The ' I NEED TO SCREAM' thread.

[West is Best]

OK, then, applying the same logic, you might as well start dropping litter...

Devonian - we do try and do our bit. We have mostly low energy light bulbs, use public transport, have a fuel efficient car, recycle as much as we're allowed use reusable nappies, wash on 40 degrees where poss, have virtually eliminated air travel etc. etc.

But do I really think this is going to make any difference? Nope. It's pretty much all just to salve my middle class conscience. If we want to get serious about emissions we have to tackle the macro-scale economic polluters. But what really gets up my nose is a prat like Cameron jetting off to the arctic and then lecturing us on climate change. Even worse than him were some of the pop stars at the climate gigs.

But my real gripe on this is the one I've added to the many other voices on here - namely about some of the absolute nonsense being produced on the subject of Global Warming. To blame both summers 2006 and 2007 on climate change, without a single scrap of evidence, brings science (which you seem keen to mention) into disrepute. I'd like to see some hardened facts on how weather extremities are linked to climate change, in a way that is demonstrably different to the past. There has been very little if no actual proof of how a singular extreme weather events are undeniably linked to climate change. This is a gaping achilles heel in the whole debate at the moment, which the media are suckers for, and which rather than aids the cause of climate change protesters is bringing the whole topic into disrepute - quite rightly so in my opinion.

So ... show me exactly how UK summers 2006 and 2007 are both caused by AGW. It's sounds great, but suffers from being absolute tosh.

[Devonian]

Devonian - we do try and do our bit. We have mostly low energy light bulbs, use public transport, have a fuel efficient car, recycle as much as we're allowed use reusable nappies, wash on 40 degrees where poss, have virtually eliminated air travel etc. etc.

But do I really think this is going to make any difference? Nope. It's pretty much all just to salve my middle class conscience. If we want to get serious about emissions we have to tackle the macro-scale economic polluters. But what really gets up my nose is a prat like Cameron jetting off to the arctic and then lecturing us on climate change. Even worse than him were some of the pop stars at the climate gigs.

I've answered this before. Cameron is laying out a stall. You don't have to vote for him - but I'd defend his right to lay out what he think we should do for us to see. If you had to listen to him it would be a lecture, but you don't.

But my real gripe on this is the one I've added to the many other voices on here - namely about some of the absolute nonsense being produced on the subject of Global Warming. To blame both summers 2006 and 2007 on climate change, without a single scrap of evidence, brings science (which you seem keen to mention) into disrepute. I'd like to see some hardened facts on how weather extremities are linked to climate change, in a way that is demonstrably different to the past. There has been very little if no actual proof of how a singular extreme weather events are undeniably linked to climate change. This is a gaping achilles heel in the whole debate at the moment, which the media are suckers for, and which rather than aids the cause of climate change protesters is bringing the whole topic into disrepute - quite rightly so in my opinion.

So ... show me exactly how UK summers 2006 and 2007 are both caused by AGW. It's sounds great, but suffers from being absolute tosh.

Imo, you need to read what the scientists are saying, not just dismiss it in posts littered with words like 'prat', 'tosh' and 'nonsense'.

I'm not a scientist properly qualified to speak on these matter - that's why I don't dismiss those that are, but try to put forward what they say (or rather, defend it from volleys of hostile fire). Why don't they do it? Because the fire would be amazing

I tell you what Jethro - it's things like that which do really make me wish we had a seriously cold month or two this winter. A few blizzards might shut them up, but the trouble is you and I both know that if we had a repeat of 1962-3 this winter they would blame it on Global Warming. Guaranteed.

We haven't had a seriously cold month since 1986...

Might we have one this year? It's not impossible, even in a warming trend.

I just don't get why people see the two, a warming trend and the odd cold month, as incompatible. If people were on average getting taller, you think you'd never see a short person, or would you see less of them???

Edited September 11, 2007 by Devonian

[Essan]

I just don't get why people see the two, a warming trend and the odd cold month, as incompatible. If people were on average getting taller, you think you'd never see a short person, or would you see less of them???

I'm 5'6" which proves that people today are no taller than they were during the Middle Ages and that the suggestion that improved diet etc has led to us growing taller in the 20th/21st century is a complete myth, fabricated by dishonest scientists pushing a personal heightist agenda

To blame both summers 2006 and 2007 on climate change, without a single scrap of evidence, brings science (which you seem keen to mention) into disrepute.

Best shoot the media and other ignorant commentators then

Who from the scientific world has blamed/attributed the weather in both summers on climate change?

