Should the fact that we don’t have a completely accurate model of the Economy that can predict the Dow Jones, allow us to conclude that all people who say enforcing a carbon tax will hurt the economy are alarmists?
For the record, global warming is not some new trendy idea that came out of some climatologists trying to explain a few hot summers. I remember way back in 1984 doing a class project on the dangers of green house gasses. The theory, based on known physical science, came before the data supporting it not the other way around. I am baffled by the global warming deniers. Physics says that increased green house gasses should lead to increased global temperature. Then we observe the climate and this seems to be the case. Even if you don’t like the data you have to respect the physics.
I feel that we are on a train on a foggy night, and got a radio warning saying there was a bridge out 2 miles ahead. Some time later looking ahead through the mist we see what look like twisted trestles and so like the bridge is actually out. Some recommends putting on the brakes before we hit the river, but others say that its so foggy that you really can’t be sure and so we should chug along full speed ahead.
I would say it depends on the specifics of their claim. For example, if they were to claim that a modest carbon tax would push the economy past a “tipping point” and send us into a Zimbabwe-like depression from which we would never recover, then yes I would call them alarmists.
Possibly you are baffled because you have been misinformed as to the central issue in the dispute.
Even Richard Lindzen - perhaps the most prominent “denier,” agrees that increased CO2 levels are likely to lead to increased global temperatures.
The critical question is whether any such increases would be amplified by water vapor feedback.
Predicting future temperatures has great uncertainty, especially because, as temperatures rise, cooling via reflective aerosols (e.g. similar to the sulfuric aerosols from volcanoes) will be seen as a practical, inexpensive countermeasure.
Unfortunately, high levels of CO[sub]2[/sub] lead to another problem. Dissolving CO[sub]2[/sub] in the oceans (whose future rate is unknown) is sometimes seen as part of climate change’s “solution” but instead CO[sub]2[/sub] may do more harm in the oceans than in the atmosphere, with today’s oceans already showing bad ecological effects from increased acidity.
I know; I’m asking you to provide one. If your “and” is meant to mark a switch away from the question-and-answer bit you quoted, then supply a question like he did so I can supply an answer like I did.
I’m not ascribing that imaginary position to 'em. You’re, like, imagining that.
[QUOTE=phaemon]
It is wrong to say that there has been cooling since 1998.
[/QUOTE]
I’m saying there has been no warming since '98, which is a distinction with a difference.
[QUOTE=Greg Charles]
OK, that report isn’t giving me a lot to be optimistic about. I don’t really understand what it’s showing to you … a reversal of the warming trend? A leveling off?
[/QUOTE]
It’s merely showing me the answer to your question about whether '05 and '10 had surpassed '98. I’m not saying it shows me a significant reversal of the warming trend or a significant leveling off, because I want each person making a prediction to lay out what they feel would show reversal or leveling off – such that I can then plug in those criteria and watch to see whether it happens or not.
No, that’s just it: I want such an “exact point” spelled out by those making the predictions. I’m not the one who should posit that there’s something significant about 2013 – or 2018, or 2023, or whatever; I want to hear what falsification criteria gets posited by those who, y’know, posit.
[QUOTE=Abe]
What simple questions? With all the equivocation being produced here, it seems a stretch to use the word “simple”. I won’t pretend to follow every obscure claim that’s been flung at Gigobuster, but so far what I do glean is a trend of a few people latching on to any argument (including oft-discredited ones) that allows them to repeatedly mistake short-term weather occurrences for long-term climate trends.
Perhaps a restatement of thesis might help.
[/QUOTE]
“What hypothetical evidence could falsify the claims made by those predicting global warming?”
You say, for example, that it’s wrong to mistake short-term weather occurrences for long-term climate trends – and, in those broad terms, I agree with you. What needs to happen, over how long a time, to count as long-term rather than short-term?
