# Global Warming progressing far faster than previously thought **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 17, 2014, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056 "2014-01-17T13:47:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2014, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/281 "2014-01-29T22:46:35Z")
I’m saying flat out you provided no evidence for your claims. Especially the “it’s doing so with unnatural force and speed”. If you are only talking about the CO2 levels, no evidence needed of course. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2014, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/282 "2014-01-29T23:09:20Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > Especially the “it’s doing so with unnatural force and speed”. Wait, what? ISTM that “unnatural force and speed” is the one claim about anthropogenic impacts on atmospheric composition that **isn’t** at all controversial. We may argue about how much humans are putting into the atmosphere and about what net effects it can be expected to have on climate, but it seems pretty self-evident that whatever anthropogenic impacts exist are by definition _unnatural_, in the sense that they’re outside of the _natural_ climate variability. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/283 "2014-01-30T00:52:11Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > As usual, the context of that is omitted: > > [NASA Finds 2013 Sustained Long-Term Climate Warming Trend - NASA](http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/january/nasa-finds-2013-sustained-long-term-climate-warming-trend/#.UuhYdrRlDV8) > > As usual it was answered before. Since i posted the full document, it’s hard to see how anything was omitted. However, and for the last time on this thread, I will ask and hope against hope that you 'll answer with a simple yes or no. Do the NOAA and NASA numbers indicate that temperatures between 1998 and 2013 have decreased very little WHILE IN THE CONTEXT OF A \*\*SUSTAINED LONG TERM WARMING TREND \*\*AND ALSO THAT, EVEN IF IT WERE NOT EXPLICITLY STATED IN THE TEXT, THIS REDUCTION IN TEMPERATURES \*\*IN NO WAY \*\*DIMINISHES THEIR (NASA’S AND NOAA’S) CONFIDENCE IN THE MODELS/PREDICTION/DATA OF A WARMING THAT WILL CONTINUE IN THE FUTURE AND THAT MOST/ALL OF THE LAST YEARS HAVE BEEN THE HOTTEST OF THE INSTRUMENTAL RECORD? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/284 "2014-01-30T01:08:20Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > Since i posted the full document, it’s hard to see how anything was omitted. That is not the whole picture anyhow. [http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M\_HEAT\_CONTENT/](http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/) > **[RealClimate: What ocean heating reveals about global warming](https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/09/what-ocean-heating-reveals-about-global-warming/)** > > RealClimate: The heat content of the oceans is growing and growing. That means that the greenhouse effect has not taken a pause and the cold sun is not noticeably slowing global warming. NOAA posts regularly updated measurements of the amount of heat... > [@](#): > > The heat content of the oceans is growing and growing. That means that the greenhouse effect has not taken a pause and the cold sun is not noticeably slowing global warming. > > NOAA posts regularly updated measurements of the amount of heat stored in the bulk of the oceans. For the upper 2000 m (deeper than that not much happens) it looks like this: > > Change in the heat content in the upper 2000 m of the world’s oceans. Source: NOAA > The amount of heat stored in the oceans is one of the most important diagnostics for global warming, because about 90% of the additional heat is stored there (you can read more about this in the last IPCC report from 2007). > [@](#): > > How to deny data > > Ideologically motivated “climate skeptics” know that these data contradict their claims, and respond … by rejecting the measurements. Millions of stations are dismissed as “negligible” – the work of generations of oceanographers vanish with a journalist’s stroke of a pen because what should not exist, cannot be. “Climate skeptics’” web sites even claim that the measurement uncertainty in the average of 3000 Argo probes is the same as that from each individual one. Thus not only are the results of climate research called into question, but even the elementary rules of uncertainty calculus that every science student learns in their first semester. Anything goes when you have to deny global warming. > [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > However, and for the last time on this thread, I will ask and hope against hope that you 'll answer with a simple yes or no. > > Do the NOAA and NASA numbers indicate that temperatures between 1998 and 2013 have decreased very little WHILE IN THE CONTEXT OF A \*\*SUSTAINED LONG TERM WARMING TREND \*\*AND ALSO THAT, EVEN IF IT WERE NOT EXPLICITLY STATED IN THE TEXT, THIS REDUCTION IN TEMPERATURES \*\*IN NO WAY \*\*DIMINISHES THEIR (NASA’S AND NOAA’S) CONFIDENCE IN THE MODELS/PREDICTION/DATA OF A WARMING THAT WILL CONTINUE IN THE FUTURE AND THAT MOST/ALL OF THE LAST YEARS HAVE BEEN THE HOTTEST OF THE INSTRUMENTAL RECORD? [looks at the ocean graph from NOAA] No. Between 1998 and 2013 the global temperature has increased. