John Mashey on the global warming deniers who reckon that AGW is a plot against capitalism:
What's really weird about this is that many of the people who do this (claim that AGW believers are attacking capitalism)
a) Have rarely, or never worked for an actual profit-making company that builds useful products or provides useful services.
b)A few work for PR/lobbying organizations that claim to speak for free-market capitalism. But, actually they generally lobby for that tiny subset of companies (of rich family foundations that own them) that make more money by imposing costs (negative externalities in economics) on their customers, employees, the public, or government. No company wants more bureaucracy than necessary, or to pay more taxes, but.... - fighting for cigarette companies - for CFCs - against pollution controls on acid rain - against recognition of AGW
c) Consider the George Marshall Institute "trio", now finally deceased. Once-great scientists, most of whose useful careers were paid for by taxpayers, they founded a K-Street lobbying outfit, disguised first as science, and second as free-market capitalist defense.
What they were doing had nothing to do with free market capitalism in general, which in fact contains many responsible companies who actually welcome reasonable regulations. Rather, it was for a small set of companies to pollute, or even sell deadly products. [Recall that the business plans of cigarette companies depend on hooking kids while their brains are forming, so they can wire-in lifelong addiction. Hence, candy-flavored cigarettes like "Twista Lime".]
d) Over in Rabett Run, similar discussions caused some idiot to accuse me of being communist, or a fellow traveler, or something like that, working to cause the downfall of market capitalism.
That was truly funny.
Anyway, I'd guess that most who think AGW-recognizers are attacking free market capitalism ... haven't often actually participated in the latter, at least not in the (mostly) responsible part thereof.
And here we have Nigel Lawson (politician) in the Daily Mail:
There may be a political explanation for this. With the collapse of Marxism and, to all intents and purposes, of other forms of socialism too, those who dislike capitalism and its foremost exemplar, the United States, with equal passion, have been obliged to find a new creed.
Lawson reckons the IPCC scientists are wrong, but doesn't know the difference between per cent and degrees:
And if the growth of such emissions continues unabated, their 'best guess' is that in 100 years' time, the planet will be somewhere between 1.8 and 4 per cent warmer than it is today, with a mid-point of a shade under 3 per cent. (Incidentally, this was published before the early 21st century warming standstill was officially acknowledged, so was not taken into account.)
Lawson has added to the pile of denialist books with his own book coming out on April 10. Naturally he misrepresents the science (book review in the Daily Telegraph):
One useful thing Lord Lawson does is to examine what the IPCC is actually saying in the small print of its latest report, as compared with the wilder exaggerations favoured by the Stern Review and Al Gore. "If you look at the IPCC's detailed predictions, on such issues as food and water shortages, sea-level rise and health, they paint nothing like the catastrophe we are made familiar with by the media. A maximum sea-level rise of 23in over 100 years hardly compares with the 20ft predicted by Mr Gore's film.
No, the IPCC does not say that 23in is the maximum sea level rise
We also have Lawson's conclusive disproof of global warming:
Snow falling on a beach in Greece appears to give the lie to the apocalyptic predictions of Al Gore and others says Lord Lawson
It's right up there with the doing-it-for-money thing, like thousands of nerds worldwide have banded together to stop doing real science in the dim hopes of using environmental causes to weasel money out of right-wing governments. Stupidity-projection is what I call it.
So a former Chancellor of the Exchequer doesn't know the difference between one degree Celsius and one percent. Rather depressing really.
Ah, Nigel obviously means the third degree. Seriously how could anyone with a clue talk about warming in terms of percentages. Per cent of WHAT, temperature in K, C, F, R (and if you know what R is you are clearly beyond help).
The peers are twittering in the treetops again
Its almost amazing how many people who have demonstrated some competence at one thing (In this case, climbing the greasy political pole) seem to think they are competent at other things.
Ah! The Rankine. I'm surprised the US didn't foist that on the world, given their continuing love affair with Fahrenheit (only joking!). Or did you mean the Rømer or Réaumur, which sometimes go by R?
Sad, I know. I knew Rankine, but had to look up the other R names.
Ah yes, too. Nigel Lawson, father of Dominic Lawson (who's had something to say on the matter), wife of Rosa Lawson-Monckton, sister of ... Well, you can guess the rest.
The funny thing is that communist countries are famous for their total lack of respect for the environment. See: Aral sea (or whats left of it), anything in China, and the Soviet Unions CO2 emissions (in the 80s it was almost as bad as Americas). I notice conservatives talk constantly about communism, but have no idea what it really is.
CFC-ozone denialism was a particularly striking example of John Mashey's point, because the denialists kept going long after even the major corporations that were most affected had given up. In fact, the 2nd wave of CFC-ozone denialism didn't even really get going until well after the major producers agreed to a CFC phaseout - it emerged from the shadows with Singer's 1989 article in National Review, first got major press when Rush Limbaugh jumped on board in 1992, climaxed with the Doolittle-Delay hearings in the fall of 1995, and then went into a spectacular crash-and-burn two weeks later when Rowland, Molina and Crutzen got the Nobel Prize. Meanwhile, back in the real world, DuPont and ICI had agreed to phase out CFC's back in 1988, and a worldwide ban had been negotiated in London in 1990, under the sponsorship of that notorious left-wing extremist Margaret Thatcher. The whole movement was driven purely by ideology.
thing is, all that environmental desolation was caused by soviet leaders who were, more than anything else, trained as engineers. Brezhnev, Kosygin, Andropov, Tikhonov, Ryzhkov, and so on ad infinitum. Equipped with that "can do" attitude engineer-types keep upbraiding we chicken little AGW luddites with; the same attitude that's worked so well for the Bushies remaking the political map of the world. You think having lawyers run your country is bad, try having engineers run it.
It's very simple, Baratos. Communism is anything that conservatives don't like.
Giving government money to oil companies = capitalism.
Giving government money to poor people = socialism.
Telling companies not to pollute = socialism.
Telling strangers who they can marry = common sense.
Robert P.:
It's interesting to note that Margaret Thatcher has a scientific background, in particular a degree in chemistry. So it's perhaps not that surprising she has been able to grasp the scientific arguments better than many politicians:
Source
"The whole movement was driven by ideology"
Even this is too generous. It's more tribalism than ideology. These guys just hate greenies.
And, of course, they define anyone who thinks global warming is a problem as a greenie. It's a self-reinforcing circular argument.
Like Kekulé's snake, they've bitten themselves in the bum.
Meet the new anti-climate change publication. [The Register](http://www.theregister.co.uk) . 4 million page views per month and highly influential in the tech community. An anti-agw mandarin, if you like.
Sure enough, they both "gore" heavily and run the [climate change against capitalism schtick](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04/04/gore_solveit_campaign/) (written for them by The Adam Smith Institute):
I was debating a Dutch climate change sceptic a few years ago in Amsterdam, in front of a reasonably large audience, and he started his talk with the phrase that many scientists arguing in favor of the AGW argument were in fact watermelons: green on the outside but red (= communist) on the inside. Many of the people there nearly fell out of their chairs. But this is nothing new: the political right has been using this kind of ridiculous smear for more than 10 years. Andrew Rowell discusses this in his book, 'Green Backlash' (1997) .
Free market capitalism?
Obviously you have no idea about either.
Jeff Harvey
as a Dutchman, your comment here could be construed to me many things.
I personally regard it as the deliberations of on idiot.
Writing as a Dutchman of course.
pough:
Or maybe it's just a twisted sort of "Clinton did it! Clinton did it!" rhetorical trope, and when it's repeated often enough the propagators actually start believing their own crap.
Roughly the denialist `logic' goes like this, which of course is totally stupid on every level:
1. Clinton/Gore did X (because I say so).
2. Therefore X is perfectly fine when we do it.
3. But of course, the fact that Clinton/Gore did X proves that they're the Antichrist.
4. Oh, and we absolutely don't do X!
(Woohoo, the same `logic' just appeared in Louis Hissink's latest response.)
Oh wait, did Nigel Lawson's book just bring up Al Gore? Joy.
Louis,
Are you serious!?!?
Because, speaking to a Dutchman (= you), your apparent inability to deliberate coherently or rationally can also be construed in several ways.
I personally regard your comment as the deliberations of an even bigger idiot.
Writing as a Canadian, of course.
...Like I was saying, before I was so rudely interrupted above, type in 'watermelon' and environmentalist' into Google search engine and you'll get thousands of hits. This kind of 'Commie bashing' is being used to attack anyone who argues that human activities are having a deleterious effect on the environment, whether it is NGOs or scientists. Brown gives it quite a bit of coverage in his book.
Louis Hissink, demonstrating to the world his succumbing to a complete and utter brain burp, spake thusly:
Louis, Jeff's nationality, which you have completely misapprehended, has not an iota to do with anything. His comment cannot be construed as anything to do with issues of nationality. It is a completely reasonable observation to relate, and the only person embarrassed by your ill-conceived outburst is you.
I say this as a born-and-bred Dutchman now privileged to live in Australia, and no Nederlander nor person of any other nationality that I know would want to stand within spitting distance of a buffoon like you making wrong-headed jibes such as you made.
The only thing that you have shown to everyone here is what an imbecile and a troll you are.
Bernard,
I really appreciate your comment. I have lived in Holland for 8 years and I think its a wonderful country - my partner is Dutch and I am very happy to live and work here. I am very privileged to be able to do the work that I do and to have the life that I have. I was gobsmacked at Louis' comment, especially as it had nothing to do with nationality but was just an experience I had debating a climate change sceptic a few years ago.
Oh well. Anyway, many thanks for your post and all of the other excellent ones you make on this site!
There's another law to be found in here somewhere:
The defender of denialism tends toward buffoonery, and the longer the denialist stays in the thread, the chances of buffoonery display tend toward one.
Best,
D
Yep. Primacy of the economy (Marx). Heroic and victorious fight of man against nature as historical inevitability (AFAIK also Marx). Heroic display of what great big deeds communism Really Existing Socialism can do.
p(denialist wrong) = 1
encapsulates the notion succinctly.
A lot of these people are Ayn Rand worshipers.
In addition to their constant fawning over Rand, these people have one more thing in common: they like to talk (and write) gibberish.
Rand wrote diarrheatically about "movers and shakers" of the human species (scientists, engineers, captains of industry, etc) while she herself accomplished precisely what?
"Invented" a silly "philosophy" and wrote a bunch of silly books for adolescents to espouse (and market) that "philosophy"?
Louis Hissink gave us the [worst argument against global warming](http://timlambert.org/2004/12/hissink/).
As to why our denialist friends claim everyone is in it for the money, has a very short answer, that is what teh science guys on their side have always done.
Of course that does not apply to Louis.
Z....hey, take it easy on engineers (at least us chemical engineers)! We're the ones who are tasked with designing more efficient, safer, and less polluting processes (which many of us are eager to do)!
Robert P's comment about Maggie Thatcher above and Meyrick Kirby's link to Maggie's speech to the Royal Society in 1988 reminded me that Monckton was her science policy advisor at that time. And that she opened the Hadley Centre in 1990 with this speech, which could very well be delivered today without much change.
And it was Lord Lawson, then just plain Nigel, who ordered (probably on orders from above) the release of funds for the setting up of the Hadley Centre. Funny ol' world!
Perhaps when Lawson's next interviewed about his book a journalist might ask him whether he thinks the scientists at Hadley have got things right about climate change or whether his son and his son's brother-in-law have it right ... and then whether he thinks the money he released to set up Hadley was money well spent or not.
> tiny subset of companies (of rich family foundations that own them) that make more money by imposing costs (negative externalities in economics) on their customers, employees, the public, or government
Might this not be the norm rather than a tiny subset?
re: #30 P. Lewis
I've seen Monckton referred to as a "policy advisor" or "special policy advisor" but can you point at a credible source for him being science policy advisor? I've seen a couple mentions like that in the blogopshere, but with no citations.
Lawson is going to be interviewed on BBC Radio 3 - in about 30min (at 9.45 GMT) - on Night Waves http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/nightwaves/
Isabel Hilton is the interviewer, and Prof Mike Hulme is also a guest, so if anyone would like to listen to Lawson getting kebabed, then go ahead. The programme can also be listened to after its been broadcast via the website, so its the gift that might keep giving. And if anyone would like to keep a tally of just how many things he gets wrong, please let us all know!
John, Tim Adam's piece in the Observer (Monckton Saves The Day says quite a lot about his time in Margaret Thatcher's policy unit. I think "policy adviser" is right. The "science" is an accretion he might like to see become accepted.
The article captures the man rather well, I'd have thought, having seen him interviewed.
#34 Gareth
Yes, I'd read "Monckton Saves the Day", which was the source for the endocrine connection I referenced a while back.
John, in retrospect, "science policy adviser" is possibly a stretch, since the remit as an adviser in Maggie's Policy Unit would have been to advise across government departments.
He certainly had inputs to education as a policy adviser, unless he's committed perjury in his witness statement in Dimmock vs The Secretary of State for Education and Skills (the case against showing An Inconvenient Truth in English and Welsh schools). If that is the case, and I've no reason to doubt it, then since the UK government department responsible for education from the mid 1960s to the early 1990s was actually called The Department of Education and Science, it is reasonable to assume that he also advised on science policy issues,1 and then he could be called a science policy adviser, though as an actual job description it was probably non-existent.
Since we know he reads this erudite blog, perhaps he can fill us in on his exact remit.
1His Heartland Institute profile, which I appreciate is likely to inflate his "achievements", lists a few science and technology inputs from that time.
Since it was me that sent the Lawson article to Tim (whether he knew of it before or not), I think I'd better comment here. The whole article was the biggest load of bull I have ever seen. There will be people who aren't acquainted with the science and will buy into this slezy propaganda. What outraged me most is that this guy is in the House of Lords, so any climate bill that goes through there will be voted against by him. It's scandalous.
I only read the Daily Mail because its stories are so far-right and biased its unbelievable, and it gives me great pleasure to shout at it. Ken Livingston was right when he said that the paper is blatantly racist- the 30s was Jews, then it was the Irish because of the IRA and now its any Muslim.
Politics ahould NEVER inform science. Science should always inform politics.
Did anyone see newsnight in the UK last night? Nigel Lawson was on debating Chris Rapley the ex-head of British Antarctic Survey. Lawson seems to be in his own little world casting himself in the middle. Apparently he agrees with the IPCC because they take a moderate position, like him of course!
I'm not sure if viewers with non-UK IPs can use iPlayer on the bbc website, but [here is the link to it anyway](http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/b009vshz.shtml?filter=txdate%3A0…)
As far as time goes you want to move it onto at least 36:00 mins.
Paul that was great thanks! Chris Rapley and Paxman really made him look like a fool. However, the average Newsnight watcher isn't likely to be as gullible as others and are more likely to be educated in science and politics, so I don't see this helping much to combat climate idiocy, they would already know it was all spin probably. Still, I would've liked Chris to have mentioned El Nino/La Nina and the difference between climate and weather to the prat Lawson. Never mind.
