The "Global Warming's a crock" or "Global Warming is real" thread.

[cantdog]

Ever read "Heavy Weather"?

 

[Liar]

Rox, I SAID I'm the wrong guy to ask. My post was merely a response to trysail's at least as ridiculously irrelevant diagram... the entire history of the planet, when what we discuss is a temperature rise the last 60-70-ish years. The temporal perspective that is in the debate (Mann or not Mann) isn't even a pixel in size there.

But yeah, it didn't occur to you to say a peep about that. Because it played right into the hands of your preconception.

 

[Pure]

tut, tut, Roxanne,

you do not even make an attempt to be fair minded. the hockey stick graph, despite some criticisms, is alive and well. essentially it amounts to a claim of a very fast rise in surface temp over the last 100 years; that's the blade of the hockey stick. the inference is that this rise is due to human activity.

there are some doubts around the earliest data.

the alleged refutation cited, relies on the Wegman report, never published in a peer reviewed journal, but ordered up by an irate congressman. Wegman is not a climatologist.

however the national academy of sciences report was generally favorable, see below.

lastly i quote the old and the revised IPCC statements, before and after the controversy. clearly they 'qualify' their views, but generally do not reject the earlier position.


by googling 'hockey stick' and climate, or checking the summary at wikipedia, one finds such pieces as these.

http://www.umass.edu/newsoffice/newsreleases/articles/36111.php

Report Affirms 'Hockey Stick' Climate Change Data; UMass Amherst Climate Scientist Comments
June 22, 2006

Contact: Raymond Bradley
413/545-2120

AMHERST, Mass. – A National Academy of Sciences report released today confirms that the last few decades of the 20th century were warmer than any comparable period in the last 400 years, affirming the findings of climate scientist Raymond Bradley of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and his colleagues. The report was requested by Congress last year to clarify research involving surface temperature reconstructions published by the scientists in the late 1990s. Bradley issued the following statement regarding the report:

“The National Academy of Sciences released their report today, on Surface Temperature Reconstructions for the Last 2,000 Years. This was requested by Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) to clarify the controversy over the so-called “hockey stick” temperature reconstructions of the last 1,000 years by Michael Mann (Penn State University), Raymond Bradley (University of Massachusetts Amherst) and Malcolm Hughes (University of Arizona).

These scientists concluded that the late 20th century warmth in the Northern Hemisphere was unprecedented during at least the last 1,000 years. This drew the ire of Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) and Rep. Joe Barton (R- Texas), who claimed the research was misleading,” Bradley says.

“The NAS report concluded that the Mann et al study “has subsequently been supported by an array of evidence.” They find it plausible that “the northern hemisphere was warmer during the last few decades of the twentieth century than during any comparable period over the preceding millennium.” They note that confidence in the record decreases back in time, especially before A.D. 1600, in agreement with the original conclusions reached by the university researchers. The Academy panel also concluded: “Surface temperature reconstructions for periods prior to the industrial era are only one of multiple lines of evidence supporting the conclusion that climatic warming is occurring in response to human activities, and they are not the primary evidence,” says Bradley.
-----
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockey_stick_controversy

In a letter to Nature on August 10, 2006, Bradley, Hughes and Mann pointed at the original title of their 1998 article: "Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the past millennium: inferences, uncertainties, and limitations"[50][51] and pointed out "more widespread high-resolution data are needed before more confident conclusions can be reached and that the uncertainties were the point of the article."

Mann and his colleagues said that it was "hard to imagine how much more explicit" they could have been about the uncertainties surrounding their work and blaming "poor communication by others" for the "subsequent confusion." He has further suggested that the criticisms directed at his statistical methodology are purely political and add nothing new to the scientific debate.[52]


Paleoclimate findings by the IPCC before and after the Hockey Stick Controversy:

Before: 2001 (page 2)[53]
" proxy data for the Northern Hemisphere indicate that the increase in temperature in the 20th century is likely to have been the largest of any century during the past 1,000 years. It is also likely that, in the Northern Hemisphere, the 1990s was the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year."

After: Current SPM statement from 2007 (page 10)[54]
"“Average Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the second half of the 20th century were very likely higher than during any other 50-year period in the last 500 years and likely the highest in at least the past 1300 years. Some recent studies indicate greater variability in Northern Hemisphere temperatures than suggested in the TAR, particularly finding that cooler periods existed in the 12 to 14th, 17th, and 19th centuries. Warmer periods prior to the 20th century are within the uncertainty range given in the TAR.”

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I'm just too bored to read this complete thread...sorry.

My two cents though...