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/285 "2014-01-30T01:14:13Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > That’s not it at all. The MWP and the LIA **were** relatively localized. Were they? I thought there was evidence of the Medieval Warm period from many locations on the planet. And hasn’t the MWP been re-added to past temperature reconstructions in the latest IPCC review? > [@](#): > > The premise of the OP is simply that when certain local Arctic temperatures which were hitherto excluded are now included in the temperature record, it changes the shape of the recent global temperature trend line. Seems like a perfectly valid point. Sure. But there are many ways science can go wrong here. For example, would a paper be published in today’s scientific climate if an excluded area showed a decrease in warming? Considering that such papers will be tagged ‘denialist’ and the scientists who write it would come under harsh criticism, I worry about selection bias in such a heavily politicized field. But that’s a different subject. Your basic point is correct - if the measurements are accurate and were previously missing from the dataset, it makes perfect sense to add them. And if that shows more warming in the near past, that’s fine. > [@](#): > > I’ve never heard either a claim or any scientific basis for a decline of extreme weather, and the consensus is clear that the odds of extreme temperatures and extreme events are shifting toward higher probabilities. There have been a number of papers recently predicting a decline in extreme weather events when the earth is warmer. [Here is one of them](http://www.gm.univ-montp2.fr/spip/IMG/pdf/Sabatier_QSRv2-3-1.pdf) It makes sense to me that global warming would increase the amount of energy in the atmosphere, and therefore lead to more extreme weather events, or stronger weather events when they occur. And I believe that’s been the consensus in the global warming community in the past. But now that the number and severity of extreme events has been falling, we’re starting to see more scientific effort being spent in reconciling that with global warming theory. The real question is, if extreme weather events were increasing as predicted, would anyone be spending the effort to falsify the conclusion? Or would it just be accepted as a priori evidence that global warming is correct? > [@](#): > > You might possibly be thinking of a recent decline in North Atlantic hurricanes, but that’s actually consistent with predictions of increased wind shear shown in some models, which also predict that when hurricanes do occur, higher SSTs will result on average in storms with higher energies. And if the number of Atlantic hurricanes were increasing, would those same facts have led you to the conclusion that maybe there’s something unknown about global warming theory because the number of hurricanes should be decreasing? Or do you just suppose that this would have been accepted as evidence for global warming without much critical analysis? > [@](#): > > As I keep saying, there aren’t any “sides” on the core issues in science. In the public sphere, the sides are the science on one side and a well-funded denialist campaign by a $12 trillion global energy industry on the other. First of all, the many claims of AGW proponents do not make up a ‘core issue’ in science. As I said before, the ‘wide consensus’ of scientists is around the very basic facts of CO2 as a greenhouse gas and the transient effect of its increase in the atmosphere. Once you get past that and start predicting economic and climatological effects decades in the future, you are WAY past where the scientific consensus is. Even the IPCC couches their future projection in terms of likelihood, not as fact, and admits that there are large error bars around most of it. Second, if you seriously think the ‘denialists’ are getting even a tiny fraction of the funding that the pro-warming side receives, you’re smoking something. > [@](#): > > Basic thermodynamics also tells us that when net forcings are increasingly at a historically unnaturally rapid rate of change, the earth’s total energy budget must be increasing at a corresponding rate. The dynamics of feedbacks and land-ocean circulation and all other such phenomena are **internal** variabilities that affect the regional impact of these changes, but not the global magnitude or the degree of climate destabilization due to the rapid forcings. This is not necessarily correct. Changes can include things like changes to the Earth’s albedo due to changes in snow or cloud cover, which directly affect the global energy budget. Energy transport mechanisms can move energy to areas where it can be converted into something other than heat, or be stored in heat sinks as a form of hysteresis that could smooth out climate variation when other short-term factors attempt to change it. Sequestration mechanisms can change, which can change the rate at which CO2 or other greenhouse gases are scrubbed from the atmosphere. A single algae bloom can contain as much carbon as the U.S. emits in a year. These interactions are complex and very hard to understand. > [@](#): > > I don’t want to sound like I’m oversimplifying, because the issues are indeed dauntingly complex, but there is no denying the fact that driving CO2 to 400 ppm in just a few hundred years is driving the climate to an entirely new regime that has not existed in many millions of years, and it’s doing so with unnatural force and speed. I agree with that. What I disagree with is that we understand what will happen as a result. For example, even with the higher CO2 concentrations, current global temperatures are still a few degrees cooler than they were at the peak of past intra-glacial periods, when CO2 was much lower. So clearly there are climate drivers we don’t understand. But what makes it even more difficult is that being a complex _adaptive_ system, studying the behavior of the climate in the past is of limited help in understanding how today’s climate might behave. It’s certainly useful to do so, but we need to be suitably humble about the conclusions we draw from that. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/286 "2014-01-30T01:17:44Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > \*\*wolfpup \*\*did a great job with other items, but really Sam, unfalsifiable? That is indeed dropping all what even you claim to accept already. As pointed before there are issues were there is need for more research, but the overall picture is very clear. To falsify that overall picture one has to go through the whole list of empirical evidence and publish research with data that debunks all those. I’m not talking about the basic atmospheric chemistry of greenhouse gases, or the science that has shown the forcing due to CO2. Nor am I talking about measurements of CO2 concentrations in the recent past or other ‘basic science’. I’m talking about predictions of catastrophic climatological or economic effects predicted decades into the future. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/287 "2014-01-30T01:47:10Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Were they? I thought there was evidence of the Medieval Warm period from many locations on the planet. And hasn’t the MWP been re-added to past temperature reconstructions in the latest IPCC review? Sure, but not as warmer as we are seeing now. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Sure. But there are many ways science can go wrong here. For example, would a paper be published in today’s scientific climate if an excluded area showed a decrease in warming? Very recently I saw that from some northern regions related to snow fall, of course the mechanism was also related to the warming. Of course that part about the warming from all around was omitted by the contrarian that posted it. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > There have been a number of papers recently predicting a decline in extreme weather events when the earth is warmer. [Here is one of them](http://www.gm.univ-montp2.fr/spip/IMG/pdf/Sabatier_QSRv2-3-1.pdf) > > It makes sense to me that global warming would increase the amount of energy in the atmosphere, and therefore lead to more extreme weather events, or stronger weather events when they occur. And I believe that’s been the consensus in the global warming community in the past. But now that the number and severity of extreme events has been falling, we’re starting to see more scientific effort being spent in reconciling that with global warming theory. > > The real question is, if extreme weather events were increasing as predicted, would anyone be spending the effort to falsify the conclusion? Or would it just be accepted as a priori evidence that global warming is correct? You asking that after you posted a paper that could? 🙂 On a previous discussion I found out that one of the scientists reporting that it was likely that hurricanes would be less in numbers was Kerry Emannuel. Back then I made the point that that was in reality a big counterpoint to the idea that climate scientists are only alarmists and only looking for disasters to get more money; well, needless to say the contrarians did not accept that scientists indeed are doing science and willing to lose all that money :rolleyes: they should had gotten by claiming that more hurricanes would come. The only fly in the ointment is that Emannuel also reported that it is also likely that once a hurricane manages to form, despite the increase of forces against them forming (and IIRC it was mostly for hurricanes in the north Atlantic, in the Pacific more are possible) the hurricanes will then become more intense, as all that energy and water vapor in the regions the hurricanes form (and lets not forget the ocean rise) will lead to harsher hurricanes when they come. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > First of all, the many claims of AGW proponents do not make up a ‘core issue’ in science. As I said before, the ‘wide consensus’ of scientists is around the very basic facts of CO2 as a greenhouse gas and the transient effect of its increase in the atmosphere. Once you get past that and start predicting economic and climatological effects decades in the future, you are WAY past where the scientific consensus is. Even the IPCC couches their future projection in terms of likelihood, not as fact, and admits that there are large error bars around most of it. > > Second, if you seriously think the ‘denialists’ are getting even a tiny fraction of the funding that the pro-warming side receives, you’re smoking something. As the Frontline program called “Climate of Doubt” showed, they only need to invest in politicians to make a difference nowadays. And that is where most of the denier action is nowadays. