Global Warming

[AtlanticFlamethrower]

If you could see how much pollution humans give off you wouldn't even think twice that humans are the main cause.

80 million barrells of oil are burnt ever day. Or 29,000,000,000 (billion) per year. I just can't see how that doesn't have an impact on our atmosphere and climate.

frozen_north is referring to 100 years ago when warming trend began - we weren't using nearly as much oil then as now for reasons I'm sure you can imagine. Population, power, transport...

The question is not that fossil fuel combustion doesn't have an effect on the atmosphere. Getting everyone to agree burning so much does impacts on the atmosphere is not hard - how stupid do you think some scientists are?

The question is 29,000,000,000 (billion) per year a really tiny amount in the Earth's system or a lot? The debate is over what effect we have, not whether there is an effect.

Miniscule, Some or Everything?

The difficult fact to the Everything hypothesis is that the warming pattern is noticable before we burned the majority of this stuff (from 1960s+) and similar warming has happened before. It's not clear man is the key to where the climate is going.

Edited November 12, 2006 by AtlanticFlamethrower

[Admiral_Bobski]

You do absolutely right and long may you do so! However, I invoke Godwin's Law here!

Paul

Curses! You got me there! I was going to use an analogy with Saddam Hussein and his inner circle, but I thought it might be in bad taste, what with current events and everything, so I used that old fall-back - Hitler. Still, at least it shows he was good for something, if only for suitable (if cliched) analogies!

If you could see how much pollution humans give off you wouldn't even think twice that humans are the main cause.

Seeing how much pollution humans gives off makes me consider the impact humans have on the climate, but still leaves open the question of how much damage we are doing, as AtlanticFlamethrower says. Which goes back largely to the question of how much of an effect CO2 has on warming.

C-Bob

PS - I hope the invocation of Godwin's Law doesn't mean we now have to end this thread - I was enjoying it so...! (I know ignorance is no protection from The Law, but I'm such a newbie at this that I didn't even know there was a Godwin's Law!!!)

[Gray-Wolf]

PS - I hope the invocation of Godwin's Law doesn't mean we now have to end this thread - I was enjoying it so...! (I know ignorance is no protection from The Law, but I'm such a newbie at this that I didn't even know there was a Godwin's Law!!!)

Heavens forfend, we'd be no better than a henchman of Benito were we to act that way!!!

More on topic, what do we think we know about the DO events during our last glaciation? It is more the 1470yr cycle I'm angling at as I feel it may well be a solar generated input that ,in effects is absent in 'normal' interglacials, may have an effect in a GW scenario (straws and camels backs kinda thing) .

I think I have read somewhere (and now part forgotton) that the next solar max in 2012 is a more active max than ther average. I understand how the sun winds up its magnetic fields to the point of breaking/reseting them over a solar cycle but I am at a loss to fathom why one solar max should prove more extreme than another (though I would expect varience in strength each cycle).

Any pointers?

Edited November 13, 2006 by Gray-Wolf

[Weather-history]

Remember Ken Ring?

Well he is welcoming global warming

http://www.ashburtonguardian.co.nz/index.asp?articleid=8264

[Gray-Wolf]

Remember Ken Ring?

Well he is welcoming global warming

http://www.ashburtonguardian.co.nz/index.asp?articleid=8264

We've had similar 'welcomings' here on NW.tv but they will probably have a smaller audience. I've said before that people rarely embrace change (especially 'forced' change) and so are happy to hear any 'Business As Usual' comment's that they can then use to defend their unwillingness to accept and implement the necessary changes.

I do think that the more 'lunar motivated personalities' that spout their version of the world then the easier it will be to spot the 'disinformation' peddled around the issue of climate change (nobody wants to be seen to side with a fool now do they?).

[Admiral_Bobski]

...what do we think we know about the DO events during our last glaciation? It is more the 1470yr cycle I'm angling at as I feel it may well be a solar generated input...

Whew - I'm glad we're not ending the thread!! This is great fun, and very interesting

On topic, though, I'm glad you mentioned the DO cycles because it'll give me an insentive to do some research into them! They are mentioned in the big, long thread on realclimate about chaos theory's relevence to climate change, but I skimmed over them a little as they didn't directly relate to the issue. I did want to go back and have a look at that part of the debate because - being perfectly honest - I know virtually nothing about them. I remember having heard about the 1470 year cycle and an investigation showing there is no solar 1470 year cycle. However there is an 80 year cycle and a 135 year cycle (I think it was 135 - have to check that) which, once every 1470 years coincide to potentially create the conditions needed to cause the DO cycles.

