The humility is implied in the fact that many others needed to confirm the early research, this has been done. Yes, more research is needed, but we already know enough to act.
I think the humility now needs to go for the ones that claim to know more than the researchers themselves regarding more confirmed items like paleo climate.
Allow me to re-phrase: Among those who agree the globe is warming and there is a 97% probability that man-king is contributing to this, you hold the middle ground between “catastrophe to civilization” and “dawn of a new golden age”. If I may extend your analogy a bit further, there’s room for debate with STD vaccinations. As long as we agree everybody is given it before they become sexual active, it should be okay to research at what age its administration is best. I’m not being a nut job thinking a four-year-old immunization system should be working on whooping cough antibodies, we can wait until eight years for the STD vaccine.
I’m in favor of just about all the mitigation proposals (the only exception is that I think we should get nuclear power deployed before we start any big programs of carbon sequestration). What makes me a “denialist” is my reasons have nothing to do with climate change. We have tank cars blowing up here and there and cesium pouring into our oceans … I’d like to see our current and immediate problems solved first, give the next generation a cleaner slate as it were.
I agree, there’s a lot of research that needs to be done. We should have a clearer idea of what’s going on by the time we clean up existing problems.
And this is the crux of the end game. Can you see that if the action is small and painless that people might just shrug and go along with it, while the costly it gets in money and effort that they might want that other research done. Research that even YOU agrees needs to be done?
As Richard Alley reports, waiting to see if extreme weather items like how many hurricanes or tornadoes will increase or not in a warming world is not a good reason to continue with our emissions as usual. If you understood that those risks could be **added **to the most likely ones you would already had told those that claim that noting should be done to take a hike.
The most likely things that are coming are not a walk in the park: ocean rise, ocean acidification, mega droughts in regions like the west, and more precipitation in the north east and northern Europe
http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/gw-overview
As Neil Degrasse Tyson tell us:
Because what it is clear is that while there is a lot of progress done by industry, the reality is that we could have an easier future if we do a concerted effort and stop listening to the ones that just spread FUD.
And oh yeah, I recommend to watch Cosmos tonight. Except the ones that thinks that those scientists and science organizations are “nobodies”.
As I said, I didn’t think we would ever get a clear statement of position out of you, and we never will. It’s not hard; I’ve provided my clear position several times, linked here where I ask about the basic views that anyone engaged in this debate in good faith should be able and willing to answer.
I guess if all one wants to do is try to discredit climate science at every opportunity with ridiculous drive-by commentary, most of which is outrageously wrong or irrelevant and much of which is contradictory, one has to be careful not commit oneself to an actual position that one would then have to defend, n’est-ce pas?
I read your entire post (yes, you have me beat for verbosity! :D) and for now I just want to focus on this set of comments because it seems to encapsulate the main basis of your “skepticism”, if I may call it that, and I think addressing these comments addresses the crux of the issue. As always, you can point out other relevant comments that I missed or I might come back to them later.
Just a minor point first – for the record, you misunderstood my comment about the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. I didn’t say that present carbon levels were an order of magnitude higher, I said that the rate of increase of CO2 in the post-industrial era is about an order of magnitude higher than it was during the PETM. Just to set the record straight.
First of all, sure, an algorithmic approximation of CO2 forcing involves a natural log function. But remember that a “forcing” in this context is an imbalance that drives the climate to a new equilibrium, and the imbalance in this case is expressed as the log of the ratio of some new level of CO2 relative to an existing equilibrium level, which is the critical number of 280ppm that existed for thousands of years before industrialization and at all interglacials since the mid-Pliocene. Simply put, sure, the forcing curve is logarithmic, but it begins at the pre-industrial reference level, not at zero, and it continues to rise dramatically well beyond disaster points like CO2 concentrations hitting 4 figures. Thus, for instance, given the reference level from which we’re starting, 800 ppm CO2 doesn’t exert double the forcing of 400 ppm but in fact approximately*** triple*** the forcing (see, for instance, Myhre et al, New estimates of radiative forcing due to well mixed greenhouse gases, Geophysical Research Letters, 1998).
