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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Sorry – wrong link (4550). Here’s the correct one.
Re: 4523, Robin
The point I was trying to make concerns the balance between scientific and political skills if you are running a subsidiary of NERC.
This morning BBC R4 is headlining some startling new ‘research’ although it hasn’t appeared on their web site yet:
http://publicbroadcasting.net/kwmu/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1477502§ionID=1
And so the stories which are being used to bolster waning interest in AGW get more and more fanciful.
Robin
I had to look at my calendar to emsure it wasn’t April 1st! This is a profile of the organiser of the conference.
I am sure he is a very nice man and his private politcs are his own business but I have some knowledge of the UWE and the degree of public politicisation in some areas is unfortunate if it spills over into teaching.
Tonyb
TonyB: Have you missed a link in #4553?
TonyN – yes I agree. But I see no evidence that Professor O’Neill is taking a political line. Or have I missed something?
TonyB – it would be fun if the UK participants in this thread could attend. Sadly not practicable. (Professor Hoggett’s profile is here.)
OK Peter, I confess. My real name is Richard Geno…..Brute is just one of those sock names that I use.
Just kidding. My real name is Leonard Edward Phant……(my friends call me L.E.)
I wonder if the “world” (or their sockpuppets) are monitoring our posts here and writing pertinent papers on the topics we discuss? Hmmmmm.
Peter,
What do the voices in your head say about my assertion?
Pielke Sr: No Climate Heating In “The Pipeline”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/05/pielke-sr-no-climate-heating-in-%e2%80%9cthe-pipeline%e2%80%9d/
Peter reur: 4535
Afraid i can’t help you there, my networking knowledge is pretty poor. However if you have any queries relating to sql, vba, vb.net 2.0 and asp.net 2.0 (make them easy on this one, i’m just learning) i’m happy to help :)
I’m programming, not networks.
To save you trying to test me again, go to http://www.utteraccess.com and lookup KeithW, i occasionally post answers to excel problems there.
Barleysane said
“To save you trying to test me again, go to http://www.utteraccess.com and look up KeithW, i occasionally post answers to excel problems there.”
Yes, it was a pretty transparent ploy.
Anyone got any sensible comments to make on the solar thread over at WUWT (my 4548)
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/05/ipcc-20th-century-simulations-get-a-boost-from-outdated-solar-forcings/
Tonyb
This relates to Robins link about the conference and describes the spoof that has become real
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/printable/6320/
Tonyb
TonyB: thanks for the link (4560). This is well worth reading. It has many quotable bits. I especially liked this:
I wonder how many people will turn up for this conference. I’d love to be there!
It’s reported that the Goracle is backing the creation of a new green “.eco” domain name. Hmm – that’ll be useful!
TonyB reur 4560
Good essay by Brendan O’Neill.
Goes to show that once the facts on the ground no longer support a multi-billion dollar hysterical craze and potential multi-zillion dollar tax boondoggle, other tactics must be used to silence or marginalize any dissent.
Regards,
Max
Robin
Well, the Goracle invented the Internet in the first place so why shouldn’t he create the new Dot Eco domain to “support environmental causes”, such as his cap and trade biz.
“This is a truly exciting opportunity for the environmental movement and for the internet as a whole,” said Mr Gore.
Sounds like a way to bilk the public out of another $100 million.
Good work, Al!
Oh no – I seem to be developing an addiction to exclamation marks.
Sorry!
Wouldn’t it be fun if all the sceptical blogs registered .eco domains.
Hi Peter,
Still beating on that dead horse you wrote, “Since 1950 the sun has been relatively constant. So what the solar scientists are saying is that the 0.6 deg C warming which has been measured since then cannot be attributed to solar causes.
I’m sure you can grasp this simple fact.”
No, Peter. What the solar scientists have said is that around 0.35C (or half) of the observed 20th century warming can “be attributed to solar causes”. Some go on further to say that the solar influence on warming after 1970 is only around 0.12C (or one-third of the observed warming over this short-term segment of the entire record), as I reminded you in my post #4544.
As you advised me many posts ago, it makes more sense to look at long-term time periods, rather than just short segments.
