General Climate Change

[Gray-Wolf]

http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=38213

Whether human influenced or just 'natural' such changes impact like never before.

[rob48]

The appliance of science:

http://www.guardian....limate-sceptics

Edited April 9, 2010 by jethro
Removed sniping

[laserguy]

http://www.prisonpla...al-warming.html

[MR EXTREMES]

i think the last few years have clearly shown how unpredictable our climate is and with co2 so high how did the northern hemisphere fair this year well lots have said coldest in 30 years,also been cold in 2009 2008.

so why is this well natural cycles clearly are being under estimated just like ipcc over doing global temp trends,

ah and lets not forget my favourate solar output of coarse cycle24 was ment to be the mother of all activity,

3 years later and although the trend has been upwards its still in the deepest minimum in many many years.

so nasa done well with the science involved with solar activity:whistling:,but why has it been a slap in the face for the big guns well its simple over esitmated trends and under estimating the power of cycles including our sun,

the last reason would be its far to early 20 30 years of climate study is nowhere enough time.

the arctic is doing better the antarctic has been effected but other parts are growing perhapes changes in the earths wobble could be enough to shift ice melt and ice growth in different directions.

i dunno just an idea :unsure:

but over all i just think panic stations right now would be silly move because no matter what nature will have the final say.

[Gray-Wolf]

Looks Like Catlin is finding the very conditions I've been fretting about this past 2 months (he 'found it' and didn't have a dream/vision about it.........)

http://www.guardian....vey-melting-ice

Edited April 9, 2010 by jethro

[VillagePlank]

There are extremists from every angle.

I've tried to keep out this one, but, y'know me, can't help myself ...

Consider the normal distribution:

Most people remember this chart as being a chart that describes people's sizes (or something similar) A peculiar property of this chart is that if one has a distinct variable then nearly everything falls under such a chart.

We could have the distinct variable, say opinion, and measure quantity of people who subscribe to such an opinion(the x-axis, and the y-axis, respectively) If you have a big enough sample, the chances are that you find a low amount of people who subscribe to extrema opinion at both ends. In exactly the same way that there are a few very short people, and a few very tall people.

We could measure this. If you take the middle vertical line the chart - this is the mean, or average of opinion. The two lines at either side is the mean +/- 1.96 the standard deviation, which gives us 95% of the entire range of opinions.

As always, there is always room for extrema, and it is a mathematical certainty that someone somewhere will fit at either end of the spectrum. In terms of this debate, one might say that there are those who believe the CO₂ is not even a GhG, and those that believe it is so insidious that the world is going to boil next year.

Of course, the conclusion must be that 95% of opinion is nothing of the sort. A whole great big grey area.

In short - we should expect opinions at extrema, but we should not categorise those that appear, say, anywhere in the 95% area as representative of such opinions. To do so is a folly.

Incidentally, I would say that scientific consensus could be well characterised by assuming the subscription of opinion to one standard deviation from the mean (not 1.96) Such a lemma, of course, says that there is still some dissent in the details, and even in magnitude, but opinion is close enough to characterise the problem.

Edited April 7, 2010 by VillagePlank

[Guest North Sea Snow Convection]

I've tried to keep out this one, but, y'know me, can't help myself ...

Consider the normal distribution:

Most people remember this chart as being a chart that describes people's sizes (or something similar) A peculiar property of this chart is that if one has a distinct variable then nearly everything falls under such a chart.

We could have the distinct variable, say opinion, and measure quantity of people who subscribe to such an opinion(the x-axis, and the y-axis, respectively) If you have a big enough sample, the chances are that you find a low amount of people who subscribe to extrema opinion at both ends. In exactly the same way that there are a few very short people, and a few very tall people.

We could measure this. If you take the middle vertical line the chart - this is the mean, or average of opinion. The two lines at either side is the mean +/- 1.96 the standard deviation, which gives us 95% of the entire range of opinions.

As always, there is always room for extrema, and it is a mathematical certainty that someone somewhere will fit at either end of the spectrum. In terms of this debate, one might say that there are those who believe the CO₂ is not even a GhG, and those that believe it is so insidious that the world is going to boil next year.

Of course, the conclusion must be that 95% of opinion is nothing of the sort. A whole great big grey area.

In short - we should expect opinions at extrema, but we should not categorise those that appear, say, anywhere in the 95% area as representative of such opinions. To do so is a folly.