[VillagePlank]

From what I understand (which, before anyone reminds me - is very little) climate change means the frequency of extreme weather will increase. It is not enough to attribute a sequence, nor instance, of an extreme event to climate change.

This is measurable.

If anyone has the complete CET record one can measure the record-breaking months and see if, say, it's frequency has increased.

Edited September 11, 2007 by VillagePlank

[jethro]

I'm not a scientist properly qualified to speak on these matter - that's why I don't dismiss those that are, but try to put forward what they say (or rather, defend it from volleys of hostile fire). Why don't they do it? Because the fire would be amazing

Wow! Something we have in common; this is exactly what I and other's do too, usually to volleys of hostile fire from your goodself.

We haven't had a seriously cold month since 1986...

I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of the CET but are you sure about that? Doesn't take a whole month of frost to kill plants, a night or too will do for many that the garden centres are now full of.

Might we have one this year? It's not impossible, even in a warming trend.

But I bet if I or anyone else on this forum had predicted this summer back in March or predicted a forthcoming cold, snowy winter then we'd be leapt upon and told, Pah! the base temps have risen, this is the christmas pudding etc.

Who from the scientific world has blamed/attributed the weather in both summers on climate change?

[West is Best]

From what I understand (which, before anyone reminds me - is very little) climate change means the frequency of extreme weather will increase. It is not enough to attribute a sequence, nor instance, of an extreme event to climate change.

That's my gripe though VP - that the media in particular are latching on to any and every weather event as attributable to GW. But there's not yet been the slightest bit of evidence to suggest there is proof for this. Extreme weather events have been going on since the earth span out of the nascent sun. I've yet to see the faintest proof that they have increased.

What has increased is the ability to report global extreme weather events and to bring them to the word's attention, and I suggest the two things are being confused.

Aside from that, which was the key to my response, I'd like to know precisely why overall warming temperatures is supposed to increase extreme weather events. The problem is that whenever anything out of the ordinary happens metereologically from a desert storm to the hailstone that hit Aunty Hilda on the head, the AGW bandwagon now charges onto it like some lascivious call-girl. It's faintly pathetic to be honest, and as I said previously is bringing the science of this into disrepute.

I'm not really saying much different from senior Met Office figures like Tim Palmer and Keith Groves who have warned about the sloppy science in this area, and the failure to prove tangible links between extreme weather events and climate change.

Who from the scientific world has blamed/attributed the weather in both summers on climate change?

Take a look at the links I and others provided. We've had Met O statements blaming both ...

Edited September 11, 2007 by West is Best

[Thundery wintry showers]

It is very misleading to hold anthropogenic global warming responsible for individual extreme events, as extreme events have always occurred within the confines of natural variability either side of the mean.

There is an argument that June/July 2007's excessive rainstorms could have been aggravated by above-normal SSTs in the cyclogenesis zones- a signal of a warmer climate- but then again we had similarly wet summers in 1912 and 1954, and both widely had a greater sunshine shortage.

Similarly, had July 2006's synoptics been repeated 30 years ago, we would probably have had a near record-breaking month, rather than record-breaking, due to the Northern Hemisphere temperature baseline being 0.6C lower, but it would still have been a very hot month.

However, as some others have suggested, it's mainly the media, not scientists, who associate certain events with "global warming". The main fingerprints of "global warming", rather, are increasing global temperature and increasing frequency/intensity of extreme events across the globe.

[West is Best]

TWS - thank you for that: you can always be counted on to add sensible scientific content.

Can I ask why in particular warming should increase extreme events any more than cooling should? Presumably during the cooler 1960's people who went through the winter of 1962-3 found it a pretty extreme weather event.

My point would be that this planet always produces a variety of extreme weather events regardless of the prevailing level of 'heat'.

[Slinky]

That's my gripe though VP - ~snip-

Crist for a second I had to check I was on the right forum, a sensible disscusion on this subject! I had given up on even typing one letter on this subject again after getting jumped on and almost bullied while expressing my thoughts on AGW and the media bandwagon. Very refreshing.

[Essan]

Take a look at the links I and others provided. We've had Met O statements blaming both ...

Have we? I must have missed them then ....

As a true sceptic I'm increasingly more sceptical of the 'so called sceptics' stance than that of those who believe in AGW. They have have a habit of of misinterpretation

[Gray-Wolf]

Have we? I must have missed them then ....

As a true sceptic I'm increasingly more sceptical of the 'so called sceptics' stance than that of those who believe in AGW. They have have a habit of of misinterpretation

I've noted an uncommon strength of hand and an uncanny ability to spot a straw at 90 paces myself......

and of the 'natural cycles', what if they are helping to 'amplify' the situation that man has caused? what if, instead of being an alternative they are in fact the things that will lead us into rapid climate change and the breaching of a myriad of 'tipping points'?

