This is a continuation of a remarkable thread that has now received 10,000 comments running to well over a million words. Unfortunately its size has become a problem and this is the reason for the move.
The history of the New Statesman thread goes back to December 2007 when Dr David Whitehouse wrote a very influential article for that publication posing the question Has Global Warming Stopped? Later, Mark Lynas, the magazine’s environment correspondent, wrote a furious reply, Has Global Warming Really Stopped?
By the time the New Statesman closed the blogs associated with these articles they had received just over 3000 comments, many from people who had become regular contributors to a wide-ranging discussion of the evidence for anthropogenic climate change, its implications for public policy and the economy. At that stage I provided a new home for the discussion at Harmless Sky.
Comments are now closed on the old thread. If you want to refer to comments there then it is easy to do so by left-clicking on the comment number, selecting ‘Copy Link Location’ and then setting up a link in the normal way.
Here’s to the next 10,000 comments.
Useful links:
Dr David Whitehouse’s article can be found here with 1289 comments.
Mark Lynas’ attempted refutation can be found here with 1715 comments.
The original Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs thread is here with 10,000 comments.
Bobclive
Yes. There has been a historical empirical correlation between solar activity (number of sunspots) and temperature; this has been quite apparent prior to any significant human GHG emissions (as you point out).
It is also true that several solar scientists have attributed at least half of the warming seen over the 20th century to the unusually high level of solar activity (highest in several thousand years).
And it is also true that this high level of solar activity ended toward the end of solar cycle 23 and that we are now in a period of very low solar activity, coinciding with a period of cooling.
And, yes. The IPCC approach of assuming that solar forcing is limited to the measurable impact from direct solar irradiance (and thereby concluding that the all natural forcing including that from the sun is essentially insignificant) is downright stupid.
It is also absurd to consider clouds only as a “feedback” to anthropogenic forcing, rather than a naturally caused forcing in itself.
I believe Henrik Svensmark et al. are onto something with the cosmic ray / cloud hypothesis; the correlation with temperature is much better than that between CO2 and temperature and the tests being run in the CLOUD experiment at CERN will tell us more about this when results are released.
Roy Spencer has also proposed that clouds act as a natural forcing, and he has shown a correlation with the PDO, without getting into what “drives” the PDO. Is there a tie to Svensmark’s hypothesis?
Then there are the recently published ISCCP results showing that the global albedo (primarily from clouds) decreased by around 4.5% between 1985 and around 2000 (a period of warming) and increased again by around 2.5% most recently (a period of slight cooling); the estimated temperature impact of this change in albedo is far greater than that calculated for the change in GHGs.
http://bbso.njit.edu/Research/EarthShine/literature/Palle_etal_2006_EOS.pdf
So there are many things out there that tell us the sun plays a much greater climate forcing role than that assumed by IPCC in its myopic fixation on anthropogenic factors alone (primarily human CO2).
As these become better defined it may well become obvious that human CO2 is only a minor player in our planet’s climate.
Max
There’s a mini ice age coming, says man who beats weather experts
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/weather/theres-a-mini-ice-age-coming-says-man-who-beats-weather-experts-20101221-1945a.html
No warming since 1960, and that official.
NIWA makes the huge admission that New Zealand has experienced hardly any warming during the last half-century. For all their talk about warming, for all their rushed invention of the “Eleven-Station Series” to prove warming, this new series shows that no warming has occurred here since about 1960. Almost all the warming took place from 1940-60, when the IPCC says that the effect of CO2 concentrations was trivial. Indeed, global temperatures were falling during that period.
“The new temperature record shows no evidence of a connection with global warming. Since that’s the reason this tempest in a teacup has brewed in the first place, it should simmer down now.”
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/SC1012/S00054/climate-science-coalition-vindicated.htm
bobclive
You said;
“Recent studies suggest that when solar activity is low, “blocking” events move eastwards from above north-eastern North America towards Europe, and become more stable.
A prolonged “blocking” during the most recent winter was responsible for the long spell of freezing conditions that gripped Europe.
Written observations from the period of the Maunder Minimum referred to the wind coming from the east during particularly cold winters, which strengthened the team’s “blocking” hypothesis.”
Hubert Lamb comments on this predominance of Easterlies (and reduction in westerlies) numerous times in his various books. It is also something we can observe over the last few years. I live in the South West of Britain and the reduction in our westerlies in recent years is very noticeable. I am shivering at the moment in an easterly.
For some reason the Little Ice age-which was highly intermittent as you know- had a high number of these events. By themselves I suspect the lack of westerlies/greater number of easterlies- just cause a single colder than normal winter. When several happen in a row I suspect the sea temperatures fall, which then exacerbates the NEXT winter into becoming a much colder one.