Beyond that, I'm pretty lost. I'll have a dig around and see what I can find out, then hopefully come back with some ideas.

As for the Ken Ring thing, I'm interested in finding out whether GW as defined is occurring (rather than just some concept of "warming in a cycle"), and what impact Man has on it. Refuting the evidence on GW is one thing, so long as the counter-arguments are intelligent and appropriate points and not just unsubstantiated denialist claims, but saying that Global Warming is a good thing...? That seems kind of crazy if we accept that, if GW is occurring, it could be potentially catastrophic.

I think "welcoming" GW is as shortsighted as introducing radical policy shifts to counteract one single element of it. Interesting, if bizarre, point of view, though.

Peace out!

C-Bob

[Gray-Wolf]

Thanks C-Bob! Maybe then it is some tie in with our presessional aspect and the 1470yr cycle falling 'in line' that could have added forcings to susceptable areas/systems and helped precipitate the chain of events that led to a climate 'shift'?

It would obviously be very worrying to discover natural ,short term, warming events to further compound the forcings we may be placing on our planet. We would then need to review the threshold points for various 'triggers' that may exist in our climatic systems as ,no matter how hard we cut back on our own emmisions the added forcing may prove too great for the system to remain stable.

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

I want to put this in the 'pot' again.

The planet has warmed and cooled in the past...this we know.

The planet has been as warm with empirical evidence of warmer periods in the past.

Each time we had warm periods we had high CO2 concentrations, empirical evidence shows much higher concentrations too.

Every single time the planet plunged into an iceage....every single time.

Now assuming we are warming the planet with 'excessive' CO2 can someone explain why we have to keep warming and that it won't reverse?

The new term is 'non linear'....well fancy that. The so called Hockey stick is as linear as you can get. Now that has been shown as incorrect AND antarctica and Greenland are not responding as initially predicted [i'll add the arctic too because it was warmer in the 30s with a quicker warmup than recent episode] non linear has been brought in.

I'm looking from above and I am certainly not jumping onto the AGW side at present.

BFTP

Edited November 13, 2006 by BLAST FROM THE PAST

[parmenides3]

How did the last ice age suddenly end. There wasnt any emissions from humans back then was there. So how are humans the cause now. The climate changes over time. It is never static.

Ice ages come and go. Variations in Solar irradiance due to extra-atmospheric influences (Milankovistch cycles) are often quoted as the cause. Vastly more active tectonic plate shifts and volcanic activity may have contributed at various times. The lpresent interglacial period probably began due to natural variations in the Earth's oscillation and orbit. The natural variations in climate have been taken into consideration. Every temperature increase in the ice-core record of interglacials comes with a matching increase in CO2 (yes, there is a lag, but once the CO2 is there, it enhances the warming). Humans are the cause now because we have artificially introduced stuff into the atmosphere which causes the atmosphere to warm. We are, in effect, replacing the 'natural order'.

Try http://www.illconsidered.blogspot.com/ . Scroll down the page a bit, & you'll find this among many other doubts about GW. You don't have to agree with what is said, but it may point you in the direction of useful research to follow up.

Cap'n: most of the variability in the climate 'predictions' derives from the use of a range of scenarios (allowing for different human response to CC) and a range of models with different sensitivities. One response to this would be to take the average of the ensemble and suggest that this is the most likely path, another is to offer the entire range and predict somewhere about the mean. Yes, there are uncertainties about how much sea-level rise there will be, and how much the temperature will rise, but 2x CO2 = 1.5<6 degrees of gross warming is the baseline. When AR4 comes out, this will probably be refined to 2.5<5 , give or take. Call it +2C (from pre-industrial levels), conservatively, for 550ppm CO2, & guess when we'll reach that number.

PS: I'd be surprised if there were 'hundreds' of scientists (particularly climate scientists) who currently argue with any credibility that the global mean temperature is unlikely to rise by another degree. A few dozen, probably, is a more likely number.