Incidentally, I would say that scientific consensus could be well characterised by assuming the subscription of opinion to one standard deviation from the mean (not 1.96) Such a lemma, of course, says that there is still some dissent in the details, and even in magnitude, but opinion is close enough to characterise the problem.

I could never have the ability to answer something in the way you have here - but that is really very good!

In terms of the 95%, I do agree. The problems with over categorisation of people come because the extremist fringe tends to be the most vociferous and therefore because loud and/or persistent voices travel far, it makes it appear there is a larger consensus than there actually may be. Such over vocal types also tend to be the most defensive too - although that said, lots of people who take a more middle ground get defensive due to concerns over being included with the loonies when their own views are actually more moderate.

This in turn can cause confusion and blur the edges of representation even further. So this is where categorisation snags wrt to the 95% you talk about comes into things. It happens on net weather in these threads a lot of the time.

All of this is why, you can tell, as I said earlier who the real 'extremists' are.

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

nothing wrong with this makes sense to me.

Apart from the fact it has absolutely no relevance to this discussion, or any aspect of the AGW/global warming/climate change debate whatsoever. Not a single credible person on either side of the debate is calling 'the end of the world', no-one is doom-mongering, no-one is proclaiming civilisation collapse, all anyone is trying to do is understand and attempt to explain some pretty unusual global climatological and atmospheric phenomena. The only people trying to hide behind 'doom-monger' name calling, and/or political/scientific conspiracy theorising are those that for some reason see the whole thing as some kind of threat to their currently comfortable way of life................

[Essan]

Apart from the fact it has absolutely no relevance to this discussion, or any aspect of the AGW/global warming/climate change debate whatsoever. Not a single credible person on either side of the debate is calling 'the end of the world', no-one is doom-mongering, no-one is proclaiming civilisation collapse, all anyone is trying to do is understand and attempt to explain some pretty unusual global climatological and atmospheric phenomena. The only people trying to hide behind 'doom-monger' name calling, and/or political/scientific conspiracy theorising are those that for some reason see the whole thing as some kind of threat to their currently comfortable way of life................

Excellent post

btw wouldn't it be ironic though if the doom-mongers on both sides turned out to be right after all? And we had catastrophic global warming due to carbon emissions and methane occuring exactly as a new catastrophic ice age starts caused by cosmic rays and a quiet sun ......

..... and a consequence .....

..... global temperatures remain exactly unchanged for the next 500 years

[VillagePlank]

The problems with over categorisation of people come because the extremist fringe tends to be the most vociferous and therefore because loud and/or persistent voices travel far, it makes it appear there is a larger consensus than there actually may be.

I think you've touched upon an observation that I like to call VillagePlank's law. You heard it here first

Consider the normal distribution of opinion above. The most vocal, and therefore the most listened too arguments tend to be from the maniac fringe - not from a consensus point of view. This, as you say, tends to exaggerate the belief in the fallacy of large numbers.

Here's a chart to illustrate the law:

Here, the blue line is the quantity of people who hold a given opinion (where there is definite and linearisable divide between both extremes) and red is the internet forum space allocated to such opinion.

As the law demonstrates, the more 'average' your view the less megabytes are used to present such a view.

Edited April 7, 2010 by VillagePlank

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

All of this is why, you can tell, as I said earlier who the real 'extremists' are.

How would you define a 'real extremist'. Would this fit:

Someone who believes that the human race cannot continue on it's present course in terms of exploitation of the earth's resources, and that the most important part of any change to a more sustainable way of life for the whole human race must start by significantly reducing the consumption of the biggest consumers (which would of course be the likes of Western Europe and the US) ?

Because many people who believe that global warming is happening, and that human activity is a significant contributor to that warming, would I think fall into this category.

[MR EXTREMES]

like i said predicting the unpredictable.

after all take a look at the meto longrange over the last few years,

i wonder what they where thinking when the climate did not play ball with there predictions:whistling:.

i can say also they where pretty convinced by the seasonal outlooks:but the climate said nope to there idears.

by the way im not disputing there short medium term forecasting.

but failing on there longterm may well help them to realise that theres more to climate than just co2.

[Gray-Wolf]

95% eh?

wasn't that the recent reappraisal of how settled the science was that man was responsible (over 95% sure)?

Does that mean folk outside of this viewpoint are 'extremists' or am I cross dressing again...........

EDIT: Oh ,and by the way back in Feb Washington DC had it's 'snowpocalypse', as the right wing media named it, no mention in the same press outlets of the record 90 degree heat they have there this early April.........strange that.

