Ok, are you now denying that such papers exist?
That’s ridiculous. You are claiming that the scientific community has accepted CAGW? Fine, prove it. What’s that? You can’t prove it? Too bad, so sad. The burden is not on me to disprove your silly claims.
No, just that I couldn’t find any. They might well exist - or not. Have you seen any? Care to cite them? Until then, they don’t enter into the argument at all, since I don’t see what bearing these hypothetical vapourware papers may have.
Oh, wait, you were trying to trap me in some sort of absolutist statement for some sort of gotcha-ya, weren’t you? Sorry. I’ll stick with the scientific facts, like those citations you still don’t seem to be addressing, even when I’ve repeatedly brought their existence to your attention.
No, I’m denying your claim that there isn’t a consensus to the contrary.
Remember, we started this little exchange when I refuted your statement : “I am skeptical that CAGW has been “accepted” by the scientific community.” with several cites. You made the claim first, don’t try shifting the burden of proof onto me.
Already done.
I have. See the Oreskes links.
Firstly, the burden’s not on me, since I’m not the one who made the original claim, although I have done so anyway. Secondly, what does “silliness” have to do with the validity of a claim, ad hominem that it is? I’ve already backed my counterclaim up with scientific paper citations that you continue to refuse to even address, whereas you “can’t be bothered” to countercite anything at all to advance your claim. So if anyone’s claim is looking a little undersupported, it’s yours.
Suit yourself. I have no idea how good your research skills are. But if you aren’t denying it, I’m not going to spend time chasing down cites. I’m not your research assistant.
Your cites didn’t stand up to scrutiny.
Having failed to meet your burden of proof, you are now trying to shift the burden of proof by demanding that I disprove your silly claim.
Not only that, you are committing the fallacy of the false dichotomy by demanding statements from scientific organizations indicating that their membership does not accept CAGW.
So that’s a big “No” on the cites. Why, are you waiting for intention to get back and do the heavy lifting for you?
And no, dear, any research assistant of mine would have adequate scientific training. And a first year logic course under their belt. Probably a nice rack, too.
Says you.
Can’t say the same for yours…because you haven’t given any:rolleyes:
Repeating this absurd canard doesn’t erase that quote from you, you know. But points for trying to accuse me of shifting the burden of proof as you…try to shift the burden of proof. It shows pluck. I like that in a young person. A distinct lack of logical reasoning ability, but pluck, sure.
That fallacy you are using, I don’t think it mean what you think it mean.
If you’ve actually read them rather than cherry-picking “random” bits, you’d have noted that my cites have included and discussed (with quotes) those minority of sources who are noncommittal in their stance too. So no false dilemma for you.
The only reason you won’t find statements from reputable scientific organisations not accepting CAGW is that none exist. Even the Petroleum Geologists caved in to shame and sense. And thus, by more than one path, is your “skepticism” disproved.
No, just waiting for you to come out and deny that such papers exist. Which you refuse to do.
Lol. Ad homenim.
Yep. You’ll get no Ackbar moment from me, sorry.
I think you mean “ad hominem”, dear. Which you are applying incorrectly. Tip: Knowing the name of a logical fallacy , but not using it properly is not going to undercut your debate opponent at all. Well, “sort of” knowing the name, I guess. So far you’re 0 for 2 on fallacies, and still no cites. And judging by the fact that you didn’t comment on anything meatier than my first two lines, you seem to be running out of steam. This is not looking good at all.
Lol. Nice to see you have been reduced to correcting my spelling and hurling personal insults.
If you think I’ve insulted you personally, report me or take it to the Pit. If you can point out where I did it, you might get an apology, too. I’m not here to trade personal insults with you, after all. It’s you logical arguments I’m after. When you make them, that is. Any day now…
And I think you’ll find I have all the patience in the world to deal with your combination of retread arguments ad ignorantiam, ad nauseam and personal incredulity. I haven’t been “reduced” to anything, since I’m still the one with the cites (and the open road). Plus, you know, there was a lot more to that post that you’ve conveniently ignored. It wasn’t just your spelling I was correcting. Your flawed logic got a beating too.
And I don’t know why you can’t spell it, it’s not like I haven’t called you on it several times already. But they do say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so I’m OK with that, honey. At least it’s better than the strawman accusation you also were erroneously throwing around like confetti.
Why should I bother? It only underscores the complete failure of your arguments on the merits.
Besides, if you actually had a valid point to make, there would be no need to criticize my spelling.
Because keeping discourse civil in GD is ultimately in everyone’s best interests
Well, since you won’t cite the insult, I guess that’s a failure that’ll have to stay in your head.
