Wednesday 18 February 2009

As CO2 rises, temperatures … don’t [update]

You’ll no doubt have heard the latest warmist all over the media recently wringing his hands over the increasing amounts of CO2 “we” are all emitting, and how this will inevitably lead to disaster. “Our” emissions are “now outside the entire envelope of possibilities" considered in the 2007 report of the International Panel on Climate Change, said the Associated Press’s near-hysterical “science” writer Randolph Schmid, and will, he says, lead to all the usual catastrophes that warmists always hope for.

Problem is, as Chip Knappenberger reports at the great new Master Resource blog, “Schmid failed to mention that during the same time, global warming proceeded at a rate much slower than anyone expected.”

Oops!

And,

while Schmid was busy [all over the media], Patrick J. Michaels testified before the U.S. House Subcommittee on Energy and the Environment that global warming was proceeding at a rate that was at the lowest values projected by a large suite of climate models. Dr. Michaels further told the Subcommittee members in the nation’s capital that another year or so of little warming would put global temperature trends outside the accepted range model prognostications.
    So, clearly, the picture is a lot more complicated than CO2 in/catastrophic climate change out. It is just that most environmental alarmists (reporters included) don’t like to think of it as such.

That seems a very polite way to report Schmid’s catastrophising.

UPDATE:  Meanwhile, on a planet far from the solar system of sanity, NASA warmist James Hansen continues his increasingly hysterical trajectory:

Coal [says the OberGruppenWarmist] is the single greatest threat to civilisation and all life on our planet. The trains carrying coal to power plants are death trains. Coal-fired power plants are factories of death.

Tim Blair quips in response: “On the other hand, it does stop people dying in winter.”

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't think anyone can scientifically deny that carbon dioxide and methane are both warming agents.

HOWEVER, global warming is a bigger issue than just these agents and other factors such as atmospheric pollution, solar activity, the earths magnetic field, the earths wobble etc must be considered before conclusions can be reached.

Taking sides using only carbon dioxide measurements measured against recent temperatures is bad science.

Anonymous said...

"I don't think anyone can scientifically deny that carbon dioxide and methane are both warming agents"

Where do these Anonymouses hide? Under rocks?

It's been demonstrated conclusively that there is no correlation in anthropogenic gases and warming.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous

Global warming/climate change a.k.a. "the sky is falling, the sky is falling" etc. relies on making terrifying assertions and subsequently relying on those assertions as validation of the imposition of collectivism by coercive force applied against individuals. That is, these arbitrary assertions are used as an excuse for the elimination of individual freedom.

If anyone is going to assert that such a thing as "global warming" exists, they need to define what it is, prove that it is real, demonstrate that it necessarily is going to result in harm to Man, demonstrate that Man is causal agent, demonstrate what actions are necessary and who should be responsible to take those actions, demonstrate whether there exists a state of emergency or not and so on.

None of this has been achieved. None. Nothing.

As has been stated many times (and by others well prior to me), one may as well start discussing the nature of the "pixies at the bottom of my garden".

Stating arbitrary assumptions as revealed truth is not science, not even "bad" science. It's primitivism, superstition and plain silliness.

LGM

Anonymous said...

In the final parpagraph to my last post the word "Stating" may be replaced by "Assuming".

LGM

Anonymous said...

I know that ordinarily you'd have every reason to dismiss an Anonymous comment out of hand but, instead of following your anti-AGW blinkers, just freaking look at what he's saying. He's making a subtle and accurate point, not spouting AGW nonsense.

There are two things that easy to conflate: the greenhouse effect and global warming. The greenhouse effect is what, AGW proponents say, drives global warming. Global warming is the rise of temperatures that they say will mess everything up.

Now, the thing is, as far as classical physics is concerned, the greenhouse effect is as real as magnetism or electricity. It was discovered by Joseph Fourier in 1824, and established experimentally in 1858 by John Tyndall (he thought it especially shocking that invisible gases had the same effect). The warming agents that was the focus of his first experiments? Water vapor. CO2, with its history (CO2 was the first molecule ever synthesized and studied), was not far behind.