:)P

[Admiral_Bobski]

PS: I'd be surprised if there were 'hundreds' of scientists (particularly climate scientists) who currently argue with any credibility that the global mean temperature is unlikely to rise by another degree. A few dozen, probably, is a more likely number.

:)P

Hi P3 :lol:

I'll write more later, but I just wanted to quickly point out two things about this statement. Firstly, when I said "hundreds" I was responsing to this previous comment by Dawlish:

There may be hundreds, but when you measure that against the many tens of thousands of scientists that accept AGW, then it is a small minotiry!

Secondly, despite that, I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if it was hundreds of scientists (which is why I didn't contest Dawlish's figures). I wasn't referring to the number of scientists who dismiss, or disagree with, GW, as you suggest - I was referring to the number of scientists who do not agree with the commonly-held view of CO2's impact on the environment, as you can see from my original comment, which was this:

If the idea of CO2 reflecting back heat in the atmosphere is so well accepted then why are there so many people - scientists, that is - who still refute the evidence?

So I think my comment has been taken somewhat out of context. :lol:

Anyway, I've got a bit of reading up to do right now, so I'll post back later... :lol:

Ciao!

C-Bob

[Roger J Smith]

You have to admit, the current state of play in this complicated subject area is borderline mass confusion.

I was watching a documentary the other day about the "fate" of penguins around the Palmer peninsula in Antarctica. Within twenty minutes, I had been told that the climate was warming, getting colder, being subjected to monster storms and freak periods of calm. In other words, dare I say this, any of the naturally occurring variations of the rugged climate down there might be used quite anecdotally to support the "theory" that global warming is real and making the climate more variable. No surprise to me, but the video included the obligatory scenes of icebergs breaking away from ice shelves, penguins sliding off the ice ("they're gonna drown") and big red suns (5 degrees warmer just looking at that).

Same on the news tonight, droughts and heavy rains in Kenya and Ethiopia are filmed and presented as more "proof" of man's interference with the world's weather patterns.

My point is that the media are more or less at the mercy of the scientists, and taking their statements about catastrophic change as a story line, whether there is any actual catastrophe or not. My feeling is that a lot of this is vastly over-hyped. Penguins have always had a rough time of it around the Antarctic, but they haven't always been followed around by television crews. By the way, it's somewhat ludicrous to hear that the penguins could be facing "mass extinction" when you're shown a huge expanse of them waddling about totally oblivious to global warming (they look like they're rather enjoying the brisk walk).

Maybe the reality is that the climate is shifting a little, not as much as the alarmists would have us believe, and that the hysteria is designed to shake down world governments for research grants and other goodies to feed a ballooning climate science population. No danger of a mass extinction there, I suppose.

But on the other hand, if it's largely a natural variation at work, who's really going to stop that? And why bother trying, it's just as likely to change to some other type such as a much colder regime, at any point in the future. Adaptation rather than prevention seems to me the better choice of strategies -- what real choice do we have?

[Gray-Wolf]

But on the other hand, if it's largely a natural variation at work, who's really going to stop that? And why bother trying, it's just as likely to change to some other type such as a much colder regime, at any point in the future. Adaptation rather than prevention seems to me the better choice of strategies -- what real choice do we have?

Adaptation to what though? It seems either way we need to research the 'changes' to find out where (climatically) we are headed so it would seem the research grants are safe. I do believe that adaptation is part of the solution, as gardeners we are told to start planting Mediterranean plants/drought resistant plants in our gardens so some change driven adaptations are both mooted and implemented.

Edited November 14, 2006 by Gray-Wolf

[Admiral_Bobski]

Adaptation to what though?

Historically, organisms adapt to changes as they happen, rather than pre-emptively adapting. There's a lot to be said for adaptation if it turns out that there is nothing we can do to stop climate change!

Meanwhile, back on the CO2 issue, I got side-tracked while looking at various articles and came across another issue that prevents me from dropping on the AGW side of the fence - the Heat Island Effect. The problem here is that many weather stations are in populated areas, and many of those are in densely populated areas - temperatures within cities are almost guaranteed to record higher temperatures due to the excess warmth in and around populated areas. In climate models and predictions, the Heat Island Effect is supposed to be taken into account by the process of "normalisation" (or "homogenisation", or a variety of other terms which all mean the same thing). However there is some doubt as to whether or not this process adequately takes the Heat Island Effect into account.