Whenever man tries to defend himself from nature...man looses. Nature will always win no matter what we try. If the earth's climate is going to change then we(man) will probably spend a great deal of time and money trying to keep it from happening to no avail.

Man is not as smart and powerful as we(man) seem to believe we are. We can't control our environment anymore than an ant can control theirs. Any effort, except those which are done as a passive attempt as cleanup, will in most cases, if not all, fail.

We(man) are an insignificant little flea on the ass of the world. Although we have spread out over the surface of this planet, as other species have, our contribution to the environment is only a fraction of all combined species.

What man should be doing is seeking ways to limit his use of non-renewable resources. Finding more efficient ways to do things without spewing deadly toxins into his house. Before man invented indoor pluming, he did not shit in his house.

But if it turns out that "global warming" was due to, not man, but a reoccurring natural phenomenon (such as the sun getting hotter) then all the time wasted by those who jumped into the religion of "global warming" will feel as if they had been hoodwinked by their priests.

 

[Pure]

fortunately, zeb, a number of common sense measures have rationales besides globabl warming. would you agree these are worth doing:

fuel economy;
reduced dependence on coal and oil;
exploiting coal and oil with reduced environmental impacts.
preventing 'death' of lakes?
preventing or reducing poisons discharged into the oceans.
reducing discharge into the air of particles, toxic gases,
keeping 'green areas' green, preserving forests, and replanting of trees.
exploration of alternatives such as biodiesel and battery run cars.
improving mass transit and reducing auto use in city cores.

because of issues like these it's hard to see what the far right anti Gore, and anti environment movement is so damn hysterical about.

 

[Darkniciad]

fortunately, zeb, a number of common sense measures have rationales besides globabl warming. would you agree these are worth doing:

fuel economy;
reduced dependence on coal and oil;
exploiting coal and oil with reduced environmental impacts.
preventing 'death' of lakes?
preventing or reducing poisons discharged into the oceans.
reducing discharge into the air of particles, toxic gases,
keeping 'green areas' green, preserving forests, and replanting of trees.
exploration of alternatives such as biodiesel and battery run cars.
improving mass transit and reducing auto use in city cores.

because of issues like these it's hard to see what the far right anti Gore, and anti environment movement is so damn hysterical about.

Simple: The hysterical doomsday scenario constantly put forth any time "Global Warming" is mentioned. There's a reason I say Envirovangelists. I see things like Gore's beating of the pulpit and promising damnation unless you follow his doctrine as nothing more than another religion, which automatically makes me suspicious.

Digging into the science behind the doomsday scenario only confirms my suspicion. You see the words possible, plausible, and sometimes likely in the reports, which quite often conflict each other on numerous points. Somehow, Gore translates that into imminent and irrefutable.

I'll give the movement this: They've positioned themselves well. Hotter than usual? Global Warming! Colder than usual? Global Warming! Drier than usual? Global Warming! Wetter than usual? Global Warming! More hurricanes? Global Warming! Fewer hurricanes? Global Warming!

When anything that happens somehow supports your conclusion, that's a nice place to be.

It's God's will. He works in mysterious ways. Just different language and a different deity.

I ( and I suspect many who look at "man made and planet destroying" Global Warming with raised eyebrows of suspicion ) have no problem with cleaning up my act for the sake of cleaner water and air. I just resist the knee-jerk, ill-researched, unequally applied "solutions" that so often accompany the pronouncements of doom from the Envirovangelists that serve as mouthpieces for the movement.

 

[trysail]

"The changes in the balance and concentration of all these gases can affect the Earth's temperature, and these temperature changes are often referred to as "global warming" or "global cooling." Greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere have been naturally rising and falling for billions of years, creating cold and warm periods in the Earth's history. For example, as the Ice Age progressed, scientists believe the amount of natural carbon dioxide in the atmosphere dropped over thousands of years, reducing the greenhouse effect, and making the Earth cooler. But many disagree on how that change in carbon dioxide occurred (see "Big Chill" http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ice/chill.html by Kirk Maasch)."


http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast21jul_1m.htm

 

[cantdog]

another religion, which automatically makes me suspicious.

Made me laugh.

