Climate Change - The Scientific Debate
Discussion
Variomatic said:
As I understand it, the whole "back radiation can't warm..." meme is a slightly pedantic semantic argument that "warming" means "making it hotter than it is", whereas what back radiation does is "keep it warmer that it would be without the back radiation" in the presence of an existing energy source.
In that sense, it's true that IR back radiation can't "warm" anything. No amount of CO2 in the atmosphere would increase the Earth's temperature if the sun wasn't pumping energy into the system.
At least, I hope that's what it is because, otherwise, those expounding it are simply barking.
I think you give too much credit to some (not all) who expound that meme. It's not just (accurate) pedantry - there are many examples of people in this thread who don't think that the greenhouse effect is real. They don't think that CO2 concentrations and by extension, all greenhouse gases, have any bearing on surface temperature. This usually stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of the physics at some level.In that sense, it's true that IR back radiation can't "warm" anything. No amount of CO2 in the atmosphere would increase the Earth's temperature if the sun wasn't pumping energy into the system.
At least, I hope that's what it is because, otherwise, those expounding it are simply barking.
Jinx said:
No problem with this plunks but HK is claiming the Surface temperature is higher. A cooling object will release radiation at specific energies. If these energies are returned to the object it cannot physically reach a higher temperature than it had before any of this energy was released (without work being done).
Higher than it would be without the returned energy, yes. The radiative equilibrium point for the system is changed by the properties of the atmosphere. QuantumTokoloshi said:
plunker said:
ok so what is it? Doesn't look like global mean temperature to me.
Please feel free to look it up yourself, seeing as you make the statement of minor deviation from the models.Here's the model comparison that appeared in the AR5 draft report that some got upset about being replaced in the final report because the obs are centred lower in this version so it looks 'worse':
The obs only run up to 2011 but nothing dramatic has happened in the last couple of years so from that I would say there's a low-side deviation starting around 2006.
Here's the one that appeared in the final report that has the obs centred a little higher:
plunker said:
rovermorris999 said:
plunker said:
Yes!
There's been long arguments on here in the past that AGW theory breaks the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and the like and you'll still find heretics who believe it's 'impossible' and looking for a paradigm-shift in the physics - for a while post-climategate they had some time in the sun (in internet land at least) but it seems to be on the wain now.
Gosh. 'Yes' from Plunker to 'Whether or not the effect of that CO2 in an unimaginably complex system is a problem is the real question, and the evidence outside of Model World is increasingly suggesting that it isn't'There's been long arguments on here in the past that AGW theory breaks the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and the like and you'll still find heretics who believe it's 'impossible' and looking for a paradigm-shift in the physics - for a while post-climategate they had some time in the sun (in internet land at least) but it seems to be on the wain now.
At last.
In case you hadn't noticed, you're now officially (at least by some of the more militant viewpoints) a Denier. You've denied in public that "the science", as embodied in the models, is more right than the observations.
In fact, you agreed with pretty much the whole of my previous (and I thought reasonable) post, yet according to the mainstream view I'm some far right, Big Oil Shill, Denier (with a capital D).
Personally, I've always considered myself to be a slightly-left-of-Lenin (but otherwise reasonable) human being who does his best to critically consider all the information he can find before making up his mind either way.
At present I'm not inclinded to believe that a fairly small group of active scientists, backed and funded by politicians, who keep blatantly moving the goal posts every time they fail to score, are the most reliable witnesses out there - regardless of how many others believe they are.
eta: And yes, I would be that juror who hung the jury if I thought there was something iffy about the prosecution case - even if it meant not going home that night
I think the observed temperatures are still within two standard deviations of the model predictions, no? It'll be interesting to see what happens in the near future. Where are all of the 'skeptic' blogs going to start drawing their trend lines from if, as looks reasonably likely, this year ends up being hotter than 1998?
Variomatic said:
plunker said:
rovermorris999 said:
plunker said:
Yes!
There's been long arguments on here in the past that AGW theory breaks the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and the like and you'll still find heretics who believe it's 'impossible' and looking for a paradigm-shift in the physics - for a while post-climategate they had some time in the sun (in internet land at least) but it seems to be on the wain now.
Gosh. 'Yes' from Plunker to 'Whether or not the effect of that CO2 in an unimaginably complex system is a problem is the real question, and the evidence outside of Model World is increasingly suggesting that it isn't'There's been long arguments on here in the past that AGW theory breaks the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and the like and you'll still find heretics who believe it's 'impossible' and looking for a paradigm-shift in the physics - for a while post-climategate they had some time in the sun (in internet land at least) but it seems to be on the wain now.
At last.
In case you hadn't noticed, you're now officially (at least by some of the more militant viewpoints) a Denier. You've denied in public that "the science", as embodied in the models, is more right than the observations.
If your point is just about 'labels' though then in that case yes I agree - if some fool thought that that's what I said means then they might consider me a denier. But it doesn't.
Edited by plunker on Thursday 17th July 20:16
Blib said:
Which of the models accurately predicted the lack of temperature increase that has been recorded for a decade or more?