But it’s even worse than that, and this is the other crucial point. The reality is that positive feedbacks are largely dominant over negative ones in the current climate regime, so that the true effects of CO2 are substantially greater than its own first-order forcing – so much so, in fact, that the aggregate of all positive and negative feedbacks probably multiply CO2 forcing by a factor of about 3 or more. This is of course not inconsistent with your metastable generalization as equilibrium is eventually reached, the salient point being that we may all be dead by then. The strong positive feedbacks include things like water vapor and ice albedo feedbacks, which are certainly incontrovertible, and we see the latter in accelerated Arctic warming. They also potentially include methane release from polar-region soils and ocean clathrates, reduced ocean CO2 uptake, and a very long list of others. The list of negative feedbacks is really quite small: lapse rate, simple thermodynamic increase in outgoing radiation, things like that. This is what’s been observed throughout the paleoclimate and is well represented in climate models. There is no persuasive evidence to the contrary.
Your suggestions about negative feedbacks is interesting but needless to say these possibilities have all been closely looked at in paleoclimate, theory, and modeling. If they happened, events like the PETM wouldn’t have occurred, and at some level one could say that ice age cycles wouldn’t be possible. Yes, we could get more Arctic precipitation in the form of snow, but that’s never been considered a significant factor in albedo: the ice cover is incontrovertibely retreating on sea and on land, accelerated Arctic warming is a fact, and two feet of snow has no greater albedo than one foot of snow. The reality supported by evidence is that both ice cover and snow cover has decreased in the northern hemisphere due to rising temperatures. It’s true that in parts of the Antarctic, Greenland, and other places, increased snowfall is contributing to central glacial mass increases, but this is overwhelmed by coastal ice losses through melt and calving. One can clearly see this in time-lapse pictures of the dwindling Greenland ice sheet, for instance.
The idea of increased cloud formation is, frankly, a discredited red herring that’s been much thrown about by denialists. It smacks of a desperate attempt to suggest climate self-stabilization either for reasons of climate politics or some idealized notion of how the climate “should” work; the trouble is, it’s not supported by the evidence. Some years ago Lindzen posited an “iris effect” where increased cloud formation would counterbalance increased warming. It doesn’t happen that way and the theory is now discredited. Moreover, clouds are actually both negative and positive feedbacks, depending on their altitude. High-altitude cirrus clouds are actually positive feedbacks that contribute to warming. It’s true that cloud feedbacks overall have significant uncertainties, compounded by factors like cloud nucleation from man-made aerosols, but this needs to understood in context. The uncertainty in cloud feedbacks is a major factor contributing to the rather large spread of values in equilibrium climate sensitivity estimates. That’s a very important statement. It means, loosely speaking, that we’re not sure just what the multiplier should be for CO2 forcing to properly reflect net positive feedbacks – somewhere between 1.5 and 4.5 probably (I suggested “3” above, which happens to be where the probability is highest). It does not mean that anyone seriously believes the aggregate feedback should be negative, or indeed, that there’s any realistic possibility that it’s lower than 1.5.
We know enough to know that climate change will be serious enough to take action now.
We need further study to find out how, in detail, it is likely to impact us, and how much.
Say we find that you have a new and incapacitating disease. We know how to slow its progress, but we don’t know how to cure it. You’re arguing that we don’t treat you while we continue the detail work?
More sidetracks and attempts to discuss all the complicated and economic/political issues that surround the global mean temperature.
Rather than discuss the topic. Which is about reality, what is actually happening.
Please don’t mention the ignore list as pertains to another poster.
This doesn’t answer my question.
If you don’t know specifically what the disease is, how can you treat me safely and with confidence. Now, if you want to give me some Advils and tell me to lay off fatty foods that’s one thing. If you want to amputate my arm, that’s quite another.
Yes, we certainly agree that we need to better understand, in detail, how climate change can and will impact us, and how much. But that can hardly be answered with any reasonable degree of certainty without understanding what is causing the climate to change—and in what degrees. To make my point with an extreme hypothetical: what if we had a complete and thorough understanding of the causes and it turned out that:
Surely, the sense of urgency and the price we’d be willing to pay would be not as great as if the fourth item came in at 40%. Correct. Now, as I’ve said in threads like this before, I think there is plenty we should do that would align with what you might think we should do if their was the urgency I allude to. And I wish the discussion more revolved around that. I mean, for examples, there are plenty of reasons to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels other than to try to avert the fantastical predictions of Al Gore.
