Monday 5 May 2008

"Global warming may 'stop', scientists predict" - TELEGRAPH

Britain's Guardian newspaper whines that the "deliberately contrarian" tone of tabloid newspapers has "damaged public perception of climate change," poor lambs. 

Little wonder the volume of "deliberately contrarian" writing is rising, since as global temperatures simply refuse to follow the course the warmists' models say they should, the "mainstream warmist" position is looking increasingly indefensible.  And the "deliberately contrarian" position isn't just confined to the tabloids.  Even scientific journal Nature is now publishing peer-reviewed articles suggesting that despite global warming models predicting  catastrophic warming, we're unlikely to see any increases in average global temperature until at lest 2015.  The Telegraph (a broadsheet)summarises the uncomfortable news:

Global warming will stop until at least 2015 because of natural variations in the climate, scientists have said...  This would mean that the 0.3°C global average temperature rise which has been predicted for the next decade by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change may not happen, according to the paper published in the scientific journal Nature.

For years skeptics have been pointing out that there's just no way the warmists' models can account for every variable in the global climate, and until they can the model's results are just so much hot air. This adjustment is the result of adding several new variables that were previously ignored, including "how the oceans behave over decades,"  "the strength of the Gulf Stream and the El Nino cyclical warming event in the Pacific," and "the giant ocean "conveyor belt" known as the meridional overturning circulation (MOC), which brings warm water north into the North East Atlantic."  All fairily important one would have thought.

Defending the warmists' long-term models, Hadley Centre scientist Richard Wood said that "climate predictions for a decade ahead would always be to some extent uncertain."  To say nothing of climate predictions for a century, or for government action based wholly and solely on these "uncertain" models. 

To put the present result in context, if these new papers are correct it will mean there will have been no warming from 1998 to 2015, a period of seventeen years.  So much for catastrophe. 

In fact, rather than showing catastrophe, the record would show that since the 'coming ice age scare' finished in 1979, when modern warmism began, the globe will have warmed for nineteen years (from 1979 to 1998),and then plateaued for seventeen or so.  Hardly catastrophic.  And hardly a strong endorsement of either the global warming models, or the still unproven causal link between CO2 and global temperature.

Looks like those models are no more reliable than your average TV weather forecast. 

Perhaps those endorsing measures to throttle industrial civilisation on the basis only of the unreliable weather forecasts of the IPCC might use this hiatus to reconsider the headlong rush into poverty and food riots for which they are already responsible.  Perhaps they'll resile from talking up dramatic sea-level rises on the bask of their horrifying models -- from strangling the use of coastal land and all their talk about the millions of "climate refugees" from low-lying islands (of which the world is still waiting to see the first such refugee) .

Perhaps those who've joined the warmist chorus out of ignorance -- not because they know anything more than anyone else, but only to show their friends they 'care about the planet'-- could just keep quiet for a little while.  Perhaps those who've been scaring the crap out of impressionable and illiterate young kids with their 'we're all gonna die' litany could just shut the fuck up for a while, so that kids can realise this is a great world in which to live rather than the place of irrational disaster-prone madness that warmists would have us believe.

And as NZ Climate Science Coalition convenor Owen McShane points out:

    These findings make two important points. The first is that natural climate variation means that there will be no warming until 2015. This is wonderful news, because it gives us lots of time to stop and think before we leap. NO more biofuels and ruminant follies.
    The next point is that all the climate models failed to predict this — until now! That means that all the climate models have grossly underestimated natural variation and they are all must be regarded with extreme suspicion.
    Therefore we need a Royal Commission to look at the whole thing before we completely destroy our economy for something that may not exist and is certainly not imminent.
    Definitely time for a tea break.

I'm not so sure about the Royal Commission, but the fact remains that to destroy your economy on the basis of extremely flawed extremely long-range weather forecasts is just insane.  (And as Climate Debate Daily reports, "An insider exchange between climate modelers reveals the extent to which they are themselves leery of attributing predictive power to their models ...continue » Click on "EXPAND ALL.")

Time for that cup of tea, I'd say, if not a complete lay down.

PS: Why not go join the legion of voters at Kiwiblog and go vote in the poll on the left-hand side for "Global Warming is a hoax and there is no evidence for it ."  It's currently leading the pack.