 

[cantdog]

you do not even make an attempt to be fair minded. the hockey stick graph, despite some criticisms, is alive and well. essentially it amounts to a claim of a very fast rise in surface temp over the last 100 years; that's the blade of the hockey stick. the inference is that this rise is due to human activity.

there are some doubts around the earliest data.

the alleged refutation cited, relies on the Wegman report, never published in a peer reviewed journal, but ordered up by an irate congressman. Wegman is not a climatologist.

however the national academy of sciences report was generally favorable, see below.

lastly i quote the old and the revised IPCC statements, before and after the controversy. clearly they 'qualify' their views, but generally do not reject the earlier position.


by googling 'hockey stick' and climate, or checking the summary at wikipedia, one finds such pieces as these.

http://www.umass.edu/newsoffice/newsreleases/articles/36111.php

Report Affirms 'Hockey Stick' Climate Change Data; UMass Amherst Climate Scientist Comments
June 22, 2006

Contact: Raymond Bradley
413/545-2120

AMHERST, Mass. – A National Academy of Sciences report released today confirms that the last few decades of the 20th century were warmer than any comparable period in the last 400 years, affirming the findings of climate scientist Raymond Bradley of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and his colleagues. The report was requested by Congress last year to clarify research involving surface temperature reconstructions published by the scientists in the late 1990s. Bradley issued the following statement regarding the report:

“The National Academy of Sciences released their report today, on Surface Temperature Reconstructions for the Last 2,000 Years. This was requested by Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) to clarify the controversy over the so-called “hockey stick” temperature reconstructions of the last 1,000 years by Michael Mann (Penn State University), Raymond Bradley (University of Massachusetts Amherst) and Malcolm Hughes (University of Arizona).

These scientists concluded that the late 20th century warmth in the Northern Hemisphere was unprecedented during at least the last 1,000 years. This drew the ire of Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) and Rep. Joe Barton (R- Texas), who claimed the research was misleading,” Bradley says.

“The NAS report concluded that the Mann et al study “has subsequently been supported by an array of evidence.” They find it plausible that “the northern hemisphere was warmer during the last few decades of the twentieth century than during any comparable period over the preceding millennium.” They note that confidence in the record decreases back in time, especially before A.D. 1600, in agreement with the original conclusions reached by the university researchers. The Academy panel also concluded: “Surface temperature reconstructions for periods prior to the industrial era are only one of multiple lines of evidence supporting the conclusion that climatic warming is occurring in response to human activities, and they are not the primary evidence,” says Bradley.
-----
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockey_stick_controversy

In a letter to Nature on August 10, 2006, Bradley, Hughes and Mann pointed at the original title of their 1998 article: "Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the past millennium: inferences, uncertainties, and limitations"[50][51] and pointed out "more widespread high-resolution data are needed before more confident conclusions can be reached and that the uncertainties were the point of the article."

Mann and his colleagues said that it was "hard to imagine how much more explicit" they could have been about the uncertainties surrounding their work and blaming "poor communication by others" for the "subsequent confusion." He has further suggested that the criticisms directed at his statistical methodology are purely political and add nothing new to the scientific debate.[52]


Paleoclimate findings by the IPCC before and after the Hockey Stick Controversy:

Before: 2001 (page 2)[53]
" proxy data for the Northern Hemisphere indicate that the increase in temperature in the 20th century is likely to have been the largest of any century during the past 1,000 years. It is also likely that, in the Northern Hemisphere, the 1990s was the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year."

After: Current SPM statement from 2007 (page 10)[54]
"“Average Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the second half of the 20th century were very likely higher than during any other 50-year period in the last 500 years and likely the highest in at least the past 1300 years. Some recent studies indicate greater variability in Northern Hemisphere temperatures than suggested in the TAR, particularly finding that cooler periods existed in the 12 to 14th, 17th, and 19th centuries. Warmer periods prior to the 20th century are within the uncertainty range given in the TAR.”

The argument against the climatology findings is mostly that correlation is not causation. Unfortunately, as Hume famously pointed out, causation rests on slippery ground. It's nothing one can prove.

To determine causes, a plausible hypothesis indicating a mechanism is a good start, and we have that a priori. After that, though, all one can do is research around the question. Enough correlation consistent with the suggested mechanism will lead one to agree to a likelihood that the cause has been found. Correlations which consistently do not fit the hypothesis, of course, cast doubt on it.

The trouble with correlative evidence is that it is statistical in nature. Most of us are insufficiently familiar with what constitutes proper statistical inference. Even when well and properly done, statistical inference indicates likelihoods; it does not prove something to be the cause of something else.

Someone for whom the conclusions are uncomfortable can surely be counted upon to harp disingenuously on the plain fact that no utter and complete proof exists. That's for certain, all right. You can't prove lightning causes thunder, either. But it's pretty darn likely, all the same, and we accept it in our daily lives.