Suuuure, because that was the entirety of my post.:rolleyes: Picking one side comment to focus on, to the exclusion of any factual debate, is not some mystery tactic to me, dear. It’s not going to just fly by, while I bow to your superior debate fu. Obfuscation and avoidance are not going to win the day for you anymore than semantics did.
I’d already won this argument when you “couldn’t be bothered” to post cites or refute mine. Now, I’m just waiting out the inevitable trailing argumentum ad nauseam part of this circus.
I’m still thinking about this issue . . . I would be interested in your thoughts about this post:
I’ll take a crack at it. First of all, when he says, “according to data from NOAA’s Earth System Laboratory…” what he means is that he went to that website where you can make graphs from their data and made a graph…but clearly without understanding much about the data or how he was using it. (Witness his struggle in the “update” to even figure out what it was that he had plotted.)
It is not clear how that data is measured, but as near as I can tell, it is from radiosondes (weather balloons) and it is some sort of reanalysis product (as it says “NCEP reanalysis” in the title of the figure). If you look at the Soden et al. paper on moistening of the upper troposphere that reached the opposite conclusion using satellite data, they note:
So, basically, we have some data analyzed by someone who clearly has very little understanding of it and that is apparently known to have severe problems that make it unreliable for long term trends. By contrast, we have the Soden paper, appearing in a peer-reviewed highly-respected journal that shows data from satellites that show not only the expected moistening trend over the period it covers, but also fluctuations that are very consistent with a climate model that includes a moistening of the upper troposphere and definitely inconsistent with the model where this moistening has been “turned off”. (The Soden paper focuses on upper tropospheric moistening, which is expected to be what is most important for the water vapor feedback, but he also shows in Fig. 1 a plot of the column-integrated water vapor obtained from satellite measurements…and compared with model simulations forced with observed sea surface temperatures that replicate it quite closely.)
And, by the way, Anthony Watts has a history of doing very poor data analysis on his blog, as has been pointed out here, here, here, and here.
Part I - Climate Change
Models and predictions:
brazil84, you may be interested in cases where models have provided useful forecasts in recent times. It’s not all that hard to find, but it’s not terribly obvious either:
From the Met Office’s press release. They’ve also got a forecast out to 2014 in case you think they’re not in the business of making near-future forecasts.
Let’s take a look at their track record:
2007 Met forecast: 0.54°C ±0.16°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2007 Measurement: 0.41°C (January - November)
2006 Met Office forecast: 0.45°C ±0.12°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2006 Measurement: 0.42°C
2005 Met Office forecast: 0.51°C ±0.12°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2005 Measurement: 0.49°C
2004 Met Office forecast: 0.50°C ±0.12°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2004 Measurement: 0.46°C
2003 Met Office forecast: 0.55°C ±0.14°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2003 Measurement: 0.48°C
2002 Met Office forecast: 0.47°C ±0.14°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2002 Measurement: 0.48°C
2001 Met Office forecast: 0.47°C ±0.14°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2001 Measurement: 0.42°C
2000 Met Office forecast: 0.41°C ±0.16°C above the 1961-1990 average.
2000 Measurement: 0.29°C
You can find these forecasts on the Met Office’s website here. The measurement data is from the HADCRU data set (relative to the 1961-1990 mean) found here. The 2006 and 2007 measurements are from here.
Their forecasts are in good agreement with what actually happened.
Well, I’ve shown you where I get my ideas about near-term model reliability, why don’t you post a link to your graph?
I’m curious to see what predictions you saw and from whom.
Apparently your browser was set to render the words “satellite measurement” as “computer simulation” 
- that’s OK. I can continue to quote the relevant passages I already quoted in posts #179 and 182 with highlights showing the measurement until you can see where the measurements are.
Note the use of the word “data” not “computer simulation.”
Note use of the words “satellite observations.”
Note use of the word “observations.”
So far I have quoted these passages three times. You have replied twice that there were no measurements in the papers and once said you “had to think about it.” - you have since brought up a blog post I will look at next.
That won’t be necessary:
From post #169.
Perhaps you could tell us quantitatively how stable climate would have to be to justify your assumption about negative feedback?
In the same vein, in post #169 you also state:
So far you have not responded to my question about how much more warming to date you expect.
As I mentioned before, I’ve provided evidence of increased water vapor, which acts as positive feedback. Where is your evidence of negative feedback outweighing it?