UPDATE:  "Can global warming’s vested interests close the deal on greenhouse gas regulation before the public wises up to their scam?" asks Steven Milloy of the Junk Science site:

    When NASA’s James Hansen sounded the alarm in Congress 20 years ago, he predicted that rising concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide, or CO2, would drive global temperatures higher by 0.34 degrees Celsius during the 1990s. But surface temperatures increased during that decade by only 0.11 degrees Celsius and lower atmosphere temperatures actually decreased.
    Global temperatures remain well below an El Nino-driven 1998 spike despite ever-increasing atmospheric CO2. Global warming hysterics purport that manmade emissions of CO2 are the primary driver of global climate and that controlling emissions will favorably affect climate. While this is obviously not so since it virtually supposes that without human activity climate change would not occur, it nevertheless remains their
viewpoint.
    The Nature study, however, reasserts Mother Nature in her rightful place as our climate dominatrix. Although there is no evidence that manmade CO2 emissions play any detectable role in
climate change, the very idea that Mother Nature may cool the planet despite humanity’s furious output of greenhouse gases should be even worse for the climate alarmists’ way of thinking.
    It would mean that greenhouse gas emissions are actually beneficial, since without them, Mother Nature’s cooling could be quite damaging.

He concludes:

    The bottom line of global warming—and that is why so many are behind it—is that its many vested interests are on the verge of a financial and political bonanza, something that scientific facts and climatic realities are likely only to spoil.
    So when global temperature doesn’t behave as predicted, excuses and explanations must be found to prevent the almost-mature golden goose from being roasted for dinner.
The spin on the Nature study provided by its authors to the New York Times is that, “We’re learning that [natural] climate variability is important and can mask the effects of human-induced global change. In the end this gives more confidence in the long-term projections.”
    The attempted logic here is that even though the alarmists have been wrong in the past—been there, done that—their failure somehow sets them up for more certain future success.
    We look past this logical fallacy at our own peril. I can’t wait for their Orwellian pronouncement that global cooling is the new global warming.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

And on NASA's temperature increase data.....
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/05/02/a_tale_of_two_thermometers/

Lyndon said...

If I were trying to support your position, I wouldn't be too keen to trumpet that study. It doesn't seem to say much about the ongoing trends.

AFAIK they assume global warming in their prediction. So if you accept their cycle and the temperature does remain more or less stable in the next few years, that means we can expect it to go up subsequently.

That is, after all, their prediction.

Incidentally, how many years to you think would be enough to indicate a climate trend, all other things being equal? There is, after all, a mess of variation in the global annual temperature graph.

Anonymous said...

If you wanna do something about global warming, start using your own shopping cart when you go shopping, grocery shopping, doing laundry, etc...

http://www.versacart.us

Anonymous said...

PC said...
To put the present result in context, if these new papers are correct...

No, these papers are no more accurate than the present models, since all of them are mathematical forecasting models, in which Ludwig von Mises had already said, that forecasting is not to be believed at all, since they're all bollocks.

PC that is why I have tried to get off from being dismissive about mathematical forecasting, since I knew that you would post something like this, when and if any recent researches in climate modeling that tried counter the argument that climate science is settled. See, you have now shot yourself on the foot, meaning that you can no longer post something like this to argue against global warming, since for you to do that, it is disingenuous that you call the IPCC models bullshit, but you are very eager to support exactly the same models (ie, the current research paper from Dr. Noel S. Keenlyside) that shows the IPCC have over-hyped global warming.

For you to continue to argue against global warming hysteria by using Keenlyside's mathematical modeling publication, you must first admit that you made an error of judgment in labeling all modelings bullshit. This mean that you have to retract your using of Von Mises argument to categorise all forecasting as bullshit. This is why I hassled you in the last few weeks about modeling, because I knew it, then that since you like to argue against global warming, the you would come to contradict yourself, and you've just done it today.

Just admit that what Von Mises had said was in a different context and that cannot be applied to everything mathematical forecasting. Once you make a retraction, then you're on the clear to bash global warming hysteria by using argument proposed and put forward by climate scientists who are using similar models to the ones used by IPCC to argue against global warming. See, you can't argue against the IPCC models and the same time endorse those models when used in other publications to give doubts about the IPCC models.

BTW, the latest paper only confirmed one undeniable fact and that is, the science of climate change is not settled yet.

Anonymous said...

What the climate frausters will claim next is that it is their brilliant foresight and influence that has resulted in the climate change slowing down. But we must all be vigilant. No stopping now. Industrial civilisation must be restricted lest the global warming gods find ourt and start turning up the heat in another 30 years or so.

Bullshitters one and all.

LGM

Anonymous said...

FF

Von Mises was writing about economics. In the study of economics it is not usual to study climate and weather forecasts. You may have noticed!