 

[Pure]

Pure's examples:
//exploration of alternatives such as biodiesel and battery run cars.
improving mass transit and reducing auto use in city cores.

because of issues like these it's hard to see what the far right anti Gore, and anti environment movement is so damn hysterical about. //



Dark said: Simple: The hysterical doomsday scenario constantly put forth any time "Global Warming" is mentioned. There's a reason I say Envirovangelists. I see things like Gore's beating of the pulpit and promising damnation unless you follow his doctrine as nothing more than another religion, which automatically makes me suspicious.

nothing to do with you personally, dark, but i think this line about Gore's alarmism, hysteria, pulpiteering-- and and that of other environmentalists is mostly bogues. more extreme statements are a likely consequence of a 'nothing's wrong' 'go about the oil business' approach of the Rep'n party, esp. its right, i mean the far right, since it has hardly any center and no left.

Digging into the science behind the doomsday scenario only confirms my suspicion. You see the words possible, plausible, and sometimes likely in the reports, which quite often conflict each other on numerous points. Somehow, Gore translates that into imminent and irrefutable.

not you personally, dark, but what's the beef? the current SPM statement i quoted says:

temperatures during the second half of the 20th century were very likely higher than during any other 50-year period in the last 500 years

that's how scientists talk.

were is left like that, the right would be saying "See, it only says 'very likely.'"

if an environmental 'evangelist' in a public speech, simplifies and says, "It's warmer now, than any period in the last 500 years", then of course the critics will say, absolute, unqualified, NOT scientific. hysterically exaggerating.

in any case, dark, lots of the measures i listed are coming. maybe the oil companies can shift gears, or ultimately--in a hundred years--take a beating. i maintain that this nobel stuff, the anti Gore work, etc etc are stalling tactics from people who know the basic points are established; the battle is lost. it's just that stalling for 20 years means billions more of profits.

 

[cantdog]

Sheeit, pure. I'll get personal on his ass. He seems really het up over nothing, to me. Call a spade a spade.

 

[Weird Harold]

fortunately, zeb, a number of common sense measures have rationales besides globabl warming.

Then why don't those rational reasons get debated on their merits instead of getting lumped into a single scare-mongering "your grandchildren are going to die" justification?

fuel economy;

Depends on how much fuel economy and how many hidden costs are involved. A car that gets 50MPG but costs more than projected purchase+fuel costs for a 25MPG car is no bargain to the buyer.

A car that gets 50MPG but can't accelerate fast enough to merge into freeway traffic is a death trap instead of a bargain.

reduced dependence on coal and oil;
exploiting coal and oil with reduced environmental impacts.

Good ideas in the abstract, but the hard realities of implementation tend to be both more expensive and less effective than the "envirovangelists" claim. (Good word, Darkniciad. )

preventing 'death' of lakes?
preventing or reducing poisons discharged into the oceans.reducing discharge into the air of particles, toxic gases,

Again, good ideas inthe abstract, but often horrendous boondoggles in application.

keeping 'green areas' green, preserving forests, and replanting of trees.

I grew up in "The Tree Planting Capital Of the World" and have seen first-hand the economic effect of forest management policies aimed at "preserving forests" -- Yellowstone National Park still bears the fire scars resulting from "preserving theforests."

Deforestation, especially in the equatorial rain-forests, IS a problem but planting a few hundred water-hungry trees in my neighborhood isn't going to solve the deforestation problem and it WILL change the local climate minutely. (in just the thirty years I've been in and out of Las Vegas the average relative humidity has tripled and the average daily temperatures have dropped about five degrees because of the importation of alien tree species that transpire much more water vapor into the air than the native species do.)

exploration of alternatives such as biodiesel and battery run cars.

Biodiesel (and other bio-fuels) is a red-herring -- It can't be scaled up to anything close to the quantities required to make a dent in fossil fuel usage; milage is reduced about 25% (according the trucking company my brother wroks for and it can't be used a temperauires below about 40F because it gels without expensive fuel heating systems tha further reduce cost-effectiveness; and, currently, 30% biodiesel is about 15% more expensive than regular #2 Diesel.

Battery run cars (and to some extent hydrogen fuel cell power) just shifts the environmental impact to the less visible (and usually more toxic) venue of battery production. I'm not sure which kind of pollution is worse but I suspect that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is easier to deal with than cyanide or lead contamination from mining operations.

improving mass transit and reducing auto use in city cores.

Las Vegas has -- and has plans to buy more -- some very "advanced" busses built by Irusbus; very sleek and high-tech systems with "glass cockpits," GPS route tracking with automated stop announcements, and all sorts of expensive technology. They're so expensive that it required a federal grant to convince the local transit authority to establish a "proof of technology" route to demonstrate the viability of the system.

There are a couple of "minor" problems with the Irusbus technology as far as I'm concerned:

1: here is no provision for the collection of fares or checking of tickets onboard the buses. This requires the employment of a security service to make random checks to insure passengers are actually paying passengers AND it requires the construction of very expensive (~~$250,000/each) Ticket Vending Machine installaions at each stop on each route the Irusbus coaches are to be used on.