Here is where Anonymous's point comes in. CO2 and global warming has, by recent history, no noticeable link. The entirety of human activity may have so far had absolutely no effect on temperatures. Yet the physics of that end of the argument adds up. The human end of the argument adds up. So what's missing? Is CO2 really one of these warming agents? Does it behave differently in the upper atmosphere? Is there some counterbalancing effect that cancels it out? What if I'm just an environmentalist who wants to throttle the evil capitialists? Want to test it? Tyndall's notes describe he did. Repeat the experiments.

Anonymous said...

Wow, thanks for springing to my defence WantsToBeAnonymous couldnt have said it better myself. :)

Eric Crampton said...

And the price of a contract at iPredict that pays $1 if 2009 is warmer than 1998 (warmest year on record) is $0.1775, which means that if it doesn't happen, you make $0.1775 per share by selling short. I still reckon fair price on this one is five cents, but I'll update that once the January temp numbers come up.

Full disclosure: I'm short more than 1500 shares on this contract because I think it's massively overpriced.

Anonymous said...

WantsToBeAnonymous

You've completely missed the point.

An assertion remains nothing but empty claim and cant unless it is proven. The burden of supplying such a proof ALWAYS rests on he who asserts the positive.

For example, were I to assert that there are fairies at the bottom of my garden, that's a positive assertion. I'm claiming those fairies exist and are real.

Must you accept that as fact? The answer, obviously, is no. Must you take my assertion seriously? The answer is no- not unless I supply the proof to suport the claim. I must provide you with proof. You do not have to disprove my assertion. The burden of providing the proof falls to me. In the absence of that proof you do not even have to consider my claim seriously at all.

The point is that this global warming climate change nonsense is assertion. The assertion (complete with terrifying scenarios) is intended as an excuse for a behaviour previously outlined.

Both of you have admitted that there is no proof that anything untoward is going on (let alone a Man caused disaster in the making), hence what you are discussing is supposition and conjecture at best, superstition and blind faith at worst.

In either case there is no validation for considering these ideas as validations for political action (initiations of coercion and the like).

LGM

Anonymous said...

Where did I, or Anonymous, ever argue for political action, or coercion, or anything of the like? I implore you, once again, to look at it without your preconceptions. You will notice that neither of us advocated any political action, nor any coercion. It's not about that. It's not about any morality, imagined or otherwise. It's about reality. What happens. What goes on underneath the covers. What happens past our eyes. What actions have what impact on the world. It is not about what should happen, or what should be done, or what value we place on this. It is consideration sans we.

So long as you believe that this question of fact is a question of morality, you will continue to be wrong. Exactly in the same way that christians are wrong about evolution. It does not matter even if you would otherwise reach the same conclusion, because you wrote the conclusion first. Anything could have appeared to justify the conclusion, and what difference would it make? It is what happens before the conclusion that matters. It always has, and always will. Likewise, if you work backward from believing a priori that anything that anyone uses as an argument for coercion is wrong, then even a high schooled child could expose your stupidity to the world.

Anonymous said...

Woops. Meant to say:
Likewise, if you work backward from believing a priori that everything that anyone uses as an argument for coercion is wrong, then even a high schooled child could expose your stupidity to the world.

That would be terribly confusing otherwise.

Anonymous said...

WantsToBeAnonymous

You're still missing the point.

There is no issue or question to consider, regarding global warming/climate change, UNLESS a proof of its existance etc. is produced. That is, you must provide the proofs previously outlined.

In the absence of proof what you have been discussing is, at best, conjecture and supposition. At worst it is superstition, primitivism and silliness.

That's the first point for you to understand.

Next, it's already been pointed out to you that the global warming/climate change notion has a purpose and that it is being employed for particular ends. Those ends are political. In other words, the notion is being employed in an atempt to validate certain political actions and a certain political ideology.

Is that so difficult to understand?

Re morality- It is immoral to treat as fact of reality something that you know is has not been established as such.

If you are concerned about how the atmosphere operates and what is going on with it, then it is respectfully submitted that you go and find out about it. Do the research. What should never be done is to state or to assume arbitrary assertion as some sort of revealed truth.

