Pix of the day

"not a single Republican thinks they don't understand GW at all"

It is most unfortunate that right-wing talk show hosts probably cover climate change more often than New York Times.

This graph measures threat assessment vs perceived knowledge in ideological opposites. Knowledge increases the threat for Democrats and decreases it for Republicans. The reason is no doubt that the Democrats have no idea how to eliminate the threat and the Republicans do.

The reason is no doubt that the Democrats have no idea how to eliminate the threat and the Republicans do.

You mean, like, haul the scientists involved in front of Congress and accuse them of fraud?

Or did you mean try to charge them with fraud in criminal court, as the republican AG of Virginia is attempting to do?

The ideal Republican plan would be to halt funding for climate studies outside of NASA NOAA, so such hearings would be moot. But, once again you misidentify the task at hand.

Right now the world gets about 90% of its power from burning carbon and 10% from other sources. It is generally agreed - even by raging climate deniers - that those percentages have to be flipped by the end of the century. That is the task and further research, while no doubt interesting and informative, is tangential to accomplishing the task.

But, once again you misidentify the task at hand.

I've correctly identified the threat as perceived by the new Republican leadership, and their self-proclaimed actions will be to attack the threat as they see it, which is the message science brings to the table.

It is generally agreed - even by raging climate deniers - that those percentages have to be flipped by the end of the century.

I'm not talking about all raging climate deniers, just those sitting in positions of power in the new House.

Jules will have you for lunch. Cooking stoats is a ladylike thing.

Paul Kelly: How many raging climate deniers are advocating for rapid transformation to low-carbon economy? Could you give us some evidence that there is a general agreement about this?

Rocco.

Just off the top of my head, there's Anthony Watts who attacks climates science on a daily basis, but who lives a very low carbon lifesytyle and has spearheaded alternative deployment both in his home and his community(Not an endorsement of Watts's science views).

You've added "rapid transformation", which we may agree on but might not be the same as "by the end of the century". Either way, there are many who see the necessity for reasons other than climate. My opinion is that continued insistence on "winning the climate argument" is, at this point, just gumming up the works.

Hank,

I've never commented on Watts's blog so it's doubtful he knows about my efforts. As you know, I come here for answers to questions about climate science. As far as recruitment, I'm mainly focused on small businesses and individuals in Chicago. Of course, you are more than welcome to participate in the Leo High School Project.

Sadly, the bunker mentality tends to take over after years of trying to get past the proliferation of idiocy to the substance. For preference, it would be good to avoid spending energy on feeding conflict with people who have slight differences from us. It makes those in agreement into too small a group to be able to do enough.

No matter that the blame for this rests solidly on the denial industry, we have to encourage those who are willing to act and avoid the blame game no matter how righteous.

My two cents: I'm good at being the fool who rushes in ...

PK, have you recruited AW for your program, or signed up with his if he's recruiting? Can you find any more people who would agree with you and him? I'd love to see you organize more toward these goals you share. Perhaps the two of you could get together somehow?

You must be joking, Hank ... neither of these people are objective, but are driven by politics, and they're both open about it.

Paul Kelly:

I've never commented on Watts's blog so it's doubtful he knows about my efforts. As you know, I come here for answers to questions about climate science

This is stupid. The place to go for a summary of climate science is to read IPCC WG1.

Any other strategy proves you to be ideologically driven.

[The comments here are degenerating rather rapidly. I've deleted a few which were quite unproductive. Don't make me kill again. I'm really not quite sure why PFK raises quite the level of outrage that he clearly does.

To address the exchange above: I really don't understand what D is saying. The IPCC is a splendid report but it won't respond to you if you ask it questions. Suggesting that asking questions on blogs about climate science is "stupid" is not itself very sensible -W]

dhogaza,

What part of (Not an endorsement of Watts's science views) don't you understand? He's just an example for Rocco of a denier who's into energy transformation.

As to the stupidity of coming here for science answers, the IPCC WG1 came out in 2007, based mainly on papers published in 2006 and before. Lots of science since then.