As far as math forecasts are concerned, PC's position would appear to be (and he can correct me if he disagrees) that a mathematical model does not establish causality. Certain knowledge of specific fact is required (things like understanding the attributes of entities, how they interact as a result, etc etc).

One can build a math model and put in it all sorts of clever fundtions and processes, but unless the model corresponds with reality it is worthless. Reality does not obey any models. The trouble with most mathematical models is that the creators of such models substitute arbitary equations for fact. They do not understand causality at all. They lack knowledge of causality to make their models work out. In effect, they substitute incantations of faith for knowledge. Such models, no matter how sophisticated they may be, will fail to be of value for any purpose other than committing fraud.

As far as Von Mises was concerned, he realised that economics is a social science and not a mathematical one. Hence math models would be of little use in understanding the consequences of Man (individual people) acting and how Man Iagain, individual people) should act. This is a most important point to grasp.

"I am not a number." - The Prisoner

Cheers

LGM


BTW boat has lost over 550 kg of mass and has two new engines with an extra 300bhp. That makes things go better some.

Anonymous said...

One can build a math model and put in it all sorts of clever functions and processes, but unless the model corresponds with reality it is worthless.

That's exactly the point that PC shouldn't enthusiastically posted the latest research proposing that there would be a delay in global warming till 2015. There is no certainty that this latest models (including existing ones) are any better. So, the science is not settle as opposed what warmists had declared already that the science is settled and case closed (no ifs no buts). So, warmists seemed to be on the run and trying to come up with all sorts of excuses.

Anonymous said...

“The Telegraph (a broadsheet) summarises the uncomfortable news: Global warming will stop until at least 2015 because of natural variations in the climate, scientists have said...”

This claim is not strictly accurate. According to the blog Climate Progress, the lead author of the report has this to say: “However, as you correctly point out, our results show a pick up in global mean temperature for the following decade (2010-2020). Assuming a smooth transition in temperature, our results would indicate the warming picks up earlier than 2015.

http://climateprogress.org/2008/05/02/
nature-article-on-cooling-confuses-revkin
-media-deniers-next-decade-may-see-rapid-warming/

Climate Progress also notes that the results of this study are consistent with a previous study by the Hadley Centre, which concluded: “… at least half of the years after 2009 [are] predicted to exceed the warmest year currently on record”.

The other point to note about these sorts of studies (decadel forecasts) is that they are relatively new, so more data is needed before making definitive claims.

Finally, note that the Nature study is based on computer models and makes both hindcasts and forecasts of temperatures, in line with accepted climate science. So it looks like there’s been a major shift in the minds of some sceptics towards acceptance of both computer modelling and forecasts, which have hitherto been dismissed as crystal-ball gazing.

Berend de Boer said...

Did you know that my 1991 Encyclopaedia Britannica still lists global cooling as the scenario?

Anonymous said...

Global cooling. Global warming. Guess the CO2 whores reckon they've got it covered each way.

Face it. The whole mess is a fraud.

LGM

AngloAmerikan said...

Has anyone studied the possibility that global warming will counter the coming ice age? When I was at high school in the seventies this was the imminent threat.

Anonymous said...

Actually the majority of the papers written on climate change during the seventies and late sixties were about global warming, only about 10% were about global cooling. For some reason global cooling got all the attention.

When people say there is a concensus, and that the science is settled they are speaking of the specific theory behind the greenhouse effect. Newtons law of the conservation of energy should be common knowledge for all of you, energy cannot be created or destroyed. The consensus that exists, is that higher levels of CO2 in the atmosphere creates a climate forcing that traps energy in the atmosphere for longer periods of time. The rate of temperature changes observed last century cannot be explained without including an energy forcing from higher levels of CO2. Temperature variations as a result of feedback effects (effects that are caused by the original forcing) and natural cyclical variations, such as the one responsible for the plateauing of current temperatures merely move the energy around, they do not expell or absorb more energy. There is no precise consensus about the specifics of how the climate will react to this increase in energy, there is however, a consensus that CO2 does create a forcing.

Given that the discussion on the effect of this increase in energy ranges from bad - to very bad, not creating legislation to counter it is a bit like not legislating against vandalism.

Anonymous said...

David

" energy cannot be created or destroyed. " Not so, according to the quantum guys and the cosmologists. So who is correct there?

As to the CO2 and climate change business. As has been stated previously, there is a series of proofs required from the proponents of coercive legislation and regulation based on CO2 theory. They have never been provided (since they do not exist). Hence the whole claim-set of warmists is little more than hot air (as in BS).

LGM