Educated Opinions on Climate change - a denouement or a hoax? Part 2.0 29

[cranky108]

So what is defined as pollution? Smoking causes many deaths each year, and that is because of the patuclite matter.

CO2 does not leave patuclite matter on walls or in your lungs.

So I see where patuclite matter above a certion concertration is a concern. CO2 regulation dosen't meet that level of concern.

 

[dawei87]

And what happens to that absorbed energy? Any analysis that looks solely at color and not a full energy cycle of the biological processes involved is short sighted.

The vast majority turns into heat. My point was that anthropogenic activities in the form of deforestation effect a negative radiative forcing. If you are trying to emphasize that some of the radiative energy gets used for photosynthesis, then the greater efficiency of crop plants compared to forest trees only serves to strengthen this effect, not negate it.

Any analysis that attempts to deliberately cover up or disregard orbital imaging of the urban heat island phenomena, to try and funnel all the research money towards CO2 is at best only half science and half political.

The effect of urban heat on the surface temperature record is a legitimate question to raise, but it has been sufficiently shown to be without merit.

For all global surface records, surface stations are compared with rural ones to factor out this effect:

http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2001/2001_Hansen_etal.pdf

Windy nights (which dilute urban heat effects) show no less of a trend than stagnant nights:

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI3730.1

"Good" stations agree with "Bad" stations:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/wmo/ccl/rural-urban.pdf

Then there's the fact that surface stations and satellites agree very closely...

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/06/Radiosonde_Satellite_Surface_Temperature.svg

Etc. Etc. There are so many nails in the coffin to the idea that UHI has a significant effect that anyone who continues to parrot it as a legitimate concern is clearly being driven by a motivation that's far less than 50% science.

The most obvious evidence of this is how climate change tracks better with anthropomorphic carbon than total carbon.

Measurements of atmospheric CO2 reflect total CO2 concentrations, not the "anthropomorphic" fraction, so i have no idea what you're talking about here.

By the way,

an·thro·po·gen·ic: Originating in human activity

an·thro·po·mor·phic: Having human characteristics

If you have to come up with excuses to ignore the effect of volcanic CO2 then chances are your actual correlation is actually with "anthropomorphic something-else."

Again, you've totally lost me. What "excuses"? Who is ignoring volcanic CO2?

It's dismissed as a significant factor because volcanic contributions to atmospheric CO2 are undercut by anthropogenic contributions by a factor of over 1:100.

http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hazards/gas/climate.php

 

[zdas04]

ronbert,
I'll admit I only read the abstract and it looked like all the other sky-is-falling reports on that subject. If it negates EPA garbage I'll have to go back and read it more carefully. Thanks for persisting.

David

 

[jmw]

I wish they wouldn't talk about "deaths" due to... this is advocacy driven emotionally loaded reporting and to be considered suspect.

The effect of particulates is usually carefully stated as the effect of long term (life time) exposure to particulates on life expectancy.
The effects are not directly known or detected; the studies cannot detect a direct link between particulate levels and life expectancy because there are other factors that also affect life expectancy.
What they look for in the data is a change in particulate levels and a change in life expectancies.
Hence a factor in the data is the change from coal fired heating to gas fired central heating or in urban communities, the shift of major industry from town and city centrers to peripheral sites... the impact of the car has some positives....



JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[cranky108]

Also suspect data outside the US, because a large part of the world is still allowed to use leaded fuels, where it is not allowed in the US, except a few usages.

Much of the US uses natural gas or propane for home heating. Very little is from coal. Coal's usage is mainly from larger users like power production, which is well regulated in terms of patictulit matter ( I still hear people look at that polution, and pointing at the cooling towers [which use recyled water]).

The dirtest of fuels, in terms of paticulite matter, is now wood. And people use wood because of the lower cost than the over regulated other fuels.

 

[KENAT]

"And people use wood because of the lower cost"

Or because it looks pretty and is 'renewable' (or at least can be) - just saying.