2: Despite all of the High-tech features the essential Irusbus "green" technology is the same 100 year-old diesel-electric technology that has dominated railroads for the last 60 years.

I have no inherent problem with more efficient mass-transit and ride the MAX (Irusbus) line every day.

What I have a problem with is the false economy of the US Government spending a few dozen million tax dollars to promote a French-built transit system that dresses up 100-year-old technology with expensive bells and whistles that add little or nothing to improved efficiency or cleaning up the environment.

because of issues like these it's hard to see what the far right anti Gore, and anti environment movement is so damn hysterical about.

What we're "hysterical" about is the rush to justify the expense of things like the Irisbus system because "it will save the planet for our children." We don't want political eye-wash or panaceas, we want practical, rational, cost-effective proposals justified on those "rationales other than global warming" you mentioned.

We'd much prefer less fear-mongering and a few more EFFECTIVE measures -- like the naural gas fueled conventional busses in the local transit company's fleet; compared to the Irusbusses, they're (orders of magnitude) cheaper, roughly equal capacity, require much less infrastructure, and actually do more to help the environment than than the diesel-electric power plants do. (of course fueling the diesel-electrics with natural gas woul make even more sense, but that would mar the space age look and aerodynamics. )

 

[DrHappy]

For the record, I agree with the "Hockey Stick Hokum" article. I find the hockey stick debate interesting, though I disagree with the statement that the hockey stick is alive and well. Let me address some of the issues introduced in a recent comment

First, I'll point out that the dismissal of the Wegman report is simply an ad hominem attack, and does not address any specific scientific argument. I don't want to get too caught up in this game, but I will point out the following:

• The 2006 NAS panel's report was never published in a peer reviewed journal either.
  
• Wegman is not a climatologist, but that's not a bad thing given the topic of his report. He's a renowned statistician and he was asked to look at the statistical methods used to create the hockey stick graph. Since he isn't a climate scientist, he arguably would be less biased, since his career isn't affected by any particular outcome. Edward Wegman is the chair of the National Academy of Science' Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics. For what it's worth, he also voted for Al Gore in 2000. His resume can be found here and is quite impressive.

For the sake of discussion, let me state the following definitions:

MBH = Michael E. Mann, Raymond S. Bradley, & Malcolm K. Hughes, the authors of the original hockey stick graph. MBH98 and MBH99 refer to their 1998 and 1999 papers.

MM = Steve McIntrye & Ross McKitrick, the authors of the papers pointing out problems with the MBH methodology. Their first such paper was published in 2003 (MM03).

Some findings of the Wegman report include:

• In general, we found MBH98 and MBH99 to be somewhat obscure and incomplete and the criticisms of MM03/05a/05b to be valid and compelling.
  
• Mann et al., misused certain statistical methods in their studies, which inappropriately produce hockey stick shapes in the temperature history.
  
• Our committee believes that the assessments that the decade of the 1990s was the hottest decade in a millennium and that 1998 was the hottest year in a millennium cannot be supported by the MBH98/99 analysis. As mentioned earlier in our background section, tree ring proxies are typically calibrated to remove low frequency variations. The cycle of Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age that was widely recognized in 1990 has disappeared from the MBH98/99 analyses, thus making possible the hottest decade/hottest year claim. However, the methodology of MBH98/99 suppresses this low frequency information. The paucity of data in the more remote past makes the hottest-in-a-millennium claims essentially unverifiable.
  
• It is clear that many of the proxies are re-used in most of the papers. It is not surprising that the papers would obtain similar results and so cannot really claim to be independent verifications.”

I have read several instances where someone has stated that “independent” studies confirm the original MBH study. However, as Wegman has stated, these studies tend to use extremely similar datasets and methodologies. There are other serious problems that the Wegman report did not address.

=================

Note that the article Report Affirms 'Hockey Stick' Climate Change Data was written by Raymond Bradley, one of the original hockey stick authors. That doesn’t necessarily make the article incorrect, but I would like to dissect some of the statements in the article and from the 2006 NAS report.

