Is global warming falsifiable?

Several predictions and confirmations in post #4

Like the confidence that cigarettes and tobacco products caused cancer the confidence grew after many experiments confirmed how bad the problem is. The several experiments that confirmed the cites in post #4 increased the confidence.

And Australia and the South West broiling never happened, as it is the other three seasons of the year.

Actually one prediction was that the chances of hot weather and other events would increase, normally one could expect record lows and record highs to be about even, instead we are seeing 3 record highs for every 1 record low.

http://www.climatecentral.org/blogs/steroids-baseball-and-climate-change

IIRC in one very recent year the situation was like 10 hot records vs 1 cold one, but in the following year the situation did go to about even, as any honest statistician can tell you, the huge disparity of the previous year is not used in favor of more global warming and neither is a single year where the records where even as evidence for a cooling trend, the scientific thing to do is to look at the average and long term trends. And taking the huge year for warming events and the even-year in context with many past decades it is clear that the record warming events have increased as predicted.

As I stated clearly before, if you get anything other than a direct clear answer, when you ask direct scientific questions, you are dealing with woo woo, not science.

“Does the global warming theory predict anything?”

If there is no answer, just unrelated nonsense, you should suspect something.

“What does it predict?”

If you can’t just link to simple explanation of basic global warming theory, then why not?

“Is there any prediction that will confirm confidence in the theory when it happens?”

I linked to this several times, but probably not in this topic. Of course there is. Any theory that is scientific has some way to be able to say if it is true or not.

When the period of milder winters was occurring, it was used over and over as “evidence” of drastic global warming happening, and happening now. People remember that sort of thing, especially when predictions about skiing or winter wheat are involved, or tropical pests moving north, or how all the arctic will soon be ice free, or how the oceans will rapidly rise, it’s no secret, it was one of the biggest “threats”. The 1990 IPCC report actually starts off discussing this issue, how can we know global warming is happening?

It doesn’t take a Nobel prize winning genius to be able to see the obvious. But it sure helps when actual climate researchers say direct things.

POLITICO Pro

“While global warming theory is consistent with record warm temperatures and more intense precipitation events, it does not directly explain cold extremes,”

This isn’t saying all physics is wrong (red herring), nor does it mean much, other than what it says.

Watching people try to spin it otherwise, better than watching TV

For those that just can’t be bothered with reading anything, the link POLITICO Pro

contains discussion of four different theories, all of them trying to explain why global warming theory has turned out to be so wrong, about the NH winters

I do think that many will not ignore that you acknowledged that those cites from post #4 did point to the science, what is clear is that you will ignore the implications of the confirmations, and that does tell us a lot indeed.

Having issues with cold weather events is only one piece of the puzzle that is not a deal breaker when one takes into account the many other predictions and their confirmations made about several other events and implications.

Various answers to “what does it predict” have been discussed in detail throughout this thread, and you keep either ignoring them or dismissing them with no valid refutation. Such answers also appear in great number in the IPCC documentation that you keep being referred to for information and keep refusing to read, perhaps because you apparently have it mixed up with the Bible.

In short: The theory of anthropogenic climate change predicts probabilistically a large number of specific changes in climate: that is, it estimates both the likely outcomes and the current uncertainty of each outcome. You have shown in the previous discussion that you have a really hard time grasping the distinction between probabilistic and deterministic prediction, and you keep demanding that climate science should do the latter when the very nature of climate systems requires it to do the former.

So I don’t have much hope that you’re going to be able to understand the details of the predictions any better than you have done up to now. Nevertheless, since you asked, here are a few more of them for you.

Or IOW, what FX is doing is to just use an apparent dubious piece of the puzzle to declare that the solution is still a duck.

A leap of faith in cute form.

:slight_smile:

PZ Myers pointed to that one in his blog, he is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota that has to deal with a lot of pseudo scientists from the biology side of things, it is indeed the same problem observed with proponents of simple answers getting stuck with what a box says and ignoring all the other pieces, experiments and confirmations made that show us the big picture.

As I’ve noted before, a big part of your inability to comprehend these issues is your focus on popular science journalism such as the above link. That sort of oversimplified summary is just exacerbating your confusion about probabilistic vs. deterministic prediction.

No, global warming theory has not “turned out to be so wrong” about recent winter trends in parts of the northern hemisphere. But you will never understand that until you actually buckle down and read some of the science that explains the calculation of uncertainty in projections, and why that is different from a simple deterministic prediction.