The jet stream is a crucial feature in this, and as it was only discovered in 1945 I suspect there is an awful lot more we need to know about it.
Mind you that goes for virtually every aspect of our climate-I don’t believe scientists know anything like as much about it as they think they do!
tonyb
PeterM and TonyB
Let me get your reactions to the topic of “uncertainty” in the science supporting climate projections and its impact on climate policy.
Tony, you have mentioned the high level of uncertainty regarding natural climate forcing (solar, etc.), and I believe the general recognition is that uncertainty goes well beyond just that.
It appears that the uncertainties related to climate model forecasts are gaining more attention, as the confidence of these models to project future climate trends is diminishing.
“Mainstream” climate scientists, such as Dr. Judith Curry, are pointing out that the very basics supporting the AGW projections of rapidly increasing global temperatures, such as the 2xCO2 climate impact with and without feedbacks, are subject to great uncertainty, raising serious questions of the IPCC climate models’ ability to make usable projections for the future.
Another point made by Curry is that there is great uncertainty regarding past climate, raising serious questions regarding claims that late 20th century warming is unprecedented or unusual.
Many scientists acknowledge that IPCC has understated uncertainty in its past reports in order to get its message across to policymakers, with statements such as (AR4 WG1 SPM report):
and
These same scientists now predict that the next IPCC report will do a better job of pointing out these uncertainties and their possible impact on the conclusions reached. We will have to wait and see whether or not this will actually be the case.
One of the basic principles in forecasting is if the uncertainties are great, the forecasts should be conservative, rather than extreme.
In direct opposition to this basic principle, however, alarmists are making the case that “due to the high degree of uncertainty in the projections, it could be much worse than our forecasts predicted” – and, therefore, by applying the “precautionary principle”, the need for immediate “action” is actually enhanced by the uncertainties in the forecasts.
No matter how you slice it, this does not appear to me to be based on rational logic.
What do the two of you think about this?
Max
Flashback 10 years!
CRU scientists warn that snowfalls in UK are a thing of the past
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html
I hope these “experts” are experiencing a bit of “virtual cold” as they are shoveling the “virtual snow” today.
Max
Max your 2955
In my 2923 I ask Peter a number of questions (none of which he has to date answered) many of which relate to uncertainty.
I have also been asked to contribute a chapter to a book on climate on that very subject. It starts like this;
“There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know.
There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don’t know.
But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don’t know we don’t know.”
Donald Rumsfeld
I have also privately communicated with Judith Curry on this subject, but the trouble is that it underpins the very notion of AGW and the lifes work of many leading scientists-such as her. Judith writes on a number of subjects, of which sea surface temperatures are a notable part. The trouble is that the idea that we have accurate sea surface global temperatures back to 1860 is complete and utter nonsense.
We don’t know to within 10 degrees what the temperature was for 99% of the world’s oceans before around 1980. Yet Hadley sell this very largely invented data and poople like Judith use it in their learned papers and the IPCC then promote it as factual.
Global land temperatures have an inaccuracy of around 1.5F-on instrumets alone. Up to the year 1900 and later, many places were still recording only the day time temoerature. The night temperature- in order to get a mean average- was ‘added’ later and the records ‘adjusted.’
As I write this, there is a programme about the Kinks on Tv and they are playing one of my favourite songs ‘Waterloo sunset.’ There is a wonderful painting by Monet from 1900 of Waterloo Bridge wreathed in Smog. Smog reduced the temperature by up to 10 degrees compared to surrounding stations. Many of the worlds great cities (that had the longest records) experienced Smog to a greater or lesser extent. It was intermittent so which records need to be adjusted for it is difficult to say-perhaps the uhi effect counter balanced it? Who knows?
Climate science is riven from top to bottom with such uncertainties, without even going into the dark alleys down which co2 records have been hidden.Deliberately? In ignorance?
We can place some approximate upper and lower limits on the range of uncertainties due to the copious records available (We even have the climate references of the Byzantine empire covering 1000 years)
All our records show periods of warmth and cold, drounght and flood, periods of extensive ice and periods of melt, and that nothing extraordinary is happening today if you look at things in a historic context.
Donald Rumsfeld could have been writing about climate science when he made his famous quote.
If you want a sneak previewe of my article let me know and I’ll send it on
tonyb
Met Office canard of the week?:
The UK may be cold but it’s still a warm world says Met Office chief
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/the-uk-may-be-cold-but-its-still-a-warm-world-says-met-office-chief-2165492.html
Met Office chief scientist, Julia Slingo stated
It turn out that this is not so.