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[zdas04]

The U.S. EIA publishes a Renewable Energy inventory. These sources are 17% of total consumption for the first 9 months of 2011. The sexy stuff (Wind, Solar, and Geothermal) is about 16% of the 17% (around 2.7% of U.S. consumption). Wood is 21% of total renewable consumption (3.6% of total U.S. consumption). That number seems to be too big for just pretty fires.

David

 

[owg]

Wait until the folks in the oil sands hear that wood is the next big renewable fuel. They get hell for chopping a few trees down to dig out the oil, even though they promise to replant afterwards. Also the folks in the UK tried wood as a renewable fuel a few centuries ago, and they are still waiting for it to renew. Sounds like its time for more regulation, that should help employment.

HAZOP at

http://www.curryhydrocarbons.ca

 

[cranky108]

Wood is also being tried as a cofuel with coal in many power plants. It reduces efficency, but makes up in cost, and has a green sound.

Other power plants are cofueling with used tires and calling it green. It increases efficency because of higher BTU values. And it is very low cost.

No doubt some wood is being sold in those nice $3 packages.

Some wood is being consumed in the form of pellets, which seems to solve several of the problems of stick.

On the other hand I toss chunks of wood in with me charcoal to add flavor, and smell (I hope they don't count this as renewable).

Tree farming in the US has become a big business, for several usages. Home farms, holiday trees, and yard decerations. But mostly trees grow in land set aside, and fence rows (farmers use as wind blocks).

 

[beej67]

For all global surface records, surface stations are compared with rural ones to factor out this effect: (link)

If I have a fireplace in two rooms of my five room farmhouse, the mean temperature in the farm house goes up whether you "compare the rooms with and without a fireplace to factor out that effect" or not, because the heat generated in the two rooms is advected to the others. Particularly if I leave all the doors open and put a couple of box fans in the doorways. ("weather")

Windy nights (which dilute urban heat effects) show no less of a trend than stagnant nights:

That's a bunk premise, for the same reason as above. If the wind carries the heat away, then the heat is elsewhere. That study is just as dumb as if I did one near a factory and determined that the local CO2 didn't make the factory any hotter than somewhere without a CO2 source. All climate modeling, CO2 or otherwise, is based on the idea of a global energy budget.

"Good" stations agree with "Bad" stations:

Meaning they're both going up at the same rate, which is what you'd expect in the farm house analogy, particularly if there's a big fan blowing hot air all around the house. ("weather") Just because they're both going up doesn't give you any meaningful information about what's causing the globe to warm.

I see *zero* "nails in the coffin" for UHI. Care to link any more? I notice you didn't link anything that said mankind turning a forest into a corn field, and a corn field into a desert, cools the planet instead of warming it, I'm very interested to read that link if it exists, and I'll kindly ask you to defend it.

The truth is that all climate models by their very nature are laden with coefficients that the modelers can tweak to calibrate the model. In order to make the model match existing data, they tweak those coefficients as part of the calibration process. And if you calibrate the model against CO2, then of course it's going to show you that warming tracks with CO2. You calibrated it that way! You could just as easily calibrate it against miles of roads or words in books or number of pirates. Anything that scales with human population. In fact, if you look at Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth hockey stick graphs, the start of the warming upswing more closely matches the start of the modern human population surge than it does the beginning of the CO2 spike.

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[dawei87]

If I have a fireplace in two rooms of my five room farmhouse, the mean temperature in the farm house goes up whether you "compare the rooms with and without a fireplace to factor out that effect" or not, because the heat generated in the two rooms is advected to the others. Particularly if I leave all the doors open and put a couple of box fans in the doorways. ("weather")

If the wind carries the heat away, then the heat is elsewhere. That study is just as dumb as if I did one near a factory and determined that the local CO2 didn't make the factory any hotter than somewhere without a CO2 source. All climate modeling, CO2 or otherwise, is based on the idea of a global energy budget.