AGW denial: a pommy clot.
"hey, take it easy on engineers "
OK. i'll pick on tap dancers.
Its lunacy to suggest climate change is a left-wing plot (more like a right-wing plot to harm the planet) since we econuts advocate greater funding to science and thus creating new technology and industry. Surely some capitalist can make money out of that somewhere. I mean they call it the free-market, and yet they can't adapt to a changing market.
It seems this and natural selection are just communist plots then, and clearly we're all in it to create some sort of New World Order.
I don't think!
Z, as a Pom and someone who has clottable blood, I object to that!
Yes, and it's a left-wing plot that will "destroy all life on earth." The deniers are the ones trying to save the earth - that is the pitch. For example, consider this latest by TimBall, the ultimate environmentalist who is single-handedly attempting to stop the destruction of all life on earth by the crazy environmentalists who are trying to reduce CO2 (and thereby simultaneously starve and asphyxiate us all):
"Environmentalism exploited for political purposes, Threatening world food production. Biofuel Madness: Environmentalism exploited for political purposes"
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/2557
Quote: "...Reducing CO2 will not affect climate, but can put all life on earth in jeopardy."
Summary of the rest: blah, blah, plants, blah, blah, Club of Rome, blah, blah, brain-washing kids
Alex Deam writes:
[[What outraged me most is that this guy is in the House of Lords, so any climate bill that goes through there will be voted against by him.]]
Despite his statements to the contrary, Monckton is not in the House of Lords. He can't vote on anything. He is a peer, but not all peers are in the HOL.
BPL
Alex is talking about Nigel Lawson, aka Lord Lawson of Blaby, who does sit in the House of Lords and who, incidentally, can be contacted through a third party here on House of Lords matters.
The Australian had another front-page wank today.
It turns out that another respected, eminent, authoritative, well-informed, insightfultudinous and otherwise godlike being has decided global warming isn't real. It is admitted in paragraph sixteen or so that he isn't a scientist, he's a historian, but the idea is that his respectedness, eminence, and authoritativeness gives him special insight into things he knows nothing about and that his opinions are so important they deserve the front page.
Right-wingers have used "Communist" as an insult approximately since 1917. Now that the Cold War is over and they got completely caught with their pants down (was I the only person in the world who was completely unsurprised by the fall of the Soviet Union, and if so, what have I got that you ain't got?), they've really got nowhere else to go. The entire US right wing has built its core identity on being "anticommunist" from the get-go. And when talking about these guys, it's always important to remember that they're dialled into a sort of Talking Clock that repeats "The ideological time at the tone is 1957. *beep*" over and over and over again.
I sort of have to wonder who's behind the push not only to claim that biofuels threaten world food supplies but also to implant the idea in the public consciousness that biofuels have to be made with foodstuffs. No, they damn well don't, and you can make biofuels just as easily and with less energy expenditure from things like weeds and switchgrass, thereby leaving high-till, high-maintenance, food-type stuff like corn for eating. But of course, doing that would not fit the prevailing narrative that biofuels don't have an adequate ROI and cause other systemic problems to boot. (Did someone just figure out an easier, cheaper, better way of making biofuels, or something, that the interested narrative-projecting parties here have to trot out the spectre of a food emergency due to biofuels production?)
Interrobang: Did someone just figure out an easier, cheaper, better way of making biofuels, or something, that the interested narrative-projecting parties here have to trot out the spectre of a food emergency due to biofuels production?
I haven't kept up on the most recent developments, but in the last couple of months there was promising development in the use of algae as a biofuel source (which, if it works, would be incredible: algae not only doesn't use conventional farmland, but also grows extremely quickly, meaning if/when biofuel's phased out, they continue to function as sequestration projects). I'll have to see if it's still looking as optimistic as it sounded after preliminary results, but given its rather off-the-wall nature, it would fit the bill you provide above. (It would even fit that bill if it didn't work -- if the public learned about it, it's a very distinctive non-food-based source of biofuel, so they'd de facto know that food isn't the only source.)
#49 Interrobang
You need to get a little bit more up to speed on biofuels to avoid getting confused about who's doing what and why.
1) Sugarcane-based ehtanol has a reasonable energy balance.
2) Reasonable people argue about the energy balance and total GHG effects of corn-based ethanol, which is a relatively mature technology. The US is doing a lot of it:
- because corn is subsidized
- and so is its use as ethanol
- and it's very good for agribusinesses like Cargill, ADM, etc.
- and hence there are a lot of US Senators who vote for it.
3) Corn infrastructure:
- at the beginning of a season, a farmer can choose whether to plant corn or something else, i.e., they are annuals, planted from seeds. if it doesn't work out, they can plant something else the next year. They plant, grow, and harvest, and get paid.
- farm machinery exists specifically for corn
- there's a complete distribution chain: harvest the corn, truck the (dnese) kernels to the nearest grain elevator, who sells it to ethanol refinery and ships it there via train.
4) Cellulosic ethanol, say from switchgrass or miscanthus, for example, are believed to be very promising in the longer-term, especially as they survive with less fertilizer and water and they grow like weeds or bamboo.
- they are perennials, i.e., grow from rhizomes, and take a while to establish.
- if a farmer decides to do this, they have to start establishing fields of it, with no return that year.
- Tractors still work, and other farm machinery can be adapted OK.
- However, unlike he distribution chain for (dense) corn kernels, the cellulosic material is voluminous, and unless you can build micro-biorefineries all over the place, you have to truck the material somewhere else.
- Cellulosic refineries are just starting to get built. Here's an early one,
Range Fuels.
They broke ground for their first plain in November 2007.
Of course, many would argue that it would be better to burn the material and generate electricity, and ship that around.
5) So, anyone I know who knows about this topic thinks there's much more potential in cellulosic longer-term than in corn-ethanol, but in the real world, it takes time (years, decades).
6) Of course, most corn in the US is fed to animals.
========================
Narratives:
A) If someone gives money to third-world development charities, and generally has real concern for environmental issues, their concern may be that growing lots of biofuels (whether from food directly or via land that might be used for food) is done for SUVs, reduces the amount of food, and ends up causing deforestration someplace else.
I.e., their argument may or may not be right or wrong, but what they say about this is compatible with their other behavior. In some cases, this seems to turn into reflexive "biofuels are bad", rather than careful analysis. Typical of political "left".
B) At the other extreme, the same external argument really means: "don't interfere with my fossil fuels or meat." Typical of political "right".
C) The third viewpoint (of which the earlier discussion is an extract) tries to use reasoned measurement and analysis of complex systems to work towards useful solutions. When someone who does this says: "corn-EROI is not much better than 1", they may or may not be right, but they are saying what their analysis yields. [There are dozens of such studies by serious people, and they don't all agree.]
A clever proponent of viewpoint X can sometimes craft an argument that supports the actions that X prefers, but confuses the other sides with parts that seem to appeal to them, i.e., misdirection.
For example, Bjorn Lomborg is very good at this.
biodiesel can be made from waste vegetable oil discarded by restaurants, thereby impacting the garbage rather than the food supply.
cw,
On the surface, that sounds great, "energy from waste matter"!
I don't know anything about the process, but here are some questions I'd ask:
What is the cost to the restaurant to collect waste vegetable oil (receptacles, lost labor etc.)?
Will restaurants voluntarily collect waste vegetable oil? How much would a collection company have to pay to make the collection worthwhile for the restaurant? If enough restaurants do not participate, would efforts be made to force them to?
How much energy would be expended collecting and transporting the waste vegetable oil?
This is in addition to whatever cost and energy is required to actually produce and distribute the bio-diesel.
Could enough energy actually be produced this way to have any significant impact in the nation's energy supply?
#53
1) it's hard to see how waste vegetable oil will be anything but a small help ... but every little bit helps, and if the waste oil is actually worth something, that will help.
2) If I had to bet, though, it be on jatropha or maybe algae for biodiesel long-term.
I believe that one's political views affect how one perceives issues. The "left" believes that the elite know better than the masses. The "right" (classical liberal, free-marketers) believes that the masses know better than the elite. Both sides see increased government power as a way to forward the elite agenda. There is a natural tendency for the "left" to identify problems in need of government solutions and the "right" to downplay problems and contend that no government action is required.
Taking welfare as an example, the "left" sees persistent poverty and thinks that the government must take action. The "right" figures that there are good reasons why governments haven't taken action in the past. The "left" tends to exaggerate problems and the "right" tends to minimize them.
With AGW, one on the "left" has every inclination to maximize the problem and call for government action. The "right" will tend to minimize the problem and say that government action is not needed. With these starting points, it's not surprising that each side gives more credibility to data that support their worldview. As the "left" will claim that the "right" doesn't care about the poor, they will claim that the "right" doesn't care about the planet and the future of mankind. One problem I have is that, although it is plausible that the "right" doesn't care about the poor (I believe they do), it is not plausible that the "right" doesn't care about the future of mankind.
In summary: people aren't commies because they believe in AGW; they believe in AGW because they are commies.
Well, in cities in the United States, they have to collect it and properly dispose of it already, and proper disposal involves paying someone to collect it and whisk it off ... somewhere. The last step's a mystery to me :)
But pouring it into the drain in large quantities tends to lead to expensive clogs before it hits the sewer proper, so cities say "no, don't do that". And back it up with enforcement.
At least that's true here in portland, oregon where I live.
So the restaurants are happy to give it away to our local biodiesel collective.
They also have an interesting arrangement with Kettle Chips (expensive but tasty "gourmet" potato chips). Kettle Chips gives their waste oil to the collective, the collective turns it into biodiesel, and they give back a percentage to Kettle Chips, who then use them to fuel their fleet of diesel VW cars they use for sales visits, etc.
Sounds great, right?
Well ... there just ain't all that much waste oil, it turns out. Drop in the bucket. Allows a few people to lower their carbon footprint, and turns a waste product into something useful, but we'll never make a significant dent in fossil fuel usage this way.
dhogaza,
Good answers. Sign me up for a seat on the the waste vegtable oil bandwagon.
Not enough for a band wagon, just enough for one of these wagons.
Well ... there just ain't all that much waste oil, it turns out. Drop in the bucket. Allows a few people to lower their carbon footprint, and turns a waste product into something useful, but we'll never make a significant dent in fossil fuel usage this way.
Right.
But we have to learn how to close the loop on processes, so this is a good start.
Best,
D
BillBodell says:
...and then enters into the same old tired tirade about how he's nonconformistically, individualistically transcended Left and Right. Just like all the individualistic libertarians out there who spew the exact same claptrap for the gazillion time in a row.
When you see the idiotic phrase "classical liberal", you know it's the end of fact-based discourse.
re biodiesel:
yes, as already specified, restaurants are currently paying for disposal of their old oil so are happy to give it away. It can be either refined into fuel oil (the side chains hydrolyzed of the glycerol backbone) or used as is, which requires starting the engine on real diesel (or the refined product just described) until enough heat is available to heat the leftover oil to proper fluidity.
no, there isn't enough oil producing vegetation in the world to switch our transport over completely; but that's not what it's being touted as (unlike ethanol).
diesels run on many things. rudolf diesel's original engine ran on peanut oil. they can be made to run on coal dust. (not that that would help things)
Oh, yes, I was interpreting pseudo-bodell as being a bit snarky, "jumping on this bandwagon", being a bit of an ass given his previous posts. But a radio flyer can be useful and every drop saved helps, right?
Yes, exactly.
If my post didn't make it clear that biodiesel from waste oil is a positive, sorry about that (but did post a link to my city's biodiesel collective!)
But it's a small positive, and this must be recognized.
And I told the Kettle Chips story because I think it's cool, a way that activists and business can cooperate in a small way to make a small positive step.
P. Lewis posts:
Oops. My apologies to Alex Deam.
Bill Bodell posts:
Good Lord, what a stupid thing to say.
People believe in AGW because the empirical evidence points that way.
dhogaza,
I'm completely serious about my support for using waste vegetable oil. I asked some questions, you gave me answers that allayed my concerns and I am convinced.
bi,
Other than indicating that you have a problem with libertarians, I don't know what point you were trying to make or respond to.
I never claimed that I transcended Left and Right. I'm personaly on the Right and that affects how I view things. But the post wasn't about me, it was how ones politics affects one's views on issues before the issues are even known.
The phrase "classical liberal" (or some other label) is needed to seperate out the "religous right" from the rest of the "right". I can't imagine why use of that term would signify the end of fact-based discourse.
BPL
If you're referring to the "commie" comment, you're right. But I think you're making reference to the next line..
If you think that everyone that believes in AGW discarded their initial bias, objectively analyzed the data and came to an opinion based purely on the empirical evidence, I think that's a naive thing to say.
Bill Bodell posts:
What part of "the empirical evidence points that way" did you not understand?
BPL,
If your point is that I said "purely on the evidence" when you said "because the empirical evidence points that way", then I'll restate my comment:
If you think that everyone that believes in AGW discarded their initial bias, objectively analyzed the data and came to an opinion based purely because the empirical evidence points that way, I think that's a naive thing to say.
Otherwise, I don't have a clue what your point is. Perhaps I'm just not sharp enough to keep up with your considerable debating skills.
Bill Bodell posts (again):
No matter how many times you say it, it will still be both wrong and irrelevant.
Do you suppose John Tyndal had an agenda about it when he showed through laboratory work that carbon dioxide was a greenhouse gas in 1859? Or that Svante Arrhenius had a global warming agenda> when he came up with the theory on 1896? He thought global warming was a good thing; that it would result in a more pleasant world. But whatever he thought, he was right.
I don't think the thousands of researchers around the world who discovered and developed the science of global warming went into it because they were trying to develop a political agenda, no. I think that's the paranoid delusion of someone who spends too much time in politics and too little in science.
BPL & BillBlodell
This argument is silly, you guys are arguing past each other due at least in part to ambiguity of English, and the difference between "some" and "all" as unstated qualifiers for "people" in:
"In summary: people aren't commies because they believe in AGW; they believe in AGW because they are commies."
Let me propose a *careful* set of statements, rather than sloppy ones, and see if there's actually any disagreement:
1) Some people bought AGW-will-be-serious in advance of the science.
1a) At least some (and maybe most) of these are politically "left".
2) Some people buy AGW-will-be-serious, regardless of political orientation, because:
- The basic physics has been there for a long time.
- An enormous mountain of data has piled up.
- Competing alternative explanations keep failing, badly.
- Once-contradictory data (like satellites) has been found in error, and when resolved, is no longer contradictory.
Such people include:
- by now, almost all real climate scientists
- many other real scientists
- other people who are reality-based and study the problem carefully
- and many people who don't understand the science very well, but are generally willing to trust experts in any field when they are unable to understand it directly, or don't have the time to study it.