But, speaking of shorter-term cycles, I also posted in #4545 some interesting information on the 30-year PDO cycle, which shows a very robust correlation with global temperature over several multi-decadal periods (while CO2 does not show a very good correlation at all). I’ll repeat what the study showed, for your info:
1910-1944 (warm) 34 years (with little change in CO2)
1944-1976 (cool) 32 years (with increased change in CO2)
1976-2007 (warm) 31 years (with major increase in CO2)
2008 (start of a new 30-year cool cycle?) (with all-time record CO2 increase)
We all know that the latter 20th century was a period of a strongly positive PDO as well as frequent (warming) El Niño events. It was also a period of rapid warming. The 20th century record warm year (1998) occurred during a very strong El Niño event, showing a direct link between global temperature and these events, which has been acknowledged by all climate scientists.
Prior to around 1976, the PDO was negative and there were more frequent (cooling) La Niña events, and global temperature cooled. Starting around 2007, La Niña events have again become more frequent and global temperature has again begun to drop. Hadley attribute the recently observed global cooling to the greater frequency of these La Niña events (and fewer El Niños).
Scientists specializing in observing PDO cycles tell us that we have entered a 30-year period of cooling PDO activity, similar to the cycles we have seen in the past.
Scientists have found an interaction between short-term ENSO and longer-term PDO. The climate signal of El Niño is likely to be stronger when the PDO is highly positive; conversely the climate signal of La Niña will be stronger when the PDO is highly negative. The mechanism for this observed interaction is, however, still unknown.
There are also other studies that show a link between these PDO cycles and cycles in solar activity; again, the exact mechanism is as yet unknown.
Is this another piece in the puzzle? Does this correlation provide another empirical observation to help explain how the sun influences our climate via PDO cycles or via ENSO? Will the global climate of the next 30 years be influenced by a cooling PDO cycle? Will scientists be able to establish the physical mechanism for these empirically observed relationships?
Who knows?
But it is clear that a myopic fixation on human CO2 emissions as the principal driver of out planet’s climate (the IPCC approach) has more holes than (if you’ll pardon the expression) a Swiss cheese, and smells a bit stronger than an overripe Limburger.
Pachauri (and all the rest) would do well by re-reading Hamlet,
“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy”.
Regards,
Max
U.S. Life Expectancy in an Era of Death Trains and Death Factories
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/04/us-life-expectancy-in-an-era-of-death-trains-and-death-factories/
Max,
Your understanding of solar science, or what solar scientists are saying is obviously severly limited. You latch on to mavericks like Soon but he is in no way typical.
Brute tried to help you out when he posted this graph but you’ve ignored him.
It shows that the only changes in TSI since 1950 have been due to regular 11-13 year solar cycles.
If you can’t read this graph take a look at this paper by Usokin et al , (often referenced by sceptics)
http://www.mps.mpg.de/dokumente/publikationen/solanki/c153.pdf
The authors conclude by saying “during these last 30 years [last 30 years of 20th century], the total solar irradiance, solar UV irradiance, and cosmic ray flux has not shown any significant secular trend, so at least this recent warming must have another source.”
The evidence from solar science is that we can expect a warming of approximately 0.85 degC for every watt of climate forcing. You’ve used this figure yourself. Let me know if you’ve forgotten about that and I’ll find where you’ve used it.
You yourself have also used the figure of 3.7 W of climate forcing from a doubling of CO2. Let me know if you’ve forgotten about that, too, and I’ll find where you’ve used it.
This means that we are due for a warming of over 3 deg C when CO2 levels double from their pre-industrial levels.
Its obvious to even blind Freddie that there are no major disagreements between mainstream solar and mainstream climate science.
The Hadley Climate centre have updated their website.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/guide/
There’ve presented a timeline which isn’t unduely alarmist. Hadley are predicting that summer sea ice in the Arctic won’t disappear completely until 2080.
Anyway take a look. Those of you who pay UK taxes to support their efforts might want to make sure they get their money’s worth.