In his book "State of Fear", Michael Crichton presents some graphs plotted using data from USHCN. He shows 3 graphs from New York State covering the same 180 year time span, one from New York City, one from West Point and one from Albany. He states that New York City and Albany are 140 miles apart, and that West Point falls somewhere in between. The results of the graph, showing the change in mean temperature over the 180 year period, are as follows:

New York City..............+5F

West Point...................no change

Albany........................-0.5F

The data are available for download by ftp at the USHCN website: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/resear...shcn/ushcn.html

I have downloaded some datasets and I'm trying to sort through the relevant bits but, so far, the information in "State of Fear" seems legitimate. The crux of the argument is that the "real" temperature change is shown in West Point and Albany, where there has been little or no development or increase in population in 180 years, whereas New York City's deviation is skewed by its massive development and population increase in the same time period.

I've seen other forums where Michael Crichton's name has been mentioned and his results are instantly pooh-poohed because "He's an author of fiction, so..." I would respond to this criticism by saying that Michael Crichton is a very smart man, with degrees under his belt (mainly in medicine, but you don't earn a medical degree by being stupid!), who really does his research before writing anything. He has a comprehensive bibliographical appendix in State of Fear, which I have just started to cross-reference - not everyone in the bibliography agrees with the views stated in the book, and several of the papers directly contradict conclusions in the book, which shows how honest he is. He has analysed a lot of evidence, made an educated decision based on his findings and then written the book - I can think of few authors who would do that.

More on this later!

More on topic, what do we think we know about the DO events during our last glaciation? It is more the 1470yr cycle I'm angling at as I feel it may well be a solar generated input that ,in effects is absent in 'normal' interglacials, may have an effect in a GW scenario (straws and camels backs kinda thing) .

Sorry, Gray-Wolf - everything I've found so far either mentions DO events in passing, without really addressing the question of their cause, or says that the causes are not well understood. I'm trying to find a legitimate article that links DO events with solar cycles, but I've not found anything yet... I know I've read something about it somewhere, if only I could remember where...! I'll keep digging.

C-Bob

Edited November 14, 2006 by Captain_Bobski

[Gray-Wolf]

Thanks C-Bob!

the other thing was the time delay that the THC has inbuilt within it for heat redistribution. If the latest research linking polar/antartic climate shifts is correct then it would seem important to know where we are in the greater scheme of things (is there a past heating event within the circulation that is only now starting to emerge?). Is the Arctic warming and Antartic cooling as a response to this past climate fluctuation that is only now emerging at the surface courtesy of the THC?

Again I must emphasise that I do accept AGW and my concerns are more to do with natural cycles compounding our own messing and the possible implications this would bring.

I am no Rheologist but can see that any temp. hike will increase the potential for 'unforseen' catastrophic collapse of portions of both the Greenland Ice Sheet and the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and the implications that this brings along with it.

[parmenides3]

Blimey, fellas! Where to start?

Roger G.: I think you have it the wrong way round; the scientists are at the mercy of the Media. Every reasonable effort to present the risks in a sensible light is gone through for the 'headline fact', which is then blown into the next great disaster. time and time again on NW we see threads on a new news report which spouts doom, only to find, on looking into it, that the report/paper/conference referred to as the source has made no such claim.

As for scientists exaggerating to squeeze funding out of government; given the budget cuts at NOAA and the generally poor level of funding outside the USA, this doesn't seem to have worked. But realistically, if a scientist makes an exaggerated claim, the normal response is for other scientists, under peer review, to knock the paper on the head, or, if it is published, show where it is wrong.

It is very dangerous to infer from the correct observation that the media tend to get carried away to the assumption that therefore there is nothing to be worried about. The issue of adaptation vs mitigation is an important one, but perhaps more on that another time. As for your statement that it is just as likely to get cooler as hotter, because of natural variation; this, regretfully, is false. As things stand, it is much, much more likely to get warmer, for the next couple of hundred years.

Cap'n Bobski: the alleged 'heat island effect' is a familiar denialist claim that the temperature record is unreliable. The Hadley centre has some excellent material on the subject. It is also, regretfully, wrong. There have been concerns about the effect of urbanisation on temperature records and some adjustments downwards were made, several years ago, to take this into account. Pielke Sr. also takes issue at times with the US surface temperature record. But when the records at several thousand stations around the world, with the records from satellite measurements, all result in showing that the global climate is warmer than it was, and continues to warm, it is hard to draw any conclusion other than the obvious one.