[QUOTE=septimus]
Predicting future temperatures has great uncertainty
[/QUOTE]
Can we make a falsifiable prediction that compensates for that? Building in a big enough margin of error, maybe, or including a few quick if/then statements?
And they do.
What I did was an “I’m just saying.” that you do not want to deal with it is understood, I did not demanded anything there from you.
The overwhelming context shows that the UN climate guys are referring to the big picture and the warming trend, there has been no good justification nor support to claim that they are reporting no warming, once again, you only concentrate on a few years to get a misleading result that no serious statistician supports either.
And as shown already, even by independent statisticians, it is a position designed to confuse people, and to ignore the warming trend that the UN itself is reporting then and continues to report now, when the only thing you can do is quote the same out of context quote again and again you only show the obvious, it was indeed taken out of context.
My point is that you weren’t demanding anything; your “I’m just saying” was that X isn’t good enough without spelling out what Y would be good enough. You said the answer to his question doesn’t mean it’s cooling, or that it’s not warming – at which point you don’t go on to add what would mean (a) cooling, or (b) not warming.
Again, that was my answer to his question, to which the UN figures were relevant and sufficient. If you ask a question to which the UN figures would insufficient or irrelevant, I’d answer it differently; you haven’t.
I concentrated on those years because he asked about '98 and '05 and '10. Ask a specific question that involves a bigger span of years, I’d answer differently.
The guy asked about three specific years, and I answered him. If you think a better question would take context into account, then ask it.
Maybe I could try a little gameplaying, to try to get into Waldo’s head the meaningless of his continual repetition if "1998 was warmer!! So:
I am worried that my neighbor is infected with the zombie/vampire virus from I am Legend.
Early in the movie Dr. Neville catches one of the z/vs to experiment on, and remarks that her temperature is the normal z/v 105 degrees.
In 1998 my neighbor came down with malaria, and ran a temp of 104.
In 1999 she measured 99 degrees, which is less than 104, so she must not be warming up.
By 2003 her daily temp was 101, which is less than 104. so she must not be warming.
By 2005, temp 102. etc-
By 2006, 103 etc.
by 2011, 104. Still not higher than 1998.
The symptoms of z/v infection include hair loss, lethal sensitivity to light, and so on.
Over the past decade, her hair has mostly fallen out, her skin has turned gray, her incisors have morphed into inch-long pointed fangs. she won’t go out of the house until night, and she insists on eating her steaks raw. But her temperature is still no higher than it was in 1998, so I guess I shouldn’t worry, right?
And to answer Waldo’s repeated insistence on falsifiable evidence: a number of predictions have been made of possible symptoms of global warming, for example melting glaciers, animals and plants moving to higher/cooler environments, tropical diseases occurring in temperate climates, increases in extreme climate events, and so on. If none of these changes can be observed, the AGW theory is at least possible faulty. But, of course, they have been observed.
Meh, You are just trying to avoid the context, no news here. Again, there was no beef with what you replied to him, only that a huge chuck of context is missing.
Your analogy to I Am Legend is excellent, and so I of course grant that the lack of warming since '98 doesn’t falsify claims made about global warming. I realize that what we’ve observed isn’t good enough to falsify it; I merely wonder what hypothetical evidence you think would falsify it?
I’m not asking about what has been observed, which hasn’t falsified it. I’m asking what could yet be observed to falsify it.
[QUOTE=GIGObuster]
Meh, You are just trying to avoid the context, no news here. Again, there was no beef with what you replied to him, only that a huge chuck of context is missing.
[/QUOTE]
He avoided the context when asking the question, and I answered the question he asked. If you’d ask a question that takes “a huge chuck of context” into account, I’d answer that question instead. Enlighten me: how could we hypothetically falsify the claims in a manner that does take “a huge chuck of context” into account?
I’m not sure what your point is here. In my opinion, there is a lot of uncertainty about future global surface temperature even ignoring human activities.