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > This is not necessarily correct. Changes can include things like changes to the Earth’s albedo due to changes in snow or cloud cover, which directly affect the global energy budget. Energy transport mechanisms can move energy to areas where it can be converted into something other than heat, or be stored in heat sinks as a form of hysteresis that could smooth out climate variation when other short-term factors attempt to change it. Sequestration mechanisms can change, which can change the rate at which CO2 or other greenhouse gases are scrubbed from the atmosphere. A single algae bloom can contain as much carbon as the U.S. emits in a year. These interactions are complex and very hard to understand. IIRC I think I told you before that so far no mechanism with the reach you mention has been identified to make the difference that one wishes. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > I agree with that. What I disagree with is that we understand what will happen as a result. For example, even with the higher CO2 concentrations, current global temperatures are still a few degrees cooler than they were at the peak of past intra-glacial periods, when CO2 was much lower. So clearly there are climate drivers we don’t understand. This seems to ignore that scientists reported that there is a lag on the full temperature effects that all the CO2 dumped already will cause. > **[Climate Change: The 40 Year Delay Between Cause and Effect](https://skepticalscience.com/Climate-Change-The-40-Year-Delay-Between-Cause-and-Effect.html)** > > Guest post by Alan Marshall from climatechangeanswers.org > [@](#): > > The reason the planet takes several decades to respond to increased CO2 is the thermal inertia of the oceans. Consider a saucepan of water placed on a gas stove. Although the flame has a temperature measured in hundreds of degrees C, the water takes a few minutes to reach boiling point. This simple analogy explains climate lag. The mass of the oceans is around 500 times that of the atmosphere. The time that it takes to warm up is measured in decades. Because of the difficulty in quantifying the rate at which the warm upper layers of the ocean mix with the cooler deeper waters, there is significant variation in estimates of climate lag. A paper by James Hansen and others [iii] estimates the time required for 60% of global warming to take place in response to increased emissions to be in the range of 25 to 50 years. The mid-point of this is 37.5 which I have rounded to 40 years. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/288 "2014-01-30T01:50:35Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > I’m talking about predictions of catastrophic climatological or economic effects predicted decades into the future. Considering that global warming is happening far faster than anyone thought it would, it’s surprising that we haven’t seen any of the predicted disasters yet. Now if they had been predicting for the last two decades the increasingly brutal winters, a cooling trend for the NH boreal winters, and the economic costs of endless blizzards each year, the alarmists would be rejoicing about now. “You see! We tried to warn you about global warming!!”. Instead the dazed predictors are scrambling to somehow say the extreme cold is from warming. And they just don’t get it. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/289 "2014-01-30T02:01:04Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > Considering that global warming is happening far faster than anyone thought it would, it’s surprising that we haven’t seen any of the predicted disasters yet. As pointed before that is not what the scientists reported, they actually claim that there is more research needed in this area, but there are hints that less hurricanes and tornadoes would form, so much for the scientists being alarmists. > [@FXMastermind](#): > > Now if they had been predicting for the last two decades the increasingly brutal winters, a cooling trend for the NH boreal winters, and the economic costs of endless blizzards each year, the alarmists would be rejoicing about now. > > “You see! We tried to warn you about global warming!!”. > **[Climate Change Deniers Cite Snowstorm, Are Completely Wrong](https://slate.com/technology/2014/01/climate-change-deniers-cite-snowstorm-debunking-donald-trump-et-al.html)** > > An intense blizzard, appropriately named Hercules, has blanketed the Northeast. Antarctic ice locked in a Russian ship containing a team of... > [@](#): > > All of this is all wrong in ways that have all been explained before. So just a few brief observations: > > 1. Statements about climate trends must be based on, er, trends. Not individual events or occurrences. Weather is not climate, and anecdotes are not statistics. > > 2. Global warming is actually expected to increase “heavy precipitation in winter storms,” and for the Northern Hemisphere, there is evidence that these storms are already more frequent and intense, according to the draft U.S. National Climate Assessment. > > 3. Antarctica is a very cold place. But global warming is affecting it as predicted: Antarctica is losing ice overall, according to the latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. However, sea ice is a different matter than land-based or glacial ice. Antarctic sea ice is increasing, and moreover, the reason for this may be climate change! (For more, read here.) > > Finally, just one last thing: When it’s winter on Earth, it’s also summer on Earth … somewhere else. Thus, allow us to counter anecdotal evidence about cold weather with more anecdotal evidence: It’s blazing hot in Australia, with temperatures in