LGM

Anonymous said...

"HOWEVER, global warming is a bigger issue than just these agents and other factors such as atmospheric pollution, solar activity, the earths magnetic field, the earths wobble etc must be considered before conclusions can be reached.

Taking sides using only carbon dioxide measurements measured against recent temperatures is bad science."


Sorry, I should have said I don't have an issue with the rest of the comment.

Anonymous said...

Sigh.

LGM, I don't know if you think it's a nice rhetorical flourish to turn the tables and go "Ah ha! Got you! You're doing the same thing you accused me of!" but at some point you need to actually shut up and and, once again, try paying attention. I don't know why I'm telling you to do it again, it didn't work last time. Imploring you to do it didn't work either. I can't think of anything else I can do over the internet.

I would ask if there's something that you couldn't follow, but as you have lacked the desire, brains, attention span, or ability to google to actually try following up on it, admitting that, or just saying "I don't get this part here." I can see that this is a lost cause.

And so, my parting shot. You can post whatever half-baked response you like. I will never read it. The disservice you have done is not to me, it is only to yourself. Whatever violence you commit against sense will stay that way unless Anonymous feels like taking over.

When you say that "It is immoral to treat as fact of reality something that you know is has not been established as such." I have to wonder if you're being intentionally dense, or if cognitive dissonance just works differently over there...

Going by your pathetic (and yes, they are pathetic: obsolete and prone to failure) epistemological standards: where's the proof? You offer nothing other than "Other people say A and then B, therefore when you say A you then also mean to say B", while ignoring my desperate pleas of "I'm not saying B, you idiot!" And you ask what I find difficult to understand? I don't understand how someone on a libertarian blog would employ such a collectivist conflation of one person and another. And get away with it. Since when does the actions of another man dictate mine? Since when does another's man's reason become my own? Since when does another man's argument become my own? Since when does another man's sins become my own? Since when does another man's purpose become my own?

And yet, on this alone you accuse me not of merely being wrong, but also deceptive? How exactly does anyone ever convince you of anything that you do not already expect is true? Are we all idiots, liars, thieves or conspirators? For what purpose am I decieving you? Maybe the fact that I'm not saying B just means I'm being extra sneaky about it. Hey! Maybe I'll turn around THIS sentence and start insisting that we need to take away everyone's hydrocarbons, or whatever. Nope? Maybe this one!

Also, ignoring that you can't even apply your arguments correctly, there's the fact that it's nothing but a giant "MY MORALITY GOES EVERYWHERE" sticker there for no purpose other than to free you from considering anything that discomforts you. Again, the comparison to creationism is fitting here. They held the creation of themselves and everything else as linked to God and thus a moral question. Biology was strictly limited to cataloging God's Creation, never to how he might have done it. You view the activity of light and particles in our atmosphere as a moral question. This really shouldn't have to be explained: if humanity wasn't in the picture, like with water vapor, would the conclusion we reach about the basic physical activity change? Of course not. If humanity wasn't in the picture, like with water vapor, would it suddenly stop, as though it were conspiring against only us? Of course not. How can this have a moral aspect? Again, without referring to anything you imagine I've said. Or anything that anyone who has ever argued for this has ever said. Or anyone who you imagine shares my goal said. It doesn't care--it can't care--what it's doing and doesn't care about two guys on the internet.

Anonymous said...

That sigh was supposed to point to my original post.

Anonymous said...

WantsToBeAnonymous

I know you'll read this. That's because you are a liar. Think on it.

---

What's been explained to you (without success it would seem- are you really that obtuse?) is that you can make all the assertions and claims you like BUT in the absence of proof what you have raved on about remains baseless. At best you have some half arsed conjecture and at worst something quite malevolent.

Again, in the absence of proof it is not possible to take your rambling conjectures and arbitrary notions very seriously. What you have been engaged in is pretending you have something of substance to contribute here. Trouble is, you have nothing of real value, just those imaginings and suppositions and conjectures and assertions.

Wake up to yourself.

LGM