Peter,
You need to see this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4r0VUybeXY
Very enteraining article from icecap
Mar 06, 2009
St Andrews University Debating Society
By Richard Courtney
I write to report on a debate that defeated the motion “This House Believes Global Warming is a Global Crisis” during a meeting of the St Andrews University Debating Society. It is difficult to arrange a debate of anthropogenic (that is, man-made) global warming (AGW) because few proponents of AGW are willing to face such debate. They know from past experience that they always lose such debates because there is no evidence that AGW exists and much evidence that it does not.
However, on Wednesday 4 March 2009, the St Andrews University Debating Society held their debate of the motion, “This House Believes Global Warming is a Global Crisis” in the Old Parliament Building, St Andrews. The debate was organized and presided over with exemplary efficiency and professionalism by the Speaker of the Society, Ms Jessica Siegel. It was conducted with all the pomp and ceremony that could be expected of an ancient society of so ancient and prestigious a university.
And the debate was lively, informative and entertaining. It got emotional at times. Some of the contributions from the floor were of exceptionally high quality. But, it was somewhat spoiled by the weakness of the proponents of the motion. (I have good reason to suspect this weakness is because stronger speakers could not be obtained to propose the motion. If so, then it is yet another example of leading proponents of AGW fearing to face their critics in open debate).
The proponents of the motion were Ross Finnie MSP, former Scottish Government Minister for Environment and Rural Development; Mike Robinson, Chief Executive of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society and Chair of Stop Climate Chaos Scotland; Gregory Norminton, Novelist ‘Serious Things’, Environmental Activist, Founder of ‘Alliance against Urban 4x4s’
The motion was opposed by myself, and Nils-Axel Morner, Leader of the Maldives International Sea-Level Project who was awarded the ‘Golden Contrite of Merits’ by Algarve University, Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, Former advisor to then UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and now an Investigator of Scientific Frauds.
Each speaker was given a strict maximum of 7 minutes to speak. The speakers would alternate between proponents and opponents of the motion until all 6 had spoken. No speaker was allowed to speak more than once except to raise a point of information, order, or etc.
The proponents had clearly not prepared. They were not co-ordinated in their presentations, they each lacked any significant knowledge of the science of AGW, and they each assumed that AGW is a fact. None of them made a substantial presentati on of arguments supporting the motion, and they all (including the politician!) lacked adequate skills at public speaking. The opponents of the motion were a sharp contrast to that. They each have significant expertise in their subject, and they had agreed the case they were to put and how they were to put it. Also, they are all very competent public speakers and their very different styles made their presentation much better than the sum of its parts.
Finnie spoke first. He argued that AGW is a fact because the United Nations (UN) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has published its Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) that says the IPCC is “90% certain” that AGW exists. From this he claimed there is a “crisis” because governments are failing to give the matter sufficient importance. It is necessary for governments to de cide a treaty that would follow-on from the Kyoto Ptotocol that intends to constrain emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) but ends in 2012. The decision needs to be made at a meeting later this year.
I replied by outlining the case for the opposition. My speech is copied here. It asserts that governments do need to have policies on climate change but empirical evidence denies the existence of AGW and so there is no need to constrain fossil fuel emissions. Indeed, the harm caused by the emission constraints would be greater than any harm that AGW could induce if it were to exist.
Robinson’s response was very angry. He seemed to think attacking the opposition speakers would provide a victory for the motion. Almost his entire speech was attempted defamation of the opposition speakers. Within seconds of starting to speak he had accused them of being “like supporters of the Nazis in 1930s Germany” (my family lost everything in the blitz so I did not take kindly to that). The speakers on the opposition side “could not get anything published in peer-reviewed journals” (Morner and I each shouted out that we have and we do). And much of the same. He said people and governments must act to stop global warming (but he did not say how they should act) because – according to him – if a person had an elevated temperature of 2 degrees then he would die so we cannot let the Earth get 2 degrees hotter in case that kills the Earth.
Morner then gave a witty, entertaining and informative lecture on sea level change. The major potential threat from AGW is severe sea-level change. He interacted with the audience and selected one individual to ja pe with (his skill at this selection was later demonstrated when that individual stood and gave a speech that won the prize – of a Society neck-tie – for best speech from the floor). Morner presented data that showed sea level is not rising as a result of AGW at a detectable rate anywhere.
