THIS PAGE HAS BEEN ACTIVATED AS THE NEW STATESMAN BLOG IS NOW CLOSED FOR COMMENTS
At 10am this morning, the New Statesman finally closed the Mark Lynas thread on their website after 1715 comments had been added over a period of five months. I don’t know whether this constitutes any kind of a record, but gratitude is certainly due to the editor of of the New Statesman for hosting the discussion so patiently and also for publishing articles from Dr David Whitehouse and Mark Lynas that have created so much interest.
This page is now live, and anyone who would like to continue the discussion here is welcome to do so. I have copied the most recent contributions at the New Statesman as the first comment for the sake of convenience. If you want to refer back to either of the original threads, then you can find them here:
Dr David Whitehouse’s article can be found here with all 1289 comments.
Mark Lynas’ attempted refutation can be found here with 1715 comments.
Welcome to Harmless Sky, and happy blogging.
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10,000 Responses to “Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs.”
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Brute,
You might just want to put your brain into gear before rushing off these ‘its cold here today in this part of the USA, therefore AGW can’t exist’ type posts.
Max may quibble about the exact numbers, but the scientific case is that world temperatures are rising by about 0.2 degC per decade, with the liklihood that this figure may rise in the coming century to give us an extra 2-3 deg C by the year 2100.
So far we’ve seen temperatures rise by 0.7 deg C since the turn of the 20th century.
Now, if you were paying any attention at all in your science classes you’ll remember that water freezes at 0 deg C or 32 deg F. With or without AGW , temperatures of around -5 or -6 deg C are not uncommon in winter.
-5 deg without AGW translates into – 4.3 degC with global warming.
So, please enjoy your skiing, but please also do try to remember your very basic arithmetic and very basic science.
Bob_FJ #3371
Is this a “problem” due to improved instruments.
ie, before a certain date the sensors were not senstive enough to measure the bands to such a small, or rather accurate scale.
There appears to be no mention of specific frequencies measured on the official sites.
On the web pages of NOAA it appears that overall measurements are taken.
Also, the cold trap obviously cools the air (sample) to remove water vapour,
is the air then heated before sampling, if so, to what temperature.
Would I be right in thinking the samples must always be at the same temperature when measured.
If so, what is this temperature, it is presumably another of those unavaliable (on the internet) “machine and data quality assurance parametres”.
This (testing) temperature is presumably the same for air samples and calibration gases.
Derek.
Hi Peter
You wrote Brute (3376): “Max may quibble about the exact numbers, but the scientific case is that world temperatures are rising by about 0.2 degC per decade, with the liklihood that this figure may rise in the coming century to give us an extra 2-3 deg C by the year 2100.
So far we’ve seen temperatures rise by 0.7 deg C since the turn of the 20th century.”
Rather than “quibbling about exact numbers”, I’ll point out the basically false logic of your statement.
The “scientific case” (if you equate IPCC projections with “scientific case”) may be “that world temperatures are rising by about 0.2 degC per decade”, but the observed fact for the past decade is that there has been no rise, and for the past eight years there has been a net global COOLING (based on the average of all temperature records) of around 0.09degC per decade. So far the IPCC projections (or “scientific case”, if you prefer this name) have been dead wrong. Lousy forecasting is what one can call this.
It is true that we’ve had 0.65degC to 0.7degC warming to date since the record began in 1850, of which solar scientists tell us roughly half was caused by solar effects with the other half theoretically caused by AGW, as was pointed out quite exhaustively earlier.
So your logic that there is a “likelihood that this figure may rise in the coming century to give us an extra 2-3 deg C by the year 2100” is flawed.
Why should it do so when the CO2 rise from 2008 to 2100 can only cause 0.4degC warming according to the radiative forcing estimates of IPCC (Myhre et al.) and all other anthropogenic factors cancel one another out according to IPCC?
This is only possible if we add in the assumed (and so far very elusive) “positive” feedbacks from water vapor and clouds. These, according to the virtual world of IPCC models, increase the 2xCO2 warming effect from 0.7degC to 3.2 degC. Quite a jump!
Yet we have not seen these feedbacks in action in the past and recent physical observations, on water vapor and primarily on clouds, have shown that they are an illusion. The (positive) water vapor feedback is much lower than assumed by IPCC and the net feedback from clouds is actually strongly negative, rather than strongly positive as assumed by IPCC). As a result, the actual theoretical 2xCO2 warming impact is closer to 0.6 to 0.8degC (rather than 4 to 5 times this amount).
Peter, if you want to debate the feedback assumptions, upon which your prognosis that there is a “likelihood that this figure may rise in the coming century to give us an extra 2-3 deg C by the year 2100”, please do so. It would be a losing proposition for you (as you probably know and you are therefore avoiding this discussion).