some regions set to possibly soar above 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the coming days. > [@FXMastermind](#): > > Instead the dazed predictors are scrambling to somehow say the extreme cold is from warming. > > And they just don’t get it. As pointed before, they did get it, but you only read the memos from denier sources. > **[2013 Is the Fourth Hottest Year on Record](https://slate.com/technology/2014/01/global-warming-2013-ties-for-fourth-hottest-year-on-record.html)** > > It’s official: 2013 is the fourth hottest year since records started being kept in 1880. It ties with 2003 for that dubious honor. > [@](#): > > It’s official: 2013 is the fourth hottest year since records started being kept in 1880. It ties with 2003 for that dubious honor. > > This result was just announced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It uses global annual land and sea surface temperatures to make the call, and in 2013 these two measures combined for a temperature 0.62 C (1.12 F) above the 20th century average of 13.9 C (57.0 F). > > Were you born after 1976? Then you’ve never experienced an average year: 2013 is the 37th year in a row with temperatures above the 20th century average. > > The report also states that nine of the 10 hottest years on record have been in the 21st century (2010 is the record holder for hottest year ever). Only one year from the 20th century is on that list, 1998, and that’s about as late in the century as you can get. Not so incidentally, 1998 was an El Niño year; those years tend to have higher surface temperatures overall. 2013 was not an El Niño year; 1998 being warmer than 2013 is no cause for celebration. > > So, yeah. One more piece in a very, very long list of evidence that the planet’s getting hotter. While surface temperatures are not the best way to keep tabs on warming—much of the extra energy is being stored deep in the oceans, and local effects can mask overall trends making you think there’s a pause in warming when no such pause exists—it would be foolish in the extreme to ignore it. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/290 "2014-01-30T02:42:25Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > That is not the whole picture anyhow. > > [http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M\_HEAT\_CONTENT/](http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/) > > [http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/09/what-ocean-heating-reveals-about-global-warming/](http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/09/what-ocean-heating-reveals-about-global-warming/) > > [looks at the ocean graph from NOAA] > No. > > Between 1998 and 2013 the global temperature has increased. What did I ommit? Or does “not the whole picture / not the whole context” mean "not sayin what you want? You did see that I only refered to the NOAA/NASA official document, didn’t you, not every single chart? * * * ## [Can anyone look at page 8 of this NOAA/NASA official document](http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/NOAA_NASA_2013_Global_Temperatures_Joint_Briefing.pdf)and check that in BOTH charts show that 2013 had a lower temperature than 1998 in both? GB and I seem to disagree on the reading of those numbers. I say the show temps betwwen 1998 and 2014 decreased, he says the increased. It’s interesting that now it’s all about heat content and registered temperature by the MetOffice, NOAA, and NASA are now basically useless. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/291 "2014-01-30T02:48:47Z")
What? > [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > [Can anyone look at page 8 of this NOAA/NASA official document](http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/NOAA_NASA_2013_Global_Temperatures_Joint_Briefing.pdf)and check that in BOTH charts show that 2013 had a lower temperature than 1998 in both? GB and I seem to disagree on the reading of those numbers. I say the show temps betwwen 1998 and 2014 decreased, he says the [sic] increased. Seriously? Now we have to argue over what the numbers say? On an official document? This is sad. really sad. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/292 "2014-01-30T02:52:01Z")
Yep, of course page 8 says what you stated it did. Why wouldn’t it? what’s the bigger picture here? Why is it important? And why would anyone argue over what a document says? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/293 "2014-01-30T03:01:55Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > What did I ommit? Or does “not the whole picture / not the whole context” mean "not sayin what you want? > > You did see that I only refered to the NOAA/NASA official document, didn’t you, not every single chart? > > * * * > > ## [Can anyone look at page 8 of this NOAA/NASA official document](http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/NOAA_NASA_2013_Global_Temperatures_Joint_Briefing.pdf)and check that in BOTH charts show that 2013 had a lower temperature than 1998 in both? GB and I seem to disagree on the reading of those numbers. I say the show temps betwwen 1998 and 2014 decreased, he says the increased. Sorry, you are misrepresenting what I said, I do not disagree with the surface record, but let the record show that you do not like the answer the big picture shows. > [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > It’s interesting that now it’s all about heat content and registered temperature by the MetOffice, NOAA, and NASA are now basically useless. Not really, do you know that the one making that report is Gavin A. Schmidt and that he contributes to RealClimate? His regular contribution about “How well are the climate models doing?” will come soon, but he is not likely to dismiss what other contributors are posting: > **[RealClimate: Global temperature 2013](https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2014/01/global-temperature-2013/)** > > RealClimate: The global temperature data for 2013 are now published. 