray seems to have confused "Doesn't know science" and "Disagrees" with "skepticism".

A common mistake on the less intelligent, there was even a Monty Python sketch about it (and argument is not just a repeated refutation of anothers' statements).

Of course, those people were educated. Even though in the arts in the main, they still were educated and knew a scam artist like Ray when they heard him.

Posted by: Mark | June 27, 2009 11:45 AM

Shorter Ray:

1. Global warming isn't a problem, because God (or some other unknown cosmic force) will save us from it. I know it.
2. Poor people are... poor. Poor people do... things that poor people do. If poor people become poorer, then... they do more of the things that poor people do. Therefore, mitigation is more expensive than adaptation.
3. As a skeptic, ...
4. As a skeptic, ...
5. As a skeptic, ...
6. As a skeptic, ...
7. As a skeptic, ...
8. As a skeptic, ...
9. As a skeptic, ...
10. Well, as a self-proclaimed skeptic, I proclaim myself to be a skeptic! Woohoo!

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 27, 2009 1:42 PM

Weirdo Ray, if you're a skeptic, why aren't you skeptical of your ideas? Posted by: Mark | June 27, 2009 11:45 AM

I'm skeptical of everything, including your ability to read my posts.

I've written time and again that I simply don't know who's right on this issue of AGW. I find a certain logic and sense in both sides of the argument. If the issue were not heavily politicised, and if the science of climate change were merely a set of theories which could be applied to the production of an advanced piece of technology, say a refraction-free lens made of artificial materials, or a super fast quantum computer, then I would tend to side with the consensus of scientific opinion as regards the correctness of the theories, and I would consider the eventual construction and successful working of a prototype product as being 'proof of the pudding'.

Here's a thought experiment. If it's a clear night, is it warmer or colder than the same night the next day but with clouds?

Here's a thought experiment for you. If it's a clear day in heat of summer, is it warmer or colder the following day if the sky is covered with cloud?

Posted by: Ray | June 28, 2009 3:19 AM

Ray, continuing with his comic book level analyses, writes:

I'm also skeptical of the processes of aid to third world countries. Without a clear plan in relation to the goals of such aid, and without the personnel with the expertise to implement that clear plan, one is again just pissing in the wind. The money is wasted. The corrupt get wealthy and the problems are recycled. No real progress is made.

First of all, let's dispense with tyhe term 'aid'. Aid usually means loans with massive strings attached - for example the privatization of public servcies, natural resources etc. In Latin America and Africa, aid usually ends up in loans that must be paid back with interest - and that interest comes in the form of structural adjustment. Patrick Bond dispenses with the frivolity of the term aid in his excellenbt book, "Looting Africa"The Economics of Exploitation". The second crucual aspect is that aid usually leads to development whose proceeds are mostly appropriated by the rich. For decades the model has been promised by western governments and commerical elites to which they are beholden to improve the lives of gthe poor but it rarely does. The biggest victims of World Bank/IMF (in other words US Treasury) structural adjustment programmes are the poor, who see their wages slashed, social security nets eliminated, local environments ravaged, and unions oblioterated in order to ensure that cpaital flows remain to the north. Finally, western governments actively support the 'corrupt wealthy'elites in the south. We help them into power and have long supported limited top-down forms of democracy. This explains in part the overt hostility on the part of western governments and the MSM to the likes of Chavez, Morales, Correa and others who for the first time in generations are taking away some of the wealth form where it is concentrated and are using it to create some small measzure of social justice.

Posted by: Jeff Harvey | June 28, 2009 4:00 AM

Ray writes:

There would appear to be other issues such as a tendency for plants to grow more profusely as a result of an increase in CO2,

There is no CO2 fertilization effect outside the lab, because CO2 is not the nutrient available in least supply (Liebig's Law of the Minimum).

thus sucking more CO2 from the atmosphere and mitigating the effects of our contribution to the atmospheric increase in CO2.

The sources and sinks for CO2 have been extensively explored. You don't seem to realize this--one more indication that you have never looked into the science behind this issue.

Please read the AR4 report before you post again.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 28, 2009 7:04 AM

Here's a news item that's not too old, December 2008.

WASHINGTON – A United Nations climate change conference in Poland is about to get a surprise from 650 leading scientists who scoff at doomsday reports of man-made global warming – labeling them variously a lie, a hoax and part of a new religion.

Later today, their voices will be heard in a U.S. Senate minority report quoting the scientists, many of whom are current and former members of the U.N.'s own Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

About 250 of the scientists quoted in the report have joined the dissenting scientists in the last year alone.

In fact, the total number of scientists represented in the report is 12 times the number of U.N. scientists who authored the official IPCC 2007 report.

Did you get that? 12 times the number of U.N. scientists who authored the official IPCC 2007 report!!

Am I dreaming, or is this consensus which many of you guys consider so persuasive, beginning to crumble?

Posted by: Ray | June 28, 2009 7:48 AM

A few posts ago, someone asked me if I could name a single qualified climatologist who was skeptical of the consensus view of anthropogenic warming. I named Roy Spencer who was immediately derided.

In connection with the current 'cap and trade' climate bill that is being considered by the US senate, a few more highly qualified scientists have been brave enough to publicly state their opinion in opposition to the bill.

You'll notice that there are quite a few Ph.D.s in this list, and many of the disciplines are related to climate change. Professor Ian Plimer is listed, of course, as is Roy Spencer.

I'm sure you can find one or two scientist here to deride. Dig up some dirt or misrepresent their religious views.

SYUN AKUSOFU, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA

ARTHUR G.ANDERSON, PH.D DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH, IBM (RETIRED)

CHARLES R.ANDERSON, PH.D ANDERSON MATERIALS EVALUATION

J. SCOTT ARMSTRONG, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

ROBERT ASHWORTH CLEARSTACK LLC

ISMAIL BAHT, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF KASHMIR

COLIN BARTON CSIRO (RETIRED)

DAVID J. BELLAMY, OBE THE BRITISH NATURAL ASSOCIATION

JOHN BLAYLOCK LOS ALAMOS NATIONAL LABORATORY (RETIRED)

EDWARD F. BLICK, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA (EMERITUS)

SONJA BOEHMER-CHRISTIANSEN, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF HULL

BOB BRECK AMS BROADCASTER OF THEYEAR 2008

JOHN BRIGNELL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON (EMERITUS)

MARK CAMPBELL, PH.D U.S. NAVAL ACADEMY

ROBERT M. CARTER, PH.D JAMES COOK UNIVERSITY

IAN CLARK, PH.D PROFESSOR, EARTH SCIENCES UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA, OTTAWA, CANADA

ROGER COHEN, PH.D FELLOW,AMERICAN PHYSICAL SOCIETY

PAUL COPPER, PH.D LAURENTIAN UNIVERSITY (EMERITUS)

PIERS CORBYN,MS WEATHER ACTION

RICHARD S. COURTNEY, PH.D REVIEWER, INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE

UBERTO CRESCENTI, PH.D PAST-PRESIDENT, ITALIAN GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY

SUSAN CROCKFORD, PH.D UNIVERSITY OFVICTORIA

JOSEPH S. D’ALEO FELLOW,AMERICAN METEOROLOGICAL SOCIETY

JAMES DEMEO PH.D UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS (RETIRED)

DAVID DEMING, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA

DIANE DOUGLAS, PH.D PALEOCLIMATOLOGIST

DAVID DOUGLASS, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER

ROBERT H. ESSENHIGH E.G. BAILEY EMERITUS PROFESSOR OF ENERGY CONVERSION THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

CHRISTOPHER ESSEX, PH.D UNIVERSITY OFWESTERN ONTARIO

JOHN FERGUSON, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE (RETIRED)

EDUARDO FERREYRA ARGENTINIAN FOUNDATION FOR A SCIENTIFIC ECOLOGY

MICHAEL FOX, PH.D AMERICAN NUCLEAR SOCIETY

GORDON FULKS, PH.D GORDON FULKS AND ASSOCIATES

LEE GERHARD, PH.D STATE GEOLOGIST, KANSAS (RETIRED)

GERHARD GERLICH, PH.D TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITAT BRAUNSCHWEIG

IVAR GIAEVER, PH.D NOBEL LAUREATE, PHYSICS

ALBRECHT GLATZLE, PH.D SCIENTIFIC DIRECTOR, INTTAS (PARAGUAY)

WAYNE GOODFELLOW, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA

JAMES GOODRIDGE CALIFORNIA STATE CLIMATOLOGIST (RETIRED)

LAURENCE GOULD, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF HARTFORD

VINCENT GRAY, PH.D NEW ZEALAND CLIMATE COALITION

WILLIAM M. GRAY, PH.D COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE

KESTEN GREEN, PH.D MONASH UNIVERSITY

WILL HAPPER, PH.D PRINCETON UNIVERSITY

HOWARD C. HAYDEN, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF CONNECTICUT (EMERITUS)

BEN HERMAN, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA (EMERITUS)

MARTIN HERTZBERG, PH.D. U.S. NAVY (RETIRED)

DOUG HOFFMAN, PH.D AUTHOR, THE RESILIENT EARTH

BERND HUETTNER, PH.D

OLE HUMLUM, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF OSLO

A. NEIL HUTTON PAST PRESIDENT, CANADIAN SOCIETY OF PETROLEUM GEOLOGISTS

CRAIG D. IDSO, PH.D CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF CARBON DIOXIDE AND GLOBAL CHANGE

SHERWOOD B. IDSO, PH.D U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE (RETIRED)

KIMINORI ITOH, PH.D YOKOHAMA NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

STEVE JAPAR, PH.D REVIEWER, INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE

STEN KAIJSER, PH.D UPPSALA UNIVERSITY (EMERITUS)

WIBJORN KARLEN, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF STOCKHOLM (EMERITUS)

JOEL KAUFFMAN, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF THE SCIENCES, PHILADELPHIA (EMERITUS)

DAVID KEAR, PH.D FORMER DIRECTOR-GENERAL, NZ DEPT. SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH

RICHARD KEEN, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO

DR. KELVIN KEMM, PH.D LIFETIME ACHIEVERS AWARD, NATIONAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY FORUM, SOUTH AFRICA

MADHAV KHANDEKAR, PH.D FORMER EDITOR, CLIMATE RESEARCH

ROBERT S. KNOX, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER (EMERITUS)

JAMES P. KOERMER, PH.D PLYMOUTH STATE UNIVERSITY

GERHARD KRAMM, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA FAIRBANKS

WAYNE KRAUS, PH.D KRAUS CONSULTING

OLAV M. KVALHEIM, PH.D UNIV. OF BERGEN

ROAR LARSON, PH.D NORWEGIAN UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

JAMES F. LEA, PH.D

DOUGLAS LEAHY, PH.D METEOROLOGIST

PETER R. LEAVITT CERTIFIED CONSULTING METEOROLOGIST

DAVID R. LEGATES, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF DELAWARE

RICHARD S. LINDZEN, PH.D MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

HARRY F. LINS, PH.D. CO-CHAIR, IPCC HYDROLOGY AND WATER RESOURCESWORKING GROUP

ANTHONY R. LUPO, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI

HOWARD MACCABEE, PH.D,MD CLINICAL FACULTY, STANFORD MEDICAL SCHOOL

HORST MALBERG, PH.D FREE UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN

BJORN MALMGREN, PH.D GOTEBURG UNIVERSITY (EMERITUS)

JENNIFER MAROHASY, PH.D AUSTRALIAN ENVIRONMENT FOUNDATION

JAMES A MARUSEK U.S. NAVY (RETIRED)

ROSS MCKITRICK, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF GUELPH

PATRICK J.MICHAELS, PH.D UNIVERSITY OFVIRGINIA

TIMMOTHY R.MINNICH,MS MINNICH AND SCOTTO, INC.

ASMUNN MOENE, PH.D FORMER HEAD, FORECASTING CENTER,METEOROLOGICAL INSTITUTE, NORWAY

MICHAEL MONCE, PH.D CONNECTICUT COLLEGE

DICK MORGAN, PH.D EXETER UNIVERSITY (EMERITUS)

NILS-AXEL MÖRNER, PH.D STOCKHOLM UNIVERSITY (EMERITUS)

DAVID NOWELL, D.I.C. FORMER CHAIRMAN, NATO METEOROLOGY CANADA

CLIFF OLLIER, D.SC. UNIVERSITY OFWESTERN AUSTRALIA

GARTH W. PALTRIDGE, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF TASMANIA

ALFRED PECKAREK, PH.D ST. CLOUD STATE UNIVERSITY

DR. ROBERT A. PERKINS, P.E. UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA

IAN PILMER, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE (EMERITUS)

BRIAN R. PRATT, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF SASKATCHEWAN

JOHN REINHARD, PH.D ORE PHARMACEUTICALS

PETER RIDD, PH.D JAMES COOK UNIVERSITY

CURT ROSE, PH.D BISHOP’S UNIVERSITY (EMERITUS)

PETER SALONIUS M.SC. CANADIAN FOREST SERVICE

GARY SHARP, PH.D CENTER FOR CLIMATE/OCEAN RESOURCES STUDY

THOMAS P. SHEAHAN, PH.D WESTERN TECHNOLOGIES, INC.