As to being driven by politics, I've said often that energy transformation can be better achieved outside the political arena and should be seen as a social movement rather than a political one. Grab a glove and get in the game, pal.

Just to help with the education side. It seems to be much worse than you think.

I came across this recently : a survey on the US population published in 2010.

http://environment.yale.edu/climate/publications/knowledge-of-climate-c…

WC should be pleased that he, along with Messrs Peterson and Fleck, is cited in support of an answer to one of the survey questions.(Question 31)

Apparently 47% of the population sampled thinks that fossil fuels are the fossilized remains of dinosaurs : and there are other gems.

I thought that some of the questions were difficult without expert knowledge, some questions were badly framed and at least one question is answered wrongly by the experts.

Try the questions yourselves : you could look at it as a beginning of the year quiz.

Paul Kelly: So I am correct in assuming that you made that "general agreement" up? I mean, I don't want to denigrate Watts and his heroic effort in buying solar panels, but one man can only take us so far, right? One would think you'd have better evidence for such an unconventional claim before telling us all about what the "task" is.

Rocco,

People support energy transformation for economic, environmental, national security and climate reasons among others. Check out these opinion polls. The one conducted by the Center for American Progress asked "America's economic future requires a transformation away from oil, gas, and coal to renewable energy sources such as wind and solar." 76% agreed. Only 11% disagreed. The claim of general agreement cannot in any way be seen as unconventional.

Yes, energy transformation is the task, since the emission reductions you seek cannot be achieved without it.

WMC: If you want to improve the signal-to-noise ratio then you shouldn't delete just our last posts but the whole "conversation". Unless PK substantiates the basic premise then the whole thing is just noise.

[I was trying to delicately hint that people were getting carried away. And no: the original exchange was worth something. What isn't worth something is everyone wanting to have the last word -W]

WMC: Well, I can't speak for others, but I wasn't trying to have the last word. I was actually trying to start the conversation on something tangible. But hey, it's your blog :)

Rocco,

If you'd like to talk about something tangible, let's start with what we agree on. We both see the necessity of energy transformation. I'd be more than happy to hear your ideas and discuss how it can be accomplished.

I suppose we should be happy 47% of Americans think fossil fuels are fossilized dinosaurs -- considering 52% think the earth is 6000 years old! ;-)

And Paul's interpretation is wholly disingenuous -- Repugs think they know more; and there is no threat (i.e. not that they know how to "solve" AGW - but that they think it's all bunk). It's the same way that Sen. Inhofe et al would claim to have expert knowledge in AGW (that it's "the biggest hoax perpetrated on the American people" etc ad nauseum).

Paul Kelly: I wasn't trying to start a conversation about energy transformation, but about climate denier's opinion on energy transformation (see post no.7). The tangible part was supposed to be the data on which you based your claim about their support for low-carbon economy.
(and I think I'll stop here, before WMC starts hinting again :))

(Posted also at James' blog)

For anyone interested in reading more about what's behind that first graphic, the paper is available online from the journal Climatic Change at

http://www.springerlink.com/content/r463w5h2v7j4151x/fulltext.pdf

I believe their "online first" version becomes unavailable once the print edition of this journal comes out.

[Thanks; and thank you for stopping by -W]

The study mines two surveys for various variable. Of those variables, only political affiliation correlated to threat assessment.

The authors assigned a positive value to high threat belief and a negative value to low threat belief. Self identified knowledge in one case and years of education in the other had a positive effect on Democrats and a negative effect on Republicans.

Rereading the paper, gender and age also correlate.

The tangible part was supposed to be the data on which you based your claim about their support for low-carbon economy.

They don't. William may scratch his head and wonder why people hammer Paul Kelly on this, but I happen to know quite a lot about US politics, and about the various people being brought back to power in the House (for example, Darrel Issa in the past - 25+ years ago - has called population ecology, modern forestry, and various related disciplines that suggest unfettered industrial natural resource extraction efforts might harm various species, ecosystems, etc, and now he's going to try to "prove" that climate science is equally "fraudulent", etc etc).