3) Then, we have people who believe one of the following:
- AGW isn't happening
- Well, maybe it is, but it has little or nothing to do with humans
- Well, maybe humans are causing some of it, but it would wreck our economy to do anything about it
- Well, doing anything about it would require government interference, or working with the UN, or *communism*.
- It's too late anyway
At least some (and maybe most) of these are from the political "right".
====
OF COURSE, there are people in 1) and 3) who did not discard their bias.
OF COURSE, the science is the science, physics is *unforgiving*. If you jump out of a 50-story building, gravity doesn't ask whether you're left or right.
OF COURSE, there is plenty of room for legitimate argument about policy, although I think the political right has been marginalizing itself by arguing with the science, i.e., anyone who has argued against the existence of AGW for many years, in the face of the scientific evidence ... isn't going to be very welcome at the policy table. ["Oh, you've been denying the science until just now. Well, what does that tell us about the quality of your judgement?"]
That's actually too bad, at least from the viewpoint of a centrist (like me) who likes to keep government as small and local as possible (and only as big and global as necessary). By delaying and delaying, people are only guaranteeing more draconian, more intrusive solutions later, as well as the inevitable dumb government actions that have unintended consequences.
In other news, CIA Agent MarkeyMouse has just found Conclusive, Rigorous, Smoking-Gun Proof that AGW is a Vast Worldwide Communist Conspiracy headed by Al Bore Gore, by successfully cracking a state-of-the-art cryptosystem invented by the ÐомиÑÐµÑ Ð³Ð¾ÑÑдаÑÑÑвенной безопаÑноÑÑи.
John Mashey,
Ah, someone I can have a conversation with. The "talking past each other" situation frustrates the heck out of me and I usually pride myself on being able to avoid it. I honestly didn't know what BPL was trying to say. If he'd said "not everyone sees issues through their initial bias", I would have clarified that I was making a generalization. I was also talking about all people, not just scientists. Thanks for clearing that up.
I agree with 1 and 3.
The issue is not that the Earth hasn't warmed (it has) or that the greenhouse effect doesn't exist (it does) or that CO2 doesn't contribute to the greenhouse effect (it does). On the intelligent blogs, I rarely see a post from a skeptic that contests any of the above. This is all "proven science". The significant debate revolves around climate sensitivity and the cost / benefit analysis of CO2 abatement. My position (which I know many disagree with) is that the magnitude of climate sensitivity is not "settled science". Many catastrophic AGW proponents see CO2 abatement as an economic boon (or at least as "cheap") while many skeptics see CO2 abatement as doing more damage than it prevents. This is a valid point of debate. I'm not aware of any skeptic that believes that the Earth will warm by 8 C over the next 100 years but that fixing the problem is "just too expensive".
I do not believe that it is "known" by the majority of intelligent, thoughtful people that AGW will be a serious problem for mankind. A case in point is the Miami skyline. Surely the developers of new construction and the insurance companies that insure them have intelligent people working for them and they don't seem to think that investing billions of dollars along the southern coast of Florida is a problem. It doesn't mean they're right, but I'm not prepared to bet against them at the moment.
I don't think science is quite as pure as you seem to. I believe that initial bias affects scientists as well as non-scientists, just to a lesser degree. For starters, a scientist's initial bias probably affects what they choose to study in the first place. It takes an unusually brave and committed scientist to take a position outside of the mainstream and, of course, there's the problem of getting funding. Initial bias also can affect how scientists interpret data. In extreme cases, scientists may decide to "gloss over" some procedural problems because they "know" the result is "right".
If it turns out that CO2 abatement is required, I'd like to see it be done with as little government involvement as possible, probably through the use of a carbon tax. There is the problem of getting other countries (China, India, etc.) to go along (don't know how to solve that one). Heck, if I believed that Humanity was truly in grave danger, even I would be willing to support a U.N. World Government to address the problem
"A case in point is the Miami skyline. Surely the developers of new construction and the insurance companies that insure them have intelligent people working for them and they don't seem to think that investing billions of dollars along the southern coast of Florida is a problem. It doesn't mean they're right, but I'm not prepared to bet against them at the moment."
"Dear Jim: Should I be worried about Bear Stearns in terms of liquidity and get my money out of there? --Peter
Cramer says: "No! No! No! Bear Stearns is not in trouble. If anything, they're more likely to be taken over. Don't move your money from Bear."
Yes indeed, the Cramers of the world are much more credible than the scientists.
Bill,
---"My position (which I know many disagree with) is that the magnitude of climate sensitivity is not "settled science".
Do many disagree?
Do you agree/disagree that sensitivity is converging on a value of ~3C/2CO2eq ±1.5C?
Do you agree/disagree that the mean value is more likely than min/max extreme values?
Do you agree/disagree that the min and max extreme values are equally unlikely?
"If it turns out that CO2 abatement is required, I'd like to see it be done with as little government involvement as possible, probably through the use of a carbon tax."
So Bill, does the Government of your country not control taxes then? If so, then who does? The people? Are people in your country choosing how much tax they want to pay? I think I speak for most of us when I say that I hope your country exists and they have an open-immigration policy.
re: #71 Bill
[in middle of painting, so quick; more later]
There are two questions:
1) Is the science settled to within an arbitrarily-small uncertainty range? No.
2) Is it settled enough to know there's a serious problem?
I'd say yes, but you disagree, I think.
Scientists: you've made a number of comments about what scientists do. To have a strong opinion, presumably you enough firsthand experience with scientists (who are human, of course, which is why science works the way it does ... it's like ECC for computers) to back what you say, so I ask a question I often ask of others:
Can you list for us real scientists (i.e., actually publish peer-reviewed research in credible journals) that:
a) You have heard speak on climate science?
b) Have discussed any of this with? or at least talked to? or at least correspond with?
c) and/or whose primary research papers, in journals like Science, etc, you've read?
d) Can you estimate how many scientists (in general) you've gone to school with, worked with, given talks to?
[and I'll be glad to to provide a quick list of my own later on.]
Alex,
I said "with as little government involvement as possible". That does not mean "no government involvement".
luminous beauty,
I disagree. My agreement/disagreement really doesn't matter. My point is that I do not consider this point "settled science" as I do the existence of a greenhouse effect.
I agree that in a normal distribution mean values are more likely than extreme values.
I agree that in a normal distribution the min and max extreme values are equally unlikely.
elspi,
It is my opinion that not all businessmen are as stupid as Peter Cramer.
John Mashey,
Scientists. That's a good topic on which I have something to say but I'll have to do some actual thinking. I'll get back to you.
Bill, I think you'll find that taxes are a fairly big form of government intervention. I'm not saying that a carbon tax is a bad idea, just that you propose one because it involves the least government involvement which is frankly ridiculous.
BillBodell wrote:
Hmmm. If X ~ N(mu, sigma), what do you think P(X=mu) is?
Sorry if I'm straying into territory that I'm not able to make sense in, but Robert in a Normal distribution or any continuous probability, isn't the probability of x equaling a specific value always 0 due to the properties of integral calculus? That might've been your point I don't know, so apologies if it was or if I've got my understanding of normal distributions wrong.
Alex:
Yup.
re: #80 Alex
Actually, here, I'd agree with Bill. Given a choice of a serious carbon tax versus having a large government bureaucracy dedicated to looking around for people being inefficient, I know which I'd rather have ...
[And actually, California already has some of the effects of a carbon tax, we pay more for power because coal is deprecated ... and unsurprisingly, we've gotten way more efficient than the US average, which isn't just mild weather. As a whole, the US electricity/person has gone up ~40-50% in 30 years. In CA, it's been flat.
Here was 2005:
http://www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/us_per_capita_electricity_2005.html
We're not so good on gallons/gasoline per capita, 2004:http://www.energy.ca.gov/gasoline/statistics/gasoline_per_capita.html
But we're not bad, given that this is the Land of the Car.
Of course, I'd love to slowly raise gas taxes in a predictable way ... but that may well be unnecessary, given the way gas prices are going.
Of course, CA is the biggest net subsidizer (not percentage, but largest amount) of the Federal government and other states, and CA is not usually considered poor.
The point is that good policies:
(a) Encourage people to do "the right thing", but making their own choices, tradeoffs, and timing. For instance, suddenly passing a law that all cars are off the road unless they get X MPG, is uncool. Passing laws that tell people gas-guzzler taxes will be going up in predictable way makes more sense.
(b) Encourage sensible changes in the installed base, which takes a long time.
For instance, in our little town, which is hyper-well-educated and strongly attuned to environmental issues, we wrestle with the tradeoffs of:
(1) reducing our carbon footprint in accordance with CA AB32, at least some of which involves much more stringent application of LEED building rules and
(2) NOT creating too much bureaucracy and extra expense. So, for instance, we work with all the local architects, who are extremely knowledgable on green building methods, and they help steer people doing renovations or new designs, getting the input into the designs early. etc, etc. I.e., there are clever ways that help work towards long-range goals, with a relative minimum fuss and intrusion on personal choices.
Again, this is why I actually say that it's too bad if small-government people take themselves out of the picture by being dumb about the science. Delaying some of this just means that there will end up being heavy-handed or inefficient government actions in some places later on when people get desperate.
In particular, as Peak Oil&Gas hit, those areas that have been improving the efficiency of their infrastructure and vehicle fleets are going to be *way* better off economically than those who haven't.
Robert,
I am sure you are right and I'm wrong. Must have been a trick question from luminous.
John Mashey,
You've caused me to do quite a bit of rereading Thomas S. Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Not an altogether bad thing.
First, it seems that you believe that only a scientist, or someone that knows a lot of scientists, can comment on scientists. That's similar to the school of thought that only baseball players (current or former) are qualified to jugde the abilities of baseball players. I find that people that never played the game professionally often have the best insights.
Second, I'm not implying that scientists are behaving badly. Just that they are human like the rest of us. I am not suggesting scientists are (except for the occasional extreme example) doing anything other than pursuing what they think is right and giving it their best effort.
Third, and I'm not certain that this is your belief, most people have a view of science that imagines it as orderly progression from discovery to discovery always moving towards the final answer, with scientists unanimously accepting each new revelation. In actuality, it progresses haltingly. A paradigm is quickly reached. Everyone tries to fill in the holes in the current paradigm. Sooner or later holes too big to be avoided appear. Some brave soul(s) propose a new theory that explains what the old theory cannot. The old guard holds on to the current paradigm like grim death. Eventually, usually with the younger scientists, the new theory gains traction. Suddenly, the paradigm shifts, leaving only a few, usually older, scientists defending the old theory (like Einstein refusing to believe in quantum mechanics).
Finally, a quote from Thomas S. Kuhn:
"Normal science, the activity in which most scientists inevitably spend almost all their time, is predicated on the assumption that the scientific community knows what the world is like. Much of the success of the enterprise derives from the community's willingness to defend that assumption, if necessary at considerable cost. Normal science, for example, often suppresses fundamental novelties because they are necessarily subversive of its basic commitments".
In other words science is generally done to add to that which is already thought to be known. And it can hardly be otherwise, nothing would be accomplished if scientists constantly questioned basic assumptions. AGW is the current paradigm in Climate Science. Everyone's on the bandwagon, working out the finishing touches. That doesn't mean that it's automatically the "correct" theory (although it may well be). I suspect that a paradigm shift is coming.
re: probabilities
Sorry, this is all bogus.
Of course the probability of a specific, exact value is zero ... but that reasoning would lead one to believe that since the probability of any value is zero, that the sum of probabilities over all of them is zero, rather than 1.0, i.e., bogus.
If X ~ N(mu, sigma), (usually N(mu, sigma^2)) the relevant calculation is to determine the *ratios*, for example of:
Ratio1 = Pr(mu+sigma) / Pr(mu)
Ratio2 = Pr(mu + 2*sigma) / Pr(mu)
ratio3 = Pr (mu + 3*sigma) / Pr(mu)
because what one is really doing is computing Pr(x +/- delta) as delta -> 0 in all the cases above.
See Normal distribution and use the first form of the Probability Density Function.
Assuming a standard normal (mu=0, sigma=1), the ratios are:
Ratio1 = .61 = exp(-.1/2)
Ratio2 = .14 = exp(-4/2)
Ratio3 = .01 = exp(-9/2)
And you can eyeball the red line in the chart to see that this fits.
The ratio:
Pr(x)/Pr(mu) is <1.0 for any value != mu.
Hence, Bill's original statement is correct.
Wherein did I imply:
"First, it seems that you believe that only a scientist, or someone that knows a lot of scientists, can comment on scientists."
Anyone can comment on anything they like. Anyone else is also free to assess the quality of knowledge behind the comments.
When I was considering getting a quad bypass, I interviewed the potential surgeon to see if he was experienced in doing such. He typically did 3-4/week, including one that morning, which gave me more confidence than listening to someone who'd once read a book about medicine.
Instead of answering straightforward questions about your actual experience to back your comments about scientists, you gave me stuff from a well-marked-up book sitting 2 feet away from me. Should I be impressed?
John Mashey,
Correct by dumb luck. I get no credit for that.
When you asked if I was a scientist or knew any scientists and implied that you knew many, that seemed to be what you were saying. If that wasn't it, what was the point?
I wasn't trying to dodge the question. I replied that I didn't think that was a requirement. I am not a scientist, don't personally know any scientists and, if I went to school with any, I didn't know it at the time.
I've learned far more about baseball from Bill James than from Joe Morgan (if you don't follow baseball, sorry.)
When getting a quad bypass, I'd also be inclined to listen to someone who was not a heart surgeon but who's opinion I trusted and whom had done a great deal of study on the topic (maybe a statistician?).
Quoting Kuhn was not meant to imply that you were unfamiliar with it. I just thought he could say it better than I. Reading it made me a little less accepting of "consensus" science as well as educating me about how science really works (which, I think, is quite different than the public perceives).
John,
Correction. I do (did) know a scientist. My father-in-law won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1988.
Believe it or not, this just occured to me. Please don't tell my wife.
BillBodell:
The "paradigm shift" already happened long ago. Alas for you denialists, the shift was the "wrong" direction.
John Mashey contended:
Hmmm. Your claim of bogosity is bogus, though I admit that reasoning did kinda mess up Zeno and most people before Newton and Leibniz. Nonetheless, the hardly bogus larger issue is that if one attempts to trump another on some precise technical point it's not a shabby idea to understand the point precisely.
"It is my opinion that not all businessmen are as stupid as Peter Cramer."
Bill
Cramer is not a businessman. He is a cheerleader of the-market-is-always-right variety.
I was comparing him to you, not to the businessmen.
The businessmen who made the "big-shit-pile" have made out like bandits. They aren't stupid. They are very competent conmen in that they don't gamble with their own money; they gamble with somebody else's.
elspi,
Seeing one's investment go from $171 to $2 a share isn't exactly "making out like bandits".