So, you are trying to say that waste urban heat extends beyond urban areas to make the entire planet warmer. Fine. However, the entire premise of the urban heat island argument (which you apparently never learned from your fellow “skeptics”) is that urban heat sources make urban temperature stations artificially high, and that this produces a bias in the overall global record.

Watts and his ilk frequently claim that urban stations are biasing the overall temperature record. It doesn’t make any sense at all to claim that *all* stations are showing a bias regardless of their proximity to urban sources. NO ONE, not even skeptics, make the argument that the waste heat from tail pipes and refrigerators are causing the observed warming *everywhere*; you are truly unique and misguided to think that this argument has any merit. You are at this point not making the urban heat island bias argument, but rather (ironically) claiming that anthropogenic activities are causing the entire planet to warm—an argument that at least on its surface I have no problem with.

You wave away my sources and hound me for more without providing the first piece of scientific evidence yourself. Do you have a single scientific source demonstrating that urban heat is responsible for any appreciable fraction of global warming? And please spare me gut speculation (which you have already given) and pretty pictures of temperature stations next to BBQ pits (which I suspect you will give me). I want a legitimate scientific study demonstrating through rational calculations that the observed global warming is due to waste heat and other urban heat sources.

All climate modeling, CO2 or otherwise, is based on the idea of a global energy budget.

Yes. Unfortunately for your premise, the sun—through the radiative forcing associated with an increased greenhouse effect—causes an imbalance far greater than the warming associated with urban heat sources.

I see *zero* "nails in the coffin" for UHI.

That’s because you want it to be the case that urban heat is causing the entire planet to warm. I suppose next you will be arguing that the anthropogenic beach urination effect is the true cause of sea level rise.

Care to link any more?

Sure:

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008GL036465.shtml

Nearly all energy used for human purposes is dissipated as heat within Earth's land–atmosphere system. Thermal energy released from non-renewable sources is therefore a climate forcing term. Averaged globally, this forcing is only +0.028 W m−2

Compared that to the greenhouse gas radiative forcing of 2.9 W/ m^2, you get two orders of magnitude difference. Not that it should be “ignored”, but there is a clear scientific reason for why it is not considered to be very important: it simply isn’t that powerful. Not political, just hard numbers.

I notice you didn't link anything that said mankind turning a forest into a corn field, and a corn field into a desert, cools the planet instead of warming it, I'm very interested to read that link if it exists, and I'll kindly ask you to defend it.

I didn’t think I actually needed a link claiming that light colors reflected more sunlight and stayed cooler than dark colors.

Keep in mind I was referring to lower atmospheric temperatures, not the temperature at the exact surface. Obviously if you sit under a pine forest you will feel cooler than under the direct sun in a corn field. But at the top of the pine forest, you are warmer due to the darker colors. This effect carries over to make the lower troposphere as a whole warmer.

The truth is that all climate models by their very nature are laden with coefficients that the modelers can tweak to calibrate the model.

In fact, if you look at Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth hockey stick graphs, the start of the warming upswing more closely matches the start of the modern human population surge than it does the beginning of the CO2 spike.

Right. It couldn’t possibly be that the industrial revolution is what allowed for that population surge to take place in the first place.

The relationship between CO2 and temperature is not a simple statistical correlation that has been “tweaked”. To claim that it is displays a gross misunderstanding of the development of climate models on your part. The numbers are not simply fudged to give a desirable result, they are based on rational laws of physics. Hindcasting involves tweaking dozens of parameters (not just CO2) to make it agree with past observations of temperature, not past observations of CO2 vs. temperature.

By the way, it seems though that you are shifting away from science and into conspiracy theory, claiming that models are simply being manipulated for political reasons. This is an extraordinarily strong claim to make, as it implies a scientific fraud on a scale never before witnessed in history. And as such it is *your* burden to prove this fantastical claim. Otherwise it is just boring speculation.