ALAN SIMMONS AUTHOR, THE RESILIENT EARTH

ROY N. SPENCER, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA—HUNTSVILLE

ARLIN SUPER, PH.D RETIRED RESEARCH METEOROLOGIST, U.S. DEPT. OF RECLAMATION

GEORGE H.TAYLOR,MS APPLIED CLIMATE SERVICES

EDUARDO P. TONNI, PH.D MUSEO DE LA PLATA (ARGENTINA)

RALF D.TSCHEUSCHNER, PH.D

DR.ANTON URIARTE, PH.D UNIVERSIDAD DEL PAISVASCO

BRIANVALENTINE, PH.D U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

GOSTAWALIN, PH.D UNIVERSITY OF GOTHENBURG (EMERITUS)

GERD-RAINERWEBER, PH.D REVIEWER, INTERGOVERNMENAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE

FORESE-CARLOWEZEL, PH.D URBINO UNIVERSITY

EDWARD T.WIMBERLEY, PH.D FLORIDA GULF COAST UNIVERSITY

MIKLOS ZAGONI, PH.D REVIEWER, INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE

ANTONIO ZICHICHI, PH.D PRESIDENT,WORLD FEDERATION OF SCIENTISTS

Posted by: Ray | June 28, 2009 8:09 AM

Ray @ 339:

Am I dreaming, or is this consensus which many of you guys consider so persuasive, beginning to crumble?

Just putting the term "650 leading scientists" into google is enough to turn up links from months ago comprehensively debunking your last ridiculous post, including posts on this very blog.

As a "skeptic", one would have thought you would have at the very least done that, rather than credulously accepting that drivel.

Perhaps the time has come for you to accept that you are "in denial". If only someone could arrange an intervention.

Posted by: Dave | June 28, 2009 8:17 AM

Thanks Ray,

Where are getting this stuff?

Posted by: MAB | June 28, 2009 8:49 AM

I'm skeptical of everything, including your ability to read my posts.

Let us have five minutes silense for the LOLcats who died after Ray posted that.

Side splitting irony.

Posted by: Mark | June 28, 2009 9:26 AM

Ray could possibly profit from a visit by OBVIØUSMAN!

Posted by: luminous beauty | June 28, 2009 1:16 PM

re: #334 Jeff

On aid:

Chavez I'm not so keen on (plusses & minuses), as an instance of the typical "oil curse", as per Michael Klare, recommended. Replacing bad A with different B doesn't guarantee that B is uniformly good. A while back at JQ, I mentioned Terry Karl, a very insightful & articulate person, and a useful political scientist.

Her talk on the "resource curse" and the micro-mechanics of its effects was quite enlightening. See The Paradox of Plenty, and she has a shorter version of the talk here, first ~25 minutes.

For anyone interested in development in general, I strongly recommend:

Making World Development Work - Scientific Alternatives to Neoclassical Economic Theory, ed Gregroire Leclerc, Charles A. S. Hall, 2007.

I have a long review there. Try to get your local libraries to order it. (It's big and expensive enough that one would expect only fairly dedicated studiers to buy.)

I'd summarize: the road to hell is paved with both good and bad intentions.

If someone has a history of actually trying to do something for "the poor" in less-developed countries, whether or not their ideas are optimal, one can actually believe they believe what they are saying.

Ex: Norman Borlaug, Doctors without Frontiers, (to pick someone local) Jenna Davis.

When libertarian/conservative thinktanks and allies thereof suddenly start saying "Don't do X, it will hurt the poor of the world", let us say there might be an element of skepticism about the real priority of helping the poor, as I noted in here.

Posted by: John Mashey | June 28, 2009 5:32 PM

Rabett has turned his eye to CATOs latest

Posted by: anybunny | June 28, 2009 6:41 PM

Ray, the majority of the people on your list are NOT climatologists. Just with a cursory glance I saw two astronomers (Akasofu and Boehm-Christiansen) and a physicist. Having a Ph.D. doesn't make you an expert on climate science, it depends on what the Ph.D. is IN.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 29, 2009 5:37 AM

Shorter Ray:

To show what a skeptic I am, I'll simply cut and paste the names from the Cato Institute's Orgone Petition!

Remember, do not even try to criticize of any of the statements of any of the people listed in the Orgone Petition. Any criticism, no matter how well-grounded in science and logic, is obviously proof of an Inquisition-like conspiracy to suppress the Galilean truth. This is the spirit of skepticism.

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 29, 2009 9:28 AM

Barton.

It was the albedo aspect of clouds that I was getting at in my response to Ray. I was hoping to elicit from him an acknowledgement that clouds have a variable impact on the passage of EM radiation in terms of reflection versus retention of EMR. However, I suspect that even if he had acknowledged such, he would have predicated it with some comment to the effect that water is a much more 'significant' GHG than is CO₂.

You have piqued my curiosity though... Could you provide a reference to a concise precis of the factors that determine the variability in albedo values for clouds?

Posted by: Bernard J. | June 29, 2009 10:32 AM

BPL @355

Akasofu was eminent in aurora physics, which I guess might be grouped within space science or atmospheric science, which I wouldn't usually label as astronomy.

Akasofu seems a sad case, as he retired after a long productive career and ~then went off wholeheartedly into AGW anti-science of notably poor quality, especially for a well-published natural scientist.

Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen (she of Energy and Environment fame, read Thacker's comments) is in the Geography Department @ Hull, although I see she's now listed as Emeritus Reader (i.e., in US terms Associate Professor Emeritus, or Oz/NZ Senior Lecturer Emeritus, I think).

Both are on Heartland's Global Warming Experts' list.

But in any case, as you say, neither is a climate scientist.

Posted by: John Mashey | June 29, 2009 2:30 PM

why would anyone possibly think there is some natural, nonbiological negative feedback mechanism holding the planet at the current temperature, when for the majority of its existence the planet was much warmer; until the carboniferous period, in fact, by what i suppose must appear as a remarkable coincidence to those who did not "drink the koolaid". perhaps the dropping temperatures induced the plants to store up carbon underground to provide heat in the future, thereby lowering carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Posted by: z | June 30, 2009 12:00 AM

Wow. Ray thinks that the "Theory of Intelligent Design" (?!) is suitable matter to "fill in the gaps" of evolution.

Ray, if you think that 'Intelligent Design' is a scientific theory that can be considered alongside evolution, then no wonder you're swallowing a lot of the anti-AGW nonsense.

Posted by: Michael | June 30, 2009 2:46 AM

Bernard J. writes:

Could you provide a reference to a concise precis of the factors that determine the variability in albedo values for clouds?

Concise? Ouch. It depends on such things as the mean particle size and the size distribution. In general you can assume that the lower down a cloud is in altitude, the higher its albedo will be. For further details see Houghton's "The Physics of Atmospheres" or some such book.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | June 30, 2009 4:53 AM

Ray: "I've never claimed to have any special knowledge about climate matters. In fact, until a few months ago I assumed like most of you on this blog that the science was settled and that anyone who disagreed with the predictions in the IPCC reports were either self-interested people aligned with the fossil-energy industries, or simply clueless fools. I began to have doubts about the soundness of the science for the case of AGW after hearing an ABC radio interview with Professor Plimer claiming that the case for AGW was much exaggerated. I'd heard of Ian Plimer previously in connection with his law suit against a scientist who claimed to have evidence that some fossilised structures on Mt Arafat were the remains of Noah's Ark. As a geologist and paleontologist, Professor Plimer was so outraged at the unsoundness of the evidence which was being claimed as scientific and being used to support the theory of 'Intelligent Design', that he took the 'Intelligent Design' scientist to court, paying the court costs himself, I believe. Such actions would imply that Ian Plimer is a scientist with integrity, which is why I paid attention to his views on climate matters during the ABC interview.

OK. Ray, humour me here. Like you, I am not even related to anyone who knows anyone who is remotely related to a climate science type of any description. Hwever, what interests me here is not necessarily science credentials but the process of logic. You point out that Plimer's POV aroused your suspicions regarding the validity of AGW theory, and that his credentials (in your view) lent his POV some weight. Fair enough. For those of us not intimate with the science of climate, the inputs, feedbacks, forcings and their inter-related mechanisms and the role of anthropogenic emissions in changing those mechanisms, that's a reasonably sound standpoint.

What I don't get is this: if your scepticism/ doubts/ reservations/ inquiring mind (delete or fill in as appropriate) were so aroused, by what stroke of reason do you then fail to apply the same standards of scrutiny to Plimer, Spencer, Watts and company, particularly given the detailed criticisms of the fundaments of the scientific bases of all these people from multiple sources? As you point out, Plimer's apparent integrity (and I don't doubt he has that in geological circles) was one of the factors that got you thinking. How is it then, that now that the integrity of Plimer (and Spencer, Watts etc.) in the domain of climate science is in question that you fail to apply the same demanding criteria to these people (given the innumerable refutations of their arguments seen here and elsewhere) that you applied to climate scientists in the first place?

In short, this: if something in what Plimer et al. said convinced you to be sceptical in the first place, how is it you are not equally sceptical of Plimer et al. given the reams of criticisms their statements have since generated?

Posted by: Steve Chamberlain | June 30, 2009 5:42 AM

Sorry, scrub the closing parenthesis in the last link of my last.

Posted by: Steve Chamberlain | June 30, 2009 6:10 AM

Ray,

You have only told me what the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC)tell you about themselves. [Would you be interested in a bridge I've got for sale? Great views of the Opera House.]

Serious people are looking for credible peer reviewed work.

Posted by: Mark Byrne | June 30, 2009 6:42 AM

Dave has it right in 372. If someone were to say that 2+4=4 and someone else were to say, no it's 5, you wouldn't feel OK taking the middle road and saying "Well, maybe it's somewhere in the middle", would you.

Denial only requires that you DON'T believe one is right. You don't have to have a replacement, just deny that the answer is the one put forward.

"It's somewhere in the middle"?

OK, so I want to kill you. You don't want to be killed. Shall we compromise on me cutting your leg off?

Or are you going to be selfish, close-minded and authoritarian and not accept the compromise position?

See how rediculous that idea can be? Sometimes one answer is right and that's it. Not the middle way, not the compromise, but one is right and all others wrong.

Posted by: Mark | June 30, 2009 7:37 AM

Shorter Ray:

My (non-)arguments have been shot down, namely that...

1. mitigation is more expensive than adaptation
2. the namelist which I simply lifted from the Cato Institute ad is indicative of how 'skeptical' I am

...so I figured I'll just throw out another non-argument -- the NIPCC 'report'!

As a self-proclaimed skeptic, I hereby proclaim myself to be a skeptic.

Posted by: bi -- IJI | June 30, 2009 8:52 AM

Ray, It isn't a theory, so stop calling it one. At least not in the sense that evolution is a theory.......though maybe it is in way that the tooth fairy is a theory in relation to dentistry...... Posted by: Michael | June 30, 2009 9:14 AM

I would maintain that my use of the word 'theory' in connection with Intelligent Design, is in accordance with at least one of the definitions of 'theory' in the Oxford English Dictionary.

Here's definition #6. "In a loose or general sense: A hypothesis proposed as an explanation; hence, a mere hypothesis, speculation, conjecture; an idea or set of ideas about something; an individual view or notion."

But I understand your point that the speculation and conjecture of the...err..hypothesis of Intelligent Design should not be elevated to the status of a scientific theory.

Posted by: Ray | July 1, 2009 7:31 AM

Further to anybunny's post #354: This link details the research those on both sides of the debate have published http://www.eecg.utoronto.ca/~prall/climate/

An eye-opener for some I'm sure...

Posted by: Chris S. | July 1, 2009 11:32 AM

Ray, IPCC and uncertainty. You are right, they are not 100% certain. They are "only" 95% certain. A one in twenty chance that they are wrong.

Ray, would you bet everything you own on one spin of a roulette wheel? I'll let you pick 2 numbers, that'll give you a slightly better than 1 in 20 chance.

Would you do it?

Posted by: stephenk | July 1, 2009 11:26 PM

Ray, IPCC and uncertainty. You are right, they are not 100% certain. They are "only" 95% certain. A one in twenty chance that they are wrong. Ray, would you bet everything you own on one spin of a roulette wheel? I'll let you pick 2 numbers, that'll give you a slightly better than 1 in 20 chance. Would you do it? Posted by: stephenk | July 1, 2009 11:26 PM

Good point and an excellent example of the scaremongering that goes on regarding AGW. I thought the certainty was described as 90%, not 95%, but let's not quibble.