The climate science community has by and large got over the Michael Crighton issue, because, in the end, it contains no substance. As a good fiction writer, he has done his research, chosen his material, ignored other material, and published the book which is most likely to seel lots of copies. It isn't climate science. Several webistes have responses from a couple of years ago to the Crighton book; their dismissals are scientific, not personal.

On Solar cycles and DO events, etc, try http://www.aip.org/history/climate/index.html and look at some of the articles.

:)P

[Admiral_Bobski]

Once again, a thorough and informative post - thanks for that P3!

Roger G.: I think you have it the wrong way round; the scientists are at the mercy of the Media.

I have to agree with P3 here - scientists do their work, then the media make their story. Whether or not scientists are biased by the source of their funding is generally not an issue. Occasionally you'll get a scientist who stands up and cries armageddon, but usually it's the media who take an honest, innocent paper, grab a few soundbites and construct the story they want.

Cap'n Bobski: the alleged 'heat island effect' is a familiar denialist claim that the temperature record is unreliable.

Fair play there, P3 - the answers are only a Google away! In the "Heat Island Effect's" defence, it seems that it was originally a legitimate "problem" with the models which, with the greater understanding that followed, later became incorporated into, and ironed out of, climate models. The fact that it is still used by "denialists" doesn't give the original proposal its due credit. (And in my defence, I confess that I hadn't read up on latest developments with it and had just come across it while looking at the CO2 problem! I was raising the issue as a point of interest, not as a refutation of GW!)

The author's message at the end of State of Fear is well worth a read, though - he makes some good points in it, and acknowledges various aspects of the AGW argument. As a point of fact, he doesn't dismiss GW out of hand. I wouldn't say that he has been unfairly run through the mill, though. Any author that writes a book (fact or fiction) based on such a contentious issue knows the flak he's liable to attract - I say fair play to him for his bravery! Still, those temperature data that he presents are interesting, nonetheless.

And finally....thanks for the link re DO cycles - I'll check it out soon!

Chin-chin!

C-Bob

[Admiral_Bobski]

As a quick update, looking for a correlation between temperature and CO2 levels, here is a pair of graphs, overlaid so they are on the same axes - the pink line is atmospheric CO2 and the blue line is temperature.

The source of these graphs is J R Petit, J Jouzel, et al. Climate and atmospheric history of the past 420,000 years from the Vostok ice core in Antarctica, Nature 399 (3 June), pp429-436, 1999.

By overlaying the graphs, which are to the exact same scale, it appears that - for the most part - CO2 followed temperature change... At least, in the fossil record. Does anyone disagree with these graphs?

:lol:

C-Bob

PS - I overlaid these graphs myself (I'm being supremely honest here!). I didn't alter the two graphs in any way (not even resizing or scaling), just overlaid them so that the x-axes were synchronised. Attached below is the original pair of graphs in jpeg format, just in case anyone else wants to double-check my splicing!

Edited November 16, 2006 by Captain_Bobski

[noggin]

Hope I can use this thread to make a point.....many people ridicule the "Ice-age Now" website, but if I stand back and try to look through dispassionate eyes, it seems to me that the media hype about GW is at an equally "up for ridicule" state. Both sides trying to shout the other down. Hysteria setting in. Who to believe? :lol:

[Admiral_Bobski]

Hope I can use this thread to make a point.....many people ridicule the "Ice-age Now" website, but if I stand back and try to look through dispassionate eyes, it seems to me that the media hype about GW is at an equally "up for ridicule" state. Both sides trying to shout the other down. Hysteria setting in. Who to believe? :blink:

You're absolutely right - I said in an earlier post: "I've always found realclimate to be biased towards global warming, almost as much as "Ice Age Now" is biased away from it.". What irritates me is the fact that the two extreme sides of the debate seem to spend more time patronising their rivals than actually responding to the arguments. Two of the most frequently used words seem to be "denialists" (used, sometimes scornfully, by pro-GW people) and "alarmists" (used, sometimes scornfully, by anti-GW people). I suggest alternative words, such as "skeptic" and "believer", both of which have associated negative connotations but are, when taken at face value, perfectly accurate words.

