According to Dr.Abdussamatov, the CO2 results from the solar warming
-it is a consequence, not a cause. If the sun is not responsible, then why is Mars warming up, at the same time as the earth.
Invest in fur coats, it will be a long stretch od cold ahaeead!
Oh, that Abdussamatov…
http://www.desmogblog.com/russian-warming-denier-blinded-by-sunspots
I did read the update…
I shall keep your admonishment in mind, particularly should I lose the bet. Thanks.
I note with wry amusement assorted parishioners who have been told it’s not OK not to believe that religion either. 
What I won’t do is debate AGW. It’s hopeless. I have, essentially, put my risk out there in a substantive way, I think.
The issue here is: do you understand all the risks on the wager?
Because it seems that you are assuming that the temperatures in Chicago or the north east is evidence enough to make your wager.
Only that, as reported by the same people, the temperature in that area was an anomaly last July; at the global level the temperature increased, making it the second warmest July on record globally:
http://global-warming.accuweather.com/2009/08/second_warmest_july_on_record.html
So, I’m also making sure that you do understand that SentientMeat is not referring to just the local temperature in Chicago.
Yer jes’ pullin’ my chain, right?
The only “risk” here is wearing that placard. I’d wear the placard for free just for a good laugh from my friends. I seem to lack the requisite passion around AGW in the same way agnostics lack the earnest passion of a Sunday Schooler for spreading the Word and recruiting Believers.
And I believe we established way earlier what the source would be for the global temperature.
Now if you are wondering if the Pedant is so witless as to assume that if it’s cold here in Chicago, it must be cold everywhere…well, thanks for stepping in and clarifying, but frankly that hurt my feelings. (It is true I think the record cold here in Chicago suggests a relative insensitivity of climate to CO2 but that’s the stuff of another discussion and I really am uninterested in debating AGW.)
CP is not the brightest candle on the altar but he’s not quite completely gone yet.
So then, this warming must be much more dramatic than any we have seen in the last 750,000 years since the CO2 levels are significantly higher than any time during that period! It is a marvelous coincidence that just as the industrial revolution started:
(1) The biosphere or oceans miraculously began to absorb all the CO2 that we started emitting.
(2) The sun conspired to cause about the same amount of CO2 to be emitted (actually about a factor of two less since the level of CO2 rise is about half of what we would expect if all of our CO2 was absorbed).
And, this doesn’t even discuss the isotopic evidence regarding the origin of the rise of CO2 levels.
The statement that the CO2 levels are a consequence of something other than our emissions is just silly beyond belief.
It is fascinating how many of the very same people who had to be dragged kicking-and-screaming into accepting the overwhelming evidence we have from oodles of measurements to accept that the Earth is warming globally seem to be so convinced that there is global warming on Mars from extremely limited evidence. If you want a discussion of what is actually happening on Mars, go here, which is summarized thus:
We also have, by the way, very good measurements of the variations in solar luminosity in recent times, so we know that there is no significant trend in solar variations that could explain any general rise in temperatures across many planets. AGW skeptics have come up with fancy hypotheses to try to magnify the effect of solar variations on the Earth’s climate (such as the sun’s modulation of intergalactic cosmic rays and their effects on cloud formation). However (besides the problems with this hypothesis explaining the current warming on Earth), I don’t see how it could explain the warming of the very different Martian atmosphere.
But there has hasn’t been any appreciable solar warming.
It isn’t. And neither is Mercury or Venus. Even sad, demoted dwarf Pluto is getting colder.
Am I to take this as an acceptance of the side bet? Why, ralph, I never thought you had it in you - congratulations on growing a pair! (Please explicitly inform us that you do not mean to accept the wager if your pair remains unsurprisingly ungrown.)
On rereading this thread, and since AGW Deniers like intention and Leaffan are conspicuous by their absence here (guesses also solicited as to why that might be :)), I’d like to pick this up with you if I may, Quartz.
The solar cycle looks set to continue its rather undramatic, steady oscillation around 1366 Wm[sup]-2[/sup] (give or take 1 Wm[sup]-2[/sup]) for a while yet. How many more years of warming would convince you, personally, that said warming was due to the extra IR-absorbing gases in the atmosphere?