As with warming, I would want to see the actual arguments and evidence. And if the conclusion is based on a computer simulation, I would need solid evidence that the computer simulation has been tested and validated. i.e. proof that the computer simulation has made actual predictions which later turned out to be accurate and were very unlikely to have been the result of chance.
Well it depends what you mean by the phrase “Cooling since Year X.” It’s not carved in stone anywhere that to evaluate “Cooling since Year X,” you take the average temperature since year X and compare it to the average temperature in some number of years preceding year X.
I think what you mean to say is that any cooling since 1998 doesn’t necessarily imply that the longer term trend is upwards. Which is true, but kinda beside the point under discussion.
Would it have been similarly dishonest, back in 1998 or 1999 to highlight 1998 as evidence of an alarming warming trend?
As a point of information, this is a common misconception. The core issue in the dispute is over water vapor feedback.
Seems to me that the starting point in disproving global warming would be to figure out exactly what predictions the hypothesis is making.
As an enlightenment effort first one has to say that you even know that it was a typo and you only want to do childish replies.
Second, to falsify what I said regarding the context: that clearly the UN is referring to a warming trend that is continuing, you only need to post a quote from a UN climate researcher that agrees that there is no warming; it is clear that the notes and releases from the UN report a warming trend, it is also clear that you continue to ignore that independent statisticians report that claiming that there is no warming trend going on is not legitimate.
"Statisticians who analyzed the data found a distinct decades-long upward trend in the numbers, but could not find a significant drop in the past 10 years in either data set. The ups and downs during the last decade repeat random variability in data as far back as 1880.
Saying there’s a downward trend since 1998 is not scientifically legitimate, said David Peterson, a retired Duke University statistics professor and one of those analyzing the numbers."
Oh, that’s beautiful. So no data can hypothetically falsify the warming trend; we instead can merely wait until the UN’s climate researchers agree there’s no warming trend? Doesn’t matter what facts roll in, only what conclusions they keep offering? Your stated falsification criterion is whatever their unstated falsification criterion is?
Now, I could be wrong; if they’ve stated such a falsification criterion, and you’re hereby endorsing it, then simply enlighten me to end my signature objection. But if they’re being as coy as you are, such that we haven’t been told what they’d accept as significant and sufficient – well, shucks, that’s a distinction without a difference.
Well, not only, no.
Truth is, though, I simply didn’t want to derail the thread, and so copy-and-pasted it for emphasis without comment; I want to minimize the one-in-a-hundred chance that I mistakenly think you’re mistaken, and I want to do it without a snide “I assume you meant to write that correctly, right?” What’s a less childish way to make sure we’re on the same page? (And why is this bugging you now? It’s how I’ve dealt with your past typos in this thread, sure as it’s saved us this back-and-forth in those instances.)
Yes, and I’m not aware of a serious researcher making that point, it was just part on the trend and they were aware that there was an exceptional El Nino that year.
And, as I think he will ignore it like many times before, the evidence for the feedback is already here.
No, once again, I’m talking about finding justification that the UN was not talking about a warming trend, your point and the out of context quote made the claim that the UN supported you on saying that there was no warming trend. Hard to falsify a misunderstanding or a baseless question.
Keep living with disappointment, as long as you do not want to deal with what the independent statisticians reported and what the UN overwhelmingly reported you only have an out of context quote and no support from the UN to claim that there is not a warming trend.
Why are you so studiously avoiding answering our simple questions Gigobuster? :rolleyes:
This is the fourth time I’ve had to ask.
I already told you why, simple answers do not work here as history shows how simple answers are distorted forever.
http://climatecrocks.com/2009/10/06/birth-of-a-crock/
http://climatecrocks.com/2011/08/31/from-the-horses-mouth-the-new-study-on-cosmic-rays-and-climate/
Until the day deniers stop jumping and defending misunderstandings (most if not of all the myths are **never **taken back by the denier sites, demonstrating that science is not what is driving them) of what researchers say, one can not really take the questions of ‘skeptics’ based on those misunderstandings seriously.