I wish the writers of these articles would cut out this kind of sniping and concentrate on the issue which, I'm sure, would greatly help in clearing these otherwise murky waters!

C-Bob

PS - I hasten to add that sometimes, depending on the context, both "alarmist" and "denialist" are legitimate words. Anyone who refutes a claim, without grounds, is either an alarmist or a denialist. It is important to back up rebuttals with some form of evidence to the contrary.

Edited November 16, 2006 by Captain_Bobski

[Admiral_Bobski]

Just a quick note -

I discovered yesterday, while perusing Christopher Monckton's notes on his article, that the graphs I posted yesterday were the exact same ones he used! (He has also printed the graphs, though not superimposed, on page 4 of his notes.) This is just to let you know that I actually came across the graphs in a completely different place - I don't want it to appear, wrongfully, that I have taken my whole argument from the Monckton piece (or that I am Monckton incognito!). I got the graph from the UNEP/GRID-Arendal site. Here's the link to the graph:

http://www.grida.no/climate/vital/02.htm

:blink:

C-Bob

[parmenides3]

You're absolutely right - I said in an earlier post: "I've always found realclimate to be biased towards global warming, almost as much as "Ice Age Now" is biased away from it.". What irritates me is the fact that the two extreme sides of the debate seem to spend more time patronising their rivals than actually responding to the arguments. Two of the most frequently used words seem to be "denialists" (used, sometimes scornfully, by pro-GW people) and "alarmists" (used, sometimes scornfully, by anti-GW people). I suggest alternative words, such as "skeptic" and "believer", both of which have associated negative connotations but are, when taken at face value, perfectly accurate words.

I wish the writers of these articles would cut out this kind of sniping and concentrate on the issue which, I'm sure, would greatly help in clearing these otherwise murky waters!

C-Bob

PS - I hasten to add that sometimes, depending on the context, both "alarmist" and "denialist" are legitimate words. Anyone who refutes a claim, without grounds, is either an alarmist or a denialist. It is important to back up rebuttals with some form of evidence to the contrary. :lol:

There is a HUGE difference (sorry for the shout) between Ice Age Now and RealClimate. One is a site promoting the book sales of an individual with limited credentials as a scientist and an absolute lack on reasoning or logic to his ideas. The other is website run by climate scientists, read by climate scientists, with climate scientists as correspondents and contributors, respected in the scientific community and, by and large, both reasoned in its discussion and technically precise where necessary. RealClimate is not an 'alarmist' site, nor does it sensationalise the issues or the science.

Cap'n Bobski: there is a lag of approximately 800 years in the ice cores between the start of warming and the rise of CO2. This is then followed by several thousand years of continued warming, running alongside CO2 levels; more heat, more life, more CO2, more heat...

Try to think of the situation we are currently in as one where the 800 year build-up has been short-circuited by industrialisation; where does that put us on the graph now?; on a rising trend. There are many articles on this. It doesn't cast any doubt on the science of, or the evidence for, AGW.

:)P

[Admiral_Bobski]

There is a HUGE difference (sorry for the shout) between Ice Age Now and RealClimate. One is a site promoting the book sales of an individual with limited credentials as a scientist and an absolute lack on reasoning or logic to his ideas. The other is website run by climate scientists, read by climate scientists, with climate scientists as correspondents and contributors, respected in the scientific community and, by and large, both reasoned in its discussion and technically precise where necessary.

Righty-ho! Let's just clarify a few things here - first of all, don't worry about the shout

My comment wasn't upon the legitimacy of the information on the two sites mentioned, merely on their evident bias. I also added in the qualifier "almost" when referring to realclimate, suggesting that their degree of bias was not as great as Ice Age Now's. There is most definitely a bias on realclimate's site, since all the climatologists who are connected with the site support the consensus view that GW is occurring. (More on "Consensus Science in a moment!)

RealClimate is not an 'alarmist' site, nor does it sensationalise the issues or the science.

In all fairness I should have left a paragraph break before saying what irritates me. I was not trying to insinuate that realclimate is an extreme pro-GW site that could fairly be described as "alarmist" (although Ice Age Now is an extreme anti-GW site that could fairly be described as "denialist"). The alarmist/denialist comment was intended as a separate comment on extremes of the GW debate. As I say, the layout of that paragraph was a tad ambiguous - my bad!