I understand that so-called certainty refers to anthropogenic emmisions having a dominant role, ie. greater than 50%. 90% or even 95% of 51% is less than 50%, so that description allows for the possibility that anthropogenic gases may not quite be the dominant factor in climate change.

Factoring in the inevitable politicisation and exaggeration in such wording, in order for politicians to take the climatologists seriously, then the odds in favour of AGW are not nearly as high as you claim. That estimated 90% probability is not a mathematically derived probability, as is the case when you spin a coin you can expect heads approximately 50% of the time.

Factor in also the probability that climate change, whether through anthropogenic causes or not, is not going to be disastrous for everyone, then your roulette analogy is very far-fetched.

Here's what a science writer called McClean had to say about the IPCC processes.

McLean writes, “The IPCC would have us believe that its reports are diligently reviewed by many hundreds of scientists and that these reviewers endorse the contents of the report. Analyses of reviewer comments show a very different and disturbing story.”

In Chapter 9, the key science chapter, the IPCC concludes that "it is very highly likely that greenhouse gas forcing has been the dominant cause of the observed global warming over the last 50 years". The IPCC leads us to believe that this statement is very much supported by the majority of reviewers. The reality is that there is surprisingly little explicit support for this key notion. Among the 23 independent reviewers just 4 explicitly endorsed the chapter with its hypothesis, and one other endorsed only a specific section. Moreover, only 62 of the IPCC’s 308 reviewers commented on this chapter at all.

As with other chapters, simple corrections, requests for clarifications or refinements to the text which did not challenge the IPCC’s conclusions are generally treated favourably, but comments which dispute the IPCC’s claims or their certainty are treated with far less indulgence. In a related finding, McLean observes, “The dominance of research presupposing a human influence also means that the IPCC editing teams are likely to consist of people predisposed to view the situation in that light.” Adds McLean, “The problems continue into the authorship of these reports.

According to IPCC documents, scientists are nominated by governments or explicitly invited by scientists already associated with the IPCC. What a wonderful way to position scientists who support a government agenda on climate and then fill out the IPCC with like-minded individuals.” Concludes McLean, “The IPCC reports appear to be largely based on a consensus of scientific papers, but those papers are the product of research for which the funding is strongly influenced by previous IPCC reports. This makes the claim of a human influence self-perpetuating and for a corruption of the normal scientific process.”

Posted by: Ray | July 2, 2009 1:02 AM

ray: "Does CO2 & CH4 follow temperature rises, or vice versa. It makes a huge difference to the case for AGW."

Well no, Ray, it makes no freaking difference whatsoever to the case for AGW. What makes a difference is if the relationships as observed are consistent with the models, when one inputs the relevant solar forcing changes that drove the initiation of the glacial transitions. (yes, they are.)

Whether initial delta CO2/CH4 leads or lags initial delta temperature DOES make a difference to the ability to use this factoid to attempt to bamboozle people - as ray here illustrates very well.

Posted by: Lee | July 2, 2009 2:21 AM

Ray @385: I understand that so-called certainty refers to anthropogenic emmisions [sic] having a dominant role, ie. greater than 50%. 90% or even 95% of 51% is less than 50%, so that description allows for the possibility that anthropogenic gases may not quite be the dominant factor in climate change.”

Ray, this is pure... pure... pure... well not to worry. But let me see if I’ve got this right. According to your... your... (sorry, your post seems unaccountably to have disabled my ability to think straight, such is its novelty) arithmetic, anthropogenic sources cannot account for more than 48.45% of emissions. So if (hypothetically) the IPCC had estimated the anthropogenic proportion of emissions at 25%, they would have to be 194% confident, correct?

Do you know, I’ve never seen an analysis like this anywhere in the scientific literature, but then I suppose that’ll be because it’s been suppressed. I wonder why.

Ray: an object lesson in how to draw an exact line from an unwarranted asumption to a foregone conclusion.

Posted by: Steve Chamberlain | July 2, 2009 6:09 AM

Ray writes:

There are so many points on that graph where increases in GHGs seem to have followed increases in temperature.

Please read:

http://BartonPaulLevenson.com/Lag.html

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 2, 2009 7:18 AM

How certain is the IPCC that man's contribution to climate change is greater than 50%? They are apparently 90% certain, a figure no doubt plucked from the sratosphere.

And that assumption is no doubt pulled from the opposite of the stratosphere so you can make the assertion...

PS We humans are the dominant species.

Yet by mass we have nothing NEAR the number of even redwood or oak trees. By count, we have nothing like even the most humble insect species.

Yet we're still dominant.

Posted by: Mark | July 2, 2009 8:39 AM

How certain is the IPCC that man's contribution to climate change is greater than 50%? They are apparently 90% certain, a figure no doubt plucked from the sratosphere.

PS We humans are the dominant species. Yet by mass we have nothing NEAR the number of even redwood or oak trees. By count, we have nothing like even the most humble insect species. Yet we're still dominant. Posted by: Mark | July 2, 2009 8:39 AM

Dear me! Who said anything about mass? I never mentioned mass in my post, or even volume. Climate is always changing regardless of our activities on the planet.

The IPCC report reckons that our GHG emissions are the dominant cause of any current warming trends. 'Dominant' means an influence on climate change which is greater than 50% of the sum total of all the causes of climate change, doesn't it?

Posted by: Ray | July 2, 2009 10:07 AM

I'm a fairly humble sort of person.

Wipes tears from eyes.

I admit I don't know who's right,

You do seem to know who's wrong, though.

but I reckon I can discern when something is definitely proved or not.

Posted by: Ray

Evidence proves otherwise, Ray.

Posted by: Mark | July 2, 2009 10:53 AM

Ray, Did you read the link I gave in #292? I'd be interested in your thoughts on it...

Posted by: Chris S. | July 2, 2009 11:41 AM

Ray,

Tell me, has Spencer proved that some unknown forcing is necessary to explain the Vostok record? All I can see is a conjecture that there is an unquantified possibility of uncertainty (if one constrains the variables to only Milankovich cycles and CO2 and CH4, conveniently ignoring all the other variables we know about) that might allow some unknown, unspecified, and unphysical internal forcing that might account for something or other in some imaginary universe where Roy Spencer gets to decide what is plausible, what is included and excluded from analysis, and how it is interpreted.

Call me skeptical.

Posted by: luminous beauty | July 2, 2009 12:58 PM

Ray writes:

I'm a fairly humble sort of person. I admit I don't know who's right, but I reckon I can discern when something is definitely proved or not.

"Proof" is for mathematics and formal logic. Science can never prove anything. It can only disprove things. But when a theory has survived every experimental and empirical test thrown at it for 150 years, it becomes perverse to withhold at least provisional assent.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 2, 2009 3:50 PM

Ray write:

What I propose is the following experiment. We continue more or less as we are for, say, the next 30 years (or would 50 years be better?), but try to make sensible changes such as developing an affordable and useful electric car because we're running out of oil. We try to clean up our act regarding industrial pollution because it creates smog in our cities which is not good for our health…

In short, we acting sensibly, showing respect for our environment, as we should be doing irrespective of any AGW considerations, and try to make a gradual transition towards less reliance on non-renewable energy resources but without dislocating the economy.

Ray, who decides what sensible is?

Can you prove that we are running out of oil? I don’t think we will ever run out of oil

How do you know there is more pollution now than in the past?

Can you prove smog is bad for our health?

What on earth do you mean by “showing respect for our environment”? This is a nonsense use of words that means nothing and hence leads to acting the same.

What do you mean by dislocating the economy? You mean without giving 12 trillion dollar to bankers?

Posted by: MAB | July 2, 2009 11:48 PM

Another Shorter Ray:

I propose an experiment to prove AGW, which also requires time travel for the planet, and which will not prove AGW. In fact I propose writing a stream of consciousness that shows the type of logic rely on.

Bottom line, make no policy change that would that Roy Spenser or Ian Plimer would disagree with.

Posted by: MAB | July 3, 2009 12:09 AM

And Fred Singer,

You can rely of Fred Singer and time travel to justify a 30-50 year experiment to ignore the most competent advice and overwhelming evidence which indicates massive reductions in CO2e are necessary to avoid pulling the trigger of turning our carbon sinks into carbon sources.

Posted by: mab | July 3, 2009 12:23 AM

Here's the link I fluffed above: http://web.mac.com/statsmonkey/APStatsatLSHS/YMS2e_files/Chapter10.pdf

Posted by: Steve Chamberlain | July 3, 2009 12:47 AM

Ray:

Which theory are you referring to, that has survied every empirical test thrown at it for 150 years? That CO2 is a greenhouse gas?

Oh sweet Darwin, will you please at least google Arrhenius?

What I propose is the following experiment.

Its a good job you weren't in charge of the moon landings.

"Since we can't precisely model the gravitational effect of every single body in our solar system, we're just going to fire a rocket and hope for the best."

Posted by: Dave | July 3, 2009 5:58 AM

Dave -

But don't you know, Arrhenius was part of the Vast Left Wing Conspiracy To Take Away Americas Cars.

Posted by: Andrew Dodds | July 3, 2009 6:54 AM

Ray writes:Climatology as a scientific discipline is fairly new, isn't it? No, not even remotely. Climate science is older than quantum mechanics or relativity. Aristotle divided the globe into frozen, temperature, and torrid zones c. 300 BC. Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 3, 2009 7:38 AM

Barton,

Did you miss the scientific discipline bit? This is why I'd like to put such phrases, sentences or paragraphs in bold. But I've been criticised for doing that, so I've refrained.

The ancient Greeks did not know about the scientific method. They should be revered for pioneering a skeptical and questioning approach. However, because they did not 'hit upon' the scientific method as we now understand it, they accepted as reasonable a whole lot of tripe, such as the theory that we see because of our eyes project a beam of light upon the object we are looking at.

For the benefit of others, I'll copy and paste a brief description of the scientific method, which I think is reasonably comprehensive, although you may wish to add to it or amend it.

"Science is the study of the physical world, but it is not just a topic, a subject, a field of interest. It is a discipline—a system of inquiry that adheres to a specific methodology—the scientific method.

In its basic form, the scientific method consists of seven steps: 1) observation;

2) statement of a problem or question;

3) formulation of a hypothesis, or a possible answer to the problem or question;

4) testing of the hypothesis with an experiment;

5) analysis of the experiment’s results;

6) interpretation of the data and formulation of a conclusion;

7) publication of the findings.

One can study phenomena without adhering to the scientific method, of course. The result, however, is not science. It is pseudoscience or junk science."

Probably the first true scientist in the history of humanity was a Moslem. He lived over a 1,000 years ago when we in the West were drowning witches, burning heretics at the stake and trying donkeys in court for sodomy.

He 'falsified' (disproved) many of Aristotle's theories, and got a head start on Isaac Newton.

His name? Abu Ali al-Hasan, or, ibn al-Hasan, or, ibn al-Haytham, whatever transcription you fancy.

What is also remarkable is that he was apparently a devout Muslim, unlike Omar Khayyam, who was a bit (or a lot) irreverent.

This is another reason why I do not discount Roy Spencer's arguments simply because he has a penchant for Intelligent Design.

Torricelli invented the barometer and noted the decrease of pressure with altitude c. 1600. Continuous temperature records began to be taken in central England c. 1650.Jean-Baptiste Joseph Fourier proposed the existence of the greenhouse effect in 1824.Louis Agassiz demonstrated that there had been ice ages in the 1850s. John Tyndall identified the major greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere as water vapor and carbon dioxide in 1859.Svante Arrhenius proposed the theory of anthropogenic global warming and made the first estimate of temperature increase under doubled carbon dioxide in 1896.Aldrich Dines came up with the first detailed energy budget for the climate system in 1917.Hulton devised the first theoretical structure for a radiative-convective model of the atmosphere in 1931. G.S. Callendar noted the increase of carbon dioxide since the 19th century and again proposed AGW in 1938.Smagorinsky et al. wrote the first tentative general circulation model of the Earth's atmosphere in 1955. The same year, Hans Suess detected the radioisotope signature of fossil fuel CO2 in year, confirmed more strongly in a paper with Roger Revelle in 1957. In 1956, Gilbert N. Plass definitively answered the "saturation" argument against AGW (though the clinching data had been acquired in the 1940s). In 1958, regular CO2 observations began at Mauna Loa observatory in Hawaii.I'll stop there since that roughly covers the field for the two millennia before my birth in 1960.Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 3, 2009 7:38 AM

These guys were not climatologists. They were mostly mathematicians, physicists and chemists. Some of them got a bit close to being climatologists, such as Smagorinsky and Roger Revelle. I say this not to diminish in any way their achievements, but just to get the facts straight.