But neither you not GIGO actually answered my question, though. Here it ia gain:
[QUOTE=magellan01]
And this is the crux of the end game. Can you see that if the action is small and painless that people might just shrug and go along with it, while the costly it gets in money and effort that they might want that other research done? Research that even YOU agrees needs to be done?
[/QUOTE]
The costs of not doing anything need to be taken into account, contrarians usually do not. Waiting for more research after more than 60 years of findings is not a a recommended thing to do.
The research will be ongoing for where more specific impacts will affect us, but waiting for it as Nordhouse reported is not recommended.
More recent studies are telling us that a change is doable even with current technology.
I’m indeed a cautious optimist, but it is clear that for a concerted effort we really need to get rid of politicians like Inhofe and others that are really doing a lot of damage by not being more proactive; in the political world (unlike the scientific, academic and among the ones that fight against pseudoscience) deniers are not interested in solutions, but with delaying tactics.
Again, after more than 60 years of the modern understanding about the issue, the conclusion of many researchers is that it is very unlikely that the mechanisms to get those hypotheticals are out there. Iffinitis indeed.
And once again, Al Gore did not invent this.
When the actual costs are being ignored it is indeed very hard to take any opinions to delay and wait seriously, after all the few contrarian researchers that were presented have gotten it wrong, or their predictions failed.
I would add “have done” and “are doing” to the list of “should do”. Not only are buildings today more energy efficient, we’ve gone through retrofitted all the older buildings to make them more energy efficient. Remember when a car that got 12 miles per gallon was considered to “sip” gas. Today, we have cars that get 50 mpg or better. Every kilowatt hour I use to heat my home comes from a wind farm for an extra 2¢ each kW-hr.
If we’re going to wait until the Federales do something, then we’re all gonna die. It’s up to the individual to make the right choice, and state governments to deal with things that government needs to do. This is a slow process and for some, very painful. Those that will feel the most pain are going to cry the loudest, let’s not be hardhearted to their pleas for mercy. If we make soccer-mom give up her SUV, then the kids don’t make soccer practice … and that’s just heart-breaking.
Well since the actual topic is pretty much just not going to be discussed itt at the moment, lets deal with some ideas that are being repeated as gospel “truth”, and then apply this to the topic.
So what? That has nothing to do with the data, the temperature records, and what is happening with the climate right now. Why is it so hard to talk about the science? Why is “your position” even an issue when looking at and trying to figure out science? Is it because science is never free of belief? Of preconceptions, of people who already made up their mind before they even examine the evidence?
in regards to current climate change, how does argumentum ad temperantiam apply?
Puerile mythology, so often repeated the non-skeptical often actually are deluded enough to treat it like a religious issue. But that is an entire topic there, one that can actually be resolved with science. But of course it introduces the religious POV, which is anathema to actual science.
And that is the biggest fallacy of them all. Because at some point in time, in the real world, judgement is required because scientific facts alone can be called true, the rest is subject to human behavior, and in that “truth” is relative. Examples are numerous.
And there is the ultimate religious belief. That “truth” exists and the only true followers know the truth, and only they are right.
It’s the very definition of a “true believer”.
Which takes us back to the simple questions and issues of scientific fact presented in the OP.
The problem with believing in “the one true truth” is obvious, right in the topic.
The facts presented in the OP are disputed. But not with any scientific thinking, not with other evidence, not with logic and reason, but with emotions and beliefs.
So far nobody has even tried to argue against the scientific data, it’s all sidetracks and denial, personal commentary, and attempts to bring all kinds of other things in, none of it is scientific.
None of it. Which is priceless.
We see pages and pages of opinions, beliefs, appeals to authorities, argument form incredulity, fallacies with out end.
Here’s what a scientific person does, if they don’t believe something.
They go check the data themselves. If somebody claims
I know that isn’t true, because I’ve simply checked. GISStemp dTs does NOT agree with the other data sets.