Paul, be honest - the current leadership of the Republican party has absolutely no interest in moving towards a carbon light economy. They *are* interested in reducing dependence on foreign oil, but not by boosting non-fossil fuel options. Their solutions are ... drill ANWR, frack the hell out of any rock formation containing hydrocarbons, and wax the rails to ease eventual development of oil shale (far worse than tar sands in Alberta).

Stoat:

To address the exchange above: I really don't understand what D is saying. The IPCC is a splendid report but it won't respond to you if you ask it questions.

No, but a certain amount of knowledge can be gained by reading WG1, and Paul's bright enough - he's brighter than all of us put together, because he knows the solution to our problems which escapes the rest of the world (other than "the Republicans" who insist that climate science is a fraud, by some strange coincidence) - to answer his own questions by reading the science.

Or perhaps he's not bright enough to do so, and needs to ask many basic questions, which might lead one to question whether or not he actually is genius enough to hold the key to the solution of humanity's future problems ...

I've said often that energy transformation can be better achieved outside the political arena and should be seen as a social movement rather than a political one. Grab a glove and get in the game, pal.

I mean ... he wouldn't be lecturing us thus if he weren't really a genius capable of teaching us how we can solve the problem without every admitting that CO2 might possibly cause warming, right?

Paul Kelly:

Knowledge increases the threat for Democrats and decreases it for Republicans.

But what passes for knowledge among the current Republican leadership is exemplified by the new vice-chairman of the House Committee on SCIENCE.

SCIENCE, Stoat. The Chair has already said he'll delegate climate science issues to this guy.

And what does his knowledge tell him?

Solar flares are responsible for warming, not CO2.

Solar flares.

As Paul points out, this knowledge reduces the threat, in his mind, of AGW climate change ...

Paul is arguing that this is rational ...

I don't know why dhogaza is allowed to continuously misrepresent my views in the most inane manner, and attribute to me words I've never spoken. He is so relentlessly wrong.

And yet, now he says "...thus if he weren't really a genius capable of teaching us how we can solve the problem without every admitting that CO2 might possibly cause warming, right?". Now, that's quite a thing to say about a fella.

[Um. Generally, I assume that you are one of the people happy with rough-and-tumble. However, D is getting well out of order (that is a strong hint, BTW), you have clearly nettled him; politics does that to people. As far as I can tell, you have never denied that GHG cause warming, and the quote of his above is indeed a misattribution of your views; and a quite pointless one, as well. Only for the sake of clarity, could you do me a favour and read What I think about global warming and state clearly and concisely which of 1-4 you agree with; or if you agree with the entire post -W]

1. The earth is getting warmer (0.6 +/- 0.2 oC in the past century; 0.1 0.17 oC/decade over the last 30 years
Agree

2. People are causing this
Might rephrase to people are causing a significant portion of it, a minor quibble.

3. If GHG emissions continue, the warming will continue and indeed accelerate
Yes, as long as this doesn't imply tipping points or "runaway warming". Since the relationship of GHGs to temperature is non linear, I'd expect periods of acceleration and periods of deceleration.

4. (This will be a problem and we ought to do something about it)
Yes. I do not discount or devalue climate concerns. I do think that there are economic, environmental and security issues due to fossil fuel dependence of equal or greater concern and certainty.

[Thanks. Your minor quibble on 2 is allowable, but probably wrong (though I suspect that many reasonable people make the same error). Certainly recent natural forcing is if anything negative, so a more reasonable answer is that (they best guess is that) we're responsible for more than the observed warming.

As for the acc, well I agree: I should probably qualify "the warming will continue and indeed accelerate" - the warming goes up to ~0.2-0.3 oC/decade, depending on scenario (see, I still don't care about the exact value and didn't even bother look it up) but doesn't accelerate thereafter (well, except for SRES A2). -W]