Edited April 7, 2010 by Gray-Wolf

[VillagePlank]

btw wouldn't it be ironic though if the doom-mongers on both sides turned out to be right after all? And we had catastrophic global warming due to carbon emissions and methane occuring exactly as a new catastrophic ice age starts caused by cosmic rays and a quiet sun ......

There is evidence to suggest exactly that. If you take a peek at the widely accepted Petite et al Vostok ice-core paper, you will see that the world seems to have an upper limit to temperature - after that it's very quickly into an ice-age.

As far as I can tell such a phenomena is insofar as the chart in the paper shows is mostly not understood.

95% eh?

wasn't that the recent reappraisal of how settled the science was that man was responsible (over 95% sure)?

Does that mean folk outside of this viewpoint are 'extremists' or am I cross dressing again...........

EDIT: Oh ,and by the way back in Feb Washington DC had it's 'snowpocalypse', as the right wing media named it, no mention in the same press outlets of the record 90 degree heat they have there this early April.........strange that.

I am afraid you are wearing suspenders and heels again.

The 95% IPCC appraisal is not a quantitative analysis (as far as I can determine) it seems to be a qualitative analysis. I'm more than happy to change my opinion if the analysis of how the numbers where derived is published. Perhaps it is, but I've never seen it - and I've looked quite hard.

VillagePlank's law is quantitative.

Edited April 7, 2010 by VillagePlank

[Gray-Wolf]

There is evidence to suggest exactly that. If you take a peek at the widely accepted Petite et al Vostok ice-core paper, you will see that the world seems to have an upper limit to temperature - after that it's very quickly into an ice-age.

As far as I can tell such a phenomena is insofar as the chart in the paper shows is mostly not understood.

"One paper an understanding does not make......", I understood that the bottom of Vostok was pretty mashed by the interactions with the ground below. Don't we now have more complete records from dome 'C', and a couple of other places, that bring things into a clearer light.

I'm sure we've been here before and it's well past groundhog day innit?

[MR EXTREMES]

How would you define a 'real extremist'. Would this fit:

Someone who believes that the human race cannot continue on it's present course in terms of exploitation of the earth's resources, and that the most important part of any change to a more sustainable way of life for the whole human race must start by significantly reducing the consumption of the biggest consumers (which would of course be the likes of Western Europe and the US) ?

Because many people who believe that global warming is happening, and that human activity is a significant contributor to that warming, would I think fall into this category.

i dont think many people really want to listen because of the corrupt nature and the uncertainty of the science.

the louder voice does seem to be the global warming camp because anything that disputes gw is pushed to one side.

so why did the northern hemisphere suffer the coldest winter in 30 years during a modrate el nino?

and why have the last few years seen coldish or colder winters?

after all in other el nino years they have been pretty mild,

something caused this run of colder winters and yet co2 is so high?

Edited April 7, 2010 by badboy657

[Gray-Wolf]

after all in other el nino years they have been pretty mild,

something caused this run of colder winters and yet co2 is so high?

An I missing something here? Didn't we just have one of the warmest global 6 months on record?

[VillagePlank]

"One paper an understanding does not make......", I understood that the bottom of Vostok was pretty mashed by the interactions with the ground below. Don't we now have more complete records from dome 'C', and a couple of other places, that bring things into a clearer light.

I'm sure we've been here before and it's well past groundhog day innit?

Well, it's cited by over 2000 other climate papers .... (Google 'Petite et al', and the first return should be the link to Nature, and gives the quantity of citations) Surely, the consensus can't be wrong? Can it?

Edited April 7, 2010 by VillagePlank

[Devonian]

...

so why did the northern hemisphere suffer the coldest winter in 30 years...

...

It didn't - but I suspect you don't want to hear the truth?

[MR EXTREMES]

An I missing something here? Didn't we just have one of the warmest global 6 months on record?

northern hemisphere coldest 30 years.

global means including the NH.

[VillagePlank]

It didn't - but I suspect you don't want to hear the truth?

Yup - quite true.

Last years NH was warm. NH data available, here Looks to me to be about 0.75C warmer than the mean.

Edited April 7, 2010 by VillagePlank

[MR EXTREMES]

Yup - quite true.

Last years NH was warm. NH data available, here Looks to me to be about 0.75C warmer than the mean.

yep i agree thats strange.

better get my floating house ready:help:

must of ment el nino had an effect around the world but pdo helped the places that needed it ie:arctic region.

intresting stuff from accurweather.co.uk

April 6, 2010

Climate Change Models taking Heat

Nice article from the Washington Post today. The story is about the ramped up attacks on climate change models. The article also gives examples of how models are also used in government, business and sports.