The 2006 NAS report has an interesting history. This report was commissioned by Congress to answer a very specific set of questions regarding the MBH hockey stick, and to determine whether the claims in the McIntyre-McKitrick studies were valid. A list of questions was sent to Ralph Cicerone at NAS, who then watered down the questions when he formed the NAS panel to investigate these claims and to write a report. By the time the panel was formed, the mission had changed to one that was much less focused on the specific claims against MBH. The panel members watered down their final report further by making it even their focus even more general and less specific, further avoiding direct confrontations with MBH. The makeup of the panel membership was hardly unbiased. Of the twelve panel members, only one, John Christy, has somewhat skeptical views of the negative climate forecasts. Many of the rest sound like activists when they make public statements regarding climate change. Given this situation, I found many statements from their report to be striking admissions on their part. Let's look at some of text in the actual report:

• It can be said with a high level of confidence that global mean surface temperature was higher during the last few decades of the 20th century than during any comparable period during the preceding four centuries.

They essentially said that it's warmer now than during the Little Ice Age. No one is really surprised by this. A key issue was whether the MWP was cool or warm. If it was cool, then we have a hockey stick. If the MWP was warm, then we don't have a hockey stick. The MWP corresponds to roughly the years 800 - 1300.

• Less confidence can be placed in large-scale surface temperature reconstructions for the period from A.D. 900 to 1600
  
• Very little confidence can be assigned to statements concerning the hemispheric mean or global mean surface temperature prior to about A.D. 900 because of sparse data coverage and because the uncertainties associated with proxy data and the methods used to analyze and combine them are larger than during more recent time periods.
  
• Based on the analyses presented in the original papers by Mann et al. and this newer supporting evidence, the committee finds it plausible that the Northern Hemisphere was warmer during the last few decades of the 20th century than during any comparable period over the preceding millennium. The substantial uncertainties currently present in the quantitative assessment of large-scale surface temperature changes prior to about A.D. 1600 lower our confidence in this conclusion compared to the high level of confidence we place in the Little Ice Age cooling and 20th century warming. Even less confidence can be placed in the original conclusions by Mann et al. (1999) that “the 1990s are likely the warmest decade, and 1998 the warmest year, in at least a millennium” because the uncertainties inherent in temperature reconstructions for individual years and decades are larger than those for longer time periods, and because not all of the available proxies record temperature information on such short timescales.

The panel waffled the best the could. The word "plausible" is key. They state that the data doesn't rule out the possibility that the MWP wasn't warm, but the data certainly does not credibly support a conclusion that it was cool. The MM studies show that the MBH studies have serious problems, but they never claimed to produce an accurate reconstruction either. As a demonstration, MM used the MBH technique to create their "reconstructions" which show a much warmer Medieval Warm Period by making some arbitrary changes in the input parameters. The MM reconstructions are just as valid as the MBH reconstruction. However, MM claim that both sets of reconstructions are junk. MM actually don't even like to have their graphs referred to as a reconstruction since they don't endorse the methods used to create them.

What does this mean? If the climate of the last 1000 years was really a hockey stick, then this would show that today's climate is "unprecedented" and would be moderately strong circumstantial evidence man's influence on climate. If there was no hockey stick, then it would show that our climate situation is nothing special.

 

[Oblimo]

Then why don't those rational reasons get debated on their merits instead of getting lumped into a single scare-mongering "your grandchildren are going to die" justification?

That's sorta like asking "Have you stopped beating your wife?" since I don't think Pure is scare-mongering at that level. Although, you have to admit it is true, my grandchild are going to die, and so will yours.

In my experience, the rational voices on both sides of the debate do not argue its merits because they are to busy combating the agitprop being spewed by the other side and the irrational trolls who've bought into the politics of it, like trysail.

 

[Darkniciad]

Sheeit, pure. I'll get personal on his ass. He seems really het up over nothing, to me. Call a spade a spade.

Feel free, no skin off my nose.

I support all sorts of environment friendly solutions. As Pure mentions, there are plenty of reasons for increased fuel economy, use of alternate energy sources, control of emissions, etc. beyond the specter of the evil CO2 monster.

I just don't believe in the religion of Global Warming.

 

[Pure]

to weird h.

thanks for the reply. i know there are problems with many ideas. perhaps you could share a few more of yours!

i agree there seem to be conundrums, like having cars with batteries demands lots of grid power, which would likely come from coal mining.

like having an 'organic' diet, with no pesticide contamination: oranges shipped to the northeast from california, on trucks burning gasoline.



any opinions on the 'buy food locally' recommendation?

do you think that home heating and hot water heating could be more done 'off the grid,' ie. solar cells, storage devices, etc..

 

[Pure]

to dark,

I just don't believe in the religion of Global Warming.

i'd say the utter denial of valid environmental isses by the right wingers is closer to being a religious dogma.

further, the 'leave it to the corps' approach of rox et al., is based on the dogma that governments fuck things up, whereas large corporations shower blessings on everyone, are supremely rational, and can be trusted to 'do the right thing' regarding discharges and wastes.