Posted by: Ray | July 3, 2009 1:03 PM

What I propose is the following experiment. We continue more or less as we are for, say, the next 30 years (or would 50 years be better?), but try to make sensible changes such as developing an affordable and useful electric car because we're running out of oil. We try to clean up our act regarding industrial pollution because it creates smog in our cities which is not good for our health. We try to change our farming practices so they have a less harmful effect on our environment, perhaps moving towards eating more kangaroo meat instead of beef and mutton, for example.

the 30 (50!!!) idea is simply stupid. you definitely< should look at the calculations. it makes a 3°C change basically inevitable, and a bigger change likely.

such an experiment is simply STUPID!

the science of climate is old. as is the scientific method. those scientists who agree with the theory have been using the scientific method all along. you are a denilaist, if you8 disagree with this!!!

Posted by: sod | July 3, 2009 5:37 PM

Shorter Ray:

The first True Scientist™ was a Muslim. Therefore, by the scientific method, it follows that Roy Spencer's theories have validity. Here is the detailed proof.

2) statement of a problem or question;

Question: Is Spencer a climate crank?

3) formulation of a hypothesis, or a possible answer to the problem or question;

Hypothesis: Spencer is not a climate crank.

4) testing of the hypothesis with an experiment;

Experiment: Look for the first True Scientist™, for some arbitrary designation of the word "True".

5) analysis of the experiment’s results;

Results: The first True Scientist™ was a Muslim.

6) interpretation of the data and formulation of a conclusion;

Conclusion: Therefore, Spencer is not a climate crank. Quo errat demonstrator.

7) publication of the findings.

Abstract: We present a proof that climatologist Roy Spencer is not a climate crank. Our novel contribution is the use of Ray's extension of the scientific method, which examines the validity of Spencer's theories using the properties of the first true scientist. ...

Posted by: bi -- IJI | July 3, 2009 11:23 PM

Ray writes: Probably the first true scientist in the history of humanity was a Moslem. He lived over a 1,000 years ago when we in the West were drowning witches, burning heretics at the stake and trying donkeys in court for sodomy.

The Witch Trials were largely confined to the Renaissance, roughly 1450-1650 AD. By and large the Christian theologians of the middle ages did not believe in witchcraft, as is clear from contemporary documents such as the laws of King Coloman or De Tonitruorum. Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 4, 2009 6:40 AM

That's even worse! 200-400 years after the first true scientist (born in Basra, now in Iraq) had published his experiments debunking many of Aristotle's theories, we in Europe were still burning witches and heretics.

Your point about Aristotle is correct to some extent; he certainly favored pure reason over empiricism. But his division of the world into climate zones was certainly based on the empirical observations of travelers. And once you get to Fourier and Agassiz, you are definitely dealing with modern, quantitative science. This makes climatology, as I said, older than either quantum mechanics or relativity. It is not a new field. Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 4, 2009 6:40 AM

When I say 'climatology' is a new discipline of science, I mean that the people you quoted who made observations about climate are not described as climatologists, just as Professor Ian Plimer is not.

The point I'm trying to make, which I think is very valid and pertinent, is that the science of climate prediction is relatively new and requires an input from many disciplines, including inputs from scientists like Fourier and Agassiz.

It could best be described as a 'soft' science like economics and medicine, although of course it relies upon input from the hard sciences, so it should perhaps be considered as a mixture of both hard and soft sciences.

The mistake that most posters in this blog make, is believing that climatology is a 'hard' science like Physics. I sense here, in this blog, a rabid dogmatism that asserts that the science is settled and anyone who questions it is in a state of 'denial', or just plain weird. This is religion; not science.

I don't mind (too much) being called weird or stupid. I'm mature enough to understand that such insults are usually projections onto others of one's own subconscious fears about oneself, which one doesn't want to confront.

Posted by: Ray | July 6, 2009 3:23 AM

I don't mind (too much) being called weird or stupid. Posted by: Ray Just as well, Ray. You ARE stupid: most posters in this blog make, is believing that climatology is a 'hard' science like Physics.

It IS physics. It's a mistake to believe that it isn't. It's stupid to say it isn't physics. And it's denialist crap to say so and use this as the reason why it's not right. See, you are stupid. Posted by: Mark | July 6, 2009 3:56 AM

The Physics of climate change is no more certain than the mathematical formulas of Professors Robert Merton and Myron Scholes who won Nobel Prizes for their fool-proof and shock-proof valuation of derivatives and options.

We all know what's recently happened to the economy, don't we?

Posted by: Ray | July 6, 2009 5:48 AM

You guys are behaving like lambs for the slaughter.

Posted by: Ray

Well you're killing us, Ray.

I need to catch my breath, now...

The Physics of climate change is no more certain than the mathematical formulas of Professors Robert Merton and Myron Scholes who won Nobel Prizes for their fool-proof and shock-proof valuation of derivatives and options.

Scholes et al were modelling the STOCK MARKET. Where "rational actors" with "full information" act to their own self best interest. I.e. they can look at what's going on and change what they are doing based on what they THINK is going to happen.

This is not physics. That you "think" it is shows how little you care to know or think for yourself.

Climate science doesn't assume that the ice sees the warming air and decides to drop down to avoid melting. It assumes that the elements will act under the forces they experience without knowing the future and being unable to counter it.

That IS physics.

Posted by: Mark | July 6, 2009 6:00 AM

Ray,

In case you aren't clear on the point, just saying 'I disagree' doesn't rank as a rebuttal, much less a refutation.

Posted by: luminous beauty | July 6, 2009 8:32 AM

And he talks about a lamb to the slaughter, lots of laughs!

Ray says

I'm mature enough to understand that such insults are usually projections onto others of one's own subconscious fears about oneself, which one doesn't want to confront.

Are you mature enough though to understand, Ray, that you project onto others your own lack of comprehension of the hard science involved in the study of climate? No you're really not, are you.

He's never studied it rigorously nor worked in the field and he'll stand for none of that nonsense that appears in the peer-reviewed literature. Why, it's just like economics. Yes of course Ray, whatever you say champ!

It's why you're categorised as undeniably "delusional", Ray.

Posted by: jemima | July 6, 2009 9:34 AM

Ray:

I sense here, in this blog, a rabid dogmatism that asserts that the science is settled

I sense here a rabid denial of reality by someone who deliberately ignores the science such as James Annan's derivation of climate sensitivity based purely on observations and instead makes ignorant, rabid and dogmatic claims such as:

It seems we have to rely upon computer modelling.

That someone who makes such rabid and dogmatic claims accuses others of being rabid and dogmatic demonstrates their enormous hypocrisy.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | July 6, 2009 12:00 PM

Ray writes:

the science of climate prediction is relatively new

1896 is relatively new?

It could best be described as a 'soft' science like economics and medicine,

Please read Hartmann's "Global Physical Climatology" or Goody and Yung's "Atmospheric Radiation" and then try to make the same claim.

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 6, 2009 6:04 PM

Ray,

What does every data series that's ever been have in common with every other data series?

Posted by: luminous beauty | July 6, 2009 8:23 PM

Why are the deniers so in love with the term 'stochastic'??

I think it's because they don't really understand what it means.

Posted by: Michael | July 7, 2009 3:06 AM

Inaccuracy and uncertainty, to varying degrees; climate change being high in the range of both factors.

Posted by: Ray

Repeating it doesn't make it true, Ray.

And inaccurate doesn't mean wrong. Uncertain doesn't mean wrong. Do you have the figures on the inaccuracy of climate change? The values for uncertainty?

Since those give you how much you have to follow the results.

Do you HAVE those numbers, Ray?

Posted by: Mark | July 7, 2009 4:25 AM

Bernard (442), not to mention statistics

Posted by: Steve Chamberlain | July 7, 2009 7:30 AM

Helpful attitude Ray,

Wake us up when you've got something to contribute.

Posted by: MAB | July 7, 2009 7:50 AM

Ray:

Wake me up

As if that's possible.

Posted by: Chris ONeill | July 7, 2009 8:19 AM

Ray's 'education' tells him that:

Stochastic is derived from the Greek word 'stochastikos' meaning: skillful in aiming.

Apparently, he is blissfully unaware that the scientific/statistical usage, including the context to which he referred without any functional understanding, is defined thus:

stochastic 1. Involving or containing a random variable or variables. 2. Involving chance or probability.

Wake me up in 30 years time and tell me whether your 2009 predictions on climate change were accurate.

Whether they are, or not, will not reflect 'stochacticity' in prediction, but may reflect stochasticity with respect to random impacts upon the final trajectory.

Ray, you do a better job at showing the world what a nong you are, than anyone else here could. Nota bene: claims of Socratic irony are not going to fly...

Posted by: Bernard J. | July 7, 2009 9:57 AM

Ray: Wake me up

As if that's possible. Posted by: Chris ONeill | July 7, 2009 8:19 AM

Don't you worry, Chris. The collective sound of millions of AGW believers falling flat on their face in a few years time (I hope not a few decades), will be loud enough to wake the dead.

There'll be lots of opportunities for Ph.D. theses in the future, on the topic of how it was possible for so many to be so duped about AGW.

Even the quintessential Australian skeptic and atheist, Phillip Adams, is a believer in AGW. Dear me!

Posted by: Ray | July 8, 2009 9:11 PM

Ray's 'education' tells him that: Stochastic is derived from the Greek word 'stochastikos' meaning: skillful in aiming. Apparently, he is blissfully unaware that the scientific/statistical usage, including the context to which he referred without any functional understanding, is defined thus: stochastic 1. Involving or containing a random variable or variables. 2. Involving chance or probability. Wake me up in 30 years time and tell me whether your 2009 predictions on climate change were accurate. Whether they are, or not, will not reflect 'stochacticity' in prediction, but may reflect stochasticity with respect to random impacts upon the final trajectory. Ray, you do a better job at showing the world what a nong you are, than anyone else here could. Nota bene: claims of Socratic irony are not going to fly... Posted by: Bernard J. | July 7, 2009 9:57 AM

I'm very puzzled why so many of you in this blog show such a lack of understanding of fundamental scientific principles. You obviously know some science, but you seem to be attributing exaggerated degrees of certainty that are not justified by the observations, the modelling and the interpretation, with regard to climate change.

Are you all just teenagers with the hubris, arrogance and certainty flowing from your hormonal changes? Or perhaps this unsubstantiated certainty in the pronouncements of scientists is a consequence of all the marvelous items of modern technology which really do work and take up most of your activities.

I would point out that all these products of science and technology which you enjoy are a result of very stringent empirical testing at all levels. The final product is a result of many, many mistakes and adjustments and fine-tuning. This continual feed-back process with modern products takes place here and now, within a very short time-frame.

Climate change is in a different ball-park. It involves predictions well into the future which cannot be proved, only deduced. We don't have the luxury of finding out 'for real' if a projected sea level rise in 50 years time would in fact happen if we don't reduce anthropogenic GHG emissions.

Apparently, he is blissfully unaware that the scientific/statistical usage, including the context to which he referred without any functional understanding....Whether they are, or not, will not reflect 'stochacticity' in prediction, but may reflect stochasticity with respect to random impacts upon the final trajectory. Posted by: Bernard J. | July 7, 2009 9:57 AM

Here, Bernard, you are revealing your religious tendencies of accepting issues as being either black or white, right or wrong. This is not science.

Whilst stochastic variability may be more frequently associated with weather, the assumtion that it has nothing to do with climate will probably be one of the reasons why you all will fall flat on your collective face at some time in the future. Have a read of this published paper from A.A. Tsonis and associates.

http://www.uwm.edu/~aatsonis/2007GL030288.pdf

Here's a selective quote expressing the gist of it.

These shifts are associated with significant changes in global temperature trend and in ENSO variability. The latest such event is known as the great climate shift of the 1970s.

Such shifts are associated with significant changes in global temperature trend and in ENSO variability. We also find the evidence for such type of behavior in two climate simulations using a state-of-the-art model. This is the first time that this mechanism, which appears consistent with the theory of synchronized chaos, is discovered in a physical system of the size and complexity of the climate system.

The more involved I become in this blog, the more convinced I become that religion is playing a strong part in the case for AGW. Personal insults, although they are like water off a duck's back because I'm anonymous, tend to confirm this view.

Posted by: Ray | July 8, 2009 10:10 PM

You do prattle on a bit don't you Ray?

Ray

I'm mature enough to understand that such insults are usually projections onto others of one's own subconscious fears about oneself, which one doesn't want to confront.

Jemima

Are you mature enough though to understand, Ray, that you project onto others your own lack of comprehension of the hard science involved in the study of climate? No you're really not, are you.

Ray

No! I'm afraid not. My understanding is that only 'something' can be projected. To project a 'lack' of something is synonymous with projecting nothing. A projection of nothing is no projection at all. In other words, that which is 'lacking' in a projection, is that which is not projected. Perhaps you can enlighten me as to how it is possible to project a 'lack' of something, from a scientific point of view.

Wikipedia suffices I think, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection

Posted by: jemima | July 8, 2009 11:04 PM

Ray:

I'm very puzzled why so many of you in this blog show such a lack of understanding of fundamental scientific principles.

