EU's new figurehead believes climate change is a myth - Times Online
The European Union's new figurehead believes that climate change is a dangerous myth and has compared the union to a Communist state.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
EU's new figurehead believes climate change is a myth
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14 comments:
Looks like you have a new mission. I don't know, the climate has certainly changed here in South Florida. I think the Global Warming Deniers have a long row to hoe on this one. But then, there is an audience who never let the facts get in the way of their delusions.
There is way too much contradictory evidence and flaws in the existing studies for me to believe that these people have any idea what they are talking about.
Gloom and doomers have been hanging on the the Mann hockey stick for years and it is nothing but junk science.
If and when they come up with evidence that can't be disputed, I will listen. Until then, I will continue to hold the activists with an axe to grind to a standard that any other scientific study should meet.
Tree rings don't work. Computer models don't work until they are created properly.
Way to much hysteria over nothing that can be proven.
I'd be interested to know your standards of scientific evidence. Computer models have holes, but they are constantly being improved, and each computer model reinforces the one before and adds information.
I've been tracking this issue for about twenty-five years. When you are looking at a system as complex as an environment there's going to be holes. That's why the models showing regional cooling are relatively new. But I can say this. The ultimate test of scientific validity is being able to make accurate predictions. And the predictions that I was reading about twenty-five years ago are happening now. And SWFlorida, as you know, is going through many of the consequences predicted earlier.
I think you're swimming against the stream on this one, but more power to you. I've been known to do so myself.
Please feel free to cite specific examples of how SW Florida is changing. Not gerneal things like 'more hurricanes' (there aren't) or rising sea level (it isn't).
I can be convinced, you just have to convincing :)
"general" things, not gerneal :)
Just from what I've seen. Look at the rainy seasons. They used to be like clockwork. Around 330 every day in the summer then virtually nothing in the winter. Most of the last twenty five years we've spent in drought conditions. It looks like average yearly rainfall is not decreasing, but the season are certainly not the same.
Yes, except for an anomalous year we've done well for hurricanes, but the total number of hurricanes has been increasing globally, almost tripling. The number of Cat 4 and 5 hurricanes has almost doubled since 1935. These are consistent with global warming theorists.
Average temperatures have been increasing as have the number of days over 90 degrees. This is based on a 255 city study among others.
Yes, the ocean levels have been rising. Over a foot in the last 100 years. This is ten times the normal rise for the last 3000 years.
This is perceptible. The last few years we've had to wait until late December of January before the area cooled off. Not long ago things started getting comfortable in around October. This is confirmed by a very conservative study completed at Gov Crist's behest claiming that average summer and fall temperatures have increased by half a degree.
An interesting thing based on what I've looked at, especially in Crist's study is how the trends are measured. If we look at the last twenty five years we see a much different picture than the century. If we calculate long term trends then we see little change. If we use comparative data, then we see significantly higher changes.
That's why I think this issue is what sociologists call a position issue where the different sides are pretty well entrenched.
I'd like to give the professor an assignment:
Read through what you posted and tell if you, as a college professor, would accept any of what you said as proof of climate change.
Anything having to with two things "feel" or "seem" should be instantly deemed irrelevant.
That leaves us with unspecified sources for purported sea-level rise, increase in hurricane frequency and temperature increase in 255 cities.
Please note your sources so that I may pick them apart adequately :)
This is a position issue solely becasue the claim can not be proven and thus the believers are required to stand by their postion because they have nothing else.
(1) Try the NOAA and research the number of hurricanes and major hurricanes and you'll realize that there has been NO increase in hurricane activity and that includes the fact that we are MUCH better now at noticing hurricanes we wouldn't have even known about in the 1930's.
(2) For sea-level rise see the following
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2008/01/04/lowering-sea-level-rise/
Somebody's models are wrong. The question is whose?
(3) 255 cities? globally? Why would we measure the temperature in the cities to spot global trends? What do you think happened in those cities. Did they shrink? No. Did they reduce their heat output? No.
Check out the study and tell me where they took all the readings:
http://blog.lehighvalleylive.com/breaking-news_impact/2008/10/Feeling%20the%20Heat%2008%20PA.pdf
That's right. At the AIRPORT!! Are you kidding me?