I do have concerns over the impact the height of solar cycle 24 may cause us. I know that we are very dependant on our electrickery and all it provides us with (power,mass communications, finacial infrastructures etc.) but we also have no idea how it will affect our global climate system a little cooling won't matter but a little warming(esp. at the poles)?

Edited September 11, 2007 by Gray-Wolf

[Stratos Ferric]

You may not be wrong, but it's not as clear cut as that. Doctors get it wrong.God knows car mechanics get it wrong.Not all climate scientists agree that the world is in imminent danger from AGW. A lot don't.

Climate scientists are also humans beings, who can lose objectivity when their work is criticised or questioned.They also like to have a roof over their head and food in their belly. Enough said.

I see it quite often in my job.I trained as a scientist and have been making a good living out of it for 22 years since.

Indeed they do, but so did medicine doctors in the past; and, just occasionally, pilots still get it wrong, and soldiers, and politicians; geez, even I make mistakes occasionally!

The point is that for all those occasional instances where they get it wrong, there are thousands where they don't. If this weren't the case then doctors, mechanics, and the rest, would have passed into history due to lack of demand.

Like Essan says, how long do we need to wait? This thread has been repeated annually for at least the last six years here in virtual space, and people like you, and Noggin, and many others (often who have a too romantic attachment to cold weather for its own sake and who, therefore, I tend to suspect have a biased perception - looking for what they WANT to happen, rather than objectively assessing the data [and, sorry to have a go at Noggin here, but comments like "it's happened before" simply are NOT true: they trip easily off the tongue, and to those who are soothed by their own assurances may provide some comfort, but as ever, there's precious little data provided to back up thes hypotheses - again, as Essan says, science is about observation and quantification]) continue to argue each and every year, against a consistent upward trend in temperatures, either that it (warming) isn't happening, which is both risible and beggaring of belief in equal measure, or else that it's a blip. On that basis Everest is a blip and might as well be the Brecon Beacons. All we need now is one of the cold monkeys to come on and say "it's only bad luck that Everest isn't in South Wales".

This is a prime example of why I feel like screaming. Here we have a professional, actually not just a professional but the president of the Royal Meteorological Society (someone, who in my view should know better), declaring that not only has this summer been utterly extraordinary - it hasn't, it's happened before - but also announcing that this is only a taste of the troubles that lie ahead due to AGW. Aaaaargh!!!!! Is it any wonder this whole thing goes round in ever decreasing circles when this kind of thing is published.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/sto...2160710,00.html

A couple of thoughts: firstly, what we have is your interpretatio of a journalist's, possibly skewed, interpretation of what has been said. If you read the whole article carefully he does (said President) go on to say that what's being presented is for challenge and that some of his theories may not survive the test. He is advancing as science always has: formation of hypothesis based on observation, that is then tested over time.

Secondly, the extent to which you want to scream at this article can be returned with added interest if you don't consider this year extraordinary. The warmest start to a year on record, the warmest rolling twelve months ever, and the second warmest summer ever. Can you please explain WHY you don't consider that extraordinary: you might want to check a dictionary first, just in case.

Sceptics who flare inadvisedly at what is perfectly fair comment hardly strengthen the legitimate position of scepticism overall.

Try reading the link again eh? It states catagorically that it is BRITAIN he is referring to. Don't have Mr. Data's records or incredible memory but ask him; it's been wetter, dryer, hotter, colder over the summer in this country before and all the same will happen again, with or without AGW.

He was talking about the YEAR not the summer: read the first paragraph. And it has NEVER been hotter - sorry, fact. Yes, it has happened before, and it will again, but as I've discussed with you before, it's the frequency with which upside records are set compared with the paucity of cold side records that is increasingly indicative of a trend, and this is a YEAR ROUND pattern. We have had seasonal blips in the past, but not sustained year round records.

[Thundery wintry showers]

TWS - thank you for that: you can always be counted on to add sensible scientific content.

Can I ask why in particular warming should increase extreme events any more than cooling should? Presumably during the cooler 1960's people who went through the winter of 1962-3 found it a pretty extreme weather event.

My point would be that this planet always produces a variety of extreme weather events regardless of the prevailing level of 'heat'.

I think the argument lies more in terms of potentially more severe hurricanes, floods, gales and thunderstorms, due to higher SSTs, warmer air holding more moisture etc. It's quite correct, as far as I'm aware, to state that any increases in heat extremes would, averaged globally, be at least offset by decreased cold extremes.