 

[Weird Harold]

thanks for the reply. i know there are problems with many ideas. perhaps you could share a few more of yours!

Most of my ideas are negative -- seeing the fallacies and hidden "costs" moe than coming up with new suggestions. About the only "positive" suggestion is the "hydrogen raft" idea I presented in another thread.

i agree there seem to be conundrums, like having cars with batteries demands lots of grid power, which would likely come from coal mining.

The hidden cost of battery powered cars isn't the electricity generation, it's in the manufacturing of the batteries: batteries require large quanities of lead, nickel cadmium, or other heavy/exotic metals. the Mining and refining of most heavy metals require hazardous materials -- like cyanide and mercury -- consume huge amounts of energy (for smelting and transportation) and tend to leave huge poisonous holes in the environment. Batteries also present a disposal problem on a par with radioactive waste -- except radioactive waste will eventually become non-radioactive; heavy metals will remain poisonous as long as they remain heavy metals.

like having an 'organic' diet, with no pesticide contamination: oranges shipped to the northeast from california, on trucks burning gasoline.


any opinions on the 'buy food locally' recommendation?

The Free Market should take care of local vs imported food questions: If it's available locally, it should be cheaper than imported produce of similar quality. If the local producers can't compete, they should begrowing something else.

NOTE: that assumes a truly FREE market with no subsidies or protective tarifs on any side.

The availability of (affordable) Oranges, lemons, limes, and other fresh fruits year round is something that has only become common in my lifetime -- thanks to the interstate highway system and commercial trucking. There are ways to make transport of goods more fuel efficient, but who do you listen to when implementing them? The "Enviros" or the "Nannies?

The easiest way to improve fuel economy in interstate trucking is to authorize more than 20 axles and more than two trailers; Economies of scale on a par with railroads are possible with mostly existing technologies. The "Nannies" who have successfully banned "triple-trailers" in about half of the States will tell you that "Highway Trains" are an unacceptable safety hazard to the the vast hordes of single individuals in gas guzzling multi-passenger vehicles who clutter our highway and make inerstate trucking one of the most hazardous occupations available.

So, "Green" efficiency or "Nanny" safety -- who wins? (Either way the Evnviroment is probably going to lose, it's just a matter of how much it loses.)

do you think that home heating and hot water heating could be more done 'off the grid,' ie. solar cells, storage devices, etc..

In New Construction, there are literally hundreds of options to make homes energy efficient and/or remove them from the Grid. The problem is that most of them add so much to the up-front costs of buying a home that only the (rich) rabid environmentalists can/will accept the additonal cost of real energy efficiency, (let alone the cost of energy independence.)

Oddly enough, there are some things that could easily be retro-fitted to existing structures but they're actually illegal for "environmental reasons" in a ot of places -- geo-thermal/"thermal bank" heat exchangers, for example; they require drilling and/or construction of a "thermal bank" and for various reasons many municiplaities ban drilling inside the city limits and/or classify a typical "Thermal Bank" (that recycles old tires as the thermal mass) as a "hazardous waste dump."

One of the most proven technologies with the theoretical capacity to power double the existing electrical power grid is nuclear power generation. They're as safe as (actually safer than) conventional fossil fuel powered plants to operate, have a much smaller ecological footprint (because they don't cause acid rain, emit CO2 or particulates) and the problem of waste disposal is seriously overblown by the "environmentalists" who apparently prefer acid rain and strip mining of coal to cheap, safe, power.

Take the politics and legal obstructionism out of the equation and look at just the technology and the actual safety record of US built nuclear power stations and you'll find that even the obsolete second generation plants have a much better incident/gigawatt-hour rate than ANY other kind of power generation. Any new plants would be third or fourth generation (depending on how you count the generations) with all the lessons learned from sixty years of nuclear reactor experience around the world -- at the very least they'd have several hundred thousand times as much computing capacity for the monitoring and control systems (which may or may not be a "good" thing.)

 

[Oblimo]

Batteries also present a disposal problem on a par with radioactive waste -- except radioactive waste will eventually become non-radioactive; heavy metals will remain poisonous as long as they remain heavy metals.

Yeah, but until they come up with fission-powered laptops so I can keep watching porn on the go, they'll have to pry my cadmium out of my cold, dead hands.

 

[Darkniciad]

I just don't believe in the religion of Global Warming.

i'd say the utter denial of valid environmental isses by the right wingers is closer to being a religious dogma.

further, the 'leave it to the corps' approach of rox et al., is based on the dogma that governments fuck things up, whereas large corporations shower blessings on everyone, are supremely rational, and can be trusted to 'do the right thing' regarding discharges and wastes.