Part II - All the other nonsense
All this stuff about semantics, the melting point of gold, cancer/smoking, and the price of tea on Vanuatu - If you recall, we started discussing this when you objected to my phrasing here (post #152):
You said the problem was (post #180):
But this explanation makes no sense - even if I had used language indicating certainty, you agree that facts are not absolute (post #183):
Oddly echoing my own words in the post previous to yours (post #182):
From my perspective, you’re trying to tell me what words I should and shouldn’t use. If my desire to not use the word “proof” instead of “evidence” bothers you, feel free to call me “unreasonable” - I still don’t think it will be true.
Well, three peer-reviewed papers versus a blog post - I’m likely to lean in the direction of the papers. Especially in light of the fact that the papers note the difficulty in calibration and coverage of the balloon methodology (thanks for the quote you mention, jshore. Balloons require that someone be there on the ground releasing the balloon, and satellites have a much larger area coverage. Budget problems have unfortunately also cut many balloon stations over the last few decades. The satellite measurements also come from both the SSM/I and HIRS instruments, which means more than one methodology has been used to arrive at those measurements - a more robust test than depending on a single balloon methodology.
I’ll play Devil’s Advocate for a moment, if I may. (Personally I’m a terrible vacillator on the subject of climate change. Call me a part-time denialist if you wish.)
Re water vapour feedback: I’d be astounded if the amount of water vapour in the atmosphere didn’t rise and fall with temperature. This is basic chemistry, vapour-pressure equilibria. You don’t need volcanos to demonstrate it; seasonal variation will do. The chapstick comes out in Winter for a reason! The atmosphere as a whole never reaches equilibrium of course, but temperature changes shift the equilibrium point, and the water content forever plays catch-up.
Whether this results in a positive warming feedback however, depends on what that water does. Water vapour is an important greenhouse gas, and superficially you’d expect a positive feedback. And for clear skies, I doubt anyone would argue otherwise. A little summary and empirical model can be found here (pdf.)
Water vapour is also fundamental to cloud formation, which complicates matters. Low cloud has a cooling effect, reflecting more incoming solar energy away than outgoing heat energy back to Earth. High cirrus cloud and ice cloud OTOH does the opposite, and has a warming effect. Richard Lindzen has argued that cirrus cloud decreases with increasing temperature (2001, pdf), creating an overall negative feedback. He calls this the “iris effect.” Roy Spencer published some observational support (pdf) for this hypothesis in 2007. Both of these papers were published in peer reviewed journals, and both use satellite data to support their arguments.
From Spencer’s paper: “[20] The sum of SW CRF and LW CRF plotted against the tropospheric temperature anomalies for the middle 41 days of the fifteen-ISO composite (Figure 4) reveals a strongly negative relationship. A linear regression yields a sensitivity factor (slope) of -6.1 W m[sup]-2[/sup]K[sup]-1[/sup], with an explained variance of 85.0%. This indicates that the net (SW + LW) radiative effect of clouds during the evolution of the composite ISO is to cool the ocean-atmosphere system during its tropospheric warm phase, and to warm it during its cool phase.” (Bolding mine. CRF is “cloud radiative forcing”, SW and LW are shortwave and longwave.)
“[21] (snip) During the composite oscillation’s rainy, tropospheric warming phase, the longwave flux anomalies unexpectedly transitioned from warming to cooling, behavior which was traced to a decrease in ice cloud coverage. This decrease in ice cloud coverage is nominally supportive of Lindzen’s ‘‘infrared iris’’ hypothesis.”
Maybe Lindzen is right, maybe he isn’t, or maybe the effect is real but not significant. But we need to KNOW. I want people to follow up on the work of Lindzen and Spencer, extend the observation areas and periods and publish their results. And if said results are against the consensus, that shouldn’t be a barrier to publication, nor should they feel like they’re sticking their heads above a parapet just for doing the research.
matt, I don’t disagree with anything that you say here. However, I would say that, on the flip side, the Spencer et al. paper is a very new paper that other scientists have not had the chance to react to yet. It is only one small part of the huge body of literature out there. So, while it certainly should be taken seriously and addressed by other scientists, this one paper should not be elevated above all the other evidence in all the other papers that points in the opposite direction, as some on the “skeptic” side have seemed to want to do.
And, in the meantime, before scientists have had a chance to weigh in on it, I’ll give you a few reasons to be skeptical that this effect is both real and significant:
(1) Lindzen’s hypothesis has received a fair bit of scrutiny and most other scientists have not found observational support for it.
(2) If Lindzen’s hypothesis is correct, it would change not only our understanding of AGW but also our understanding of paleoclimate. For example, one would have to re-figure out how to explain the ice age - interglacial cycles in light of such a strong stabilizing effect on the climate.