 

[beej67]

So, you are trying to say that waste urban heat extends beyond urban areas to make the entire planet warmer. Fine.

Exactly.

However, the entire premise of the urban heat island argument (which you apparently never learned from your fellow "skeptics") is that urban heat sources make urban temperature stations artificially high, and that this produces a bias in the overall global record.

I'm not making that argument at all. That's a dumb argument. You don't even need the "global temperature record" to show global warming. You could throw all the data in the toilet and still make a very easy case for global warming, in fact a more solid case, by simply looking at glacial recession as your indicator. Global temperature records aren't great, and are full of measurement holes. The recession of the glaciers is easily tracked. (incidentally, glacial recession tracks more closely with human population growth than it does specifically with CO2) The globe is warming and anyone who says otherwise is politically motivated.

But there's a difference between these two statements:

"The globe is warming" and

"The globe is warming completely because of CO2 emissions and no other reason."

Proving the first does not prove the second.

Yes. Unfortunately for your premise, the sun—through the radiative forcing associated with an increased greenhouse effect—causes an imbalance far greater than the warming associated with urban heat sources.

You keep mischaracterizing "my premise" in a wild attempt to attack it, without taking the time to listen to it at all. Entirely unsurprising in this "debate." Urban heat islands are primarily an albedo effect due to how asphalt interacts with *sunlight* differently than forest. You should do a little research.

That's because you want it to be the case that urban heat is causing the entire planet to warm. I suppose next you will be arguing that the anthropogenic beach urination effect is the true cause of sea level rise.

I have no agenda here, you clearly do. I don't "want" anything, and your line of continuous personal attack is not only childish, it's unprofessional and bordering on a violation of the terms of use of this website. That said, lets look at your sarcastic example, and go through the obvious and easy debunking procedures for it, and you'll see some surprising parallels with some of the articles you've linked.

All of the pee in the world does not make the ocean rise. Why? The pee, before it was pee, was groundwater or surface water. Before it was surface water, it was rain. Before it was rain it was clouds, and before it was clouds it was in the ocean. Peeing in the ocean is simply one link in the global hydrologic cycle, moving water that used to be in the ocean back into the ocean. Put simply, you can see how it neutralizes easily if you draw your control volumes properly. Drawing them improperly leads you to silly conclusions.

What does that tell you about a study that says "wind carries the urban heat away, so it doesn't affect the globe's mean temperature." ..?

Sure:

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008GL036465.shtml

That's about direct heat generated by human machinery, not about the changes in sunlight absorbed due to urbanization, deforestation, and agriculture. Try again?

I didn't think I actually needed a link claiming that light colors reflected more sunlight and stayed cooler than dark colors.

No, you need a link that says terraforming the planet to suit our purposes for agriculture and urbanization on such a massive scale that it's easily seen from space doesn't change the global energy budget.

Keep in mind I was referring to lower atmospheric temperatures, not the temperature at the exact surface. Obviously if you sit under a pine forest you will feel cooler than under the direct sun in a corn field. But at the top of the pine forest, you are warmer due to the darker colors. This effect carries over to make the lower troposphere as a whole warmer.

A leaf does not produce the same warmth to its adjacent area as a slab of green asphalt does, because something else rather interesting is going on inside the leaf. It's capturing energy and using it in chemical reactions, and this goes on on a massive scale. If you believe the paleontologists, it's where the oil comes from. This very important process is ignored in every treatment of the effects of albedo on climate I've read. Got a link to one that takes it into account? I'd love to read it.

Right. It couldn't possibly be that the industrial revolution is what allowed for that population surge to take place in the first place.

Of course it was. That the industrial revolution produced more global effects than simply a change in CO2 is my entire point.

By the way, it seems though that you are shifting away from science and into conspiracy theory, claiming that models are simply being manipulated for political reasons.