Checking 6 different locations in Greenland, there are 4 that have below average temperature and 2 that are above average.
Beijing is slightly below normal, as are both Moscow and Vladivostok.
Several locations across northern North America, from Alaska to Montreal, are also at below normal temperature.
Slingo better check those thermometers, before making blanket statements.
The current wave of below normal temperatures may not be “global”, but it appears to cover major portions of the Northern Hemisphere (where it happens to be winter – duh!).
Max
TonyB
I’d love a “sneak preview”.
Maybe you can e-mail it to me, if you are not ready to go “public” yet.
Thanks,
Max
TonyB
You mention contacts with Dr. Judith Curry (2957) regarding uncertainties in past climate records.
Dr. Curry has gone on record in this recent interview in Scientific American by Michael Lemonick (of the pro-AGW climate think tank, Climate Central, Inc.)
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=climate-heretic
The most significant areas of uncertainty she sees are:
– The 2xCO2 climate forcing without feedbacks
– The net “amplifying or mitigating impacts” of feedbacks
– Data about past climate – is current warming unusual?
– Model projections of future climate – how reliable are they?
On her blog site, she summarized her position on what she referred to as the “positive feedback loop between climate science and policy and politics”, including some thoughts on the impact of “Climategate”, errors in the IPCC reports, the protection of what she refers to as the “IPCC dogma”, the impact of the “blogosphere” and the role that climate scientists should play in the future to regain the credibility of climate science.
http://judithcurry.com/2010/11/03/reversing-the-direction-of-the-positive-feedback-loop/
She has opened many of the questions on “uncertainty” for comment on her site; the most recent thread covers the verification and validation of climate models:
http://judithcurry.com/2010/12/18/climate-model-verification-and-validation-part-ii/#comment-23719
An earlier thread covered the 2xCO2 impact without feedbacks
http://judithcurry.com/2010/12/11/co2-no-feedback-sensitivity/#comment-21097
And she has stated she would start a new thread on uncertainties surrounding cloud feedbacks in January – that one should be extremely interesting!
I am very much impressed with the way Dr. Curry is approaching this all. While she is still very much a climate “insider”, she is using the blogosphere very effectively to open the discussion beyond just the established and accepted “groupthink” or “dogma”.
Lemonick starts his interview off with calling Curry a “Climate Heretic” (who has “turned on her colleagues”) and then debates whether she has acted as an effective “peacemaker” by “encouraging her colleagues to treat skeptics with respect” or has been a “dupe – someone whose well-meaning efforts have only poured fuel on the fire”.
It is clear from Lemonick’s op-ed comments (and the quotes from Gavin Schmidt and the late Stephen Schneider he adds at the end) that he is uneasy with Curry’s questioning of the orthodoxy.
But I say, “hats off to this lady” – let’s hope she can get a lively discussion started that will bring more knowledge to all of us on this vital but highly “uncertain” topic, not only by sharing her knowledge, but also by letting other viewpoints be heard and commenting constructively on them.
Max
Max Your 2960
I think Judith Curry tackles some vital questions, demonstrating that she is able to move on and re examine her previously entrenched position.
The subjects you outline are certainly deserving of special attention and each are tackled in my article that has been forwarded to you.
The trouble is that as we see on this blog very few people -and especially climate scientists- are able to re examime information, especially if it conflicts with their world view.
To tell someone that the information they have been using to great acclaim-such as STT’s- is completely worthless, is not something that can be taken on board easily.
Tonyb
TonyB
You wrote:
Indeed, as Thomas Kuhn noted in his treatise on “paradigms” in science (so this quirk is not limited to today’s “climate science” – even though the multi-billion dollar economic and resulting political implications have exacerbated the situation enormously).
It takes courage for a climate “insider” to rationally question the infallibility of the “paradigm” upon which his/her career may have been based.
But the alternate is blind acceptance without question – in which case the “paradigm” becomes “dogma” (and no longer has much to do with “science”).
It is this dilemma that Brian Cox totally overlooked in his lecture (other thread), in arguing for the scientific validity of “peer review” and “consensus opinion”.
I seriously doubt that the “dangerous AGW paradigm” will survive in its pre-Climategate state – particularly if the current stall in warming continues for a few more years.
It seems highly likely to me that there will be a “paradigm shift”, and that a new “paradigm” will emerge.
Will this mean a greatly diminished role for GHGs, together with an enhanced role of natural forcing factors? Will Svensmark’s cosmic ray cloud hypothesis become part of the new “paradigm”? Will the secret of how clouds act as a natural thermostat be scientifically discovered and empirically validated? Will other (today as yet untested) hypotheses emerge?