Cap'n Bobski: there is a lag of approximately 800 years in the ice cores between the start of warming and the rise of CO2. This is then followed by several thousand years of continued warming, running alongside CO2 levels; more heat, more life, more CO2, more heat...

Try to think of the situation we are currently in as one where the 800 year build-up has been short-circuited by industrialisation; where does that put us on the graph now?; on a rising trend. There are many articles on this. It doesn't cast any doubt on the science of, or the evidence for, AGW.

Two things on your first comment - firstly, you are agreeing that initially temperature rise preceded CO2 rise, yes? Your second sentence there makes it sound like the temperature continued to increase for 400,000 years, despite the dips. But, regardless of that, at every upturn of the graph, temperature precedes CO2 increase. And, in fact, at a couple of points (such as around the 110,000 years ago mark) temperature increases despite a continuous downward trend in CO2 levels!

If the alleged central causes of GW, such as CO2, are not being properly handled then I would say that it does cast doubt on the science of AGW. If CO2 caused temperature increase, as we are told time and time again by the climatologists, then why does the graph quite clearly show the exact opposite?

:lol:

C-Bob

PS - On "Consensus Science"...I know you disregard Michael Crichton's climatological viewpoint, but his views as a scientist are worth noting. Try the link below and read a few of his speeches (to respected audiences) - especially "Testimony of Michael Crichton before the United States Senate", "Aliens Cause Global Warming" and "Environmentalism as Religion". Definitely worth reading.

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

Blimey, fellas! Where to start?

.

As for your statement that it is just as likely to get cooler as hotter, because of natural variation; this, regretfully, is false. As things stand, it is much, much more likely to get warmer, for the next couple of hundred years.

P

How can you come by that statement? It is false to state that. Irrespective of mans input of CO2 the fact still remains that even when CO2 was higher than now and temps as warm [if not warmer] ice age followed. What has changed? We cannot really say can we?!

BFTP

Edited November 17, 2006 by BLAST FROM THE PAST

[parmenides3]

Morning, Cap'n, Blast.

In response to your doubts about the role of CO2, I have lifted this wholesale from Coby Beck ('A few things Ill considered'), with apologies. Does this help to clarify the question?

A close examination of the CH4, CO2 and temperature fuctuations recorded in the Antarctic ice core records does in fact reveal that yes, the temperature moved first in what is, when viewed coarsely, a very tight correlation. But what it is not correct, is to say the temperature rose and then 800 years later the CO2 rose. These warming periods lasted for 5000 to 10000 years (the coolings lasted ~100kyrs) so for the majority of that time (~90%) temperature and CO2 rose together. This means that this wonderful archive of climatological evidence clearly allows for CO2 acting as a cause while also revealing it can be an effect.

The current understanding of those cycles is that changes in orbital parameters (Milankovich and other cycles) caused greater amounts of summer sunlight in the northern hemisphere. This is a very small forcing. But it caused ice to retreat in the north which changed the albedo increasing the warmth in a feedback effect. Some ~800 years after this process started, CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere began to rise and this also amplified the warming trend even further as another feedback mechanism.

You can also go here ( http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=13 ) for a discussion by climate scientists of exactly this question but with greater technical detail and full references to the scientific literature.

So, CO2 did not trigger the warmings, but it did contribute to them, and according to climate theory and model experiments, Greenhouse Gas forcing was the largest factor in the ultimate change.

One thing that this says for the future is that we may well see additional natural CO2 come out of the woodwork as whatever process that took place repeatedly over the last 650K yrs begins to play out again. The likely candidates are outgassing from warming ocean waters, carbon from warming soils and methane from melting permafrost.

On Michael Crighton: I've tried to avoid direct commentary on the book, because I haven't read it. Instead, my comments have tried to reflect the discussions of it on website and blogs relating to CC and climate science. Note that Crighton (a writer, not a scientist) was asked to testify by Senator James Inhofe, one of the best known (and least popular) anit-AGW political figures in the Bush administration. My personal inclination is to value the work of the people at the coal-face, the scientists, over the work of either politicians or writers; for this reason, I think we should treat Crighton's contribution to understanding of the climate and GW with some degree of caution.