"I believe that one's political views affect how one perceives issues."
If you're considering science an "issue" then the only scientists that let their political views affect science are retards, bad scientists, and greedy scientists. If there are any on the AGW side, it is an unbelievably small minority.
"The "left" believes that the elite know better than the masses. The "right" (classical liberal, free-marketers) believes that the masses know better than the elite."
No, the left or socialism is about equality and fairness so a socialist wouldn't say that the elite know better than the masses, for in a socialist society there is no "elite" for the masses are all equal. If you now say socialists claim that nationalisation is a good thing and therefore increases government control, well yes it does, but only for the reason that a free-market with less control can give corporations free rein to screw over the consumer i.e the masses. Socialism removes the class structure (which still exists no matter how much reality tv suggests otherwise) while capitalism or the right-wing keeps it in place, thereby keeping the elite or upper class.
"Both sides see increased government power as a way to forward the elite agenda."
Again, lefties see increased power as a way to foward the masses agenda if you want to call it that, while righties see increased government control and bureacracy as a threat to the elitist agenda.
"Taking welfare as an example, the "left" sees persistent poverty and thinks that the government must take action. The "right" figures that there are good reasons why governments haven't taken action in the past. The "left" tends to exaggerate problems and the "right" tends to minimize them."
I'm just trying to think why you would claim that noticing that poverty exists in the world (or even solely in the US or Britain or wherever you're from) is an exaggeration. Poverty or at least a poor quality of life depending on your definition of poverty will always exist while no-one does anything to counteract it. There is not a "good reason" for poverty most of the time, as most people are born into it rather than just living reckless lives. Unless of course you consider it good from the fat cats point of view, getting richer while the poor get poorer? Once every child born can say they started on a level playing field, then we can say that indviduals are as near as responsible for their own monetary problem. I don't think the difference between left and right in terms of welfare is that the left sees poverty and the right doesn't or sees less. I think the right does see poverty, but chooses to solve it in a laissez-faire way rather than in a "robin hood" way. Whether someone thinks this is the correct way to solve it or not is what defines someone as socialist or capitalist in an economic sense, not their observation of poverty's existence.
"With these starting points, it's not surprising that each side gives more credibility to data that support their worldview."
What data is there that supports a world view of the right that government intervention isn't needed in regards to AGW? Either you're claiming that there is some (however great or small) amount of data that refutes AGW (show us please) or that there is data that shows that despite AGW happening, we don't need governments to intervene to solve the problem. Are you some idealist who believes that companies will just switch from fossil fuels to greener fuels through free will? The companies exist to make a profit and money doesn't have any morals. Check throughout history and you will notice that all morality of what companies should do for the greater good of mankind is only done because of the existence of government regulation, for instance in the case of racial equality laws so that you can't fire someone because they are black or female or gay or whatever.
"One problem I have is that, although it is plausible that the "right" doesn't care about the poor (I believe they do), it is not plausible that the "right" doesn't care about the future of mankind."
I think it is plausible that there are some on the right (or in fact from either political side) that don't care about the future of mankind. It is an inherent trait of humanity to be selfish and greedy on occasion, a evolutionary concept of "survival of the fit enough" which (along with an inherent concept of looking after others in your own species- which is more important I don't know ask PZ or someone) is what shapes a person's morality that we are born with. It is therefore quite possible for people (right or left) to think only about themselves or think only of the success of the human species right now, and not worry about the future. This is what I believe is what underlies what some capitalists mean when they claim that it is uneconomical to reduce CO2 emissions. Maybe it is RIGHT NOW, but maybe by in twenty years, a hundred years or whatever (I don't know what the time frame is) it most certainly will have been economical to do it. Trillions of Pounds I hear or something (some links would be nice please). And that's only economically. There are other reasons to reduce emissions such as conservationist (we're running out of fossil fuels remember), moral (think of the number that might die directly or even indirectly- riots perhaps?), species protection, and of course climate (would you like a sahara-like climate in place of the Med?). There might be others that I've forgotten, but the point is that none of those mentioned are political. Only a moron would reject those in place of their political belief.
"In summary: people aren't commies because they believe in AGW; they believe in AGW because they are commies."
There are so many ways in which this statement is wrong, it's untrue. Firstly, you spent an entire comment talking about what you thought you knew about the left and right, then here at the end you mention communism. Let's get this common misconseption out of the way. WHile communism is left-wing the converse is not true. If you're left-wing, you're not always communist. Communism is the far-left, an extreme form of socialism, which is the whole left. While both carry the left wing idea of equality and government intervention in the economy, in communism, there is no such thing as private property. "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs." Marxists advocate a transition from a capitalist society to first a socialist one, and then unto their ultimate goal of a communist society.
You say, "people aren't commies because they believe in AGW", well if the environment is such a left wing issue as you claim (it usually is), then why wouldn't someone who agrees with the whole AGW concept, but hasn't formed there own political opinion yet, then decide that because of AGW, people should look after the environment, and therefore discover socialist concepts (let's face it more socialists have been enviromentally concious in the past than capitalists) that way?
You the say "they believe in AGW because they are commies." I shall reiterate BPL's retort here:
"People believe in AGW because the empirical evidence points that way." I think this is mostly true as "the only scientists that let their political views affect science are retards, bad scientists, and greedy scientists" as I said above. The majority of these in terms of AGW are right wing, sure there are some on the left wing, but 99.9% on the AGW side are legimately basing their beliefs on the science. You could be right that more politicans and the layperson are basing AGW on their own politics because (especially on the left) they haven't seen the evidence and so jump on the bandwagon so to speak, and that kind of thing is wrong. However when you make the absolute statement "People believe in AGW because they are commies", you are basically saying that ALL scientists that believe in AGW are politically biased. So on the one side we have the scientists with all their data saying AGW is correct and then we have you saying it's a communist plot. How much evidence of this do you have? I'm assuming you've done your own scientific homework and can show us what data fits you theory. Unless of course it's not a theory only an unfounded hypothesis.
"I'm personaly on the Right and that affects how I view things." So therefore you're biased to the right by your own admission. In which case I think it's pretty stupid of you to make the sweeping statement about all believers of AGW believe because they are communist. Maybe this is your bias showing through?
"The phrase "classical liberal" (or some other label) is needed to seperate out the "religous right" from the rest of the "right"."
Surely the term "religious right" would suffice to describe the part of the right which is religious. Or maybe "fundamentalism"? A liberal, classical or not, is neither left nor right, as on the economy, they both oppose monopolies as socialists do and oppose government intervention as capitalists do. I think also it seems unnecessary to restrict this to a debate between the left and the non-religious right as plenty of christian fundamentalists see it as absurd that man could shape the climate, "Man can't control nature, don't be silly" despite their position on natural selection ("Nature can't control existence, don't be silly"). SO the right in this discussion should be the whole right not just the non-fundamentalist part.
"If you think that everyone that believes in AGW discarded their initial bias, objectively analyzed the data and came to an opinion based purely on the empirical evidence, I think that's a naive thing to say."
I think that a good scientist does discard their inital bias and objectively analyzes the data, and I also have every faith that most scientists are good scientists. Anyone who doesn't is just a conspiracy loving moron. Sure, there will be a minority that haven't but so what? OOOH BIG SCARY THOUGHT: IN EVERY WALK OF LIFE THERE ARE BAD PEOPLE, SCIENTISTS INCLUDED but guess what? BAD PEOPLE ARE IN THE MINORITY IN LIFE THATS WHY THEY'RE BAD PEOPLE AND THE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE AREN'T IN JAIL! Most people adhere to the social norm of being good people you know. ALso I think your own statement that BPL was making reference to was the most naive one. Both were absolute and so are debateably naive but yours was the most wrong as more scientists are good than bad so you're the most naive.
"BPL & BillBlodell This argument is silly, you guys are arguing past each other due at least in part to ambiguity of English, and the difference between "some" and "all" as unstated qualifiers or "people" in:
"In summary: people aren't commies because they believe in AGW; they believe in AGW because they are commies.""
John there is no ambiguity in what Bill said. He so far hasn't corrected his own absolute statement and only claims BPL's one is wrong. However I think you summed up the three types of people fairly well.
"OF COURSE, the science is the science, physics is unforgiving. If you jump out of a 50-story building, gravity doesn't ask whether you're left or right."
I think that's the most fantastic statement I have read in a long time. Someone should show that to all the people at ScienceBlogs, it is perhaps the best metaphor on why science is amoral. I think the makers of Expelled should see this one too. It's better than the "we make a stand for him" one for definite.
"By delaying and delaying, people are only guaranteeing more draconian, more intrusive solutions later, as well as the inevitable dumb government actions that have unintended consequences."
I'd never really thought about that argument before but it seems quite likely yes.
"The issue is not that the Earth hasn't warmed (it has) or that the greenhouse effect doesn't exist (it does) or that CO2 doesn't contribute to the greenhouse effect (it does). On the intelligent blogs, I rarely see a post from a skeptic that contests any of the above."
I have seen such posts they are very common, even on ScienceBlogs unfortunately.
"I'm not aware of any skeptic that believes that the Earth will warm by 8 C over the next 100 years but that fixing the problem is "just too expensive"."
As I said above, "This is what I believe is what underlies what some capitalists mean when they claim that it is uneconomical to reduce CO2 emissions. Maybe it is RIGHT NOW, but maybe by in twenty years, a hundred years or whatever (I don't know what the time frame is) it most certainly will have been economical to do it." Since you're right wing Bill, I'm guessing you fit into the category of capitalist that only looks at now and not the future when they might be dead. So therefore your statement, "it is not plausible that the "right" doesn't care about the future of mankind" could be contradicted by yourself! And if you argue against that, remember "I'm personaly on the Right and that affects how I view things." You still sure that it's implausible that people on the right don't look out for mankind's future?
"I don't think science is quite as pure as you seem to. I believe that initial bias affects scientists as well as non-scientists, just to a lesser degree. For starters, a scientist's initial bias probably affects what they choose to study in the first place. It takes an unusually brave and committed scientist to take a position outside of the mainstream and, of course, there's the problem of getting funding. Initial bias also can affect how scientists interpret data. In extreme cases, scientists may decide to "gloss over" some procedural problems because they "know" the result is "right"."
Sure that happens but then if it's so widespread that to believe in AGW you have to be a communist, then how can you believe that "the Earth hasn't warmed (it has) or that the greenhouse effect doesn't exist (it does) or that CO2 doesn't contribute to the greenhouse effect (it does)." These statements about warming, the greenhouse effect and CO2 are all deduced by scientists. The same ones that are supposeably impure and communist. You can't selectively choose how much science you want to believe in.
"My point is that I do not consider this point "settled science" as I do the existence of a greenhouse effect." Bill here would have you believe that no progress has been made in climate science since the late 19th century. It's a wonder people go into it considering it's such a stagnant science.
"Oops. My apologies to Alex Deam." Thank you BPL for this apology, it's nice to find admittance of mistakes on ScienceBlogs which you tend not to find from the denialists (AGW or evolutionary) on here.
"Suddenly, the paradigm shifts, leaving only a few, usually older, scientists defending the old theory (like Einstein refusing to believe in quantum mechanics)."
Erm, Einstein didn't contest quantum mechanics as a whole as if you remember, in his Annus mirabilis (1905) one of his papers was "On a Heuristic Viewpoint Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light." It (from wikipedia) "proposed the idea of energy quanta. This idea, motivated by Max Planck's earlier derivation of the law of black-body radiation, assumes that luminous energy can be absorbed or emitted only in discrete amounts, called quanta." Hence it was Einstein that first came up with the idea of the quantum and therefore of quantum mechanics. What Einstein didn't like was the idea of its probability aspects and more importantly it's "spooky action at a distance concept." And who could blame him? These two ideas, while accepted by the physics community, still trouble everyone that meets it and there are plenty that hope that physics soon turns back to the old days of cause and effect (myself included). So you see, Einstein and Quantum Mechanics isn't an illustration of the old not liking a new theory, more that most from then until now have wished it were otherwise while accepting its legitimacy. I often hear talk of hidden variables or even Bohmian mechanics for instance.
Sorry about my last comment, it was a lot longer than I expected.
"Actually, here, I'd agree with Bill. Given a choice of a serious carbon tax versus having a large government bureaucracy dedicated to looking around for people being inefficient, I know which I'd rather have"
John, tax is a form of bureaucracy let's not forget.
Also, what is so wrong with the government making sure we're efficient? I've always said that it needs to come from the government as most people aren't going to be energy efficient of their own free will. I'm an example of this. I'm too lazy to be environmental and help out as an individual (I leave stuff on stand-by and worse) but I sure as hell would do something if the government was forcing me to do more (as long as their bureacracy was scientifically logical I wouldn't complain). It doesn't matter how many Live Earths you have, most people won't help except when Live Earth is on. The same goes for Children in Need for instance (look it up if you're not from Britain) as people tend only to give to charity when thats on not the rest of the year. And nothing hits a viewer sat at home harder than images of dying children in Africa.
My Grandad years ago worked in some form of energy management (he's asleep right now so I can't ask him exactly what) for Birmingham Council (the one in England not Alabama), and he always said the council should be doing more for energy efficiency. If he could forsee that then there's no reason why other more qualified people can't now. By the way, my Grandad seems to be right wing as well, so I don't think he can be biased or anything here.
"And actually, California already has some of the effects of a carbon tax, we pay more for power because coal is deprecated ... and unsurprisingly, we've gotten way more efficient than the US average, which isn't just mild weather"
As a Brit, I'm just wondering if California seemingly being good at the whole environmental thing is because of your Governor Arnie?
Oh and for the price of petrol (or gasoline if you will) you should feel lucky. Mainly due to fuel duty, averages prices are (give or take a month or two) $0.83/litre in the US while it's a staggering $2.04/litre over here. Though I contend it's actually 5/6 pence more for us now.
"My father-in-law won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1988." So Bill does that mean your Father-in-Law is one of Leon Max Lederman, Melvin Schwartz or Jack Steinberger?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Prize_in_Physics#List_of_Laureates
"John Mashey contended:
Sorry, this is all bogus. Of course the probability of a specific, exact value is zero ... but that reasoning would lead one to believe that since the probability of any value is zero, that the sum of probabilities over all of them is zero, rather than 1.0, i.e., bogus.
Hmmm. Your claim of bogosity is bogus, though I admit that reasoning did kinda mess up Zeno and most people before Newton and Leibniz. Nonetheless, the hardly bogus larger issue is that if one attempts to trump another on some precise technical point it's not a shabby idea to understand the point precisely."
Thanks Robert, I was sure about the zero thing and integral calculus, but being only a student, I thought there might've been something you knew that I didn't. I don't get how this relates to AGW, maybe luminous beauty or someone else could explain the choice of questions posed to Bill?