Norminton then spoke to conclude the case for the proponents of the motion. Like Finnie he seemed to be extremely nervous: both were shaking during their presentations. Norminton’s hand was shaking so much he put it into his pocket. (I know others interpret this to be nervousness, but I think it was extreme anger: Norminton had not expected any opposition to the motion, and the assertion of clear evidence that AGW does not exist was – to him – an outrage too hard to accept.) Also, like Finnie, he did not address the motion. He said he was not a scientist so he had to accept the word of scientists about global warming and scientists agree that gl obal warming is real and man-made. He said, the speakers on the opposition side were “not scientists”. Lord Monckton interjected that “Courtney and Morner are”. And Norminton replied, “So was Mengele.” Monckton raised a Point of Order demanding withdrawal of the remark. Norminton lacked the wit to withdraw and move on, so he refused to withdraw. Monckton persisted pressing the Point of Order and Norminton continued to refuse to withdraw. Only moments before Morner had made himself the lecturer the students would most like to have, and support for Norminton drained away as he insisted that Morner was akin to a murderer operating in a Nazi concentration camp. Norminton continued by saying the threat of global warming was real, and it was killing polar bears, but it is not clear that anybody was listening to him.
Monckton then summated the case for the opposition. He had not prepared a speech but took notes of the proponents’ speeches with a view to refuting arguments of the proponents that Morner and myself had not covered, and by defending the opposition case against rebuttals of its arguments. This was a deliberate use by our side of Monckton’s debating skills. But he had a problem because the proponents of the motion had not made a case and they had not addressed any of our arguments. Instead, they had made personal attacks on the opposition speakers, and they had asserted – with no evidence or argument – that the IPCC is right. So, Monckton’s summarizing speech consisted of evidence that the proponents of the motion had merely provided errors of logic and fact but they had not a case. He pointed out that polar bears had quadrupled their number in recent decades and this was not a sign that their species is threatened. And he cited and named each of the logical fallacies utilized by the proponents of the motion.
The debate then opened to the floor. Four persons each spoke well. One gave a balanced pr esentation and the other three spoke in favour of the motion. But by then the debate had been settled. Prior to the debate the opponents of the motion had expected to lose the vote because the students have been exposed to a lifetime (i.e. their short lifetime) of pro-AGW propaganda. We consoled ourselves with the certainty that we would win the arguments because opponents of AGW have all the facts on our side. But in the event we won both. The motion was defeated when put to the vote.
Barelysane,
Very good.
As I described Mr. Martin’s debating technique @ 4540:
The Alarmists seem to have torn a page from the same script…….All hat and no cattle.
Brute,
Your video does not cite any real studies. I’ve heard all it before of course. Such an analysis may sound fine superficially, but it can’t stand up to too much scrutiny. Its just politically naive in the extreme.
Your film seems to suggest that there is no difference between the extreme right and left.
I won’t go into details here of why I disagree with that line. You wouldn’t be swayed by anything I had to say anyway. More importantly for you, though, you should realise it’s not a view shared, historically, by any US government either.
Take a look at the history of South and Central America and the Caribbean. There have been, and still are, governments of the far right and far left. No need to name them. You know who they are.
Do you really think that they’ve been treated the same by US governments over the years? Of course they haven’t. It’s not that I’m agreeing with your governmenst actions historically. But I wouldn’t call them naive either. They know the score just as well as anyone else.
Hi Peter,
Your 4569 and 4570 do not shed any new light on our discussion, but I will nevertheless go into both into some detail.
Your statement, “You latch on to mavericks like Soon but he is in no way typical” is downright silly.
I have shown studies, not only by W.Soon, but also by other solar scientists, such as J. Lean, B. Geerts. E. Linacre, M. Lockwood, R. Stamper, N.Scafetta, B.J. West, S. Baliunas, N. Shaviv, J. Veizer, S.K. Solanki, I. G. Usoskin, B. Kromer, M. Schüssler, J. Beer, R. Bradley, K. Georgiova, G. Bianchi, B. Kirov, J. Boer, J.C. Gerard and D.A, Hauglustaine, and others, who all tell me on average that the unusually high level of 20th century solar activity has been a major factor in the observed warming, accounting for a bit more than half of the warming over the 20th century, or 0.35C.