It’s the only one that doesn’t show any cooling. It’s also the worst data set to use for looking at trends, but it’s the one to use if you want to convince people the world is still warming as predicted.
The satellite data is the worst to use if you want it be warming.
But, even that satellite data shows the exact same thing, that in fact the world IS STILL warming in every season except the NH winter.
In essence, actual looking at the data shows a warming world, except for the NH winters. Which are actually so much colder they cause the annual global mean to be flat, or slightly colder. Which is exactly why looking at a global yearly mean is misleading.
The world is warming, and cooling, at the same time.
Ain’t that a kick in the pants?
Then I’m not seeing the problem. What I see is that without the alarmism emanating dorm some on this board and the type put forth in Gore’s book, great steps have been taken. Just look at trash recycling. It gratifies me greatly every time I place things in the recycling bins in my building, thinking that all this stuff from all these people was routinely just put into landfills. Now it’s scheduled for reuse. But that, along with the instances of energy efficiency you cite were all done without the Global Warming or Climate Change panic and scare tactics. People were able to see a benefit (better guess milage, less dependence on foreign oil, less junk in landfills) and the cost (dividing up your trash, paying an additional $.02/kW-hr) and they were mostly very happy to do it. And, again, all these steps, which I embrace in full, were done without the Chicken Little-esque “The planet is warming, the planet is warming. We’re all gonna either burn up or be submerged by the rising seas!”
So, two things. One is that much of what the most fervent climate alarmist might want done can be gotten to without having everyone embrace the their position and fears. The other is one I asked before and have yet to see an answer two. So here it is for the third time:
[QUOTE=magellan01]
And this is the crux of the end game. Can you see that if the action is small and painless that people might just shrug and go along with it, while the costly it gets in money and effort that they might want that other research done? Research that even YOU agree needs to be done?
[/QUOTE]
I’ll follow with this. Specifically, what do you want to see done? And for each item, please list the benefit and the cost. Here’s the format:
Item #1: _____________________________________________________.
Benefit: ______________________________________________________.
Cost: ________________________________________________________.
Item #2: _____________________________________________________.
Benefit: ______________________________________________________.
Cost: ________________________________________________________.
It seems to me, that before you ask society to sign-on for doing X, you should enable them to do a cost-benefit analysis, right?
Posts #671 and #672, the thing to point out here is that it seems that your assumption is that no economical research or a review of what is capable with the technology available was ever made.
Wouldn’t it be easier to drop all the tax subsidies the oil companies get to keep gas prices down?
This represents the fallacy that deniers are spending billions to promote: that we don’t yet know enough to be actionable or, to take some of the extremes that are promoted by the worst of the fringe groups, that what we think we know is completely wrong.
The reality is that the research exists, well encapsulated by the IPCC reports and supported by all major scientific organizations including the world’s national science bodies. The IPCC Working Group I deals with the question of science – what we know about climate change. Working Group II deals with the harms that these changes are causing and will cause in the future. Working Group III deals with what we have to do about it. All the assessment reports (and special reports) are based on expert assessments of the current state of the published science; the WG1 report alone references somewhere around 14,000 scientific papers.
Few of these conclusions are slam-dunks and all involve various degrees of uncertainty, competently and forthrightly stated. But uncertainty shouldn’t be confused with lack of knowledge and well quantified risk that justifies action. Moreover, while some mitigation policies carry little or no cost, the ones that do incur significant costs have to be weighed against the direct costs of inaction, which are real, considerable, and quantifiable. Indeed, the science is now so well established that this may be the last of the regular cycle of comprehensive IPCC Assessment Reports; it’s likely that from now on it will focus on specialized technical reports, similar to the recent SREX report on weather extremes.
The standard denialist or “skeptic” meme that concrete science doesn’t actually exist is wrong and it’s tiring to keep hearing it.
NOTE: WG2 will be releasing the updated Fifth Assessment at the end of March, WG3 later in the year. At this time those links are to the Fourth Assessment reports from 2007. WG1 has released the Fifth Assessment on the physical science.
So, if we agree you’re right, we won’t have to keep hearing the same thing over and over? Emissivity is going down, got it, we should do something NOW, got it … what do you think we should do?