[Emphasis added.]

FXMastermind thinks that probabilistic predictions about complex non-deterministic physical systems are just “woo woo” and “not science” and avoidance of “a direct clear answer”.

That’s really all you need to know about why he keeps mistakenly insisting that the lack of simple deterministic predictions in climate science constitutes some kind of a “gotcha” discrediting “global warming theory”.

Expect him now to start complaining that the detailed extensive projections I quoted from the IPCC WG1AR5 TS in my most recent post are “no answer, just unrelated nonsense”.

Are you seriously impugning the scientific bonafides of heathergirl1234? You know that you lose all credibility when you try and dismiss her groundbreaking climate research out of hand like that.

It’s obvious that FXMastermind has read all of her peer-reviewed papers and you just don’t have a leg to stand on, you dirty warmist.

Also, prediction isn’t the only measure of a scientific model’s success. The global warming idea has much greater explanatory power than any of the alternatives. Darwinian Evolution doesn’t predict a whole lot, but it is vastly superior at explaining the observed facts than any other theory regarding the origin of species.

Meanwhile, the simplest prediction made by the global warming model is that the globe will continue to get warmer – and that’s what is happening. Its predictions are coming true.

Before moving forward, as quick recap of how we got to this point. Sam Stone made some good points.

Clear and easy to follow.

Clear, easy to understand.

At which point I interjected.

Remember, I claimed what was being discussed has already been found.

And of course, like clockwork.

Which is complete bullshit, as the theory predicts the most warming in winters, at high latitudes, in the NH winters. (boreal winter)

Nope. That IS the theory, Tyndall predicted this, and it has been used over and over as evidence of global warming, of both the theory being confirmed, as well as a clear sign of global warming is happening.

Nope, I’m clearly stating that the theory says one thing, and we are observing something different. You can’t change the theory, and still claim it was correct. Which was my point. That is exactly what some people are trying to do, they now claim glob al warming predicted colder winters.

Nope. the actual science is what predicts the most warming winter, as well as nights warming faster than days, and the land warming faster than the oceans. That’s all basic global warming theory.

There are no “recent models” predicting that, you made it up. In fact, no model can predict such events. Hell, most climate modelers still think NH winters are warming up. Just because *Cohen et al *and others theorized something, that does not mean everybody jumped on board.

Far from it.

Of course there were all kinds of red herrings and sidetracks, but no matter. The original point stands.

Now of course there will be yet another attempt to sidetrack, obscure or spin things, but no matter.

Braganza 2004 found models that used GhGs as the forcing did not match observations.

Alexander 2006 found a decraese in DTR but it didn’t match the models.

But clearly we have a falsifiable point at last. If days warm more than nights, it’s not greenhouse forcing. If nights cool, while days warm, it’s not greenhouse forcing. (except of course, just as in both papers, they use “outs” to explain why the models can’t predict what is observed)

What this means, is even if we observe the opposite of what the theory predicts, there can still be a reason, so the theory is valid, even if the observations don’t match.

But, in essence this is at least a concrete step towards defining what the theory predicts. (this is a no brainer, because it was predicted in the 1800s)

What else was predicted in the 1800s? And is used as evidence that the global warming theory is correct? And is a key point for stating global warming is happening?

What else was predicted, was confirmed, and is used as solid evidence for not only the theory, but that global warming is happening now? But doesn’t appear in the SS blog, or in GIGOs post #4?

What really important prediction did Tyndall make? That has been confirmed? What is a another key prediction of the theory, that has to be observed, or the theory is wrong?

I bet you can guess. Hell, if you are still reading this far down into the post, you are either a masochist, a scientists, or angry about something.

If you are at all scientific, and you already know why nights are supposed to warm faster than days, you could even figure this one out by yourself. The reasoning is simple. The greenhouse effect is always happening, unlike solar heating, which stops at night. So the extra greenhouse effect means night time temperatures won’t fall as fat, with an increased greenhouse effect.

This is the basic theory. So where else on the planet is it dark for a long time?

And when is it nightime much longer than daytime?

OMG it’s basic theory. The polar regions are dark all winter! And winter time it’s dark much longer. So we should see the greenhouse effect at work. Which is exactly why the polar regions are expected to warm the most, and why winters are supposed to show the most warming. (in addition to this, winter and the cold polar regions are also much drier, so water vapor isn’t abundant, which means the CO2 greenhouse effect shows up much stronger)

This is basic global warming theory, and it’s incomprehensible why the SS page doesn’t state this, or why GIGO/wolfpup hasn’t stated it clearly when asked.