A lack of understanding of fundamental scientific principles that would lead someone to say bollocks such as:

I think it likely that the CO2 measurements, however accurately taken, are probably unrepresentative of general fluctuations in CO2 levels at the global level, just as most graphs of both temperature changes and CO2 levels are probably unrepresentative of the true global picture

and to not realize why Beck's graph is total garbage.

Ray puzzled by a lack of understanding of scientific principles? What a hypocrite.

Posted by: Chris O'Neill | July 9, 2009 12:11 AM

..and to not realize why Beck's graph is total garbage. Ray puzzled by a lack of understanding of scientific principles? What a hypocrite. Posted by: Chris O'Neill | July 9, 2009 12:11 AM

Nope. Genuinely puzzled. I've never come across any scientist with such an attitude as yours, separating data and statistics into categories of 'total garbage' and 'not garbage'.

You sound like some fanatic to me.

Posted by: Ray | July 9, 2009 7:12 AM

Ray,

How do you judge a real and present problem? With evidence? That is what we do.

Posted by: MAB | July 9, 2009 7:35 AM

Ray No! I'm afraid not. My understanding is that only 'something' can be projected. To project a 'lack' of something is synonymous with projecting nothing. A projection of nothing is no projection at all. In other words, that which is 'lacking' in a projection, is that which is not projected. Perhaps you can enlighten me as to how it is possible to project a 'lack' of something, from a scientific point of view.

Wikipedia suffices I think, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection Posted by: jemima | July 8, 2009 11:04 PM

Nope. The wikipedia entry you refer to does not explain how it is possible to project a 'lack' of something onto someone else, which is what you accused me of doing.

Posted by: Ray | July 9, 2009 7:50 AM

Nope. Genuinely puzzled. I've never come across any scientist with such an attitude as yours, separating data and statistics into categories of 'total garbage' and 'not garbage'.

Strange Ray, how would scientist cope without discerning which data a statistics are inappropriate or distorted of erroneous? How would we have progress if not by employing discernment.

Posted by: MAB | July 9, 2009 7:59 AM

I've never come across any scientist with such an attitude as yours, separating data and statistics into categories of 'total garbage' and 'not garbage'.

Posted by: Ray

Ah, I think I see where Ray's problem is.

He's a frigging idiot.

Posted by: Mark | July 9, 2009 8:07 AM

Mark,

I think he's earned that label.

Posted by: MAB | July 9, 2009 8:15 AM

Ray,

A lack of something is something.

This was discovered by some Indian guy about 2500 years ago and translated into mathematical notation about 900 years later.

When this discovery was smuggled into Europe in about 1202, it began the transformation of the superstitious nonsense that passed for knowledge into the science we know today.

What do we call this great discovery, Ray?

If you don't know the answer, then know this; a persistent lack of comprehension is equivalent to a boatload of stupid.

Posted by: luminous beauty | July 9, 2009 9:48 AM

The collective sound of millions of AGW believers falling flat on their face in a few years time (I hope not a few decades), will be loud enough to wake the dead.

Careful Ray. Your "even-handed, on the fence, oh-so-rational moderate skeptic" mask is slipping.

Posted by: Dave | July 9, 2009 3:07 PM

Reading the recent post on Monbiot's article led me to this. And I thought of our dear Ray. Especially with I read this:

How on Earth do we sum up such dim-witted obstinacy in a single phrase?

Climate change fact-ignorers? A little too cumbersome I think. Climate obfuscators? Better, but still not quite right. Climate change creationists. A suggestion from a friend that I believe sums them up perfectly. Although people have linked the two groups before, as far as I can see no one has used the phrase before.

Think about it. They operate in very similar ways. They have a fixed position and ignore evidence that does not fit their case. And they cherry-pick shreds of data that do appear to back them up.

They play up the "it's just a theory" debate just like the creationists and they paint themselves as valiant scientific mavericks who are supposedly ignored and vilified by the establishment.

Posted by: MAB | July 9, 2009 10:36 PM

Nope. Tackling real and present problems is better policy than spending valuable resources on imaginary, uncertain and probable problems. That's just plain common sense.

This is utter nonsense, because there is no such difference. For instance: you need to build a new levee to protect a recently developed coastal area. It needs to last at least 50 years. How high do you build it?

Posted by: Deen | July 10, 2009 4:55 AM

This is utter nonsense, because there is no such difference. For instance: you need to build a new levee to protect a recently developed coastal area. It needs to last at least 50 years. How high do you build it? Posted by: Deen | July 10, 2009 4:55 AM

Firstly, if you think there's a danger from rising sea levels, it's not sensible to develop low-lying coastal areas, just as it's not sensible to build in a flood plain.

What seems truly crazy to me is to insist on development in problem areas and then hope that disasters can be prevented by spending huge amounts of resources trying to change the climate of our planet.

Dykes and levees have always been needed throughout civilization, in areas subject to flooding. If you are going to insist on development in such flood-prone regions, then you need lots of cheap energy to build adequate levees. How high? Much higher than the highest flood on record.

Cheap energy can come in the form of cheap labour. China pays the same price for oil and coal as everyone else when they buy it on the world market. But their manufactured goods are very cheap because their labour costs are low. Low labour costs are equivalent to cheap energy.

On the 7pm news this evening, I witnessed Al Gore making pronouncements about lots of new jobs being created in the environment and renewable resources sector as a consequence of our tackling the AGW problem.

That's probably true. New industries create new jobs. They require people with new skills.

However, what is quietly brushed aside and never mentioned, is 'how many old jobs are lost?'.

Those who are good at maths and understand that the concept of zero probably had its origins in India, should also understand that, if 5 new jobs are required to produce the same amount of solar energy as can be produced by coal-powered stations employing one or maybe two people, then those 5 new workers should be paid 1/5th or 2/5ths the wage of the coal employees they replaced, in order for the energy cost to the public at large to remain the same.

A fundamental principle behind our prosperity is that you don't create wealth by doing things less efficiently, but by doing things more efficiently. Employing, say, 5 people to produce a million watt hours from solar energy or wind power, when you could employ just one or two people to produce a million watt hours from burning coal, is doing things less efficiently. The consequence of this is less prosperity.

If you AGW adherents are genuine and serious about reducing anthropogenic GHG emissions, then I'm afraid you will probably have to accept a substantial pay cut, in real terms.

Furthermore, since one cannot reasonably expect the desperately poor, or even the moderately poor, to accept any pay cut whatsoever, the pay cut of the wealthy and the reasonably well-off, will have to be substantial if we are to seriously tackle AGW.

Hands up all those earning between $50,000 and $100,000 per year who are willing to accept a 50% pay cut to save the planet! Hands up all those who are earning more than $500,000 who are willing to accept a 75% pay cut!

See what I mean?

Posted by: Ray | July 11, 2009 10:51 AM

Ray, you don t understand economic basics.

you are ignoring the external costs of fossil fuels.

3 high tech jobs might be better than 5 low tech ones.

the numbers you made up are simply stupid.

Posted by: sod | July 11, 2009 12:59 PM

Employing, say, 5 people to produce a million watt hours from solar energy or wind power, when you could employ just one or two people to produce a million watt hours from burning coal, is doing things less efficiently. The consequence of this is less prosperity.

Ray, if you ignore profoundly significant, but externalised, factors when indulging in your arithmetic, you are bound to come to such seductive, and completely unsupportable, conclusions.

You see, if the cost of "employ[ing] just one or two people to produce a million watt hours from burning coal" does not account for the downstream cost of responding to the damage caused by burning coal, it might appear 'more efficient'. However, if the real costs are factored into the debt incurred by those benefiting from burning coal, then "employing, say, 5 people to produce a million watt hours from solar energy or wind power" might be a 'no-brainer', to turn that rather distasteful phrase.

It seems that today's Western consumers are not only infatuated with credit card debt, but with environmental debt as well. But hey, it's easy to palm the repayments off to the future generations - they're not here to quibble about it, are they?

If you AGW adherents are genuine and serious about reducing anthropogenic GHG emissions, then I'm afraid you will probably have to accept a substantial pay cut, in real terms. ...snip... Hands up all those earning between $50,000 and $100,000 per year who are willing to accept a 50% pay cut to save the planet! Hands up all those who are earning more than $500,000 who are willing to accept a 75% pay cut!

For you information, 12 years ago I left my well-paying work in biomedical research in order to study, and then to work, in ecological science. I did this purely because I believe in the importance of the work that I do. In that time I have taken about an 80% loss of earnings, through being a student and through the pittance that ecologists are paid by comparison to my previous profession.

I have now 'lost' close to half a million dollars in potential earnings, and yet my quality of life is better than it has ever been. There is much that we think we need that we do not, there is much that we can use differently or more efficiently, there is much that we can do for, and produce for, ourselves: and I do all of this because I genuinely intend to do my best in acheiving my part in treading lightly on the planet.

Taking a small cut in income is not difficult for any but the lowest of earners, and I say this as someone who has gone from comfortable 'middle class', to technical 'poverty' on the pay-scale.

So don't try you moral blackmail on me. Instead, you might explain to us what you are doing to be less of a boil on the backside on the biosphere.

Posted by: Bernard J. | July 12, 2009 9:50 AM

On Beck. The paper is crap because

1. It is internally inconsistent, requiring impossible fluxes of CO2 into and out of the atmosphere as the Beck roller coaster goes up and down.

2. It relies on measurements from poorly sited locations that sampled polluted local conditions.

3. Many of the measurements were incompetently designed and carried out, including those by Nobel Prize winners.

These issues are explored in a way even Ray can understand here, and in more detail here

Posted by: Eli Rabett | July 12, 2009 11:25 AM

Computerised banking is vastly more efficient than old-fashioned banking based on clerks, personal transactions, and paper records only, for everything.

we just saw this during the collapse of the financial system.

i think the technical aspects of banking are just another good example of externalised costs.

When we do this, there are always winners and losers. But on the whole, the winners outnumber the losers. For example, if we sack 1,000 car workers in order to install a robotised work flow on the factory floor, thus saving costs and producing cars that are not only cheaper but perhaps more consistent quality-wise, then large numbers of people benefit from the lower price and beter quality.

you should do some serious reading on economic theories. if nobody has the money to buy those cheaper cars (because not having a job means not having money), then you are not going to sell them.

Carbon trading is designed to penalise and discourage current efficient means of producing energy (through taxation), and subsidise inefficient means of producing energy (solar power, wind power, wave power etc etc) in the hope that such 'clean power' methods will eventually become as efficient as, and hopefully even more efficient than, current methods.

again: the "efficiency" of the fossil fuel energy is a FAKE. we are paying the additional price when fighting environmental problems and wars in the middle east.

When the advocates of using atomic power claimed it was just as cheap as coal but much cleaner, the atomic power deniers, those who had an emotional objection and fear of atomic power generation, tended to emphasise that the unaccounted cost of disposal of atomic radioactive waste would, in the long run, make it more expensive than coal.

well Ray, why not give that speech about "emotional objections and fears" in Chernobyl? they are still looking for workers to build the new sarcophagus. i think people without fear and emotional objections are exactly what they are looking for. bring your kids along!

Posted by: sod | July 12, 2009 12:09 PM

"not used by a solar CELL," I meant. Must remember to preview...

Posted by: Barton Paul Levenson | July 12, 2009 3:42 PM

Intuition in science is what you get after a lot of learning and experience in an area. Sort of like plumbing or carpentry.

Posted by: Eli Rabett | July 12, 2009 11:47 PM

Intuition in science is what you get after a lot of learning and experience in an area. Sort of like plumbing or carpentry. Posted by: Eli Rabett | July 12, 2009 11:47 PM

Intuition occurs frequently irrespective of one's learning and experience in plumbing or carpentry, or any other area.

It's a great source for inspiration and ideas, but not scientifically reliable.

Posted by: Ray | July 13, 2009 9:07 AM

In a monopoly you can charge whatever you like. However, the free market benefits us all because it rewards and encourages efficiency. Subsidies encourage and reward laziness and the staus quo. Charles Darwin would have understood this principle perfectly.

Ray, I'm skeptical of these arguments. Unregulated markets lead to oligarchies (media and energy), duopoly (groceries), and barriers to new entrants. They lead to "too big to fail" (financial). They lead to coal getting more subsidies than renewables. They lead to strategic acquisition of patents for "disruptive technology" (advanced NiMH) . They lead to concentration of ownership, concentration of wealth, and purchasing of the political process.

In fact there is no such thing as a free market. Someone always has to chooses which bits are open to markets and which are open to policy, transparency, secrecy or manipulation.

So I'm afraid if you are hoping for so called free-markets to solve our problems you'll need to need to specify a heap of detail for what you mean. Without the detail its just a phrase that is practically meaningless.