You see, the “natural factors only” model starts to diverge from the actual data at around the start of the 1980’s - that’s already three decades of rising temperatures despite roughly constant solar warming. Would you require another three decades of divergence, or would, say, another 7 years convince you?
Sorry to keep pimping this thread in the hope that AGW-Deniers might show up, but I’ve just seen an article which gives them a back door to escape through (though they would need huge balls to do so with a straight face):
Methane escaping from Arctic sea floor.
This is pretty worrying, because a methane (CH[sub]4[/sub]) molecule has many more possible patterns of vibration that can absorb IR wavelengths than a simple CO2 molecule, such that it is something like 20 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas.
But if, as Quartz suggests, the current warming might be caused by something other than higher IR-absorbing gas concentrations, AGW Deniers could pull a remarkable stunt: They could claim that the warming up until, say, 1990 was natural (eg. solar), and that subsequent warming was caused by this methane release due to said natural warming, which is also natural but which we’ve only just discovered!
jshore, any ideas on how one might counteract this future bullshit beyond simply throwing up one’s hands in despair?
Well, what would be relevant are the methane concentrations in the atmosphere, not the amount released by this particular source. And, methane concentrations had actually leveled off for a while although they may be beginning to rise again. Also, I think the relative radiative forcing effects of methane and CO2 are known well enough that I don’t think it makes any sense to implicate methane and not CO2.
Well, my guess would be that it’s because I hadn’t gotten around to reading it yet, so please re-insert your snark into your fundamental orifice.
On an more practical note, what temperature record are you planning to use for this bet with Chief Pedant? Satellite? Which one? Terrestrial? Which one?
PS - as has been repeatedly pointed out, “Deniers” is an insult. It is a pathetic, puerile attempt to equate people who happen to disagree with you with people who deny the Holocaust. Attempting to insult those who oppose you only reveals the weakness of your position. If I were to call AGW supporters say “Sheep”, you would be equally insulted, which is why I don’t do that. Please re-insert the term “Deniers” into the aforementioned location as well, it is not conducive to scientific discussion.
Deniers is appropriate when the vast majority of practicing climate scientists think AGW is happening and only a tiny fringe composed primarily of non climate scientists make arguments it isn’t.
Even if that were true (it isn’t), it still wouldn’t be appropriate. Among other things, it is an insult to those who died in the Holocaust … some of us still care about that, although I suppose YMMV.
w.
Is that actually a connection that’s widely made? I’m honestly curious, because I don’t think I would’ve made the leap denier = holocaust denier. Does the word generally carry this connection in English?
Seems to me that the ones that deny that the contrarians are currently reaching fringe levels want to make that leap because they want to say that the opponents are the ones godwinizing the discussion.
Of course that only works by denying 
that the word existed before the Nazis came into the historical picture.
I don’t know. I’m not convinced by any current theory. We know that the oceans can act as a massive heat sink that can take years to change, so a considerable delay is to be expected. I do not advocate suspending research pending falsification of the solar theory.Anyway, you’re missing my point, so I’ll repeat it: further warming while there’s a continued lack of sunspots will falsify this theory. I would suggest that it will take at least 1 11-year cycle. Note that a lack of warming with no sunspots will not confirm the theory either - only the reverse holds.
What I have seen is that skeptics like Martin Durkin have acted dishonestly when telling people that they have evidence of the solar activity (sunspots) driving the current warming.
So, since 1975.
That is indeed more than 11 years.
If you folks want data that IMO is least likely to be wrong measurement wise, look for data on permafrost temperature profiles.
Look for among other names studying this Dr. Osterkamp (sp?), at University of Alaska, Fairbanks.
Of course if global warming models predict cooling in permafrost regions, your in trouble
No. There’ve been a normal number of sunspots. Now there aren’t. We’ll have to wait and see what effect this has.
Oh, this is just crap. And yes, there is a majority consensus amongst climate scientists, we don’t really need to smack that one down again, do we?