Who knows?
But it is my guess that whatever happens, the “dangerous AGW paradigm” will not survive in its pre-Climategate form and will be replaced by a new one, and that this shift will result in broad policy changes.
And I agree with Judith Curry that the blogosphere will play a major role in the flow of information.
Max
There’s an interesting new government proposal to find ways to make us conform to their climate plans discussed at
http://www.climate-resistance.org/2010/12/driving-to-distraction.html
which recalls the “drowning puppies” ad campaign. I thought Ben’s invitation to submit evidence to the parlamentary sub-committee might interest anyone here who wrote to the ASA about that campaign.
TonyB #2957
Your chapter sounds fascinating. One of the first things I read that opened my eyes to the enormity of the AGW scandal was a discussion of historical sea surface temperatures at Climate Audit revolving round the use of leather v. wooden buckets for sampling the seawater. There was some question as to whether the weight (and therefore age) of the sailor taking the sample might be a factor influencing temperature, since a younger, weaker sailor wouldn’t dip his bucket so deep, for fear of falling overboard. It may have been a joke by a commenter, but it opened my eyes to the enormity of the naive faith in statistics – any statistics – which underpins the whole fantasy.
I recently read a short book on climate history by Le Roy Ladurie, author of “Histoire humaine et comparée du climat” (2004), since I was interested to know if he was aware of the Mann/Jones climate revisionism. He does indeed mention them (and Lamb) in polite terms without going into details, almost as if he’s deferring to the greater wisdom of scientists. I’ll hunt out his longer, definitive work and see if there’s anything interesting therein, since I don’t think it’s been translated into English.
Geoff 2964
I remember that thread, although not that specific method of sampling.
It is perfectly plausible. One man might dip a bucket over the side and scoop water from the very surface, whilst another might allow the bucket to sink to its full five fathoms where the temperature would be very different.
Of course things might be subsequently equalised by then leaving the water in the bucket on the deck in hot sunshine for the rest of the day!
They are sheer nonsense, yet we are supposed to believe their accuracy is so great that they can be added to the equally absurd (but for different reasons) land temperatures and used to promote public policy.
tonyb
To one and all
I’ll be away from my computer for a few days, but would like to wish you all
MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY NEW YEAR
Max
Just to wish you all a Merry Christmas, or a Merry Mid winter/summer solstice, depending on your POV.
and also let you know that 2010 was the warmest ever.
http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2010/12/nasa-2010-meteorological-year-wa.html
Wishing you all a cooler 2011 !
Probably shouldn’t have said the warmest ever.
How about ‘the warmest in recorded history’?
Peter
How about ‘the warmest for the stations Hansen chooses to use from the data he can find in his “comically cluttered office” after ensuring he makes no meaningful allowances for UHi which now affects the majority of his data base.’
Look forward to your answering my two questions on ‘global’ temperatures- land and ocean.
The words ‘comical’ could have been made for them.
No hurry, its getting near Christmas for you so I’ll wish you and yours a happy Christmas and a less credulous New Year
Tonyb
Merry CHRIST-mas & Happy HOLY-days to you Pete.
By the way, the “warmest year on record” seems to have bypassed us here in the United States.
I can surmise that the CO2 levels parked over America must be less than the levels over the remainder of the globe.
Brute,
Thank you for the Christmas wishes.
Happy Yuletide to you too!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yule
Global Warming is back with a vengeance this year………Of course, as Peter and other “experts” will pontificate, sub-zero temperatures and snowfall measured in feet is all the result of a warming earth due to my grossly overpowered automobile and my seven figure bank account………
I-95 Blizzard from New Jersey to Maine
http://www.accuweather.com/blogs/news/story/43534/i95-blizzard-from-new-jersey-t-1.asp
ICE AGE: Columbia, SC has first Christmas snow since records first kept in 1887…
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9KBLRDG0&show_article=1
Atlanta’s First Since 1882…
http://www.breitbart.tv/atlantas-first-white-christmas-since-1862/
Moscow’s main airport closed after overnight snow…
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE6BP01E20101226
Airport Christmas for Europe’s stranded travellers…
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20101225/india_nm/india537794
Paper: ‘No matter what the weather, it’s all due to warming’…
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/557597/201012221907/The-Abiding-Faith-Of-Warm-ongers.htm
Climate: Nothing makes fools of more people than trying to predict the weather. Whether in Los Angeles or London, recent predictions have gone crazily awry. Global warming? How about mini ice age?