You could start by explaining your understanding of the way free market efficiency resulted in the US banking system being bailed out to the tune of 12 trillion dollars. Pretty efficient eh?

Then we can discuss enternalities.

Posted by: MAB | July 13, 2009 9:41 AM

Shorter Ray:

"You guys and all the scientists are wrong. I know this because I'm a rationalist, and I have intuitions of dead rats."

Ray, 'rationalist' and 'rat' share the first three letters, but they aren't related concepts.

Oh, and Ray, if free markets are such wondrous things and need to be left unfettered - why did you argue above about the utility of subsidies for the coal industry?

Posted by: Lee | July 13, 2009 1:27 PM

Ray writes:

The free market arrangement I'm advocating is simply one that encourages efficient production of goods and services and particularly the efficient production of energy because that underpins everything else.

What is the detail of this "free market arangement" that you are advocating? Who gets to decide on the structure of the markets? Who gets to tinker with the rules? Are our elected leaders permitted to put a price on carbon?

Posted by: MAB | July 13, 2009 11:11 PM

A bit of courage, that's doable.

Work around the Humphrys, that's doable.

Perhaps it would be "courageous" to delay action? Given the strong evidence and risks that are unsterstood by the public. Including the views of people around the globe..

Posted by: MAB | July 14, 2009 3:21 AM

Ray, that depends on what we count.

Posted by: mab | July 14, 2009 5:55 AM

Ray, that depends on what we count. Posted by: mab | July 14, 2009 5:55 AM

I'm counting energy units. For example, my impression is that those who opt to install solar voltaic panels on their roof end up paying more for their electricity consumption, even taking government subsidies into consideration. If they are not paying more, it's probably because they are making great sacrifices in their electricity consumption, by running a gas fridge, by not having an air-conditioner, by not having a stove and being careful they don't use too many devices at the same time such as boiling water for coffee whilst watching plasma TV.

I'm taking into consideration here the total construction costs of a solar voltaic system, including the cost of batteries and replacing batteries every few years. Such devices have an embedded energy cost before one has even started using them. It's like paying thousands of dollars in advance for one's power requirements, perhaps even 50 years worth of power consumption in advance.

When you also take into consideration the lost interest on such money which otherwise could be sitting in an investment account, the inevitable cost of maintenance and repairs during the lifetime of the solar panels, inverters and batteries, and the government subsidies which are paid for by everyone else, one ends up having used very expensive electricity and probably having suffered considerable inconvenience in the process.

Posted by: Ray | July 14, 2009 8:38 AM

PMM:

god-awful

nasty bunch of eco-nazis

moronic, sanctimonious, morally self-righteous nazi losers

bastards

Thanks for your coherent, well-argued rebuttal!

Posted by: Dave | July 14, 2009 10:41 AM

I guess Ray is against patents, copyrights and trademarks too, then.

They are, after all, infringements on the Free Market.

The international currency should not exist either, according to Ray, since that is an infringement of the Free Market. Sell your goods in Euros! (though that did get Iraq invaded and put Venezuela (!!!) on the "axis of evil" after it...).

I guess he's fighting away to get the no-bid contracts to Haliburton removed and put for tender, like the Right Upstanding Free Market person he is.

Isn't he?

Posted by: Mark | July 14, 2009 1:36 PM

Ray, - sometimes it is worth learning about a thing before you make statements about the thing.

Posted by: Lee

Just don't expect Ray to learn that.

Posted by: Mark | July 14, 2009 4:06 PM

PMM doesn't know why he's "even writing in this god-awful blogsite". We know though PMMM - you just dropped by to share the love! Keep it up and you'll gain some insight for yourself.

Ray: could you redo your sums on energy costs where electricity and fuel bills increase due to actions taken to mitigate global warming, but making the novel assumption that those increased energy expenses would be offset by an equivalent reduction in income taxes? Are you better or worse off economically?

If this much complexity in the modelling becomes too tricky what would be wrong with deferring to professional economists on the subject? The world is full of economists, smart ones, who don't share your pessimistic opinion.

Posted by: jemima | July 14, 2009 10:27 PM

Ray: could you redo your sums on energy costs where electricity and fuel bills increase due to actions taken to mitigate global warming, but making the novel assumption that those increased energy expenses would be offset by an equivalent reduction in income taxes? Are you better or worse off economically? If this much complexity in the modelling becomes too tricky what would be wrong with deferring to professional economists on the subject? The world is full of economists, smart ones, who don't share your pessimistic opinion. Posted by: jemima | July 14, 2009 10:27 PM

The world is full of people with all sorts of opinions and ideologies. I don't subscribe to anything that doesn't make sense at a fundamental level. If an economist wishes to express his views on this blog, then let him do so. I can't change my opinion because of hearsay that certain economists, whom I don't know, may may not share my pessimism.

Pessimists tend to be realists. I don't see how more accurate and realistic I can be than calculating how much electricity I consume when taking a shower.

The basic equation here is, material prosperity is determined by (1) the efficiency with which we produce energy, (2) the efficiency with which we use that energy, and (3) the ways in which we use that energy.

There is huge scope for reducing our carbon footprint by changing the ways in which we use energy. But changing the ways in which we use energy involves changing human behaviour, a very steep uphill battle.

I would be inclined to think that the Communist party of China would be more suited to such a task. They'll stand for no nonsense. If overpopulation is a problem, then make it illegal to have more than one child.

Is this the sort of world you want?

Posted by: Ray | July 14, 2009 11:36 PM

The accountants will be pissed that I didn't calculate the PV and FV with discount rates. But I'm too tired and fuel scarcity leading to price rises will counter much of(if not exceed)this bias.

Posted by: MAB | July 15, 2009 12:15 AM

. My impression is, you never, ever start saving money from day one without drastically changing your electricity consumption habits, especially if you borrow money to install the thing. It's all a big con. You pay through the nose for the privilege of deluding yourself that you are acting responsibly with regard to the environment.

your impression is NOT based on facts. actually your "impression" is simply wrong.

but don t learn about the facts. you have your "impression". you also have the "impression" that an electric instantaneous hot water heater is a economically sound idea. sigh.

Posted by: sod | July 15, 2009 1:25 AM

My annual electricity bill for all heating of water is much less than the interest I would receive from a sum of money, equivalent to the additional installation cost of a solar heater, invested in a savings account.

Posted by: Ray

Then the cost of replacing that very small amount of power use is likewise miniscule.

Or you are getting gypped by your banker on interest charges.

Or, and this is going to surprise people who read your raving lunacy, you're lying.

Posted by: Mark | July 15, 2009 6:08 AM

Then the cost of replacing that very small amount of power use is likewise miniscule. Posted by: Ray | July 15, 2009 6:11 AM

I see you have not understood at all what I'm talking about.

You can check out the cost of installing a solar water heater. It's substantial. An instantaneous water heater is relatively cheap.

Once you've installed a solar heater, it costs you about $200 per year in lost interest alone, even if you don't use it at all. When you do use it, there's a tendency to waste water because there's no additional cost, except on a dull day when the booster kicks in.

Posted by: Ray | July 15, 2009 6:28 AM

Ray, way back in the mists of time:

When people try to bamboozle you about a general issue with mathematics that you don't understand, be skeptical.

Ray now:

Anything wrong with my maths?

Sorry Ray, as you know, I get to disregard any arguments you make that involve mathematics, as you have previously done.

Also, I take issue with your statement that:

But changing the ways in which we use energy involves changing human behaviour, a very steep uphill battle.

While at the same time quoting ideal energy figures based on a shower duration roughly one tenth of the average duration - ie. based on a truly massive behavioural shift.

So basically, if you apply your maths to average US adult behaviour, you end up with more like $30 a year on showers, for one person.

Which is why your "impression" is a very odd thing to use as a basis for a decision on the cost-effectiveness of solar.

Posted by: dave | July 15, 2009 8:48 AM

So basically, if you apply your maths to average US adult behaviour, you end up with more like $30 a year on showers, for one person.

the truth.

but on the other hand, we could follow the ray approach to showers: why invest in solar water heating, when you can also just reduce the number of showers you take?

if you take just 3 showers of 9 sec length during the year, it will never pay out....

Posted by: sod | July 15, 2009 9:02 AM

You can check out the cost of installing a solar water heater. It's substantial. An instantaneous water heater is relatively cheap.

Posted by: Ray

Actually, you can do one for your very miniscule demands yourself (planning permission will not be needed unless your local housing association have a stick up their butts) for a cost of around £100 and two or three hours of your time.

With interest rates at some of the lowest in decades, you will come out about even even at your tiny rate.

However, I DO have one question: do you ever wash the dishes?

Posted by: Mark | July 15, 2009 11:37 AM

And it's looking like 8 minutes is the average:

http://www.greenerpeople.com/forum/everyday-tips-greener-people/111-turn-off-water-while-you-brush-your-teeth.html http://crunchydomesticgoddess.com/2008/05/27/im-having-a-quickie-the-five-minute-shower-challenge/

And do you use a power shower, Ray? 'cos that 1 minute shower could beat or equal the water I use in five minutes:

http://greenliving.lovetoknow.com/WaterConservationCalculator

Posted by: Mark | July 15, 2009 11:48 AM

In addition to learning to research and think, Ray apparently needs to learn to read.

@510, I described a photovoltaic grid-tie system, and explained why such a system does not need batteries, because it uses the grid for 'storage.'

Ray responds with some utterly irrelevant tripe about cost of batteries, and then describes some calculation about a $3,000 solar water system - which Ray --IS NOT A GRID-TIE PHOTOVOLTAIC SYSTEM!!!.

He then goes on to say that PV systems can't support normal household loads - GRID TIE, Ray. It means something.

He tries to imply that cost of maintainance is significant. For a grid tie system, typical maintainance consists of keeping the panels clean - washing them down once a month or so, and no big problem if you don't do it. There are no batteries to maintain.

Ray does not know what the fuck he is talking about.

Posted by: Lee | July 15, 2009 4:14 PM

I described a photovoltaic grid-tie system, and explained why such a system does not need batteries, because it uses the grid for 'storage.' Ray responds with some utterly irrelevant tripe about cost of batteries, and then describes some calculation about a $3,000 solar water system - which Ray --IS NOT A GRID-TIE PHOTOVOLTAIC SYSTEM!!!. Posted by: Lee | July 15, 2009 4:14 PM

It's very sad to witness such a lack of understanding about such basic issues from you guys.

The facts are, producing electricity from solar voltaic panels on your roof is a very, very expensive way to generate electricity at the present time. What you do with that electricity doesn't change it's cost. Whether you operate your fridge with it, watch TV with it, or feed the electricity back into the grid, the cost of producing the electricity is not changed.

You might be quite happy to accept a government hand-out, or subsidy, in order to make the cost appear more attractive, but as I mentioned before, there's no free lunch. The full cost of that electricity is borne by the community.

Subsidies for PV panels may be justified in remote areas where there is no grid and no alternative electricity supply. In such situations, batteries are necessary for storage, which of course adds to the real cost of the electricity.

Feeding susrplus electricity back into the grid, if there is one, is clearly cheaper than battery storage, but the real cost of the initial production, per kilowatt hour, remains the same whatever you do with it, and that cost is very much greater than the cost of electricity from coal power stations or atomic power stations.

Batteries are not tripe. Lack of a cheap, powerful, durable and lightweight battery is one the major stumbling blocks in the development of alternative energy, particularly for the electric car.

Anyone who thinks solar voltaic panels are a good idea would presumably also have a solar water heater. In a large household in locations where there's no scarcity of water, solar water heaters might in the long run result in a real monetary saving, but probably only in relation to a life style which is unsustainable if AGW is a real threat.

The attitude that we can continue living as we are whilst using massively subsidised clean energy, is just laughable.

As the real cost of energy rises, it's necessary to change your lifestyle accordingly. That means running a smaller car with a more fuel-efficient engine (or taking a bus), taking a one minute shower instead of a 10 minute shower, switching off unnecessary lights and appliances in the hope that, as electricity costs rise, your electricity bill will remain the same.

If those of you who believe in the AGW scare are not already putting into practice such measures, then I'm sad to say you are either hypocrites are just plain dumb.

I'm out of here. I've had my say. Those of you who have a spark of intelligence will understand what I've been trying to get across.

Posted by: Ray | July 15, 2009 10:18 PM

Shorter Ray: People should use less hotwater, but incentives to use less hotwater will reduce our material wealth.

Posted by: Mark Byrne | July 15, 2009 11:22 PM

Lee,

Out of interest, how are you heating your water. I'd have expected that California would be suitable to solar HW?

Posted by: MAB | July 16, 2009 3:00 AM

Ray, The attitude that we can continue living as we are whilst using massively subsidised dirty energy, is just laughable. (That is even before we count the costs of climate change. When you count climate change the costs of that attide are beyond laughing matters.) I find your assertions about the understandig and efforts of others to be insincere or ill informed. Posted by: MAB | July 15, 2009 11:11 PM

You can't count the costs of climate change because they are not known. They are estimated by scientist and economists in a manner which is extremely controversial and very approximate, and possibly wildly inaccurate.