Alex,
Mel Schwartz
"Seeing one's investment go from $171 to $2 a share isn't exactly "making out like bandit"
The CEO made 28,400,000/year. http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/12/9X3I.html
Word of advice, just stay down.
Alex,
Most of your response seems to be the left / right, more / less government debate. I think we're clear on where we disagree, so we can leave it at that.
The "commie" comment was an attempt at being clever (the "commie" in the title post, the careful use of "left" and "right" at length followed by "commie", etc). I considered a winking emoticon, but that would have been cheating. Apparently, commies don't have a sense of humor.
To clarify a couple of things:
I don't think that noticing poverty is an exaggeration. I claim that the "left" would tend to exaggerate poverty that exists and the "right" would tend to downplay it.
I agree.
No. I believe that companies will switch when it is in their financial interest to do so. This might be for savings or PR purposes.
The use of the term AGW can be confusing when used with terms like "for" and "against". It could be said that I support AGW since I do believe that humans are contributing to global warming. But, I don't believe we are contributing to nearly as much warming as you, no doubt, do. My issues are climate sensitivity to a doubling of CO2 and the cost / benefit analysis of CO2 abatement measures (I'm not meaning to debate these right now, just define terms).
That's your definition of right wing. My definition sounds better. Personally, I contend that I am every bit as concerned about the future of mankind as anyone on the left
My main point (a long time ago) was that I believe that everybody views things from their own worldview and that that affects their perceptions. I also think this applies (hopefully to a lesser extent) to scientists. Having said this, it follows that I have a worldview that affects my perceptions.
I think Thomas Sowell's labels of "constrained" and "unconstrained" from Conflict of Visions are better than "left" and "right", but they're cumbersome and most people haven't read the book.
The term "Classical Liberal" is an attempt to define a place that's mostly on the Right but doesn't include the "religious right" and is not doctrinaire Libertarian, essentially, what Liberals were in the 1700's.
elspi,
Not anymore.
BillBodell:
Hahaha.
Hahahahaha.
Your `standards' of proof are hilarious.
How about "activist" and "inactivist"?
Wow
The goal posts are moving so fast I need a star chart to keep up.
> 100 million "isn't exactly "making out like bandit"" because it STOPPED?
How many billions does it take to be making out like a bandit these days?
bi,
You're debating skills are too advanced for me. I give up.
Alex Deam writes:
There are certainly folks like that, but other fundamentalists see environmental destruction as symptomatic of man's sinful nature; we destroy our good home because we're fallen. 83 leading evangelicals here in the US recently signed a statement saying Christians should do more to combat global warming. Even Pat Robertson is saying global warming is real.
Barton, I wasn't denying that there aren't Christians who are environmentally concious, I have friends and family that are in that category in fact. My point that you quoted was to show that those who are Christian fundamentalists are more likely to be right wing (I believe the term "Christian right" is a common term in the US) and don't believe in AGW. These are Christians that take the word of the Bible the most literally. My argument was that it would be stupid of Bill or anyone (to quote myself) "to restrict this to a debate between the left and the non-religious right as plenty of christian fundamentalists see it as absurd that man could shape the climate." And Bill was trying to seperate the christian right from the rest of the right on this debate when I don't think that distinction is needed. Note I also said "plenty of" not all christian fundamentalists as I agree with you that there are those that are environmentally active.
Do you by any chance have a link to maybe an article on "83 leading evangelicals here in the US recently signed a statement saying Christians should do more to combat global warming"?
I personally have never heard of Pat Robertson. Do you mean this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Robertson This person confuses me because he seems to be both a Zionist and a believer of the New World Order Jewish conspiracy à la David Icke.
On AGW he has been "converted":
But:
This guy seems to have the typical attitude that inflicts the denialists i.e. weather=climate. He also seems to have once been an advocate of (and maybe is again) the belief that AGW is a communist plot, which is what this whole article is about. I love circles me! Convenient or what?
Bill has replied to what I said:
It failed.
As I said this is ridiculous thing to do. If you're going to compare right and left throughout your whole comment and then attempt to use a synonym of left at the end, use socialism or something not communism which isn't a synonym. The reason the title post had "commie" in it is because that's one of the things that AGW-deniers do, they claim it's a communist plot. Not because it's true or because communism is the entirety of the left wing, but because communism has been feared in the US and elsewhere since 1917. Communism is a buzz word for them that makes readers jump up and shake their fist at those sneaky Marxist scientists, which the word socialism is unlikely to be as effective at doing.
1.I am not a communist
2.I never said I was a communist
3.I have a sense of humour
4.Your "joke" wasn't funny, it was a thinly veiled retort exposing your denialist viewpoint
I have to ask: why is your "AGW proponents=commies" comment all of a sudden a joke? When Barton took you up on it, you dismissed his argument. Did your mind not decide it was a joke until after?
Well before you said:
So if the left sees persistent poverty, therefore the right doesn't see persistent poverty i.e. less of it. But you say that noticing poverty isn't an exaggeration. Therefore we agree there is persistent poverty, no? But then how can the left exaggerate poverty if it already exists by your own admission?
But Bill, when will it be in their financial interests to move to greener fuels? When either the governments make it so via taxes and bureaucracy which is what I was advocating in the first place, or when fossil fuels run out- WHICH ISN'T RELATED TO GLOBAL WARMING! But what about PR purposes you say? The PR alone will never help enough to get them to change, as you will still have people claiming it was a communist plot. Once the governments are united that AGW is real (and that means ALL the parties as well with the Nigel Lawsons of this world not spewing their propaganda, then almost the entirety of the public will be convinced) then they would change from a PR perspective. But notice those two reasons you gave aren't going to happen, so government involvement is needed.
I'll leave that to others who are more aware of the technical aspects of AGW but I am sure you are wrong here. I myself am interested in links examining economic costs both now and in the future if nothing is done.
Sorry what was your definition then?
And that wasn't my definition either. I was merely saying that there is a category of right wingers ,
"that only looks at now and not the future when they might be dead." And I think that if you truly believe that its uneconomical to do something RIGHT NOW then you belong in that category, as it will have been in the future. Unless you have some data that suggests it won't be an economical catastrophe in the future in which case please share.
We are pretty much agreed here. Still your "hopefully to a lesser extent" shouldn't be hopefully at all. The majority of scientists ARE good scientists. And no you didn't say world view before, you said "political view" which is different. And it is less so with scientists. Those that are influenced on the AGW debate are most likely to be right wing, as they see it as a threat to their capitalism, when it is nothing of the sort. And as for your worldview affecting your perceptions, maybe it is doing so on the AGWers=commies debate or just AGW overall?
Well OK, but the mention of Classical Liberal (whether your description is accurate or not I have no idea) isn't needed here because as I said there are those on the Christian right that are just as anti-AGW as others on the right and see science as a left wing plot. I think just the separation of left and right is needed with maybe some anomalies. Barton seems to think Pat Robertson for instance.
Alex,
I was ready to respond to the first person jumping on the "commie" statement. BPL, while quoting the statement, really seemed to be addressing the bigger issue. I also believe I admitted that the "commie" thing was stupid. The "commies don't have a sense of humor" was just me pressing my luck. You didn't think it was funny. It made me chuckle. Anyone want to break the tie?
Socialist has almost as bad a reputation in the U.S. as communist. I agree that socialist is closer to a synonym for the "left" but no one on the left here would make that substitution. I avoid throwing those terms around (other than in abortive attempts at humor) since they tend to throw the discussion off track.
Businesses will change to renewable energy when it costs less, which will happen when the price of fossil fuel gets too high or via a carbon tax. Many businesses are already launching "green" campaigns for, I believe, almost purely PR purposes.
The Religious Right and Classical Liberals may often end up on the same side, but I think they are coming from very different points of view.
It's important that you understand that we do not agree on the danger posed by AGW. The "AGW is a serious problem" view believes that climate sensitivity is 3 C +/- 1.5 C. I believe that we don't know the actual climate sensitivity but that it's probably less than 1 C. Most scientists, "denialists" and "alarmists" alike, peg the warming directly from CO2 at between 0.3 and 1.0 degrees Celsius for a doubling in CO2 levels. It's proposed positive feedback that results in higher estimates of climate sensitivity. I don't see any evidence that these proposed feedbacks are a net positive.
If I agreed with the "AGW is a serious threat" theory, I wouldn't be arguing about whether we should do anything about it. I'd be arguing about HOW to do something about it.
BillBodel: I don't see any evidence that these proposed feedbacks are a net positive.
Well, there's yer problem!
Setting aside models at the moment, there's Tung 2007, Gregory 2002, Hansen 1993, Hoffert 1992, and Lorius 1990. All conclude net positives on the feedbacks, looking strictly at empirical evidence. Furthermore, none of the values are outside the ranges predicted by the climate models, even those used in the Charney Report of 1979 (which was 1.5-4.5 C / doubling). No fewer than three studies I'm aware of (including Royer, above) show that the minimum possible overall sensitivity cannot be below 1.5C (with the most likely values being close to 3).
These are just the ones I was able to find with a very quick search. There are no doubt more out there.
I am not a climatologist (I have undergraduate science education (primarily in physics) and am currently a grad student, but not in the physical sciences). I am NOT confident enough in my own understanding of climatology to accept it in place of the experts. I look at what the experts are saying on this, and despite trying to find convincing papers that show a low climate sensitivity, I have yet to find any evidence to suggest that the 3C figure is too high.
However, lest I be accused of hippocracy, I have to ask: What evidence forms the basis of your belief in the low climate sensitivity? You write with more sophisticated English than the trolls I usually grapple with; I assume you are rational enough to form beliefs based on evidence rather than trying the other way around. If I'm way off-base here due to a bombshell-yet-obscure paper that I'd overlooked, please, prove me wrong.
re: #109 Billbodell
1) Is this your *only* objection, or is there a long list behind it? I.e., you believe that it's probably <1C, although I'm not sure what that means to you. Does that mean it's a normal distribution with a mean <1C, and some sigma, or does that mean that you think that even mean+2*sigma < 1C? Or what? What *would* worry you?
[I ask because some people generate a list of objections, concerns, or contradictory data, then delve deeper, and watch as new data arrives, and their confidence level changes up or down with the results. Others know the answer, apriori, and if someone answers, the next objection pops to the top, forever. I don't want to assume...
I ask about the distribution, because mathematically-ambiguous statements are not fruitful. Of course, many people think in terms of means and not distributions, so this may be hard.]
2) "I don't see any evidence that these proposed feedbacks are a net positive." Where have you looked?
3) I promised you a "scientists I know" etc, comment.
I happened to post something relevant over a while ago at NY Times TierneyLab, comment #84, which includes quotes by some interesting people I've met.
In addition, I know, have known, went to school with, worked with, have met with a lot more (natural) scientists than that [1,000s, I've lost track], including many more climate scientists at universities, NCAR, GFDL, lots of physicists, geoscientists, chemists, biochemists, etc. [I'm not counting Computer Scientists, since many of us are really engineers, or engineer/(scientists), but not so often natural scientists, and while methods overlap, in oterh areas they are very different. Adding CS, math & statistics would yield a lot more.]
I don't have a Nobeler as a father in-law (which I hope was positive), but I have met 3, one of whom is a friend [and also currently a VC investing in cleantech.]
Alex:
86 leading evangelicals join global warming initiative
I'll briefly recap my concerns regarding climate sensitivity. I expect most of you know the details (feel free to point out any errors in the base assumptions). I don't expect to convince anyone here that I'm right. I primarily hope to show that my skepticism is based on something more substantial than "it's a commie plot" or "weathermen can't predict tomorrow's weather, much less that of 100 year from now".
Base assumptions: CO2 concentrations were ~280 ppm in pre-industrial times. CO2 concentrations are currently ~385 ppm. The effect of CO2 on warming is logarithmic (each marginal increase in CO2 has less effect than before). The global temperature has increased by about 0.6 C in the 20th century.
Since we're about 38% of the way to a doubling of CO2 and the effect is logarithmic, we should have seen about 50% of the increase. If we attribute all of the temperature increase to CO2, with no consideration of feedbacks, we should anticipate a further increase of 0.6 C when we hit 560 ppm. This gives a climate sensitivity of 1.2 if all of the increase is due to CO2. Of course, it would be less if some of the historical increase was due to other factors. A climate sensitivity of 3 would mean that we should have seen an increase in temperature of 1.5 C by now.
From what I've seen, the "AGW is a serious problem" proponents have explained the difference above as being due to a lag in the warming affect, aerosols masking the increase or other negative feedbacks like solar. The most common explanation for a lag is that the heat is being stored in the oceans and will be released in the future. If the lag is less than 20 years, I would have expected to see its effect by now. Also, recent research seems to show that the oceans are not warming. I don't believe the aerosol theory. If other negative feedbacks have been holding down temperature, then we'd need a good theory as to why these feedbacks will stop or reverse their sign.
Once we've agreed on the degree of warming expected (if that ever happens) then its time to discuss CO2 abatement solutions through a cost / benefit point of view. As an example, a Kyoto-like solution seems like it would have very little benefit at a significant cost. We have to be very careful about unintended consequences.
I'll go a little OT here since I was listening to reports of food riots on the radio this morning. It looks like the rise in bio-fuels may be a factor. We have to be sure to look at issues from a third world perspective. It's relatively easy for the developed middle class to spend less on cell phones or cable TV so that they can spend more on food. It's considerably more challenging for third world people living in grinding poverty. Another example, (which will get me into all kinds of trouble) is organic farming. It's easy for the American upper classes to pay a premium for organic. For the poor, it's another matter. And that's not even considering the effect on the environment of all the additional farmland that would be needed due to lower productivity.
John Mashey,
Reviewing your post, I think I answered your first question. But, to make sure (and trying to avoid any claims that I'm dodging the question), I believe the maximum "proven" climate sensitivity is 1.2 C. I suspect it's less.
Where have I looked? At the observed rise in CO2 concentrations and the observed rise in tempurature. I would consider anything else a theory. I know areosols should be a negative feedback, but I have doubts about how long the effect lasts and whether it is global or local. I believe that the IPCC acknowledges that the sign of water feedback is unknown. I believe that the size and sign of other feedbacks (solar, cosmic rays etc.) are unknown. I know you'll want me to produce references for the above. I'm not going to (yet) because it's a lot of work and I know that I'm not going to convince anyone here anyway. My purpose here isn't to sway those that disagree. I have a much more limited objective, that it is possible for a rational person to be skeptical of the "AGW is a serious problem" view. If you think it's worthwhile to try and convince me that I'm wrong, bring on the citations.
Recent research shows that this might be a possibility, but is not conclusive, and isn't consistent with satellite measurements of sea level rise. The inconsistency might mean we're missing something basic in the science. The last explanation I've seen attributed to Willis is the occam's razor explanation: there's an instrumentation problem causing seemingly inconsistent data to be gathered.
Also, there's research that would seem to indicate that the deep ocean has been warming over the last couple of decades.