2010 and 2005 remain the warmest years since records began in the 19th Century. 1998 ranks third in two records, and in the analysis of Cowtan & Way, which interpolates the... > [@](#): > > The global temperature data for 2013 are now published. 2010 and 2005 remain the warmest years since records began in the 19th Century. 1998 ranks third in two records, and in the analysis of Cowtan & Way, which interpolates the data-poor region in the Arctic with a better method, 2013 is warmer than 1998 (even though 1998 was a record El Nino year, and 2013 was neutral). > [@](#): > > New this year: for the first time there is a careful analysis of geographical data gaps – especially in the Arctic there’s a gaping hole – and their interpolation for the HadCRUT4 data. Thus there are now two surface temperature data sets with global coverage (the GISTEMP data from NASA have always filled gaps by interpolation). In these two data series 2007 is ranked 3rd. Their direct comparison looks like this: > > Figure 1 Global temperature (annual values) in the data from NASA GISS (orange) and from Cowtan & Way (blue), i.e. HadCRUT4 with interpolated data gaps. > > One can clearly see the extreme year 1998, which (thanks to the record-El Niño) stands out above the long-term trend like no other year. But even taking this outlier year as starting point, the linear trend 1998-2013 in all four data sets is positive. Also clearly visible is 2010 as the warmest year since records began, and the minima in the years 2008 and 2011/2012. But just like the peaks are getting higher, these minima are less and less deep. > > In these data curves I cannot see a particularly striking or significant current “warming pause”, even though the warming trend from 1998 is of course less than the long-term trend. Even in Nature, there was recently a (journalistic) contribution that in its introduction strongly overstated this alleged “hiatus”. It makes a good story that perhaps some cannot resist. (“Warming trend is somewhat reduced, but within the usual range of variation” simply does not make good headline.) > [@FXMastermind](#): > > Yep, of course page 8 says what you stated it did. Why wouldn’t it? > > what’s the bigger picture here? Why is it important? And why would anyone argue over what a document says? As pointed, we are not arguing about that number, only about the clear cherry pick that omitted the big picture of the ocean temperatures, together with what the latest temperature records show. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/294 "2014-01-30T03:19:40Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Were they? I thought there was evidence of the Medieval Warm period from many locations on the planet. And hasn’t the MWP been re-added to past temperature reconstructions in the latest IPCC review? First of all, considering some of the utter bullshit that gets thrown around here sometimes when climate change is discussed, I appreciate the opportunity to have a reasonable discussion, although I disagree with many of your points. Since there are a lot of them, I’ll try to be brief. But if anything needs more information, I’d be happy to clarify. On the above point: the MWP was mainly a NH phenomenon, mostly confined to Europe, Greenland, and a few other areas, and the LIA, too, was more associated with regional and seasonal variations rather than any global impact. Not sure what you mean by “hasn’t the MWP been re-added … in the latest IPCC review?” It was always there in the paleo reconstructions, but never considered globally synchronous and never matching today’s global average temperatures. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Sure. But there are many ways science can go wrong here. For example, would a paper be published in today’s scientific climate if an excluded area showed a decrease in warming? Considering that such papers will be tagged ‘denialist’ and the scientists who write it would come under harsh criticism, I worry about selection bias in such a heavily politicized field. Jesus H. Christ, the **science** isn’t politicized – the way that vested interests **abuse** the science is! There is a huge, huge disconnect between the manufactured public perception and the actual facts of the science. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > There have been a number of papers recently predicting a decline in extreme weather events when the earth is warmer. [Here is one of them](http://www.gm.univ-montp2.fr/spip/IMG/pdf/Sabatier_QSRv2-3-1.pdf) > > It makes sense to me that global warming would increase the amount of energy in the atmosphere, and therefore lead to more extreme weather events, or stronger weather events when they occur. And I believe that’s been the consensus in the global warming community in the past. But now that the number and severity of extreme events has been falling, we’re starting to see more scientific effort being spent in reconciling that with global warming theory. The paper you cite is an attempt at a 7Ky paleoclimate reconstruction of storm activity. It says nothing about a prediction of fewer severe weather events, and since there weren’t any global climate forcings even remotely comparable to today in that time period, it’s not even particularly relevant to the topic. Except, perhaps, that insofar as it posits thermal gradients to lead to enhanced lower-troposphere baroclinicity, it actually argues the opposite: that thermal gradients contribute to climate destabilization. As indeed they do. Here is what’s been predicted and what’s really happening with extreme weather: [http://www.climatecommunication.org/new/articles/extreme-weather/overview/](http://www.climatecommunication.org/new/articles/extreme-weather/overview/) > **[2013 in review: a year of increasing extreme weather events](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/dec/18/2013-extreme-weather-events)** > > John Vidal looks back at a year of record heatwaves, floods, rainstorms and cyclones > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > The real question is, if extreme weather events were increasing as predicted, would anyone be spending the effort to falsify the conclusion? Or would it just be accepted as a priori evidence that global warming is correct? > > And if the number of Atlantic hurricanes were increasing, would those same facts have led you to the conclusion that maybe there’s something unknown about global warming theory because the number of hurricanes should be decreasing? Or do you just suppose that this would have been accepted as evidence for global warming without much critical analysis? Forgive me if I’m reading too much into that, but I detect hints of conspiracy theory. My honest answer? Scientific curiosity and the prospect of discovery would prompt the investigation of **ANY** significant change in any of these critically important phenomena, whether up or down, conforming to theory or contrary to theory. That’s how science works. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > First of all, the many claims of AGW proponents do not make up a ‘core issue’ in science. As I said before, the ‘wide consensus’ of scientists is around the very basic facts of CO2 as a greenhouse gas and the transient effect of its increase in the atmosphere. Once you get past that and start predicting economic and climatological effects decades in the future, you are WAY past where the scientific consensus is. Even the IPCC couches their future projection in terms of likelihood, not as fact, and admits that there are large error bars around most of it. Wrong. **Everything** published by the IPCC WG1, WG2, WG3, and the special reports are **all** the result of consensus. There is always scientific uncertainty, even if the confidence is high, and the IPCC expresses their assessments in well-calibrated language. The assessment reports convey a tremendous amount of objective information about the knowns and unknowns in the vast areas of physical sciences, impacts and vulnerabilities, and potential mitigation measures, all without being policy-prescriptive. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Second, if you seriously think the ‘denialists’ are getting even a tiny fraction of the funding that the pro-warming side receives, you’re smoking something. Wow – with all respect, you’ve gone off the rails on that one. Funding for legitimate scientific research, if that’s what you’re thinking of, is mostly agenda-neutral, and most of climate science is publicly funded. PR funding by the $12 trillion global energy industry for their self-interest, not so much. It amounts to almost $1 billion a year, mostly dark money funnelled through “donor-directed” foundations and other means to a plethora of front groups preaching denialism and spreading misinformation and doubt about climate science in the mass media and on the Internet. You need to at least read this post I made about that: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=16993891&postcount=62](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=16993891&postcount=62) > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > This is not necessarily correct. Changes can include things like changes to the Earth’s albedo due to changes in snow or cloud cover, which directly affect the global energy budget. Energy transport mechanisms can move energy to areas where it can be converted into something other than heat, or be stored in heat sinks as a form of hysteresis that could smooth out climate variation when other short-term factors attempt to change it. Sequestration mechanisms can change, which can change the rate at which CO2 or other greenhouse gases are scrubbed from the atmosphere. A single algae bloom can contain as much carbon as the U.S. emits in a year. These interactions are complex and very hard to understand. That doesn’t change anything I said. Albedo changes are reasonably predictable feedbacks that are part of the forcings model and thus part of the measured and modeled radiative fluxes. Changes in sequestration mechanisms are a red herring because carbon sequestration for the most part can only decrease under the present circumstances, since most of the dynamic uptake is due to oceans. More importantly, the idea that we’ll have sudden algae growths all over the planet or some other magical occurrence that will save us is right up there with the fantasy of other self-limiting factors that are supposed to occur with