Just looking at the cover of this "study" was enough to let me know whether or not these folks have an axe to grind.
In addition, they compare the 2000-2007 period to the 1971-2000 period when everyone knows the 70's were a cooler than normal decade.
Talk about stacking the deck.
Like I said before, I can be convinced, but you've got to find scientifically valid (as in, unibiased) information before I can be swayed.
Quote from your very own NOAA on hurricanes from May 2008.
"This study adds more support to the consensus finding of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and other reports that it is likely that hurricanes will gradually become more intense as the climate continues to warm," said Tom Knutson, research meteorologist and lead author of the report. "It's a bit of a mixed picture in the Atlantic, because we're projecting fewer hurricanes overall.”
Your source is confirming the IPCC!
And here's a link from your NOAA that confirms, more hurricanes and more major hurricanes and though it admits that the NOAA has not done much research with regard to human elements of global warming it cites "recent studies that suggest the warming of the oceans in the Atlantic main development region in the 20th century is due to the increase in greenhouse gases."
This is the link. http://hurricanes.noaa.gov/pdf/hurricanes-and-climate-change-09-2006.pdf
The more scientists learn the more they realize that they have more to learn. That's science. The original idea was that warmer oceans would lead to more hurricanes and stronger hurricanes. But no dynamic system is that simple. So now the research is suggesting that the warmer oceans will lead to stronger storms, which release more energy, which might in turn lead to fewer hurricanes, but more major hurricanes.
And in the 1930's there were no satellites, but there were plenty of weather stations around the world to keep track of hurricanes. This was a major issue. It's unlikely that we missed any.
As far as global climate temperatures, which was not the focus of my above comment, I guess you would suggest that NASA has an ax to grind over the issue.
Here's another link from the Brookings Institute. http://www.brookings.edu/views/papers/easterbrook/20060517.pdf
But maybe the Brookings Institute is too liberal. How about the United States Department of Defense that recognizes global warming as one of the most significant defense issues of the next century?
How about this from Scientific American and the world recognized science mag Nature: Although most scientists are convinced that global warming is very real, a few still harbor doubts. But a new report, based on an analysis of infrared long-wave radiation data from two different space missions, may change their minds. "These unique satellite spectrometer data collected 27 years apart show for the first time that real spectral differences have been observed, and that they can be attributed to changes in greenhouse gases over a long time period," says John Harries, a professor at Imperial College in London and lead author of the study published today in Nature.
Or data from the National Climatic Data Center:
As is evident in the graph, 2001 was second only to 1998 in terms of global temperature, and the trend has been toward increasing temperatures at least since the beginning of the 20th century. Land temperatures have greater anomalies than the ocean, which is to be expected since land heats up and cools down faster than water.
How about the National Research Council?
I didn't include the IPCC, of course, for obvious reasons. But I could go on and on about sources and links. The bottom line is that you can't be convinced. You approach the topic as tearing the research apart rather than weighing the evidence. Almost all research on any dynamic system has holes, whether it's social interaction or climate change or even turbulence studies. That's why scientists use controls to deal with your concerns. They are the same concerns shared by many scientists.
When I first started researching this issue there were many scientific agencies that withheld their opinions on global warming until more facts came out. This is good science. Every one of these agencies are now convinced.
I call it the Ostrich Theory. People will hold to their pre-conceived notions despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. They bury their heads.
My career is studying dynamic systems. Global and even local climate is a dynamic system (though admittedly outside of my field of study). And invariably they never offer simple explanations, and often result in unexpected outcomes. It's frustrating doing this research because every hole you plug, two pop up. But to deny global warming because there are holes in the research, or because the models leave out variables that we don't even know about makes as much sense as denying evolution because the fossil record isn't complete.
I'm not expecting to convince you. If nothing else you can simply say "your resources are wrong, mine are right...so there." Please. You demand evidence from me, but present none of your own. The burden of proof isn't only on one claimant. It's on both. I can make my case. Can you make your case except to comment that the thermometers are located at airports? Or your sea level critique which is a blog offering absolutely no scientific credentials. But I guess scientists are all biased and only non-scientists know the truth. Or how about your very scientific method of judging the adequacy of a report based on its cover...wow!
Now I've already gone back on my own advice on this issue. There's plenty of reasons for reducing carbon emissions that have nothing to do with global warming, so I think that's what we need to focus on.