So I think it may be a bit premature to accept this claim as gospel.
As for your not believing the cooling effect of aerosals, WTF should I care?
dhogaza,
I agree. That's why I used the word "seems".
There's no reason you should.
re: #113, #114
References would be nice, but for now, general sources are OK.
You quote some specifics, so you must get them from somewhere.
Unless I misunderstand your earlier writings, with the exception of your (deceased) father-in-law, you don't know scientists, talk to them, or attend their lectures. [Nothing wrong with this, as not everyone is located where this is easy, although if you live where I think you do, your are fortunate to be a few miles from Argonne National Laboratory, and maybe 20 miles from Fermilab, both of which have excellent people [I've visited both]. Between them, there are lectures [occasionally on climate science] and speaker's bureaus. Argonne, in particular, does a lot of energy & environment work.]
But, if not that:
Do you read:
Science?
Nature?
AGU Journals
AIP publications
PNAS
IPCC reports [which after all are free, on-line].
Credible textbooks on climate science
Websites of science organizations like NASA, UK Met, NOAA, NSIDC, etc.
or is your info from the popular press?
or from blogs?
and if so, which ones?
I ask because this is somewhat reminiscent of an experience I had at a party, in which a women opined that there was no evidence whatsoever of global warming. I asked her politely how she knew. She said she'd studied it very carefully, and made a few very specific comments.
I asked her where she got that info? Did she know scientists and talk to them about it? Did she attend lectures at Stanford (not too far away)? Did she read science journals?
At that point, she got very defensive and angry, said the scientists were wrong, and she'd studied it carefully enough to be sure, but refused to say where she got the info. [Of course, I had a pretty good idea. I look in on those websites now and then.]
(off to finish taxes and go to Bay Area sea-level rise meeting, so back in a couple days.)
Barton at #112, thanks for the link. It certainly seems (at least in early 2006 anyway) that the christian evangelicals are split on the issue then.
BillBodell wrote:
So, what you're saying is that your skepticism isn't based on commie plots or the inadequacy of weather forecasts but rather a back-of-the-envelope estimate that you believe trumps all of the estimates made by climate scientists using various independent methods?
I don't get what you mean here. Barton seemed to be addressing the fact that you said all supporters of AGW were communist (joke or not) by saying that it's the empirical evidence that says so. I think he was directly addressing your issue, not "the bigger issue".
Yes you did EVENTUALLY say that, after apparently "arguing past each other" with Barton, but later on after you said it was stupid you said:
Now I'm not sure what new-fangled dictionary you're using, but mine tells me that clever and stupid are antonyms.
This is true. But remember I said:
Note the "unlikely to be AS EFFECTIVE". I agree that for some of America (especially more so than the UK) the word socialist has bad connotations, but it's definitely not as bad as communist.
It's not just a closer synonym, it is the synonym. I wouldn't know about the attitude of US lefties to the term socialism so you probably know more than me. What term do they prefer? Don't say "Democrat" because over here the Democrats come across as left of centre, not a true left. However, since socialism is proper term, and since the more knowledgeable lefties will know the proper terms that describe their political philosophy, I reckon that there will be a number (maybe small as I say you probably know more than me) that like the term socialism, regardless of what people say that it has a stigma, because it is correct.
You're right they do and have! However I think it's important that people understand the correct use of political terminology especially when it comes to a discussion on global warming for instance. If first of all we have denialists going on about it all being a commie plot as in the head post, when they are misusing the political terms (because of them not knowing the correct ones, their stupidity or worse, as a piece of spin), then it should be corrected. For if there are denialists out that can't get the science right, so then turn the argument in to a political one, their point is made invalid by the fact they can't get the politics right either.
So how do you propose that the prices will get too high? You give two reasons (tax and PR which I will come to in a sec) but a third is the running out of fossil fuels, which is not related to global warming, so in this third scenario, they would switch for reasons other than climate change.
As I said before, a carbon tax is a big form of government intervention and I was advocating government intervention. You said it should be as little as possible. Still, you also said that companies would do it off their own back by switching to greener fuels regardless of what the government says. Thus a carbon tax isn't an example of them doing it off their own back.
Yes and I believe it's the government support for AGW that is making it look bad for them from a PR perspective if they don't change. Also, the a lot of the main companies aren't such as ExxonMobil and others which aren't changing and funding say the George C. Marshall Institute to spew their filth, the same institute which has backed tobacco companies. PR won't be enough to get these to change. It needs government involvement whatever that may be as that's the only way (related to AGW) that it will happen. You advocated a carbon tax and I still claim this isn't the lowest form of government involvement so I think we should agree that you advocate a high form of government involvement.
Well maybe they are, but there are those for both that claim it is a commie plot so both are relevant to this discussion. The whole right is. Not just a part of it.
I don't really know anything about positive feedback etc maybe someone could help? However what I do know is that it's the same scientists that concluded AGW is happening (which you endorse) that are quantifying it as well. I am perfectly willing to trust these scientists, if you don't, then it just goes back to the main idea that it's a conspiracy, or it's bad science. I don't see how that many scientists can be bad (see my comments above about good and bad people/scientists, social norm, jail etc) so how else unless it's a conspiracy do you propose so many scientists could be wrong by your own belief?
Erm, you already have argued about this.
Brian D said: "What evidence forms the basis of your belief in the low climate sensitivity?" I would also like to know. And the answers to John's questions at #117. Not because I think you're lying or anything, but because I genuinely want to know how you go about arguing against the consensus. If you're right, or onto something, it'll make interesting reading. If not, it will allow the ones in the know so to speak to show you where you're going wrong. And as for "If you think it's worthwhile to try and convince me that I'm wrong, bring on the citations", well I don't think the onus is just on us to provide citations, since we back the consensus, the onus is on you to show (at least generally) your sources so that it can be seen exactly where you're going wrong or what citations we need to provide. (I of course am using "we" here loosely as I'm unlikely to provide citations, being unfamiliar with the exact technical points. Give me a few years when I'll hopefully have some letters after my name!)
let me join in the acclamation of joy to meet somebody who's not apparently being contrarian on agw just for the excuse to be an asshole.
so, my back of the envelope quibble with your quibble is that your assessment of not so much positive feedback tends to clash, in my mind, with the historical observation of the climate wandering off all over the place. it's clear, to me at least, that there are some pretty big negative and positive feedbacks in there with all sorts of parameters and triggers and correlated inputs, and it's the kind of thing where a person is reasonably likely to walk off the edge of a cliff in the dark.
Alex,
I'd like to respond to you point-by-point but with the size of our posts and the exponential growth that would entail, the internet would soon run out of space.
In the U.S., no Liberal would be caught dead referring to themselves as a Socialist. They don't even like referring to themselves as Liberals.
I was saying that, if CO2 abatement was required, I'd prefer a carbon tax. I did not mean to imply that I believed CO2 was necessary yet.
More on CO2 Sensitivity in the next post.
John, Alex, Robert, z,
First, CO2 sensitivity, then my influences.
I think a primary problem in discussing AGW is that we aren't always sure what we're arguing about. As I've said before, I could be considered an AGW believer if the definition was believing that man is responsible for global warming. I do believe that's true, I just don't think we're responsible for more than 0.6 C (at most) over the last 100 years. I do not know of any skeptic that I've read or seen post on a intelligent blog that does not agree with the above. By that definition, AGW is indeed "settled science" and there is no more need for debate.
The real issue of contention is "how much warming will CO2 cause in the future?". In order to get climate sensitivity to the range of 3.0 C +/- 1.5 C (the IPCC forecast) requires positive feedbacks. Many people forecast a higher climate sensitivity. A positive feedback of less than 1 will eventually stabilize but a positive feedback higher than that would lead to a "run-away" system. This would lead to a "tipping-point" such as Hansen and Gore have been warning about.
A climate sensitivity of ~ 3 C is not proven. It is not "settled science". It may be the best theory climate science has at the moment, but at this point it's just a theory. A majority of climate scientists may agree with this theory, but it is not a topic where there is no more need for debate.
In all areas of science, there tends to be a prevailing paradigm. In theoretical physics, it was "string-theory". There was a competing theory called "supergravity". For years, "string-theory" had the upper hand. That's where all the funding went, that's where all the young theoretical physicists went. This doesn't mean that the scientists weren't trying as hard as they could and being as honest as possible. There's nothing wrong with science having a paradigm, in fact that may be the only way it can function. In the end, the "supergravity " folks became relevant after years in the darkness. I understand that "serious AGW" is the current paradigm in climate science and that I'm swimming against the current.
Most believers in "serious AGW" constantly call for everyone defer to the advice of Climate Science experts. This depends on the situation. If I were lost in the forest, I'd be a fool not to take the advice of a survival expert. However, when you're at home on a Saturday afternoon doing the chores, you're not likely to respond to an appeal from a survival expert that you take his week-long class. You don't believe that there is a significant chance of finding yourself in that situation anytime soon. From the survival expert's point of view, outdoor survival skills are vastly important. He can't understand why you don't sign up for the class. His whole life is about outdoor survival, he's probably been a member of rescue teams and seen plenty of people perish because they didn't know what to do (I, for one, am all set since I've watched portions of several Man vs. Wild episodes).
Many experts with a great deal of expertise in their field have urged us to "invest in real estate", "invest in tech stocks", "go to war in Vietnam", "electrical power lines cause cancer", "breast implants are dangerous", "floss every day" etc. etc. Almost all of them are intelligent and had the best intentions. If I'd been placed in a one-on-one debate with any of these experts, they'd have wiped the floor with me. Their whole life has been consumed with these issues. It is not reasonable to ask me to either believe everything they say or acquire an equal level of expertise before disagreeing with them.
I was born a contrarian. When everyone picked their favorite Beatle, I picked George. I claimed to like the Beach Boys better than the Beatles (although I'm not sure I really did). My favorite flavor milk shake at McDonalds was strawberry. I spent a lot of time thinking about public policy (and taking whatever history classes I could manage while getting my LAS Math degree). About 15 years ago, I ran across Reason magazine and found that I agreed with almost everything I read. I discovered that I was probably a Libertarian. I found that I avoided doctrinaire Libertarians and anyone that mentioned Ayn Rand, so I was probably a small "l" libertarian. I believe I first became aware of the AGW issue through my reading on radical environmentalism.
I thought it odd that the same groups of people lined up against each other on such a broad range of issues. Thomas Sowell's "Conflict of Visions" cleared that up for me (the most important book I've ever read). I get stacks of books on AGW, Universal Health Care, Economics, History and Baseball for my birthday and Christmas (and whenever my wife isn't looking). My kids think that's very strange. "Code of the Street" by Elijah Anderson is the most important book I've read in the last five years.
I've read Michaels, Singer, Spencer, Fagan, Bailey, Svensmark & Huber (among many others, almost all of which are on the skeptical side). I have never read an entire IPCC report or any complete scientific study. However, when studies are referenced by skeptics, I make a point to check "mainstream" sites to get their opinion. I started reading serious blogs when I stumbled on to ClimateAudit because of the Y2K issue with GISS. I like Climate-Skeptic for the way he doesn't push alternate theories, but I find commenting there to be boring. I regularly read Tamino, Deltoid and RealClimate to get their point of view. If I read anything something significant at CA, I see what the opposition has to say. I read the opposition to discover weaknesses in skeptical arguments, verify what I've heard elsewhere and to, occasionally, learn something. I find the level of civility to be higher at the skeptical sites. I am usually only motivated to post when the topic is "the only way anyone could disagree with "serious" AGW is if they're evil or on the Exxon payroll".
I've never seen a "serious AGW" rebuttal of my "back of the envelope" climate sensitivity point (which I have gotten from Climate-Skeptic). I'd be interested in hearing a reasoned argument about where I might have it wrong.
z,
I agree. And I don't think we have a very complete knowledge about the size and sign of all those feedbacks.
Bill Bodell posts:
You're leaving out large parts of the equation. It's not a simple linear relationship between CO2 and temperature. You have to take all the forcings into account, including solar, aerosol, etc.
You believe wrong. Google "Clausius-Clapeyron law."
Carbon dioxide does not affect either the amount of energy coming from the sun or the amount of cosmic rays arriving from the universe; i.e., neither feeds back on CO2.
Barton already pointed out one problem with your statement, but giving you the benefit of the doubt and assuming you meant forcings, not feedbacks ... why do you say they are unknown?
We MEASURE solar output and cosmic rays and have for decades now.
"unknown" would also appear to mean "unmeasurable".
Sunspot or other solar cycles? Tamino just posted today on the subject. His specialty is period analysis, i.e. analyzing cycles in data. Why would I trust the dubious handwavers saying "there must be an unknown mechanism! Must be!" over the analysis of professionals?
BillBodell:
The big "If". You only need to look around to see how hard it is to warm-up the oceans.
e.g. there has been only a tiny amount of overall warming south of 40S latitude in the last 30 years. That's nearly all ocean except for Antarctica which has little effect because of its very high albedo.
Also e.g., compare warming over the oceans with warming over the land (shown here about half way down the page). Warming over land has been about 2.5 times warming over the oceans in the past 30 years. If you just took the warming over land, the indicated sensitivity can easily be 3 deg C per CO2 doubling.
My link didn't come out in my last comment:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/
dhogaza,
Thanks for the benefit of the doubt. I was most of the way through a long reply assuming that BPL didn't know what he was talking about. I realized that the chances of BPL making stupid mistakes were slim, re-read his post, realized that the problem was my interchangable use of feedback and forcing and decided to postpone my response until I could think things through a little better.
I believe the idea behind a forcing is that it would be independent, while a feedback would be caused by something else. But, couldn't almost anything (other than solar & cosmic rays) be either?
Chris,
I'm not saying that the lag can't be longer than 20 years, just that's what would have been required to observe the resulting warming.
Bill Bodell:
This is a little bit of a sweeping generalisation.
Whilst I admit that there can be quite a bit of sniping from the ranks of those that give credence to AGW, there is just as much, if not more, from the denialists' side. Pop over to Morahasy's site if you don't believe me.
Oh, and as I have said a number of times, I am of a sceptical inclination myself. This means that I look at the data, and reason from the best analyses that can be performed on them. I continually look for the nugget that will knock my socks off, but with respect to AGW I have yet to see the convincing mathematics that would contradict the very large case for AGW.
I am too sceptical to trust unquestioningly that the AGW case is forever carved in stone, and I hope that I am open to any future evidence that proves otherwise. However, to date I am infinity more sceptical about the denialist cases that have been made - as much as I try to find reason otherwise - so I have yet to be lured to the 'dark' side.
I really think that it is time that 'sceptic' and 'skeptic' were removed from labelling the body of folk who really, deep down, are denialists, but that is more the topic of another thread that is percolating now.