increasing atmospheric carbon. The only problem with that? In paleoclimate records, it doesn’t happen. Look at the events of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > I agree with that. What I disagree with is that we understand what will happen as a result. For example, even with the higher CO2 concentrations, current global temperatures are still a few degrees cooler than they were at the peak of past intra-glacial periods, when CO2 was much lower. So clearly there are climate drivers we don’t understand. Wrong again. What we understand is that the somewhat higher temperatures during the previous interglacial were equilibrium temperatures. It takes thousands of years to reach equilibrium once CO2 accumulation has stopped. We are just beginning the journey. And CO2 is still increasing with no end in sight. We truly are in a completely new climate regime unprecedented since long before the dawn of humanity. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/295 "2014-01-30T03:45:15Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Sorry, you are misrepresenting what I said, I do not disagree with the surface record, but let the record show that you do not like the answer the big picture shows. > Not really, do you know that the one making that report is Gavin A. Schmidt and that he contributes to RealClimate? His regular contribution about “How well are the climate models doing?” will come soon, but he is not likely to dismiss what other contributors are posting: > > [RealClimate: Global temperature 2013](http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2014/01/global-temperature-2013/) > > As pointed, we are not arguing about that number, only about the clear cherry pick that omitted the big picture of the ocean temperatures, together with what the latest temperature records show. You’re right and I’m wrong in everything, I get it. That’s your position. Thanks ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/296 "2014-01-30T09:04:22Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > You’re right and I’m wrong in everything, I get it. That’s your position. Thanks An entirely justifiable position. ---
**Author:** ![doorhinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/297 "2014-01-30T19:49:36Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > An entirely justifiable position. But unbelievable. Which is basically the same problem, given their history, that the UN/IPCC/CO2-is-evil-camp has had convincing the public that their data and man-made-inputs should not be questioned. It’s simply not believable. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/298 "2014-01-30T20:39:01Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > But unbelievable. Which is basically the same problem, given their history, that the UN/IPCC/CO2-is-evil-camp has had convincing the public that their data and man-made-inputs should not be questioned. It’s simply not believable. More ignorance, Steve McIntyre gained fame in 2007 by finding an error in the GISS record that affected the readings a little, the error was acknowledged and corrected and it did not change the overall pattern of increased warming. The problem has been that after that contrarians like McIntyre have been coasting, he and many others have even more access to the records and have virtually not reported any other significant issue. That they have failed after so many years should had been enough for many to dismiss them, but failure is not a problem for contrarians. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/299 "2014-01-30T23:21:57Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > But unbelievable. Which is basically the same problem, given their history, that the UN/IPCC/CO2-is-evil-camp has had convincing the public that their data and man-made-inputs should not be questioned. It’s simply not believable. Sure, it obviously has **nothing** to do with the fact that the fossil fuel industry is spending almost $1 billion a year on concerted, diversified, and massive PR campaigns to undermine the science. It only has to do with the fact that the general public understands climate science **much** better than climate scientists. :rolleyes: Have you ever even looked at an IPCC report? The AR5 WG1 contains almost as many pages of citations as it does pages of content. The IPCC reports **ARE** the science. The contrarian arguments are all on Internet blogs, with a few occasionally appearing in very bad second-rate vanity journals. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056/300 "2014-01-30T23:54:55Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Sure, it obviously has **nothing** to do with the fact that the fossil fuel industry is spending almost $1 billion a year on concerted, diversified, and massive PR campaigns to undermine the science. It only has to do with the fact that the general public understands climate science **much** better than climate scientists. :rolleyes: > > Have you ever even looked at an IPCC report? The AR5 WG1 contains almost as many pages of citations as it does pages of content. The IPCC reports **ARE** the science. The contrarian arguments are all on Internet blogs, with a few occasionally appearing in very bad second-rate vanity journals. I’d love a quote for the “1 billion a year” stuff. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056.md?page=14) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-progressing-far-faster-than-previously-thought/679056.md?page=16)