But to simply parrot IPCC predictions that have already been shown to be based on false assumptions, to label them the “scientific case” in a futile effort to lend them a semblance of credibility and then to believe that anyone in his right mind would accept these to be correct is silly.
Regards,
Max
Hi Peter,
Let’s look at various “crystal ball forecasts” of “global temperature” for the early 2ist century.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3117/3153645872_db0cb08b0e_b.jpg
Hadley has gone on record with a forecast of 0.3C per decade rise over the early 21st century (the red line on the graph).
IPCC SPM 2007 was a bit more conservative with an estimate of 0.2C per decade for the first two decades.
You appear to think that we are likely to reach a temperature 2C higher than today by year 2100. On a linear basis, this would be a rate of 0.21C per decade over the next 92 years. Let’s call it the same as the IPCC forecast.
On this basis, you made a bet with me that the 1998 all-time annual high of 0.515C would be exceeded by the year 2011 at the latest (the red dot on the graph).
As the chart shows, there has been a significant warming period from 1970 to today (solid black line, dashed trend line), yet the actual 21st century trend (so far) has been one of cooling (the shorter black dashed line).
The sun is currently very inactive. Many solar scientists seem to think that the next decade or so will be one of unusually low solar activity, resulting in a net cooling trend.
There are studies indicating a connection between solar activity and oscillations of ENSO, etc. High ENSO activity has been cited as a possible cause for some of the late 20th century warming. In particular, the all-time record warm year 1998 was a strong El Nino year.
With anthropogenic warming responsible for only around half of the 20th century warming, with the rest caused by unusually high level of solar activity, it appears to me that a logical conclusion would be that we will experience a slight net cooling over the next decade or so, now that this unusually high level of solar activity has reversed.
So my forecast (admittedly no more than an educated guess) is shown on the graph (blue line).
Let’s see how things really work out, Peter.
Regards,
Max
Pete,
RE: 3376
Ah Pete; I understand your point……If the average December 31st temperature in the Arctic is -25 degrees and the temperature rises .2 degrees, it’s still damn cold. But what does it mean when the temperature drops producing snow and record cold in heretofore “warm” areas? Record cold and record snowfall bucks your religious ideology and you don’t like it…….I understand.
The argument regarding anecdotal cold temperature reports from US locations isn’t washing either, (see links relating to India & China reporting record cold and record snowfall).
What does it mean when summertime daily mean temperatures are trending lower and record snowfall occurs in southern latitudes?
The entire global warming fraud is well funded mental masturbation by some ideologically biased “scientists” paid off (with my tax dollars) by greedy politicians and sensationalized news stories propagated by a sympathetic news media to sell advertising in newspapers and television.
I would think a “progressive”, “antiestablishment”, “counterculture” activist such as yourself would be able to see through this obvious exploitation by “big business” of perfectly natural occurrences. Hell, even British Petroleum and Exxon/Mobil are getting into the act of hyping this fad.
There’s an old saying that is appropriate here:
“Don’t piss on my leg and tell me its raining”.
Fairbanks Alaska – 4th Coldest On Record
October 2008 went down as Fairbanks’ fourth-coldest October on record since 1904, according to meteorologist Rick Thoman with the National Weather Service in Fairbanks. The average temperature of 15.1 degrees was 8.4 degrees below normal.
Radar Sites In Greenland Show Icecap Growth Over the Years
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Ice_Core_Sites_In_Greenland_Show_Snow_Levels_Rising.pdf
Biggest Snowstorm in 30 Years Hit Las Vegas
http://www.skepticsglobalwarming.com/global-warming-myth/weather/snow-weather/biggest-snowstorm-in-30-years-hit-las-vegas/
Important Announcement: New Orleans Police Department GlobalWarmingHoax.com Relief Drive.
http://www.globalwarminghoax.com/comment.php?comment.news.95
We can add Europe to the “US only” list of continents that are suffering from Anthropomorphic Global Cooling………I seem to remember the eco-chondriacs predicting that the ski industry would be bankrupt and “non- existant” by now. Sheez.
Record cold in Europe
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/article5415841.ece
My, my……………………By the way Pete, RECORD cold means that it has never been this cold for this time period before now.
CO2 continues to rise and here we have RECORD cold.
Record cold in Britain
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/weather/article5420871.ece
Spokane roofs collapsing under record snow
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/1154/story/429985.html
These pesky FACTS keep interfering with the global warming doctrine.