Just because all these solar scientists I have cited do not agree with Peter Martin (amateur AGW aficionado from Brisbane, Australia) does not mean that they are “mavericks” (as you put it).
Peter, forget your argument about “the last 30 years”. Many of these scientists have agreed that only around one-third of the late 20th century warming can be explained by solar activity, but that over the longer-term 100-year record of the 20th century, this was a bit more than half.
I can accept this. Is this so hard for you to understand and accept?
Now to your 4570, where Hadley now predicts that summer Arctic sea ice will not “disappear” until 2080. This is, in fact, great news for us all, as well as a wonderful boondoggle. No one who reads and understands this lo-o-o-o-o-ong range prediction of gloom and doom for the poor polar bears today will be around to see if Hadley got it right 72 years from now.
The “fuzz-heads” at Hadley seem to be learning a lesson: rather than making “predictions of unprecedented warmth” next year (which never turn out to be right), they now take the safe road of predicting disastrous climate change in 70+ years! Ho-hum.
Peter, the whole problem here is very simple.
There are a large group of “climate scientists” (including Hadley and IPCC) who have a myopic fixation on human carbon dioxide as the primary driver of our planet’s climate since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
This “paradigm” pays their salaries and provides them funding for more research work to validate this fixation on human CO2 as the primary driver of climate today.
The paradigm is financially supported (with taxpayer money) by the politicians of this world, who see the chance to grab even more obscene amounts of taxpayer money in carbon taxes, etc. to shuffle around, plus some individuals (like Al Gore) who see the opportunity for personally earning very large sums of money from cap and trade schemes, etc.
Maybe you have noticed my “agenda” in our discussion here on global warming. If not, let me explain.
I do not earn any money, one way or the other, from the ongoing scientific, economic and political debate surrounding the AGW hypothesis.
My “agenda” is to open your mind to other possible explanations for the observed period of warming, based on studies by many scientists who are not caught in the AGW paradigm or have not “sold out” to this paradigm in order to receive funding for further work.
As you must agree, there are many explanations for the changes in our climate that have credibility every bit as good as the prevailing AGW paradigm.
Based on past climate changes, these other (natural) explanations show us that there is no real impending disaster from warming caused by human CO2 emissions. At best, these emissions have a very slight warming effect on our climate, which has already been warming naturally since the early 19th century, as we are emerging from the Little Ice Age and approaching the milder climate we enjoyed prior to that during the Medieval Warm Period.
There are many indicators that point to a cooling of our climate over the next few decades, which has already begun. All temperature records show essentially no warming over the past decade, and a significant rate of cooling since 2001.
This is obviously not caused by a drastic reduction in human CO2 emissions.
In fact, Peter, these have increased over the past decade, as newly emerging giant economies like China, India and Brazil have begun to improve the standard of living of their populations through industrialization, just as the industrially developed world did many decades ago. It will continue, as the poorest non-industrialized nations of the world gradually follow suit and pull their populations our of abject poverty.
So there are obviously other overriding factors at play other than human CO2 emissions.
Attempts to claim “it’s really warming, but we can’t see it because it’s masked by temporary natural factors or (even more ludicrous) because the warming we’ve already experienced from our past CO2 emissions is “hiding undetected in the ocean to fry us all in the future” are feeble explanations or ludicrous suggestions to attempt to rationalize the observed fact that it is no longer warming.
Open your eyes, Peter, and you will see that our planet’s climate is very much more complex than this agenda-driven oversimplistic approach of the IPCC and the “mainstream consensus scientists” (supported by some power-hungry politicians and the opportunistic disaster-loving media).
Question critically whether or not “man” is really the “driver” of climate.
When you do, open your eyes to think outside of the AGW paradigm or box, be rationally skeptical of all that you hear, read or see. Look for weaknesses in all claims from both sides of the argument and subject them to a “reality check”. If they do not pass this test, discard them.
Peter, if you follow this approach you will become more knowledgeable than if you just swallow all that is being fed to you by the multi-billion dollar AGW industry.
Think for yourself.
Regards,
Max