Models project not predict so you'd need to feed the real world conditions (eg ENSO cycles) into a model to properly assess how they perform against the obs. There are papers that have attempted to do this (or perhaps I should say 'a paper' cos I only know of one).hairykrishna said:
I think the observed temperatures are still within two standard deviations of the model predictions, no? It'll be interesting to see what happens in the near future. Where are all of the 'skeptic' blogs going to start drawing their trend lines from if, as looks reasonably likely, this year ends up being hotter than 1998?
what happens if it does not?plunker said:
You're extrapolating way too far on what you think my words imply about the models, which undermines your point somewhat. It's one thing to say that the recent obs are increasingly suggesting low-sensitivity as they remain on the cool side, but you need a lot more than the obs-to-date to say the science as embodied by the models is wrong, or that the obs establish that the longer-term sensitivity is low.
If your point is just about 'labels' though then in that case yes I agree - if some fool thought that that's what I said means then they might consider me a denier. But it doesn't.
Don't worry, I'm not calling you a Big Oil Shill If your point is just about 'labels' though then in that case yes I agree - if some fool thought that that's what I said means then they might consider me a denier. But it doesn't.
My point was about the labels - there are a few sites I can think of where, if you dared to suggest that the models and obs weren't behaving exactly as expected and in perfect harmony with each other, you'd be driven out with flaming torches.
The big one as far as labels go is probably "Denier".
It's pretty well established from recorded comments by high profile believers that the assocation with holocaust denial is, if not originally intended, at very least intentionally continued. Personally, I couldn't care less if someone wants to point that sort of insult at me because I see it for what it is and laugh.
But many people are more sensitive than I am and, frankly, it's just extremely poor form to keep using it knowing that, especially considering it's not even an accurate description of the position held by any serious sceptics.
We don't deny that the climate is changing, we don't deny that Man (along with every other living organism on the planet) causes some of that change, and we don't deny that emissions of CO2 are part of that effect.
What we do is exhibit a sceptical attitude to one or more of the following:
Whether the effect is enough to worry about
Whether the harm will outweigh the benefits
Whether "decarbonising" will actually make a difference
Whether the supposed "cure" will be worse than the disease
Whether it's sensible to take drastic action, which will lead to harm to millions of people, based on computer models that are increasingly failing to deliver a picture anything like observed reality.
hairykrishna said:
I think the observed temperatures are still within two standard deviations of the model predictions, no? It'll be interesting to see what happens in the near future. Where are all of the 'skeptic' blogs going to start drawing their trend lines from if, as looks reasonably likely, this year ends up being hotter than 1998?
At two standard deviations, what is the chance of a correlation? Less than 1% (assuming normal distribution)? And that's without even looking at causality?Variomatic said:
plunker said:
You're extrapolating way too far on what you think my words imply about the models, which undermines your point somewhat. It's one thing to say that the recent obs are increasingly suggesting low-sensitivity as they remain on the cool side, but you need a lot more than the obs-to-date to say the science as embodied by the models is wrong, or that the obs establish that the longer-term sensitivity is low.
If your point is just about 'labels' though then in that case yes I agree - if some fool thought that that's what I said means then they might consider me a denier. But it doesn't.
Don't worry, I'm not calling you a Big Oil Shill If your point is just about 'labels' though then in that case yes I agree - if some fool thought that that's what I said means then they might consider me a denier. But it doesn't.
My point was about the labels - there are a few sites I can think of where, if you dared to suggest that the models and obs weren't behaving exactly as expected and in perfect harmony with each other, you'd be driven out with flaming torches.
The big one as far as labels go is probably "Denier".
Variomatic said:
It's pretty well established from recorded comments by high profile believers that the assocation with holocaust denial is, if not originally intended, at very least intentionally continued. Personally, I couldn't care less if someone wants to point that sort of insult at me because I see it for what it is and laugh.
But many people are more sensitive than I am and, frankly, it's just extremely poor form to keep using it knowing that, especially considering it's not even an accurate description of the position held by any serious sceptics.
We don't deny that the climate is changing, we don't deny that Man (along with every other living organism on the planet) causes some of that change, and we don't deny that emissions of CO2 are part of that effect.
What we do is exhibit a sceptical attitude to one or more of the following:
Whether the effect is enough to worry about
Whether the harm will outweigh the benefits
Whether "decarbonising" will actually make a difference
Whether the supposed "cure" will be worse than the disease
Whether it's sensible to take drastic action, which will lead to harm to millions of people, based on computer models that are increasingly failing to deliver a picture anything like observed reality.
That's all quite fine by me. If you'd used 'That' instead of 'Whether' I might have said something to the effect that your list is too goal-oriented and one-directional but 'whether' implies you think about it both ways which is good. But many people are more sensitive than I am and, frankly, it's just extremely poor form to keep using it knowing that, especially considering it's not even an accurate description of the position held by any serious sceptics.
We don't deny that the climate is changing, we don't deny that Man (along with every other living organism on the planet) causes some of that change, and we don't deny that emissions of CO2 are part of that effect.
What we do is exhibit a sceptical attitude to one or more of the following:
Whether the effect is enough to worry about
Whether the harm will outweigh the benefits
Whether "decarbonising" will actually make a difference
Whether the supposed "cure" will be worse than the disease
Whether it's sensible to take drastic action, which will lead to harm to millions of people, based on computer models that are increasingly failing to deliver a picture anything like observed reality.
Edited by plunker on Thursday 17th July 22:43
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