BillBodell:
I presume what you actually mean by these words is: "I'm not saying that the lag can't be longer than 20 years, just that's what is required to observe the resulting (relatively low) warming."
In that case, since I've pointed out how much the oceans slow down warming, I presume you now don't have any problem with a 3 deg C/double CO2 producing the observed warming.
Oh, and Bill.
I hope you don't take my previous post itself as sniping! It was meant as a genuine comment, and not as an attack on you. I actually appreciate the considered nature of your posts, even if we sometimes part company on interpretations.
Cheers.
I don't think liberals "would be caught dead" calling themselves socialist yeah, but mainly because they aren't the same thing as far as I'm aware (especially economically). Or was this your answer to when I asked what the term is that the American lefties use? If so that's interesting and bizarre! I always thought that liberals could be left or right depending on their exact liberal stance. Kind of like the political compass if you've seen that.
I wasn't debating whether a carbon tax would be necessary or not. What I was saying is that though you want as little government involvement as possible "if CO2 abatement was required", a carbon tax doesn't represent a low form of government involvement, nor is there a way for companies (not just some but the ones that are the worst CO2 emitters especially) to change to greener fuels with an uninvolved government. There are three scenarios which I can see would make them lower emissions:
1.PR- though this will only happen if ALL the politicians (say Democrats AND Republicans in America) create negative PR for these companies by endorsing the AGW consensus i.e. government involvement.
2.Carbon Tax or caps or whatever-high government involvement
3.Prices make it more viable for green fuels than fossil fuels- this can only happen if either the government subsidises it (or the scientists developing greener technology), or when there is a worldwide shortage of fossil fuels (either because there is no more which will happen sooner or later, or because of where such fuels come from due to the regions' instability).
Sorry I might be wrong, but I thought this was what we are responsible for?
Unfortunately Bill, I've seen quite a few, and I haven't been subscribing to ScienceBlogs for very long at all.
Again, I may be mistaken, but from everything I've ever read, the quantification of how much warming CO2 could do with a doubling of it is settled science in the same vein as CO2 causes warming in the first place. I mean it is the same scientists as well saying that, that said before that AGW is happening. Course I could be wrong (one of us is here for sure) so I look forward to someone telling me or you why it is/isn't settled science.
I'm hoping Bill that your area of expertise is not physics like your father-in-law else my criticism could get me into trouble here! Still providing I get the exam results I want in August, I'll be reading physics at Oxford so hopefully I haven't got this wrong.
Anyway, I think your analogy using string theory was a bad one. I get the overall point you're trying to make here, that sometimes the consensus isn't settled, but I don't think this applies to string theory. As far as I'm aware, string theory is one possible idea with plenty of mathematical basis for a Theory of Everything. But that's just it. It only has a mathematical basis and the same science that relativity and quantum mechanics are based on to form it. After that, it seems like an interesting idea that hypothesises strings, extra dimensions and branes. I don't think that many (if any at all) have ever claimed string theory (in its various forms) to be correct and settled science, more that a lot of physicists have had high hopes for it as the right one of the candidates for a ToE.
Personally, string theory (or superstring theory or M theory or whatever) is a nice idea. The idea of strings gets rid of point particles, which is quite cool, and a ToE is always welcome. However, its need for a multitude of extra dimensions to avoid tachyons seems to be just too crazy even for theoretical physics. I hope reality isn't really like that. Normality would be nice please. I mean its hypothesises are going to very difficult to verify experimentally if at all even with the LHC.
Hmm, again I don't think this analogy is quite right though I get what you mean. I think the AGW equivalent of a survival expert, is if the survival expert was saying (regardless of whether you're indoors or outdoors) that you are 100% definitely going to get lost in the Amazon rainforest and you should take his advice to survive the Amazon, while your beliefs about AGW amount to you as the survival expert telling us all we're going to get lost in a forest somewhere, and then saying this is how to survive. Both you and the experts are claiming AGW is happening (or getting lost in a wooded area will happen) but you disagree on how bad (or the size of the forest).
In your analogy, just because you're inside and it doesn't seem realistic doesn't make the expert wrong. Therefore while you might not take the expert's advice that you need this training, it doesn't mean he is any less wrong.
I don't know about the first two things you mentioned there, but I don't think there's been any consensus on those others between the experts. And that's the important thing. It goes idea, consensus, settled. What I mean is that one expert may have said to the President (I don't really know much about Vietnam sorry) "we need to invade," while the rest disagreed. It doesn't mean the expert's right (ignoring the fact that that's politics and not science, so "right" isn't easy to define) because he's an expert. And nor would it make all those that disagreed with this lone expert right because they have the consensus (though they are more likely). If Vietnam was a science matter, then only when it was settled would someone be "right". The same goes for AGW: it's not the consensus that makes it true but its settled nature. How far it is settled is what you disagree on compared to the consensus.
Absolutely. I mean the Emperor's New Clothes and all where it's the child that points out the problem is an illustration if this. But I think it is reasonable to believe the settled science which you do just what is settled science is what we differ on. You don't have to go with the consensus as this isn't always right. I don't automatically go "string theory is right" just because it's consensus. But to disagree though, while a mere child can do it, I think you need to base it on something. The child in the story based it on the logic that the Emperor is naked but he's supposedly wearing new clothes so something was wrong with the consensus. So no you don't need to be an expert to disagree so long as you're basing it on something scientifically relevant (and not say politics like some sceptics do). It could then be a useful insight.
So would I. Also, has anyone got any links that describe everything to do with these positive feedbacks that make it 3C for doubled CO2?
CO2 can - you now know why the denialist triumphant cry that warming at the end of ice ages preceeds a rise in CO2 concentration in the atmosphere by up to 800 years is a meaningless statement.
Alex,
As I was making my analogies, I kept thinking that they were slightly off and trying to improve them. Eventually, I gave up and went with what I had. It looks like you interpreted my general meaning quite well in spite of the flaws. There might be some quibbles, but I'm generally happy (and surprised) that so much got through. More about climate sensitivity to come.
I don't contend that a carbon tax is "less government", just that it seems to be the "least" government that will get the job done. I'm not opposed to government, I'd just like to see as little of it as possible.
dhogaza,
The way I saw the 800 year CO2 lag situation was that Al Gore was trying to make it seem like (intentionally or not) the graph was evidence that CO2 caused warming. The fact that CO2 actually lagged warming made him look bad (and provide ammunition to skeptics) and served to remove that argument from his quiver. I don't see the lag as proving the opposite case (that warming caused all the CO2 rise). I understand the "serious" AGW argument that CO2 was a feedback to warming initially caused by CO2 and consider that plausible.
I've been googling "IPCC Climate Sensitivity" on and off all day looking for the explanation behind the IPCC 3.0 C +/- 1.5 C estimate for climate sensitivity. My goal was to see exactly how the IPCC justified it. No luck. I'm not saying that it doesn't exist, just that I can't find it. Any help?
Meanwhile, I kept running into site after site that argued against it. I've seen enough AGW proponents say "Google X" that I think I might try saying "google 'IPCC Climate Sensitivity'".
As an example (a skeptical site's interpretation of the original study):
Which seems to agree with the study's abstract on Schwartz's web site
(maybe the scientists among you will tell me if the two don't match up. What the heck is K? Can't be Kelvin right? Alternative symbol for Celsius?)
Stephen E. Schwartz is a pretty mainstream scientist. The skeptics still think he has it a little too high.
To get back around to my primary point, I agree that global warming, the greenhouse effect and AGW is "settled science". I don't believe the magnitude of climate sensitivity is "settled" and that seems to be the most important issue at the moment.
Yes I'm pretty sure K is Kelvin. Both Kelvin and Celcius are proprtional. What I mean is 1 degree K is the same as 1 degree C, just that the two temperature scales are offset by 273 degrees. However, since Kelvin is a SI unit, then it's probably more common to see temperatures in scientific publications given as this, with the skeptic site giving it in Celcius because it's more common among the layperson
Hmm I'm sure that some people on here will probably have something to say about Stephen E. Schwartz and his study that Bill gave above. Not heard of him myself but then I wouldn't expect myself to (I really need to get acquainted with the names of the usual characters that come up in these debates).
However, I did a quick google and wikipedia was high up as per usual, and his entry has this to say on him and global warming:
There was also a pdf link on there to do with it. Make of that what you will.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_E._Schwartz
I'll be out of town for a couple of days. If the conversation is still going on, I'll rejoin then. Otherwise, it's been a pleasure.
Bill
The analogies could've been terrible, and the flaws that I pointed out, they were fairly good and did get the points you were trying to make across, which is the main thing. I often find that when I'm talking to people, and I want to use an analogy/metaphor, that they're usually really crappy, but a few hours later I'll think of a really good one and be kicking myself. It's just a minor version of "turn-the-clock-back syndrome."
I know the feeling of not wanting the government to be too much on your back! The thing about carbon tax is that I think at this precise moment it doesn't help. Sure, it gives the governments plenty of spending money, but it is also unfair right now. It taxes the most emitting cars which is fair enough, but the most emitting ones are most likely to be 4X4s. These are needed by a lot of their users such as farmers and most don't have a choice about using them (though I think "soccer mums" do). Meanwhile, there isn't really a viable alternative for people that are badly affected by a carbon tax. There aren't enough economical (if any) green cars on the road yet. This is what I would advocate especially to start off with. The governments should be subsidizing a lot more scientists and industry to develop/research the green technology and technology related to it. By this I mean especially nuclear fusion, hydrogen fuels, and algae methods of producing hydrogen/vegetable oil. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_hydrogen_production_(Algae)
Also we need to look at viable space travel too, so that nuclear waste can be safely disposed. I think that more research in carbon nanotube space elevators and laser launch systems (http://www.thespacereview.com/article/437/1) is needed for this. The reason I advocate nuclear fission is that it is greener than fossil fuels, and we can control where the waste products (assuming we don't get rid of these too http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_Fast_Reactor) go. I don't know about America but I know that Britain can't survive solely on renewable energies like wind, solar, hydro etc, and if we have a hydrogen economy we have to power it at the source with something so until nuclear fusion or biologically produced hydrogen are viable, we need nuclear fission here in Britain at least to fill the energy gap in a CO2-lite country. As much renewable first, then nuclear fission to top it off.
I think once subsidizing has worked and the technology I mentioned above is cheaper, more reliable and economical, then we can go to a carbon tax, and after that if we can get the world to run completely reliantly on non-CO2 fuels, then maybe even completely phase them out. I don't think taxing them or banning them now will work, but only when we can be completely reliant on them without any losses. It would be like (and now it's my turn for a bad analogy!) Sony bringing out a Playstation 4 (I'm sure it will eventually), but then stopping production of the Playstation 3 straight away.
Sorry about the formatting and hyperlinking problems above. Hopefully people can see what was meant to come out.
BillBodell wrote:
Did you try the fourth hit on your search, viz., [this one](http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/meeting/CSW/product/CSW_Report.pdf)? In particular, look at the abstracts and Annex 5.
Um, are you really up to understanding this stuff if you're having difficulty interpreting K?
And do they give their reasons for that?
I was out of town for two days. I thought I put up a message here saying so, but I don;t see it, so I'm assuming I messed up.
This thread is getting a little long and old, but I don't want to be seen as not repling to anything. From here on out, I'll only respond if someone specificly asks me something.
Robert,
Through further research I discovered that the interchangable use of K and C for changes in magnitude is not recommended but is apparently widespread in scientific documents. I know it threw me. I actually hadn't known that K and C had the same scale with only different starting points. People are always telling non-scientists to "read the actual scientific studies". If we do as recommended, this sort of thing is going to happen.
I had seen your link and browsed the pdf looking for where the current climate sensitivity was explained. I couldn't find it. When you pointed out the link, I read it again and still can't find it. The point of the conference seems to focus on how to use computer models determine if the 3.0 C +/- 1.5 C climate sensitivity used by the IPCC is correct. If you saw anything specific to how the current 3.0 C sensitivity is determined, please point it out specificly.
re: #138, #144, #145
BillBodell:
Here are some sources, with comments:
1) IPCC Climate Change 2007, The Physical Science Basis, Section 8.6, see especially 8.6.1, 8.6.2.
Table 8.2 gives the estimates from various models, which range from 2.1C to 4.4C, and Section 8.6.2 summarizes reasons for their range. Figure 8.14 compares the climate feedback parameters across the models.
2) There is a current discussion of climate sensitivity at Real Climate.
3) There is a discussion of Schwartz's paper as well, at Real Climate, guest by tamino. You might want to start with that one, since it's a good intro: read the first few paragraphs and the last few paragraphs. Also, read his reference to this post in RC.
4) Bottom line:
There is a huge amount of data, analysis and papers by competent professionals (references embedded in the above references) that bound the doubling from 280 to 560 to the 2C to 4.5C range. This is complicated enough that, like many similar such things in the past, it takes a good while for uncertainties to reduce, and the IPCC explains that in detail.
Schwartz (who is a competent professional as well) said 1.1C +/-.5 in a recent paper. Striking results *often* don't stand up. Lindzen's IRIS didn't, and I'd guess this one won't. Tamino already has offered some reasons why not, and notes that's how real science works. Even competent professionals make mistakes.
5) After you study this stuff, you ought to seriously consider why you are *so* willing to accept an estimate so far away from the huge bulk of work (as in #109, before you understood the difference between K and C), and why you are so trusting of "skeptic" websites and so distrusting of scientists. It's one thing to have normal healthy skepticism, but to overweight highly-variant results in an area outside one's expertise is something very different, and it's certainly been seen before. Some people are normally skeptical in many areas, but totally different in others, as showed up in the climate change kerfuffle in Skeptical Inquirer last summer. Some skeptics couldn't even make themselves read beyond one paragraph into a straightforward article by a NASA scientist, because it said AGW was real.
I'm sorry to say, but some websites have been designed exactly to confuse people with your political leanings and level of scientific knowledge. Some run well-design marketing campaigns patterned after the cigarette wars, targeted to specific sub-populations.
They are likely to cause you to act against your own (or your kids') interests in behalf of a relatively small set of other people who have very obvious economic interests in never having CO2 limits of any sort. If you have major stock holdings of the right sort, especially in coal, then the above doesn't apply - it's in your interest to have people burn as much (oil+gas, and then coal) as fast as possible and keep the price up, and to avoid alternate energy sources as long as possible. That first runs the US economy off a cliff, and later, the climate. It certainly helps them (in the short term), it might help you for a little while, but it won't leave your descendants an economy they'll like very much.
In any case, given that it is all too likely that we're going to run over the 560ppm mark, whether it's 2C or 3C shouldn't be a big argument. This is like driving in the fog towards a cliff, with experts telling us that between 20 and 40 seconds from now, we'll go over the cliff, and arguing that until we know exactly, there's no problem, and we should hit the gas until then.
The question is NOT: "do we know something exactly?", it's "Do we know enough to start taking action?".