What you can be certain about is your own consumption of energy.

There's no doubt whatsoever that my latest quarterly electricity bill was $123.46, and there's no doubt whatsoever that, if I stick to my one-minute shower routine per day, taking hot water showers will cost me approximately $3 per year. That's a very low carbon footprint for shower-taking.

If I were an AGW fanatic like the rest of you, I would insist upon only taking a shower after 9pm or before 7am, because that's the period of my off-peak rate.

My off-peak rate is 6.6 cents per kwh. My previous calculation used an average rate of 18 cents per kwh, which resulted in an annual charge of $3. If I apply the off-peak rate, the annual cost of one shower per day, for one person, in my house, is just $1.10.

That's right! The annual cost of keeping 'yours truly' clean and sweet every day, would be just one dollar and 10 cents, if I were an AGW fanatic.

But I don't care because I don't believe the case for AGW is proved. I'm prepared to splash a whole $3 per annum on shower-taking.

Posted by: Ray | July 16, 2009 7:34 AM

Please explain yourself.

Posted by: Ray

Please excuse yourself.

I'm not aware of any coal-fired power stations being subsidised, or oil and gas-fired power stations, or petrol-driven vehicles being subsidised.

Nelson: I see no ships!

Posted by: Mark | July 16, 2009 8:04 AM

Ray, do your homework.

You are just spouting rubbish based on your ill informed impressions try doing some research. Fossil fuels receive in excess of 9 billion a year in subsides in Australia. (Our tax dollars).

Yes we can make engines more efficient, yes we can make cars more efficient, yes fluros last longer and yes fluros save money.

No off peak is is distortion to subsides the inadequacies of coal fired power.

No you have no idea of the carbon foot print of other posters here, now I that I have some idea of yours I'm confident that my whole family's footprint is lower than yours(100% Greenpower).

Posted by: MAB | July 16, 2009 8:24 AM

You are just spouting rubbish based on your ill informed impressions try doing some research. Fossil fuels receive in excess of 9 billion a year in subsides in Australia. (Our tax dollars). Posted by: MAB | July 16, 2009 8:24 AM

I never spout rubbish. However, I understand that I may appear to spout rubbish to people who are incapable of appreciating a sensible and reasonable argument. I can't help that. I am not responsible for other people's inability to see sense.

No you have no idea of the carbon foot print of other posters here, now I that I have some idea of yours I'm confident that my whole family's footprint is lower than yours(100% Greenpower). Posted by: MAB | July 16, 2009 8:24 AM

I certainly have an idea, but unless you give me precise details, facts and figures, as I have given you, then it's true that I can't have an accurate idea of your carbon footprint. You might be confident, but you can't expect me to just take your word for it without backing up your claims with facts and statistics. After all, I'm a skeptic. That means being not only skeptical of AGW claims but your claims that you have 100% Greenpower.

All my views are based on facts as I see them. If my facts are wrong, then point them out and explain how and why they are wrong. There's no point in just saying they are wrong. I need a demonstration of how they are wrong. Why would any adult with even a spark of intelligence expect other people to accept that something is right or wrong just because (I, he, she) says so?

Here's why I'm skeptical of your claims you have 100% greenpower.

We live in a society where nothing moves, or happens, or is produced without expenditure of energy. All of the hi tech products we buy, whether solar water heaters, PVPs, or motor cars, need energy to manufacture, deliver and install. The amount of energy consumed in the production of any product or service is approximately proportional to its unsubsidised price which usually includes a profit margin and taxes to the government.

Assuming that anthropogenic C02 emmisions are a threat, just to humour you, then in order to determine how green you are, you need to be aware of how much 'dirty' fossil fuel was used in the manufacture of your so-called 'green' devices. The CO2 molecules in the atmosphere don't care about government subsidies.

Let's assume that you are using both a solar water heater and a grid-connected PVP for your energy supply. In order for you to be 100% green, all the metals and minerals used in the construction of these devices would have to be mined and processed using only greenpower. I think we can agree straight away that this is not the case. About 90% of all energy produced in Australia is from fossil fuels. Maybe even 95%, but let's not quibble.

Furthermore, the tradesman who installed your so-called 'green' systems, would have to drive to work in an electric car manufactured entirely from green energy sources. (Well, that's a bit unrealistic, isn't it!)

I could go on, and on, and on, itemising the 'greenness' of the tradesman's electric drill, and the terribly subsidised 'dirty fuel' nature of the aluminium in the tradesman ladder which was used to climb onto your roof to install your solar heater, not to mention the aluminium in your solar water heater, etc etc. etc. Suffice it to say that, in a society where 90% of the energy supplies come from fossil fuels, one can consider any item one buys as having an 'embedded' carbon footprint in proportion to its unsubsidised price.

If a government subsidy is involved, as is the case regarding the electricity subsidiy to the aluminium refining and smelting industries, then the carbon footprint of the aluminium in your PVP and solar water heater is not accurately reflected in the price. The price should be even higher. The true unsubsidised price of your solar heater should be a few hundred dollars more. No?

Let's assume that AGW is a real threat and we're fighting against time, then let's have a look at what really happens to the environment when we take all these factors I've enumerated into consideration.

I'll use my own situation because I have the facts and figures at hand.

My current electricity bill is about $500 per year, using conventional electricity from fossil fuel. Let's say I'm convinced about the real threat of AGW and decide to switch to a subsidised PVP connected to the grid.

Because I'm concerned about the environment and not just my own pocket, I'll do the calculations based on the unsubsidised cost of the PVP. That's because I'm a sincere, honest and thoughtful person.

I find that a 1kw PVP costs about $12,000. I try to find out if it was made with clean energy but can find no information on this. I assume that, if it was made with clean energy, the manufacturer would not be keeping it a secret, and that therefore it is reasonable to presume it was made with 'dirty' energy.

I'm currently using $500 per year of dirty energy. Does it make sense to install $12,000 of dirty energy in one go, in order to help the environment? The $12,000 equivalent of C02, from day one, is circulating in the atmosphere from day one and will continue to circulate in the atmosphere for many years, causing terrible devastation (according to the IPCC).

At the rate of $500 per year, it will take me 24 years to reach that level of C02 that installing a PVP would cause in one go at the time of manufacture.

Which is better, a gradual build-up to $12,000 equivalent of C02 over a 24 year period, or a sudden injection of $12,000 of C02 at the beginning of that 24 year period?

Perhaps you climate experts can answer that; help enlighten me.

Posted by: Ray | July 17, 2009 1:08 AM

If I were an AGW fanatic like the rest of you, I would insist upon only taking a shower after 9pm or before 7am, because that's the period of my off-peak rate. My off-peak rate is 6.6 cents per kwh. My previous calculation used an average rate of 18 cents per kwh, which resulted in an annual charge of $3. If I apply the off-peak rate, the annual cost of one shower per day, for one person, in my house, is just $1.10. That's right! The annual cost of keeping 'yours truly' clean and sweet every day, would be just one dollar and 10 cents, if I were an AGW fanatic.

No, if you were an 'AGW fanatic' you would use as little fossil fuel-derived electricity as possible, because dirty kWh would be your over-riding concern, not cost.

If you were thrifty you would shower in the off-peak time. Although even this wouldn't matter, because if you have off-peak hot water, by definition it isn't heated during the day, even if you use hot water then.

Anyone with more sisters than thumbs could tell you this.

[Insert pejorative root-vegetable substitute term here]

Posted by: Bernard J. | July 17, 2009 2:18 AM

Ray, unlike you I have researched and calculated the energy payback period of solar hot water (few months), wind power (few months), and PV (less than 3 years). That is accounting for full lifecycle energy inputs. Unlike you, ill informed impression are not enough for me. Posted by: MAB | July 17, 2009 2:05 AM

Then why are you keeping your calculations a secret? Why don't you share your calculations and demonstrate how it is possible to manufacture and install a solar water heater and a windmill for the cost of a few months of home energy usage and a PVP for less than 3 years usage. I'm sure lots of people would be interested.

If I think people have ill-informed impressions, I do my best to provide them with the facts and figures. Why are you not doing the same?

Are you afraid to discover your calculations might be bodgy?

Posted by: Ray | July 17, 2009 6:39 AM

I'm not sure if Ray understands that not every dollar spent produces the same CO2. This is possibly why 'the Rays' of this world cannot see that we can restructure economies to favor growth in low CO2 production. Posted by: Mark Byrne | July 17, 2009 2:39 AM

Ray understands very well that every dollar spent does not have exactly the same C02 value associated with it.

However, in economies like Australia and China that are 90% run on fossil fuels, the dollar value of an item is the best approximation we have of the carbon footprint associated with the item.

If an item is manufactured in a factory that is run entirely on renewable energy, then such a fact should be advertised and we might then deduce that the real C02 value associated with the item would be somewhat less than the dollar price would indicate.

Likewise, if we buy something made mostly from aluminium, we can deduce that the actual carbon footprint is slightly higher than the dollar price would suggest because aluminium is refined and smelted using fairly significant electricity subsidies. In other words, the true carbon footprint of the item is disguised by the subsidies.

The same is true of solar voltaic panels. You might be very pleased to pay only $4,000 and accept the $8,000 subsidy. However, the environment doesn't make a distinction between the price you paid and the size of the subsidy. If the PVP and constituent parts were not largely manufactured, at all stages, using clean renewable energy, then the carbon footprint of the PVP is approximately a whopping $12,000 equivalent of C02.

Posted by: Ray | July 17, 2009 7:25 AM

Wind, payback in months

Solar hotwater, payback in months

PV, payback < 3 years

So Ray, why do you rebuke the average person for not taking quick showers but denounce economic incentives that reward quick showers?

Posted by: MAB | July 17, 2009 8:23 AM

So Ray, why do you rebuke the average person for not taking quick showers but denounce economic incentives that reward quick showers?

Posted by: MAB

Because he's a two-faced troll.

Posted by: Mark | July 17, 2009 9:13 AM

Shorter Ray:

It's extremely difficult to set good prices for carbon emissions. Therefore, according to Reason™, Rationality™, and Common Sense™, we Know™ that global warming mitigation is more expensive than global warming adaptation.

Posted by: bi -- IJI | July 17, 2009 11:43 PM

Ray, you don t understand the basics.

your claims about subsidies (for renewables) are simply false.

their purpose is NOT just to make the energy they supply cheaper. it is helping to establish a market for them, moving the into mass production. and making them competitive with established technologies. the subsidies on renewable energy are a good idea. by market mechanism, they support cheap appliances, that produce lots of energy.

even the rather problematic biofuels make sense.: some people assume that we could jump from generation zero biofuels to generation 5 (rubbish turned into high end petrol) without taking the intermediate steps. (and one can also learn a lesson about interest groups..)

you are also wrong about the CO2 imprint.

it is cheap energy, that gives a high CO2 value to basic goods. cheap energy allows stuff to be transported around, making even a breakfast cost a lot of fossil fuel.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/03/26/ING3PHRU681.DTL

your way of calculating this, is mixing up cause and effect! (the expensive local product didn t use the fossil fuel of the transport of the cheap product, which is cheap because oil is cheap)

The Chinese worker rides to work on a bicycle

and then the product he produced is moved by bicycle as well?

you are also wrong on nuclear power.

we are tackling CO2, because we want to avoid consequences of global warming. nuclear power threatens similar devastating consequences by accident. it is pretty stupid, to fight one risk with a similar other one.

Posted by: sod | July 18, 2009 5:09 AM

Keep digging Ray,

If I thought that anyone might take you seriously I'd pointout how many times you contractict your self in this thread.

But I think its a fair bet that anyone sensible reading this blog will work it out for themselves.

For the guys (and girls?) still posting here give your selves a break this Ray is a incoherent time waster. A zealot for ill informed assertions, and fallacious argument.

Posted by: Observa | July 18, 2009 7:47 AM

Shorter Ray:

Product prices are a good gauge of carbon emissions, because when they're not a good gauge, it only serves to show that putting a price on carbon is difficult, and that we should switch to nuclear power.

Therefore, we know that global warming mitigation is more expensive than global warming adaptation.

Posted by: bi -- IJI | July 18, 2009 9:41 AM

For the guys (and girls?) still posting here give your selves a break this Ray is a incoherent time waster. A zealot for ill informed assertions, and fallacious argument.

Posted by: Observa

But the Big Lie requires that the Lie be Left Uncountered.

And, to be honest, Ray's insanity so blatantly obvious in his posting history ensures that he can get a new one ripped for each insane mumbling produced and nobody will feel any genuine sympathy.

He's a bit like that Muslim preacher in the UK who was extradited. Glass Eye, Hook. Pockmarked. Really Ranted about how Evil Western Society was.