[Stratos Ferric]

...I'd like to know precisely why overall warming temperatures is supposed to increase extreme weather events. ...

Whilst agreeing with the sentiment that the ignorant press attribute everything to GW, it would be reasonable to expect that in any closed system with increased energy (after all, that's what temperature is a measure of) the average size of flux would increase given that the volume (and all else) in the system is unchanged.

Give me a tin full of 10oz fireworks and they will make a certain level of noise. Give me the same number of 11oz fireworks and cram them into the same tin: they will make a bigger noise when they explode. Can't see what's so mysterious about this. If you doubt this go put a pan of cold water on a ring, turn the ring on, watch for five minutes, then come and report back what you observed.

West: I'm a gardener, I've lost count of the many, many people who want their garden designed with the Med in mind, they also want Bananas, Olive Trees, Palms etc; when I point out that actually they'll be very lucky to get them through many a winter they look at me as though I'm barking mad. They all say the same thing "but we don't get winters like that anymore, they're a thing of the past, global warming, blah, blah, blah". Frost is obsolete in this country, droughts are the norm, in a short while we'll be just like Greece; drives me insane.

And do you have any data to the contrary. I can very easily make the case for the prosecution. Yet another example of empty rhetoric: sorry, but it's true. There are also many horticulturalists out there observing tender plants over-wintering quite happily now where even twenty years ago they wouldn't have stood a chance.

...

We haven't had a seriously cold month since 1986...

I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of the CET but are you sure about that? ...

...

And that makes my point. Somebody states a fact, you then say you aren't really in a position to verify it (i.e. you don't know and can't be bothered to go find out), but still persist in doubting it.

Staggering.

...Can I ask why in particular warming should increase extreme events any more than cooling should? Presumably during the cooler 1960's people who went through the winter of 1962-3 found it a pretty extreme weather event.

...

Now go take that pan of water and put it in the fridge, and watch it for a week or two, then report back again.

[acbrixton]

A couple of thoughts: firstly, what we have is your interpretatio of a journalist's, possibly skewed, interpretation of what has been said. If you read the whole article carefully he does (said President) go on to say that what's being presented is for challenge and that some of his theories may not survive the test. He is advancing as science always has: formation of hypothesis based on observation, that is then tested over time....

He was talking about the YEAR not the summer: read the first paragraph. And it has NEVER been hotter - sorry, fact. Yes, it has happened before, and it will again, but as I've discussed with you before, it's the frequency with which upside records are set compared with the paucity of cold side records that is increasingly indicative of a trend, and this is a YEAR ROUND pattern. We have had seasonal blips in the past, but not sustained year round records.

Indeed. It is worth pointing out that the President went on to cite the southerly tracking jetstream and EL Nino as the causes of the exceptionally wet summer and not AGW.

regards

ACB

[Devonian]

Crist for a second I had to check I was on the right forum, a sensible disscusion on this subject! I had given up on even typing one letter on this subject again after getting jumped on and almost bullied while expressing my thoughts on AGW and the media bandwagon. Very refreshing.

Everyone gets jumped on - it's one of the 'sine qua non's' of internet discussion.

I'm not a scientist properly qualified to speak on these matter - that's why I don't dismiss those that are, but try to put forward what they say (or rather, defend it from volleys of hostile fire). Why don't they do it? Because the fire would be amazing

Wow! Something we have in common; this is exactly what I and other's do too, usually to volleys of hostile fire from your goodself.

Oh no you don't...

You know who I mean by qualified - climatologists and meteorologists from the Met O, NOAA, IPCC and the rest. They are the qualified ones.

[Gray-Wolf]

If our skeptics are so sure of the cyclic nature of our current weather then they can show me other comparable periods of weather extremes( globally and not just regionally) of the records with the global climate records for the past 15yrs and highlight, for me, a comparable ,global, period of time that shows the same frequency of weather anomalies/records as over the last 15yrs.

If you can do so then I may even have to rethink my experience of the last 15yrs to bring it into this 'new' context.

[West is Best]

Whilst agreeing with the sentiment that the ignorant press attribute everything to GW, it would be reasonable to expect that in any closed system with increased energy (after all, that's what temperature is a measure of) the average size of flux would increase given that the volume (and all else) in the system is unchanged.

There are a huge number of a priori assumptions here from describing the world's atmosphere as a closed system to that the temperature increase is universal.

I see no evidence that extreme weather events have increased. Perhaps you can find me some, but I suspect the wait will be rather longer than the one you suggest with the fridge pan. Amusing though your analogy is it's an entirely spurious comparison. The earth's atmosphere is not a sealed saucepan with universally tangible heat exchange. Temperature changes, measurable though they might be, are extremely uneven. Mind you, pop your pan in the freezer and then imagine a posse of Lilliputians living on it and I rather fancy they'd find conditions rather extreme.