In talking specifically about the climate models, here are some excerpts from the story......

If policymakers don't heed the models, "you're throwing away information. And if you throw away information, then you know less about the future than we actually do," said Gavin Schmidt, a climate scientist at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

"You can say, 'You know what, I don't trust the climate models, so I'm going to walk into the middle of the road with a blindfold on,' " Schmidt said. "But you know what, that's not smart."

Climate scientists admit that some models overestimated how much the Earth would warm in the past decade. But they say this might just be natural variation in weather, not a disproof of their methods.

"We're never going to perfectly model reality. We would need a system as complicated as the world around us," said Ken Fleischmann, a professor of information studies at the University of Maryland. He said scientists needed to make the uncertainties inherent in models clear: "You let people know: It's a model. It's not reality. We haven't invented a crystal ball."

Scientists say they don't need models to know that the world is warming: There is plenty of real-world evidence, gathered since the mid-1800s, to suggest that. "There's no climate model in that conclusion," said Christopher Field, of the Carnegie Institution for Science in California.

But Warren Meyer, a mechanical and aerospace engineer by training who blogs at www.climate-skeptic.com, said that climate models are highly flawed. He said the scientists who build them don't know enough about solar cycles, ocean temperatures and other things that can nudge the earth's temperature up or down. He said that because models produce results that sound impressively exact, they can give off an air of infallibility.

NASA's Schmidt counters......Put in the conditions on Earth more than 20,000 years ago: they produce an Ice Age. Put in the conditions from 1991, when a volcanic eruption filled the earth's atmosphere with a sun-shade of dust. The models produce cooling temperatures and shifts in wind patterns, Schmidt said, just like the real world did.

If the models are as flawed as critics say, Schmidt said, "You have to ask yourself, 'How come they work?' "

Edited April 7, 2010 by badboy657

[Gray-Wolf]

Talking of 'Hot' U.S. more on their record breaking April temps;

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitalweathergang/2010/04/pm_update_mid-summer_or_still.html

Hmmm, Spring now bb, shouldn't we be focusing on the heatwave instead of the old winters chill?

[sgian dearg]

Apart from the fact it has absolutely no relevance to this discussion, or any aspect of the AGW/global warming/climate change debate whatsoever. Not a single credible person on either side of the debate is calling 'the end of the world', no-one is doom-mongering, no-one is proclaiming civilisation collapse, all anyone is trying to do is understand and attempt to explain some pretty unusual global climatological and atmospheric phenomena. The only people trying to hide behind 'doom-monger' name calling, and/or political/scientific conspiracy theorising are those that for some reason see the whole thing as some kind of threat to their currently comfortable way of life................

You are welcome to your opinion and I respect your right to hold it, but I don’t think your argument is particularly well made. If, as you believe, “all anyone is trying to do is understand and attempt to explain some pretty unusual global climatological and atmospheric phenomena” then who is it that’s promoting restrictive policies relating to business, travel, lifestyle and anything else connected to greenhouse gas emissions based on their conclusions of said attempts to understand? If, as you believe, “no-one is doom-mongering, no-one is proclaiming civilisation collapse” then what is the reason for all the legislation currently being brought onto our statutes and what is its purpose? Rather than your stated belief that “The only people trying to hide behind 'doom-monger' name calling, and/or political/scientific conspiracy theorising are those that for some reason see the whole thing as some kind of threat to their currently comfortable way of life” is it not possible that some people are merely concerned (without being conspiracy theorists) that some political impositions and some scientific postulation have gone beyond the point at which the facts can definitely support them, and whether or not these concerned people enjoy a comfortable way of life they might be worried that those in the driving seat may not be taking us in the right direction? So, although your definition of a “credible person” might be open to question, as might mine, your assertion that not one of them is treating climate change as anything other than an academic exercise completely devoid of any underlying agenda is one that, I would suggest to you, could easily be interpreted differently than you appear to. I would also suggest, with respect, that my original statement does have relevance to the debate, if not the science, insofar as it parallels the manner in which sometimes the expression of ones beliefs are manifested.

[rob48]

Fully agree with Tamara's (NSSC) 12.20 posting:

"The problems with over categorisation of people come because the extremist fringe tends to be the most vociferous and therefore because loud and/or persistent voices travel far,"

certainly rings true.

I'd also like to add that sgian dearg's appearance has been a most welcome development on this thread.

Keep that dagger sharp!