Not really. Ask a bunch of atmospheric chemists what the problem is, they're going to tell you atmospheric chemistry, especially when their research dollars depend on it. Where things get political is with scientists supporting the Kyoto protocol, when no credible study ever has shown that Kyoto would have an effect, even if atmospheric warming were 100% due to CO2, which I absolutely don't believe it is. And that's a separate discussion that I don't even want to bother having, because it gets into who's moving which money where (Goldman Sachs) to take advantage of "carbon trading."

I'm an environmentalist. I believe it's important we reduce pollution, and CO2 is among the things we should reduce. I think the greatest damage CO2 is doing to our environment isn't even in the skies, it's in the oceans, which are slowly changing in pH as CO2 forms carbonic acid and dissolves the world's coral reefs. Google that, it's terrifying. There are other geopolitical reasons to reduce CO2 emissions as well, most particularly that tying the US economy to a globally traded commodity puts us at great economic risk if the dollar collapses. There are many reasons to reduce CO2, and in particular our dependence on foreign oil.

But as an environmentalist, I'm very afraid of what's going to happen to the environmental movement when CO2 is exposed for the faked up bogey man that it is, in terms of its effects on climate. The backlash when the truth comes out will hurt all environmentalism.



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[dawei87]

I'm not making that argument at all. That's a dumb argument.

Apologies for not having understood your original premise. As I said, I have seen the UHI argument brought up a hundred times. But I have never seen anyone make the claim that you have, of urban albedo affecting the entire global temperature.

You could throw all the data in the toilet and still make a very easy case for global warming, in fact a more solid case, by simply looking at glacial recession as your indicator.

Well, there are many skeptics who I suspect would like to throw feces at you for saying that. But I personally agree that glacial recession is just one of many observations indicating warming.

But there's a difference between these two statements:

"The globe is warming" and

"The globe is warming completely because of CO2 emissions and no other reason."

I never said it was warming because of CO2 “and no other reason.” I simply think CO2 is the dominant factor.

No, you need a link that says terraforming the planet to suit our purposes for agriculture and urbanization on such a massive scale that it's easily seen from space doesn't change the global energy budget.

We already agreed that it changes it; we just have disagreement on the magnitude and the sign of that change.

That's about direct heat generated by human machinery, not about the changes in sunlight absorbed due to urbanization, deforestation, and agriculture. Try again?

You are the one making the positive hypothesis that the observed warming trend is due to anthropogenic albedo changes, so it really should be your responsibility to prove this claim, not mine to disprove it. But since it is a new argument, I found it interesting enough to work out. Anyone can feel free to correct my math where they see fit. (And yes, I am aware that this is a simplistic calculation. By omitting something I am not implying that it should not be considered, I am simply creating a baseline calculation and I welcome any added complexity you would like to contribute.)

Estimating the temperature change due to a change in albedo is relatively straightforward using Stefan-Boltzmann and assuming a blackbody.

Teff = [S0(1 – A)/4sigma]^.25

where Teff is the temperature of the surface in K, S0 is the solar constant, A is the albedo, and sigma is the Stefan-Boltzmann constant.

The Earth’s current albedo is approximately 0.30. The solar constant is 1370 W/m^2 and sigma is 5.67*10^-8.

Plugging that in, we get an effective temperature of 255.0 K. Lower than reality, but we are of course ignoring the greenhouse effect so this is expected.

Now, to calculate the effective temperature of urbanization we need an estimate of 1) The percent of the surface area that is urbanized and 2) the approximate albedo of an urbanized area.

Estimates for the first factor vary, but a recent estimate found it to be around 3% of all land area, so we will go with that. I make no judgment on how valid this estimate is compared to previous, lower estimates.

http://www.earth.columbia.edu/news/2005/story03-07-05.html

Of course, albedo extends beyond just land area, so this 3% needs to be translated to a global fraction, which makes it 0.876% of Earth’s total surface area, assuming the Earth is 70.8% water.