The sight of confused and angry travelers stuck in airports across Europe because of an arctic freeze that has settled across the continent isn’t funny. Sadly, they’ve been told for more than a decade now that such a thing was an impossibility — that global warming was inevitable, and couldn’t be reversed.
This is a big problem for those who see human-caused global warming as an irreversible result of the Industrial Revolution’s reliance on carbon-based fuels. Based on global warming theory — and according to official weather forecasts made earlier in the year — this winter should be warm and dry. It’s anything but. Ice and snow cover vast parts of both Europe and North America, in one of the coldest Decembers in history.
A cautionary tale? You bet. Prognosticators who wrote the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, global warming report in 2007 predicted an inevitable, century-long rise in global temperatures of two degrees or more. Only higher temperatures were foreseen. Moderate or even lower temperatures, as we’re experiencing now, weren’t even listed as a possibility.
Since at least 1998, however, no significant warming trend has been noticeable.
Unfortunately, none of the 24 models used by the IPCC views that as possible. They are at odds with reality.
Karl Popper, the late, great philosopher of science, noted that for something to be called scientific, it must be, as he put it, “falsifiable.” That is, for something to be scientifically true, you must be able to test it to see if it’s false. That’s what scientific experimentation and observation do. That’s the essence of the scientific method.
Unfortunately, the prophets of climate doom violate this idea. No matter what happens, it always confirms their basic premise that the world is getting hotter. The weather turns cold and wet? It’s global warming, they say. Weather turns hot? Global warming. No change? Global warming. More hurricanes? Global warming. No hurricanes? You guessed it.
Nothing can disprove their thesis. Not even the extraordinarily frigid weather now creating havoc across most of the Northern Hemisphere. The Los Angeles Times, in a piece on the region’s strangely wet and cold weather, paraphrases Jet Propulsion Laboratory climatologist Bill Patzert as saying, “In general, as the globe warms, weather conditions tend to be more extreme and volatile.”
Got that? No matter what the weather, it’s all due to warming. This isn’t science; it’s a kind of faith.
Scientists go along and even stifle dissent because, frankly, hundreds of millions of dollars in research grants are at stake. But for the believers, global warming is the god that failed.
Why do we continue to listen to warmists when they’re so wrong? Maybe it’s because their real agenda has nothing to do with climate change at all. Earlier this month, attendees of a global warming summit in Cancun, Mexico, concluded, with virtually no economic or real scientific support, that by 2020 rich nations need to transfer $100 billion a year to poor nations to help them “mitigate” the adverse impacts of warming.
This is what global warming is really about — wealth redistribution by people whose beliefs are basically socialist. It has little or nothing to do with climate. If it did, we might pay more attention to Piers Corbyn, a little-known British meteorologist and astrophysicist who has a knack for correctly predicting weather changes. Indeed, as London’s Mayor Boris Johnson recently noted, “He seems to get it right about 85% of the time.”
How does he do it? Unlike the U.N. and government forecasters, Corbyn pays close attention to solar cycles that, as it turns out, correlate very closely to changes in climate. Not only are we not headed for global warming, Corbyn says, we may be entering a “mini ice age” similar to the one that took place from 1450 A.D. to 1850 A.D.
We don’t know if Corbyn’s right or not. But given his record, he deserves as much attention as the warm-mongers whose goal is not to arrive at the truth but to reorganize society in a radical way.
It’s getting colder………just as the IPCC and Hansen prophesized in their sacred texts…………
Oh wait…..they never mentioned colder temperatures……
Cold weather endangers sea creatures…
http://www.islandpacket.com/2010/12/26/1490923/cold-weather-endangers-sea-creatures.html#
Record lows set for Miami, Key West…
http://www.weather.com/outlook/driving/interstate/map/USGA0028?bypassredirect=true&mapdest=US_Lows_Tonight:SE
Brute,
It seems to me a bit of a coincidence that a cold end to 2010 coincides with an intensifying La Nina. It looks much like the La Nina of 2007-2008, which resulted in a relatively cold 2008 globally, so on that comparison, 2011 could be bad news. I thought I’d also check on the latest info on the PDO, which has also shown remarkable correlation with the ~60-year, global air temperature oscillation that Max and others have discussed, (30 years warming followed by 30 years cooling).
I found this article which, back in July, predicted just what you are now experiencing:
A Massive Winter Heading for the Northern Hemisphere?
http://www.landscheidt.info/?q=node/189
It’s a bit of a flashy website, but it pulls together some interesting graphs and data. (that point towards bad times ahead.)
Incidentally, even David B. Benson, a tragic at RC has pointed out the significance of the PDO. (Pacific Decadal Oscillation) I think he might be writing a paper on it.