Nearly 1500 cold temp records & 770 snow records set in U.S. in past week
More global warming? Atlanta Bismarck Boise Butte Chicago Denver Houston Miami Minneapolis Mobile New York Oklahoma City Olympia Phoenix Portland Raleigh San Francisco Seattle St. Louis
http://mapcenter.hamweather.com/records/7day/us.html?c=mintemp
Snowfall immobilizes rural communities in eastern, central Turkey
http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=162347&bolum=101
Aw, c’mon, Brute.
Peter has been trying to explain to you why record cold weather all over the northern hemisphere is not “climate change” (it’s just weather), as opposed to above average summer melting of Arctic sea ice (i.e. the “canary” in the cage of disastrous AGW).
Now when above average winter refreezing of Arctic ice occurs, this has nothing to do with global climate change either.
There is a principle involved here, which “climate scientists” call the “inverse C/W relationship”.
Let me explain how this works:
When it gets warmer (W), that’s climate (C).
When it gets colder (C), that’s weather (W).
Once you understand the basics, it’s easy to make the distinction.
Regards,
Max
Max,
I see; up is down and cold is hot. Got it.
Ok, I’m headed outside now in my short sleeve shirt and flip flops in the non bitter cold to shovel some Anthropomorphic Global Warming, (we used to call it snow), off of the driveway.
Ring the New Year in – chilled to the bone
http://hoboken411.com/archives/15760
We can tell these bums that are seeking shelter that the frigid cold temperatures are “imagined” and a direct result of them burning anything they can get their hands on to keep warm because Al Gore said that they must “sacrifice” for the sake of Earth God Gaia……… from the comfort of his 26 room mansion.
Frigid temperatures swell homeless shelters
http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Frigid+temperatures+swell+homeless+shelters/1071899/story.html
I’m wearing my sarcasm on my sleeve again…. I know that the article about the bums isn’t funny, but the global warming religious fanatics advocate “conservation” and “sacrifice” from their ivory towers and have absolutely no regard for the plight of the “commoners”……they pontificate to the masses and completely ignore the realities of their policies and environmental fantasies…..the entire “movement” is disgusting and twisted.
Again yesterday, I was asked by one of my client’s “Environmental Committees” what they could do to “go green”…..when I proposed the changes and how they must “sacrifice” the room went silent……
Happy New Year.
Addendum: (I got paid anyway)
Look, face it – we’re all doomed (as I said at 3369). One way or another, we’re all doomed.
But this, I suggest, captures the essence of the AGW hypothesis.
Happy 2009 to all. Robin
I’ve put up an end-of-year post (here) that revisits the two New Statesman articles that sparked off this remarkably long lived thread.
I found reading them again, a year after they were published, both interesting and instructive. The one by David Whitehouse has stood the test of time very well, and seems even more relevant today than it did when it was first published. The petulance of Mark Lynas’ response, on the other hand, already seems rather dated.
The first sentence of Brute’s #3383 seems to fit very well with Dr Whitehouse’s approach too.
A very happy New Year to everyone.
Brute,
What’s happening this year in China? Last year it was cold there and of course according to you guys this proved how AGW was all a sham.
The record that you pointed to in the UK was to the coldest year since the mid 90’s. That’s not really too impressive a record.
You’re having a cold spell in the USA right? And, yes cold records are being set, but you only need to look at:
http://mapcenter.hamweather.com/records/7day/us.html?c=mintemp (and that’s your reference not mine!)
to see that even during a cold period, maximum as well as minimum records are being broken. For instance:
Fayette Sat, 27 Dec 2008 Max 73 Prev.72 in 1946
Muscle Shoals Ap Sat, 27 Dec 2008 Max75 Prev 72 in 1982
There are another 500 or so similar maximum records listed.
If you want to get a truer picture of what is happening you might want to find websites which sound a little more objective than http://www.globalwarminghoax.com !
PS I should have said coldest New Year (in the UK) since the mid 90’s. That’s not really too impressive a record.
Brute,
On the subject of records, you’ve predicted a “all-time record cold year 2011”. What do you mean by that? Since when?
Any chance of having a bit of a flutter with you that there won’t be an all time record cold year any time soon?
Worst snowstorm on record kills nine in Tibet
http://aftermathnews.wordpress.com/2008/11/12/worst-snowstorm-on-record-snowfall-kills-nine-in-tibet/
Pete,
GlobalWarmingHoax.com has as much credibility as RealClimate.com and is operated by some of the premier scientific minds of our age I’ll have you know! (If I could figure out how to make one of those smiley faces here I would).
As far as China, there was a snowstorm “of the century” last month in China…..killed 7 people and a few thousand yaks.