Maybe you should try to convince NATO that they have nothing to worry about. Here's the link I'm referencing...
http://my.att.net/s/editorial.dll?pnum=1&bfromind=7406&eeid=6354501&_sitecat=1505&dcatid=0&eetype=article&render=y&ac=0&ck=&ch=ne&rg=blsadstrgt&_lid=332&_lnm=tg+ne+topnews&ck=
You are making one rather large mistake in all of this. You are assuming that I need to convince someone else that I am right - I don't. Time will do that for me. I am only trying to shed light on people who do studies with an axe to grind. Yes, including NASA, NATO, Gore, IPCC, etc.
When they start from scratch and build scientifically valid models (with proof of why they are valid) and conduct their studies in an open and honest manner - thye will find that they have been wrong all along.
If I'm wrong, I'm just one bozo with no influence on anybody. But if they're wrong...
That's great. You hold others to impossible standards and yourself to none! Wish I could do that. And anyone who disagrees with you, regardless of their credentials, has an ax to grind...but not you. No, you make a mistake. Scientifically valid models being the key. That's a great one. Whenever a model is created (by scientists) all you have to say is it's not scientifically valid or you can't prove it's scientifically valid or explain why it's scientifically valid. Scientific validity is determined by reproducing the experiment and getting the same results. That being the measure of validity, the models are valid. Now a legitimate scientific criticism of the models is that they are not complete. That's true. Often variables are left out because they are either unknown or too complex to factor. As models improve they factor more variables, and guess what, they produce consistent results with previous models, only more precise. But since there's always a variable missing or indeterminate critics can argue that the models are not complete. It's rare that scientists ever have "complete" models. By your notion planes should not be able to fly because there's no such model that can accurately configure the turbulence that allows the plane to have lift.
You're wrong on another score. If you are wrong about global warming then the Earth is headed for ecological calamity. If you, without having to prove that you are right, can convince other people to adopt the same mistaken notions, then there's less pressure on our institutions to make the necessary changes. You are significantly more than one bozo.
If they are wrong then we don't have this calamity, but we still have a cleaner, healthier environment with more innovative technologies in place, as well as a safer world. Like I said earlier, there's more than one reason to break away from carbon based fuels.
I really hope I'm wrong. I really do. But the science suggests that I'm not.
Oh, please. No one is saying that better ecological behavior is a bad thing. I just don't think you should lie to people to accomplish your ends.
The Mann hockey stick, the major yardstick used by most global warming alarmists and widely used in the IPCC report, has been disproven and debunked at least a dozen different ways but the GW crowd refuses to acknowledge it because their world falls apart without it.
Why can't the the theory of man-made global warming stand on its own without this "flawed science" ?
We simply do not know enough about what we don't know to draw the dramatic and dire conclusions reached by most in the GW community.
I am not saying that the scientists are wrong in their conclusion - I'm simply saying they do not have a sufficient basis to draw the conclusion.
If this is such an obvious problem and a no-brainer for any intelligent person to understand, why can't it be proven?
Actually, the Mann research was an explanation of the complexities of paleoclimatology. The "hockey stick" has been reproduced in many other research formats. The critiques of this research is often in matters of methodology, not so much on conclusions. The fact that the 20th century has been the warmest century and the last few decades the warmest of the warmest has not been "disproven." Scientists, however, correctly point out that models of temps a thousand years ago are less reliable than for the last century, so it's difficult to assess just how warm or cold they were compared to today. Criticisms of one research study, a research study that was actually designed to outline the difficulties of such research studies, is shaky grounds for stating that Global Warming has been disproven.
Regardless, I hope you're right, but I'm going to advocate based on the certainty that you are wrong.
Take care not to take my words and twist them. I did not say that Global Warming was disproven. I said the Mann model had been disproven. Any scientific model that yields the same results regardless of the input is bunk that was designed to produce a predetermined outcome.
As I said before, I couldn't tell you whether man-made global warming is a reality or not. But I can tell you that I am confident that that science has not proven its case.
It sort of like court. I'm not saying I've proved my client innocent - I'm not sure that's even possible - I'm only saying that the prosecution has not proved mankind guilty by any stretch of the imagination.
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