Never said they weren't. Is the utter denial/automatic minimization of factors beyond the control of man any different?

I just don't believe the Envirovangelists. That doesn't mean that I don't consider it plausible that we are having an effect. I just also consider it plausible that factors like the increased solar activity during much of the time period in question ( late 1800s to present ) might have something to do with it.

There are too many maybe's in those areas of study, which are in their infancy. I can see smog caused by smokestacks and car exhaust, so I can understand decreasing emissions. I can see the problem with fossil fuel having limited supplies, thus fuel economy and alternate energy sources make sense. I can see dead fish and understand that the BP refinery is dumping too much shit in the water, and know that needs to be stopped.

I can even accept invisible things. I can't see the propellant in hair spray destroying the ozone layer, or even know for sure if something we've only started to study a short while ago is even actually suffering damage from it. I can, however, live without aerosols. If someone is too lazy to pump their finger to spike their hair, screw them. I think I can get along without styrofoam, too.

There's plenty of common ground out there to accomplish goals without the CO2 satan screamed about from the global warming pulpit to complicate it.

 

[Weird Harold]

There's plenty of common ground out there to accomplish goals without the CO2 satan screamed about from the global warming pulpit to complicate it.

I wonder why none of the envirovangilists ever suggest installing CO2 scrubbers in every home and business? It seems to me that "scrubbing" the CO2 from urban air before it has a chance to disperse to the tropics and upper atmosphere where it can cause GW.

There's problems with that simplistic solution, like disposing of the CO2 scrubbers once they're exhausted, and the sheer scale of production required to equip every structure with a CO2 scrubber. However, there were and (and still are) problems with equipping every gasoline powered engine with a catalytic converter but how many vehicles have you seen lately without one?

 

[S-Des]

I just don't believe in the religion of Global Warming.

i'd say the utter denial of valid environmental isses by the right wingers is closer to being a religious dogma.

Just for the sake of accuracy, would you mind citing exactly what "right wingers" you're talking about and their actual opinions on GW (i.e. is it completely non-existant, is it happening but not as bad as feared, is it not our fault, etc...). GWB is the first Republican president to admit it's happening, so he's not a denier. Most of the radio and TV people I listen to freely admit that there are problems, they just won't go as far as people like Gore. Bill O'Reilly (that evil neo-con) says he fully believes it and that he's happy Gore won the Nobel. So are you talking about a handful of hardcore disbelievers who might be sticking their heads in the sand because it's financially beneficial, or are you just smearing everyone to the Right because it's convenient?

 

[Guest]

Just for the sake of accuracy, would you mind citing exactly what "right wingers" you're talking about and their actual opinions on GW (i.e. is it completely non-existant, is it happening but not as bad as feared, is it not our fault, etc...). GWB is the first Republican president to admit it's happening, so he's not a denier. Most of the radio and TV people I listen to freely admit that there are problems, they just won't go as far as people like Gore. Bill O'Reilly (that evil neo-con) says he fully believes it and that he's happy Gore won the Nobel. So are you talking about a handful of hardcore disbelievers who might be sticking their heads in the sand because it's financially beneficial, or are you just smearing everyone to the Right because it's convenient?

Probably because it's convenient.

Those smug, deceitful, holier-than-thou right wingers, anyway.

 

[Weird Harold]

...So are you talking about a handful of hardcore disbelievers who might be sticking their heads in the sand because it's financially beneficial, ...

A random thought: Why is it that the "solutions" that are being implemented are making someone (usually the promoter of the "solution") very rich?

An example of what I mean is the "Ethanol Solution" to fossil fuels: Since Congress decreed that Ethanol must become a significant portion of our fuel supply, the price of porn (and only corn) has risen sharply (affecting the price of breakfast more than the price of fuel.) The farmers might not be getting rich, but Archer-Daniels-Midland corporation is. (or at least rich-er.)

It seems to me that if alcohol is to be part of the solution to fossil fuel dependence, that it would make more sense to distill it from plants that aren't already commercially viable -- the celulose in grass clippings and/or sawdust can be fermented into fuel-grade alcohol (or methane which is a better motor fuel) without driving up the price of feeding the kids corndogs for dinner.

I don't recall the proper name, but there is a grass or shrub that will grow in commercial quantities on land that is too poor and dry to support any other commercial crop that can be fermented into a close analog of crude oil (minus the sulphur and other contaminants) -- but I see very little serious effort to pursue that line of bio-fuel development, just "solutions" that just happen to make someone a huge(r) profit without the bother of R&D costs.

 

[S-Des]

Probably because it's convenient.

Those smug, deceitful, holier-than-thou right wingers, anyway.

I do you so.