He was so bad not one serious Muslim stood up for him. Except the muslim equivalent of the National Front, and the ordinary folk know they're completely hatstand just as the white version is.

Abu Hamsa. That was his name.

Ray is a denialist Abu Hamsa.

Posted by: Mark | July 18, 2009 3:49 PM

Ray:

If what I'm saying is not correct... then do me a favour and point out any flaw or incorrect assumptions I've made.

Ray,

You've gone past the point of warranting any further favours, time for you to got back to school and correct your dependence on ill informed impressions.

Too much time wasting on someone whose goal it seems, is to waste the time of people who study the evidence.

Posted by: Janet Akerman | July 18, 2009 10:37 PM

Here is an analysis of the energy-payback break even point for PV systems, from the Engineering Dept of the Australia National University at Canberra.

"Summary

The use of photovoltaic systems on a large scale in order to reduce fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions requires that the energy associated with the construction, operation and decommissioning of PV systems be small compared with energy production during the system lifetime. That is, the energy payback time should be short. The energy intensity and cost of PV systems are closely related. At present the energy payback time for PV systems is in the range 8 to 11 years, compared with typical system lifetimes of around 30 years. About 60% of the embodied energy is due to the silicon wafers. As the PV industry reduces production costs and moves to the use of thin film solar cells the energy payback time will decline to about two years. "

http://www.ecotopia.com/Apollo2/pvepbtoz.htm

8 - 11 years, Ray, and expected to decline to 2 years as thin film systems replace silicon wafer systems. Once more - you don't know the fuck you're talking about, Ray.

Posted by: Lee | July 18, 2009 10:46 PM

Is the penny beginning to drop?

Posted by: Ray

For you, there is no penny.

You have reached the end of penny.

Posted by: Mark | July 19, 2009 4:09 AM

sod and Lee,

Had either of you seen the learn curves for PV? Showing how price decreased with cumulative production. Basically we get better with practice. Given that coal is increasing in price a cross over in price between PV and coal ($/Watt) is expected before 2020.

Even the IEA are starting to pay attention.

Posted by: MAB | July 19, 2009 7:54 AM

Ray.

I am curious where you live, and still very curious about what off-peak electricity is defined as in that area.

See, in the places where I have lived, off-peak hot water is only heated off-peak. No matter the time of day I used it, I paid off-peak rates.

I really am interested to know, so that I can determine if you are arguing from a logical base that happens to be affected by regional peculiarities in definitions, or whether you are just shooting from the hip when you shoot from the mouth.

Posted by: Bernard J. | July 19, 2009 9:45 AM

Ray: You continue to be incoherent. Money represent agreed value. Posted by: Lee | July 19, 2009 11:18 AM

True! And the value of everything, agreed upon or not, represents the total average energy associated with the product, since in our society nothing happens, nothing moves and nothing is produced without expenditure of energy.

For currencies like the US and Australian dollar, the agreed value fluctuates. For items that you buy with those currencies, the price differs from store to store and may also differ in stores that allow bargaining.

So you are quite right that, at the level of this individual transaction, the money you pay for an item may be a very poor approximation of the 'fossil fuel' emissions associated with its production, because the price for the same item varies considerably. If you buy something second hand, for a trivial sum, then of course that trivial sum does not represent the entire energy content of the manufacture, marketing and delivery of the product. That's already been paid for by the original purchaser. What you are doing is re-imbursing the original purchaser a portion of that original energy cost, for the privilege of owning the product second-hand.

It's also true that C02 is not the only GHG emission from fossil fuel, so I am using C02 as an abbreviation for all undesirable emissions from fossil fuels.

If we refer to the paper from the ANU Engineering Department you linked to, that calculates an energy payback of 6.9 years without taking all costs into consideration, they have this to say in relation to the fossil fuel input:

"By far the largest fossil fuel inputs for a photovoltaic system are associated with production and installation. Fossil fuel derived energy required for the operation and decommissioning of a PV system is trivial. Hydroelectricity and wind energy share this characteristic. Many studies have looked at energy inputs to PV systems. It is difficult to arrive at definitive numbers because production technology is constantly improving and because the fossil fuel intensity of various operations depends on production scale and production location."

In other words, it's difficult to put a precise number on the fossil fuel input for manufacture because there's so much variation in the efficiency of production techniques, and the efficiency of energy production from fossil fuel, and also by implication, it's difficult because of the mix of various types of energy sources that may have been used, either directly or indirectly, in a product's manufacture.

They also add in a rather cumbersome way that may confuse some readers who are not alert, that once the PV system has been built, the fossil fuel input for its operation and decommissioning at the end of its life is trivial, just as it is for other alternative energy sources such as Hydroelectrivity and wind energy. No argument there, but it's clear to see that this ANU paper is a piece of propaganda that attempts to disguise the full cost of the PV technology.

I suspect the reason why you find my arguments incoherent, is because I'm approaching the problem from the perspective of total GHGs in the atmosphere, whereas you seem to be approaching the problem from the perspective of your hip pocket. I'm saying that the average price paid for a product in a country that exclusively uses fossil fuels for all its energy requirements would be a good approximation of the GHG gasses associated with its production.

You may buy something at a bargain price. Someone else is ripped off. It all everages out.

Let's take an extreme example as an anaolgy, just to drive my point home, if that's possible.

I buy a good quality cup of coffee in a small cafe in the middle of the Mall and pay just $5. I get the ANU Enigineering Department to analyze the total energy input, from all fossil fuels associated with that cup of coffee.

(They'll probably get it wrong because they'll ignore a very small portion of the waitress' wage, on the basis that's it's an insignificant cost, and they'll probably ingnore a thousand other associated costs, each of which is small and insignificant, but which in total actually becomes significant. But let's not get side-tracked.)

After hours (days, even years) of analysis, the ANU Engineering Department comes up with a figure of 90 cents total energy input, leaving me wondering what happened to the other $4.10 I paid. Did it just evaporate? Was it given to charity perhaps, resulting in a response from the ANU, we don't do charity so we ignored that? Did someone burn the $4 and throw the 10 cents into a pond to see the splash? It's certainly a mystery, don't you think?

But, let's move on. The next cup of coffee I buy is in Tokyo, in one of these really expensive coffee houses where you have to book in advance. The price of a cup of coffee is a bit higher, as you would expect. Not $5 but $400. I enquire as to the brand of coffe and am surprised that it is the same brand as the last cup of coffee I bought in the Mall in Australia. Wow! I'm paying $400 for an item which the ANU Engineering Department has estimated costs just 90 cents to produce. What's happened to the other $399.10?

I then notice the coffe pot. Pure silver. The waitress is dressed like a geisha, in flowing, ornate robes. The interior of the coffee house is splendid. Magnificent murals and tapestries adorn the walls, and the hi fi system is something to die for. State-of-the art valve/transistor hybrid producing mellifluous tones one has never heard before. The waitress informs me that the coffee room itself has been acoustically designed to produce the most pleasing sound.

I do a bit of digging and find that the owner of the restaurant owns a Rolls Royce and employs a chauffeur, (of course). He lives in a mult-million dollar mansion in the most expensive part of Tokyo.

Now all is clear. I pay 90 cents for the cup of coffee, and $399.10 for everything else. I contribute to the cost of the owners' Rolls Royce, house, lavish lifestyle. Does anyone think that these additional things and activities do not involve an energy input? Am I at least being a little less incoherent?

Do you think the C02 molecules in the atmosphere care one stuff about how they were produced? Do I have to personify them to get my point across? "Whoopee! I'm a C02 molecule produced in the production of a lovely clean and green PVP. I'm going to let infrared radiation escape from the plant because that's the right thing to do."

"Aw shucks! I do envy you. I'm a miserable C02 molecule. I was produced by that idiot Ray during one of his one-minute showers using disgustingly dirty coal. I guess I'll just have to block all heat radiation that attempts to pass through me."

I sometimes wonder if you guys are smart enough to even determine if the penny has dropped.

Posted by: Ray | July 19, 2009 10:42 PM

@Ray: "Am I at least being a little less incoherent?" No.

@Ray: "Do you think the C02 molecules in the atmosphere care one stuff about how they were produced?" No.

Do YOU think they care one stuff about how much they cost, Ray? Your answer to that seems to be 'yes' - which is why what you are writing is gibberish.

Posted by: Lee | July 20, 2009 12:17 AM

sod and Lee, Had either of you seen the learn curves for PV? Showing how price decreased with cumulative production. Basically we get better with practice. Given that coal is increasing in price a cross over in price between PV and coal ($/Watt) is expected before 2020.

thanks for the link. i was aware of the trend, but the paper is a very nice sum up.

Ray is advocating (like many others) a "support research but don t pay subsidies for renewables" approach. but that is just a another way of advocating "doing nothing".

the experiences we collect from solar panel production are of extreme value. it was completely unclear, whether people would build such stuff on their roofs. we collect experiences about long term deployment of panels, and the real effectivity on different houses with different facings and angles.

Now all is clear. I pay 90 cents for the cup of coffee, and $399.10 for everything else. I contribute to the cost of the owners' Rolls Royce, house, lavish lifestyle. Does anyone think that these additional things and activities do not involve an energy input? Am I at least being a little less incoherent?

let me apply the Ray way of reasoning in two different ways.

1. i ll take a look at the oil price.

http://www.themarketguardian.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/oil-price-chart-1-12-09.png

now if we follow Ray, every $ paid ends up in energy. and as we know, a lot of that energy is based on oil. can you figure out, what that oil price spike would have made with ALL prices, if Ray was even only somewhat right?!?

1. i ll apply the Ray approach to coffee.

my thesis is: all the money spent ends up in coffee. obviously, if i buy a coffee, it is obvious that the money is spent on coffee. but if i buy a newspaper? obviously the journalist drank coffee while writing his story. as did the staff, while printing it.and the guy selling the papers, is having coffee all the time.

sooner or later, all money spent will end up in coffee! so the price of coffee is utterly crucial to our economy! an increase in coffee price (fair trade jumps to mind) would ultimately break the world economy!

Posted by: sod | July 20, 2009 1:56 AM

I have here next to me, tucked among the volumes on the bookshelf near my desk, two books. One is hardbound, about 400 pages, a specialized technical manual that was produced in a print run of 250 and cost $600 - it was a gift from a very good friend. The other is hardbound, about 400 pages, a controversial science popularization that I bought in the remainder bin for $6.00 - $5.95, actually, but let's make it even. Ray tells us that the $600, 400 page book has 100x the greenhouse gas impact as the $6.00, 400 page book.

I thought I'd explained that.

If you buy a collectors' item, the collector's item is like a banknote which, hopefuly, rises in value.

The money to buy the collector's item was brought into existence through energy input. Money represents energy.

A Van Gogh painting worth a million dollars is effectively a million dollar banknote. You can cash it in, any time, for a million dollars, hopefully more.

The fact that the painting actually cost $2 to produce many years ago (in terms of ink and paper), is irrelevant. We have now bestowed upon this painting a million dollar value, just as we bestow upon a million banknote the same value.

However you juggle the figures, the total greenhouse gasses emitted from any country depends on how green are their energy supplies.

I doesn't depend on silly projects like installing PVPs on roofs that take 40 years for a real energy/economic payback.

We kid ourselves if we think the energy payback is 2, or 3, or 4 years. But that's quite understandable. The main occupation of humanity at large would seem to be to kid itself.

Posted by: Ray | July 20, 2009 3:16 AM

Ray has left the building, hes is now off with the fairies, PV pays back its energy inputs in less than 3 years. Mind you, the Rays of this world don't need facts, he has his blind faith in his own ill informed impressions. Posted by: MAB | July 20, 2009 3:30 AM

Absolutely untrue. I'm always open to different interpretations supported by facts.

Provide the facts, and I'll do a complete about face. There's no 'loss of face' issue as far as I'm concerned.

I'm not here for ego purposes. Deliver the facts which meet my scrutiny and I'll eat humble pie.

Posted by: Ray | July 20, 2009 4:26 AM

Then Ray, go and substantiate your claim, as requested.

Posted by: MAB | July 20, 2009 4:34 AM

em>Read the facts Ray, they are even linked for you. Posted by: MAB | July 20, 2009 4:31 AM 589 Then Ray, go and substantiate your claim, as requested. Posted by: MAB | July 20, 2009 4:34 AM

Your link doesn't work. But never mind. There's such a thing as commone sense. Anyone who believes that a $12,000 solar panel can pay for itself in 2, or 3, or 5, or even 10 years, is off the planet.

Posted by: Ray | July 20, 2009 5:04 AM

Ray, no one is arguing that you can get a monetary payback time of 4 years on a PV system. Stop with the straw man.

The carbon emission payback time is 2,3,4 years. Pay attention.

Oh BTW, MAB has posted that link about a half dozen times in this thread. Go find it and learn something.

Posted by: Lee | July 20, 2009 6:13 AM