All sarcasm aside, this is my point exactly……Every time there is a “warmer than usual” temperature recorded somewhere, every news outlet and environmentalists screams GLOBAL WARMING!!!!!WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!!REPENT!!!REPENT!!!! at the top of his/her lungs. For every record cold temperature story that I point out as “proof” of an impending ice age, don’t you think that every 1/10 of degree anomaly higher pointed out by you and your crowd is equally ludicrous? Can’t you make the comparison and figure it out for yourself?
Yes, the point is that the climate (or weather, or however the Alarmists have decided to parse their language this month depending on the current state of the thermometer), is immaterial. THE CLIMATE CHANGES EVERY CENTURY, EVERY DECADE, EVERY YEAR, EVERY MONTH, EVERY DAY, EVERY HOUR ………..ad nauseum.
The average temperature of the Earth waxes and wanes over weeks, months, years, decades, centuries……throughout millennium……throughout it’s 4.5 billion year existence and anyone that stands up and states that the exact, perfect “average” temperature for the globe is “X” should be bound up in an insane asylum.
The planet is a big place and there are an infinite amount of temperature variables/conditions interacting at any given time…..for anyone, including Al Gore or “Jimmie” Hansen to pretend or purport to have any idea whatsoever of what the temperature will be next week or 100 years from now is idiotic. For anyone to say what the global average temperature “should” be is the true definition of conceit. These guys actually believe that they can control the weather….or climate…..or “manage the atmosphere” of the entire globe……what nonsense.
Think about that for a minute.
What isn’t nonsense is the money being skimmed off by these charlatans in the name of “saving the planet”. Clever marketing and repetition of talking points and ideology does not make a “planetary crisis”….. it does however create an industry based on a fraud.
Further, for anyone to actually take what either of these bureaucrats have to say about anything seriously is equally idiotic, (and I think that you understand that it’s nonsense also; however, agree with the cultural implications of their proposed “solutions”).
Now, if you want to go about your personal life pinching pennies in an attempt to save yourself half a watt or ¼ therm and recycling tuna fish cans because you feel like you are “doing something” about the planet’s health, more power to ya…..just don’t force your religious compunctions down everyone else’s throats……keep it to yourself.
The problem is that global warming Alarmists have confused science with their environmentalist religion and suspended logic and reason in deference to their faith (Earth Worship).
It also happens to provide a good excuse to further other personal and cultural choices they deem appropriate to impose on the rest of society……even though others may not share their socialist convictions.
People still believe in freedom of choice, freedom of thought, freedom of the markets and personal property rights. These are the foundations that my country was founded upon and its worked pretty damn good so far.
Happy New Year.
I don’t believe that I’ve written that….but if you’d point out to me where I had, I’ll try to back it up in context. I don’t think that I’ve ever written anything predicting futeure weather/climate conditions…..(except maybe in jest)but if you say that I have, please point me to the referenced comment and I’ll address it.
Brute,
It may have been Max that said it. If so maybe he can respond.
“freedom of choice, freedom of thought,[and speech -PM] freedom of the markets and personal property rights” Yes of course we can have all these things to a greater or lesser degree according to the wishes of the democratic majority in society.
I thought you might have gone on to mention the constitution of the USA too!
All very noble sentiments; but they make F all difference to the science of global warming!
Here we have “Shearing the Flock” in reverse.
Church of England Gives 150 Million Pounds to Gore’s Investment Firm
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2008/12/30/church-england-gives-money-gores-investment-firm
Here’s an extraordinary thing. (And think I can use “extraordinary” without hyperbole.) Last Sunday, 28th December, the Sunday Telegraph published an article “2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved” by Christopher Booker. In just four days, the online version has attracted well over 1,000 comments – making this thread’s 6,400 comments over 12 months seem positively feeble. Most of the comments were supportive of Booker’s argument.
Elsewhere, TonyN has suggested that computers may have caused global warming. Well maybe, but the response to Booker’s article is just one example of the vast collection of online comment critical of the AGW hypothesis that suggests to me that computers may eventually be its undoing. Apart perhaps from the advent of printing, has there ever been a phenomenon to compare with this? Throughout the Western world, nearly all politicians, political parties, scientific and other institutions, NGOs, churches, charities and, in particular, the mainstream media have totally embraced the AGW hypothesis (routinely described as “climate change”) – to the extent that it is as much taken for granted as the proposition that day follows might. One consequence is that already seriously damaged economies are quietly accepting the need for yet more damage in the name of CO2 reduction. Yet a vast and apparently increasing number of largely intelligent, informed and literate people are using the Internet to actively question and debate the hypothesis – the majority it appears rejecting it entirely.