About 20 minutes ago, I almost fell out of my seat when I saw a TV commercial with Nancy Pelosi and Newt Gingrich agreeing that we must take action to address climate change. They don't necessarily agree on the actions, and of course, this is no surprise from Nancy (since in CA, we quite well understand that AGW is going to be very, very expensive for us (and for the US, since CA is the biggest subsidizer of the Fed Gove and other states).
But seeing Newt ... wow!
BillBodell asked:
Bill, you're reading but you're not seeing. The purpose of that conference wasn't to determine if an estimate of 3.0C is correct. It was to refine the estimates to see if they could be improved. It worries me that you missed that. You've made another mistake -- the conference summary makes clear that the current estimates of climate sensitivity fall into a range between 1.5 and 4.5 C. Not only can you see that in the abstracts and Annex 5, you can also see that in paragraph 2 on page 1 of the report. The inaccurate but shorthand way to describe that range is "3.0 +/- 1.5" but: 1) you won't find that phrase in the report; and 2) you've fallen into a trap of thinking there's consensus that the sensitivity is 3.0 C, so that's what you've been looking for.
On the one hand, you claim upthread that the "science is not settled." On the other, you say you're convinced by your back-of-the-envelope estimator that the sensitivity is less than 1.0 C, implying that the science is simple enough to be resolved on a 3x5 card. Perhaps you think this is simple but unsettled? Please examine why you think this to be the case.
Robert,
Paragraph 2, page 1 as follows:
I know that the last three IPCC assessments have estimated climate sensitivity as being in the range of 1.5 to 4.5 C. I was looking for how the IPCC arrived at that. That was what I was intially looking for. I believed that you were referring to that link because the information was there.
I am not suggesting that the science is "settled" because I'm smarter than everyone else and it was so simple, even a non-scientist could solve the problem. I think you fail to understand my point. I am arguing that climate sensitivity is not "settled". Would you use the term "settled science" for climate sensitivity?
My point about the "back of the envelope" calculation is that, given the CO2 increase since 280 ppm and the rise in tempurature in the 20th century (0.6 C), that (everything else being equal) would point to a climate sensivity of 1.2 C. It could be more or less. It could be more if the net effect of other forcings was negative. It could be less if there the net of other forcings was positive. Go ahead, show me where the other negative forcings were and why they'll stop being there in the future.
John Mashey,
1, Thanks. 2. & 3. I've been following them 4. True. I agree, striking results often don't stand up, other times (far less often) they indicate a crack in the current paradigm.
I do not see the debate about climate sensitivity (as you seem to) as being between non-scientist skeptics and scientists. There are web sites on both sides, informed observers on both sides and scientists on both sides. There may well be more scientists on one side than another, but it is clearly not just uninformed, on the Exxon payroll PR flacks against all good and pure scientists on the other.
In an area in which knowledge has not yet become "settled science" (and, yes, I'm including the true value of climate sensitivity in that category) what is one to do? One often needs to have an opinion on things that are not known for certain. Why go with the minority view? It's not at all clear. You feel better about the people who hold that view? I just feels right? It fits in better with the way you see other things work? You just like standing out in a crowd?
I agree that a difference between 2 C and 3 C or between 5 C and 6 C is not significant.
The most disturbing part of your post is when you start going on about how "some websites have been designed exactly to confuse people" like me. I had thought that you were better than those that use the "the only ones that oppose us are in the pay of Exxon" argument. Some people are so certain that they're right (based on the obvious observation that they're smarter than almost everyone they know) that they believe the only way anyone could disagree with them is if they are evil or are naive and led astray by those that are evil. This does a disservice to people like me. Although I value intellect, if I see 10 intellectually elite people on one side and 10,000 "common" people on the other side, I'm likely to think that the "common" people know something that the elite don't, even if they are unable to clearly explain the basis of their opinion (see Thomas Sowell's Conflict of Visions for a full analysis). Implying that I can be easily misled into acting against my own welfare and that of my children by some smooth talking PR people is insulting.
You assume that the only way someone could be against you would be if it was in their short term financial interest. Businessmen and investors are also concerned about the longer term (although it is not always apparent). Exactly what kind of monster would it take to say to himself "I'm going to allow millions of deaths as a consequence of GW because I can make money off of it"? A more likely scenario is that they see what they believe to be wrong science hurting their interests (they may be wrong, but I credit them with good intentions). An example might be the breast implant industry. When junk science was causing bankruptcies to businesses that had never done anything wrong, if they'd said "there's no evidence of breast implants causing harm", you might have said that that was a carefully orchestrated campaign to protect their financial interests at the expense of the suffering women. In retrospect, they might have just been convinced that they didn't do anything wrong, that breast implants weren't dangerous and that they, their employees, their investors and even some of the women that received implants were suffering needlessly. If that's what they were thinking, then they would have been right.
And, if Exxon is so evil, why is BP so good, pushing hard for alternative energy? Does BP have some concern about the long-term that Exxon lacks? Has it occurred to the greens that BP is pushing for actions from governments that would lead to their making more money? I don't have a problem with Exxon or BP. I don't understand why only one of them is evil. Are some businesses "good" and some "bad"? And is the way to tell the difference by observing which ones agree with you?
BB:
No, everything else being ignored, which they don't have to be as Annan points out in section 3.1 of his paper.
As Annan points out:
"Many studies have attempted to estimate climate sensitivity using the overall warming
trend of the last several decades or century, using a range of models, methods and prior
assumptions [Knutti et al., 2002; Gregory et al., 2002; Andronova and Schlesinger , 2001; Forest et al., 2002]."
but also:
"The resulting pdfs have generally shown that the recent warming does
not provide a useful constraint when compared to the long-established (albeit subjective) estimate of 1.5-4.5 â¦C. One fundamental reason for this is that the net forcing is itself not well constrained, and in particular is not constrained well away from zero, due to the possibility of sulphate aerosols substantially cancelling out the greenhouse gas forcing. If the net forcing is small, then climate sensitivity would have to be very high to explain the observed warming."
"Nevertheless, the results rarely assign a high probability to values in excess of 10 â¦C, and they generally point to a maximum likelihood value well within the conventional range."
"We use as a typical representative of this class of constraints a probabilistic estimate of (1,3,10) where in this notation, used throughout this paper, the central value indicates the maximum likelihood estimate in degrees Celsius and the outer values represent the limits of the 95% confidence interval for a pdf, or 95% of the area under the curve for a likelihood function."
So Annan is pointing out that the research done using 20th Century warming has led to a maximum likelihood estimate of climate sensitivity of 3 degrees Celsius with a 95% confidence interval of 1 degree Celsius to 10 degrees Celsius. So just accounting for CO2 forcing and ignoring everything else simply amounts to ignoring all the scientific research.
BillBodell:
1. The abstracts I pointed to show how the working group arrived at describing the estimated sensitivity as being in the range of 1.5 to 4.5 -- it's cuz the estimates are in the range of 1.5 to 4.5. That's what your question was, and I pointed to the exact place you could find the answer.
2. In #109 above you said said that you believe that climate sensitivity was probably less than 1.0 C. Would you please explain why you believe it's "probably" less than 1.0 C when all of the models whose abstracts I pointed to fall in the range 1.5 to 4.5 C?
3. I believe it is settled science that there are feedbacks between temperature and CO2. I believe it is settled science that there are time lags in the warming system. I believe it is settled that the back-of-the-envelope estimate you took from Climate-Skeptic ignores both of those effects. BTW, in #124 your wrote: "I find the level of civility to be higher at the skeptical sites." Another thing I believe is that it's cuz you don't have a sense of humor.
#149 BillBodell
1) The reason I comment on the websites is that I've studied them and their funding extensively, as well as the use of advertising techniques and campaigns.
A 1990s Western Fuels [coal] memo describes ways in which to convince people that more CO2 is really good for the world, goes through target audiences receptive to this and how to reach them, and their #1 audience is older conservative males, listing characteristics that I think you fit pretty well. As far as I know, it's not online, but I have seen it in a credible PPT presentation, and it will show up in a meticulously-researched book I know is coming. It's standard market-research+campaign, but nothing to do with science.
2) I have been a manager, director, or VP in 4 companies, including being a company officer across an IPO. I've helped sell computers to most big oil companies and auto companies. I work with venture capitalists and startups and give lectures on such. Does that sound anti-business?
3) As for
'Exactly what kind of monster would it take to say to himself "I'm going to allow millions of deaths as a consequence of GW because I can make money off of it"?'
Have you ever heard of the cigarette business?
The business plans of cigarette companies *depend* on hooking kids early enough to "wire" their brains for addiction, because people who start in their 20s have a much better chance of stopping, so they need to catch them earlier, preferably around 12-14.
Read Allan Brandt's "The Cigarette Century" and Chris Mooney's "The Republican War on Science" and maybe Jeff Goodell's "Big Coal" (I grew up right near coal country in Western PA, and I'm sorry: I learned a long time ago that some coal operators were OK, and some could care less how many men died or got black lung, because the owners would be off to the next mine.)
A bunch of the people and organizations {thinktanks, PR agencies, lobbyists} involved in protecting cigarette profits by saying "it's your right and no regulation of anything" also get money from other people. Some of the same people use the same well-honed tactics.
So, you want to trust your kids and grandkids to the sort of folks who created and marketed "Twista Lime", "Kauai Kolada", "Warm Winter Toffee" and similar products. You certaintly dont' want to trust those elitist scientists who say that cigarettes are bad for them.
Good luck, so long, killfile.
152 John Mashey:
Apologies for the off-topic, but if I may ask, which book will that memo be appearing in?
John Mashey,
Since I've been "killfiled" you won't be reading this but, for those following along.
I don't know what's wrong with any of the above. You don't think Al Gore's recent PR campaign did similar things? The only possible problem would be if Western Fuels didn't believe what they were trying to convince other of.
I don't recall ever saying that you were anti-business.
After all the intelligent discussion it's disapointing to see your posts devolve into the standard "It's all Exxon's fault" and "It's just like cigarette companies" pablum.
Chris, Robert,
I've since found some links to where the 1.5 C to 4.5 C estimate comes from. Apparently, someone 30 years ago averaged the output of two models together and added 1.5 for an error range. Since, there have been studies that generally confirm that range. Just to be clear, I never meant to suggest that such studies didn't exist (I knew they must), I was just having a difficult time finding them.
Why do I think that the actual climate sensitivity is below 1.0 C? Well, when it gets down to the technical details, I'd have to play "my scientist against your scientist" and that wouldn't help any of us. In the manner of a "who's most likely to win the World Series" opinion, my thinking goes like this. If climate sensitivity was 3.0 C for a doubling of CO2 and we are 40% of the way to a doubling from 280 ppm to 560 ppm (which should have resulted in over 50% of the warming), then the globe should have warmed 1.5 C in the 20th century. It didn't, it warmed 0.6 C. Some of the ways that this discrepency has been explained away (heat being stored in the oceans, areosols etc.) just don't do it for me.
This thread is getting so that I have to scroll down too far to find it. That and the fact that John doesn't like me means that it's probably time to close this one. If anyone says anything really interesting, I might reply, otherwise, this is it. It's been the best blog discussion I've been involved in for quite a while.
BillBodell wrote:
"...just don't do it for me." No other reason, just a feeling? Perhaps even after this thread you think of yourself as skeptical but you exhibit the characteristics of someone in denial.
BillBodell wrote:
That's cuz our senses of humor are finely tuned.
re: #153 Brian D
Naomi Oreskes is working on another book; if you've seen "The American Denial of Global Warming", that's about the George C. Marshall Institute piece. She did another talk at Stanford last week, mostly about the Western Fuels Association's campaign of the 1990s. It will probably be a year until it gets out.
See Only in it for the Gold - Defense of Kestenbaum, my posts of April 18 and 19th.
Robert,
I, obviously, hit the wrong tone there. I was trying to imply that my opinion on a topic such climate sensitivity is without scientific value. I have been trying to make the argument that climate sensitivity is not "settled science". You've asked why I believe the figure is less than 1.0 C and I replied.
As for the sense of humor comments, what do you mean? After all, I was the one with the funny "commie" comments.
#158 John Mashey:
Thank you. Yes, I'd seen that video (I post on YouTube as "TempestStormwind" and had been defending that video since Tim and Tamino both linked it; I noticed your arrival there and thank you for your work on the Schulte affair, amongst other things); knowing it's from Oreskes is encouraging (and gets me wishing that talk had been recorded, for the same reasons I'm glad her American Denial talk was). I'll keep an eye out for updates.
re: #160 Brian D
I'm afraid YouTube is not the best site for serious discussions, but your patience is admirable.
They did record it, but I have no idea if it will get to be public.
BB:
Have you ever calculated how much heat the oceans can absorb or don't factual calculations "do it for you"?
Or in this case, my (BB's) scientist against your 10,000 scientists.
Bill Bodell writes:
The Board of Directors of Exxon-Mobil?
Your idea that no one can really be a villain is touching but naive. Big corporations in Nazi Germany lent themselves to projects to gas Jews, and employed slave labor. Big tobacco companies in the USA spent millions to learn how to hook kids on cigarettes. Big companies in the PRC sell toys painted with lead compounds to kids in the US. The people behind these decisions may not be slavering serial murderers, but they are obviously willing to do anything that will keep filling their bank accounts.
Bill Bodell writes:
And why do they "just [not] do it" for you, Bill? Because accepting them would blow away your hypothesis?
Maybe I've misjudged you and you actually wrote a radiative-convective model of the Earth's atmosphere, taking into account a model for the distribution and properties of industrial aerosols, and concluded that their effect was negligible? Because if you didn't do that, why should we give any consideration at all to your protest that such explanations "just don't it" for you? What would such a statement mean in that case except that you were going to believe what you wanted to believe, and the hell with the evidence?
I LOV\E LOVE LOVE how libertarians who generally know essentially nothing about economics started out by denying the existence of global warming and based on that denial posited conspiracy theories about how emissions trading was a Commie One World Government plot.
Never mind that emissions trading was developed in the US from the 1980's (originally to deal with problems almost entirely unrelated to global warming) precisely because it requires LESS government intervention and allows greater scope for the private sector.
Now some at least of the libertarians have reluctantly started to accept reality- but can't give up their conspiracy theories about the evils of emissiond trading.
With their usual faith in their own ability as Randian Ubermensnchen to solve any problem, they've set out to fidn an alternative to emissions trade - and have coem up with the carbon taxes.
Never mind that any competent economist could explain to them why an optimally efficient carbon tax and a carbon emissions trading scheme would have essentially identical economic impacts.
So the supposed champions of free markets are committed to arguing that governments are more efficient than companies and markets in setting the price of carbon.
In other news, War is Peace, Love is Hate and Ignorance is Strength.
Emissions trading Ian? Surely you're not talking about Carbon Off-setting?
I think the technical term for that is PWNAGE.