As for number 2, urban albedo ranges from 0.10 to 0.20, though some are much higher. From Table 2, here:

http://hokulea.soest.hawaii.edu/ocn435/classes/papers-class12/Taha-10.pdf

We will be very conservative and say it’s 0.10 everywhere, which is only slightly higher than the average albedo of pure asphalt.

Taking a weighted average, we get a new (urbanized) global albedo:

.99124*.3 + .00876*0.1 = 0.298

And a new Teff = 255.16

Compared to 255.0, that is a temperature difference of 0.16 C across the entire time span of human urbanization, under the very conservative assumptions of urbanized surface area and its average albedo. As compared to ~ 0.8 C observed over the past 100 years.

Of course I ignored agricultural lands in this calculation; since agricultural lands represent a much larger surface area, and since their albedo tends to be higher than what was previously there, I stand by my claim that direct anthropogenic albedo changes force a negative radiative forcing, not a positive one.

A leaf does not produce the same warmth to its adjacent area as a slab of green asphalt does, because something else rather interesting is going on inside the leaf. It's capturing energy and using it in chemical reactions, and this goes on on a massive scale. If you believe the paleontologists, it's where the oil comes from. This very important process is ignored in every treatment of the effects of albedo on climate I've read. Got a link to one that takes it into account? I'd love to read it.

You emphasize that asphalt and a leaf of the same albedo do not have the same temp since the leaf does more than the asphalt, and I don’t disagree with that.

You get a double positive whammy by replacing a forest with a parking lot, but you get a double *negative* whammy by replacing a forest with a lighter agricultural field, since agricultural crops are better at photosynthesizing than most natural plants. And since global agricultural land represents an area more than ten times greater than urban land, I just don't see where there is any opportunity for a positive forcing. Interested to see your math.

What does that tell you about a study that says "wind carries the urban heat away, so it doesn't affect the globe's mean temperature." ..?

Except that the paper was not talking about warming of the entire planet, it was talking about urban bias due to poor station siting. You were not making the urban bias argument, but there are many people that do.

Not really. Ask a bunch of atmospheric chemists what the problem is, they're going to tell you atmospheric chemistry, especially when their research dollars depend on it.

Again, this is moving beyond skepticism and you are now making a positive claim that there exists an unfathomably large scientific hoax going on. A strong claim requires strong evidence, of which I see very little if any. I find arguments like ‘follow the money’ to hardly be convincing. Unless you can demonstrate a strong argument for why a real, existing problem would *NOT* logically receive research funding, then the mere existence of funding does not make me the least bit skeptical.

And that's a separate discussion that I don't even want to bother having, because it gets into who's moving which money where (Goldman Sachs) to take advantage of "carbon trading."

That there might be businesses or governments seeking to take advantage of AGW for personal gain is a separate question irrelevant to the science. There are those who will try to gain and profit on absolutely anything that happens in the world, and I see no reason why we shouldn't expect people to take advantage of AGW too.

But seeing big businesses profit through greenwashing or carbon trading markets does not itself make me skeptical of the existence of AGW, any more than seeing businesses profiting on security guards and alarm systems would make me skeptical of the existence of crime.

I'm an environmentalist. I believe it's important we reduce pollution, and CO2 is among the things we should reduce. I think the greatest damage CO2 is doing to our environment isn't even in the skies, it's in the oceans, which are slowly changing in pH as CO2 forms carbonic acid and dissolves the world's coral reefs. Google that, it's terrifying.

I’m familiar with ocean acidification and agree that it is of great concern, especially considering many agronomists believe that the only way we will feed (and power) 9 billion people is through massive-scale marine aquaculture.

The backlash when the truth comes out will hurt all environmentalism.