Blast: I think we are back to dealing with timescales again, but Andrew Dessler, on http://gristmill.grist.org/user/Andrew%20Dessler has just re-issued a previously popular comment related to this.

The reason I state that the Cap'ns statement is false is that, according to all the climate centres, all the models, all the projections, and even the conclusions of most of the less-enthusiastic scientists on AGW, the climate is almost certainly going to continue to warm. The main reason for this is the lag in response to temprature increase in the oceans. As far as '...we cannot really say, can we?...'; this implies an uncertainty in the science which is probably stronger than the real state of affairs. We are, actually, in quite a good position to say, with some confidence, that there is unlikely to be an ice age, or even the beginnings of one, for at least 10,000 years, and more probably about 50,000 years.

Of course, I know that this is not really what you are suggesting; you are pointing to historical precedent to indicate that previous warming cycles have been followed by cooling cycles, and that this is still possible. This is a view you share with, for example, Bill Gray, former hurricane boss at NOAA, but it is not shared by the vast majority of climate scientists. In conclusion; there are good reasons why I was so clear in my rebuttal; it is not the case that 'it is just as likely to get cooler as get warmer'. It is 99% likely to get globally warmer in the coming four decades. It is 1% likely to get cooler. These final numbers are my personal selection, not scientific onclusions.

:)P

[Admiral_Bobski]

Hi P3 - I'm having a little trouble here. First off, Coby Beck says "...this wonderful archive of climatological evidence clearly allows for CO2 acting as a cause while also revealing it can be an effect..." What is this statement based on, precisely? The fact that CO2 and temperature rose hand in hand after the initial temperature increase can quite equally be applied to the principle that temperature increase causes CO2 to rise. And, since the temperature started to increase first, this is a perfectly rational explanation for the fact that they rose together thereafter. There is no need to invoke the concept that "CO2 then causes temperature to increase" to explain the graph. To my mind this seems to be a totally arbitrary attribution of cause and effect (but one that neatly fits the AGW theory...).

On Michael Crighton: I've tried to avoid direct commentary on the book, because I haven't read it. Instead, my comments have tried to reflect the discussions of it on website and blogs relating to CC and climate science. Note that Crighton (a writer, not a scientist) was asked to testify by Senator James Inhofe, one of the best known (and least popular) anit-AGW political figures in the Bush administration. My personal inclination is to value the work of the people at the coal-face, the scientists, over the work of either politicians or writers; for this reason, I think we should treat Crighton's contribution to understanding of the climate and GW with some degree of caution.

Okay, well I highly recommend reading the book. Why? Because it is well researched, well presented and it faces some legitimate issues in a legitimate way. How can you make comments based on the opinions of bloggers without reading the source material first? How do you know that their interpretation of the book is accurate? How do you know that you won't read the book differenly from them?

Also, I'm terribly sorry but I didn't realise you couldn't be a writer and a scientist at the same time. Crichton has a degree in medicine which, to the best of my knowledge, is a scientific degree. Therefore, by definition, he is a scientist. He researches every book he writes exhaustively, and he conducts his research in a scientific manner, by analysing all the facts, sorting out inconsistencies, determining what is accurate and what is not and seeing where different theories overlap. Seems pretty scientific to me. The fact that he doesn't hold a post at a University or some think-tank at the forefront of research is neither here nor there.

Read the speeches! It doesn't matter who asked him to give the speech - read what he said in the speech. You seem to be under the impression that Crichton dismisses GW out of hand. This is not true - he believes that there is some global warming occurring, and that some of the observed GW is caused by human activity. His point is about how "environmental sciences" are conducted, and the flaws inherent in the nature of the research.

You say we should treat Crichton's contribution with caution. Why? What makes his contribution any less valid than any climate scientist's contribution? He didn't just make stuff up for the book - every fact stated in the book is taken from scientific research. The story is fiction, yes, but the facts are facts

We are, actually, in quite a good position to say, with some confidence, that there is unlikely to be an ice age, or even the beginnings of one, for at least 10,000 years, and more probably about 50,000 years.

How good a position, since we really don't know what triggers ice ages with any certainty? No, I'm not now going with the "Ice Age Now" belief, but 10,000 years is a really long time - I'd hold off on a comment like that until we have a better understanding of these things.

I look forward to the next 20 years - it will be interesting to see how good these climate models actually are...

C-Bob