Robert Tulip wrote:Flann 5 wrote:
One of the main arguments against man made global warming is that historically co2 increases in the atmosphere have followed not preceded periods of warming. I would be interested to hear a response to this argument from those who hold to man made global warming.


Hi Flann, that is easy. Natural climate change is driven by earth’s orbital cycles. When northern summer is at perihelion, closest to the sun, the snow that fell in winter melts and glaciers retreat. When northern summer is at aphelion, furthest from the sun, the snow that fell in winter does not melt, and glaciers advance. This is called the Milankovitch Cycle. Now, when the orbital warming or cooling factor gets going, it produces other impacts, such as albedo, or whiteness. When there is lots of snow the earth reflects more sunlight and gets colder, and vice versa. Also, it affects the ocean carbon cycle.

http://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2 ... te-system/ is a very good simple science article you can read to get more detail.

Thanks for your response here Robert. I grant that you have greater knowledge of the finer points of climatology than I do.
I just don't get the logical argument.
It seems to be accepted science that temperature increases also increase co2 levels,or do you dispute that?

If global temperature increases also increase co2 levels and increased co2 levels increase global temperature then we should see a continuous relentless rise in temperatures.

Historically this is not the case and co2 level variations seems to lag behind temperature variations.

What do you make of the correlation between solar activity (sunspots) and inactivity and warming and cooling? It does seem to be very closely matched don't you think?

This thread is meant to be about Bill Nye of course. I'm sure Nye is convinced that global warming is a dire threat but his defend the polemic at all costs approach,and use of scare tactics are questionable.

It's now being called "climate disruption" apparently. The constant changing of language from climate "warming" to "change" to "disruption" strikes me as Orwellian.
Something I'm sure you would appreciate Robert.

Flann 5 wrote:I just don't get the logical argument. It seems to be accepted science that temperature increases also increase co2 levels, or do you dispute that? If global temperature increases also increase co2 levels and increased co2 levels increase global temperature then we should see a continuous relentless rise in temperatures. Historically this is not the case and co2 level variations seems to lag behind temperature variations.

Hi Flann, as I explained in the comment that you quoted, higher temperature means that less CO2 dissolves in the ocean, and plants rot faster, so the CO2 level in the air rises. This produces a feedback loop, since the blanket of CO2 allows light in but doesn’t let heat out. That is the greenhouse effect. Earth has maintained Goldilocks stability of liquid water since its early days except possibly for some snowball earth periods. The reason is that when things heat up or cool down too much other feedback loops swing into action. When the whole earth was frozen for millions of years, volcanoes pumped out enough heat and CO2 to turn the cycle around. When things have got hotter in the interglacials, the orbital factors have combined to make things cooler again. The interglacials happen when the June solstice is at the orbital point closest to the sun and all the snow from winter melts so the glaciers retreat. These patterns are all cyclic, except for the current linear pattern of shifting carbon from the crust to the air using technology. If we keep doing that we will boil the sea.

Flann 5 wrote: What do you make of the correlation between solar activity (sunspots) and inactivity and warming and cooling? It does seem to be very closely matched don't you think?

Sunspots have a regular eleven year cycle, and also had a mysterious minimum which was linked to a mini ice age a few hundred years ago. But this eleven year cycle is tiny compared to the main geological drivers of climate change, which are the earth’s orbital wobble, tilt and egginess.

Flann 5 wrote: This thread is meant to be about Bill Nye of course. I'm sure Nye is convinced that global warming is a dire threat but his defend the polemic at all costs approach, and use of scare tactics are questionable.

I do not see much of Bill Nye. As I noted above in my response to geo, the politics of climate science is very complex. There is some role for simplifying education, as long as it does not distort essential messages. For example I do not think that we should aim to wreck the economy for the sake of the climate. But nor should we wreck the climate for the sake of the economy.

Flann 5 wrote: It's now being called "climate disruption" apparently. The constant changing of language from climate "warming" to "change" to "disruption" strikes me as Orwellian. Something I'm sure you would appreciate Robert.

No, I don’t see this language change as Orwellian, since global warming, climate change and climate disruption are all simple objective scientific terms which serve to promote understanding, whereas the Big Brother use of language was about deceiving people through false propaganda. If you wanted to see a real Orwellian use of language in the climate debate, the best example is that people with not much grasp of science seek to call themselves ‘skeptics’, a term with an esteemed meaning that has been corrupted into rejection of science.

Robert Tulip wrote:Flann 5 wrote:
It's now being called "climate disruption" apparently. The constant changing of language from climate "warming" to "change" to "disruption" strikes me as Orwellian. Something I'm sure you would appreciate Robert.


No, I don’t see this language change as Orwellian, since global warming, climate change and climate disruption are all simple objective scientific terms which serve to promote understanding, whereas the Big Brother use of language was about deceiving people through false propaganda. If you wanted to see a real Orwellian use of language in the climate debate, the best example is that people with not much grasp of science seek to call themselves ‘skeptics’, a term with an esteemed meaning that has been corrupted into rejection of science.

Hi Robert. Thanks for your explanation here. The science of climatology is a bit too technical for me.Climatologists acknowledge that it's extremely complex and there is much that is not understood. Some things just don't add up from my limited perspective. There are highly qualified skeptics too.

There seems to be a propaganda war going on and there are problems on both sides. The touted 97 percent of climate scientists consensus is one example.
If those promoting the global warming position were more honest in their presentation of these things more people might believe them.
The reality is that significant numbers of the general public simply don't. It has become politicized and that's not going to clarify anything.

Flann 5 wrote:Climatologists acknowledge that it's extremely complex and there is much that is not understood. Some things just don't add up from my limited perspective. There are highly qualified skeptics too. There seems to be a propaganda war going on and there are problems on both sides. The touted 97 percent of climate scientists consensus is one example. If those promoting the global warming position were more honest in their presentation of these things more people might believe them. The reality is that significant numbers of the general public simply don't. It has become politicized and that's not going to clarify anything.

Hi Flann. My comments on the propaganda content of the climate debate are at http://www.booktalk.org/post156377.html#p156377 in case you missed it. I agree with geo’s basic point that climate scientists have not established a theory of change on how to stabilize the climate, and this problem is the basis of the propaganda war.

I agree with the analysis of the Danish political scientist Bjorn Lomborg, who has proved that the subsidies provided to renewable power will not reduce world temperature by any meaningful amount. The main thing that does not “add up” is that wind and solar subsidies are not best value for money for tax dollars aimed at climate security. But what does add up is that burning all the reserves factored into fossil fuel stock prices would boil the sea due to a runaway greenhouse effect.

I think a big part of the problem is that the politics of climate have been co-opted by the political left with their big government tax and spend mentality as the solution to all problems. The theory of the unity of the left against the right is a recipe for failure and stagnation. What is needed instead is a way to explain to the political right that action to preserve climate security serves their economic interests.

To paraphrase Marx, the climate scientists have interpreted the world but the point is to change it. That requires a much more entrepreneurial free enterprise market based model than the climate movement has advocated.

So I don’t think that people like Nye or James Hansen are able to lead the public debate on climate policy, any more than atheists can lead a debate on religious reformation. Scientists who lack a focus on economics and politics are not able to define and sell a message about political and economic change.

Robert Tulip wrote:I agree with the analysis of the Danish political scientist Bjorn Lomborg, who has proved that the subsidies provided to renewable power will not reduce world temperature by any meaningful amount. The main thing that does not “add up” is that wind and solar subsidies are not best value for money for tax dollars aimed at climate security. But what does add up is that burning all the reserves factored into fossil fuel stock prices would boil the sea due to a runaway greenhouse effect.

Hi Robert. I think it's fair to say that those who believe that human production of co2 is a dire threat to the planet have a genuine concern about this.
It's always good to try to focus on the science rather than the politics to determine what is real or not. As I understand it co2 levels in the past have been much higher by multiple factors.

So why did we not see a runaway greenhouse effect then? What distinguishes humanly produced co2 from naturally produced co2?

It does seem to be the case that solar activity plays a big role in the climate. So why does the IPCC largely ignore this as a factor in climate change.

The correlations are extremely high between solar activity and global temperatures. Furthermore the IPPC's climate models predictions are constantly proving to be much higher than real temperatures over time.

This suggests their models assumptions are incorrect for whatever reasons. Professor Nir Shaviv thinks it's because they are ignoring the solar effects on climate.

He may be wrong or right but I think we have to wonder why the IPCC'S climate models predictions are consistently wrong.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bs0UWctZ7hU

Incidentally, I just happened to notice today, a headline on the front page in the current issue of New Scientist as I was getting groceries. In large print, the doom of planet earth. Then in smaller print it says the state of the earth in 7 million years time.
That's journalism.

I had a look at the "canaries in the mine" in your post. The thing is that most of these are contested by the hardcore skeptics.

There is a strange entertainment value in how this plays out in the public arena. Here Lawrence Krausse gets a hard time from an AGW skeptic following an interview Krausse gave on climate change, on the box.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYw6YMJd-tw

There is a strange entertainment value in how this plays out in the public arena. Here Lawrence Krausse gets a hard time from an AGW skeptic following an interview Krausse gave on climate change, on the box.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYw6YMJd-tw

Another scientist speaking out of his area of expertise.
Krauss is particularly annoying. His hypothesis of "something from nothing" is unscientific and dumb.

ant wrote:Quote:
There is a strange entertainment value in how this plays out in the public arena. Here Lawrence Krausse gets a hard time from an AGW skeptic following an interview Krausse gave on climate change, on the box.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYw6YMJd-tw




Another scientist speaking out of his area of expertise.
Krauss is particularly annoying. His hypothesis of "something from nothing" is unscientific and dumb.

It's quite bizarre ant. I did a search on the whole climategate business. When you consider how Bill Nye tried to dismiss this, it's sobering to actually read these emails themselves.

It's pretty shocking and the first casualty here is science itself. There are 180 pages in this pdf including these emails with an explanatory commentary.
I've read through about ten of them so far.

Whether man made global warming is real or not this is pure propaganda.

http://www.lavoisier.com.au/articles/gr ... emails.pdf

Do you guys think it is merely coincidence that almost all of the people denying man-made climate change are Christians? Would you at least admit that maybe, just possibly, we're seeing the confirmation bias in action here?

Chris OConnor wrote:Do you guys think it is merely coincidence that almost all of the people denying man-made climate change are Christians? Would you at least admit that maybe, just possibly, we're seeing the confirmation bias in action here?

Hi Chris. I don't know if they are all Christians. I doubt it. The guy who took Lawrence Krausse to task is an avowed atheist.

In the end it's the evidence that counts. Personally I was inclined to accept the official line that there was this massive consensus among climate scientists.

That's why I didn't get involved when ant was questioning this on the Matt Ridley thread. It was only when I started examining it that I began to question it.

I lean more towards being skeptical now but that's because it looks dubious.

The people who made the channel four documentary "The great global warming swindle" aren't all Christians. I think Matt Ridley is an atheist though I'm not certain about that.

Lets be honest, Krausse is factually scientifically plain wrong in many of the assertions he made. Because he's a well known physicist people are likely to take him seriously though he's in error on climate matters where he's not an expert.

To say the Antartic is rapidly melting is factually wrong,for example.

Bill Nye publicly tried to whitewash the whole climategate skullduggery and makes absurd scare statements while tacitly approving the idea of criminalising "climate deniers"
These criticisms are valid I think.

On the substantive issue we need the evidence. Where is the empirical evidence that man made C02 causes global warming?
It may contribute, but I think it's questionable.

Chris OConnor wrote:Do you guys think it is merely coincidence that almost all of the people denying man-made climate change are Christians? Would you at least admit that maybe, just possibly, we're seeing the confirmation bias in action here?

Where's this from, please.. source?