I mean, usually the two main points are actually in the same statement, for example. “Over 150 years ago, John Tyndall predicted the specific patterns of greenhouse warming - nights warming faster than days and winters warming faster than summers. Both these patterns have been observed.” See?

“Tyndall made another prediction of what greenhouse warming should look like. Just as greenhouse gases slow down nighttime cooling, they also slow down winter cooling. So Tyndall anticipated winters warming faster than summers. Again, recent analysis of temperature trends over the last few decades bear this out (Braganza et al 2003, Braganza et al 2004). Both thermometers and satellites find winters warming faster than summers.” See? It’s simple, and easy, and it doesn’t require reading a 200 page document either.

It’s basic global warming theory, and it can be explained in less than a minute, if you don’t have to also prove that the CO2 is from human sources. (it is)

So all this misdirection over winters is a good distraction, but it won’t change anything.

If it turns out that CO2 induced warming is actually the CAUSE of colder NH winters, then Tyndall (and a lot of other people) were very very wrong.

tl;dr

Tyndall (and everyone else) predict winters will warm faster than summers, due to the greenhouse effect. Observing winter cooling, while summers warm, with out any other forcing to explain it, falsifies a main assumption of the greenhouse theory.

So, you agree that the greenhouse effect is falsifiable. That is good to know. Of course, since there has, indeed, been another forcing discovered, that particular method of falsification requires a better understanding of the impact that the forcing has on the theory. That is simply standard, self-corrective science.

(Of course, if you try to dodge around the forcing effect by playing games regarding which levels of the ocean have warmed, equivocating over the word “deep” that has been used in the research, I will have to conclude that you are doing nothing but posting nonsense in order to keep this thread going forever.)

Lord Kelvin did not actually disprove the Theory of Evolution by demonstrating that the Earth could not have been old enough to support the myriad changes that Darwin’s theory predicted to have happened. He did, however, demonstrate that aspects of the Theory of Evolution would be subjected to unknown factors before being demonstrated to have been correct. While the discovery of radiant nuclear solar energy did not occur until 1907, (Lord Kelvin first published his attempts to disprove Darwin’s 1859 publication in 1864), Darwin’s theory was not invalid from 1864 through 1907. Nor did it fail to be “falsifiable,” although the claims of Kelvin did not, ultimately, prove evolution false.

Using your source for the “predictions” made by basic global warming theory, which of the following do you consider predictions? Can any of them be falsified?

Then using the above as an example, which of those are predictions? And can any of them falsify global warming theory?

Not only that, I explained where part of it may already have been falsified. If the expected winter amplification is not resulting in winter warming happening faster than summer warming, the theory is false.

No, it’s not considered a forcing, and it certainly has not been “discovered”, in the sense that the consensus has adopted this new theory, nor have the models all been changed.

First, once you realize it’s not a forcing, the rest makes no sense.

In regards to “standard, self-corrective science”, that doesn’t exist. If this new theory is validated, and we are sure there is indeed an unexpected feedback from CO2 forcing, that is a very large change in the theory, and it means all the models are wrong. It also means a lot more than that.

But it is by no means certain this is what is happening. 27 years isn’t long enough to say.

And that is bull and pushing again the flawed single piece that you are using to counter the many other pieces already assembled and confirmed as Kimstu showed already.

Sorry. You declaring that the oceans are failing to heat up is only valid for your own idiosphere. The rest is you simply waving your hands, once again, to keep yourself at the center of the thread.

And, since you agree that the theory is falsifiable–the actual question of the OP–you have now spent over 125 posts dancing around the topic, making snide remarks, cherry-picking factoids, and ignoring other posters’ actual submissions for no purpose other than to play games.

Actually, I stated clearly the same thing in post 33 and 34. I should have just stopped then.

Big wall of tap dancing text omitted.

All that talk about Braganza 2004 and Alexander 2006 and not a single counter, just to compain about models, the point stands anyhow, there is no good mechanism to explain away the fact that nights are warming more than the days other than the effect of increasing CO2 warming the earth.

I don’t even know what you mean by “the oceans are failing to heat up”.

The oceans are actually warming more than the land, according to the data.