It’s not a bogey man. For that matter it's also not Armageddon. It will not cause an ice age over night or send tidal waves of sea level rise flowing into NYC. But it is a problem that exacerbates many other problems that humanity will face throughout the 21st century. I do not know the magnitude of this problem, no one does. I believe it’s at least possible that the warming will surpass 3 C by the end of the century, and that concerns me. Even if it stays within 1 C it can cause problems. And considering that skeptics such as Spencer and Lindzen acknowledge at least a 1 C warming associated with 2x CO2, and that the planet is on par to greatly exceed 2x, I have yet to find any comfort from skeptical arguments.

By the way, I see you’re an environmental engineer. My degree was in environmental engineering too, from UF

 

[beej67]

Compared to 255.0, that is a temperature difference of 0.16 C across the entire time span of human urbanization, under the very conservative assumptions of urbanized surface area and its average albedo. As compared to ~ 0.8 C observed over the past 100 years.

So while we're ball parking it, let's say agricultural lands have a quarter the albedo delta as compared to the "untouched" condition, and cover eight times the area that urban lands do. That'd be another 0.32 C, for a total of 0.48 C. 60% of warming right there. And that's presuming that the ordinary greenhouse effect doesn't amplify those numbers any.

Hardly something to neglect, when crafting an elaborate carbon trading policy. Hell, your simple calculation for urbanization alone is 20%. 20% is not insignificant. 20% is not something you can wish away.

You get a double positive whammy by replacing a forest with a parking lot, but you get a double *negative* whammy by replacing a forest with a lighter agricultural field, since agricultural crops are better at photosynthesizing than most natural plants.

I completely disagree with this. All natural lands have layers of ground cover, forests moreso than grasslands, but agricultural lands have a single plant, no layering, and no ground cover between plants. And they're hotter. You can either trust me on this, or find out for yourself and spend a day picking tobacco. The climate modelers have got agriculture all wrong, because they've never spent any time out in a field.

That there might be businesses or governments seeking to take advantage of AGW for personal gain is a separate question irrelevant to the science

Not when so much money from these very businesses and governments is being pumped into the science, in the form of research grants. You find what you're supposed to find according to the people paying the bills. It's not that they're faking it on purpose, it's just that they're putting all sorts of validity into models that are calibrated against CO2, so the models show a correlation. Mistaking correlation for causality is a very, very common error in science. And computer modeling cannot, cannot, determine causality. I don't blame them for some kind of conspiracy. I merely blame them for presuming causation from the correlation they've identified. And why wouldn't they, when their job depends on it? I would too.



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[berkshire]

An article came out in Gizmag today that may render this discussion moot,or provoke it even more.
B.E.

http://www.gizmag.com/criegee-birad...aign=94ffc1ff15-UA-2235360-4&utm_medium=email

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[KENAT]

"that may render this discussion moot"

Ever the optimist huh berkshire?

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[josephv]

Climate Change Sparks Battles in Classroom

"In 2009, the Heartland Institute, which has received significant funding from Exxon-Mobil, expanded its audience beyond teachers and students with a pamphlet, called The Skeptic’s Handbook, mailed to the presidents of the country’s 14,000 public school boards."

http://www.conserv.missouri.edu/forms/science-2011-reardon-688-9.pdf

 

[berkshire]

Yes,
But I covered my butt by mentioning that it could provoke it even more.
B.E.

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[zdas04]

berkshire,
If you produced peer-reviewed definitive proof that there is a god, there are people whose religion would require that they doubt it.

Same with the AGW religion. "Belief" is "acceptance of an hypotheses in the absence of data", and both sides of the AGW discussion have a significant number of religious zealots who will not be convinced by facts, let alone an article from GizMag which actually sounds disgusting.

David

 

[berkshire]

David,
I went to school in the same country Kenat did. During the time I was in school, 1950s-60s. The teachers assured us that global warming by increased carbon dioxide production could never happen, because plants would make use of the increased CO2 levels to become more plentiful and luxuriant, sequestering the carbon, and thereby negating the whole thing, according to them the system was in balance.
Is what is going on now totaly political, or is there a change in scientific fact?
Or did my teachers have their facts screwed up?
B.E.

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor