Taylor: I guess it does, although I’m not a big fan of the way that term has been used. You know, Richard Feynman, one of the greatest American physicists, once said that the finest scientists were always trying to prove themselves wrong.
In science, we should all be skeptics, especially of our own work. I’ve been wrong enough in the past to know I might be wrong now.
SL: Do you believe Gov. Kulongoski purged you for your views?
Taylor: I don’t believe the governor purged me. I decided to retire, and it was a personal decision.
SL: But did anyone ever tell you to back off or you might lose your job?
Taylor: I’m not prepared to comment on that.
h/t Icecap.
Vitruvius: There is no one on this board whom I respect more in terms of science than yourself, however I find I disagree with you on a number of .
One of the important ones is the Gerlich and Tscheuschner paper (or as I like to call it the G&T). Like yourself I have read it and actually discussed it a fair bit both on SDA and over at CJunk (the restrictions on linking here mean I can’t supply all the references in one post, but I can link them if anyone is interested.
There was a very long discussion in which G&T were involved over at Dot Earth which is good reading for (link available on request).
And finally it resulted in another arXiv posting by Arthur Smith.
Best,
John
PS otter, nope – not me. I always put my name to what I say.
PPS ol hoss, I am sure Virtuvius could explain the laws of thermodynamic radiation so you could have it from a second source. He appears to be quite knowledgeable about it.
Heat cannot by itself pass from a colder to a warmer body.
That’s all you need to know.
We’re not the only ones. April snow in London, England.
Settled science is an oxymoron; skeptical scientist is a redundancy. Vitruvius, I believe it was the former head of the Dutch national weather service who also produced papers pointing out that it was likely impossible to produce meaningful forecasts more than five days into the future. The authors of “Taken by storm” have pointed out the vacuity of climate modeling for similar reasons.
Also, while energy cannot be transfered in the form of heat from a colder body to a warmer body energy can in fact be transfered from a colder body to a warmer body by other means. This was proven to me at a very young age when I got whacked on the head with a snowball ; )
Vitruvius,
Where does one find the 3% number? (I.e. portion of atmospheric CO2 created by humans.)
Thanks.
Good morning to all it’s April 19 and snowing in Qualicum, Vancouver island. Quite without argument the mildest climate in Canada. I do not see any tree houses here with wide eyed childern listening to the little weird=beard spouting crapola re the so called “global warming” oops that buzz phrase is now “climate change” a plague on all his houses.
cheers Bubba
two inches last night in deep cove…we’re DOOMED !
You, sir, are a fraud.
Posted by: Vitruvius at April 19, 2008 12:13 AM
The dance Vitruvius, remember the dance.
More later, I haven’t stirred them up nearly enough yet.
Hugger
We will solve the “global warming” issue by the believers and the deniers going to war and whomever is the victor will get to declare what the climate will do.
When ever one blog site bans a troll, that troll would also be baned from the other millions of sites. One delete would be worth millions. Problem solved.
ron in kelowna at April 19, 2008 12:25 AM
Ah, the final word from the thought Police. Sieg, Sieg….you know the drill. Hark, is that the sound of Jackboots I hear in the distance???
About that Free Speech you keep talking about José …
Hugger
[quote]The equations, even when they are correct, can’t be computed with sufficent accuracy in tractable time and space to determine whether or not there is any convergence or the lack thereof.[/quote]
Virtuvius & DrD
I think I agree that the present State of climate model methodology must fail re: tractable time but.. Feyman did not rule out a future functioning climate Model.
I would point to the obvious mass of “Redundant” data that it is not necessary to calculate in tractable time, once an accurate model is running. (real-time weather)
The challenge for society & Science IMO is to build a full functioning climate model, without the sleaze factor of Social engineering or agenda driven Project Management. (I know something about project Management, the good, the bad, and the Ugly)
The Manhattan Project (buzz-word) is an American process where anti-trust laws, etc are exempted/suspended. This allows the brightest & best from the private sector to “fully” contribute. The US Senate has battered that buzzword around Energy policy, but it’s a complex process that doesn’t work IMO in a generalized research context.
If Canadian Scientists would step up to the plate and offer (via PMO) to “lead” a WORLD climate model project, independent of the UN, the US Politicians may find clear advantages in that path rather than mess with one of our own.
The Bubble Gum crowd has a flawed model, and a shitty attitude, both need fixing.
DrD: … while energy cannot be transfered in the form of heat from a colder body to a warmer body…
Are you sure about that?
Regards,
John
To rolik, hugger and dan, I repeat:
CO2 is up 5% since 1998, yet the world’s average temperature has not increased with it in the past ten years. Why?
The oceans are cooling. Why?
The 2006 hurricane season was 66% below the 2005 season, despite claims that hurricanes would become more frequent and more powerful. Why?
The 2007 hurricane season was 50% below the 2005 season. Why?
The Antarctic ice cap and Greenland are both increasing in mass, rather than melting as agw claims they would be. Why?
The Earth’s average temperature has fallen Every Single Month for the last 15 months, erasing 40 years worth of natural global warming. Why?
btw, rolik, when you speak of precipitation, could you explain it including the effects of the PDO, solar forcing, volcanic influences, wildfires, and so forth?
Thanks!
On the subject of suppressing views, here is a link from the New Times regarding suppression of the views of the top climate scientist at NASA.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/29/science/earth/29climate.html
Hugger
‘Ah, the final word from the thought Police. Sieg, Sieg….you know the drill. Hark, is that the sound of Jackboots I hear in the distance???’~ hugger
Missed role call, did you? Forgot to press your brown shirt?
hugger~ perhaps you could also explain to us why hundreds of scientists are being refused peer-review of their climate articles?
The Bubble Gum crowd has a flawed model, and a shitty attitude, both need fixing.
———-
I wonder which University Faculty reads Popular Science the most ? Science or Arts ?
————
Thought police are a dangerous thing. But a problem arises when there is no thought, just litter and graffiti.
Otter, do you have a link to any web page that supports that contention? I’d love to be able to show it to certain “settled science” parties.
Alchemist and lead. Oye. Any more ancient references for us to consider? They also used to rack people in Spain. I believe they now use waterboarding instead. More humane and all.
Hugger
Thought police are a dangerous thing. But a problem arises when there is no thought, just litter and graffiti.
Posted by: ron in kelowna at April 19, 2008 2:00 PM
Is there a limit to your denial? Your anti free speech stance is in black and white. What might be your final solution?
Hugger
otter at April 19, 2008 1:59 PM
Link please. Unlike some, I don’t have all the answers. I do my best to seek balance though.
Old feller once said to me, “there’s two sides to every story, and somewhere in the middle is the truth”. I always thought he was a wise man.
He helped me in that graduate course on my way to acquiring my Summa cum laude credentials.
Hugger
Mr. Taylor sounds reasonable, informed, balanced and is an obvious authority on the subject of global warming. HE MUST BE STOPPED!
Amid a worsening global food crisis exacerbated, say experts and critics, by the race to divert food or feed crops into biomass for the manufacture of vehicle fuel, and inundated by a flood of expert advice criticising the shift to renewable fuel, the commission appears to be getting cold feet about its biofuels target.] gaurdian.co.uk
Posted by: ron in kelowna at April 19, 2008 1:03 AM
So, if all this bio fuel is being diverted to replace Oil and derivatives, did you ever stop to ask yourself why the price of fuel has doubled in recent years? Why the Oil industry has downsized its refining capacity? Why every time there is a blip in the world production or refining capability its a further excuse to raise prices?
Can someone provide real evidence that this purported increase in bio fuel use is a significant factor? Or is this just more fodder at this point for the mush minds?
I have read numerous sources that dispel this, and contend that rising prices of commodities such as rice are as a result of a combination of factors including rising populations, protectionism and good old fashioned profit driven motivation. Charge what the market will bear.
This is not such an abstract concept, especially when you consider that corporate interests through the policies of governments and agricorp have come to control vast areas of food production. Add to that the influences of commodity traders and futures markets.
All of these forces are intertwined and although the article represents a truth, it doesn’t deal with underlying pressures and necessary reactions to those pressures. It seems clear that production and use of bio fuel is not in the interests of big Oil, and their performance is a matter of record.
Hugger
Missed role call, did you? Forgot to press your brown shirt?
Posted by: otter at April 19, 2008 1:58 PM
Oberfuhrer, das Sie vergaßen, die Sitzung zu erwähnen
Hugger
“It seems clear that production and use of bio fuel is not in the interests of big Oil .. ”
Sure it is.
It takes more than a litre of fossil fuel BTU equivalents to make a litre of biofuel BTU equivalents. aka, net loss. If we forget Biofuel and just put gasoline in our tanks, we will use less fossils. I bet Taylor knew it 30 years ago. So did I. For the media though, “Natures Fuel” was a better story.
BTW, it was not the Oil Industry that pushed biofuels — the so-called Greens did.
Also, funny thing, that after farmers suffered through years of poor prices, one year of good prices .. Headlines !! FOOD PRICES DOUBLE !!
[TORONTO — Biofuels derived from crops such as corn and canola might have the support of Canadian governments but activists say a growing reliance on the technology represents a real threat to the environment and the global agriculture sector – a warning they plan to take across the county.
Beginning April 28 with stops in Charlottetown, Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Halifax, Ottawa and Montreal, the tour’s slate of international speakers will talk about how the “global conflict over the production of crops for fuel” is devastating farmers and leading to mass deforestation, said CBAN co-ordinator Lucy Sharratt.] CP
http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5iFkKEb_amOg5tbUR12w9aw7j3fVg
If there is any justice in this world, the George Taylors and Tim Balls and Steve McIntyres and Bjorn Lomborgs will all see the day when the Al Gores and David Suzukis and Maurice Strongs are behind bars.
ron in kelowna at April 19, 2008 3:28 PM
Your reference article looks suspiciously like the words of environmentalist global warming conspiracy theorists. You can’t have it both ways. Are you converting? The logical point derived from that article is to apply caution before haste in utilizing bio fuels. Seems like a fair consideration.
The rest of your post doesn’t make any sense. i.e. You seem to be theorizing that only fossil fuels can be used to make biofuels. Biofuels can be used to produce more biofuels. Do you know how easy it is to make Ethanol?
Jeepers man, give me some molasses, an empty Ketchup can and some copper tubing and I’ll show you how. I learned from an old Newfie who could barely speak mainlander.
It doesn’t take a chemistry degree.
Hugger
‘link, please’?
Fantastic. You’ve just told me that you know very little- or you would have known how to answer, or what to point to.
As expected, you don’t have any answers, because the answers would prove agw Wrong.
I expect the same or No response from dan or rolik.
John Cross; thanks for posting the Smith paper. It was straighforward enough except Smith didn’t then consider the warming effect of various atmospheric compositions. It would have been simple enough to model a planet with a perfectly flat surface and uniform albedo and an atmosphere with same N2 and O2 composition as earth but just varying CO2 concentration. Either the calculations are non-trivial or they don’t show much of an effect of CO2. I felt cheated when I got to the end of the paper. Also, the paper doesn’t consider the 17 degree K discrepancy between the moons calculated temperature and the measured temperature. For a planetoid with no atmosphere one would expect closer agreement if the theory took into account all variables.
One of the biggest heat sinks on the earth is represented by the oceans which have a mass of about 1.35×10(exp 21) kg compared to the atmosphere’s 5.14 x 10(exp 18) kg of which about 5×10(exp 16)kg is water vapor but CO2 masses only about 1.8×10(exp 15)kg. Also H20 has more than 4X the specific heat capacity of air. As there is a temperature gradient in the oceans, the effective thermal mass is less and one should be able to pick up global warming signals in the form of rising ocean temperatures of surface waters which seem to be absent.
What this tells me is that any greenhouse effect on the earth is dominated by H2O vapor and the phase transitions of H2O in the atmosphere. When one gets into clouds, this results in models which do not have explicit mathematical solutions but rather must be modelled. It’s a simple enough matter to simulate a spherical water covered earth using various cloud formation algorithms. I’d be very interested in seeing what the effects of altering atmospheric CO2 are in this model (well within the capabilities of even high end home computers).
If such a model shows a very strong dependency of calculated atmospheric temperature on tiny changes in CO2, then I’ll change my mind about the AGW theory. Until such time I’ll consider the effects of solar irradience, changes in suns magnetic field and other factors to be far more important determinents of the earths climate.
loki, you claim “tiny changes” in CO2. Are you talking tiny in terms of total volume, or tiny in terms of percentages? Because an increase of ~35% doesnt seem all that tiny to me.
Biofuels can be used to produce more biofuels. Do you know how easy it is to make Ethanol?
Jeepers man, give me some molasses, an empty Ketchup can and some copper tubing and I’ll show you how.
First you need to refine the molasses from sugar cane or sugar beets…first you need to grow the sugar cane or sugar beets. That takes energy. No doubt using biofuels. heh
Somebody else who believes in perpetual motion.
“Only about 0.03 percent of the Earth’s atmosphere consists of carbon dioxide (nitrogen, oxygen, and argon constitute about 78 percent, 20 percent, and 0.93 percent of the atmosphere, respectively) But carbon dioxide is produced both naturally and by humans. About 97 percent of atmospheric carbon dioxide is natural, in fact. Only about 3 percent is from human activity. That means that only about 0.11 percent of the greenhouse effect (that is, 3 percent of 3.6 percent) is due to human releases of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Factoring in the other greenhouse gases, the total human contribution to the greenhouse effect is about 0.3 percent. In other words, about 99.7 percent of the greenhouse effect is due entirely to nature.
When you consider that the greenhouse effect contributes about 60 degrees Fahrenheit to the Earth’s average temperature (which would be about zero degrees Fahrenheit without the greenhouse effect), it doesn’t really seem like atmospheric carbon dioxide levels — even if they triple or quadruple because of human activities — are all that important to global climate.
If the carbon dioxide-emissions reductions called for by the Kyoto global warming treaty were implemented, human greenhouse contributions would be reduced by about 0.03 percent. Atmospheric physicist Fred Singer says this would have an “imperceptible effect on future temperatures — one-twentieth of a degree by 2050.”
As the Kyoto protocol would require cutting energy use by about 30 percent by 2010 — necessarily causing inestimable negative economic consequences — it’s easy to see why U.S. politicians can’t run away from the Kyoto protocol fast enough.”
alan, maybe you can cite someone else making those claims?
Fred Singer is, to put it bluntly, a whore.
Fred Singer is, to put it bluntly, a whore.
Posted by: Samuel at April 19, 2008 6:05 PM
An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: “argument to the man”, “argument against the man”) consists of replying to an argument or factual claim by attacking or appealing to a characteristic or belief of the person making the argument or claim, rather than by addressing the substance of the argument or producing evidence against the claim. The process of proving or disproving the claim is thereby subverted, and the argumentum ad hominem works to change the subject.
Posted by: Samuel at April 18, 2008 7:31 PM
: ol hoss at April 19, 2008 5:34 PM
I can make it out of cull taters too.
Pa..
Thanks, John Cross, for the Arthur Smith paper. It does, I think, a good job of summarizing the standard model, which at least according to their summary, I think I previously understood.
It seems to me that the Smith model is making a lot of assumptions about the uniformity and ideality of the underlying physical processes, whereas Gerlich & Tscheuschner are saying “but you can’t do that!” Smith is happily integrating all over the place, definitely an elegant and simple model, but G&T are saying no, you have to look at more complex non-linear phenomenon, which render the system chaotic.
It’s like that old joke about if you ask: Say you define a dog’s tail to be a leg. How many legs does the dog have? The mathematician says one, the physicist says five, and the engineer says, “but you can’t do that”.
If so, then standard models may get lucky and get the correct answer, or they may get hit by a non-linearity bus, and the only way to tell is post-hoc. On the other hand, if the system is linear enough in practice, then it’s more a matter of Larry (father of Perl) Wall’s note to the effect that:
“Basically, we need to find the right oversimplification to make people think they understand it. Kind of like canceling the dx’s and dy’s in calculus–the physics profs always tell you to do that, while warning you not to tell the math profs they’re telling you to do that, because it doesn’t always work, except in real life.”
Food for thought ~ which is what I come here for, not to argue.
As always, John, it’s a pleasure to hear from you, now forward and onward in the name of real science, good technology, and a better tomorrow.
Samuel, the amount of human CO2 production is miniscule when compared to the amount of CO2 already present in the atmosphere. Assuming 380 ppm CO2 gives use 1.95×10(exp15) kg of CO2 present in the atmosphere. Human CO2 production has been estimated at about 10 billion tons/year or 1×10(exp 12) kg which is 0.05% of the CO2 already present.
We know that atmospheric CO2 concentration has been considerably higher than 380 ppm in the past. The higher the CO2, the greater the growth of plants so I consider higher atmospheric CO2 to be a good thing.
H2O in gas form makes up about 1% of the atmosphere or 10000 ppm. CO2 at 380 ppm is negligeable in comparison and this is why H2O is considered to be the primary greenhouse gas. I’d be very surprised if significant changes in planetary temparature would occur over the range of 300-450 ppm of CO2. What isn’t being included in GCM’s is the effect of plants on climate. Increased CO2 acts as plant fertilizer and this results in changes in albedo as well as H2O atmospheric concentrations as when plants transpire they release H2O. Plant pollens serve as nuclei for raindrop formation, etc. I wouldn’t even begin to speculate what effects this would have on climate as it is a highly non-linear system. As Vitruvius has pointed out, the atmosphere is also a chaotic system and thus exquisitely sensitive to initial conditions. We can’t even come up with a good model of effects of CO2 concentrations on temperature in a mathematical ideal spherical planet model and to think that we can predict the climate 50 years from now on the far more complex earth is simply insanity.
Fred Singer is, to put it bluntly, a whore.
Really what did you pay him?
sammy
“””””Fred Singer is, to put it bluntly, a whore.”””””
I donna kno this falla, so’s I’ll not defend him not support your contention, butt you sure have proven yerself an arse!!!!!
I should also like to agree with Loki, I too am interested in the effect of the latent heats of water during phase changes (delightful things, phase changes). Also, I am interested in the work done by convective transport ~ heat is not transfered by radiation alone.
Perhaps John has a good reference or two, or even better, can provide us with a few paragraphs summarizing his own understanding of the standard models on those topics.
Loki, there’s a Solar Cycle 24: Implications for the United States paper by David Archibald, March 2008, that from pages 22 through 28 considers both the Beer-Lambert effect, and the optimum CO2 levels for plant growth (which are way higher than what we have now):
westinstenv.org/wp-content/Solar_Arch_NY_Mar2_08.pdf
Even if the science is correct, and the models are feasible, and an effective engineering plan can be designed, we still have one last problem, which Phillip Shaw and others have alluded to above. If this is to be a global solution, then how can we trust trans-national statist organizations to manage the project?
Late and over-budget are bad enough, but there are three other considerations that form a whole ‘nother class of problem. First, we have the authoritarians. These are people who want to force you to do what they want you to do. They want control. They want power. It’s a personality type.
Second, we have greedy avarice. These are people who want your money more than wanting to do something actually sound. And third, we have frauds. These are people who lie, cheat, and steal for unearned personal benefit.
Combined, these considerations produce the phenomenon of greedy authoritarian frauds with no respect for human rights or sense of moral ethics, and their danger increases in proportion to the size of the project. This is a huge risk factor involved in any grand statist scheme.
To anyone who thinks they have the answer, I say, be very careful. There are people who want us to rush to judgement, even though the derivatives are changing slowly, and they want us to do that for immoral reasons. They are the enemy.
Vitruvius, thank you for the link to the Archibald paper which was fascinating. It is a little more mainstream than the writings of Theodore Landscheidt, but Landscheidt also predicted maximal cooling around 2030 based on his analysis of sunspot cycles.
What will be interesting to see is what will happen to the BC lieberal government with it’s yearly increase in “carbon taxes” which will be taking a larger and larger chunk of peoples income as the earth cools and the heating bills in the BC interior steadily climb. It might be worthwhile to start a legal action against the BC government to deal with this pending problem.
I have far more faith in the sunspot/climate correlation than I do in GCM’s. As Archibald noted the global warming fanatics have spurred a large number of people to start studying climate science (I would have never thought about it as I have so many other interests) to be able to provide scientific refuation of the AGW hypothesis and we’ll have a chance to do something about the coming cold weather. The Archibald paper should be required reading for any politician although I’m sure they’ll find some excuse in it to increase the power of government to deal with global cooling.
You have more faith than me, Loki, I don’t think anyone really knows what’s going on or is even likely to happen; I think that, at least at this point, it’s purely a toss of the coin. We have time to study the problem more and understand it better. We have time to advance technology, and to adapt.
Why are people telling us to rush?
Why?
What’s in it for them?
Vitruvius: Kind of like canceling the dx’s and dy’s in calculus–the physics profs always tell you to do that, while warning you not to tell the math profs they’re telling you to do that, because it doesn’t always work, except in real life. I like that. I never heard of that story before but I remember doing that exact thing in grad school!
I do not think that G&T have really shown much of anything except that the greenhouse effect does not work the same way as a greenhouse – but I think we all knew this anyway. Perhaps we will just have to agree to disagree on this one. If you are interested there was a significant discussion on this paper over at Dot Earth and G&T joined in.
In regards to the effect of the latent heats of water during phase changes I could not add anything tonight since I am on my way to bed.
Good night.
Regards,
John
Vitruvius: Kind of like canceling the dx’s and dy’s in calculus–the physics profs always tell you to do that, while warning you not to tell the math profs they’re telling you to do that, because it doesn’t always work, except in real life. I like that. I never heard of that story before but I remember doing that exact thing in grad school!
I do not think that G&T have really shown much of anything except that the greenhouse effect does not work the same way as a greenhouse – but I think we all knew this anyway. Perhaps we will just have to agree to disagree on this one. If you are interested there was a significant discussion on this paper over at Dot Earth and G&T joined in. I tried to link to it but I was slammed into the moderator queue (could someone please release it).
In regards to the effect of the latent heats of water during phase changes I could not add anything tonight since I am on my way to bed and I hate having my posts moderated!
Good night.
Regards,
John
No need to disagree, I am not married to the G&T paper. Good night, John.
Loki: I think that Dr. Smith’s paper was a direct reply to G&T and thus limited in scope. He did provide some references to the contributions of various greenhouse gases. I don’t think you understand where the -17C temperature for the moon comes in. He is saying that because the moon is a rotating body with a real surface (and thus real values of heat content etc.) there is a difference between the average temperature and the effective temperature.
In regards to your comments about CO2, first – I think you used 380 ppm to find the mass of CO2 and that is a volume measurement. For mass CO2 makes up about 580 ppm which means there is about 5.2*10^18 * 580*10^-6 = 3*10^15.
Second, the 10 Gt (giga-tonne) value you give is the carbon released, not the CO2. Essentially when talking about CO2 you must multiply by about 3.67 – so it is more like 36 Gt.
Third, you made a small math error in your initial calculation and dropped a zero (10 giga tonne = 1×10^13, not 1×10^12).
So when you take all that into account the anthropogenic CO2 production is more like 1% per year. Keep in mind that the total human contribution to atmospheric CO2 is about 30%.
In regards to your comments on plants, I know that certain aspect are considered in climate models but the effect of CO2 is not as important as you seem to think to plant growth. For example there will not be a great benefit for C4 type plants (as opposed to C3) since they are already efficient CO2 users. There will be a benefit from the reduced water stress due to lower transpiration rates, but plants are usually under a great number of simultaneous stresses. CO2 in a greenhouse works well where you have adequate temperature and fertilizer, but field trials have not shown a large effect. In regards to human consumption, the nutrition of a food can generally be estimated by the nitrogen content and adding CO2 won’t provide more nitrogen (it will cause a rise in plant mass and sugar content).
Anyway, I can’t post a link tonight but if there is any of the above you question I may be able to supply a link tomorrow.
Regards,
John
johnlee
Oh, I didn’t realize Fred Singer was on this discussion board!
Mr. Singer, you’re a whore, the reason I say that is because you took money from tobacco companies and claimed that second hand smoke isnt connected to lung cancer. You should be ashamed of yourself.
David Suzuki takes money from Oil Companies and that makes him …. ok ?