This questioning and debate is of the greatest importance – “the need to tackle climate change” is affecting the thrust of much (arguably most) public policy, not least energy policy and the interests of the world’s poorest people. By any definition, therefore, the debate is a major political issue. It is real politics. Yet hardly any politician or established political commentator appears to be concerned about it, regarding any questioning of climate change policy as a kind of heresy. I seriously doubt if our politicians are any longer interested in politics, and instead are wholly focused on their short-term personal interests. Surely this must change?
Hi Derek, Reur 3377
I should not be back home so soon, but I did a silly, and last night up in the foothills at 700m altitude, in my camper-van 60Km away, I nearly froze to death, because I forgot to take appropriate bedding, and I forgot about global warming. Thus better equipped, I will recommence tomorrow, but may not be in mountain radio range for a day or few.
According to the CDIAC web page, per Keeling et al, 2008, the method of CO2 analysis is: http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/co2/sio-mlo.html
I Googled for Siemens Ultramat 3, Keeling et al 2002, and Bacastow et al 1985 and guess what, could find nothing relevant. However, it seems that ML should upgrade to a more modern instrument such as the current Siemens Ultramat 23, and cross-correlate in parallel with the obsolete type 3!
HOWEVER, the type 23 may only offer improved accuracy over the earlier NDIR model, but essentially, according to Wiki’, the type 3 can specifically isolate a molecule species specific wavelength, (frequency/wave-number)
Thus, in the emphasized sentence, this is presumably why the H2O gas, and any water condensate is removed.
THIS DOES NOT MEAN THAT I HAVE FAITH IN THE ML PUBLISHED DATA!
As a septuagenarian coalface managerial engineer, (retired), I have seen a lot of data in my time, and I can strongly opine that the ML saw-tooth graph must be from Santa-land. How to pin-it-down as crap, is of course immensely difficult, without having a mole in there.
BTW, according to one source, CH4 comprises only about 0.00017%, of the atmosphere, N2O only about 0.00003%, and O3 only about 0.000004% , compared with a relatively massive 0.038% for CO2! Thus this population needs to be weighted appropriately against their absorption strengths.
Oh, and BTW, there are about six isotopic combinations in CO2, (#C x #O x #O), each with their own absorption lines, but the lesser ~5 are of significant orders of magnitude below the top-guy, much of the order of say N2O.
Peter #3390
Happy New Year!
Thats a great site that I hadn’t seem mentioned previously. It does however illustrate the point that there are lies damned lies and weather statistics.
Several of the high ‘records’ looked suspicious when there was a record low one just a few miles away.
Records need to be loked at individualy. For example some of them are even less impressive than that the UK has had its coldest start for say 12 years. Many of the records on that site started in last ten years, many are of a dubious quality and many seem to be taken in distinct uhi areas such as airports. Having just looked at the Philadelphia weather records back to 1790 it appears that once again these high temperatures have all happened in the past as my CET graph back to 1660 show.
tonyB
Bob #3397
TimC over at globalwarmingsceptics posted an interesting link to which I responded as follows.
That was another interesting post. I have cherry picked the following from your link
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/Kfunds.htm
“Development of these instruments had begun in academia, and in the late 1930s little entrepreneurial firms took up the technology. The firms received a big boost from government orders during the Second World War, but afterward they also developed instruments for monitoring civilian industrial processes. It was wholly fortuitous that they could accurately monitor CO2 not just in a factory but in the atmosphere at large. Most of Keeling’s seniors thought that such instruments were more costly than anyone needed to measure something that fluctuated so widely as atmospheric CO2 levels.”
Two things stand out, the first being that a machine designed for use in a factory was also perfect for measuring co2 3000m up a volcanic site operated by a complete amateur.
The second being that keelings seniors were under the impression that atmospheric co2 varied so widely.
There is a very murky trail and this is all as difficult to unravel as some of the machinations of the EU!
tonyB
Hi Peter,
Re ur exchange with Brute on record cold temperatures worldwide.
It is true, as you say, that several record cold temperatures worldwide do not constitute global cooling, as defined by “climate scientists”.
Brute is right in saying that they do, however, give us a clus that it may not really be warming globally, after all.
But, playing by the “rules” of the “climate scientists”, the Hadley record (+ others) tell us that it has cooled since the end of 2000 (i.e. the past 8 years), and that the rate of coolig (average of all 4 records) was around 0.09C per decade.
This tells us that the forecasts of Hadley and IPCC for 0.3C viz 0.2C warming per decade are not occurring at this time. Since the first decade of the 21st century is soon drawing to a close, it is a very good bet that both IPCC and Hadley misjudged what is really happening to our planet’s climate.
That’s all.
Regards,
Max