Back though to my earlier point. Weather extremes occur in any given prevailing temperatures, partly because it all depends on your definition of a weather extreme, and partly because of the unevenness: a heatwave here, a freeze there. We have a tendency to latch onto to everything at the moment as proof that AGW is driving extremities: thus 'Boscastle 2006' neatly ignores 'Lynton 1952'. For every extreme weather event this year there have been 10 million predecessors, and more.

By the way, just to play with some local data and taking your favoured 10-year rolling average. Summer is a three-month season, and therefore a reasonably long timespan. We have just witnessed the coolest summer for fifteen years in the UK (though equal with 1998). At 15.2C the summer was 'well below average' compared to the 16.3C rolling 10 year average. I haven't checked but I'm guessing it's the coldest season relative to the average for more than a decade. Does this indicate the end of global warming... ? Presumably not, but might give pause for thought?

And that makes my point. Somebody states a fact, you then say you aren't really in a position to verify it (i.e. you don't know and can't be bothered to go find out), but still persist in doubting it.

Staggering.

So now that on Jethro's behalf I've given you some hard facts about this summer as 'well below average' I look forward to your thoughts!

[noggin]

and, sorry to have a go at Noggin here, but comments like ....

No offence taken.

[Devonian]

By the way, just to play with some local data and taking your favoured 10-year rolling average. Summer is a three-month season, and therefore a reasonably long timespan. We have just witnessed the coolest summer for fifteen years in the UK (though equal with 1998). At 15.2C the summer was 'well below average' compared to the 16.3C rolling 10 year average. I haven't checked but I'm guessing it's the coldest season relative to the average for more than a decade. Does this indicate the end of global warming... ? Presumably not, but might give pause for thought?

Not as much pause, surely, as all those warm/mild seasons? Record breakingly warm summer last year, record breakingly warm winters? Three, I think it was, record breaking warm months last year, and amazingly warm April this year. Several 'warmest in the entire record' months in the recent past.

I just go by the figure. I see warming. Atm I see no sign of a cool down (indeed with Arctic ice in the pitiful state it is I'd most certainly not bet on a cold winter).

Edited September 12, 2007 by Devonian

[West is Best]

I see warming. Atm I see no sign of a cool down

I don't think you would though Devonian even if it was happening.

But it was addressed to Stratos Ferric, not you.

Edited September 12, 2007 by West is Best

[Devonian]

I don't think you would though Devonian even if it was happening.

What are you saying? That if we had a cold month I'd deny it? Is that what you mean? That if it cooled down I'd go around saying the opposite? What you write is tantamount to saying I'd not tell the truth?

Edited September 12, 2007 by Devonian

[West is Best]

Well against SF's 10 year preferred rolling average (preferred because it's a better indicator of trends according to him) we've just had not merely one 'well below average' month but an entire 'well below average' season. The first I think for 10 years. Facts ...

(well below average is an official designation for a month or season exceeding 1 degree below average)

Edited September 12, 2007 by West is Best

[Devonian]

Well against SF's 10 year preferred rolling average (preferred because it's a better indicator of trends according to him) we've just had not merely one 'well below average' month but an entire 'well below average' season. The first I think for 10 years. Facts ...

(well below average is an official designation for a month or season exceeding 1 degree below average)

No we haven't! .

[West is Best]

No we haven't! .

Look, why don't you read things properly first instead of pitching in without stopping to think, especially when it wasn't even addressed to you?

I have posted facts up about this summer against the 10 year rolling average which is Stratos Ferric's own proudly proclaimed preferred measuring stick - which is why I've now put it back to him. If you care to look you'll see exactly what I mean. Now either address my point or butt out of it. By the way, it is pretty scandalous really that that Met O link is still comparing to the 1961-1990 average . I can see why people get very hot under the collar. 1990 is 17 years ago now, and there's no real excuse for them to be using that anymore.

Here's the relevant paragraph again, sigh:

'By the way, just to play with some local data and taking your favoured 10-year rolling average. Summer is a three-month season, and therefore a reasonably long timespan. We have just witnessed the coolest summer for fifteen years in the UK (though equal with 1998). At 15.2C the summer was 'well below average' compared to the 16.3C rolling 10 year average. I haven't checked but I'm guessing it's the coldest season relative to the average for more than a decade. Does this indicate the end of global warming... ? Presumably not, but might give pause for thought?'

Edited September 12, 2007 by West is Best