(3) Let me quote the concluding lines in the Spencer et al. paper after they say “This decrease in ice cloud coverage is nominally supportive of Lindzen’s ‘‘infrared iris’’ hypothesis.” They then go on to say: “While the time scales addressed here are short and not necessarily indicative of climate time scales, it must be remembered that all moist convective adjustment occurs on short time scales. Since these intraseasonal oscillations represent a dominant mode of convective variability in the tropical troposphere, their behavior should be considered when testing the convective and cloud parameterizations in climate models that are used to predict global warming.” Their statement about the time scales is probably correct…but it points out an important constraint on their results: Namely, that if this effect occurring on these short time scales is significant, one would expect to see its effect not only on the decadal time scales of interest for AGW but also on shorter timescales where it is easier to test climate models against observations. As a particular example, we have had lots of discussion on this Board recently regarding the apparent discrepancy on decadal time scales between the predicted temperature structure of the warming in the tropical atmosphere (so-called “tropical amplification” as you go up in the atmosphere, a consequence of moist adiabatic lapse rate theory) and the observations from satellites and weather balloons. On the face of it, it might seem that this effect that Spencer et al. claim to see could address exactly that since it is dealing with the same basic processes. However, the immediate problem I can see with this is that we already know from [url=]Santer et al. that this tropical amplification is seen in the observations on the monthly to yearly time scales, so it does not seem possible for the effect that Spencer et al. identify to somehow be responsible for the discrepancy on the decadal time scales and yet not produce a similar discrepancy on shorter time scales that are still considerably longer than the time scales over which the process that they identify seems to operate.
I was already skeptical; I’d read Hartman’s paper. Lindzen himself has backpedalled on it a bit, IIRC. If it wasn’t for Spencer’s paper, I wouldn’t have brought it up at all.
OTOH there are plenty of papers documenting higher than expected outgoing longwave radiation from the tropics. The “iris effect” might not be causing it, but something is: http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EAE03/07515/EAE03-J-07515.pdf
http://www.globalwarming.org/node/178
We’ve explained the ice ages? When did that happen?
I agree that ice ages are evidence against strong negative feedback, but they don’t disprove it. Explanations for the ice ages are partial and tentative in the first place. Besides which, one possible source of negative feedback isn’t an issue. It’s the combination of all feedbacks positive and negative, and the resulting climate sensitivity, that’s important.
On another note, the Medieval Warm Period seems to be back, in 18 sites all over the planet, using non tree-ring proxies. (click the icon to download pdf - free access, no registration required.) And again.
Please show me what their prediction was in 2002 for the next 5 years.
Yes, let’s look at their track record.
Oh really? It looks to me like you could have made better forecasts by just taking the measurement for each year and using it as the forecast for the next year. The so called “naive method.”
My understanding is that the “naive method” is normally used as a baseline to assess forecast models. If a forecast model cannot outperform the naive baseline, it is discarded.
But please feel free to correct me.
I will try to respond to the rest of your post later.
No, it’s not me telling you what words to use. It’s you, deciding on your own non-standard, private, definitions of those words. Then using your own private definitions to misinterpret the obvious meaning of my statements so that you can pretend I said something incorrect.
I asked you whether you agreed it’s been scientifically proven that regular smoking increases one’s chances of getting lung cancer. As far as I can tell, you’ve ignored my question.
I also asked you whether you agreed that it’s a scientific fact that the melting point of gold is 1064 C. As far as I can tell, you ignored that question too.
I think the reason is that even you don’t use the non-standard, private definitions of “scientific fact” and “scientific proof” which you have been using to misconstrue my statements.
I read the paper and it doesn’t appear that those “satellite observations” are being presented as evidence – not independently of the simulation, anyway. What the paper seems to be saying is that you can take a simulation which assumes great sensitivity; plug in measurements for water vapor and aeresols, and get a result that is consistent with temperature records. Then when you alter the simulation to get rid of the sensitivity assumption, the temperatures no longer match.
That’s correct. When I get a chance, I will try to get you something. Please keep in mind that you have the burden of proof.
(And when I say “burden of proof,” I’m using the normal, reasonable meaning I described earlier.)
Are you saying there’s a contradiction?
Yes I’ve looked for graphs. Here’s one:
http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/climate-changes-2001/synthesis-spm/synthesis-spm-en.pdf
Last page. Looks to me like we’re already at the edge of the error zone, if not outside it.
Repeating something that is not true enough times does not make it true. And, it is simply untrue that we are outside of the zone of the 2001 IPCC TAR, as is clearly documented in the 2007 IPCC AR4 report (Fig. 1.1 in Chapter 1) and in this peer-reviewed paper (also available as a PDF file here for those without access to Science).